For longer than anyone has recorded history, water has bubbled from out of the ground at a natural spring in what used to be deep woods about an hour’s drive down a two-lane road south of Columbia.
American Indians let four gravely wounded British soldiers in on the secret in 1781, leaving the men to astonish the garrison in Charleston that left them behind to die. Since then, people have flocked to the Healing Springs of Barnwell County for some restorative and perhaps supernatural help.
That’s why Annabelle Galik of Goose Creek drinks the clear, cool water, which according to local property records was deeded to the Almighty God in 1944. Two and a half years ago, Galik, 50, was diagnosed with lung cancer and given about four months to live. She drank the water along with some more traditional cancer treatments. “I’d take a shower in it if I could,” Galik said. “Jesus owns it, and if He’s maintaining it here, it’s got to be good.”
“There’s just something about this place. People for hundreds of years can’t be wrong,” Steve Galik said. “It’s about as close as I think you can get to the Garden of Eden.”
And speaking of special places with healing properties, don’t forget El Santuario de Chimayo, north of Santa Fe, New Mexico, where the dirt might also cure what ails you.
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