This is our third visit to BcGn-17, and hopefully this time we will be able to locate the house we have been looking for. Monday was our first day, and we spent it in the classroom learning about the archaeology of the region from Paleoindigenous times to present, and also a bit about the goals of the Nassau Mills Research Project.
Our project aims to collect and compare information about habitation and industry related to the mill complex at Nassau Mills. We’ve worked on the probable site of the first mill-owner’s house, Charles Perry, and reconstructed its probable phases of occupation (2017, 2018, 2024), in some cases we have been able to tie them in to particular events or people we know from the documentary record.
We have also been exploring small farmsteads located in the area of Nassau Mills. We can compare the material culture record from these small sites to get a better sense of how the surrounding farmers lived and what access to material they had from local stores or from Peterborough.
What we know about BcGn-17 so far is that it is the site of an initial occupation of this parcel, and it likely represents an improved log cabin site dating from the 1850s. We think the standing brick house on the parcel is probably the main house built by the owner in the later 1800s once bricks were readily available. We don’t know how long the cabin remained at the site, or even if it was turned into a farm building before it was eventually demolished.
While we have collected many artifacts in 2009 and 2023 that suggest a domestic use of this site, our excavations in 2023 were not successful in conclusively locating a house structure. On the very last day of excavation, we found the drain feature we had been tracking seemed to end in a pile of rubble that had some artifacts mixed into it. While we were excited to see a possible hint of the structure we were seeking, we alas had to cover it back up to wait until our return, which is now!
We divided our complement of 26 into three groups, the Raccoons, the Rats, and the Earthworms. We will be rotating them through various tasks related to archaeological fieldwork during the course of our investigations. I as always, will try and provide a little peek into the operations!
It was looking at lunch time as though a major storm would be arriving, so we packed up and headed back to the classroom for the afternoon. It looks like we would have been ok staying on site, but instead we managed to work in some hands-on artifact analysis for the Raccoons and Earthworms, while the Rats were off with James learning some more mysteries of surveying. We convened after break with a little overview of the Ontario Heritage Act and the Standards and Guidelines for Consultant Archaeologists, and then, just like that, day two was over.
It’s looking like a beautiful day tomorrow to be out on site. See you then!
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