Canadian Historic Sites: Occasional Papers in Archaeology and History No. 7

Archaeological Explorations at Signal Hill, Newfoundland, 1965-1966

by Edward B. Jelks

Conclusions

As a result of the excavations at Signal Hill, the remains of several buildings were located and a sizeable sample of artifacts that had been lost or discarded by the occupants was accumulated. These things offer no startling additions to recorded history, but they do provide insights into what life was like at Signal Hill in the 19th century. The preceding report has attempted to describe the structural remains, the soil, and the artifacts in such a way that detailed comparisons can be made with related data from other sites. No effort has been made to go far beyond full description.

But archaeology and history have a story to tell about Signal Hill, a story that can really be told effectively only on the spot. For the overriding reality that moulds human thought and action at Signal Hill is the hill itself.

Thrusting starkly above land and sea, Signal Hill offers a vantage point for surveying the approaches to St. John's. But before its strategic value can be exploited, the challenge posed by the hill's obdurate topography and unhappy climate has to be met. The logistic problem of raising cannon to the summit presented worrisome problems to the engineers of the 19th century. There were few level spots for erecting buildings, and even the smallest structure required special tailoring to make it fit the hill's topography. Steeply canted expanses of bare bedrock, when iced over in winter, made footing treacherous. And the blustery wind which constantly rakes the hilltop is a continual source of annoyance.

Down below, around the harbour, a city grew. Streets appeared in orderly rows; houses materialized along the streets, rank upon rank; massive buildings, commercial and civic, were erected. At St. John's, man imposed the architectural accoutrements of his civilization upon the face of nature.

And men set out to transform the crest of Signal Hill, too: to sculpture its flanks into sheer, unsurmountable cliffs; to blanket its surface with batteries, barracks, blockhouses and buildings of diverse shapes, sizes, and purposes; to prepare there an impregnable fortress that would be garrisoned with thousands of men and that would stand, Gibraltar-like, for centuries to come. Several master plans for the hill's development were drafted at one time or another, and several starts on their implementation were made. In 1811, 200 tons of building stone from Cape Breton and 80 more salvaged from the ruined fortress of Louisbourg, Nova Scotia, were stockpiled on Signal Hill ready for the anticipated construction to begin. But nothing much ever happened. An abundance of ambitious plans and a half-century of intermittent efforts produced little tangible results, and the hill stands today virtually unaltered.

The reasons that enthusiastic plans were repeatedly abandoned short of completion do not lie entirely in fluctuating fiscal and political policies in London. They reside to a large degree in the psychological reaction to the hill's physical properties. The necessary money and energy to develop the St. John's area were forthcoming—but they were expended on the hospitable environment around the harbour, not on Signal Hill. There is no question but that men could have overcome the hill technologically; but it is a fact of history that they did not conquer if psychologically.

Signal Hill has a stark, aloof majesty that stirs the senses and imagination of almost everyone who climbs to its summit. Its story is wrapped up in the mood it creates and in the intractability of its substance; and those two factors have, ultimately, directed the course of human activities on the hill. Attempting to convert the hill's natural advantages to his own purposes, man found himself, instead, continually forced to accommodate his enterprise to the temper of the hill. Instead of shaping the hill to fit his preconceived mould, man was compelled to shape his works to the demands of the hill.

The archaeological studies complement the historical record in recounting the story of Signal Hill. The adaptation of men's plans to the demands of the hill's physiography are manifest in the structural remains unearthed: in the scaling of bedrock and levelling with rubble to make a suitable spot for the erection of a building; in the fitting of foundations and walls to the configuration of the bedrock; in the conduits and double walls designed to decrease dampness. The story is reflected, too, in steel rods anchored in the bedrock where cannon were parbuckled up the cliffs, in incompletely sheered scarps, in discarded chisels and hammers, in rusty ice creepers.

It is the writer's opinion that the archaeological remains at Signal Hill can best be used interpretively as witnesses of men's desultory efforts to meet the hill's environmental challenge. Of the historically important events that took place there—the Battle of Signal Hill and Marconi's wireless breakthrough—there is little or no archaeological evidence. But historical and archaeological displays oriented toward the drama of the hill's setting could effectively reinforce the stark scenic appeal that so forcefully impresses most visitors.