Two Civil War Enfield rifles that have been kept in water are chosen for wood conservation. The hope is to put them and 18 others on display

Conservation of 20 British-made rifles intended for Confederate use is in a significant new phase, as specialists have removed two of them from an aquarium tank so they can be treated with a wood preservative.

Josh Headlee, curator and historic preservation specialist with the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, and parks division archaeologist Aimee Bouzigard last month cleaned the tank that contains the wooden rifle crate and weapons.

The Pattern 1853 Enfields -- carried by a blockade runner and lost when it hit a sandbar in Charleston, S.C, in 1863 -- are in water at Sweetwater Creek State Park in Douglas County, Ga., as corrosive salts are removed.

The tank also safeguards the rifles while the state develops means to one day exhibit them in open air.

Headlee told the Picket he will use SP-11 treatment made by Preservation Solutions. Conservators recently used SP-11 to treat an intact coffin found in 2013 on the edge of the marsh at Fort McAllister, a Confederate river outpost below Savannah.

They were pleased with the results and decided to try the chemical on the rifles.

“We feel optimistic about it,” said Headlee, adding the two removed weapons will remain in water until treatment.

“We are going to pick around each one, try to get the crusty stuff off the wood.” He said the rifles are coated with hardened materials, including rusted iron from the barrels.

Headlee travels to the park a couple times a year to do maintenance, which includes cleaning the tank and using a light stream from a hose to remove gathered muck and sediment from the crate and its contents. He adds fungicide to limit algae growth in the tank, which holds filtered freshwater.

Unfortunately, the iron rifle barrels, locks and bayonets are heavily deteriorated or gone. A tin and lead lining that sealed the cargo from salt air and ensured the rifles were not tampered with likewise is in bad condition.

Josh Headlee and Aimee Bouzigard handle rifles in July (Photos, Georgia DNR)

The trigger guards, butt plates and nose caps at the end of the barrels are brass and are still intact.

“The wood is in remarkably great shape. There are rifles we have that are broken. I assume that was damage they sustained when they were sinking,” Headlee said. One end of the crate was damaged, apparently when the CSS Stono sank.

The rifles were placed in an alternating butt to muzzle pattern before shipment, and blocks were used to prevent the weapons from shifting.

Headlee transported the rifles, a piece of the crate and a short wooden block. The items will be treated at a facility at Panola Mountain State Park.

While SP-11 worked well as a composite for the coffin, likely made of pine, Headlee is mindful that the rifles have stocks made of walnut, a harder wood.

Without chemical treatment, pieces of wood taken out of water will shrink, warp and crack. “They could literally just fall apart,” Headlee said last year.

The product is designed to displace water in the wood with preservatives that help to solidify the wood so it can be permanently exposed to the air.

Treating each rifle could take several months, so there is no timetable on completion of the project. The brass items will be treated separately and the conservators hope one day to reassemble them on the rifle stocks and what’s left of the barrels.

The CSS Stono, laden with precious arms, munitions and goods from Europe, in 1863 ran aground on a submerged sandbar off Fort Moultrie in Charleston Harbor while trying to evade Federal ships. Headlee believes the captain scuttled the vessel so the items could not fall into Union hands.

An archaeological diver pulled up the pine crate from the shipwreck in the late 1980s. Officials did not initially know how many of the highly-prized Pattern 1853 rifles were inside, their position or condition. Each weapon originally weighed about 9 pounds and was approximately 53 inches long. The bore is .577-caliber.

The craftsmanship involved in the manufacture of the guns was very good, Headlee said. “Enfield was top quality.” The Enfield was the second-most widely used infantry weapon in the Civil War after the Springfield.

The 1851 and 1853 Enfields, made for the British army, were an important technological advance from smoothbore to rifled muskets, increasing the accuracy and distance.

Researchers years ago found in the crate a bullet mold, tools and tampions, or cork and brass plugs inserted into the muzzle to ward off moisture.

At least one of the weapons bears the mark, “T. Turner,” a reference to well-known English gunmaker Thomas Turner, who turned out quality weapons in the mid-19^th century.

Only three intact cases of the single-shot weapon are known, according to a 2007 Atlanta Journal-Constitution article.

The CSS Stono was previously known as the USS Isaac Smith, a steamer that saw Federal service before its capture by Confederate land forces.

