Project
Antigua & Barbuda:
Great Fort George, Monk’s Hill
Drawing on my interests in comparative approaches to the study of colonialism, I co-led, together with my colleague Dr Murphy, the survey and test excavation of the largest British colonial fort on the Caribbean island of Antigua (Antigua and Barbuda, West Indies) in 2015. The project combined landscape archaeology (survey, drone mapping, GIS) and historical cartography with heritage perspectives to get a better understanding of the everyday life of African and Afro-descendant slaves and British officers living and/or working in the fort between the 17th and 20th centuries. This research informed both the restoration of the site and its tourist development and promotion project.
– View from Monk’s Hill over Falmouth Harbour to English Harbour and the Caribbean Sea (Author)
– Staking out points over the main fort entrance (Author)
– One of Great Fort George’s building structures (Author)
– View of part of the fort’s wall (Author)
Fieldwork
Funded by the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation, the results of the project are on display in the Nelson’s Dockyard Museum permanent exhibition on Antigua, as well as in the interactive section of the Spanish National Museum of Archaeology’s permanent exhibition in Madrid.
– Some of the archaeological finds (Author)
– Me and a colleague whilst surveying the fort (Courtesy of Nicki Murphy)
– Dense Caribbean rainforest vegetation whilst surveying the fort (Author)
– The fort’s cementery (Author)
Media
– Project presentation & interview at ABS TV Radio