FOOTNOTES:
[1] Ivor Noël Hume, "Excavations at Rosewell, Gloucester County, Virginia 1957-1959" (paper 18 in Contributions from the Museum of History and Technology: Papers 12-18, U.S. National Museum Bulletin 225, by various authors; Washington: Smithsonian Institution, 1963), pp. 153-228. Hereafter cited as Rosewell.
[2] Dr. & Mrs. William Carter Stubbs, Descendants of Mordecai Cooke and Thomas Booth (New Orleans, 1923), p. 14 (footnote).
[3] Vestry Book of Petsworth Parish, Gloucester County, Virginia 1677-1793, annotated by C. G. Chamberlayne, The Library Board (Richmond, 1933), p. 97. Hereafter cited as Vestry Book.
[4] Records of Colonial Gloucester County Virginia, compiled by Polly Cary Mason (Newport News, 1946), vol. 1, p. 86. The Gloucester rent roll of 1704 showed Robert Porteus owning 892 acres and Madam Porteus (presumably his widowed mother) with 500 acres. The latter may have been situated elsewhere in the parish and have been property inherited by her at the death of her first husband, Robert Lee.
[5] Vestry Book, pp. 284, 295, 304, 318.
[6] Vestry Book, October 6, 1725, pp. 186-187. "Petso Parish Detter this Year in Tobacco ... To Robert Portuse Esqr for Keeping Two barsterd Children vizt John & Watkinson Marvil 01333 ½."
[7] William & Mary Quarterly (1896), ser. 1, no. 5, p. 279. "Oldmixon says that Bacon died at Dr. Green's in Gloucester, and Hening describes this place in 1722 as 'then in the tenure of Robert Porteus Esq.'" But as Robert Porteus purchased additional land in 1704, Dr. Green's home site may not have been the same as that of Edward Porteus.
[8] Vestry Book, p. 85. The kitchen measurements are absent.
[9] Vestry Book, pp. 74-75. At a previous vestry meeting on 28th June, 170[2?] details of the proposed glebe house were given as follows: "Six & thirty foot Long & twenty foot wide with two Outside Chemneys two 8 foot Square Clossetts planckt above & below, with two Chambers above Staires and ye Staires to Goe up in ye midst of ye house with 3 Large Glass windows Below Stair [] Each to have 3 Double Lights in ym with a Glass window in Each Chamber above Staires Each to have 3 Lights in ym & Each Clossett to have a window in it and Each window to have 3 Lights." There is no evidence that these specifications were derived from Robert Porteus' house.
[10] Vestry Book, p. 273. May 28, 1746: "Ordered this Present Vestry, have thought it Better to Build a New Glebe house rather then to Repair the old one...." Then follow specifications for the new building.
[11] Robert Hodgson, The Life of the Right Reverend Beilby Porteus D.D. (London, 1823) pp. 3-4. Hodgson describes Newbottle in the following terms: "It consisted chiefly of plantations of tobacco; and on one of these, called Newbottle (from a village of that name near Edinburgh, once belonging to his family, but now in the possession of the Marquis of Lothian), he usually resided. The house stood upon a rising ground, with a gradual descent to York river, which was there at least two miles over: and here he enjoyed within himself every comfort and convenience that a man of moderate wishes could desire; living without the burthen of taxes, and possessing, under the powerful protection of this kingdom, peace, plenty, and security."
[12] A request for information was published in the English magazine Country Life (May 24, 1962), vol. 131, no. 3403, p. 1251. This yielded a reply from the Reverend W. B. Porteus of Garstang Vicarage, Mr. Preston, Lancashire. He noted that Bishop Beilby Porteus was buried at Sundridge in Kent and that prior to the Second World War family connections of the Bishop's wife named Polhill-Drabble still lived in that village and were deeply interested in their lineage. The Rev. Porteus feared that Mr. and Mrs. Polhill-Drabble were now dead, and as I have been unable to trace them, I assume that this is the case.
