Kitchen floor fill and brick paving

The earthen layers appearing in these two photos, of varying compositions of clay, sand, gravel, and [probably] floor sweepings, document the incremental raising of the floor levels in the kitchen and "root" cellars as occasional creek floods, and frequent water table incursions, inundated the working kitchen and food storage areas. Brick floor paving and fireplace hearth stones were uncovered at three different elevations in the kitchen. The bricks seen in these photos are probably the intermediate floor level, since the original brick floor (laid in "running" bond) was found against the southern face of the eastern fireplace pier ["jamb" or, anglicized, "leg"], approximately 6 inches below the bricks shown here. Laurence Ward, 2009