Mysterious Civil War artifact rumored to be from alligator attack, park says

War artifacts are typically weapons and uniforms, but occasionally something so strange shows up, that even historians are at a loss.

One such oddity — a ragged chunk of leather — is part of the Civil War collection at the Vicksburg National Military Park in western Mississippi.

“This alligator hide was one of the first natural history specimens to be cataloged,” the park wrote in a June 30 Facebook post.

“Previous staff members held on to its old label which provides a clue on how this alligator hide was obtained. The label reads, ‘Hide of alligator which bit a soldier during the war and caused loss of a leg.’ We will never know whether this tale is true.”

The label suggests “an alligator bit a soldier during the campaign and siege” at Vicksburg, which began in 1862 and ended with the Confederates losing control of the Mississippi River on July 4, 1863.

Park visitors are unlikely to see an alligator today, officials said. However, the battlefield is within the known range for alligators, which can exceed 10 feet in Mississippi, the state reports.

Union and Confederate troops fought 18 months at Vicksburg, resulting in 48,000 casualties, the National Park Service says.

Alligators may have claimed some of the lives, based on first-person accounts documented by the American Battlefield Trust.

Among the reports is a journal entry by Capt. Charles B. Haydon of the 2nd Michigan Infantry, who was at Vicksburg in 1863 when he wrote: “The alligators eat some soldiers [!] but if the soldiers would keep out of the river they would not be eaten.”

Lieutenant John G. Earnest of the 79th Tennessee Infantry was at Vicksburg around the same time and reported being awakened one morning by the “roar” of a hungry alligator.

“I found the mosquitoes had pulled me to the edge of the bayou, and an old alligator jubilant at the prospect of getting me for his breakfast,” Earnest wrote. “I vowed never to allow myself to sleep on that bayou’s bank again.”

Vicksburg National Military Park covers 1,815 acres, and is about a 45-mile drive west from Jackson. The park “commemorates one of the most decisive campaigns of the Civil War, the 1863 Siege of Vicksburg,” the National Park Service says

This story was originally published July 3, 2025 at 12:37 PM with the headline "Mysterious Civil War artifact rumored to be from alligator attack, park says."