The 2025 Field Season So Far

Students and staff pointing to the western wall palisade trench. The linear features running perpendicular to the palisade are plow scars.

Summer has fully arrived in southern Maryland, with a healthy dose of heat and humidity. Our 2025 Field School in Historical Archaeology has concluded and our seventeen students have returned to their home institutions a bit dirtier and with callouses on their hands. Their hard work paid off as we have expanded our excavated area around the western wall of St. Mary's Fort. Our objective in exploring this area of the fort was to identify any features associated with the palisade wall. To this end, we've identified post holes and some other curious features that warrant further investigation. Our secondary goal was to fully excavate this zone in anticipation of reconstructing a portion of the western palisade at some point in the future--more on this below!

With the field school concluded, we will shortly be returning to where recent excavations at the fort began in 2019: the west bastion. In 2019 the team uncovered roughly 25 ft. of the northwest palisade wall and much of the western curve of the bastion. We also excavated a 10 ft. segment of the palisade trench, which was critical to confirming the early date of the palisade and thus, the identification of the site as St. Mary’s Fort. The team spent much of the 2024 field season excavating sections of the palisade that formed the west bastion, along with other associated features. This summer/fall, we will return to this area to dig a large circular pit feature located at the opening of the bastion.

Section of northwest palisade wall excavated in 2019

There are two challenges with working in this area. The first is that excavations led by Dr. Tim Riordan in 1992 also targeted this part of the site. Normally backfilled units from previous work don’t present an issue. In this case, however, Tim’s team used a grid that was slightly off set from our current grid, so we must navigate backfilled units that overlap with our unit edges. This adds time and requires close attention to our maps when starting new units.

The larger complication with this section of the site is that numerous late 17th-century features overlap the west bastion and palisade. As “problems” go, this is a great one. The aforementioned 1992 campaign identified the chimney base of a small building and multiple subsurface features (likely small cellars and pits) running roughly east-west in this area. The structure was oriented in a similar fashion as the road that led out to Mill Creek that was installed as part of the late 1660s Baroque town plan of St. Mary’s City. Thus, the building was likely constructed after the town plan was initiated. Artifacts found in the vicinity support this hypothesis.

Aerial image of the west bastion showing the excavation portions of the palisade trench. Note the large pit feature located at the opening of the bastion.

The 2018 ground-penetrating radar (GPR) survey brought new insights about the house. First, it demonstrated that the structure overlay the southwestern palisade wall of St. Mary’s Fort. Nearby, near the opening of the west bastion, the survey also revealed the presence of the aforementioned large circular pit (see above), and recent excavations have found many artifacts dating to the late 17th-century in the surface of the filled fit. We believe that this pit is likely a product of the adjacent house.

Sketch plan of the west bastion reconstruction

Why the focus on the west bastion? Thanks to a grant from the Maryland Heritage Area Authority, together with matching funds from the HSMC Foundation, we have the exciting opportunity to reconstruct a portion of St. Mary’s Fort. Our goal is to rebuild the bastion, firing platform, and 20–40 ft. of palisade on either side. We plan to move one of the original cannons that was stationed in St. Mary’s Fort, currently on display on the path leading to the reconstructed Brick Chapel, to the firing platform where it originally would have guarded the fort. An ADA-accessible ramp will provide access to the platform and interpretive signage spaced throughout will share information about the project. We will begin this project in the coming days, beginning with the palisade wall itself. The firing platform, ramp, and interpretive signage will follow once we've excavated the large pit feature.

The prospect of bringing a part of St. Mary’s Fort aboveground for the first time is thrilling, but there is much work to be done to clear the area prior to construction. We encourage you to visit the site to see this process as it unfolds. And stay tuned here for the next installment of Field Notes!