Long, long before Camp Sherman was established as one of thirty-two Army Camps in 1917, the lands that would become Camp Sherman were home to a thriving prehistoric culture of American Indians who utilized the lands for survival, earthwork construction and interment for their dead )6,7).
Two thousand years ago, American Indians of the Hopewell culture lived in scattered hamlets throughout the south-central Ohio valley. They would often come together to celebrate feasts, funerals, and rites of passage. It's unclear how or exactly why they came together, but when they did, they would construct monumental earthworks that would span hundreds of acres of land (6).
These earthworks were constructed outward since there was no means to construct upwards at the time. In doing so, they created perfect geometric shapes of circles, squares, and octagons throughout the current Ross County area. These complexes would encompass hundreds of acres of land with their massive earthen walls (6,7).
While earthworks were constructed throughout the area, one spot located on the northern edge of present-day Chillicothe wound up being the most significant of the culture, even though it was likely one of the smallest earthworks ever created by the Hopewell. Mound City Group sits adjacent to the Scioto River about two miles north of Chillicothe on Route #104. It was likely a prime and coveted tract of land that attracted the prehistoric American Indians to it, and its location is likely what made it so coveted to land agents in 1917 as they would incorporate it into Camp Sherman (6).
Two thousand years ago, the Hopewell would utilize an area of about 15 acres and create a complex that contained twenty-four mounds of varying shapes and sizes and a low-earthen wall that would later encompass all the mounds. The site was in use by Hopewell from A.D. 100 to A.D. 400. They did not build all the mounds at once, but they were constructed individually and gradually. Long before the mound was built, a small, wooden-framed building was fabricated. Once complete, the building would host ceremonial funerals where culturally significant people were interred (6).
The bones of these chosen few were cremated in a small, shallow clay-lined pit. Afterwards, the ashes were swept up and then placed on the floor within the building and then adorned with burial items made of exotic natural materials that often came from far distances. Multiple ceremonies and burials would take place within each building before the structure was either taken down or burned down. After it was removed or burned, mound building would commence. In all, about one hundred cremated remains were interred before mounds were built over them (6,7).
Not all the mound areas contained human burials though. A few of the mound spots contained objects that were "ritually killed" and then interred. One mound covered the remains of several hundred pipestone effigy pipes that were all broken inside of a bag before being interred.
Objects left with burials consisted of flint from the Knife River in North Dakota, galena from the southern shores of the Mississippi river, mica from the Blue Ridge mountains in Tennessee and North Carolina, copper from the Lake Superior region and obsidian from the Yellowstone area of Wyoming. Evidence shows that many of these materials were brought to the site and area, they were likely not traded for.
After the Hopewell concluded their use of the site, it existed in a relatively untouched state for nearly eighteen centuries. With the influx of settlers into the region in the 19th century, land that was once barren of human life, started teeming with activity to "tame" the land.
New settlers cleared acres upon acres of land and then utilized the fertile soils for large-scale farming. When farmers encountered mysterious earthworks and mounds, they were often plowed under to make room for a booming agriculture business (6,7).