civil war photo iIDed from Fla state archives by Ivan Salis

[ivan salis]

this photo was IDed from the tiny troop placard on the first left hand side tent ..it says
"1 US battery B"
"Artillery"
and was most likely taken between Feb 22 and their departure from Jacksonville in April of 1864

this group was aka as "Elders horse artillery" which took part in the battle of "Olustee" feb 20th of 1864 ---it landed in Jacksonville Feb 5th , marched out of Jacksonville on Feb 7th to the battle of Olustee on Feb 20th and then rapidly retreated back to Jacksonville --getting there Feb 22nd of 1864 -- it stayed about 2 months rebuilding its manpower and supplies and left Jacksonville --it arrived in Virginia on April 25th of 1864

I have notifed the state of florida archives so that it can properly ID this photo in its archives from now on.. I have located this camp site in Jacksonville because of things in the photo from the civil war era (large building in the rear ) Jacksonville had few large building back hen and with it and a civil war era map layout --the camp sites location was not too hard to figger out .. it was a typical junky abandoned large city block sided vacant lot next to the Lavilla school and was being used as "overflow" student parking...after getting the ok ..I found civil war items that backed up my theory as to it being the "elder site" ...sadly the site has been recently bought up by a nearby medical group who is going to build a new medical building upon the spot and it no longer able to be detected anymore ..

 

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[against the wind]

Nice detective work.
Any pictures of your finds?

 

[ivan salis]

no I haven't taken photos of my finds -- in the past I used them for show and tell at our local Nassau county grade school --3rd thru 5th grade school that my wife taught at ....but now that she has retired .... I have been thinking of donating them to either the fort clinch state park or the Olustee battlefeild site .. so that the public at large can enjoy seeing them ...

 

[Professor of Engineering]

Thanks for sharing!

 

[kingskid1611]

That is cool. My eyes don't work that well so I can't see the sign on the tent.

 

[ivan salis]

oh the sign is tiny but if you do the work and crop it out of the photo and carefully blow up correctly the image is readable --its not quite as easy as it sounds however----went to the local Amelia Island Museum of History --civil war talk today put on by the head man who does the Fort Clinch civil war reenacting bits --who was talking about civil war era uniforms and kit --north and south --took all the civil war finds that I obtained off the lot and asked if he could use them at the fort for display --he said his display area was" jam packed" but then said that the museum was expanding next year and was going to need exhibits for its new civil war display --so I donated my finds to the museum for their display in the future --it took over 2 hours to explain what each item was and transfer ownership from me to them --a couple of the items where highly "collectible" --high value items --like a six sided confederate imported from England WHITWORTH sniper bullet and a Cherokee rose button (state of Florida confederate button)--the total value if I was to guess of the collection would be about 1500 to 2000 but I did not ask for a receipt for tax write off --I just want the stuff to be seen by folks and to let History live