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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/11544-0.txt b/11544-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9ab0d29 --- /dev/null +++ b/11544-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10619 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 11544 *** + +[TR: ***] = Transcriber Note +[HW: ***] = Handwritten Note + + + + +SLAVE NARRATIVES + + +A Folk History of Slavery in the United States +From Interviews with Former Slaves + + +TYPEWRITTEN RECORDS PREPARED BY +THE FEDERAL WRITERS' PROJECT +1936-1938 +ASSEMBLED BY +THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS PROJECT +WORK PROJECTS ADMINISTRATION +FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA +SPONSORED BY THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS + + +WASHINGTON 1941 + + + + +VOLUME II + +ARKANSAS NARRATIVES + +PART 5 + + + + +Prepared by +the Federal Writers' Project of +the Works Progress Administration +for the State of Arkansas + + + +INFORMANTS + +McClendon, Charlie +McCloud, Lizzie +McConico, Avalena +McCoy, Ike +McDaniel, Richard H. +McIntosh, Waters +Mack, Cresa +McKinney, Warren +McMullen, Victoria +Madden, Nannie P. +Madden, Perry +Mann, Lewis +Martin, Angeline +Martin, Josie +Mathis, Bess +Matthews, Caroline +Maxwell, Malindy +Maxwell, Nellie +May, Ann +Mayes, Joe +Meeks, Rev. Jesse +Metcalf, Jeff +Miller, Hardy +Miller, Henry Kirk +Miller, Matilda +Miller, Nathan +Miller, Sam +Miller, W.D. +Minser, Mose +Minton, Gip +Mitchell, A.J. +Mitchell, Gracie +Mitchell, Hettie +Mitchell, Mary +Mitchell, Moses +Moon, Ben +Moore, Emma +Moore, Patsy +Moorehead, Ada +Mooreman, Mary Jane (Mattie) +Morgan, Evelina +Morgan, James +Morgan, Olivia +Morgan, Tom +Morris, Charity +Morris, Emma +Moss, Claiborne +Moss, Frozie +Moss, Mose +Mullins, S.O. +Murdock, Alex +Myers, Bessie +Myhand, Mary +Myrax, Griffin + +Neal, Tom Wylie +Nealy (Neely), Sally +Nealy, Wylie +Neland, Emaline +Nelson, Henry +Nelson, Iran +Nelson, James Henry +Nelson, John +Nelson, Lettie +Nelson, Mattie +Newborn, Dan +Newsom, Sallie +Newton, Pete +Norris, Charlie + +Oats, Emma +Odom, Helen +Oliver, Jane +Osborne, Ivory +Osbrook, Jane + +Page, Annie +Parker, Fannie +Parker, J.M. +Parker, Judy +Parker, R.F. +Parks, Annie +Parnell, Austin Pen +Parr, Ben +Patterson, Frank A. +Patterson, John +Patterson, Sarah Jane +Pattillo, Solomon P. +Patton, Carry Allen +Payne, Harriett McFarlin +Payne, John +Payne, Larkin +Perkins, Cella +Perkins, Marguerite (Maggie) +Perkins, Rachel +Perry, Dinah +Peters, Alfred +Peters, Mary Estes +Peterson, John +Pettis, Louise +Pettus, Henry C. +Phillips, Dolly +Piggy, Tony +Pittman, Ella +Pittman, Sarah +Poe, Mary +Pollacks, W.L. +Pope, John (Doc) +Porter, William +Potter, Bob +Prayer, Louise + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Charlie McClendon + 708 E. Fourth Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 77 + + +"I don't know exactly how old I am. I was six or seven when the war +ended. I member dis--my mother said I was born on Christmas day. Old +master was goin' to war and he told her to take good care of that +boy--he was goin' to make a fine little man. + +"Did I live up to it? I reckon I was bout as smart a man as you could +jump up. The work didn't get too hard for _me_. I farmed and I sawmilled +a lot. Most of my time was farmin'. + +"I been in Jefferson County all my life. I went to school three or four +sessions. + +"About the war, I member dis--I member they carried us to Camden and I +saw the guards. I'd say, 'Give me a pistol.' They'd say, 'Come back +tomorrow and we'll give you one.' They had me runnin' back there every +day and I never did get one. They was Yankee soldiers. + +"Our folks' master was William E. Johnson. Oh Lord, they was just as +good to us as could be to be under slavery. + +"After they got free my people stayed there a year or two and then our +master broke up and went back to South Carolina and the folks went in +different directions. Oh Lord, my parents sho was well treated. Yes +ma'm. If he had a overseer, he wouldn't low him to whip the folks. He'd +say, 'Just leave em till I come home.' Then he'd give em a light +breshin'. + +"My father run off and stay in the woods one or two months. Old master +say, 'Now, Jordan, why you run off? Now I'm goin' to give you a light +breshin' and don't you run off again.' But he'd run off again after +awhile. + +"He had one man named Miles Johnson just stayed in the woods so he put +him on the block and sold him. + +"I seed the Ku Klux. We colored folks had to make it here to Pine Bluff +to the county band. If the Rebels kotch you, you was dead. + +"Oh Lord yes, I voted. I voted the Publican ticket, they called it. You +know they had this Australia ballot. You was sposed to go in the caboose +and vote. They like to scared me to death one time. I had a description +of the man I wanted to vote for in my pocket and I was lookin' at it so +I'd be sure to vote for the right man and they caught me. They said, +'What you doin' there? We're goin' to turn you over to the sheriff after +election!' They had me scared to death. I hid out for a long time till I +seed they wasn't goin' to do nothin'. + +"My wife's brother was one of the judges of the election. Some of the +other colored folks was constables and magistrates--some of em are +now--down in the country. + +"I knew a lot about things but I knew I was in the United States and had +to bow to the law. There was the compromise they give the colored +folks--half of the offices and then they got em out afterwards. John M. +Clayton was runnin' for the senate and say he goin' to see the colored +people had equal rights, but they killed him as he was gwine through the +country speakin'. + +"The white people have treated me very well but they don't pay us enough +for our work--just enough to live on and hardly that. I can say with a +clear conscience that if it hadn't been for this relief, I don't know +what I'd do--I'm not able to work. I'm proud that God Almighty put the +spirit in the man (Roosevelt) to help us." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Lizzie McCloud + 1203 Short 13th Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 120? + + +"I was one of 'em bless your heart. Yes ma'm, Yes ma'm, I wouldn't tell +you a lie 'bout that. If I can't tell you the truth I'm not goin' tell +you nothin'! + +"Oh yes, I was a young lady in slavery times--bred and born in +Tennessee. Miss Lizzie and Marse John Williams--I belonged to them--sho +did! I was scared to death of the white folks. Miss Lizzie--she mean as +the devil. She wouldn't step her foot on the ground, she so rich. No +ma'm wouldn't put her foot on the ground. Have her carriage drive up to +the door and have that silk carpet put down for her to walk on. Yes +Lord. Wouldn't half feed us and they went and named me after her. + +"I know all about the stars fallin'. I was out in the field and just +come in to get our dinner. Got so dark and the stars begin to play +aroun'. Mistress say, 'Lizzie, it's the judgment.' She was just a +hollerin'. Yes ma'm I was a young woman. I been here a long time, yes +ma'm, I been here a long time. Worked and whipped, too. I run off many a +time. Run off to see my mammy three or four miles from where I was. + +"I never was sold but they took we young women and brought us down in +the country to another plantation where they raised corn, wheat, and +hay. Overseer whipped us too. Marse John had a brother named Marse +Andrew and he was a good man. He'd say to the overseer, 'Now don't whip +these girls so much, they can't work.' Oh, he was a good man. Oh, white +folks was the devil in slavery tines. I was scared to death of 'em. +They'd have these long cow hide whips. Honey, I was treated bad. I seen +a time in this world. + +"Oh Lord, yes, that was long 'fore the war. I was right down on my +master's place when it started. They said it was to free the niggers. Oh +Lord, we was right under it in Davidson County where I come from. Oh +Lord, yes, I knowed all about when the war started. I'se a young woman, +a young woman. We was treated just like dogs and hogs. We seed a hard +time--I know what I'm talkin' about. + +"Oh God, I seed the Yankees. I saw it all. We was so scared we run under +the house and the Yankees called 'Come out Dinah' (didn't call none of +us anything but Dinah). They said 'Dinah, we're fightin' to free you and +get you out from under bondage.' I sure understood that but I didn't +have no better sense than to go back to mistress. + +"Oh Lord, yes, I seed the Ku Klux. They didn't bother me cause I didn't +stay where they could; I was way under the house. + +"Yankees burned up everything Marse John had. I looked up the pike and +seed the Yankees a coming'. They say 'We's a fightin' for you, Dinah!' +Yankees walked in, chile, just walked right in on us. I tell you I've +seed a time. You talkin' 'bout war--you better wish no more war come. I +know when the war started. The Secessors on this side and the Yankees on +that side. Yes, Miss, I seen enough. My brother went and jined the +Secessors and they killed him time he got in the war. + +"No, Missy, I never went to no school. White folks never learned me +nothin'. I believes in tellin' white folks the truth. + +"White folks didn't 'low us to marry so I never married till I come to +Arkansas and that was one year after surrender. + +"First place I landed on was John Clayton's place. Mr. John Clayton was +a Yankee and he was good to us. We worked in the field and stayed there +two years. I been all up and down the river and oh Lord, I had a good +time after I was free. I been treated right since I was free. My color +is good to me and the white folks, too. I ain't goin' to tell only the +truth. Uncle Sam goin' send me 'cross the water if I don't tell the +truth. Better _not fool_ with dat man!" + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Lizzie McCloud + 1203 E. Short 13th Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 103 +[TR: Appears to be same as previous informant despite age discrepancy.] + + +"Well, where you been? I been wonderin' 'bout you. Yes Lawd. You sure is +lookin' fine. + +"Yes, honey, I was bred and bawn in Davidson County, Tennessee. Come +here one year after surrender. + +"My daughter there was a baby jus' sittin' alone, now, sittin' alone +when I come here to this Arkansas. I know what I'm talkin' about. + +"Lizzie Williams, my old missis, was rich as cream. Yes Lawd! I know all +about it 'cause I worked for 'em. + +"I was a young missis when the War started. I was workin' for my owners +then. I knowed when they was free--when they said they was free. + +"The Yankees wouldn't call any of the colored women anything but Dinah. +I didn't know who they was till they told us. Said, 'Dinah, we's comin' +to free you.' + +"The white folks didn't try to scare us 'bout the Yankees 'cause they +was too scared theirselves. Them Yankees wasn't playin'; they was +fitin'. Yes, Jesus! + +"Had to work hard--and whipped too. Wasn't played with. Mars Andrew come +in the field a heap a times and say, 'Don't whip them women so hard, +they can't work.' I thought a heap of Mars Andrew. + +"I used to see the Yankees ridin' hosses and them breastplates a +shining'. Yes Lawd. I'd run and they'd say, 'Dinah, we ain't gwine hurt +you.' Lawd, them Yankees didn't care for nothin'. Oh, they was fine. + +"My husband was a soldier--a Yankee. Yes ma'am. They sends me thirty +dollars every month, before the fourth. Postman brings it right to me +here at the house. They treats me nice. + +"When I come here, I landed on John Clayton's place. He was a Yankee and +he was a good white man too. + +"I'm the onliest one left now in my family." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Irene Robertson +Person Interviewed: Avalena McConico + on the [TR: ---- ----] west of Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 40[TR: ?] +[TR: Much of this interview smeared and difficult to decipher; + illegible words indicated by "----", questionable words + followed by "?".] + + +"Grandma was a slave woman. Her name was Emma Harper. She was born in +Chesterville, Mississippi. Her young master was Jim and Miss Corrie +Burton. The old man was John Burton. I aimed[?] to see them once. I +seen both Miss Corrie and Mr. Jim. My grandparents was never sold. They +left out after freedom. They stayed there a long time but they left. + +"The first of the War was like dis: Our related folks was having a +dance. The Yankees come in and was dancing. Some "fry boys" [---- ----] +them. The next day they were all in the field and heard something. +They went to the house and told the white folks there was [----] a +fire. They heard it. [----] he [----] about. Master told them it +was war. Miss Burton was crying. They heard about [----] in [----] at +Harrisburg where they could hear the shooting. + +"They put the slaves to digging. They dug two weeks. They buried their +meat and money and a whole heap of things. They never found it. A little +white,[?] Mollita[?], was out where they were digging. She went in the +house. She said, Mama, is the devil coming? They said he was." Master +had them come to him. He questioned them. They told him they got so +tired [----] of them said he [----] he [---- ----] the [----] Yankees +come he'd tell them where all this was, but he was just talking. But +when the Yankees did come they was so scared they never got close to a +Yankee. They was scared to death. They never found the meat and money. +They [----] and cut the turkeys' heads off and the turkey fell off the +rail fence, the head drop on one side and the body on the other. They +milked a cow and cut both hind quarters off and leave the rest of the +cow there and the cow not dead yet. + +"Mr. South[?] Strange at Chesterville, Mississippi had a pony named +Zane. The Yankees hemmed him and four more men in at Malone Creek and +killed the four men. Zane rared up on hind legs and went up a steep +cliff and ran three miles. Mr. Strange's coat was cut off from him. It +was a gray coat. Mr. Strange was a white man. + +"Uncle Frank Jones was forty years old when they gathered him up out of +the woods and put him in the battle lines. All the runaway black folks +in the woods was hunted out and put in the Yankee lines. Uncle Frank +lived in a cave up till about then. His master made him mean. He got +better as he got old. His master would sell him and tell him to run away +and come back to his cave. He'd feed him. He never worked and he went up +for his provisions. He was sold over and over and over. His master +learnt him in books and to how to cuss. He learnt him how to trick the +dogs and tap trees like a coon. At the end of the trail the dogs would +turn on the huntsman. Uncle Frank was active when he was old. He was +hired out to race other boys sometimes. He never wore glasses. He could +see well when he was old. He told me he was raised out from England, +Arkansas. + +"When freedom was told 'em Uncle Frank said all them in the camps +hollered and danced, and marched and sung. They was so glad the War was +done and so glad they been freed. + +"Grandma was sold in South Carolina to Mississippi and sold again to Dr. +Shelton. Now that was my father's father and mother. She said they rode +and walked all the way. They came on ox wagons. She said on the way they +passed some children. They was playing. A little white boy was up in a +persimmon tree settin' on a limb eating persimmons. He was so pretty and +clean. Grandma says, 'You think you is some pumpkin, don't you, honey +child.' He says, 'Some pumpkin and some 'simmon too.' Grandma was a +house girl. She got to keep her baby and brought him. He was my father. +Uncle was born later. Then they was freed. Grandma lived to be +ninety-five years old. Mrs. Dolphy Wooly and Mrs. Shelton was her young +mistresses. They kept her till she died. They kept her well. + +"Grandma told us about freedom. She was hired out to the Browns to make +sausage and dry out lard. Five girls was in the field burning brush. +They was white girls--Mrs. Brown's girls. They come to the house and +said some Blue Coats come by and said, 'You free.' They told them back, +'That's no news, we was born free.' Grandma said that night she melted +pewter and made dots on her best dress. It was shiny. She wore it home +next day 'cause she was free, and she never left from about her own +white folks till she died and left them. + +"Times seem very good on black folks till hard cold winter and spring +come, then times is mighty, mighty bad. It is so hard to keep warm fires +and enough to eat. Times have been good. Black folks in the young +generation need more heart training and less book learning. Times is so +fast the young set is too greedy. They is wasteful too. Some is hard +workers and tries to live right. + +"I wash and irons and keep a woman's little chile so she can work. I +owns my home." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Irene Robertson +Person Interviewed: Ike McCoy, Biscoe, Arkansas +Age: 65 +[TR: Illegible words indicated by "----", + questionable words followed by "?".] + + +"My parents named Harriett and Isaac McCoy. Far as I knew they was +natives of North Kaline (Carolina). He was a farmer. He raised corn and +cabbage, a little corn and wheat. He had tasks at night in winter I +heard him say. She muster just done anything. She knit for us here in +the last few years. She died several years ago. Now my oldest sister was +born in slavery. I was next but I came way after slavery. + +"In war time McCoys hid their horses in the woods. The Yankees found +them and took all the best ones and left their [----] (nags). Old boss +man McCoy hid in the closet and locked himself up. The Yankees found +him, broke in on him and took him out and they nearly killed him +beating him so bad. He told all of 'em on the place he was going off. +They wore him out. He didn't live long after that. + +"Things got lax. I heard her say one man sold all his slaves. The War +broke out. They run away and went back to him. She'd see 'em pass going +back home. They been sold and wouldn't stay. Folks got to running off to +war. They thought it look like a frolic. I heard some of them say they +wish they hadn't gone off to war 'fore it was done. Niggers didn't know +that[TR: ?] war no freedom was 'ceptin' the Yankees come tell them +something and then they couldn't understand how it all be. Black folks +was mighty ignant then. They is now for that matter. They look to white +folks for right kind of doings[?]. + +"Ma said every now and then see somebody going back to that man tried to +get rid of them. They traveled by night and beg along from black folks. +In daytime they would stay in the woods so the pettyrollers wouldn't run +up on them. The pettyrollers would whoop 'em if they catch 'em. + +"Ma told about one day the Yankees come and made the white women came +help the nigger women cook up a big dinner. Ma was scared so bad she +couldn't see nothing she wanted. She said there was no talking. They was +too scared to say a word. They sot the table and never a one of them +told 'em it was ready. + +"She said biscuits so scarce after the War they took 'em 'round in their +pockets to nibble on they taste so good. + +"I was eighteen years old when pa and ma took the notion to come out +here. All of us come but one sister had married, and pa and one brother +had a little difference. Pa had children ma didn't have. They went +together way after slavery. We got transportation to Memphis by train +and took a steamboat to Pillowmount. That close to Forrest City. Later +on I come to Biscoe. They finally come too. + +"I been pretty independent all my life till I getting so feeble. I work +a sight now. I'm making boards to kiver my house out at the lot now. I +goiner get somebody to kiver it soon as I get my boards made. + +"We don't get no PWA aid 'ceptin' for two orphant babies we got. They +are my wife's sister's little boys. + +"Well sir-ree, folks could do if the young ones would. Young folks don't +have no consideration for the old wore-out parents. They dance and drink +it bodaciously out on Saturday ebening and about till Sunday night. I +may be wrong but I sees it thater way. Whan we get old we get helpless. +I'm getting feebler every year. I see that. Times goiner be hard ag'in +this winter and next spring. Money is scarce now for summer time and +craps laid by. I feels that my own self now. Every winter times get +tough." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Richard H. McDaniel, Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 73 + + +"I was born in Newton County, Mississippi the first year of the +surrender. I don't think my mother was sold and I know my father was +never sold. Jim McDaniel raised my father and one sister after his +mother died. One sister was married when she died. I heard him say when +he got mad he would quit work. He said old master wouldn't let the +mistress whoop him and she wouldn't let him whoop my father. My father +was a black man but my mother was light. Her father was a white man and +her mother part Indian and white mixed, so what am I? My mother was +owned by people named Wash. Dick Wash was her young master. My parents' +names was Willis and Elsie McDaniel. When it was freedom I heard them +say Moster McDaniel told them they was free. He was broke. If they could +do better go on, he didn't blame them, he couldn't promise them much +now. They moved off on another man's place to share crop. They had to +work as hard and didn't have no more than they had in slavery. That is +what they told me. They could move around and visit around without +asking. They said it didn't lighten the work none but it lightened the +rations right smart. Moster McDaniel nor my father neither one went to +war. + +"From the way I always heard it, the Ku Klux was the law like night +watchman. When I was a boy there was a lot of stealing and bushwhacking. +Folks meet you out and kill you, rob you, whoop you. A few of the black +men wouldn't work and wanted to steal. That Ku Klux was the law watching +around. Folks was scared of em. I did see them. I would run hide. + +"I farmed up till 1929. Then I been doing jobs. I worked on relief till +they turned me off, said I was too old to work but they won't give me +the pension. I been trying to figure out what I am to do. Lady, could +you tell me? Work at jobs when I can get them. + +"I allus been voting till late years. If they let some folks vote in the +first lection, they would be putting in somebody got no business in the +gover'ment. All the fault I see in white folks running the gover'ment is +we colored folks ain't got work we can do all the time to live on. I +thought all the white folks had jobs what wanted jobs. The conditions is +hard for old men like me. I pay $3 for a house every month. It is a cold +house. + +"This present generation is living a fast life. What all don't they do?" + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Waters McIntosh + 1900 Howard Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 76 + + +"I was born July 4, 1862 at 2:08 in the morning at Lynchburg, Sumter +County, South Carolina. + + +Parents + +"My mother was named Lucy Sanders. My father was named Sumter Durant. +Our owner was Dr. J.M. Sanders, the son of Mr. Bartlett Sanders. Sumter +Durant was a white man. My mother was fourteen years old when I was born +I was her second child. Durant was in the Confederate army and was +killed during the War in the same year I was born, and before my birth. + + +Sold + +"When I was a year old, my mother was sold for $1500 in gold, and I was +sold for $500 in gold to William Carter who lived about five miles south +of Cartersville. The payment was made in fine gold. I was sold because +my folk realized that freedom was coming and they wanted to obtain the +cash value of their slaves. + + +Name + +"My name is spelled 'Waters' but it is pronounced 'Waiters.' When I was +born, I was thought to be a very likely child and it was proposed that I +should be a waiter. Therefore I was called Waters (but it was pronounced +Waiters). They did not spell it w-a-i-t-e-r-s, but they pronounced it +that way. + + +How Freedom Came + +"My mother said that they had been waiting a long time to hear what had +become of the War, perhaps one or two weeks. One day when they were in +the field moulding corn, going round the corn hoeing it and putting a +little hill around it, the conk sounded at about eleven o'clock, and +they knew that the long expected time had come. They dropped their hoes +and went to the big house. They went around to the back where the master +always met the servants and he said to them, 'You are all free, free as +I am. You can go or come as you please. I want you to stay. If you will +stay, I will give you half the crop.' That was the beginning of the +share cropping system. + +"My mother came at once to the quarters, and when she found me she +pulled the end out of a corn sack, stuck holes on the sides, put a cord +through the top, pulled out the end, put it on me, put on the only dress +she had, and made it back to the old home (her first master's folk). + + +What the Slaves Expected + +"When the slaves were freed, they got what they expected. They were glad +to get it and get away with it, and that was what mother and them did. + + +Slave Time Preaching + +"One time when an old white man come along who wanted to preach, the +white people gave him a chance to preach to the niggers. The substance +of his sermon was this: + +"'Now when you servants are working for your masters, you must be +honest. When you go to the mill, don't carry along an extra sack and put +some of the meal or the flour in for yourself. And when you women are +cooking in the big house, don't make a big pocket under your dress and +put a sack of coffee and a sack of sugar and other things you want in +it." + +"They took him out and hanged him for corrupting the morals of the +slaves. + + +Conditions After the War + +"Immediately after the War, there was a great scarcity of food. Neither +Negroes nor white folk had anything to eat. The few white people who did +have something wouldn't let it be known. My grandmother who was +sixty-five years old and one of the old and respected inhabitants of +that time went out to find something for us to eat. A white woman named +Mrs. Burton gave her a sack of meal and told her not to tell anybody +where she got it. + +"My grandmother brought the meal home and cooked it in a large skillet +in a big cake. When it got done, she cut it into slices in the way you +would cut up a pie and divided it among us. That all we had to eat. + + +House + +"The white people in those days built their houses back from the front. +In South Carolina, there were lots of farms that had four to twelve +thousand acres. From what mother told me, Master Bill's place set back +from the road. Then there was a great square place they called the yard. +A fence divided the house and the yard adjoining it from that part of +the grounds which held the barn. The yard in front and back of the house +held a grove. + +[Illustration] + +The square around the house and the Negro quarters were all enclosed so +that the little slaves could not get out while parents were at work. The +Negroes assembled on the porch when the gong called them in the morning. +The boss gave orders from the porch. There was an open space between the +quarters and the court (where the little slaves played). There was a +gate between the court and the big house. + +"On the rear of the house, there was a porch from which the boss gave +orders usually about four o'clock in the morning and at which they would +disband in the evening between nine and ten--no certain time but more or +less not earlier than nine and not often later than ten. Back of the +house and beyond it was a fence extending clear across the yard. In one +corner of this fence was a gate leading into the court. Leading out of +the court was an opening surrounded by a semi-circular fence which +enclosed the Negro quarters. + +"The cabins were usually built on the ground--no floors. The roofs were +covered with clapboards. + +"When I was a boy we used to sing, 'Rather be a nigger than a poor white +man.' Even in slavery they used to sing that. It was the poor white man +who was freed by the War, not the Negroes. + + +Furniture + +"There wasn't any furniture. Beds were built with one post out and the +other three _sides_ fastened to the sides of the house. + + +Marrying Time + +"I remember one night the people were gone to marry. That was when all +the people in the community married immediately after slavery. + + +Ghosts + +"We had an open fireplace. That was at Bartlett Sanders' place. He had +close on to three thousand acres. Every grown person had gone to the +marrying, and I was at home in the bed I just described. + +"My grandfather's mother[HW: ?] had a chair and that was hers only. She +was named Senia and was about eighty years old. We burned nothing but +pine knots in the hearth. You would put one or two of those on the fire +and they would burn for hours. We were all in bed and had been for an +hour or two. There were some others sleeping in the same room. There +came a peculiar knocking on grandmother's[HW: great grandmother?] chair. +It's hard to describe it. It was something like the distant beating of a +drum. Grandmother was dead, of course. The boys got up and ran out and +brought in some of the hands. When they came in, a little thing about +three and a half feet high with legs about six or eight inches long ran +out of the room. + + +Ku Klux Klan + +"Whenever there was a man of influence, they terrorized him. They were +at their height about the time of Grant's election. Many a time my +mother and I have watched them pass our door. They wore gowns and some +kind of helmet. They would be going to catch same leading Negro and whip +him. There was scarcely a night they couldn't take a leading Negro out +and whip him if they would catch him alone. On that account, the Negro +men did not stay at home in Sumter County, South Carolina at night. They +left home and stayed together. The Ku Klux very seldom interfered with a +woman or a child. + +"They often scared colored people by drinking large quantities of water. +They had something that held a lot of water, and when they would raise +the bucket to their mouths to drink, they would slip the water into it. + + +White Caps + +"The white caps operated further to the northwest of where I lived. I +never came in contact with them. They were not the same thing as the Ku +Klux. + + +Voting + +"In South Carolina under the Reconstruction, we voted right along. In +1868 there were soldiers at all of the election places to see that you +did vote. + + +Career Since the War + +"In 1881 I married. The year after that, in '83,[HW: ?] I merchandised a +little. Then I got converted. I got it in my head that it was wrong to +take big profits from business, so I sold out. Then I was asked to +assist the keeper of the jail. + +"In 1888 I went to school for the first time. I was then twenty-six +years old. By the end of the first term, I knew all that the teacher +could teach, so he sent me to Claflin University. I left there in the +third year normal. + +"When I returned home, I taught school, at first in a private school and +later in a public school for $15 a month. + +"A man named Boyle told me that he had some ground to sell. I saved up +$45, the price he asked for it. When I offered it to him, he said that +he had decided not to sell it. I went to town and spent my $45. A few +days later, he met me and offered me the place again. I told him I had +spent my money. He then offered it to me on time. There was plenty of +timber on the place, so I got some contracts with a man named Roland and +delivered wood to him. When I went to collect the money, he said he +would not pay me in money. + +"A man named Pennington offered me 20ยข a day for labor. I asked if he +would pay in money. + +"He replied, 'If you're looking for money, don't come.' + +"I went home and said to my wife, 'I am going to leave here.' + +"I came to Forrest City, Arkansas January 28, 1888. I farmed in Forrest +City, making one crop, and then I entered the ministry, and then I +preached at Spring Park for two years. + +"Then I entered Philander Smith College where I stayed from 1891-1897. I +preached from the time I left Philander until 1913. + +"Then I studied law and completed the American Correspondence course in +Law when I was fifty years old. I am still practicing. + + +Wife and Family + +"In 1897, when I graduated from Philander, my wife and six children were +sitting on the front seat. + +"I have eleven sons and daughters, of whom six are living. I had seven +brothers and sisters. + +"My wife and I have been married fifty-six years. I had to steal her +away from her parents, and she has never regretted coming to me nor I +taking her." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +"Brother Mack" as he is familiarly and affectionately known to his +friends is a man keen and vigorous, mentally and physically. He attends +Sunday school, church both in the morning and evening, and all +departments of the Epworth League. He takes the Epworth Herald, the +Southwestern Christian Advocate, the Literary Digest, some poultry and +farm magazines, the Arkansas Gazette, and the St. Louis Democrat, and +several other journals. He is on omnivorous reader and a clear thinker. +He raises chickens and goats and plants a garden as avocations. He has +on invincible reputation for honesty as well as for thrift and thought. + +Nothing is pleasanter than to view the relationship between him and his +wife. They have been married fifty-six years and seem to have achieved a +perfect understanding. She is an excellent cook and is devoted to her +home. She attends church regularly. Seems to be four or five years +younger than her husband. Like him, however, she seems to enjoy +excellent health. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Cresa Mack + 1417 Short Indiana St., Pine Bluff, Ark. +Age: 85 + + +"I can tell you something about slavery days. I was born at South Bend, +Arkansas on the old Joe Clay place. I 'member they used to work 'em +scandalous. They used me at the house and I used to wait on old +mistress' brother. He was a old man named Cal Fletcher. + +"I 'member when they said the Yankees was comin' the boss man put us in +wagons and runned us to Texas. They put the women and chillun in the +wagons but the men had to walk. I know I was something over twelve years +old. + +"Old mistress, Miss Sarah Clay, took her chillun and went to Memphis. + +"My white folks treated us very well. I never seed 'em whip my mother +but once, but I seen some whipped till they's speechless. Yes ma'm I +have. + +"I can 'member a lot 'bout the war. The Lord have mercy, I'se old. I +'member they used to sing + + 'Run nigger run, + The paddyrollers'll ketch you, + Run nigger run.' + +"Corse if they ketch you out without a pass they'd beat you nearly to +death and tell you to go home to your master. + +"One time I was totin' water for the woman what did the washin'. I was +goin' along the road and seed somethin' up in a tree that look like a +dog. I said 'Look at that dog.' The overseer was comin' from the house +and said 'That ain't no dog, that's a panther. You better not stop' and +he shot it out. Then I've seen bears out in the cane brakes. I thought +they was big black bulls. I was young then--yes mam, I was young. + +"When the Yankees come through they sot the house afire and the gin and +burned up 'bout a hundred bales a cotton. They never bothered the +niggers' quarters. That was the time the overseer carried us to Texas to +get rid of the Yankees. + +"After the surrender the Yankees told the overseer to bring us all up in +the front yard so he could read us the ceremony and he said we was as +free as any white man that walked the ground. I didn't know what 'twas +about much cause I was too busy playin'. + +"I didn't know what school was 'fore freedom, but I went about a month +after peace was declared. Then papa died and mama took me out and put me +in the field. + +"I was grown, 'bout twenty-four or five, when I married. Now my chillun +and grand chillun takes care of me." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Warren McKinney, Hazen, Arkansas +Age: 85 + + +I was born in Edgefield County, South Carolina. I am eighty-five years +old. I was born a slave of George Strauter. I remembers hearing them say +"Thank God Ize free as a jay bird." My ma was a slave in the field. I +was eleven years old when freedom was declared. When I was little, Mr. +Strauter whipped my ma. It hurt me bad as it did her. I hated him. She +was crying. I chunked him with rocks. He run after me, but he didn't +catch me. There was twenty-five or thirty hands that worked in the +field. They raised wheat, corn, oats, barley, and cotton. All the +children that couldn't work stayed at one house. Aunt Mat kept the +babies and small children that couldn't go to the field. He had a gin +and a shop. The shop was at the fork of the roads. When de war come on +my papa went to build forts. He quit ma and took another woman. When de +war closed ma took her four children, bundled em up and went to Augusta. +The government give out rations there. My ma washed and ironed. People +died in piles. I don't know till yet what was de matter. They said it +was the change of living. I seen five or six wooden, painted coffins +piled up on wagons pass by our house. Loads passed every day lack you +see cotton pass here. Some said it was cholorea and some took +consumption. Lots of de colored people nearly starved. Not much to get +to do and not much house room. Several families had to live in one +house. Lots of the colored folks went up north and froze to death. They +couldn't stand the cold. They wrote back about them dieing. No they +never sent them back. I heard some sent for money to come back. I heerd +plenty bout the Ku Klux. They scared the folks to death. People left +Augusta in droves. About a thousand would all meet and walk going to +hunt work and new homes. Some of them died. I had a sister and brother +lost that way. I had another sister come to Louisiana that way. She +wrote back. + +I don't think the colored folks looked for a share of land. They never +got nothing cause the white folks didn't have nothing but barren hills +left. About all the mules was wore out hauling provisions in the army. +Some folks say they ought to done more for de colored folks when dey +left, but dey say dey was broke. Freeing all de slaves left em broke. + +That reconstruction was a mighty hard pull. Me and ma couldn't live. A +man paid our ways to Carlisle, Arkansas and we come. We started working +for Mr. Emenson. He had a big store, teams, and land. We liked it fine, +and I been here fifty-six years now. There was so much wild game living +was not so hard. If a fellow could get a little bread and a place to +stay he was all right. After I come to dis state I voted some. I have +farmed and worked at odd jobs. I farmed mostly. Ma went back to her old +master. He persuaded her to come back home. Me and her went back and run +a farm four or five years before she died. Then I come back here. I +first had 300 acres at Carlisle. I sold it and bought 80 acres at Green +Grove. I married in South Carolina. We had a fine weddin, home weddin. +Each of our families furnished the weddin supper. We had 24 waiters. +That is all the wife I ever had. We lived together 57 years. It is hard +for me to keep up with my mind since she died. She been dead five years +nearly now. I used to sing but I forgot all the songs. We had song +books. I joined the church when I was twelve years old. + +I think the times are worse than they use to be. The people is living +mighty fast I tell you. I don't get no help from the government. They +won't give me the pension. I can't work and I can't pay taxes on my +place. They just don't give me nothing but a little out of the store. I +can't get no pension. + + + + +Little Rock District +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of Interviewer: Irene Robertson +Subject: Ex-Slave--History +Story:--Information + +This Information given by: Warren McKinney +Place of Residence: Hazen, Green Grove Settlement, Arkansas +Occupation: Farming +Age: 84 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] + + +Warren McKinney was born in Edgefield County, South Carolina. He was +born a slave. His master was George Strauter. He had a big plantation +and worked twenty-five or thirty work hands. There were twenty-five or +thirty children too small to work in the field. They raised cotton, +corn, oats, and wheat. His mother washed and ironed and cooked. He was +small but well remembers once when his mother had been sick and had just +gotten out. George Strauter whipped her with a switch on her legs. +Warren did not approve of it. Rocks were plentiful and he began throwing +at him. He said Mr. George took out after him but didn't catch or whip +him. + +George Strauter tried to teach them all how to be good farmers and be +saving. Warren knew war was going on but he didn't see any of it. His +father came home several times. He was off building forts. He said he +remembered a big "hurly-burly" and he heard 'em saying, "Thank God I'ze +free as a jay bird." He didn't know why they were fighting so he didn't +know then why they were saying that. + +George Strauter had a shop at the fork of the roads. He had his own gin. +They sold cotton and bought provisions at Augusta, Georgia. They made +some of their meal and flour and raised all their meat and made enough +lard to do the year around. + +He heard them talking about the "Yankees" burning up Augusta, but he saw +where they had burned Hamburg, South Carolina or North Augusta they call +it. + +After they were free he remembers his mother bundling up her things and +her family and them all going in an ox cart to Augusta to live. Warren's +mother washed, cooked and ironed for a living. Her husband went off and +lived with another woman after freedom. Warren was about eleven years +old then. The Government furnished food for them too. One thing that +distressed Warren was _the way people died for more than a year_. He saw +five or six coffins piled up on a wagon being taken out to be buried. He +thought it was changing houses and changing ways of living. They didn't +have shoes and warm clothes and weren't fed from white folks smoke +house. _Lots of the slaves had Consumption and died right now_. Stout +men and women didn't live two years after they were freed. Lots of them +said they didn't like that freedom and wanted to go back but the masters +were broke and couldn't keep many of them if they went back. + +When Warren was about fifteen years old, there was a white man or two, +but colored leaders mostly got about a thousand colored people to start +for the West walking. Warren had sisters and brothers who started on +this trip. Warren had some fussy brothers, his mother was afraid would +get in jail. They kept her uneasy. They shipped their "stuff" by boat +and train. He never saw them any more but he heard from them in +Louisiana. Louisiana had a bad name in those days. + +When Warren was about fourteen and fifteen, his mother had them on a +farm, farming near Hamburg. + +When he was sixteen or seventeen, his mother and the other children came +on the train to about where Carlisle now is but it wasn't called by that +name. There were very few houses of any kind. Mr. Emerson had a big +store and lots of land. He worked black and