Revolutionary War Encampment Identified in Connecticut

REDDING, CONNECTICUT—Archaeologists Beth Morrison and Laurie Weinstein of Western Connecticut State University and their students surveyed a possible Revolutionary War–era encampment in Redding, Connecticut, and concluded that the site was likely home to 1,000 to 1,500 Connecticut soldiers during the winter of 1779. Known as the Middle Encampment, the site was under the command of General Samuel Holden Parsons. Twelve collapsed fireplaces and other piles of rocks are thought to mark the locations of cabins and other outbuildings. A layer of burned animal bone at the site is similar to debris found at nearby Putnam Park, where soldiers from New Hampshire and Canada camped under the command of Major General Israel Putnam over the same winter. The investigators also recovered military buttons, shoe buckles, and musket balls. “We’re happy to say that every single [site] we put a hole into came up with a period-specific artifact,” Morrison said in a report by The Redding Pilot. The site of a third Revolutionary War encampment in the region has been lost to development. The Middle Encampment has been named a state archaeological preserve. For more on the archaeology of the Revolutionary War, go to "Finding Parker’s Revenge."