At 99, Charles J. Turner Jr. has dug up Georgia battle relics nearly his whole life. That collection and an impressive array of purchases are finding new life at the Atlanta History Center's Civil War exhibits

Charles Turner in Chattanooga, Tenn., in 1938 and in 2023 with part of his enormous collection (AHC); canister and shrapnel Turner found at Pickett's Mill decades ago and artifacts he bought on display in "More Perfect Union (Picket photos)

Charles J. Turner Jr. was just a boy when the relic hunting bug hit, and he’s been at it ever since. At age 99, Turner’s still curious about what Civil War treasure rests in the soil of North Georgia.

Turner recalls a seminal moment in 1933 or 1934, during the Great Depression, while he was growing up on Lucile Avenue in Atlanta.

“One of the kids I went to school with lived in the area and he picked up a Minie ball in the woods one day and brought it to school and he showed it to me,” the retired electrical engineer recently told the Picket.

The young hobbyist subsequently got some suggestions for places to look from noted historian and artist Wilbur G. Kurtz, who refurbished the Cyclorama painting and was a technical adviser for the film “Gone with the Wind.”

Visitors can flip through digital version of Sherman's Barnard volume at top of case (Picket photo)

Turner’s passion for digging Civil War artifacts and buying militaria is an incredible boon for the Atlanta History Center. The collector is in the process of donating hundreds of collected items to the institution. Some items he purchased in recent years went directly to the AHC.

Patrons are beginning to see the fruits of Turner’s efforts. A display in the AHC’s new “More Perfect Union” exhibit includes a trove of artifacts he bought, including a flag of the consolidated 6^th and 9^th Tennessee Infantry.

There’s a lot more.

Nearby is a rare cartridge box and rusted canister from the pitched fighting at Pickett’s Mill northwest of Atlanta. Farther down is a copy of photographer George Barnard’s album recording Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman’s campaign in the South and Sherman’s rank insignia (Picket photo, left). Both items belonged to the Sherman family.

Turner bought the two items from an auction house a couple years back and donated them to the AHC; he dug up the Pickett’s Mill canister in the 1950s/1960s, before the site became a state park.

His generosity will result in educational opportunities for future generations, museum officials contend. Turner's items in "More Perfect Union" are the tip of the iceberg. A gallery opening in several months figures scores of items he personally obtained while relic hunting.

His undug relics will be unveiled in coming months

Much of the relic hunter’s finds and purchases filled a large room and now the AHC is using those items to buttress its already immense collection and tell more stories about the fighting in Georgia. (Photos below, courtesy Atlanta History Center)

The gallery in “More Perfect Union” dedicated to the Atlanta Campaign has been named the Charles J. Turner Family Gallery in his honor.

His undug collection of weaponry will be the backbone of “The Hard Hand of War: Soldiers, Weapons, and Mass Production,” the museum’s second new exhibit about the Civil War. It will open in several months.

“Together, his collection represents one of the most comprehensive covering the Atlanta Campaign,” the history center says.

It’s remarkable that a man who started collecting during President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s first term in office is still in the game. Now, Turner says, it is time for others to appreciate his collection. Most have gone to the Atlanta History Center.

“That’s where they really ought to be, where people can see them,” Turner said.

Wilbur Kurtz gave the Atlanta boy lasting advice

Turner grew up at a time when stories about the Civil War weren’t far removed from those who experienced its triumphs and tragedies. He recalls the former Confederate soldiers’ home near Grant Park.

The war was very much part of the fabric that made up Atlanta during his youth. “There were sons and daughters of veterans who had stories to tell,” Turner related to the Civil War Picket in a recent phone call.

By the time he was a teen, Turner was on the prowl for finds across the battlefields of metro Atlanta. Relic hunting in Atlanta used to be quite common, since just about the whole city was a battlefield.

Around the time he turned 18 in February 1944, Kurtz wrote a letter to his father, Charles J. Turner, with relic location suggestions and the recommendation to learn the history of the battles. (Above, courtesy Atlanta History Center)

The correspondence, which is kept at the Atlanta History Center, starts with this detailed passage:

“Your son’s hobby is an excellent one – I’d say – but perhaps I’m prejudiced, since ‘tis the same one I’ve ridden for more than years than I’d like to say. As for Civil War relics – bullets, etc., the Atlanta area affords but poor pickings at this late date. The primary shortage was brought about by the impoverished citizenry during the trying period immediately following the close of the war – they found out that bullets could be sold as junk lead to hardware stores, etc, and the money could be spent for bacon and cornmeal, next door – so bullet hunting was perhaps more profitable than blackberry gathering – being an all-year-round opportunity and not seasonable. Miss Sarah Huff (died last spring) told me that she had picked them up by the gallon, as a child – and that she knew that many, many others were doing the same things – to the same end as cited above.”

Huff as a young girl experienced the impact of the war in Atlanta and later wrote a book about her experiences.

Kurtz went on to write that Ezra Church, Cascade Road, Beecher Park, Utoy Creek area (right), Venetian Hills, New Hope Church and Kennesaw Mountain still had the potential for discoveries.