[13] Seven courses surviving, top at 2 ft. 2 in. below modern grade. Shell mortar. Specimen bricks: 9 in. by 4-1/8 in. by 2-7/8 in. (salmon) and 7½ in. by 4¼ in. by 2 in. (dark red).
[14] A late 17th-or very early 18th-century house at Tutter's Neck in James City County, measuring 42 ft. 3 in. by 19 ft. 1 in., possessed a chimney at either end with dimensions of 9 ft. 11 in. by 4 ft. 11 in. and 9 ft. 9 in. by 5 ft. The jambs varied in thickness from 1 ft. 6 in. to 1 ft. 11 in. See footnote 22.
[15] Albert C. Manucy, "The Fort at Frederica," Notes in Anthropology (Tallahassee: Florida State University, 1962), vol. 5, pp. 51-53. An excavated powder magazine of 1736 exhibited similar construction.
[16] E2. Figure 12, no. 1.
[17] See footnote 27.
[18] The undercutting is shown on the plan (fig. 3, area H) as a straight-edged unit. This has been done for the sake of neatness, but it should be noted that there was actually a series of holes that presented an extremely ragged appearance.
[19] An unusual lead-glazed earthenware rim sherd from a jar was probably from the same pot as other fragments (fig. 15, no. 14) found in the cellar hole.
[20] Vestry Book, p. 56. "Necholas Lewis" indentured to "Henry Morris of Straten Major in ye County of King and Quine ... to Learn ye said orphant ye art of Coopery."
[21] Rosewell, fig. 26, nos. 1-4.
[22] Thomas Jones was the younger brother of Frederick Jones, whose James City County home site at Tutter's Neck was excavated in 1961. See Ivor Noël Hume, "Excavations at Tutter's Neck in James City County, Virginia, 1960-1961" (paper 53 in Contributions from the Museum of History and Technology; U.S. National Museum Bulletin 249; Washington: Smithsonian Institution), 1965, fig. 20, no. 8. Hereafter cited as Tutter's Neck. A fragment of a lead-glass gadrooned Romer of the same period as the Clay Bank stem was found on the Tutter's Neck site.
[23] Mary Stephenson, "Cocke-Jones Lots, Block 31" (MS., Research Dept., Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia, 1961), p. 6.
[24] Tutter's Neck, fig. 17, no. 17; also I. Noël Hume, "Some English Glass from Colonial Virginia," Antiques (July 1963), vol. 84, no. 1, p. 69, figs. 4 and 5.
[25] Ivor Noël Hume, Here Lies Virginia (New York: Knopf, 1963), fig. 105.
[26] J. C. Harrington, "Dating Stem Fragments of Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Clay Tobacco Pipes," Archeological Society of Virginia, Quarterly Bulletin (September 1954), vol. 9, no. 1.
[27] Mathematical formula based on Harrington's chart, prepared by Lewis H. Binford, University of Chicago. See Lewis H. Binford, "A New Method of Calculating Dates from Kaolin Pipe Stem Samples," Southeastern Archaeological Newsletter (June 1962), vol. 9, no. 1, pp. 19-21.
[28] Audrey Noël Hume, "Clay Tobacco-Pipe Dating in the Light of Recent Excavations," Archeological Society of Virginia, Quarterly Bulletin (December 1963), pp. 22-25.
[29] Adrian Oswald, "The Archaeology and Economic History of English Clay Tobacco Pipes," Journal of the Archaeological Association (London, 1960), ser. 3, vol. 23, pp. 40-102.
[30] Adrian Oswald, "A Case of Transatlantic Deduction," Antiques (July 1959), pp. 59-61.
[31] W. J. Pountney, Old Bristol Potteries (Bristol, 1920), pl. 3 (lower left), and p. 37.
[32] F. H. Garner, English Delftware (London, 1948), pl. 26B.
[33] For a posset pot with these handle characteristics attributed to Brislington, 1706-1734, see W. M. Wright, Catalogue of Bristol and West of England Delft Collection, (Bath: Victoria Art Gallery, 1929), pl. 3.
[34] For shape parallel (but not body) see Tutter's Neck, fig. 18, no. 21.
