Page 1 of 112 Editors and Authors Page 2 of 112 Table of Contents Battlefield Studies Archaeology of Modern Conflict: The War after the War in Lithuania and Battle of Užpelkiai Forest, 1949 Gediminas Petrauskas, Aistė Petrauskienė, Vykintas Vaitkevičius………………......................................................................4 The Methodology Used to Identify the Battle Site of Fulford Chas Jones………………………………………………………………………..19 The Battle of Alcalá La Vieja. Location and Understanding of a Medieval Battle. Mario Ramírez Galán, Rafael Montalvo Laguna and María Benítez Galán………………………………………………………...26 Initial Discussions on Military Archaeology Zhao Congcang…………………………………………………………………..44 The Battle of Cheriton: The Archaeology of an English Civil War Battlefield Kevin M. Claxton………………………………………………………………...50 American Revolutionary War “Running the Gauntlet: Locating the Battle of Parker’s Ferry, South Carolina” Steven D. Smith, James B. Legg, Brian C. Mabelitini…………………………..64 “In the Morning We Began to Strip and Bury the Dead:” A Context for Burial Practices During the American War for Independence Robert A. Selig &Wade P. Catts………………………………………………...78 Historical Narrative and Cultural Landscape Analysis: Revealing the American War of Independence Battle of Chelsea Creek Victor T. Mastone, Craig J. Brown, Christopher V. Maio.............................................................................................93 Page 3 of 112 Battlefield Studies Archaeology of Modern Conflict: The War after the War in Lithuania and Battle of Užpelkiai Forest, 1949 Gediminas Petrauskas1, Aistė Petrauskienė2, Vykintas Vaitkevičius3 1. National Museum of Lithuania, Department of Archaeology, Arsenalo St. 1, LT-01143 Vilnius, Lithuania. E-mail: [email protected] 2. National Museum of Lithuania, Department of Modern History, Arsenalo St. 1, LT-01143 Vilnius, Lithuania. E-mail: [email protected] 3. Vilnius University, Faculty of Communication, Saulėtekio Av. 9, 1st building, LT-10222 Vilnius, Lithuania. E-mail: [email protected] INTRODUCTION Modern conflict archaeology, investigating military conflicts of the 20th and early 21st centuries has diverged as a branch of archaeology at the turn of the millennium (Moshenska, 2013; Saunders, 2013). Since then, the main trends and schools of research, i.e. the First and the Second World Wars, the Spanish Civil War, the Cold War, Latin American military dictatorships, have become prominent (Robertshaw & Kenyon, 2008; Saunders, 2010; Zarankin & Salerno, 2011; González-Ruibal, 2012; Moshenska, 2012; Carr & Jasinski, 2013; Symonds & Vařeka, 2014). B y focusing on landscape, collective and living memory, oral history, text sources, and cartography, modern conflict archaeology has expanded possibilities of investigating recent military conflicts, their analysis and interpretation. In Lithuania, investigation of modern conflict sites began in the 1990s. Over the last three decades, archaeologists have explored mass graves of Nazi and Soviet soldiers, disposal sites of Lithuanian partisans, bunkers, underground quarters, battlefields, and partisan liaison homesteads (Jankauskas et al., 2005b; Petrauskas & Vaitkevičius, 2013; Vėlius & Žygelis, 2013; Petrauskienė & Petrauskas, 2014; Vaškevičiūtė & Zabiela, 2016; Petrauskienė et al., 2017). For a long time, however, Lithuanian researchers were interested in the prospect of forensic archaeology and forensic anthropology only, therefore, a comprehensive overview of modern conflict sites was not available (Jankauskas et al., 2005a, 2007, 2010, 2011; Jankauskas, 2009, 2012, 2015; Bird, 2013). During the last decade, the number of investigations of Lithuanian partisan war sites has increased significantly, a scientific approach has emerged, and, eventually, these sites have become an object of Lithuanian archaeology (Petrauskienė & Petrauskas, 2014; Petrauskienė et al., 2017; Petrauskas et al., forthcoming a). The article examines data of the field research of the Užpelkiai Forest battle (Radviliškis District, Central Lithuania), conducted from 2014 to 2017 (Petrauskas et al., 2017, forthcoming b). The battle of 13 August 1949 between Lithuanian partisans and the Soviet Army had a major impact on the partisan leadership, leaving a deep trace in the history of the Lithuanian partisan war (1944–1953). By analysing archival data, the cartography, narratives of surviving witnesses, and archaeological data, a comprehensive analysis of the Užpelkiai Forest battle is presented. Based on the field research data, the analysis of armament and war strategy, the details of the battle, the deployment of Soviet soldiers and Lithuanian partisans, their battlefield scenes are reconstructed. The authors discuss the methodology of the battlefield study, argue