Karin Bruwelheide

The Man in the Iron Coffin: An Interdisciplinary Effort to Name the Past

The examination of a cast-iron coffin from the Mason family cemetery at Pulaski, Tennessee, offered an exceptional opportunity to study relatively well-preserved human remains, associated artifacts, and the coffin itself. Only a few studies of cast-iron coffins and their contents have incorporated the results of interdisciplinary research in the interpretation of the burial and the remains. The investigation is based on the use of an evolving protocol that promotes the collection of relevant information from several disciplines when evaluating cast-iron coffins and their contents. Multiple lines of evidence identify the remains as those of Isaac Newton Mason, a private in the First Tennessee Confederate Cavalry Regiment, and provide a detailed and intimate glimpse into the past.

Human Finger and Hand Bone Necklaces from the Plains and Great Basin

Culturally patterned violent conflict between social groups has a long history in the prehistoric Plains and Great Basin of North America. Evidence for both the small-scale feuding and raiding that resulted in traumatic injuries and death and the large-scale warfare that destroyed villages and produced mass fatalities has been detected archaeologically and through studies of human skeletons (Bovee and Owsley 1994; Blakeslee 1999; Brooks 1994; Hollimon and Owsley 1994; Lambert 2002; Owsley 1994; Owsley and Bruwelheide 1997; Willey 1990). The prevalence of conflict varied through time and by location, being less frequent in the Plains during the Archaic and Woodland periods, and more common during the Village period. The pace and bloodiness of intertribal warfare increased even more dramatically during the protohistoric and historic periods as the Cheyenne, Crow, Sioux and other groups migrated from the east into already occupied lands in the Plains. In the Great Basin, warfare was prevalent during the last millennia as Numic populations including the Paiute, Ute, Shoshone and Comanche expanded their territories through military force (Sutton 1986). Numic groups avoided hostility toward one another, but were “militarily aggressive” and at war with “virtually all of their neighbors” (Sutton 1986:77). Shoshone movements northward into the Plains began after 1500, while the Ute and Comanche entered the southern Plains circa 1700. Resident populations were displaced or eliminated. Territorial expansions and competition for resources through militarism changed tribal relationships, boundaries, and cultures throughout the Plains and

Skeletal Evidence of Anatomical and Surgical Training in Nineteenth-Century Richmond

A brick well containing human bones and artifacts dating to the mid-nineteenth century was discovered during construction on the Medical College of Virginia campus of Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) in 1994. The commingled assemblage associates the well with the first years of operation of the Egyptian Building, opened in 1844 and built to house the Medical Department of Hampden-Sydney College, established in 1838. A 2011–2012 analysis of the human bones identifies a minimum of 44 adults (individuals 15 years and older) and 9 children (ages 14 years and younger) represented by at least 19 fairly intact bodies plus partial remains of an additional 34 individuals. Males and females are represented, and African and European ancestries are conveyed in the morphometric analysis of the crania. Patterned cuts indicating autopsy and dissection are present on several bones and identify the well as a repository for the disposal of cadavers used in medical teaching and training during the college’s formative years.

Lives Lost: What Burial Vault Studies Reveal About Eighteenth-Century Identities

When a subterranean burial vault was discovered at the eighteenth-century Maryland residence Darnall’s Chance, an effort began to learn the identities and life histories of those inside the high-status crypt. Identification of the human remains as members of the residence’s first family, while inferred based on burial location, remained only conjectural. Sparse records provided little insight into the elite family’s morbidity, mortality, and mortuary practices. Prolonged and excruciating illnesses of two family members, as expressed by conditions in the bones, were undocumented in the written record, as were the births and deaths of infants and children. An interdisciplinary investigation spanning two decades incorporating archaeology, osteology, chemistry, genetics, genealogy, and history was required to identify the remains–some by name–and establish their biological relatedness. This bioarchaeological approach offers information that augments primary source documents related to the family while adding to the larger skeletal record of the eighteenth century. It also provides evidence for the prominence of Lettice Lee Wardrop Thomson Sim, household matriarch, in sustaining and caring for her family. These details expand on the historical framework of women’s roles in familial relationships in both life and death.