Example of a Civil War Enfield rifle (NPS photo)

Some of the CSS Stono’s contents were retrieved by the South, but others, including the crate of Enfields, could not be salvaged at the time, apparently because they were below the water line. In 1865, the “stuck” ship was burned to prevent it from falling into the hands of Federal troops.

The crate was originally curated by the South Carolina Institute of Archaeology and Anthropology (at the University of South Carolina), say Georgia officials. The South Carolina institute did conserve smaller items, but donated the rifle crate to Georgia for extensive conservation treatment and display. 

Headlee said “the sky is the limit” on how the weapons can eventually be presented and interpreted to the public, should conservation of the wood and remaining metal components be successful.

“To bring them to the light of day would be a huge success,” he said.

They want to display this crate of Enfield rifles out of the water. But safeguarding the wood involves a lot of research, care.

The CSS Stono rifles (Photos by Don Scarbrough, interpretive range at SCSP)

Historic preservation specialists in Georgia are researching various ways to treat a wooden crate and 20 Enfield rifles that have been kept in an aquarium, where filtered freshwater continues to draw out salt and other contaminants.

The crate carried by the blockade runner CSS Stono has been on display for seven years at Sweetwater Creek State Park in Douglas County, west of Atlanta. The British-made Enfield was the second-most widely used infantry weapon in the Civil War after the Springfield.

The aim is to eventually display the weapons out of water, said Josh Headlee, curator and historic preservation specialist with the Georgia Department of Natural Resources.

The crate when it appeared briefly uncovered by water in January

“Essentially, we are testing or working with some products that we’ve never used before. So before we try them on something as important as the rifle crate we test it on an inconspicuous piece of waterlogged wood to see how well it does,” he wrote in a recent email.

“This is something that most museum professionals or conservators are familiar with – before you use a product on an important artifact you test it on a “non-important” item or in a well-hidden spot on the artifact before you use it on the entire item.”

The products are designed to displace water in the wood with preservatives that help to solidify the wood so it can be permanently exposed to the air. “We just want to make sure that what we do isn’t going to harm the rifles in any way," said Headlee.

The visitor center is currently closed due to the coronavirus pandemic

The CSS Stono, laden with precious arms, munitions and goods from Europe, in 1863 ran aground on a submerged sandbar off Fort Moultrie in Charleston (S.C.) Harbor while trying to evade Federal ships. The rifles remained in the water for more than a century.

An archaeological diver pulled up the crate from the South Carolina shipwreck in the late 1980s. Officials did not initially know how many of the highly-prized Pattern 53 rifles were inside, their position or condition. Each weapon originally weighed about 9 pounds and was approximately 53 inches long. The bore is .577-caliber.

Every six months or so, technicians travel to Sweetwater Creek to examine the cache and clean the tank. Last year, Headlee said the remains of the walnut rifle stocks were in good shape, while the crate itself and a metal lining that protected the rifles have not fared so well. The crate is likely made of pine, a softer wood. And the metal lining, made of an alloy, appears to be waterlogged. The iron rifle barrels, locks and bayonets deteriorated because of years of saltwater corrosion.

In January, technicians drained the 3,000-gallon tank and again cleaned the crate and installed a new filter.

A closeup view of the rifle stock remnants (Don Scarbrough)

“We were having a little bit of algae/fungus problem … and it was clouding the water and ruining our filters and pumps,” said Headlee. “This new pump has a UV light unit in it that the water travels through that is supposed to help control the algae growth.  We’ve also added a mild fungicide to the water to help keep everything clear.”

“It pretty much cleared up right away,” Sweetwater interpretive ranger Don Scarbrough said of the tank’s appearance following the work in January.

Because of the coronavirus pandemic, the Sweetwater visitor center housing the aquarium has been closed since mid-March.

The park staff recently resumed tours of the ruins of the New Manchester textile mill, which operated during the Civil War, Scarbrough said.

Recovered Enfield rifle stocks are holding up well, but crate and protective metal lining are showing more signs of deterioration

Enfield rifles are surrounded by a metal lining (Sweetwater Creek State Park)

A crate of 20 British-made Enfield rifles that never made it into the hands of Confederate soldiers has remained in water ever since it was pulled from the wreckage of the blockade runner CSS Stono in the late 1980s.

For the last six years, the weapons have been on display in a 300-gallon aquarium at Sweetwater Creek State Park west of Atlanta. Every six months or so, technicians with the Historic Preservation Division of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources clean the tank and check on the status of the artifacts.

