"Conveyed to Safety" - Part I

A private client brought a framed 35-star flag to Museum Textile Services for conservation. The flag belonged to Henry Harrison Hadley (1841–1903) from Malta, OH. In 1862, Hadley joined the 90th Ohio infantry during the American Civil War. His leg was shattered and nearly amputated in Tennessee, after which Hadley was discharged for disability in 1863. He re-entered service in 1865 as Captain of Co. “D” of the 119th United States Colored Infantry at Camp Nelson in Paducah, KY. Hadley left honorably in 1866.

Flag Before Conservation. Image by MTS. Courtesy of Client.

​The flag has a silk canton with 35 gold painted stars and a silk bow in the top-left corner that may or may not have held the flag to a pole. The stripes are made of alternating ribbons of a figured white silk with multiple shades of reddish ribbons; only 10 stripes are extant. At the lower-right corner of the frame is a handwritten note in ink on paper that reads, “Flag made by colored refugees during the war of the Rebellion. Presented to Col. Henry H. Hadley after he had conveyed them in safety within the Union Lines.”  

Detail of color preserved beneath the note card.

Condition
The flag is in extremely fragile condition: an 8 on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being powdered fibers. It spent much of the 20th century glued to a now-brittle, discolored paper board. There are tidelines throughout due to one or more moisture events. The flag is heavily faded, except below where the ribbon and note card were. The silk is extremely brittle, distorted, and puckered within the frame. There are dark spots corresponding to adhesive.

​Given all these concerns, we would normally begin by separating a textile from its failing support board. Conservators attempted mechanical separation with the aid of humidification, isopropyl alcohol, and great patience, but we were only able to safely lift the card and bow off without creating new breaks in the silk. Any pressure easily turned the silk to powder. We needed to shift our treatment goals to find a way to conserve the flag together with its board. 

Conservator Kayla Sylvia testing removal methods to separate the flag from its board.

Stay tuned for Part II of this blog, where we outline our decision-making process and show the final results of treatment for this unique and priceless relic.

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Kayla Silvia is a Conservator at MTS.  She has a BA and BS from (SUNY) at Oneonta, and a MPhil in Textile Conservation at the Centre of Textile Conservation from the University of Glasgow in Scotland.