Indiana Spirit Quest #86: Bad Name Traditional Cache

The Indiana Spirit Quest series of geocaches will take you to a number of small, rural, historic cemeteries built by Hoosier Pioneers in central/Northeast Indiana. PRAIRIEPARTNERS has set a record for one-day ISQ finds on 10-16-2004 at 55! 90 cacher teams have logged over 1,250 finds.

TOP TEN FINDS

FTF's

2. 14 --Buddaman
3. 12 --Bluegillfisherman
4. 8 --Pinestrail

This quest by Kodiak Kid will take you to the scene of the crime--murder most foul! Come to Mack Cemetery, if you dare!

"Shot through the heart, and you're to blame,
You give love, a bad name!"
-J. Bon Jovi

This quest takes you to a forgotten spot in Van Buren Township, which most certainly must be haunted if there is such a thing. Of the 20 graves listed by a recent historian, very few markers remain intact. The first interred there was a Josiah Remington in 1837. The presiding preacher was John P. Jones, who later became a well-known statesman in Indiana. After turning some stones and wiping off the mud, I found what I was looking for. The grave of Addie Dwight, buried with her family...

"The saddest tragedy in the annals of the county took place, singularly enough, on the quiet, charming beach of Stone Lake, where one would expect nothing but the ripple of the waves, the songs of the birds, and the laughter of children, which this mad crime so rudely disturbed. Addie Dwight, a charming young lady of eighteen years, who was admired and respected by all who met her, the youngest daughter of Charles Dwight, was teaching at the Lake Schoolhouse and took her pupils down to the lake at noon, on June 22, 1871, to give them a promised frolic on the beach.

While here, unconcious of any danger, Chauncey Barnes, a young man living near this place, in Elkhart County, drove up, accompanied by a young woman of White Pigeon, and asked for an interview with the school teacher. They walked away together for a short distance. Barnes had, for some time, been paying marked attentions to Miss Dwight, but she had declined to receive his company, and his attempts at a reconciliation had been in vain. He took his disappointment very much to heart, and, suffering from jealousy, he went to see her this day for a last attempt, and madly resolved to end her life and his, if he could not win her. As the children came toward the two, seated together at some distance, a pistol shot was heard, and Addie was seen, with her hands raised, begging for her life. But a second bullet was sent crashing through her head, and she fell dead at the feet of her lover and murderer. Barnes then emptied the revolver into his own head, and when the neighbors came to the scene, though bleeding horribly, he was reloading his revolver, determined to take his own life.

The murderer was confined in the county jail, and for some time was at the point of death, but finally recovered. At his trial, the defense was insanity, but though ably defended, he was found guilty of murder, and sentenced to the penitentiary for life. He is still confined there.

This causeless crime, which so cruelly blotted out an innocent young life, aroused great feeling throughout the county, and much sympathy was expressed for the victim, and indignation toward the murderer. This latter, however, was softened by his attempted suicide, and the sorrow of his family. It was one of those events which, though having a tinge of romance in history and stories of love and sorrow, are too terribly tragic in the real life of one's own generation."

Although the stones are unreadable or missing in many cases, the bases still mark the graves. Starting at Ann Dwight's grave moving toward the road (north) the Dwights are buried in this order-

Ann Dwight, 2nd wife of Chas, 48 yrs, 1879;
Addie Dwight, dau of Chas. & Ann, 18 yrs, 1871;
Mary Dwight, dau of Chas. & Ann, 1863;
Charles Dwight, 1889;
Mary Dwight, 1st wife of Chas., 1818-1854;
Willis Dwight, son of Chas & Ann, 1858-1863;
William Vangilder, son of B & H, 11 yrs, 9/17/1857;
Polly Vangilder, dau of B & H, 9 yrs, 6/20/1857;
Josiah Remington, no marker.

Your cache is a micro, log only, BYOP. A small cylinder, well camo'ed but not all that well hidden. --Kodiak Kid (Photos by Kodiak Kid)

Gee, so who was and what happened to the Young Woman from White Pigeon?? And Barnes must have been quite a guy to survive FOUR self-inflicted gunshot wounds to the head... (Stone Lake is about a mile and a half north of the cache...)

photo by Kodiak Kid

The cache container is very small. BYOP. Park with care. If you find a fallen US flag, please stick it back in the ground. As always, please be respectful, and cache in, trash out.

Cache In - Trash Out!

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NIGHT CACHING IS STRICTLY FORBIDDEN ON ALL ISQ's