Archeological Investigations Part 16

The northern or left branch presented a smooth, solid floor of rock at the beginning. The roof is about 13 feet above the floor, being a flat stratum broken by a joint-seam along which there is a slight fault. A ledge of friable sandstone 3 feet thick lies next below the roof. The disintegration of this gave a dry covering to the clayey earth which covered the floor almost to the extreme edge of the rock overhanging the stream and gradually rose toward the rear, where it entirely filled the s.p.a.ce from floor to roof. The distance between the side walls is 8 feet at the mouth. They diverge slightly, and at 65 feet are about 12 feet apart. Here they separate more sharply, forming a chamber 30 feet in diameter, measuring on every side to the contact of the earth and the roof. At the extreme rear a slight wash or depression in the earth revealed the top of a vertical solid wall, thus marking the limit of the cave in that direction. It seems, however, to extend farther to the east and the west than it can now be followed; in fact, the indications are that at one time a considerable cross-cavern extended along this line.

The work of clearing out this branch began at the entrance. The superinc.u.mbent earth was removed by a trench whose boundary was the solid rock on each side until the cave widened to more than 8 feet between the walls; then a width of 7 to 9 feet was excavated midway between the sides, the entire trench having a length of 92 feet, or reaching nearly to the vertical wall at the rear. For about 60 feet the earth was removed to the rock floor. At this distance the floor dipped. The bottom of the trench continued to follow the same level it had held to this point, in the belief that the dip in the floor was due to a crevice or slight erosion channel and would soon disappear, bringing the rock to its normal position. This was not the case; several holes were dug, the deepest one 3 feet, into the mingled clay and rock, without finding any evidence of a solid bottom. The conclusion seemed certain that the pa.s.sage leading from the entrance of the cave to the large room at its farther end was only a tributary or branch of a cross-cave extending in an east and west direction, as intimated above. Prof. Eigenmann, of the State university, reached the same conclusion through surveys not connected with this work. Under the circ.u.mstances further digging seemed useless; for if this should be a cross-cave the bottom would probably, almost certainly, be on a level with the stream now flowing through the central pa.s.sage, while if it should prove to be only a cellar-like deepening, it would not be utilized for a habitation.

At 30 feet from the entrance the acc.u.mulated earth had a thickness of 6 feet; from there it rose gradually to the roof at the end.

At 37 feet, in a pocket of coa.r.s.e sand on the rock floor, such as settles in a gentle current, were four fragments of bone. There is not enough of them to identify with certainty, but they seem to belong to a deer, a turkey, and some bird about the size of a quail.

At 66 feet in, a foot lower than the surface of the bedrock (being 5 or 6 feet beyond the above-mentioned dip), were small fragments or particles of charcoal, or what had every appearance of such. They were in earth that showed the lamination or stratification due to successive water deposits, and had been introduced in the same manner.

The entire earth deposit below the sand capping showed this lamination, sometimes horizontal, sometimes curved, proving a long period of deposition. Further evidence of age is found in the travertine, 7 inches thick, that occurs on top of the earth at the back of the cave.

In the absence of all other evidence the specks of charcoal can not be accepted as proof of human life in the vicinity at the time these deposits were forming.

While the work was in progress three students from the university came through the central cave in a small boat, having entered through a sink hole 3 miles away in an air line. At some point of their course they lost their lanterns and made the remainder of the journey in absolute darkness, feeling their way along the walls, dragging or carrying the craft over shallows, and at one place lying flat in the bottom and propelling the boat by applying hands and feet to the roof, which was less than a foot above the water.

MARTIN COUNTY

Various caves are reported in the vicinity of Shoals. Those whose location was clearly given are merely "rock houses" or recesses in the Carboniferous conglomerate bluffs bordering the east fork of White River. Some of them would make fairly good shelters, but all which can now be examined are at so low a level that the river gets into them or very close to them in flood periods. Consequently there is no probability that ancient remains are to be found in them. Some of the shelters higher up on the cliffs may have been utilized, but the bottom of these is now covered with huge blocks, some weighing a hundred tons. It is true that such rock houses, in all parts of the country, were regular resorts for modern Indians, and they probably furnished shelter to the earliest inhabitants of this region, no matter how remote the period of occupation. But owing to their open front and the exposed situation of most of them, it is quite possible that the wind may remove the fine material falling from roof and sides almost as fast as it is deposited. At any rate the debris on the floors is seldom more than 3 or 4 feet deep, and articles very plainly of no great age are frequently found at all levels in it.

