Cave Projects Group Newsletter - Can anyone help?

Subpopulus Hibernia

Active member
I?m in the hunt for a mysterious newsletter that may have been produced by the Cave Projects Group some time in the mid-1970s, that might contain information on some caves in Ireland.

The back-story is that the Shannon Group have been exploring a remote karst area in county Leitrim that hasn't been visited since the mid-1970s, and are currently trying to find out what work has been previously been done on the area. We know that the Cave Projects Group were active in the area in 1974/75, and they produced a number of large-scale maps of the area marking a multitude of potholes. Group members also briefly describe explorations in their own club journals, like the Royal Forest of Dean Caving Club Newsletter. Unfortunately we have little idea as to what they actually explored. The fifth CPG newsletter mentions that a lot of work was happening in Leitrim, and that the findings would be published 'in either a Birmingham University SS Journal or a further CPG newsletter'. 

The BCRA library has Newsletters 1-5, which were produced between 1970 and 1974. The BCRA library also catalogues a ?new series?, though there?s nothing in their collection beyond the first five newsletters. The BCRA librarian isn?t really sure what this ?new series? refers to - and the person who produced the catalogue can?t be tracked down right now. The information isn?t in a BUSS journal either since there?s none later than an expedition report produced in 1974.

So does anyone know anything about a possible sixth Newsletter by the Cave Projects Group - one that might have been produced some time around 1975 and contains information on caves in county Leitrim in Ireland?


Here's the BCRA Library entry for the CPG Newsletter:
http://caving-library.org.uk/catalogue/BCL/code/php/library.php?action=search&lib=&type=any&search=title&search_string=Newsletter&title=Newsletter&orig=Cave%20Projects%20Group%20(CPG)
 

rhychydwr1

Active member
1975 that is going back a bit.  Most cavers were not born then.  Try contacting Gloucester SS or Forest of Dean CC.
 

Subpopulus Hibernia

Active member
rhychydwr1 said:
1975 that is going back a bit.  Most cavers were not born then.  Try contacting Gloucester SS or Forest of Dean CC.

Thanks, never though of doing that. Is John Elliott still knocking about?

bograt said:
I was around in the '70's, was the CPG referred to part of the BSA?

Sorry, haven't a clue.
 

graham

New member
bograt said:
I was around in the '70's, was the CPG referred to part of the BSA?

No, it wasn't. Not as such. It was a relatively informal grouping of, mainly, ex-Birmingham Uni cavers who got together under that heading to do stuff that required more expertise/manpower than was available in one of their clubs.

I'm nowhere near our library to check the collection at the moment, but I do have a nagging memory that there were only 5 N/L that they produced. Try asking Matthew Parkes if there are any in the SUI Library.

But yes, John Elliott was certainly involved.
 

Subpopulus Hibernia

Active member
psychocrawler said:
Cave Project Group NL 5
pp 30 - 33 Other Sites Outside Fermanagh
B. Leitrim
Polticoghlan and Teampoll Shetric

We have access to CPG Newsletter 5, it's just that at the end of it there's a postscript mentioning that there'd been a lot of work done at Gorteenaguinnell over the summer of '74 and that it would be published in a future edition. We're currently spot-holing and surveying in Gorteenaguinnell and we'd like to know what the overlap is with the CPGs work.

The Royal Forest of Dean informally described some of this work in their May 1975 newsletter, but we'd like to know if there's formal descriptions to go with the large-scale maps of the moor that they made. There's a lot of potholes marked on these maps, but no descriptions to got with them. The fact that someone went to the trouble of making large-scale maps suggests that their work was at least written up, even if it wasn't published.

Ordinarily I wouldn't have bothered inquiring about this, it's just the mysterious 'new series' on the BCRA library website piqued my curiosity and made me wonder if a sixth or even seventh newsletter made it out.
 

Jenny P

Active member
Subpopulus Hibernia said:

I suspect that the entry for a possible next issue of the CPG Newsletter is in the Library catalogue simply because it was mentioned in CPG N/L 5.  There is certainly no further issue after no. 5 in the British Caving Library.  As you say you have already checked the BUSS publications and there is nothing there, the next thing might be to check with Deej Lowe.

