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MORE FUN WITH
Roy Earl (REMEMBER THEM ?) in Tazwell County |
Earl and myself went in all those caves we could find in Wards Cove and Tazewell area. Found Glenwood Church Cave, and the Cauliflower Cave right under Glenwood Church. That was virgin when I got into it. Earl, myself, and brother Jim explored in Wards Cove Cave together. Brother Jim and myself would go up to Roanoke and get with Earl; we would drive on out to Tazewell, cave, come back, stop at Blacksburg to take a shower, and come back on into Roanoke. Then drive home getting in early Monday morning.
We had some real trips there in Tazewell. Got in Wards Cove Cave and all those holes in the Cove: Dry Cave, Fallen Rock Cave, a number of others. One of em had a wooden trough in it; a man used it for an animal shelter. It had a rail fence across the mouth and a gate. We found a crawl hole in the back of it; went on back, crawled a ways and dropped down into a room with a stream. On the way back out I was leading and got stuck. Panicked. I just threw my weight backwards and forwards and couldnt move. Finally, still panicky, I told Earl to grab and hold me. He grabbed me and that calmed me down. After a little bit of reasoning I told Earl. Take my wallet out of my pocket. Thats what was holding me, my wallet.
Another feature in wards Cove was a canyonlike thing; I forget the name of it. There are a number of holes off of it. A little window looked into a cauldron where the stream plunged down into it, just boiling. Standing waves in the cauldron from the waterfall. I was laying up in the window watching Earl skirt the sides of the cauldron; lo and behold, he slipped and fell in it. I was just powerless to do anything because I was laying in this hole with no rope. He managed to right himself before he went under the water. There was some flow of water in that place.
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The
Legend of |
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Here follows the legend of the Murder Hole, as reported in a 1944 newsletter of the VPI Grotto:
It was about 5:00 on a fall morning and the traveling salesman was very anxious to get an early start. The farmer with whom he had spent the previous night had helped to harness his horse, and was accompanying him to the road. The morning was very dark with cold rain coming down in waves. The only light was an occasional jagged streak of lightening followed by a peal of thunder, echoing and reechoing across the mountain ridges. The buggy sank deeply into the soft muddy ground causing much straining and weird cracking on the water-soaked harness. Despite all this, the peddler was in high spirits. He was thinking of home; of his wife and children. In two more days he would be with them. He thought of the long prosperous journey which lay behind, of his buggy empty of wares, of his full pockets, and of the short journey ahead.
The farmers thoughts werent so pleasant, however. He too was thinking of what a prosperous journey the peddler had had, and of how full were his pockets. Evil ideas. How easy it would be to rob this traveler. News traveled so slowly that no one would know but what he had gotten home safely; his family could never trace him. As his plans developed the farmer grabbed the buggy whip and hit the peddler a solid blow on the temple with the whip butt. He quickly frisked him, removing all his valuables including a considerable amount of gold. Now to dispose of the evidence. The farmer drove the horse and buggy up close to a bottomless sinkhole. He carefully pointed the horses head toward the hole and gave him a sharp cut with the whip. The horse, unaware of what lay before it, plunged headlong to its doom, carrying with it the peddler and the buggy. Since this episode took place, about fifty acres of woodland have been cleared and the logs all rolled into this sinkhole to destroy them and to fill the sinkhole. Consequently the only evidence we have of the tragedy is as related to us by the lady on whose farm the hole, now known as Murder Hole Number Two, exists. -VPI GROTTO GRAPEVINE, March 3, 1944.
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L. to R. Bob Woody and Charles Marr at Catawba Murder Hole
Photo by D Anderson |
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previous--Pig Hhole, pg188
next--Blue Hole, pg190
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