Unlike the other mounds at Pineland, which were shell middens, the Smith Mound is a sand mound with thin layers of shell, and was used for burials. The Smith Mound was originally about long and high. (Cushing gave dimensions for this mound of long, wide and high.Cushing has been said to have used 'hyperbole' in his estimates of the heights of mounds. []) It was surrounded by a pond fed by a canal which branched from the Pine Island Canal. A path wound around the mound to the summit, which was narrow but flat. Cushing observed potsherds, broken shell ladles, and human bones on the mound. The Smith Mound was constructed around 1000 years ago. Part of the mound was destroyed more than a century ago, and the adjacent pond and canal filled in. Half of the mound and the pond were preserved by its owner, Captain Smith.
