History investigators: Ambitious college class starting this week will focus on the stories of enslaved people at Dawkins House in Union, S.C. The home to where the wartime governor fled is being preserved

Shored-up house (Annie Smith/USC Union), 1850 Dawkins slave schedule; interior door (Picket photo)

A course debuting Tuesday at the University of South Carolina Union won’t be like the campus classes I attended back in the day. There will be no lecture hall, study sessions or a professor regurgitating set material.

Rather, “HIST 480-701 -- Internship in Public History” will turn students into investigators, digging up little-known facts about the Thomas and Mary Poulton Dawkins House in Union and the people – free and enslaved – who lived there before, during and after the Civil War.

The timing of the class is perfect. The once dilapidated home is slowly being rehabilitated into a new campus facility.

“Everything we are doing is bottom up,” said Andrew Kettler, assistant professor of history at the two-year campus (right). He will work with a small, but he believes mighty, group. So far, three students have signed up for the assignment, which includes building an archival history.

Kettler hopes a few students more will join the inaugural effort. He expects a bigger class in the spring once the work and documentation takes shape.

Union, which is south of Spartanburg, briefly served as the Civil War capital of the state after Columbia fell to Union forces in 1865 and Gov. Andrew Magrath fled to Union. From about Feb. 15, 1865, until early April, Magrath ran the state from the Dawkins House. He apparently worked in an informal library near the drawing room, which survives today.

According to histories and local legend, Magrath and his subordinates burned possibly incriminating documents and correspondence in the home’s fireplaces. (The building served as South Carolina's capitol while the city was briefly is capital.)

The 1850 federal slave schedule indicates Thomas Dawkins (left) enslaved about 20 persons, but there may have been more elsewhere. Some likely worked at other locations besides the home, which was called “The Shrubs.” (The project has not yet found an 1860 slave schedule)

Over the years, residents came and went from the Dawkins House, which is located on the small USC-Union campus. But there had been one constant: The deterioration of the building into near ruin.

Now the nonprofit Preservation South Carolina is working with the campus and local leaders to rehabilitate the house into an alumni and corporate center for the college. Raising money for the effort has taken time, but officials continue to make progress.

“This is the first time for PSC to have a class that is going on at the same time as one of its preservation projects,” said Kettler.

There’s a lot at stake. Supporters say it’s important the full history of the home and its occupants be told, warts and all. But they also want the building to be aimed at the future and bring new attention to USC Union, which has a growing enrollment. Currently, it has about 1,400 students; many are affiliated with the athletics programs.

Union County has a long segregation history and the area was known for Ku Klux Klan activity and postwar lynchings. There have been recent efforts, however, to acknowledge that history. Kettler said there is much more to learn.

2021 markers details part of the county's lynching history (Picket photo)

Annie Smith, director of development on the campus, said the course also will seek to identify those individuals who lived in the original structure between 1765 and the early 1800s, before Thomas Dawkins bought and expanded the residence.

The class research will include library, courthouse and genealogical records. Kettler previously told the Picket the aim is less about assigning blame for slavery than moving toward acknowledgement and reconciliation

“We don’t know what we are going to find. It just has to be an honest investigation,” said the professor.

So far, they have possible names for 2 enslaved

A large focus of the class is finding out about the enslaved persons, most of whose names are not know. Names were not included in old census records.

“Focusing searches on that specific population will also allow for uncovering connections to the later history of Black citizens in Union County,” says the class syllabus.

Kettler (right, Picket photo) and a couple students conducted some research over the summer, including at the South Caroliniana Library at the main University of South Carolina campus in Columbia. “We’re digging constantly,” he said.

Kettler, 42, said they have learned the possible names of two of the enslaved. He is not identifying them at this point until he can confirm accounts. One was mentioned in a postwar newspaper article saying the bride was a Dawkins servant (slave). The second may have been a lynching victim in the 1870s, said the professor.

He expects students will glean more names from county-by-county agricultural censuses.

