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Jan. 8, 2012, 7:15 PM EST / Source: WHAG-TV

HANCOCK, MD - Research for the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Hancock turned up a surprising discovery: a number of Union soldiers' graves were found at a local church.

These soldiers' graves were left unmarked and forgotten, until now.

"Everyone that's in Antietam wasn't necessarily everyone that died during the war," says Lily Wolford, chairperson of the Battle of Hancock Sesquicentennial Commemoration Committee.

St. Thomas Episcopal Church was used as a hopsital by the Union Army.

"The Confederates got tired and after a day or two of shelling Hancock, they moved on to Romney, West Virginia," says historian John Mentzer.

After the war, the soldiers who were buried here were disinterred and moved to Antietam. But when local historians looked back at church records, they realized five soldiers were still here.

"Those soldiers we were pretty certain had been missed by the burial parties and remained here at St. Thomas," says local historian and St. Thomas vestry member Tracy Salvagno.

The grave markers had been destroyed or lost over the years. Salvagno was able to identify three of the soldiers based on the priest's records, but two remain unknown.

"I'm sure there was a wonderful ceremony at Antietam when all that happened, and so it's a little sad that these people have been lost," says Salvagno. "So I was just very excited to be a part of that."

Finding them in the cemetery was the next challenge.

Using ground-penetrating radar, they were able to determine the most likely area for the bodies to be buried based on depressions found in the ground.

As part of the Battle of Hancock's 150th commemoration, St. Thomas hosted a memorial ceremony.

"I thought after a 150 years this would be really a great time to finally, officially, memorialize these graves," says Salvagno.

And in the spring, St. Thomas is planning to have new gravestones made for these soldiers.

The newly-found graves have been connected to soldiers from Maryland, New York and Illinois. Read more at your4state.com.

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Union Army Graves Discovered in Hancock

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