icturesque bluffs of limestone form the northern bank of the river above Horrican [Hurricane] Island. Abrupt, tower-like shapes, rising from the bed of the Ohio, present bold, wild groups pleasing to the observer. Among these limestone masses I also saw the much admired cave formations described by many travelers under the name of Cave-in-Rock (La Grande Caverne). Despite my desire, I had to give up the wish to examine more carefully the inner formation and structure of the dropstone and had to content myself with a superficial and fleeting look at this masterpiece of nature.
The cave is formed on a perpendicular cleft, extending to a height of more than one hundred feet, running in parallel layers of limestone. It does not contain as many remains of petrified sea and shell-bearing animals as the limestone formations at the falls of the Ohio, at Cincinnati, or in the mountains of Kentucky. The traces of bones of prehistoric mammals are said to have disappeared from these caves. However, there can be no doubt that more careful investigation and excavation would bring many of them to light.
During high water a great part of the cave is flooded by the river. At average low water, however, it is dry and can easily be reached and therefore explored. The cave has frequently been used as a place of refuge on the part of travelers meeting with an accident or seeking to escape inclement weather. The Indians are reported to have made use of it as a hiding place while on war expeditions, sallying forth from it to attack passersby and molest the colonists. Like all stories dealing with the aborigines, these theme is a favorite subject to the Americans and as unbelievable as other adventurous stories that have been told me about this place.
The summit of the rocky elevation on the north bank of the Ohio near the cave is overgrown with the American [eastern red] cedar (Juniperus virginianus [virginiana]), its roots penetrating into the clefts and fissures of the limestone and protruding in bunches. This evergreen covering the rock banks of the upper Mississippi and Missouri, and there attaining a considerable height, prefers to grow on limestone cliffs. Its growth becomes more and more vigorous as one goes north. Forming small clumps of forest, this variety breaks the monotony of the desolate prairies along the river in the northwest.
Passing several dangerous rocks called Battery Rock Bar during the night, we landed early on the morning of April 21 near the Saline at Shawneetown. Here is a very important salt factory supplying the great part of the United States with this important product.
[Author's footnote: In the United States the common salt or sodium chloride in combination with potassium salt and calcium salt occurs most frequently in the rich springs on the Kenhawa, the Little Sandy River, at Shawneetown, Boone's Like at Franklin on the Missouri, the saline near Ste. Genevieve in whose salt beds I found found bones of the American mastodon and in the salt springs of Riviere a la Mine. One should also read on this point Major Long's Account of an Expedition from Pittsburgh to the Rocky Mountains, Vol. I, page 34.]
The little settlement of Shawneetown derives its name from the Shawnee (Chuoanous) nation, which had one of its principal village here. This Indian tribe had not disappeared entirely, but by frequent intermixture of white blood has departed more from the customs of its ancestors than have the other neighboring tribes. Roaming about restlessly, the Shawnees and the half-bloods who assume this name live on the banks of the Ohio and in the states of Indiana and Illinois, do some agriculture, but mostly hunt and fish. Excepting the Iroquois and Algonquins, whom I only know slightly, they are one of the few tribes living within the inhabited parts of northeastern America inclined to accept the ways of the immigrated European races.
Source: Paul Wilhelm, Duke of Wurttemberg. Travels in North America, 1822-1824. Translated by W. Robert Nitske. Edited by Savoie Lottinville. Norman, Okla.: University of Oklahoma Press, 1973. 155-156 (April 20-21, 1823).
