Little Alex · Moore Family Stories

William Alexander Gill
December 22, 1891 was a beautiful sunny day. Grandad was on a livestock buying
trip to Arkansas. Granmama thought he would be home before long.
Joseph Mote was22, Sudie 15, Jennie 11, Oaksie 6 and William Alexander was 5.

Alex was always having a time with his ears. Granmama kept a little cloth sack
of salt on the warm hearth. Laying that on his ears, usually helped the ache. She
would put drops of warm sweet-oil [olive oil] in his ears. Sometime blowing tobacco
smoke in his ears, helped. There was no medicine. They hurt him real often.
Mote was plowing in the little garden by the house, to be ready for spring planting.
Alex's ears hurt, Jenny took him to the creek to play. They tried everything, nothing
worked

His fever come up--they bathed him--and up---to high--- He went into a spasm.

Granmama called Mote, "Get the Doctor!! Quick!!"
Mote unhitched the horse from the plow and rode unto town-- whipping him all the way.
The Doctor wouldn't come---"There's not a thing in this world that I know to do."

Mote rushed back home--- and Alex was dead.
He went back to town, to send a telegram to Grandad in Arkansas.
He had already left there. A telegram to the next place, couldn't catch him either.
We have a letter from the Doctor, telling Granmama that Alex had to be buried.
They just couldn't wait longer than ten days. Granmama buried her fourth son.

Grandad come in from Arkansas before long. He went by Judge J. A. Lynch's store.

Judge J A Lynch
[[One of his sons, Joe W. married Mama's sister, Theresa.
They come with their belongings in ox carts. They had 50 head of cattle, no horses
or mules. They were headed west---where the big bridge across the Brazos is now.
One of their oxen fell dead, as the cart was being pulled up the bank of the Brazos River.
Him and the boys skinned the ox to make shoes for their kids.

They went back east, 2 miles, and camped. They bought a little land and settled there.
It was pretty country, in a little ridge of low mountains,
They got tired of hauling water and decided to dig a well. They couldn't find water.
A man come along with a well driller and they paid him to drill a deeper one.
The water, it tasted peculiar, they didn't know about using it.
They drilled another well and it tasted fine. Other travelers used the first well.
One traveling family, had a whole bunch of kids, and their Mama had mental problems.
They camped and she drank the water a while---and got better.
That became 'The Crazy Woman Well'. Other wells were drilled.
Word spread---more people wanted to drink, 'the water that the crazy woman drank'.
Lynch's bought a little more land and put in a store.
And it grew into Mineral Wells, Texas, with 'Crazy Water']]

Judge Lynch knew that Grandad hadn't heard about Alex.
He told him, "Wait a minute, I'm fixing to go home and we'll ride along together."
On the way, he told him about Alex.

When he got home, they all screamed and bawled and just fell in the floor.
One by one they would get up and go outside.
They made it up---- "Let's don’t talk about it anymore."--- And they didn't.

It happened six years before I was born. I never heard about it until I was 17.
One lonesome evening, Granmama told me and Fred.
I believe it was the first time that she ever told it.
'Little Alex'. We have a good picture of him, he looks to be about five years old.

Oaksie named her second son, Alex
LM, Alex's older brother, named one of his sons, Alex.