145-year-old remains of Civil War soldier found in Tennessee

A construction worker in Franklin, Tennessee, a suburb of Nashville, made a historic discovery Thursday afternoon while digging a sewer line.  He found the remains of a Civil War soldier.

The soldier was still wearing part of his Union uniform.

It was a fierce and bloody battle, fought 145 years ago. 

Union and Confederate soldiers clashed in the historic Battle of Franklin. 

In the end, some 10,000 sons, fathers, husbands, never made it home.  Today, what’s believed to be the remains of an unknown union soldier were found scattered in a two-foot, hastily dug grave in the middle of a construction site in Franklin.

Eric Jacobson of the Carnton Plantation, a civil war landmark in Tennessee, said “and this is hallowed ground, where he was buried in a shallow grave.“

Civil War historians, archaeologists, and police gathered around to view a tender and tragic piece of history.

J.T. Thompson of the Civil War museum Lotz House said “pretty spectacular, I mean, this doesn’t happen every day!“

As police went about the business of collecting bones and amazingly well-preserved Union eagle buttons.

J.T. Thompson placed a Union, 34-star flag by the site, the kind of flag that was no doubt waving in the wind on that bloody day.

Eric Jacobson said “and if he is a Union soldier, he died a long, long way from home in fact, he’s one of those missing-in-action soldiers.“

About 2,000 soldiers died in the 1864 battle of Franklin, nearly 200 of them were Union soldiers.