The Dig In 1972

A Memory of Loveden Hill.

Virginia and I arrived at Loveden Hill in early September of 1972 during the middle of the last major dig on the site. She had found an ad in the Times for volunteers at the site and moved into the farm enclosure in our Citroen van.
We were delighted to find that we would be doing the cataloguing of finds as they came down the hill to the farm house. This meant we would get to see everything and would need some training to know what to record about each find. Nigel Kerr, Site Director, spent the best part of our first week with us. The system had already been set up by two Americans who had just gone back to school in the States and it seemed quite effective.
We spent our days scrubbing things with brushes in very cold water and separated out the various content of the cremation pots. We were in the low 900's when we got there so about half way through. There were about half a dozen people uncovering cremations and sending them down the hill to us. Kevan Cammidge was the site supervisor and s pent most of his time up top on the hill. We labelled and recorded all the contents on 3x5 index cards.
This went on through October but by November most of the volunteers had left (to a medieval tannery in London) and only four of us were left on the site.
Virginia and I had moved out of the Citroen van and into an empty farmhouse at Temple Hill and Kevin and I were lifting the last few inhumations on and very wet and cold hilltop. Somewhere in there I had started teaching part -time at The King's School in Grantham and we had finished cataloging the finds and Virginia was putting pots together at Temple Hill. Temple Hill had real windows and doors and fireplaces that worked so it was luxury. We continued in this mode until late February when the dig was put to bed for the time being and we returned to Canada. The finds were all sent to Lincoln Museum.
Eleven years later we were in England with our two children and went to visit Kevin who was computerising at Lincoln Museum and as we walked past pottery on the lower floor and Virginia suddenly said "Hey, that's my handwriting." There was the pottery from Loveden Hill.

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