Archaeology at 8SJ34: The Nombre de Dios Mission/La Leche Shrine Site, St. Augustine

Archaeology at 8SJ34 
The Nombre de Dios Mission/La Leche  Shrine Site, St. Augustine.  
Summary report on the 1934 – 2011  excavations  
Kathleen Deagan 
Florida Museum of Natural History 
University of Florida 
Florida Museum of Natural History  
Miscellaneous Reports in Archaeology # 62  
2012
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Table of Contents 
LIST OF FIGURES ..................................................................................................................... ii LIST OF TABLES ..................................................................................................................... iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ....................................................................................................... iv 
INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................................................................ 1 LANDSCAPE AND CHANGE .................................................................................................................... 3 HISTORICAL BACKGROUND ............................................................................................................... 10 
Pre-1565 .................................................................................................................................... 10 Spanish arrival, 1565 ................................................................................................................. 12 CONDITION OF 8SJ34 TODAY ............................................................................................. 30 
ARCHAEOLOGY AT 8SJ34 ..................................................................................................................... 31 1938 ........................................................................................................................................... 31 1951 ........................................................................................................................................... 32 1976 Survey ............................................................................................................................... 41 1985 Excavations ...................................................................................................................... 43 1994 Electromagnetic and subsurface survey ........................................................................... 51 1993-2001 Excavations ............................................................................................................. 53 
2009-2011 EXCAVATIONS ...................................................................................................................... 90 Unit 263N 413E ......................................................................................................................... 91 Unit 268N 417.5 E ..................................................................................................................... 94 Unit 271N 425E (2011) ............................................................................................................. 98 Unit 260N 424E ......................................................................................................................... 99 Unit 290N 439E ....................................................................................................................... 102 Unit 245.2N 395.13 E (the “Chapel unit”) .............................................................................. 102 
8SJ34 MATERIAL CULTURE ............................................................................................................... 109 Indigenous ceramics ................................................................................................................ 114 Imported Ceramics .................................................................................................................. 121 Non-Ceramic Remains ............................................................................................................ 125 Faunal Remains and Subsistence ............................................................................................ 131 
SUMMARY AND INTERPRETATION ................................................................................................. 132 Precolumbian occupation ........................................................................................................ 133 Sixteenth and early seventeenth century occupation (s) ......................................................... 134 Mission Period Occupation ..................................................................................................... 141 Future Directions ..................................................................................................................... 146 REFERENCES CITED ............................................................................................................................. 147
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APPENDIX 1: METHODS AND PROTOCOLS .................................................................................... 158 APPENDIX 2 EXCAVATED MATERIAL ITEMS, 1985-2009 .......................................................... 165 
APPENDIX 3: FAUNAL SPECIES LISTS AND RELATIVE PROPORTIONS THROUGH TIME  8SJ34 ......................................................................................................................................................... 176 
LIST OF FIGURES 
Figure 1 Location of the Nombre de Dios Mission/La Leche Shrine site ........................................... 1 Figure 2 Location of excavations in northeastern property area ......................................................... 2 Figure 3 Detail of the 1586 Boazio map. ........................................................................................... 5 Figure 4 The ca. 1593 Mestas map ...................................................................................................... 5 Figure 5 Detail of the 1747 map by Antonio de Arredondo. ............................................................ 6 Figure 6 Detail from the Pablo de Castello map (1764) ...................................................................... 7 Figure 7 Detail from the Bellín map (1764) ........................................................................................ 7 Figure 8 Detail from the Puente map (1769). ...................................................................................... 8 Figure 9 Detail from the Dorr Map (1892) .......................................................................................... 9 Figure 10 Detail from a 1943 Florida Department of Transportation aerial photo ........................... 10 Figure 11 Locations of 1938 excavation trenches ............................................................................ 32 Figure 12 Map showing 1952 excavation area and foundation ......................................................... 33 Figure 13 Approximate location of 1951-52 excavations ................................................................. 34 Figure 14 Excavation unit designations for 1952 excavations .......................................................... 35 Figure 15 Distribution of colonial-era artifacts from the 1976 auger survey ................................... 42 Figure 16 Approximate location of 1985 Unit 201N418E in relation to the 1951 excavations ........ 44 Figure 17 Postmolds at base of unit 201N418E ................................................................................ 47 Figure 18 287N 440E (1985) Top of ditch and wall trench .............................................................. 48 Figure 19 Location of 1997 electromagnetic and posthole survey ................................................... 51 Figure 20 Locations of major features excavated at 8SJ34, 1985-2009 ........................................... 56 Figure 21. Cross section of the Feature 4 moat/ditch (Cusick 1993) ................................................ 57 Figure 23 Western terminus of Feature 4/21 moat or ditch. ........................................................... 64 Figure 24 Area 4 linear trench stains in cross section, Unit 272N 412E. ........................................ 65 Figure 25 Linear stains/wall sleepers in Trench 292N 408E ........................................................ 68 Figure 27 Feature 19/21 possible structural complex around Unit 268N 422E ............................... 74 Figure 28. Post and Wall trench complex, Unit 268N 422E ............................................................. 75 Figure 28 North profiles of Units 271N 419E and 271N 422E, ....................................................... 79 Figure 29 Features 19 and 21 east-west profile ................................................................................. 79 Figure 10 Lime kiln excavation showing positions of burnt logs ..................................................... 80 Figure 31. Feature 5 Lime kiln plan view ......................................................................................... 81 Figure 32 North-south section of lime kiln at 442.5E line (after Waters 1998) .............................. 82 Figure 33. Lime kiln cross section showing lime and shell deposits ................................................ 82 Figure 34. North wall, Unit 278N422.5 E showing intrusion of modern dredge fill ...................... 83 Figure 35 South wall, Unit 278N 422.5E showing destroyed eastern end of the lime kiln .............. 84 Figure 36 Diagram of a Roman pot kiln (based on Bailey 1938 ) ................................................... 84 Figure 37 Postmold 8 (possible flue stain) in Feature 5 lime kiln .................................................. 85 Figure 38 Unit 263N 413E plan view ............................................................................................... 92 Figure 39 East-west cross section of Feature 32 ............................................................................... 93
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Figure 40 Units 268N 416.5E - 417.5E plan view ............................................................................ 95 Figure 41 Feature 33 plan view in Unit 268N 417.5E ...................................................................... 96 Figure 42 Features in Unit 271N 425E ............................................................................................. 98 Figure 43 Features in Unit 260N 242E; Feature 34 section ............................................................ 100 Figure 44 Unit 290N439E showing 1934 ground surface and 1934 excavation ........................... 102 Figure 45 West and north profiles of the "Chapel unit"(2009) ....................................................... 104 Figure 46 Chapel Unit north wall (exterior of Chapel's south wall) .............................................. 105 Figure 47 Chapel unit west wall soil profile .................................................................................. 105 Figure 48 Chapel unit Area 1 coquina block rubble pit .................................................................. 106 Figure 49 Relative percentages of indigenous ceramics through time periods ............................... 114 Figure 51 Ming "Kraakporcelain" sherd ........................................................................................ 125 Figure 52 Wrought iron spikes ....................................................................................................... 125 Figure 53 Weaponry-related items, 8SJ34. ................................................................................... 126 Figure 54. Bead varieties from 8SJ34. ............................................................................................ 128 Figure 55 Copper alloy star and 7-layer faceted chevron bead ..................................................... 129 Figure 56 Silver one-real cob coins, Mexico City post-1572. ........................................................ 130 Figure 57 Architectural features at 8SJ34 ...................................................................................... 137 Figure 58 Hypothetical wall lines ................................................................................................. 138 
LIST OF TABLES 
Table 1 Eyewitness Accounts Of The Establishment Of St. Augustine 15 Table 2 Christian Population Of Nombre De Dios 24 Table 3 Distribution Of Materials Excavated In 1951 37 Table 4 201E 418E Artifacts By Provenience (1985 Excavation) 45 Table 5 Materials Excavated In Unit 287N 442E (1985) 49 Table 6 8SJ34 Datum Plane Information 55 Table 7 Excavated Materials from The Ditch/Moat Feature 58 Table 8 Materials in Wall Trench Features Associated with the Moat/Ditch 61 Table 9 Unit 272n 412e Excavated Materials 66  Table 10 Materials Excavated In Trench 292N 408E (2001) 69 Table 11 Materials in Feature 19 Structural Complex Deposits 75 Table 12 Excavated Material from the Lime Kiln (Feature 5) 86 Table 13 Unit 263N 419E ( 2009) 92 Table 14 Unit 268N 416.5-417.5E (2009) 94 Table 15 Distribution of Excavated Material In Unit 260N 424E (2009) 99 Table 16 Materials Excavated from the Chapel Test 106 Table 17 Distribution of Artifact Proportions Through Temporal Periods 111 
Table 18 Summary of all Excavated Materials 1985-2009 112 Table 19 Distribution of Native American Ceramics 1985-2009 115 Table 20 Comparison of Indigenous Ceramic Distributions at 8SJ34 and 8SJ31 118 Table 21 Imported European Tradition Ceramics 121 Table 22 Colonial Era Ornaments, Clothing and Personal Items 125 Table 23 Distribution of Excavated Material Remains in Mission-Era Contexts 138   
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 
The 2009-2011 projects at the Nombre de Dios Mission/Nuestra Señora de la Leche Shrine  (“Mission and Shrine”) were supported by grants from the St. Augustine Foundation, Inc. at Flagler College, the Lastinger Family Foundation, and the James Lockwood Foundation. We gratefully  acknowledge their interest and assistance. Matching support was provided by the Florida Museum  of Natural History, and the University of Florida Institute for Early Contact Period Studies.  
The six field seasons of excavation at the site prior to 2009 provided the basis for the current  program, and have been supported by the organizations listed in the table below. 
YEAR 
FUNDING SOURCE 
Field Supervisor 
Technical report
1985 
- Florida Department of State Historic  Preservation Matching Grants in Aid;  -Florida Museum of Natural History  and the Department of Anthropology  University of Florida 
Ed Chaney 
(this report)
1993 
-The Institute for Early Contact Period   Studies, University of Florida 
James Cusick 
Cusick 1993 
1994 
-The National Geographic Society -University of Florida Division of   Sponsored Research 
-Florida Museum of Natural History,   University of Florida 
John W. Morris 
Morris 1994 
1997 
- Florida Department of State Historic  Preservation Matching Grants in Aid -Florida Museum of Natural History,   University of Florida 
Gifford Waters 
Waters 1998, 2005 
2001 
- Florida Department of State Historic  Preservation Matching Grants in Aid  - St. Augustine Foundation, Inc.  -Florida Museum of Natural History,  University of Florida 
Gifford Waters
(this report; Waters  2005) 
2009 
-St. Augustine Foundation, Inc 
-The Lastinger Family Foundation -Florida Museum of Natural History,   University of Florida 
Kathleen  
Deagan/Gifford  
Waters 
(this report)
2011 
- The St. Augustine Foundation, Inc - The Lastinger Family Foundation - The James Lockwood Foundation  - The Frank D. Upchurch Endowment 
Kathleen  
Deagan/Gifford  
Waters
(this report; Waters  in prep.) 

 

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- The Institute of Early Contact Period   Studies (UF)  
- Florida Museum of Natural History 

 

 

 

