From August 23 to September 25, 1993, Panamerican Consultants, Inc., of Tuscaloosa, Alabama, under subcontract to Gulf Engineers and Consultants, Inc., of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, conducted archaeological data recovery of six vessels or vessel fragments and portions of a marine railway exposed on the north bank of the Savannah River (south shore of Hutchinson Island) opposite Savannah, Georgia. The historic watercraft and marine railway remains, situated in the second of five areas within the Fig Island Channel Site, are threatened by ongoing maintenance activities of the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers Savannah Harbor Navigation Project and imminent dredging operations slated for the Savannah Harbor Deepening Project. Complete data recovery was deemed necessary to mitigate present and future impacts to the site. A steam-powered, flat-bottomed, double-ended lighter, a centerboard sailing craft, a naptha or gasoline motor launch, and a bateau are among the types of watercraft documented during this research. No specific identifications of the vessels have been made, but all were apparently abandoned sometime in the late nineteenth or early twentieth centuries. In addition to the vessels, an historic marine railway situated in the project area has been identified as a maintenance facility built and opened in 1888, or shortly before, by a Mr. George F. Byrnes and closed only a few years later following his death in 1890.
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