A few weeks ago Hank and I attended the Ohio Genealogical Society annual conference in Cincinnati, afterwards we had the opportunity to go over to Covington, Ky. to Fort Wright to see Battery Hooper (one of the fortresses built for the defense of Cincinnati). Battery Hooper has a fine little museum, and a very nice gentleman that works there by the name of Dan. I got to talking to him about my great grandfather who was at Battery Coombs, and how someday I'd love to be able to find it. As we were getting ready to leave, Dan gave us directions to Ludlow Hill upon which the battery stood 150 years ago. What a joy it was to look up the hill upon which my great grandfather had served. Dan and I continued our correspondence and I sent several primary sources about the 1st OVHA, including several letters my gg grandfather sent to my g grandfather while the latter served in the war. Dan told me to set a date and he'd accompany us up Ludlow Hill to try to find Battery Coombs. Not realizing that I choose Memorial Day weekend (rather fitting, I'd say) Hank and I drove to Covington on Thursday and met Dan and his friend Paul, and headed up Ludlow Hill. An archeologist gave Dan a modern topographical map, and had marked the location of the site of the old battery, Dan had his compass, and we had the original layout of the battery showing the rifle pit, the sunken battery and all that sort of stuff. Up the hill we went, and it was STEEP. There were no paths up (at least not that we could find), and heavy vegetation had entirely taken over. We followed the big ravine that was to lead up to the site and sure enough after a while we reached a large flat area. Still the vegetation was heavy, but I found what appeared to be the rifle pit. Just about the time I found that, Dan found what appeared to be the old military road and we followed it out a ways and using his compass discovered that indeed the road was leading toward Battery Bates. There was no doubt that we had found Battery Coombs. I'd still like to return again sometime and do a little more investigating, look over the area a little more, we also have some drawings of what the buildings around it looked like and I think a little more walking over the area might reveal a bit more stuff, but it was thrilling enough to know that I was standing in the very area that my g grandfather no doubt walked. The First Ohio Heavy Artillery spent nearly a year of the war at this site, so that made it even more fun to see. The climb up was bad enough, but coming down was even harder. I pretty much sat down and slid down as if sledding, though still I couldn't do that the whole way down. We chose to follow what appeared to be a wash coming off the end of the military road, and it was wicked. I was happy to get to the bottom of the hill. NO snakes were seen, and NO ticks or poison ivy were picked up/contracted. :-) I took a picture of the rifle pit while standing in it (another way cool thing), and Hank took one of me standing on the ground of Battery Coombs, as well as one of me standing in the road. I put the pictures up on a website, and if anyone's interested they can be seen by going to http://lindatrent.homestead.com/BatteryCoombs.html The original "Letters from the Homefront" that my gg grandfather to his son will appear in an upcoming edition of the Ohio Civil War Genealogical Journal later this year. Linda Trent