Manassas John Does were two Union soldiers whose skeletal remains were found near Manassas, Virginia in 2014. Examination indicated they were killed during the Second Battle of Manassas AKA the Second Battle of Bull Run.
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The Second Battle of Manassas/Bull Run occurred between August 28–30, 1862, near Manassas (Junction), Virginia, and the Bull Run stream. The battle was fought between the Army of Northern Virginia of the Confederate States of America, led by General Robert E. Lee, and the Army of Virginia of the United States, led by Major General John Pope, on the same ground as the First Battle of Manassas/Bull Run from over a year ago.
Arguably the main focal point of the Northern Virginia Campaign, it ended with a Confederate victory and 14,462 Union soldiers and 7,298 Confederate soldiers killed, wounded, captured, or reported missing. The results of the battle encouraged Lee to initiate the Maryland Campaign and invade the Union for the first time. Additionally, the Union Army's resulting retreat from eastern Virginia resulted in low Union morale and the Pope being relieved of command and spending the remainder of the Civil War on the Western Frontier.
To preserve the history of both battles, the Manassas National Battlefield Park was established in 1936 and listed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 15, 1966. In 2014, the National Park Service encountered a surgeon's pit, a pit that would hold the amputated limbs of wounded soldiers, during a utility project. In addition to the 11 amputated limbs, two nearly complete skeletons were discovered.
The excavation was the first time a surgeon's pit at a Civil War battlefield was excavated. The discovery of the two soldiers in the pit is also historically the first time that Civil War soldiers were discovered in such a burial pit.
An investigation conducted by the NPS and the Smithsonian Institution determined that both of the skeletons were white men aged between 25 and 34 who died of injuries received during the Second Battle of Manassas. One soldier still had a .577 Enfield bullet lodged in his upper thigh, and the second soldier had three gunshot wounds from a .31 caliber lead buckshot. It is presumed that the two soldiers were too wounded to be helped by the surgeon and were buried in the pit after their death.
As a Union sack coat was found with the second soldier, and mostly the Confederacy used Enfield bullets, the two unknown soldiers were identified as Union soldiers. Isotope analysis showed both men consumed food and water from the Northeastern United States.
On June 19, 2018, the unknown Union soldiers were transferred to the custody of the United States Army, which subsequently buried them at Section 81, Site 5 of Arlington National Cemetery.