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Note: Following the deaths of her parents, Mary Elizabeth (Loe) Lowe and her brothers were taken in by her grandfather, John A. Suggs, and his family. Lizzie got to know William Dudley Henry and began to see him whenever she could. John A. Suggs did not like Wiliam Henry and would not allow him to come onto his property so they began meeting secretly. One night in October of 1879, he carried a ladder over to the house and placed it under the upstairs window where Lizzie slept. She handed him her bags, came down the ladder and together they eloped into the night. They first went to Goliad where they were married throught the good graces of her uncle (the county sheriff), Joseph Stephen Loe. They spent ten days of their honeymoon at a famous (at the time) amusement park in Port Arthur, Texas. She was 14 years old at the time. Told to me by my grandfather, Alexander Stephens Henry. Lizzie's uncle, Joseph Steven Loe, had married Nancy Haney Warner. Nancy's sister, Charlotte "Callie" had married William R. Henry and together they had a son who they named William Dudley Henry. William Dudley was a passdown name in the Warner family. William and Lizzie then were cousins by virtue of their parents marriages. There was otherwise no relationship between them. After the honeymoon, they went to Lavaca County, Texas, where they lived until for a few years until moving to Gonzales County. Sometime in the early 1900's, they moved to Copperas Cove. William's aunt, Sarah Emily Bullock and her family had relocated there and I think William and Lizzie moved there to be near them. When I was two years old, I lived with my grandparents, Alex and Dora Henry, for a while. William Dudley Henry was living with them also. He was referred to as "the old man" and he was the oldest and most wrinkled thing I had ever seen. He was kind to me but being 92 years old at the time, he wasn't much fun. One day in March of 1948, he went to visit his son, Tom, and his family for a few days. He walked into their living room one evening, tripped over Tom's cat, fell and banged his head on the cast iron heater and died almost immediately. The blow to the head proved to be superficial but it did trigger a fatal heart attack. During the funeral, my grandmother held me up over the coffin and asked me if I wanted to kiss him goodbye. I really freaked out on her and my memory became active. I remember the funeral like it was yesterday, the funeral parlor, funeral chapel, the services, the long drive from Lampasas to Copperas Cove, the cemetery, the green tent for the graveside services and the burial. When my grandfather, Alex Henry, died in 1964, I had the most strange feeling about the funeral. I knew it wasn't deja vu because it was a real memory. Everything was exactly like I remembered it from sixteen years previous. The same funeral parlor, funeral chapel, the long drive, the Copperas Cove cemetery, the tent in exactly the same place as it had been before and the burial in almost exactly the same spot. William had purchased eight burial plots for his family and I have been unfortunate to fill the last four. On the death certificate of William Dudley Henry, Ed Henry, William's youngest son and my great uncle, provided an erroneous middle name. He said that William's middle name was DOUGLAS. I grew up with this family. William's middle name was DUDLEY. I now know that William Dudley was a pass down name from the family of Wetenhall Warner, his mother's family. I asked three of my aunts what they remembered their grandfather's name to be and they all replied DUDLEY. I asked two uncles and neither knew. Guys just aren't in step with that kind of thing. I have now been in a position where I had to supply death certificate information on two different occasions. In the circumstances following a close relatives death small details are difficult to remember and I think Ed Henry came up with a name that was close to Dudley. I have inquired about changing the death certificate and it is nearly impossible. The erroneous name is now engraved in stone.
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