Camp Douglas

[Marak]

I am new to this all, less than a year in, and have join with a group portraying the 8th regiment Veterans Reserve Corps stationed at Camp Douglas (also a rather new group). We have been invited by the Camp Douglas Restoration Foundation to participate in a site dig the last week of June that is the follow-up to a non-invasive imagery survey that provided evidence to warrant further investigation. I consider myself very lucky to have this opportunity to participate in this, and look forward to sharing news of the excavation here. Below is a link to the Foundation's website with more information about their projects and goals.

http://www.campdouglas.org/

(This is my first post here, please pardon any oversight on my part in posting)

[Curt Schmidt]

Re: Camp Douglas

Hallo!

Welcome to the AC!

Please share any follow-up's.

Imaging may not be as "exciting" as "sample trenching" or "excavating" but in an era of tight dollars technology can help pull down funding if funding sources can be more sure that something is "down there."

And yes, sometimes knowing where stuff is not, is of great help. One of the not so well known flubs in modern times was the site development and visitors' center construction at Fort Laurens (Bolivar, Ohio) where an old inaccurate map and faulty local intelligence/history had the fort some 200 plus yards north of the development. Until they started to dig the footers and found material in the dirt piles as they were digging inside of the fort and ended up putting the visitors' center over the front gate.

Thanks for sharing!!

Curt

[Marak]

Re: Camp Douglas

I was able to get out to the dig site at Camp Douglas on Friday. The people doing the actual excavation were very happy to have people visit and explain their project (they are actively trying to gain more public support.)

Based on ground penetrating radar surveys done in 2006 and 2008 they chose to dig in three locations, which roughly correspond to perpendicular to what would have been the fence line, where the headquarters building would was, as well as where one of the garrison buildings was. The area excavated in proximity to the garrison building site yielded no finds, other than a nice example of the layers of fill going as far down as the Lake Michigan sand that was the topsoil at the time of the camp.

The area perpendicular to the fence line showed some significant deviance of metal on the imaging survey,this turned out to be an old pipe, from the time the area was a neighborhood, after the camp was dismantled.

The area near the location of the HQ was the most interesting, they uncovered what they believe to be portions of the foundation of the HQ building. They took a block of it that was loose for further study.

I'll post the pictures I took as soon as I can, uploading them was delayed by having to help my folks clean up and fix their fence after the storm yesterday.