Hammett Grove Meta-igneous Suite is here formally named within the northwestern Piedmont of SC and interpreted to be a dismembered ophiolite. Name introduced as informal Hammett Grove complex by Mittwede (1986). Suite consists of amphibolite facies metamorphic equivalents of comagmatic mafic and ultramafic igneous rocks. Crops out over a strike length of at least 30 km in southwestern Cherokee and eastern Spartanburg Cos. Main body of the suite is 11 km long and approximately 1 km wide with a maximum thickness of 30 m. Suite is divided into (presumed ascending) Pacolet Soapstone, South Goucher Metapyroxenite, North Goucher Metagabbro, White Plains Metabasalt (all new names), and unnamed metachert. In fault contact with Late Proterozoic to early Paleozoic metamorphic rocks of the Inner Piedmont belt and the 383-Ma Pacolet Mills pluton. Author suggests that Hammett Grove is not only allochthonous, but a thrust slice or klippe of Kings Mountain belt derivation, and documents a middle Paleozoic accretionary event.

Source: GNU records (USGS DDS-6; Reston GNULEX).