I’ve always wanted to get a metal detector, for kicks and giggles. But I wouldn’t really know where to target an area for anything of value, especially historic worth. Most Civil War battlefields have basically been stripped clean now. Areas that were fields of trees then are gone now, and vice-versa. I was raised on a mountain ridge on the MD/WV border, and as a kid I’d go relic digging with a childhood friend. There used to be a farm on the hillside, and we’d find all manner of things with our bare hands - patent medicine bottles, milk jugs, old glass electrial insulators from poles from back in the early 1900’s. Too bad we didn’t have a metal detector back then. The hillside we searched as kids is still undeveloped - too steep. I bet there’s a lot of hidden goodies still there, just under the topsoil.
You should give it a go. You can get a good detector for only a few hundred dollars. There are lots of people out there all over the USA doing metal detecting and finding neat things. There aren’t many of us at all here, so I spend a lot of time doing research for new places around Tokyo to go hunting. There’s stuff everywhere waiting to be discovered.
In south-central pa there are a lot of abandoned homesteads that are deep in overgrown areas. People didn’t believe in banks then. A prospector I knew told me that he’d sweep old gate posts and look under flagstone in hearths. Sometimes find a stash of coins.