Phase II Archaeological Investigation Proposed Wastewater Treatment Plant Site Young Harris, Georgia Our Project Number ES-708A

The Young Harris Phase II project consisted of subsurface testing of archaeological resources to be impacted by construction of a wastewater treatment plant proposed by the Young Harris 201 Facilities Plan. This project was conducted at the request of Mr. John B. Lovell, the project engineer, with authorization from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The necessity of this additional investigation was established in the original archaeological survey report, which was prepared as Earth Systems Division project number ES-708. The field investigation for this project was completed in three field days with a three person crew. The Town of Young Harris is located in Towns County, Georgia, near the North Carolina- Georgia border (see Figure 1). The environmental setting and archaeological/historical perspective of the project area was discussed in the original survey document, and will not be repeated in this report. This archaeological subsurface testing project was planned to provide adequate data to fully identify and assess the archaeological resources known to be present at the proposed wastewater treatment plant site. The site conditions and the data recovered from the original survey necessitated investigation of two areas that were believed to be critical to understanding the nature and level of significance of the extant resources. Those areas were: (1) a knoll, located southwest of the proposed treatment plant site, that was believed to be an Indian mound; and (2) the proposed treatment plant site, which was believed to contain a prehistoric Indian village. An additional area of investigation was added to the project during the field work phase. This area was located across Highway 66 from the proposed treatment plant tract, and contained a known archaeological site designated as 9Tw21 in the University of Georgia archaeological site files (see Figure 2). The subsurface investigation on the proposed treatment plant site was conducted with a combination of hand advanced auger tests and small hand excavated test excavations. The auger tests were done with a four inch bucket auger, and in most cases were advanced to either groundwater level or to the point of auger refusal. The hand excavated tests were terminated at the interface between the plowed zone and undisturbed subsoil. Soil from a number of the hand excavated units was sifted through 1/4'' hardware cloth to insure artifact retrieval and the unscreened soil was carefully checked with 5" brickmason trowels. The patterning of the auger and test excavation stations is discussed in the section that follows, as are the results achieved. The investigation of archaeological site 9Tw21 was carried out through the application of pedestrian survey techniques. This was done in order to determine the horizontal extent of the resources present, and to establish whether or not that site extended onto the primary study tract. The results of that investigation, and the techniques applied, will be discussed in a later section of the report. A number of local residents were interviewed during the field phase in order to gather background data for the assessment of the archaeological resources present. It was also necessary to spend a good bit of project time contacting landowners and tenants to gain permission to conduct the planned field investigations.