Miracles to Yesterday by David Brinkman

In a lifelong personal struggle to balance his faith and a love for science, David Brinkman's life would take a dramatic change when his father was suddenly taken away by cancer. In an attempt to honor his father, he became the historian for his dad's WWII reunion group. Initially documenting the men's accounts, Brinkman's focus would move to finding missing sailors and solving WWII mysteries.

One by one, miracle events would lead Brinkman to unsolved history mysteries in his home state of South Carolina. Historical research and archaeology would lead him to find lost ferries, bridges, an Old South Carolina State House, and the site of a skirmish that would mark the end of the American Civil War. The fantastic story of a lost Roman Statue of South Carolina's most famous son (John C. Calhoun) would be brought back to life with the possibility of a find that could rock the Art and Civil War communities.

In 2010, a near death experience for Brinkman would link the miracles and bring on the discovery of the lost Colonial town of Granby, South Carolina which, in 1786, had been chosen as the new Capital for the State of South Carolina. Then, Brinkman would team up with the South Carolina State Archaeologist to lead an effort which would find the lost British outpost Fort Congaree II. This forgotten fort had been the training ground for young men who would later become heroes of the American Revolution, and whose Commander, valiantly gave his life to save a young Colonel George Washington at the beginning of the French Indian War.

Still not done, in 2014, Brinkman would be the first of only 20 people in the world to be a perfect full sequence maternal line DNA (mitochondrial) match to that found in the bones of King Richard III. Brinkman would lead the effort to find the 18 Richard III matches in the United States and complete the genealogy from him through the Jamestown settlement to the family of the King.

Amazingly, through all these projects, near and far, Brinkman would find that they were all related and that there indeed was a middle ground for faith and science.

Table of Contents                                           Page 
	
Introduction                                                   1
Chapter 1: Science                                             3
Chapter 2: Faith                                               7
Chapter 3: A Father to Many                                   25
Chapter 4: The History Begins: Attack Transport APA-154 
               (The USS Lowndes)                              31
Chapter 5: Researching the Greatest Generation: 
               A Historian is born                            69
Chapter 6: A Lot of History on the River                      95
Chapter 7: A Story of Broad Crossings                        101
Chapter 8: Heaven drops a Survey                             123
Chapter 9: The Story of Sherman's Crossing                   145
Chapter 10 - The Lourdes of Granby                           155
Chapter 11: A Story of Granby                                165
Chapter 12: The King is Found                                217
Chapter 13: A King's Match in America                        229
Chapter 14:  A Fort is Found                                 245
Chapter 15: A Story of Fort Congaree II                      261
Chapter 16: A State House and Tavern are Found               273
Chapter 17: Miracles to Come? Was the Truth and Justice 
                in the Old State House?                      287
Chapter 18: A Career Cut Short and the Calling               307
Chapter 19: Miracles or not?                                 317
Chapter 20: A Final Tribute and Miracle                      333
APPENDIX A: The History Timeline of Miracles to Yesterday    341
APPENDIX B: History Corrected in Miracles to Yesterday       347
APPENDIX C: The USS Lowndes Ship and Beach Party             349
APPENDIX D: The people of Sarah Friday's 1810 Granby         353
               Samuel Johnston home site:                    354
               The Cake Shop site:                           356
               The Tobacco Inspection and storage facility:  357
               The Town Well site:                           357
               Lewis Pou home site:                          358
               Abraham Geiger site:                          359
               James/John Patton's store site:               360
               Means store site:                             360
               Bell's store site:                            361
               Granby Courthouse site:                       364
               Seibels Burying ground site:                  365
               Seibels store site:                           366
               Hane home site:                               367
               Hane Burying ground site:                     368
               Muller's store site:                          370
               Henry Muller home site:                       370
               Hane Salt house site:                         371
               Burk's store site:                            371
               Toy store site:                               372
               Mill site:                                    373
               Distillery site:                              374
               Peter the Barber site:                        375
               Jesse Sharp site:                             375
               Friday's Entertainments site:                 375
               Mr. Cayce (Fort Granby) site:                 377
               Mr. Cayce's store site:                       379
               Black Smith site #1:                          379
               Black Smith site #2:                          379
               Captain John Hart home:                       380
APPENDIX E: Those that Dig History                           385
INDEX                                                        393

Back Cover:

Lost and waiting to be found: King Richard III in America, an early British outpost fort that would bring birth to American independence, an early back-country Colonial village that could have been a Capital, the first Broad crossings of a new nation, the skirmish that marked the end of the American Civil War, and WWII D-Day invasion secrets of Europe and the Pacific.

