Union soldiers camped at Camp Hambright near Glasgow Junction, Kentucky in early 1862 relied on Dripping Cave as their primary water source. While at the encampment, soldiers also visited nearby Hundred Dome Cave out of curiosity. Accounts describe soldiers exploring deep into both caves, with one soldier exploring over half a mile into Dripping Cave. Historic graffiti left by Union soldiers has been found in Hundred Dome Cave, including the names of soldiers from Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Indiana regiments who were stationed at Camp Hambright.

1. 1
Thirty-Second Ohio Valley History Conference
Brief Diversions on “The Great Rush South”: Union Soldiers, Camp Hambright, and the
Exploration of Dripping and Hundred Dome Caves, Kentucky in Early 1862.
Joseph C. Douglas (Volunteer State Community College)
and Marion O. Smith (Independent Scholar)
Friday October 7, 2016
Tennessee Technological University
Cookeville, Tennessee

2. 2
In early 1862, the Union Army of the Ohio in central Kentucky was on the move, as
Confederate positions began to give way. The Union victory at Mill Springs, and especially the
fall of Forts Henry and Donelson to Grant’s forces in early February, made Confederate
positions north of Nashville untenable. Confederate General Albert Sydney Johnston and his
Army evacuated Bowling Green, Kentucky, his headquarters since the previous October. As they
withdrew, Union forces moved south towards Nashville, generally following the Louisville and
Nashville (L & N) Railroad.
Although dubbed the “Great Rush South” by the New York Times the following month, the
initial Union Army movement down the line was slowed by the destruction of all the bridges on
the railroad, including the major bridges at Munfordville and Bowling Green over the Green and
Barren rivers respectively.1 The troop movement was also hampered by wet weather and poor
roads, which resulted in significant mud and associated delays. As various brigades marched
south they encamped at irregular intervals along the way. All of these encampments were named,
either officially or unofficially, and solders sometimes spent several days at them before moving
on, due to delays in obtaining supplies, crossing the rivers, or other problems. The soldiers used
this time, whenever possible, to visit nearby caves, considered the great wonders of Kentucky.
As the Union Army moved through the cave region of central Kentucky, the soldiers were
keenly aware they were travelling through a well-developed karst terrain. Karst is a landform
characterized by the dissolution of limestone, underground drainage connected to the surface by
sinkholes (insurgences) and springs (resurgences), and extensive development of caves, which in
Kentucky range from small or short caves to the longest known cave in the world, Mammoth
Cave. The karst terrain is present in two adjacent areas. South and west of Muldraugh Hill,
soldiers entered the extensive Mississippian (or Pennyroyal) Plateau, a large physiographic

3. 3
province dominated by rolling sinkhole plains. West of the rail line, but close by, is a line of
upland limestone hills with dissected sandstone caps, locally known as knobs. Both the sinkhole
plains and the knobs contain caves, with active stream caves in the plains and both older (paleo)
and active passages in the caves of the knobs. Mammoth Cave is located in the uplands west of
the L &N Railroad line and had been world famous for decades. It had also been the subject of
two recent guidebooks (1858, 1860) by Professor Charles W. Wright. In the hurried days of early
1862, Mammoth Cave was too far away for most enlisted men to visit, although officers with
horses and money to stay at the cave hotel made the nine mile journey to see it.
But enlisted men could visit other caves closer to their line of march. Three closer, well-
publicized caves had recently been opened for tourism: Diamond Cave (1859), Hundred Dome
(now Coach) Cave (1860), and Osceola (or Indian) Cave (1861). Written accounts and extant
historic graffiti show that Union soldiers visited all of these caves, as well as number of others in
the region.2 Hundred Dome Cave, for which there is more data than Diamond or Osceola, was
located only about a mile from a Union Army encampment. At Hundred Dome Cave, the
soldiers’ interactions with the underground environment were primarily recreational outings,
social in nature, and were prompted by the notoriety of Kentucky caves and the broader cultural
conception of caves as natural curiosities.
The second type of environmental interaction soldiers had with caves in the region was
primarily utilitarian and due, in part, to a major characteristic of karst terrains, the rarity or
absence of lower order surface streams such as brooks and creeks, as most drainage is
underground. The Union Army and its soldiers thus often relied on water from underground
sources, such as at Dripping Cave, which lay directly on the line of movement, a mile or two
south of Glasgow Junction (today Park City), Kentucky.