In a few places along the river bluffs limestone crops out beneath the sandstone, and springs occasionally appear along the line of junction, eroding small cavities, but these are subject to overflow, and none of them has an opening large enough to enter without crawling.

ORANGE COUNTY

VICINITY OF PAOLI.--From this town six caves were visited, all that could be located by diligent inquiry. None of them has any particular designation except "Mill Cave," which is so named because the stream issuing from it furnishes power for a flour mill. The water covers the floor at all seasons.

One, though quite small, could have been occupied at a former period, but the roof and front fell in some years ago, entirely closing it.

A third has a small entrance on a hillside. A steep and rough descent was followed beyond reach of daylight without coming to a level bottom.

The other three are very small with rock bottoms.

FRENCH LICK SPRINGS.--Two or three miles from this place is "Star Cavern," which is advertised as being of great size and beauty. The immediate surroundings are quite romantic and deserve the praise accorded the spot by visitors. The cave itself, however, more resembles an artificial tunnel than a natural result of erosion. The floor is clean rock with a little brook flowing over it.

Two other caves not far from Star Cave are dry, but with solid rock floors, so they were not visited.

ORANGEVILLE.--Near this place are the so-called Gulfs of Lost River.

The stream sinks a few miles east of Orleans, emerges at the "Gulfs"

from one side of a very large sink hole with precipitous margin, and immediately goes out of sight again in a deep pool or chasm. It reappears a mile or so away at the foot of a cliff where, after heavy rains, it boils up like a gigantic fountain. Numerous small caves or sink holes exist in the neighborhood, three of which were reported as being dry, lighted, having good entrances, and well suited for habitancy. One of them is at the bottom of a sink hole on a hill. The descent is steep and rocky for 20 feet (it was not followed farther) and no doubt so continues to the level of the river which flows almost directly under it.

The two others are in the princ.i.p.al "Gulf." They are open and of good size, but mud high on the walls shows they are filled with water in wet seasons.

CRAWFORD COUNTY

MARENGO CAVE.--This is growing famous as it becomes better known.

Blatchley says that in it "are probably crowded more beautiful formations of crystalline limestone than in any other known cave of similar size in the United States." Visitors who have been in both say it surpa.s.ses Luray Cavern in the magnificence of its sheets and columns of deposited material.

As it was not opened until 1883, and the bottom can be reached only by a stairway 60 feet high, it was of course unknown to the aborigines.

A small cave near Marengo has an opening on a hillside, and can be directly entered from the outside; but it is at times a pa.s.sageway for a strong current of water 3 feet deep and extending the full width of the cavity.

MILLTOWN.--A mile north of the town is a large cave which would furnish an abode for scores of people. The entrance is in a slight depression on the level upland west of Blue River. The descent is down an easy slope of fallen rock and earth about 30 feet deep to a rock floor. Beyond the foot of the slope there is a slight thickness of earth, so that explorations could reveal nothing that had a certainty of antiquity.

There is presented here a fine example of the manner in which caves of this character become exposed to the upper world. At first, there was an underground channel draining the adjacent country over a territory of varying extent, sometimes many square miles. At some point the roof fell in more rapidly than in other parts, until at last it became so thin as to give way entirely. If the debris was not sufficient in amount to extend above that part of the roof which remained intact on either side, so that it would be gradually carried away, the cave would remain open in both directions, as is the case at the "Gulfs"

just described and at other caves statements of which appear in subsequent pages. Usually the debris quite chokes up one side and all the superficial drainage is turned into the other, which is thus kept open. In time, the slope around the depression becomes tolerably uniform except close to the entrance, and there is no outward indication that the cave ever extended farther than the spot where the new entrance is located. So the cave, as it is now open to examination, is only a portion of the original pa.s.sage, and as the explorer pursues his way, he may be going toward either the former mouth or the source. In the former case, he comes out of a large opening, or what was formerly such, on some slope in the neighborhood, or descends until his way is obstructed by water. In the latter, he may find his way shut off by diminis.h.i.+ng pa.s.sages, or he may descend to lower levels through newer drainage channels cut by the streams which have been reversed and forced to carve other outlets for themselves.

