Uvalde County, TX - Bios:  Andrew Jackson Hale, Part I

BIOS:  Andrew Jackson Hale, Uvalde Co. TX

   Selected and converted.American Memory, Library of Congress.
   
   Washington, 1994.
   
   Preceding element provides place and date of transcription only.
   
   This transcription intended to be 99.95% accurate.
   
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   collection, refer to accompanying matter.
   
   U.S. Work Projects Administration, Federal Writers' Project (Folklore
   Project, Life Histories, 1936-39); Manuscript Division, Library of
   Congress.Copyright status not determined.
   
   00011
   
   [????] 4350 words
   
   EDITORIAL FIELD COPY
   
   by
   
   Mrs. Florence Angermiller, P.W. [???]
   
   Page 1
   
   232
   
   From F.C. by
   
   Mrs. Gussie Hale, P.W.
   
   Pioneer Experiences and Tales of Early Days UVALDE COUNTY, DISTRICT
   #10 PART ONE
   
   ANDREW JACKSON HALE
   
   Uvalde, Texas.
   
   "Uncle Jack" Hale is 82 years old and lives on the Rocksprings Highway
   about about a mile from the depot. He is of sound physical and mental
   condition and remembers his early-day experiences clearly. His
   parents, Andrew M. and Sarah Hale, were natives of Alabama, coming to
   Texas about two years after they were married and just before the
   breaking out of the Civil War. "Uncle Jack" was born in Greenville,
   Hunt County, Texas, May 20, 1856. He was not the oldest child as his
   mother's first baby was born on a boat they boarded for Texas but died
   soon after birth and was buried at sea.
   
   When the Civil War broke out, his father enlisted and drove a team for
   the Southern Army. In "Uncle Jack's" own words:
   
   "He was never in the firing line, only a teamster. I remember him
   coming home several times during the war. I also remember after the
   war that some Yankees came in and settled on a little creek called
   Long Branch, about one-half mile of our house. Father and them were on
   friendly terms.
   
   "Every morning at sunrise and in the evening at sundown, they would
   fire a cannon off. Father would take us children and mother up there
   to see this. There were several men in this company who were wearing a
   ball and chain on their ankles. On our return home one evening, I said
   to my father, 'Father, what were all those men doing with that ball
   00022and chain on their ankles?' He said, 'Well, son, during the war
   there were some men who would never fight; they would run in a battle.
   So when they go to fire this cannon every day, they have to put the
   ball and chain on them to keep them from running away, for when they
   smell gun powder, they'll run in spite of hell.'
   
   "When I was about fifteen years old, my brother and me used to haul
   beef, hides and cotton bales from Hunt County to Jefferson, Texas. He
   used ox wagons with four yoke of steers to each wagon. Ten mile a day
   was a big drive. My older brother and myself made this a business.
   Sometimes when we were making those trips, we would see [DEL: hundres
   :DEL] hundreds of turkey and big bunches of hogs being driven to
   market. There were no trains and that was the only means and the
   easiest way of getting them to market. Jefferson was the nearest
   shipping point and it is located on Lake Caddo.
   
   "When roosting time came, they would sure have to find a place for
   those turkey to roost; that is, a thicket of some kind, or they would
   fly up on anything that they would see to roost on. As for the hogs,
   they would be tired when night came and would lie down and bed up like
   cattle. Of course, they would have a wagon along and feed these hogs
   three times a day.
   
   "When we were freighting to Jefferson, there was a black-jack grove on
   the road to Jefferson. The little town had a saloon, restaurant,
   barber shop, post-office and about two grocery stores. It is now
   called Cumby and is about sixteen miles east of Greenville. My brother
   and I were returning one evening with a load of whiskey for Bill and
   Frank Arnold. As we were nearing this spot, we heard a lot of shouting
   and when we reached the black-jack grove, we could almost walk 00033on
   dead men. There had been six men killed. The Downings, Stricklands and
   Fryers had met here. There was an old feud between these three and
   they had gotten into this shooting scrape and six were killed. I know
   there was one Fryer and one Downing killed, but I don't remember just
   who the rest were. I don't remember exactly what the feud was about,
   either. I believe the shooting came up over a horse race. My brother
   and I stayed there about an hour and when we left, the dead men were
   still lying in the road and we had to pull around them to get our team
   by.
   
