MD Survey Report The Adam Park Project Metal Detector Survey Report No.8 8 Adam Park 7th – 17th February 2011 1 MD Survey Report Index Index .......................................................................................................................... 2 Introduction ................................................................................................................ 3 The Survey Criteria and Area of Interest ................................................................... 4 The Location and Type of Artefacts .......................................................................... 8 Summary of Artefact Catalogue .............................................................................. 10 The Cartridges ...................................................................................................... 10 Large Calibre Round ............................................................................................ 15 Bullets .................................................................................................................. 16 Charger Units ....................................................................................................... 19 Evidence of Fire Damage..................................................................................... 21 Webbing Buckles ................................................................................................. 22 Buttons ................................................................................................................. 28 Large General Service Button .............................................................................. 29 Other Related Artifacts ............................................................................................ 29 Cambridgeshires Collar Badge ............................................................................ 29 Royal Engineers Cap Badge / Collar Badge ........................................................ 31 Possible Pendants ................................................................................................. 33 Horse pendent ...................................................................................................... 33 The ‘Hippo’ Badge .............................................................................................. 34 Brass Fittings ....................................................................................................... 34 Scallop badge ....................................................................................................... 35 Coins .................................................................................................................... 36 Sake Bowl ............................................................................................................ 37 Conclusions .............................................................................................................. 38 Appendix 1 - TAPP - Finds Log – 8 & 17 Adam Park ............................................ 39 Appendix 2 ............................................................................................................... 59 List of Projectiles Found at 8 Adam Park ................................................................ 59 Appendix 3 ............................................................................................................... 64 List of Cartridges found at 8 Adam Park ................................................................. 64 Appendix 4 – Sketch Map of Survey Area .............................................................. 75 Appendix 5 – Distribution of Cartridges by Manufacturer. ..................................... 76 Appendix 8 – Distribution of Bullets (over cartridges) ........................................... 77 Appendix 9 – Distribution of Webbing Items.......................................................... 78 2 MD Survey Report Introduction The metal detector survey at 17 Adam Park took place in November 2010 in which a concentration of artefacts, thought to be from a set of discarded webbing, was unearthed. A second survey at 8 Adam Park along the bordering fence line to No.17 took place between the 6th and 8th December revealed another large quantity of bullets, cartridges and buckles. On the final day of this second survey the team took shelter from a torrential downpour under the front porch of No.8. Whilst waiting for the rain to stop it was noted that water cascaded off the portico roof onto the ground directly in front of the house. In doing so the torrent washed away the topsoil and exposed a number of WW2 items. We resolved to carry out the next survey on this site. The Adam Park Project raised enough sponsorship at the end of 2010 to organise a number of surveys around the estate in February 2011. A metal detector survey team once again returned to 8 Adam Park. The aim of the survey was to recover any artefacts that may be associated with the fighting that took place at Adam Park from the 13th to 15th February 1942 and the use of the estate as a POW camp from March 1942 until the end of the Japanese occupation of Singapore in 1945. Fig 1 – No 8 Adam Park evocatively covered by the anti malarial ‘smog’ may have been the site of the Japanese accommodation for the POW camp. It appears from the research into the history of the fighting at Adam Park that No.8 was used by the 1st Battalion of the Cambridgeshire Regiment as the deployment area for the Battalion HQ Company possibly housing the Signals Platoon. The role of the house during the period of occupation by the POW’s is in dispute. AIF veterans in interviews recall that the property was the location of the Japanese guardhouse. 3 MD Survey Report However house No.7 is also a good candidate for this facility and it was hoped we would obtain some material evidence to help resolve this issue. The objectives of this survey were three fold: 1) Recover as many of the artefacts lying on the surface as possible. 2) To find evidence as to why the artefacts had been deposited in such large numbers in such a small area and had come to the surface. 3) To assess the impact this discovery has on the potential for battlefield and POW archaeology on the rest of the estate. This was the third survey carried out where many of the finds were lying on the ground so time was also used to train the new volunteers in the recovery of surface items. Nine days were originally allocated to the survey at No.17 and it was hoped that the majority of the garden could be covered in that period however the survey team was overwhelmed by the number of artefacts that were unearthed along the top platform and only a 150m2 area was eventually surveyed. The Survey Criteria and Area of Interest Three transects each 2m x 25m wide were set out along the length of the top platform adjacent to the portico. Fig 2 – The Google earth image of the site showing the location of the transects in Area 1. A field walk was organised for Area 2 (T4) in which a number of artefacts were recovered from the surface. The position of these artefacts was recorded by the total station. 4 MD Survey Report A field walk was organised to recover surface artefacts down the slope from the top platform and a number of pertinent items were found in the area which appeared to be the ‘runoff’ from the rain water stretching from the top platform down to the fence line. An initial visual search was undertaken of Area 1 (T1 – 3) – this involved two volunteers moving along the transects, often on hands and knees, locating, marking and bagging surface finds. Then the same individuals followed up the search by logging the details of each item and adding labels. Finally the items were lifted and removed to a safe location. A second visual inspection was then carried out over the same area this time using a trowel to clear away surface debris and a few centimetres of top soil. The recovery process was then repeated. Fig 3 – Some artefacts were clearly visible on the surface once the grass had been pulled away. Here a .303 cartridge, pieces of roof tile and a webbing buckle have been exposed. An initial metal detector sweep of the transects was then carried out using the ‘all ferrous’ setting on the metal detector and a multitude of returns were registered. Therefore a full survey of all ferrous returns was deemed to be inappropriate given the time constraints. A new White’s Prizm Mk 6T metal detector was used as the preferred machine as its operation was familiar to the majority of the team members as many had used a Prizm Mk 2 in previous surveys and the upgraded machine provided more accurate positional readings. It was set to maximum sensitivity but the discrimination function 5 MD Survey Report was set to exclude ferrous materials and smaller non ferrous items (1st three settings muted). The operators had difficulty discerning between non-ferrous and ferrous hits as the artefacts were so densely packed in. Tonal ID was not used as the constant pitch changes across a small area confused the operators. Depth indicator was checked against the first isolated finds but the concentration of hits in amongst the building material meant that the depth readings became superfluous. Large ferrous items lying deeper in the earth tended to return a cluster of ‘non ferrous’ readings or masked the returns from smaller non ferrous material on the surface. This meant that a number of sweeps of the more densely populated areas were undertaken to ensure as many of the artefacts