Shaw Air Force Base: Archeological Data Recovery at Sites 38SU145, 38SU133, and 38SU145, with Results of Test Excavations

This report presents the results of the archeological testing of sites 38SU136, 38SU137, and 38SU141; and of data recovery conducted at sites 38SU45, 38SU133, and 38SU145, otherwise known as the Blackwater Pond Site Cluster. The sites are located in the Coastal Plain province near the northwestern edge of Big Bay, one of the largest Carolina bays in South Carolina. Situated 50 km east of the Fall Line and within the Wateree River-to-Big Bay sand sheet, these sites offer important new information on a range of problem domains, including geomorphic setting, chronology, settlement patterns, site structure, and social organization. All of the sites are located on land owned by the U.S. Air Force and will be affected by construction of new target areas within the Poinsett Electronic Combat Range. Consequently, data recovery operations at the NRHP-eligible sites 38SU45, 38SU133, and 38SU145 were performed to mitigate unavoidable adverse effects caused by new target construction. Likewise, Phase 11 testing was required at the potentially eligible sites 38SU136, 38SU137, and 38SU141 that also will be impacted by target construction. This phase of the current project was accomplished in order to determine the nature and significance of these sites. All work was conducted in accordance with, and in partial fulfillment of, the obligations of the U.S. Air Force under the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, as amended through 1992 (P.L. 89-665; 80 Stat. 915; 16 U.S.C. § 470 et seq.); the Archaeological and Historic Preservation Act of 1974, as amended (P.L. 93-291; 16 U.S.C. § 469); the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (P.L. 90-190; 42 U.S.C. §§ 4321-4347); Executive Order 11593, 'Protection and Enhancement of the Cultural Environment"; the American Indian Religious Freedom Act of 1978 (AIRFA; 42 U.S.C. § 1996); and the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act of 1990 (NAGPRA; 25 U.S.C. § 3001 et seq.). Data recovery at sites 38SU45, 38SU133, and 38SU145 identified several broad themes in the prehistoric settlement systems around Big Bay. First, the earliest cultural systems in the region (i.e., Paleo-Indian and Hardaway-Dalton) appear to have been organized as high technology foragers, incorporating both high residential mobility and high logistical mobility. The territorial ranges of these systems would appear to have been very extensive, including both the Piedmont and the Coastal Plain. Moreover, they appear to have been oriented along the Wateree-Santee drainage network. The Big Bay ecotone may have been occupied during both warm and cold seasons. During the warm season the region was exploited primarily by high technology forager residences of still unknown population sizes, and during the winter the area was exploited by communal hunting parties taking advantage of seasonal deer aggregations. By the later half of the Early Archaic period (i.e., the Palmer phase), settlement in the region appears to have shifted toward more generalized forager residences with fewer residential moves. It is unclear if multiple household occupations were the norm in the Palmer phase, but there is ample evidence for multihousehold forager residences in the vicinity of Big Bay by the middle-Holocene interval. By this time, there also appears to have been a significant contraction of territorial home ranges. In the case of the Big Bay populations, it would appear that they were participating in settlement systems confined almost entirely to the Coastal Plain. Range reduction and, possibly, increased group size suggest that there was significant population pressure on resources by the middle-Holocene interval and that we should expect to see evidence for the emergence of subsistence intensification during this interval. During the ceramic Late Archaic, the Big Bay ecotone was exploited by seasonally dispersed populations who occupied the area only very briefly. Based on the evidence gathered by the current project and the results of other studies conducted on the Coastal Plain, it is inferred that the Thom's Creek occupation of the Big Bay ecotone included dispersed single households of possible nuclear family composition. Other site types may emerge from continued investigation of the sites ringing the bay, but at the present time, only debris representative of nuclear family short-term residences has been discovered. Low intensity, dispersed utilization of the Coastal Plain uplands appears to be a common trend in Thom's Creek settlement systems throughout South Carolina. Traditionally, uplands utilization has been interpreted as involving a fall migration of groups into the uplands from more permanent and aggregated settlements situated along the coast and major river systems. While this pattern has been historically documented in more recent ethnographic accounts, there is no firm basis (either archeologically or environmentally) for assuming this pattern in the distant prehistoric past. Another possible explanation for dispersed short-term residences in the uplands is that they are due to partially mobile populations, all of whose subsistence settlement round is contained within the upland environment. The low frequency of reoccupation on the same exact location season after season suggests that social units may have been fairly fluid and changing during this period and that exploitation of the uplands was not rigidly structured by land tenure or other mechanisms for determining property rights. During the Middle Woodland period there appears to have been an increased utilization of the uplands, perhaps resulting in small semipermanent residences of seasonally sedentary hamlets. Finally, during the Late Woodland and early Mississippian periods, the ecotone was exploited by dispersed and mobile multihousehold units which established camps or seasonal settlements in places of resource abundance. This may have required a number of brief stays and abandonment of locations prior to settling into a site with the proper resource composition and balance. Testing of 38SU136/137 revealed that the site contains a long record of prehistoric occupation that probably extends back to the Early or Middle Archaic. The ceramic phases present at the site include Thom's Creek, Deptford, Cape Fear, Berkeley, Wilmington, and Pee Dee-a range of occupation including the terminal Late Archaic, Middle Woodland, Late Woodland, and Mississippian periods. Density contour maps for this site show 14 lithic and eight ceramic clusters. Based on this work, it is believed that 38SU136/137 can contribute to our understanding of the trends toward more residential structures and increased family size through time in South Carolina, and can provide us with a more complete picture of these processes within the Big Bay environmental setting. For these reasons, it is recommended that site 38SU136/137 be determined eligible for inclusion in the NRHP under Criterion D. Site 38SU141 has many of the same properties documented for site 38SU136/137 and contains a great deal of horizontal and vertical integrity of individual components which probably represent the residue of short term occupations by small social units, primarily nuclear families or multiple nuclear family clusters. Density contour maps for this site indicate the presence of 13 ceramic and nine lithic clusters. These artifact clusters exhibit similar distributions of occupational and structural components to those recognized for the Blackwater Pond Site Cluster, In contrast to site 38SU136/137 and the Blackwater Pond Site Cluster, however, there is a greater representation of Woodland and Mississippian period occupations. The presence of extensive Middle and Late Woodland ceramic deposits may represent longer residence by perhaps aggregated social units composed of multiple families. Clearly, the occupations at site 38SU141 can provide important information on settlement variability, site function, and social evolution in the uplands of the Wateree River valley. Therefore, it is recommended that the site be determined eligible for inclusion in the NRHP under Criterion D.