“Tracing formerly enslaved people is very difficult because of name changes,” said Kettler. Others may have moved north decades later during the Great Migration.

The students, working like detectives, will dig up records from myriad sources, such as death schedules and wills. If they can find a Dawkins will, it may list enslaved persons and what they may have received upon Thomas’s death. That could help the effort to find out more about those individuals.

College hopes for an archives open to the public

The public history course outline includes this overview:

“Students will be engaging with archival documents to gain respect for the application and relevance of historical knowledge, as well as support the broader goals of the university and its environs. With the work in this course, USC Union students can begin to explore documents that are to be organized into a “Dawkins House Archive” that will be housed at the future Alumni and Corporate Sponsor Center in the Dawkins House. Our focus on the course will be on answering: What were the historical experiences of those who resided at the Dawkins House?”

Kettler envisions binders of documents at a location ”where people can see the actual letters.” (At left, part of 1867 correspondence by Thomas Dawkins)

Students will share extensive readings during the semester. Topics will include the Dawkins House, memory, the antebellum period, slavery, Reconstruction, “historic sites as powerful institutions,” contemporary Union and modern public history.

The class is half education on the topic and half working through the methods of public history. Students will analyze documents, said the professor. “They will do the work of the historian.”

Resources include census records, newspapers, the Union Country Museum, Rose Hill Plantation State Historic Site, diaries and other papers. Kettler wants to see if the county clerk has deeds to property owned Thomas Dawkins. That might help the researchers go back to those who lived in the house way back in 1765.

One goal of the endeavor is to get local folks involved in uncovering the area’s history and make the Dawkins House a destination of sorts. Kettler, who believes a book may result from the project, is available to speak to groups about the Dawkins House as part of South Carolina Humanities’ speaker’s bureau.

For white citizens, a world turned upside down

When it comes to the Civil War period, recorded experiences have almost exclusively been of white people.

Mary Poulton Dawkins was many things in her 86 years, the majority of which were ensconced in the home that was dubbed “The Shrubs” in honor of a family estate by the same name in her native England.

Dawkins (right), who in 1845 married Thomas, a prominent South Carolina judge 14 years her senior, was described by relatives as headstrong and proud of her imported furniture and Queen Victoria.

There was another side of the Englishwoman, however, that doesn’t project well these days.

While of the “highest culture,” Mary had a tendency toward bigotry, an observer wrote, and a paternalistic view of slavery.

Enslaved people had become a majority in Union County during the 1840s.

Following the South’s loss in the Civil War, and the Dawkins’ fortune largely gone, Mary lamented Reconstruction and the brief political power accorded to Black people.

“The negroes on the plantation had really no ill feeling, but poor ignorant creatures, they were intoxicated with the idea of power and always fond of idleness; began to steal and destroy property, scarcely a night without a burning,” Mary wrote in a memoir penned late in life. “There was no redress, no law, and the ‘Ku Klux’ was formed to frighten the negroes, so sensational, supersti­tious.”

Group is raising more money for work on house

Some 120 years after Mary’s death, Preservation South Carolina is raising money for the next phase of the restoration of the residence.

Bill Comer, a Union native who is heading up the DawkinsHouse rehab project for PSC, previously said the refurbished site will provide lessons from the past once it reopens.

Early rendering of what the house will look like when completed (PSC)

The $300,000 state-funded Phase 1 of the work, which concluded more than a year ago, shored up the building. Phase 2 will be much more extensive and expensive.

PSC said they need at least $845,000 for the next phase of work. About $284,000 has been raised or been committed, including a $100,000 award from the Timken Foundation and a $25,000 grant from the SC Department of Archives and History, said Comer.

Donations to the project can be made here.

“We hope to finalize other significant funding arrangements within the next several weeks. Fundraising efforts will be ongoing until the house is fully renovated and ready for use,” Comer said in an email.

