Arrived @ Chocolate ~ 9am with Nick Honerkamp and Nonna Harris to find a backhoe sitting at the site. Freaked, and then realized that the restoration workers from (Company name V), Fredericksburg, Va. were at the site. They were trying to stabilize the chimney at Structure H, the closest structure to High Point Road/West Perimeter Road. They said their plan was to "use as much shell that had come from the structure itself' to produce the tabby which they were using to restore the chimney. Currently, there are 2 brick piers (added later) that are helping to stabilize the chimney from the interior of the hearth. The plan is to build the tabby blocks around the chimney so that the bricks are no longer necessary for support. It appears that they are actually digging a new "builder's trench around the exterior of the chimney base (Figure 1). They had a small pile of artifacts that they had collected from this trench including: large iron pintal, brass lamp wick holder, blue transfer print historic (looked like pearl ware on one side and white ware on underside, but was really too dirty to tell), base of an olive-green bottle with kick up (Figure 2). Maybe should monitor. The backhoe was being used to carry the tabby mixture being made at the Reynolds barn to structure H.
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