4. 4
There was a Union Army encampment located near Glasgow Junction where numerous troops
stayed in February and March of 1862. Called Camp Hambright, it was named for Colonel
Henry A. Hambright (1819-1893) of the 79th Pennsylvania Regiment, part of the General James
S. Negley’s Seventh Brigade, which in turn was part of General Alexander McCook’s Second
Division. Other regiments in the brigade also used the name Camp Hambright. Surprisingly, the
exact location of the Camp remains unknown; it was described in a letter by one Pennsylvania
soldier as on the pike “about two miles below the famous Bell’s Tavern.”3 Another wrote in his
diary that “[w]e…marched 1 and ½ miles, camped, and called it Hambright.”4 A different
Pennsylvania diarist recorded “[m]arch in mud to Bell’s Tavern. Took R. Road for short
distance, struck the pike & arrived at our present place at 6 p.m.”5 A soldier in the 1st Wisconsin
noted in a letter that the division “encamped one mile from Bell’s Tavern and a few rods from
Dripping Spring Cave.”6 Using a larger scale of reference, a Pennsylvania newspaper
correspondent placed the camp on the L & N railroad line “93 miles from Louisville, 22 from
Bowling Green, and 92 from Nashville.”7 Additional sources are imprecise or imply that the
encampment was near or at Bell’s Tavern, in Glasgow Junction proper. Local informants are
unfamiliar with the camp’s location, and the Kentucky Office of State Archeology has no report
on the site. To add to the confusion, two other temporary encampments were also called
Hambright, one about twelve miles north of Bacon Creek, Kentucky and the other in Tennessee,
north of Camp Andy Johnson. But the totality of the evidence indicates the main Union Army
encampment in early 1862 near Glasgow Junction was south of Bell’s Tavern, along the pike to
Bowling Green, and near a cave usually called Dripping Cave.8 In recent field work we have
attempted to find Camp Hambright by locating Dripping Cave, the camp’s most conspicuous
geological feature. Unfortunately, we have so far been unable to relocate the cave and examine it

5. 5
for Civil War graffiti. The sinkhole plain landscape has been greatly modified by road
construction for Highway 31W and Interstate 65, and by the agricultural practice of filling
sinkholes.9
Dripping Cave was more than a landmark for Camp Hambright, however, it became a vital
resource for the men there. Water had been a concern, and potential problem, ever since the
Union Army entered the Mississippian Plateau, and it loomed larger as the Army moved south.
The scarcity of surface creeks is a natural feature of the karst landscape, but there were
additional problems. Men in the Union Army, both at the time and later, plainly stated that
retreating Confederates had deliberately fouled ponds and other water sources along the route of
their retreat. Reports of such environmental destruction are not unknown in the Civil War, there
are Confederate stories of Sherman’s men poisoning wells in his March to the Sea for example,
but without physical evidence or other corroboration the charge remains unconfirmed. At a
minimum though, Union soldiers believed many water sources in the region had become victims
of the war. An newspaper account from the “Camp at Bell’s Tavern,” dated February 14, 1862,
stated that the roads had been blocked with timber, the roads plowed up, and “[a]ll the ponds,
some fifteen in number, on the line of march, were rendered unfit for man or beast, owing to the
fact that these desolators had killed horses, cattle, sheep and hogs, ripped them open, and thrown
them into the water. In a few instances drains had been dug and the water let off.”10 An Indiana
regimental history notes that, “[s]cattered over the face of the county are many small lakes, or
ponds, but the enemy, in their retreat, had dragged into them dead mules and horses, until they
were totally unfit for use.”11
The lack of suitable surface water meant that the men at Camp Hambright relied heavily upon
Dripping Cave as their water supply. The [Ebensburg, Pennsylvania] Alleghanian observed that

6. 6
“[m]ost of the water used by the brigade is obtained from the Dripping Cave, one of the noted
subterraneous caverns which abound in this locality.”12 While at the camp, William Clark of
Company B., 79th Pennsylvania Infantry wrote in his diary that the cave was equipped for
efficient retrieval of the resource, “[t]onight I went to a cave close to camp. We went 50 feet
down a ledge of broken rocks at the foot of which is a good spring of water which runs into a
trough, and buckets coming down by windlass from the top are filled with water, & drawn up on
a wire. We went back ½ a mile into the cave but had to return as our light was burning low.”13
Clark also noted, “I am on the Water Committee.”14 Asbury L. Kerwood’s Annals of the Fifty-
Seventh Regiment Indiana Volunteers states that “[t]here were but few wells in that region, and
we had to obtain our entire supply of water for cooking from the caves, which rarely failed to
contain an abundance of the very best.”15
Dripping Cave was also a natural curiosity. It was explored by numerous soldiers who went
much farther inside than necessary to obtain the water below the entrance. One Pennsylvania
soldier noted, “I examined it as far as I could penetrate for [high] water.”16 Another wrote in his
diary, “[m]ade an examination of the cave which is on the grounds on which we are
encamped.”17 An anonymous correspondent wrote for the Alleghanian, “[d]uring our stay at
Camp Hambright I had the pleasure of visiting the Dripping Cave and Hundred Dome Cave. We
could not penetrate the former to a great distance, on account of the water that flows through
it.”18 As noted above, William T. Clark and a party of soldiers went in a half-mile. Henry
Witmer Miller, also from Pennsylvania, gave a lengthy description in a letter to his father,
writing that “[w]e have Several caves in the vicinity of our encampment one of which is
Supposed to be the South end of Mammouth[.] [I]t has a Splendid ceiling formed from water
drippings[,] a place in the center looks much like a centre table and over it hangs a rock from