A great many individuals and agencies have made this work both possible and productive,  not only during the current projects reported here, but over many years of archaeological work in  St. Augustine. We would particularly like to thank the Catholic Diocese of St. Augustine under  Bishops John Snyder, Victor Galleone and Felipe Estevez for more than 30 years of support and  enthusiasm for this project, including permission to work on the property. The entire staff of the  Mission and Shrine have provided logistical support of the excavations in many large and small  ways – water for screening, help in backfilling, cheerful repairs of spigots run over by field  vehicles, and too many others ways to individually list here. I thank them for their hospitality,  patience and good humor. We owe a special thank you to Eric Johnson, Director of the Mission  and Shrine, who over many years has given us sound advice, constant encouragement and many  eagerly-anticipated Friday pizza lunches.  
Carl Halbirt and the City of St. Augustine Archaeology program have provided innumerable  kinds of assistance and invaluable advice over the years. Carl has been present on site regularly,  sharing ideas and helping sort out interpretations. He has also generously released his volunteer  crew members to help us in the field on many occasions. At his instigation the City of St. Augustine  Public Works Department has provided us with superbly skilled assistance in grading excavation  areas, taking overhead photography and in sinking well points, for which we are most grateful. We  also would like to acknowledge Maurice Williams, formerly of the Florida Museum of Natural  History, who trained field school students in remote sensing methods, and supervised the  electromagnetic conductivity survey of the site. 
Much of the work at the Mission and Shrine site has been carried out by the people who  have volunteered to provide their time, skills and energy to the project. We especially appreciate the 
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members of the St. Augustine Archaeological Association, who have joined us over the years to  provide volunteer labor, moral support, advice and enjoyable speaking venues and good parties.  At the heart of the archaeological program are the field school students who have comprised  the field crews over the years between 1985 and 2001. Ed Chaney, Jim Cusick , Billy Ray Morris  and Gifford Waters served as exceptionally able field supervisors, a job that requires archaeological  acuity and precision, time and personnel management skills, teaching talent, physical stamina and  tactful leadership. The field supervisors also each prepared excellent technical field reports on each  season’s work, without which I would not have been able to prepare this one. The table above lists  these field supervisors and the source of funding for each season. From 1976 through 1994, student housing and laboratory facilities were provided by the Historic St. Augustine Preservation Board,  and in 2001 by the City of St. Augustine.  
 The 2009 and 2011 core field crews at 8SJ34 included SAAA members Nick McAuliffe,  Toni Wallace, Peter Larsen, Janet Jordan and Courtney Boren. Their skill, dedication and humor  made the final two field seasons at the site successful and great fun. Dr. Gifford Waters of the  Florida Museum of Natural History, who has worked on the Mission and Shrine projects since  1994, also participated in the 2009-2011 seasons. Gifford provided supervision in the field and in  the analysis and curation of the excavated materials from the site, and continues to manage the  artifact collection at the Florida Museum of Natural History. He directed the survey and testing  phases of the project to uncover the stone church at the site’s south end.  
Invaluable information and insights have been provided by a great many colleagues who  have collaborated with us over the years. Dr. Michael Gannon of the University of Florida has  been a decades-long source of historical inspiration and endless moral support. Dr. Eugene Lyon  has devoted many hours over the course of the project to providing us with guidance, advice,  interpretation and critical new historical information. Likewise, Prof. Herschel Shepard and the late  Albert Manucy helped us immensely in identifying and interpreting architectural features. Dr. Paul 
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Hoffman of Louisiana State University has also provided us with most useful critical reviews of our  reports from a historical perspective over the years. Sister Cathy Bitzer of the Catholic Diocesan  Archives has searched the holdings for materials relating to the archaeology at the site, and  produced extremely valuable materials that changed the course of the excavations.  
Dr. Betsy Reitz and her students of the University of Georgia have carried out the analyses  of faunal remains from the site since the project’s beginning, not only reconstructing the diets of the  site’s inhabitants, but also helping us reconstruct the taphonomy and formation processes of the site  itself. We have also benefited greatly from discussing these strategies – particularly as related to  shellfish - with Irv Quitmeyer of the Florida Museum of Natural History, who has provided a great  many shell identifications for us over the years. Ann Cordell of the Florida Museum of Natural  History has likewise provided us with identification of pottery types, paste composition and  minerals from the Fountain of Youth Park. She has also incorporated samples from the site into her  ongoing studies of Florida indigenous pottery to help us better understand the production traditions  and exchange patterns of pottery represented at the site.  
The many fine photographs of the site and site artifacts found in this report and on our  project websites (www.flmnh.ufl.edu/histarch) are the work of Jim Quine, Pat Payne and Jeff Gage.  Jim Q. has been the official “crew portrait” photographer since the beginning of the program.  Conservation of excavated objects from the site has been done under the supervision of James Levy  of the State of Florida Underwater Archaeology Conservation Lab since 1985.  
 I and my co-workers at the Fountain of Youth Park have also constantly benefited and  continuously learned from discussions and review of our data with colleagues working in other  Spanish colonial sites. Thanks to Jamie Anderson, Keith Ashley, Judy Bense, Mike Gannon, Buff  Gordon, Carl Halbirt, Bonnie McEwan, Jerry Milanich, Stan South, Chester DePratter, Vicki  Rolland, Al Woods and Maurice Williams. 
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INTRODUCTION 
 The Nombre de Dios Mission /La Leche Shrine site in St. Augustine (8SJ34) has been the focus  of intermittent archaeological investigation for more than 75 years. Located on Hospital Creek,  approximately opposite the St. Augustine inlet, the site has long been associated with the initial  settlement of St. Augustine by Pedro Menéndez de Aviles in 1565, as well as with both the  Franciscan Nombre de Dios mission (established in 1587) and the seventeenth century Shrine of  Nuestra Señora de la Leche (discussed below).  
 The site today has an island-like appearance, surrounded on three sides by Hospital Creek (east,  west and south) and bounded on the north by present day Ocean Avenue (Figure 1).  Figure 1: Location of the Nombre de Dios Mission/La Leche Shrine site
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It measures about 230 meters north to south, and about 210 meters east to west, encompassing  about 1.5 acres(.6 hectares). The property is owned by the Catholic Diocese of St. Augustine and is  maintained as a site of religious and historical tourism. The focus of most archaeological  investigation has been in the northeast quadrant of the property, immediately south of Ocean  Avenue on the eastern shore around the “rustic altar” (Figure 2).  
Figure 2: Location of excavations in northeastern property area
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 This area encompasses approximately 1.5 acres, or .6 hectares. Although the discussion of  archaeological data in this report is focused on 8SJ34, it should be noted that research at the site has  been done over the years in conjunction with excavations at 8SJ31 (the Fountain of Youth Park  site), located adjacent and to the north of the Nombre de Dios-La Leche site. Site components of  both Menéndez-era and Mission of Nombre de Dios occupations extended across both  contemporary properties. 
 The most recent extensive investigations at the Nombre de Dios-La Leche site were undertaken  in 2009 and 2011 by the University of Florida and the St. Augustine Archaeological Association  under the supervision of Kathleen Deagan and Gifford Waters (April 1 – June 10, 2009 and  November 6-December 18 2011). These were the latest in a series of excavations at the site  beginning with those of Mr. Jack Winter in 1938 (Winter 1938) as part of the St. Augustine  Historical Program’s effort to locate elements of St. Augustine’s early defenses (see also  Chatelaine 1940:iii, 87). Subsequent projects were carried out in 1952 (Spellman 1952), 1975  (Luccketti 1982); 1985 (this report); 1993 (see Cusick 1993); 1994 ( Morris 1995); 1997 (Waters  1998); 2001, 2009 and 2011 (this report). This report is intended both to document the 2009 and  2011 archaeological excavations at 8SJ34 and to summarize the results of all excavations carried  out at the site to date. 
LANDSCAPE AND CHANGE 
 8SJ34 is a dry hammock within a Saltwater Lagoon-Marsh environmental zone. The soils  throughout the site are classified as St. Augustine-Urban Land Complex , surrounded on the east  and south by Pellicer Silty Clay Loam in the areas of tidally inundated marsh (Readle 1983).  Pellicer Silty Clay Loam is “very poorly drained, nearly level soil that form in clayey tidal  sediments more than 40 inches thick…. they are flooded daily by high tide” (Readle 1983:93). St.  Augustine soils are characterized as “somewhat poorly drained level soils that are formed as a result 
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of dredging and filling activities. The soils consist of sandy marine sediments mixed with  fragments of loamy or clayey material and fragments of shells”( Readle 1983:101). It is subject to  periodic flooding and a high water table, and is not considered suitable for cultivated crops (Readle  1983:32). Most of urban St. Augustine is comprised by this soil, which in addition to movement of  marine sediments, was undoubtedly also formed by human occupation and cultural deposition  processes.  
 The soils of the Nombre De Dios-La Leche site are generally comprised of St. Augustine Soil  with heavy amounts of marine shell resulting from human deposition. At the eastern edge of the  site, bordering Hospital Creek, the surface elevation is approximately 5 feet above mean sea level  
(MSL). The surface slopes sharply upward toward the west, achieving an elevation of  approximately 9 feet MSL adjacent to the rustic altar. This dramatic rise in surface elevation is  largely the consequence of twentieth century dredge and filling activities which took place after  1938 (that is, after the Winter excavations occurred). This sharp demarcation between post-1938  fill and intact soils was revealed during both the 1994 and 2009 field seasons (Morris 1995:11,  below). The highest point of the property is the area in which the 2009-2011 excavations took  place, at ca. 10 MSL. 
 There have been major changes in the surrounding coastal morphology, water levels and  water channel locations over the millennia, and these have shaped the landscape seen today at the  Shrine. Such changes have come about through both natural and human impacts, including sea level  rise, water-related soil erosion and accretion, and storm action, as well as dredging and filling of  wetlands and waterways during roadway (particularly Ocean Avenue) and bridge construction.  Although the precise extent to which these activities affected the landforms around Hospital Creek  is unclear, depictions of the property on historic maps, combined with the results of archaeological 
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testing, makes it apparent that an unknown amount of land along the eastern side of the site has  been removed or severely altered.  
 The nature of landform change before the late eighteenth century is largely unknown, since no  precise maps showing the coastline at this scale exist before then. Although showing the coastline,  the Boazio (1586) (Figure 3) and Mestas (ca. 1593) (Figure 4) maps depict the area in a  representational and distorted manner, without reliable scale.  

Figure 3: Detail of the 1586 Boazio map. The area between the two creeks enclosing the fort is thought to be the  probable vicinity of 8SJ34.  

Figure 4: The ca. 1593 Mestas map, showing the pueblo of Nombre de Dios above and to the right of the fort.
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 The first maps that permit comparison with the present configuration of St. Augustine’s  shoreime were made in the eighteenth century, and include the 1737 map by Antonio de  Arrendondo (Figure 5), the 1764 map by Pablo de Castello (Figure 6), and the 1784 map made by  Maríano de la Rocque (Figure 7). These show the general configuration of the mouth of Hospital  Creek, the Nuestra Señora de la Leche Shrine (8SJ34), and the Fountain of Youth Park site  (8SJ31). These maps indicate that the most dramatic change in the immediate area of the sites has  been the filling of much of the east-west extending branch of Hospital Creek and the marshland that  bordered it between the Nombre De Dios-La Leche site and the Fountain of Youth Park site; the  dredging of Hospital Creek to form the boat basin today border in the eastern side of the Nombre  De Dios-La Leche site, and the construction of Ocean Avenue and the storm drain system that  empties into Hospital Creek..  
Figure 5: Detail of the 1747 map by Antonio de Arredondo. North is toward the left side of the image.
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Figure 6: Detail from the Pablo de Castello map (1764) showing the Hornabeque line and Nombre de Dios to the  south of the defense. 

Figure 7: Detail from the Bellín map (1764)showing structures on both banks of Hospital Creek
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Figure 8: Detail from the Puente map (1769). The key identifies "12" as the place known as Nombre de Dios and  as the place where the first Mass was said in 1565. The shrine of La Leche is noted, as well as the circumstances  of its destruction. (Courtesy of Elspeth Gordon) 
 During the eighteenth century and before, the mouth of Hospital Creek was located  approximately where the present boat basin at the east end of Ocean Avenue is today, on the east side of the Nombre de Dios-La Leche site. The creek extended in a southeasterly direction along the  east and south sides of the Shrine of Nuestra de Señora de la Leche to a point just west of present day San Marcos Avenue, ending approximately in the area between Hope Street and Old Mission  Road.  
 Hospital Creek retained much of its original configuration through the nineteenth century. In  1885 it formed a lagoon along the east side of San Marcos Avenue (Wellge 1885), and it was still  plotted in this position in 1891 (Dorr 1892) (Figure 9). The western and southern portions of the 
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creek were gradually filled during the early years of the twentieth century, both through natural  accretion and human activity.  
  
Figure 9: Detail from the Dorr Map (1892) 
 Major changes in the immediate waterscape of Hospital Creek and 8SJ34 undoubtedly occurred  when the present inlet was dredged by the Corps of Engineers in 1942. A 200 meter wide inlet was  dredged some 400 meters north of the existing inlet, almost directly east of the La Leche shrine and  
the Fountain of Youth Park. Maintenance dredging of the channel has occurred since that time,  undoubtedly altering the water flow and sand deposition patterns in this area. Other alterations  undoubtedly occurred with the construction of the towering metal cross erected on the site in 1965  to commemorate St. Augustine’s 450th anniversary under the direction of Micheal Gannon, then  Director of the Nombre de Dios Mission and Shrine. 
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Figure 10: Detail from a 1943 Florida Department of Transportation aerial photoshowing the site area prior to  the filling of south Hospital Creek 
HISTORICAL BACKGROUND 
Pre-1565  
 The native people living in the vicinity of St. Augustine and northeastern Florida at the time of  European arrival were members of the Timucua socio-linguistic community, which was comprised  of multiple tribes loosely confederated into independent and often competitive chiefdoms.  Considered archaeologically, this region incorporated at least seven distinct but interacting cultural  subdivisions with distinctive material assemblages (see Milanich 1996:44-55). St. Augustine is  located in what was considered to be the Timucua “heartland”, a region extending from the mouth  of the St. Johns River southward along the river and the Atlantic coast to Lake Harney and the north 
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end of the Indian River (approximately the same area called the “Northern St. Johns Region” by  John Goggin (1952).  
 The principal defining archaeological characteristic of the Timucua heartland is the production  and use of St. Johns Series pottery: a smooth, chalky-textured ware using spiculate-containing  clays. This pottery, and presumably the Timucua people and their ancestors, appeared in the region  about 2,500 years ago (ca. 1550 BC), and continued to live in the St. Augustine area until about 200  years ago (AD 1750). The only major change and chronological division in the 2,500 year-long St.  Johns ceramic tradition was marked by the introduction of check stamping as a ceramic design  motif, at approximately 1200 years BPE (A.D. 800). This change, initiating the St. Johns II period,  was accompanied by larger, more sedentary populations, and probably a greater dependence on  farming.  
 According to Spanish and French accounts of the 1560’s, the cacique of the St. Augustine  area, Seloy (or Soloy), was subject to the regional chief Saturiwa, whose seat was near present day  Jacksonville, close to the mouth of the St. Johns River. Saturiwa headed the “Agua Salada” or  “Saltwater” tribes, one of the many Timucua political units and linguistic subdivisions recorded by  early Spanish and French chroniclers. Somewhat ironically, however, the political and linguistic  affiliations of the Timucua in the vicinity of St. Augustine itself are unclear. It is uncertain whether  they were speakers of the “maritime” coastal dialect recorded by the Franciscan friar and linguist  Francisco Pareja (generally referred to by scholars today as the Mocama dialect), or the Agua  Salada (“Saltwater”) dialect that he distinguished as separate from the maritime dialect (Hann  1996:6-7; Granberry 1987:36) (for synthetic ethnohistorical works on the century Timucua see  Deagan 1978b; Hann 1996; Milanich 1996, Worth 1995). 
 The first Spanish settlement of 1565 was located in the vicinity of Hospital Creek, in the  territory governed locally by the cacique Seloy. Both Seloy and regional chief, Saturiwa, were 
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bitter enemies of the Spaniards, and remained violently hostile well after other Timucua caciques had treated with Menéndez (Barrientos 1965:140). The initial Spanish settlement in Seloy’s  territory endured for only nine months, until Timucuan hostility drove the Spaniards to a new site  across the bay on Anastasia Island, more safely distanced from Seloy (Lyon 1997b). It was not,  apparently, until 1572 that the Seloy Timucua were either sufficiently peaceable or sufficiently  vanquished by disease and warfare to allow the Spaniards to move back to the mainland and  establish St. Augustine in its present downtown plaza location  
 The archaeological data recovered so far at the Nombre De Dios-La Leche site suggest that there  was only a very sparse occupation of the site by Timucuans before the mid-sixteenth century. Very  few archaeological deposits date to the pre-1565 period, which is in sharp contrast to the north side  
of Hospital Creek. From the present-day Fountain of Youth Park northward, a series of dense, St.  Johns II period precolumbian occupation sites extends northward for nearly a mile along St.  Augustine’s Intracoastal Waterway (Chaney 1986:34-38; Handley 2001; Smith and Bond 1983; Wallace, et. al. 2007). To the south, however, beginning at approximately Ocean Avenue, no  precolumbian St. Johns period sites have been recorded, despite extensive survey and testing (Chaney 1986:34-35; Goggin 1952-53; Herron 1990; Luccketti 1982; Smith and Bond 1981). It is  possible that the original configuration of Hospital Creek marked a Native American cultural  boundary of sorts. 
Spanish arrival, 1565  
 The general outline of events surrounding the establishment of St. Augustine has been well known through familiar sources for decades (see especially Chatelaine 1941; Lyon 1976; Solis de  Meras 1923). Menéndez was the Captain General of the Spanish fleet stationed in the West Indies  to protect trade and shipping. He was also a privateer and had a troubled history of tax evasion and  smuggling. But the protestant French presence in Florida convinced Phillip II of Spain to enter into 
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a joint venture with Menéndez to both settle Florida and expel the French. A race to Florida began  in 1565 between Menéndez' colonization expedition and the French relief fleet under the command  of Jean Ribault sent to assist the barely-surviving French settlement at Fort Caroline (at the site of  present day Jacksonville, Florida) (McGrath 2000).  
 The two fleets arrived in Florida almost simultaneously. Menéndez decided to make landfall  about 50 miles south of Fort Caroline, and came ashore to claim Florida for Spain in the vicinity of  St. Augustine. More than 800 Spaniards (including 26 women) made their camp at or near a village  under the jurisdiction of the Timucua Cacique Seloy. While Menéndez and most of the soldiers  marched north to deal (this time successfully) with the French at Fort Caroline, the rest of his  expedition established the settlement in or near the Indian town.  
 The events of these first days are unclear, and eyewitness accounts of the establishment of the  settlement are ambiguous and often contradictory (Table 1). It is well established, however, that the  encampment - the real or pueblo- was established close to or perhaps around the fort, where  civilians and off-duty soldiers lived in bohios (Indian-style huts). This encampment site has been  identified in the southeastern quadrant of the Fountain of Youth Park (8SJ31) (Deagan 2009).   Pedro Menéndez wrote that he sent his Captains ashore initially to make an entrenchment  intended to protect goods and people that were being unloaded from the ships. The intention was to  later select a site for the fort more carefully once the immediate threats and uncertainties of arrival  were past. In contrast, Father Francisco López de Medoza Grajales, one of the expedition’s  chaplains, wrote that upon landing, the Spaniards took a house of a chief, and made a fortification  around it (see Table 1).  
 Father López’s account is partially corroborated by a third-hand comment by the French  commander of Ft. Caroline, Rene de Laudonniere. He noted that Ribault “had been informed by  King Emola, one of our neighbors arriving during our consultations, that the Spaniards had gone 
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ashore in great numbers and had seized the houses of Seloy and used them for their Negroes whom  they had brought to do labor. He said that they now lodged themselves on the land and had made  protective trenches around themselves” (in Bennett 2001:159).  
 The traditional manner of creating a fortification in the century would have been the construction  of a moat and earthwork, which leave distinctive archaeological signatures. It should be noted,  however, that many of the early Spanish forts in Florida did not have such moats. At Menéndez’s  other townsite of Santa Elena, which he established in 1566, Fort San Felipe did not have a moat  until four years after the fort itself was constructed (South 1983:43). And no trace of the first Santa  Elena fort of 1566 (San Sebastian) or its moat has ever been found, despite an extremely extensive  program of testing and excavation over more than 20 years (South 1980, DePratter and South 1995; South and DePratter 1996).  
 Eugene Lyon (1997) has documented that the first fort at St. Augustine contained a casa de  municiones, which housed the expedition’s supplies, munitions and the lodgings of the expedition’s  officials. Because the storehouse housed the ammunition, there was considerable fear of fire:   "...neither by day or by night was any flame lit in the said (storehouse) unless the said Camp master ordered it. And when a candle was lit one person had it placed in a water jar " (in Lyon  1997a:134). Eyewitnesses recount that the building had a stout wooden door.   Another contemporary, Bartolomé Barrientos, stated that the fort's powder house was thatched  with palmetto leaves: "they (the Indians) fired the powder magazine, which readily caught fire  because it was thatched with palmetto leaves"( Barrientos 1965:106). The Spaniards referred to the  building as a buhio, the word used in the Caribbean to describe a thatched hut, and sometimes a  large house of a cacique. 
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TABLE 1: Eyewitness Accounts of the Establishment of St. Augustine 
The Adelantado: 
I sent on shore with the first 200 soldiers, two captains, Juan Vincent a brother of the Captain Juan Vicente, and  Andres Lopez Patiño, old soldiers, in order to throw up a trench in the place most fit to fortify themselves in, and to  collect there the troops that were landed so as to protect them from the enemy if he should come upon them. They did  this so well that when I landed on Our Lady’s Day to take possession of the country in your Majesty’s name, it seemed  as if they had had a months time, and if they had had shovels and other iron tools, they could not have done it better,  for we have none of these things, the ship laden with them not having yet arrived. I have smiths and iron, so that I can  make them with dispatch, as I shall. When I go onshore we shall seek out a more suitable place to fortify ourselves in,  as it is not fit where we are now. This we must do with all speed, before the enemy can attack us, and if they give us  eight days more time, we think we shall do it,  
Pedro Menéndez de Aviles translated by Henry Ware “ Letters of Pedro Menéndez de Aviles, Massachusetts  Historical Society Proceedings VIII:419-425.  
The Captain and Brother-in law 
As soon as he reached there (the harbor of St. Augustine) he landed about 300 soldiers and sent two captains with  them, who were to reconnoiter that daybreak the next morning the lay of the land and the places which seemed to them  strongest (for defense), in order that they might dig a trench quickly while it was being seen where they could build a  fort…”(Gonzálo Solís de Méras, Connor translation p. 89) 
The Priest  
 " They went ashore and were well-received by the Indians, who gave them a very large house of a cacique which is on  the riverbank. And then Captains Patiño and San Vicente, with strong industry and diligence, ordered a ditch and moat  made around the house, with a rampart of earth and fagots..." (Father Francisco López de Medoza Grajales, Lyon  translation 1997:6.) 
The Enemy 
(the Spaniards) “went on shore at the River of Seloy, which we had called the River of Dolphins” (Jean Ribault) “had been informed by King Emola, one of our neighbors arriving during our consultations, that the Spaniards had gone  ashore in great numbers and had seized the houses of Seloy and used them for their Negroes whom they had brought to  do labor. He said that they now lodged themselves on the land and had made protective trenches around themselves Laudonniere- 2001: 158-159. 