[35] Barnard Rackham, Mediaeval English Pottery (London: 1948), pl. 94. Barnard Rackham, Catalogue of the Glaisher Collection of Pottery and Porcelain (Cambridge, 1935), no. 20, pl. 3A.
Griselda Lewis, A Picture Book of English Pottery (London, 1956), fig. 23.
[36] J. C. Harrington, "Tobacco Pipes from Jamestown," Archeological Society of Virginia, Quarterly Bulletin (Richmond: June 1951), fig. 4.
[37] I am indebted to Dr. B. C. McCary of the Archeological Society of Virginia for the identification of the prehistoric Indian artifacts. Clifford Evans, "A Ceramic Study of Virginia Archeology," (Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 160; Washington: Smithsonian Institution, 1955), p. 69.
[38] W. A. Thorpe, A History of English and Irish Glass (London, 1929), vol. 2, pl. 29 and 31, no. 2.
[40] Henry C. Mercer, "Ancient Carpenters' Tools," Bucks County Historical Society (Doylestown, Pa., 1951), p. 51 and fig. 49. John L. Cotter, "Archeological Excavations at Jamestown, Virginia," U.S. National Park Service Archeological Research Series, no. 4 (Washington, 1958), p. 174, pl. 72 top.
[41] Cotter, no. 1, p. 176, pl. 74 top.
[42] These objects are extremely common on 18th-century sites. Rosewell, p. 224, and fig. 36, no. 8. Tutter's Neck, fig. 16, no. 12.
[43] Mercer, op. cit., p. 295ff.
[44] Two larger examples were found in a cache of metal objects deposited in about 1730 and found on the Challis pottery kiln site in James City County. Two more were encountered in excavations on the Hugh Orr house and blacksmith shop site on Duke of Gloucester Street in Williamsburg where they apparently dated from the mid-18th century.
[45] Carl Gustkey, "Sir Francis Wyatt's Horse," The National Horseman (April 1953), [no pagination] fig. 2.
[46] The majority of marked 18th-century hoes excavated in Virginia exhibit rectangular stamps, while postcolonial marks tend to be stamped on the blades rather than the raised spines and without any die edge being impressed.
[47] Louis R. Caywood, "Green Spring Plantation," Archeological Report, Virginia 350th Anniversary Commission (Yorktown: United States National Park Service, 1955), pl. 9 (bottom).
[48] Kenneth E. Kidd, The Excavation of Ste Marie I (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1949), p. 108 and pl. 24b.
[49] See p. [12] for a consideration of the ball's possible significance.
[50] Catalogue of Exhibition of Early English Earthenware, Burlington Fine Arts Club (London, 1914), p. 29 and fig. 41.
[51] Ivor Noël Hume, "An Indian Ware of the Colonial Period," Archeological Society of Virginia, Quarterly Bulletin (September 1962), vol. 17, no. 1, p. 5.
[52] Ivor Noël Hume, "A Century of London Glass Bottles, 1580-1680," The Connoisseur Year Book (London, 1956), p. 102, fig. 14 right.
[53] A William Partridge was named in the Bristol Freedom Roll for 1689, cf. Oswald, op. cit. (footnote 30), p. 88.
[54] Ibid., p. 70. Perhaps Jacob Fox, Bristol Freedom Roll for 1688, or John Fletcher, Chester Freedom Roll 1673, or Josiah Fox of Newcastle-under-Lyme who was working in 1684. Other examples with this mark occur in groups A3 and A4, also on the Harwood property (surface find) close to the north bank of Aberdeen (Clay Bank) Creek. See p. [14]. A single unstratified example has been found in Williamsburg, coming from disturbed topsoil behind Capt. Orr's Dwelling on Duke of Gloucester Street.
[55] Oswald lists no maker with these initials in the appropriate period. However, a bowl impressed on the back with the initials S A over the date 1683 was found in the river Thames at Queenhithe (London) and is in the author's collection. See also D. R. Atkinson, "Makers' Marks on Clay Tobacco Pipes Found in London," Archaeological News Letter (London, April 1962), vol. 7, no. 8, p. 184; no. 24; and fig. 2, no. 24. See also Rosewell, p. 221 (footnote 96).