It is anticipated Bennett Preservation Engineering of Charleston will begin updating and preparing design specifications for Phase 2 in early October and that construction will begin in January 2027. “Phase 2 will take the building well beyond stabilization to the point that it is ready to accommodate the Final Phase of mechanical, electrical and plumbing construction,” Comer said.

USC Union offers associate degrees in arts and science and a bachelor's in nursing

After that, the house will be owned by the Union Laurens Commission for Higher Education.

“PSC will continue to work collaboratively with USC Union and the commission via a memorandum of understanding to help secure funding and to provide historical preservation counsel until it is completely finished,” Comer added.

Juggling myths and the real stories

The Dawkins House rehabilitation and the university course are coming at a fortuitous time in South Carolina.

Gov. Henry McMaster has championed commemoration, including the state’s importance in the American Revolution. That awareness includes the complex history of slavery and its legacy, said Kettler.

“The base of the Freedmen’s Bureau was in Beaufort, South Carolina,” he said, arguing that’s where emancipation really began.

There are a lot of stories about the Dawkins House, he argued. “School kids know about the myth of McGrath’s silver.”

Upon learning of Rebel Gen. Robert E. Lee's surrender at Appomattox in early April 1865, Magrath and his staff raced away from Union as Maj. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman's Federal troops moved in. 

Magrath apparently hid a silver tea set at the Dawkins' home while he was based there. Mary Dawkins wrote the couple took the set to Mills House in Charleston after Magrath was released and they gave it to him.

The silver tea set story is covered in the book "South Carolina's English Lady," compiled and edited by the late Sarah Porter Carroll in the 1980s. You can read the text on Family Search (right).

Letters and accounts written by relatives of Mary Dawkins -- and included in Carroll's book -- suggest slaves at “The Shrubs” and any other land owned by Thomas were treated more kindly than at other plantations. But that view belies the fact the institution was inherently cruel and violent.

For Kettler and students, this will be in intense exercise in public history, a movement that marries academic with engagement in the community.

Kettler hopes uncovering the history of the house and 19^th century Union will better inform the community of its rich, complex history.

There is a  “mythic, shrouded history we are going to uncover.”

READ MORE:

https://civil-war-picket.blogspot.com/2026/04/as-fundraising-intensifies-to-fix-up.html

https://civil-war-picket.blogspot.com/2026/01/scs-civil-war-governor-slept-and-likely.html

https://civil-war-picket.blogspot.com/2025/09/craftsman-has-window-to-history-of-home.html

https://civil-war-picket.blogspot.com/2025/02/s-carolinas-governor-fled-to-this-house.html

https://civil-war-picket.blogspot.com/2024/07/south-carolina-community-gets-into-game.html

As fundraising intensifies to fix up Dawkins House in Union, S.C., a university prepares to identify, learn and teach about those enslaved at Civil War landmark

Dawkins House awaiting next phase of work (Picket photo), Mary Poulton Dawkins and part of slave schedule

Mary Poulton Dawkins was many things in her 86 years, the majority of which were ensconced in a Union, S.C., home that was dubbed “The Shrubs” in honor of a family estate by the same name in her native England.

Dawkins, who in 1845 married a prominent South Carolina judge 14 years her senior, was described by relatives as headstrong and proud of her imported furniture and Queen Victoria. She was determined to see the Poultons restored to their former position of wealth and prominence, whether in the United States or England.

There was another side of the Englishwoman, however, that doesn’t project well these days.

While of the “highest culture,” Mary had a tendency toward bigotry, an observer wrote, and a paternalistic view of slavery. The 1850 federal slave schedule indicates husband Thomas Dawkins enslaved about 30 persons.

One of several fireplaces on the main floor of the dwelling; the library is nearby (Picket photo)

Following the South’s loss in the Civil War, and the Dawkins’ fortune largely gone, Mary lamented Reconstruction and the brief political power accorded to Black people.

