Fort Excavations

1995 Field Season

In 1995, the horizontal and vertical boundaries of the site were established through excavation and analysis of hundreds of shovel test units (small red squares on map below). The basic question that was addressed was the nature of the site as a physical and archaeological entity. In addition, architectural and refuse disposal activity areas were identified. An unexpected discovery from the first research period was the abundant Indian pottery fragments. This indicated that Indians made up a sizeable part of the community. The pottery, however, revealed that the Indians were from outside the area and migrated here to be allied with or fight against the Spaniards at this settlement. The 1995 excavations also revealed that it is almost impossible to identify the three year French presence (1719-1722) from the artifacts alone.