Discoveries large and small emerge at Revolutionary War site

They've found musket balls and shell fragments, the expected refuse of battle.

Archaeologists and volunteers combing the grounds of the Red Bank Battlefield this month have unearthed at least 150 artifacts, about 50 of them tied to the crucial Revolutionary War fight 238 years ago.

But they have also discovered objects with a more personal, human connection, said Wade Catts, regional cultural director of JMA, a division of Commonwealth Cultural Resources Group in West Chester, conducting the dig in National Park, Gloucester County.

Those are the ones - such as a bent picture frame, twisted shoe buckle, and buttons - that conjure up images of individual lives ended violently during a 45-minute hailstorm of iron and lead on Oct. 22, 1777.

"You feel the emotion; the human side is so important," Catts said. "Personal items are an indicator of a human being on that field.

"They're carrying the kinds of things you might carry in your pockets. You can't recover that from a book."

Researchers have used ground-penetrating radar and metal detectors to scour the battlefield for clues and translated period documents to learn more about the clash and outlines of the Americans' Fort Mercer.

One interior wall of the fort appears to have been found by archaeologists who came upon nails used in its construction. The possible location of an outer wall and gate is being investigated.

The most compelling pieces of the past are often the objects such as the 18th-century metal picture frame that probably belonged to a Hessian soldier who may have been one of more than 300 mowed down as they attacked Americans outside Fort Mercer.

The artifact, located by a metal detector a few inches in the earth, "could have been tucked away in the uniform," Catts said.

"The frame might have had a miniature painting of a loved one," he said. "It's a personal item, and that brings an immediacy to the event."

Was the frame damaged in the fight? Whom did it belong to?

"The things you had in your pockets were an indicator of who you were and what you were doing there," Catts said. "These guys [Hessians] were dying pretty far from home."

"Put yourself there," he said. "The sun is going down late in the day in late October, and this could be the last day of your life."

Who wore the buttons recovered nearby and the grooved buckle - likely from a Hessian's shoe - that may have become twisted when the soldier was wounded?

"When you begin to recover actual lead shot and canister and find mangled pieces of metal like a buckle, that shows you the ferocity of the battle," Catts said.

"Books can tell you it was ferocious," he said. "Then you see an object showing you the impact of canister shot on a human being, and there's a level of realization.

"Maybe the soldier went down and lost his leg at the same time," Catts said. "You don't want to stop a cannonball with your foot 50 yards from the fort."

Among the more exciting discoveries was half of a small-caliber cannonball, said Jennifer Janofsky, curator of the Red Bank Battlefield and Whitall House and Giordano Fellow in Public History at Rowan University.

The work of the archaeologists "has been extremely worthwhile," she said. "They have been doing mapping that gives us a much better sense of what the fort looked like and how it actually functioned.

"They've also translated Hessian and French accounts that give us a better idea of the human drama of the day and the loss the Hessians faced."

The battlefield has drawn more public interest since public digs on June 8, 10, and 20, Janofsky said. The number of "likes" on its Facebook page has increased from 800 to about 1,100.

"We'd like to make the archaeological work a routine part of our programming," Janofsky said.

The site already has an annual reenactment of the battle every October. Indeed, some of the recovered objects have been from the uniforms of reenactors.

But archaeologists know the difference and are amazed at how many artifacts from the battle remain in the ground and "still tell stories," Catts said.

"We're getting a sense of the density and distribution of the artifacts," Catts said. At the same time, "we're looking at (period) maps and descriptions from documents.

"No one has put this combination of sources together before. It's that combination that makes the difference."