Page 179 - Maryland Historical Trust - Archaeology Colonial MD

exceptionally descriptive account of their journey to this fort, which you can read in full in the Archives of Maryland. A short excerpt describing the Indian settlement will have to suffice here:
“They live on an Island in the mid-
dle of the Potomack River, its aboutt
a mile long or ƒumething Better, and aboute a quarter of a mile Wide in the Broaddis place. The forte ƒtands att
ye upper End of the Island, butt nott quite ffinniƒhed, & theire the Iƒland
is a Lower Land, and Little or noe Bank... the fforte is about fifty or ƒix-
ty yards ƒquare, and theire is Eigh- teene Cabbins in the fforte and nine Cabbins without the forte that we Could ƒee. As for Provitions they have Corne, they have Enuf and to spare.”13
It is clear from an account of a second expedition by the Stafford County mi- litia later that year that the Tayac was still fearful his people would continually be blamed for any unrest between na- tive groups and the colonists and it is for this reason that the Piscataway removed
themselves further from the English. The Piscataway fort at Heater’s Is- land was excavated by the University of Maryland, College Park during the sum- mer of 1970. Now owned by the Mary- land Department of Natural Resources, Heater’s Island was privately owned and still being actively farmed in 1970. A total of 120 formal test units were excavated by UMCP students at Heater’s Island, the majority situated in two large excavation blocks. Unfortunately, no final report of the 1970 excavations was ever produced by UMCP and the collection itself would not be analyzed for another 35 years.14 The Maryland Historical Trust hopes to eventually publish a manuscript describ- ing in detail the Heater’s Island project and the extant collections from the site. Numerous intact cultural features were encountered at the site, including trash pits, hearths, trenches, and clear evidence of a square palisaded fort with bastions. Artifacts included European goods (glass trade beads, musketballs, nails, Europe- an flint, gun parts, brass arrow points, kaolin pipes and colonial ceramics), Na-
tive American ceramics, animal bone, shell, and a relatively small assemblage of flaked stone tools. The majority of the native-made ceramics pre-date the Con- tact period occupation of Heater’s Island, which combined with the paucity of lith- ic artifacts suggests increasing reliance on objects of European manufacture.
Both the colonial records of Mary- land and Pennsylvania make it clear that by 1701, the Piscataway (increasingly referred to as the Conoys or Ganawese) were contemplating abandonment of Maryland for Pennsylvania. A Piscat- away Indian named Weewhinjough (pos- sibly the Tayac’s brother) was present at a meeting in Philadelphia on April 2nd, 1701 between several Indian leaders, the Council of Pennsylvania, and Proprietor William Penn in which both parties promised peace, loyalty to the Crown of England, and agreements were made re- garding the English settlement of lands around the Susquehanna River.15 The Piscataway abandoned Heater’s Island (perhaps temporarily) in December of 1704 due to a smallpox epidemic. At least 57 men, women and children reportedly died in the epidemic and the following year, the Piscataway Tayac failed to pres- ent himself to the Maryland Governor to renew Articles of Peace with the En- glish.16 This author [McKnight] believes that the Tayac and the main body of Piscatway left Heater’s Island in 1704, but other scholars disagree. It is unde- niable that there was a continued Native American presence at Heater’s Island beyond 1704. Dennis Curry points out that the account of Baron Christoph von Graffenried attests to the presence of Indians at the Island of “Canavest” (probably a corruption of Ganawese) as late as 1712.17 However, Graffenried does not specifically name them “Pisca- taway,” “Conoy,” or “Ganawese,” and the presence of a French fur trader named Martin Chartier casts some confusion into the mix. Chartier was married to a Shawnee woman, and had lived among the Shawnee at Pequea in Pennsylvania and in Cecil County, Maryland. It may be that the Shawnee were taking advan-
tage of recently abandoned (and previ- ously cleared) land, or that multiple eth- nic groups were residing in the Heater’s Island/Canavest territory.
Regardless of whether Conoy were still at Heater’s Island in 1712, it is cer- tain that at least some of them had al- ready made good on William Penn’s promise of friendship and had moved north to settle along the Susquehanna. Some “Ganawense” from Maryland were established at a site called Conejoho- lo when Pennsylvania Secretary James Logan was visiting several Indian towns along the river in October of 1705.18 The “Canoise” are again reported in this loca- tion, 9 miles above Pequea, when Penn- sylvania Governor John Evans visits the region in the summer of 1707.19
Sometime before May of 1719, the Piscataway/Conoy established them- selves further up the Susquehanna near modern-day Bainbridge, PA.20 Their community came to be known as “Conoytown” and they would reside there for the next 25 years. The Conoy Town Site (36LA57) was excavated in 1951 by the Pennsylvania State Museum, and in 1970 by the Pennsylvania His- torical and Museum Commission. The excavations revealed the presence of at least 12 bowl-shaped refuse pits, a house pattern of postmolds, and a great many Native American burials accompanied by European trade goods (especially glass beads).21
The Conoy moved on in late 1743 or early 1744. In May of 1743 one of the most useful documents relating to the movements of the Piscataway is re- corded in the records of the Pennsylva- nia Provincial Council. A letter from a Mr. Cookson to the Council relays an account he had from “Old Sack,” Pisca- taway Tayac, providing his perspective on the movements of his people:
“We desire you to acquaint our Brother the Governor, that our fforefathers came from Piscatua to an Island in Potowmeck, and from thence down to Philadelphia in Old Proprietor Penn’s Time, in Order to shew their ffriend-
177