   "When I was about 24 or 25 years old, I was deputy sheriff and jailer
   at Greenville. But there was serious trouble came up and I left there
   between suns in order to avoid further and more serious trouble which
   I knew would be sure to come if I stayed. It hurt my feelings to go
   but all my friends insisted that it was the best thing to do until
   things were more peaceable. So to please them and my mother and
   father, I left.
   
   "I remember the Negro slaves quite well. My Uncle Jack Hale, the man I
   was named for, had slaves. I remember them when they would go to work
   every morning. They had a boss and when they didn't work or did
   something they shouldn't do, my uncle would sometimes whip them, but
   never unmercifully.
   
   "One time when I was quite a boy, twelve or fourteen years old, I saw
   a Negro whipped. There was a widow woman living near us and there was
   lake of water between our place and her house. She would always come
   down to this lake to wash her clothes. One day after she had finished
   a day's washing and had gone to the house, Judge McGowan's Negro came
   down through there hauling wood and one of them stole her clothing off
   the line. Mrs. [Weaver?] saw him from the 00044house and recognized
   the Negro and reported it to the judge. He investigated and found the
   Negro with the clothes. He asked father and some more men to come up
   to his house a certain day, he wanted then for a witness or something
   like that, but he was going to whip that Negro. When the time came,
   they rolled a big, whiskey barrel out and had two Negros to strip him
   down to his waist and put him across that barrel. One Negro was made
   to stand on his head and one on his feet. Then he made another Negro
   slave whip him with a big, leather strap. They whipped him till the
   blood was running d down his back and when they got through whipping
   him, they rubbed salt into the raw, bloody cuts. Oh, it was something
   terrible. I was just a boy but this made a terrible impression on me.
   My uncle's slaves loved him and did'nt leave him when they were freed,
   but stayed with him till they died. They went by his name.
   
   "In '82, I went up the trail with a man named Tom King. He was a big,
   cattle man and a banker. We had one-thousand head of cattle and were
   moving them from Greenville to Jones and Shackelford County in East
   Texas. Mr. King had bought a big ranch there and this herd was cows
   and calves. He was taking them to grass. I drove the chuck wagon and
   cooked for the outfit but rode too when it was necessary. There were
   about fourteen men in all.
   
   "I remember one day I was shoeing a mule while we were resting the
   cattle at noon. Part of the men were standing guard and the rest were
   eating dinner. Charley Moore rode up while I was holding the mule's
   foot between my knees. The mule, being a fool, wouldn't stand. Moore
   came up behind him and gave him a kick to make him stand up. The mule
   reared and jumped, jerking me down. The nails in the shoe were
   sticking out and very sharp. They cut a gash in my leg about
   00055seven or eight inches long and real deep. I carry the brand there
   yet. ell, when I got up, I was mad as the devil. I knew that Moore had
   done this on purpose for he and I had been on terms that were none too
   good for several days. I came up with a rasp in my hand that I had
   been using to shoe the mule and I threw it at Moore's head with all
   the force I had. I hit him on the nose and cut the end of his nose off
   and it dropped down on his mouth. The boss was standing there looking
   on. My leg was bleeding badly and King says, 'Well, we've got to sew
   that leg up for Jack is going to bleed to death.' All the kind of
   thread they had was a spool of ordinary, sewing thread and that's just
   what he used. He took about twelve or sixteen stitches in my leg and
   put a wet pack on it to get the blood stopped. Then he turned to Moore
   and sewed his nose back on but it was always crooked afterward. It was
   the boss' time to talk then. He said, 'Moore, you knew that mule was a
   fool. Why did you do that?' Then he turned to us both and says, 'Now
   you fellows renew this and I'll set you both afoot out here in this
   lonely country.' It was fifty miles or more between ranches.
   
   "Well, we started on and everything went all right till we got to
   Brownwood. He had a lot of cows that were given out -- road-foundered
   -- and and would fight a man on a horse or afoot either. They had the
   road brand on them and King's brand, also. When they got too bad, we
   would just leave them beside the trail and the next man who came along
   with a herd would pick them up and find out who they belonged to and
   turn them over to King. One day, we had just eaten dinner and was
   within a short distance of Brownwood. I was behind, driving the chuck
   wagon. One of the cows on ahead was mad and fighting. We met a young
   man and a little girl in the road. They were coming from school, I
   suppose.
   