“The negroes on the plantation had really no ill feeling, but poor ignorant creatures, they were intoxicated with the idea of power and always fond of idleness; began to steal and destroy property, scarcely a night without a burning,” Mary wrote in a memoir penned late in life. “There was no redress, no law, and the ‘Ku Klux’ was formed to frighten the negroes, so sensational, supersti­tious.”

Some 120 years after Mary’s death, the nonprofit Preservation South Carolina is raising money for the next phase of the restoration of the dilapidated Dawkins House. The dwelling is destined to become an alumni and corporate center for the University of South Carolina Union, a small campus in the heart of the Piedmont city. (Picket video below of Bill Comer of PSC)

At the same time, USC-Union is establishing a genealogical and archives course that will focus on the history of the house and its occupants and visitors, including the identification of the enslaved, who – with a few exceptions -- currently are known only by their age and gender. The goal is to offer the class this fall.

It is anticipated that the course will be open to students and Union County residents who have an interest in ancestry research and history.

Backers of the Dawkins House project have said it is important the whole history of the home – warts and all – be told. That's the aim of other sites in Union County, including Rose Hill, former home of the Gist family.

Andrew Kettler, an assistant professor of history, told the Picket the aim of the course is less about assigning blame than moving toward acknowledgement and reconciliation. He describes it as a public history course; the syllabus is still being finalized.

“We are going to run … grants this summer that focus on finding sources related to the Dawkins House,” Kettler said (left, Picket photo). “We are currently recruiting two students and will apply for that funding at the end of April. The grant students will assist with identifying materials that focus on the Dawkins House held in local archives.”

Annie Smith, director of development on the campus, said the course also will seek to identify those individuals who lived in the original structure between 1765 and the early 1800s, before Thomas Dawkins bought and expanded the residence.

Bill Comer, a Union native who is heading up the Dawkins House rehab project for Preservation South Carolina, previously said the refurbished site will provide lessons from the past once it reopens.

“Those who were slaves should be identified and recognized, just as much as the Dawkins family and their prominent guests. Going forward, people of all races and religions should pass through the Dawkins House's doors and occupy its spaces, to do good without discrimination and to learn.”

Thomas Dawkins' property is listed on two pages of the 1850 schedule (click to enlarge)

Fireplaces apparently burned more than wood

The Dawkins House is a terminus residence situated on the campus at the end of Church Street. The property is best known for several weeks in spring 1865.

Union, which is south of Spartanburg, briefly served as the capital of the state after Columbia fell to Union forces in 1865 and Gov. Andrew Magrath fled to Union.

Gov. Magrath, before leaving Columbia, got in touch with college chum Thomas Dawkins (right) about using the home and others nearby to conduct business amid the chaos.

From about Feb. 15, 1865, until early April, Magrath ran the state from the Dawkins House. He apparently worked in an informal library near the drawing room, which survives today. Chaos ruled across South Carolina.

According to histories and local legend, Magrath and his subordinates burned possibly incriminating documents and correspondence in the fireplaces. (The home served as South Carolina's capitol while the city was briefly its capital.)

Amid the panic, Mary P. Dawkins later wrote, folks in Union tried to stay upbeat.

“The young people were hopeful to the last, so when soldiers were with us music, dancing, charades, etc. made such enjoyable eve­nings, never to be forgotten. There was bon amie, a comradeship born of the situation, very fascinating and rare.”

Recollecting the great silver tea set caper

The house has had several additions and changes over the centuries (Picket photo)

Upon learning of Rebel Gen. Robert E. Lee's surrender at Appomattox, Magrath and his staff raced away from Union as Maj. Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman's Federal troops moved in. He was eventually captured on May 25 and imprisoned at Fort Pulaski near Savannah, Ga., until release that December. 

Magrath apparently hid a silver tea set at the Dawkins' home while he was based there. Mary Dawkins wrote the couple took the set to Mills House in Charleston after Magrath was released and they gave it to him.

The silver tea set story is covered in the book "South Carolina's English Lady," compiled and edited by the late Sarah Porter Carroll in the 1980s. You can read the text on Family Search.