white. Mr. Emerson let them +have seven or eight mules and wagons and they farmed near there. He +remembers pretty soon there was a depot where the depot now stands, a +bank, a post office, and two or three more stores, all small buildings. +He liked coming to Arkansas because he got to ride on the train a long +ways. It was easy to live here. There were lots of game and fish. + +Warren never shot anything in his life. He was no hunter. _Nats_ were +awful. Warren made smoke to run the nats from the cows. Four or five +deer would come to the smoke. Cows were afraid of them and would leave +the smoke. When he would go the deer would leap four or five feet in the +air at the sight of him. + +When Warren lived in Augusta, Georgia, they had schools a month at a +time but Warren never did get to go to any, so he can't read or write. +But he learned to save his money. He joined a church when he was twelve +years old in South Carolina and belongs to the Baptist church at Green +Grove now. + +The old master in South Carolina persuaded his mother to come back. They +all went back four or five years before his mother died. While Warren +was there he married a woman on a joining farm. + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Victoria McMullen + 1416 E. Valmar, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 54 +Occupation: Seamstress + + +"My mother was born March 16, 1865, and knew nothing of slavery. + +"Both my grandmothers and both grandfathers were slaves. My father was +born in the same year as my mother and like my mother knew nothing of +slavery although both of them might have been born slaves. + +"I knew my mother's mother and father and my father's mother, but I +didn't know my father's father. + +"He was from Texas and he always stayed there. He never did come out to +Louisiana where I was born. My mother was born in Louisiana, but my +father was born in Texas. I don't know what county or city my father was +born in. I just heard my grandmother on his side say he was born in +Texas. + +"During the War (he was born in '65 when the War ceased), Grandmother +Katy--that was her name, Katy, Katy Elmore--she was in Louisiana at +first--she was run out in Texas, I suppose, to be hidden from the +Yankees. My father was born there and my grandfather stayed there. He +died in Texas and then Grandma Katy come back to Louisiana with my +father and settled in Ouachita Parish. + +"Grandma Katy was sold from South Carolina into Louisiana to Bob +McClendon, and she kept the name of Elmore who was her first owner in +South Carolina. It was Bob McClendon who run her out in Texas to hide +her from the Yankees. My grandfather in Texas kept the name of Jamison. +That was the name of his master in Texas. But grandma kept the name of +Elmore from South Carolina because he was good to her. He was better +than Bob McClendon. The eastern states sold their slaves to the southern +states and got all the money, then they freed the slaves and that left +the South without anything. + +"Grandma Katy had Creek Indian blood in her. She was of medium size and +height, copper colored, high cheek bones, small squinchy eyes, black +curly hair. Her hair was really pretty but she didn't curl it. It was +just naturally curly. She was a practical nurse as they call it, but she +did more of what some people call a midwife. They call it something else +now. They got a proper word for it. + +"They got it in these government agencies. That is what she was even in +slavery times. She worked for colored people and white people both. That +was after she was freed until she went blind. She went blind three years +before she died. She died at the age of exactly one hundred years. She +treated women and babies. They said she was a real good doctor in her +day. That is been fifty-four years ago. [I will be fifty-four years old +tomorrow--September 18, 1938.] In slavery times my grandma was almost as +free as she was in freedom because of her work. + +"She said that Bob McClendon was cruel to her. Sometimes he'd get angry +and take the shovel and throw hot ashes on the slaves. And then he'd see +them with blisters on them and he would take a handsaw or a flat plank +and bust the blisters. Louisiana was a warm country and they wouldn't +have much clothes on. When the slaves were freed, he went completely +broke. He had scarcely a place to live. + +"I seen him once. Be look like on old possum. He had a long beard down +to his waist and he had long side burns too. Just a little of his face +showed. He was tall and stooping and he wore his hair long and uncut +down on his neck. You know about what he looked like. He had on blue +jeans pants and brogan shoes and a common shirt--a work shirt. He wore +very common clothes. When they freed the Negroes, it broke him up +completely. He had been called a 'big-to-do' in his life but he wasn't +nothing then. He owned Grandma Katy. + +"Grandma Katy had a sister named Maria and a brother named Peter. He +owned all three of them. I have seen all of them. Grandma Katy was the +oldest. She and Uncle Peter stayed close together. He didn't have no +wife and she didn't have no husband. But Aunt Maria had a husband. She +lived off from them after freedom. It was about twelve miles away. My +great-aunt and great-uncle--they were Maria and Peter--that was what +they were. Uncle Peter died first before I left Louisiana, but Aunt +Maria and Grandma Katy died after I came to Arkansas. Grandma Katy lived +four years after I came here. + +"After they was free and my father had gotten large enough to work and +didn't have no horse, my grandma was going 'round waiting on women--that +is all she did--all the rest of the people had gotten large and left +home. Papa made a crop with a hoe. He made three bales of cotton and +about twelve loads of corn with that hoe. He used to tell me, 'You don't +know nothin' 'bout work. You oughter see how I had to work.' After that +he bought him a horse. Money was scarce then and it took something to +buy the place and the horse both. They were turned loose from slavery +without anything. Hardly had a surname--just Katy, Maria, and Peter. + +"I knew more about the slave-time history of my mother's folks than I +did about my father's but I'll tell you that some other time. My +grandmother on my mother's side was born in Richmond, Virginia. She was +owned by a doctor but I can't call his name. She gets her name from her +husband's owners. They came from Virginia. They didn't take the name of +their owners in Louisiana. They took the name of the owners in Virginia. +She was a twin--her twin was a boy named June and her name was Hetty. +Her master kept her brother to be a driver for him. She was sent from +Virginia to Louisiana to people that were related to her Virginia +people. She called her Louisiana mistress 'White Ma;' she never did call +her 'missis.' The white folks and the colored folks too called her +Indian because she was mixed with Choctaw. That's the Indian that has +brown spots on the jaw. They're brownskin. It was an Indian from the +Oklahoma reservation that said my mother belonged to the Choctaws. + +"She rode from Virginia to Louisiana on a boat at the age of twelve +years. She was separated from her mother and brothers and sisters and +never did see them again. She was kept in the house for a nurse. She was +not a midwife. She nursed the white babies. That was what she was sent +to Louisiana for--to nurse the babies. The Louisiana man that owned her +was named George Dorkins. But I think this white woman came from +Virginia. She married this Louisiana man, then sent back to her father's +house and got grandma; she got her for a nurse. She worked only a year +and a half in the field before peace was declared. After she got grown +and married, my grandfather--she had to stay with him and cook and keep +house for him. That was during slavery time but after George Dorkins +died. Dorkins went and got hisself a barrel of whiskey--one of these +great big old barrels--and set it up in his house, and put a faucet in +it and didn't do nothin' but drink whiskey. He said he was goin' to +drink hisself to death. And he did. + +"He was young enough to go to war and he said he would drink hisself to +death before he would go, and he did. My grandma used to steal +newspapers out of his house and take them down to the quarters and leave +them there where there were one or two slaves that could read and tell +how the War was goin' on. I never did learn how the slaves learned to +read. But she was in the house and she could steal the papers and send +them down. Later she could slip off and they would tell her the news, +and then she could slip the papers back. + +"Her master drank so much he couldn't walk without falling and she would +have to help him out. Her mistress was really good. She never allowed +the overseer to whip her. She was only whipped once in slave time while +my father's mother was whipped more times than you could count. + +"Her master often said, 'I'll drink myself to death before I'll go to +war and be shot down like a damn target.' She said in living with them +in the house, she learned to cuss from him. She said she was a cussin' +soul until she became a Christian. She wasn't 'fraid of them because she +was kin to them in some way. There was another woman there who was some +kin to them and she looked enough like my grandma for them to be kin to +each other. We talked it over several times and said we believed we were +related; but none of us know for sure. + +"When the slaves wanted something said they would have my grandma say it +because they knew she wouldn't be whipped for it. 'White Ma' wouldn't +let nobody whip her if she knew it. She cussed the overseer out that +time for whipping her. + +"When grandma was fourteen or fifteen years old they locked her up in +the seed house once or twice for not going to church. You see they let +the white folks go to the church in the morning and the colored folks in +the evening, and my grandma didn't always want to go. She would be +locked up in the seed bin and she would cuss the preacher out so he +could hear her. She would say, 'Master, let us out.' And he would say, +'You want to go to church?' And she would say, 'No, I don't want to hear +that same old sermon: "Stay out of your missis' and master's hen house. +Don't steal your missis' and master's chickens. Stay out of your missis' +and master's smokehouse. Don't steal your missis' and master's hams." I +don't steal nothing. Don't need to tell me not to.' + +"She was tellin' the truth too. She didn't steal because she didn't have +to. She had plenty without stealin'! She got plenty to eat in the house. +But the other slaves didn't git nothin' but fat meat and corn bread and +molasses. And they got tired of that same old thing. They wanted +something else sometimes. They'd go to the hen house and get chickens. +They would go to the smokehouse and get hams and lard. And they would +get flour and anything else they wanted and they would eat something +they wanted. There wasn't no way to keep them from it. + +"The reason she got whipped that time, the overseer wanted her to help +get a tree off the fence that had been blown down by a storm. She told +him that wasn't her work and she wasn't goin' to do it. Old miss was +away at that time. He hit her a few licks and she told old miss when she +came back. Old 'White Ma' told the overseer, 'Don't never put your hands +on her no more no matter what she does. That's more than I do. I don't +hit her and you got no business to do it.' + +"Her husband, my grandfather, was a blacksmith, and he never did work in +the field. He made wagons, plows, plowstocks, buzzard wings--they call +them turning plows now. They used to make and put them on the stocks. He +made anything-handles, baskets. He could fill wagon wheels. He could +sharpen tools. Anything that come under the line of blacksmith, that is +what he did. He used to fix wagons all the time I knowed him. In harvest +time in the fall he would drive from Bienville where they were slaves to +Monroe in Ouachita Parish. He kept all the plows and was sharpening and +fixing anything that got broke. He said he never did get no whipping. + +"His name was Tom Eldridge. They called him 'Uncle Tom'. They was the +mother and father of twelve children. Six lived and six died. One boy +and five girls lived. And one girl and five boys died--half and half. He +died at the age of seventy-five, June 6, 1908. She died January 1920. + +"I came out here in January 1907. I lived in Pine Bluff. From Louisiana +I came to Pine Bluff in 1906. In 1907 I went to Kerr in Lonoke County +and lived there eight years and then I came to Little Rock. I farmed at +Kerr and just worked 'round town those few months in Pine Bluff. +Excusing the time I was in Pine Bluff and Little Rock I farmed. I farmed +in Ouachita Parish, Louisiana." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Nannie P. Madden + West Memphis, Arkansas +Age: 69 + + +"I am Martha Johnson's sister. I was born at Lake Village, Arkansas. I +am 69 years old. I was born on Mr. Ike Wethingtons place. Pa was +renting. Mother died in 1876 on this farm. We called it Red Leaf +plantation. Father died at Martha Johnson's here in West Memphis when he +was 88 years old. + +"Mother was not counted a slave. Her master's Southern wife (white wife) +disliked her very much but kept her till her death. Mother had three +white children by her master. After freedom she married a black man and +had four children by him. We are in the last set. + +"We was born after slavery and all we know is from hearing our people +talk. Father talked all time about slavery. He was a soldier. I couldn't +tell you straight. I can give you some books on slavery: + + Booker T. Washington's Own Story of His Life and Work, + 64 page supplement, by Albon L. Holsey + + Authentic Edition--in office of Library of Congress, + Washington, D.C., 1915, copywrighted by J.L. Nichols + Co. + + The Master Mind of a Child of Slavery--Booker T. Washington, + by Frederick E. Drinker, Washington, D.C. + +I have read them both. Yes, they are my own books. + +"I farmed and cooked all my life." + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Perry Madden, Thirteenth Street, south side, + one block east of Boyle Park Road, Route 6, + Care L.G. Cotton, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: About 79 + + +Birth and Age + +"I have been here quite a few years. This life is short. A man ought to +prepare for eternity. I had an uncle who used to say that a person who +went to torment stayed as long as there was a grain of sand on the sea. + +"I was a little boy when slavery broke. I used to go out with my +brother. He watched gaps. I did not have to do anything; I just went out +with him to keep him company. I was scared of the old master. I used to +call him the 'Big Bear.' He was a great big old man. + +"I was about six years old when the War ended, I guess. I don't know how +old I am. The insurance men put me down as seventy-three. I know I was +here in slavery time, and I was just about six years old when the War +ended. + + +Schooling + +"I got my first learning in Alabama. I didn't learn anything at all in +slavery times. I went to school. I would go to the house in slavery +tine, and there wouldn't be nobody home, and I would go to the bed and +get under it because I was scared. When I would wake up it would be way +in the night and dark, and I would be in bed. + +"I got my schooling way after the surrender. We would make crops. The +third time we moved, dad started me to school. I had colored teachers. I +was in Talladega County. I made the fifth grade before I stopped. My +father died and then I had to stop and take care of my mother. + + +An "Aunt Caroline" Story + +"I know that some people can tell things that are goin' to happen. Old +man Julks lived at Pumpkin Bend. He had a colt that disappeared. He went +to 'Aunt Caroline'--that's Caroline Dye. She told him just where the +colt was and who had it and how he had to get it back. She described the +colt and told him that was what he come to find out about before he had +a chance to ask her anything. She told him that white people had it and +told him where they lived and told him he would have to have a white man +go and git it for him. He was working for a good man and he told him +about it. He advertised for the colt and the next day, the man that +stole it came and told him that a colt had been found over on his place +and for him to come over and arrange to git it. But he said, 'No, I've +placed that matter in the hands of my boss.' He told his boss about it, +but the fellow brought the horse and give it to the boss without any +argument. + + +Family and Masters + +"My old master's slaves were called free niggers. He and his wife never +mistreated their slaves. When any of Madden's slaves were out and the +pateroles got after them, if they could make it home, that ended it. +Nobody beat Madden's niggers. + +"My father's name was Allen Madden and my mother's name was Amy Madden. +I knew my grandfather and grandmother on my mother's side. My +grandfather and grandmother never were 'round me though that I can +remember. + +"When the old man died, the Negroes were divided out. This boy got so +many and that one got so many. The old man, Mabe Madden, had two sons, +John and Little Mabe. My mother and father went to John. They were in +Talladega because John stayed there. + +"My father's mother and father fell to Little Mabe Madden. They never +did come to Alabama but I have heard my father talk about them so much. +My father's father was named Harry. His last name must have been Madden. + +"My grandfather on my mother's side was named Charlie Hall. He married +into the Madden family. He belonged to the Halls before he married. Old +man Charlie, his master, had a plantation that wasn't far from the +Madden's plantation. In those days, if you met a girl and fell in love +with her, you could git a pass and go to see her if you wanted to. You +didn't have to be on the same plantation at all. And you could marry her +and go to see her, and have children by her even though you belonged to +different masters. The Maddens never did buy Hall. Grandma never would +change her name to Hall. He stayed at my house after we married, stayed +with me sometimes, and stayed with his other son sometimes. + +"My mother was born a Madden. She was born right at Madden's place. When +grandma married Hall, like it is now, she would have been called Hall. +But she was born a Madden and stayed Madden and never did change to her +husband's name. So my mother was born a Madden although her father's +name was Hall. + +"I don't know what sort of man Mabe was, and I only know what my parents +said about John. They said he was a good man and I have to say what they +said. He didn't let nobody impose on his niggers. Pateroles did git +after them and bring them in with the hounds, but when they got in, that +settled it. Madden never would allow white people to beat on his +niggers. + +"They tried to git my daddy out so that they could whip him, but they +couldn't catch him. They shot him--the pateroles did--but he whipped +them. My daddy was a coon. I mean he was a good man. + + +Early Life + +"My brother was big enough to mind gaps. That was in slavery times. They +had good fences around the field. They didn't have gates like they do +now. They had gaps. The fence would zigzag, and the rails could be +lifted down at one section, and that would leave a gap. If you left a +gap, the stock would go into the field. When there was a gap, my brother +would stay in it and keep the stock from passing. When the folks would +come to dinner, he would go in and eat dinner with them just as big as +anybody. When they would leave, the gap would stay down till night. It +stayed down from morning till noon and from one o'clock till the men +come in at night. The gap was a place in the rails like I told you where +they could take down the rails to pass. It took time to lay the rails +down and more time to place then back up again. They wouldn't do it. +They would leave them down till they come back during the work hours and +a boy that was too small to do anything else was put to mind them. My +brother used to do that and I would keep him company. When I heard old +master coming there, I'd be gone, yes siree. I would see him when he +left the house and when he got to the gap, I would be home or at my +grandfather's. + + +Occupational Experiences + +"I have followed farming all my life. That is the sweetest life a man +can lead. I have been farming all my life principally. My occupation is +farming. That is it was until I lost my health. I ain't done nothin' for +about four years now. I would follow public work in the fall of the year +and make a crop every year. Never failed till I got disabled. I used to +make all I used and all I needed to feed my stock. I even raised my own +wheat before I left home in Alabama. That is a wheat country. They don't +raise it out here.[HW: ?] + +"I came here--lemme see, about how many years ago did I come here. I +guess I have been in Arkansas about twenty-eight years since the first +time I come here. I have gone in and out as I got a chance to work +somewheres. I have been living in this house about three years. + +"I preached for about twenty or more years. I don't know that I call +myself a preacher. I am a pretty good talker sometimes. I have never +pastored a church; somehow or 'nother the word come to me to go and I go +and talk. I ain't no pulpit chinch. I could have taken two or three +men's churches out from under them, but I didn't. + + +Freedom and Soldiers + +"I can't remember just how my father got freed. Old folks then didn't +let you stan' and listen when they talked. If you did it once, you +didn't do it again. They would talk while they were together, but the +children would have business outdoors. Yes siree, I never heard them say +much about how they got freedom. + +"I was there when the Yankees come through. That was in slave time. They +marched right through old man Madden's grove. They were playing the +fifes and beating the drums. And they were playing the fiddle. Yes sir, +they were playing the fiddle too. It must have been a fiddle; it sounded +just like one. The soldiers were all just a singin'. They didn't bother +nobody at our house. If they bothered anything, nothing was told me +about it. I heard my uncle say they took a horse from my old manager. I +didn't see it. They took the best horse in the lot my uncle said. Pardon +me, they didn't take him. A peckerwood took him and let the Yankees get +him. I have heard that they bothered plenty of other places. Took the +best mules, and left old broken down ones and things like that. Broke +things up. I have heard that about other places, but I didn't see any of +it. + + +Right after the War + +"Right after the War, my father went to farming--renting land. I mean he +sharecropped and done around. Thing is come way up from then when the +Negroes first started. They didn't have no stock nor nothin' then. They +made a crop just for the third of it. When they quit the third, they +started givin' them two-fifths. That's more than a third, ain't it? Then +they moved up from that, and give them half, and they are there yet. If +you furnish, they give you two-thirds and take one-third. Or they give +you so much per acre or give him produce in rent. + + +Marriage + +"I was married in 1883. My wife's name was Mary Elston. Her mother died +when she was an infant. Her grandmother was an Elston at first. Then she +changed her name to Cunningham. But she always went in the name of +Elston, and was an Elston when she married me. My wife I mean. I married +on a Thursday in the Christmas week. This December I will be married +fifty-five years. This is the only wife I have ever had. We had three +children and all of them are dead. All our birthed children are dead. +One of them was just three months old when he died. My baby girl had +three children and she lived to see all of them married. + + +Opinions + +"Our own folks is about the worst enemies we have. They will come and +sweet talk you and then work against you. I had a fellow in here not +long ago who came here for a dollar, and I never did hear from him again +after he got it. He couldn't get another favor from me. No man can fool +me more than one time. I have been beat out of lots of money and I have +got hurt trying to help people. + +"The young folks now is just gone astray. I tell you the truth, I +wouldn't give you forty cents a dozen for these young folks. They are +sassy and disrespectful. Don't respect themselves and nobody else. When +they get off from home, they'll respect somebody else better 'n they +will their own mothers. + +"If they would do away with this stock law, they would do better +everywhere. If you would say fence up your place and raise what you +want, I could get along. But you have to keep somebody to watch your +stock. If you don't, you'll have to pay something out. It's a bad old +thing this stock law. It's detrimental to the welfare of man." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Lewis Mann + 1501 Bell Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 81 + + +"As nigh as I can come at it, I was bout five or six time of the war. I +remember when the war ceasted. I was a good-sized chap. + +"Durin' the war my mother's master sent us to Texas; western Texas is +whar they stopped me. We stayed there two years and then they brought us +back after surrender. + +"I remember when the war ceasted and remember the soldiers refugeein' +through the country. I'm somewhar round eighty-one. I'm tellin' you the +truf. I ain't just now come here. + +"I was born right here in Arkansas. My mother's master was old B.D. +Williams of Tennessee and we worked for his son Mac H. Williams here in +Arkansas. They was good to my mother. Always had nurses for the colored +childrun while the old folks was in the field. + +"After the war I used to work in the house for my white folks--for Dr. +Bob Williams way up there in the country on the river. I stayed with his +brother Mac Williams might near twenty-five or thirty years. Worked +around the house servin' and doin' arrands different places. + +"I went to school a little bit a good piece after the war and learned to +read and write. + +"I've heard too much of the Ku Klux. I remember when they was Ku Kluxin' +all round through here. + +"Lord! I don't know how many times I ever voted. I used to vote every +time they had an election. I voted before I could read. The white man +showed me how to vote and asked me who I wanted to vote for. Oh Lord, I +was might near grown when I learned to read. + +"I been married just one time in my life and my wife's been dead +thirteen years. + +"I tell you, Miss, I don't know hardly what to think of things now. +Everything so changeable I can't bring nothin' to remembrance to hold +it. + +"I didn't do nothin' when I was young but just knock around with the +white folks. Oh Lord, when I was young I delighted in parties. Don't +nothin' like that worry me now. Don't go to no parades or nothin'. Don't +have that on my brain like I did when I was young. I goes to church all +the place I does go. + +"I ain't never had no accident. Don't get in the way to have no accident +cause I know the age I is if I injure these bones there ain't anything +more to me. + +"My mother had eight childrun and just my sister and me left. I can't do +a whole day's work to save my life. I own this place and my +sister-in-law gives me a little somethin' to eat. I used to be on the +bureau but they took me off that." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Angeline Martin, Kansas City, Missouri + Visiting at 1105 Louisiana St., Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age 80 + + +"Well, I was livin' then. I was born in Georgia. Honey, I don't know +what year. I was born before the war. I was about ten when freedom come. +I don't remember when it started but I remember when it ended. I think +I'm in the 80's--that's the way I count it. + +"My master was dead and my mistress was a widow--Miss Sarah Childs. She +had a guardeen. + +"When the war come, old mistress and her daughter refugeed to +Mississippi. The guardeen wouldn't let me go, said I was too young. + +"My parents stayed on the plantation. My white folks' house was vacant +and the Yankees come and used it for headquarters. They never had put +shoes on me and when the Yankees shot the chickens I'd run and get em. +They didn't burn up nothin', just kill the hogs and chickens and give us +plenty. + +"I didn't know what the war was about. You know chillun in them days +didn't have as much sense as they got now. + +"After freedom, my folks stayed on the place and worked on the shares. I +want to school right after the war. I went every year till we left +there. We come to this country in seventy something. We come here and +stopped at the Cummins place. I worked in the field till I come to town +bout fifty years ago. Since then I cooked some and done laundry work. + +"I married when I was seventeen. Had six children. I been livin' in +Kansas City twenty-three years. Followed my boy up there. I like it up +there a lot better than I do here. Oh lord, yes, there are a lot of +colored people in Kansas City." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Josie Martin + R.F.D., Madison, Arkansas +Age: 86 + + +"I was born up near Cotton Plant but took down near Helena to live. My +parents named Sallie and Bob Martin. They had seven children. I heard +mother say she was sold on a block in Mississippi when she was twelve +years old. My father was a Creek Indian; he was dark. Mother was a +Choctaw Indian; she was bright. Mother died when I was but a girl and +left a family on my hands. I sent my baby brother and sister to school +and I cooked on a boarding train. The railroad hands working on the +tracks roomed and et on the train. They are all dead now and I'm 'lone +in the world. + +"My greatest pleasure was independence--make my money, go and spend it +as I see fit. I wasn't popular with men. I never danced. I did sell +herbs for diarrhea and piles and 'what ails you.' I don't sell no more. +Folks too close to drug stores now. I had long straight hair nearly to +my knees. It come out after a spell of typhoid fever. It never come in +to do no good." (Baldheaded like a man and she shaves. She is a +hermaphrodite, reason for never marrying.) "I made and saved up at one +time twenty-three thousand dollars cooking and field work. I let it slip +out from me in dribs. + +"I used to run from the Yankees. I've seen them go in droves along the +road. They found old colored couple, went out, took their hog and made +them barbecue it. They drove up a stob, nailed a piece to a tree stacked +their guns. They rested around till everything was ready. They et at one +o'clock at night and after the feast drove on. They wasn't so good to +Negroes. They was good to their own feelings. They et up all that old +couple had to eat in their house and the pig they raised. I reckon their +owners give them more to eat. They lived off alone and the soldiers +stopped there and worked the old man and woman nearly to death. + +"Our master told us about freedom. His name was Master Martin. He come +here from Mississippi. I don't recollect his family. + +"I get help from the Welfare. I had paralysis. I never got over my +stroke. I ain't no 'count to work." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Bess Mathis, Hazen, Arkansas +Age: 82 + + +"I was born in De Sota County, Mississippi. My parents' owners was Mars +Hancock. Mama was a cook and field hand. Papa milked and worked in the +field. Mama had jes' one child, that me. I had six childern. I got five +livin'. They knowed they free. It went round from mouth to mouth. Mama +said Mars Hancock was good er slave holder as ever lived she recken. I +heard her come over that er good many times. But they wanted to be free. +I jes' heard em talk bout the Ku Klux. They said the Ku Klux made lot of +em roamin' round go get a place to live and start workin'. They tell how +they would ride at night and how scarry lookin' they was. I heard em say +if Mars Hancock didn't want to give em meat they got tree a coon or +possum. Cut the tree down or climb it and then come home and cook it. +They had no guns. They had dogs or could get one. Game helps out lots. + +"The women chewed for their children after they weaned em. They don't +none of em do that way now. Women wouldn't cut the baby's finger nails. +They bite em off. They said if you cut its nails off he would steal. +They bite its toe nails off, too. And if they wanted the children to +have long pretty hair, they would trim the ends off on the new of the +moon. That would cause the hair to grow long. White folks and darkies +both done them things. + +"I been doin' whatever come to hand--farmin', cookin', washin', ironin'. + +"I never expects to vote neither. I sure ain't voted. + +"Conditions pretty bad sometimes. I don't know what cause it. You got +beyond me now. I don't know what going become of the young folks, and +they ain't studyin' it. They ain't kind. Got no raisin' I call it. I +tried to raise em to work and behave. They work some. My son is takin' +care of me now." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Caroline Matthews + 812 Spruce Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 79 + + +"Yes'm, I was born in slavery times in Mississippi. Now, the only thing +I remember was some soldiers come along on some mules. I remember my +mother and father was sittin' on the gallery and they say, 'Look a +there, them's soldiers.' + +"And I remember when my parents run off. I was with 'em and I cried for +'em to tote me. + +"My mother's first owner was named Armstrong. She said she was about +eleven years old when he bought her. I heard her say they just changed +around a lot. + +"Freedom was comin' and her last owners had carried her to a state where +it hadn't come yet. That's right--it was Texas. + +"Her first owners was good. She said they wouldn't 'low the overseer to +'buke the women at all. + +"But her last owners was cruel. She said one day old missis was out in +the yard and backed up and fell into a pan of hot water and when her +husband come she told him and he tried to 'buke my mother. You know if +somebody tryin' to get the best of you and you can help yourself, you +gwine do it. So mama throwed up her arm and old master hit it with a +stick and cut it bad. So my parents run off. That was in Texas. + +"She said we was a year comin' back and I know they stopped at the +Dillard place and made a crop. And they lost one child on the way--that +was Kittie. + +"I heard mama say they got back here to Arkansas and got to the bureau +and they freed 'em. I know the War wasn't over yet 'cause I know I heard +mama say, 'Just listen to them guns at Vicksburg.' + +"When I was little, I was so sickly. I took down with the whoopin' cough +and I was sick so long. But mama say to the old woman what stayed with +me, 'This gal gwine be here to see many a winter 'cause she so stout in +the jaws I can't give her no medicine.' + +"When I commenced to remember anything, I heered 'em talkin' 'bout Grant +and Colfax. Used to wear buttons with Grant and Colfax. + +"But I was livin' in Abraham Lincoln's time. Chillun them days didn't +know nothin'. Why, woman, I was twelve years old 'fore I knowed babies +didn't come out a holler log. I used to go 'round lookin' in logs for a +baby. + +"I had seven sisters and three brothers and they all dead but me. Had +three younger than me. They was what they called freeborn chillun. + +"After freedom my parents worked for Major Ross. I know when mama fixed +us up to go to Sunday-school we'd go by Major Ross for him to see us. I +know we'd go so early, sometimes he'd still be in his drawers. + +"I know one thing--when I was about sixteen years old things was good +here. Ever'body had a good living." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Malindy Maxwell, Madison, Arkansas +Age: Up in 80's + + +"I was born close to Como and Sardis, Mississippi. My master and +mistress was Sam Shans and Miss Cornelia Shans. I was born a slave. They +owned mama and Master Rube Sanders owned pa. Neither owner wouldn't sell +but they agreed to let ma and pa marry. They had a white preacher and +they married out in the yard and had a big table full of weddin' supper, +and the white folks et in the house. They had a big supper too. Ma said +they had a big crowd. The preacher read the ceremony. Miss Cornelia give +her a white dress and white shoes and Miss Cloe Wilburn give her a veil. +Miss Cloe was some connection of Rube Sanders. + +"They had seven children. I'm the oldest--three of us living. + +"After 'mancipation pa went to see about marrying ma over agen and they +told him that marriage would stand long as ever he lived. + +"Mama was sold at twelve years old in Atlanta, Georgia. Ma and pa was +always field hands. Grandma got to be one of John Sanders' leading hands +to work mong the women folks. They said John Sanders was meanest man +ever lived or died. According to pa's saying, Mars Ruben was a good +sorter man. Pa said John Sanders was too mean a man to have a wife. He +was mean to Miss Sarah. They said he beat her, his wife, like he beat a +nigger woman. + +"Miss Sarah say, 'Come get your rations early Saturday morning, clean up +your house, wash and iron, and we'll go to preaching tomorrow--Sunday. I +want you to all come out clean Monday morning.' They go ask Mars John +Sanders if they could go to preaching. I recken from what they said they +walked. Mars John, when they git their best clothes on, make them turn +round and go to the field and work all day long. He was just that mean. +Work all day long Sunday. + +"Miss Sarah was a Primitive Baptist and that is what I am till this day. +Some folks call us Hardshell Baptist. The colored folks set in the back +of the church. The women all set on one side and the men on the other. +If they had a middle row, there was a railing dividing mens' seats from +the womens' seats on the very same benches. + +"Miss Cloe, Miss Cornelia, and Miss Sarah cook up a whole lot of good +things to eat and go to camp meeting. Sometimes they would stay a week +and longer. They would take time bout letting the colored folks go long. +We had big times. My grandpa took a gingercake cutter with him and sold +gingercakes when they come out of the church. He could keep that money +his own. I don't know how he sold them. My sister has the cutter now I +expect. My girl has seen it. It was a foot long, this wide (5 inches), +and fluted all around the edges, and had a handle like a biscuit cutter. +They was about an inch thick. He made good ones and he sold all he could +ever make. Grandpa took carpet sacks to carry his gingercakes in to sell +them. I remember that mighty well. (The shape of the cutter was like +this: [Illustration].) He purt nigh always got to go to all the camp +meetings. Folks got happy and shouted in them days. It would be when +somebody got religion. At some big meetings they didn't shout. + +"When I was born they had a white mid-wife, Miss Martin. My mistress was +in the cabin when I was born. I was born foot foremost and had a veil on +my face and down on my body a piece. They call it a 'caul.' Sometimes I +see forms and they vanish. I can see some out of one eye now. But I've +always seen things when my sight was good. It is like when you are +dreaming at night but I see them at times that plain in day. + +"I don't know how old I am but I was a good size girl when 'mancipation +come on. Miss Cornelia had my age in her Bible. They done took me from +the cabin and I was staying at the house. I slept on a trundle bed under +Miss Cornelia's bed. Her bed was a teaster--way high up, had a big stool +to step on to go up in there and she had it curtained off. I had a good +cotton bed and I slept good up under there. Her bed was corded with sea +grass rope. It didn't have no slats like beds do now. + +"Colored folks slept on cotton beds and white folks--some of em at +least--picked geese and made feather beds and down pillows. They carded +and washed sheep's wool and put in their quilts. Some of them, they'd be +light and warm. Colored folks' bed had one leg. Then it was holes hewed +in the wall on the other three sides and wooden slats across it. Now +that wasn't no bad bed. Some of them was big enough for three to sleep +on good. When the children was small four could sleep easy cross ways, +and they slept that way. + +"They had shelves and tables and chairs. They made chests and put things +in there and set on top of it too. White folks had fine chests to keep +their bed clothes in. Some of them was made of oak, and pine, and +cypress. They would cook walnut hulls and bark and paint them dark with +the tea. + +"I recollect a right smart of the Civil War. We was close nough to hear +the roar and ramble and the big cannons shake the things in the house. I +don't know where they was fighting--a long ways off I guess. + +"I saw the soldiers scouting. They come most any time. They go in and +take every drop of milk out of the churn. They took anything they could +find and went away with it. I seen the cavalry come through. I thought +they looked so pretty. Their canteens was shining in the sun. Miss +Cornelia told me to hide, the soldiers might take me on with them. I +didn't want to go. I was very well pleased there at Miss Cornelia's. + +"I seen the cavalry come through that raised the 'white sheet.' I know +now it must have been a white flag but they called it a white sheet to +quit fighting. It was raised a short time after they passed and they +said they was the ones raised it. I don't know where it was. I reckon it +was a big white flag they rared up. It was so they would stop fighting. + +"Mars Sam Shan didn't go to no war; he hid out. He said it was a useless +war, he wasn't going to get shot up for no use a tall, and he never went +a step. He hid out. I don't know where. I know Charles would take the +baskets off. Charles tended to the stock and the carriage. He drove the +wagon and carriage. He fetched water and wood. He was a black boy. Mars +Sam Shan said he wasn't goiner loose his life for nothing. + +"Miss Cornelia would cook corn light bread and muffins and anything else +they had to cook. Rations got down mighty scarce before it was done wid. +They put the big round basket nearly big as a split cotton basket out on +the back portico. Charles come and disappear with it. + +"Chess and Charles was colored overseers. He didn't have white +overseers. Miss Cornelia and Miss Cloe would walk the floor and cry and +I would walk between. I would cry feeling sorry for them, but I didn't +know why they cried so much. I know now it was squally times. War is +horrible. + +"Mars Sam Shan come home, went down to the cabins--they was scattered +over the fields--and told them the War was over, they was free but that +they could stay. Then come some runners, white men. They was Yankee men. +I know that now. They say you must get pay or go off. We stayed that +year. Another man went to pa and said he would give him half of what he +made. He got us all up and we went to Pleasant Hill. We done tolerable +well. + +"Then he tried to buy a house and five acres and got beat out of it. The +minor heirs come and took it. I never learnt in books till I went to +school. Seem like things was in a confusion after I got big nough for +that. I'd sweep and rake and cook and wash the dishes, card, spin, hoe, +scour the floors and tables. I would knit at night heap of times. We'd +sing some at night. + +"Colored folks couldn't read so they couldn't sing at church lessen they +learnt the songs by hearing them at home. Colored folks would meet and +sing and pray and preach at the cabins. + +"My first teacher was a white man, Mr. Babe Willroy. I went to him +several short sessions and on rainy days and cold days I couldn't work +in the field. I worked in the field all my life. Cook out in the winter, +back to the field in the spring till fall again. + +"Well, I jes' had this one girl. I carried her along with me. She would +play round and then she was a heap of help. She is mighty good to me +now. + +"I never seen a Ku Klux in my life. Now, I couldn't tell you about them. + +"My parents' names was Lou Sanders and Anthony Sanders. Ma's mother was +a Rockmore and her husband was a Cherokee Indian. I recollect them well. +He was a free man and was fixing to buy her freedom. Her young mistress +married Mr. Joe Bues and she heired her. Mr. Joe Bues drunk her up and +they come and got her and took her off. They run her to Memphis before +his wife could write to her pa. He was Mars Rockmore. + +"Grandma was put on a block and sold fore grandpa could cumerlate nough +cash to buy her for his wife. Grandma never seen her ma no more. Grandpa +followed her and Mr. Sam Shans bought her and took her to Mississippi +with a lot more he bought. + +"My pa's ma b'long to John Sanders and grandpa b'long to Rube Sanders. +They was brothers. Rube Sanders bought grandpa from Enoch Bobo down in +Mississippi. The Bobo's had a heap of slaves and land. Now, he was the +one that sold gingercakes. He was a blacksmith too. Both my grandpas was +blacksmiths but my Indian grandpa could make wagons, trays, bowls, +shoes, and things out of wood too. Him being a free man made his living +that way. But he never could cumolate enough to buy grandma. + +"My other grandma was blacker than I am and grandpa too. When grandpa +died he was carried back to the Bobo graveyard and buried on Enoch +Bobo's place. It was his request all his slaves be brought back and +buried on his land. I went to the burying. I recollect that but ma and +pa had to ask could we go. We all got to go--all who wanted to go. It +was a big crowd. It was John Sanders let us go mean as he was. + +"Miss Cornelia had the cistern cleaned out and they packed up their +pretty china dishes and silver in a big flat sorter box. Charles took +them down a ladder to the bottom of the dark cistern and put dirt over +it all and then scattered some old rubbish round, took the ladder out. +The Yankees never much as peared to see that old open cistern. I don't +know if they buried money or not. They packed up a lot of nice things. +It wasn't touched till after the War was over. + +"I been farming and cooking all my life. I worked for Major Black, Mr. +Ben Tolbert, Mr. Williams at Pleasant Hill, Mississippi. I married and +long time after come to Arkansas. They said you could raise stock +here--no fence law. + +"I get $8 and commodities because I am blind. I live with my daughter +here." