Merryspring’s archeological dig illuminates 18th Century Midcoast life: Militias, homesteads, hardscrabble existence
ROCKPORT — More than 240 years ago, the geology of what is now Merryspring Nature Center — that sanctuary of gardens, woods and fields that lies on the border of Camden and Rockport —was much the same; the humans living there then, however, were working hard to even survive, let alone build a fledgling community.
Down the road, in Glen Cove, in 1779, Continental land and naval forces, including 290 Massachusetts Militia and Native American Penobscot warriors, had gathered to rout out the British in Castine.
That did not go well, as we know, and the Continental soldiers beat a retreat back to the west side of Penobscot Bay. One of the safety spots was, as archeologist Harbour Mitchell III has determined, was the ridge that is now known as Merryspring.
With precision, he has carefully excavated the topsoil around old foundations, sifting and measuring and analyzing, finding clues of lives past. In addition to a militia encampment there, he has also uncovered more about the people who once resided on the Asa Hosmer Farm, settled circa early 1800s.
“Archaeological testing reveals spatially extensive archaeological deposits associated with two early historic period sites,” wrote Mitchell, in his recently published report that comprises five sections, now bound in a collection titled, The Archaeology of Merryspring Nature Center: The Asa Hosmer Farm (ME 073.014) and The Lt. Benjamin Burton Militia Encampment.
(See attached PDFs for the complete compendium)
“The sites, located approximately 50m distant from one another, are: ME 073.015, the fourth quarter 18th c. Lt. Benjamin Burton Militia Encampment, named after the historically identified officer in charge an 18th c. militia encampment believed to be located there; and ME 073.014, the 19th c. Asa Hosmer Farm, named after the farm’s first occupant, c. 1803,” wrote Mitchell.
“The whole strongly suggests the site’s initial occupation was not a frontier residence; it is likely the initial occupation was not an effort at frontier settlement by a simple settler-farmer (homesteader) and his family,” he wrote. “Indeed, historical data suggest late 18th c. coastal and interior mid-Maine was not only grossly underdeveloped economically, but predominantly populated by under-educated or totally uneducated settlers/subsistence farmers, that is, families whose circumstances included permanent destitution and, in some cases, near, if not outright starvation (Taylor 1990).”
“This is a really exciting discovery for Merryspring," said Ray Andresen, president of Merryspring's Board of Trustees. "Harbour has literally 'dug up' some of our history, at least what was here on our property more than 200 years ago."
During his dig, which Mitchell launched in 2018, he discovered porcelain — Chinese and English — stemware, earthenware, and other glazes representative of, “fourth quarter 18th c. material culture.”
He also found an opaque glass trade bead, lithic debitage, large 18th Century flat buttons, and case bottle fragments.
Mitchell surmised that: “the Asa Hosmer farm was not what is commonly referred to as a self-sustaining farm, one which supplies its own internal needs. The appearance of (presumably) purchased (or bartered) butchered mammal parts (e.g., calf tail vertebrae, and pigs feet), and the high volume of utilitarian redwares, suggests the possibility of a dairy farm, perhaps supplying the micro-region with milk and other dairy products, while sustaining itself on food and other products purchase with the proceeds. This possibility also hints at growing post-Revolutionary War, micro-regional, economic specialization.”
Mitchell is an archeologist with a keen sense of Maine history, weaving throughout his analysis and compendium descriptions of the smallest details, from the background of flattened buttons, to the big social, cultural and economic picture of a state just finding itself in a still-new nation.
He worked as an archaeologist and consultant for the University of Maine at Orono, the United States Department of the Interior, for archaeological contractors in Maine and New Hampshire, and for the Maine Historic Preservation Commission. He has also pursued independent research, involving Native American and early European-American archaeological sites throughout Lincolnville, Camden, the Saint George River drainage, and the East Machias River in Crawford. His work includes archaeological investigations of the earliest Paleo-Indian period 10,000 years ago, to the early 19th Century.
And the early 19th Century was hard for inhabitants of Maine. He cites a first-hand quote of Camden resident Alibeus Partridge, in 1813.
“The times are exceedingly dark... hundreds and hundreds have neither bread nor potatoes to eat... [shipping] is almost cut off. The British take and carry of[f] and burn numbers of [ships] so that... the southern trade is so stopt that no provisions is brought from thence to help the difficulty.” (Taylor 1990:239).
Mitchell’s compendium is a rich resource of local history, and writes with a bird’s eye view of the area’s development.
“Given that most, if not all 17th and 18th c. first settlement in Maine began and developed immediately along the littoral, then moved inland, the question begs, ‘What was different about Camden; why does Camden’s first settlement pattern differ so dramatically from other, contemporary first settlement?’ The answer, the author believes, is two-fold - the initial English military’s strategic relationship to control of the region, and the yeoman prioritization of agriculture over entrepreneurship.”
And, he delves into the landmarks known well traveled today:
For example, Park Street, which traverses Camden into Rockport, and the,
- present-day Park Street/Simonton Road junction, at the Camden/Rockport boundary, is the Warren Road and its 1811 extension;
- that the route from present-day Camden to 18th c. Warren existed in the 1760s as a well known and well developed route through the interior;
- that the 19th c. Warren Road is, in fact, the 18th c. “fort-to-fort” road;
- he“fort-to-fort”trans-regional highway was in place and fully functional at Camden’s initial settlement in 1769.
Think about all that the next time you drive Park Street, toward points west.
Mitchell describes how he first embarked on what eventually resulted in a fascinating look at Camden-Rockport in its early settlement years.
He had been walking in the park with Brett Willard, Merryspring Nature Center’s Program Director, in April 2018 when they focused on an old cellar hole.
Who isn’t intrigued with the remnants of a cellar, imagining life centuries ago, taking in the lilac bushes that wives had planted outside kitchen doors, or the blackberry brambles that slowly creep over the rocks? But Mitchell advanced it 100 steps further.
“Upon reviewing the stone cellar, Brett and the author continued across an open field immediately adjacent to, and northeast of the cellar,” he wrote, in outlining why he even got interested in a dig there. “As the walk took place in early April, the field had not yet grown up into tall grass, and its contour was readily visible. Some 50m east-northeast of the stone lined cellar, and easily discernible to the naked eye, was a large, though shallow, sub-rectangular depression. To the author, the depression resembled a filled cellar hole. After noting the depression, both Brett and the author continued their walk to the spring after which Merryspring Nature Center is named. The spring’s location is immediately north of, and downhill from the stone-lined cellar, the depression, and the open field.”
The Merryspring Board of Trustees granted him permission to conduct a preliminary dig, and he was off on a three-year project.
"We always wondered about that cellar hole, how old it was and why it was there," Andresen said. "But who would have ever guessed that there was a Revolutionary War encampment in one of our meadows."
The culmination is Mitchell’s report, and well worth the time to read, and gain a much deeper appreciation for what came before.
Reach Editorial Director Lynda Clancy at lyndaclancy@penbaypilot.com; 207-706-6657
Event Date
Address
United States
