DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker at Sour Lake tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Now, Sour Lake — the name says something right there, doesn't it? Before it was anything else, it was a health resort, one of those early-day spots where Texans came to soak their troubles away in mineral baths.
And not just any Texans, mind you. General Sam Houston himself made his way to those waters. If that doesn't give a place some standing, I don't know what does.
But the truth is, those healing waters had been drawing visitors long before Houston ever showed up — the Indians had been using them for years. The place had a reputation that ran deep, in more ways than one. Now here's where the story takes a turn you might not see coming.
One of those springs at Sour Lake carried water with a high sulphuric acid content. And during the Civil War, that particular spring got put to work — its water primed telegraph batteries. That's right.
A Texas mineral spring, the kind folks came to for their health, ended up in service to Confederate communications. And that mattered, because at best, telegraph service in those years was limited. Limited is almost an understatement.
The Civil War system, running from 1861 to 1865, stretched only from Shreveport to Marshall to Houston, and then from Houston down to Galveston and over to Orange. That was it. Every word on that wire was precious, and keeping those batteries primed was vital.
The system had been started back in 1854, so it wasn't exactly new, but it was fragile, it was sparse, and it was carrying the weight of a war. Here's the number that stops me cold every time. In February of 1865, a twenty-word telegram sent from Shreveport to Houston cost thirty-six dollars.
Twenty words. Thirty-six dollars. You think about what a man chose to say — or what he left out — for that price, and Sour Lake's little spring suddenly feels like the hinge of something much larger than a bath house.
The waters healed. And for a while, they also carried the words of a nation at war.
What the marker says
Early-day health resort, with baths that attracted such Texans as Gen. Sam Houston. The healing waters had been used for years by the Indians. One spring's water, with high sulphuric acid content, primed telegraph batteries during the Civil War. This was of vital importance, for at best telegraph service was limited. Started in 1854, the 1861-65 system went only from Shreveport to Marshall to Houston, and Houston to Galveston to Orange. A 20-word telegram sent from Shreveport to Houston in February 1865 cost $36. (1965)