"Most soldiers were buried where they fell," he said.

Saturday, Lowry gave a presentation on the practice of mortuary science on the battlefield at the National Museum of Civil War Medicine on East Patrick Street.

At 64, Lowry is a trade embalmer for the Charleston Mortuary Service in Charleston, W.Va., and a Civil War embalming re-enactor.

"There are some people who are born to do this," he said. "It's not a job everybody can do."

The practice of embalming did not gain popularity until Dr. Thomas Holmes performed the procedure on the body of Col. Elmer Ellsworth, who was killed in 1861 after taking down a Confederate flag at the Marshall House in Virginia.

Ellsworth lied in state at the White House and the city hall in New York. He was buried in his hometown of Mechanicsville, N.Y., 10 days after his death, Lowry said. Many were amazed that his body remained in such good condition following the long trip.

Embalmers used pumps to inject about a gallon and a half of arsenic, alcohol, zinc chloride and other chemical combinations into the body, he said. Blood was not initially taken out of the body because many of soldiers bled to death.

Formaldehyde, which is still used in the embalming process today, was not discovered until 1867, he said. Embalmers did not start using it until the 1890s.

Lowry, who collects antique embalming tools, showed several pumps, bottles and caskets he has gathered since the 1980s.

The museum's building was the home of the James Whitehill Undertaking Co. during the Civil War, he said. Dr. Richard Burr embalmed soldiers killed at Antietam, South Mountain and Monocacy in the building's basement.

During the battle of Gettysburg, Burr set up an embalming tent, he said. His tent differed from the others because it had garland and wreaths on it. Burr hung pine adornments to mask the smell of decaying bodies.

Undertakers did not embalm, Lowry said. Doctors and surgeons who learned about embalming in medical school handled the process.

During the war, some bodies were shipped back to their hometowns, he said. However, if a body began to stink, workers removed it from the train and buried it at the next train stop.

"The body had to be free of odor before they would ship it," he said. "The primary purpose (for embalming) was to get the body back to the family."

As soldiers went off to battle, some embalmers passed out fliers encouraging them to prepay for their embalming, Lowry said. Each was given a card to carry for identification regarding their burial wishes and payment.

After morale suffered, embalmers were not allowed to pass out the fliers, he said. Instead they followed the battles and would pick through the dead to find officers with rich families to pay for their embalming.

Lowry will give the presentation again from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. today at the museum.

http://www.fredericknewspost.com/sections/news/display.htm?StoryID=61715