Civil War Witness Trees

[musketshooter]

The museum of the Confederacy in New Orleans has a piece that is imbedded with numerous iron balls from canister shot.

[Merc]

The several skirmishes that were fought in western Virginia (later West Virginia) early in the Civil War were insignificant compared to Gettysburg and Antietam, but they did leave behind some of the implements of war on what is now mostly private land.

With permission of the land owners, and using metal detectors, we searched the hillsides surrounding the small town of Gauley Bridge, WV where one of the larger fights took place. We primarily found lead minie and musket balls. We obtained maps from a museum in Pittsburgh of the locations of the various Union positions when they were engaged by the CSA soldiers. The Union held the high ground which is were we concentrated our efforts since it was all still a wooded area. Modern housing now occupies the Rebel positions.

This photo shows all fired minie balls of various sizes. Notice there are some 3 ring .69 and .58 caliber minie balls. Some had 2 rings and Enfield balls had no rings. These were found on the Union held positions and were fired at them by the Rebel soldiers.

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This group of musket and minie balls were not fired, so they were either dropped or discarded by the Union soldiers. The minie balls were for a standard issued .58 caliber Springfield rifled musket The musket balls and buckshot were used in what was known as a “buck n’ ball” load. Usually, there were three buckshot and one musket ball per load. This combination was fired by a smoothbore musket and was effective at close range.

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I mounted this last group of items in a shadow box and it contains both fired Rebel minie balls and dropped Union minie balls from Gauley Bridge. The exploded artillery shells, canister bal, horse shoe and kettle handle came from Camp Bartow near Marlinton, WV where the two sides engaged in an artillery dual.

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[togor]

Too cool! At what depth did you find these artifacts?

[Merc]

Too cool! At what depth did you find these artifacts?

The lead we found were anywhere from 2” to 4” below ground. We were working the side of a steep hill that require us to wear golf spikes to stay stationary or to hang onto small trees to keep from sliding down the hill. We also saw what looked like rifle pits that were dug into the hillside.

Gauley Bridge, WV is situated at the confluence of the New River and Gauley River that form the Kanawha River and is only a few miles from the “New River Bridge” that’s pictured on the West Virginia state quarter. It’s a good 4 hour drive from home but it’s worth the trip.

We could always tell whose minie balls we were digging. Rarely, the Rebs would have a .58 cal. rifled musket unless it was from a captured Springfield. At that time during the war, they used whatever they had and mostly fired .69 cal., ringless Enfields and round balls from old smoothbores.

[togor]

Thank you for the posts. Very enjoyable reading.

[lyman]

The lead we found were anywhere from 2” to 4” below ground. We were working the side of a steep hill that require us to wear golf spikes to stay stationary or to hang onto small trees to keep from sliding down the hill. We also saw what looked like rifle pits that were dug into the hillside.

Gauley Bridge, WV is situated at the confluence of the New River and Gauley River that form the Kanawha River and is only a few miles from the “New River Bridge” that’s pictured on the West Virginia state quarter. It’s a good 4 hour drive from home but it’s worth the trip.

We could always tell whose minie balls we were digging. Rarely, the Rebs would have a .58 cal. rifled musket unless it was from a captured Springfield. At that time during the war, they used whatever they had and mostly fired .69 cal., ringless Enfields and round balls from old smoothbores.

interesting,


I have a coworker that digs, he showed me some stuff he dug up in eastern Va a few weeks ago,,
buttons, (some looked like new, a couple from VMI) coins etc,
the area he was in is 'multi historical' as in per colonial, colonial, and CW all in that area (like most of VA)


re the Gauley,

did anyone notate the rifle pits? and let someone (historical society type) know what you found,
some historians may want to know,

we have similar areas here on the South bank of the James the CSA dug to defend from the Union,



also, kinda off topic, have you ever rode the Gauley in season?

the upper is a blast

[Merc]

You’re lucky to live where the layers of early American history are so rich and dense.

The only person we told about the rifle pits was the property owner. I doubt if he ever contacted anyone about them.

We’ll be metal detecting private property this spring in western MD along the Potomac that was part of Lee’s retreat from Gettysburg. In this case, everything we find will be turned over to the property owner who is a lecturing historian.

The Gauley is a well known for white water rafting. Never tried it.

[lyman]

you should, at least once,

did the upper lower combo once,
double upper a couple times (upper, stay on the river overnight, and back to the top a 2nd time the next day)
and a few single upper trips,

good times