Need a place to go this summer that’s both fun, educational, and lets you wander everywhere? You might want to check out Fort Knox. Sure it’s a bit of a jaunt from Portland, but it’s absolutely worth it. Not only do they have activities there (as well as a gift shop and guided tours, if that’s your thing), but the Friends of Fort Knox have been having archaeological schools for a few years digging up the history of Knox.
The fort, located in Prospect Maine, is one of the largest stone forts built during the Civil War. It was built to protect the Penobscot River and Bangor, Maine from a river attack between 1844 and 1864, but was never finished.
According to the Maine.gov website, it is New England’s “finest unmodified specimen of military architecture of that period.”
Equipped with two batteries (each facing the river to defend from both sides) that fired several types of cannons, the fort would’ve made an impressive defense. Part of the intrigue of Fort Knox comes with two hot-shot furnaces that were used to heat up the cannons before firing them at ships. Unfortunately the furnaces became obsolete as soon as wooden ships ceased being built, but to this day they stand as a stubborn reminder of warfare.
But enough about the history, what about the unique archaeological finds that this school has uncovered? One of the school sessions was lead by historical archaeologist Peter Morrison (a few years back). Morrison had a hunch about one of the areas in the fort, thinking that it had once been a black smithy while the fort was under construction. With this in mind, he lead two schools (each a week long) to excavate certain areas. What they found was interesting in two ways because they found two sets of artifacts.
In the first set of artifacts they found Crown glass (a type of glass made in the 1700’s) and bits of ceramic tableware (cups, plates and saucers). According to Morrison, “these would have been old pieces of ceramics by the time the fort was being built. This all hints that this was a residence from the late 1700s to the early 1800s.”
Apparently the fort was built on top of several farm houses, this site being one of those, so this finding wasn’t too surprising.
The second set of artifacts would’ve been more up Morrison’s alley. They included “railroad spikes, an iron pin, wedges and half-rounds or feathers used to cut granite, a piece of iron nail stock used to make nails and two padlocks,” all of which are pretty common finds for a smithy.
The artifacts were well cared for by the school and the Friends of Fort Knox planned on having other schools opened up for other amateur archaeologists to help uncover more history of the fort.
So if you want a place to go that’s ripe with history, knowledge and the possibility of being in on uncovering some of Maine’s Civil War past, Fort Knox is where you want to be.
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