New-York tribune., 1919-12-07
Cave Hermit Dies
Without Revealing
40-Year Fire Secret
Arthur Carey, First White
Settler i'm Leicester, Kept
Blaze Going; Source of
His Wealth Was Unsolved

LEICESTER, Mass, Dec. 2.-Old
records in the Town Clerks Office re-
ferring to Arthur Carey, original owner
Of $50 acres Of land in Leicester, one
Of the founders of the town and the
first white man to settle In the then
Indian region known as Towtaid, re-
call the fact that the mystery relating
to Carey was never solved.
Carey was found here, living. in
cave, when the first white explorers
came here in 1899, and he had been in
for moro than twenty-five years.
Having no flint and steel and no
other means of starting fire to cook
and to keep his lonely cave warm,
Carey used the Indian way Of whirling
a dry hardwood pointed stick in q
mass Of finest tinder until the heat Of
the revolving stick sets the material on
fire.
Tame Bear as Pet
Carey kept one fire blazing and smol-
dering for forty years without once al
lowing it to flicker. He had tame
bear and tame deer when his cavern
was found by the explorers from Bos-
ton in 1899, and the wild creatures and
birds Of the wilderness did not seem to
fear him. He had almost forgotten
human speech, and it was days before
he could converse with them.
Carey was born in Ireland and was
ian outlaw under England's rule in his
native land. 1t was believed he was a
former member of pirate crew.
About the year 1910 a pirate vessel
was sunk off Cape Cod by a warship
and her crew was taken to Boston and
hanged on Corn Hill. One of the pi
rate crew escaped and was never
10
1t was believed in later years that
Carey was the youthful pirate, who was
released from stone cell through pity
of iailer's daughter.
In June, 1899, an exploring party Of
white men. striking westward from
Worcester, landed in the Towtaid coun
try, which Is now Leicester, and located
on what is now Leicester Hill, the
most luxuriant growth of wild straw
berries they ever saw and an abundance
of rattlesnakes which knew no fear of
mankind.
Found Hermit in Cave
The same day that they left Straw
berry Hill they located another hill,
which ever since has been known as
Carey's Hill.
Living in cave which he had dug
out Of the side of steep pitch on the
hill, they found hermit white man,
who gave his name as Arthur Carey.
He said that he had lived there for
nearly twenty years; for so long, in
fact, that he had lost count of the
months and years.
He told of leaving Boston in the
night time and Of travelling through the
almost trackless forests to Long Pond,
which he crossed at a narrow place in
a dugout drawn up on shore belonging
to Indians, and of how he was met in
a dense pine wood by another white
man dressed in furs and armed with
musket and an ak, who took him to
his log cabin and fed him and made
him remain as a guest for several
weeks.
The white man, he said, was named
Ephraim Curtis, and his loghouse was
on the great overland trail.
Careys story Tailed with what the
white explorers already knew about
Curtis, as that hardy pioneer was the
: first white man to settle in Worces-
ter and built his hut on what is now
Lincoln street, in 1878, and land that
he preempted that year is still in pos
session of his descendants, the Curtis
family. Curtis expressed sympathy with
Carey and advised him to locate on a
steep hill about seven miles further
west, and that was how Carey came
into the Towtaid country.
Took Week to Start Fire
He dug his cave into the hillside
with sharpened pine splinters, and
when he got it about thirty feet deep
he fashioned rude supports for the
roof out of fallen trees. He had only
an ak and very few utensils, all that
he carried on his back on the long walk
from Boston.
He made bows and arrows and man
aged to snare rabbits and shoot deer
and wild fowl enough to keep alive, but
his methods were ruder and cruder than
that of the Indians, who at least had
few of the necessaries of life.
Carey told his visitors that without
flint and steel it required more than
week for him to start fire by twirlns
a pointed stick in bunch of driest
tinder and once he got the blaze going
he tended it carefully as his most treas
ured possession.
Traded With Indians
When the white explorers found him
he was still under fifty years of age
and his hair, that streamed in tangled
wisps over his shoulders, and his long,
matted beard were brown.
He had traded to some extent with
the redmen and had an outfit of rude
stone dishes fashioned by the Indians
out of soapstone, great supply of
hunting and fishing arrows, furs and
clothing made of the tanned skins of
wild animals. He had rude table
made of pine wood, split into rough
planks. and a chair and a rough sort of
bed, piled with pine and spruce boughs
and furs.
He had no powder or shot and eager
ly traded some of his most highly
priced furs for an extra musket and
some powder and shot that the ex-
plorers let him have. He cultivated
field of maize and had methods of
smoking meat and fish for his winter
diet.
AS the Towtaid district filled up with
settlers, however, Carey withdrew fur
ther back into the wilderness, but his
love for the old cave overcame any
fears that he might have held and one
day he returned to it, He wore fine
raiment and was plentfully supplied
with golden money, one of the rarest
sights in the new country, where even
worn shlllings were scarce and all
trading was done by barter.
Mystery Never Solved
In June, TIA, after a survey by
John Chandler, of Worcester, 80 house
lots Of 80 to so acres apiece were al
1Ot$