Upper Notley Site (18ST75)

The Upper Notley site (18ST75) consists of the archeological remains associated with an extant mid/late 18th-century house and an earlier 18th-century dwelling, now gone. It is located west of Leonardtown in St. Mary’s County, on a hill top overlooking the Wicomico River to the west. The standing building is a modest brick and frame structure with two large chimneys, one-and-a-half stories tall, with an almost complete cellar. A kitchen wing was added in the 1930s.

The site was excavated in 1981 by Dennis Pogue during a salvage archeology project. The work was undertaken to examine areas slated to be disturbed by construction related to the restoration of Notley Hall, and also to recover evidence pertaining to the house’s construction date. Local tradition held that Notley Hall was the survivor of a larger, older structure.

The fieldwork at 18ST75 entailed controlled surface collection of a plowed area immediately surrounding the house, excavation of shovel test pits in the unplowed yard areas, and additional subsurface testing based on the results of the surface collection and shovel test pits. Large block excavations were conducted at the south gable end of the house and in a plowed field to the southeast.

The excavations revealed that Notley Hall was built on top of an earlier structure, and was not a survivor of that building. Among the features uncovered were brick foundations and chimney footings for the earlier house, along with builder’s trenches and postholes. Bricks from this structure were re-used in the construction of the current house. Excavations in the plowed field revealed additional postholes and a trash pit.

(Edited from the Maryland Historical Trust Synthesis Project)