From Revolution to Statehood – The Archaeology of Merryspring Nature Center
The afternoon’s talk-in-the-park will focus on two archaeological sites located in Merryspring Nature Center.
At its beginning, in the late 1760’s and early 1770’s, Camden was made up of only a few families, a mill on the river, and some farms. After the devastating defeat of Colonial forces at Castine in 1779, all that stood between the English, and control of Maine’s entire mid-coast, was a small, now long forgotten Colonial American militia outpost in what is today, Merryspring Nature Center.
After the war, the abandoned outpost became home to Michael Shays (c.1780’s), followed by Hardy (c. 1791), William Gregory (c.1793), and Elisha Gibbs (c. 1799). In 1805, only yards away from the old outpost, Asa Hosmer, Camden’s first school teacher, built his home. But, by the mid-1820’s, Hosmer’s home appears to have been abandoned, leaving only an overgrown cellar hole as a reminder of the rich history in Merryspring’s fields.