This change occurred in the Milltown Cave a very long time ago.

Standing on the debris, several feet within the entrance and beneath a part of the roof now perfectly dry and showing no marks of percolating water, is a stalagmite 31 inches in diameter, which has weathered to a depth of 3 to 4 inches from atmospheric influences alone.

WYANDOTTE CAVE.--So much has been printed concerning this celebrated cavern that no mention need be made of its interior features. The place seems excellently adapted as a habitation for primitive people.

It is situated on a hill at whose foot is the bank of Blue River. Five miles away, as the road runs, is the Ohio. The backwater sometimes reaches up the tributary for more than 10 miles. The flint-bearing stratum of the Harrison County aboriginal quarries outcrops a short distance away and appears at several points within the cave. The country is extremely rugged, and good springs occur frequently. Game was formerly abundant in the hills, and Blue River still rewards the angler with various species of fish, many of them of large size.

A former race, presumably the modern Indian, did much work within the cave. Tons of travertine or stalagmite, the so-called alabaster, have been quarried from some of the deposits, while a large number of flint nodules has been dug out of the cave-earth where they fell from the disintegrating limestone. Some of this labor was carried on more than a mile from daylight.

The mouth of the cave was formerly almost closed by a ma.s.s of talus.

About 10 feet has been removed from the top of this, so that one may now walk in without difficulty. On the inner side of the portion remaining there is a slope for 96 feet, to a vertical depth of a little more than 27 feet. The next 100 feet gives a descent of about 3 feet; then another steep slope begins. The first point at which bedrock floor is found within the cave is 120 feet lower than the point of entry. It is supposed that the drainage to which the cave owes its origin was outward; if this was the case the floor must be more than 120 feet below the roof at the doorway. While this may be true, it is not indicated by the condition of the visible strata. For about 50 feet outward the side walls are nearly parallel and nowhere more than 30 feet apart. Then they terminate at an angle in the outcrop of the ledge along the hillside. The appearance and condition of the upper strata, together with this narrow separation of the side walls outside the cave, produce the impression that at a period not very remote the roof of the cavern reached to the outcropping ledge in which the walls end. Even though the rock floor should be at the great depth supposed there is a possibility that an earth floor could be found below the detritus which has acc.u.mulated since the roof fell in or has worn away.

To test the matter a shaft was begun at a point 16 feet in front of the doorway. This was as near as such work could be done without interfering with the advent of visitors, and allowed a margin of 30 feet toward the outer slope. The shaft, 6 feet in diameter, soon pa.s.sed into a compact ma.s.s of red clay filled with rocks of various sizes. At 14 feet down this was broken by an irregular stratum averaging a foot in thickness, of coa.r.s.e sand or fine gravel with a slight admixture of clay, such as would form in a running stream. Its slope was inward or toward the cave. As there are sandstone ledges on the hillside above, this sand may have come from them, but, if so, it is singular that none appeared elsewhere. At 18 feet down was a ma.s.s of travertine measuring nearly 3 feet across and from 6 to 12 inches thick. It had formed around the lower part of a stalagmite 18 inches long, and the bottom of the whole formation rested horizontally on clay. This gave the excavators hope that an earth floor had been reached, as the stalagmite was vertical and resembled in all respects stalagmites in the cave. But it was soon found to be a foreign inclusion, and the same confused mixture of clay and stone continued below as above. Various fragments of stalact.i.tes and stalagmites were found as part of the detritus. These, especially the vertical one, seem to confirm the supposition that the roof reached out this far at a period which is quite recent as compared with the age of the cave.