 

The Colonists  
 Menéndez’s colonists included some 500 soldiers, 200 seamen, and 100 “others”, comprised by  civilians, clergy and the wives and children of 26 soldiers. All were from Spain. One hundred and  thirty eight of these soldiers also held “office” (license) in various crafts and trades, including 10  stonemasons 15 carpenters, 21 tailors 10 shoemakers, eight blacksmiths, five barbers, two surgeons,  two lime makers, three swordsmiths, a gunmaker and a crossbow repairman. Other trades  represented among the group included tanners, farriers, wool carders, a hatmaker, an embroiderer, a  bookseller, coopers, bakers, gardeners, an apothecary, and a master brewer. Another 117 of the
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soldiers were also farmers, ready to settle and farm the land once the French were vanquished  (Lyon 1976:92).  
 Their circumstances deteriorated within a month. After the capture of Ft. Caroline, Menéndez  renamed the French fort “San Mateo”, and left a garrison of three hundred men there. Those who  remained in St. Augustine were obligated to build their own fort, and in October of 1565 Menéndez  wrote to the King that “we are suffering for want of food, and the labors and dangers that we  undergo are great, the fort that we erect here being built by the labor of every man, of whatever  rank, of six hours every day, three hours before noon and three hours after, and if the men do not  endure it well, many of us will be sick and die” (AGI Seville Santo Domingo 221, in Quinn  1979:397). The following month, in November of 1565, another fort was established near the  mouth of the Indian River and 200 men were left there. Additionally, a considerable number of  soldiers and seamen accompanied Menéndez on his explorations and voyages, which took place  almost continuously for the first five months after settlement.  
 Thus by November of 1565, it was likely that fewer than 200 people remained at the St.  Augustine settlement, living in the campo real. They continued to suffer from hunger, illness and  Indian attacks, and it was reported in January of 1566 that more than 100 people had died in the  Florida forts from hunger and cold (Lyon 1976:140). 
Mutiny and Rebellion 
 These conditions, exacerbated by the failure to find wealth, led to mutinies against Menéndez by  the soldiers in both St. Augustine and San Mateo in the Spring of 1566. Records of the St.  Augustine mutiny provide additional detail about the storehouse. The rebels apparently gained easy  access to the fort at midnight on March 8, and proceeded to the casa de munición, which had a  wooden door. After pounding on it with lances and halberds, they forced the door and tied up the  loyal soldiers inside. 
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 They made their escape in a boat, leaving a rear guard to spike the fort guns. Witnesses  recounted that the rebels went "down river" about a league and a half (approximately four statute  miles) from the fort to the bar of St. Augustine, where they were just out of reach of the fort guns.  This information, combined with recent work on the changing configurations of the St. Augustine  inlet and bar (Franklin and Morris 1996), indicates that this first fort "must have been on the west  shore of the Matanzas river, at a point somewhere above an east-west line drawn through the inlet at  that time" (Lyon 1997a:135).  
 The mutiny was ultimately quelled, but the Spaniards' fears of fire were realized a month later.  On April 19, the fort burned, either as a result of Indian attack or accident. In either case, relations  with the Timucua in the area had deteriorated badly, and the Spaniards decided to move the fort  across to the east side of the bay rather than rebuild the burned Seloy fort. This they did, building an  insubstantial fortification at the (then) north end of Anastasia Island. When a relief fleet of 17 ships  under General Sancho de Archineaga arrived in June of 1566, they were able to build a more  substantial fort. This third fort, too, was across the bay from the original Seloy fort in hostile Indian  territory (Lyon 1997a-b). 
Abandonment and Casas Fuertes 
 By the end of 1566, peace treaties were established between the Spaniards (by then  headquartered on Anastasia Island) and the Timucuan groups to the west and north of the St. Johns  River. In Saturiwa’s domain, however, which included the vicinity of St. Augustine, hostilities  continued and accelerated. Again, writing to the King in early 1567, Menéndez reported that “all  the caciques in the interior of this territory have proclaimed themselves allies of the Adelantado and  vassals of the King. Most of them have done away with their idols and worship the Cross;  excepting those caciques who inhabit the area thirty to forty leagues around the Lutheran (note: 
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French) fort. These are on the warpath, and try to let no Christian escape with his life.” (Barrientos  in Quinn 1979:535).  
 After relocating across the bay, Menéndez ordered one of his officers, Captain Andrada, to build  a series of blockhouses, or casas fuertes, to guard against and combat Saturiwa’s forces. The  Captain was to  
“ proceed with 100 of his men in his company to Polican, an island close to the Matanzas  River, some five leagues south of St. Augustine...and there build a build blockhouse. In the  interval of construction, Capt. Hernando Muñoz and his lieutenant with fifty of their men were  to stand guard. A second blockhouse was to be erected alongside the first, and here soldiers  were to be stationed constantly so as to watch the movements of any ships at sea. The  blockhouses were to be built on high ground for maximum effect and were to remain in  communication with St. Augustine. The entire island was to be kept free of Indians, since the  natives, subjects of Saturiba, are enemies of the Spaniards…..  
 “ Still another blockhouse, similar to the one at Polican, was to be erected in Soloy, in the district of cacique Soloy, by Francisco Muñoz with about the same number of men as was  assigned to Polican. Construction of this last-mentioned post was to be undertaken by the end  of July 1567. Other outposts were planned on a height overlooking the residence of cacique  Alimacani (at the mouth of the St. Johns river), and at Old St. Augustine (San Agustín el Viejo).  All of these blockhouses were to be built in the designated places to overawe the unfriendly  Indians who had never desired alliance with the Christians” (Barrientos in Quinn 1979:532).  
 This description of the establishment of blockhouses in 1567 is immediately relevant to the  archaeological investigations the Nombre de Dios-La Leche site (8SJ34). Not only does it  document that there was a Casa Fuerte built at or near the original site of St. Augustine (“San  Agustín el Viejo”), but that this blockhouse was distinct from that built at “Soloy, in the district of 
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cacique Soloy”. Obviously the place called Soloy by the Spaniards in 1567 was not the same place  at which the first settlement had been established in 1565.  
 For more than a century, historians and archaeologists have referred to that first Spanish  settlement site as having been located “at Seloy’s village” which in fact it undoubtedly was, given  that it was under the regional jurisdiction of Seloy (see discussion by Gordon 2006). However it  must be considered that the town referred to by the Spaniards by the name of Soloy (at least by  1567) may well have been further to the north of what is today the mouth of Hospital Creek. It is  also possible that Seloy’s village may have been relocated after the arrival of the Spaniards in 1565,  and the establishment of their settlement. This suggestion is reinforced by later accounts that  describe the village of “Soloy” as two leagues distant from Nombre de Dios in 1602 (Baltazar  López in Hann 1996:158; Pedro Bermejo in Arnade 1959:60).  
 It is also possible that the Soloy and San Agustin Viejo blockhouses were built opposite one  another across what is today Hospital Creek, in the manner of the Polican Blockhouse and its  companion across the Matanzas River. Although Hospital Creek today is dramatically altered and  diminished from even its nineteenth century configuration, it was undoubtedly a much more  significant inlet and body of water during the century. If this were the case, the locations of the  blockhouses have not yet been discovered. Without archaeological verification, it is difficult to  assess the veracity and reliability of the single documentary account referring to casas fuertes  constructed at both Soloy and San Agustín el Viejo, just as it is difficult to assess whether both of  them were in fact actually built.  
 It is known, however, that the blockhouse at Old St. Augustine was active in 1568, and was  reported to have been located across the river or bay from the Anastasia Island fort. In July of  1568, hostile Indians of gathered at the casa fuerte of “San Agustin del Viejo” (Lyon 1997b: 104),  and on the twentieth of that month, “seven suits of padded armor were lost when a canoe was 
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carrying thirty suits for the succor of the soldiers who were in the casa fuerte of Old St. Augustine  (San Agustín Viejo), because warlike Indians had gathered there. The said canoe turned over in the  arm of the sea over which one must cross to the said strong house..." (Lyon 1997b:140).   It is not known how long the mainland casas fuertes were manned after this date, but it seems  clear that the second and third forts of St. Augustine, as well as the town itself, remained on  Anastasia Island until 1572. In that year the town was once again relocated, this time to the site it  occupies today.  
The Nombre de Dios Town and Mission 
 After the first fort and settlement were moved to Anastasia Island in 1566, relations between the  Timucua and the Spanish, as noted, remained hostile until at least the early 1570's. Organized  efforts to convert the Timucua in the St. Augustine vicinity did not begin until after 1573, when the  first Franciscan missionaries came to Florida St. Augustine area (Gannon 1965:36-37; Hann  1996:138-140). Even then, notable success in conversions did not take place until after 1577, when  Fray Alonso de Reinoso recruited a new group of friars and brought them to St. Augustine. They  baptized many native inhabitants in the vicinity of St. Augustine before the formal establishment of  mission churches in 1587 (Juan Menéndez Márquez (1602) in Arnade 1959:51-52; Hann 1996:139;  Geiger 1937:55) including, most importantly, some of the local governing elite (see Bushnell  1994:104-108). Doña María Meléndez, the cacica of Nombre de Dios in the early years of the  seventeenth century, is one of the best known of these. She inherited the position from her mother,  Doña Catalina , who “was the cacica nearest this presidio of St. Augustine and one of the first to  become Christians, serving and favoring the españoles without wavering” (Menéndez Marqués and  Las Alas 1595, in Bushnell 1994:120) . Her daughter, Doña María, assumed the position of cacica  in the 1590’s. Doña Maria was described as being very hispanicized, and was married to a Spanish  soldier, Clemente Vernal, who lived with her and their children at Nombre de Dios. 
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 Amy Bushnell has described the practice in Florida (as well as in most other parts of the century Spanish Americas) of Spanish governors taking the children of high ranking Native Americans into  their households to be raised and educated in the Spanish tradition. Both Pedro Menéndez de  Aviles and Pedro Menéndez Marqués practiced this sort of patronage, and their elite charges  frequently adopted the Governor’s name at baptism as their own Christian names. These elite  native girls were often married to Spaniards chosen by the Governor (Bushnell 1994: 105-107), and  Doña Maria could have been one of these.  
 At the time Doña Catalina and later Doña Maria were governing, the center of the mission  community was probably located at what is today the southwest quadrant of the Fountain of Youth  Park (Deagan 2009:40-44). Two concentrations of late sixteenth century Christian Indian burials in  this vicinity suggest the location of the early mission church and campo santo area, although the  community itself extended both to the north and south of the church.  
 A recent comprehensive study of the location and history of the Nombre de Dios mission has  suggested that the town of Nombre de Dios was built by Spanish soldiers in 1580, with the intention  that Native peoples would settle there, and facilitate conversion (Gordon 2006). The  archaeological evidence recovered so far from the Nombre de Dios-La Leche and Fountain of  Youth Park sites does not, so far, support this. At the Fountain of Youth Park site there is (as noted  above) a Christian Indian burial area and church dating to the late and early seventeenth centuries  in the southwestern part of the property (Deagan 2009:40-44), suggesting that this was the site of  the initial Nombre de Dios mission church. The site’s archaeological deposits, however, show that  it was also the location of intensive Timucua occupation both before and after the construction of  the church. It is of course possible that a 20 or so year hiatus occurred in that occupation between  the arrival of Menéndez and the installation of María Melendez’s mother, Catalina, as cacica, but  this cannot be either demonstrated or disproved by the currently available data. 
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 When Frances Drake attacked St. Augustine in 1586, there was an established village of  Spanish-allied Christian Indians at what was to become the mission and town of Nombre de Dios.  Following that raid, Juan de Posada wrote to Phillip II that, although he arrived in St. Augustine  after the Drake raid, 
 “I came in time to avoid that which our people feared from the aborigines, since ours had  no fort, artillery, food supplies, or munitions, and what was the worst, the natives were plotting to kill them all- soldiers, women and children – as has been ascertained within the  past eight days. Although he (Drake) burned this city and the fort he did no damage at all to  an Indian village which is a cannon’s shot from here. On the contrary, he sent persons there  to flatter these natives, just as he did with those yonder; but they found the village deserted  because in addition to being Catholic and such close neighbors, they had withdrawn to the  bush with their women and children ” . Sept. 2, 1586 (in Quinn 1979:151).  
 The town was described in 1586 as “a cannon’s shot” away, which was under about 1,500 yards  according to Manucy (1962:34,49). In 1593 the native town of Nombre de Dios was recorded as  1,500 pasos (paces, which is a variable width of about 1 meter) from the Spanish town of St.  Augustine (Mestas map 1593); and in 1606 and 1659 it was described as a quarter of a league (1  kilometer) distant (Geiger 1937:196; Juan de la Calle in Chatelaine 1941:123n12). The mouth of  Hospital Creek is 1.52 kilometers from the archaeologically-identified sixteenth century Spanish  town plaza, and thus the village of Nombre de Dios was almost certainly located in the vicinity of  the Nombre de Dios-La Leche and Fountain of Youth Park sites of today. The church, presumably  the plaza, and other important structures were at least initially, however, at the location discussed  above.  
 The Christian Timucuans in the St. Augustine vicinity attended Mass in the town of St.  Augustine until after 1587, when the first Franciscan mission doctrina was established at the 
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Timucua pueblo of Nombre de Dios, and was given the same name. Franciscan friar Antonio de  Escobedo was assigned there and helped build the first mission church, which within a few years  had “many statues of saints” (Arnade 1959:29). Eight years later in 1595, a mass baptism of 80  people was held at Nombre de Dios (Alonso de las Alas testimony 1602, in Arnade 1959:57), and  by then, the governance of the town had passed to Doña María Melendez, the daughter of the  previous cacica. In that year, to demonstrate her allegiance, she obliged each of the 48 heads of household under her to give one arroba of maize to assist the Spanish colonists in St. Augustine (in  Bushnell 1981:97).  
 It was at about this time or before that Doña María married Spanish soldier Clemente de Vernal.  In 1606 they had two children old enough to be confirmed (usually 7 years of age) by Bishop  Altamirano during his visit in that year. Altamirano confirmed 84 people at Nombre de Dios,  including the cacica, her 2 children and “twenty españoles” who presumably lived at the Indian  town. Villages subject to Doña María included Palica, Nombre de Dios Chiquito, Capuaca, Solo,  San Pablo, Cahericao, San Mateo, and according to the Bishop’s account, the San Pedro mission  community on Cumberland Island. She is said to have lived most of the time at San Pedro after  1604 (Hann 1996:16).  
 This assertion, if accurate, underscores the profound political changes among the Native  American groups of La Florida after the arrival of the Spaniards. San Pedro and San Juan del  Puerto were occupied by Mocama Timucua people, while the other noted groups (located to the  south of the St. Johns River) were Saltwater Timucua (see Ashley 2009; Deagan 2009; Worth  2009). The consolidation of these formerly independent political and cultural areas under Doña  Maria (and possibly Doña Catalina before her) suggests direct and major Spanish intervention in  indigenous political affairs. 
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Table 2 Christian Population of Nombre de Dios
Date 
Population 
Source
1602 
200 Timucuans 
Bermejo 1602 
1606 
216 Natives, 20 Espanoles 