(Now, as then, diggers should seek permission from owners of private property. Most governments ban relic collecting on battlefields, parks and other historic sites. Those government sites largely were not in existence during Turner’s youth.)

Gordon Jones, senior military historian and curator at the AHC, said the Turners saw Kurtz at the July 1944 dedication of the Peachtree Creek monument at Piedmont Hospital in the Buckhead area of the city.

“Great story, great connection,” he said of their friendship.

Enthusiast struck paydirt years ago at Pickett's Mill

About that time, Charles J. Turner Jr. was drafted into the U.S. Amy and spent the closing months of World War II in Germany, where his unit oversaw labor by German prisoners of war.

He later attended Georgia Tech, where he received two engineering degrees. He had a long career with Lockheed before retiring in the mid-1980s.

The lifelong Atlantan nurtured his hobby all this time, amassing a large collection. He stayed mostly within 100 miles of Atlanta, including sites in Resaca and Jonesboro.

Notable relic collectors in the area included Beverly M. DuBose Jr. and his son Beverly M. Dubose III. Their collection was the backbone of the old AHC “Turning Point: The American Civil War” exhibit, which closed to make way for “More Perfect Union.”

Turner spent a lot of time at Pickett’s Mill in the 1950s and 1960s “Most of the stuff I found at Pickett’s started out with an old Army mine detector. I graduated up to commercial.”

He found belt buckles, bayonets, rifle barrels, rifle parts, uniform buttons and more. (Turner in the 1990s, right)

“One of the things I enjoyed finding was the shot from the cannon down that gully.”

In late May 1864, cannons mowed down Federal attackers who futilely charged through a ravine toward Confederates waiting for them in strength. At "More Perfect Union," the case of canister is next to an artillery piece that may have fired some of those rounds. (Picket photo, right; click to enlarge)

Turner says he has found thousands of items in the field. He recalls spotting a locket in a creek bed near Dallas, Ga. The locket contained an image of a woman.

The majority of the guns in his collection came from dealers and antique stores.

While in his 80s, Turner began to collect more items pertaining to the Atlanta Campaign, including the 6th/9th Tennessee flag. In the mid-2010s, he began working with the AHC to preserve his collection, officials said.

Charles J. Turner Jr. with the 6th/9th Tennessee flag before it went on display (AHC)

Gallery features a trove of Turner's collection

“More Perfect Union” tells a much wider story than “Turning Point” about the causes and repercussions of the conflict. Topics include slavery, secession, economic forces, Reconstruction and how all of this translates today.

But, of course, there are the items related to soldiers, uniforms and weaponry.

Another fabulous caption will go right here

Additional Turner items currently on display include:

-- Two canteens, including a Confederate one picked up by a Yankee soldier after the Battle of Resaca in May 1864;

--- Drum carried throughout the Atlanta Campaign by William A. McKinzie with the 78^th Illinois;

-- Sword of Col. John G. Mitchell with the 113^th Ohio;

-- Kepi of Confederate Brig. Gen Francis Cockrell with the Missouri Brigade. He commissioned the item for $35 from a hat maker in Mobile, Ala.; (right, Picket photo)

-- Cartridge box and cap pouch made by Wellborn, Nichols & Oliver in Dalton, Ga.

-- Smith & Wesson revolver used by a soldier with the 125^th Ohio, known as “Opdycke’s Tigers”;

-- An Austrian Lorenz rifle-musket carried by William Blair Mosby of the 5^th Mississippi;

-- Whitworth sharpshooter rifle used by J.E. Gilbert of the Rebel Army of Tennessee. Turner says he used to have four or five Whitworth rifles. “They are hard to find.”

-- Gen. Sherman’s order for the assault on Kennesaw Mountain;

Time has not diminished his passion for hobby

Charles Turner’s passion for collecting hasn’t much faded over the years. He was out in the field about a year ago, a close friend providing the transportation.

 “A lot of my friends are relic hunters just like me.”

The enthusiast looks for Civil War artifacts in 2012 (Courtesy AHC)

One pal drives him out to the field.

“He started hunting with me 20 years ago. I am still collecting whenever I have a chance. I am not able to get out in the field with a metal detector.”

Turner attended a AHC gala held the week “More Perfect Union” opened. He was among the special guests of honor

Wilbur Kurtz’s 1944 letter to Turner’s father was prophetic, calling the boy’s hobby “an excellent one.” (Click letter below to enlarge; courtesy Atlanta History Center)

The historian and artist finished the correspondence with encouragement for the teen to learn about the battles that shaped the destiny of the country and the South. He listed nearly a dozen books, including one by Union Maj. Gen. Jacob Cox and others by or about Joseph E. Johnston, John Bell Hood, Leonidas Polk and Patrick Cleburne.

“If that boy of yours is really serious about these things, encourage him to keep at it as a hobby to the end that he may become fully informed as to what happened – and where – during that storied summer of 1864.”

“Someone should carry the torch for this sort of thing – so why not Junior?”

Junior, who turns 100 in February, still tends to that flame.