To a depth of 25 or 26 feet the task of excavating was as tedious and difficult as digging up a much-traveled, rocky road, the earth being dry enough to scour the shovels. Then the earth grew moist and within 2 feet was muddy. Cavities appeared, into some of which a switch could be thrust 3 or 4 feet. Where such a cavity extended under a large stone, stalact.i.tes were in process of formation. Soon the earth began to work into a soft mud under the feet of the workmen, and at 32 feet particles and small clods were noticed falling from the sides of the shaft. A foot lower this breaking away became more decided. It may have been due merely to the loose condition of the wet earth allowing unsupported portions to fall from the freshly exposed surface, but there was also the risk that the softer earth was sliding under the weight of that above. The workmen, two of whom were experienced well and cistern diggers, declared the risk too great and demanded to be brought to the surface.

The depth reached by this shaft was at least 5 feet lower than at any point inside, within 200 feet of the mouth of the cave. The material, with the exception of the sand layer, was almost identical from top to bottom, there being no apparent difference other than increase of moisture in the lower part. The only explanation suggesting itself at present is that the chasm is filled with large loose rocks up to a point near the bottom of the shaft; that debris from the hillside above has covered these more rapidly than it could settle in the crevices and cavities among them; and that water which makes its way downward finds some obstruction to its free pa.s.sage out at the bottom of the chasm.

The only safe plan of excavation seems to require the removal of all the earth between the side walls to a depth below the mud. If the rock bottom, or any solid bottom, is at a depth of 120 feet, there is small chance that man lived in this region at a time when it was easily accessible.

SALTPETER CAVE.--This is about 600 yards northwest of Wyandotte Cave.

"The entrance, in a side of a ravine, is 5 feet high and 19 feet wide.

Once within, a gigantic room expands, 220 feet long, 75 feet wide, and 10 to 30 feet in height, with smooth flat ceiling and earthen floor, the latter descending and with its edges much enc.u.mbered with fallen rock." [W.S. Blatchley.]

From the description given, this would seem an ideal site for research. Unfortunately, the bottom of the ravine is not more than 5 feet lower than the top of the talus at the entrance. This slight elevation is the only barrier which keeps the surface water from flowing in, and while the ravine seldom has any water in it, there would be enough after a moderate rain to drown out the diggers who were working below its level if the bank were removed.

LITTLE WYANDOTTE.--This, like three caves on Blue River above Wyandotte, four in the vicinity of Leavenworth, and one on the opposite side of the river in Meade County, Ky., has a small entrance in solid rock, with a steep and narrow pa.s.sage to the foot of a slope which does not expand into a room of any size until at some distance beyond daylight.

HARRISON COUNTY

The only cave of any note in Harrison County is at the King quarries, 5 miles east of Corydon. It has two outlets, one at the foot of a little cliff, through which a fine spring has an exit; the other in the face of the cliff, about 10 feet higher and a little to one side.

The latter discharges more or less water after every rain. The drainage of several large sink holes is through the two openings. The owner says mud has acc.u.mulated to a depth of 3 feet on the floor within his remembrance, due to cultivation around the sink holes, which causes the soil to waste.

ILLINOIS

MONROE COUNTY

MAMMOTH CAVE.--The so-called "Mammoth Cave of Illinois" is near Burksville, in Monroe County. An opportunity was afforded to visit it while engaged in the cave work. It is very extensive, according to the owner's description, being "7 or 8 miles long." The mouth is at the bottom of a sink hole, and the cave is now reached by a narrow stairway 40 feet high. Formerly it was necessary to clamber down the walls, stepping from ledge to ledge with a foot and a hand on either side. Then a ladder was made, said to have been 50 feet long; and, with more frequent visitors, the stairway followed. The crevice is very short, a mere crack, apparently made by water working its way down from the bottom of the sink. All the drainage within the rim goes into the cave, and it acc.u.mulates in the rainy season until the floor is covered. A farmer living near says he has seen the water from the cave rise until it covered the bottom of the sink hole. As similar depressions are numerous in the vicinity, probably the combined inflow is greater than the cave can carry away. The floor has been leveled and a close pavement of large slabs laid over the muddy portions. No one has ever heard of human remains being found anywhere in the cave.