Fones Cliffs property to be preserved

Scott Strickland, an archaeologist and GIS manager at St. Mary’s and his colleague, St. Mary’s archaeologist Julia King, have spent months surveying land along the Rappahannock River for Indian artifacts under a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. But, until recently, this property was off-limits.

The archaeologists have plans to continue looking for evidence of three Indian villages that, based on explorer Capt. John Smith’s records, they believe were located along these cliffs in 1608. Smith described the villages “situated high upon white clay cliffs” just downstream of Tappahannock, across from marshlands.