-- [ From: Linda Derry * EMC.Ver #2.5.03 ] --
 
 
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Hi.  I work for a contract company in CT.  Our field crew has been excavating at
 what appears to be a 17th century homestead.  They have begun excavating a moun
d filled with carbon and are thinking it may be a pit used for charcoal producti
on.  Does anyone know of a charcoal producing pit that has been excavated, so th
at we can compare the profiles?  I have not been able to find any good literatur
e on charcoal pits,  The emphasis seems to be on iron production with just a men
tion of charcoal production.  Researchers at Plymouth Plantation have never hear
d of any pits being found in this area, however it does not have to be from New
England.
 
                            Roberta Charpentier
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Roberta,
 
I don't have a profile of a Charcoal mound for you, but have you seen the really
 nice woodcut of a charcoal mound in Frederick Overman's  The manufacture of Iro
n in All Its Various Branches (Philadelphia: H.C. Baird, 1854)?  I could fax you
 a copy if you haven't.  It's also reproduced in the book entitled Industry and
Technology in antebellum Tennessee: the Archaeology of Bluff Furnace by Bruce Co
uncil, Nicholas Honerkamp and M. Elizabeth Will. (Univ. of Tenn. Press, Knoxvill
e).
 
Although I have not seen the article, I have been told that in one of the last f
ew issues of Tennesse Archaeologist, Cecil Isom has a report on Charcoal Kilns i
n Kentucky.  Perhaps you can get a copy?
 
Linda Derry
Alabama
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