The first day of digging

    The archaeological work has finally begun at Yarrow's lot.  The owner has given permission, and a team of archaeologists from the DC government is digging.  The team consists of Ruth Trocolli, Archaeologist for the District of Columbia, her assistant, Charde Reid, and Mia Carey, a PhD candidate in archaeology at the University of Florida.  These photos are from the first day's work.  The plan is to dig a series of round test pits in a grid across the property.  (The lot is 30 feet wide and 150 feet deep) to give the archaeologists an overview of what's under ground.  Once those are completed, trenches will be dug in the more promising spots.  The work is complicated by the fact that the property had both a cellar and swimming pool and the spoil from these excavations was spread on top of the soil from Yarrow's day.  This overburden may be two to four feet deep.
    The archaeologists would also like to use remote sensing.  This consists of Ground Penetrating Radar that can "see" what's under the ground.  GPR images aren't quite like xrays though.  They only show irregularities in the soil.  Nonetheless, GPR should show if the foundation from Yarrow's house is down there, if there are logs from his house or organic remnants of logs, and possibly the rectangular soil disturbance from his grave.  The archaeologists would also benefit from earthmoving equipment to help dig.  The city doesn't have money for this, however, and so arrangements have been made for donations from the public to the DC Preservation League.  The League will then use the money to pay for the needed equipment and operators.  Donations are tax deductible and can be made online at https://dcpres.wufoo.com/forms/z1qvq2b30nfy8d6/,  The archaeological team has set up its own website for the project at http://yarrowmamoutarchaeology.weebly.com/.  You can follow the progress there.

Differing Perspectives on Slavery

    One of my topics for the Speakers Bureau for the Montgomery County Maryland Historical Society is Differing Perspectives on Slavery in Montgomery County and Washington D.C.  I use excerpts from my two books, The Recollections of Margaret Loughborough and From Slave Ship to Harvard to show the various views about slavery and race relations that prevailed in a border area before the Civil War.  Local cable news interviewed me about my talk at the Gaithersburg Museum in this short video.Montgomery County Media interview.

Submission to Old Georgetown Board on Yarrow's property

The Old Georgetown Board will be asked to approve any new construction on Yarrow Mamout's property, 3324 Dent Place, so I decided to submitted the linked document to the Board to share what I know with anyone wanting to construct on the property and with the Board.

Submission to Old Georgetown Board

Questions and Answers with Deborah Kalb

    Each time I'm asked about the story, I see new angles and tell it slightly differently.  An example is this Question and Answer session I had with the book blogger Deborah  Kalb.
http://deborahkalbbooks.blogspot.com/2014/12/q-with-james-h-johnston.html

PowerPoint Presentation

I've given about a hundred book talks, using a PowerPoint presentation. Audiences have liked it, so I decided to experiment with sharing it online.  I've substituted text for my narration but the slides are the same.  Warning: it is long and it only runs on computers, not iPads or tablets.  Let me know what you think of the presentation.  To view the presentation, click on this link:  PowerPoint Presentation

The cemetery

Old Meeting House

    That Yarrow was buried in his backyard would not have seemed as odd in 1823 as it does today.  This isn't because people were routinely buried in their yard; they weren't.  Rather, this is because Yarrow's yard backed on a cemetery.  The old Presbyterian cemetery was located between 33rd and 34th Streets and Volta and Q.  The Tudor style house in this photograph is believed to have been used in connection with the cemetery.  But it is also thought that this building later served an African American congregation, and the graves of several African Americans have been found north of Q Street, meaning they were in the same block as Yarrow's.  In fact, one of those graves was located perhaps less than 100 feet from the back of Yarrow's property.  All this suggests that the African American congregation at this church was burying its dead on the periphery of the old Presbyterian cemetery on the north side of Q Street, perhaps as far as Yarrow's backyard.  Hence at the time, the rear of Yarrow's yard was so close to the cemetery that it would not have seemed unusual to bury him back there.

The hand made bricks

    By the second day of demolition, the cellar at Yarrow's property was exposed. This picture looks at the southwest, back corner.  It looks as though the back wall of the cellar, which is to the left, is lined with machine made bricks.  The ones on the far wall look different.  They appear to be hand made.  This is what the concern has been about all along, that these bricks may have been made by Yarrow Mamout.  Previous posts on this blog have a picture of bricks from the same wall but taken from outside the cellar several several years ago.  That picture was sent to an archaeologist who said it showed hand made bricks and suggested the cellar, at least this part, pre-dated the house. This is the reason for thinking these bricks might have been made by Yarrow.  To enlarge the picture, just click on it, or you can download it to your photo editing software and then enlarge it.