“The rifles themselves are in great shape, as far as the wood goes. That’s kind of a mystery,” said Josh Headlee, a curator and historic preservation specialist.

The remnants of the wooden crate and metal lining have not fared so well.

While the rifle stocks are walnut, the crate is likely pine, a softer wood, said Headlee. And the metal lining, made of an alloy, appears to be waterlogged.

The tank was recently cleaned (Georgia Dept. of Natural Resources)

“The metal is taking on properties of cloth, becoming really soft,” he said. The rifles are bulging that metal outward.

Headlee and another specialist recently cleared the tank algae and loose reddish sediment. “I run my hand over (the rifles) and that removes the stubborn algae.”

Pending conservation of the artifacts, technicians have worked over the past several years to remove damaging salt (chloride).

“We are actually right at tap water,” said Headlee. “We feel most of the salts have already leached out.”

The CSS Stono, laden with precious arms, munitions and goods from Europe, in 1863 ran aground on a submerged sandbar off Fort Moultrie while trying to evade Federal ships.

Wooden crate (front) has softened over the years (Sweetwater Creek State Park)

“It looks like this crate had fallen off a stack and one end had busted completely out,” said Headlee. “A couple of the rifles were damaged. Because the crate was damaged all the sediment had washed in it and basically turned to concrete.”

After Georgia acquired the guns from South Carolina, technicians chipped off the encrusted material.

Other crates containing the highly prized Pattern 53 rifles are still lying in Charleston Harbor.

At least one of the weapons bears the mark, “T. Turner,” a reference to well-known English gunmaker Thomas Turner, who turned out quality weapons in the mid-19th century.

The iron rifle barrels, locks and bayonets in the crate are heavily deteriorated from saltwater corrosion. Brass components, including butt plates, trigger guards and the nose cap at the end of the barrels, better withstood the ravages of longtime submersion. Researchers also found a bullet mold, tools and tampions, or cork and brass plugs inserted into the muzzle to ward off moisture. Those items are not in the aquarium.

The metal lining sealed the cargo from salt air and ensured the rifles were not tampered with. Inside, the rifles were placed in an alternating butt to muzzle pattern. Wooden blocks were used to prevent the weapons from shifting.

The artifacts have been in a “holding pattern” until money is secured for conservation.

The 3,000-gallon tank after recent cleaning (Sweetwater Creek State Park)

In the short term, Headlee may look at a fungicide as a way to cut down on algae.

“I would love something more done with them,” he says of the rifles, crate and lining.

Officials are looking into a possible heritage grant to do extensive conservation that will take the artifacts out of the water. For now, the items remain in a protective water environment. 

But even that can’t prevent degradation.

“We are doing everything we can do to slow it down,” said Headlee. “I am noticing it is picking up.”

Enfield rifles recovered in shipwreck stay on display, await long-term conservation

Recent photo of the rifle crate. Water will be changed soon.

(Georgia State Parks)

An unusual display greets campers, hikers, boaters and Civil War aficionados who venture into the visitor center at Georgia’s Sweetwater Creek State Park west of Atlanta.

The curious skim through the text of wall panels to learn more about the jumble of wood and corroded metal resting in the middle of a large freshwater tank.

The carefully constructed box of British-made rifles was intended for the hands of Confederate soldiers. But they never made it ashore in Charleston, S.C. The CSS Stono, a blockade runner laden with precious arms, munitions and goods from Europe, in 1863 ran aground on a submerged sandbar off Fort Moultrie while trying to evade Federal ships.

This rare crate of 20 Enfield rifles remains in “suspension” until funding is procured for their permanent conservation so that they can be displayed outside a water environment at Fort McAllister State Park near Savannah.

(Georgia State Parks)

The Picket first spoke about the Pattern 1853 Enfield rifle-muskets with Josh Headlee, senior preservation technician with the state’s Historic Preservation Division, in December 2013. That post ranks in the top five of the most-popular articles on this blog.

“One of the challenges that we face now is coming up with a way to support the crate without causing further damage to it,” Headlee recently said. “The lining of the crate … is made up of a tin composite material.  This tin is quite malleable now, given that it has rested in saltwater and now freshwater for over 150 years.  In essence the weight of the stack of rifles is wanting to fall down and burst open what is left of the crate.”

