Dendroarchaeology has a discontinuous history in the Southeastern United States, mostly because of misconceptions (the Southeast is too mesic), bad sampling practices (no standard protocol exists for preserving prehistoric wood samples), and a lack of reference tree-ring chronologies long enough to date wood from the abundant prehistoric sites. The majority of archaeological applications in recent years has focused on the dating of historic sites and structures to verify the documented year(s) of construction largely in response to requests from historical agencies to verify when a particular structure was built. We have found that most structures are one to two generations younger than their reported date(s) of construction, but most agencies find this information useful as tree-ring dating lends historical credibility to any site. The future of dendroarchaeology in the Southeast is encouraging but many more trained experts are needed to meet the demand of dating historical structures and sites. Furthermore, once a sampling protocol becomes standardized for retrieving wood from prehistoric sites, the potential for absolute dating of these sites is enormous given that abundant wood is archived in locations throughout the Southeast.

During the historic mining episodes at Cagle Saltpetre Cave, wooden leaching vats needed for the lixiviation of calcium nitrate from mined sediments (from which saltpeter was then produced) were constructed and used in the cave. When mining operations ceased, these features were abandoned and preserved in situ, some remaining virtually intact. Their remarkable preservation enabled tree-ring dating of timbers associated with these vats to be accomplished. Tree rings from oak planks used in the construction of the leaching vats were measured to 0.001 mm precision on a Velmex measuring system. Using COFECHA software, we crossdated the measurement series to both the Norris Dam State Park and Piney Creek Pocket Wilderness white oak reference chronologies, spanning the years from 1633 to 1982, obtained from the International Tree-Ring Data Bank. Graphical comparisons via scatter plots were inspected to ensure correct temporal placements. The final chronology developed from 39 dated series correlated very highly with the Norris Dam State Park reference chronology (r  =  0.49, n  =  170 yrs, t  =  7.29, p < 0.0001) and verified that our site chronology extends from 1692 to 1861 The results of our analyses indicate that saltpeter was mined and processed at the site during separate episodes throughout the 19^th Century. Additionally, saltpeter-processing technology changed throughout the course of the mining operations.

The Marble Springs homestead in south Knox County serves as a significant heritage site for the state of Tennessee because it was the final home of one of our nation's most important founding statesmen and first governor of Tennessee (1796 to 1801, 1803 to 1809), John Sevier. Recent archaeological and historical research had called into question the authenticity of the original John Sevier log cabin located at the Marble Springs homestead. We used tree-ring dating to determine the year(s) of construction of the Governor John Sevier cabin and the adjacent Walker Springs log cabin (which had been relocated to the site later and has no ties to Gov. John Sevier) by first extracting cores from all accessible logs in the cabins and then evaluating the cutting dates of these logs. A nearby reference chronology at Norris Dam anchored the Gov. John Sevier cabin chronology from 1720 to 1834 and the Walker Springs cabin chronology from 1675 to 1826. The cutting dates obtained from six logs in the Gov. John Sevier cabin suggest construction of the cabin was completed sometime between late 1835 and early 1836. We were able to date cores from 29 logs from the Walker Springs cabin, which strongly support final construction between late 1827 to early 1828. Our dendrochronological analyses suggest that the cabin at Marble Springs long thought to be the original cabin occupied by Gov. John Sevier was instead likely built during the occupancy of the property by a later tenant, George Kirby, in the early to mid-1830s, well after the death of Sevier in 1815.

The Hoskins House is a two-story, single pen log structure located in Tannenbaum Historic Park, Greensboro, North Carolina. The house is thought to have been built by Joseph Hoskins, who lived in Guilford County from 1778 until his death in 1799. Previous archaeological testing of soil around the house yielded over 1000 artifacts, and the ceramics of these gave a Mean Ceramic Date (MCD) of 1810 as a possible initial year of construction. Our objective was to date the outermost rings on as many logs as were accessible in the Hoskins House to determine the year or range of years when the house was likely built. We compared 37 ring-width measurement series from 28 white oak group logs with a composite reference chronology created from three oak reference chronologies from Virginia. We found that the logs were cut over a 3-year period from 1811 to 1813, lending credence to the initial MCD of 1810. Joseph Hoskins had already passed away in 1799 and the property was deeded to his two sons, Joseph and Ellis. Ellis Hoskins eventually was later deeded sole possession of the property. The two-story log house located at Tannenbaum Historic Park may be more correctly called the “Ellis Hoskins House” rather than the “Joseph Hoskins House.”

