{"id":84430,"date":"2026-07-14T09:31:34","date_gmt":"2026-07-14T13:31:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/?p=84430"},"modified":"2026-07-14T09:31:34","modified_gmt":"2026-07-14T13:31:34","slug":"dna-reveals-the-identity-of-a-teenager-who-died-in-the-revolutionary-war-cracking-a-nearly-250-year-old-cold-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/dna-reveals-the-identity-of-a-teenager-who-died-in-the-revolutionary-war-cracking-a-nearly-250-year-old-cold-case\/","title":{"rendered":"DNA Reveals The Identity Of A Teenager Who Died in the Revolutionary War, Cracking a Nearly 250-Year-Old Cold Case"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>From<em> Smithsonian Magazine:<\/em><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com\/DCOYb9fAw7lQP08KSfa4ZuOCmC8=\/750x500\/filters:focal(2016x1517:2017x1518)\/https:\/\/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/filer_public\/f2\/1f\/f21fd14f-3eff-49e4-abcf-8bf3ccdc8115\/img_3924_1.jpeg\" alt=\"Graves of unidentified soldiers\" width=\"471\" height=\"314\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The boy was around 14 when he joined the Continental Army. He signed his enlistment papers with an \u201cX,\u201d suggesting that he\u2019d never learned to write his name. During his three-and-a-half-year military career, he marched more than 1,000 miles. When he died at the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.battlefields.org\/learn\/revolutionary-war\/battles\/camden\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Battle of Camden<\/a>\u00a0in South Carolina in 1780, he was buried in an unmarked grave and forgotten for nearly 250 years.<\/p>\n<p>Researchers excavated the boy\u2019s remains in 2022. Now, they\u2019ve discovered this young soldier\u2019s identity: His name was\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/familyhistorydetectives.com\/americas-oldest-john-doe-private-john-pumphrey-of-the-7th-maryland-regiment\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Private John Pumphrey<\/a>, and he was one of America\u2019s oldest\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/marylandmatters.org\/2026\/07\/04\/scientists-who-identified-remains-of-revolutionary-war-soldier-from-maryland-hope-to-name-others\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">John Doe<\/a> cases.\u00a0\u201cAs far as we knew, this was the first time somebody that died in the 1700s had been identified with their genetic genealogy profile,\u201d says\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/familyhistorydetectives.com\/about\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Allison Peacock<\/a>, president of\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/fhdforensics.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">FHD Forensics<\/a>, a Texas-based company specializing in John Doe investigations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>From Smithsonian Magazine: The boy was around 14 when he joined the Continental Army. He signed his enlistment papers with.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-84430","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-news","7":"entry"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84430","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=84430"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84430\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":84431,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84430\/revisions\/84431"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=84430"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=84430"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=84430"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}