Prehistoric and Historic Excavations at Site 9GW347, Gwinnett County, Georgia

This report represents the results of historic documentation and archaeological data recovery excavations at Site 9Gw347, the Annistown Mills Site, located on the Yellow River in Gwinnett County. Data recovery excavations and documentary research were undertaken at the site in order to mitigate the adverse effects of the widening, realignment, and reconstruction of Annistown Road, in accordance with Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act. The section of the Yellow River near the present Annistown Bridge was used as a mill seat from approximately the 1830s until 1908 with frequent changes in ownership. The last mill on the site was never rebuilt after a devastating 1908 fire. Data obtained from the historic component at Site 9Gw347 revealed that the historic mill midden identified by Gantt et al. (1995) during the Phase 11 testing of the site was not an intact layer representing multiple structures. The midden in Blocks I and 3 appears to be a secondary redepostion of the burned structural remains found in Block 2. The reposition of these burned remains occurred during construction of the new Annistown Bridge during the mid-1970s. Data obtained from the prehistoric component at Site 9Gw347 revealed that the few Woodstock sherds identified by Gantt et al. (1995) during the Phase 11 testing of the site actually came from a surprisingly intact layer representing a prehistoric midden. The presence of Swift Creek, Woodstock, Averret, Etowah, Savannah, and Lamar sherds, together with two OCR determinations and a Carbon-14 estimate, together suggest that the shelter was reoccupied for short visitations over a period of four centuries, approximately between A.D. 1000 and A.D. 1450. The concentrated nature of the prehistoric midden deposit, its artifactual contents, and associated cupules and landscape features, are interpreted in terms of the Southeastern Indian ethnographic record.