Alexander was born in Botetourt County, Virginia on November 14, 1794, as the fourth child of John Fitz Patrick, and Elizabeth Callaway of Bedford County Virginia.  

Alexander Jefferson Patrick moved to Texas from Perry County Kentucky at the age of 43, in 1837 and selected a bluff on the west side of the Trinity River in Robertson County, now Leon County.   He laid out a town believing it would be the head of the navigation on the west side of the Trinity.  The city was named Cairo, and is one of the oldest cities in Texas.  He moved his family from Kentucky to Cairo in April 1841.  Many published books on the early days of Texas have retold the story of Colonel Alexander Patrick’s Steam Boat landing in Cairo with his family.  Later the Indians became so troublesome he moved the family to the old town of Franklin, the County Seat of Robertson County.  Mr. Patrick and the other citizens built a fort around a wood school house as a precaution against Indians but it never had to be used.  In 1844 he moved his family back to Cairo his original home.  Six years later Cairo seemed to be declining.  In 1850, Centerville the new county seat was just beginning to grow and at the first city land auction, Alexander bought the main corner lot in town.  He later became the county tax accessor, and eventually the county clerk.  Cairo still served as the families home during this period and they lived there until his death on November 18, 1874.  His wife preceded him in death by a few years.  They were both buried in the family plot in the Centerville Texas Cemetery.

The Republic of Texas was one of many new ventures in his life and it seemed to be a new beginning for his children rather than for him and his wife.  Alexander was already a successful man in the state of Kentucky, when he moved Catharine his wife and twelve children to Cairo Texas. 

Alexander graduated from Madison County Academy in Kentucky, and married in January of 1818, to Catherine White the daughter of a Drum Major in the Revolutionary War.  In 1821 he was the first Post Master in Perry County Kentucky as well as the owner of the Patrick Salt Works.  Later in 1833 he was also the owner of a Grist Mill and Saw Mill on Troublesome Creek Kentucky.  He was elected to the Kentucky Legislature several times, and later became a Justice of the Peace.  Early Perry County Court documents revealed his assistance in helping others obtain Revolutionary Pensions. 

Alexander Patrick was an active member of the Whig Party, a member of the Baptist Church, and a practicing Mason.  Obviously an active member of the community, it’s hard to understand why he would sell all his holdings and move to Texas. 

The move turned out to be a good one however because the family as a whole prospered and became a very important part of the development of the new Republic.  Alexander became a well known land owner, and planter.