Construction Site Offers Fleeting Glimpse of the Civil War Past (Archaeology)

Waterloo50

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This is an article from 2015 but I thought people would be interested in how some of these important civil war sites can be accidentally discovered. It’s a typical situation, construction work begins, someone finds a small relic and then the archaeologists have to rush to discover as much as they can before the construction work starts again. Unfortunately many civil war sites end up being built over but at least the archaeological team get a brief opportunity to photograph, record and date the site. Every single discovery adds a piece to the puzzle.
Here’s the article.

https://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/12/...s-fleeting-glimpse-of-the-civil-war-past.html
 
A development site in Sussex County Delaware exposed a African American cemetery article below.

https://history.delaware.gov/2019/02/18/site-of-purported-african-american-cemetery-discovered-near-frankford/
Wow, that’s intresting, I’m quite impressed by the landowner who encouraged everyone to research and work on private property. The only reason that those graves were found and saved was because the local people raised their concerns that a development could disturb the graves, it took a lot of effort by the locals to get the County council to agree to halt the development should the graves be found, thank goodness that they did otherwise it would have been built over and nobody would have been any the wiser.
It seems to me that developers (not all of them) view these historic sites as a bit of a nuisance, time is money and all of that. We have a similar problem with developers here in the UK, a few years ago a farmer wanted to build a barn and whilst the footings were being dug they uncovered a large roman mosaic floor, the farmer didn’t report the discovery because he didn’t want the archaeologists or the local authorities delaying or denying him the building of his barn. He was heavily fined but that bit of history was lost forever. Makes me wonder how many other significant historic discoveries have been lost to us.
Many thanks for posting that article. :thumbsup:
 
Looks like one archaeological find that everyone would want to avoid, it would be interesting to know why they were placed there in the first place, an ammo dump maybe, the article doesn’t offer a date on the cannon balls but it does say that they were pre-civil war, I like the fact that some poor individual was told to keep digging and don’t stop until there’s none left. I’d be interested to know how they dispose of them.
 
Ten Civil War era cannonballs were found under a sidewalk at the University of Alabama in 2015 and we often have no idea what is under our feet.:timebomb:
 
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Ten Civil War era cannonballs were found under a sidewalk at the University of Alabama in 2015 and we often have no idea what is under our feet.:timebomb:
That’s true enough, I was at a beach in Dorset a few years ago when the bomb disposal squad arrived, the beach was closed because a WW2 mine had washed up on the tide line, i didn’t even spot it, I was to busy getting a tan, if that thing had gone off it would have ruined my day....
 
Looks like one archaeological find that everyone would want to avoid, it would be interesting to know why they were placed there in the first place, an ammo dump maybe, the article doesn’t offer a date on the cannon balls but it does say that they were pre-civil war, I like the fact that some poor individual was told to keep digging and don’t stop until there’s none left. I’d be interested to know how they dispose of them.

The site, in Pittsburgh, is quite close to where the Allegheny Arsenal was located. The Allegheny Arsenal was one of the premiere manufactures of Union arms and munitions.

Perhaps if they were pre-Civil War, they were left there by you Brits on your way to kick the French out of Ft. Duquesne!

 
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