Mary wrote that a few months after hostilities ended, "our servants (were) free and sought for by (Union) soldiers.” One book says she presented a paternalistic view of slavery.

Enslaved people had become a majority in Union County during the 1840s, and the area became a hotbed of Ku Klux Klan activity during Reconstruction.

Letters and accounts written by relatives of Mary Dawkins -- and included in Carroll's book -- suggest slaves at “The Shrubs” and any other land owned by Thomas were treated more kindly than at other plantations. But that view belies the fact the institution was inherently cruel and violent.

Widow stayed proud of her English roots

During most of their 25-year marriage, Thomas and Mary Dawkins lived the good life. They were well-known in society, had amassed a fortune and were active in local civil and social affairs. They were key supporters of the Church of the Nativity, about a half mile from their home. Mary enjoyed traveling to Charleston and Edisto Island on the Atlantic Ocean.

Things went south after 1861.

 The left rear of the house dates back to the 1760s or so (Picket photo)

“When the war closed every servant Judge and Mrs. Dawkins owned left them, with the exception of ‘Aunt Sophia,’ who showed she appreciated their many kindnesses to her by remaining loyally with them for years as their cook, then, after a long period, going out and doing private nursing,” wrote one relative, as related in Carroll’s collection.

Mary Dawkins wrote that, actually, a few other servants, as she called the enslaved, stayed faithful to the household.

She said that a few months after hostilities ended, "our servants (were) free and sought for by (Union) soldiers.” 

Thomas Dawkins died in 1870. Mary wrote of experiencing sadness after the war while she allowed several relatives to live at The Shrubs. She said she occasionally helped her former servants. Most of her extended family had remained in England, rather than move to New York as she had in the 1830s.

While left with some money when Thomas died, Mary went through it and was almost penniless when she died at 86 in November 1906. Relatives remained in the house for years.

“Mrs. Dawkins was a woman of broad and rare culture, and not so long ago compiled some very interesting reminiscences of her life,” her obituary read. “She was a charming conversationalist, and she numbered many young friends as well as older ones, who considered it a great pleasure to spend an hour in her society. In her death Union loses a gentlewoman, whose presence and quiet influence will be greatly missed.”

In the end, Mary Poulton Dawkins’ story is well-known.

Those of the enslaved in the household she managed are not. (Above, Picket photo of Bill Comer and Robert Schmitt on front porch of The Shrubs)

'The integrity will stand on its own merit'

Curtiss Hunter, tourism director for the county and a member of the Union County Community Remembrance Project (UCCRP), which documents racial violence and lynching and promotes healing through preservation, previously told the Picket restoration of the Dawkins House will boost tourism and community engagement.

Hunter (left) said its full history should be part of its interpretation. “I believe … the story of the Dawkins House should be told as authentic as there is history to prove the content. The integrity will stand on its own merit.”

Hunter’s group in 2021 put up three marker detailing racial injustices in the county. Among them was Sax(e) Joiner, who was hanged by white men just before Union fell during the Civil War. He allegedly wrote an insulting letter to a white woman and was taken from the jail by a mob.

Kettler, the professor at USC-Union, said faculty and students will turn to the census, the Union Country Museum, Rose Hill Plantation State Historic Site, diaries and other papers.

“We are also accessing the University Archives, which have been in storage for a time. As well, part of the PURE grant work over the summer will be to try to find other archives in the state that might have reference to the Dawkins House and its inhabitants.”

Tour of home took me way back in time

The Picket attended a January meeting at USC-Union at which Comer and Joanna Rothell, director of outreach and preservation for Preservation South Carolina, made a pitch to area corporations and businesses to donate money for work on the Dawkins House.

I later saw the inside of the house, which has some wonderful architectural elements, timbers dating to the 1700s and windows undergoing conservation.

Comer reiterated the project will attempt to identify those who lived in or worked at the home in the 1700s and 1800s. Hopefully, he said, the team will be able to contact descendants. “We are going to do the right thing,” he told the audience.