The technician said he plans in the next six months to install a brace to disrupt further degradation of the metal lining.

Over time, the freshwater tank environment has helped draw out salt and other contaminants.

“Most of the sodium chlorides are out of the water,” said Headlee. “Most of the metal parts of the rifles are gone. What is left we don’t want to corrode. We have fragments of barrels and locks.”

Rifles are placed in tank in 2013

Water was changed about once a week when the salt levels were especially high. But, over time, the interval has changed to about every six months.

Headlee says he and others are surprised at how intact the walnut stocks appear to be. Weapons found in other saltwater environments haven’t fared so well. “I wondered if the rifles weren’t wrapped in oil cloth before they were crated up, and that helped preserve them.”

Brass components, including butt plates, trigger guards and the nose cap at the end of the barrels better withstood the ravages of longtime submersion. Researchers also found a bullet mold, tools and tampions, or cork and brass plugs inserted into the muzzle to ward off moisture.

Three of the tampions found with rifles (Ga. DNR)

The CSS Stono was previously known as the USS Isaac Smith, a steamer that saw Federal service before its capture by Confederate land forces.

Some of the CSS Stono’s contents were retrieved by the South, but others, including the crate of Enfields, could not be salvaged, apparently because they were below the water line. In 1865, the “stuck” ship was burned to prevent it from falling into the hands of Federal troops.

An archaeological diver pulled up the crate from the shipwreck in the late 1980s. The Georgia Department of Natural Resources acquired the guns from South Carolina. 

Headlee said he expects conservation of the rifles could run into the tens of thousands of dollars. An outside contractor could guide the department in an appropriate technique, perhaps by freeze-drying the material to remove moisture without causing further damage.

Typical Pattern 1853 Enfield (NPS)

“They are on the radar screen and (officials) are well aware of the fact that as long as they are in the water and monitored and are being taken care of, the status quo is OK for now. And they are available to the public.”

There is no timetable for the conservation.

Fort McAllister is a suitable permanent home, Headlee says, because of its focus on Southern blockade runners. The site has a display on the CSS Nashville, a vessel that was destroyed nearby by Union forces in early 1863.

The rifles have been on display for two years. Visitors to Sweetwater Creek State Park often walk down to the ruins of the New Manchester mill, which produced textiles for the Confederacy before it was burned by Union troops in 1864.

Rare crate of Civil War Enfield rifles yields picture of daring Civil War blockade runners

Enfield rifles prepared for display (Georgia DNR)

• See July 2022 update on rifles

The carefully constructed box of British-made rifles was intended for the hands of Confederate soldiers.

A century and a half later, after a failed blockade run, a fire and years resting in the sandy bottom of Charleston Harbor, the weathered container and its contents are instead a time capsule in the hands of conservators and archaeologists.

“The last time somebody looked at those, and put them on crates, was about 150 years ago,” said J. Doug Bailey, a gun collector who has studied the Pattern 1853 Enfield rifle-musket for more than three decades.

Twenty Enfields -- the second most widely used infantry weapon in the Civil War after the Springfield -- are being conserved by the Historic Preservation Division of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, which acquired the guns from South Carolina. 

Rifles are enclosed in metal liner (Georgia DNR)

The crate carried by the doomed CSS Stono is currently on display at Sweetwater Creek State Park in Douglas County, west of Atlanta, while the preservation lab at Panola Mountain State Park is being overhauled.

The rifles are in large aquarium of filtered freshwater that is drawing out salt and other contaminants.

“It (is) a once in a lifetime thing,” Josh Headlee, senior preservation technician with the division, told the Picket of the rare opportunity to conserve and study a case of Enfields.

Only three intact cases of the single-shot weapon are known, according to a 2007 Atlanta Journal-Constitution article.

Typical Pattern 1853 Enfield (NPS)

Although the iron rifle barrels, locks and bayonets are heavily deteriorated from saltwater corrosion, the walnut stocks of the rifles are in “tremendous shape.”

Brass components, including butt plates, trigger guards and the nose cap at the end of the barrels better withstood the ravages of longtime submersion.

Researchers also found a bullet mold, tools and tampions, or cork and brass plugs inserted into the muzzle to ward off moisture.

At least one of the weapons bears the mark, “T. Turner,” a reference to well-known English gunmaker Thomas Turner, who turned out quality weapons in the mid-19^th century.

