Rome, Georgia - History (part 12 of 17)

I boarded the outgoing Western and Atlantic train at the (Union) depot Saturday morning at 8 o'clock and found the Williamson party occupying the parlor car. The party consisted of Capt. Williamson, Mr. Jack King, his second; Judge H. B. Tompkins, and Maj. C. B. F. Lowe.*

I paid my way to Marietta, and when I learned from the conductor to what point the Williamson party had paid their way I antied up more cash to carry me to Kingston.

At Kingston, Capt. Williamson's private car was in waiting. It was placed next to the engine. I knew this meant a quick cut loose and fast run through Rome to avoid arrest, and to get rid of me, as I had been spotted. When Rome was reached, the train was stopped at the depot, and I ran to the private car and took my seat on the steps. As I expected, the special car was uncoupled and run through town at the rate of twenty miles an hour. Two miles the other side of Rome Mr. Jack King discovered me hiding on the steps. The train was stopped and I was put off like a tramp, and had to count the crossties for two miles through the hot sun.

In Rome I called upon Colonel John T. Graves, and Mr. Taylor, the city editor of his paper. Mr. E. W. Barrett, of The Constitution, and myself went to work to secure a special engine to follow the Williamson party. We called upon Major Lawrence, of the Rome and Decatur Road. He informed us that the Williamson party had sent to him for permission to go over his road on a tour of inspection, and he replied that he had no engineer to pilot them. The Williamson party was then side-tracked at a junction two miles from the city.

But a wide-awake citizen of Rome, Maj. John J. Seay, to whom we had told the story, enlisted in our cause, and he procured an engineer from his dummy who knew the Rome and Decatur road.

At the junction we found Capt. Williamson's car. We offered them our pilot and they invited us into the private car, giving us a fine lunch and champagne and cigars. This was the car from which I had been fired like a tramp an hour before.

While waiting for Capt. Williamson's engine to return, the party went into the woods and the captain practiced handling his revolver by firing at a blazed pine tree. The blaze was the height of a man with a round place for the head.

Judge Tompkins would give the command: "Are you ready? One, two three, fire!" And Capt. Williamson would raise his pistol and send five balls into the tree, many shots striking the blazed place.

Somebody ran into the woods and stated that the sheriff of Floyd County, with a deputy, was coming down the track. Hurriedly an arrangement was made and Capt. Williamson and Mr. King ran through the woods, with the understanding that the train was to pick them up two miles down the road.

*According to the Barrett narrative, it was W. B. Lowe. Capt. Wm. B. Lowe was about this time engaged in railroad construction and was a casual resident of Rome. He was the father of Miss Rebie Lowe, who married Baron Rosencrantz, of Austria. Capt. Jas. W. English, of Atlanta, a business associate and close friend, states that Capt. Lowe was ill when the duel was fought, and in his opinion was not present. Practically all the principals In the duel are now dead. Exceptions are Mr. Calhoun, now a resident of Frankfort, Ky., and Dr. Henry Battey, of Rome.

The sheriff produced a telegram from Governor Gordon instructing him to arrest certain gentlemen. He didn't find whom he wanted, and when the other engine arrived, the party pulled out. Two miles down the track Capt. Williamson and Mr. King got aboard, and we were rolling towards Cedar Bluff, the place of meeting, at thirty miles an hour. As we passed Raynes Station, at 3 o'clock in the afternoon, I left a telegram for The Journal, and two hours afterward found that it had not been sent off. The mail is better than telegraphing from a country railway station.

We were in Cherokee County, Alabama, and the sheriff was one of those bushy, black-whiskered fellows with a broad-brim white hat on, who meant business.

The private car got off, but the special engine was stopped by the sheriff. However, the car did not get far when it met the regular passenger. Our car had to be backed to Cedar Bluff and into the hands of the bushy-whiskered sheriff.

Mr. Calhoun and Capt. Harry Jackson were on the regular passenger, having come from Atlanta by the way of Anniston. They got off, and there was Ed Bruffey, hobbling behind them on one crutch.

Capt. Seay, who was known to the sheriff, made affidavit that the gentleman was not Capt. Williamson and Mr. Calhoun was released. Mr. Bruffey represented himself as Pat Calhoun and was arrested, but was released when the station master, who knew Mr. Calhoun, saw him.

The sheriff swore he would hold the special train and engine. Both trains were searched. Mr. Calhoun and Capt. Jackson were locked up in a closet in the private car. Capt. Williamson and Mr. King were in a closet on the regular passenger. An arrangement had been made for as many of the party as possible to leave on this train. When the passenger train pulled out, it carried off Capt. Williamson, Mr. King, Dr. Battey, Capt. Williamson's private secretary, Capt. Seay and myself. The rest of the party were left behind on the private car.

The passenger train coming from Rome was an hour late when it reached Raynes' Station. Dr. Cooper was aboard. Myself, Capt. Seay and Capt. Williamson's private secretary got aboard and returned to Cedar Bluff. The bushy-whiskered sheriff of Cherokee County was still on hand, and he had been made to believe that the entire duelling party had gone to Raynes' Station on the regular passenger. He was anxious to know what happened. He was told that mutual apologies had been made and everything satisfactorily settled. This explanation induced him to let the special train and engine move off.

At Raynes' Station everybody got off and the seconds had a talk. The sun was just setting, and I wired The Journal that the fight was about to take place.

While the seconds were arranging preliminaries, there was a loud clatter of horses' feet, and four men on mules and carrying shotguns came in sight.

It was nearly dark and we had left the only telegraph station between Cedar Bluff and Rome behind us. I knew the lateness of the hour and the remoteness of a telegraph station would make it impossible for me to reach The Journal with the news in

Some Day Man Will Conquer Water

Vigorous steps have been taken by Rome leaders to frustrate the freshets, or get above them. One plan is to dam up ravines far above Rome, and rlease th water when the rivers are low. Another is to have the city grow northward on the hills and use the abandoned river fork land for a park. (Near the bottom of the picture is Hamilton athletic field submerged.)

The warning was none too soon. Down the railroad the four men with shotguns were coming at a dog trot. Everybody jumped aboard and the train moved off toward Rome before the men got in shooting distance.

Capt. Williamson had the choice of weapons and selected the hammerless Smith & Wesson five-shooter. Mr. King was to give the command as follows :

At the command "fire," each principal was to raise his weapon and shoot five shots and to stop when their revolvers were empty. The command and the manner of firing was not that laid down in the Code, and some objection was made at first by Capt. Jackson. But, as Mr. Calhoun didn't seem to care, the arrangement was accepted as satisfactory. Capt. Jackson thought the men should fire one shot at a time, and that the command should be "Gentleman, are you ready? Fire, one, two, three, - stop!"

At thirty-five minutes past seven o'clock, the principals were placed in position twelve paces apart. Only the pi-incipals, seconds, doctors, reporters and Capt. Seay were allowed on the field.

The last i-ays of daylight were fading out of the western sky, while in the east the full moon was rising above the tree tops. Each man stood facing the other against a background of underbrush. Not a breath of wind stirred the leaves, and the only sound that

Mr. King produced two new nickelplated pistols and Capt. Jackson selected one and went over to his principal to show him how it had to be fired.

"There, my finger's gone!" and Mr. Bruffey walked off holding up a bloody hand. A part of the third finger of his right hand had been torn away by the ball.

At this time I passed close to Capt. Williamson and Mr. Calhoun, to see if there was any quick breathing, or anything to indicate nervousness. But the breathing of both was slow and regular, and there was not a tremor of the body. Two cooler, braver men never stood on the field of honor.

Capt. Seay had to be forcibly moved out of the way. He then called upon the doctors and the reporters to help him remove the principals and the seconds into the coach and take them back to Rome.

Mr. Bruffey put in with: "Yes, these men are two of the best citizens of Georgia, and it would be a terrible calamity if either of them was killed. Gentlemen, if it will satisfy you, you can each take a couple of cracks at me."

Six rapid shots rang out on the still night air. Mr. Calhoun was asked if he was hurt and he said, "No." Capt. Williamson was asked if he was hurt and he answered that he was not.

"My statement before that committee was to impress the legislature with the fact that your railroad was offered to the Central in 1887. I say this with four balls, and I do not wish to take your life."

"Mr. Williamson, in my remarks before the legislative committee, you did not personally enter my mind. I say this holding four shots in reserve, and when I have fired them in the air I expect you to withdraw your remarks, since I have made this statement."

"Since you have stated that you meant nothing personal in your remarks, I now withdraw the statement I made before the legislative committee."

We arrived in Rome a few minutes after 9 o'clock, and that was the first telegraph station reached after the fight. I sent the first authentic news of the fight to Atlanta at that hour.

Cap. Williamson and the other gentlemen who live in Rome got off, and Mr. Calhoun, Capt. Jackson, Dr. Cooper, Judge Tompkins, Major Lowe and myself were sent through on Capt. Williamson's private car, arriving in Atlanta at 2 o'clock on Sunday morning.

Notes Of The Fight

Capt. Jackson tells a good story on Mr. Ed Bruffey. He says when they found it impossible to give Ed the shake, they just swore him in. The party had to travel as secretly as possible to avoid arrest. Soon after Bruffey had been "sworn in" he approached Capt. Jackson and said: "Captain, is there any particular lie you want me to tell, or shall I just lie generally?"

The saddest thing of the day was the grief of Capt. Williamson's private secretary at the thought of his employer's having to face death. He remained in the coach during the fight, and when the six shots rang out, he jumped to his feet and exclaimed: "My God! Is he killed?"

It is claimed by Mr. Williamson that it did not occur to him that he could reserve any shot, and that was why he fired so rapidly and left himself unarmed.