The $300,000 state-funded Phase 1 shored up the building. (At right, Robert Schmitt, who was worked on the home's windows, shows where the spiral staircase once rose. Picket photo)

Phase 2 of the ambitious project will be much more extensive and expensive. The aim is for PSC to eventually hand over the house to the university for finishing and customization.

Rothell said Phase 2 will include:

-- Installation of new piers on concrete footings in the crawlspace;

-- Strengthening of porch, first and second floor framings, the roof system and all walls;

Rendering of the finished house, complete with landscaping (Preservation SC-USC Union)

-- Installation of the required framing for a new interior staircase where the original historic, spiral staircase was located in the central hall. This will entail strengthening the floors and walls in this area, including any necessary new footings in the crawlspace.

Name of house will honor famed black coach

PSC said they need at least $845,000 for the next phase of work. About $206,000 has been raised or been committed. Donations to the project can be made here.

“Fundraising is through personal outreach to corporations, organizations and individuals and participation in local meetings,” Comer told the Picket.

Construction could start in September or October, if enough money or promises come in.

PSC put out a fundraising brochure that includes “premier naming opportunities” for portions of the house, including the library, front porch, main hallway and the original 1700s home that was incorporated into later additions. Organizers hope one day to rebuild a spiral staircase that once joined the first and second floors.

The restored residence will be known as the Willie and Mary Jeffries’ Commons at Dawkins House. (PSC photo, right)

Willie Jeffries  played for the all-black Sims High School in Union and is the legendary former football coach of South Carolina State University. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2010 and is a member of the South Carolina Athletic Hall of Fame.

In 2023, the South Carolina High School League recognized the Sims football squad’s 96-game unbeaten streak from 1946-1954 as the longest in state history. 

According to PSC: 

"The 'Commons' represents a shared and vibrant space—one designed to bring people together. Located on the USC Union campus, it will serve as a hub for connection and collaboration, where students, faculty, and corporate partners can gather for networking, professional development, meetings, and special events. It will a place where ideas are exchanged, partnerships are formed, and innovation is fostered."

The library remains where Gov. Magrath worked in spring 1865 (Picket photo)

Artifacts in the round: Archaeologists provide fascinating conservation update on shattered wagon wheel, Confederate munitions found in S.C. river cleanup

Wheel before treatment began and in shower stall more recently for cleaning, 6-pounder and 12-pounder shells (SCIAA); George Barnard photo of damage in Columbia after the Civil War (Library of Congress)

Maybe it’s just me (it probably is), but an unusual Civil War artifact undergoing conservation in Columbia, S.C., looks like a king crab or spider with a few of its legs missing.

There, I said it.

I have been fascinated by the remnants of a wagon wheel believed destroyed on Feb. 19, 1865, when Federal forces sacked the South Carolina capital and dumped captured Confederate ammunition and materiel into the Congaree River.

A metal detector first noticed the round object buried in the bed of the Congaree. Archaeologists surmised it was a just another rubber tire -- one of many found during an extensive river cleanup a few years back. More than 500 Civil War-related artifacts were recovered during the project, and this is among the most unexpected.

Jim Legg, public archaeologist for the South Carolina Institute for Archaeology and Anthropology (SCIAA), this month provided an update to the Picket on the conservation of the artifact and other pieces, none of which were believed to be fired. (At right, a sample of grapeshot and canister, SCIAA photo)

Hundreds of items emerged in 2022 and 2023 as crews removed century-old coal tar along the Congaree shoreline. Since then, Legg’s office and TRC Companies, a subcontractor for Dominion Energy, have been working to conserve items with a wide range of dates.

The completed military part of the collection will go to South Carolina Confederate Relic Room and Military Museum in Columbia for eventual exhibit.

The wheel hub, which has evidence of charring, will take at least another year to preserve. Archaeologists did not find any other wheels, metal hubs or large pieces of wood near the artifact.

