Exploration this summer continued in the location where we have projected the north bulwark of the triangular fort. Open excavations were divided here by the forked dirt road that is still in use and extends through the site, so the excavation areas lay to both sides of the road.

We last saw the east fort wall over sixty feet away, heading north under the corner of the Civil War earthwork in the "North Church" area. If the east palisade "curtain" was 300' long, as described by William Strachey, it should terminate somewhere under those earthworks, and extend outward into some form of a bulwark. We have projected a circular bulwark or bastion, based on the one we found at the east corner of the fort, but it may actually take very different form.

A twenty by twenty foot square dug at the middle of the projected bulwark area revealed few features, only two small postholes near the NE and SW corners. The artifacts from the plowzone ranged from fort-period objects to later 17th-century artifacts, to those relating to the 1862 earthworks.

Twenty feet away, on the other side of the road, a wealth of features were uncovered. Previous excavations here found a well filled in the late 17th century, as well as series of ditches and postholes. This season we found more of these, as well as additional features including three probable graves.

Among a great number of postholes, several large, structural posts appear to be from the colonial period, and obviously represent one or more buildings here. These postholes cut through the ditches and a possible slot trench, which date to an earlier period. The ditches and the trench run in a south-north direction, and they may be quite early. Small tests dug within them produced copper scrap, cracked rock, and, from the western ditch, a very small and early tobacco pipe bowl. The possible slot trench is fairly shallow and ill-defined. It terminates or turns at a sharp angle, and appears to be intersected by the eastern of the two ditches. All three features have the potential to be fort-related, although subsequent trenching revealed that they probably extend straight out into the field and might not take the form of a bulwark. However, they could be part of the flagpole-like fort extension seen on the Zuniga map, or they could simply prove to be later road or boundary ditches. Nonetheless, this season's work indicates that we have more to dig in the north bulwark area before we can define this corner of the fort!