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Nellie Maxwell, Biscoe, Arkansas +Age: 63 + + +"Mama was Harriett Baldwin. She was born in Virginia. Her owners was +Mistress Mollie Fisher and Master Coon Fisher. It was so cold one winter +that they burned up their furniture keeping a fire. Said seemed like +they would freeze in spite of what all they could do. + +"Grandpa was sold away from grandma and three children. He didn't want +to be sold nary bit. When they would be talking about selling him he go +hide under the house. They go on off. He'd come out. When he was sold he +went under there. He come out and went on off when they found him and +told him he was sold to this man. Grandma said he was obedient. They +never hit him. He was her best husband. They never sold grandma and she +couldn't 'count for him being let go. Grandma had another husband after +freedom and two more children. They left there in a crowd and all come +to Arkansas. Grandma was a cook for the field hands. She had charge of +ringing a big dinner-bell hung up in a tree. She was black as charcoal. +Mama and grandma said Master Coon and old Mistress Mollie was good to +them. That the reason grandpa would go under the house. He didn't want +to be sold. He never was seen no more by them. + +"Grandma said sometimes the meals was carried to the fields and they fed +the children out of troughs. They took all the children to the spring +set them in a row. They had a tubful of water and they washed them dried +them and put on their clean clothes. They used homemade lye soap and +greased them with tallow and mutton suet. That made them shine. They +kept them greased so their knees and knuckles would ruff up and bleed. + +"Grandma and mama stopped at Fourche Dam. They was so glad to be free +and go about. Then it scared them to hear talk of being sold. It divided +them and some owners was mean. + +"In my time if I done wrong most any grown person whoop me. Then mama +find it out, she give me another one. I got a double whooping. + +"Times is powerful bad to raise up a family. Drinking and gambling, and +it takes too much to feed a family now. Times is so much harder that way +then when I was growing." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Sallie C. Miller +Person interviewed: Ann May, Clarksville, Arkansas +Age: 82 + + +"I was born at Cabin Creek (Lamar now, but I still call it Cabin Creek. +I can't call it anything else). I was sold with my mother when I was a +little girl and lived with our white folks until after the war and was +freed. We lived on a farm. My father belong to another family, a +neighbor of ours. We all lived with the white folks. My mother took care +of all of them. They was always as good as they could be to us and after +the war we stayed on with the white folks who owned my father and worked +on the farm for him. His master gave us half of everything we made until +we could get started our selves, then our white folks told my father to +homestead a place near him, and he did. We lived there until after +father died. We paid taxes and lived just like the white folks. We did +what the white folks told us to do and never lost a thing by doing it. +After I married my husband worked at the mill for your father and made a +living for me and I worked for the white folks. Now I am too old to cook +but I have a few washin's for the white folks and am getting my old age +pension that helps me a lot. + +"I don't know what I think about the young generation. I aim at my +stopping place. + +"The songs we sang were + + 'Come ye that love the Lord and let your Joys be known' + 'When You and I Were Young, Maggie' + 'Juanita' + 'Just Before the Battle, Mother' + 'Darling Nellie Gray' + 'Carry Me Back to Old Virginia' + 'Old Black Joe' + +Of course we sang 'Dixie.' We had to sing that, it was the leading +song." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Joe Mayes, Madison, Arkansas +Age: ? + + +"I was born a slave two years. I never will forget man come and told +mother she was free. She cooked. She never worked in the field till +after freedom. In a few days another man come and made them leave. They +couldn't hold them in Kentucky. The owners give her provisions, meat, +lasses, etc. They give her her clothes. She had four children and I was +her youngest. The two oldest was girls. Father was dead. I don't +remember him. Mother finally made arrangements to go to Will Bennett's +place. + +"Another thing I remember: Frank Hayes sold mother to Isaac Tremble +after she was free. She didn't know she was free. Neither did Isaac +Tremble. I don't know whether Frank Mayes was honest or not. The part I +remember was that us boys stood on the block and never was parted from +her. We had to leave our sisters. One was sold to Miss Margaret Moxley, +the other to Miss Almyra Winder. (He said "Miss" but they may have been +widows. He didn't seem to know--ed.) Father belong to a Master Mills. +All our family got together after we found out we had been freed. + +"The Ku Klux: I went to the well little after dark. It was a good piece +from our house. I looked up and saw a man with a robe and cap on. It +scared me nearly to death. I nearly fell out. I had heard about the +'booger man' and learned better then. But there he was. I had heard a +lot about Ku Klux. + +"There was a big gourd hanging up by the well. We kept it there. There +was a bucket full up. He said, 'Give me water.' I handed over the gourd +full. He done something with it. He kept me handing him water. He said, +'Hold my crown and draw me up another bucket full.' I was so scared I +lit out hard as I could run. It was dark enough to hide me when I got a +piece out of his way. + +"The owners was pretty good to mother to be slavery. She had clothes and +enough to eat all the time. I used to go back to see all our white folks +in Kentucky. They are about all dead now I expect. Mother was glad to be +free but for a long time her life was harder. + +"After we got up larger she got along better. I worked on a steamboat +twelve or thirteen years. I was a roustabout and freight picker. I was +on passenger boats mostly but they carried freight. I went to school +some. I always had colored teachers. I farmed at Hughes and Madison ever +since excepting one year in Mississippi. + +"I live alone. I get $8 and commodities from the Sociable Welfare. + +"The young folks would do better, work better, if they could get work +all time. It is hard at times to get work right now. The times is all +right. Better everything but work. I know colored folks is bad managers. +That has been bad on us always. + +"I worked on boats from Evansville, St. Louis, Memphis to New Orleans +mostly. It was hard work but a fine living. I was stout then." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Jesse Meeks + 707 Elm Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 76 +Occupation: Minister + + +"I am seventy-six. 'Course I was young in slavery times, but I can +remember some things. I remember how they used to feed us. Put milk and +bread or poke salad and corn-meal dumplin's in a trough and give you a +wooden spoon and all the children eat together. + +"We stayed with our old master fourteen years. They were good folks and +treated us right. My old master's name was Sam Meeks--in Longview, Drew +County, Arkansas, down here below Monticello. + +"I got a letter here about a month ago from the daughter of my young +mistress. I wrote to my young mistress and she was dead, so her daughter +got the letter. She answered it and sent me a dollar and asked me was I +on the Old Age Pension list. + +"As far as I know, I am the onliest one of the old darkies living that +belonged to Sam Meeks. + +"I remember when the Ku Klux run in on my old master. That was after the +War. He was at the breakfast table with his wife. You know in them days +they didn't have locks and keys. Had a hole bored through a board and +put a peg in it, and I know the Ku Klux come up and stuck a gun through +the auger hole and shot at old master but missed him. He run to the door +and shot at the Ku Klux. I know us children found one of 'em down at the +spring bathin' his leg where old master had shot him. + +"Oh! they were good folks and treated us right." + + + + +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Subject: Superstitions +Story:--Information + +This information given by: Jesse Meeks +Place of residence: 707 Elm Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Occupation: Minister +Age: 76 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] + + +"I remember there was on old man called Billy Mann lived down here at +Noble lake. He said he could 'give you a hand.' If you and your wife +wasn't gettin' along very well and you wanted to get somebody else, he +said he could 'give you a hand' and that would enable you to get anybody +you wanted. That's what he said. + +"And I've heard 'em say they could make a ring around you and you +couldn't get out. + +"I don't believe in that though 'cause I'm in the ministerial work and +it don't pay me to believe in things like that. That is the work of the +devil." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Jeff Metcalf + R.F.D., Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 73 + + +"My mother's name was Julia Metcalf and my father's name was Jim +Metcalf. They belong to an old bachelor named Bill Metcalf. I think I +was born in Lee County, Mississippi. They did not leave when the war was +over. They stayed on the Bill Metcalf place till they died. I reckon I +do remember him. + +"I can't tell you 'bout the war nor slavery. I don't know a thing 'bout +it. I heard but I couldn't tell you it been so long ago. They didn't +expect nothing but freedom. They got along in the Reconstruction days +about like they had been getting along. Seemed like they didn't know +much about the war. They heard they was free. I don't remember the Ku +Klux Klan. I heard old folks talk 'bout it. + +"I don't know if my father ever voted but I guess he did. I have voted +but I don't vote now. In part I 'proves of the women votin'. I think the +men outer vote and support his family fur as he can. + +"I come here in 1914 from Mississippi. I got busted farmin'. I knowed a +heap o' people said they was doing so well I come too. I come on the +train. + +"I ain't got no home, no land. I got a hog. No garden. Two times in the +year now is hard--winter and simmer. In some ways times is better. In +some ways they is worser. When a trade used to be made to let you have +provisions, you know you would not starve. Now if you can't get work you +'bout starve and can't get no credit. Crops been good last few years and +prices fair fur it. But money won't buy nothin' now. Everything is so +high. Meat is so high. Working man have to eat meat. If he don't he get +weak. + +"The young folks do work. They can't save much farmin'. If they could do +public work between times it be better. I had a hard time in July and +August. I got six children, they grown and gone. My wife is 72 years +old. She ain't no 'count for work no more. The Government give me an' +her $10 a month between us two. Her name is Hannah Metcalf. + +"I wish I did know somethin' to tell you, lady, 'bout the Civil War and +the slavery times. I done forgot 'bout all I heard 'em talkin'. When you +see Hannah she might know somethin'." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Hardy Miller + 702-1/2 W. Second Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 85 +Occupation: Yardman + + +"Mistress, I'll tell you what my mother said. She said she birthed me on +Christmas morning in 1852 in Sumpter County, Georgia. It was on her old +master's place. Bright Herring was his name. Old mistress' name was Miss +Lizzie. My father belonged to a different owner. + +"Mac McClendon and John Mourning was two nigger traders and they brought +my mother and sister Nancy and sister Liza and my sister Anna and Hardy +Miller--that's me--out here on the train from Americus, Georgia to +Memphis and put us on a steamboat and brought us here to Pine Bluff and +sold me to Dr. Pope. He was a poor white man and he wanted a pair of +niggers. He bought me and Laura Beckwith. In them days a doctor examined +you and if your heart was sound and your lungs was sound and you didn't +have no broken bones--have to pay one hundred dollars for every year you +was old. That was in 1862 and I was ten years old so they sold me for +one thousand dollars and one thousand dollars for Laura cause she was +sound too. Carried us down to Monticello and when I got free my mammy +come after me. + +"Fore I left Georgia, my daddy belonged to a man named Bill Ramsey. You +see niggers used the name of their masters. + +"I can remember when I was a boy Bill Ramsey set my father free and give +him a free pass and anybody hire him have to pay just like they pay a +nigger now. My daddy hired my mammy from her master. My mammy was her +master's daughter by a colored woman. + +"My daddy had a hoss named Salem and had a cart and he would take me and +my mammy and my sister Liza and go to Americus and buy rations for the +next week. + +"I member when the war started in 1861 my mammy hired me out to Mrs. +Brewer and she used to git after me and say, 'You better do that good or +I'll whip you. My husband gone to war now on account of you niggers and +it's a pity you niggers ever been cause he may get killed and I'll never +see him again.' + +"I member seein' General Bragg's men and General Steele and General +Marmaduke. Had a fight down at Mark's Mill. We just lived six miles from +there. Seen the Yankees comin' by along the big public road. The Yankees +whipped and fought em so strong they didn't have time to bury the dead. +We could see the buzzards and carrion crows. I used to hear old mistress +say, 'There goes the buzzards, done et all the meat off.' I used to go +to mill and we could see the bones. Used to got out and look at their +teeth. No ma'm, I wasn't scared, the white boys was with me. + +"Dr. Pope was good to me, better to me than he was to Master Walter and +Master Billy and my young Miss, Aurelia, cause me and Laura was scared +of em and we tried to do everything they wanted. + +"When the war ended in 1865 we was out in the field gettin' pumpkins. +Old master come out and said, 'Hardy, you and Laura is free now. You can +stay or you can go and live with somebody else.' We stayed till 1868 and +then our mammies come after us. I was seventeen. + +"After freedom my mammy sent me to school. Teacher's name was W.H. +Young. Name was William Young but he went under the head of W.H. Young. + +"I went to school four years and then I got too old. I learned a whole +lot. Learned to read and spell and figger. I done pretty good. I learned +how to add and multiply and how to cancel and how to work square root. + +"What I've been doin' all my life is farmin' down at Fairfield on the +Murphy place. + +"Vote? Good lord! I done more votin'. Voted for all the Presidents. +Yankees wouldn't let us vote Democrat, had to vote Republican. They'd be +there agitatin'. Stand right there and tell me the ones to vote for. I +done quit votin'. I voted for Coolidge--we called him College--that's +the last votin' I did. One of my friends, Levi Hunter, he was a colored +magistrate down at Fairfield. + +"Ku Klux? What you talkin' about? Ku Klux come to our house. My sister +Ellen's husband went to war on the Yankee side durin' the war--on the +Republican side and fought the Democrats. + +"After the war the Ku Klux came and got the colored folks what fought +and killed em. I saw em kill a nigger right off his mule. Fell off on +his sack of corn and the old mule kep' on goin'. + +"Ku Klux used to wear big old long robe with bunches of cotton sewed all +over it. I member one time we was havin' church and a Ku Klux was hid up +in the scaffold. The preacher was readin' the Bible and tellin' the +folks there was a man sent from God and say an angel be here directly. +Just then the Ku Klux fell down and the niggers all thought 'twas the +angel and they got up and flew. + +"Ku Klux used to come to the church well and ask for a drink and say, 'I +ain't had a bit of water since I fought the battle of Shiloh.' + +"Might as well tell the truth--had just as good a time when I was a +slave as when I was free. Had all the hog meat and milk and everything +else to eat. + +"I member one time when old master wasn't at home the Yankees come and +say to old mistress, 'Madam, we is foragin'.' Old mistress say, 'My +husband ain't home; I can't let you.' Yankees say, 'Well, we're goin' to +anyway.' They say, 'Where you keep your milk and butter?' Old mistress +standin' up there, her face as red as blood and say, 'I haven't any milk +or butter to spare.' But the Yankees would hunt till they found it. + +"After a battle when the dead soldiers was layin' around and didn't have +on no uniform cause some of the other soldiers took em, I've heard the +old folk what knowed say you could tell the Yankees from the Rebels +cause the Yankees had blue veins on their bellies and the Rebels didn't. + +"Now you want me to tell you bout this young nigger generation? I never +thought I'd live to see this young generation come out and do as well as +they is doin'. I'm goin' tell you the truth. When I was young, boys and +girls used to wear long white shirt come down to their ankles, cause it +would shrink, with a hole cut out for their head. I think they is doin' +a whole lot better. Got better clothes. Almost look as well as the white +folks. I just say the niggers dressin' better than the white folks used +to. + +"Then I see some niggers got automobiles. Just been free bout +seventy-two years and some of em actin' just like white folks now. + +"Well, good-bye--if I don't see you again I'll meet you in Heaven." + + + + +Interviewer: Beulah Sherwood Hagg +Person interviewed: [HW: Henry Kirk] H.K. Miller + 1513 State Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 86 + + +"No ma'am, it will not bother me one bit if you want to have a long +visit with me.... Yes, I was a little busy, but it can wait. I was +getting my dishes ready for a party tomorrow night. + +"Yes ma'am, I was born during slavery. I was born at a little place +called Fort Valley in Georgia, July 25, 1851. Fort Valley is about 30 +miles from Macon. I came to Little Rock in 1873. My old mistress was a +widow. As well as I can remember she did not have any slaves but my +father and mother and the six children. No ma'am, her name was not +Miller, it was Wade.... Where did I get my name, then? It came from my +grandfather on my father's side.... Well, now, Miss, I can't tell you +where he got that name. From some white master, I reckon. + +"We got free in Georgia June 15, 1865. I'll never forget that date. What +I mean is, that was the day the big freedom came. But we didn't know it +and just worked on. My father was a shoemaker for old mistress. Only one +in town, far as I recollect. He made a lot of money for mistress. Mother +was houseworker for her. As fast as us children got big enough to hire +out, she leased us to anybody who would pay for our hire. I was put out +with another widow woman who lived about 20 miles. She worked me on her +cotton plantation. Old mistress sold one of my sisters; took cotton for +pay. I remember hearing them tell about the big price she brought +because cotton was so high. Old mistress got 15 bales of cotton for +sister, and it was only a few days till freedom came and the man who had +traded all them bales of cotton lost my sister, but old mistress kept +the cotton. She was smart, wasn't she? She knew freedom was right there. +Sister came right back to my parents. + +"Just give me time, miss, and I'll tell you the whole story. This woman +what had me hired tried to run away and take all her slaves along. I +don't remember just how many, but a dozen or more. Lots of white folks +tried to run away and hide their slaves until after the Yankee soldiers +had been through the town searching for them what had not been set free. +She was trying to get to the woods country. But she got nervous and +scared and done the worst thing she could. She run right into a Yankee +camp. Course they asked where we all belonged and sent us where we +belonged. They had always taught us to be scared of the Yankees. I +remember just as well when I got back to where my mother was she asked +me: "Boy, why you come here? Don't you know old mistress got you rented +out? You're goin' be whipped for sure." I told her, no, now we got +freedom. That was the first they had heard. So then she had to tell my +father and mother. She tole them how they have no place to go, no +money,--nothing to start life on; they better stay on with her. So my +father and mother kept on with her; she let them have a part of what +they made; she took some for board, as was right. The white ladies what +had me between them fixed it up that I would serve out the time I was +rented out for. It was about six months more. My parents saved money and +we all went to a farm. I stayed with them till I was 19 years old. Of +course they got all the money I made. I married when I was 20, still +living in Georgia. We tried to farm on shares. A man from Arkansas came +there, getting up a colony of colored to go to Arkansas to farm. Told +big tales of fine land with nobody to work it. Not half as many Negroes +in Arkansas as in Georgia. Me and my wife joined up to go. + +"Well, ma'am, I didn't get enough education to be what you call a +educated man. My father paid for a six months night course for me after +peace. I learned to read and write and figure a little. I have used my +tablespoon full of brains ever since, always adding to that start. I +learned everything I could from the many white friends I have had. Any +way, miss, I have known enough to make a good living all these years. + +"Now I'll get on with the story. First work I got in Arkansas was +working on a farm; me and her both; we always tried to stay together. We +could not make anything on the Garner farm, and it was mighty unhealthy +down in Fourche bottoms. I carried her back to Little Rock and I got +work as house man in the Bunch home. From there I went to the home of +Dudley E. Jones and stayed there 28 years. That was the beginning of my +catering. I just naturally took to cooking and serving. White folks was +still used to having colored wait on them and they liked my style. Mr. +Jones was so kind. He told his friends about how I could plan big +dinners and banquets; then cook and serve them. Right soon I was +handling most of the big swell weddings for the society folks. Child, if +I could call off the names of the folks I have served, it would be +mighty near everybody of any consequence in Little Rock for more than 55 +years. Yes ma'am, I'm now being called on to serve the grandchildren of +my first customers. + +"During the 28 years I lived in Mr. Jones' family I was serving +banquets, big public dinners, all kinds of big affairs. I have had the +spring and fall banquets for the Scottish Rite Masons for more than 41 +years. I have served nearly all the Governor's banquets, college +graduation and reunion parties; I took care of President Roosevelt--not +this one, but Teddy----. Served about 600 that day. Any big parties for +colored people?... Yes ma'am! Don't you remember when Booker T. +Washington was here?... No ma'am. White folks didn't have a thing to do +with it, excepting the city let us have the new fire station. It was +just finished but the fire engines ain't moved in yet. I served about +600 that time. Yes ma'am, there was a lot of white folks there. Then, I +have been called to other places to do the catering. Lonoke, Benton, +Malvern, Conway--a heap of places like that. + +"No miss, I didn't always have all the catering business; oh, no. There +was Mr. Rossner. He was a fine man. White gentleman. I used to help him +a lot. But when he sold out to Bott, I got a lot of what business Mr. +Rossner had had, Mr. Bott was a Jew. All that time my wife was my best +helper. I took a young colored fellow named Freeling Alexander and +taught him the business. He never been able to make it go on his own, +but does fine working on salary. He has a cafeteria now. + +"Well thank you miss, speaking about my home like that. Yes ma'am, I +sure do own it. Fifty-two years I been living right here. First I bought +the lot; it took me two years to pay for it. Next I build a little +house. The big pin oak trees out front was only saplings when I set them +out. Come out in the back yard and see my pecan tree.... It is a giant, +ain't it? Yes ma'am, it was a tiny thing when I set it out fifty-two +years ago. Our only child was born in this house,--a dear daughter--and +her three babies were born here too. After my wife and daughter died, me +and the children kept on trying to keep the home together. I have taught +them the catering business. Both granddaughters are high school +graduates. The boy is in Mexico. Before he went he signed his name to a +check and said: "Here, grandpa. You ain't going to want for a thing +while I'm gone. If something happens to your catering business, or you +get so you can't work, fill this in for whatever you need." But thank +the good Lord, I'm still going strong. Nobody has ever had to take care +of H.K. Miller. Now let me tell you something else about this place. For +more than ten years I have been paying $64.64 every year for my part of +that asphalt paving you see out in front. Yes ma'am, the lot is 50 foot +front, and I am paying for only half of it; from my curb line to the +middle of the street. Maybe if I live long enough I'll get it paid for +sometime. + +"I haven't tried to lay by much money. I don't suppose there is any +other colored man--uneducated like me--what has done more for his +community. I have given as high as $80 and $100 at one time to help out +on the church debt or when they wanted to build. I always help in times +of floods and things like that. I've helped many white persons in my +lifetime. + +"Well, now, I'll tell you what I think about the voting system. I think +this. Of course we are still in subjection to the white people; they are +in the majority and have most of the government on their side. But I +think that, er,--er,--well I'll tell you, while it is all right for them +to be at the head of things, they ought to do what is right. Being +educated, they ought to know right from wrong. I believe in the Bible, +miss. Look here. This little book--Gospel of St. John--has been carried +in my pocket every day for years and years. And I never miss a day +reading it. I don't see how some people can be so unjust. I guess they +never read their Bible. The reason I been able to make my three-score +years and ten is because I obeys what the Good Book says. + +"Now, let me see. I can remember that I been voting mighty near ever +since I been here. I never had any trouble voting. I have never been +objected from voting that I remember of. + +"Now you ask about what I think of the young people. Well, I tell you. I +think really that the young people of today had better begin to check +up, a little. They are going too fast. They don't seem to have enough +consideration. When I see so many killed in automobile accidents, and +know that drinking is the cause of so many car accidents,--well, yes +ma'am, drinking sure does have a lot to do with it. I think they should +more consider the way they going to make a living. Make a rule to look +before they act. Another thing--the education being given them--they are +not taking advantage of it. If they would profit by what they learn they +could benefit theirselves. A lot of them now spend heap of time trying +to get to be doctors and lawyers and like that. That is a mistake. There +is not enough work among colored people to support them. I know. Negroes +do not have confidence in their race for this kind of business. No +ma'am. Colored will go for a white doctor and white lawyer 'cause they +think they know more about that kind of business. I would recommend as +the best means of making a living for colored young people is to select +some kind of work that is absolutely necessary to be done and then do it +honestly. The trades, carpentering, paper hanging, painting, garage +work. Some work that white people need to have done, and they just as +soon colored do it as white. White folks ain't never going to have Negro +doctors and lawyers, I reckon. That's the reason I took up +catering--even that long ago. Fifty-five years ago I knew to look around +and find some work that white folks would need done. There's where your +living comes from. + +"Yes, miss, my business is slack--falling off, as you say. Catering is +not what it used to be. You see, 30 or 40 years ago, people's homes were +grand and big; big dining rooms, built for parties and banquets. But for +the big affairs with 500 or 600 guests, they went to the hotels. Even +the hotels had to rent my dishes, silver and linens.... Oh, lord, yes, +miss. I always had my own. It took me ten years to save enough money to +start out with my first 500 of everything.... You want to see them?... +Sure, I keep them here at home.... Look. Here's my silver chests, all +packed to go. I have them divided into different sizes. This one has +fifty of every kind of silver, so if fifty guests are to be provided +for. I keep my linens, plates of different sizes, glasses and everything +the same way. A 200-guest outfit is packed in those chests over there. +No, ma'am, I don't have much trouble of losing silver, because it all +has my initials on; look: H.K.M. on every piece. Heap of dishes are +broken every time I have a big catering. I found one plate +yesterday--the last of a full pattern I had fifteen years ago. About +every ten years is a complete turnover of china. Glassware goes faster, +and of course, the linen is the greatest overhead. Yes ma'am, as I was +telling you, catering is slack because of clubs. So many women take +their parties to clubs now. Another thing, the style of food has +changed. In those old days, the table was loaded with three four meats, +fish, half dozen vegetable dishes, entrees, different kinds of wine, and +an array of desserts. Now what do they have? Liquid punch, frozen punch +and cakes. In June I had a wedding party for 400, and that's all they +served. I had to have 30 punch bowls, but borrowed about half from my +white friends. + +"You have got that wrong about me living with my grandchildren. No +ma'am! They are living with me. They make their home with me. I don't +expect ever to marry again. I'm 86. In my will I am leaving everything I +have to my three grandchildren. + +"Well, miss, you're looking young and blooming. Guess your husband is +right proud of you? Say you're a widow? Well, now, my goodness. Some of +these days a fine man going to find you and then, er--er, lady, let me +cater for the wedding?" + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Henry Kirk Miller [HW: Same as H.K. Miller] + 1513 State Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age 87 [HW: 86] + + +"I am eighty-six years old-eighty-six years and six months. I was born +July 25, 1851. I was a slave. Didn't get free till June 1865. I was a +boy fifteen years old when I got free. + +"I have been living in this house fifty years. I have been living in +Arkansas ever since 1873. That makes about sixty-five years. + +"The engineer who got killed in that wreck the other day (a wreck which +occurred February 7, 1938, Monday morning at three and in which the +engineer and five other people were killed) came right from my town, +Fort Valley, Georgia. I came here from there in 1873. I don't know +anybody living in Fort Valley now unless it's my own folks. And I don't +'spect I'd know them now. When I got married and left there, I was only +twenty-one years old. + + +Parents and Relatives + +"My mother and father were born in South Carolina. After their master +and missis married they came to Georgia. Back there I don't know. When I +remember anything they were in Georgia. They said they came from South +Carolina to Georgia. I don't know how they came. Both of my parents were +Negroes. They came to Arkansas ahead of me. I have their pictures." (He +carried me into the parlor and showed me life-sized bust portraits of +his mother and father.) + +"There were eighteen of us: six boys and twelve girls. They are all dead +now but myself and one sister. She lives in Atlanta, Georgia. I am older +than she is. + + +Occupation + +"I am a caterer. I have been serving the Scottish Rite Masons in their +annual reunion every six months for forty-one years. We are going to the +Seventh Street Entrance this Friday. One of the orders will have a +dinner and I am going down to serve it. I served the dinner for Teddy +Roosevelt there, thirty years ago. This Roosevelt is a cousin of his. + + +Masters + +"My parents' master was named Wade. When he died, I was so little that +they had to lift me up to let me see into the coffin so I could look at +him. I went to his daughter. My name is after my father's father. My +grandfather was named Miller. I took his name. He was a white man. + +"Wade's daughter was named Riley, but I keep my grandfather's name. My +mother and father were then transferred to the Rileys too, and they took +the name of Riley. It was after freedom that I took the name Miller from +my original people. Haven Riley's father was my brother." (Haven Riley +lives in Little Rock and was formerly an instructor at Philander Smith +College. Now he is a public stenographer and a private teacher.) + +"Wade owned all of my brothers and sisters and parents and some of my +kin--father's sister and brother. There might have been some more I +can't remember. Wade was a farmer. + +"I remember once when my mother and father were going to the field to +work, I went with them as usual. That was before Wade died and his +daughter drew us. + +"My wife died six years ago. If she had lived till tomorrow, she would +have been married to me sixty years. She died on the tenth of February +and we were married on the sixth. We just lacked five years of being +married sixty years when she died. + + +Food + +"For food, I don't know anything more than bread and meat. Meal, meat, +molasses were the only rations I saw. In those times the white people +had what was known as the white people's house and then what was known +as nigger quarters. The children that weren't big enough to work were +fed at the white people's house. We got milk and mush for breakfast. +When they boiled cabbage we got bread and pot-liquor. For supper we got +milk and bread. They had cows and the children were fed mostly on milk +and mush or milk and bread. We used to bake a corn cake in the ashes, +ash cake, and put it in the milk. + +"The chickens used to lay out in the barn. If we children would find the +nests and bring the eggs in our missis would give us a biscuit, and we +always got biscuits for Christmas. + + +Houses in the Negro Quarters + +"In the nigger quarters there were nothing but log houses. I don't +remember any house other than a log house. They'd just go out in the +woods and get logs and put up a log house. Put dirt and mud or clay in +the cracks to seal it. Notch the logs in the end to hitch them at +corners. Nailed planks at the end of the logs to make a door frame. + +"My people all ate and cooked and lived in the same room. Some of the +slaves had dirt floors and some of them had plank floors. + +"Food was kept in the house in a sort of box or chest, built in the wall +sometimes. Mostly it was kept on the table. + +"In cooking they had a round oven made like a pot only the bottom would +be flat. It had an iron top. The oven was a bought oven. It was shaped +like a barrel. The top lifted up. Coal was placed under the oven and a +little on top. + + +Tables and Chairs + +"Tables were just boards nailed together. Nothing but planks nailed +together. I don't remember nothing but homemade benches for chairs. They +sometimes made platted or split-bottom chairs out of white oak. Strips +of oak were seven feet long. They put them in water so they would bend +easily and wove them while they were flexible and fresh. The whole chair +bottom was made out of one strip just like in caning. Those chairs were +stouter than the chairs they make now." + +(To be continued) [TR: No continuation found.] + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Annie L. LaCotts +Person interviewed: Matilda Miller + Humphrey, Ark. +Age: 79 + + +The day of the interview Matilda, a nice clean-looking Negro woman, was +in bed, suffering from some kind of a pain in her head. She lives in a +little two-room unpainted boxed house beside the highway in Humphrey. +Her house is almost in the shadow of the big tank which was put up +recently when the town acquired its water system. + +When told that the visitor wanted to talk with her about her early life, +Matilda said, "Well, honey, I'll tell you all I can, but you see, I was +just a little girl when the war was, but I've heard my mother tell lots +of things about then. + +"I was born a slave; my mother and daddy both were owned by Judge +Richard Gamble at Crockett's Bluff. I was born at Boone Hill--about +twelve miles north of DeWitt--and how come it named Boone Hill, that +farm was my young mistress's. Her papa give it to her, just like he give +me to her when I was little, and after she married Mr. Oliver Boone and +lived there the farm always went by the name of 'Boone Hill.' The house +is right on top of a hill, you know, it shure was a pretty place when +Miss Georgia lived there, with great big Magnolia trees in the front +yard. I belonged to Miss Georgia, my young mistress, and when the +niggers were freed my mamma staid on with her. She was right there when +both of his chillun were born, Mr. John Boone and Miss Mary, too. I +nursed _both_ of them chillun. You know who Miss Mary is now, don't you? +Yes'um, she's Mr. Lester Black's wife and he's good, too. + +"I was de oney child my mother had till twelve years after the +surrender. You see, my papa went off with Yankees and didn't come back +till twelve years after we was free, and then I had some brothers and +sisters. Exactly nine months from the day my daddy come home, I had a +baby brother born. My mother said she knew my daddy had been married or +took up with some other woman, but she hadn't got a divorce and still +counted him her husband. They lived for a long time with our white +folks, for they were good to us, but you know after the boys and girls +got grown and began to marry and live in different places, my parents +wanted to be with them and left the white folks. + +"No mam, I didn't see any fighting, but we could hear the big guns +booming away off in the distance. I was married when I was 21 to Henry +Miller and lived with him 51 years and ten months; he died from old age +and hard work. We had two chillun, both girls. One of them lives here +with me in that other room. Mamma said the Yankees told the Negroes when +they got em freed they'd give em a mule and a farm or maybe a part of +the plantation they'd been working on for their white folks. She thought +they just told em that to make them dissatisfied and to get more of them +'to join up with em' and they were dressed in pretty blue clothes and +had nice horses and that made lots of the Negro men go with them. None +of em ever got anything but what their white folks give em, and just +lots and lots of em never come back after the war cause the Yankees put +them in front where the shooting was and they was killed. My husband +Henry Miller died four years ago. He followed public work and made +plenty of money but he had lots of friends and his money went easy too. +I don't spect I'll live long for this hurtin' in my head is awful bad +sometime." