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2012 BOURBON FIELD: PRELIMINARY INVESTIGATIONS of a BARRIER ISLAND PLANTATION SITE, SAPELO ISLAND, GEORGIA by Rachel Laura Devan

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2012 BOURBON FIELD: PRELIMINARY INVESTIGATIONS of a BARRIER ISLAND PLANTATION SITE, SAPELO ISLAND, GEORGIA by Rachel Laura Devan BOURBON FIELD: PRELIMINARY INVESTIGATIONS OF A BARRIER ISLAND PLANTATION SITE, SAPELO ISLAND, GEORGIA by Rachel Laura DeVan Perrine B.A., The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, 2008 A thesis submitted to the Department of Anthropology College of Arts and Sciences The University of West Florida In partial fulfillment of requirements for the degree of Masters of Arts 2012 The thesis of Rachel Laura DeVan Perrine is approved: ____________________________________________ _______________________ Norma J. Harris, M.A., Committee Member Date ____________________________________________ _______________________ George B. Ellenberg, Ph.D., Committee Member Date ____________________________________________ _______________________ David C. Crass, Ph.D., Committee Member Date ____________________________________________ _______________________ John E. Worth, Ph.D., Committee Chair Date Accepted for the Department/Division: ____________________________________________ _______________________ John R. Bratten, Ph.D., Chair Date Accepted for the University: ____________________________________________ _______________________ Richard S. Podemski, Ph.D., Dean, Graduate School Date DEDICATION This thesis is dedicated to my late grandma, Dorothy Ore, who was supportive and enthusiastic about my decision to pursue a career in archaeology and whose zest for life and positive attitude will always be an inspiration to me. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Over the course of my thesis work, I have been very fortunate in having help through every stage of the project. I could not have completed my thesis without the assistance and support of those individuals who lent a hand along the way and I would like to take this opportunity to express my gratitude. First of all, I would like to thank my UWF thesis committee members, Norma Harris, John Worth, and George Ellenberg for their guidance and help during the various phases of my research. Norma Harris deserves a special thank you for helping me to develop my thesis project, accompanying me to Sapelo Island to assist with excavations, helping me acquire financial support for my research, and for her mentorship through all stages of my thesis work. I am indebted to my fourth committee member, Dave Crass, and the Georgia Department of Natural Resources (DNR) Historic Preservation Division for providing financial support during the excavations on Sapelo. I greatly appreciate the accommodations and transportation provided by island manager, Fred Hay, and the DNR staff on Sapelo over the course of field work in May and August of 2010. Many thanks are also due to Nick Honerkamp of the University of Tennessee Chattanooga (UTC) for loaning his field school crew during my archaeological field work, for assisting with every phase of archaeological excavation at Bourbon Field, and for sharing data collected by previous UTC field schools at other plantation sites on Sapelo Island. I appreciate the help of the 2010 UTC field school students for their hard work and cooperation during the May excavations at Bourbon Field. The field and lab work of my thesis project would not have been possible without the assistance of a number of individuals. I wish to specially thank my field crew--Roc Jarvis, iv Elizabeth Murphy, Lindsey Cochran, Brett Briggs, Adam Beavers, Brian Miller, Dan Webb, and Colin Bean--for putting up with my many demands and for the amazing job they did despite the heat, the bugs, and the long hours. Thank you to Elizabeth Benchley for providing Archaeology Institute vehicles and other resources for my crew and our trips to Sapelo, and to Karen Mims for assisting with my preparations for field work. I am indebted to Norine Carroll for her help obtaining field equipment, providing work space and resources for my lab work, and her moral support and general assistance throughout the course of my thesis work. I could not have completed the lab work without the assistance of Jan Lloyd and the many hours of often tedious work put in by Patty McMahon and Elizabeth Murphy. Many thanks also to Roc Jarvis for his assistance with my GIS maps and Morgan Wampler for her help with artifact photos. I greatly appreciate the financial assistance provided by the Pat and Hal Marcus Fellowship in Historical Archaeology, which facilitated my thesis writing and helped me to make significant strides in the completion of my project. I would also like to thank the Scholarly and Creative Activities Committee (SCAC) for funding my historical research. Special thanks to Kenneth H. Thomas, Jr. for his assistance with my archival research. His input was invaluable during the analysis of my historical data and the additional resources he provided were crucial to the completion of my history chapter. I am extremely grateful for the support of my family and friends through all the ups and downs of my thesis work. Thank you to Mom, Dad, Caroline, Nick, and Grandmother for all the encouragement and for the enduring interest and enthusiasm in my project. I am particularly indebted to my husband, Wes Perrine, for the love, support, patience, and help in every stage of my thesis work. The stress of undertaking this project would have been so much greater without his moral support. v TABLE OF CONTENTS DEDICATION .............................................................................................................................. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ............................................................................................................ iv LIST OF TABLES ....................................................................................................................... viii LIST OF FIGURES ....................................................................................................................... xi ABSTRACT ...................................................................................................................................xv CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................1 CHAPTER II. BOURBON FIELD: SITE DESCRIPTION AND PREVIOUS INVESTIGATIONS ..........................................................................................9 A. Environmental and Geological Setting .......................................................9 B. Site Description ..........................................................................................11 C. Previous Archaeological Research .............................................................16 D. Research Parameters ..................................................................................22 CHAPTER III. PREHISTORIC AND EARLY HISTORIC OCCUPATIONS OF BOURBON FIELD (1000 B.C.-A.D. 1800) ........................................................................25 A. Historical Research Methods .....................................................................25 B. Prehistoric Occupations..............................................................................27 C. The Spanish Mission Period .......................................................................28 D. The British Colonial Period (1733-1776) ..................................................29 E. The Revolutionary War and Early American Independence (1776-1789)................................................................................................34 F. The French Sapelo Company (1789-1800) ................................................35 CHAPTER IV. THE ANTEBELLUM ERA AND BEYOND: OCCUPATIONS OF BOURBON FIELD THROUGH THE 19TH AND 20TH CENTURIES .......51 A. Turn of the Century and the Early Antebellum Period (1800-1820s) .......51 B. The Late Antebellum Period (1827-1860) .................................................63 C. The Civil War (1861-1865) .......................................................................75 D. Reconstruction, the Postbellum Era, and Beyond (1865-1960s) ...............77 CHAPTER V. ARCHAEOLOGICAL RESEARCH METHODS ..........................................83 A. Field Work .................................................................................................83 B. Lab Work ...................................................................................................99 CHAPTER VI. SHOVEL TEST EXCAVATIONS: DATA ANALYSIS AND RESULTS ..102 A. Establishing Boundaries for Bourbon Field’s Historic Components .......102 B. Stratigraphy ..............................................................................................106 vi C. Native American Artifact Assemblage ....................................................109 D. Historic Artifact Assemblage and South’s Artifact Groups .....................111 E. Historic Ceramics.....................................................................................117 F. High v. Low Status Artifacts ...................................................................130 G. Architectural Artifacts and Historic Structures........................................140 H. Historic Middens ......................................................................................155 I. Summary and Discussion of Shovel Test Data ........................................160 CHAPTER VII. TRENCH 10 EXCAVATIONS: DATA ANALYSIS AND RESULTS .......173 A. The Tabby Remains .................................................................................173 B. Stratigraphy ..............................................................................................177 C. Historic Artifact Assemblage and South’s Artifact Groups ....................179
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