Posts Tagged ‘dutch oven’

Unusual Dutch Oven Lid Found at Tannehill.

Thursday, April 9th, 2009
New discovery is clue to type of cookware made during the Civil War
The partially ledgible inscription on this dutch oven lid reads "No. 3 Bisquit"

The partially legible inscription on this dutch oven lid reads "No. 3 Bisquit"

Over the years, archaeological digs at Tannehill have uncovered much cast iron cookware ranging from small fragments of rims, handles and feet to nearly complete lids and bodies. We know from a few historical documents that iron cooking implements were cast here, but these documents don’t tell what specific patterns were made.
This piece may have been a “reject,” or miss cast item.
The underside of the lid is very thick, about three times thicker and much heavier than usual.

The underside of the lid is very thick, about three times thicker and much heavier than usual.

The underside of the lid is very thick, about three times thicker and much heavier than usual. The jagged edges and seam across the middle of the underside of the lid suggest that this piece was either cast improperly or never finished. This might indicate that the piece was actually made here rather than brought in from somewhere else. If so, we now have a pattern that we can compare to many cookware fragments that our digs have uncovered in order to determine if these otherwise unidentifiable items were made at the iron works during the Civil War.

Side view of the dutch oven lid.

Side view of the dutch oven lid.

Tags: , , ,
Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

Volunteers finish trash pile, continue search for kitchen

Monday, September 22nd, 2008

Seventeen volunteers arrived ready to dig!

A long line of diggers.

So many volunteers arrived that we were able to finish the Fork Units around the trash pile and move on to the units to the southwest where we suspect we will find evidence of a structure.

A final animal bone fragment from the trash pile.

Possible bone fragment.

Dr. Sharyn Jones, UAB Anthropologist, removes a final, large bone fragment from the trash pile. Over seven hundred pieces of animal bone were recovered from around the fireplace at House 1 and the trash pile in the Fork Units. Catherine Wright, a graduate student working with Dr. Jones and recipient of the Garnet M. Garvin Internship in Historical Archaeology next semester, will do a study of this important collection.

An abundance of iron cookware fragments.

Pot parts

Part of the handle, one leg and three fragments from the lid of a Dutch Oven found in a single 1-meter square.  Two other units contained multiple pieces of iron pots while other units yielded single fragments.  This seems like a high concentration of ironware that may indicate a kitchen.

The site had visitors much earlier in history.

arrow point

Two stone arrow tips and a piece of chert, not native to the area and showing signs of having been modified by humans, indicate that this area, which may have been a kitchen during the Civil War, may also have served as a small hunting camp during prehistoric times.

Heading home.

Heading home after a productive day.

A light rain brought an end to a very productive day. The crew passes the blast furnaces after returning from the dig along the same trail that slave ironworkers traveled daily between 1858 and 1865.

Tags: , , , , , ,
Posted in Slave Quarters | 4 Comments »