Graves??

[rebelfirefighter07]

I was deer hunting a week or so back and ran across something interesting. First I will describe the area. You park in a large valley heading south with a mountain to your left and a mountain to your right. The farther south you go the closer the mountains get until the valley closes and the mountains join. A creek that starts where the mountains meet splits the valley down the middle. Starting about midways in is a small ridge within the valley. A Civil War battle was fought on the mountain to the left. Area has almost zero trash on the surface.

As I'm walking I'm about a half mile from where the mountains meet and I see pile of rocks about 4 feet long and 3 feet high. I go alittle father and I see more piles. It clicks that this might be something so I walk towards them. I get up on the small ridge and find what looks to be a rock wall roughly 15 ft long and another next to it about 10ft. It looks similar in a way to walls I've seen at Civil War sites. There are about a half dozen of these rock piles between the ridge and the mountain to the left.

The piles vary from maybe 4 to 7 feet long and 3 to 4 feet high at the most. They weren't in rows or anything, they were just there. I do not believe these rocks were piled up when clearing farm land because this is a very narrow part of the valley and the entire area is covered in rocks the size of your hand to the size of a small house.

Whats your opinions? Civil War graves? Indian burial site? I'm not disturbing it either way I'm just curious. If I can prove its Civil War I'm gonna try and get some markers back in there. I will try and get pictures the next time I go deer hunting in there.

 

[trixie charger]

Under the direction of Jim D’Angelo, the site was tested and remapped using a Trimble Geo XT GPS unit in order to show any obvious patterns from which a hypothesis of design could be inferred as Dick Jefferies and Paul Fish had done with Plant Scherer sites 9MO152 and 9MO153. The piles are located along a 10-20 degree slope between a logging road and the level floodplain of Berry Creek. Although not all the piles were measured, they range from as small as about 1 √ó 1 m to about 3 √ó 1.5 m and stand from 0.5 to 1 m high as measured from the downslope ground level.


Sterling Howard and Elizabeth Stipek excavating a rock pile at 9MO487, with other piles visible in the background.

Three rock piles were selected for partial excavation, and two 50-cm diameter shovel tests were excavated on a boulder outcrop associated with the site. No artifacts or associated features were found, and the boulder outcrop was determined to be natural. TRC concluded that there was no apparent pattern to the distribution of the rock piles that would suggest a ceremonial purpose as had been suggested for 9MO152 and 9MO153. Rather, the size and location of the piles suggests that they represent wagonloads of rock that were dumped in connection with the clearing of fields, most probably from the upper part of the ridge just east of the site.

 

[trixie charger]

Here are the pics

 

[Ramitt]

interesting, nice find trixie, Same location RebFF

 

[creskol]

interesting, nice find trixie, Same location RebFF

That is some good stuff there, Trixie! Interesting read! Thanks!

 

[trixie charger]

Thanks guys, glad to help. HH

 

[rebelfirefighter07]

Trixie has a different location than what I found. In my area there is no logging road. Only one of the piles I found could have been dumped from a wagon. The rest wouldn't be accessible due to the rough terrain.

 

[Monty]

Firefighter, I'm just speaking for myself but I am sure others would like to see some photographs of the area. How 'bout snapping a few next time you go that way? Thanks, Monty

 

[Red James Cash]

They might be native american rock piles,we have the same thing all over the place in MA.

 

[BttleDiggerDrew]

You found Jimmy Hoffa! lol

 

[RW]

If there was a battler there, maybe there was a camp there. Maybe they were built for shelter from incoming ammo?

 

[goverton]

From the angle of the colored pic, the pile of rocks resemble a man laying down, head at the top, face up, rocks for shirt and right arm accross front.......

 

[CRUSADER]

I think that the nearby land used to be ploughed & farmers have removed the large stones & dumped them in a pile.

 

[trixie charger]

Crus,

 

[goverton]

Here is what I see

 

[trixie charger]

I see the Man in the pile. What you must realize is humans are programed to see faces or forms familiar to us when we look at anything.
Its our way to discern friend or foe, threat or harmless, family or stranger and so on, its our nature. The Archaeologists completed a through dig at all the sites and nothing was found, that's what I am going on. These were not the same he found but they are in the same state and general location.

 

[goverton]

I see the Man in the pile. What you must realize is humans are programed to see faces or forms familiar to us when we look at anything.
Its our way to discern friend or foe, threat or harmless, family or stranger and so on, its our nature. The Archaeologists completed a through dig at all the sites and nothing was found, that's what I am going on. These were not the same he found but they are in the same state and general location.

Maybe one needs to look further down the line he (rock) is pointing........A good book to Read.''When Rocks begin to Speak"

I have seen turtles, snakes, in rocks and others see rocks.......

 

[trixie charger]

True I see all kinds of things in rocks and clouds and leaves and soup and pretty much anything else. Like I said we are programed to find patterns and shapes everywhere we look, its Human Nature.

 

[Broken knee]

In my opinion if there are stone walls in the area than they maybe stock piles for them? Otherwise I'd say piled for land clearing.
And as far as access a team of oxen, horse's or a single horse/ox with a rock sled can negotiate pretty difficult terrain. HH
Broken Knee