This early 20th century tinted postcard shows the general appearance of the 1861 shop building. 

Anticipating the massive trenching necessary to lay pipe for the Campus Central Energy Plant project, the area where the building stood was tested and found to contain the intact foundations of the original building.  Apparently they were not removed when the building was demolished many years ago. 

The photographs (below) shows some of the longitutinal piers of the original building which was over 500 in length.

An interesting feature of the foundation is the massive base of the smoke stack, a protion of which can be seen (left), as well as the outline of the builder's trench dug to construct it.  The smoke stack is visible at the right of the building in the postcard picture above.

Apparently a secure water supply for the Augusta Arsenal was a problem for a number of cisterns were constructed during the 19th century to store water underground.  The nearly 40 foot cistern shown (below left) was discovered when piping for the Campus Central Energy Plant was being installed.  The photo at (right below) shows the arched brick end of the cistern, estimated to be 12 feet wide.  It is likely that pipes carried roof rain runoff to fill these large underground tanks.  Study of documents indicates that there were several such cisterns located around the long 1861 shop building.

It was not possible to conduct archaeological excavation of the cistern, but workmen found dozens of keys to arsenal facilities abandoned in it.  Many of the keys were stamped with the name of the part of the facility which they secured.