St. Mary's City Zone (18ST1)
Site History
The St. Mary's City Zone (18ST1) is the overall site number for the 17th-century town & capital of the Maryland Colony, as well as Early Archaic-Contact sites and a Late Woodland village.
During the first 30 years of its existence, St. Mary's City was a country neighborhood, with 12 to 14 buildings located within one or two miles of the fort constructed when the settlement was established in 1634. In 1667 St. Mary's City was incorporated by Lord Baltimore into a town containing about 1 square mile. Between 1672 and 1676 the first streets were laid out and by the latter year the town had about 30 houses and a large new brick State House. From this period until the year 1694, when the capital of the province was removed to Annapolis, St. Mary's reached a peak of about 60 buildings. St. Mary's Historic District contains the remains of about 60 structural and archeological sites that embody architectural type specimens that are eminently suited to the study of earliest style and methods of construction.
St. Mary's City was established on the site of a Yeocomico Indian village, which was being abandoned. Artifacts from the Early Archaic through this Contact period have been found in many areas of the site.
After the capital was removed to Annapolis, St. Mary's City also lost its status as a county seat, and the community then declined rapidly. By the year 1789, all that remained of the former capital was the brick State House, which had been erected in 1676 and was then being used as a church, and seven widely scattered houses. In 1829 the old State House was demolished, and its bricks reportedly used to build Trinity Church, about 10m away. By 1934 only two 17th century structures were still extant. In 1934, Maryland observed the 300th-anniversary of its founding. As part of that commemoration, the existing replica of the 1676 State House was carefully reconstructed, though 100 meters to the south, and oriented 90 degrees off from the original alignment. In 1965 the State established a temporary commission to study the desirability and feasibility of restoring St. Mary's City. As a result of their report, in 1966 a permanent commission, the St. Mary's City Commission, was created to preserve, develop, and maintain Historic St. Mary's City (HSMC).
Archaeological Investigations
The HSMC research department was established in 1966 and the archaeology program began in 1971. Fieldwork within the zone is continuous, with an archaeological field school session conducted every summer, conferring course credit on students through St. Mary's College of Maryland. Other archaeological work has been conducted over the years prior to ground disturbance for the installation of utility lines or new construction. St. Mary's College property is subjected to surface collection and/or shovel test pits before new buildings are built.
Probably every sampling method has been employed at one time or another to parts of this extensive site. The central portion, surrounding the 17th-century town center, is currently excavated in 5 × 5 foot excavation units, usually just to the base of plowzone. Soil is screened through 1/4 inch mesh hardware cloth.
As most loci within the St. Mary's City site are identified with sub-numbers (18ST1-13, for example), the summaries of work done are ordinarily broken out into the site records for the individual loci. However, in 2018, Dr. Timothy J. Horsley conducted a geophysical survey on two tracts within the St. Mary's City National Historic Landmark, with the goal of identifying evidence related to the first fortified settlement constructed by English colonists in 1634. These investigations focused on two areas considered the most likely sites for the fort: the Town Center area/Smith's Town Land, long believed to be the site of the fort (referred to as the Traditional Site); and a tract on the south side of Mill Creek known as Mill Field (the Mill Field Site). Concentrations of early 17th-century material have been recovered in both locations, and excavations in Mill Field in 1992 revealed structural remains, a burial, and evidence of a possible palisade.
In total, geophysical investigations covered an area of 22.5 acres at the two locations. Within these areas, topsoil magnetic susceptibility surveys, magnetometry, and ground-penetrating radar (GPR) surveys were conducted. The GPR survey in the Mill Field revealed numerous other anomalies. This survey was followed up by extensive ground-truthing, which revealed evidence of the 1634 fort.
References
2022 Geophysical Investigation of Mill Field, Historic St. Mary's City, St. Mary's County, Maryland. (Horsley Archaeological Prospection, LLC) MHT # ST 310.
1985 Archaeological Collections at Historic St. Mary's City. MHT# ST 41.
1986 Discovering Maryland's First City: A Summary report on the 1981-1984 Archaeological Excavations in St. Mary's City, Maryland. St. Mary's City Research Series No. 1. MHT# ST 58.
1985 Report to the State Archaeologist on Excavations in Historic St. Mary's City (18ST1). MHT# ST 51.
2021 (1986) Historic St. Mary's City Archaeology, 1971-1986. A Bibliography of Publications and Manuscripts prepared by or for the Archaeology Department, Historic St. Mary's City. MHT# ST 89.