The Discovery of Plumley's Hole, Burrington Combe and the Death of Joe Plumley (UBSS Proceedings v.20(1))

Abstract: The tragic death of Joseph Plumley in 1875, not 1874 as often recorded, at the site of a newly discovered cave in Burrington Combe is well known. This paper examines contemporary newspaper reports recorded here for the first time in speleological literature. Important detail in these new references conflicts with later accounts which were largely based either upon the eye-witness note in a pamphlet published privately by Evan Llewellyn in 1911 or local hearsay of the 1920's. The possibility of an active stream cave, low in Burrington Combe, may offer the caver an important cave system as yet unexplored in an area where caver interest has been reawakened by the discoveries at Lionel's Hole and Pierre's Pot.