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Nathan Miller, Madison, Arkansas +Age: Born in 1868 + + +"Lady, I'll tell you what I know but it won't nigh fill your book. + +"I was born in 1862 south of Lockesburg, Arkansas. My parents was +Marther and Burl Miller. + +"They told me their owners come here from North Carolina in 1820. They +owned lots of slaves and lots of land. Mother was medium light--about my +color. See, I'm mixed. My hair is white. I heard mother say she never +worked in the field. Father was a blacksmith on the place. He wasn't a +slave. His grandfather willed him free at ten years of age. It was tried +in the Supreme Court. They set him free. Said they couldn't break the +dead man's will. + +"My father was a real bright colored man. It caused some disturbance. +Father went back and forth to Kansas. They tried to make him leave if he +was a free man. They said I would have to be a slave several years or +leave the State. Freedom settled that for me. + +"My great grandmother on my mother's side belong to Thomas Jefferson. He +was good to her. She used to tell me stories on her lap. She come from +Virginia to Tennessee. They all cried to go back to Virginia and their +master got mad and sold them. He was a meaner man. Her name was Sarah +Jefferson. Mariah was her daughter and Marther was my mother. They was +real dark folks but mother was my color, or a shade darker. + +"Grandmother said she picked cotton from the seed all day till her +fingers nearly bled. That was fore gin day. They said the more hills of +tobacco you could cultivate was how much you was worth. + +"I don't remember the Ku Klux. They was in my little boy days but they +never bothered me. + +"All my life I been working hard--steamboat, railroad, farming. Wore +clean out now. + +"Times is awful hard. I am worn clean out. I am not sick. I'm ashamed to +say I can't do a good day's work but I couldn't. I am proud to own I get +commodities and $8 from the Relief." + + + + +Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lacy +Person interviewed: Sam Miller, Morrilton, Arkansas +Age: 98 + + +"I is ninety-eight years old, suh. My name's Sam Miller, and I was born +in Texas in 1840--don't know de month nor de day. My parents died when I +was jes' a little chap, and we come to Conway County, Arkansas fifty +years ago; been livin' here ever since. My wife's name was Annie +Williamson. We ain't got no chillun and never had none. I don't belong +to no chu'ch, but my wife is a Baptis'. + +"Can't see to git around much now. No, suh, I can't read or write, +neither. My memory ain't so good about things when I was little, away +back yonder, but I sure members dem Ku Klux Klans and de militia. They +used to ketch people and take em out and whup em. + +"Don't rickolleck any of de old songs but one or two--oh, yes, dey used +to sing 'Old time religion's good enough for me' and songs like dat. + +"De young people! Lawzy, I jest dunno how to take em. Can't understand +em at all. Dey too much for me!" + + +NOTE: The old fellow chuckled and shook his head but said very little +more. He could have told much but for his faulty memory, no doubt. He +was almost non-committal as to facts of slavery days, the War between +the States, and Reconstruction period. Has the sense of humor that seems +to be a characteristic of most of the old-time Negroes, but aside from a +whimsical chuckle shows little of the interest that is usually +associated with the old generation of Negroes. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: W.D. Miller, West Memphis, Arkansas +Age: 65? + + +"Grandpa was sold twice in Raleigh, North Carolina. He was sold twice to +the same people, from the Millers to the Robertsons (Robersons, +Robinsons, etc.?). He said the Robertsons were not so very good to him +but the Millers were. Grandma was washing when a Yank come and told them +they had been sot free. They quit washing and went from house to house +rejoicing. My parents' names was Jesse and Mary Miller, and Grandma +Agnes and Grandpa Peter Miller. The Robertsons was hill wheat farmers. +The Millers had a cloth factory. Dan Miller owned it and he raised +wheat. Mama was a puny woman and they worked her in the factory. She +made cloth and yarn. + +"I was born in Raleigh, North Carolina or close by there. My father's +uncle John House brought about one hundred families from North Carolina +to Quittenden County, Mississippi. I was seven years old. He said they +rode mules to pick cotton, it growed up like trees. We come in car +boxes. I came to Heath and Helena eleven years ago. Papa stayed with his +master Dan Miller till my uncle tolled him away. He died with smallpox +soon after we come to Mississippi. + +"It is a very good country but they don't pick cotton riding on mules, +at least I ain't seed none that way." + + + + +El Dorado District +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of Interviewer: Pernella Anderson +Subject: Slavery Customs +Story:--Information + +Information given by: Mose Minser--Farmer--Age--78 +Place of Residence: 5 miles from El Dorado--Section 8 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] + + +Ah use ter could tawk an tell a thing plum well but ah been broke up by +a cah. Cah run ovah mah haid an ah couldn' tawk fuh 30 days. So now ah +aint no good fuh nothin. Ah recollect one night ah dream a dream. De +dream at ah dreamt, next morning dat dream come true. Jes like ah dreamt +hit. Yes hit did. Ah wuz heah in slavery time. Ah membuh when dey freed +us niggers. Se here, ah wuz a purty good size kid when dey free us. Ah +kin membuh our house. Sot dis way. An ole Marster called all his niggers +up. Dey all come along roun in a squad on de porch. Ah did not heah whut +he said tuh em. But mah step-pa wuz dere an tole us we wuz free. Ah +atter dey freed mah step-pa ah recollect he went on home and fried some +aigs (eggs) in de ubben. Know we didn have no stove we cooked on de +fiuhplace. As ah said cook dem aigs, gimme some uv hit, an he lef' den. +Went east and ah aint nevah seed dat man since. Ah membuhs once ah got a +whoopin bout goin tuh de chinquepin tree. Some uv um tole me ole master +wuz gwianter let us quit at dinnuh an so in place uv me goin ter dinnuh +ah went on by de chinquepin tree tuh git some chanks. Ah had a brothuh +wid me. So ah come tuh fine out dat dey gin tuh callin us. Dey hollered +tuh come on dat we wuz gointer pick cotton. So in place uv us goin on +tuh de house we went on back tuh de fiel'. Our fiel wuz bout a mile fum +de house. Ole Moster waited down dere at de gate. He call me when ah got +dere an wanted tuh know why ah didn come and git mah dinnah sos ah could +pick cotton. So he taken mah britches down dat day. Mah chinks all run +out on de groun' an he tole mah brothah tuh pick um up. Ah knocked mah +brothuh ovah fuh pickin um up an aftuh ah done dat ole moster taken his +red pocket han'cher out and tied hit ovah mah eyes tuh keep me fum seein +mah brothuh pick um up. + +So when he got through wid me and put mah britches back on me ah went on +tuh de fiel and went tuh pickin cotton. Dat evenin when us stop pickin +cotton ah took mah brothah down and taken mah chinquapins. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Gip Minton, Des Arc, Arkansas +Age: 84 + + +"I was born at Jackson, Alabama on the Tennessee River. It was sho a +putty river. I never did know my grandfolks. I think my father was a +soldier. My master was a soldier, I think. He was in de war. I do +remember the Civil War. I remember the last battle at Scottsboro. There +was several but one big battle and they got to Belfontain. That is where +it seemed they were trying to go. I don't recollect who won the battle. +I heard them fighting and saw the smoke and after they went on saw the +bodies dead and all that was left was like a cyclone had swept by. There +was a big regiment stationed at Scottsboro. It was just like any war +fought with guns and they lived in tents. They took everything they +could find. Looked like starvation was upon de land. + +"I had two sisters and one brother and my mother died when I was a baby. +I come out here to Arkansas with my mothers old master and mistress and +never did see nor hear of none of them. No I never did hear from none of +them. I come out here when I was ten or twelve years old. It was, it was +right after the war. I recken I was freed, but I was raised by white +folks and I stayed right on wid em. Dat freedom ain't never bothered me. + +"My master and mistress names was Master Alfred Minton. Dey call me Gip +for him. Gip Minton is what they always called me. My mistress was Miss +Annie Minton. I stayed right wid em. They raised me and I come on here +wid em. I don't know nothin about that freedom. + +"I recken they was good to me. I et in de kitchen when they got through +or on a table out in de back yard sometimes. I slept in an outhouse they +fixed up mostly, when I got up big. + +"We come on the train to Memphis and they come on thater way to Lonoke +whar we settled. Don Shirley was the man I come on horseback with from +Memphis to Lonoke. He was a man what dealt in horses. Sure he was a +white man. He's where we got some horses. I don't remember if he lived +at Lonoke or not. + +"I have voted, yes ma'am, a heap of times. I don't remember what kind er +ticket I votes. I'm a Democrat, I think so. I ain't voted fur sometime +now. I don't know if I'll vote any more times or not. I don't know what +is right bout votin and what ain't right. + +"When I was a boy I helped farm. We had what we made. I guess it was +plenty. I had more to eat and I didn't have as many changes of clothes +as folks has to have nowdays bout all de difference. They raised lots +more. They bought things to do a year and didn't be allus goin to town. +It was hard to come to town. Yes mam it did take a long time, sometimes +in a ox wagon. The oxen pulled more over muddy roads. Took three days to +come to town and git back. I farmed one-half-for-the-other and on shear +crop. Well one bout good as the other. Bout all anybody can make farmin +is plenty to eat and a little to wear long time ago and nows the same +way. The most I reckon I ever did make was on Surrounded Hill (Biscoe) +when I farmed one-half-fur-de-udder for Sheriff Reinhardt. The ground +was new and rich and the seasons hit just fine. No maam I never owned no +farm, no livestock, no home. The only thing I owned was a horse one +time. I worked 16 or 17 years for Mr. Brown and for Mr. Plunkett and +Son. I drayed all de time fur em. Hauled freight up from the old depot +(wharf) down on the river. Long time fore a railroad was thought of. I +helped load cotton and hides on the boats. We loaded all day and all +night too heap o'nights. We worked till we got through and let em take +the ship on. + +"The times is critical for old folks, wages low and everything is so +high. The young folks got heap better educations but seems like they +can't use it. They don't know how to any avantage. I know they don't +have as good chances at farmin as de older folks had. I don't know why +it is. My son works up at the lumber yard. Yes he owns this house. +That's all he owns. He make nough to get by on, I recken. He works hard, +yes maam. He helps me if he can. I get $4 a month janitor at the Farmers +and Merchants Bank (Des Arc). I works a little garden and cleans off +yards. No maam it hurts my rheumatism to run the yard mower. I works +when I sho can't hardly go. Nothin matter cept I'm bout wo out. I plied +for the old folks penshun but I ain't got nuthin yet. I signed up at the +bank fur it agin not long ago. I has been allus self sportin. Didn't +pend on no livin soul but myself." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: A.J. Mitchell + 419 E. 11th Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 78 +Occupation: Garbage hauler + + +"I was 'bout seven when they surrendered. I can remember when my old +master sold Aunt Susan. She raised me. I seen old master when he was +tryin' to whip old Aunt Susan. She was the cook. She said, 'I ain't +goin' let you whip me' and I heard my sister say next day he done sold +Aunt Susan. I ain't seed her since. I called her ma. My mother died when +I was two years old. She was full Injun. My father was black but his +hair was straight. His face was so black it shined. Looked like it was +greased. My father said he was freeborn and I've seen stripes on his +back look like the veins on back of my hand where they whipped him +tryin' to make him disown his freedom. + +"Old Jack Clifton was my master. Yes ma'm, that was his name. + +"I 'member when they had those old looms--makin' cloth and old shuttle +to put the thread on. I can see 'em now. + +"I can 'member when this used to be a Injun place. I've seen old Injun +mounds. White folks come and run 'em out and give 'em Injun Territory. + +"I heered the guns in the war and seed the folks comin' home when the +war broke. They said they was fitin' 'bout freedom, tryin' to free the +people. I 'member when they was fitin' at Marks Mill. I know some of the +people said that was where they was sot free. + +"I don't know as I seed any Ku Klux when they was goin' round. Hearin' +'bout 'em scared me. I have a good recollection. I can remember the +first dream I ever had and the first time I whistled. I can remember +when I was two or three years old. Remember when they had a big old +conch shell. Old master would blow it at twelve o'clock for 'em to come +in. + +"Old master was good to us but I 'member he had a leather strap and if +we chillun had done anything he'd make us younguns put our head 'tween +his legs and put that strap on us. My goodness! He called me Pat and +called his own son Bug--his own son Junie. We played together. Old +master had nicknames for everybody. + +"My first mistress was named Miss Mary but she died. I 'member when old +master married and brought Miss Becky home. + +"Marse John (he was old master's oldest son) he used to tote me about in +his saddle bags. He was the overseer. + +"I 'member old master's ridin' hoss--a little old bay pony--called him +Hardy. I never remember nobody else bein' on it--that was his ridin' +hoss. + +"Old master had dogs. One was Gus and one named Brute (he was a red bone +hound). And one little dog they called Trigger. Old master's head as +white as cotton. + +"I do remember the day they said the people was free--after the war +broke. My father come and got me. + +"Now I'm givin' you a true statement. I've been stayin' by myself +twenty-three years. I been here in Pine Bluff--well I jest had got here +when the people was comin' back from that German war. + +"My God, we had the finest time when we killed hogs--make sausage. We'd +eat cracklin's--oh, we thought they wasn't nothin' like cracklin's. The +Lord have mercy, there was an old beech tree set there in my master's +yard. You could hear that old tree pop ever' day bout the same time, +bout twelve o'clock. We used to eat beech mass. Good? Yes ma'm! I think +about it often and wonder why it was right in old master's yard. + +"I've cast a many a vote. Not a bit of trouble in the world. Hope elect +most all the old officers here in town. I had a brother was a constable +under Squire Gaines. Well of course, Miss, I don't think it's right when +they disfranchised the colored people. I tell you, Miss, I read the +Bible and the Bible says every man has his rights--the poor and the free +and the bound. I got good sense from the time I leaped in this world. I +'member well I used to go and cast my vote just that quick but they got +so they wouldn't let you vote unless you could read. + +"I've had 'em to offer me money to vote the Democrat ticket. I told him, +no. I didn't think that was principle. The colored man ain't got no +representive now. Colored men used to be elected to the legislature and +they'd go and sell out. Some of 'em used to vote the Democrat ticket. +God wants every man to have his birthright. + +"I tell you one thing they did. This here no fence law was one of the +lowest things they ever did. I don't know what the governor was studyin' +'bout. If they would let the old people raise meat, they wouldn't have +to get so much help from the government. God don't like that, God wants +the people to raise things. I could make a livin' but they won't let me. + +"The first thing I remember bout studyin' was Junie, old master's son, +studyin' his book and I heard 'em spell the word 'baker'. That was when +they used the old Blue Back Speller. + +"I went to school. I'm goin' tell you as nearly as I can. That was, +madam, let me see, that was in sixty-nine as near as I can come at it. +Miss, I don't know how long I went. My father wouldn't let me. I didn't +know nothin' but work. I weighed cotton ever since I was a little boy. I +always wanted to be weighin'. Looked like it was my gift--weighin' +cotton. + +"I'm a Missionary Baptist preacher. Got a license to preach. You go down +and try to preach without a license and they put you up. + +"Madam, you asked me a question I think I can answer with knowledge and +understanding. The young people is goin' too fast. The people is growin' +weaker and wiser. You take my folks--goin' to school but not doin' +anything. I don't think there's much to the younger generation. Don't +think they're doin' much good. I was brought up with what they called +fireside teachin'." + + + + +Circumstances of Interview +STATE--Arkansas +NAME OF WORKER--Bernice Bowden +ADDRESS--1006 Oak Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +DATE--November 2, 1938 +SUBJECT--Exslaves +[TR: Repetitive information deleted from subsequent pages.] + + +1. Name and address of informant--Gracie Mitchell + +2. Date and time of interview--November 1, 1938, 3:00 p.m. + +3. Place of interview--117 Worthen Street + +4. Name and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with +informant--Bernice Wilburn, 101 Miller Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas + +5. Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you--None + +6. Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.--A frame house +(rented), bare floors, no window shades; a bed and some boxes and three +straight chairs. In an adjoining room were another bed, heating stove, +two trunks, one straight chair, one rocking chair. A third room the +kitchen, contained cookstove and table and chairs. + + +Text of Interview + +"They said I was born in Alabama. My mother's name was Sallie and my +father was Andrew Wheeler. I couldn't tell when I was born--my folks +never did tell me that. Belonged to Dr. Moore and when his daughter +married he give my mother to her and she went to Mobile. They said I +wasn't weaned yet. My grandmother told me that. She is dead now. Don't +know nothin' bout nary one o' my white folks. I don't recollect nothin' +bout a one of 'em 'cept my old boss. He took us to Texas and stayed till +the niggers was all free and then he went back. Good to me? No ma'm--no +good there. And if you didn't work he'd see what was the matter. Lived +near Coffeyville in Upshaw county. That's whar my husband found me. I +was living with my aunt and uncle. They said the reason I had such a +good gift makin' quilts was cause my mother was a seamstress. + +"I cooked 'fore I married and I could make my own dresses, piece quilts +and quilt. That's mostly what I done. No laundry work. I never did farm +till I was married. After we went to Chicago in 1922, I took care of +other folks chillun, colored folks, while they was working in laundries +and factories. I sure has worked. I ain't nobody to what I was when I +was first married. I knowed how to turn, but I don't know whar to turn +now--I ain't able. + +"I use to could plow just as good as any man. I could put that dirt up +against that cotton and corn. I'd mold it up. Lay it by? Yes ma'm I'd +lay it by, too. + +"They didn't send me to school but they learned me how to work. + +"I had a quilt book with a lot o' different patterns but I loaned it to +a woman and she carried it to Oklahoma. Mighty few people you can put +confidence in nowdays. + +"I don't go out much 'cept to church--folks is so critical. + + "You have to mind how you walk on the cross; + If you don't, your foot will slip, + And your soul will be lost." + +"I was a motherless chile but the Lord made up for it by givin' me a +good husband and I don't want for anything." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +According to her husband, Gracie spends every spare moment piecing +quilts. He said they use to go fishing and that Gracie always took her +quilt pieces along and if the fish were not biting she would sew. She +showed me twenty-two finished quilt tops, each of a different design and +several of the same design, or about thirty quilts in all. Two were +entirely of silk, two of applique design which called "laid work". They +were folded up in a trunk and as she took them out and spread them on +the bed for me to see she told me the name of the design. The following +are the names of the designs: + + 1. Breakfast Dish + 2. Sawtooth (silk) + 3. Tulip design (Laid work) + 4. "Prickle" Pear + 5. Little Boy's Breeches + 6. Birds All Over the Elements + 7. Drunkard's Path + 8. Railroad Crossing + 9. Cocoanut Leaf ("That's Laid Work") + 10. Cotton Leaf + 11. Half an Orange + 12. Tree of Paradise + 13. Sunflower + 14. Ocean Wave (silk) + 15. Double Star + 16. Swan's Nest + 17. Log Cabin in the Lane + 18. Reel + 19. Lily in de Valley (Silk) + 20. Feathered Star + 21. Fish Tail + 22. Whirligig + +Gracie showed me her winter coat bought in Chicago of fur fabric called +moleskin, and with fur collar and cuffs. + +She sells the quilt tops whenever she can. Many are made of new material +which they buy. + + +Personal History of Informant + +1. Ancestry--Father, Andrew Wheeler; Sallie Wheeler, mother. + +2. Place and date of birth--Alabama. No date known, about 80 years old. + +3. Family--Husband and one grown son. + +4. Places lived in, with dates--Alabama, Texas till 1897, Arkansas +1897-1922, Chicago, 1922 to 1930. Arkansas 1930 to date. + +5. Education, with dates--No education. + +6. Occupations and accomplishments, with dates--Cooked before marriage +at 16; farmed after marriage; home sewing. + +7. Special skills and interests--Quilt making and knitting. + +8. Community and religious activities--Assisted husband in ministry. + +9. Description of informant--Hair divided into many pigtails and wrapped +with rags. Skin, dark. Medium height, slender, clothing soiled. + +10. Other points gained in interview--Spends all her time piecing +quilts, aside from housework. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Hettie Mitchell (mulatto) + Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 69 + + +"I am sixty-nine years old. I was raised in Dyersburg, Tennessee. I can +tell you a few things mother told us. My own grandma on mother's side +was in South Carolina. She was stole when a child and brought to +Tennessee in a covered wagon. Her mother died from the grief of it. She +was hired out to nurse for these people. The people that stole her was +named Spence. She was a house woman for them till freedom. She was never +sold. Spences was not cruel people. Mother was never sold. She was the +mother of twelve and raised nine to a good age--more than grown. The +Spences seemed to always care for her children. When I go to Dyersburg +they always want us to come to see them and they treat us mighty well. + +"Mother was light. She said she had Indian strain (blood) but father was +very light and it was white blood but he never discussed it before his +children. So I can't tell you excepting he said he was owned by the +Brittians in South Carolina. He said his mother died soon after he was +sold. He was sold to a nigger trader and come in the gang to Memphis, +Tennessee and was put on the block and auctioned off to the highest +bidder. He was a farm hand. + +"Mother married father when she was nineteen years old. She was a house +girl. She lived close to her old mistress. She was very, very old before +she died she nearly stayed at my mother's house. Her mind wasn't right +and mother understood how to take care of her and was kind to her. The +Spences heard about grandma. They wrote and visited years after when +mother was a girl. + +"The way that father found out about his kin folks was this: One day a +creek was named and he told the white man, 'I was born close to that +creek and played there in the white sand and water when I was a little +boy.' The white man asked his name, said he knew the creek well too. +Father told him he never was named till he was sold and they named him +Sam--Sam Barnett. He was sold to Barnett in Memphis. But his dear own +mother called him 'Candy.' The white man found out about his people for +him and they found out his own dear mother died that same year he was +taken from South Carolina from grief. He heard from some of his people +from that time on till he died. + +"I worked on the farm in Tennessee till I married. I ironed, washed, and +have kept my own house and done the work that goes along with raising a +small family. We own our home. We have saved all we could along. I have +never had a real hard time like some I know. I guess my time is at hand +now. I don't know which way to turn since my husband got down sick. + +"I don't vote. Seem like it used to not be a nice place for women to go +where voting was taking place. Now they go mix up and vote. That is one +big change. Time is changing and changing the people. Maybe it is the +people is changing up the world as time goes by. We colored folks look +to the white folks to know the way to do. We have always done it." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Mary Mitchell, Hazen, Arkansas +Age: 60 + + +"I was born in Trenton, Tennessee. My parents had five children. They +were named William and Charlotte Wells. My father ran away and left my +mother with all the children to raise. By birth mother was a +Mississippian. She had been a nurse and my father was a timber man and +farmer. My mother said she had her hardest time raising her little +children. She was taken from her parents when a small girl and put on a +block and sold. She never said if her owners was bad to her, but she +said they was rough on Uncle Peter. He would fight. She said they would +tie Uncle Peter and whoop him with a strap. From what she said there was +a gang of slaves on Mr. Wade's place. He owned her. I never heard her +mention freedom but she said they had a big farm bell on a tall post in +the back yard and they had a horn to blow. It was a whistle made of a +cow's horn. + +"She said they was all afraid of the Ku Klux. They would ride across the +field and they could see that they was around, but they never come up +close to them." + + + + +Circumstances of Interview +STATE--Arkansas +NAME OF WORKER--Bernice Bowden +ADDRESS--1006 Oak Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +DATE--November 3, 1938 +SUBJECT--Exslaves +[TR: Repetitive information deleted from subsequent pages.] + + +1. Name and address of informant--Moses Mitchell, 117 Worthen Street + +2. Date and time of interview--November 1, 1938, 1:00 p.m. + +3. Place of interview--117 Worthen Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas + +4. Place and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with +informant--Bernice Wilburn, 101 Miller Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas + +5. Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you--None + +6. Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.--A frame house +(rented), bare floors, no window shades; a bed and some boxes and three +straight chairs. In an adjoining room were another bed, heating stove, +two trunks, one straight chair, one rocking chair. A third room, the +kitchen, contained cookstove and table and chairs. + + +Text of Interview + +"I was born down here on White River near Arkansas Post, August, 1849. I +belonged to Thomas Mitchel and when they (Yankees) took Arkansas Post, +our owners gathered us up and my young master took us to Texas and he +sold me to an Irishman named John McInish in Marshall for $1500. $500 in +gold and the rest in Confederate money. They called it the new issue. + +"I was twelve years old then and I stayed in Texas till I was +forty-eight. I was at Tyler, Texas when they freed us. When they took us +to Texas they left my mother and baby sister here in Arkansas, down here +on Oak Log Bayou. I never saw her again and when I came back here to +Arkansas, they said she had been dead twenty-eight years. Never did hear +of my father again. + +"I'm supposed to be part Creek Indian. Don't know how much. We have one +son, a farmer, lives across the river. Married this wife in 1873. + +"My wife and I left Texas forty-one years ago and came back here to +Arkansas and stayed till 1922. Then we went to Chicago and stayed till +1930, and then came back here. I'd like to go back up there, but I guess +I'm gettin' too old. While I was there I preached and I worked all the +time. I worked on the streets and the driveways in Lincoln Park. I was +in the brick and block department. Then I went from there to the asphalt +department. There's where I coined the money. Made $6.60 in the brick +and block and $7.20 a day in the asphalt. Down here they don't know no +more about asphalt than a pig does about a holiday. _A man that's from +the South and never been nowhere, don't know nothin', a woman either_. + +"Yes ma'm, I'm a preacher. Just a local preacher, wasn't ordained. The +reason for that was, in Texas a man over forty-five couldn't join the +traveling connection. I was licensed, but of course I couldn't perform +marriage ceremonies. I was just within one step of that. + +"I went to school two days in my life. I was privileged to go to the +first free school in Texas. Had a teacher named Goldman. Don't know what +year that was but they found out me and another fellow was too old so +they wouldn't let us go no more. But I caught my alphabet in them two +days. So I just caught what education I've got, here and there. I can +read well--best on my Bible and Testament and I read the newspapers. I +can sorta scribble my name. + +"I've been a farmer most of my life and a preacher for fifty-five years. +I can repair shoes and use to do common carpenter work. I can help build +a house. I only preach occasionally now, here and there. I belong to the +Allen Temple in Hoboken (East Pine Bluff). + +"I think the young generation is gone to naught. They're a different cut +to what they was in my comin' up." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +This man and his wife live in the outskirts of West pine Bluff. They +receive a small sum of money and commodities from the County Welfare +Department. He has a very pleasant personality, a good memory and +intelligence above the ordinary. Reads the Daily Graphic and Arkansas +Gazette. Age 89. He said, "_Here's the idea, freedom is worth it all_." + + +Personal History of Informant + +1. Ancestry--Father, Lewis Mitchell; Mother, Rhoda Mitchell + +2. Place and date of birth--Oak Log Bayou, White River, near Arkansas +Post, Ark. + +3. Family--Wife and one grown son. + +4. Places lived in, with dates--Taken to Texas by his young master and +sold in Marshall during the war. Lived in Tyler, Texas until forty-eight +years of age; came back to Arkansas in 1897 and stayed until 1922; went +to Chicago and lived until 1930; back to Jefferson County, Arkansas. + +5. Education, with dates--Two days after twenty-one years of age. No +date. + +6. Occupations and accomplishments, with dates--Farmer, preacher, common +carpenter, cobbler, public work on streets in Chicago, farmed and +preached until he went to Chicago in 1922. The he worked in the +maintenance department of city streets of Chicago and of Lincoln Park, +Chicago. + +7. Special skills and interests--Asphalt worker + +8. Community and religious activities--Licensed Methodist Preacher. No +assignment now. + +9. Description of informant--Five feet eight inches tall; weight, 165 +pounds, nearly bald. Very prominent cheek bones. Keen intelligence. +Neatly dressed. + +10. Other points gained in interview--Reads daily papers; knowledge of +world affairs. + + + + +Pine Bluff District +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of Interviewer: Martin - Barker +Subject: Negro Customs + +Information by: Ben Moon +[TR: Information moved from bottom of second page.] + + +I was born on the Walker place, in 1869. My father was a slave to Mr. +Bob. I used to drive Miss Lelia (Eulalie) to the Catholic church here in +Pine Bluff. She used to let me go barefooted, and bare headed. + +Miss Lelia was the daughter of Col. Creed Taylor. All during slavery +time I drove her gins. We had eight mules. Eight at a time hitched to +each lever, they would weave in an out but they was so hitched that they +never got in any body's way. They just walked around and round like they +did in those days. We had herds of sheep, we sheared them and wove yarn +for socks. We raised wheat, when it was ripe we laid a canvas cloth on +the ground and put wheat on it, then men and women on horse back rode +over it, and thrashed it that way. They called it treading it. Then we +took it to the mill and ground it and made it into flour. For breakfast, +(we ate awful soon in the morning), about 4 AM, then we packed lunch in +tin buckets and eat again at daylight. Fat meat, cornbread and molasses. +Some would have turnip greens for breakfast. + +Summertime, Miss Lelia would plant plenty of fruit, and we would have +fried apples, stewed peaches and things. + +Sunday mornings we would have biscuit, butter, molasses, chicken, etc. + +For our work they paid us seventy-five cents a day and when come cotton +picking time old rule, seventy five cents for pickin cotton. Christmas +time, plenty of fireworks, plenty to eat, drink and everything. We would +dance all Christmas. + +All kind of game was plentiful, plenty of coon, possum, used up +everything that grew in the woods. Plenty of corn, we took it to the +grist mill every Saturday. + +Ark. riv. boats passed the Walker place, and dey was a landing right at +dere place, and one at the Wright place, that is where the airport is +now. + +All de white folks had plenty of cattle den and in de winter time dey +was all turned in on the fields and with what us niggers had, that made +a good many, and you know yorself dat was good for de ground. + +Mother was a slave on the Merriweather place, her marster was Mick[TR: +name not clear] Merriweather. My granma was Gusta Merriweather, my +mother Lavina and lived on the Merriweather place in what was then +Dorsey county, near Edinburg, now Cleveland Co. My grandfather was Louis +Barnett, owned by Nick Barnett of Cleveland co., then Dorsey co. Fathers +people was owned by Marse Bob Walker. Miss Lelia (Eulalie) was mistis. +Miss Maggie Benton was young mistis. + +I dont believe in ghosts or spirits. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Emma Moore + 3715 Short West Second, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 80 +Occupation: Laundry work + + +"I'se born in slavery times. When my daddy come back from the War, he +said I was gwine on seven or eight. + +"He stayed in the War three years and six months. I know that's what he +always told us. He went with his master, Joe Horton. Looks like I can +see old Marse Joe now. Had long sandy whiskers. The las' time I seed him +he come to my uncle's house. We was all livin' in a row of houses. +Called em the quarters. I never will fergit it. + +"I was born on Horton's Island here in Arkansas. That's what they told +me. + +"I know when my daddy went to war and when he come back, he put on his +crudiments (accoutrements) to let us see how he looked. + +"I seed the soldiers gwine to war and comin' back. Look like to me I was +glad to see em till I seed too many of em. + +"Yankees used to come down and take provisions. Yes, 'twas the Yankees! + +"My granddaddy was the whippin' boss. Had a white boss too named Massa +Fred. + +"Massa Joe used to come down and play with us chillun. His name was Joe +Horton. Ever'body can tell you that was his name. Old missis named Miss +Mary. She didn't play with us much. + +"Yes ma'am, they sure did take us to Texas durin' of the War--in a ox +wagon. Stayed down there a long time. + +"We didn't have plenty to eat but we had to eat what we did. I member +they wouldn't give us chillun no meat, jus' grease my mouf and make my +mother think we had meat. + +"Now my mother told me, at night some of the folks used to steal one of +old massa's shoats and cook it at night. I know when that pot was on the +rack but you better not say nothin' bout it. + +"All us chillun stayed in a big long log house. Dar is where us chillun +stayed in the daytime, right close to Miss Mary. + +"I used to sit on the lever at the gin. You know that was glory to me to +ride. I whipped the old mule. Ever' now and then I'd give him a tap. + +"When they pressed the cotton, they wet the press and I member one time +they wet it too much. I don't say they sont it back but I think they +made em pay for it. And they used to put chunks in the bale to make it +weigh heavy. Right there on that lake where I was born. + +"Used to work in the field. These white folks can tell you I loved to +work. I used to get as much as the men. My mammy was a worker and as the +sayin' is, I was a chip off the old block. + +"The first teacher I went to school to was named Mr. Cushman. Didn't go +only on rainy days. That was the first school and you might say the las' +one cause I had to nuss them chillun. + +"You know old massa used to keep all our ages and my daddy said I was +nineteen when I married, but I don't know what year 'twas--honest I +don't. + +"I been married three times. + +"I member one time I was goin' to a buryin'. I was hurryin' to get +dressed. I wanted to be ready when they come by for me cause they say +it's bad luck to stop a corpse. If you don't know that I do--you know if +they had done started from the house. + +"My mama and daddy said they was born in Tennessee and was bought and +brought here. + +"I been goin' to one of these gov'ment schools and got my eyes so weak I +can't hardly see to thread a needle. I'se crazy bout it I'm tellin' you. +I sit up here till God knows how long. They give me a copy to practice +and they'd brag on me and that turned me foolish. I jus' thought I was +the teacher herself almos'. That's the truf now. + +"I can't read much. I don't fool with no newspaper. I wish I could, +woman--I sure do. + +"I keep tellin' these young folks they better learn somethin'. I tell em +they better take this chance. This young generation--I don't know much +bout the whites--I'm tellin' you these colored is a sight. + +"Well, I'm gwine away from here d'rectly--ain't gwine be here much +longer. If I don't see you again I'll meet you in heaven." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Patsy Moore, Madison, Arkansas +Age: 74 + + +"My mother was sold in Jamestown, Virginia to Daphney Hull. Her white +folks got in debt. My papa was born in Georgia. Folks named Williams +owned him. Ma never seen her ma no more but William Hull went to +Virginia and bought her two sisters. + +"I was named Patsy after grandma in Virginia. She had twenty-one +children to ma's knowing. Ma was a light color. Pa was a Molly Glaspy +man. That means he was Indian and African. Molly Glaspy folks was nearly +always free folks. Ma was named Mattie. If they would have no children +they got trafficked about. + +"Daphney Hull was good but William Hull and his wife was both mean. They +lived on the main road to Holly Springs. Daphney Hull was a Methodist +man, kind-hearted and good. He was a bachelor I think. He kept a woman +to cook and keep his house. Auntie said the Yankees was mean to Mr. +William Hull's wife. They took all their money and meat. They had their +money hid and some of the black folks let the Yankees find out where it +was. They got it. + +"Papa was a soldier. He sent for us. We come to Memphis, Tennessee in a +wagon. We lived there five or six years. Pa got a pension till he died. +Both my parents was field hands in slavery. Ma took in washing and +ironing in Memphis. + +"I was born in De Sota County, Mississippi. I remember Forrest's battle +in Memphis. I didn't have sense to be scared. I seen black and white +dead in the streets and alleys. We went to the magazine house for +protection, and we played and stayed there. They tried to open the +magazine house but couldn't. + +"When freedom come, folks left home, out in the streets, crying, +praying, singing, shouting, yelling, and knocking down everything. Some +shot off big guns. Den come the calm. It was sad then. So many folks +done dead, things tore up and nowheres to go and nothing to eat, nothing +to do. It got squally. Folks got sick, so hungry. Some folks starved +nearly to death. Times got hard. We went to the washtub onliest way we +all could live. Ma was a cripple woman. Pa couldn't find work for so +long when he mustered out. + +"I do recollect the Civil War well. + +"I live with my daughter. I have a cough since I had flu and now I have +chills and fever. My daughter helps me all I get. She lives with me. + +"Some of the young folks is mighty good. I reckon some is too loose +acting. Times is hard. Harder in the winter than in summer time. We has +our garden and chickens to help us out in summer." