1866 Newspaper notices of the Blowing Cave of Georgia

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1866 NEWSPAPER NOTICES OF THE BLOWING CAVE OF GEORGIA

Marion 0, Smith

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During the summer and fall of 1866 several short stories about "The. Blowing Cave

of Georgia" were widely dispersed in newspapers of the eastern United States. Although

all of these notices emphasized air movement at the entrance, one little was said about

the interior of the cave. Three of the articles are reproduced below, which will acquaint
the reader with the historical background of what we know today as either GGR 250, Blowing
Cave (the most likely), or GGR 56, Glory Hole, and some of the nineteenth eee thinking’

on fluctuating air currents.

Curious Cave.--A singular cave in Bainbridge county [sic ] , Ga., 18 re-
ported, with an orifice so small that no person can enter it. © Through this
orifice a strong current of air is alternately blown out and drawn in, with-
out any apparent cause, and regulated by no known law.--New York Evening Post.

The "Blowing Cave" is doubtless referred to. It is no new discovery, but
has been long known. The alternations of inhalation and exhalation are regu-
lar, and are supposed to be caused by the ebb and flow of the tides in the
Gulf of Mexico. We believe that the distance from the mouth of the cave to
the Gulf is about seventy miles, and it is supposed that there is a subter-
ranean communication between the mouth of the cave and the waters of the
Gulf .--Columbus [Georgia] Enquirer.

} New Orleans Picayune, August 5, 1866, p. 6, c. 3.

The Blowing Cave of Georgia
: Gainbevilie, Ala., Aug. 2, 1966.
Editor Mobile Daily Times:+ :

Among many other interesting items contained in your last issue, I noticed
a paragraph in regard to one of Georgia's greatest natural curiosities. I
allude to the "Blowing Cave," as it is called by the inhabitants of the section
in which it is located. | oy

Thinking that a few particulars in regard to this truly strange phenomenon
might prove interesting, and lead to further inquiry, l dot them down.

Blowing Cave is situated on: the plantation of Col. David Barrow, 2 5
Decatur county, 2 Georgia, twenty-seven miles from Thomasville, the terminus of
the Savannah and Gulf Railroad. The cave is at the bottom of a small natural
basin, (whose diameter will not. at any point exceed thirty feet) in a perfect-
ly smooth plain, and surrounded with a dense copse of wood. There are no in-
dications to lead to the supposition that it was occasioned by any eruption of
a volcanic or convulsive nature, as the face of the surrounding country, as
well as the immediate neighborhood of the cave itself is wholly free of stones,
ruggedness and other marks of convulsive action.

When first discovered and brought into notice by Colonels Barrow and McKins-
ley,4 in the year 1836 or'37, the orifice of the cave was three or four feet
to the left of the present one, and much larger. Colonel McKinsley proposed |
exploring it, but in attempting to sound it with lead and line, and failing to
touch bottom, gave up the undertaking as too hazardous for further venture. ©

The present mouth of the cave is about one and a half feet in diameter,

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Civil War era map of southwestern Georgia. Pilate 14%. Atias
Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies.

to Accompany the

through which at one period of the day there issues a strong current of air,
not in puffs, but a continuous stream, with a roar that is heard at a dis-
tance of sixty or seventy yards. |

In the winter of 1864, in company with several ladies, I visited the
cave at the time of his "blowing out;" and by way of experiment, one of
the ladies threw her veil into the mouth of it, which was blown into. the
air to the height of six or seven feet. I then threw my hat--a heavy
woolen one--into it with a like result. Several articles, heavier than
either of the above, were tried, but were immediately expelled. _

At another period of the day the suction is relatively as great. Any

light article held near the orifice is instantly drawn into the cave. .
Dr; Cotton, tne otate geologist, > a gentleman of hight scientific
‘ability, visited it at the solicitation of Cols. McKinsley and Barrow,
and gave it as his opinion that these reserved phenomena were caused by
the ebb and flow of the tide, and that the cave was originally one of the
fathomless lime sinks so numerous in that part Of Georela. I believe
the doctor's theory correct. |
Leading from all points into the basin are Indian trails, deep worn,
indication much visiting to the cave, by the red man, ere the exe of the
white man woke up the echoes of the forest, and it was probably regarded
by them as a place of sanctity, where they held commune with the spirits
in the great hunting ground above. 2 Ji we BOK
Augusta Daily Constitutionalist, August oT. AROO. Oh 44 Gs Se

THE BLOWING CAVE.-- Several articles in reference to this Georgia
phenomenon have lattely appeared in our paper. The Bainbridge Argus
(published in the county in which the mouth of the cave is located)
noticing these articles, reports the following additional facts con-
cerning it: : ao 3

"we are credibly informed, however, that the cave has been explored.
Mr Michael. Ganous, / who resides within a short distance of it, states
that he has himself descended into its mouth to the depth of one hundred
feet, and that the interior covers about half an acre, across which a
stream passes whose waters are continually agitated from some cause,
and that anything thrown upon its surface is instantly sucked under.

The walls of the cavern are limestone rock. In very wet weather, the
cave is filled with water, which sometimes rises above its mouth. It
is situated about eighteen miles from this city.” _

Milledgeville Southern Recorder, Oetober 2. 1066, 0. 35° ce» 1.

NOTES

i, Henry St. Feus (c1818-£11885), a New Orleans attorney and captain of the 7th
Louisiana Battalion Infantry, CSA, after the Civil War lived in Mobile, where he was

a proprietor and editor of the Times before resuming the practice of law. Mobile
directories (1866-85); 1860 Census, La., Orleans,. 6th Ward, 137; (1870), Mobile, ,
Mobile, 2nd Ward, 15; Andrew B. Booth, comp., Records of Louisiana Confederate Soldiers

and Louisiana Confederate Commands (3 vols., Spartanburg, 5. C., 1984 [1920]}), 33672.

2. Grady County was created by the legislature August 1/7, 1905, to begin existence
the first day of 1906. It took its territory from Thomas County and the eastern portion
of Decatur County. Pat Bryant, Georgia Counties: Their Changing Boundaries (Atlanta,

1963), G1.

a5 Barrow, whose age was not given in the census, before the war lowned 3875 acres
of land and ninety-three slaves worth a total.of $67,500. 1860 Census, Ga., Decatur,
16th Dist., Blowing Cave P. 0., 285 Frank S. Jones, History of Decatur County Georgia

(Spartanburg, S. C., 1980 fi971]), dey a

4. Not identified.

5. John Ruggles Cotting (1783-1867), a Massachusetts-born chemistry professor, was
Georgia's first state geologist (1835-37). National Cyclopaedia of American Biography,
5:185-86.

6. Not identified.

ae Probably Mitchell Gainus (b. c1845), a farm laborer, and a veteran of the
8th Florida Infantry, CSA. 1860 Census, Ga., Decatur, 16th Dist., Blowing Cave P. 0.;
26; (1870), Limesink Precinct, 13.