Beneath the Parking Lot: Centuries of History at Gloucester Point

Summary

Recent excavations on the campus of the Virginia Institute of Marine Science have shed new light on multiple periods of occupation at Gloucester Point, ranging from Woodland period native communities to the 21st-century development of the area. Working in advance of a large-scale construction project, archaeologists from DATA Investigations uncovered and excavated hundreds of features, providing a detailed glimpse at patterns of early 18th-century Gloucestertown buildings, efforts to clean up and restructure the post-Revolutionary War landscape, and camp life during Union occupation of Gloucester Point, to name a few. Excavations also revealed an impressive array of domestic and war-related artifacts from the two military occupations in particular, providing us with an opportunity to imbue our analysis of the site with a personal nature. The recent discoveries at Gloucester Point allow us to tell new stories about the individuals and communities that inhabited this complex landscape over time.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• A Port Town in Conflict and Peace: Gloucester Town and the Forty-Third Year of Increasingly Complex Archaeology at Gloucester Point, Virginia   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2018

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Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 893