Unearthing St. Mary’s Fort, the Founding Site of the Maryland Colony.

Online lecture and discussion Thursday, April 15 7 p.m. Unearthing St. Mary’s Fort, the Founding Site of the Maryland Colony, Travis G. Parno, Ph.D.

Watch on Historic St Mary's City's Youtube Channel

In March of 1634, Maryland colonists arrived on the shores of the modern-day St. Mary’s River and established Maryland’s first capital, St. Mary’s City. Immediately they set about building St. Mary’s Fort, the massive palisaded fort that would be their homes for the earliest period of colonial settlement. The world the colonists inserted themselves into was home to socially and politically diverse groups of Native peoples, many of whom were part of the Piscataway paramount chiefdom. Join Dr. Travis Parno, HSMC’s Director of Research and Collections, as he shares the story of the discovery of St. Mary’s Fort and what it can tell us about interactions between the Maryland colonists and the Native peoples of southern Maryland.