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pagesofhistory Found Treasures


Students and interns from two North Carolina universities uncovered artifacts from the sunken Modern Greece blockade runner originally recovered in 1962 by Navy divers.


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n 1962, at the request of North Carolina government officials, Navy divers began a salvage opera- tion of the Modern Greece, a supply-laden Confederate blockade runner that was sunk off the coast of Wilmington 100 years earlier. Over two summers, the divers, with assistance from the Coast Guard, recovered tens of thousands of items, including rifles and pick heads. The artifacts were catalogued, and a


large portion was placed in water-filled outdoor containers on the grounds of Fort Fisher, N.C., where they sat, forgot- ten, for 50 years. In March, students of the East Carolina University maritime studies program and interns from the University of North Carolina Wilmington recovered the artifacts from the debris- filled tanks so they can be properly pre- served and exhibited. The impact of the Modern Greece


on North Carolina history is consider- able, according to Mark Wilde-Ramsing, deputy state archeologist and head of the Underwater Archeology Branch of the North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources. In addition to its bounty of artifacts, the ship was responsible for the development of the state’s underwater archeology and conservation laboratory, as well as legislation protecting historic wrecks from theft. Wrecks like the Modern Greece also can offer unique insight into our cultural history, says Gordon Watts, director of


PHOTO: NORTH CAROLINA DEPARTMENT OF CULTURAL RESOURCES


the Institute for International Maritime Research in Washington, N.C. “Frequently the information that is preserved at arche- ological sites is not necessarily preserved in the historical record,” Watts explains. “The his- torical record really reflects a pretty limited spectrum of the population, whereas the archeological record reflects a much greater, if not more comprehensive, record of our evolution as a culture.” — Don Vaughan


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WAVES Member Turns 100 athryn Barclay joined the U.S. Navy in Canton, Ill.,


in 1942. On Feb. 9, as she turned 100 years old, she still remembers fondly her service in the military and her proudest accomplishments. Barclay, who retired as a lieutenant commander, was one of the first women to serve with the Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service (WAVES). She served in the Navy as a nurse during World War II and the Korean War. “I worked setting up the operating


room,” Barclay says. “They wouldn’t even go in there until I was there. One time I even got to perform an appendectomy. … I was always in the operating room.” MO


History Lesson On June 28, 1914, Crown Prince of Austria Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife were as- sassinated, touching off a conflict between the Austro-Hungarian govern- ment and Serbia that es- calated into World War I.


Hannah Piner, standing, and Laurel Seaborn, kneeling, partic- ipate in a project to move Modern Greece artifacts from their old tanks to their new tanks.


JUNE 2012 MILITARY OFFICER 71


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