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Ada Moorehead + 2300 E. Barraque, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 82? + + +"I was here in slavery times, honey, but I don't know exactly how old I +am. I was born in Huntsville, Alabama but you know in them days old +folks didn't tell the young folks no thin' and I was so small when they +brought me here. I don't know what year I was born but I believe I'm +about eighty-two. You know when a person ain't able to work and dabble +out his own clothes, you know he's gone a long ways. + +"My white folks was Ad White what owned me. Called him Marse Ad. Don't +call folks marse much now-days. + +"My father was sold away from us in Alabama and we heard he was here in +Pine Bluff so Aunt Fanny brought us here. She just had a road full of us +and brought us here to Arkansas. We walked. We was a week on the road. I +know we started here on Monday morning and we got here to the courthouse +on the next Monday round about noon. That was that old courthouse. I +reckon that ground is in the river now. + +"When we got here I saw my father. He took me to his sister--that was my +Aunt Savannah--and dropped me down. + +"Mrs. Reynolds raised me. She come to Aunt Savannah's house and hired me +the very same day I got here. I nursed Miss Katie. She was bout a month +old. You know--a little long dress baby. Don't wear then long dresses +now--gettin' wiser. + +"Mrs. Reynolds she was good to me. And since she's gone looks like I'm +gone too--gone to the dogs. Cause when Mrs. Reynolds got a dress for +Miss Katie--got one for me too. + +"My father was a soldier in the war. Last time I heard from him I know +he was hauling salt to the breastworks. Yes, I was here in the war. That +was all right to me but I wished a many a time I wasn't here. + +"I went to school two or three days in a week for about a term. But I +didn't learn to read much. Had to hire out and help raise my brother and +sister. I'm goin' to this here government school now. I goes every +afternoon. + +"Since I got old I can think bout the old times. It comes to me. I +didn't pay attention to nothin' much when I was young. + +"Oh Lord, I don't know what's goin' to become of us old folks. Wasn't +for the Welfare, I don't know what I'd do. + +"I was sixteen when I married. I sure did marry young. I married young +so I could see my chillun grown. I never married but once and I stayed a +married woman forty-nine years to the very day my old man died. Lived +with one man forty-nine years. I had my hand and heart full. I had a +home of my own. How many chillun? Me? I had nine of my own and I raised +other folks' chillun. Oh, I been over this world right smart--first one +thing and then another. I know a lot of white folks. They all been +pretty good to me." + + + + +Interviewer: Mary D. Hudgins +Person Interviewed: Mrs. Mary Jane (Mattie) Mooreman +Home: with son +Age: 90 + + +"Yes, ma'am. I've been in Hot Springs, been in Hot Springs 57 years. +That's a long time. Lots of changes have come--I've seen lots of changes +here--changed from wooden sidewalks and little wood buildings. + +"Your name's Hudgins? I knew the Hudginses--knew Miss Nora well. What's +that? Did I know Adeline? Did I know Adeline! Do you mean to tell me +she's still alive? Adeline! Why Miss Maud," (addressing Mrs. Eisele, for +whom she works--and who sat nearby to help in the interview) "Miss +Maude, I tell you Adeline's WHITE, she's white clean through!" (see +interview with Adeline Blakeley, who incidentally is as black as "the +ace of spades"--in pigmentation.) "Miss Maude, you never knew anybody +like Adeline. She bossed those children and made them mind--just like +they was hers. She took good care of them." (Turning to the interviewer) +"You know how the Hudgins always was about their children. Adeline +thought every one of 'em was made out of gold---made out of pure GOLD. + +"She made 'em mind. I remember once, she was down on Central Avenue with +Ross and he did southing or other that, wasn't nice. She walked over to +the umbrella stand, you remember how they used to have umbrellas for +sale out in front of the stores. She grabbed an umbrella and she whipped +Ross with it--she didn't hurt him. Then she put it back in the stand +and said to the man who ran the store, 'If that umbrella's hurt, just +charge it to Harve Hudgins.' That's the way Adeline was. So she's still +alive. Law how I'd like to see her. Bring me a picture of her. Oh Miss +Mary, I'd love to have it. + +"Me? I was born on Green river near Hartford, Kentucky. Guess I was +about a year and a half, from what they told me when my mistress +married. Don't know how she ever met my master. She was raised in a +convent and his folks lived a long way from hers. But anyhow she did. +She was just 13 when she married. The man she married was named Charles +Mooreman M-O-O-R-E-M-A-N. They had a son called Charles Wycliff +Mooreman. He was named for his mother's people. I got a son I called +Charles Wycliff too. He works at the Arlington. He's a waiter. They say +he looks just like me. Mr. Charles Wycliff Mooreman--back in Kentucky. +I still gets letters from him. + +"Miss Mary I guess I had a pretty easy time in slavery days. They was +good to us. Besides I was a house niggah." (Those who have been "house +niggahs" never quibble at the word slave or negro. A subtle social +distinction brewed in the black race to separate house servants from +field hands as far as wealthy planters from "poor white trash.".) "Once +I heard a man say of my mother, 'You could put on a white boiled shirt +and lie flat down on the floor in her kitchen and not get dirty.'" + +"Cook? No, ma'am!" (with dignity and indignation) "I never cooked until +after I was married, and I never washed, never washed so much as a rag. +All I washed was the babies and maybe my mistress's feet. I was a lady's +maid. I'd wait on my mistress and I'd knit sox for all the folks. When +they would sleep it was our duty--us maids--to fan 'em with feathers +made out of turkey feathers--feather fans. Part of it was to keep 'em +cool. Then they didn't have screens like we have today. So part of it +was to keep the flies off. I remember how we couldn't stomp our feet to +keep the flies from biting for fear of waking 'em up. + +"No, Miss Mary, we didn't get such, good food. Nobody had all the kinds +of things we have today. We had mostly buttermilk and cornbread and fat +meat. Cake? 'Deed we didn't. I remember once they baked a cake and Mr. +Charles Wycliff--he was just a little boy--he got in and took a whole +fistful out of the cake. When Miss found out about it, she give us all +doses of salts--enough to make us all throw up. She gave it to all the +niggahs and the children--the white children. And what did she find out? +It was her own child who had done it. + +"Yes ma'am we learned to read and write. Oh, Miss Maude now--I don't +want to recite. I don't want to." (But she did "Twinkle, Twinkle Little +Star" and "The Playful Kitten"--the latter all of 40 lines.) "I think, I +think they both come out of McGuffey's second Reader. Yes ma'am I +remember's McGuffey's and the Blueback speller too. + +"No, Miss Mary, there wasn't so much of the war that was fought around +us. I remember that old Master used to go out in the front yard and +stand by a locust tree and put his ear against it. He said that way he +could hear the cannon down to Bowling Green. No, I didn't never hear any +shooting from the war myself. + +"Yes ma'am, the Confederates used to come through lots. I remember how +we used to go to the spring for water for 'em. Then we'd stand with the +buckets on our heads while they drank--drank out of a big gourd. When +the buckets was empty we'd go back to the spring for more water. + +"Once the Yankees come by the place. It was at night. They went out to +the quarters and they tried to get 'em to rise up. Told 'em to come on +in the big house and take what they wanted. Told 'em to take anything +they wanted to take, take Master's silver spoons and Miss' silk dress. +'If they don't like it, we'll shoot their brains out,' they said. Next +morning they told Master. He got scared and moved. At that time we was +living at Cloverport. + +"It was near the end of the war and we was already free, only we didn't +know it. He moved on up to Stephensport. That's on the Ohio too. He took +me and a brother of mine and another black boy. While we was there I +remember he took me to a circus. I remember how the lady--she was +dressed in pink come walking down a wire--straight on down to the +ground. She was carrying a long pole. I won't never forget that. + +"Not long afterwards I was married. We was all free then. My husband +asked my master if he could marry me. He told him 'You're a good man. +You can come and live on my farm and work for me, but you can't have +Mattie.' So we moved off to his Master's farm. + +"A little while after that his Master bought a big farm in Arkansas. He +wanted to hire as many people as he could. So we went with him. He +started out well, but the first summer he died. So everything had to be +sold. A man what come down to bid on some of the farm tools and +stock--come to the auction, he told us to come on up to Woodruff county +and work for him. We was there 7 years and he worked the farm and I took +care of myself and my babies. Then he went off and left me. + +"I went in to Cotton Plant and started working there. Finally he wrote +me and tried to get me to say we hadn't never been married. Said he +wanted to marry another woman. The white folks I worked for wouldn't let +me. I'd been married right and they wouldn't let me disgrace myself by +writing such a letter. + +"Finally I came on to Hot Springs. For a while I cooked and washed. Then +I started working for folks, regular. For 9 years, tho, I mostly washed +and ironed. + +"I came to Hot Springs on the 7th of February--I think it was 57 years +ago. You remember Miss Maud--it was just before that big hail storm. You +was here, don't you remember--that hail storm that took all the windows +out of all the houses, tore off roofs and swept dishes and table-cloths +right off the tables. Can't nobody forget that who's seen it. + +"Miss Mary, do you know Miss Julia Huggins? I worked for her a long +time. Worked for her before she went away and after she came back. +Between times I cooked for Mrs. Button (Burton--but called Button by +everyone) Housley. When Miss Julia come back she marches right down to +Mrs. Housley's and tells me she wants me to work for her again. 'Can't +get her now,' says Mrs. Housley, 'Mattie's done found out she's black.' +But anyhow I went to see her, and I went back to work for her, pretty +foxy Miss Julia was. + +"I been working for Mrs. Eisele pretty near twenty five years. Saw her +children grow up and the grand children. Lancing, he's my heart. Once +when Mr. and Mrs. Eisele went to see Mrs. Brown, Lancing's mother, they +took me with them. All the way to Watertown, Wisconsin. There wasn't any +more niggas in the town and all the children thought I was somthing to +look at. They'd come to see me and they'd bring their friends with 'em. +Once while we was there, a circus come to town. The children wanted me +to see it. Told me there was a negro boy in it. Guess they thought it +would be a treat to me to see another niggah. I told 'em, 'Law, don't +you think I see lots, lots more than I wants, everyday when I is at +home?' + +"It used to scare me. The folks would go off to a party or a show and +leave me alone with the baby. No, Miss Mary, I wasn't scared for myself. +I thought somebody might come in and kidnap that baby. No matter how +late they was I'd sit on the top step of the stairs leading +upstairs--just outside the door where Lansing was asleep. No matter what +time they come home they'd find me there. 'Why don't you go on in your +bedroom and lie down?' they'd ask me. 'No,' I'd tell 'em, 'somebody +might come in, and they would have to get that baby over my dead body.' + +"Jonnie, that's my daughter" (Mrs. D.G. Murphy, 338 Walnut Street, a +large stucco house with well cared for lawn) "she wants me to quit work. +I told her, 'You put that over on Mrs. Murphy--you made her quit work +and took care of her. What happened to her? She died! You're not going +to make me old.' + +"Twice she's got me to quit work. Once, she told me it was against the +law. Told me there was a law old folks couldn't work. I believed her and +I quit. Then I come on down and I asked Mr. Eisele" (an important +business executive and prominent in civic affairs, [HW: aged 83]) "He +rared back and he said, 'I'd like to see anybody stop me from working.' +So I come on back. + +"Another time, it was when the old age pensions come in. They tried to +stop me again. Told me I had to take it. I asked Mr. Eisele if I could +work just the same. 'No,' he says 'if you take it, you'll have to quit +work.' So I stamped my foot and I says, 'I won't take nobody's pension.' + +"The other day Jonnie called up here and she started to crying. Lots of +folks write her notes and say she's bad to let me work. Somebody told +her that they had seen me going by to work at 4 o'clock in the morning. +It wasn't no such. I asked a man when I was on the way and it was 25 +minutes until 5. Besides, my clock had stopped and I couldn't tell what +time it was. Yes, Miss Mary, I does get here sort of early, but then I +like it. I just sit in the kitchen until the folks get up. + +"You see that picture over there, it's Mr. Eisele when he was 17. I'd +know that smiling face anywhere. He's always good to me. When they go +away to Florida I can go to the store and get money whenever I need it. +But it's always good to see them come back. Miss Maud says I'm sure to +go to Heaven, I'm such a good worker. No, Miss Mary, I'm not going to +quit work. Not until I get old." + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Evelina Morgan + 1317 W. Sixteenth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: App. 81 +[TR: Original first page moved to follow second page per + HW: Insert this page before Par. 1, P. 3] + + +"I was born in Wedgeboro, North Carolina, on the plantation of--let me +see what that man's name was. He was an old lawyer. I done forgot that +old white man's name. Old Tom Ash! Senator Ash--that's his name. He was +good to his slaves. He had so many niggers he didn't know them all. + +"My father's name was Alphonso Dorgens and my mother's name was Lizzie +Dorgens. Both of them dead. I don't know what her name was before she +married. My pa belonged to the Dorgens' and he married my ma. That is +how she come to be a Dorgen. Old Man Ash never did buy him. He just +visited my mother. They all was in the same neighborhood. Big +plantations. Both of them had masters that owned lots of land. I don't +know how often he visited my mother after he married her. He was over +there all the time. They were right adjoining plantations. + +"I was born in a frame house. I don't know nothin' about it no more than +that. It was j'ined to the kitchen. My mother had two rooms j'ined to +the kitchen. She was the old mistress' cook. She could come right out of +the kitchen and go on in her room. + +"My father worked on the farm. They fed the slaves meat and bread. That +is all I remember--meat and bread and potatoes. They made lots of +potatoes. They gave 'em what they raised. You could raise stuff for +yourself if you wanted to. + +"My mother took care of her children. We children was on the place there +with her. She didn't have nobody's children to take care of but us. + +"I was six years old during of the War. My ma told me my age, but I +forgot it; I never did have it put down. The only way I gits a pension, +I just tells 'em I was six years old during of the War, and they figures +out the age. Sorta like that. But I know I was six years old when the +Rebels and the Yankees was fighting. + +"I seed the Yankees come through. I seed that. They come in the time old +master was gone. He run off--he run away. He didn't let 'em git him. I +was a little child. They stayed there all day breaking into +things--breaking into the molasses and all like that. Old mistress +stayed upstairs hiding. The soldiers went down in the basement and +throwed things around. Old master was a senator; they wanted to git him. +They sure did cuss him: 'The ----, ----, ----, old senator,' they would +say. He took his finest horses and all the gold and silver with him +somewheres. They couldn't git 'im. They was after senators and high-ups +like that. + +"The soldiers tickled me. They sung. The white people's yard was jus' +full of them playing 'Yankee Doodle' and 'Hang Jeff Davis on a Sour +Apple Tree.' + +"All the white people gone! Funny how they run away like that. They had +to save their selves. I 'member they took one old boss man and hung him +up in a tree across a drain of water, jus' let his foot touch--and +somebody cut him down after 'while. Those white folks had to run away. + + +Patrollers + +"I used to hear them all talk about the patrollers. I used to hear my +mother talking about them. My ma said my master wouldn't let the +patrollers come on his place. They could go on anybody else's place but +he never did let them come on his place. Some of the slaves were treated +very bad. But my ma said he didn't allow a patroller on the place and he +didn't allow no other white man to touch his niggers. He was a big white +man--a senator. He didn't know all his Negroes but he didn't allow +nobody to impose on them. He didn't let no patroller and nobody else +beat up his niggers. + + +How Freedom Came + +"I don't know how freedom came. I know the Yankees came through and +they'd pat we little niggers on the head and say, 'Nigger, you are just +as free as I am.' And I would say, 'Yes'm.' + + +Right After Freedom + +"Right after the War my mother and father moved off the place and went +on another plantation somewheres--I don't know where. They share +cropped. I don't know how long. Old mistress didn't want them to move at +all. I never will forget that. + + +Present Occupation and Opinions + +"I used to cook out all the time when I got grown. I couldn't tell you +when I married. You got enough junk down there now. So I ain't giving +you no more. My husband's been dead about seven years. I goes to the +Methodist church on Ninth and Broadway. I ain't able to do no work now. +I gets a little pension, and the Lord takes care of me. I have a hard +time sometime. + +"I ain't bothered about these young folks. They is _somethin' awful_. It +would be wonderful to write a book from that. They ought to git a +history of these young people. You could git a wonderful book out of +that. + +"The colored folks have come a long way since freedom. And if the white +folks didn't pin 'em down they'd go further. Old Jeff Davis said when +the niggers was turned loose, 'Dive up your knives and forks with them.' +But they didn't do it. + +"Some niggers was sharp and got something. And they lost it just like +they got it. Look at Bush. I know two or three big niggers got a lot and +ain't got nothin' left now. Well, I ain't got no time for no more junk. +You got enough down there. You take that and go on." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +During the interview, a little "pickaninny" came in with his mother. His +grandmother and a forlorn little dog were also along. "Tell grandma what +you want," his mother prompted. "Is that your grandson?" I interrupted. +"No," she said, "He ain't no kin to me, but he calls me 'ma' and acts as +if I was his grandma." The little fellow hung back. He was just about +twenty-two months old, but large and mature for that age. + +"Tell 'ma' what you want," his grandmother put in. Finally, he made up +his mind and stood in front of her and said, "Buh--er." His mother +explained, "I've done made him some corn bread, but he ain't got no +butter to put on it and he wants you to give him some." + +Sister Morgan sat silent awhile. Then she rose deliberately and went +slowly to the ancient ice-box, opened it and took out a tin of butter +which she had evidently churned herself in some manner and carefully cut +out a small piece and wrapped it neatly and handed it to the little one. +After a few amenities, they passed out. + +Even with her pitiful and meagre lot, the old lady evidently means to +share her bare necessities with others. + +The manner of her calculation of her age is interesting. She was six +years old when the War was going on. She definitely remembers seeing +Sherman's army and Wheeler's cavalry after she was six. Since they were +in her neighborhood in 1864, she is undoubtedly more than eighty. +Eighty-one is a fair estimate. + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: James Morgan + 819 Rice Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 65 + + +"During the slave time, the pateroles used to go from one plantation to +the other hunting Negroes. They would catch them at the door and throw +hot ashes in their faces. You could go to another plantation and steal +or do anything you wanted if you could manage to get back to your old +master's place. But if you got caught away from your plantation, they +would get you. Sometimes a nigger didn't want to get caught and beat, so +he would throw a shovel of hot ashes in the pateroles' faces and beat it +away. + +"My daddy used to tell lots of stories about slavery times. He's been +dead forty-three years and my mother has been dead forty-one +years--forty-one years this May. I was quite young and lots of the +things they told me, I remember, and some of them, I don't. + +"I was born in 1873. That was eight years after the War ended. My +father's name was Aaron and my mother's name was Rosa. Both of them was +in slavery.[TR: sentence lined out.] I got a brother that was a baby in +her lap when the Yankee soldiers got after a chicken. The chicken flew +up in her lap and they never got that one. The white folks lost it, but +the Yankees didn't get it. I have heard my mother tell all sorts of +things. But they just come to me at times. The soldiers would take +chickens or anything they could get their hands on--those soldiers +would. + +"My mother married the first time in slavery. Her first husband was sold +in slavery. That is the onliest brother I'm got living now out of +ten--that one that was settin' in her lap when the soldiers come +through. He's in Boydell, Arkansas now. It used to be called Morrell. It +is about one hundred twenty-one miles from here, because Dermott is one +hundred nine and Boydell is about twelve miles further on. It's in +Nashville[HW:?] County. My brother was a great big old baby in slavery +times. He was my mother's child by her first husband. All the rest of +them is dead and he is the onliest one that is living. + +"I was a section foreman for the Missouri Pacific for twenty-two years. +I worked there altogether for thirty-five years, but I was section +foreman for twenty-two years. There's my card. Lots of men stayed on the +job till it wore them out. Lewis Holmes did that. It would take him two +hours to walk from here to his home--if he ever managed it at all. + +"It's warm today and it will bring a lot of flies. Flies don't die in +the winter. Lots of folks think they do. They go up in cracks and little +places like that under the weatherboard there--any place where it is +warm--and there they huddle up and stay till it gets warm. Then they +come out and get something to eat and go back again when it cools off. +They live right on through the winter in their hiding places. + +"Both of my parents said they always did their work whatever the task +might be. And my daddy said he never got no whipping at all. You know +they would put a task on you and if you didn't do it, you would get a +whipping. My daddy wouldn't stand to be whipped by a paterole, and he +didn't have to be whipped by nobody else, because he always did his +work. + +"He was one of the ones that the pateroles couldn't catch. When the +pateroles would be trying to break in some place where he was, and the +other niggers would be standing 'round frightened to death and wonderin' +what to do, he would be gettin' up a shovelful of ashes. When the door +would be opened and they would be rushin' in, he would scatter the ashes +in their faces and rush out. If he couldn't find no ashes, he would +always have a handful of pepper with him, and he would throw that in +their faces and beat it. + +"He would fool dogs that my too. My daddy never did run away. He said he +didn't have no need to run away. They treated him all right. He did his +work. He would get through with everything and sometimes he would be +home before six o'clock. My mother said that lots of times she would +pick cotton and give it to the others that couldn't keep up so that they +wouldn't be punished. She had a brother they used to whip all the time +because he didn't keep up. + +"My father told me that his old master told him he was free. He stayed +with his master till he retired and sold the place. He worked on shares +with him. His old master sold the place and went to Monticello and died. +He stayed with him about fifteen or sixteen years after he was freed, +stayed on that place till the Government donated him one hundred sixty +acres and charged him only a dollar and sixty cents for it. He built a +house on it and cleared it up. That's what my daddy did. Some folks +don't believe me when I tell 'em the Government gave him a hundred and +sixty acres of land and charged him only a dollar and sixty cents for +it--a penny a acre. + +"I am retired now. Been retired since 1938. The Government took over the +railroad pension and it pays me now. That is under the Security Act. +Each and every man on the railroad pays in to the Government. + +"I have been married right around thirty-nine years. + +"I was born in Chicot County, Arkansas.[TR: sentence lined out.] My +father was born in Georgia and brought here by his master. He come here +in a old covered ox wagon. I don't know how they happened to decide to +come here. My mother was born in South Carolina. She met my father here +in Arkansas. They sold her husband and she was brought here. After peace +was declared she met my daddy. Her first husband was sold in South +Carolina and she never did know that became of him. They put him up on +the block and sold him and she never did know which way he went. He left +her with two boys right then. She had a sister that stayed in South +Carolina. Somebody bought her there and kept her and somebody bought my +mother and brought her here. My father's master was named McDermott. My +mother's last master was named Belcher or something like that. + +"I don't belong to any church. I have always lived decent and kept out +of trouble." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +When Morgan said "there is my record", he showed me a pass for the year +1938-39 for himself and his wife between all stations on the Missouri +Pacific lines signed by L.W. Baldwin, Chief Executive Officer. + +He is a good man even if he is not a Christian as to church membership. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person Interviewed: Olivia Morgan + Hazen, Ark. +Age: 62 + + +"I am 62 years old. I was born in Lafayette County close to New +Lewisville. I heard mama say many a time she was named after her +state--North Carolina. Her name was Carolina Alexandria. They brought +her a slave girl to this new country. She and papa must of met up +toreckly after freedom. She had some children and I'm one of my papa's +oldest children. + +"Papa come here long fore the war started. The old master in Atlanta, +Georgia--Abe Smith--give his son three boys and one girl. He emigrated +to Arkansas. + +"Mama said her first husband and the young master went off and he never +come back as she knowed of. Young master played with mama's second girl +a whole heap. One day they was playing hiding round. Just as she come +running to the base from round the house, young master hit her on the +forehead with a rock. It killed her. Old master tried to school him but +he worried so they sent him off--thought it would do his health good to +travel. I don't think they ever come back. + +"After freedom mama married and went over to papa's master's. Papa +stayed round there a long time. They got news some way they was to get +forty acres land and a mule to start out with but they said they never +got nothing. + +"My papa said he knowed it to be a fact, the Ku Klux cut a colored +woman's breast off. I don't recollect why he said they got after her. +The Jayhawkers was bad too. They all went wild; some of em left men +hanging up in trees. They needed a good master to protect em worse after +the war than they needed em before. They said they had a Yankee +government then was reason of the Ku Klux. They run the Jayhawkers out +and made the Yankees go on home. Everybody had a hard time. Bread was +mighty scarce when I was a child. Times was hard. Men that had land had +to let it lay out. They had nothin' to feed the hands on, no money to +pay, no seed, no stock to work. The fences all went to rack and all the +houses nearly down. When I was a child they was havin' hard times. + +"I'm a country woman. I farmed all my life. I been married two times; I +married Holmes, then Morgan. They dead. I washed, ironed, cooked, all at +Mr. Jim Buchannan's sawmill close to Lewisville two years and eight +months; then I went back to farmin' up at Pine Bluff. My oldest sister +washed and ironed for Mrs. Buchannan till she moved from the sawmill to +Texarkana. He lived right at the sawmill ground. + +"My papa voted a Republican ticket. I don't vote. My husbands have voted +along. If the women would let the men have the business I think times +would be better. I don't believe in women voting. The men ought to make +the livings for the families, but the women doing too much. They +crowding the men out of work. + +"Some folks is sorry in all colors. Seems like the young folks ain't got +no use for quiet country life. They buying too much. They say they have +to buy everything. I ain't had no depression yet. I been at work and we +had crop failures but I made it through. Some folks good and some ain't. +Times is bout to run away with some of the folks. They all say times is +better than they been since 1928. I hope times is on the mend." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Tom Morgan, Madison, Arkansas +Age: 71 + + +"My mother was the mother of fourteen of us children. Their names was +Sarah and Richard Morgan. + +"My great-grandfather b'long to Bill Woods. They had b'long to the +Morgans and when freedom come they changed their names back. Some of +them still owned by Morgans. + +"Mother's owners was Auris and Lucella Harris. They had a boy named +Harley Harris and a girl. He had a small farm. + +"Mother said her master wasn't bad, but my father said his owner was +tough on him--tough on all of them. They was all field hands. They had +to git up and be doing. He said they fed by torch morning and night and +rested in the heat of the day two or three hours. Feed the oxen and +mules. In them days stock and folks all et three times a day. I does +real well now to get two meals a day, sometimes but one. They done some +kind of work all the year 'round. He said they had tasks. They better +git the task done or they would get a beating. + +"I haven't voted in so long a time. I voted Republican. I thought I did. + +"I worked at the railroad till they put me off. They put me off on +disability. Trying to git my papers fixed up to work or get something +one. Back on the railroad job. I farmed when I was young." + + + + +El Dorado District +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of Interviewer: Pernella Anderson +Subject: Slavery Days--Cruel Master Murdered by Slaves +Story:--Information + +This Information given by: Charity Morris +Place of Residence: Camden, Arkansas +Age: 90 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] + + +Ah wuz born in Carolina uh slave an ah was de eldest daughtuh of +Christiana Webb whose owner wuz Master Louis Amos. Mah mammy had lots uv +chillun an she also mammied de white chillun, whut wuz lef' mammyless. +When ah wuz very small dey rented me out tuh some very po' white fokes. +Dey wuzn use tuh slaves so mah marster made him promise [HW: not] tuh +beat me or knock me bout. Dey promise dey wouldn. Dey cahried me home an +ah clare dey wuz so mean tuh me till ah run off an tried tuh fin' de way +back tuh mah marster. Night caught me in de woods. Ah sho' wuz skeered. +Ah wuz skeered uv bears an panthers so ah crawled up in a ole bandoned +crib an crouched down gainst de loft. Ah went off tuh sleep but wuz woke +by somethin scratchin on de wall below. Ah stayed close as ah could tuh +de wall an 'gin er prayin. Dat things scratched all night an ah prayed +all night. De nex' mawnin dese white fokes sent word tuh Marster dat ah +had lef' so Marster foun' me an took me home and let me stay dar too. Ah +didn' work in de fiel' ah worked in de house. We lived in uh log cabin. +Evah Sunda mawnin Marster Louis would have all us slaves tuh de house +while he would sing an pray an read de Bible tuh us all. + +De people dat owned de plantation near us had lots of slaves. Dey owned +lots uv mah kin fokes. Dey marster would beat dem at night when dey come +fum de fiel' an lock em up. He'd whoop um an sen' um tuh de fiel'. Dey +couldn' visit no slaves an no slaves was 'lowed tuh visit em. So mah +cousin Sallie watched him hide de key so she moved dem a li'l further +back so dat he had tuh lean ovah tuh reach dem. Dat mawnin soon when he +come tuh let em out she cracked him in de haid wid de poker an made +little Joe help put his haid in de fiuh place. Dat day in de fiel' +Little Joe made er song; "If yo don' bleave Aunt Sallie kilt Marse Jim +de blood is on huh under dress". He jes hollered hit. "Aunt Sallie kilt +Marse Jim." Dey zamined Aunt Sallie's under dress so dey put huh in jail +till de baby come den dey tried huh an sentenced huh tuh be hung an she +wuz. + +Our Marster use tuh tell us if we left de house de patarollers would +catch us. One night de patarollers run mah two brothers home, Joe an +Henry. + +When de ole haid died out dey chillun got de property. Yo see we slaves +wuz de property. Den we got separated. Some sent one way an some nother. +Hit jes happent dat Marse Jim drawed me. + +When de Wah broke out we could heah li'l things bein said. We couldn' +make out. So we begin tuh move erbout. Later we learnt we wuz runnin fum +de wah. In runnin we run intuh a bunch uv soldiers dat had got kilt. Oh +dat wuz terrible. Aftuh mah brudders foun out dat dey wuz fightin tuh +free us dey stole hosses an run erway tuh keep fum bein set free. Aftuh +we got tuh Morris Creek hit wuz bloody an dar wuz one uv de hosses +turnin roun an roun in de watuh wid his eyes shot out. We nevah saw +nuthin else uv Joe nor Henry nor de othuh horse from dat day tuh dis +one. But we went on an on till we come tuh a red house and dat red house +represented free. De white fokes wouldn go dat way cause dey hated tuh +give us up. Dey turnt an went de othuh way but hit wuz too late. De news +come dat Mr. Lincoln had signed de papuhs dat made us all free an dere +wuz some 'joicing ah tells yo. Ah wuz a grown woman at dat time. Ole +Moster Amos brought us on as fur as Fo'dyce an turnt us a loose. Dat's +wha' dey settled. Some uv de slaves stayed wid em an some went tuh othuh +places. Me an mah sistuh come tuh Camden an settled. Ah mahried George +Morris. We havn' seen our pa an ma since we wuz 'vided and since we wuz +chillun. When we got tuh Camden and settled down we went tuh work an +sont back tuh de ole country aftuh ma an pa. Enroute tuh dis country we +come through Tennessee an ah membuh comin through Memphis an Pine Bluff +to Fordyce. + +As we wuz comin we stopped at de Mississippi Rivuh. Ah wuz standin on de +bank lookin at de great roll uv watuh high in de air. Somebody snatched +me back and de watuh took in de bank wha ah wuz standin. Yo cound'n +stand too close tuh de rivuh 'count uv de waves. + +Der wuz a col' wintuh and at night we would gather roun a large camp +fire an play sich games as "Jack-in-de-bush cut him down" an "Ole gray +mule-out ride him." Yaul know dem games ah know. An in de summer times +at night we played _Julands_. On our way tuh Arkansas we drove ox-teams, +jinnie teams, donkey teams, mule teams an horse teams. We sho had a good +time. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Emma Morris, Forrest City, Arkansas +Age: 71 + + +"My parents was Jane and Sam McCaslin. They come from close to Atlanta, +Georgia to Hernando, Mississippi after slavery. Ma was heired and they +bought pa before they left North Carolina. They bought pa out of a +nigger drove after he was grown. He raised tobacco and corn. Pa helped +farm and they raised hogs. He drove hogs to sell. He didn't say where +they took the hogs, only they would have to stay up all night driving +the hogs, and they rode horses and walked too and had shepherd dogs to +keep them in a drove. + +"Pa was a Bรถwick (B(our)ick) but I never heard him say nothing bout +Master Bowick, so I don't know his other name. He said they got in a +tight [TR: missing word?] and had to sell some of the slaves and he +being young would bring more than one of the older men. He was real +black. Ma was lighter but not very light. + +"McCaslin was a low heavy set man and he rented out hacks and horses in +Atlanta and pa drove, greased the harness and curried and sheared the +horses. Master McCaslin brought them in town and rented them out. He +didn't have a livery stable. He just furnished conveyances. I heard him +tell about a good hitching post where he could more than apt rent out +his rig and how he always stopped and fed the horses when eating time +come. He took a feed box all the time. Master McCaslin would tell him to +not drive too hard when he had to make long drives. He never would let +him take a whoop. + +"He had some girls I heard him say. May and Alice was their names. He +didn't say much about the family. He took a basket of provision with him +to eat Miss May and Miss Alice fixed up. The basket was close wove and +had a lid. The old man farmed. He drove too. He drove a hack. Ma worked +in the field. I heard her tell about the cockleburs. Well, she said they +would stick on your dress and stick your legs and you would have to pick +them off and sometimes the beggar's-lice would be thick on their clothes +and they would pick them off. + +"When they would clean out the fence corners (rail fence) they would +leave every little wild plum tree and leave a whole lot of briers so +they would have wild plums and berries. They raised cotton. Sometime +during the War old Master McCaslin took all his slaves and stock way +back in the bottoms. The cane was big as ma's wrist she said. They put +up some cabins to live in and shelter the stock. Pa said some of em went +in the army. He didn't want to go. They worked a corn crop over in +there. + +"They left soon as they was freed. I don't know how they found it out. +They walked to way over in Alabama and pa made terms with a man, to come +to Mississippi. Then they come in a wagon and walked too. She had three +little children. I was [HW: born] close to Montgomery, Alabama in +September but I don't know how long it was after the War. I was the +first girl. There was two more boys and three more girls after me. Ma +had children born in three states. + +"Ma died with the typhoid fever. Then two sisters and a brother died. Pa +had it all summer and he got well. Miss (Mrs.) Betty Chamlin took us +children to a house and fed us away from ma and the sick girls and boy. +We was on her place. She had two families then. We got water from a +spring. It was a pretty spring under a big hill. We would wade where the +spring run off. She moved us out of that house. + +"Miss Betty was a widow. She had several boys. They worked in the field +all the time. We stayed till the boys left and she sold her place. She +went back to her folks. I never did see her no more. We scattered out. +Pa lived about wid us till he died. I got three girls living. I got five +children dead. I got one girl out here from town and one girl at +Meridian and my oldest girl in Memphis. I takes it time around wid em. + +"I seen the Ku Klux but they never bothered us. I seen them in Alabama, +I recken it was. I was so small I jes' do remember seeing them. I was +the onliest child born in Alabama. Pa made one crop. I don't know how +they got along the rest of the time there. We started share cropping in +Mississippi. Pa was always a good hand with stock. If they got sick they +sent for him to tell them what to do. He never owned no land, no home +neither. + +"I farmed all my life. I used to make a little money along during the +year washing and ironing. I don't get no help. I live with the girls. My +girl in Memphis sends me a little change to buy my snuff and little +things I have to have. She cooks for a lawyer now. She did take care of +an lady. She died since I been here and she moved. I rather work in the +field than do what she done when that old lady lived. She was like a +baby to tend to. She had to stay in that house all the time. + +"The young folks don't learn manners now like they used to. Times is +better than I ever seen em. Poor folks have a hard time any time. Some +folks got a lot and some ain't got nothing everywhere." + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Claiborne Moss + 1812 Marshall Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 81 + + +"I was born in Washington County, Georgia, on Archie Duggins' +plantation, fifteen miles from Sandersville, the county-seat, June 18, +1857. + +"My mother's name was Ellen Moss. She was born in Georgia too, in +Hancock County, near Sparta, the county-seat. My father was Fluellen +Moss. He, too, was born in Hancock County. Bill Moss was his owner. +Jesse Battle was my mother's owner before she married. My mother and +father had ten children, none of them living now but me, so far as I +know. I was the fifth in line. There were four older than I. The oldest +was ten years older than I. + +"Bill Moss' and Jesse Battle's plantations ware not far apart. I never +heard my father say how he first met my mother. I was only eight years +old when he died. They were all right there in the same neighborhood, +and they would go visiting. Battle and Moss and Evans all had +plantations in the same neighborhood and they would go from one place to +the other. + +"When Bill Moss went to Texas, he gave my mother and father to Mrs. +Beck. Mrs. Beck was Battle's daughter and Mrs. Beck bought my father +from Moss and that kept them together. He was that good. Moss sold out +and went to Texas and all his slaves went walking while he went on the +train. He had about a hundred of them. When he got there, he couldn't +hear from them. He didn't know where they was--they was walking and he +had got on the train--so he killed hisself. When they got there, just +walking along, they found him dead. + +"Moss' nephew, Whaley, got two parts of all he had. Another fellow--I +can't call his name--got one part. His sister, they sent her back +five--three of my uncles and two of my aunties. + +"Where I was raised, Duggins wasn't a mean man. His slaves didn't get +out to work till after sunup. His brother, who lived three miles out +from us, made his folks get up before sunup. But Duggins didn't do that. +He seemed to think something of his folks. Every Saturday, he'd give +lard, flour, hog meat, syrup. That was all he had to give. That was +extra. War was going on and he couldn't get nothing else. On Wednesday +night he'd give it to them again. Of course, they would get corn-meal +and other things from the kitchen. They didn't eat in the kitchen or any +place together. Everybody got what there was on the place and cooked it +in his cabin. + +"Before I was born, Beck sold my mother and father to Duggins. I don't +know why he sold them. They had an auction block in the town, but out in +the country they didn't have no block. If I had seen a nigger and wanted +to buy him, I would just go up to the owner and do business with him. +That was the way it was with Beck and Duggins. Selling my mother and +father was just a private transaction between them. + + +Rations + +"Twice a week, flour, syrup, meat, and lard were given to the slaves. +you got other food from the kitchen. Meat, vegetables, milk,--all the +milk you wanted--bread. + + +A Mean Owner + +"Beck, Moss, Battle, and Duggins, they was all good people. But Kenyon +Morps, now talk about a mean man, there was one. He lived on a hill a +little off from the Duggins plantation. His women never give birth to +children in the house. He'd never let 'em quit work before the time. He +wanted them to work--work right up to the last minute. Children were all +born in the field and in fence corners. Then he had to let 'em stay in +about a week. Last I seen him, he didn't have nothin', and was ragged as +a jay bird. + + +Houses + +"Our house was a log house. It had a large room, and then it had another +room as large as that one or larger built on to it. Both of these rooms +were for our use. My mother and father slept in the log cabin and the +kids slept back in the other room. My sister stayed with Joe Duggins. +Her missis was a school-teacher, and she loved sister. My master gave my +sister to Joe Duggins. Mrs. Duggins taught my sister, Fannie, to read +and spell but not to write. If there was a slave man that knowed how to +write, they used to cut off his thumb so that he couldn't write. + +"There was some white people wouldn't have the darkies eating butter; +our white people let us have butter, biscuits, and ham every day. They +would put it up for me. + +"I had more sense than any kid on the plantation. I would do anything +they wanted done no matter how hard it was. I walked five miles through +the woods once on an errand. The old lady who I went to said: + +"'You walk way down here by yourself?' + +"I told her, 'yes'. + +"She said, 'Well, you ain't going back by yo'self because you're too +little,' and she sent her oldest son back with me. He was white. + +"My boss was sick once, and he wanted to get his mail. The post office +was five miles away. He said to me: + +"'Can't you get my mail if I let you ride on my horse?' + +"I said, 'Yes sir.' I rode up to the platform on the horse. They run out +and took me off the horse and filled up the saddle bags. Then they put +me back on and told me not to get off until I reached my master. When I +got back, everybody was standing out watching for me. When my boss heard +me coming, he jumped out the bed and ran out and took me off the