Unlike anyone today who would erect a statue of defeated Confederate general Robert E. Lee, the people who stocked a time capsule in 1887 that was placed under Lee’s statue in Richmond didn’t hold any special sentiment for the Confederacy.  In fact, there wasn’t a single item of Confederate material found in the box.

The capsule was uncovered as workers demolished the pedestal on which the statue stood for more than a century.  Contemporary newspaper accounts from when the time capsule was placed in the pedestal told of various pieces of Confederate memorabilia was put in the box–as well as what would be a rare find:  a photograph of the corpse of Abraham Lincoln in his coffin.

But as the Washington Post reports, when officials opened up the time capsule today, they found three waterlogged books from the late 1800s, a pamphlet or two, a ghostly photo and a British coin.  Not a single item of military garb or a “stars and bars” flag.

It may be that the box located and uncovered by workers last week, after Lee’s statue was dismantled and removed–it will be melted down and used by a Virginia African-American artist in a new piece–wasn’t the time capsule written about in newspapers in the 1880s.

The three publications found:  “American Ephemeris and Nautical Almanac” of 1875; a copy of “The Huguenot Lovers: A Tale of the Old Dominion,” which records indicate was published in 1889; and an unlabeled maroon-colored book that was too wet to open.