BURLINGTON, VERMONT—Vermont Public Radio reports that the possible remains of soldiers who died during the War of 1812 were found buried in rows at a construction site in northwestern Vermont. John Crock of the University of Vermont said that a hospital barracks and a large army base that housed as many as 4,000 soldiers had been located in the area, and there was likely to have been a cemetery connected to the military hospital even though there are no official records of one. Soldiers died of pneumonia, influenza, and typhus, in addition to battle wounds, he added. Many of the wooden coffins found in the cemetery had been built to size, he said, and some of the graves had already been exhumed, perhaps by University of Vermont medical students looking for anatomical specimens in the 1820s and 1830s. Crock and his team plan to analyze the soldiers’ bone chemistry to try and determine where they grew up and how old they were at the time of death. To read about the wrecks of two merchant ships that were used for military purposes during the War of 1812, go to "Mussel Mass in Lake Ontario."