   00066
   
   The man was well dressed. The little girl saw this cow and thought it
   was a gentle milk cow and ran ahead to scare her. The cow knocked the
   child down and had her between her horns on the ground. The young man
   ran and caught the cow by the horns and the little girl jumped up and
   climbed up on a fence close by. The cow was so weak the man could
   manage her very well, although she was churning him around
   considerably. I knew when they came in sight what would happen, but I
   was too far away to prevent it. When I finally got to where they were,
   the man says, 'Mister, come and help me. I'm in a hell of a shape!' I
   says, 'Turn her loose and run and jump on the fence like the little
   girl did.' He said, 'No, the cow will catch me and kill me. I wont
   risk that.' I said, 'Hell, stand there and hold her all day. I'll
   drive around.' Then I got out of the wagon and went and examined the
   little girl. She wasn't hurt but scared to death. I finally got her
   quiet and over some of her scare and turned to the man with language
   that won't do to repeat and I says, 'Now, I am going to let you out of
   this. I'll take this cow and hold her till you get a start and then I
   am going to turn her loose.' So I caught the cow by the horns and gave
   him a kick in the seat of the pants. He made about two jumps and hit
   the fence and landed on the other side. I says, 'Now, I'll show you
   how to handle a cow.' I caught the old cow by the horn and the jaw and
   with a little twist, threw her down. He was very angry and said,
   'Mister, I'll kill that cow before morning.' Sure enough he did. she
   was missing next morning and the boss sent one of the boys back to
   look for her and he found her with two bullet holes in her head. The
   boss said he didn't blame him, he would have done the same thing.
   Well, I had my own fun out of him.
   
   00077
   
   "For four or five days after that, nothing of interest happened. By
   the time, we were miles from any ranch or house of any kind. One
   evening we struck camp on a hill. The cattle had all bedded down.
   About midnight, it came up a cloud and begin to lighten and thunder.
   The boss said, "Get up, boys. All of you get your horses and get
   around those cattle.' He had a Negro boy along about sixteen years
   old, that had been given to the boss when he was small. King had
   raised the boy in the saddle. Well, we were all out riding around the
   herd to try to avoid a stampede and the Negro boy went to sleep. The
   same Charley Moore that I had the round with a few days before, rode
   up to the boy and hit him across the back with his quirt. The Negro
   had on an old-fashioned slicker and it popped like the crack of a
   rifle. Well, that was all that was needed. Those cattle was gone with
   the wind. We were riding as close to the leaders as we could, trying
   to hold them together. Now, just over the hill, there was an old road
   and in this old road, a ditch had been washed out by the rain. It was
   about seven or eight feet deep ad twelve or fourteen feet wide. The
   cattle was running full speed and going straight for that ditch. When
   the leader discovered the ditch, they stopped suddenly. But the others
   coming on behind, pushed them on in and they piled in that ditch till
   it was full and heaped up like a railroad dump. The others coming on
   would climb over them and scatter in every direction. It was raining
   blue snakes and as dark as it could be. We couldn't tell exactly what
   was taking place but we were riding as close to the herd as possible
   and afterward, we were black and blue from being hit by the horns of
   the running cattle. It was just an accident that some of the men were
   not in the lead of the cattle and had gone into the ditch first. There
   00088were about one-hundred and forty head killed right there. Some
   were crippled and some we never got back at all. We stayed there a
   week getting all we could find. We would attend all the round-ups in
   the country and that way, we got back several head. We managed to save
   a few of the cripples and the boss got some of the ranchers to look
   after them for him.
   
   "After it was all over, the boss said to Moore, 'If you do another
   thing like that, you will go back where you come from quick.' But we
   didn't have any more trouble till we reached the ranch. King couldn't
   get possession of the ranch house so a cousin of mine, [Wiley?] Hale,
   and a man named Newt Brisco and myself, lived in a dugout all the
   winter and looked after the herd till the next spring. Then King came
   and brought another herd and a fresh crew of men. King made [Wiley?]
   Hale foreman of this ranch and he remained foremen there for
   thirty-two years.
   