Mr. Calhoun says he did not hear any bullets whizzing past him. "I felt as calm and cool," says he, "as if I had been making a law speech." And he looked just as he said he felt.

There came near being a serious collision at Cedar Bluff between Capt. Williamson's special and the regular passenger, on which Capt. Jackson and Mr. Calhoun arrived. Had the special had a few minutes more time when it pulled out from the sheriff there would have been a smashup.

About an hour before the fight took place Capt. Williamson was asked by me if he felt any apprehension of what was coming. He said: "I don't any more mind going into this fight than I do going to breakfast. I have no fear of death and I attribute this to my philosophy. A man must eventually die anyway, and to die now is only to hasten matters a few years."

When the duel was over, it was a happy party that boarded the train and made the champagne corks pop. Mr. Calhoun called Capt. Williamson "John," and Capt. Williamson called

Rome Dwellings Of High Altitude And Low

1 - Mrs. C. S. Sparks. 2 - Mrs. E. L. West. 3 - Col. and Mrs. J. Lindsay Johnson ("Rio Vista," on the Etowah). 4 - Barry Wright. 5 - John C. Glover. 6 - Hugh B. Parks. 7 - Richard A. Denny (formerly Capt. John J. Seay and Thos. W. Alexander). 8 - Mrs. Henry J. Hine- 9 - Judge and Mrs. Waller T. TurnbuU ("Saracinesca," Tubbs Mountain). 10 - W. Coleman Bryan (J. Park Bowie). 11 - J. E. S. Angle (John Montgomery).

They tried to make the old Cherokee sheriff believe the special train carried the mail and that he would be hung for interfering with the mails, but it was no go.

Capt. Jackson, in discussing the duel after it was over, said: "My man showed as noble courage as was ever witnessed on the field, and he had a man of true grit in front of him."

When Ed Bruffey, who has been unable to walk without crutches for several months, left the train to go on the field he forgot his crutches and jumped about in a very lively manner.

And now the fight is over, everybody is satisfied and happy, and will remain so unless the Governor of Alabama opens up a correspondence with the Governor of Georgia.

Gordon Noel Hurtel

The duel is a thing of the past and the friends of all concerned are pleased at the bloodless result. But those who were upon the field may have to make another trip to Alabama. Gov. Tom Seay wants to see them.

Alabama's chief executive made every exertion to prevent the duel in his state. He telegraphed to every county, and yesterday morning when he ascertained that his officers had been eluded, and that the fight took place near the state line, he was angry.

Gentlemen who were in Montgomery yesterday morning and who reached Atlanta last night say that Gov. Seay says he will have officers sent for all parties interested in the affair, and see that the law is vindicated. Just what will be done remains to be seen.

On our return to Atlanta yesterday Mr. Bruffey and myself were asked thousands of questions about the Calhoun-Williamson duel - among them if the men really shot to kill? Were the pistols loaded with balls or were the cartridges blank? And hundreds of other such, I may say, foolish questions.

The bravery shown by both parties in the fight was simply unequaled. They are the two bravest men I ever saw, and in the history of this country, it is safe to say, there will never be another such duel.

Had it not been for the darkness, both men would have been killed, for both are good shots. Mr. Williamson apparently wanted to hit Mr. Calhoun before the latter could get good aim, and therefore fired all five of his balls in less than two seconds. He was familiar with his pistol, but his haste was evidently the cause of his wild shots.

Mr. Calhoun, on the other hand, was a perfect stranger to the hammerless Smith & Wesson self-cocker. In fact, Capt. Harry Jackson says Mr. Calhoun not only never used one before but had never had one in his hands, and as for himself, he never saw one until yesterday on the grounds. Capt. Jackson at first protested against the weapons, but Mr. Calhoun said he was perfectly willing to use them. Mr. Calhoun is a dead shot, and while he might have shot to kill, it struck me otherwise.

After the first shots and when the colloquy ensued, Mr. Calhoun simply held Mr. Williamson's life in his hands. He could have killed him at any moment, and it would have been perfectly justifiable under the code. Whether he ever had any idea of shooting again is the question. No one knew then and perhaps no one knows now. Mr. Williamson's cool bravery in telling him to "shoot your remaining four balls and then we will load and shoot again," folding his arms and standing erect to receive the balls, was an exhibition of courage that gained for him the admiration of everyone on the field. Mr. Calhoun's action in firing his four balls into the air was magnanimous and a clear exhibition of the manhood of the man.

When Mr. King started to approach Mr. Williamson during the colloquy and Capt. Jackson leveled his revolver and cried "Hold your position; if you approach I will kill you!" - the scene was dramatic beyond desci-iption.

There were on the field besides the principals and the seconds the two surgeons, Dr. Cooper and Dr. Battey, Col. John J. Seay, of Rome; Mr. Dozier, The Constitution's engineer; John G. Taylor, of The Rome Tribune, and Mr, Bruffey and myself.

Everyone thought Mr. King was armed, and expecting a general shooting, there was somewhat of a scramble among the spectators. Bruffey dropped on the ground behind a stump ; the others drew back in the woods, and I sought shelter of a pine sapling the size of my arm to the immediate right of Capt. Jackson.

As a scene for a wild and picturesque duel no more strange spot could have been selected than in that small clearing in a clump of woods. It was not more than 75 feet square and was covered with a growth of scrubby bushes. On three sides were great tall trees underneath which was a dense undergrowth. On the fourth side was the railroad track with The Constitution engine and Mr. Williamson's car, containing Judge Tompkins and Mr. W. B. Lowe, both of whom Capt. Jackson refused to allow on the field.

With the puffing engine, the dimlylighted car, the group in the clearing surrounded by the great, tall trees in the gathering shadows, the scene was a weird one. Then the reports of the pistols, the flames from their muzzles, - next the silence, the colloquy, the four shots in the air, the frightened owls hooting and moaning in the distance - it was a queer, a picturesque, a strange, a grand picture.

The special engine and the car bearing Mr. Williamson and party and the train with Mr. Calhoun and Capt. Jackson arrived in Cedar Bluff at the same minute. A big, black-bearded sheriff with a pistol in one hand, a telegram in the other, followed by a posse of five armed men, jumped on the platform of Mr. Williamson's car.

"You are Williamson; I arrest you!" But Col. Seay told the sheriff he was mistaken, and got him away. Then Bruffey whispered to me, "You cover all this. I am going to be arrested and go to jail, and it won't be the first time, either."

In a second the cold muzzle of a pistol was against Bruffey's temple. "We'll see!" cried the sheriff, jerking his arm and lifting him off his crutches.

One of the bravest men I ever saw was Mr. Dozier, The Constitution's engineer. He runs a dummy on Col. Seay's line in Rome, and through Col. Seay's kindness I was able to secure his services to run the engine I had obtained. At Raynes' Station a party of officers ran up to arrest the crowd. A big fellow with a rifle went toward the engine, to the edge of the cut in which it stood, and leveled his rifle at Mr. Dozier.

Col. John J. Seay and Dr. J. B. S. Holmes, of Rome, are trumps. Rushing back to Rome after being put off Mr. Williamson's car in the woods, I went intmediately to Dr. Holmes' office to telephone General Manager

Lawrence, of the Rome & Decatur, to have an engine ready for me immediately. Mr. Lawrence replied he had only one engine and no engineer who had ever been over his road. I could have it if he had an engineer, but without one it was impossible.

Then I drove out to the depot, told Mr. Lawrence I had a man, secured a fireman as Mr. Lawrence went to his office to write instructions for the engineer. Mr. Seay and Engineer Dozier arrived, jumped in the engine, threw the throttle wide open and we were off running wildly down the track without orders or instructions, but fortunately, the track was clear and we got through safely.

Catching Mr. Williamson's engine and car which were side-tracked at the junction and were not able to move without a pilot, I offered them our pilot, provided we were taken aboard their car, with the understanding that that engine was to pull the car and ours to follow. They had no alternative. It was take us aboard or not get to the dueling grounds on time. They accepted the offer with thanks, but just then the sheriff appeared. We took Mr. Williamson and Mr. King on our engine and were off. Their engine and car followed.

E. W. Barrett

The Calhoun-Williamson duel was the one thing discussed in the hotel corridors, private parlors and on the streets yesterday from dawn to dark. Minute details of the fight were in great demand. The Constitution's magnificent and complete work excited the admiration of everybody, and the issue of the paper was exhausted long before the noon hour. Twice the edition could have been sold.

On Friday last, when the trouble then pending between the gentlemen became known, members of The Constitution staff were instructed to watch it closely and to shadow the gentlemen connected with it until the conclusion was reached. Their work in yesterday's edition shows how faithfully they carried out their orders. Mr. E. W. Barrett was assigned to the Williamson party. Mr. Edward C. Bruffey was put on the Calhoun party.

This was Friday afternoon about half past 4 o'clock. The Kimball House was then the battlefield and the two reporters hung closely around with ears and eyes open, never leaving the hotel except to follow either Mr. Williamson or Mr. Calhoun. The work was slow, but it was interesting.

Late Friday night it became apparent to those who were conversant with the latest work that the gentlemen were preparing to leave the city. About half past 10 o'clock Capt. Jackson entered the Kimball and went up the elevator. In a few minutes he came down and walked hurriedly out the Wall Street entrance with his shadow close behind him. At the Union Depot he entered a cab and was driven rapidly to his residence. A cab followed closely behind.

Capt. Jackson remained at his residence about 10 minutes, and came out carrying a small satchel. He then re-entered the cab and was driven to the Union Depot. Stopping at the eastern end, he was joined by Mr. Calhoun, who was awaiting him. Together the two gentlemen entered a Mann car and went to a section which had been reserved for them. Mr. Bruffey was on the same train when it pulled out.