 

Pitlamp

Well-known member
I don't think Deej is registered to this forum but I'll send him an email and ask him to look at this. If necessary I'll relay any reply.
 

Pitlamp

Well-known member
Have been in touch with Deej and he offers the information below. He also adds that, if you do need any further info which he may be able to supply, you could contact him directly via the editorial address at BCRA's Cave & Karst Science.

I hope that's some help.




The short answer is that "CPG 6" never appeared. For those with any interest, the slightly longer answer is below.

The Cave Projects Group (CPG) was the love-child of, among others, the late Roger Solari. It was not a "club" but a bunch of disenchanted club cavers who simply wanted to find, explore and survey caves without the surrounding quagmire of politics and ego-trip personalities. That being said, there were personalities a-plenty. CPG appeared in about 1968 or 1969, with loosely affiliated members derived from Birmingham University Speleological Society, the Royal Forest of Dean Caving Club, the Gloucester Speleological Society, and (especially in its later years) beyond. Membership (if it could be called that) was loose and "by invitation only" - you might be invited to join a trip or a Project; equally you might invite yourself along... CPG became a useful banner under which to publish the results of scattered and diverse caving activities by teams from a spectrum of backgrounds.

The CPG's work in Ireland (particularly in Fermanagh, but wider than that) was supported by cavers from all the clubs listed above, and others besides. Various names have been mentioned in earlier responses, but just off the top of my head I think the following also had significant involvement (no particular order): Dave Underhill, Martyn Farr, Rod Beaumont, Andy Hall, Pikey Wolfenden, Colin Anderson, Maurice Febry, Di Court, John Elliott and (probably) many more...

Roger Solari was instrumental in producing CPG Newsletters 1 to 4 and in assembling much of the material that made up the much more substantial CPG 5, with me as its Editor. After Rog's tragic death in 1974 the essentially "nebulous", perhaps even "nihilistic" nature of the CPG became apparent, and pulling together the final material for CPG 5 was (politely) "a bit of a struggle". In the current context it was even more difficult because I had no direct knowledge of the "Irish" work - Dave Underhill and Pikey Wolfenden in particular supplied valuable missing details, but I suspect that the full story was never told. I also know that folks out there (mentioned above or unknown to me) have information that didn't make it into CPG 5, which was just one of the reasons that (eventual) production of the mysterious "CPG 6" was speculated amid the elation and optimism felt when actually completing CPG 5!

For several years I continued to "solicit" material from various CPG affiliates, including the next generation (largely deriving from Sheffield University Speleological Society) but, apart from projects that I was involved in directly, there was little promised from the original project participants and hardly anything to show from the pre-CPG-5 projects. Then, in the late 1970s, the still-active remnants of the old-style CPG were blown apart by "personal issues" and the feeble torch that was still being carried for CPG 6 was finally extinguished. Whereas (eventually) the cracks were plastered over and attempts were made to pick-up various projects based in the Forest of Dean and in the Dales, the "Irish" projects were not (to my knowledge) rekindled. If any additional work was done in Ireland to follow up the leads still extant at the time of Rog's death, the results were not channelled back to me. Various bits and pieces of exploration were described in BUSS and SUSS journals, possibly also in those of the RFDCC and GSS, as well as in Descent and various BCRA publications, but it's commonly not clear which initial work was kick-started under the CPG banner.

Of the cavers mentioned, at least some remain active, notably Andy Hall (now with the Red Rose) and a few of the more resilient RFDCC and GSS members, but whether they recall anything of the expeditions that led to the CPG 5 comments prompting the "CPG 6 enquiry" only they can answer... Theoretically the CPG still exists, if indeed it ever existed at all!

Deej
 

Subpopulus Hibernia

Active member
Brilliant stuff. Thanks for writing that Deej, and thanks as well to Pitlamp. It's a great little mini-history of the CPG.

There's a few more avenues of inquiry I might follow, but based on what you've told me the records of what was explored in '75 are probably now scattered and lost. It may be possible to track down some information but it's probably not in the ordered form we were hoping to find. We'll just have to get on with exploring then...
 
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