Had a great meeting this evening with the Tiny Township Heritage Committee. They appear to share many of our goals and objectives and I would anticipate a strong working relationship with them when it comes to building an inventory of sites and the preservation of this valued history in their area.
The have a particular current interest in Carhagouha and perhaps someone can create a post on information regarding this site, its authenticity and its history. I believe the ownership was recently transferred from the Knights of Columbus to the Shrine. Was a village site ever found here? Have excavations ever been done?
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I will check the ownership of the site. I think the transfer went the other way- from the Shrine to the Knights. The site was identified as such by A.E. Jones when he was here in the early 20th century. As far as archaeological investigation- I think it has been limited. There is some doubt of it's authenticity. I will check the files at the Shrine regarding the site. Every August 12th(?) at 1615 (4:15) there is a Mass celebrating the anniversary of the first Mass in Ontario (1615). The Shrine organizes this. If Tiny is interested, they need to work with the Shrine on this one.
Yes- the Shrine has the ownership. The Knights transferred it about 10- 12 years ago. I guess with all the Champlain celebrations coming up= the site will have some attention paid to it for being the location of the first Mass in Ontario.
I assume we are going to exercise security and caution in posting locations and their details online so that the cretins with metal detectors don't learn where to walk.
The question of site identification to the public is a huge one for some people. I would hope at some point to have all of the important sites (however that might be determined) posted or plaqued or otherwise marked for the enhancement of community knowledge and acknowledgement of Huronia’s rich cultural heritage to the more casual passer by.
If we look at how things are now, I doubt that you would find a relic hunter on the publicly posted sites such as Ste. Ignace. Ste. Louis, Carhagouha and Ossossane and the posting of the penalties would further discourage site abuse.
The lack of public knowledge of these sites probably causes more harm than good at this point as the accidental unearthing probably does more damage than the odd metal detector guy risking a substantial fine digging on a “known” or posted site is likely to do.
The site was examined by Frank Ridley in the late 60's and I believe dates to about 1400. That is based on a perusal of artifacts that Frank recovered from the site. Furthermore the site thankfully is not on the field but further south so it is to some degree protected.!! As the real village of Caraouhgua has not yet been found it is in the Tiny penninsula among about 50 known village sites. So take your pick and until all 50 are archaeologically tested you might know for a very long time.
Of the 50 odd village sites in north Tiny, how many were pre trade and how many post trade. I would assume that if there was enough data to determine that these were village sites and not just camps or single item finds, then there would have been enough evidence to determine pre or post trade. How many of the 50 village sites are known to be post trade? How many of these post trade sites are within the approximate distance from the area of Ossossane, say the 8th Conc. north that are referred to by Champlain and Sagard.
I think we can reduce the number of possible Carhagouha sites and perhaps apply a better logic now than the one used to determine the current marked site. This is an important site to the Catholics and should be of significant interest to Champlain ear historians, as such it appears to be of interest to the Tiny Township Historical Committee and it would be nice to think that some effort could be put forth to narrow the field and perhaps find a more substantiated site prior to the Champlain anniversary events scheduled for August 2015.
What would the next step be?
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