horse +and carried me and the sacks and all back into the house. + + +Soldiers + +"I saw all of Wheeler's cavalry. Sherman come through first. He came and +stayed all night. Thousands and thousands of soldiers passed through +during the night. Cooper Cuck was with them. He was a fellow that used +to peddle around in all that country before the War. He went all through +the South and learned everything. Then he joined up with the Yankees. He +come there. Nobody seen him that night. He knowed everybody knowed him. +He went and hid under something somewhere. He was under the hill at +daybreak, but nobody seen him. When the last of the soldiers was going +out in the morning, one fellow lagged behind and rounded a corner. Then +he galloped a little ways and motioned with his arms. Cooper Cuck come +out from under the hill, and he and Cooper Cuck both came back and stole +everything that they could lay their hands on--all the gold and silver +that was in the house, and everything they could carry. + +"Wheeler's cavalry was about three days behind Sherman. They caught up +with Sherman, but it would have been better if they hadn't, 'cause he +whipped 'em and drove 'em back and went right on. They didn't have much +fighting in my country. They had a little scrimmage once--thirty-six men +was all they was in it. One of the Yankees got lost from his company. He +come back and inquired the way to Louisville. The old boss pointed the +way with his left hand and while the fellow was looking that way, he +drug him off his horse and cut his throat and took his gun off'n him and +killed him. + +"Sherman's men stayed one night and left. I mean, his officers stayed. +We had to feed them. They didn't pay nothing for what they was fed. The +other men cooked and ate their own grub. They took every horse and mule +we had. I was sitting beside my old missis. She said: + +"'Please don't let 'em take all our horses.' + +"The fellows she was talking to never looked around. He just said: +'Every damn horse goes.' + +"The Yankees took my Uncle Ben with them when they left. He didn't stay +but a couple of days. They got in a fight. They give Uncle Ben five +horses, five sacks of silverware, and five saddles. The goods was taken +in the fight. Uncle Ben brought it back with him. The boss took all that +silver away from him. Uncle Ben didn't know what to do with it. The +Yankees had taken all my master's and he took Ben's. Ben give it to him. +He come back 'cause he wanted to. + +"When Wheeler's cavalry came through they didn't take nothing--nothing +but what they et. I heard a fellow say, 'Have you got anything to eat?' + +"My mother said, 'I ain't got nothin' but some chitlins.' + +"He said, 'Gimme some of those; I love chitlins.' "Mother gave 'em to me +to carry to him. I didn't get half way to him before the rest of the men +grabbed me and took 'em away from me and et 'em up. The man that asked +for them didn't get a one. + + +Slave Money + +"The slaves would sometimes have five or six dollars. Mostly, they would +make charcoal and sell it to get money. + + +Patrollers + +"I seen patrollers. They come to our house. They didn't whip nobody. Our +folks didn't care nothin' about 'em. They come looking for keys and +whiskey. They couldn't whip nobody on my master's plantation. When they +would come there, he would be sitting up with 'em. He would sit there in +his back door and look at 'em. Wouldn't let 'em hit nobody. + +"Them colored women had more fun that enough--laughing at them +patrollers. Fool 'em and then laugh at 'em. Make out like they was +trying to hide something and the patrollers would come running up, grab +'em and try to see what it was. And the women would laugh and show they +had nothing. Couldn't do nothin' about it. Never whipped anybody 'round +there. Couldn't whip nobody on our place; couldn't whip nobody on Jessie +Mills' place; couldn't whip nobody on Stephen Mills' place; couldn't +whip nobody on Betsy Geesley's place; couldn't whip nobody on Nancy +Mills' place; couldn't whip nobody on Potter Duggins' place. Potter +Duggins was a cousin to my master. Nobody run them peoples' plantations +but theirselves. + + +Social Life + +"When slaves wanted to, they would have dances. They would have dances +from one plantation to the other. The master didn't object. They had +fiddles, banjo and quills. They made the quills and blowed 'em to beat +the band. Good music. They would make the quills out of reeds. Those +reeds would sound just like a piano. They didn't have no piano. They +didn't serve nothing. Nothing to eat and nothing to drink except them +that brought whiskey. The white folks made the whiskey, but the colored +folks would get it. + +"We had church twice a month. The Union Church was three miles away from +us. My father and I would go when they had a meeting. Bethlehem Church +was five miles away. Everybody on the plantation belonged to that +church. Both the colored and the white belonged and went there. They had +the same pastor for Bethlehem, Union, and Dairy Ann. His name was Tom +Adams. He was a white man. Colored folks would go to Dairy Ann +sometimes. They would go to Union too. + +"Sometimes they would have meetings from house to house, the colored +folks. The colored folks had those house to house meetings any time they +felt like it. The masters didn't care. They didn't care how much they +prayed. + +"Sometimes they had corn shuckings. That was where they did the serving, +and that was where they had the big eatings. They'd lay out a big pile +of corn. Everybody would get down and throw the corn out as they shucked +it. They would have a fellow there they would call the general. He would +walk from one person to another and from one end of the pile to the +other and holler and the boys would answer. His idea was to keep them +working. If they didn't do something to keep them working, they wouldn't +get that corn shucked that night. Them people would be shucking corn! +There would be a prize to the one who got the most done or who would be +the first to get done. They would sing while they were shucking. They +had one song they would sing when they were getting close to the finish. +Part of it went like this: + + 'Red shirt, red shirt + Nigger got a red shirt.' + +After the shucking was over, they would have pies, beef, biscuits, corn +bread, whiskey if you wanted it. I believe that was the most they had. +They didn't have any ice-cream. They didn't use ice-cream much in those +days. Didn't have no ice down there in the country. Not a bit of ice +there. If they had anything they wanted to save, they would let it down +in the well with a rope and keep it cool down there. They used to do +that here until they stopped them from having the wells. + +"Ring plays too. Sometimes when they wanted to amuse themselves, they +would play ring plays. They all take hands and form a ring and there +would be one in the center of the ring. Now he is got to get out. He +would come up and say, 'I am in this lady's garden, and I'll bet you +five dollars I can get out of here.' And d'reckly he would break +somebody's hands apart and get out. + + +How Freedom Came + +"The old boss called 'em up to the house and told 'em, 'You are free as +I am.' That was one day in June. I went on in the house and got +something to eat. My mother and father, he hired them to stay and look +after the crop. Next year, my mother and father went to Ben Hook's place +and farmed on shares. But my father died there about May. Then it wasn't +nobody working but me and my sister and mother. + + +What the Slaves Got + +"The slaves never got nothing. Alexander Stephens, the Vice-President of +the Confederacy, divided his plantation up and gave it to his darkies +when he died. I knew him and his brother too. Alexander[HW: *] never did +walk. He was deformed. Big headed rascal, but he had sense! His brother +was named Leonard[HW: *]. He was a lawyer. He really killed himself. He +was one of these die-hard Southerners. He did something and they +arrested him. It made him so mad. He'd bought him a horse. He got on +that horse and fell off and broke his neck. That was right after the +War. They kept garrisons in all the counties right after the War. + +"I was in Hancock County when I knew Vice-President Stephens. I don't +know where he was born but he had a plantation in Toliver [HW: +Taliaferro] County. Most of the Stephenses was lawyers. He was a lawyer +too, and he would come to Sparta. That is where I was living then. There +was more politics and political doings in Sparta than there was in +Crawfordville where he lived. He lived between Montgomery and Richmond +during the War, for the capital of the Confederacy was at Montgomery one +time and Richmond another. + +"After the War, the Republicans nominated Alexander Stephens for +governor. The Democrats knew they couldn't beat him, so they turned +'round and nominated him too. He had a lot of sense. He said, 'What we +lost on the battle-field, we will get it back at the ballot box.' Seeb +Reese, United States Senator from Hancock County, said, 'If you let the +nigger have four or five dollars in his pocket he never will steal.' + + +Life Since Freedom + +"After my father died, my mother stayed where she was till Christmas. +Then she moved back to the place she came from. We went to farming. My +brother and my uncle went and farmed up in Hancock County; so the next +year we moved up there. We stayed there and farmed for a long while. My +mother married three years afterwards. We still farmed. After awhile, I +got to be sixteen years old and I wouldn't work with my stepfather, I +told my mother to hire me out; if she didn't I would be gone. She hired +me out all right. But the old man used all my money. The next year I +made it plain to her that I wanted her to hire me out again but that +nobody was to use a dollar of my money. My mother could get as much of +it as she wanted but he couldn't. The first year I bought a buggy for +them. The old man didn't want me to use it at all. I said, 'Well then, +he can't use my money no more.' But I didn't stop helping him and giving +him things. I would buy beef and give it to my mother. I knew they would +all eat it. He asked me for some wheat. I wouldn't steal it like he +wanted me to but I asked the man I was working for for it. He said, +'Take just as much as you want.' So I let him come up and get it. He +would carry it to the mill. + + +Ku Klux Klan + +"The Ku Klux got after Uncle Will once. He was a brave man. He had a +little mare that was a race horse. Will rode right through the bunch +before they ever realized that it was him. He got on the other side of +them. She was gone! They kept on after him. They went down to his house +one night. He wouldn't run for nothing. He shot two of them and they +went away. Then he was out of ammunition. People urged him to leave, for +they knew he didn't have no more bullets; but he wouldn't and they came +back and killed him. + +"They came down to Hancock County one night and the boys hid on both +sides of the bridge. When they got in the middle of the bridge, the boys +commenced to fire on them from both sides, and they jumped into the +river. The darkies went on home when they got through shooting at them; +but there wasn't no more Ku Klux in Hancock County. The better thinking +white folks got together and stopped it. + +"The Ku Klux kept the niggers scared. They cowed them down so that they +wouldn't go to the polls. I stood there one night when they were +counting ballots. I belonged to the County Central Committee. I went in +and stood and looked. Our ballot was long; theirs was short. I stood and +seen Clait Turner calling their names from our ballots. I went out and +got Rube Turner and then we both went back. They couldn't call the votes +that they had put down they had. Rube saw it. + +"Then they said, 'Are you going to test this?' + +"Rube said, 'Yes.' But he didn't because it would have cost too much +money. Rube was chairman of the committee. + +"The Ku Klux did a whole lot to keep the niggers away from the polls in +Washington and Baldwin counties. They killed a many a nigger down there. + +"They hanged a Ku Klux for killing his wife and he said he didn't mind +being hung but he didn't want a damn nigger to see him die. + +"But they couldn't keep the niggers in Hancock County away from the +polls. There was too many of them. + + +Work in Little Rock + +"I came to Little Rock, November 1, 1903. I came here with surveyors. +They wanted to send me to Miami but I wouldn't go. Then I went to the +mortar box and made mortar. Then I went to the school board. After that +I ain't had no job. I was too old. I get a little help from the +government. + + +Opinions of the Present + +"I think that the young folks ought to make great men and women. But I +don't see that they are making that stride. Most of them is dropping +below the mark. I think we ought to have some powerful men and women but +what I see they don't stand up like they should. + + +Own Family + +"I have three daughters, no sons. These three daughters have twelve +grandchildren." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Frozie Moss (dark mulatto), Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 69 + + +"When my grandma whut raised me got free she and grandpa come to Memphis +and didn't stay there long till they went to Crittenden County on a +man's farm. My grandma was born in Alabama and my grandpa in Virginia. I +know he wasn't in the Nat Turner rebellion, for my mother had nine +children and all but me at Holly Grove, Mississippi. I was born up in +Crittenden County. She died. I remember very little about my father. I +jes' remember father a little. He died too. My grand parents lived at +Holly Grove all during the war. They used to talk about how they did. +She said hardest time she ever lived through was at Memphis. Nothing to +do, nothing to eat and no places to stay. I don't know why they left and +come on to Memphis. She said her master's name was Pig'ge. He wasn't +married. He and his sisters lived together. My grandmother was a slave +thirty years. She was a field hand. She said she would be right back in +the field when her baby was two weeks old. They didn't wont the slaves +to die, they cost too much money, but they give them mighty hard work to +do sometimes. Grandma and grandpa was heap stronger I am at my age. They +didn't know how old they was. Her master told her how long he had her +when they left him and his father owned her before he died. I think they +had a heap easier time after they come to Arkansas from what she said. I +can't answer yo questions because I'm just tellin' you what I remembers +and I was little when they used to talk so much. + +"If the young generation would save anything for the time when they +can't work I think they would be all right. I don't hear about them +saving. They buys too much. That their only trouble. They don't know how +to see ahead. + +"I owns this house is all. I been sick a whole heap, spent a lot on my +medicines and doctor bill. I worked on the farm till after I come to +Brinkley. We bought this place here and I cooks. I cooked for Miss Molly +Brinkkell, Mr. Adams and Mrs. Fowler. I washes and irons some when I can +get it. Washing and ironing 'bout gone out of fashion now. I don't get +no moneys. I get commodities from the Sociable Welfare. My son works and +they don't give me no money." + + + + +Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lucy +Person interviewed: Mose Moss, Russellville, Arkansas +Age: 65 + + +"Mose Moss is my name, suh, and I was born in 1875 in Yell County. My +father was born in old Virginny in 1831 and died in Yell County, +Arkansas, eight miles from Dardanelle, in 1916. Yes suh, I've lived in +Pope County a good many years. I recollects some things pretty well and +some not so good. + +"Yes suh, my father used to talk a heap about the Ku Klux Klan, and a +lot of the Negroes were afraid of em and would run when they heard they +was comin' around. + +"My father's name was Henry Moss. He run away from the plantation in +Virginia before the War had been goin' on very long, and he j'ined the +army in Tennessee--yes suh, the Confedrit army. Ho suh, his name was +never found on the records, so didn't never draw no pension. + +"After he was freed he always voted the Republican ticket till he died. + +"After the War he served as Justice of the Peace in his township in Yell +County. Yes suh, that was the time they called the Re-con-struc-tion. + +"I vote the Republican ticket, but sometimes I don't vote at the reg'lar +elections. No, I've never had any trouble with my votin'. + +"I works at first one thing and another but ain't doin' much now. Work +is hard to get. Used to work mostly at the mines. Not able to do much of +late years. + +"Oh, yes, I remember some of the old songs they used to sing when my +parents was living: 'Old-Time Religion' was one of em, and 'Swing Low, +Sweet Chariot' was another one we liked to sing." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: S.O. Mullins, Clarendon, Arkansas + Janitor for Masonic Hall + He wears a Masonic ring +Age: 80 + + +"My master was B.F. Wallace--Benjamin Franklin Wallace and Katie +Wallace. They had no children to my recollection. + +"I was born at Brittville, Alabama. My parents' names was George W. +Mullins and Millie. They had, to my recollection, one girl and three +boys. Mr. Wallace moved to Arkansas before the Civil War. They moved to +Phillips County. My mother and father both farm hands and when my +grandmother was no longer able to do the cookin' my mother took her +place. I was rally too little to recollect but they always praised +Wallace. They said he never whipped one of his slaves in his life. His +slaves was about free before freedom was declared. They said he was a +good man. Well when freedom was declared all the white folks knowed it +first. He come down to the cabins and told us. He said you can stay and +finish the crops. I will feed and clothe you and give you men $10 and +you women $5 apiece Christmas. That was more money then than it is now. +We all stayed on and worked on shares the next year. We stayed around +Poplar Grove till he died. When I was nineteen I got a job, porter on +the railroad. I brought my mother to Clarendon to live with me. I was in +the railroad service at least fifteen years. I was on the passenger +train. Then I went to a sawmill here and then I farmed, I been doing +every little thing I find to do since I been old. All I owns is a little +house and six lots in the new addition. I live with my wife. She is my +second wife. Cause I am old they wouldn't let me work on the levy. If I +been young I could have got work. My age knocks me out of 'bout all the +jobs. Some of it I could do. I sure don't get no old age pension. I gets +$4 every two months janitor of the Masonic Hall. + +"I have a garden. No place for hog nor cow. + +"My boys in Chicago. They need 'bout all they can get. They don't help. + +"The present conditions seem good. They can get cotton to pick and two +sawmills run in the winter (100 men each) where folks can get work if +they hire them. The stay (stave) mill is shut down and so is the button +factory. That cuts out a lot of work here. The present generation is +beyond me. Seems like they are gone hog wild." + + +Interviewer's Note + +The next afternoon he met me and told me the following story:---- + +"One night the servants quarters was overflowin' wid Yankee soldiers. I +was scared nearly to death. My mother left me and my little brother +cause she didn't wanter sleep in the house where the soldiers was. We +slept on the floor and they used our beds. They left next mornin'. They +camped in our yard under the trees. Next morning they was ridin' out +when old mistress saw 'em. She said they'd get it pretty soon. When they +crossed the creek--Big Creek--half mile from our cabins I heard the guns +turn in on 'em. The neighbors all fell out wid my master. They say he +orter go fight too. He was sick all time. Course he wasn't sick. They +come and took off 25 mules and all the chickens and he never got up. +They took two fine carriage horses weighed 2,000 pounds apiece I speck. +One named Lee and one Stone Wall. He never went out there. He claimed he +was sick all time. One of the carriage horses was a fine big white horse +and had a bay match. Folks didn't like him--said he was a coward. When I +went over cross the creek after the fightin' was over, men just lay like +dis[A] piled on top each other." [A: [Illustration] He used his fingers +to show me how the soldiers were crossed.] + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Alex Murdock, Edmondson, Arkansas +Age: 65 + + +"My owner or least my folks was owned by Dr. [HW: 'Murder'] (Murdock). +He had a big farm. He was a widower. He had no children as ever I knowed +of. Dr. 'Murder' raised my father's mother. He bought her at Tupelo, +Mississippi. He raised mother too. She was bright color. I'm sure they +stayed on after freedom 'cause I stayed there till we come to Arkansas. +Father was a teamster. He followed that till he died. He owned a dray +and died at Brinkley. He was well-known and honorable. + +"I worked in the oil mill at Brinkley-American Oil Company. + +"Mother was learned durin' slavery but I couldn't say who done it. She +taught school 'round Buena Vista and Okolona, Mississippi. She learned +me. I was born 1874--November 25, 1874. I heard her say she worked in +the field one year. They give her some land and ploughed it so she could +have a patch. It was all she could work. I don't know how much. It was +her patch. Our depot was Prairie Station, Mississippi. My parents was +Monroe [HW: 'Murder'] Murdock[TR: lined out] and Lucy Ann Murdock[TR: +lined out] [HW: Murder]. It is spelled M-u-r-d-o-c-k. + +"I farmed all my whole life. Oil milling was the surest, quickest living +but I likes farmin' all right. + +"I never contacted the Ku Kluxes. They was 'bout gone when I come on. + +"I voted off an' on. This is the white folks' country and they going to +run their gov'mint. The thing balls us up is, some tells us one way and +some more tells us a different way to do. And we don't know the best +way. That balls us up. Times is better than ever I seen them, for the +man that wants to work. + +"I get $8 a month. I work all I can." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Bessie Myers, Brassfield, Arkansas +Age: 50? didn't know + + +"My mother was named Jennie Bell. She was born in North Ca'lina +(Carolina). She worked about the house. She said there was others at the +house working all the time with her. + +"She said they daresn't to cross the fence on other folks' land or go +off up the road 'lessen you had a writing to show. One woman could +write. She got a pass and this woman made some more. She said couldn't +find nothing to make passes on. It happened they never got caught up. +That woman didn't live very close by. She talked like she was free but +was one time a slave her own self. + +"Mother said she would run hide every time the Yankee men come. She said +she felt safer in the dark. They took so many young women to wait on +them and mother was afraid every time they would take her. + +"She said she had been at the end of a corn row at daylight ready to +start chopping it over, or pull fodder, or pull ears either. She said +they thought to lie in bed late made you weak. Said the early fresh air +what made children strong. + +"On wash days they all met at a lake and washed. They had good times +then. They put the clothes about on the bushes and briers and rail +fences. Some one or two had to stay about to keep the clothes from a +stray hog or goat till they dried. And they would forage about in the +woods. It was cool and pleasant. They had to gather up the clothes in +hamper baskets and bring them up to iron. Mother said they didn't mind +work much. They got used to it. + +"Mother told about men carried money in sacks. When they bought a slave, +they open up a sack and pull out gold and silver. + +"The way she talked she didn't mind slavery much. Papa lived till a few +years ago but he never would talk about slavery at all. His name was +Willis Bell." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Sallie C. Miller +Person interviewed: Mary Myhand, Clarksville, Arkansas +Age: 85 + + +"My mammie died when I was a little girl She had three children and our +white folks took us in their house and raised us. Two of us had fever +and would have died if they hadn't got us a good doctor. The doctor they +had first was a quack and we were getting worse until they called the +other doctor, then we commence to get well. I don't know how old I am. +Our birthdays was down in the mistress' Bible and when the old war come +up, the house was burned and lost everything but I know I am at least 83 +or 84 years old. Our white folks was so good to us. They never whipped +us, and we eat what they eat and when they eat. I was born in White +County, Tennessee and moved to Missouri but the folks did not like it +there so we come to Benton County, Arkansas. One side of the road was +Benton County and the other side was Washington County but we always had +to go to Bentonville, the county seat, to tend to business. I was a +little tod of a girl when the war come up. One day word come that the +'Feds' were coming through and kill all of the old men and take all the +boys with them, so master took my brother and a grandson of his and +started South. I was so scared. I followed them about a half mile before +they found me and I begged so hard they took me with them. We went to +Texas and was there about one year when the Feds gave the women on our +place orders to leave their home. Said they owned it now. They had just +got to Texas where we was when the South surrendered and we all come +back home. + +"We stayed with our white folks for about twenty years after the war. +They shore was good to me. I worked for them in the house but never +worked in the field. I came across the mountain to Clarksville with a +Methodist preacher and his family and married here. My husband worked in +a livery stable until he died, then I worked for the white folks until I +fell and hurt my knee and got too old. I draws my old age pension. + +"I do not know about the young generation. I am old and crippled and +don't go out none." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Griffin Myrax + 913 Missouri Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age 77? + + +"I don't know my age exactly. You know in them days people didn't take +care of their ages like they do now. I couldn't give you any trace of +the war, but I do remember when the Ku Klux was runnin' around. + +"Oh Lord, so much of the time I heard my mother talk about the slavery. +I was born in Oklahoma and my grandfather was a full-blooded Crete +Indian. He was very much of a man and lived to be one hundred thirty +years old. All Crete Indians named after some herb--that's what the name +Myrax means. + +"I heard my mother say that in slavery times the man worked all day with +weights on their feet so when night come they take them off and their +feet feel so light they could outran the Ku Klux. Now I heard her tell +that. + +"My parents moved from Oklahoma to Texas and I went to school in +Marshall, Texas. All my schoolin' was in Texas--my people was tied up +there. My last schoolin' was in Buchanan, Texas. The professor told my +mother she would have to take me out of school for awhile, I studied too +hard. I treasured my books. When other children was out playin' I was +studyin'. + +"There was some folks in that country that didn't get along so well. I +remember there was a blind woman that the folks sent something to eat by +another colored woman. But she eat it up and cooked a toadfrog for the +old blind woman. That didn't occur on our place but in the neighborhood. +When the people found it out they whipped her sufficient. + +"When my grandfather died he didn't have a decayed tooth in his head. +They was worn off like a horse's teeth but he had all of them. + +"I always followed sawmill work and after I left that I followed +railroading. I liked railroading. I more or less kept that in my view. + +"About this slavery--I couldn't hardly pass my sentiments on it. The +world is so far gone, it would be the hardest thing to put the bridle on +some of the people that's runnin' wild now." + + + + +Name of Interviewer: Irene Robertson +Subject: Ex-slaves--Dreams--Herbs: Cures and Remedies +Story:-- + +This information given by: Tom Wylie Neal +Place of Residence: Hazen, Arkansas--Near Green Grove +Occupation: Farmer--Feeds cattle in the winter for a man in Hazen. +Age: 85 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] + + +His father and mother belonged to Tom Neal at Calhoun, Georgia. He +remembers the big battle at Atlanta Ga. He was eight years old. He saw +the lights, [saw the bullets in the air at night] and heard the boom, +boom of guns and cannons. They passed along with loaded wagons and in +uniforms. The horses were beautiful, and he saw lots of fine saddles and +bridles. His mistress' name was Mrs. Tom Neal. She had the property and +married Tom Neal. She had been married before and her first husband died +but her first husband's name can't be recalled. She had two +children--girls--by her first husband. Her second husband just married +her to protect them all he could. He didn't do anything unless the old +mistress told him to do it and how to do it. Wylie Neal was raised up +with the old mistress' children. He was born a slave and lived to +thirteen years. "The family had some better to eat and lots more to +wear, but they gave me plenty and never did mistreat me. They had a +peafowl. That was good luck, to keep some of them about on the place." +They had guineas, chickens and turkeys. They never had a farm bell. He +never saw one till he came to Arkansas. They blew a big "Conch shell" +instead. Mistress had cows and she would pour milk or pot-liquor out in +a big pewter bowl on a stump and the children would come up there from +the cabins and eat [till the field hands had time to cook a meal.][HW:?] +Wylie's mother was a field hand. They drank out of tin cans and gourds. +The master mated his hands. Some times he would ask his young man or +woman if they knew anybody they would like to marry that he was going to +buy more help and if they knew anybody he would buy them if he could. +The way they met folks they would get asked to corn shuckings and log +rollings and Mrs. Neal always took some of her colored people to church +to attend to the stock, tie the horses and hitch up, maybe feed and to +nurse her little girls at church. The colored folks sat on the back +seats over in a corner together. If they didn't behave or talked out +they got a whipping or didn't go no more. "They kept the colored people +scared to be bad." + +The colored folks believed in hoodoo and witches. Heard them talking +lots about witches. They said if they found anybody was a witch they +would kill them. Witches took on other forms and went out to do meaness. +They said sometimes some of them got through latch holes. They used +buttons and door knobs whittled out of wood, and door latches with +strings. + +People married early in "Them days"--when Mistress' oldest girl married +she gave her Sumanthy, Wylie's oldest sister when they come home [they +would let her come.] They sent their children to school some but the +colored folks didn't go because it was "pay school." Every year they had +"pertracted meeting." Looked like a thousand people come and stayed two +or three weeks along in August, in tents. "We had a big time then and +some times we'd see a colored girl we'd ask the master to buy. They'd +preach to the colored folks some days. Tell them the law. How to behave +and serve the Lord." When Wylie was twelve years old the "Yanks" came +and tore up the farm. "It was just like these cyclones that is [TR: +illegible word] around here in Arkansas, exactly like that." + +His mistress left and he never saw her again. General [HW: John Bell] +Hood was the [TR: illegible word] he thinks, but he was given to Captain +Condennens to wait on him. They went to Marietta, Ga., and Kingston, Ga. +"Rumors came about that we were free and everybody was drifting around. +The U.S. Government gave us food then like they do now and we hunted +work. Everybody nearly froze and starved. We wore old uniforms and slept +anywhere we could find, an old house or piece of a house. In +1865-1869--the Ku Klux was miserable on the colored folks. Lots of folks +died out of consumption in the spring and pneumonia all winter. + +"There wasn't any doctors seeing after colored folks for they had no +money and they used herbs--only medicine they could get." + +Only herbs he remembers he used is: chew black snake roots to settle +sick stomach. Flux weed tea for disordered stomach. People eat so much +"messed up food" lot of them got sick. + +Wylie Neal wandered about and finally came to Chattanooga. They got old +uniforms and victuals from the "Yanks" about a year. + +Colonel Stocker come and got up a lot of hands and paid their way to +Memphis on the train. From there they were put on the _Molly Hamilton_ +boat and went to Linden, Arkansas, on the St. Francis River. "He fared +fine" there. In 1906[TR: ?] he came to Hazen and since then he has owned +small farms at Biscoe and forty acres near Hazen. It was joining the old +Joe Perry place. Dr. ---- got a mortgage on it and took it. Wylie Neal +lives with his niece and she is old too so they get relief and a +pension. + +"He don't believe in dreams but some dreams like when you dream of the +dead there's sho' goner be falling weather." He "don't dream much" he +says. + +He has a birthmark on his leg. It looks like a bunch of berries. He +never heard what caused it. It has always been there. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Sally Nealy + 105 Mulberry Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 91 + + +"Yes mam, I was a slave! I was sixteen years old when the war begun. I +was born in Texas. + +"My old master was John Hall and my young master was Marse Dick. Marse +John went to war the 5th day of May in 1861 and he was killed in June. +They wasn't nothin' left to bring home but his right leg and his left +arm. They knowed it was him cause his name was tattooed on his leg. + +"He was a mean rascal. He brought us up from the plantation and pat us +on the head and give us a little whisky and say 'Your name is Sally or +Mary or Mose' just like we was dogs. + +"My old mistress, Miss Caroline, was a mean one too. She was the mother +of eight children--five girls and three boys. When she combed her hair +down low on her neck she was all right but when she come down with it +done up on the top of her head--look out. + +"It was my job to scrub the big cedar churns with brick dust and Irish +potato and polish the knives and forks the same way. Then every other +day I had to mold twelve dozen candles and sweep the yard with a dogwood +bresh broom. + +"She didn't give us no biscuits or sugar 'cept on Christmas. Jest shorts +and molasses for our coffee. When the Yankee soldiers come through old +mistress run and hide in the cellar but the Yankees went down in the +collar too and took all the hams and honey and brandied peaches she had. + +"They didn't have no doctors for the niggers then. Old mistress just +give us some blue mass and castor oil and they didn't give you nothin' +to take the taste out your mouth either. + +"Oh lord, I know 'bout them Ku Klux. They wore false faces and went +around whippin' people. + +"After the surrender I went to stay with Miss Fulton. She was good to me +and I stayed with her eleven years. She wanted to know how old I was so +my father went to Miss Caroline and she say I 'bout twenty now. + +"Some white folks was good to their slaves. I know one man, Alec Yates, +when he killed hogs he give the niggers five of 'em. Course he took the +best but that was all right. + +"After freedom the Yankees come and took the colored folks away to the +marshal's yard and kept them till they got jobs for 'em. They went to +the white folks houses and took things to feed the niggers. + +"I ain't been married but once. I thought I was in love but I wasn't. +Love is a itchin' 'round the heart you can't get at to scratch. + +"I 'member one song they sung durin' the war + + 'The Yankees are comin' through + By fall sez I + We'll all drink stone blind + Johnny fill up the bowl.'" + + + + +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Subject: Songs of Civil War Days +Story:--Information + +This information given by: Sally Neeley +Place of residence: 105 N. Mulberry, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Occupation: None +Age: 90 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] +[TR: Same as previous informant (Sally Nealy).] + + +(1) + "In eighteen hundred and sixty-one + Football (?) sez I; + In eighteen hundred and sixty-one + That's the year the war begun + We'll all drink stone blind, + Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(2) + "In eighteen hundred and sixty-two + Football (?) sez I; + In eighteen hundred and sixty-two + That's the year we put 'em through + We'll all drink stone blind, + Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(3) + "In eighteen hundred and sixty-three + Football (?) sez I; + In eighteen hundred and sixty-three + That's the year we didn't agree + We'll all drink stone blind. + Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(4) + "In eighteen hundred and sixty-four + Football (?) sez I; + In eighteen hundred and sixty-four + We'll all go home and fight no more + We'll all drink stone blind. + Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(5) + "In eighteen hundred and sixty-five + Football (?) sez I; + In eighteen hundred and sixty-five + We'll have the Rebels dead or alive + We'll all drink stone blind, + Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(6) + "In eighteen hundred and sixty-six + Football (?) sez I; + In eighteen hundred and sixty-six + We'll have the Rebels in a helava fix + We'll all drink stone blind, + Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(7) + "In eighteen hundred and sixty-seven + Football (?) sez I; + In eighteen hundred and sixty-seven + We'll have the Rebels dead and at the devil + We'll all drink stone blind. + Johnny, came fill up the bowl." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +The word "football" doesn't sound right in this song, but I was unable +to find it in print, and Sally seemed to think it was the right word. + +Sally is a very wicked old woman and swears like a sailor, but she has a +remarkable memory. + +She was "bred and born" in Rusk County, Texas and says she came to Pine +Bluff when it was "just a little pig." + +Says she was sixteen when the Civil War began. + +I have previously reported an interview with her. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Wylie Nealy [HW: Biscoe Arkansas?] +Age: 85 + + +I was born in 1852. I am 85 years old. I was born in Gordon County. The +closest town was Calhoun, South Carolina. My sister died in '59. That's +the first dead, person I ever saw. One of my sisters was give away and +another one was sold before the Civil War started. Sister Mariah was +give to the young mistress, Miss Ella Conley. I didn't see her sold. I +never seed nobody sold but I heard 'em talking about it. I had five +sisters and one brother. My father was a free man always. He was a +Choctaw Indian. Mother was part Cherokee Indian. My mother's mistress +was Mrs. Martha Christian. He died and she married Tom Nealy, the one +they call me fur, Wylie Nealy. + +Liberty and Freedom was all I ever heard any colored folks say dey +expected to get out of de war, and mighty proud of dot. Nobody knowed +they was goin to have a war till it was done broke out and they was +fightin about it. Didn't nobody want land, they jess wanted freedom. I +remembers when Lincoln was made the President both times and when he was +killed. I recollects all that like yesterday. + +The army had been through and swept out everything. There wasn't a +chicken or hog nowhere to be had, took the stock and cattle and all the +provisions. So de slaves jess had to scatter out and leave right now. +And after de army come through. I was goin back down to the old place +and some soldiers passed riding along and one said "Boy where you goin? +Said nothing up there." I says, "I knows it." Then he say "Come on here, +walk along back there" and I followed him. I was twelve years old. He +was Captain McClendenny. Then when I got to the camp wid him he say "You +help around here." I got sick and they let me go back home then to +Resacca, Georgia and my mother died. When I went back they sent me to +Chattanooga with Captain Story. I was in a colored regiment nine months, +I saw my father several times while I was at Chattanooga. We was in +Shermans army till it went past Atlanta. They burned up the city. Two of +my masters come out of the war alive and two dead. I was mustered out in +August 1865. I stayed in camp till my sisters found a cabin to move in. +Everybody got rations issued out. It was a hard time. I got hungry lots +times. No plantations was divided and the masters didn't have no more +than the slaves had when the war was done. After the Yankees come in and +ripped them up old missus left and Mr. Tom Nealy was a Home Guard. He +had a class of old men. Never went back or seen any more of them. +Everybody left and a heap of the colored folks went where rations could +be issued to them and some followed on in the armies. After I was +mustered out I stayed around the camps and went to my sister's cabin +till we left there. Made anything we could pick up. Men come in there +getting people to go work for them. Some folks went to Chicago. A heap +of the slaves went to the northern cities. Colonel Stocker, a officer in +the Yankee army, got us to come to a farm in Arkansas. We wanted to stay +together is why we all went on the farm. May 1866, when we come to +Arkansas is the first farmin I had seen done since I left Tom Nealy's +place. Colonel Stocker is mighty well known in St. Francis County. He +brought lots of families, brought me and my brother, my two brothers and +a nephew. We come on the train. It took four or five days. When we got +to Memphis we come to Linden on a boat "Molly Hamilton" they called it. +I heard it was sunk at Madison long time after that. Colonel Stocker +promised to pay $6 a month and feed us. When Christmas come he said all +I was due was $12.45. We made a good crop. That wasn't it. Been there +since May. Had to stay till got all the train and boat fare paid. There +wasn't no difference in that and slavery 'cept they couldn't sell us. + +I heard a heap about the Ku Klux but I nebber seed them. Everybody was +scared of them. + +The first votin I ever heard of was in Grant's election. Both black and +white voted. I voted Republican for Grant. Lot of the southern soldiers +was franchised and couldn't vote. Just the private soldiers could vote +at tall. I don't know why it was. I was a slave for thirteen years from +birth. Every slave could vote after freedom. Some colored folks held +office. I knew several magistrates and sheriffs. There was one at Helena +(Arkansas) and one at Marianna. He was a High Sheriff. I voted some +after that but I never voted in the last Presidento election. I heard +'em say it wasn't no use, this man would be elected anyhow. I sorter +quit off long time ago. + +In 1874 and 1875 I worked for halves and made nough to buy a farm in St. +Francis County. It cost $925. I bought it in 1887. Eighty acres to be +cleared down in the bottoms. My family helped and when my help got +shallow, the children leaving me, I sold it for $2,000, in 1904. I was +married jess once and had eight children; five livin and three dead. Me +and the old woman went to Oklahoma. We went in January and come back to +Biscoe (Arkansas) in September. It wasn't no place for farming. I bought +40 acres from Mr. Aydelott and paid him $500. I sold it and come to Mr. +Joe Perry's place, paid $500 for 40 acres of timber land. We cleared it +and I got way in debt and lost it. Clear lost it! Ize been working +anywhere I could make a little since then. My wife died and I been doing +little jobs and stays about with my children. The Welfare gives me a +little check and some supplies now and then. + +No maam, I can't read much. I was not learnt. I could figure a little +before my eyes got bad. The white folks did send their children to pay +schools but we colored children had to stay around the house and about +in the field to work. I never got no schoolin. I went with old missus to +camp meeting down in Georgia one time and got to go to white church +sometimes. At the camp meeting there was a big tent and all around it +there was brush harbors and tents where people stayed to attend the +meetins. They had four meetins a day. Lots of folk got converted and +shouted. They had a lot of singings They had a lots to eat and a big +time. + +I don't think much about these young folks now. It seems lack everybody +is having a hard time to live among us colored folks. Some white folks +has got a heap and fine cars to get about in. I don't know what go in to +become of 'em. + +People did sing more than I hear them now but I never could sing. They +sing a lot of foolish songs and mostly religious songs. + +I don't recollect of any slave uprising. I never heard of any. We didn't +know they was going to have a war till they was fighting. Yes maam, they +heard Lincoln was going to set 'em free, but they didn't know how he was +going to do it. Everybody wanted freedom. Mr. Hammond (white) ask me not +long ago if I didn't think it best to bring us from Africa and be slaves +than like wild animals in Africa. He said we was taught about God and +the Gospel over here if we was slaves. I told him I thought dot freedom +was de best anywhere. + +We had a pretty hard time before freedom. My mother was a field woman. +When they didn't need her to work they hired her out and they got the +pay. The master mated the colored people. I got fed from the white folks +table whenever I curried the horses. I was sorter raised up with Mr. +Nealy's children. They didn't mistreat me. On Saturday the mistress +would blow a cone shell and they knowed to go and get the rations. We +got plenty to eat. They had chickens and ducks and geese and plenty +milk. They did have hogs. They had seven or eight guineas and a lot of +peafowls. I never heard a farm bell till I come to Arkansas. The +children et from pewter bowls or earthen ware. Sometimes they et greens +or milk from the same bowl, all jess dip in. The Yankees took me to +General Hood's army and I was Captain McCondennen's helper at the +camps.