No one knew whither the gentlemen were bound, and a careful watch was necessary to prevent a loss. At every station the front and rear entrances had to be watched, and when Captain Jackson emerged from the section at Anniston, followed by Mr. Calhoun, his shadow made himself scarce. Capt. Jackson passed within three feet of Mr. Bruffey in leaving the car, without knowing it. From that time on it was a game of hide and seek. No two gentlemen ever tried harder to evade friends and avoid observation than Capt. Jackson and Mr. Calhoun, and the watch kept upon them was hard work. But Mr. Bruffey was equal to the task, and when the fight came off he was on hand to see it.

Rome'S Historic Clock Tower, And Other Scenes

The top of the tower is the highest point in downtown Rome, and it has often been sought by romantic young people who wanted to get married in an unusual way. Other views on this page include the office of the Howel Cotton Co., the jail, the N., C. & St. L. (Rome) railroad station (in oval), the City Hall Park bandstand and various machines for locomotion.

left the city and with renewed interest and increased watchfulness lingered about the Kimball, all night long. About 6 the next morning Mr. Williamson left his room, closely followed by Mr. Barrett. The gentleman and his friend walked to the Union Depot and boarded a Western & Atlantic train, Mr. Barrett within reach. At Kingston, where Mr. Williamson's private car was awaiting him, Mr. Barrett's presence was detected, and an attempt was made to give him the shake. But he would not have it, and accepting a seat upon the front platform, made his way into Rome. Outside of Rome, on the Rome and Decatur road, Mr. Barrett was made to leave the train. He felt knocked out, but not defeated. Hurrying back to Rome he sought Mr. Lawrence, superintendent of the Rome & Decatur, and chartered a special engine. But Mr. Lawrence could not furnish an engineer. Then Mr. Barrett "bought" one off a dummy line and in a short time overtook Mr. Williamson's private car. The car was standing upon a side-track and could not move. Mr. Williamson's engineer had never been over the road and the superintendent would not permit the train to move under a man unacquainted with the line.

Mr. Barrett's engineer, however, knew the road. When he pulled out of Rome, Mr. Barrett was in a hurry, and ordered the engineer to turn the machine loose. By those who were on the engine the ride was described as having been wild, reckless and dangerous. But Mr. Barrett was willing to take all chances. Realizing that Mr. Williamson could never reach the field without his help, Mr. Barrett approached Judge Tompkins, saying:

The last line of the duel heading in yesterday's Constitution, stating that Mr. Williamson makes retraction, conveyed a wrong idea. The fact was that Mr. Williamson withdrew his remarks when Mr. Calhoun stated that in his statements before the legislative committee Mr. Williamson personally did not enter his mind.

" 'Capt. Jackson carried with him a pair of dueling pistols which were believed by those who saw them to indicate that the worst is anticipated.'

"Your reporter is mistaken. I did not carry with me a pair of dueling pistols. I have never had a pair of dueling pistols in my hand, and have never seen but one pair in my life.

"In the report in your issue of today there are some inaccuracies in matters of detail which I do not deem it necessary to correct. Reference to the dueling pistols is made only because I wish to correct the public impression that I am supplied with such weapons. My connection with these matters has always been in the interest of peace and humanity. Though sometimes necessary to prevent certain bloodshed, duels are always to be deplored by no one more than yours,

The idea is prevalent that public opinion is generally right, and this view has some foundation in fact; but a certain public opinion which has of late been expressed through the columns of the daily press must be noted as an exception to the rule.

There are few newspapers in this country that believe in dueling, and The Tribune is not one of them. It is a practice which few people can contemplate in the abstract with approval, but it appears to us that the daily press, in its eagerness to condemn the practice, has done serious injustice both to the courage and the character of two brave and honorable gentlemen, and has failed to give proper emphasis to one of the few really noble episodes that ever occurred in a duel in the South.

The writer of his personal knowledge has been aware for many years that Pat Calhoun was one of the coolest and bravest men that this country has produced. There have been few Americans possessed of more unquestioned nerve and coolness, and these qualities, rising higher than a mere absence of fear and indifference to dan- ger, are born of a loftiness of purpose and a devotion to interest which completely dominate the mere issues to person and to life. In this view, Mr. Calhoun is a man of phenomenal loftiness and self-abnegation in danger, and this statement did not need the episode in Alabama to prove it, but has been tested upon other occasions of equal trial, and is characteristic of a family of brothers whose history and record, if told to the world, would read like a romance of daring and manly resolution.

Without knowing anything further of Mr. Williamson than the report of the duel which reliable witnesses have given to the newspapers, The Tribune has expressed its opinion of his courage and resolution in similar terms; but if one should found his opinion of these gentlemen upon the current comments of the newspapers, he would believe that they were both cowardly in thieir natures and fraudulent in their effort to palm themselves off as brave men before the public.

There were just three things that any thoughtful and truthful man ought to realize in the attitude of Mr. Calhoun upon the field of combat. In the first place, if fear had silenced his weapon when Mr. Williamson began to shoot, it is scarcely probable that he could have recovered his equanimity in time to address such calm, tranquil and commanding words to the adversary who confronted him. Mr. Calhoun's character and record justify the view that he was a man who, with his adversary's life in his hands, hesitated to make the sacrifice upon a misunderstanding, and that his humanity triumphed over his indignation and vengeance and he parleyed for the life that he had a right, under the code, to destroy.

An even stronger view is in the fact that Mr. Calhoun endeavored to establish before that duel terminated the truth of the assertions which he had made before the legislative committee, and endeavored to fix upon the records that would go from that battleground the correctness of his position and the argument he had sought to make for the cause. And this view is also sustained in the minds of those who know him by the knowledge of his absolute and self-sacrificing devotion to all the great interests that he has from time to time represented. A third view, also probable to those who know the nature of the man, was that Mr. Calhoun having coolly received the fire of a courageous antagonist, determined, with his own life safe, to seek a nobler revenge in sparing the life that he had a technical right to take, and to give back to the man whom he thought had insulted him the life which might be spent in usefulness hereafter.

The Tribune, that has 'something more than a casual acquaintance with these parties, believes that either one of these views might have actuated Mr. Calhoun, and that all of them did actuate him as he stood there upon this famous field of honor.

Moreover, while it does not approve of duelling, this paper is frank to express the belief that a more genuine, honorable and bona fide duel was never fought by brave men with better faith, or terminated in higher honor than

THE VERDERYS AT CASSVILLE. - Mrs. Susan Verdery Prather, of Atlanta, tells in the following manner the touching story of how Thos. J. Verdery, her brother, and other members of the family happened to be buried at Cassville, Bartow County, once a flourishing town, now little more than a memory :

"My sister, Mary Verdery, married Col. Warren Akin in 1849 "at 'Chieftain's,' on the Oostanaula River, near Rome. He was a widower, his first wife having been Miss Eliza Hooper, daughter of Judge Jno. W. Hooper. When Miss Eliza died, a year after their marriage, she was buried in the cemetery at Cassville. In the early fifties, Col. Akin built a home in the suburbs of Cassville. Two colleges, the Cassville Female College, built by the Methodists, for young women, and the Cherokee Baptist College, built by the Baptists, for the young men, were situated on either side of his handsome home.

"Col. Akin was 36 years old when he married my sister Mary, just turned 18 years. He was a kind brother and son-in-law, and was devoted to the Verderys. After Brother Thomas was killed at Fredericksburg, Va., in 1862, Col. Akin insisted that he be buried at Cassville, and this was done. During the war the Yankees burned the colleges and Col. Akin's home. They took special delight in destroying the Akin place because Col. Akin was a member of the Confederate Congress; he had refugeed to Oxford, and later to Elberton. After the war. Col. Akin built a home in Cartersville, near Cassville, and resided there. My mother was visiting the Akins when she died,

"Three years later - in 1875 - when my father, Augustus N. Verdery, and his sister, Mrs. Pleasant Stovall, of Athens and later Augusta, were living with us in Atlanta, they went to visit the Akins. My father died there and was buried beside my mother and my brother. My aunt, Mrs. Stovall, lived with us some years longer, and before she died said, 'Please bury me by my dear brother Augustus.' She was laid at rest beside him. My sister, Virginia (Mrs. Dr. Hezekiah Witcher, of Cedartown), who died in 1900, and Oriana were buried with the family at Cassville in accordance with their requests."

Judge Wright And Col

JUDGE WRIGHT AND COL. SHORTER'S COTTON. - Partners often fall out and go their respective ways thereafter. In ante-bellum days Judge Augustus R. Wright and Col. Alfred Shorter owned the bridges of Rome, and charged folks to cross them. An estrangement developed between the two men, and at a speech in Cedartown, Judge Wright paid his respects to his former associate by declaring, "Alfred Shorter shears his sheep and turns them out to grow more wool."

The break did not come until after the war, for we find these old Romans in substantial agreement on business matters during the conflict. Col. Shorter owned fertile farms in Alabama, Mississippi and Georgia, conducted several mercantile establishments, and each year grew better off than the year before. He had no time to waste, no bump of folly, no extravagances, few luxuries ; he had plenty of time for business, plenty of money for education and charity, lots of desire to listen to hard common sense. He could see an advantage or a disadvantage in a trade in a minute, and was extremely cautious about going into enterprises; but once he was in, he put forward all his energies until success was assured. It has been said that the only man who ever worsted Col. Shorter in any kind of a large business transaction was Judge Wright.

