An Archaeological Survey of Five Islands in the Savannah River: An Impact Assessment for the Richard B. Russell Multiple Resource Area

This report describes a survey of five islands in the Savannah River which will be drowned by the construction of the Richard B.. Russell Reservoir. Thirteen sites occupied by prehistoric Indians were found. The oldest was on the highest point of Paris Island North, where spear points from about 8,000 B.C. were found. In addition, other sites with artifacts ranging in age from about 4,000 years to about 500 years..-ago were discovered. Their ages were determined by the styles and types of stone and pottery artifacts collected from them. The sites dating from about 4,000 years ago were left by Indians known as the Late Archaic people, and they were located near rapids in the river which were-used to help capture fish migrating upstream. Later people also used these sites. Other sites located on the islands were used to take advantage of particular natural resources, such as a supply of quartz stone, to make tools found on the southeast side of Paris Island South. By about 500 A.D., the Indians that we call Middle Woodland may have been doing a little gardening on the low floodplain terraces. Before that the Indians probably relied mainly on hunting and gathering. The fact that several of the islands are located near the point where two major streams, Beaverdam Creek and Rocky River, flow into the Savannah may have encouraged Indians to stop or live there. The rivers and streams were used like roads and this location would have been a "crossroads". This is only speculation however, since we need much more information about the surrounding area before we can be sure that the islands were used in this way. The pattern of the location of the sites on the islands is similar to site location patterns discovered on the mainland, which leads us to believe that the Indians did not view the islands as being a different kind of environment. The river is narrow and shallow enough to wade across at least a few places next to each island, so the Indians used the land on the islands the same way they used the adjacent mainland, for hunting, fishing, gardening, and to gather raw materials. The information gathered at the islands will be added to that gathered elsewhere in the river valley to provide a more complete picture of the way the Indians lived and changed over the last 10,000 years.