Brown Johnston Archeological Report




The Brown Johnston Site (44 Bd 1) takes its name from its recent owner, the late Mr. Brown Johnston. It lies on the left bank of Wolf Creek, a fairly large tributary which enters New River at Narrows, Virginia, approximately twenty-five miles from the site, as the creek flows. The site is two and a quarter miles north-northeast of Bastian, about 2000 feet from Pine Grove Church, and one mile below the confluence of Wolf Creek with Hunting Camp Creek (Figure 1). The site is on the primary terrace, about eight feet above the normal level of Wolf Creek, although slightly higher than adjacent sections of the valley floor. Elevation of the site is 2160 feet above mean sea-level. The valley of Wolf Creek is about one-half mile wide at the site, bordered by steep hills which are out-liers from Brushy Mountain to the east and Rich Mountain to the west.

The valley affords protection from the cold winds from the north and west which prevail in winter, and it offered primitive inhabitants most of the things they needed. The creek, with its many branches and numerous springs provided never failing sources of pure water, and in addition supported considerable and varied foods important to Indian diet. Among the latter were fishes, frogs, fresh-water mussels, snails (periwinkles), and terrapins. Further, the stream would attract game of all types to the area, thereby facilitating procurement of meat by conventional hunting and by use of traps and snares. The valley also supported a variety of trees and shrubs important to the Indians. These would have included nuts, sugar maples, berries, edible greens (poke, cress, etc.), plants which yielded fibers (milkweed, etc.), and ample supplies of firewood. Soils in the valley vary from slaty rock to rich, deep clay loams. The soil at the site proper was clay loam, overlying clay about two feet thick, which in turn lay over a stratum of gravelly sand of uncertain thickness. Soils were and are non-acid, as evidenced by the great number of earthworms found and by the generally good to excellent bone-preservation noted in the refuse and burials. Although Wolf Creek has flooded the site in recent years, no accumulation of silt was found, nor was there any indication that the floods had eroded the site. In prehistoric times, the creek probably did not flood since the headwaters areas were completely wooded, and run-off from melting snows and torrential rains would have been retarded to provide more uniform flow to the stream. If the creek had flooded in the distant past, it is unlikely that the Indians would have chosen to establish a village on such a low terrace.

The Bland County area opened to White settlement after the French and Indian War, and it is likely that the Wolf Creek valley was cleared and put to the plow around 1770. No resident Indians were found in the area, and those Indians who came to harass the settlers during Lord Dunmore's War, the War for American Independence and the troubled years after were from the Ohio area. Their purpose was to slow westward movement of the English, not to defend or re-take their homelands. Those Indians were Shawnees, Miamis, Delawares, Wyandots, and Mingoes--none of whom had lived in the Bland County area in prehistoric times.

No evidence was found that the site had been occupied by Europeans, and there was no contamination of the site by recent activities, although the land had been plowed many times in the past. When first visited by the author, the field was a permanent pasture, and this condition prevailed at the time the present work was done. Never having seen the site plowed, the author relied solely on reports of surface finds and area distribution of village refuse provided by local collectors to control the layout and conduct of excavations. Until 1969, the site was owned by Mr. & Mrs. Brown Johnston, but in this year title to the site area passed to the Virginia Department of Highways, to become part of the right-of-way for Interstate 77. Mr. Johnston is reported to have plowed up a human burial at the site about 1930, but he had never permitted anyone to dig into the site. He had allowed collectors to make surface collections, though. Among these were Mr. Wayne Richardson of Bland and Mr. E. E. Jones, Jr. of Bluefield, WV. Neither of these men had found the site to be overly-productive of artifacts, and one other collector said that he considered the site to be one of his poorer ones. Despite the paucity of collectible relics, both Mr. Jones and Mr. Richardson had noted the occurrence of pottery, periwinkle shells, and scraps of deer bone on the surface and had classified the site as a "village", as opposed to a mere campsite. When the decision was announced to build Interstate 77 along the valley of Wolf Creek, Mr. Richardson verified that construction and the attendant rechanneling of Wolf Creek would destroy the site. Accordingly, in 1967, he notified the author of the site of it's impending destruction. No work was scheduled at the site until title to the land had been acquired by the Department of Highways and construction appeared imminent. The Spring of 1970 was chosen for the work so as to take advantage of pleasant weather and optimum soil moisture conditions. A five-foot square test was dug at the site in the Fall of 1969 by Mr. E. E. Jones, Jr. and the author. We found the plowed topsoil to be only .8 feet thick, and at the base we found tan clay subsoil. Clearing this level, we found one burned area (which later turned out to be the central hearth for house feature #45, and two postmolds astride the hearth. Refuse and cultural materials were scant in the test square, amounting only to a few chert chips and twelve limestone- tempered potsherds. Based on the evidence of the surface collectors and the data found in the test square, we decided to excavate with power equipment, if this could be arranged. The present work has been a cooperative effort of the Virginia State Library, the Tazewell Residency of the Virginia Department of Highways and the Archeological Society of Virginia. The author planned and arranged the work, solicited the help of the Society's members, coordinated the work of the Highway Department's equipment at the site, supervised the actual excavations, recorded and mapped the finds, analyzed the materials found, and prepared this report. He is responsible in every way for this study, although he acknowledges his debt to the many persons who helped him. These are listed in the section on Acknowledgements.

(The Complete Report can be purchased from Wolf Creek Indian Village & Museum Giftshop or by contacting us at 276-688-3438 or by email: indianvillage@naxs.net)