   "I went back to Greensville with King and about fourteen other men.
   When we reached [DEL: Stephen :DEL] Stephens County, King says, 'Now,
   Jack, you go to the store and buy the grub and me and the rest of the
   boys will go on down the creek and make camp. So I went on to the
   store. Two men owned the store by the name of Duke and Steward. It was
   a new store and had a porch without any top on it. An empty barrel was
   sitting on the porch with the top out and they had dropped some
   scantlings in it. They were one-by-threes and about two and a half
   feet long. There were several houses close, among them a barber shop.
   We were all talking and having a good time. I had gotten the groceries
   and was getting cartridges for my pistol. About this time, the Negro
   boy who had been getting some straps for his spurs, walked into the
   store and I said, 'Cumby, put those groceries in the wagon. The boy
   picked up 00099a sack of flour and threw it over his shoulder and hit
   a big ceiling-lamp, breaking the lamp casting and spilling oil all
   over the floor. Well, Duke came over and began to curse the Negro. I
   says, "Now, don't do that. I'll make him clean it up.' Duke says, 'You
   take up for a damn Negro, don't you?' I said, 'Yes, he is a good boy
   and I am traveling with him.' So I told Cumby to clean it all up. He
   started in to cleaning it all up and I picked up the groceries and
   took them to the wagon myself. About that time the barber come running
   out of his shop and says, "Hey, Mister, you better go back in there.
   They're beating that Negro up.' I jumped out of the wagon and as I ran
   in, I grabbed one of those one-by-three pieces of timber out of the
   barrel. When I got inside, they had the Negro boy in one corner
   holding him by the throat and beating him with a bluing bottle. He was
   bloody all over. I grabbed Duke by the collar and jerked him back and
   told him to stop that. He says, 'You're no better than a damn Negro,'
   and he called me a name no Texan will stand for and threw the bottle
   at me. When he said that, I struck him edgeways with that plank across
   the head and cut the scalp loose across his head and it dropped down
   over his ear. He dropped to the floor and I thought I knocked his
   brains out. He went under the counter and I didn't see him any more.
   Steward was looking on. I turned to him and said, 'what have you got
   to do with this, sir?' He said, 'This!' and threw a fifty-pound scale
   weight at me. It just brushed my ear. Then he turned and ran. I threw
   the scantling at him as he ran and broke his nose with it.
   
   'I went on outside and told the Negro to get on [?] and go tell King
   to come up there. As luck would have it, there wasn't a sheriff or
   deputy in town. King came and said, 'Ive raised this 001010Negro boy
   from a small child and I know he is a good boy. I will back Hale up in
   any thing he has done.' Meantime I was in my wagon and they were
   throwing rocks at me from every side. I took out my pistol and fired
   it in the air several times and they left the scene pronto. In a short
   time all the cowboys were there with their six-shooters. The boss
   turned to me and said in a low tone of voice, 'Jack you take my horse,
   (which was a big bay name John) take the Negro boy and go across the
   mountains and don't stop till you get to Greenville. If they overtake
   you, fight them to a finish.' But they knew which way we went. The
   boss paid for the lamp. In a short time the sheriff come in and they
   watched the camp for two nights. The boss then had a private talk with
   the sheriff and told him that Duke and Stewart had started that
   trouble with Hale and he was in the right, and the best thing he could
   do was to drop it. For if you ever take these boys there will be a hot
   battle, and there is more than one of them too. There were two ox
   rangers in our outfit and the sheriff decided not to go after us.
   
   "We made it fine across the country getting buffallo meat from
   buffallo hunters and killing deer and fish, ocasionly stealing a goat.
   Every once in a while we would stop at a little country store and get
   bread. [Well?], we reached Greenville O.K. Marion Hale, my oldest
   brother was sheriff of Hunt County at that time. In the meantime, King
   had sent my brother a telegram saying. "Jack's had trouble. Watch for
   telegram from [DEL: ste :DEL] Stephens County sheriff, for Jack's
   arrest. Take care of it. I will be home at an early date.' Sure
   enough, my brother had gotten the telegram from the [DEL: ste :DEL]
   Stephens County Sheriff. [?] Marion wired him back. 'Will be on the
   look-out for him,' and signed, 'Hunt County Sheriff , [DEL: ot :DEL]
   Not giving his name. Well, the boss and I got at the courthouse at the
   very same minute and relate the news to my brother behind closed
   doors.
   