7. 7
which, there is a piece of Stone projecting upon which could be Suspended a light. [T]here is
also a fine Spring of water in it. [T]o this cave many soldiers pay frequent visits. [T]o look upon
its national [natural?] curiosities and partake of its refreshing waters.”19
Because of its steepness, merely going into Dripping Cave to access the water or see the
cave’s features could be hazardous. Geologist Angelo George relates the story of Corporal Cyrus
C. Hodge (1837-1923) of the 30th Indiana Regiment who in early 1862 had rocks fall on him, or
perhaps fell, while getting water in a cave behind Bell’s Tavern and was badly injured. This
ultimately led to his discharge from the Army for disability on July 16, 1862. However, our field
examination of Bell’s Tavern Cave reveals that it is not a water source. More likely, Hodge was
injured in Dripping Cave while at Camp Hambright, a mile or two south of Bell’s Tavern.20
Although the quality of the cave water may have been good, outdoor life in a crowded Army
encampment in winter was not healthy. Aside from serious injuries such as Cyrus Hodge’s, death
from illness was close-by. The roster for Company D of the 78th Pennsylvania, for instance, lists
two privates, George W. Rowley and Andrew Kelly, as having died at Camp Hambright on
February 22nd and 23rd, 1862 respectively.21 For others, their time at Camp Hambright was
happier, as they used their stay there to visit other caves in Kentucky, lured not by water but
curiosity and the desire to experience the famous Kentucky underground. One Pennsylvania
soldier wrote, “[w]e remained at Camp Hambright five days. It was a very pleasant place and we
enjoyed ourselves ‘amazingly.’”22 Kerwood’s Annals of the Fifty- Seventh Regiment Indiana
Volunteers notes that “[t]he delay here, which was prolonged to two days, was improved by the
men in visiting the numerous caves with which the country abound. One very large one, not
more than a mile from our camp, called Hundred Dome Cave, was visited by nearly all the men
in the regiment.”23

8. 8
Hundred Dome Cave is large cave with over three miles of complex passages. It first came
into public notice when it was mined for saltpeter in the War of 1812 era by brothers Williamson
and Fleming Gatewood. In 1859 the cave was more thoroughly explored by the landowner John
D. Courts and Kelion F. Peddicord, whose family was living with Courts at the time. Peddicord
and Courts developed the cave for tourism by building paths, bridges, and ladders through about
one-half mile of varied cave passage. They also installed a plank floor in the entrance room
which could be used for dances. 24 By early 1860, Hundred Dome Cave was receiving publicity
in newspapers as a great curiosity worthy of a visit.
When the Civil War broke out the following year, formal cave tourism at the site faded, as
seen in the reduced amount of historic graffiti from 1861 compared to 1860. Kelion Peddicord
and two of his brothers joined the Confederate Army, and while the war-time activities and
political sympathies of John D. Courts are unknown, there is no mention of the landowner,
payments for permission, or the use of guides by any of the soldiers on their visits.25 A large and
impressive cave, well-known due to recent publicity, outfitted for visitors, and seemingly
abandoned, Hundred Dome Cave was an ideal attraction and brief diversion for Union Army
soldiers moving south in February and March 1862.
The most illuminating first-hand account of Hundred Dome Cave comes from a March 16,
1862 letter by a Pennsylvania soldier writing to a friend at home. Published in the [Clearfield,
Pennsylvania] Raftman’s Journal, the author, referred to as “N. J.”, described his journey into
the underground, expressing both a sense of wonder and adventure:

