7/29/22 Report - Coin Beaches and Treasures of The Florida East Coast. Some New Finds.

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of the Treasure Beaches Report.

Illustration From Frank Hudson's Lost Treasures of Florida's East Coast (copyright 1983).

I was looking at some areas that I used to hunt on Google Maps.  I was interested to see what some of my favorite old hunting spots looked like in recent times.  I knew those spots well, including what they looked like, as well as the kinds of things I found there in the past.  I was especially interested in a couple of the areas that produced a lot of old silver in the past.  I thought of Frank Hudson's books and wondered if he identified those areas as good coin areas.

This area shown above is not the area that originally interested me, but I noticed that Frank mentioned relatively few areas as coin beaches.  He did point out a lot of areas where there were supposed to be buried chests and things like that.

The illustration above shows the area around the Sebastian Inlet.  He pointed out five spots in that area.  Only one was described as a good coin beach.

The areas marked 2, 3, 4, and 5, are indicated as having had buried chests.  The only area on that map described as a good coin beach is area1.  That description reads as follows.  Good Coin Beach.  Work the beach with a good coin detector from the inlet south for three miles. I suggest that you use a detector that will penetrate down for a good 12 inches as thousands of Spanish Coins, Gold Chains and other artifacts of Gold and Silver have been recovered here coming from offshore wrecks.

Hudson goes on to discuss and give the location of five 1715 Fleet wrecks, but he did not provide a map for those beaches and did not specifically describe any of those beaches as being particularly good beaches to detect for coins.  I guess it might be implied.  Since 1983, I'm sure people have a lot more knowledge of those beaches.  The book was published nearly forty years ago.  

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A couple days ago I went out to look for bottles. In a very short time I found the Carter's cone ink bottle shown below.  I've found a few of those in the past, but had recently been thinking that it has been quite a while since I found an ink bottle.

Carters Cone Ink Bottle.

Embossed Bottom of Carter's Coine Ink  Bottle.

This bottle still has some barnacles  on it.  The bottom is embossed: CARTER'S, 1897, MADE IN U.S.A.

I've found some of these before and sold a few.  Besides aqua, I've also found them in brown.

Below is an ad published in 1882 that shows cone bottles, as well as other ink bottles.

The above ad and a very detailed history of the company can be accessed using the following link.

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See Carter’s Ink – Bay Bottles

Here is one brief excerpt.

Over the next ten years the company would lose both of their original founders when Dinsmore retired in the late 1880’s and John W. Carter accidentally drowned in 1895. Shortly after Carter’s death the business was incorporated under the name “The Carter’s Ink Company.” It was managed by the trustees of his estate until 1901 when Carter’s oldest son, Richard B. Carter assumed the presidency. He would continue to serve as president until his death in 1949.

From other things I've seen, it appears that the shape of the bottles had changed by 1919. It seems to me that a pre-1900 date is possible or likely for this bottle.

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Without going into detail, I'll just show one more bottle that was foundWednesday.  It is a half-pint Florida Store milk bottle with an outline of Florida shown on one side.

I had some time previously found a quart size Florida Store bottle bearing the outline of Florida.

I also went bottle hunting yesterday but have not photographed any of those bottles.

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It appears that the continuing south winds have produced a little erosion at some locations.  I noticed yesterday, for example, erosion south of Jupiter Inlet.  It isn't big and is not sufficient for me to increase my beach conditions rating for finding old items, but there is some chance of finding things, even if they are mostly more modern.

There is nothing on the NHC map, and the Treasure Coast surf continues at about 2 - 3 feet.

With the old bottles being available, I've been doing more of that and very little metal detecting, but plan to do some metal detecting soon.

Good hunting,

TreasureGuide@comcast.net