1675 
30-35 people 
Calderón 1675 
1689 
20 families 
Ebolina de Compostela  
1689 
1711 
39 Timucuans (16 men, 11 women,  5 boys, 7 girls).
Córcoles y Martínez  
1711 
1717 
50 Timucuans – 15 men, 16  
women, 19 children
Primo de Rivera 1717 
1726 
62 Chiluca – 55 old Christians, 7  
recent converts (19 men 23 women  23 children)– had stone church and  convent
Benavides 1726 
1728 
43 people, 14 men, 17 women, 12  
children.
Bullones 1728 
1738  
(April)
49 (15 warriors) Timucua: 12 men, 7  women; Yamassee: 2 men eight  
women; Uchise: 1 woman;  
Apalachee: 2 men) 
Benavides 1738 
1738  
(late) 
23 people in 13 families 
Guemes y Horcasitas  
1739 
1759 
Consolidated; listed as “Nuestra  
Senora de la Leche”– 11 households  including Timucua(6)  
Yamassee(23) Ibaja (10) Chiluque  (1), Costa (9) Casipuya (1)  
Chickasaw(2) 
Ruís 1759 
(Sources: Hann, John 1996 The Timucua University Press of Florida, pp. 308-323; 
 Worth, John 1995, Timucuan chiefdoms of Spanish Florida, Volume 2. University  Press of Florida. 147-155. 

 

  
 In 1654-55 a smallpox epidemic was reported to have virtually wiped out the population of  Nombre de Dios, and Governor Rebolledo ordered that the population of Santiago de Oconee (a  visita on the edge of the Okefenokee swamp comprised of Mocama Timucua and fugitive Indians  from elsewhere) should be forcibly moved to St. Augustine to repopulate Nombre de Dios (Hann  1996:154-157; Worth 1995:50-51). The relocation effort appears to have been largely unsuccessful,  since most of the Oconee inhabitants fled to the interior before they could be moved. It is probable  that the portion of the Nombre de Dios mission village located at the Fountain of Youth Park site 
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was largely abandoned after that time, and the mission population was concentrated in the area  occupied today by the Nombre De Dios-La Leche site (see discussion in Deagan 2009; Waters  2009).  
 Nombre de Dios continued in decline through much of the seventeenth century, and did not have  a resident friar for much of the century. In 1674, a visita conducted by Bishop Gabriel Díaz Vara  de Calderón of Cuba noted in St. Augustine that: “Going out of the city at half a league to the north  there is a small village of scarcely more than thirty Indian inhabitants, called Nombre de Dios, the  mission of which is served by the convent” (Wenhold 1937:8).  
 The inhabitants of Nombre de Dios mission were expected to remain available for ferrying duty.  During the first half of the seventeenth century, several mission towns at strategic water crossings,  including Tocoy and its nearby successor, San Diego de Helaca, on the St. Johns River west of St.  Augustine; Nombre de Dios and Tolomato along the Tolomato River just north of the city; and San  
Juan del Puerto at the mouth of the St. Johns River operated the ferries. These towns were  generally exempt from the yearly repartimiento labor (Worth 1995:II 24). 
 During the early seventeenth century the Shrine of Nuestra Señora de la Leche y Buen Parto (Our Lady of the Milk and Safe/Happy Delivery) was established at Mission Nombre de Dios.  Nuestra Señora was represented by a venerated statue from Spain, thought to have been brought to  Florida by the Franciscans (Gannon 2008). The shrine was the focus of much devotion among  Catholics, and women in particular, and drew substantial offerings and alms. In 1677 St. Augustine  Governor Pablo de Hita y Salazar was the head of the confraternity (a lay religious organization  devoted to good works) at Nombre de Dios, and he built a stone and masonry church in which to  house the image. The governor wrote that he had “built a church for Our Lady out of mortar and  masonry, the only one like it in the provinces”(Hita y Salazar 1678 in Bushnell 1994:131). 
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 The location of that original shrine has been traditionally thought to have been in the vicinity of  the stone chapel erected to commemorate that devotion, today on the grounds of the Nombre de  Dios-La Leche site. Tests in 2011, however, revealed a very large stone building some 100 feet to  the south of the present chapel, making it likely that stone church/shrine was located in that area  (discussed below).  
 The seventeenth century stone church of La Leche, as well as the mission buildings at Nombre  de Dios, were burned in 1702 by the English and Indian forces of South Carolinian Colonel James  Moore, who laid unsuccessful siege to St. Augustine in that year. Father Martín de Alanco, the  missionary in charge of Nombre de Dios, reported that the English set fire to the entire town with  “fury and rancor”, especially when burning the Catholic churches. He further noted that “the fire was so voracious that nothing, not even a vestige, was left of these churches, the convent (of San  Francisco) and the doctrinas because the construction, including the roofs and fences, was of  wood”(in Arnade 1959b: 57-58). This was corroborated by other testimonies, and curiously, none  of the reports (including that of Father Alanco) made mention of a stone church at the mission.  Micheal Gannon writes that the La Leche chapel was rebuilt of coquina, and that it measured 33  feet by 15 feet, and could accommodate the 40 Christian Indians remaining at the mission (Gannon  1965:77).  
 As a consequence of the Moore raid, a new intermediate defense line for St. Augustine (called  the Hornabeque line) was built along the south side of Hospital Creek, and was completed between  1706 and 1708 (Chatelaine 1940:84). The fortification consisted of an earthen wall with a moat,  extending between the San Sebastian River on the west, and the mouth of Hospital Creek on the east. A small bastion or lunette with six cannon was constructed by 1715 at the eastern end of the  Hornabeque line, at the village of Nombre de Dios on the south side of Hospital Creek. At that  time, the mission town of Nombre de Dios must have extended across Hospital Creek and occupied 
26  
both the north and south banks (possibly the northern Nombre de Dios Macaris and the southern  Nombre de Dios Chiquito discussed below).  
 The war between the Yamassee of South Carolina and their former British began in 1715, and  had a major impact on both the Native American population of St. Augustine, and on the Mission of  Nombre de Dios (See Bushnell 1994:195-96; Hann 1989). Large numbers of Yamassee migrated  to St. Augustine after 1715 in an attempt to ally themselves with the Spanish, and they swelled the  Native American population of the community. Many of the Yamassee immigrants apparently  settled at or near the Mission of Nombre de Dios. By 1723 a census of Native American towns  recorded two villages named Nombre de Dios – “Nombre de Dios Macaris”- the “old” Nombre de  Dios containing the Shrine of La Leche- and another called “Nombre de Dios Chiquito”, which  was on the south side of Hospital Creek, inside the Hornabeque defense wall (Table 2) .  In 1728 Nombre de Dios Chiquito was described as having been the biggest of all the native  settlements initially "because of having two villages united in it, with the two caciques ruling," but  with only one friar” (Hann 1989:196). At that time it was located about four miles from St.  Augustine, but by 1728 harassment by the Chickasaw and other tribes had driven Nombre de Dios  Chiquito's inhabitants to a site "close to the city, a rifle-shot away." By 1734 the "Village of  Chiquito" contained only fifteen men above the age of twelve", and in 1738 Nombre de Dios  Chiquito had a total of forty inhabitants (Table 2; Hann 1989).  
 The end came for the La Leche stone church at Nombre de Dios (Macaris) in 1728, at the hands  of Col. James Palmer, another British raider who attacked St. Augustine with a force of Yamasee  and English soldiers. They ravaged the church and burned the settlement at Nombre de Dios before  retreating, taking many captives with them. After the Palmer raid, the governor of St. Augustine  commanded that the Church and buildings at Nombre de Dios be blown up in order to prevent them 
27  
from being used by the enemy. Most of the town seems to have moved south of the Hornabeque  wall at that time.  
 The La Leche shrine and hermitage were rebuilt on the south side of the Hornabeque line  during the 1750’s. It was described in 1759 as:  
 “newly built with the alms which the faithful and devotees of this supreme Lady have given. It is  18 varas long, 9 wide, 4 ½ high; and in the front is a belfry or wall, in which the bells are located. It  is of stone with a roof of shingle. It has a dining room and a room joining with the sacristy where  the religious live. The room to the north of that is designated for those who make a pilgrimage to  visit this miraculous image. The church has its front to the east, from where the port or entrance to  the bar is seen. From the edge of the sea it is a stone’s throw, and is about 850 paces from the city.”(Solana 1760 in Deagan 1991:558-559). The site described by Solana was probably located to  the south of the great cross that was erected in 1965 to commemorate the 400th anniversary of St.  Augustine’s founding and the first Mass.  
 By 1759 the area encompassed by the present day site of 8SJ34 (north of Hospital Creek) was  largely abandoned. The two Nombre de Dios settlements – Macaris and Chiquito – appear to have  been combined on the south side of Hospital Creek, and were inhabited by a mixed group of  refugee Indians, including six Timucuans, twenty-three Yamasee , five half-Timucua and half Yamasee children, ten Ibaja, two Chickasaw, one Casipuya, one Chiluque and one Costa household.  At the time of Spanish departure from St. Augustine in 1763, there were two Native towns  remaining – Tolomato and Nombre de Dios, both within a gunshot of the fort, and containing only  86 people between them. 
28  
Nombre de Dios in the British and Second Spanish Periods  
 With the arrival of the British to St. Augustine, the La Leche church building (on the south side  of the Hornabeque line and Hospital Creek) was put into use as a hospital. The property to the north  of the creek, including 8SJ34 and extending nearly two miles to Mose, became part of Governor  Grant’s Farm, which was an experimental agricultural plantation (see Schaefer 2000). After  Grant’s departure in 1771, the subsequent Governor, Patrick Tonyn, allowed several Minorcan  families to farm parts of the lands, including parcels on what is today 8SJ34. In 1778 for example,  the family of Juan Villalonga built a small house and farmed on the north side of Hospital Creek  (Bagwell 1938:9), probably within the present boundaries of 8SJ34.  
 When Florida was returned to Spain in 1784, the government designated the land within 1,500  varas yards of the town walls as the“mil y quinientos” – a perimeter left clear of construction and  high vegetative growth for defensive purposes (Hill 1940:xxx). The Nombre de Dios-La Leche site fell within this area, as did the still extant building of the second La Leche church and  hermitage south of Hospital Creek.  
 The land (on the south side of the creek) on which the church stood in 1784 was given to the  Catholic Church under the supervision of Father Thomas Hassett, and became again a place of  worship. It served as a church until 1793, when it was dismantled to provide building materials for  the first Cathedral of St. Augustine (Gannon 1965:107-108).  
 Government permits were given, mostly to Minorcans who had arrived in St. Augustine during  the British occupation, to farm tracts of land in the mil y quinientos as long as no high crops were  grown and no substantial or permanent buildings were constructed there. Farming of the present  Nombre de Dios-La Leche site area by the Villalongas, Seguis, Fushas, Solanas and others  continued through the Second Spanish and territorial periods (Bagwell 1938). 
29  
 By the mid-nineteenth century the present property comprising 8SJ34 was owned by one John  McGuire, who had acquired it from Phillip Solana. McGuire had protected the site during his  ownership, apparently recognizing its association with the Nombre de Dios Mission. In 1868 he  sold it for one dollar to Bishop Augustín Verot, who had been ordained as the first Bishop of  Florida in 1858. Verot mistakenly believed that a missionary had been martyred at Nombre de  Dios, and noted some years later that he acquired the property “not for my own personal and  individual benefit, but is for the benefit of the Church and to perpetuate the memory of the martyrdom of a missionary which occurred there” (August 7, 1874, in Bagwell 1939:7). He undertook a reconstruction of the first La Leche chapel in 1875, however a hurricane just two years  later severely damaged the building. A second reconstruction based on Verot’s original chapel was  undertaken in 1918, and that structure remains on the site today (see Gordon 2006).  The site also served as a Catholic cemetery at the end of the nineteenth century. The Tolomato  cemetery near the City Gates became overcrowded after the yellow fever epidemic of 1884, and the  Shrine of Nuestra Señora de la Leche became a burial ground for St. Augustine’s Catholics after  that time. A new and larger Catholic cemetery, San Lorenzo, was opened in 1892, and burials  ceased at the Nombre de Dios-La Leche site by the early years of the twentieth century.  
CONDITION OF 8SJ34 TODAY 
 Relatively little sub-surface alteration to the site has occurred since the cessation of its use as a  cemetery. During the 1930’s a small office building and gift shop for the La Leche shrine were built at the extreme northwestern corner of the site, expanding gradually over the years to its 2009  configuration. A small rustic altar was placed at the northeast corner of the site at some point after  the late 1930’s to commemorate the first Mass in St. Augustine in 1565, and a number of cement  and asphalt pathways have been constructed throughout the grounds. 
30  
 An extensive irrigation system has been installed throughout the property, with its impact  largely restricted to the upper 25 centimeters of soil deposit. The rich plantings and tree coverage  on the grounds have been perhaps the most extensive twentieth century disturbance to the  archaeological deposits across the site.  
 Little has been documented about the impacts of road construction (Ocean Avenue) along the  north boundary of 8SJ34, or the placement of storm drain outlets into the marsh to the east. These  were undoubtedly significant. Archaeological excavations have shown that approximately the  eastern 10 meters of the property, bordering the water’s edge, consists of dredge fill, including the  remains of wood and tarpaper buildings, perhaps a fish shack that stood in Hospital Creek, still  visible on a 1943 aerial photo of the area (Figure 10) . Records of dredging in Hospital Creek to  create the existing boat basin on the east side of the site have not yet been located, but that activity was potentially among the most destructive of activities to the century archaeological deposits.  
ARCHAEOLOGY AT 8SJ34 
1938  
 The first recorded archaeological study of the Nombre de Dios-La Leche site was done in 1938,  as part of the Carnegie Institute of Washington-sponsored study of the Defenses of Spanish Florida (Chatelaine 1941). Excavations were done by Mr. Jack Winter along the eastern (waterfront) side  
of the property, searching for evidence of early Spanish fortifications (Winter 1938).  Approximately 115 feet of three and four-foot wide trenches were excavated over a period of seven days, located in the approximate position shown in Figure 11. Portions of two of these trenches  were located during the excavations of 1994 and 2009.  
 Winter’s field notes do not provide information on the kinds or quantities of artifacts recovered  from the excavations, however he did provide rough sketches of postmolds and pits in the trenches. 
31  
No evidence for Spanish fortification activity was recovered, and the current location of the  excavated materials is unknown. 
Figure 11: Locations of 1938 excavation trenches 
1951  
 In 1951 Father Charles Spellman, Director of the Diocese of St. Augustine Archives,  undertook excavations in search of the original stone chapel of Nuestra Señora de la Leche  (Spellman 1952; UFAL site file records). With the assistance of students from the University of  Florida working under John Goggin, he excavated eight units that appear to have measured five by  five feet (no scale is provided on the extant maps or report) (Figure 12). 
32  

Figure 12: Map showing 1952 excavation area and foundation 
  
 Another 23 units were apparently also excavated in 1951, although there is no mention of these  in the report (Spellman 1952). Evidence for the excavation of these units, however, is provided by  labeled artifact collections and laboratory forms at the Florida Museum of Natural History, and  recently-located field excavation forms provided by Sister Catherine Bitzer of the Archives of the  Catholic Dioceses of St. Augustine. The excavation is described on the 1951 University of Florida  Archaeological Site Form as:
33  
“About 100 to 150 feet directly south of the Chapel Building…running under the roadway down the sloping hill for about forty feet. First pit dug almost on a straight line from the east side of the  chapel”.  
Figure 13: Approximate location of 1951-52 excavations by Spellman and the University of Florida   
 This suggests a location approximately in the vicinity of that shown in Figure 13. Figure 14  shows the excavation plan and grid of the 1951 investigations. In the eastern cluster of units 
34  
Spellman uncovered the remnants of a masonry (coquina block and tabby) building foundation at a depth of about 12 inches beneath the 1951 surface (Figure 14).  