9. 9
The first room of the cave is fitted up for a ball room. It is floored and has closets, and
staging for the band, and all complete…The long avenues, the spacious rooms, the deep
chasms, the high domes, the huge columns, the formations which encrust the rocks, the
myriads of dormant bats which hang in ponderous (and almost numberless) bevies from
the ceiling, all presented to me a new and interesting scene. We had no guide, and no
light only that which our parraffine [sic] candles produced. We clambered down ladders
and stair-ways, across bridges and around ledges, sometimes walking and sometimes
crawling. We could not see the bottom of many of the chasms by the dim light of our
candles, neither could we see the ceiling of some of the highest domes. We continued our
explorations until our curiosity was entirely satisfied, and then returned to camp with a
number of specimens…26
In the summer of 2016, Jeff Burns, a caver involved in a practice rescue exercise in Hundred
Dome Cave, observed and photographed historic graffiti on the wall of a dome on the old
commercial tour route. The authors subsequently visited the site in September 2015 and recorded
several historic names, dates, and associated writing, along with observations on other material
culture in the cave. We undertook additional research trips in May and September 2016.
Some of the graffiti are poorly preserved and impossible to fully decipher, but other wall and
ceiling markings are in fair to excellent condition and legible. Of those we can read, some are
just initials, or represent common names. These contain too little information for us to identify
with certainty. However we have positively identified nine Union soldier names found in the
cave, with three additional identifications we consider likely. We have also produced brief
biographies for most of them.27 The soldiers include two men from the 78th Pennsylvania, two
from the 79th Pennsylvania, three from the 1st Wisconsin, one from the 6th Indiana, and one from
the 57th Indiana regiment. Of the three likely but not certain identifications, two are men from the
78th Pennsylvania and one from the 6th Indiana. Somewhat surprisingly, all nine of the men
whose names we identified in Hundred Dome Cave survived the war, although three were
discharged for disability, and one, Albert G. Terhune of the 57th Indiana Regiment, died in the
fall of 1865 “of disease contracted in the army.”28

10. 10
Historians have long studied particular environmental aspects of the American Civil War
such as topography and weather, but many studies narrowly center on specific battles. Although
major engagements such as Stones River and Chattanooga were fought in karst regions, analyses
are seldom extended to the scale of landforms. More recently, innovative works by
environmental historians have produced fine grained studies with new perspectives on topics
such as physical destruction, military strategy and landscape, and the environment and soldier
health. They have also expanded the focus beyond single battles to include entire campaigns,
especially in Virginia and Georgia.29 Our current study of central Kentucky’s cave region in the
Civil War adds to the field, we hope, by examining a previously understudied region with a
distinctive landscape in a period of major troop movement, rather than a single battle. Union
soldier used the Dripping and Hundred Dome caves in two primary ways; as water sources, and
as objects of wonder, which stemmed from the nineteenth century American conception of caves
as sublime curiosities. Just as people visited mountains, wilderness, and other natural features,
soldiers visited Kentucky caves to see the natural wonders, experience the unique environment,
and have an exciting adventure with their fellows. These activities represent brief recreational
diversions for men engaged in a deadly serious enterprise, and show strong continuity with pre-
Civil War practices. We suggest that the environmental interactions seen among Union soldiers
in Kentucky can be found in similar landforms throughout the eastern and western theaters, with
local variation, as soldiers in both Union and Confederate armies traveled, camped, drilled, and
fought across the great karst regions of eastern America.
1 “Our Tennessee Correspondence; How to Reach Nashville,” New York Times, March 28, 1862.
2 Additional caves in the general area which Union soldiers visited includeJames Cave (GlasgowJunction), Lone
Star Saltpeter Cave (Bacon Creek), Long Cave (GlasgowJunction), Lost River Cave (Bowling Green), Railroad Crevice
Cave (Munfordville),and Short Cave (GlasgowJunction),All except Short Cave, which has not been examined,
contain extant Civil War soldier graffiti.

