An artists interpretation of how Fort Hollingsworth might have appeared in 1813.
Early this Monday morning workers in downtown Elkton were out at the corner of Main and North Streets putting up a new sign. By lunch time, anyone passing that way was able to pause and read informative wayside interpretive panels telling the story of the War of 1812 in Elkton and Maryland. Part of the Star Spangled Banner National Heritage Trail, it has information on the local attacks on Elkton and the broader Maryland campaign.On the upper Elk Creek, just outside town, a series of defensive arrangements were hastily put up in the spring of 1813 in preparation for an attack on the county seat. Fort Hollingsworth and Fort Defiance were part of the placements and here’s how the Alexandria Gazette described the enemy attack in 1813: “Two small batteries . . . in the town . . . opened their fire upon the barges, and compelled them to retreat with considerable precipitation.”
Similar signs are going up at appropriate places all along the trail. Be sure to read these attractive boards as you travel around the county and region.
Maryland history straight ahead. Signs for Elk Landing, Fort Hollingsworth and the Maryland Archaeological Society Field-School mark the spot, along with one tossed in for the Cecil County Airpark.
Dozens of people from the Archeological Society of Maryland were at Elk Landing on this beautiful Sunday afternoon working to dig up new clues about Fort Hollingsworth and the pre-historic period at a strip of land located at the confluence of the Big and Little Elk creeks. The former farm and Chesapeake Bay port bustled with activity as professional and avocational investigators carefully scrapped, swept and sifted the soil with small trowels, brushes and other hand-tools looking for the smallest fragments of evidence that might shed light on the past. Under the careful supervision of professionals working with the Maryland Historical Trust, lots of people from all around the state were busy with these types of tasks, acquiring first-hand experience during the 41stannual Tyler Bastian Field Session. The enthusiasts, which numbered near one hundred people in total during the school, had been at it for over a week.
George Reynolds the dean of Cecil County’s archaeologist has been conducted studies in the county since the 1950s. He opened this year’s annual field-school last weekend with a talk about exploring the Landing and the area in the first study 30 years ago.
A fortification was put up here to protect Elkton from a British attack during the War of 1812 and this is a central focus of this year’s investigation. To help with spotting places for careful examination, ground penetrating radar had been used weeks earlier. The students today were digging at those prime spots, in particular working a long trench where they carefully eyed changes in the soil strata while sifting for relic fragments long buried deeply in the ground. Elsewhere there were clusters of students from Towson State University out in the old plow fields looking for pre-historic Native American artifacts.
In a period of over thirty years, the old farm soil has yielded many secrets as a number of digs have been done here. Investigators have found material culture from pre-historic people, aboriginal burial grounds, bottles, arrowheads, cannonballs, plenty of 19th-century relics, and lots more. A formal report on this latest dig should be released by September, according to the principal investigator, Dr. James Gibb and the President of the Northeastern Maryland Archaeological Society. Dan Coates.
We’ll look forward to hearing that report from the Archeological Society as the soil at the Landing still contains many secrets.
Two members of the Maryland Archaeological Society carefully sift the soil, looking for clues about Fort Hollingsworth, the War of 1812 redoubt.Four archaeologists work in a trench searching for evidence related to the War of 1812 fort.
