Captain Frederick Brome excavated Genista I Cave in the 1860s. Brome’s investigations were so thorough that they prompted scientists of the calibre of Hugh Falconer and George Busk, secretaries of the Royal Society and the Linnean Society respectively, to visit Gibraltar in search of the breccias. Brome had taken up the appointment of Governor of the Military Prison on Windmill Hill, an ancientwave-cut platform at the southern end of Gibraltar where a system of fissure caves, known as the Genista Caves are situated. The largest and most important is Genista I which was discovered by Brome. He used his prisoners to excavate this deep fissure which yielded large quantities of bone some of which are thought to be the oldest found in Gibraltar. The fauna included brown bear, wild cat, lynx, leopard, spotted hyena, horse, narrow-nosed rhinoceros, wild boar, red deer, aurochs and ibex. The exploration of the caves commenced as a result of a decision taken in 1862 to enlarge the boundaries of the military prison and to construct a large water tank. According to George Busk :
Busk was humorously referring to Genista as the Latin name of the broom, a Mediterranean shrub, as a play of words with Brome. Brome obtained the Secretary of State’s approval, at his suggestion, to employ prisoners on the new works and their construction and he kept a close supervision over what was going on. He clearly had great vision and intuition when it came to caves. He described the first time he found the fissure which was to lead to the discovery of Genista I like this: He was a thorough researcher and gained the respect of the scientists of the day with whom he corresponded. Busk, for example, wrote thus: Brome also discovered Genista II which was a smaller cave. Genista III and Genista IV followed and all showed some evidence of habitation but Genista four was very inaccessible and was thought be a place of refuge rather than a place to live as its entrance was forty feet down from the summit on a cliff face of the Rock of Gibraltar. Most of the Genista floors are covered in stalagmites and investigators found human remains, pottery and broken bones. One possibility is that the caves were used as a place to live but after being abandoned they were reused as burial places.
