Relic hunting has zilch to do with economic status. They range from
MD's to engineers to business guys to truck drivers, to backhoe
drivers to whatever. The intrinsic value of the objects is perhaps
only slightly secondary to their emotive value. Certainly, every one
I've talked to has heard of someone who found a buckle of great
monetary value. Those who have found objects of great value have them
in their collections for the most part.
These are not stereotypical ignorant Bubbas, although there are those
who have brick-like intelligence. What motivates some of them is the
sorry fact that battlefields, campsites, fortifications and the like
are routinely destroyed. They see themselves as salvors of history.
That much is true, absent archaeological study. These guys know the
Official Military Atlas of the Civil War, they know the Michler maps
and they know where earthworks are that Michler missed. Their
research is easily on a par with our own in these aspects.
Visit a relic show and you will see countless objects for sale. You
will see perhaps one out of 500 exhibitors who has a diorama with the
artifacts in place showing how they were placed when found and quite
frankly, we as archaeologists would do well to emulate that
particular aspect of their work.
Working with archaeologists has happened. I had the novel experience
of putting one metal detector fanatic with one archaeologist at a
Civil War earthworks threatened with imminent destruction north of
Richmond, VA. No blood was shed, although "frank views were
exchanged." Steve Sylvia, one of the leads on the recent obliteration
was present, as was Mac Mason, then the grand old man of relic
collectors. Mason had written a definitive volume on CW artifacts. At
lunch, Mac came up on his cane and was talking about the artifacts
that had been "found" at that earthwork, starting in the 1930's with
a cavalry sabre found in the ditch, then 3 Kentucky buttons later
were found with a metal detector. Mac was fulminating about "damned
archaeologists who dig up stuff and hide it in museums and no-one
ever sees it again". This is Litany #1. To which I replied, "Mac,
where are those Kentucky buttons, I'd sure like to see them and
photograph them." Mac said "Well, I sold them to so-and-so". I asked
"What did he do with them?" Mac responded, "He sold them to so and so
who moved to England". I said that the bottom line was that he had no
idea where they were now and the difference was that if someone
wanted to see the stuff archaeologists dug up, it took a call to the
repository to set up an appointment. Dead silence all around.
Litany #2 is that they save what would otherwise be destroyed. True
to a point. Absent archaeology, they go in and get the artifacts out
so there is at least some minimal info gathering. But, the other 99%
of the time, sites are not going to be destroyed are the ones that
they're hunting. That's not mentioned.
Litany #3 is that the artifact are actively decaying in the ground.
True to a minor point, but having seen collections with bronze
disease, rust piles and the like, it is a minority who do any
conservation other than wash and clean their artifacts before putting
them into display cases or boxes or whatever.
Litany #4 is that a very minor contingent of bad apples give the rest
a bad name. Here in VA we were regularly having these ceremonies
where naked Confederates boxes of bones were deposited on the steps
of the State Capitol building and buried with all due ceremony.
First, grave disturbance, second, theft of the buttons on the uniform
(how does one know they were Confederate?), third, criminal trespass,
fourth, transport of a body without a permit. All of that went
unremarked and not one of these birds was charged with anything.
Litany # 5 is that there is no context. Sometimes, that is true. Most
of the time, when there are pit features, artifact distributions and
the like, the argument holds no water.
Litany #6 is that archaeologists should buy the land that they want
to preserve. This is the first obfuscatory point normally made, and
equally specious.
Litany #7 is that they work with archaeologists if asked. True, to a
point. But, where Mike Johnson, Fairfax County archaeologist, worked
with the Northern VA Relic Collectors Association, not once did they
involve him until AFTER they had vacuum cleaned the sites. They let
him photo artifacts, sometimes.
Working with relic collectors has been tried by all sorts of
archaeologists, from the self-described curmudgeons to the get along
with anyone types and it just doesn't lead to productive outcomes.
Public lands have been looted, parks with earthworks have been
looted, graveyards have been robbed and archaeological sites have
been pillaged.
In my view, the only workable solution will be to get down in the
trenches with them, and point by point, demolish their arguments,
pull the BS out, spotlight the horrible practices and keep pounding
that until change is forced. Each time a newspaper article is
written, such as the one in the Post, we have to think ahead to
counter each point in the standard litany. After all, there might be
a few unwritten sites hanging around, but I'd have to say that 99% of
our stuff has a report. That cannot be said for the relic collectors,
and in fact way less than 1/1000 of them ever write anything. Shame
them into doing better. If we lose that war, we have only ourselves
to blame for not being able to counter their arguments effectively.
Moral relativism be damned. It just isn't.
Lyle Browning
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