Figure 14: Excavation unit designations for 1952 excavations (north at top of map) and estimated locations of  coquina (black) and tabby (grey) features recorded on 1951-52 analysis forms 
  
 The footprint of the structure, as reconstructed from field sketches, appears to measure at least 80 feet east to west, and at least 35 feet north to south. Two and possibly more rooms are  suggested. What appear to have been exterior wall foundations were described by Spellman as  coquina block, although these may actually have been remnants of walls themselves, since the  maximum excavated depth was just 12 inches below ground surface, and no footing trench was 
35  
described or noted. At least one interior tabby wall “foundation” was described by Spellman, and  several areas of very deteriorated lime mortar tabby or tabby rubble suggested interior floors.   Excavations in the general vicinity of Spellman’s work done by Ed Chaney in 1985, however,  located the remains of a very deteriorated tabby or lime mortar former pathway in this area (see  below, “1985 Excavations”). It is possible that at least some of what Spellman described as: “ a  loose mixture of oyster shell and mortar….it can be literally brushed away with a broom” was also  part of the earlier path. Chaney dated the path deposit to the late nineteenth or early twentieth century. 
 Shovel tests excavated during 2011 by the University of Florida re-exposed portions of the  foundation of the structure uncovered by Spellman. These showed that it was of coquina block  construction over packed oyster shell footing trenches. The dimensions of the building are about 85  feet east to west, and 40 feet north to south. The construction date (and therefore the identification)  of the structure cannot be made with certainty until the actual footings (rather than the remnants of  what may have been above-grade walls) are studied. However, there is also no record of a stone  building on the site, other than the present La Leche chapel, after 1728.  
 The artifacts recovered during the 1951 excavations (Table 3) suggest a late seventeenth or early  eighteenth century date for the structure. Of the dateable European ceramics, 86 percent date to the  first half of the eighteenth century, 7.7 percent date to the seventeenth century, and nearly 7 percent  date to the British or Second Spanish periods (1765-1821). All of the post-1750 artifacts were  
recovered from the upper six inches of soil. A mean ceramic date calculated on the dateable  ceramics excavated in 1951 yielded a midpoint date of 1726.6 for the entire assemblage, and 1720.8  for all proveniences excluding Level 1. 
 The recovery methods (screen size, materials saved versus material discarded, etc.) used by  Spellman are unknown, and this could have introduced bias in the artifact assemblage. A 1985 
36  
excavation unit in this same vicinity (Figure 13) done by Ed Chaney, however, produced a very  similar ceramic assemblage and dates, using very fine-grained techniques. Despite the shallowness  of the structural deposits, the most reasonable date for their deposition and abandonment appears to  be the early eighteenth century. If the church that was rebuilt after Moore’s burning of the original  La Leche chapel was, in fact, just 33 feet by 15 feet, (Gannon 1965:77), the structure located by  Spellman is most like the 1677 stone church . 
8SJ34 NOMBRE DE DIOS-LA LECHE SHRINE SITE
TABLE 3 Distribution of materials excavated in 1951 (Levels in inches below 1951 surface)

L-1  
0-6" 
L-2  
6"- 
12" 
L1-2  
0- 
12"
L-3  
12- 
18" 
PIT
SITE  
TOTAL
% Euro.  
ceramics
% all  
material
Majolica : sixteenth century

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yayal B/W 
1 

 

 

 

1 
0.3%

Majolica : seventeenth century

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Abó Polychrome 
1 

 

 

 

1 
0.3%

Puebla Polychrome 
5 

 

 

 

5 
1.3%

San Luis polychrome 
19 
1 
1 

2 
23 
5.9%

(Subtotal) 
26 
1 
1 

2 
30 
7.7% 
1.37%
Majolica eighteenth century
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Huejotzingo B/W 
4 

 

 

 

4 
1.0%

San Augustín B/W 
77 
18 

2 
1 
98 
25.3% 

(Subtotal) 
81 
18 

2 
1 
102 
26.3% 
4.65%
Majolica UID date

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unidentified Majolica 
8 

 

 

 

8 
2.1%

Unidentified White Majolica 
12 
2 

1 

15 
3.9%

Unidentified B/W Majolica 
30 
4 
6 

 

40 
10.3%

(Subtotal) 
50 
6 
6 
1 

63 
16.2% 
2.87%
Subtotal All Majolica 
257 
25 
7 
3 
3 
295 
76.0%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Other ceramics seventeenth-eighteenth century 

 

 

 

 

 

Guadalajara Polychrome 
1 
1 

 

 

2 
0.5%

Asian Porcelain 
3 
5 

 

 

8 
2.1%

Olive Jar 
53 
12 
3 

2 
70 
18.0%

(Subtotal) 
57 
18 
3 

2 
80 
20.6% 
3.64%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Utility ceramics sixteenth-nineteenth century 

 

 

 

 

 

Redware 
4 
4 

 

 

8 
2.1%

Lead glazed Redware 
33 

1 

 

34 
8.8% 

Lead glazed Coarse  
Earthenware 
2 

 

 

 

2 
0.5% 

(Subtotal) 
39 
4 
1 

 

44 
11.3% 
2.00%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

European ceramics eighteenth century

 

 

 

 

 

 

Agate ware 
4 

4 

 

8 
2.1%

Staffordshire Slipware 
8 
4 

 

 

19 
4.9%

Plain Faience 
2 

 

 

 

2 
0.5%

B/W Faience 
3 
2 

 

 

5 
1.3%

Polychrome Faience 
6 
2 

 

 

8 
2.1%

(Subtotal) 
23 
8 
4 

 

42 
10.8% 
1.91%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

37  
8SJ34 NOMBRE DE DIOS-LA LECHE SHRINE SITE
TABLE 3 Distribution of materials excavated in 1951 (Levels in inches below 1951 surface)

L-1  
0-6" 
L-2  
6"- 
12" 
L1-2  
0- 
12"
L-3  
12- 
18" 
PIT
SITE  
TOTAL
% Euro.  
ceramics
% all  
material
European ceramics post 1760

 

 

 

 

 

 

Annular Ware 
1 

 

 

 

1 
0.3%

Creamware 
12 

 

 

 

12 
3.1%

Pearlware, Hand painted 
7 

 

 

 

7 
1.8%

Pearlware, Transfer printed 
1 

 

 

 

1 
0.3%

Refined Earthenware, Hand  Painted 
4 

 

 

 

4 
1.0%

Whiteware 
2 

 

 

 

2 
0.5%

(Subtotal)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

27 

 

 

 

27 
7.0% 
1.23%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All European Ceramics 
303 
55 
15 
3 
5 
388 

17.68%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

NATIVE AMERICAN CERAMICS
 

 

 

% Native 
American  ceramics
% all 
material
St. Johns ware

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Plain 
73 
21 
3 
2 
5 
104

 

Stamped 
32 
13 

 

7 
52

 

(Subtotal) 
105 
34 
3 
2 
12 
156 
11.33% 
7.11%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

San Pedro wares

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cord marked 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

Plain 
3 

 

 

 

3 

 

Stamped 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

(Subtotal) 
5 

 

 

 

5 
0.36% 
0.23%
San Marcos/Altamaha Ware

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Incised, Puncate 
2 

 

 

 

2 

 

Check Stamped 
3 
3 

2 

8 

 

Complicated Stamped 
2 

 

 

 

2 

 

Plain 
138 
26 
14 

 

178
 

Punctate 
12 
3 

 

2 
17
 

Stamped 
233 
114 
14 
7 
29 
397
 

(Subtotal) 
390 
146 
28 
9 
31 
604 
43.86%

Shell Tempered San  
Marcos/Altamaha

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Check Stamped 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

Complicated Stamped 
2 

 

 

 

2 

 

Cord Marked 
4 

 

 

 

4 

 

Plain 
59 
27 
4 
1 

91

 

Stamped 
59 
27 

1 

87

 

(Subtotal) 
125 
54 
4 
2 

185 
13.44%

Subtotal All San  
Marcos/Altamaha 
515 
200 
32 
11 
31 
789 
57.30% 
35.95%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unclassified Wares

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sand tempered 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Plain 
176 
116 
6 
7 
8 
313

 

Check stamped 
22 
45 

 

1 
68

 

Complicated Stamped 
1 

1 

 

2 

 

Cord marked 
5 

 

 

 

5 

 

Incised 

 

 

 

2 
2 

 

"Stamped" 
2 

 

 

 

2 

 

 

 

38 
8SJ34 NOMBRE DE DIOS-LA LECHE SHRINE SITE
TABLE 3 Distribution of materials excavated in 1951 (Levels in inches below 1951 surface)

L-1  
0-6" 
L-2  
6"- 
12" 
L1-2  
0- 
12"
L-3  
12- 
18" 
PIT
SITE  
TOTAL
% Euro.  
ceramics
% all  
material
(Subtotal) 
206 
161 
7 
7 
11 
392 
28.47% 
17.86%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sand and shell tempered

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Plain 
18 
4 

 

 

20

 

Stamped 
2 
2 

 

 

4 

 

Cob marked 

2 

 

 

2 

 

(Subtotal) 
20 
8 

 

 

26 
1.89% 
1.18%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Other

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mission Red Filmed 
2 

 

 

 

2 

 

Orange Fiber Tempered 
2 
2 

1 

5 

 

(Subtotal) 
4 
2 

1 

7 
0.51% 
0.32%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All Native American Ceramics 
855 
405 
42 
21 
54 
1375 

62.64%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Glassware and Domestic Items

 

 

 

 

 

 

Glass, Amber 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

Glass, Clear 
24 
1 

 

4 
29

 

Glass, Dark Green 
92 
16 
3 

 

111

 

Glass, Light Green 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

Bone Handle 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

(Subtotal) 
119 
17 
3 

4 
143 

6.51%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Architectural Items

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wrought Spike 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

UID Nail 
64 
21 

 

 

85

 

Roof tile 
4 
1 

 

 

5 

 

Brick Fragment 
12 
1 
2 

 

15

 

Glazed Brick Fragment 

2 

 

 

2 

 

Mortar Fragment 
8 
1 
1 

 

10

 

Painted Plaster 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

Plaster 
3 

 

 

 

3 

 

(Subtotal) 
93 
26 

 

 

122 

5.56%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Arms: 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cannonball Fragment 

1 

 

 

1 

 

Gunflint 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

Gunspall 

1 

 

 

1 

 

Lead Shot 
4 

 

 

 

4 

 

(Subtotal) 
5 
2 

 

 

7 

0.32%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Personal and ornamental Items

 

 

 

 

 

Aglet? 
2 

 

 

 

2 

 

Bead, Blue Glass 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

Bead, Facetted Clear Glass 

 

1 

 

1 

 

Bead, Bone 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

Pendant, Brass 

1 

 

 

1 

 

"Ferric Cone" 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

Kaolin Pipe Bowl 

 

1 

 

1 

 

Kaolin Pipe Stem 
2 
2 

 

 

4 

 

(Subtotal) 
7 
3 
2 

 

12 

0.55%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

39 
8SJ34 NOMBRE DE DIOS-LA LECHE SHRINE SITE
TABLE 3 Distribution of materials excavated in 1951 (Levels in inches below 1951 surface)

L-1  
0-6" 
L-2  
6"- 
12" 
L1-2  
0- 
12"
L-3  
12- 
18" 
PIT
SITE  
TOTAL
% Euro.  
ceramics
% all  
material
Production Items

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lead fragment, facetted 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

Iron Object 
4 
1 

 

 

5 

 

Worked Bone 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

Copper Fragment 

1 

 

 

1 

 

Iron Fragment 
95 
25 
6 
1 

127

 

Lead Fragment 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

(Subtotal) 
102 
27 
6 
1 

136 

6.20%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

nineteenth-twentieth c. Items

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

U.S. Penny 
2 

 

 

 

2 

 

Bras Casing* 
3 

 

 

 

3 

 

Lead Bullet* 
4 

 

 

 

4 

 

Shell Button, 4-hole 
1 

 

 

 

1 

 

(Subtotal) 
10 

 

 

 

10 

0.46%

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TOTAL ARTIFACTS 
1494 
535 
71 
25 
63 
2195

 

 

 

 The composition of the artifact assemblage recovered by Spellman has unusual statistical  characteristics. Nearly nine percent of all the artifacts are Spanish or Mexican majolica, which is  more than four times the average for majolica in the Spanish home sites of eighteenth century St.  Augustine (see Deagan 1983). Native American ceramics comprised 62.7% of the total artifact  assemblage, which is much lower than the proportion of Native American ceramics in either  eighteenth century Spanish households, or in other contemporary mission communities around St.  Augustine (see for example, Waters 2009; White 2002). These figures imply that the structure was  occupied or used principally by Spaniards, and the obvious identification at the Nombre de Dios in  the early eighteenth century is the church and/or convento.  
 The current sample of excavated material suggests also that the structure may be an element of  the 1677 stone shrine church built by Governor de Hita y Salazar, or the post-1702 mission  rebuilding of that church after the destruction of the site by James Moore. Obviously, additional  excavation of the structure will be necessary to precisely determine its function and date of  construction (and particularly if the building were constructed over the site of the original late 
40  
seventeenth century La Leche Shrine). It seems very likely, however, that it was part of the Nombre  de Dios Mission and Shrine of Nuestra Señora de la Leche complex in the first decades of the  eighteenth century, that is, between the destruction of the buildings by Moore in 1702, and  subsequently again by the Spanish governor after the Palmer attack of 1728.   In the absence of an interpretive report or publication, Spellman’s excavations went largely  unheeded until the present decade, being reconstructed only through the recent location of the  excavation records in the Catholic Diocese of St. Augustine. The University of Florida survey and  excavations in 2009 and 2011 confirmed the location and size of the masonry building, and analysis  of that material is currently underway.  
1976 Survey  
 In 1976 The Florida State University Field School directed by Kathleen Deagan began a broad scale sub-surface survey of the St. Augustine environs in order to help define the locations of  colonial period (and particularly century) sites. The area of North City between the Castillo de San  Marcos and May Street, to the east of San Marcos Avenue, was tested on a 10-meter grid using a 4”  bit diameter power auger (Chaney 1986; Luccketti 1981; Herron 1990).  
 In 1976 Nicholas Luccketti excavated 404 auger holes on the property owned by the Catholic  Diocese, extending between Pine Street on the south, San Marcos Avenue on the west, the  waterfront on the east and Ocean Avenue on the north (Figure 15) (Luccketti 1981:45-46). Of the  287 tests on the property south of Hospital Creek, only seven (2.5%) yielded artifacts, and these  were non-clustered scatters near the southeastern corner of the property. Most of the area to the  south of Hospital Creek consisted principally of fill and dredge soil, typically to a depth deeper than  the auger bit (48 inches or 1.22 meters). 
41  
  

