US soldiers' remains found at historic Revolutionary War landmark are revealed to be from a completely different era

New York Post

11-06-2025

Archaeologists recently announced the discovery of skeletons at Colonial Williamsburg – but the skeletons weren't from the Revolutionary War.
The remains were found while excavators searched around the grounds of a Revolutionary War-era gunpowder magazine, or storage facility, according to The Associated Press.
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Near the building, archaeologists were taken aback when they uncovered the eye sockets of a human skull – and then four human skeletons, plus three amputated legs.
Rather than dating back to colonial America, the four skeletons are from Civil War times. The soldiers died during the Battle of Williamsburg while fighting for the Confederacy in 1862, according to local historians.
The skeletons were found with their arms crossed. Interestingly, they were not buried in their uniforms – rather, they were found in more comfortable clothes, and archaeologists uncovered buttons and a trouser buckle.
7 Archaeologists found human remains at Colonial Williamsburg, which surprisingly dated back to the Civil War rather than the Revolutionary War.
AP
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The graves were aligned east-west, with the head at the west end and the feet at the east end, a burial tradition commonly associated with Christianity.
Since the discovery, historians have determined that a makeshift hospital once operated nearby to treat wounded Confederate soldiers.
Although the remains were found in 2023, Colonial Williamsburg officials didn't announce the discovery until this month.
7 Staff members from the Colonial Williamsburg museum excavating the remains of Confederate soldiers from the Civil War in 2023.
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7 Archaeologist Jack Gary holds up a photo of a church that once stood beside the gunpowder magazine at Colonial Williamsburg in May.
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7 Colonial Williamsburg Lab Assistant Evan Bell discusses using hospital lists, unit records and other documents to identify the remains of Civil War soldiers at the Colonial Williamsburg archaeology department in Williamsburg.
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Archaeologists are working to identify the soldiers — whose identities are unknown.
'Everyone deserves dignity in death. And being stored in a drawer inside a laboratory does not do that.'
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Researchers have narrowed down the possible identities of four men who served in regiments from Alabama, Louisiana, South Carolina and Virginia, but are withholding the names until they have confirmation.
Jack Gary, Colonial Williamsburg's executive director of archeology, told the Associated Press that the discovery came together when they found lists of hospital patients in the archives.
7 Gary points to a photo showing where the graves of Civil War soldiers were found near the gunpowder magazine at Colonial Williamsburg.
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7 'If these men were found in a mass grave on a battlefield, and there was no other information, we probably wouldn't be trying to [identify them],' Gary said.
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7 A historical marker for The Battle of Williamsburg from the Civil War in Williamsburg is seen here.
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'It is the key,' Gary noted.
'If these men were found in a mass grave on a battlefield, and there was no other information, we probably wouldn't be trying to [identify them].'
Last week, the bodies were reinterred at a local burial ground where other Confederate soldiers were buried.
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'Everyone deserves dignity in death. And being stored in a drawer inside a laboratory does not do that,' Gary said.
Even though the Civil War has been thoroughly studied for over 160 years, new discoveries are still being made.
Last spring, a Civil War-era cannonball was found in the backyard of a Virginia home.
A few years earlier, a long-forgotten map that shed light on the aftermath of the bloody Battle of Antietam was uncovered.