Civil War fired bullet recovered at Culp’s Hill, Gettysburg in 1934 – 1935 (SOLD)

A while back I was fortunate to acquire some interesting, fired bullets that were recovered many years ago from Culp’s Hill, Gettysburg battlefield, it is a fired Minie ball. It still has the faint impression of the ramrod. Culp’s Hill was the right-most flank of the "fishhook" line formed by Union Army troops during the Battle of Gettysburg and saw fierce and brutal fighting all three days of the battle. Culp’s Hill has two rounded peaks with a narrow saddle between them.

Although heavily wooded and unsuitable for artillery, the main peak of Culp’s Hill rises substantially above the surrounding landscape. Nearby Baltimore Pike was critical for Union Army supplies and preventing a Confederate advance on Baltimore or Washington, DC - Culp’s Hill was critical to Union strategy.

These bullets were recovered by a laborer in the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) at the Gettysburg Battlefield during 1934 – 1936 (see pictures). In the summer of 1934, some seventy years after generals Robert E. Lee and George G. Meade led their armies to Gettysburg, a new kind of army arrived, composed of young men axes and shovels.

These men were taught about the conservation of the nation’s natural resources. Their enemy was not some foreign power. The enemy was an economic depression that had, at its height, put an estimated fifteen million Americans out of work and denied them the opportunity to support their communities, families, and themselves. This new army was called the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), and Gettysburg was but one battlefield in the campaign to put Americans back to work.

This bullet, along with some others, was obtained directly from a Pennsylvania family. The grandfather was in the CCC at Gettysburg and brought some battlefield relics home. Back then there was such an abundance of Civil War relics, and most had little value, so there was no problem keeping what you found – it is just as found almost 90 years ago.