[HW: ?] We went down through Marietta and Atlanta and through +Kingston. Shells come over where we lived. I saw 'em fight all the time. +Saw the light and heard the roaring of de guns miles away. It looked +like a storm where the army went along. They tramped the wheat and oats +and cotton down and turned the horses in on the corn. The slaves show +did hate to see the Yankees waste everything. They promised a lot and +wasn't as good as the old masters. All dey wanted was to be waited on +too. The colored folks was freed when the Yankees took all the stock and +cattle and rations. Everybody had to leave and let the government issue +them rations. Everybody was proud to be free. They shouted and sung. +They all did pretty well till the war was about to end then they was +told to scatter and no whars to go. Cabins all tore down or burned. No +work to do. There was no money to pay. I wore old uniforms pretty well +till I come to Arkansas. I been here in Hazen since 1906. I come on a +boat from Memphis to Linden. Colonel Stocker brought a lot of us on the +train. The name of the boat was Molly Hamilton. It was a big boat and we +about filled it. I show was glad to get back on a farm. + +I don't know what is goin to become of the young folks. Everything is so +different now and when I was growin up I don't know what will become of +the younger generation. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Emaline Neland, Marianna, Arkansas +Age: Born 1859 + + +"I was born two years before the War. I was born in Murray County, +Tennessee. It was middle Tennessee. When I come to remembrance I was in +Grant County, Arkansas. When I remember they raised wheat and corn and +tobacco. Mother's master was Dr. Harrison. His son was married and me +and my brother Anderson was give to him. He come to Arkansas 'fore ever +I could remember. He was a farmer but I never seen him hit a lick of +work in my life. He was good to me and my brother. She was good too. I +was the nurse. They had two children. Brother was a house boy. Me and +her girl was about the same size but I was the oldest. Being with the +other children I called her mother too. I didn't know no other mother +till freedom. + +"Freedom! Well, here is the very way it all was: Old master told her +(mother) she was free. He say, 'Go get your children, you free as I is +now.' Ain't I heard her say it many a time? Well, mother come in a ox +wagon what belong to him and got us. They run me down, caught me and got +me in the wagon. They drove twenty-five miles. Old Dr. Harrison had +moved to Arkansas. Being with the other children I soon learnt to call +her ma. She had in all ten or eleven children. She was real dark. + +"Pa was a slave too. He was a low man. He was a real bright man. He was +brighter than I is. He belong to a widow woman named Tedford. He renamed +his self after freedom. He took the name Brown 'stead of Tedford. I +never heard him say why he wasn't satisfied with his own name. He was a +soldier. He worked for the Yankees. + +"After the War pa and ma got back together and lived together till she +died. There was five days' difference in their deaths. They died of +pneumonia. He was 64 years old and she was 54 years old. I was at home +when pa come from the War. All my sisters was light, one sister had +sandy hair like pa. She was real light. Ma was a good all 'round woman. +She cooked more than anything else. She nursed. Dr. Harrison told her to +stay till her husband come back or all the time if he didn't ever come +back. Ma never worked in the field. When pa come he moved us on a place +to share crop. Ma never worked in the field. He was buying a home in +Grant County. He started to Mississippi and stopped close to Helena and +ten or twelve miles from Marianna. He had a soldier friend wouldn't let +him go. He told him this was a better country. He decided to stay down +in here. + +"I heard a whole heap about the Ku Klux. One time when a crowd was going +to church, we heard horse's feet coming; sound like they would run over +us. We all got clear out of reach so they wouldn't run over us. They had +on funny caps was all I could see, they went so fast. We give them the +clear road and they went on. That is all I ever seen of the Ku Klux. + +"I seen Dr. Harrison's wife. She was a little old lady but we left after +I went there. + +"I used to sew for the public. Yes, white and colored folks. I learnt my +own self to sew. I never had but one boy in my life. He died at seven +weeks old. I raised a stepson. I married twice. I married at home both +times. Just a quiet marriage and a colored preacher married me both +times. + +"The present conditions is hard. I want things and can't get 'em. If I +had the strength to hold out to work I could get along. + +"The present generation--young white and black--blinds me. They turns +corners too fast. They going so fast they don't have time to take +advice. They promise to do better but they don't. They do like they want +to do and don't tell nobody till they done it. I say they just running +way with their selves. + +"I get $8 and a little help along. I'm thankful for it. It is a blessing +I tell you." + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Henry Nelson + 904 E. Fifth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: About 70 + + +"My name is Henry Nelson. I was born in Arkansas--Crittenden County near +Memphis, Tennessee. I was born not far from Memphis but on this side. + +"My mother's name was Adeline Taylor. That was her old slavery folks' +name. She was a Taylor before she married my father--Nelson. My father's +first name was Green. I don't remember none of my grandparents. My +father's mother died before I come to remember and I know my mother's +mother died before I could remember. + +"My father was born in Mississippi--Sardis, Mississippi--and my mother +was a Tennesseean--_Cartersville_[HW:?] Tennessee, twenty-five miles +above Memphis. [HW: Carter, in Carter County, about 35 m. north of +Memphis, but no Cartersville.] [TR: moved from bottom of following +page.] + +"After peace was declared, they met in Tennessee. That was where my +mother was born, you know. They fell in love with one another in Shelby +County, and married there. My mother had been married once before during +slavery time. She had been made to marry by her master. Her first +husband was named Eli. He was my oldest sister's father. Him and my +mother had the same master and missis. She was made to marry him. She +was only thirteen years old when she married him. She was fine and stout +and her husband was fine and stout, and they wanted more from that +stock. I don't know how old he was but he was a lot older than she was. +He was a kind of an elderly man. She had just one child by him--my +oldest sister, Georgia. She was only married a short time before freedom +came. + +"My father farmed. He was always a farmer--raised cotton and corn. My +mother was a farmer too. Both of them--that is both of her +husbands--were farmers. + +"My mother and father used to go off to places to dance and the +pateroles would get after them. You had to have a pass to go off your +place and if you didn't have a pass, they would make you warm. Some of +them would get caught sometimes and the pateroles would whip them. They +would sure got whipped if they didn't have a pass. + +"The old master come out and told them they were free when peace was +declared. He said, 'You are free this morning--free as I am.' + +"Right after the War, my mother come further down in Tennessee, and that +is how she met my father where she was when she was married. They went +farming. They farmed on shares--sharecropped. They were on a big place +called Ensley place. The man that owned the place was called Nuck +Ensley. + +"My mother and father didn't have no schooling. I never heard that they +were bothered by the Ku Klux. + +"She didn't live with her first husband after slavery. She left him when +she was freed. She never did intend to marry him. She was forced to +that." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +Nelson evidently rents rooms. A yellow sallow-faced, cadaverous, and +dissatisfied looking "gentleman" went into the house eyeing me +suspiciously as he passed. In a moment he was out again interrupting the +old man with pointless remarks. In--out again--standing over me--peering +on my paper in the offensive way that ill-bred people have. He +straightened up with a disgusted look on his face. He couldn't read +shorthand. + +"What's that you're writin'?" + +"Shorthand." + +"What's that about?" + +"History." + +"History uv whut?" + +"Slavery." + +"He don't know nothin' about slavery." + +"Thank you. However, if he says he does, I'll just continue to listen to +him if you don't mind." + +"Humph," and the "yellow gentleman" passed in. + +Out again--eyeing both the old man and me with disgust that was +unconcealed. To him, "You don't know whutchu're doin'." + +Deep silence by all. Exit the yellow brother. + +To the old man, I said, "Is that your son?" + +"Lawd, no, that's jus' a roomer." + +Out came the yellow brother again. "See here, Uncle, if you want me to +fix that fence you'd bettuh come awn out heah now. It's gettin' dark." + +I closed my notebook and arose. "Don't let me interfere with your +program, Brother Nelson." + +The old man settled back in his chair. His eyes inspected the sky, his +jaw "sorta" set. The yellow brother looked at him a minute and passed +on. + +Five minutes later. Enter, the Madam. She also was of the yellow variety +with the suspicious and spiteful look of an undersized black Belgian +police dog. A moment of silence--a word to him. + +"You don't know whutchu're doin'." Silence all around. To me, "You're +upsettin' my work." + +I arose. "Madam, I'm sorry." + +The old man spoke, "You ain't keepin' me from nothin'." + +"Well, I said, you've given me a nice start; I'll come again and get the +rest." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Henry Nelson, Edmondson, Arkansas +Age: 70 +[TR: Appears to be same as last informant despite different address.] + + +"My mother belong to the Taylors close to Carterville, Tennessee. My +father never was sold. He belong to the Nelsons. My parents married +toreckly after the surrender and come on to this state. I was born ten +miles from Edmondson. Their names was Adeline and Green Nelson. They +didn't get nothing after freedom like land or a horse. I'm seventy years +old and I would have known. + +"I was at Alton, Illinois in the lead works thirteen years ago and I had +a stroke. I been cripple ever since. + +"My folks never spoke of being nothing but field hands. Folks used to be +proud of their crops, go look over them on Sunday when company come. Now +if they got a garden they hide it and don't mention it. Times is changed +that way. + +"Clothes ain't as lasty as they used to be. People has a heap more money +to spend and don't raise and have much at home as they did when I was a +child. Times is all turned around and folks too. I always had plenty +till I couldn't do hard work. I farmed my early life. We didn't have +much money but we had rations and warm clothes. I cleared new ground, +hauled wood, big logs. I steamboated on the Sun, Kate Adams, and One Arm +John. I helped with the freight. I railroaded with pick and shovel and +in the lead mines. I worked from Memphis to Helena on boats a good +while. I come back here to farm. Time is changed and I'm changed. + +"It has been so long since I heard my parents tell about slavery I +couldn't tell you straight. She told till she died, talked about how the +Yankees done when they come through. They took axes and busted up good +furniture. They et up and wasted the rations, then humor up the black +folks like they was in their favor when they was settin' out wasting +their living. They done made it to live on. Some followed them and some +stayed on. They wanted freedom but it wasn't like they thought it would +be. They didn't know how it would be. They didn't know it meant _set +out_. Seem like they left. In some ways times was better and some ways +it was worse. They had to work or starve is what they told me. That's +the way I found freedom. 'Course their owners made them work and he +looked out for the ration and in slavery. + +"I keeps up my own self all I can. I don't get help." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Iran Nelson + 603 E. Fourteenth Ave., Pine Bluff, Ark. +Age: 77 + + +"Yes ma'm, they fotch me from Mississippi to Arkansas on the +steamboat--you know they didn't have railroads then. They fotch my +mother and they went back after grandfather and grandmother too. + +"Dr. Noell was our master and he had us under mortgage to his +brother-in-law. They fotched us here till he could get straight from +that debt, but fore that could be, we got free. + +"I knowed slavery times. I member seem' em lash some of the rest but you +know I wasn't big enough to put in the fields. Old mistress say when I +got big enough, she goin' take me for a house girl. When they fotched +mama and grandmother here they had eighty some odd head of niggers. They +was gwine carry em back home after they got that mortgage paid but the +war come. + +"I member when the Yankees come, my white folks would run and hide and +hide us colored folks too. Boss man had the colored folks get all the +meat out of the smokehouse and hide it in the peach orchard in the +grass. + +"I used to play with old mistress daughter Addie. We would play in the +parlor and after we moved to town some of the little girls would pick up +and go home. You know these town folks didn't believe in playin' with +the colored folks. + +"After mama was free she stayed right there on the place and made a +crop. Raised eight hundred bales and the average was nine. Mama plowed +and hoed too. I had to work right with her too. + +"I never went to school but once. I learned my ABC's but couldn't read. +My next ABC's was a hoe in my hand. Mama had a switch right under her +belt. I worked but I couldn't keep up. Just seein' that switch was +enough. I had a pretty good time when I was young, but I had to go all +the time." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: James Henry Nelson + 1103 Orange, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 82 +Occupation: Gardener + + +"I member all about the war--why of cose. I saddled many a cavalry hoss. +I tell you how I know how old I am. Old master, Henry Stanley of Athens, +Alabama, moved to Palaski, Tennessee and left me with young mistress to +take care of things. One day we was drivin' up some stock and I said, +'Miss Nannie, how old is you?' And she said, 'I'm seventeen.' I was old +enough to have the knowledge she would know how old I was and I said, +'How old am I?' And she said, 'You is seven years old.' That was durin' +the war. + +"I remember the soldiers comin' and stoppin' at our building--Yankees +and Southern soldiers, too. They fit all around our plantation. + +"The Yankees taken me when I was a little fellow. About two years after +the war started, young Marse Henry went to war and took a colored man +with him but he ran away--he wouldn't stay with the Rebel army. So young +Marse Henry took me. I reckon I was bout ten. I know I was big enough to +saddle a cavalry hoss. We carried three horses--his hoss, my hoss and a +pack hoss. You know chillun them days, they made em do a man's work. I +studied bout my mother durin' the war, so they let me go home. + +"One day I went to mill. They didn't low the chillun to lay around, and +while I was at the mill a Yankee soldier ridin' a white hoss captured me +and took me to Pulaski, Tennessee and then I was in the Yankee army. I +wasn't no size and I don't think he would a took me if it hadn't been +for the hoss. + +"We come back to Athens and the Rebels captured the whole army. Colonel +Camp was in charge and General Forrest captured us and I was carried +south. We was marchin' along the line and a Rebel soldier said, 'Don't +you want to go home and stay with my wife?' And so I went there, to +Millville, Alabama. Then he bound me to a friend of his and I stayed +there till the war bout ended. I was getting along very well but a older +boy 'suaded me to run away to Decatur, Alabama. + +"Oh I seen lots of the war. Bof sides was good to me. I've seen many a +scout. The captain would say 'By G----, close the ranks.' Captains is +right crabbed. I stayed back with the hosses. + +"After the war I worked about for this one and that one. Some paid me +and some didn't. + +"I can remember back to Breckenridge; and I can remember hearin' em say +'Hurrah for Buchanan!' I'm just tellin' you to show how fur back I can +remember. I used to have a book with a picture of Abraham Lincoln with +an axe on his shoulder and a picture of that log cabin, but somebody +stole my book. + +"I worked for whoever would take me--I had no mother then. If I had had +parents to make me go to school, but I got along very well. The white +folks taught me not to have no bad talk. They's all dead now and if they +wasn't I'd be with them. + +"I'm a natural born farmer--that's all I know. The big overflow drownded +me out and my wife died with pellagra in '87. She was a good woman and +nice to white folks. I'm just a bachin' here now. I did stay with my +daughter but she is mean to me, so I just picked up my rags and moved +into this room where I can live in peace. I'm a christian man, and I +can't live right with her. When colored folks is mean, they's meaner +than white folks. + +"I'm gettin' along very well now. I been with white folks all my +day--and it's hard for me to get along with my folks. + +"In one way the world is crueler than they used to be. They don't +appreciate things like they used to. They have no feelin's and don't +care nothin' bout the olden people. + +"Well, good-bye, I'm proud of you." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: John Nelson, Holly Grove, Arkansas +Age: 76 + + +"My parents was Jazz Nelson and Mahaney Nelson. He come from Louisiana +durin' slavery. She come from Richmond, Virginia. I think from what they +said he come to Louisiana from there too. They was plain field hands. + +"My folks belong to Miss Mary Ann Richardson and Massa Harve Richardson. +They had five children and every one dead now. They lived at Duncan +Station. + +"The white folks told em they was free. They had no place to go and they +been workin' the crop. White folks glad for em to stay and work on. And +the truth is they was glad to git to stay on cause they had no place to +go. They kept stayin' on a long time. + +"I was so small I don't know if the Ku Klux ever did come bout our place +at tall." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Lettie Nelson + St. Marys Street, Helena, Arkansas +Age: 55 or 56? + + +"Grandma was Patsy Smith. She said in slavery they had a certain amount +of cotton to pick. If they didn't have that amount they would put their +heads between the rails of the fences and whoop them. They whooped them +in the ebenin' when they weighed up the cotton. Grandma was raised in +Virginia. She was light. Mama was light. They was carried from Virginia +to Louisiana in wagons. They found clothes along the road people had +lost. She said several bundles of good clothes. They thought they had +dropped off of wagons ahead of them. They washed and wore the clothes. +Some of 'em fit so they wore them. Mama left her husband and brother in +Virginia. Ed Smith was her second husband. He was a light man. My +grandpa was a field man. I never heard if grandpa was sold. Jimmie +Stansberry was the man that bought or brought mama and grandma to +Louisiana. Mama cooked and worked in the field both. Grandma did too. +She cooked in Louisiana more than mama. They belong to Lou and Jimmie +Stansberry and they had two boys. They lived close to Minden, Louisiana. +I don't know so much about my parents and grandma talked but we didn't +pay enough attention to remember it all. She was old and got things +confused. + +"They was glad when freedom come but they lived on with Jimmie +Stansberry. I remember them. Grandma raised me after my parents died. +Then she lived with me till she died. She was awful old when she died. +They would talk about how different Virginia and Louisiana was. It took +them a long time to make that trip." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Mattie Nelson + 710 E. Fourth Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 72 + + +"I was born in Chicot County, Arkansas in '65. They said I was born on +the roadside while we was on our way here from Texas. They had to camp +they said. Some people called it emigrate. Now that's the straightest +way I can tell it. + +"Our mistress and master was named Chapman. I member when I was a child +mistress used to be so good to us. After surrender my parents stayed +right on there with the Chapmans, stayed right on the place till they +died. + +"My mudder and pappy neither one of em could read or write, but I went +to school. I always was apt. I am now. I always was one to work--yes +ma'm--rolled logs, hope clean up new ground--yes ma'm. When we was +totin' logs, I'd say, "Put the big end on me" but they'd say, "No, +you're a woman." Yes ma'm I been here a long time. I do believe in +stirrin' work for your livin', yes ma'm, that's what I believe in. + +"I been workin' ever since I was six years old. My daughter was just +like me--she had a gift, but she died. I seen all my folks die and that +lets me know I got to die too. + +"White folks used to come along in buggies, and hoss back too, and stop +and watch me plow. Seem like the hotter the sun was the better I liked +it. + +"Yes ma'm, I done all kinds a work and I feels it now, too." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Dan Newborn + 1000 Louisiana, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 78 + + +"I was born in 1860. Born in Knoxville, Tennessee. I suppose it was in +the country. + +"Solomon Walton was my mother's owner and my father belonged to the +Newborns. My grandmother belonged to the Buggs in Richmond, Virginia and +she was sold to the Waltons. When my mother died in '65 my grandmother +raised me. After she was freed she went to the Powell Clayton place. Her +daughter lived there and she sent up the river and got her. I went too. +Me and two more boys. + +"I never went to school but about thirty days. Hardly learned my +alphabet. + +"In '66, my grandmother bound two of us to Powell Clayton for our +'vittils' and clothes and schoolin', but I didn't get no schoolin'. I +waited in the house. Stayed there three years, then we come back to the +Walton place. + +"My grandmother said the Waltons treated her mean. Beat her on the head +and that was part of her death. Every spring her head would run. She +said they didn't get much of somethin' to eat. + +"I was married 'fore my grandmother died--to this wife that died two +months ago. We stayed together fifty-seven years. + +"To my idea, this younger generation is too wild--not near as settled as +when I was comin' up. They used to obey. Why, I slept in the bed with my +grandmother till I was married. She whipped me the day before I was +married. It was 'cause I had disobeyed her. Children will resist their +mothers now. + +"I think the colored people is better off now 'cause they got more +privilege, but the way some of 'em use their privilege, I think they +ought to be slaves. + +"My grandmother taught me not to steal. My white folks here have trusted +me with two and three hundred dollars. I don't want nothin' in the world +but mine. + +"I been workin' here for Fox Brothers thirty-eight years and they'll +tell you there's not a black mark against me. + +"I used to be a mortar maker and used to sample cotton. Then I worked at +the Cotton Belt Shops eight years. + +"I've bought me a home that cost $780. + +"I don't mind tellin' about myself 'cause I've been honest and you can +go up the river and get my record. + +"Out of all due respect to everybody, the Yankees is the ones I like. + +"Vote? Oh yes, Republican ticket. I like Roosevelt's administration. If +I could vote now, I'd vote for him. He has done a whole lot of good." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person Interviewed: Sallie Newsom + Brinkley, Ark. +Age 75? + + +"Miss, I don't know my age, but I know I is old. I'm sick now. + +"My grandma's mistress and mama's mistress and my mistress was Miss +Jennie Brawner at Thomasville, Georgia. Me and my oldest sister was born +in Atlanta. Then freedom come on. My own papa wanted mama to follow him +to Mississippi. He had a wife there. She wouldn't go. She stayed on a +while with Mr. Acy and Miss Jennie. They come from Virginia. Her name +was Catherine. + +"Grandma toted her big hoop dresses about and carried her trains up off +the floor. Combed her long glossy hair. Mama was a house girl too, but +then grandma took to the kitchen. She was the cook then. + +"Old Miss Jennie wanted mama to give her my oldest sister Lulu, so mama +gave her to her. Then when we started to come to Holly Grove, +Mississippi, Miss Jennie still wanted her. Mama didn't want to part from +her. She was married again and brought me but my aunts told mama to +leave her there, she would have a good home and be educated, so she +'greed to leave her two years. She sent back for her at the end of two +years; she wrote and didn't want to come. She was still at Miss +Jennie's. I haben seen her from the day we left Atlanta till this very +day. A woman, colored woman, was here in Brinkley once seen her. Said +she was so fine and nice. Had nice soft skin and was well to do. I have +wrote but my letters come back. I know Miss Jennie is dead, and my +sister may be by now. + +"My papa was Abe Brooks. His master was Mars Jonas Brooks. Old master +give him to the young master. He was rich, rich, and traveled all time. +His pa give him a servant. He cooked for him, drove his carriage--they +called it a brake in them days--followed him to the hotels and +bar-rooms. He drink and give him a dram. When he was freed he come to +Mississippi with the Brooks to farm for them. I went to see my papa at +Waterford, Miss. + +"When we was at Holly Springs, Mississippi my cousin was a railroad man +so he helped me run away. He paid my way. I come to Clarendon. I cooked, +washed and ironed. In two or three years I went back to see mama. They +was glad to see me. They had eight children. + +"I couldn't guarantee you about the eight younger children, but there +ain't a speck of no kind of blood about me and Lulu Violet but African. +We are slick black Negroes. (She is very black, large and bony.) + +"Miss Jennie Brawner had one son--Gus Brawner--and he may be living now +in Atlanta. + +"My uncle said he seen the Yankees come through Thomasville, Georgia. I +never seen an army of them. I seen soldiers, plenty of em. None of the +Brooks or Brawners went to war that I heard of. I was kept close and too +young to know much of what happened. I heard about the Ku Klux but I +never seen them. + +"I know Miss Jennie Brawner come from Virginia but I don't brought +grandma with her or bought her. She never did say. + +"I don't vote. My husband voted, I don't know how he voted. + +"Since I been sick, I get a check and commodities." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Sallie C. Miller +Person interviewed: Pete Newton, Clarksville, Arkansas +Age: 83 [TR: 85?] +Occupation: Farmer and day laborer + + +"My white folks was as good to me as they could be. I ain't got no kick +to make about my white people. The boys was all brave. I was raised on +the farm. I staid with my boss till I was nearly grown. When the war got +so hot my boss was afraid the 'Feds' would get us. He sent my mammy to +Texas and sent me in the army with Col. Bashom, to take care of his +horses. I was about eleven or twelve years old. Col. Bashom was always +good to me. He always found a place for me to sleep and eat. Sometimes +after the colonel left the folks would run as off and not let me stay +but I never told the colonel. I went to Boston, Texas with the colonel +and his men and when he went on the big raid into Missouri he left me in +Sevier County, Arkansas with his horses 'Little Baldy' and 'Orphan Boy'. +They was race horses. The colonel always had race horses. He was killed +at Pilot Knob, Missouri. After the colonel was killed his son George (I +shore did think a lot of George) come after me and the horses and +brough' us home. + +"While I was in Arkadelphia with Col. Bashom's horses, I went down to +the spring to water the horses. The artillery was there cleaning a big +cannon they called 'Old Tom'. Of course I went up to watch them. One of +the men saw me and hollered, 'Stick his head in the cannon.' It liked to +scared me to death. I jumped on that race horse and run. I reconed I +would have been killed but my uncle was there and saw me and stopped the +horse. + +"Another time we went to a place and me and another colored boy was +taking care of the horses while our masters eat dinner. I saw some +watermelons in the garden with a paling fence around it. I said if the +other boy would pull a paling off I would crawl through and get us a +watermelon. He did but the man who owned the place saw me just as I got +the melon and whipped us and told us if we hollered he would kill us. We +didn't holler and we never told Col. Bashom either. + +"After the war my mammie come back from Texas and took me over to Dover +to live but my old boss told her if she would let him have me he would +raise and educate me like his own children. When I got back the old boss +already had a boy so I went to live with one of his sons. He told me it +was time for me to learn how to work. My boss was rough but he was good +to me and taught me how to work. The old boss had five sons in the army +and all was wounded except one. One of them was shot through and through +in the battle of Oak Hill. He got a furlough and come back and died. I +left my white folks in 1869 and went to farming for myself up in Hartman +bottom. I married when I was about seventeen years old. + +"They though' a house near us was hainted. Nobody wanted to live in it +so they went to see what the noise was. They found a pet coon with a +piece of chain around his neck. The coon would run across the floor and +drag the chain. + +"The children now are bad. No telling that will be in the next twenty or +thirty years everything is so changed now. + +"I learnt to sing the hymns but never sang in the choir. We sang +'Dixie', 'John Brown's Body Lies, etc.', 'Juanita', 'Just Before the +Battle, Mother', 'Old Black Joe'." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Charlie Norris + 122 Miller Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 81 + + +"Born in slavery times? That's me, I reckon. I was born October 1, 1857 +in Arkansas in Union County. Tom Murphy was old master's name. + +"Yes ma'am, I remember the first regiment left Arkansas--went to +Virginia. I member our white folks had us packin' grub out in the woods +cause they was spectin' the Yankees. + +"I member when the first regiment started out. The music boat come to +the landin' and played 'Yankee Doodle.' They carried all us chillun out +there. + +"After they fit they just come by from daylight till dark to eat. They +was death on bread. My mother and Susan Murphy, that was the old lady +herself, cooked bread for em. + +"I stayed with the Murphys--round on the plantation amongst em for five +or six years after freedom. Andrew Norris, my father's old master, was +the first sheriff of Ouachita County. + +"My mother belonged to the Murphys and my father belonged to the +Norrises and after freedom they never did go back together. + +"My mother told me that Susan Murphy would suckle me when my mother was +out workin' and then my mother would suckle her daughter. + +"I was raised up in the house you might say till I was a big nigger. Had +plenty to eat. That's one thing they did do. I lived right amongst a +settlement of what they called free niggers cause they was treated so +well. + +"Sometimes Susan Murphy got after me and whipped me and old Marse Tom +would tell me to run and not let her whip me. You see, I was worth +$1,500 to him and he thought a lot of us black kids. + +"Old man Tom Murphy raised me up to a big nigger and never did whip me +but twice and that was cause I got drunk on tobacco and turned out his +horse. + +"Yes ma'am, I voted till bout two or three years ago. Oh Lawd, the +colored used to hold office down in the country. I've voted for white +and black. + +"Some of the colored folks better off free and some not. That's what I +think but they don't." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person Interviewed: Emma Oats (Mulatto) + Holly Grove, Ark. +Age: 90 or older + + +"I was born in St. Louis. My mother died when I was little. I never +knowed no father. (He was probably a white man.) Jack Oats raised me. +Jim Oats at Helena was his son. He is still living. He come through here +(Holly Grove) not long ago. I was raised on the Esque place. + +"I was fraid of my grandma. I wouldn't live with her. I know'd her. She +was a big woman, big white eyes, big thick lips, and had 'Molly Glaspy +hair,' long straight soft hair. She was a African woman. She made my +clothes. I was fraid of her. I never lived with her. My folks was all +free folks. When my mother died my uncle took us--me and brother. He +hired us out and we got stole. Gene Oglesby stole us and brought us to +Memphis to Joe Nivers. I recken he sold us then. Then they stood me up +in the parlor and sold me to Jack Oats. They said I was 'good pluck.' +Joe Nivers sold me to Jack Oats for $1,150.00 when I was four years old. +My brother was name Milton Smith. I ain't seen him from that day till +this. Joe Nivers kept him, I recken. I come here on a 'legal +tender'--name of the boat I recken. I know that. I recken it was name of +a boat. I got off and Thornton Walls, old colored man, toted me cross +every mud hole we come to. He belong to Bud Walls' (white man at Holly +Grove) daddy. When we got home Jack Oats and all of em was there. + +"I slept on a pallet and lounge and took care of their children. I +played round. Done bout as I pleased. They had a cook they called Aunt +Joe--Joe Oats. We had plenty to eat and wear. They dressed me like one +their children. We had good flannel clothes. When she washed her +children she washed me too. When she combed their hair she combed mine +too. She kept working with it till I had pretty hair. Some of her +children died. It hurt me bad as it did them. All I done was play with +em and see after em. Their names was Sam, John, Dixie, Sallie, Jim. I +went in the hack to church; if she took the children, she took me. I was +a good size girl when she died. The last word she spoke was to me; she +said, 'Emma, take care of my children.' Dr. John Chester was her doctor. + +"Oats come here from North Alabama. Will Oats, Wyatt Oats, and Jack +Oats--all brothers. + +"When mistress living we took a bath every Friday in a sawed-intwo +barrel (wooden tub). The cook done our washing. We had clean fresh +clothes. We had to dress up every few days. If we get dirty she say she +would give us lashes. She never give me none, I never was sassy (saucy). +That what most of em got 10 lashes, 25, 50 lashes for. + +"When I was bout grown I went to school a little bit to James A. Kerr +here at Holly Grove. I was good and grown too. + +"I was settin' on the gate post--they had a picket fence. I seen some +folks coming to our house. I run in the house and says, 'Miss Mai Liza, +the Yankees coming here!' She told her husband to get in the bed. He +says, 'Oh God, what she know bout Yankees?' Miss Mai Liza say, 'I don't +know; she's one of em, I speck she knows em.' One of the officers come +in and asked him what was the matter. He said he was sick. He had boils +bout on him. He had a Masonic pin on his shirt. He showed it to the +officer. He asked Lou and Becky and all the servants if he hadn't been +bushwhacking. They all said, 'No.' He said he wanted something to eat. +They went to the well house and got him some milk. + +"They camped below the house. They went to their store house and brought +more rations up there in a wagon. Lou cooked and she had help. She set a +big table and they had the biggest dinner. They had more hams. They had +'Lincoln Coffee' there that day. It was a jolly day. They never et up +there no more or bothered round our house no more. The officer had +something on his bare arm he showed. He said, when he went to leave, +'Aunt Lou, you shall not be hurt.' + +"Mr. Oats had taken long before that day all his slaves to Texas. He +took all but Wash Martin. They went in wagons and none of them ever come +back. + +"Miss Callie Edwards was older than Miss Henrietta Jackson. They kept +Wash Martin going through the bottoms nearly all time from their houses +at Golden Hill to Indian Bay. They kept him from one place to the other +to keep him out of the war. They hired him out to school Miss Henrietta. +Miss Callie Edwards died then they give him to Miss Henrietta. + +"During the war Mrs. Keeps come up to our house. They heard a gun. She +was jes visiting Mrs. Oats. Mrs. Keeps went home and the bushwhackers +had killed him. He was dead. + +"I never seen no Ku Klux in my whole life. + +"I remember the stage coach that run every two or three days from Helena +to Clarendon. + +"I don't remember bout freedom. Dr. Green, Hall Green's daddy, told his +colored folks they was free. They told our folks. I heard em talking +bout it. I was kept quiet. It was done freedom, fore I knowed it. I +stayed on and done like I been doin'. I stayed on and on. + +"When I was grown I come here to school and soon married. I washed and +ironed and cooked all over Holly Grove. I was waiting on the table at +the boarding house here at Holly Grove. Mr. Oats was talking bout naming +the town. They had put the railroad through. I ask em why didn't they +name the town Holly Grove. It was thick with holly trees. They named it +that, and put it up on the side of the depot. That way I named the town. + +"My folks give me five acres of land and Julia Woolfolk give a blind +woman on the place five acres. I didn't know what to do wid it. I didn't +have no husband. I was young and foolish. I let it be. + +"My husband farmed. I raised my family, chopped and picked cotton and +done other things along with that. I have worked all my life till way +after my husband died. + +"My husband could jump up, knock heels together three times before he +come down. He died May 12, 1909. He was 83 years old February 16, 1909. + +"I never voted. I never heard my husband say much bout voting. I know +some colored folks sold their voting rights. That was wrong. + +"I lived at Baptist Bottoms two years. It lack to killed me." + +Wyatt Oats and Miss Callie Edwards owned the husband of Emma Oats. She +was married once and had two girls and two boys--one boy dead now. Emma +lives at one of her daughters' homes. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Helen Odom and mother, Sarah Odom + Biscoe, Arkansas +Age: 30? + + +"Great-grandmother was part African, Indian, and Caucasian. She had two +girls before slavery ended by her own master--Master Temple. He was also +Caucasian (white). She was cook and housemaid at his home. He was a +bachelor. Grandmother's name was Rachael and her sister's name was +Gilly. Before freedom Master Temple had another wife. By her he had one +boy and two girls. He never had a Caucasian wife. In fact he was always +a bachelor. Grandmother was a field hand and so was her sister, Gilly. + +"But after freedom grandmother married a Union soldier. His took-on name +was George Washington Tomb. He was generally called Parson Tomb +(preacher). He met Grandmother Rachael in Arkansas. + +"When Master Temple died his nearest relative was Jim McNeilly. He made +a will leaving everything he possessed to Master McNeilly. The estate +had to be settled, so he brought the two sisters to Little Rock we think +to be sold. They rode horseback and walked and brought wagons with +bedding and provisions to camp along the road. The blankets were frozen +and stood alone. It was so cold. Grandmother was put up on the block to +be auctioned off and freedom was declared! Aunt Gilly never got to the +block. Grandmother married and was separated from her sister. + +"Whether the other three children were brought to Arkansas then I don't +know but this I know that they went by the name McNeilly. They changed +their names or it was done for them. They are all dead now and my own +mother is the only one now living. Their names were John, Tom, and +Netline. Mother says they were sold to Johnson, and went by that name +too as much as McNeilly. They remained with Johnson till freedom, in +Tennessee. + +"My mother's name is Sarah. + +"They seem to think they were treated good till Master Temple died. They +nearly froze coming to Arkansas to be sold. + +"I heard this told over and over so many, many times before grandmother +died. Seemed it was the greatest event of her life. She told other +smaller things I can't remember to tell with sense at all. Nothing so +important as her master and own father's death and being sold. + +"Times are good, very good with me. Our African race is advancing with +the times." