WPA Mrs. Anna Brazel

Wrier: Edith L. Crawford

Carrizozo, N. Mex.

PIONEER STORY.

By-Mrs. Anna Brazel.

I was twelve years old when we left Murfreeboro, Tennessee, and seventeen when we arrived in New Mexico.

We spent five years in the state of Texas, on our way to New Mexico, on account of my mothers health and the awful stories we heard about the Indians and the terrible deeds they were committing out in this part of the country.

I have lived in the state of New Mexico, forty seven years and most of the time in Lincoln County.

I was married to William W. Brazel, July 19, 1894, five children were born to this union, three girls and two boys four of them are living in Lincoln County and the oldest boy in Tularosa, Otero County, New Mexico.

Little Creek, New Mexico was never a town just a settlement of farmers and stock men, our post office was Bonito City, New Mexico, eight miles west of Little Creek, we rode horse back to the post office about once a week for our mail.

In later years there was a big saw mill located on the head of Little Creek, New Mexico.

Little Creek, New Mexico is located twenty four miles southeast of Carrizozo, New Mexico, and eleven miles east of Ruidoso, New Mexico

My fathers farm on Little Creek, New Mexico, joined Pat Garrett's ranche home on the North, this is the old home place of Pat Garrett, where Miss Lizzie Garrett was born.

The X I T Ranche was in Texas between Plainview, Texas and the extreme west line of New Mexico, on the staked plains. The Long S Ranche was in Texas southwest of Canon City, Texas.

The night my father reached the Long S Ranche, in Texas come of the cowboys had found a white man wandering around in a circle they first thought he was crazy, but on riding up to him found he was about dead for water his tongue was swollen out of his mouth, the cowboys were giving him a couple of table spoons full of water at a time until he got so he could talk, he told the cowboys that "he was trying to make it to the Long S Ranche and had become lost on the plains, had run out of water for himself and horse the horse had died from thirst, and he started to walk he knew not where looking for water".

Father said "he would of have died in a few hours from thirst if they hadn't found him when they did".

This happened when father was on his horseback trip to Roswell, New Mexico.

One night while we were crossing the plains somewhere between Plainview, Texas, and Roswell, New Mexico, (I do not remember just where it was), we heard an awful commotion. At first it scared us for we were afraid it was Indians, but Father soon detected it was a herd of cattle stampeding. We could not go back to sleep and just as it was breaking day Father got up and built a fire. In a short time two cowboys rode up and wanted to know if they could get a cup of coffee, said they were worn out from riding after the stampeding cattle the night before. Father made some coffee and cooked some meat and bread for them. They ate their breakfast and were soon on their way looking for their stampeding herd. The trail we traveled from Plainview, Texas to Roswell, New Mexico was the "Butterfield Trail". It crossed the Mal Pais at [Oscure?], New Mexico, now called the Mocking Bird Gap crossing, and went on over to Fort Selden, New Mexico.

Father and Mother sold their farm on Little Creek, New Mexico in 1894. They went back to Bowie, Texas and bought them a small farm. Mother only lived two years after they went to Bowie, dying in December, 1896. Father continued to live there for fifteen years. He sold his farm at Bowie and moved to Corpus Christie, Texas and went in for raising onions on a big scale. He did well with his onion farm. He died in Corpus Christie in October 1925 and was buried at Alpine, Texas.

NARRATOR: Mrs. Anna Brazel, Carrizozo, New Mexico., Aged 64 years.

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