Though that might appear unnecessary today, it probably appeared uneccessary to document the flags when they came to the U.D.C. from Bishop Capers and the veteran s association in the early part of this century. The closest either of these flags seems to have come to capture was the odd incident Eugene Smith relates in his book concerning the 24th flag and General Ellison Caper s baby. Individual exchanges of flags, letters, personal items, swords and weapons were common in the post war era. The flag of the 97th Ohio was certainly returned in 1885 by General Capers to the men who carried it into the caldron that was Franklin. Jones in his book, that is an exhaustive study of the Twenty-fourth, certainly believes that Smith brought the colors home.
All physical evidence supports that position.
The B.B. Smith Sixteenth flag shows no trace of capture marking and does not match the painting found in the Book of Captured Flags. I await additional information on the subject. If you have information, especially accounts that might indicate a loss, capture of colors, or clarify the 1905 return, or the presentation of the flag to the U.D.C., probably between 1890 and 1910, I would appreciate being made aware of them and I am certain the museum of the Sixteenth in Greenville would appreciate that information, as well. At the end of the Virginia Section of the book, The Returned Battle Flags, is this page. It is the page before one turns to begin the South Carolina Section.