“I have always thought the wheel was from (an) explosion. One thing that threw it off was that black rubber disk in the middle of the hub (left, TRC companies photo),” Legg wrote in an email.

"I finally just took it out to see what it was, and found that it was the rubber wheel from a 20th century kid's wagon. Either it floated into that location, or maybe one of the EOD (explosive ordnance disposal) guys picked it out of the junk pile and dropped it in there. It was a perfect fit.”

Even with that oddity, Legg is comfortable calling the fragment a casualty of Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman’s troops.

The features are consistent with a 1860s wagon wheel and it was found where at least one heavy wagon was blown to pieces.

“There is no record of any guns or gun carriages being destroyed/dumped in the river,” he added.

Something blowed up real good at river

Federal troops threw Confederate war materiel into the river after they took what they wanted before marching to North Carolina. Much of the state capital went up in flames, from a variety of sources, after its surrender.

Sean Norris, program archaeologist for TRC Companies, previously said of the wheel:

William Waud depiction of the burning of Columbia in 1865 (Library of Congress)

“The official records mention the explosion and the destruction of a wagon and a team of mules in a couple correspondences. It seems possible that what was left of the wagon after it was destroyed was thrown in the river along with everything else that was being dumped. There would be no specific reason for the wagon parts to be discarded elsewhere.”

The wheel at first was treated in a basic solution at the Relic Room before Legg moved it to his laboratory. Most of the recovered iron items considered the most important have been conserved.

The wheel has presented some challenges

Legg keep the wheel fragment in a shower stall for about a month during rinsing and hand cleaning. The artifact then went into a small tank, where it is undergoing polyethylene glycol (PEG) treatment for about another year.

“For size comparison this thing appears to be the same size as those seen on the NPS field artillery carriages -- fairly massive,” Legg wrote. In any case, they are the same basic design as a heavy wagon wheel hub.” (A gun carriage wheel at Chickamauga, Jim Legg photo)

I asked Legg whether the wheel has presented a conservation challenge.

“Yes, the fact that it is heavily encased in wrought iron hardware. Ideally, it would be cut apart, and the iron bands would be treated with electrolysis while the wood underwent the PEG process, then reassembled.” He said the cost for that would be enormous.

“I did a lot of manual cleaning of the iron before I started the PEG, but the bands are still fairly crusty. The iron will pretty much have to fend for itself, and I can only hope that it is not too unstable after the process is done. I can probably do some hand cleaning at that stage, perhaps with air abrader (a tool used to reduce corrosion), which will at least make it look better.”

A few items are distinctively modern

Norris said the project encountered Native American ceramics and projectile points and typical historic glass and ceramics that you would expect to find in river a flowing through a city.

The Relic Room exhibit on the Congaree finds will include a few non-Civil War items. Legg provided a photo (above) with a range: A brass hose nozzle, an iron sash weight, a Waterbury Clock Company winding key, an iron fork with wood handle (possibly Civil War), a silver plate fork from the Seaboard Coast Line Railroad, two .50-caliber BMG cartridges dated 1944, a pocket knife and a fire department button from the 1890s. 

Legg will produce a report on 1865 ordnance dump and a exhibit, possibly to open in 2027, at the Relic Room in Columbia.

“I have recently had some preliminary discussions with the museum about the exhibit, and the permanent curation of the collection there,” he said.

A group of 24-pounder and 12-pounder Confederate canister plates (SCIAA photo)

I asked Legg, who has helped produce three exhibits at the museum, how it might interpret the hundreds of historic artifacts found in the Congaree River cleanup.

“My thinking right now is to put the ordnance dump in the more general context of the Federal destruction of military resources in and around Columbia. I will also want to cover the pollution mitigation project itself, which was an amazing thing to see, even aside from the archaeology component.”

The Picket has reached out to the Relic Room for comment.

Recent view of the wagon wheel hub undergoing conservation in Columbia (SCIAA photo)