The rifles came from the wreckage of the CSS Stono, a blockade runner -- laden with precious arms, munitions and goods from Europe  – that in 1863 ran aground on a submerged sandbar off Fort Moultrie while trying to evade Federal ships.

The CSS Stono was previously known as the USS Isaac Smith, a steamer that saw Federal service before its capture by Confederate land forces.

Some of the CSS Stono’s contents were retrieved by the South, but others, including the crate of Enfields, could not be salvaged, apparently because they were below the water line. In 1865, the “stuck” ship was burned to prevent it from falling into the hands of Federal troops.

An archaeological diver pulled up the crate from the South Carolina shipwreck in the late 1980s. 

“The water was murky,” said Headlee. “He could not feel where the stack of rifles ended.”

USS Isaac Smith, later converted to CSS Stono

Officials did not initially know how many of the highly-prized Pattern 53 rifles were inside, their position or condition. Each weapon weighed about 9 pounds and was approximately 53 inches long. The bore is .577 caliber.

“The Confederacy imported more Enfields during the course of the war than any other small arm,” according to the National Park Service. “It has been estimated that over 900,000 P53 Enfields were imported to America and saw service in every major battle from Shiloh in April 1862 through Vicksburg in 1863, to the final battles of 1865.”

The crate was originally curated by the South Carolina Institute of Archaeology and Anthropology (at the University of South Carolina), said David Crass, head of Georgia’s Historic Preservation Division.

The South Carolina institute did conserve smaller items, but donated the rifle crate to Georgia for extensive conservation treatment and display. 

In early 2007, Headlee turned to Atlanta’s Delta Air Lines to X-ray the crate so that researchers would best know how to tackle the chore of conserving the metal lining and rifles.

A powerful industrial X-ray machine was unable to provide more than faint images through the packed sediment, which Headlee likened to concrete.

"I guess if we want to find out what we've got, we'll have to start digging down a layer at a time,” he told The Journal-Constitution.

The rifles were placed in a solid wooden case and metal lining

His words have proven true in the years since, with a “painstakingly slow” process of using hand tools to separate the rifles and other contents. “It took years to chip away,” Headlee told the Picket this week.

Most of the wooden crate is gone, but a lining made of tin and lead remains. One end of the crate was damaged, apparently when the CSS Stono sank.

After the level of sodium chloride is stabilized, officials will consider longer-term conservation techniques. The state hopes to eventually place the crate on permanent display after the long conservation process.

Bailey, who lives in Roswell, Ga., told the Picket that the North also imported thousands of Enfields from Europe before it increased production of the venerable Springfield rifle. The South, with limited manufacturing capacity, was heavily dependent on imported weapons and goods.

.557 Enfield Minie Ball (NPS)

On today’s market, a P53 Enfield in rough condition can go for as little as a few hundred dollars, while rarer specimens may fetch as much as $10,000.

The 1851 and 1853 Enfields, made for the British army, were an important technological advance from smoothbore to rifled muskets, increasing the accuracy and distance, said Bailey. “They were very well made.”

Headlee asked Bailey to take a look at the rifles, and they found the Thomas Turner mark clearly visible on one weapon.

“Some of the stocks were in amazing condition and we washed them off,” he said. “I was taken they went to so much trouble and time to pack them.”

The metal lining sealed the cargo from salt air and ensured the rifles were not tampered with. Inside, the rifles were placed in an alternating butt to muzzle pattern. Wooden blocks were used to prevent the weapons from shifting.

Lockplates on CSS Stono rifles likely resembled this (J. Doug Bailey)

In an online journal for his agency, Headlee wrote: “The rifles will obviously never look like they did when they were brand new. In fact, with much of the iron gone, they will at best look like shells of their former selves.  However, there are enough fragments and recognizable parts left that they are an instrument of education for Civil War and Enfield Rifle scholars who are being given a rare glimpse into how the rifles were crated and transported."

Bailey likened the discovery to that of Enfields found in the wreckage of the blockade runner Modern Greece near Fort Fisher, N.C.

“Once they get it stabilized and in a preserved state, anyone who is interested in the blockade runners and what (the rifles) looked like when brought over it will bring great insight,” Bailey said of the CSS Stono rifle crate.

“You are kind of stepping back in time. I found it extremely interesting.”

• Click here for November 2015 update on rifles