Col. Shorter was above age (58) when the Civil War broke out; he made arrangements to help the Confederacy financially, and in the darker days just prior to the occupation of Rome in 1864 by the Union army, refugeed to a safer place in Thomas

County. Naturally he couldn't carry his cotton with him, nor did he have time to dispose of it. Judge Wright was in the Confederate Congress, helping in an executive capacity to direct the war. The judge crossed the Potomac fi'om Richmond on some kind of a pass and laid before President Lincoln the question of Col. Shorter's cotton and Southern cotton in general, saying he wanted to save as much of it as possible from destruction by the Yankee army. Mr. Lincoln was deeply moved and gave Judge Wright a pass back through the lines, but said in effect: "I am sorry I can't furnish you men to transport it, but if you can arrange that detail, I will probably be looking the other way."

Judge Wright had access to Rome and Col. Shorter's cotton. Alexander Thornton Harper, of Cave Spring, had made "contact" with the latter through the trust Col. Shorter reposed in him. The authority to dispose of the cotton was somewhat in doubt, but it was war times, and Judge Wright took the bull by the horns. Sherman was fast swooping down upon Rome with an appetite for material things, so Judge Wright loaded the cotton on freight cars, clambered aboard and set out for Savannah or other convenient mart, and there disposed of it on a "commission" basis.

Cotton was extremely valuable then, worth nearly a dollar a pound, and it was said Col. Shorter's lot brought around $50,000. Judge Joel Branham was authority for the statement that Judge Wright was twitted about CoL Shorter's cotton in a post-bellum political campaign, and with characteristic directness replied, "Well, if I did steal Shorter's cotton, I left him enough to go on!"

Col. Shorter was satisfied that he got anything at all, for otherwise the cotton would have been appropriated by the Yankee army to turn against the South, and he is said to have remarked that under ordinary conditions neither Judge Wright nor any other man could do him up in a deal, and if Judge Wright would continue to transact business with him in peace times, he would consider the association highly desirable.

The Tragic Death Of Von

Gammon^-^ following a football game played at Brisbine Park, Atlanta, Saturday, Oct. 30, 1897, between the University of Virginia and the University of Georgia teams.

Von Gammon was born Dec. 4, 1879, at Rome. His paternal grandfather was Col. Wni. Gamble Gammon, Tennessee farmer and banker, who died in 1895 at Rome and was there buried. His maternal grandfather was Maj. Jno. T. Burns, State Attorney General in 1869, who moved to Texas. His father was Jno. Aiken Gammon, Rome clothing merchant, and his mother was Rosalind Burns. An uncle was Wm. Melville Gammon, the first chairman in 1916 of the city commission. His older brother, E. Montague Gammon, was for several years principal of the Rome City Schools, and is now teaching at Savannah. Wm. G. Gammon, a younger brother, was killed more than 20 years ago at Cartersville after playing a game of baseball with the Rome team, by falling under a freight train. Will lies buried in Myrtle Hill, Rome, by the side of Von.

The Gammon home was a comfortable two-story frame structure at 420 Third Avenue, one block west of the P^towah river and a wash-hole which drew the Gammon boys and their young friends like a magnet. The home was on the upper edge of a lot that extended about 100 feet below the dwelling to the old Rome railroad tracks, and to the rear 300 feet to an alley. At the lower corner front, under a large sycamore tree, were two parallel tennis courts, which were always full of players, and at the upper side was a green-carpeted bank which held the "audience." Nearby was a grassy spot where the boys tried their skill at wrestling, French and American style. Of his age. Von Gammon was the best wrestler ; in fact, he was best at everything he tried - a typical young Greek god, and admired extravagantly as such without an exception anywhere. "Ros," his youngest brother, sometimes known in fun by the nickname of the "Polk County one-eyed giant," was the best wrestler in his class, and game little Hunter McClure was not far behind him.

The parents of the Gammon boys provided them with the latest things in the athletic line. On the back porch were the parallel bars and the punching bag and boxing gloves; a downstairs locker kept skates, baseballs, bats and mitts, football togs and bathing suits, tennis racquets, etc. ; and any boy who came without his own could dig into the Gammon collection and have what was there. In the back yard was the high-jumping and polevaulting apparatus, and nearby could be found the 16-pound shot which Von and "Monty" used regularly in practice. In the barn was located the flying trapeze for wet weather use. Once a year the barn was cleaned out, the boys of the neighborhood brought their shinny sticks, moved bales of hay and sacks of feed, and mowed down rats. In 1896 they killed 40-odd in 15 minutes.

The favorite game for the crowd was shinny, the forerunner of hockey and golf. Two sides tried to knock a wooden block through goals with wooden sticks. This game was played in a vacant lot near the Gammon place, across the railroad. Occasionally the tennis courts were cleared and all engaged in the games of "footand-a-half," "follow-the-leader" and "stinga-ma-ree." The grand climax came in two ways. Somebody would yell, "Let's go in washin'!" That was enough to break up any game except the one Mrs. Gammon favored, expressed in this query as she appeared at the end of the porch :

If other parents wanted to get rid of their boys, Mrs. Gammon was always glad to "mother" them. She was a tall lady with a fine head of auburn hair, a most kindly smile, a fine sense of humor and a whole-soulness that made her a friend to every boy. On her lawn and under her watchful eye a splendid spirit of sportsmanship and play was developed; and in a large degree she was responsible for the spirit that Rom,ans have shown in the years that have followed. She urged her boys to do their best, no matter the consequences, and on every athletic field they excelled. "Monty" was known as the "strong man" of Rome. Some six feet six inches tall, he could throw the hammer or put the shot farther than anybody in town. At the North Rome Park field day in 1895 or 1896 he threw the hammer so far that it hit Capt. J. W. Ewing between the shoulders. Capt. Ewing was carried from the field in a cab, but soon recovered. Von exhibited his strength that day by lying on his back and lifting "Monty" (feet in hands) entirely off the ground.

Many a boy now a man remembers how "Monty" and Von took him in their arms, standing six feet apart, and tossed him from one to the other through the air, caught him safely and flung him back and forth. Von was of such heroic build and nature that many held it the highest privilege to stand in his presence, that they might do his bidding, or simply be free to admire his noble qualities. He never smoked, drank, cursed or got out of humor; he never lorded it over a boy of weaker build or took advantage of a fallen foe; his parents were in comfortable circumstances, but not wealthy, hence he was not proud of purse, nor would all the money in the world have changed him from the manly boy that he was.

Bicycling having been taken up enthusiastically by the young people of both sexes, a racing club of amateurs was formed at Rome, and it included Von Gammon, Frank Bowie, Will Fahy and others. Von got away with the most prizes. That was in 1896 and the summer of 1897. On August 24, 1897, Von was due to have raced with the amateurs in Atlanta, but hurt his leg in practice and was unable to compete. R. D. Jackson won. In the professional class, Bobby Walthour, later national champion, defeated Anderson, and M. A. Elliott won the mile handicap in 2:07 1-5. The Rome Tribune of Friday, Oct. 1, 1897, reported: "Mr. Von Gammon left yesterday afternoon to enter the University. He will go into training for the football team and will add great strength to it."

The year before, in the fall of 1896, Von had entered the freshman class at the University of Georgia, Athens, and had made the football team as quarterback. He was regarded as one of the University's most promising athletes. In the autumn of 1897, W. Reynolds Tichenor, who had played quarterback at Auburn the year before, entered Georgia. "Tick" was so small he could play quarter only, and Von's driving power was needed at fullback, so this change was made, and they were playing those positions when Von met his death. "Tick," now an attorney in Atlanta, and for many years a football referee, states that Virginia had scored 11 points and Georgia 4 when the accident happened. Virginia had the ball, and sent a mass play over Georgia's left tackle. Von was playing behind the line, and he went under the play like he had been thrown from a catapult. When the players had been disentagled. Von was unconscious, and a substitute slipped upon him "Tick's" Auburn sweater. Miss Mary Connally, now Mrs. John Spalding, sent him a carriage blanket. He was taken from the field to the Grady Hospital, where he lingered 11 hours, and died at 3:45 a. m., Sunday, Oc-

The game went on; Geo. Price* was shifted from right guard to fullback, and S. Ed. Bayless, of Kingston, placed at right guard. Virginia won it by the score of 17 to 4. After the game the Georgia players realized the condition of their comrade, and among a few of the alumni and supporters the cry of foul play was heard; a small crowd went to the Virginia hotel headquarters inquiring. "Where's Collier; we want Collier!"

Such an imputation, according to Mr. Tichenor, was entirely unjust. There was no foul play; the field was hard and it is likely that Von's head hit the sun-baked clay as he fell under the struggling players, or it may have been that his head was kicked by somebody's shoe, just as likely by one of his own teammates. Tichenor also received injuries which necessitated his removal.

The diagnosis of the doctors showed a fractured skull and concussion of the brain in the case of Von Gammon. He died at 18 years, in the flush of young manhood, and mourned by everybody. His father was with him a few minutes before the end, and his Spartan mother arrived shortly afterward.

Seldom had news cast such a pall over Rome. The word was received as the good people were on the eve of entering the churches for their devotional services, and the announcement was made from the pulpits. James Cothran carried the sad intelligence to the central church neighborhood and broke it to Von's sweetheart, who expressed her great grief through her tears. The body was removed to the residence at 4:55 p. m., Sunday, where many friends gazed for the last time on the fine features of their hero; then the funeral was held at 11 o'clock Monday morning, Nov, 1, 1897, from the First Presbyterian Church, the pastor, the Rev. Geo. T. Goetchius, officiating, assisted by the Rev. S. R. Belk, pastor of the First Methodist Church, and the interment was in the Branham addition of Myrtle Hill cemetery.

A number of college friends accompanied the body to Rome, and members of the Bachelors' Club (or Poverty Hall Boys) acted as pallbearers between the station and the home, and as honorary pallbearers at the funeral. They sent a beautiful floral wreath, "Gates Ajar," a feature of which was a dove of pure white hovering over the lilies. The boys of the Virginia football team also sent a handsome offering, and the coffin was transformed into a bower of roses, carnations and their accompanying green. Offerings came from Atlanta and from the students at Athens and Auburn, Ala.

