Majpr CW archeological find in Georgia

[Mike Ventura]

Archeologists find the site of Camp Lawton, which replaced Andersonville as Union prison late in the war. Cited as most significant civil war find in decades.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/08/14/georgia.civil.war.camp/index.html?eref=mrss_igoogle_cnn

[David Fox]

Re: Majpr CW archeological find in Georgia

I'd personally and respectfully vote for the submarine "Hunley" as the most important Civil War (re)discovery in decades. As to Andersoville (Camp Sumpter) being the sole southern prison to capture the public's interest, the prison camp at Salisbury, North Carolina has always kept some public attention, if for no other reason than the oft published drawings of a prisoners' baseball game. Libby Prison was certainly in the public's eye when it was reconstructed in Chicago in the 1880s and was a popular exhibit and museum during and after the great Chicago Columbian Exposition of 1894. One suspects the "5000 page" journal is a journalist's exaggeration or a misprint.

[Ross L. Lamoreaux]

Re: Majpr CW archeological find in Georgia

I believe its considered significant by archaeologists for what has been unearthed, not so much for its historic significance. There will be announcements soon, but I understand through museum circles that some excellent POW items were found among other items.

[Hank Trent]

Re: Majpr CW archeological find in Georgia

One suspects the "5000 page" journal is a journalist's exaggeration or a misprint.

Why would one suspect that?

http://www.tfaoi.com/aa/2aa/2aa225.htm

One of the greatest Civil War collections ever discovered begins its national tour November 1, 2000, at the New-York Historical Society in New York City. The traveling exhibition, "Eye of The Storm: The Civil War Drawings of Robert Knox Sneden," organized by the Virginia Historical Society of Richmond, Virginia, is based on the illustrated 5,000-page Civil War memoir of Private Sneden. Nearly 100 detailed watercolors, maps, and drawings depicting Sneden's experience as a soldier in the Army of the Potomac, a Union map-maker, and prisoner of war in some of the worst Confederate prisons-including Andersonville will be on display through December 31, 2000....

The Virginia Historical Society thought it had found the missing Sneden collection. The real surprise came three years later, when Kelly's research led him to a Sneden descendant who owned another collection consisting of the 5,000 page diary/memoir and approximately 500 additional watercolors and maps.

Not all 5,000 pages are focussed on Camp Lawton, of course, but the sentence in the article is accurate, as far as I can see: The journal is 5,000 pages and it does include information on Camp Lawton.

I think the prison site is a pretty cool find.

Hank Trent
hanktrent@gmail.com

[David Fox]

Re: Majpr CW archeological find in Georgia

Geez. You're correct. a man could keep a journal of 5,000 pages. A tad of math yields one page a day every day for something near fourteen years. I read "kept a 5,000-page journal that detailed the misery at Camp Lawton" to mean the journal was limited to the "six weeks" the camp was in operation. That would require 119 pages every day of the camp's existence. The authour wouldn't have been so much in danger of starvation as of a hideous death by writer's cramp.

[toptimlrd]

Re: Majpr CW archeological find in Georgia

The way I read it was he had a journal of 5,000 pages and within those 5,000 pages a portion was a description of the conditions at the prison; not that the journal had 5,000 pages about the prison itself.

Since we also discussed important archaeological finds in recent history, let's not forget the Arabia and Maple Leaf.