Drawing of Confederate trenches and gun emplacements discovered in Knoxville in 2009 as part of University of Tennessee construction of sorority housing.

Among the discoveries in the site along the Rebel lines approximately southwest of the fort were “unusually well-preserved evidence of cannon emplacements, including the original ruts left by the cannon wheels, and artifacts including friction primers, belt buckles and metal remnants believed to be left from when soldiers in the trench burned available items to stay warm” in the unusually cold winter of 1863-64.

“Thanks to this fantastic archaeology, this is the only known spot that we can say without a doubt was a Confederate position in the Battle of Fort Sanders,” said Steve Dean, president of the East Tennessee Civil War Alliance. “We had maps, but never any actual indisputable proof that this find has provided.”