The sea defence diaries - more finds and some thoughts

The sea , sand and tide can be a very unpredictable thing and taking a walk along the stone pier and looking over into harbour confirmed to myself that even someone as experienced as myself cannot get it right all the time. It is almost as if nothing had ever happened in the harbour as the deep excavation now seems a distant memory as the silt is disappearing faster than predicted. So I am so glad I was in the right place at the right time to take advantage of this brief open window I had. In comparison my Margate Harbour finds are minuscule compared to what the Mudlarks find on the Thames. However, what I have found does represent Victorian and Georgian Margate and that is important. I am now thinking if I managed to finds all these items in Margate Harbour what on earth must be buried in Ramsgate Harbour ?

A few days ago at low water had a look on the low water mark at Ramsgate behind the clock house looking at the way the shingle has laid and how the mud banks are formed. I did notice that someone had been digging and where they had been digging they had came across a wall buried in the shingle. I expect the wall must had been the objective because I was able to make a few finds amongst the spoil that had been washed through by the tide of which I will feature soon in another posting.

Getting back to Margate, I am still continuing searching for items and will be delivering a new batch of finds to the Margate Museum in the next week or so for the future exhibition.

i have been photographing more finds which I have included is this posting and in the top photograph are some of the pieces of bone found in the harbour. As you can see I have found another piece of smashed animal jawbone.

In this photograph is a copper keel bolt, a corroded copper boat nail with a rove. a washer marked with a broad arrow, an eyelet for a sail, brass tacks, a bronze cleat and a piece of copper keel band.

I like this piece of retro, it is a Lucas ranger fog light glass. Not sure how it ended up in the harbour.

I have used a badly corroded two pence piece for scale. In one part of the harbour all the coins found have suffered terrible corrosion.

A few modern finds including a cowl for a seagull outboard engine.