Work stalls in search for Confederate statue’s time capsule
RICHMOND, Va. – Work crews searching for a time capsule they believed was buried inside the pedestal under a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee that had towered over Richmond, Virginia, hit a snag Thursday.
Crews were having difficulty finding the capsule’s precise location. Then late Thursday morning, a crane they were using to lift heavy pieces of a cornerstone broke down, stalling work indefinitely.
Officials did not give an estimate on whether work would resume Thursday.
State officials were scheduled to remove the 134-year-old time capsule from the cornerstone a day after the large Confederate statue was taken down. But after removing a 2,500pound capstone and a 500-pound lid, crews were unable to pinpoint the capsule’s precise location.
A newspaper article from 1887 suggests the copper time capsule contains mostly memorabilia, including a U.S. silver dollar and a collection of Confederate buttons. But one line from that article has piqued the interest of historians. Listed among the artifacts is a “picture of Lincoln lying in his coffin.”