Martin and Gilly Simons: Downside, Shoreham Test PitDay 1
27 April 2020

Since moving to our house 5 years ago, every time we planted a shrub it was very hard to get any depth easily, there seemed to be a hard layer of coal ash and clinker quite near the surface. Our house is built on what was a very large World War One army camp in Shoreham, existing from 1914 to 1919. It covered an area of farmland from west of Buckingham Park then east along the north side of Upper Shoreham Road as far as Southlands Hospital and stretched northwards on the Downs to beyond what is now the A27.
Up to 20,000 recruits were housed here at any one time!
https://shoreham-army-camp.worthingmuseum.co.uk/topics/welcome-to-the-camp-1/
So, we decided to dig a metre square test pit in the lawn (more weeds than lawn!), towards the end of our garden, away from our shrub planting efforts. With a little research we discovered we are close to a cookhouse and a drying room in Area 15.
Off came the turf ready to start tomorrow, husband and wife team (wife didn’t want her photo taken)!

Downside, Shoreham Test Pit Day 2
It’s the second day, we got down through 8 inches of topsoil, lots of rubbish finds, bathroom tile, flowerpot, glass, asbestos cement sheet, bits of brick, lots of cinders, several pieces of sandstone of varying thickness, plastic, bits of flint (some interesting, details to follow when we have got through the topsoil) and some very anaemic skinny worms!
One photo for today, three pieces of burnt flint, I like to think probably prehistoric, can’t imagine a soldier would put flint in a hut stove!

Downside, Shoreham Test Pit Day 3
Still working down through topsoil, we went down another 6 inches with similar finds as before until we reached a layer of soft ash where the worms were very fat! We called it a day, could do no more, back ache! Mind you the digging was very easy compared with Sompting!
Today’s photo of miscellaneous finds left to right, a bit mixed up, top to bottom as follows: 4 pieces of sandstone, 2 of bathroom tile, slate, asbestos cement, 4 white china, 1 glazed pottery, fragment of glass jar neck, bit of flowerpot, thin alloy button, miscellaneous plastic, part of a doll, molten aluminium, piece of steel cable and a castor! This is just a selection of the best finds!!!! And a bonus find, a possible axe. Flint finds tomorrow.

Downside, Shoreham Test Pit Day 4
My wife, Gilly, starts trowelling one side, after going through an inch of softish ash/clinker she says “Oh, feels like concrete”. I was a bit gutted she found it and not me! So, we scrape away and yes it does feel solid, impossible to trowel so had a good dig in and managed to break through, it was a two inch thick layer of compacted ash and clinker, really solid. Definitely not a floor as it wasn’t level and followed the downward contour of the slope, not a road surface as not thick enough to support a horse and cart. As it was 10 metres south of our shrub planting efforts it was clear that this compacted surface extended some distance, my guess is it was an assembly area or a very wide pathway between huts. We excavated this surface which was sitting directly on subsoil. There was one find directly underneath, a small piece of white china, probably from a plate or saucer, although I can’t imagine soldiers with saucers! We can assume that all the topsoil we have excavated is imported/created post 1919!
So, the mystery of the hard shrub planting was solved.
The excavation continues!
Today’s photos of the test pit compacted ash surface, and of the flint finds from the topsoil above the compacted surface, top to bottom left to right: blade, small worked out core, possible knife, 3 struck flakes, 4 retouched pieces/flakes.

Downside, Shoreham Test Pit Day 5
We are now trowelling through a silty fine subsoil with scattered flint nodules 1-3 inches, many broken and some by human hand. We excavated about 3 inches when flint nodules became more common together with a number of pieces of burnt flint, and still some worked flints appearing. After a further 3 inches flecks of chalk appeared and over the next few inches small lumps of chalk, before we reached lumpy chalk bedrock at about 30 inches from the surface, the last few inches yielded no finds.
Other than the one piece of white china there were no other finds of historic origin below the compacted ash surface, the surface was so compact that no worms were able to penetrate below.
Photo of the profile today.
Last report tomorrow.

Downside, Shoreham Test Pit Day 6
2 May 2020
Of course, the hole needed filling, we did it layer by layer and made such a good job with compaction that when we put the turves back, we had a dip! Had to import soil from elsewhere to top it up.
We sent this photo to the family; they were horrified that I was standing in such a deep hole! I was actually on my knees in a two-and-a-half-foot deep hole!!!! And no, I wasn’t actually using that pointy spade!
Today’s final two finds photos from below the compacted ash surface are of the burnt flint (top photo) and of the flint finds top to bottom left to right: thick roughly retouched scraper, retouched flake, possible concave scraper, 4 small retouched flints to be further researched, 2 small and 1 large core fragments, 2 possible knives, and 4 retouched flakes/pieces.
I find it astonishing that a randomly dug test pit could produce so many pieces of worked prehistoric flint, just shows what is underground on the lower slopes of the South Downs. And I have no intention of excavating my garden!!!!
Best wishes to all, hope to get digging at Sompting soon, even with a face mask!

