The World Turned Upside Down: Revisiting the Archaeology of the American Revolution

Part of: Society for Historical Archaeology 2022

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "The World Turned Upside Down: Revisiting the Archaeology of the American Revolution," at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

For over a century, antiquarians and scholars have been studying the archaeology of the American Revolution. Their work has identified campsites, battlefields, burials, and shipwrecks, all of which have provided new information about this formative period in American history. This session revisits famous and forgotten sites and collections associated with the American Revolution in order to expand our understanding of this crucial period. Through the use of new theories, technologies, and approaches, archaeology has tremendous potential for illuminating this storied conflict and exploring the lives and experiences of Revolutionary War generation. At the same time, these studies, which include terrestrial, cartographic, maritime, forensic, and collections-based research, expand, enhance, contradict, and question accepted beliefs about the Revolution, quite literally turning our archaeological world upside down.

Other Keywords
Revolutionary War • Battlefield • American Revolution • war • Technology • Material Culture • Underwater Archaeology • Preservation Planning • American Revolutionary War • Metal Detection

Geographic Keywords
Northeast • New Jersey • Mohawk Valley • Northeast United States • Eastern US • US-East Coast • Middle Atlantic, Delaware Valley, Mohawk Valley, Chesapeake • Virginia, Great Britain • Southeastern United States (Virginia)

Resources Inside This Collection (Viewing 1-11 of 11)

  • Documents (11)
Documents
  • Archaeological and Geophysical Investigations of Cook’s Fort (1774-1783), Monroe County, West Virginia (2022)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only W. Stephen McBride. George Crothers. Kim A. McBride.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "The World Turned Upside Down: Revisiting the Archaeology of the American Revolution" , at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. This paper reports on recent archaeological and geophysical investigations at Cook’s Fort, Monroe County, WV, constructed by local militia in 1774 during Dunmore’s War and garrisoned by militia and used as a place of refuge by settlers throughout the Revolutionary War. During these wars this...

  • Assessing the Remains of the Crosswicks Creek Revolutionary War-Era Shipwrecks (2022)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Jaclyn F Urmey.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "The World Turned Upside Down: Revisiting the Archaeology of the American Revolution" , at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. The Revolutionary War is a rich part of American history. The colonial artifacts left behind also have stories of their own to tell, yet the challenges in learning about those stories are the methods used to glean information and what amount of information is there from the past to understand...

  • Bullet Riddled Artifacts: Curated Objects of Memory from the First Day of the American Revolution (2022)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Douglas D Scott. Joel Bohy.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "The World Turned Upside Down: Revisiting the Archaeology of the American Revolution" , at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. The British Regulars retreat from Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775 is legendary in American history. Colonial militias and the famous Minute Men companies ambushed the British column along the retreat route back to Boston. Our study began with documenting an extant bullet damaged house...

  • Damages, Depredations, Sufferings And Destruction: The Landscape Of Conflict And The "Late War With Great Britain" (2022)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Robert A. Selig. Wade P. Catts.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "The World Turned Upside Down: Revisiting the Archaeology of the American Revolution" , at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. The eight-year long War for American Independence left physical scars on the new United States. Where armies moved and fought, they left behind devastation. Those scars are reflected in the depredation claims, damage claims, citizens’ petitions for redress and other written records that...

  • "…The Enemy Threw Themselves Upon His Cannon In The Very Teeth Of A Murderous Fire Of Grape [sic]" - The Results Of Two Seasons Of Work At The Barber Wheatfield, Saratoga National Historical Park. (2022)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only William A Griswold. Joel Dukes.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "The World Turned Upside Down: Revisiting the Archaeology of the American Revolution" , at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Beginning in 2019, the Northeast Archeological Resources Program (NARP), in conjunction with Saratoga National Historical Park (SARA), American Veterans Archaeological Recovery (AVAR), Advanced Metal Detecting for the Archaeologist (AMDA) and other partners began a two year program of study...

  • Gershom Prince's Powderhorn, Battle of Wyoming, 1778 (2022)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only M. Denise Dennis.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "The World Turned Upside Down: Revisiting the Archaeology of the American Revolution" , at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. My presentation will discuss a rare, if not unique, Revolutionary War artifact, the Gershom Prince Powderhorn. Gershom Prince was an African American soldier who served in the French and Indian War and the American Revolution under Capt. Robert Durkee of the Connecticut Line. Prince was...

  • "Guns and ships, and so the balance shifts":A Material Culture Analysis of Betsy and the British Naval Strategy of Scuttling during the Battle of Yorktown, 1781 (2022)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Jillian M Schuler.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "The World Turned Upside Down: Revisiting the Archaeology of the American Revolution" , at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. By the time General Charles Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown in October 1781, the majority of his coveted shipping fleet laid abandoned at the bottom of the York River. In 1978, the Yorktown Shipwreck Archaeological Project was launched with the intention of surveying several of these...

  • "Huts Placed in a More Exact Order than Philadelphia" Reassessing the Camps of the Connecticut Line and Hand’s Brigade at Morristown National Historical Park, Applying a Conjunctive Approach to Investigating Revolutionary War Encampments (2022)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Richard F. Veit. Adam Heinrich. Sean McHugh. Steve Santucci.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "The World Turned Upside Down: Revisiting the Archaeology of the American Revolution" , at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. After 80+ years of archaeology at campsites from the American Revolution is there really anything left to be learned from more excavation? Shouldn’t these sites be left alone before they look like the archaeological equivalent of Swiss cheese? This paper, based on three recent seasons of...

  • "Led Into The Fire Of The Whole Body Of The Enemy": Archaeological Survey Of The Stone Arabia Battlefield 19 October 1780 (2022)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Jon Jasewicz. Robert A. Selig. Wade Catts.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "The World Turned Upside Down: Revisiting the Archaeology of the American Revolution" , at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. On 19 October 1780, a force of Native American, Loyalist, British and German soldiers met and overwhelmed an American formation composed of Massachusetts Levies and New York militiamen in an engagement known as the Battle of Stone Arabia. The Patriot defeat allowed the Crown Forces to lay...

  • The Mysterious Skull of Count von Donop: Using Forensic Science to Resolve a Historical Case of Mistaken Identity (2022)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Saine C. Hernandez Burgos. Richard F. Veit. Hillary A. DelPrete. Thomas A. Crist.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "The World Turned Upside Down: Revisiting the Archaeology of the American Revolution" , at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Count Carl Emil Ulrich von Donop, adjutant to the Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel, volunteered for service in America during the Revolution and served as a Colonel commanding four battalions of Hessian grenadiers and the Jäger Corps. An aggressive and skillful officer, he played a key role in the...

  • Revisiting the Battle of Yorktown: Part of the Battlefield is Missing! (2022)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only John D. Broadwater.

    This is an abstract from the session entitled "The World Turned Upside Down: Revisiting the Archaeology of the American Revolution" , at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. The last major battle of the American Revolution took place in Yorktown, Virginia, ending with the surrender of the Southern British Army under the command of General Charles Earle Cornwallis. The remains of the British, French, and Colonial earthworks are preserved by the National Park...