ANOTHER THOUSAND FEET of tunnels, T-junctions and a further access point have been discovered under the Historic Garrison Savannah.
The revelation comes from one of the men leading the exploration, Peter Stevens, who said that a part of the underground system could go on show in a few months.
Stevens noted that while the Barbados Historic Garrison Consortium Inc. was eager to invite the general public into the underground features, which have been declared safe by an engineering team, certain measures still had to be taken.
Steps have to be sunk to allow easy access and exit and officials from a range of Government departments have to approve the tunnels.
But, Stevens said, the benefits would make the wait worthwhile.
“Opening them up and showing people these things is an educational act and that actually does a lot to secure our [World Heritage] status, because our status is not for life. It is only for as long as we deserve it,” he said.
The tunnels, rediscovered during the restoration of George Washington House, were originally built in the 1820s to drain the once marshy Garrison Savannah and to move storm water.
The tunnels were cut through the limestone rock of the island and the roofs are arched, boasting quarried bricks in their work. They were possibly built by the then British War Department in conjunction with the army medical department.
One tunnel runs to Pebbles Beach, another possibly leads to the beach near to Coconut Court Hotel, a third exit was at Pavilion Court and there are others leading to Needhams Point.
Stevens, in an exclusive interview with the SUNDAY SUN, said since news of the rediscovery of the tunnels broke last December, the team of explorers had walked and sometimes crawled through 1 000 more feet taking the total to 2 000 feet of explored passageways.
But, said the vice-president of the consortium, there was much more.
There was talk, he added, of a bicycle-spoke system of radiating tunnels on the southern side of the Savannah; more access points, some in the Barbados Defence Force’s St Ann’s Fort; others thought to be as far as Dalkeith Hill or in the gully behind George Washington House, and even of caves that linked to the tunnels.
“We did a further exploration across the Savannah and we went to where we left off,” he said.
They continued the exploration of the tunnel which ran from Bay Street, under George Washington House and under the Garrison Savannah. Stevens said the explorers came to another access point and, on investigation, that branch took them towards Blocks A and B at the Garrison.
“So we were under the Savannah, across from the Grandstand, and we’re going in the direction of Bush Hill on that line,” he said.
“And we came to a T-junction. By this time we were crawling on our hands and knees because that area of the tunnel has been silted up by about three or four feet.
“We took this T-junction. It went about 150 feet and it stopped at a grate and we couldn’t get past and it looked like a water inlet that had been filled up. We went back and we continued towards A and B blocks and we finally came to a collapsed section, which would be roughly under the race track in front of A and B blocks,” he said.
“This particular tunnel is about three-and-a-half, 4 000 feet long,” he revealed.
However, he conceded that tunnel might just be a small part of a very large underground network.
He said they had been told that a part of the network, to the southern side, was laid out like a bicycle wheel – a central hub with about five tunnels radiating out.
“And we’re looking for that. We’re hoping that this particular tunnel would connect us with that network, but it hasn’t,” he said, adding that to explore more passageways and access ways would require permission from property owners in the area.
“The other thing we found out is that there are caves in a certain area very near the Savannah, but these were blocked up and people who have been in the caves said there is a blocked up doorway that was used as an escape route to the tunnels,” he reported.
He added that there were stories of children being lost in the caves and that, he surmised, was one of the reasons they were blocked.