The active pallbearers were Edward E. Pomeroy, Sam Carter, Jim Mell and Ed Lyndon, representing the University of Georgia; and Walter and Laurie Cothran, Charlie Hill, Reuben Towers, Clifford B. Seay and Boiling Sullivan, from Rome. The balconies of the famous old church were well filled, as well as the ground floor; a larger crowd had never attended a funeral in Rome, and few eyes were dry at the conclusion.

Dr. Goetchius was so overcome that he made his remarks very brief; but they expressed the feeling of every sorrowing heart. He had in mind the sad fate of his own son, "Arnie" Goetchius, who a year or two before had been killed when he skated off a balcony, as a student at the Alabama Polytechnic Institute, at Auburn. Misses May and Carrie Clark and Messrs. Horace King and Dick Cothran sang "Some Sweet Day." A vast concourse of people rode or trudged to the cemetery. The water sprites of the Etowah, the Oostanaula and the Coosa piped a melancholy requiem far below, and the spirits of his ancestors and the ancestors of his friends opened up their arms and received

According to the Atlanta Constitution of Oct. 31, 1897, Von was injured in the middle of the field, on the left hand side, at the beginning of the second half. After six and a half minutes, Hill, of Virginia, scored the first touchdown by bucking a yard. A touchdown counted four and a goal two at that time, and Templeman's goal made the score 6-0 in favor of Virginia. After a punt to near the Virginia line, Morrison punted and the ball hit Walden, of Georgia, in the breast, and rolled back of the line, where Capt. Kent, of Georgia, fell on it for Georgia's only score of the game. Tichenor failed at goal, and the score stood: Virginia, 6; Georgia, 4. From Georgia's 15-yard line Morrison kicked a drop-kick goal, which made the score 11-4. The half ended in a few minutes niiore. In the second half, Hill scored on an end run from the Georgia 25-yard line, and Templeman kicked goal. There was no further scoring, and the final was 17-4. After Von's injury, Tichenor retired; he got two hard clouts on the head, and Harmon Cox took his place and played a good game. Kent made the longest run of the game, 40 yards, on a trick play in the first half. The accounts stated that the play was rough and injuries were frequent; that Georgia played gamely, but was outclassed by the heavy Virginians.

Georgia's coach was Chas. Hallan McCarthy, old Brown fullback and now a college professor residing at Brookland, D. C. Glenn Warner, later Carlisle Indian school coach, had coached Georgia and Von Gammon the year before. Hugh Jennings, of Brooklyn's ball club, later of Detroit, was coach of the baseball team. Frank R. Mitchell was manager. A Mr. Izard was referee for the Virginia- Georgia game, and Wm. Martin Williams, "Tick's" Auburn roommate and Commissioner of Internal Revenue under appointment by Woodrow Wilson, was umpire. Hatton Love joy, of Georgia, and a Mr. Smith were linesmen, and Fred Morton, of Athens, timekeeper. Dr. Bizzell, of Atlanta, and Dr. Samuel C. Benedict, of Athens, attended Von on the field, and Dr. William Perrin Nicolson attended him at the Grady Hospital.

Georgia's sponsors, driven in a carriage behind four beautiful black horses, were Misses Dee Murphy (Mrs. Boykin Robinson, of New York, N. Y.) and Leontine Chisholm (Mrs. Walter P. Andrews, of Atlanta), and Virginia's sponsors were Misses Callie Jackson and Catherine Gay (Mrs. Inman Sanders, of Atlanta).

The Rome boys in college when Von Gammon met his death were: From the freshman class (1901), Wm. D, Hoyt, Jr., C. P. Morton and Robt. Yancey; from the junior class (1899), Laurence A. Cothran and J. Boiling Sullivan; from the senior class (1898), Benj. C. Yancey; and from the law class, R. P. White. Von had entered the class of 1900 the year before, but on account of some conditoins and late entry in the fall of 1897 was repeating some of his work and was classed with 1901.

"Captain Morrison, of the Virginia football team, writes a letter to the Savannah Press in reply to statements of its correspondent that the Virginia men deliberately tried to injure the Georgia players.

"Capt. Morrison denies this charge and sends extracts from a letter written to him by Capt. Kent, of Georgia, thanking him for considerations shown the memory of Von Gammon, and wishing the Virginia team much success.

"Morrison says the injuries sustained by Tichenor and Gammon, of the Georgia team, were entirely accidental and deeply regretted by the Virginia team."

Martin V. Bergen, Jr., old Princeton player and then coach of Virginia, wrote to a friend in Atlanta under date of Nov. 1, 1897, from Charlottesville, Va.:

"The game was clean, hard played, but yet not a rough, foul game. Our men had been instructed to play fairly and did so, and you have my word on the fact that I saw no hitting at

The Home Of Von Gammon, 420 Third Avenue

The Gammon place was the mecca for the young men of Rome, gathered to test their physical prowess in numerous ways. Tennis, weight exercises, wrestling and boxing were enjoyed here, while at the foot of the avenue was the wash-hole wrhich drew more boys than any in town.

"Gammon was hurt while we had the ball, attempting to make a tackle, which precludes any probability that we were to blame. The play was a straight formation play.

"I write you this partly because I thought you would like to have my assurances of the character of the game and the absolute absence of either premeditated or actual rough play or intentional injury to men."

The Georgia team and others disbanded for the season. In the last session of the Georgia Legislature a bill had been introduced outlawing football, but it had failed of passage. Now a new attempt was made. A legislator said: "The boys at Athens will have to cut their 'wool' and sell the 5-cent cotton out of their pants." The bill would no doubt have been successful but for the intervention of Von Gammon's mother, who stated publicly that a mishap to an individual should not be allowed to cut off the pleasure and profit of thousand of youths, and she declared to friends that she would sacrifice her other boys, if need be, to the cause of such bodydeveloping and character-building contests.* The Georgia Legislatui-e had railroaded through an anti-football bill by a vote of 91 to 3, the Senate passed it Nov. 18 by 31 to 4, and it was up for Gov. Wm. Y. Atkinson's signature when Mrs. Gammon wrote the executive a letter which stayed his pen. An Atlanta dispatch to the Rome Tribune of Dec. 9, 1897, said:

"The bill was passed soon after the killing of young Von Gammon, and the legislators felt that they were avenging his death by so promntl making future accidents of a similar nature impossible. But it turns out that Von Gammon came from a Spartan family and that neither his relatives nor friends are seeking that sort of vengeance.

*Mrs. Gammon's tenacity of purpose Is illustrated by the following incident of nearly 20 years ago : One of the largest and most beautiful trees in Rome is an elm which grows out of the far sidewalk in front of the Gammon home, and also in front of Judge Jno. W. Maddox's abode. A telephone lineman came one day to cut off some limbs to make way for wires. Mrs. Gammon requested him to "spare the tree," - it was dear to her boys and everybody in the neighborhood. He said it was necessary to cut the limbs, and went away. When he returned with his saw, he found Mrs. Gammon sitting under the tree in a chair, with a double-barrel shotgun across her lap. The man went away again, and stayed away.

tion says that football was her son's favorite game, and that if he could be consulted he would join in the request of his fellow students for the veto of the bill.

"In her letter this heroic mother calls the governor's attention to the fact that two of her sons's schoolmates. Will Reynolds and Arnie Goetchius* have recently met accidental deaths, one by falling over a precipice and one by falling down stairs. She asks if it is not equally sensible for the legislature to abolish precipices and stairways on account of those deaths as it is to abolish football because of the death of her son.

"Letters from all parts of the country have poured in upon the governor, and the state has also been thoroughly aroused. It has been argued that if football is prohibited at the Georgia University and the other colleges of the state, these institutions will be unable to compete with the big schools of the north, where football is played.

*Arnie Goetchius was on roller skates when he fell to his death. He was a good student and well liked by his classmates and the boys of Rome. Will Reynolds had gone with his family to White Cliff Springs, Tenn., neav Athens, for the summer vacation, and one Sunday afternoon while out walking with Miss Mattie Rowell and others of Rome he ventured too near a precipice and plunged to a ledge perhaps 100 feet below, taking with him Miss Rowell's parasol. Two mountaineers climbed down the steep mountainside, tied Will's lifeless body to a pole and carried it between them to the top. In order to catch an early morning train for Rome, the funeral party were obliged to go down to the valley in hacks at night, by the light of pine torches and lanterns. Will was one of the most popular young men in Rome, and hundreds of sorrowing friends attended his funeral from the First Presbyterian Church. A sad circumstance connected with the tragedy was that his mother had intended leaving with her children on the day after the accident for a visit to her old home at Jacksonville, Ala.

**The reference is to Dr. Chas. H. Herty, lor whom old Herty Athletic Field at Athens was named, and who wrote as follows : 'Tt stands as a fact which cannot be contradicted that active physical exercise is an absolute necessity. Even in cases of sickness, one of the best treatments a physician can give is to take exercise. Over three hundred young men confined to their books, with no well directed exercise, would in a year or two present a pitiable figure. It is in consequence of this that college faculties are forced into all kinds of schemes to give regulated and active exercise to their students. Some colleges, in order to avoid the rough forms of field sports, have large grounds for physical exercise, as well as thoroughly equipped gymnasiums. Even then certain forms of field sports are necessary."

law in the interests of society. In answer, unquestionably it is not. In the first place, the conditions necessary to its highest development are total abstinence from intoxicating and stimulating drinks - alcoholic or otherwise - as well as from cigarettes and tobacco in any form; strict regard for proper and healthiest diet and for all the laws of health; persistent regularity in the hours of going to bed and absolute purity of life."

