Dr. Edward Alexander

Edward Alexander was a pioneer military surgeon in charge of the Marine Hospital department at El Paso he was born in Germany near the Switzerland line, May 2, 1832. Dr. Alexander pursued his studies in Constance College and in the University of Munich and Vienna, and on the completion of a thorough course in medicine and surgery, he graduated in 1854. He came to the United States about the time of the commencement of the war between North and South. He did not know the language of the people at that time, but soon afterward he enlisted in the Federal Army and was advanced rapidly to the position of Medical Officer. In 1874 he was located to Fort Bliss at El Paso, and has remained here in the federal service, with the exception of the period from 1876 to 1888, he having resigned because of his wife's failing health. In the latter year, when El Paso was made a quarantine station, he again entered the service. His official capacity at the port of El Paso under the Surgeon General of the Marine Hospital at Washington. Dr. Alexander is a member of the City and County Medical Association of El Paso, the American Medical Association, the Public Health Association of the United States, Canada and Mexico, and the Association of Military Surgeons of the United States, who were in the service during the Civil War. He is moreover one of the greatly revered pioneers of El Paso and his mind is stored with an interesting fund of information about Western Texas, especially in connection with its military life.