11. 11
3 Letter of Henry Witmer Miller,Co.H, 79th Pennsylvania Regiment, February 22, 1862,Penn State Libraries
Archive.
4 Diary of WilliamT. Clark,Co. B, 79th Pennsylvania Regiment, February 17, 1862,Lancaster County Historic Society.
5 Diary of J. H. Druckenmiller,February 18, 1862,Lancaster County Historical Society.
6 Letter from “Quad,” Company F, 1st Wisconsin Infantry,February 22, 1862.
http://thecivilwarandnorthwestwisconsin.wordpress.com/page/204/?app-downloads=ios accessed 11/26/2015.
7 “Letter from Kentucky,” The [Ebensburg, Pennsylvania] Alleghanian, March 13, 1862,p. 1.
8 Even the soldiers gotconfused. See Adam S. Johnston, The Soldier Boy’s Diary Book (Pittsburgh: n.p., 1868) pp. 9-
11. Johnston callsthecamp south of GlasgowJunction Water Cave Camp; the confusion persists as a Civil War
envelope from Camp Hambright dated February 20th 1862 was sold on e-bay with a description attributingitto the
later camp by the same name in Tennessee.
9 A local informant, RonnieDoyle of Park City, believes DrippingCave may have been Kel ly Cave, a cavereputed to
have significantwater and in the suspected area.Kelly Cave was apparently filled by road construction.Personal
communication,September 3, 2016.
10 “Gen. Mitchell’s Division,”Cincinnati Commercial, reprinted in the New York Times, February 23, 1862.
11 Asbury L. Kerwood, Annalsof the Fifty-Seventh Regiment Indiana Volunteers (Dayton, Ohio: W. J. Shuey, 1868) p.
39.
12 “Letter from Kentucky,” The [Ebensburg, Pennsylvania] Alleghanian, March 13, 1862,p. 1.
13 Diary of WilliamT. Clark,February 18, 1862.
14 Ibid.
15 Kerwood, p. 39.
16 The [Clearfield, Pennsylvania] Raftsman’s Journal, March 19, 1862,p. 3.
17 Diary of J. H. Druckenmiller,February 18, 1862.
18 “Letter from Kentucky,” The [Ebensburg, Pennsylvania] Alleghanian, April 1, 1862,p. 1.
19 Letter of Henry Witmer Miller February 22,1862.
20 Angelo George, “Cave Accidents before 1900,” Journal of Spelean History 29 (2): 55-61 [1995];Thirtieth Indiana
Infantry Roll,p. 14; For a description and further information on Hodge, includinghis two overlappingmarriages,
see “Cyrus C. Hodge,” http://www.hodges-hodge-society.org/db/getperson.php?=I1965&tree=6 ; the cave atBell’s
Tavern was reportedly used to store foodstuffs for the inn in the antebellum period. Accordingto a recent field
examination by Kristen Bobo, it may also havebeen mined for saltpeter.
21 78th Pennsylvania Volunteers Company D Muster Roll. http://pa-roots.co/pacw/infantry/78th/78cod.html
accessed 11/23/2015.The company also lostthree men while in Louisvillein December 1861 and two men at
Camp Wood in January 1862,all presumably fromdisease.
22 The [Clearfield, Pennsylvania] Raftsman’s Journal, March 19, 1862,p. 3.
23 Kerwood, p. 39.
24 For a more thorough discussion of the history of Hundred Dome Cave, see Marion O. Smith and Joseph C.
Douglas,“Civilian and Soldier Names of Hundred Dome (Coach) Cave, Kentucky, 1859-1862,”Shannon R. Trimboli,
Luke E. Dodd, and De’Etra Young, eds. Proceedings for Celebrating the Diversity of Research in the Mammoth Cave
Region: 11th Research Symposium at Mammoth Cave National Park (BowlingGreen: Western Kentucky University,
2016) pp. 1-8.
25 Marshall County [Texas] Republican, January 28,1860; Louisville Daily Journal, March 24, 1860;For the
development of the cave for tourismsee India W.P. Logan, Kelion Franklin Peddicord of Quirk’s Scouts Morgan’s
Kentucky Cavalry, C. S. A. (New York and Washington D.C., 1908) pp. 10-12, 21-27; Also see GilbertS. Bailey, The
Great Caverns of Kentucky (Chicago:Church & Goodman, 1863).
26 The [Clearfield, Pennsylvania] Raftsman’s Journal, March 19, 1862,p. 3. A shorter accountin “Letter from
Kentucky,” The [Ebensburg, Pennsylvania] Alleghanian, April 3,1862, p. 1 is so similaritclearly comes from the
same source.
27 Marion O. Smith and Joseph C. Douglas,pp. 1-8.
28 George Hazard,Hazard’s History of Henry County, Indiana, 1822-1866,Vol. 1 (New Castle,Indiana:George
Hazard,1906) p. 416.

12. 12
29 Megan Kate Nelson, Ruin Nation: Destruction and the American Civil War (Athens and London: University of
Georgia Press,2012); Lisa M. Brady, War Upon the Land: Military Strategy and the Transformation of Southern
Landscapes During the American Civil War (Athens and London: University of Georgia Press,2012);Kathryn Shively
Meier, Nature’s Civil War: Common Soldiers and the Environment in 1862 Virginia (Chapel Hill:University of North
Carolina Press,2013);Brian Drake,ed., The Blue, the Gray, and the Green: Toward an Environmental History of the
Civil War (Athens and London: University of Georgia Press,reprinted. 2015).