Jas. B. Nevin, Jno. H. Reece and Wm. H. Ennis were Floyd County's representatives in the legislature that year. They made strenuous efforts to defeat the legislation after Mrs. Gammon had written Mr. Nevin as follows from Rome under date of Nov. 2, 1897:

"Dear Mr. Nevin: It would be the greatest favor to the family of Von Gammon if your influence could prevent his death from being used as an argument detrimental to the athletic cause and its advancement at the University. His love for his college and his interest in all manly sports, without which he deemed the highest type of manhood impossible, is well knov\^n by his classmates and friends, and it would be inexpressibly sad to have the cause he held so dear injured by his sacrifice. Grant me the right to request that my boy's death should not be used to defeat the most cherished object of his life. Dr. Herty's article in the Constitution of Nov. 2d is timely, and the authorities of the University can be trusted to make all needed changes for all possible consideration pertaining to the welfare of its students, if they are given the means and the confidence their loyalty and high sense of duty should deserve.**

For several weeks the enemies of football trained the guns on the game through the newspapers, and its defenders replied. The Athens Banner, the ancient paper published at the seat of the University of Georgia, declared, "We do not favor a game where brutality steps in and usurps the place of athletic development; it was a display of savagery which tarnishes the fair names of both of the great universities represented in the contest."

Young men go to college to make useful citizens of themselves, not cripples. There are numerous 'manly' sports and athletic exercises which do not involve risk of lifelong injury or death as the price of indulging in them. If we must have football riots for the popular entertainment - pugilistic mills and bull fights and bear baitings being forbidden - let them be committed to professions. They are not adapted to the proper character and ends of college training. They should be prohibited to their students by every college faculty without waiting for an untimely funeral to make the necessity of such action more obvious than it is already."

"Mrs. Gammon bears no ill-will toward the game because of her son's death, and requests that his death be not used to defeat the most cherished object of his life. She would have the game go on. But the lives of other worthy sons are to be considered. It seems impossible to prevent brutality in the game by revision of the rules, hence the only thing to be done is to prohibit the game." - Savannah News.

" 'No, I never played a game of football in my life and have no special interest in the matter. But if I had a son and he were afraid to go into a game because of the dangers of injury, I should be ashamed of him. I am sure young Americans are made of sterner stuff. Are we ready to ordain tiddle-de-winks and lawn tennis as national games?'

"If the son happened to be brought home mutilated or dead, we suspect that our friend would look at the matter differently. There are plenty of ways other than brutal sport for a young man to exhibit his courage, endurance and pluck." - Augusta Chronicle.

revive the measure was made and it expired with the ending of the session of the Legislature soon afterward. The governor was moved by Mrs. Gammon's letter and his own belief that the progress of the world necessarily brings suffering to a few.

In his veto. Gov. Atkinson said: "Football causes less deaths than hunting, boating, fishing, horseback riding, bathing or bicycling. If we are to engage in legislation of this character now under discussion, the state should assume the position of parent, forbid all these sports to boys, make it a penal offense for a boy to engage in any of them, and for any parent to permit his child to engage in them. The government should not usurp all the authority of the parent. Yet this legislation is a long stride in that direction.

"It would be unfortunate to entirely suppress in our schools and colleges a game of so great value in the physical, moral and intellectual development of boys and young men.

"The president of the university of one of our sister states said to me: 'If these young men were not permitted to expend their exuberant spirits and excess of youthful energies in this way, they would find vent in carousals, debaucheries and - dissipations.'

"Chancellor Day, of the University of Syracuse, a Methodist institution, says: 'I do not feel like joining the universal outcry against the game. Football is encouraged by the faculty of Syracuse University. During my three years of office there has not been a serious accident on our field or to our team. I believe that some such game as football which contains elements of roughness and danger is necessary to the development of many young men in university, college and seminary. Its future, I am told by lovers of the game, is tending toward more open playing.'

"Football would fail of one of its chief ends, in my estimation, if it did not teach the young men self-control. A man who goes through a season of being trodden upon and knocked down deserves fairly a diploma in the art of self-control. It is valuable discipline. Football in the university has been a source of gratification to the faculty and trustees. We rejoice at the high standard of scholarship kept up by the men in active play. One man who played the game during his entire course was able to keep up his

On Wednesday, Dec. 12, 1895, a group of friends of Von Gammon decided to play a free admission game of football on Christmas Day, Dec. 25, at the North Rome Athletic Park. Cliff Seay was referee, Laurie Cothran umpire and Barry Cothran timekeeper.

Although the fond parents were bowed down with grief, there were many consolations in the loss of their devoted son. Mrs. Gammdn caused the news of Von's death to be printed in the native language in every civilized country of the world. Into her scrapbook went the many written expressions of sympathy. The faculty and students of the University met at the chapel, under the leadership of Chancellor Boggs, and resolutions passed there were signed by Harry Dodd (now of Atlanta), president of the Athletic Council; Paul H. Doyal, (of Rome), president of the Demosthenian Literary Society; Macon Dudley, vice president of the Bicycle Association, and Harmon Cox (of Atlanta and Chicago), for the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity. Von was then a member of the freshman class (1901), and its committee - Robt. Yancey, of Rome; C. H. Story and J. A. Scruggs - also passed resolutions.

A student correspondent wrote The Tribune from Athens Dec. 15 that Von was one of the most popular men in college, and that he had just been elected president of the Bicycle Association, and was a member of the Phi Kappa Literary Society and the Sigma Alpha Epsilon college fraternity. And he added:

"Rome is as usual well represented. Rome boys have always stood well at the university and the ones there now are endeavoring to keep up their good

"There are at present eight boys from Rome attending the college. These are: Ben C. Yancey, '98, Chi Phi fraternity and member of Phi Kappa Literary Society; Hugh White, '98, Sigma Nu fraternity and Phi Kappa; J. B. Sullivan, '99, Sigma Alpha Epsilon and Phi Kappa; Paul H. Doyal, '99, Sigma Alpha Epsilon and Phi Kappa; Robert C. Yancey, '01, Chi Phi and Phi Kappa; Will" Hoyt, '01, Chi Psi and Phi Kappa, and C. P. Morton, '01.

"Among the offices held by these boys may be mentioned: Editor in chief of 'The Georgian,' business manager 'Red and Black,' manager tennis team, manager track team, president Phi Kappa Society, 1st lieutenant and sergeant major in the battalion, two members of athletic council, editor in chief of 'Pandora,' vice president bicycle club and other smaller offices.

"Two Romans belong to the literary club and two are on the track team; they took one first, one second and three third prizes in the field day a week ago."

An exceedingly graceful act was performed by the authorities of the University of Virginia, the surviving members of the 1897 football team and others in subscribing $500 for a bronze plaque to Von Gammon and his mother. This memorial was presented in the University of Georgia chapel at Athens Saturday morning, Nov. 5, 1921, 24 years after the game in which Von played. It was given into the hands of Chancellor David C. Barrow and Prof. S. V. Sanford by an official of the University of Virginia, and Prof. Sanford has since acted as its custodian, pending selection of a particular spot to place it for all time. The plaque is circular in shape, about three feet in diameter, and shows the son gazing with love and admiration into the face of his mother. Among the Romans present at the exercises were Walter S. Gothnan, J. Ed Maddox, Wilson M. Hardy, Barry Wrip;ht, Paul H. Doyal, Jas. P. Jones, Thos. D. Caldwell, Sam S. King and Thos. E. Clemmons.

Incidentally, Virginia and Georgia played another football game that same afternoon on Sanford Mead, before a big crowd, and the Red and Black of Georgia triumphed over the Old Gold and Blue of Virginia by the record score of 21 to 0.*

WRIGHT WILLINGHAM'S CIRCUS. - Romans all - or 500 of them - gathered at the Municipal Building Saturday, Jan. 1, 1921, on call of John M. Vandiver, president of the Chamber of Commerce, who thought a mass meeting and some oratorical prescrip. tions might make the farmers and everybody else feel better over bad times.

"You don't know^ any hard times," said Judge John W. Maddox. "At the end of the Civil War we had nothing in Chattooga County but a brokendown steer that was not worth the Yankees' trouble to take away."

The Rev. Elam F. Dempsey, pastor of the First Methodist Church, and the Rev. A. J. Moncrief, pastor of the First Baptist Church, were listening attentively from comfortable seats on the platform. Somebody shouted that it was time to give the bean-spillers a chance to be heard. No names were mentioned.

Mr. Vandiver diplomatically ignored the suggestion by conferring in an undertone with a stage "confederate," after which he announced that Wright Willingham would speak. Col. Willingham's first shot woke the ministers up.

"My friends, I ain't much of a prohibitionist, myself. I can fight better and talk better with a little encouragement in me. Gaze at my friend Dr. Dempsey here on my right; he has been getting fat drinking tea. And as for old Dr. Moncrief there, he looks like he never had a drink in his life! Ha-ha!"

"Judge Maddox may think just because it didn't hurt to lose a leg in the war that a man's swollen jaw in the present contains no pain. My jaw hurts and there's no use to deny it. I'm just about as careful tackling this situation as I was going after a bull dog out at George Stallings' house during our own war here recently, when I was weak from influenza. I went to George's place in the sticks one night; had quite a time climbing fences, crossing race tracks in getting near the house, and when I thought I was there a great big dog came bowwowing down the front walk in my direction. I could tell by his voice he was a bull dog. I was too weak to fight or run. There was only one way in the world, my friends, to stop that bull dog, and that was by diplomacy. With a prayer on my lips I stooped down and with all the graciousness at my command, I said, 'Here, doggie, here doggie, nice old doggie!'