Alfred Jackson was an enslaved African American born on The Hermitage plantation (outside Nashville, Tennessee) of President Andrew Jackson around 1810, and lived most of his life on the plantation. Staff from The Hermitage wished to better understand and interpret lifeways of those once enslaved on the plantation, but the date of construction of Alfred's Cabin first had to be determined. Was it built when Alfred was enslaved or was a freedman? We extracted nearly 100 core samples from eastern red cedar logs used to construct the cabin. Of these, 39 cores were used to develop a master tree-ring chronology for the cabin. Crossdating of the Alfred's Cabin chronology was accomplished using an eastern red cedar chronology developed by the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory Tree-Ring Laboratory at Columbia University in Palisades, New York. The 39 series from Alfred's Cabin resulted in a high-quality master tree-ring chronology, with an average inter-series correlation of 0.66 and an average mean sensitivity of 0.28. Graphical (skeleton plot and line plot) comparison and statistical crossdating with COFECHA anchored the Alfred's Cabin chronology firmly between 1749 and 1842 (r  =  0.45, n  =  94 yrs, t  =  4.83, p < 0.0001). Cutting dates of these 39 trees ranged from 1841 to 1843. This latter date indicates that the final trees used to construct the cabin were harvested in spring or early summer of 1843, with final construction of Alfred's Cabin occurring soon after.

The Swaggerty Blockhouse has historical and cultural significance for Tennessee because it is believed to be the only remaining 18^th Century blockhouse in the state. We incorporated analyses of artifacts obtained from archaeological excavations coupled with tree-ring dating techniques to determine the possible year of construction of the structure. A nearby reference tree-ring chronology from Norris Dam anchored the Swaggerty Blockhouse tree-ring chronology from 1674 to 1859. The assemblages of artifacts (nails, ceramics, and window glass) recovered from the site corroborated the construction date and provided a clear understanding of the structure's use as a barn for storage and hog processing. Based on our analyses, the historic Swaggerty “Blockhouse,” originally believed to have been built by James Swaggerty in 1787, is instead a small cantilever barn built by Jacob Stephens in 1860 and used for hog farming.

On 26 May 2003, intense rainfall from a series of thunderstorms in eastern North Carolina caused flooding that eventually destroyed the concrete dam in Hope Mills, draining Hope Mills Lake, and revealing a formerly submerged and buried structure that was identified as a timber crib dam. Inspection revealed these logs to be old-growth longleaf pines, which are now rare on the coastal plain landscape. Our primary objective was to develop a new multi-century longleaf pine tree-ring chronology by crossdating the tree rings from sections extracted from logs in the crib dam with an anchored tree-ring chronology created from nearby living longleaf pine trees. We also examined the climatic response in the longleaf pine trees to evaluate their potential for reconstructing climate. Using tree-ring measurements obtained from old-growth longleaf pines found at a nearby church, we were able to date the rings on 21 series representing 14 logs from the crib dam, spanning the years 1597 to 1825. Distorted sapwood in many of the logs prevented us from finding absolute cutting dates and lessened the strength of correlation during the period of overlap between the church series and crib dam series. Human disturbances, specifically related to the naval stores industry, likely influenced the growth-ring patterns of the crib dam pine samples, as well. Correlation analyses between the longleaf pine chronology and temperature, precipitation, Palmer Drought Severity Indices, and North Atlantic sea surface temperatures showed a significant response to cool and wet spring months.

We investigated the potential for using long-archived wood samples extracted from archaeological contexts at four Mississippian Period (AD 900–1600) settlements in eastern Tennessee for tree-ring dating purposes. Sixteen wood samples recovered from prehistoric sites were analyzed to: (1) crossmatch samples from each site with the intent of determining the relative chronological order of sites, (2) establish a floating prehistoric tree-ring chronology for eastern Tennessee, (3) determine the applicability of dendrochronology in prehistoric archaeology in eastern Tennessee, and (4) establish a strategy for future research in the region. We succeeded in crossmatching only three of the 16 tree-ring sequences against each other, representing two sites relatively close to each other: Upper Hampton and Watts Bar Reservoir. The average interseries correlation of these three samples was 0.74 with an average mean sensitivity of 0.26, and they were used to create a 131-year-long floating chronology. The remaining samples contained too few rings (15 to 43) for conclusive crossmatching. Our results demonstrate that dendrochronological techniques may be applied to the practice of prehistoric archaeology in the Southeastern U.S., but highlight the challenges that face dendroarchaeologists: (1) poor wood preservation at prehistoric sites, (2) too few rings in many samples, (3) the lack of a reference chronology long enough for absolute dating, and (4) the lack of a standard on-site sampling protocol to ensure the fragile wood samples remain intact.