the concept of modern conflict archaeology. The War after the War in Lithuania The 20th century is marked by countless military conflicts. Some of them, such as the First and the Second World Wars, were universal, embraced entire countries where millions of soldiers and civilians were Page 4 of 112 killed. However, some military conflicts were local and differed from the former ones not only in scale, but by reason and aspirations. Among the latter, partisan wars, defensive in nature and regardless of the country, were fought not against something, but for something (Gailius, 2011). In the 20th century, wars for liberating, protecting and defending the independence from more powerful enemies were common in many countries. Prior to the Second World War, Stalin and Hitler divided the Europe into the Soviet Union and the Nazi Germany spheres of influence. In 1940, a young State of Lithuania was occupied by the Soviet Union (Lithuania declared its independence in 1918), one year later by the Nazi Germany, and in 1944, when the Second World War was close to its end the Soviet Union reoccupied Lithuania for another 50 years. A painful experience of the first Soviet occupation, when in June 1941 the Soviets exiled about 17,500 Lithuanian statesmen, teachers, military officers, clergymen, and farmers, was one of the main reasons why from the first days of the second Soviet occupation in 1944, large units of Lithuanian Freedom Army partisans, mostly called ‘forest brothers’ by locals, gathered in the woods. The period of 1944 to 1946 was the most active in the Lithuanian partisan war (Gaškaitė-Žemaitienė, 2006; Kuodytė, 2015). Numerous battles took place during the first years of the Lithuanian war for independence resulting in deaths of a large number of partisans. Partisans gathered in large units up to several hundred, installed fortified camps in the woods, attacked Soviet headquarters in district centres, and liberated political prisoners. However, the painful experience of the first years necessitated changing the partisan war tactics. Freedom fighters split into sections of 3 to 4 and units of 7 to 8 partisans, who mostly lived in the woods or well-concealed underground bunkers in partisan supporter homesteads. Although partisans stayed in separate small units, they acted strictly under the command of the leadership, and any non-compliance resulted in punishment by the Military Court. The establishment of the Lithuanian partisan leadership is what the Lithuanian partisan war is distinguished for. In February 1949, partisan representatives from all over Lithuania founded the Union of Lithuanian Freedom Fighters (Lietuvos laisvės kovos sąjūdis, hereinafter LLKS), and on 16 February 1949 a political declaration was signed (Gaškaitė-Žemaitienė, 2006; Gailius, 2011; Kuodytė, 2015). The declaration, stating that the partisan leadership was the only legitimate government in the occupied Lithuania was the main document for the succession and struggle for the restoration of an independent democratic state of Lithuania. In 1999, the Parliament of the Republic of Lithuania recognized the declaration as a legitimate document, and Jonas Žemaitis (codename Vytautas), the Chairman of the LLKS was announced as the fourth President of Lithuania. In 1944–1953, Lithuania had a population of slightly more than 2 million, 50,000 of which were partisans, supported by a growing number of liaisons and partisan supporters. During this ‘the war after the war’ period, more than 20,000 freedom fighters were killed, about 140,000 people were arrested and imprisoned in forced labour camps, and 118,000 persons were exiled to Siberia (Anušauskas, 2015; Starkauskas, 2015). After the partisan war was physically suppressed, the Soviet government launched a propaganda company against Lithuanian partisans and their supporters. During the 50 years of the Soviet occupation, many books and movies were released, Lithuanian partisans were called ‘bandits’, ‘traitors of the homeland’, and ‘bourgeois nationalists’. The only counterweight to the Soviet propaganda was publications of Lithuanian intellectuals who had fled West during the Second World War (Tauras, 1962; Vardys, 1965; Remeikis, 1980; Daumantas, 1988). Only after Lithuania restored its independence in 1990, the official attitude towards Lithuanian partisans has changed. The Lithuanian partisan war has been investigated on the basis of archival documents and recollections of survivors, and many partisan diaries and albums have been published (e.g. Ramanauskaitė-Skokauskienė, 2007; Baliukevičius, 2008). Isolated from the Soviet propaganda, the objective image of the Lithuanian partisan war has been an objective of current studies. The Battle of UŽPELKIAI Forest The Užpelkiai