Quietly settled into a software engineering job where he sat behind a computer all day long with little human interaction, David Brinkman's life took a dramatic change 20 years ago when his father died after a short illness. Striving simply to honor his father, he discovered history mysteries that each miraculously led to something bigger.

Over those next 20 years, the cumulative effect of dozens of coincidences, incredibly timed events, illogical and irrational decisions, and a near death experience tied the discoveries together into something bigger than the sum of all the finds. Along the way, Brinkman was transformed from an introverted geek whose most extensive outdoor project had been to dig a post hole for a mailbox to a dogged investigator making unlikely historical discoveries that led to international correspondences, public speaking requests, national television coverage, and the recognition as the 2017 Distinguished South Carolina Archaeologist of the Year. But, as Brinkman would slowly learn through all of this, that transformation and the discoveries were just side effects of something much bigger, something invisible to most, unless observed in just the right way.

This book attempts, in the most scientific way possible, to document the discoveries and help others to see the invisible force behind them.

David Brinkman was born in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina but has spent most of his life in Columbia. He graduated from Midlands Technical College with an A.S. in Electronics Engineering Technology and the University of South Carolina with a B.S. in Computer and Electrical Engineering. For 30 years, he worked as a software engineer for NCR, AT&T, and Intel Corporations. He is an officer and two-time past Chairman of the Greater Piedmont Chapter of the Explorers Club. Alongside David has been Odess, his wife of 24 years, who embraced with faith, all these miracles into time.

Countdown to publication

Expected availability date: June 18, 2018

King Richard III and the Knights of Templar?

A new find was brought to my attention by a fellow Ricardian while I was completing the chapters on Richard III. It all has to do with a painting in the Rothley Temple near Leicester, England. The painter is unknown, and the work is estimated to be the mid-1800s. The Rothley Temple property and building were given, by the first Plantagenet Kings, to the Knights of Templar in the 12th century.

After the first Crusade in 1118, a royal sanctioned Order of Knights was formed to carry our dangerous military operations and to protect Christians on pilgrimages from Europe to Jerusalem. The Knights were devoted Christians who dedicated themselves to the Virgin Mary and pledged to a life of poverty and chastity. Living at the site where the Temple of Solomon had stood, the Order would soon become known as the Knights of Templar. In 1127, the Templars were recognized by the Pope. By 1139, the Templars were given special rights and were only accountable to the Pope. Over the years, they garnered much admiration, trust, and wealth. So much so that people started trusting their fortunes with the Templars. Complex banking systems, security methods, and espionage were developed by the Templars to protect the wealth they held. Before long, there were chapters of the Templars all around Western Europe, and they acquired vast land holdings.

Things started to change for the Templars when Muslim military actions retook Jerusalem in the late 12th century. One by one, the Crusader strongholds fell. Many people became concerned over the immense wealth that the Templars had acquired, and French King Philip IV launched an effort to bring an end to the Templar Order. When Pope Clement V gave in to pressure from King Philip, the Templars' end was near. Thousands of Templars were rounded up and forced to confess to lies of heresy made up by their captors. Many of the Templars refused to confess and were tortured to death. Those who confessed would eventually go free but, they were broken men. The Order of the Knights of Templar was dissolved in 1312.

The detail in the Rothley Temple painting is impressive. The chapel is accurate down to minute details which show a priest blessing a Templar. The three different levels of Templar are shown in the painting in their three distinct uniforms. In the center of it all is a King of England. The painter, just like us, would have had access to the images of all the Kings of England but this image doesn't come close to the Kings of the Templar era. In fact, it is a dead-ringer for King Richard III's official portrait and the facial reconstruction completed on his skull in 2015. The problem is, of course, that Richard was born over 200 years after the last Templars.

Above: The 19th Century Rothley Painting and King Richard III.

It should be noted that the effort to correct King Richard III's reputation dates back to Sir Edward Buck's publication of "The History of King Richard Third" in 1616. It's no coincidence that this first Ricardian effort did not surface until after the end of the House of Tudor with the death of Queen Elizabeth I.

Was the inclusion of King Richard III in the Templar painting Devine intervention, or was the painter an early Ricardian who drew parallels between the unjust and tragic endings of good men? Maybe the painting depicts the Templar martyrs protecting and leading Richard III to his final destination.

David Brinkman