Noël Hume, Ivor, 1927-2017

Born in London, Noël Hume studied at Framlingham College, Suffolk and St. Lawrence College, Kent. He spent a short stint in the British Army during World War II, and as an assistant stage manager for a London theatre, before deciding to pursue archaeology as a career and joining the staff of Guildhall Museum in London where he worked from 1949 to 1957. His early speciality was 17th and 18th century wine bottles. He became chief archaeologist and director of the expanded Colonial Williamsburg archaeology program in 1957 and served in that capacity for the next three decades. He was made an officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1993 for his service to British cultural interests in Virginia.

Noël Hume discovered and excavated the 17th century site of Wolstenholme Towne, at Carter's Grove Plantation just east of Williamsburg. Wolstenholme at Martin's Hundred was one of the early Virginia settlements after Jamestown and evidence of the 1622 Indian attack was found in the deaths of several of the citizens. Major excavations in Colonial Williamsburg included work at the original site of Eastern State Hospital, conducted in 1972 — which was the largest site work since the excavation of the Governor's Palace in 1930 — the James Geddy House and shop, Weatherburn's Tavern and outbuildings and the cabinetmakers shop. In 1962, he participated in the excavation of the New Bremen Glass Manufactory, also known as the Amelung Glass Manufactory, near present-day Frederick, Maryland. The excavation was sponsored by The Corning Museum of Glass and the Smithsonian Institution. Noël Hume retired as Director of the Department of Archaeological Research at Colonial Williamsburg in 1988.