William Hicks Plantation (18ST1-110)
Site History
The William Hicks Plantation site (18ST1-110) is a multi-component site consisting of a mid- to late Woodland short-term camp/hamlet, a late 17th-century town lot, and mid to late 18th-century plantation. The site is also alternately known as Hicks-Mackall Plantation, Clocker's Choice or Providence. The site lies on the west side of Maryland Route 5 in Historic St. Mary's City, in the area around Anne Arundel Hall.
William Hicks was a tobacco factor who operated a store in St. Mary's City in the mid-18th century but spent most of his time living in England. He was the son of Captain John Hicks, a merchant and tobacco planter who lived in St. Mary's City in the second quarter of the 18th century. John Mackall acquired the property in the late 18th century and lived there until at least 1798.
Archaeological Investigations
This site was originally recorded by Historic St. Mary's City archaeologist Garry Wheeler Stone in 1977, during the digging of a trench to install a television antennae system at St. Mary’s College of Maryland. The backhoe trench was excavated at the base of the exterior stairs leading into the original Anne Arundel Hall (which has been subsequently demolished). This work produced numerous artifacts and revealed the edge of a pit feature. A subsequent controlled excavation unit determined that the pit dated from the late 17th or very early 18th centuries. Most of the readily identifiable ceramics recovered from the buried plowzone dated from the circa 1754-1815 William Hicks-John Mackall Plantation period. A drainage ditch from the Hicks-Mackall Plantation and several minor post holes also were excavated. Some 17th-century artifacts were recovered south of the 18th-century artifact concentrations.
In 1994, a Phase I survey for the State Highway Administration was conducted through Historic St. Mary's City along Maryland Route 5. Eleven shovel test pits were excavated within the site. Tests adjacent to the walkway ramp showed modern materials due to construction disturbance. Colonial materials were present to the northwest, including brick, shell tempered mortar, oyster shell, and wrought nails. One of the shovel tests revealed an artifact-rich stratum that was interpreted as a probable 18th-century midden containing tobacco pipe fragments, ceramics, wine bottle glass, and faunal bone. A 5 × 5 foot test unit was placed within the midden concentration, yielding a total of 4623 artifacts.
Between 2009 and 2014, Historic St. Mary’s City archaeologists conducted a mitigation project for the replacement of Anne Arundel Hall and construction of a new visitor's center. Approximately 12,300 square feet of the site was mechanically removed, revealing 545 features or feature-related contexts. A post-in-ground structure probably dating to the 17th century was completely exposed, as were related 17th-century paling fences, drainage ditches, and planting features. The 18th-century midden was also more fully explored. Analysis of the mitigation results is ongoing.
The excavations undertaken in the 1970s and 1990s revealed an Indigenous presence on the site. A total of 25 precontact period artifacts were recovered, including 9 sherds of a shell-tempered pottery that are likely Mockley, indicating a Middle Woodland date. Additional precontact contexts were identified during the Anne Arundel Hall mitigation project, including a partially sealed pit feature containing Late Woodland pottery and a groundstone mano and metate embedded at the surface of subsoil.
All records and artifacts are curated at the Historic St. Mary's City Archaeological Laboratory.
References
1977 18 ST 1-10 Archaeological Observations Made During the Construction of a Master Antennae Television System for the St. Mary's College Campus, July 1977 (SMCC). MHT Library # ST 115.
1977 Archaeological Field Report on the Excavation of 18 ST 1-110-1, pp. 3. Manuscript on file at HSMC.
1996 Phase I archeological survey for the Md. Rt. 5 streetscape project, St. Mary's City, Md. (SHA Archeological Report No. 159.) MHT # ST 142.