   "In '83 I went to Williamson County and farmed there for about five
   001111years on the Dykes farm. One Xmas in Granger, Texas, I remember
   Jim Curtis killed Little Buck [Walton?]. The shooting was accidental
   and Curtis was acquitted. He and several other boys were in Georgetown
   attending the trial as we were witnesses in the case. Well, we camped
   in the wagon yard and of course were drinking some. The case was not
   called for several days. Naturally, we got restless. Bill Dykes, Bob
   Wilson and my self, get old Dan , my buggy horse, and put him to my
   buggy to take in the town. There was a Jew who had a cheap-John fruit
   stand out in the middle of the street. We came around the corner of
   the court house full speed. Now, Dan was a high stepper and Dykes
   said, 'Jack pull him into that damn Jew's fruit stand.' I said,
   'Good!' And that is just what we did. Two buggy wheels just took out
   one side of the stand. Oranges, pocket knives and money purses went in
   every direction. As for the Jew he got a good tumble too. Well, that
   raised a yell, and here came the town marshall. He took in after us to
   arrest us and around and around the court house we went. If the
   marshall crowded us too fast for Dan to trot, he laped. Every now and
   then Dykes would yell, 'Clear the track for Dykes and Jack! Lay on the
   buggy whip, Jack!' and I would do it every time he would tell me to.
   Finally, they [DEL: corralled :DEL] corraled us and caught us. Dykes
   and me put up the fight and Wilson run. Well, there was a plank fence
   all around the court house yard, and steps leading up over the fence
   into the court house yard. They had to take us over these steps to get
   us into the court house yard, for that's where the jail was also. That
   is where the fun started. As they would try to force us over these
   steps, we would brace our feet on the bottom step, we would give them
   a hard jerk and land them way back outside the court house fence. They
   soon got tired of that and used their six-shooter for clubs. One of
   the officers cut me across the head with his gun and I have that scar
   yet too. We were all skinned and bruised badly. We saw they had us
   bested when they 001212begin [DEL: us :DEL] using their guns, as we
   didn't have any. So we marched on to jail and stayed there till
   midnight, when we got bond and got out, went to the doctor. We got our
   wounds dressed and paid a fine of fifty-five-dollars for our fun.
   
   "In the spring of '87, I went up the trail with Crusoe Beard. He took
   2,000 head of cattle to the [?]. I. T. ranch on the plains. There was
   no town there, just a wide , open country. We passed through Fort
   Worth and hit the old Chisolm Trail and traveled it for about fifty
   miles. We made the trip fine with the exception of a few stampedes.
   They were all young cattle and they drove fine. We had four head of
   horses each. Some were gentle and some were wild. Anyway, we had to
   ride them if they pitched or not. As well as I remember, we had
   twelve/ men in the outfit.
   
   "After we got up on the plains, we came into some tall weeds called
   milkweeds. There were worlds of antelope everywhere. One night, one of
   the boys struck a match while they were on guard and stampeded the
   herd. I was riding a big, black horse called Nigger. He was a spoiled
   horse and would pitch nearly every time I would get on him. Well, the
   cattle scattered everywhere. However, we held the main herd together.
   Next day we heard of a round-up a few miles from there so me and one
   of the other boys rode over there to see if any of our cattle, that
   had gotten away, were there. This was just a round-up on the range, no
   fences, no ranches of any kind. When we got there, I says to the other
   boy, 'You cut the cattle out of the main herd,' as he was riding a
   good cutting-horse and my horse was a bronc. He brought out several
   head for me to hold and had gone back to look for more. I was riding
   around these to hold them and rode through a thick bunch of these milk
   weeds. Up jumped four baby antelope about a week old. They run right
   under my horse. He quit the earth. He was a big horse and he had never
   pitched like that before. The antelope were young 001313and didn't
   have sense enough to get out of the way. They stayed right under the
   horse and he continued to pitch. He killed two of them and broke the
   shoulder of another. The fourth one wasn't hurt. He kept on pitching
   till he was ready to quit. When he did decide to quite, I needed a
   breathing spell.
   
   "I saw that one of the little antelope wasn't hurt. But I didn't get
   off of this horse as I knew I never would get back on him. I waited
   till the other boy came back. I said. 'John, I want that baby antelope
   to take back to camp.' He said, 'All right, I'll rope 'im.' But he
   caught him with his hands. Well, we carried it back. It got as gentle
   as a goat. We would milk a cow and feed it milk. It stayed around camp
   till we were ready to leave. When we started back home the boss said,
   'Jack, give me that antelope. You don't need it. I want it for my
   family.' I said, 'All right, Crusoe, I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll
   give it to you if you will set the drinks up to the outfit when we get
   back to Snyder and call the antelope Jack.' He said he would and did.
   Beard kept it till it was grown and still had it the last time I heard
   of him five years later."
   
   Part Two Follows. 00141[???] - life sketches

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