Figure15: Distribution of colonial-era artifacts from the 1976 auger survey (from Luccketti 1982). Numbers  indicate the total number of artifacts from each hole.  
 The portion of the Catholic Diocese property comprising 8SJ34 (that is, north and west of  Hospital Creek) was tested with 117 auger tests, 38 (32%) of which yielded artifacts. Most of these  were Native American San Marcos (75%) and St. Johns (12%) ceramics, but concentrations of  European artifacts (comprising 13% of the recovered material) were noted at the southern end of the  property, bordering on Hospital Creek (Figure 15). This was in approximately the area test by  Spellman in 1952, although the location of those excavations was unknown in 1976. An area of  shell midden was also identified in the extreme northeast corner of the property, in the vicinity of  the rustic altar.
42  
1985 Excavations  
 The Nombre de Dios-La Leche site was not investigated archaeologically again until 1985, when  University of Florida graduate student Ed Chaney tested three areas of the site. Remains of the  1565 encampment of Pedro Menéndez had recently been located on the grounds of the Fountain of  Youth Park (8SJ31), directly adjacent to the north of the Nombre de Dios-La Leche site (Chaney  1986; Deagan 2009). No evidence for a moat or defensive structure had been identified at 8SJ31,  however, and the presence of sixteenth century materials at Nombre de Dios-La Leche provoked  Chaney to excavate test units at the site to better understand the nature of the century occupation there. The discussion here is based on Chaney’s field notes and excavation records.   Three units were excavated during the summer of 1985. These were designated by the coordinates of the unit southwest corners. Chaney attempted to tie in his excavations to the existing  grid at the Fountain of Youth Park site (8SJ31). Subsequent excavations at 8SJ34 (after 1985) used  a grid established in relation to magnetic north (see discussion in Cusick 1993, Appendix A).  Chaney’s grid designations and cardinal orientation, therefore, do not correspond directly to those  used in other excavations.  
201N 418E 
 The southernmost unit, designated as 201N 418E, was placed about 30 meters (98.4 feet)  southwest of the southwest corner of the La Leche chapel, approximately at the 1993-2009 grid  point 215N 386E (see Figures 13, 16). This was a three meter by 1.5 meter unit, oriented north south, and was probably within the confines of the structure located by Spellman (although the  existence of that structure was unknown in 1985). Relatively few artifacts were recovered from this  unit, and all dated predominantly to the eighteenth century mission period. No sixteenth century or  precolumbian contexts were identified (Table 3). 
43  
  Figure 16: Approximate location of 1985 Unit 201N418E in relation to the 1951 excavations  The southern half of unit 201N 418E was dominated by a thick layer of concrete over concrete  
rubble (Feature 1). This overlaid Feature 2, a band of unfinished concrete that was thought to be  related as a foundation to Feature 1. Feature 2 contained a cut nail (post-1850), assigning a date for  both features of the late nineteenth or early twentieth century. Chaney did a series of soil probes,  and posited that these features were related to a no-longer-extant paved pathway extending from  the west side of the La Leche chapel to the south and east.  
 The northern half of the excavation unit contained several deep postmolds that may be related  to the structure uncovered by Spellman (Figure 17). However, additional field testing to precisely  locate the Spellman units in relation to Chaney’s excavation will be needed in order to explore this possible relationship.  
 The artifact assemblage recovered from Chaney’s southern unit (Table 4) is very similar to that  recovered from the 1951 Spellman excavations, in that it has a high proportion of European pottery  in relation to the amount of Native American pottery, and the artifacts themselves date  predominantly from the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. Based on presently  available evidence it appears to have been part of the same occupation and possibly the same 
44  
structure as that uncovered during the 1951 excavations. If so, the paucity of artifacts and other  remains suggests that the 1985 excavation unit may have been inside the structure. 
8SJ34 Nombre de Dios-La Leche Shrine site 
TABLE 4- 201N 418E Artifacts by Provenience (1985 excavation)
(5 centimeter  
levels within  
zones)
Z1L 
1 
Z1 
L2
Z2 
L1
Z2 
L2
Z2 
L3
Z2 
L4
Z2 
L5
A1  
L1- 
4 
A 
3L 
2 
F2 
L1
TO 
T 
Prop.  
tot
EUROPEAN 
TRADITION  
CERAMICS
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Majolica
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Puebla Blue on 
White
 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Puebla Polychrome 

1 
1 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

3 

San Agustin Blue on White
 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

San Luis Polychrome 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Unidentified 
Polychrome
 

1 

1 
1 

 

 

 

3 

Unclassified White 

 

1 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

2 

Subtotal
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

11 
0.04
Other Tablewares
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Plain Delftware 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Asian Porcelain 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Creamware
 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Subtotal
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3 
0.01
Utility Pottery
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Olive Jar
 

1 

1 
2 

1 

 

5 

Lead Glazed Coarse Earthenware
 

1 

1 

 

 

 

 

2 

Unidentified Coarse Earthenware 

 

 

6 
4 

 

 

 

 

10

Subtotal
 
2 
6 
12 
7 
3 

1 

 

31 
0.11
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

NATIVE 
AMERICAN  
CERAMICS
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

St. Johns Plain
 

3 
1 

 

 

1 

 

5 

St. Johns Check 
Stamped 

 

2 
2 

 

 

2 

 

6 

San Marcos Plain
 
2 
1 
1 
1 

 

1 

 

6 

San Marcos Stamped
 

1 
4 
3 
1 
1 
1 

 

11

Unclassified Grit 
tempered Plain
 

2 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 

Unclassified Sand Tempered Plain
 

 

1 
1 

 

1 

 

3 

Unclassified 
Sand/Grit Tempered  Plain
 

1 
1 
3 

 

2 

 

7 

Unclassified Sand Temp. Red Filmed
 

 

1 

 

 

1 

 

2 

 

 

45  
8SJ34 Nombre de Dios-La Leche Shrine site 
TABLE 4- 201N 418E Artifacts by Provenience (1985 excavation)
(5 centimeter  
levels within  
zones)
Z1L 
1 
Z1 
L2
Z2 
L1
Z2 
L2
Z2 
L3
Z2 
L4
Z2 
L5
A1  
L1- 
4 
A 
3L 
2 
F2 
L1
TO 
T 
Prop.  
tot
Unclassified San 
Tempered Stamped
 

 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

1 

Unclassified Shell Tempered Plain 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Subtotal
 
2 
10 
12 
8 
2 
1 
9 

 

44 
0.15
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

GLASS
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Clear
 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Dark Green
 

 

3 

 

 

 

 

 

3 

Clear Flat 

 

3 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

4 

Green
 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

1 

Unidentifiable
 
1 
6 
7 

 

 

 

 

1 
15

Yellow 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Subtotal
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

25 
0.09
ARCHITECTURAL ITEMS 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Square nail
 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Nail
 

3 

1 

 

 

 

2 
6 

Wire Nail 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 
2 

Nut 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Subtotal
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

10 
0.03
TOOLS
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stone Biface 

 

 

1 
1 

 

 

 

 

2 

Shell
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3 
0.01
TOTAL 
ARTIFACTS 
1 
10 
45 
61 
33 
10 
2 
9 
1 
5 
289 
1.00
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Iron fragments 

1 
4 
9 
2 

1 

 

11 
28

 

 

46  

Figure 17: Postmolds at base of unit 201N418E (tabby /plaster floor feature is in lower left corner of unit). 
Unit 325N 408E  
  
Chaney’s northernmost 1985 excavation unit, 325N 408E, was on the north side of Ocean Avenue  near the southern edge of the dirt lot presently used for parking. Chaney found that the soil in this  unit consisted principally of relatively recent (late nineteenth or early twentieth century) fill dirt  extending down to sterile sand (designated as Zone 1 levels 1-5 and Zone 2 level 1). There was  some suggestion that the area may have been graded prior to filling, but other than a very few Native American and Spanish sherds mixed in the fill layer, there was no indication of colonial  period activity in this unit.
47  
Unit 287N 440E 
 Chaney placed this 1.5 by three meter unit in the northwestern corner of 8SJ34, on the sloping  ground just southeast of the rustic altar. The upper 10 centimeters of soil were largely modern  humus and eroded slope soil. Below this was a shell midden, designated by Chaney as Zone 3. The  upper 15 centimeters of the midden covered the entire unit. However below that level, the midden  occurred in only the south half of the unit, while sterile soil appeared in the northern half. At that  point it was recognized that the southern “midden” deposit was actually part of a large feature, and  upon excavation this was revealed to have been part of a wide ditch or moat. The field designations  for the fill from the ditch include Zone 3, levels 3-13.  

Figure 18: 287N 440E (1985) Top of ditch and wall trench (upper) and near base of ditch and wall trench (lower)
48  
 A narrow trench (Feature 3) was encountered running east to west across the unit, parallel to  the edge of the ditch (Figure 18). It appeared at 20 centimeters below the top of the ditch, as  initially recognized. The trench varied from 20-25 centimeters in width, and was 25 centimeters  deep. Two postmolds were found at its base. This feature is assumed to have been associated with  the ditch, possibly supporting a wall or palisade.  
 Materials recovered from the ditch feature indicated that it was filled in during the sixteenth  century (Table 5). The feature’s fill included a facetted Chevron bead, typical of the mid- century,  as well as a copper star thought to have been part of a flagellant’s lash. The proportion of St. Johns  pottery, associated with the local Timucua people, was more than three times greater than that of  San Marcos pottery in the ditch fill, also indicating a date early in the Spanish occupation period  (see Deagan 2009b; Waters 2009).  
 As the feature was further investigated over subsequent field seasons (1994 and 1997) however,  other segments of what is assumed to be the same ditch or trench had fill episodes dating to the later  or perhaps even the seventeenth century. These investigations are discussed below.  
TABLE 5 8SJ34 Materials excavated in Unit 287N 442E (1985)
 
Z1L1 
Z2L1 
Z3L1 
Z3L2
Area 
1 
F3 
PPM1 
PPM3 
DITCH 
TOTAL
European Ceramics
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Seville B/B
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
1 
Unidentified Morisco  Ware
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
1 
Unidentified B/B Majolica
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 
2 
Olive Jar
 
1 
3 
1 

 

 

 

6 
11
Glazed Olive Jar
 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Redware
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 
2 
Unglazed Coarse  
Earthenware 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
2 
Late Painted Pearlware
 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Subtotal: 
1 
1 
5 
1 

 

 

 

13 
21
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Indigenous Ceramics
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

St. Johns Plain
 
2 
22 
18 
1 
2 
1 

82 
129
St. Johns Check Stamped 
2 
10 
25 
17 
2 
1 

 

46 
104
Subtotal: 
2 
12 
47 
35 
3 
3 
1 

128 
233

 

49  
TABLE 5 8SJ34 Materials excavated in Unit 287N 442E (1985)
 
Z1L1 
Z2L1 
Z3L1 
Z3L2
Area 
1 
F3 
PPM1 
PPM3 
DITCH 
TOTAL
San Marcos/Altamaha 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Plain 
2 
3 
10 
23 

2 

 

9 
50
Stamped 
1 
4 
7 
2 

 

 

1 
10 
25
Subtotal: 
3 
7 
17 
25
 
2 

1 
19 
75
San Pedro Grog  
Tempered
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stamped
 

12 
2 

 

 

 

2 
16
Plain
 

 

1 

 

 

 

1 
2 
Grog/Sand tempered Plain 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 
2 
Grog/Sand tempered  
Stamped
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 
2 
Subtotal: 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unclassified Wares
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sand and Grit Tempered  Plain
 

 

 

 

1 

 

6 
7 
Sand Tempered Incised
 

 

4 

 

 

 

 

4 
Sand Tempered Plain 
4 
1 

10 

4 

 

29 
48
Sand Tempered Red  
Filmed
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
1 
Sand Tempered Stamped
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 
2 
Lamar-like Incised
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
1 
Subtotal: 

1 

14 

5 

 

39 
63
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TOTAL Indigenous  
ceramics: 
9 
20 
76 
77 
3 
10 
1 
1 
193 
393
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nonceramic Artifacts
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Glass

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Clear 
4 
1 
6 

 

 

 

 

1 
12
Clear Flat
 
15 
29 
1 

 

 

 

 

45
Light Green 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Fasteners
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hook 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Unidentified Nail Frag.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
1 
Wire Nail 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Wrought Spike
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
1 
Personal Items
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chevron Bead 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
1 
U.S. Coin 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Pipestem
 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Copper Star 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Tools 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stone Biface Tool 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Shell Tool
 

1 

 

 

 

 

6 
7 
Misc. Materials
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Chert debitage
 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

 

50  
TABLE 5 8SJ34 Materials excavated in Unit 287N 442E (1985) 
 
Z1L1 
Z2L1 
Z3L1 
Z3L2
Area 
1 
F3 
PPM1 
PPM3 
DITCH 
TOTAL
Iron Fragment 

1 
13 
6 

 

 

 

5 
25
Lead Fragment
 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Plastic Fragment 
2 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 
Subtotal Nonceramic  
Artifacts: 
10 
19 
51 
7 

 

 

 

16 
102
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TOTAL ARTIFACTS 
45 
100 
328 
244 
9 
30 
3 
3 
630 
1403

 

