Douglas D. Scott is an American archaeologist most notable for his work at the Little Bighorn in the mid-1980s. Working with Richard Fox, Melissa Connor, Doug Harmon, and staff and volunteers from the National Park Service, Scott worked to sketch out a field methodology that has enabled archaeologists to systematically investigate battlefields. This work is internationally recognized as constituting a great step forward in our ability to interpret battlefields archaeologically, regardless of the extent of the historical record. At the Little Bighorn, the fieldwork produced an interpretation of the battle that for the first time gave a clear understanding of the way the battle developed and pointed out some of the glaring inaccuracies of the historiography of the event. The fieldwork also helped determine which of the 242 headstones to the 210 U.S. soldiers lost at the Little Bighorn were erroneous, and recovered skeletal elements allowed one of the soldiers to be positively identified. It was not as successful in recovering the remains of 24 men lost in Deep Ravine and whose whereabouts are unknown to this day.
Scott has led similar work at other Indian Wars battlefields, including Fort Washita and the site of the Sand Creek Massacre. In the early 2000s, he led fieldwork at Pea Ridge and Wilson's Creek, two Civil War battlefields in Arkansas and Missouri, respectively.
For this work, Scott has been honored with awards from the National Park Service. He is currently the president of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Scott is also a member of the Advisory Board for Armchair General Magazine.
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