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| 1869 photo of Cardiff Giant |
IMPORTANT DISCOVERY.
The Body of a Giant Ten Feet and a Half High Exhumed
In a Petrified State.
GREAT EXCITEMENT IN THE LOCALITY.
On Saturday morning last the quiet little Village of Cardiff, which lies in the valley about twelve miles south of Syracuse, was thrown into an excitement without precedent, by the report that a human body had been exhumed in a petrified state, the colossal dimensions of which had never been the fortune of the inhabitants of the little village to behold, and the magnitude of which was positively beyond the comprehension or the understanding of the wise men of the valley.
We are told that there were giants on the earth once; and, if the reports of those who have investigated this story are true, and that they are we have no doubt, this stony man—who for hundreds of years may have slept untouched and undisturbed, had it not been for the rude hand of a Cardiff farmer— must have been one of them. The excitement in and around Cardiff extended until it reached the City of Salt [Syracuse], and all day yesterday the discovery was the chief topic of conversation at the hotels and public places in the city.
Of course, the most extravagant stories were told, and greedily devoured up by gaping listeners. Some would have thought the body exhumed was twenty-five feet high, and proportionately large. All day yesterday crowds visited the scene of the discovery, and returned to tell the tale of the wonderful discovery to their eager friends.
The facts of the discovery of the body or statue are as follows:—
On Saturday morning, two men by the name of Gideon Emmons and Henry Nichols, were engaged in digging a well on the farm of Mr. Newell, about a mile and a half from Cardiff, when they suddenly came upon what appeared to be a man's foot of colossal dimensions; at first they were somewhat startled, as a matter of course, and proceeding to dig around It, they discovered the legs and body of what they supposed to be a petrified man of monstrous size.
The body lay about two and a half feet below the surface of the earth, on its back, with its right arm and hand crossed upon its breast. Its legs were crossed one lying upon and across the other.
The news of the discovery of the supposed human being spread like wildfire through the valley, and all day Saturday and Sunday hundreds of people visited the locality.
We dispatched a reporter to the scene of the discovery yesterday, and from him learned the above facts. Dr. J. F. Boynton, of this city, a geologist of celebrity, paid a visit to the locality yesterday afternoon, and, inasmuch as his opinion is of great value and worthy of the utmost consideration.
We give it to our readers this morning. The Doctor made a most thorough examination of the discovery, digging under it in order to examine its back, and, after mature deliberation, pronounced it to be a statue of a Caucasian. The features are finely cut and are in perfect harmony. The stone is the gypsum of Onondaga county. It is the doctor’s opinion that the statue was carved by the Jesuits or the early inhabitants of the country, and was placed in the slough, in which it was found, for the purpose of concealing it. It must have been placed there by friendly hands, for an enemy would have mutilated it. It was not buried, but was covered over with boughs and branches of hemlock, alder, cotton-wood, willow and maple.
The Doctor showed us, that evening, a hemlock stick about three feet long which he took from under the statue. The stick was in a perfect state of preservation, although it must have laid there many hundred years. There are a great many sticks or boughs under and around the statue which Indicate the correctness of the Doctor's theory, that the statue was covered up by some parties who wished to conceal it, and has remained in that state for at least three hundred years.
The dimensions and proportions of the statue are colossal and majestic. Its length is ten feet three inches; from the top the head to the lower portion of the chin it measures eight and one half inches; it is two feet five and one-half inches across the breast; from the niche of the eye to the end of the nose, six and one-half inches; the neck is eleven inches in diameter; length of mouth, five Inches; from the end of the nose to end of chin, six and one- half inches; the middle finger is seven and three-fourth inches long; width of hand, six inches; width of foot across the toes, eight and one-half inches; from the top of the head to the lower portion of the mouth, twenty-two inches; length of foot from heel to toe, eighteen and one-half inches. The measurements were made with a carpenter’s rule, and may vary a little.
It is the opinion of the Doctor that there are other records hidden in the locality which, when discovered, may throw some additional light upon the discovery. The statue, in his opinion, has not lain there over three hundred years. It was covered over that evening, and will not remain on view.
Further investigations will be made to-day by the Doctor, the result of which we shall lay before our readers to-morrow. In a few weeks the statue will be brought to Syracuse, where it can be seen by all. It cannot be seen where it now is. The value of this discovery to scientific men cannot be estimated. We sincerely hope that it may be secured for our Historical Society. We heard of fabulous offers made for it yesterday –offers as high as ten thousand dollars.
The above is Doctor Boynton's theory of the discovery. Coming from a scientific man, it is entitled to great weight and consideration. We are not disposed to dispute it, and yet we incline to the opinion that the discovery is the petrified body of a human being.
A statue would hardly have its legs crossed, nor would its arms be placed in the position described above. We know that men of mighty stature have inhabited the earth in days gone by— giants in fact, and who can tell but this may be the body of one of those mighty men, which has lain there for thousands of years, until form and flesh has been turned to stone. The features are as perfect and the form is as complete as that of a living person, and it has every appearance of being once a human being.
The question will undoubtedly be satisfactorily settled very shortly, and the decision of scientific men may coincide with Dr. Boynton’s, and show that we are wrong in our conjectures.
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| Cardiff Giant at "Stub" Newell's farm |
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