 
1994 Electromagnetic and subsurface survey 
 In order to try and investigate the area between the presumed campsite and the sixteenth century  features at the Nombre de Dios site, a systematic, sub-surface posthole test program, and an  electromagnetic conductivity survey were undertaken in an approximately 1,000 square-meter of  the Church’s property adjacent to the north side of Ocean Avenue (Curtis 1998).  
Figure 19: Location of 1997 electromagnetic and posthole survey 
A small creek marks the northern boundary of the survey area (and the southern boundary of the Fountain of Youth Park site), the paved city street of Ocean Avenue marks the southern boundary 
51  
of the survey area; the water of Hospital Creek forms the eastern boundary and a Church-owned  building delimits the west side of the area. The eastern (shoreline) edge of the property has been  impacted both by dredging for the boat basin, and the construction of storm drainage facilities,  while the southern edge has been largely destroyed by the construction of Ocean Avenue. The  western side of the survey area was previously occupied by a large house, demolished sometime after 1943 (this can be seen in the 1943 photo, Figure 10). Grid coordinates for the survey corners  are: SW: 321N398E; NW:394N398E; NE: 394N434E; SE:321N434E. Forty eight postholes were  excavated at 5 meter intervals, to a depth that encountered standing water (averaging 91.8  centimeters below ground surface).  
 Nineteenth and twentieth century artifacts – pottery, wire nails, glass, brick, concrete etc. - were  abundant throughout the survey area (Curtis 1998). Despite the large amounts of these modern  materials, the survey nevertheless showed that nearly all of the survey area contained evidence for  a Mission Period (1587-1763) and possibly earlier Native American occupation. Of the 128  indigenous ceramic sherds recovered, 68 (54%) were St. Johns pottery, 21(17%) were San Marcos  pottery, and 29 (31%) of unclassified sherds. These proportions are very similar to those recovered  at 8SJ31 to the south of Ocean Avenue, and are consistent with the mission period Native village  occupation (ca. 1587-1763) of Nombre de Dios.  
 A single sherd of Puebla tradition majolica and eight sherds of Spanish utilitarian earthenwares  comprise the only European colonial-period ceramics. These results additionally suggest that  properties of both the Nombre de Dios-La Leche Shrine site (8SJ34) and the Fountain of Youth  Park site(8SJ31) were indeed part of a spatial (and probably cultural) continuum during the  sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.  
 The materials were most densely concentrated at the eastern side of the survey area, adjacent to the waterfront. The depth of sterile soil ranged from about 30-40 centimeters along the edge of 
52  
Ocean Avenue, to greater than one meter in the northeastern quadrant of the survey area. That  quadrant is bounded on one side by the dredged boat basin, and on the other by a tidally-inundated  stream . Although the deposit depths may correspond more to the accumulation of materials and  marsh mud at the water's edge than to intensity of occupation, it is worth noting that it is contiguous  with the distribution of mission period village remains documented to the north at the Fountain of  Youth Park (see Deagan 2009a: 99, Figures 5.2-5.54).  
 The electromagnetic conductivity survey carried out in the same survey area revealed a linear  discontinuity of about 4.5 meters in width extending northward from the north edge of Ocean  Avenue for 15 meters. It forms a boundary between the west side of the survey area, which exhibits  very low conductivity, and the east side, which has dramatically higher conductivity properties.  The conductivity patterns are clearly related to the wet and high saline soil conditions adjacent to  the shorelines, as well as to the former presence of a building on the property, which was demolished after 1943 (this can be seen on the photograph shown in Figure 10). The linear  electromagnetic anomaly is nevertheless provocative, and merits further archaeological attention.  
1993-2001 Excavations  
 It was not until 1993 that Chaney’s discovery of a moat-like feature at 8SJ34 was re investigated. In that year, James Cusick and the University of Florida’s Institute for Early Contact  Period Studies returned to the site to uncover more of the ditch feature, and assess its significance.  Subsequent excavations by the University of Florida field schools in 1994, 1997 and 2001 built  upon and expanded the discoveries made in 1985 and 1993. The controls and protocols for  excavation, sampling and recording were the same for all of the work done between 1993 and 2009,  and documentation of these is included in this report as Appendix A. Details of those excavations  are reported in Cusick (1993) Morris (1995) and Waters (1998) and will be summarized here. 
53  
 Elevations for all excavations were tied into the same reference points (manhole covers in  Ocean Avenue, as well as the base of the rustic altar). Throughout this report, elevations have all  been converted to meters below datum in reference to the 2009 datum plane (referred to as ambd, adjusted meters below datum). The reference point for that datum plane was the westernmost square manhole cover in the cluster of 4 manholes at the eastern end of Ocean Avenue. This was 3.21  meters below the 2009 datum plane. That manhole is 6.27 feet (2.3 meters) above mean sea level.  Therefore all elevations in this report can be converted to meters above mean sea level by adding  2.3 meters.  
 Figure 20 shows the locations of all excavations and major features documented between 1985  and 2009. The most significant of these for understanding the site are the ditch or moat feature; a  series of shallow linear trenches, large (50 centimeters or more in diameter) post stains suggesting a  structure, and a lime kiln. Small postmolds were common throughout the excavations but rarely  revealed regular architectural patterns. Very few trash pit or fire pits were located in these  excavations, suggesting a low incidence of domestic occupation.  
Table 6 8SJ34 datum plane information: Meters above reference points 
Year 
NE corner  lowest tier  of altar  
bricks
SE corner:  lowest tier 
of altar  
bricks
NE corner 
highest tier  of altar  
bricks
SE corner: 
highest tier  of altar  
bricks
Westmost  
manhole,  
east end of  
Ocean Ave
Manhole in  front of 
main gate to  grounds
Oak  
Tree  
PVC  
marker
Convert  
to 2009  
datum  
plane

 

1985 

 

 

1.40 
2.96 
2.34 

+35 
1993 
1.30 

 

 

2.82 
2.48 
1.76 
+39 
1994 

1.25 

 

2.77 
2.76 
1.70 
+44 
1997 
1.76 

 

 

3.03 

1.52 
+28 
2001 
1.65 

 

 

2.92 

 

+29 
2009 
1.96 
1.91 
1.70 
1.74 
3.25 

 

0 
2011 
1.74 

 

 

 

 

 

+22

 

The Ditch/Moat  
 Cusick’s 1993 excavations relocated the ditch-like feature first found in the 1985 excavation by  Chaney. A five meter by five meter unit (281N 436E) exposed the entire width of the suspected  moat feature (designated as Feature 4), providing a complete cross section (Figure 21). This 
54  
revealed that it was, in fact a moat-like ditch. The top of the ditch appeared at 1.85/ 2.24 ambd, or  about 40 centimeters below the 1985 ground surface. At the 436E grid line the ditch itself measured  four meters wide and had a depth of 80 centimeters (base 2.64 ambd) . At the 441 E grid line five  meters to the east, Feature 4 was 4.5 meters wide, and it’s had a maximum depth of one meter, with  its base 20 centimeters lower at 2.84 ambd than to the west. This suggests that the ditch became wider and deeper as it sloped toward the water to the east (Figure 22). It is also possible that the  shallower depth (below ground surface) at the western end of the feature could also have been  caused by soil erosion impacting the upper levels of the ditch fill.  
 Investigation of the moat/ditch feature was continued and expanded in the 1994 and 1997 field  seasons. That work revealed that the eastern end of the ditch has been cut off by modern dredge  and filling activity. From its presently existing eastern end, the feature extends approximately 38  meters (124.6 feet) to the west, extending WNW along an orientation of 70 degrees west of grid  north. At that point, the ditch ended abruptly at approximately grid line 413E, with no evident turn  either toward the north or the south. Excavations and shovel testing to the west, north and south of  the ditch terminus indicated that the feature in fact consists only of this single 38 meter-long  segment (Waters 1998:26). The ditch at this end was encountered at approximately 50 centimeters  below the 1997 ground surface, at an elevation of 2.22 ambd. (1.94) Base: 2.80).The western end of  the ditch had a wedge-shaped terminus, narrowing to approximately two meters in width over its  westernmost 80 centimeters. East of this point, the ditch was four meters wide and 70 centimeters  deep.  
 Table 7 shows the contents of the ditch feature’s fill (dating its abandonment). The latest  dating items, and the only ones that date to the seventeenth or eighteenth centuries, are a sherd of  English Delftware (from Area 4, Level 1) and a kaolin pipebowl fragment (Feature 4, level 3). The 
55  
pipe fragment was associated with the excavation of a modern (ca. 1976) auger test that intruded  into the feature, and was thought to be the result of this later disturbance (Cusick 1993:25).  Figure 20. Locations of major features excavated at 8SJ34, 1985-2009
56  
  
Key: Provenience Soil description 
A Topsoil/Z1 L1 Removed 
B Z1L2 and F4 top 10YR 3/2 with broken and whole oyster shell  C F4 fill 10YR 3/3 with broken shell and shell flecking  D F4 fill 10YR 3/3 with charcoal and shell flecking  G Erosional zone , base of F4 10YR 4/4 with very light shell flecking  I Tan-gold sterile sand 10YR 6/6  
X Trench for sprinkler pipe 
Y 1976 Auger test (10YR 7.5, 3.2)  
Z 1938 Excavation unit Tan, black, gold striated fill 

 

Figure 21. Cross section of the Feature 4 moat/ditch (Cusick 1993) 
 Other than the Delftware from Level 1, all of the European ceramics found in the ditch feature  have lifespans (periods of production) dating from the mid-sixteenth to the early seventeenth 
57  
century. Native American ceramics suggest a late or early seventeenth date for the ditch filling,  both in the proportions of San Marcos to the local St. Johns pottery (see Deagan 2009b) and the  presence of Mission Red Filmed and Jefferson Ware ceramics, which are both thought to date to the  early seventeenth century in St. Augustine (Waters 2009; Worth 2009). Given these data, it appears  likely that the ditch/moat feature was abandoned and filled by the early years of the seventeenth  century, and could have been constructed any time between 1565 and then. 
TABLE 7 8SJ34 Nombre de Dios Mission-La Leche Shrine Site
Excavated materials from the Ditch/Moat Feature
Unit
287
/442
286/
440
281/
436
281/
436
277/
411
277/ 
411
277/
411
277/
411
277
/419

Provenience 
Z3
A4
L1 
F4
A5
L1 
F22B 
F22 
F22N
A2
L1 
A3
L1 
Total 
Prop.
TOT
European Tradition Ceramics

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Columbia Plain 

 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

1 

Seville B/B 
1 

9 
1 

 

 

 

1 
12

Seville White 

 

2 

 

 

 

 

 

2 

Unidentified 
Morisco Ware 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Unidentified 
B/B Majolica 
2 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 

Unidentified 
Majolica 

 

2 

 

 

 

 

 

2 

Subtotal 
Majolica 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

20 
0.02

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Olive Jar, 
Middle Style 
6 
1 
6 

 

1 

 

 

14

Glazed Olive 
Jar 

 

5 

 

 

 

 

 

5 

Redware 
2 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 

Unglazed 
Coarse  
Earthenware 
1 

9 

 

3 

 

4 
17

Subtotal 
Earthenware 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

38 
0.03

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Delftware, 
Plain 

2 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 

Chinese 
Porcelain 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Subtot. Non 
Spanish 

3 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3 
0.00

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Indigenous 
Ceramics

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Deptford 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Orange Fiber 
Tempered  
Plain 

 

2 

 

 

 

 

 

2 

 

 

58  
TABLE 7 8SJ34 Nombre de Dios Mission-La Leche Shrine Site
Excavated materials from the Ditch/Moat Feature
Unit
287
/442
286/
440
281/
436
281/
436
277/
411
277/ 
411
277/
411
277/
411
277
/419

Provenience 
Z3
A4
L1 
F4
A5
L1 
F22B 
F22 
F22N
A2
L1 
A3
L1 
Total 
Prop.
TOT

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

St. Johns Plain 

6 
172 
2 
8 
12 
3 
1 
16 
220

St. Johns 
Check Stamped 
46 
3 
212 
11 
8 
13 
3 

 

296

Subtotal St. 
Johns 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

516 
0.43

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

San Marcos/
Altamaha Plain 
9 
4 
47 
3 
15 
11 
10 
1 
2 
102

San Marcos/
Altamaha  
Stamped 
10 

102 
5 
10 
15 
16 

13 
171

San Marcos/
Altamaha  
Incised 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
7 

10

Subtotal San 
Marcos 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

283 
0.23

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

San Pedro 
Grog  
Tempered  
Plain 
2 

11 
1 
4 
2 
1 

 

21

San Pedro 
Grog  
Tempered  
Stamped 
2 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 

Subtotal San 
Pedro: 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

24 
0.02

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jefferson Ware Stamped 

 

 

 

 

1 
1 

 

2 

Lamar-like 
Incised 
1 

 

 

 

 

2 

 

3 

Mission Red 
Filmed 

 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

1 

Colonoware 

 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

1 

Subtotal "Mission wares" 

 

 

 

 

 

 

7 
0.01

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unclassified Indigenous Ceramics

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sand Tempered Plain 
29 
1 
10 

5 
12 
2 
3 

62

Sand Tempered Stamped 
2 

 

 

3 
4 

 

 

9 

Sand Tempered Red Filmed 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Grog/Sand 
tempered Plain 
2 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 

Grog/Sand 
tempered  
Stamped 
1 

3 
1 

 

 

 

 

5 

Grit Tempered Plain 
6 

 

 

10 
6 

1 

23

Grit Tempered Stamped 

 

17 

2 
6 

 

 

25

 

 

59 
TABLE 7 8SJ34 Nombre de Dios Mission-La Leche Shrine Site
Excavated materials from the Ditch/Moat Feature
Unit
287
/442
286/
440
281/
436
281/
436
277/
411
277/ 
411
277/
411
277/
411
277
/419

Provenience 
Z3
A4
L1 
F4
A5
L1 
F22B 
F22 
F22N
A2
L1 
A3
L1 
Total 
Prop.
TOT
Grit/Sand 
Tempered  
Plain 

 

26 

 

 

 

 

 

26

Eroded 
Decorated 

 

17 

 

 

 

 

 

17

Subtotal Unclassified 
Indigenous Ceramics 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

0.13

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

SUBTOTAL INDIGENOUS 
CERAMICS 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

0.81

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Non Ceramic Materials

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shell Tool 
6 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

6 

Bead. Bone 

 

 

 

 

1 

1 

3 

Clear Glass 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Unidentified 
Nail Frag. 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Wrought Nail 

 

2 

1 
1 

 

 

4 

Wrought Spike 
1 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

2 

Musketball 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Lead Shot 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Bead, Ceramic 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
1 

Bead, Chevron Bead 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Bead, Glass 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Copper Star 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Kaolin 
Pipebowl 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Corroded Iron Object 

 

1 

 

2 

2 

5 

Iron Fragment 
5 
5 
13 

2 

 

 

 

25

Subtotal Non 
Ceramic 
16 
6 
20 

3 
4 

3 
1 
53 
0.05

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TOTAL 
ARTIFACTS 
221 
24 
674 
24 
72 
90 
45 
13 
44 
1207

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Indigenous 
ceramics< 1  
cm. 

8 

 

32 
32 

 

5 
16

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Weighed 
Substances 
287/442 
286/440 
281/436 
281/436 
277/411 
277/411 
277/411

 

 

(in grams)
Z3, 
287N
A4L1 
620 
F4
A5L1 
533 
F22B 
F22 
F22N 
A2L1 
A3 
A2L4

Construction

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Brick 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

0.8 

 

"Cement" 

 

 

 

10.1

 

 

 

 

 

Coquina 
6.5 
45 

 

197.8 
121.9 
401.6 
117 

 

 

Mortared 
Coquina 

 

 

 

 

 

 

260

 

 

 

 

60 
TABLE 7 8SJ34 Nombre de Dios Mission-La Leche Shrine Site
Excavated materials from the Ditch/Moat Feature
Unit
287
/442
286/
440
281/
436
281/
436
277/
411
277/ 
411
277/
411
277/
411
277
/419

Provenience 
Z3
A4
L1 
F4
A5
L1 
F22B 
F22 
F22N
A2
L1 
A3
L1 
Total 
Prop.
TOT
Daub 
7.4 
5.4 
20

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mortared 
Coquina 
5.1 

 

 

7.8 
20.9 
89.6 
250 
15.9 

 

Tabby 

 

30

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Subsistence

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Faunal bone 
90.5 
15.7 

 

63.1 
50.6 
53.6 
17.1 
166.1 
0.4 

Marine Shell 
124050 
7540 
23 

42400 
48750 
30850 
6950 
58800 
1650

Charcoal 
5.7 
0.2 

 

48 
28.1 
43.2 
14.4 
14.8 
0.2 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Misc.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unfired Clay 

5 
3 

 

 

0.4

 

 

 

Concretion 
57.3 

73 
1 
11

 

 

 

 

Rock 

 

3.5

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wall trenches associated with the ditch/moat  
 Although the dating of the ditch is fairly straightforward, determining its function is not. As  discussed above, the 1997 excavations (Waters 1998) revealed that it consists of a single, straight  segment of ditch, and apparently did not surround anything. Much effort has been devoted to  determining what the ditch defended if, in fact, it was a defensive entrenchment.   Evidence for narrow wall footing trenches with impressions of shallow posts in their bases  were found along the north side of the ditch in 1985 (Unit 285N 438E, Feature 3, top (2.56 ambd);  1993 (Unit 286N 436.5E Feature 6, top 2.13 ambd ) and 1994 (Unit 286N440E, Area 3. top 2.57  ambd). The trenches were consistently shallow, measuring between 25 and 30 centimeters wide,  and were between 20 and 25 centimeters deep. They did not become visibly evident until the  overlying shell midden was removed.  
 The trenches initially suggested that there may have been a wood wall or palisade along the  north side of the ditch, implying that the fort, or other focus of defense, was also to the north.  However their orientation is different from that of the ditch itself. Rather than the NE-SW  alignment of the ditch, the narrow trenches are oriented from east to west, and do not follow the 
61  
northern edge of the ditch. This may have been owing to hasty construction, or possibly to two  separate construction periods for the moat and the wall trench segments. 
 Very little cultural material – artifacts, faunal bone or shell refuse- was present in the fill of these  linear features (Table 8). This suggests that they were in use during a very early period of site  occupation, prior to the major deposits. Other than a single fragment of clear glass recovered from  Feature 23, only indigenous ceramics were found in the trenches.  
  