"My picture of religion up toward old Shorter hill is the picture of the shouting Methodists. I ain't ready to embrace that. And coming on down toward Broad Street we find the orthordox Presbyterians. Why, my friends, the Presbyterians are so orthodox that you couldn't pierce their orthodoxy with a Beg Bertha shell!"

Dr. Word was re-elected mayor in 1861 for 1862, and his record was such that his friends championed his cause a third time; but he declined, saying that since no man had ever been mayor of Rome three times in succession, he would not care to break the precedent. Dr. J. M. Gregory was accordingly elected without opposition Dec. 29, 1862. His aldermen from the First Ward were J. C. Pemberton and Jos. E. Veal; from the Second, Albert G. Pitner and Wm. T. Newman, and from the Third, J. H. Cooper and Chas. H. Smith. Others who were put forward for Council and Aldermen were Reuben S. Norton, Robt. T. Hargrove, Jno. W. Noble, Dr. Joshua King, Gen. Geo. S. Black and Wm. Ramey.

From the top, the Lindale Inn; the Auditorium, erected by the Massachusetts Mills of Georgia in honor of Lindale's sacrifices in the World War; the old Hoss mill, now deserted; beautiful Silver Creek, which divides Lindale in half and flows through the mill property, shown in the next; homes of mill employes, who are encouraged in every way to develop

ARMSTRONG (CHEROKEE) HOTEL. - This noted structure stands at the southwest corner of Second Avenue and East First Street. It was built and opened by R. T. Armstrong, of Birmingham, Ala., at a cost of nearly $150,000. The first floor walls are of gray granite and the four stories above of brick. It is owned by the Rome Hotel Co., of which concern the J. A. Rousavilles are the principal stockholders. For several years subsequent to 1900 the hotel was called The Cherokee, but recently the original name has been used. As long as the younger generation can remember its ground floor has sheltered a barber shop - first, Ned Huggins' (Ned was also sexton of the First Presbyterian Church), and now Slaughter McCain's - where enough hair and whiskers have been cut to fill the Armstrong. In the corner Dick Cothran conducted a brokerage business for quite a while.

"The partial destruction by fire of one section of the Armstrong hotel early yesterday morning injures for a short time a building that has stood as an ornament to this city for more than 30 years.

"When this hotel was constructed and opened, it was the largest and finest in Northwest Georgia. It was a veritable capitol, as hotels went in those days. It pushed Rome at one swoop from a town into the proportions of a city.

"Among those famous orators and notable men who have held forth here were Senators A. O. Bacon, A. S. Clay and Hoke Smith, of Georgia; Senator Broussard, of Louisiana; Congressman James Tawney, of Minnesota; John Temple Graves, Gordon Lee, Judge Wm. T. Newman, Seaborn Wright, Senator Burton, of Ohio; Congressman Jno. L. Burnett, of Alabama; Wm. J. Bryan, of Nebraska; David B. Hill, of New York, and a host of others that we cannot now recall.

"When the hotel was first opened a large number of Rome's wealthiest and most prominent families left their homes and resided there. For a while it was the center around which the social life of Rome revolved.

"Many times since its construction the hotel has been on fire, but always heretofore the fire department has been able to control the flames. The inside architecture of the hotel was peculiarly sensitive to fire, being such as readily drew a draft to any part of the building. This class of hotel construction is now out of date."

BELGIAN COLONY. - In 1848 Gen. Louis Joseph Barthold LeHardy (Viscount de Beaulieu), dissatisfied with political conditions growing out of the liberation of Belgium from the United Neitherlands, left Brussels at the head of a company of Belgians to found a colony in the United States, for the purpose of engaging in agricultural pursuits. The old General and those members of his household who joined him were idealists to whom the songs of birds and bees in trees and clover constitued much sweeter music than the hum-drum strife of the Old World, so they turned their faces southward on reaching America's friendly shores.

It is quite likely that they disembarked at New York, asked for new country, were directed to Charleston and there sent by a Rome "Scout" to the heart of Cherokee Georgia. Rome was a place of some 3,000 inhabitants, and it stood out as the largest settlement in that corner of the state and a city which must grow fast.

General LeHardy was a man accustomed to army life and the hardships of the outdoors; his training had been along democratic, practical lines, and he welcomed an opportunity to remove the restraints of political obligations like a bird released from the cage. He turned his estate into cash and financed the colony across the Atlantic. In the party were his son, Caiiiille LeHardy, and family; his nephews, the sons of his brother, Compte Adolph LeHardy - Eugene LeHardy, 21, and J. C. LeHardy, 17; Louis Henry Carlier, a civil engineer and Camille LeHardy's brother-in-law; Prof.

E. Gaussoin and daughter, Miss Elise Gaussoin, whom Henry Carlier married after they reached Rome; a Miss Robert (pronounced like the French), who later mai-ried Max Van Den Corput, of Cave Spring, (Max Corput and Felix Corput, his brother, were also Belgians) ; and a number of others, perhaps a total of 25. General Le- Hardy, Camille LeHardy and Louis Carlier selected a farm tract three miles east of Rome, where in a lowland dip there was an abundance of fresh water bubbling from a dozen springs. This was on the Etowah River and included a productive botton land full of arrow heads and bits of pottery, evidence that an Indian village was once there located. Included in their settlement were several men and women of the agricultural class. The others scattered; Eugene and Julius ("Jules") went to work in Rome, while a few of the Belgians set out stakes between the eastern foot of Mt. Alto and the Coosa River. Dr. L. M. E. Berckmans, another Belgian, was attracted to Rome by the exploits of his friends, the LeHardys, but he did not arrive until about 1870.

The farming Belgians raised truck and fruit, especially grapes, and they sent their goods to the Rome market in little wagons drawn by ponies or mules. Everything they offered for sale was fresh and wholesome and put up in good style; the apples in nice boxes, the grapes covered with mosquito netting, and their prices were as low as could be found. The law permitted of making wine out of grapes, and considerable wine was made.

As in most cases where aristocrats attempt to go back to the soil, however, the colony plan was not a success financially. The titled Belgians undoubtedly did their utmost with Dame Nature, but Her Highness, treated to the picture of the grandeur of palaces and of refined tastes and temperamental dispositions, did not smile her favor upon them. The story is told that a fastidious young Belgian was in the habit of driving an ox cart to Rome, the while he was dressed in a summer suit of snowy whiteness, suede gloves and patent leather shoes. After some seven years, disintegration of the colony, individually and collectively, set in. General LeHardy and Camille LeHardy and family left for Charleston, where they lived until 1858, when they returned to Brussels. Dr. J. C. LeHardy went to live in Savannah. Eugene LeHardy departed Jan. 2, 1861, for Europe to buy supplies for the Confederate Government, and was there marooned until after the Civil War.

But a circumstance was eventually to arise which was to pile sorrow upon disappointment for the doughty Belgians. Camille LeHardy, it will be recalled, had married Rosine Marie Terese Josephine Carlier, a sister of Henry Carlier. Relations between the brothers-in-law were apparently pleasant enough to permit Mr. LeHardy to go back to Belgium and leave the country place in the care of Mr. and Mrs. Carlier. Quite possibly Mr. Carlier never expected Mr. LeHardy to return, so that when he and his family did come back after the close of the war, friction arose between the two men over possession of the place. They continued to live together, but it was a house divided. According to the story told by Mr. LeHardy, Mr. Carlier would frequent throw rocks at him from the woods, and otherwise nag him and members of the LeHardy family. Finally one day Mr. LeHardy heard a commotion in the barn, and, rushing to the scene, found Mr. Carlier astride of and pummeling Henry LeHardv then 17. Mr. LeHardy went to the house and got a gun, and, poking it through a crack in the barn, fired and killed Mr. Carlier, whose body was laid to rest in Myrtle Hill cemetery. Mr. LeHardy's peaceful disposition, his unblemished reputation and the attendant circumstances caused a jury to render a verdict of acquittal.

The tragedy occurred in the summer of 1870 and about eight years later Mr. LeHardy removed his family to Eagle Cliff, Lookout Mountain, near Flintstone, Walker County, Georgia, where he died March 6, 1888. He was the last of the Belgians at Rome, Eugene LeHardy, his cousin, having died there Dec. 27, 1874, and having been put to rest in Myrtle Hill. * * *

BERRY INFANTRY. - A Civil War company organized by Col. Thos. W. Alexander, commanding officer, and named after Capt. Thos. Berry, Mexican War veteran and father of Miss Martha Berry, head of the Bel-ry Schools.

On the eve of its departure for camp near Griffin, the company was presented with a handsome battle flag by Miss Florence W. Underwood (Mrs. E. M. Eastman), a daughter of Judge John W. H. Underwood.

Noted Guests At The Berry Schools

1 - Dr. Howard A. Kelly, of Baltimore, Md., in group on girls' campus. May 5, 1921. 2 - Princess Caroline R. Radziwill among girls. 3 - President Theodore Roosevelt, Oct. 8, 1910, - a Republican with a background intensely Democratic. 4 - Miss Alice Nielsen in a group. 5 - Dr. Albert Shaw, of New York, editor of the American Review of Reviews, and Mrs. Shaw, on visit Apr. 22-26, 1921. 6 - A group containing Miss Helen Keller.

Booten & Harkins' Cavalry

BROAD STREET "INHABITANTS." - Now and then an old-tinie chronicler comes back to Rome and takes note of the many changes in business locations. In order that the present occupants may "write their own," the following list of establishments and individuals (furnished by R. V. Mitchell)* for 1922, is herewith set down. The chronicler starts at the foot of Broad (Etowah River) and walks northward through North Rome. On his left at 1 and 3 Broad is the market produce establishment of Stamps & Co., after which the 100 block starts, and continues to Second Avenue; the 200 block starts at Second and ends at Third, and so on.

