DANVILLE (ALA.) METEORITE. 



(Fell November 27, 1868.) 



Although the meteorite of Danville, Ala., fell in November, 

 1868, and an analysis has been made of it during the past 

 summer, it is only recently that I obtained a complete account 

 of the phenomena attending its fall. 



On Friday evening, November 27, 1868, about five o'clock, 

 Mr. T. F. Freeman, of Danville (about lat. 34° 30' and long. 87° 

 W. Greenwich), on stepping* from his house, was startled by 

 a loud report, so much like artillery that for the moment its 

 origin was attributed to the firing of a . small piece of artillery 

 kept in the village ; but on inquiry it was ascertained that no 

 firing had taken place there, but that the sound was heard at 

 the village, and attributed to very heavy artillery at Decatur, 

 Trinity, Hillsboro, or some other point to the northward of 

 Danville. During the war artillery had been often heard in 

 the valley of the Tennessee, and various speculations were 

 indulged in as to what was meant by this cannonade at such 

 a time of day and in such a direction. 



The following day Mr. Wm. Brown, living three miles west 

 of Danville, brought to the village a piece of rock, which he 

 said fell near him and some laborers who were picking cotton. 

 He dug it up at a depth of about one and a half to two feet. 

 It weighed about four and a half pounds, and had the char- 

 acteristic aspects of a meteoric stone. But it was broken by 

 the party obtaining it, and all but half a pound, now in my 

 possession, has been scattered, and probably lost or thrown 

 away. 



Several other stones fell in the same vicinity. Some negroes 

 working in a cotton-field on the plantation of Capt. McDaniel, 

 half a mile from Danville, heard a body fall with a whizzing, 

 humming sound, and strike the ground near them with tre- 

 mendous force ; but they were alarmed, and did not approach 