[56] A pipe with similar ornament is in the author's collection of examples from the river Thames at London.
Contributions from
The Museum of History and Technology:
Paper 53
Excavations at Tutter's Neck
in James City County, Virginia, 1960-1961
Ivor Noël Hume
| LOCATION OF THE SITE | [32] |
| HISTORY OF THE SITE | [32] |
| THE EXCAVATION | [42] |
| THE RESIDENCE | [43] |
| THE KITCHEN | [45] |
| THE REFUSE PITS | [46] |
| ANIMAL REMAINS | [51] |
| THE ARTIFACTS | [52] |
| CONCLUSIONS | [55] |
Figure 1.—Top: Hypothetical elevations based on foundations discovered on Tutter's Neck site. Bottom: Conjectural reconstruction based on elevations of the Tutter's Neck site, about 1740. Elevations by E. M. Frank, director of architecture, Colonial Williamsburg; conjectural drawings by R. Stinely.
Ivor Noël Hume
Excavations at
TUTTER'S NECK
in James City County, Virginia, 1960-1961
Land clearance for reforestation of property leased from Williamsburg Restoration, Inc., resulted in the exposure of numerous fragments of early 18th-century pottery and glass. Partial excavation of the site, known as Tutter's Neck, revealed foundations of a small colonial dwelling and outbuilding, both of which had ceased to exist by about 1750.
This paper describes and analyzes the artifacts recovered from refuse pits on the site. These artifacts, which have been given to the Smithsonian Institution, are closely dated by context and are valuable in the general study of domestic life in early 18th-century Virginia.
The Author: Ivor Noël Hume is director of the department of archeology at Colonial Williamsburg and an honorary research associate of the Smithsonian Institution.
In the summer of 1959 the Chesapeake Corporation undertook land-clearance operations prior to reforestation on property leased from Williamsburg Restoration, Inc., lying to the east of College Creek, which runs into the James River below Jamestown Island (see fig. 2). In the course of this work the foundations of a small and hitherto unrecorded colonial residence were bulldozed and largely destroyed. In the spring of 1960, Mr. Alden Eaton, director of landscape construction and maintenance for Colonial Williamsburg, while walking over the razed area, picked up numerous fragments of early 18th-century pottery and glass which he later brought to the writer for identification. As the result of this find a survey of the site was undertaken, and two colonial foundations were located and partially excavated.[57]
The area available for study was limited by the need to cause as little disturbance as possible to the newly planted seedlings, by a shortage of time and labor, and by the remarkable speed with which the ground became overgrown with locust trees and infested by mayflies and mosquitoes. The location of the excavation area, nearly a mile from the nearest road, and off a track pitted with mud-filled depressions, made access impossible during most of the winter months; consequently, work was possible only in the spring and fall of 1960. By the summer of 1961 both the approach and the site itself had become completely overgrown.
Regardless of these limitations it was possible to obtain full details of the surviving remains of both the dwelling and its associated kitchen, as well as recovering a number of informative groups of domestic artifacts from trash pits under and around the latter structure. Fortunately, the presence of seal-adorned wine bottles in two pits provided data that led to the identification of one of the owners of the property, and thence to a reconstruction of the history of the site in general.
It should be noted that whereas the colonial artifacts that have been excavated from Marlborough and Rosewell provide a useful range of household items of the middle and third quarters of the 18th century, respectively, the Tutter's Neck material belongs only to the first 40 years of that century, with the emphasis largely upon the first decade. This last is a phase of Tidewater archeology about which little is known, falling as it does after the end of the Jamestown era and at the beginning of the Williamsburg period. Although, of course, Williamsburg was already being built at the turn of the century, so intensive was the occupation in the following 75 years that few archeological deposits of the city's early days have remained undisturbed. The fact that the Tutter's Neck site was abandoned before 1750, and never again occupied, consequently enhances its archeological importance.