Gibson & DeJournett, wholesale grocery. 109 - Montgomery & Co., wholesale grocery. Ill - Scoggins Furniture Co. McGhee Cotton Co. R. J. Ragan, wholesale grocery.

Rome Chamber of Commerce, Floyd County Farm Bureau and Boy Scout headquarters (in rear). Rome Book Store Co. McGhee Tire Co. Floyd County Bank. 4 - Drs. M. M. McCord and Carl L. Betts. Griffin-Cantrell Hardware Co.

wholesale grocers. 212% - Henson Pressing Club. nlt~T^'^\ '^- Pilson, Jr., groceries. Zlb - Holder's 5 and 10-cent store. 218 - Misses Hawkins, millinery.

A Study In Better Citizenship

"Human products of the soil" at the Berry Schools, Mt. Berry (via Rome), m Floyd County Ga. At the top is the boys' band, which is a "wind-jamming" organization without a peer in the state. In the center is a field day group receiving medals from the girls, and the onlookers are the children of Georgia farmers. In the oval is the champion baseball team.

BURIED TREASURE. - There are various tales of buried treasure and frenzied hunts around Rome. Northern soldiers dug into an old cemetery in North Rome, later abandoned. Now and then somebody gets an idea old Dr. Berckmans was rich, and disturbs the ruins of his retreat on Mt. Alto, as they do the sacred precincts of Gen. Burwell's deserted home near Hell's Hollow. Virgil A. Stewai't tells how his father, Samuel Stewart, used to receive from the Indians gifts of pieces of gold, lead and tin which they could produce at any tim,e by going out on the trail for four hours. White men often tried to follow the Indians to these treasure beds, but the redskins were too nimble for them, and the secret is supposed never to have been discovered.

James Foreman, an Indian, was brought back from the west after the war by the Nobles to locate precious metals and ores. He searched some time, but claimed the face of the country and the forests had changed, and he could not find anything. The forks of the rivers were thought to be a

James went to gardening for Mrs. F.obt. Battey. She showed him one day how to set out okra seed. When the plants came up they were too close together, for which Mrs. Battey rebuked him. James was half full of "fire-water," and he replied with a fiendish grin, "Do you know I'm an Indian?" She replied, "Do you remember my father, William Smith? He often whipped Indians bigger than you!"

James soon went back to his tribesmen. He told Horry H. Wimpee while he was here that Coosa meant "rippling water" or "where two waters meet," Oostanaula meant "mother of waters" or "clear water," and Etowah meant "muddy bottom." These meanings are doubtful. "Etowah" is said to mean "high banks."

Will Mitchell tells of a spooky hunt for buried treasure. Looking wistfully from a window of the North Rome Public Schools one day when he was a boy, wishing he could be out where the birds were singing so sweetly, he saw two men drive up to the front of the school lot and measure off a certain distance from a tree, and then measure from another tree. Inquiry next morning of a negi-o family living near the school disclosed that at midnight two men had driven up in a buggy and gone to digging by the light of a lantern, and sure enough - by looking down the hole Will could discern plainly the print of a tin or steel box which had been removed.

A Cherokee Indian, Holland, came to Rome between 1874 and 1880, probably from Indian Territory, looking for minerals. He may have 'been the Indian who went to the Sproull place on the Kingston road and told Capt. C. Wm. Sproull that he had a chart which showed where buried treasure was located and would give him half if they found anything. The Indian stepped off distances from certain large trees, made cross marks on the ground and finally came to the blacksmith shop. His chart showed that the treasure was supposed to have been hidden under the anvil. The anvil was moved and the Indian and a negro dug a deep hole, but without success.

CARLIER SPRINGS. - On the Chulio road, three miles east of Rome. Here in 1848 Gen. L. J. B. LeHardy, Camille LeHardy, Louis Henry Carlier and others started a Belgian colony.

with the idea of housing other colonists from Belgium if the venture proved a success. The Belgians built a two-room log house and several outbuildings, and lived there perhaps seven years. Around the springs was a tract of 100 acres which extended to the Etowah River. J. J. Cohen acquii-ed it later, and sold to Geo. M. Battey, who about 1890 sold to his father. Dr. Robert Battey, who died there in 1895. S. R. Cockrill, a graduate of Cornell University, now conducting a truck farm on the Alabama road near the North Georgia Fair Grounds, bought the place from Mrs. Martha Battey, having lived in a cabin on a part of it for some years previously. The present owner is Mrs. Ella Tarvin.

In a two-story frame house on this place Mrs. Battey established about 1894 a small school for the neighborhood children, and maintained it at her own expense. Sunday School under Methodist auspices was held on Sundays. The day school later was taken over by Floyd County and called the Battey Heights School, and in time was removed to another building in the neighborhood.

There is a suggestion of the old world on this place for which the Belgians were not responsible. Many years ago Godfrey Barnsley, the Englishman who developed Barnsley Gardens near Adairsville, brought from the grave of Napoleon on the Island of St. Helena a willow switch which he transplanted on his Bartow County estate. Some years later he presented an off-shoot of this willow to Mrs. Battey and she planted it on or near a pond at Carlier Springs, and there it is today in the form of quite

CARNEGIE LIBRARY. - Erected in 1911 with funds donated by Andrew Carnegie, of Pittsburg, Pa.; 7,000 volumes; nearly 5,000 members; main story and basement devoted to meetings of the U. D. C, Floyd County Camp 368 of Confederate Veterans, the Junior Music Lovers' Club, Woman's Club, Girl Scouts and other organizations and conventions. Librarian since establishment. Miss Helen Underwood Eastman ; board of trustees. Judge Max Meyerhardt, president; Mrs. J. Lindsay Johnson, vice president; W. Sinclair Rowell, seci'etary; Mrs. Jno. C. Printup, Mrs. J. A. Rounsaville, Mrs. Perrin Bestor Brown and Prof. Byard F. Quigg. Located on city property on west side of Broad Street be-

Scenes On The Berry School Campus

At top, a dormitory built by the boys; in oval, the log cabin on the Thos. Berry place, where the idea of the institutiot< originated in small classes taught by Miss Martha Berry'; the handsome chapel, inside which is a blank tablet to be engraved at the anonymous donor's death; at bottom, the "shack" where Col. Roosevelt, Wm. G. McAdoo, Dr. Albert Shaw and a host of noted men and women have been entertained.

CAVES AROUND ROME. - The best known cave in Floyd County is at Cave Spring, sixteen miles southwest of Rome. From this flows a spring that is an important part of Little Cedar Creek, and from which the town is supplied with pure, sparkling water through a ram, at practically no cost. Entrance is effected in a steep, rocky bluff immediately above the point whence the water issues, and still higher is a second opening, lined with rusty brown boulders. It is possible to go quite a distance down on a ladder. Water and beautiful stalactites and stalagmites are found; it is

On a ridge equidistant between the old Lytle Park in South Rome and De- Soto Park, back of the home of J. Nephew King- and on his land, is what used to be known as Jonas King's cave. This is easily entered and candles or lamps reveal a large, irregularly shaped compartment, at the bottom of which flows a small stream. There are several smaller compartments connected by tunnels which must be crawled through on the stomach. At certain intervals during the Civil War this cave was used as a "magazine" for the storage of gun powder made from the salt peter in Bartow County, and for other war materials. At one time also the magazine had been located on Myrtle Hill cemetery near the section which now contains the mortal remains of 277 Confederate soldiers. The entrance of this cave is in a small oak grove and is free from obstructions.

Rome's so-called "salt peter cave" is about half a mile north of Recce's spring, in North Rome. This is obscured by a heavy growth of underbrush in the center of a cultivated field. Small boys say the Oostanaula River, perhaps a mile and a half away, can be reached through the cave, but nobody has ever ventured to explore it to that extent. In 1854 it was called Nix's Cave by White's Historical Collections of Georgia.

Mitchell's cave, named after Daniel R. Mitchell, is located in the face of Whitmore's Bluff, nine miles up the Oostanaula River. A cool stream of water flows out of it and treakles laughingly down the mountainside to the silvery Oostanaula. White's Collections called it Woodward Cave and stated it was once a noted cache for stolen goods.

Another cave of some interest can be found on Black's Bluff, three miles down the Coosa River. It was explored more than a year ago by a group of Boy Scouts.

A large cave is located in Turkey Mountain, northeastern end of Texas Valley, and another of some size in Texas Valley is on the farm of the late J. J. Fisher.

On May 23, 1922, a cave was found on the Peek place 1,000 feet south of Bird Station, quarter of a mile from the Polk County line. It was explored by County Engineer Kieffer Lindsey and County Commissioner J. E. Camp^ who found it to be 30 feet deep and 20 feet wide at the bottom. The walls were smooth and composed of hard shale rock, and they tapered into a cone. shape toward the top. Mr. Lindsey was the first man who had ever entered it, for the earth at the opening had just given away when he was called. He threw a lighted newspaper to the bottom. The paper exhausted the oxygen, so when he went down by rope his lantern was extinguished. His opinion was that the place had been a lime-sink and the lime had worn away through erosion, leaving an underground chamber as perfectly formed as the cupola of a knight's castle. * * *

Cave Spring, Montgomery

CAVE SPRING, MONTGOMERY M. FOLSOM ON. - "At last we ascended a rising ground, from which we could see the tapering spires and arching roofs of the most beautiful town in Georgia. There sat Cave Spring like a happy school girl, framed in a setting of green and gold, with the deep blue sky and the purple hills of the Coosa in the background; Little Cedar Creek bubbling melodiously at her feet; the vine-clad summits of the hills rising overhead; the streets winding leisurely along through verdant bowers, under spreading branches and over grassy levels; each happy home nestled cozily among the yards and gardens, orchards and vineyards. It was a scene once beheld never to be forgotten."