Headache Springs, a quarter mile north of this site, was noted for its healing mineral waters. During the Civil War, as sea blockades cut off imports, a Confederate medical laboratory operated here. It was one of nine and the only one west of the Mississippi River. For the government it made medicines and whiskey. At this time the army was buying medicinal herbs, including poke root, snakeroot, mullein, jimson weed, Jerusalem oak, nightshade, mistletoe, and cherry bark. With mineral salts, these were the medicines of desperation.