Black Civil War troops to get recognition in South Carolina
The treasure hunter who discovered remains on Folly Island 23 years ago is working to have a historical marker put at the site of the first graves of 19 Union soldiers.
From LATimes.com
The treasure hunter who discovered remains on Folly Island 23 years ago is working to have a historical marker put at the site of the first graves of 19 Union soldiers.
Robert Bohrn cannot forget the black Union soldier whose bones he and another Civil War relic hunter uncovered on Folly Island, S.C., more than 20 years ago.
“It’s one thing to find a coin, a slave tag, a person’s ring,” Bohrn said. “It’s way different to turn your shovel blade over and see a human being.”
Feeling as though he is a caretaker for that soldier and the 18 others whose skeletons were found at the lonely outpost, Bohrn, 53, now is working with South Carolina to erect a historical marker near the site.
He has been fascinated with Civil War history since he was just 5 years old. At 14, he got his first metal detector and combed in and around Charleston, S.C. — uncovering slave tags, Confederate coins and Union buttons.
Relic hunting became Bohrn’s hobby, if not his passion.
He knew Union soldiers had camped on Folly Island, about 12 miles south of Charleston, during the war, so he hunted for relics there over the years. But the woods were dense with undergrowth and difficult to penetrate.
After a bulldozer cut a rough road in 1987 for a new subdivision, Bohrn and fellow Civil War buff Erik Croen went looking.
They didn’t find what they usually found — items that a soldier might drop, such as bullets, coins, pieces of knapsacks. The only relics they uncovered were badly deteriorated buttons.
But then Croen dug up what looked like a root. On closer inspection, he realized it was a human femur.
State archaeologists retrieved the bones of 19 black men, ages 16 to 40. All but one lay on their backs, hands across their abdomens. Only two skulls remained. Someone apparently had pilfered the others years before…
Continued at LATimes.com
