Analysis of the Recovered Artifacts from the Controlled Surface Collection at the Peach Orchard Site (41CE477), Cherokee County, Texas

Abstract

The Peach Orchard site is one of several historic Caddo archaeological sites recently recorded by Kevin Stingley in the Bowles Creek drainage in the middle Neches River basin in Cherokee County, Texas. The Peach Orchard site had been exposed in erosion along a county road that bisects the southern end of the upland landform, while the remainder of the landform was primarily grass-covered when it was first recorded earlier in 2015. In November 2015, the landowner decided to shallowly plow the site area to improve its grass cover, and this plowing provided an opportunity to complete a surface collection of the site area from November to December 2015.

Test Excavations and Additional Surface Collections at the Peach Orchard Site (41CE477) on Bowles Creek in Cherokee County, Texas

“…As has been discussed previously, the ceramic assemblage from the Peach Orchard site is consistent with a Neche cluster of historic Caddo Allen phase sites on Bowles Creek and the Neches River (see Perttula 2016: Table 3). These assemblages are almost exclusively comprised of sherds from grogtempered vessels, and with high proportions of brushed sherds to plain sherds (1.77-7.50) and substantial ratios of brushed to other wet paste sherds (5.0-13.0).…”

“…This is an area with numerous Historic Caddo Allen phase settlements, including the Peach Orchard site (Figure 1). Investigations at these sites have included pedestrian survey, systematic surface collections, intensive shovel testing, excavation of several 1 x 1 m units, and remote sensing (McKinnon 2016;Perttula andStingley 2016, 2017;Perttula et al 2016). The ancestral Caddo sherd collection from the sites strongly suggest they are locations of post-A.D. 1680 Historic Caddo settlements, probably by the Neche or Nechas Caddo peoples.…”