Connie began with saying she was honoured to give this lecture as it was Con that first introduced her to archaeology way back in 1986 when she took one of his courses, and she has not looked back since - hence her long list of WAS titles.
Connie introduced the site, an area of land currently in use as horse paddocks just south of the A27, opposite Sompting Church and Sompting Abbotts. The project started when WAS were asked in 2017 to investigate the remains of a small flint building in one of the paddocks that was only meant to be a couple of days work…..

The flint wall that started it all

Showing a bird’s eye image that was taken from a members drone, Connie talked through the site history. From the church - built in the 10th century - to the current Tristram family landowners owning the land since 1879. In 1936 the first South of England show was held there and in 1960 it hosted the Donkey Derby. A 1627 survey documented a Malting House on the site, 1772 Map shows the area as Malthouse Barn Field, Malthouse Field and Malthouse Close, 1896 map shows a pond and line of trees and the 1936 South of England show map shows the excavation area as close to the entrance, empties yard and rabbit stand.
The coast had been extremely close to the site but from the 13th century longshore drift led to the silting up of the local coastline and by the 18th century the land was being farmed. Connie added that a bonus to the work at Malthouse field had been the opportunity for WAS to fieldwalk an area further south of the site as part of the EPIC project which had recently dug a new channel for the local watercourse, exposing potentially prehistoric soil layers and worked flint. Members from WAS had found plenty including a broken Barbed and tanged arrowhead, microliths and a knapping site.
Summarising what had been found to date, Connie discussed the structure under the tree which had substantial walls and floor tiles. It could have held water but no drain was located. A pathway leading to it had oyster shell and clay pipe in it. A flint wall running east- west abuts the rectangular building and could be part of an earlier structure. A north-south flint wall contained a chalk block structure that revealed a well. On John Mill’s advice the 2019 excavations targeted the well cut which could date its construction. A clay with flints layer was discovered adjacent to the well cut, potentially deposited at the end of the last ice age and containing worked flint. When it became too deep to excavate the well cut further, an auger sample took the excavation to a total depth of 3.6 meters and revealed medieval pottery and struck flint.

The well cut: the depths members had to sink to

A compact ‘yard like’ surface was located below the north-south flint wall, and features that could be postholes were identified running along the middle of the building complex. The features are comparable with other known excavated Malthouse sites. A pit was also discovered that contained medieval pottery, oyster shell and worked flint, possibly evidence of an earlier occupation. Gordon Hayden then made a guest appearance via a video Connie showed from 2018 where he discussed layers of burning located within one of the trenches.
The 2019 excavations had only just finished so results are still being analysed, but trench targets had been established through Geophysical surveys in the spring. One survey had identified features in other paddocks. One was natural geology but the other (Trench 10) contained a modern water pipe (probably associated with the 1936 show), a degraded chalk surface which is found across the site which had features dug into it, a potentially military-cut trench, Romano-British pottery and a medieval pit containing Saxo-Norman pot sherds.

The enigma that was Trench 10

Building materials from across the site include substantial amount of flint, chalk, brick and evidence of wattle and daub. A piece of Caen stone from a mullion window was also discovered which contained a VV (Virgin of Virgins) apotropaic mark, possibly reused from another site. Finds include Prehistoric, Romano-British, medieval and later pottery, two 16th century Nuremberg Jettons and a French clay pipe stem (Connie likes to think it is evidence of smuggling). A piece of Bronze Age pottery contained a thumb print and some of the medieval pottery could be from Binsted.
More modern finds include glass, a powder compact, a key for a Hornby ‘0’ gauge toy train and a tube of Gleam toothpaste.
The flint finds indicate temporary hunting and farming but not permanent settlement.
Connie finished by revealing that a recent Tristram family document had come to light from 1758 showing another building on the site which could line up with one of the as yet unexcavated geophysical anomalies, possibly evidence of an earlier building. That’s for next year….to be continued ………

Some of the finds

Worthing Library is undergoing building works starting in the Autumn 2019, so beginning with the November 12th lecture, the venue will be The Gordon Room, next to The Assembly Room around the corner in Stoke Abbot Road.

The timing will alter also as the room must close earlier than the library.  The venue will be open from 7pm for notices, coffee and chat, the lecture running between 7:30 and 8:30pm.

The John Pull Memorial Lecture this year (12 February 2019), was given by John Skelton of Brighton and Hove Archaeological Society. It was an excellent presentation on excavations of Medieval remains at Hog Croft, Ovingdean, near Brighton.  It appears to be the site of a manorial complex that existed during the Saxon/Norman period.  The intriguing finds from the site included a possible Pilgrim bottle, spurs, apothecary bottle, and what looked suspiciously like a Boy Scout badge.  He concluded with a demonstration of digital photogrammetry techniques for recording 3D models of objects and sites.