 
8SJ34 Nombre de Dios-La Leche site

Table 8. Materials in wall trench features associated with the  Moat/Ditch

 

West end of Moat 

North side of Moat 

 

277N  
441E
277N  
411E
277N  
411E 

286N 
440E
287N 
442E
286N 
436E 

 

A 4 
A5L 
F23 

A3 
F3 
F6

Clear Glass
 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

San Pedro Plain 
1 

2 

 

 

 

 

St. Johns Incised 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

St. Johns Plain
 
2 
6 

1 
2 
1

St. Johns Stamped 

1 
4 

2 
1 
17
 
San Marcos Chk.  
Stamp.
 

 

 

1

 

 

San Marcos Plain 

 

4 

 

2 
10
 
San Marcos Stamped
 

2 

 

 

15

Subtotal
 2 
3 
6 

1 
2 
25

Unclassified Indigenous Wares 

 

 

 

 

 

Grit Tempered Plain
 

 

 

 

 

2

Grog/Grit Tempered 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

Sand/Grit Tempered  Plain
 

3 

 

1 
9

Sand Tempered  
Decorated 
2 

1 

 

 

6 

Sand Tempered Plain 
3 

14 

 

4 
22

Unidentifiable 

15 

 

 

 

16
 
Subtotal Unclassified 
5 
15 
18

 
5 
34
 
All Artifacts 
6 
18 
37 

 

10 
77

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Indigenous sherds < 1  centimeters. 
3 
19 
22 

2

 

 

 

 

62  
 A series of north-south extending, narrow, linear trench segments was also uncovered  immediately to the west of the ditch’s western terminus at the 412.5E grid line (Figure 23).  oriented wooden wall sill trench. This was designated as Feature 23 (2.33 ambd) (Figure 23), and is  interpreted as a north-south extending wall trench. The stains were about 25 centimeters wide and  20 to 25 centimeters deep, and were aligned north to south. The wall trench segments represented  by Feature 23 continue for an unknown distance (but no farther than 10 meters) to the north.  Excavations in 2001 revealed that the Feature 23 trench does not extend as far northward as the 292  north line, which is 11 meters north of the documented north end of the wall feature. Test units  placed between these points were badly disturbed by modern graves, tree roots and irrigation pipes,  and could not provide reliable evidence for the northern extension or terminus of the Feature 23  wall. The alignment of the Feature 23 wall trench does not conform to the NE-SW alignment of  the moat/ditch itself. Like the trenches along the north side of the ditch, the Feature 23 wall is  oriented along cardinal directions rather than the roughly 70 degrees west of north orientation of the  ditch. This supports the possibility that the ditch and the wall trenches may have been constructed  at different times.
63  

Figure 23: Western terminus of Feature 4/21 moat or ditch. Top: plan view with associated features.(facing  north). Bottom: Photo of moat end facing south
64  
Other Wall Trenches  
 Waters’ excavations in 2001 (Unit 272N 412E) located a north-south extending linear feature to  the south of the ditch on the same east line as Feature 23 (Figures 23-24).  

Figure 24 Area 4 linear trench stains in cross section, Unit 272N 412E. Top: North profile, Bottom: South profile  
This was designated as Area 4. Although it extended across the unit in two separate segments, it  was thought to represent a southern extension of the Feature 23 wall trench. Area 4 also had a  similar configuration to that of Feature 23. It was 25 centimeters wide, and about 25 centimeters  
deep). It intruded through the lowest level of midden deposit, and contained only charcoal and  faunal bone (Table 9). Both the stratigraphic position and fill contents indicate a prehistoric or very  early historic deposition date. If the linear trenches in 272N 412E , in fact, associated with Feature 
65  
23, it would indicate a wall extending at least 14 meters north –south, at the western end of the  ditch/moat.  
 Area 4 was discontinuous across the square, suggesting that if it were a trench associated with  the Feature 23 wall, such a wall would also have been discontinuous. It is possible that only  sections of wall were placed on sleeper sills, with fascines, earth or other impermanent construction  between. 
8SJ34 Nombre de Dios Mission and La Leche Shrine.  
Table 9 Unit 272N 412E excavated materials 
 
Z2 
Area1
Area 
2 
Zone 
3 
Fea. 
29
Area 
3 
Area 
4 
Area5
PM 
3 
PM 
5 
TOTAL
Top elevation 
1.42 
1.52 
1.55 
1.62 
1.62 
1.69 
1.7 
1.9 
1.69 
1.69
 
Puebla Blue on White Majolica 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Olive Jar 
3 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3 
Glazed Olive Jar 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

St. Johns Plain 
11 
8 
5 
2 
22
 

 

 

 

48
St. Johns Check Stamped 
7 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
9 
San Marcos Plain 
8 

4 

1 

 

 

1 

14
San Marcos Stamped 
11 
2 
5 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

19
San Pedro Grog 
Tempered 
5 
5 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

10
Mission Red Filmed 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Grog/Grit Tempered 
Plain 

 

3 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3 
Grit/Shell Tempered 
Plain 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Sand and Grit Tempered Stamped 
4 
4 
4 

 

 

 

 

 

 

12
Sand and Grit Tempered Plain 
14 
3 
1 

1 

 

 

 

 

19
Sand Tempered Stamped 

 

3 

1 

 

 

 

 

4 
Sand Tempered Plain
 
6 
4 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

11
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shell Tool 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Indeterminate Iron Nail Fragment 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Total Artifacts 
69 
29 
29 
4 
25
 

 

1 
1 
158
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Weighed Substances (in  grams)
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Indigenous sherds < 1 cm. 
100 
63 
30 
6 
10
 

 

 

 

 

Iron Fragment 
0.3 
1.2 
0.5
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Brick 
15.8
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Coquina 
41
 
0.7
 

 

 

 

 

16.5
 
Mortar 
6.7 

2.1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

66  
8SJ34 Nombre de Dios Mission and La Leche Shrine.  
Table 9 Unit 272N 412E excavated materials 
 
Z2 
Area1
Area 
2 
Zone 
3 
Fea. 
29
Area 
3 
Area 
4 
Area5
PM 
3 
PM 
5 
TOTAL
Faunal Bone 
19.9 
52.4 
34 
13.2 
91 
5.4 
13.6 

 

 

 

Charcoal 
3.4 
9.3 
1.7 
78.1 
4.8
 
2.2 
59.6
 

 

Rock 

26.3 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Marine shell 
35700 
33150 
11650 
2575 
36300 
1100 
5847 
25
 

 

 

 

 The 2001 excavations carried out by Waters also included a 12-meter long east-west oriented  test trench, extending from 412E to 424E to the north of the moat/ditch feature (Figure 25). The  trench was one meter north to south, extending across the unit from 292N to 293N. Five shallow,  parallel linear stain features were located in the trench, all appearing at approximately 2.20 – 2.24  ambd, at the base of the Zone 2 midden deposit, and intruding into sterile soil. Their shapes and  locations suggest that they were construction-related, possibly log sill sleepers to support a wall or  earthwork.  
 Like the other linear wall trenches located at the site, these were also oriented directly north to  south. They were distinguished by their soil fill, which was a medium to light brown sandy loam  with a small amount of crushed shell. They were spaced somewhat irregularly, With the distance  between their centers (west to east) at 2.2; 2.8; 2.4and 2.8 meters. These linear features varied in  depth from 20 to 30 centimeters, and also varied in width from 30 to 50 centimeters. Only one of  these (Area 3 in Section 4) showed evidence for a post in its base.  
 Although this series of parallel trenches shared a similar orientation and physical configuration  with Feature 23, none of them lined up directly with that feature, or appeared to represent an  extension of the Feature 23 wall trench. They appear to be remnants of a different but possibly  related construction.
67  

 

 

Figure 25 Linear stains/wall sleepers in Trench 292N 408E Top: Plan view.  
Bottom: North profile, 292N 441-417E 
  
 All of the features in the 2001 excavation trench at 292N 408E appeared beneath the Zone 2  shell midden, and had soil fill distinct from that of the Zone. As in other parts of the site, the Zone  2 midden deposit dates to the seventeenth century Nombre de Dios occupation. The presumed wall  trenches contain exclusively Native American materials, except for a single fragment of lead found  in the Area 2, Section 3 Trench (Table 10). Other features in the excavation trench include two  remnants of what may be living surfaces (Feature 26 and Feature 30) a pit-shaped feature (Feature  28) and numerous postmolds.  
 This area of the site is notable for the marked paucity of artifacts and other remains (Table 10).  Only 411 artifacts were recovered from these 12 square meters of excavation, which a much lower 
68  
density than that found in other parts of the site. Fifty-one percent of the artifacts from the  excavation trench were recovered from Zone 2, and 97% of the artifacts were of indigenous  production.  
 The function of these linear features is, so far, not evident. Although they are similar to sleeper  sills found at the Fountain of Youth Park site (8SJ31) and other sites in St. Augustine, the paired  parallel arrangement doesn’t represent any so-far known architectural patterns. It is possible that  they may have been related to the construction of defensive elements, such as earth and fascine  revetments or barriers. Their relationship to the moat/ditch, however, is unclear.   As discussed above, all of the linear trench features at the site (presumed to be non-permanent  wall trenches or sleeper sill stains) share the north-south orientation of Feature 23 (the presumed  wall trench at the moat’s western terminus). The linear stains are not aligned to the moat/ditch  feature, which is oriented at an angle of 70 degree west of north. The two sets of alignments are  normally considered to be an indication of different construction periods. The absence of European  materials in the linear features’ fill, and the fact that they were obviously abandoned and filled in  before the midden soil was deposited, raises the possibility that these could be of pre-Menéndez,  Timucuan origin, or a very early Spanish construction.  
Potential Structure 
 A more promising series of features related to possible European building construction was  uncovered during the 1997 excavations (Waters 1998). These features were the focus of  excavations carried out in 2009 and in 2011, and the combined results of those investigations are  discussed here.  
 A series of posts and wall trenches were concentrated in units 264.5N/423E; 268N/422E and  269.5N/419E, forming what appears to have been the northeast corner of a structure (Figure 27).  Three very large (approximately 1.0 to 1.3 meters in diameter), north-south aligned postholes were 
69  
designated as Feature 19 North, Feature 19 South and Feature 25. The posthole centers were  approximately 2.8 meters apart. Two additional large posts extended to the west in unit 261.5N  4219E, and these were designated as Area 9/10 and Area 8, and were 2 meters apart. The top  elevations of these features ranged between 2.05 ambd to 2.08 ambd, indicating the grade surface at  the time they were deposited (Table 10).  
 The north to south line of postmolds were connected by a narrow wall trench (Feature 19 Wall  Trench). The wall trench was apparently formed by a log sill, since no postmolds were associated  with it, and it was somewhat irregular in orientation. Its width varied from 25 to 30 centimeters,  and its depth was variable across the base, ranging from 17 to 27 centimeters. The trench appeared  to connect Features 19 North and 19 South at their centers, however it passed to the west side of Feature 25. It was not clearly contiguous, but rather resolved into separate segments near its base,  which was itself variable in elevation across the feature (Figure 27).
70  

TABLE 10 Trench 292N 408E (2001)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Materials excavated in Trench 292N 408E (2001)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Provenience
Z2L 
1 
Z2L 
2 
Z3L 
1 
Z3L 
2 
A1 S2 
A2S3 
A3  
S1 
A3S 
4 
F26/ 
27 
A1/ 
A6  
S1
F2 
8 
F3 
0 
PM1  
S2
PM2  
S2
PM 
3 S2
PM3  
S4
P
M 
7S 
2 
A5 
S1
PM5  
S1
PM5  
S3
PP 
M6
TO 
T.
Function

 

 

 

Trench
Trench
Trench
Trench
Surface
Pit?/
Pit
Surface
Post
Post
Post
Post
Post
Post
Post
Post
Post

Top m.b.d. 
1.67 
1.77 
1.85 
1.94 
1.85 
1.87 
1.85 
1.9 
1.75 
1.8 
1.
83 
1.
85 
1.82 
1.83 
1.82 
1.83 
1.8
8 
1.86 
1.97 
1.98 
2.14 

Top a.m.b.d. 
1.96 
2.06 
2.14 
2.23 
2.14 
2.16 
2.14 
2.19 
2.04 
2.09
2.
12
2.14 
2.11 
2.12 
2.11 
2.12
2.17 
2.15 
2.26 
2.27 
2.43

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Seventeenth Century European-tradition  
Ceramics

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Puebla Blue On White 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Puebla Polychrome 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Uid Tin Enamel 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Uid Mexico City 
Majolica 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 
Olive Jar 
3 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

5 
Olive Jar Glazed 
1 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 
Uid Coarse Earthenware 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Subtotal seventeenth
Century Ceramics 
8 
2 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

13 
Asian Porcelain 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
English Ceramics

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Creamware 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Delftware 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Finger Painted Pearlware

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shell Edged Pearlware 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Subtotal English 
Ceramics 
3 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3 
Subtotal All Non indigenous Ceramics 
11 
3 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

17 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Indigenous Ceramics

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Orange Fiber Tempered Plain 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

St. Johns Plain 
7 
5 
2 
1 

2 
1 

 

4 

4 

1 
1 

1 

 

 

 

29 
St. Johns Stamped 
5 
3 
3 
1 

 

2 
1 

3 

3 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

1 
23 
Subtotal St. Johns 
12 
8 
5 
2 

2 
3 
1 

7 

7 

1 
1 

1 

1 

1 
52 

 

71 
San Pedro Plain 
7 
3 

 

 

2 

 

 

3 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

16 
San Pedro Decorated 
2 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3 
Subtotal San Pedro 
9 
4 

 

 

2 

 

 

3 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

19 
San Marcos Plain 
5 
4 
1 

 

2 

 

 

 

1 
2 

 

1 
1 

 

 

 

 

17 
San Marcos Stamped 
4 
4 
2 

 

1 

1 

1 
1 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

15 
Subtotal San Marcos 
9 
8 
3 

 

3 

1 

1 
2 
2 
1 

1 
1 

 

 

 

 

32 
Mission Red Filmed 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Unclassified Sand/Grit  Tempered Plain 
4 
3 
2 

 

1 
2 

1 
2 

 

 

0 

 

 

1 

 

 

16 
Unclassified Sand/Grit  Tempered Decorated 
3 
2 
2 

 

1 

 

 

1 
1 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

11 
Unclassified Grit/Shell  Tempered Plain 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Unclassified Grog/Grit  Tempered Decorated 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Unclassified Grog/Grit  Tempered Plain 

 

 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 
Unclassified Sand  
Tempered Decorated 
7 
5 
2 

 

3 

 

1 
2 
1 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

1 

23 
Unclassified Sand Tempered Plain 
8 
6 
6 

 

4 
3 

1 
3 
1 
2 
1 
1 

 

 

1 

 

 

37 
Subtotal Unclassified 
23 
16 
12 

 

10 
5 

3 
8 
4 
4 
1 
2 

 

 

2 

1 

91 
All Indigenous 
Ceramics 
107 
72 
40 
4 

34 
16 
4 
6 
38 
14 
26 
4 
6 
4 
2 
2 
5 
2 
2 
2 
390 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nonceramic Artifacts

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Light Green Glass 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Unidentified Glass 
2 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3 
Cornaline D'Aleppo Bead 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Spanish Coin 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Lead Shot 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Wrought Spike 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Uid Nail 
3 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

5 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Iron Fragment 
0 
0 

0 

0 

 

 

0 
1 
0 
0 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Lead Fragment 

 

 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 
Red Brick 
1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shell Tool 
3 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3 
Chert Debitage 
1 

1 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Subtotal Non-Ceramic Artifacts 
12 
4 
1 
0 

1 

 

 

1 
1 
1 
0 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

22 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TOTAL ARTIFACTS 
130 
79 
41 
4 

35 
16 
4 
6 
39 
15 
30 
4 
6 
4 
2 
2 
5 
2 
2 
2 
411 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

72