3 CONFEDERATES WILL LIE IN STATE

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, January 19, 1992                   TAG: 9201190070
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: E4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: RICHMOND                                LENGTH: Medium
3 CONFEDERATES WILL LIE IN STATE
The bodies of three Confederate soldiers who died in a skirmish in 1864 will lie in state in the Capitol rotunda today and will be buried later in a Confederate cemetery.
The state flag will fly at half staff during a ceremony honoring the men, who were never buried after the Battle of Ware Bottom Church in rural Chesterfield County.
Civil War remains are unearthed frequently in Virginia, but most are never turned over to authorities, historians said. Historians don't know how many soldiers were left unburied after the war.
Relic hunters using metal detectors found the bodies about 2 inches underground, said W. Baxter Perkinson of the National Organization of Sons of Confederate Veterans. The anonymous relic hunters stripped the remains of buttons, a tin snuff box and other items, he said.
"They must have thought what they were doing was illegal, but it was not," Perkinson said. Relic hunting is illegal only on federal property.
A fourth set of remains found nearby lay in state last June. It was the first time a body lay there since Civil War Gen. Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson died in battle in 1864.
Those remains were deposited anonymously at a state park ranger's office near the battlefield in December 1990. A manifest of items found with the body was attached, along with a request that the man be given proper burial. The note also said three other sets of remains were found and that they would be returned.
An Army officer in uniform appeared at Perkinson's door in Petersburg three weeks ago and delivered the three sets of remains, Perkinson said.
"He didn't identify himself and he was in a hurry," Perkinson said. The man asked that the bodies be given a proper burial in a Confederate cemetery.
The officer said the bodies were not returned earlier because the relic hunter was shipped to Saudi Arabia before the Persian Gulf War began in January, Perkinson said.
A group of Civil War re-enactors in battle dress will stand guard over the bodies, Perkinson said. He made plain pine coffins for the bodies, similar to coffins used in the 19th century.
The remains will join about 30,000 Confederate dead in Blandford Cemetery in Petersburg.
About 700 Confederates and an equal number of Union soldiers died at Ware Bottom Church in June 1864.
The men were identified as Confederates by the buttons, ammunition and other items found with them.

by Archana Subramaniam by CNB