Desoto Caverns

Story & photo submitted from: TM, Georgia, USA

We took our children to DeSoto Caverns on Saturday, 02/09/02, for a day of fun touring the caverns and such. While in the caverns I took many pictures using a Kodak DC3400 digital camera that my wife had given me for Christmas. When we were exiting the caverns I turned around and took a shot into the large main room of the caves. Although I looked at the small monitor on the camera I didn't notice anything unusual at the time.

Later that evening I downloaded the pics taken that day onto my computer. Only at this time did I notice this strange mist or 'ecto' on the last shot taken back into the caverns. At first viewing it looked like a face or something, but when I sat back and looked at the entire picture it looks like a native American standing upright. Our guide informed us that these caverns were used for centuries by native Americans for living areas and they also used areas in them for burial grounds.

We were shown where one such burial site was once at. She told us that at some point in the past some modern day native Americans were taking the tour and objected to the displaying of their ancestors' bones like that. They somehow obtained permission to come in and remove the remains and then they took them somewhere else in the caverns and re-interred them.

No one other than those who did this know where they were re-interred. The caverns were also used as a 'speakeasy' during the early 20th century during the Prohibition era in the U.S. Supposedly others died here then as well. There was one other grave that we were shown. It was of a 'white' man who lived during the time that the Indians used the caverns. He supposedly came into the caverns and carved his name and the date, some time back in the 1700's, onto this very large slab of stone. He was caught by the native Americans and scalped and killed for desecrating their area and was supposedly buried beside the stone slab which still shows his name and the date. I have no idea as to what this is on this picture. There was nothing visible to the naked eye when I took this shot, other than the rock formations and such. The temperature was around 55 to 60 degrees both inside and out. The weather was clear, no precipitation.