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +Teacher in Biscoe school. Father was a graduate doctor of medicine and +in about 1907, '08, '09 school director at Biscoe. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Jane Oliver + Route 4, near airport, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 81 + + +"I'm certainly one of em, cause I was in the big house. When Miss Liza +married they give sister to her and I stayed with Miss Netta. Her name +was Drunetta Rawls. That was in Mississippi. We come to Arkansas when I +was small. + +"I remember when they run us to Texas, and we stayed there till freedom +come. I remember hearin' em read the free papers. Mama died in Texas and +they buried her the day they read the free papers. I know. I was out +playin' and Miss Lucy, that was my young mistress, come out and say, +'Jane, you go in and see your mother, she wants you.' I was busy playin' +and didn't want to go in and I member Miss Lucy say, 'Poor little fool +nigger don't know her mother's dyin'.' I went in then and said, 'Mama, +is you dyin'?' She say, 'No, I ain't; I died when you was a baby.' You +know, she meant she had died in sin. She was a christian. + +"Me and Lucy played together all the time--round about the house and in +the kitchen. Little Marse Henry, that was big old Marse Henry's son, he +was a captain in the army. We all called him Little Marse Henry. Old +mistress was good to us. Us chillun called her Miss Netta. Best woman I +ever seed. Me and Lucy growed up together. Looks like I can see just the +way the house looked and how we used to go down to the big gate and +play. I sits here and studies and wonders if I'd know that place today. +That's what I study bout. + +"I used to hear em say we only stayed in Texas nine months and the white +folks brought us back. + +"My uncle Simon Rawls, he took me after the war. Then I worked for Mrs. +Adkins. + +"I went to school a little and learned to read prints. The teacher tried +to get me to write but I wouldn't do it. And since then I have wished so +much I had learned to write. Oh mercy! Old folks would tell me, 'Well, +when you get up the road, you'll wish you had.' I didn't know what they +meant but I know now they meant when I got old. + +"I was married when I was young--I don't think I was fifteen. + +"Yes ma'am, I've worked hard. I've always lived in the country. + +"I can remember when the white folks refugeed us to Texas. Oh we did +hate the Yankees. If I ever seed a Yankee I didn't know it but I heard +the white folks talkin' bout em. + +"I used to hear em talk bout old Jeff Davis and Abe Lincoln. + +"Bradley County was where we lived fore we went to Texas and afterward. +Colonel Ed Hampton's plantation jined the Rawls plantation on the +Arkansas River where it overflowed the land. I loved that better than +any place I ever seed in my life. + +"I couldn't say what I think of the young folks now. They is different +from what we was. Yes, Lord, they is different. Sometimes I think they +is better and sometimes wuss. I just thanks the Lord that I'm here--have +come this far. + +"When I bought this place from Mr. R.M. Knox he said, 'When I'm in my +grave you'll thank me that you took my advice and put your savings in a +Home.' I do thank him. I been here thirty years and I get along. God +bless you." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Ivory Osborne + Route 5, Box 158, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 85 + + +"Know about slavery? Sho I do--I was born in '52. Born in Arkansas? No +ma'm, born in Texas. + +"Oh yes, indeed, I had a good master. Good to me, indeed. I was that +high when the war started. I member everything. Take me from now till +dark to tell you everything I know bout slavery. + +"I put in three years and five months, choppin' cotton and corn. I +member the very day, on the 10th of May, old mistress blowed the conk +and told us we was free. + +"Oh Lord, I had a good time. + +"I never was whipped. + +"Ku Klux used to run me. Run me clear from the plum orchard bout a mile +from the house. Run to my mistress at the big house. + +"Miss Ann had eight darkies and told her stepmother, 'Don't you put your +hand on em.' She didn't either. + +"I went to school since 'mancipation in Nacitosh. Learned to read and +write. Was in the eighth grade when I left. Stood at the head of every +class. They couldn't get me down. I done got old and forgot now. + +"I didn't know the difference between slavery and free, I never was +whipped. + +"Did I ever vote? You know I voted, old as I am. Ain't voted in over +forty years. I ain't nobody. My wife's eighty. I've had her forty years. +_Cose_ I voted the Republican ticket. You never seed a colored person a +Democrat in your life. + +"In slavery days we killed seventy-five or eighty hogs every year. And I +don't mean shoats, I mean hogs. I ain't lost my membrance." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Jane Osbrook + 602 E. 21st Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 90 + + +"Yes ma'm, I was livin' in slavery days. I was borned in Arkansas I +reckon. I was borned within three, miles of Camden but I wasn't raised +there. We moved to Saline County directly after peace was declared. + +"I don't know what year I was born because you see I'm not educated but +I was ninety the 27th of this last past May. Yes ma'm, I'm a old bondage +woman. I can say what a heap of em can't say--I can tell the truth bout +it. I believe in the truth. I was brought up to tell the truth. I'm no +young girl. + +"My old master was Adkison Billingsly. My old mistress treated us just +like her own children. She said we had feelin's and tastes. I visited +her long after the war. Went there and stayed all night. + +"I member when they had the fight at Jenkins Ferry. Old Steele had +30,000 and he come down to take Little Rock, Pine Bluff and others. +Captain Webb with 1,500 Rebels was followin' him and when they got to +Saline River they had a battle. + +"The next Sunday my father carried all us children and some of the white +folks to see the battle field. I member the dead was lyin' in graves, +just one row after another and hadn't even been covered up. + +"Oh yes, I can tell all bout that. Nother time there was four hundred +fifty colored and five white Yankee soldiers come and ask my father if +old mistress treated us right. We told em we had good owners. I never +was so scared in my life. Them colored soldiers was so tall and so black +and had red eyes. Oh yes ma'm, they had on the blue uniforms. Oh, we +sure was fraid of em--you know them eyes. + +"They said, 'Now uncle, we want you to tell the truth, does she feed you +well?' My ma did all the cookin' and we had good livin'. I tole my +daughter we fared ten thousand times better than now. + +"I come up in the way of obedience. Any time I wanted to go, had to go +to old mistress and she say, 'Don't let the sun go down on you.' And +when we come home the sun was in the trees. If you seed the sun was +goin' down on you, you run. + +"I ain't goin' tell nothin' but the truth. Truth better to live with and +better to die with. + +"Some of the folks said they never seed a biscuit from Christmas to +Christmas but we had em every day. Never seed no sodie till peace was +declared--used saleratus. + +"In my comin' up it was Whigs and Democrats. Never heard of no +Republicans till after the war. I've seed a man get upon that platform +and wipe the sweat from his brow. I've seed em get to fight in' too. +That was done at our white folks house--arguin' politics. + +"I never did go to school. I married right after the war you know. What +you talkin' bout--bein' married and goin' to school? I was housekeepin': +Standin' right in my own light and didn't know it." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Annie Page + 412-1/2 Pullen Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 86 + + +"I was born 1852, they tell me, on the fifteenth of March. I was workin' +a good while 'fore surrender. + +"Bill Jimmerson was my old master. He was a captain in Marmaduke's army. +Come home on thirty days furlough once and he and Daniel Carmack got +into some kind of a argument 'bout some whisky and Daniel Carmack +stabbed him with a penknife. Stabbed him three times. He was black as +tar when they brought him home. The blood had done settled. Oh Lawd, +that was a time. + +"My eyes been goin' blind 'bout six years till I got so I can't excern +(discern) anything. + +"Old miss used to box me over the head mightily and the colored folks +used to hit me over the head till seem like I could hear a bell for two +or three days. Niggers ain't got no sense. Put 'em in authority and they +gits so uppity. + +"My brother brought me here and left me here with a colored woman named +Rachael Ross. And oh Lawd, she was hard on me. Never had to do in +slavery times what I had to do then. + +"But the devil got her and all her chillun now I reckon. They tell me +when death struck her, they asked if the Lawd called her, and they say +she just turned over and over in the bed like a worm in hot ashes." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Annie Page + 400 Block West Pullen, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 85 + + +"Yes'm I 'member the war. I never knowed why they called it the Civil +War though. + +"I was born in Union County, Arkansas, 'bout a mile from Bear Creek, in +1852. That's what my old mistress tole me the morning we was sot free. + +"My mistress was a Democrat. Old master was a captain in Marmaduke's +army. + +"I used to hope (help) spin the thread to make the soldiers' clothes. +Old mistress cared for me. Lacy Jimmerson--the onliest mistress I ever +had. She wanted to send us away to Texas but old master say it want no +use. Cause if the Yankees won, they have to bring us back, so we didn't +go. + +"Did they _whip_ us? Why I bet I can show you scars now. Old Miss whip +me when she feel like fightin'. Her granddaughter, Mary Jane, tried to +learn me my ABC's out of the old Blue Back Speller. We'd be out on the +seesaw, but old Miss didn't know what we doin'. Law, she pull our hair. +Directly she see us and say 'What you doin'? Bring that book here!' + +"One day old master come home on a thirty-day furlough. He was awful +hot-headed and he got into a argument with Daniel Carmack and old Daniel +stobbed him right in the heart. Fore he die he say to bury him by the +side of the road so he can see the niggers goin' to work. + +"I never seen no Ku Klux but I heard of 'em 'rectly after the war. + +"I'se blind. I jest can see enough to get around. The Welfare gives me +eight dollars a month. + +"My mother died soon after the war ended and after that I was jest +knocked over the head. I went to Camblin and worked for Mrs. Peters. +Then I runned away and married my first husband Mike Samson. I been +married twice and had two children but they all dead now. + +"Law, I jest scared of these young ones as I can be. I don't have no +dealins with 'em." + + + + +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Subject: Apparitions +Subject: Superstitions +Subject: Birthmarks +Story:--Information + +This information given by: Annie Page +Place of residence: 412-1/2 Pullen Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Occupation: None Age: 86 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] +[TR: Repetitive information deleted from subsequent pages.] + + +"I told 'bout old master's death. Mama had done sent me out to feed the +chickens soon of a morning. + +"Here was the smokehouse and there was a turkey in a coop. And when I +throwed it the feed I heard somethin' sounded just like you was draggin' +a brush over leaves. It come around the corner of the smokehouse and +look like a tall woman. It kept on goin' toward the house till it got to +the hickory nut tree and still sound like draggin' a brush. When it got +to the hickory nut tree it changed and look like a man. I looked and I +said, 'It's old master.' And the next day he got killed. I run to the +house and told mama, 'Look at that man.' She said, 'Shut your mouth, you +don't see no man.' Old miss heard and said, 'Who do you s'pose it could +be?' But mama wouldn't let me talk. + +"But I know it was a sign that old master was goin' to die." + + +Superstitions + +"I was born with a caul over my face. Old miss said it hung from the top +of my head half way to my waist. + +"She kept it and when I got big enough she said, 'Now that's your veil, +you play with it.' + +"But I lost it out in the orchard one day. + +"They said it would keep you from seein' ha'nts." + + +Birthmarks + +"William Jimmerson's wife had a daughter was born blind, and she said it +was her husband's fault. She was delicate, you know, and one afternoon +she was layin' down and I was sittin' there fannin' her with a peafowl +fan. Her husband was layin' there too and I guess I must a nodded and +let the fan drop down in his face. He jumped up and pressed his thumbs +on my eyes till they was all bloodshot and when he let loose I fell down +on the floor. Miss Phenie said, 'Oh, William, don't do that.' I can +remember it just as well. + +"My eyes like to went out and do you know, when her baby was born it was +blind. It's eyes just looked like two balls of blood. It died though, +just lived 'bout two weeks." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Fannie Parker + 1908 W. Sixth Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 90? + + +"Yes, honey, this is old Fannie. I'se just a poor old nigger waitin' for +Jesus to come and take me to Heaven. + +"I was just a young strip of a girl when the war come. Dr. M.C. Comer +was my owner. His wife was Elizabeth Comer. I said Marse and Mistis in +them days and when old mistress called me I went runnin' like a turkey. +They called her Miss Betsy. Yes Lord, I was in slavery days. Master and +mistress was bossin' me then. We all come under the rules. We lived in +Monticello--right in the city of Monticello. + +"All I can tell you is just what I remember. I seed the Yankees. I +remember a whole host of 'em come to our house and wanted something to +eat. They got it too! They cooked it them selves and then they burned +everything they could get their hands on. They said plenty to me. They +said so much I don't know what they said. I know one thing they said I +belonged to the Yankees. Yes Lord, they wanted me to tell 'em if I was +free. I told 'em I was free indeed and that I belonged to Miss Betsy. I +didn't know what else to say. We had plenty to eat, plenty of hog meat +and buttermilk and cornbread. Yes ma'm--don't talk about that now. + +"Don't tell me 'bout old Jeff Davis--he oughta been killed. Abraham +Lincoln thought what was right was right and what was wrong was wrong. +Abraham was a great man cause he was the President. When the rebels +ceded from the Union he made 'em fight the North. Abraham Lincoln +studied that and he had it all in his mind. He wasn't no fighter but he +carried his own and the North give 'em the devil. Grant was a good man +too. They tried to kill him but he was just wrapped up in silver and +gold. + +"I remember when the stars fell. Yes, honey, I know I was ironin' and it +got so dark I had to light the lamp. Yes, I did! + +"It's been a long time and my mind's not so good now but I remember old +Comer put us through. Good-bye and God bless you!" + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Subject: Ex-slavery +Story: Birth, Parents, Master. + +Person Interviewed: J.M. Parker, (dark brown) +Address: 1002 Ringo Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Occupation: Formerly a carpenter +Age: 76 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] + + +"I was born in South Carolina, Waterloo, in Lawrence County, [HW: +Laurens Co.] in 1861, April 5th. Waterloo is a little town in South +Carolina. I believe that fellow shot the first gun of the war when I was +born. I knew then I was going to be free. Of course that is just a lie. +I made that up. Anyway I was born in 1861. + +"Colonel Rice was our master. He was in the war too. The name Parker +came in by intermarriage, you see. My mother belonged to Rice. She could +have been a Simms before she married. My father's name was Edmund +Parker. He belonged to the Rices also. That was his master; Colonel Rice +and him were boys together. He went down there to Charleston, South +Carolina to build breastworks. While down there, he slipped off and +brought a hundred men away from Charleston back to Lawrence County where +the men was that owned them. He was a business man, father was. Brought +'em all through the swamps. They were slaves and he brought 'em all back +home. They all followed his advice. + +"My mother's name was Rowena Parker after she married. + +"Colonel Rice was a pretty fair man--a pretty good fellow. He was a +colonel in the war and stood pretty high. Bound to be that way by him +being a colonel. Seemed like him and my father had about the same number +of kids. He thought there was nobody like my mother. He never _whipped +the slaves himself_ but his _overseer would sometimes jump on them_. The +Rice family was very good to our people. The men being gone they were +left in the hands of the mistress. She never touched anybody. She never +had no reason to. + + +Pateroles + +"Patterollers didn't bother us, but we were in that country. During the +war, most of the men that amounted to anything were in the war and the +patrolers didn't bother you much. The overseer didn't have so much power +over me than. That pretty well left the colored people to come up +without being abused during the war. The white folks was forced to go to +the war. They drafted them just like they do now. They'd shoot a _po'_ +white man if he didn't come. + + +Breeding + +"My master didn't force men and women to marry. _He didn't_ put 'em +together just to get more slave. Some times other people would have +women and men just for that purpose. But there wasn't much of it in my +country. + + +House, Stock, Parents' Occupations + +"Our house was a frame building, boxed in with one-by-twelve like we +have here in the country. That was a good house with regular flooring, +tongue and groove. We was raised up in a good house. Old Colonel Rice +had to protect his standing. He had good stock. My father was a carriage +man. He had to keep those horses clean and they always looked good. That +carriage had to shine too. Colonel Rice was a high stepper. He'd take +his handkerchief and rub it over the horses hair to see if they were +really clean. He would always find 'em clean though when the old man got +through with them. He would drive fine stock. Had some fine horses. +Couldn't trust 'em with just anybody. + +"My mother was cook. She helped Mrs. Rice take care of the kids, and +cooked around the house. She took care of her kids, too. + +"The house we was born and bred in was built for a carriage house, but +somehow or 'nother they give it to us to live in. My mother being a +cook, she got what she wanted. That was a good house too. It was sealed. +It had good floors. It had two rooms. It had about three windows and +good doors to each room. + +"We had just common furniture. Niggers didn't have much then. My father +was a good mechanic though and he would make anything he wanted. We +didn't have much, just common things. But all my people were mechanics, +harness makers, shoemakers,--they could make anything. Young Sam Parker +could make any kind of shoe. He made shoes for the white folks; Young +Jacob was a blacksmith; he made horseshoes and anything else out of +iron. He may still be living. In fact, he made anything he could get his +hands on. My young uncles on my mother's side, I don't know much about +them, because they were all mechanics. My grandfather on my mother's +side could make baskets--any kind--could make baskets that would hold +water. + +"My father had thirteen children. Three of them are living now. My +brother lives here in the city. He was born during the war and his +mother was supposed to be free when he was born. + + +Right After the War + +"That's what my mother told me. I can remember a long ways back myself. +After the war, it wasn't long before they began to open up schools. They +used to run school three or four months a year. Both white and colored +in the country had about three or four months. That is all they had. +There weren't so very many white folks that took an interest in +education during slave time. Colored people got just about as much as +they did right after the war. What time we went to school we went the +whole day. We would come home and work in the evening like. We had +pretty fair teachers. All white then at first. They didn't have no +colored till afterwards. If they did, they had so few, I never heard of +them. + +"The first teacher I had was Katie Whitefold (white). That was in +Waterloo. Miss Richardson was our next teacher. She was white too. We +went to school two terms under white women. After that we began to get +teachers from Columbia, South Carolina, where the normal school was. + +"The white teachers who taught us were people who had been raised right +around Waterloo. We never had no Northern teachers as I knows of. Our +first colored teacher was Murry Evans. He a preacher. He was one of our +leading preachers too. After him our colored women began to come in and +stand examination wasn't so hard at that time, but they made a good +showing. There were good scholars. + +"I went to school too much. I went to school at Philander Smith College +some, too. I went a good piece in school. Come pretty near finishing the +English course (high school). I finished Good[HW: sp.?] Brown's 'Grammer +of Grammers'. Professor Backensto (the spelling is the interviewer's) +sent away and got it and sold it to us. We was his students. He was a +white man from the North and a good scholar. We got in those grammars +and got the same lessons they give him when he was in school--nine pages +a lesson and we had to repeat that lesson three times. When my mother +died, I was off in the normal school. + +"Right after the war, my parents farmed. He followed his trade. That +always gave us something to eat you know. When we farmed, we +sharecropped--a third and a fourth--that is, we got a third of the +cotton and a fourth of the corn. Potatoes and things like that went +free. All women got an acre free. My mother always got an acre and she +worked it good too. She always had her bale of cotton. And if she didn't +have a bale, she laid it next to the white folks' and made it out. They +knew it and they didn't care. She stood well with the white people. +Helped all of 'em raise their children, and they all liked that. + +"I went along with my father whenever he had a big job and needed help. +I got to be as good a carpenter as he was. + +"I married out here. About eighty-five. People were emigrating to this +country. There was a boom to emigrating then. Emigrating was a little +dangerous when a man was trying to get hands. White folks would lay +traps and kill men that were taking away their hands--they would kill +white just as quick as they would black. I started out under a white +man--I can't remember his name. He turned me over to Madden, a colored +man who was raised in Waterloo. We came from there to Greenwood, South +Carolina where everything was straight. After that we had nothing to do +but get on the train and keep coming. We was with our agent then and we +had no more trouble after that. + +"I got off at Brinkley over at Minor Gregory's farm. He needed hands +then and was glad to get us. He is dead now. I stayed in Brinkley the +space of about a year. Then he gave us transportation to Little Rock. +The train came from Memphis, and we struck out for Little Rock. I +married after I come to Little Rock. I forget what year. But anyway my +wife is dead and gone and all the children. So I'm single now. + + +Opinions of the Present + +"I think times are about dead now. Things ought to get better. I believe +things are going to get better for all of us. People have got to think +more. People have got to get together more. War doesn't always make +thing better. It didn't after the Civil War. And it didn't after the +World War. The young people are all right in their way. It would just +take another war to learn 'em a lesson. + + +Support + +"I can't do any work now. I get a little help from the welfare. It +doesn't come regular. I need a check right now. I think it's due now. +But they haven't sent it out yet. That is, I haven't got it. + +"I'm a Christian. All my family were Methodists. I belong to Wesley. + + + + +Interviewer: Mary D. Hudgins +Person Interviewed: Judy Parker +Home: 618 Wade Street, Hot Springs, Ark. +Aged: 77 + + +For location of Wade Street, see interview with Emma Sanderson. + +As the interviewer walked down Silver Street a saddle colored girl came +out on a porch for a load of wood. + +"I beg your pardon," she began, pausing, "can you tell me where I will +find Emma Sanderson?" + +"I sure can." The girl left the porch and came out to the street. "I'll +walk down with you and show you. That way it'll be easier. Kind of cold, +ain't it?" + +"It surely is," this from the interviewer. "Isn't it too cold for you, +can't you just tell me? I think I can find it." The girl had expected to +be only on the porch and didn't have a coat. + +"No, ma'am. It's all right. Now we're far enough for you to see. You see +those two houses jam up against one and 'tother? Well Miz Parker lives +in the one this way. I goes down to look after her most every day. +That's where you'll find her.--No ma'am--'twaren't no bother." + +The gate sagged slightly at the house "this way" of the "two jam up +against one and 'tother." A large slab from an oak log in the front yard +near a woodpile bore mute evidence of many an ax blow. (Stove wood is +generally split in the rural South--one end of the "stick" resting +against the ground, the other atop a small log.) + +Up a couple of rickety steps the interviewer climbed. She knocked three +times. When she was bade to enter she opened the door to find an old +woman sitting near a wood stove combing her long, white hair. + +Mrs. Parker was expecting the visit. A few days before the interviewer +had had a visit from a couple of colored women who had "heard tell how +you is investigating the old people.--been trying to get on old age +pension for a long time--glad you come to get us on.----No? Oh, I see +you is the Townsend woman." (An explanation of her true capacity was +almost impossible for the interviewer.) + +Mrs. Parker, however, seemed to comprehend the idea perfectly. She +expected nothing save the chance to tell her story. Her joy at the gift +of a quarter (the amount the interviewer set aside from her salary for +each interviewee) was pitiful. Evidently it had been a long time since +she had possessed a similar sum to spend exactly as she pleased. + +"I don't rightly know how old I is. My mother used to tell me that I was +a little baby, six months old when our master, Joe Potts was his name, +got ready to clear out of Florida. You see he had heard tell of the war +scare. So he started drifting out of the way. Bet it didn't take him +long after he made up his mind. He was a right decided man. Mister Joe +was. + +"How did we like him? Well, he was always good to us. He was well +thought of. Seemed to be a pretty clever man, Mr. Joe did." ("Clever" in +plantation language like "smart" refers more to muscular than mental +activity. They might almost be used as synonyms for "hard working" on +the labor level.) + +"So Mr. Joe got ready to go to Texas. Law, Miss, I don't rightly know +whether he had a family or not. Never heard my Mother say. Anyhow he +come through Arkansas intending to drift on out into Texas. But when he +got near the border 'twix't and between Arkansas and Texas he stopped. +The talk about war had about settled down. So he stopped. He stopped +near where the big bridge is. You know where Little River County is +don't you? He stopped and he started to work. Started to make a crop. +'Course I can't remember none about that. Just what my Mother told me. +But I remembers him from later. + +"He went at it the good way. Settled down and tried to open up a home. +They put in a crop and got along pretty good. Time passed and the war +talk started floating again. That time he didn't pay much attention and +it got him. It was on a Sunday morning when he went away. I never knew +whether they made him go or not. But I kind of think they must of. Cause +he wouldn't have moved off from Florida if he had wanted to go to war. + +"He took my daddy with him! Ma'am--did he take him to fight or to wait +on him--Don't know ma'am, but I sort of think he took him to wait on +him. But he didn't bring him back. My daddy got killed in the war. No +ma'am. I don't rightly know how he got killed. Never heard nobody say. I +was just a little girl--nobody bothered to tell me much. + +"Yes, that we did. We stayed on on the farm and we made a crop--the old +folks did. Mr. Joe, when he went off, said "Now you stay on here, you +make a crop and you use all you need. Then you put up the rest and save +for me." He was a right good man, Mr. Joe was. + +"No, we didn't never see no fighting. There wasn't nothing to be scared +of. Didn't see no Yankees until the war was through. Then they started +passing. Lawsey, I couldn't tell how many of them there was. More than +you could count. + +"We had all stayed on. I was the oldest of my mother's children. But she +had two more after me. There was our family and my two uncles and my +grandmother. Then there was some other colored folks. But we wasn't +scared of the Yankees. Mr. Joe was there by that time. They camped all +around in the woods near us. They got us to do their washing. Lawsey +they was as filthy as hogs. I never see such folks. They asked Mr. Joe +if we could do their washing. Everything on the place that come near +those clothes got lousey. Those men was covered with them. I never see +nothing like it. We got covered with them. No, ma'am, we got rid of 'em +pretty easy. They ain't so hard to get rid of, if you keep clean. + +"After it was all over Master Joe got ready to go back to Florida. He +took Warley and Jenny with him. They was children he had had by a black +woman--you know folks did such things in them days. He asked the rest of +us if they wanted to go back too. But my folks made up their minds they +didn't. You see, they didn't know how they'd get along and how long it +would take them to pay for the trip back, so they stayed right where +they was. + +"Lots of 'em went to Rondo and some of us worked for Herb Jeans--he +lived farther up Red River. After my mother died I was with my +grandmother. She washed and cooked for Herb Jeans's family. I stayed on +with her, helped out until I got married. I was about fifteen when that +time come. + +"My man owned his place. Sure he did. Owned it when I married him. He +owned it himself and farmed it good. Yes ma'am we stayed with the land. +He made good crops--corn and cotton, mostly. Course we raised potatoes +and the truck we needed--all stuff like that. Yes, ma'am we had thirteen +children. Just three of them's living. All of them is boys. + +"Yes ma'am we got along good. My husband made good crops and we got +along just good. But 'bout eight years ago my husband he got sick. So he +sold out the farm--sold out everything. Then he come here. + +"Before he died he spent every last cent--every last cent--left me to +get along the very best way I kin. I stays with my son. He takes care of +me. He don't make much, but he does the best he kin. + +"No ma'am, I likes living down in the country. Down there near Red River +it's soft and sandy. Up here in Hot Springs the rocks tear up your feet. +If you's country raised--you like the country. Yes ma'am, you like the +country." + +As she left the interviewer handed her a quarter. At first the old +woman's face was expressionless. But she moved the coin nearer to her +eyes and a smile broke and widened until her whole face was a wrinkle of +joy. When she turned in the doorway, the interviewer noticed that the +hand jammed into an apron pocket was clutched into a possessive fist, +cradling the precious twenty five cents. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: R.F. Parker + 619 N. Hickory, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 76 + + +"I was born in '62. I reckon I was born in slavery times. Born in Ripley +County, Missouri. Old man Billy Parker was my master, and my young +master was Jim Parker. + +"They bought my mother in Tennessee when she was a child. I wasn't big +enough to remember much about slavery but I was big enough to know when +they turned my mother loose, and we come to Lawrence County, Arkansas. + +"I remember my mother sayin' she had to plow while her young master, Jim +Parker, was off to war, but I don't know what side he was on. + +"I remember seein' some soldiers ridin' down the road, about +seventy-five of 'em. I know I run under a corn pen and hid. I thought +they was after me. They stopped right there and turned their horses +loose 'round that pen. I can remember that all right. They went in the +white folks' house and took a shotgun. I know I remember hearin' mama +talk about it. I think they had on blue clothes. + +"I was goin' on seven when we come to Arkansas. I know I'd walk a while +and she'd tote me a while. But we was lucky enough to get in with some +white people that was movin' to Arkansas. We was comin' to a place +called 'The Promised Land.' We stayed there till '92. + +"I have farmed and done public work. I worked nine years at that heading +factory in the east end (of Pine Bluff). + +"I used to vote. When I was in north Arkansas, I voted in all kinds of +elections. But after I come down here to Jefferson County, I couldn't +vote in nothin' but the presidential elections. + +"I don't think the young people are goin' to amount to much. They are a +heap wilder than when I was young. They got a chance to graduate +now--something I didn't get to do. + +"I never went to school a day in my life, but the white people where I +worked learned me to read and write." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +This man could easily pass for a white person. + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Annie Parks + 720 Pulaski Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: About 80 +Occupation: Formerly house and field work + + +"I was born and raised in Mer Rouge, Louisiana. That is between here and +Monroe. I have been here in Little Rock more than twenty-five years. + +"My mother's name was Sarah Mitchell. That was her married name. I don't +know what her father's name was. My father's name was Willis Clapp. He +was killed in the first war--the Civil War. My father went to the war +from Mer Rouge, Louisiana. I don't remember him at all. But that is what +my mother told me about him. My mother said he had very good people. +After he married my mother, old man Offord bought him. Offord's name was +Warren Offord. They buried him while I was still there in Mer Rouge. He +was a old-time Mason. That was my mother's master--in olden days. + +"His grandmother took my mother across the seas with her. She (his +grandmother) died on shipboard, and they throwed her body into the +water. There's people denies it, but my mother told me it was so. Young +Davenport is still living. He is a relative of Offords. My mother never +did get no pension for my father. + + +Slave House and Occupation + +"I was born in a log house. There were two doors--a front and a +back--and there were two windows. My mother had no furniture 'cept an +old-time wooden bed--big bed. She was a nurse all the time in the house. +I heard her say she milked and waited on them in the house. My father's +occupation was farming during slavery times. + +"My mother always said she didn't have no master to beat on her. I like +to tell the truth. My mother's master never let no overseer beat his +slaves around. She didn't say just what we had to eat. But they always +give us a plenty, and there wasn't none of us mistreated. + +"My father could have an extra patch and make a bale of cotton or +whatever he wanted to on it. That was so that he could make a little +money to buy things for hisself and his family. And if he raised a bale +of cotton on his patch and wanted to sell it to the agent, that was all +right. + + +Family + +"I have a brother named Manuel Clayton. If he's living still, he is +younger than I am. He is the baby boy. I doesn't remember his father at +all. I had five sisters with myself and two brothers. All of them were +older than me except Manuel. My mother had one brother and two sisters. +Her brother's name was Lin Urbin. We always called him Big Buddy. He +hasn't been so long died. My older brother is named Willis Clayton--if +he's still living. Willis has a half dozen sons. He is my oldest +brother. He lives way out in the country 'round Mer Rouge. + + +Freedom + +"My mother said they promised to them money when they were freed. Some +of them gave them something, and some of them didn't. My mother's folks +didn't give her nothin'. The Government didn't give her nothin' either. +I don't know just who told her she was free nor how. I don't remember +myself. + + +Patrollers and Ku Klux + +"I never heard much about pateroles. My mother said they used to whip +you if they would catch you out without a pass. I heard her talk about +the Ku Klux after freedom. + + +Slave Worship + +"My mother could always go to church on Sunday. Her slave-time preacher +was Tom Johnson. Henry Soates and Watt Taylor were slavery-time +preachers too. Old man Jacob Anderson too was a great preacher in slave +time. There was a big arbor where they held church. That was outdoors. +There was just a wood frame and green leaves laid over it. Hundreds of +people sat under there and heard the Gospel preached. The Offords didn't +care how much you worshipped. If I was with them, I wouldn't have no +trouble. + +"In the winter time they had a small place to meet in. They built a +church after the war. When I went home, eight or nine years ago, I +walked all 'round and looked at all the old places. + + +Health + +"You know my remembrance comes and goes. I ain't had no good remembrance +since I been sick. I been mighty sick with high blood pressure. I can't +work and I can't even go out. I'm 'fraid I'll fall down and get myself +hurt or run over. + + +Support + +"I don't get no help 'cept what my daughter gives me. I can't get no Old +Age Pension. I never did get nothin' for my father. My mother didn't +either. He was killed in the war, but they didn't give nobody nothin' +for his death. They told me they'd give me something and then they told +me they wouldn't. I'm dependent on what my daughter does for me. If I +was back in Mer Rouge, I wouldn't have no trouble gettin' a pension, nor +nothin' else. + + +Slave Marriages on the Offord Plantation + +"My mother said they just read 'em together, slavery times. I think she +said that the preacher married them on the Offord plantation. They +didn't get no license. + + +Amusements + +"They had quiltings and corn shuckings. I don't know what other +amusements they had, but I know everything was pleasant on the Offord +plantation. + +"If slaves went out without a pass, my mother said her master wouldn't +allow them to beat on them when they come in. They had plenty to eat, +and they had substantial clothes, and they had a good fire. + + +Age + +"I don't know how old I am. I was born before the war. My father went to +the war when it begun. I had another brother that was born before the +war. He don't remember nothin' about my father. I don't neither. I was +too young." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +Allowing for a year's difference between the two youngest children, and +allowing that the boy was born immediately before the War, the girl +could not be younger than seventy-eight. She could be older. She states +all facts as through her mother, but she seems to have experienced some +of the things she relates. Her memory is fading. Failure to get pension +or old age assistance oppresses her mind. She comes back to it again and +again. She carries her card and her commodity order with her in her +pocketbook. + +She had asked me to write some letters for her when her daughter +interfered and said that she didn't want it done. She said that she had +told the case worker that her husband worked at the Missouri Pacific +Shop and that the case worker had asked her if she wouldn't provide for +her mother. They live in a neat rented house. The mother weighs about a +hundred and ten pounds and is tall. The daughter is about the same +height but weighs about two hundred and fifty. Time and again, the old +lady tried to convey to me a message that she didn't want her daughter +to hear, but I could not make it out. The daughter was belligerent, as +is sometimes the case, and it was only by walking in the very middle of +the straight and narrow path that I managed to get my story. + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Austin Pen Parnell + 4314 W. Seventeenth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 73 +Occupation: Carpenter + + +Birth and General Fact About Life + +"I was born April fifteenth, 1865, the day Lincoln was assassinated, in +Carroll County, Mississippi, about ten miles from Grenada. It's about +half the distance between Grenada and Carrollton. Carrollton is our +county seat but we went to Grenada more than we went to Carrollton. + +"When I got older, I moved to Grenada and I come from there here. I was +about thirty-five years old when I moved to Grenada. About 160 acres of +land in Grenada was mine. I bought it, but heirs claimed the place and I +had to leave. I had no land then, only a lot here and I came over here +to look it over. A lady had come to Mississippi selling property and she +had a plat which she said was in Little Rock not far from the capitol. +Her name was Mrs. Putman. The place was on the other side of the +Fourche. But I didn't know that until I came here. She misguided me. I +came to Arkansas and looked at the lot and didn't want it. I made a trip +over here twice before I settled on living in Little Rock. I told the +others who had bought property from her the truth about its location. +They asked me and I hate to lie. I didn't knock; I just answered +questions and didn't volunteer nothing. They all quit making their +payments, Just like I did. My land had a rock on it as big as a bale of +cotton. + +"Mr. Herring thought hard of me because I told the others the truth. I +went into the office one day and Mr. Herring said, 'Parnell, I +understand you have been knocking on me.' I said, 'Well, I'll tell you, +Mr. Herring, if telling the truth about things is knocking on them, I +certainly did.' He never said anything more about it, and I didn't +either. + +"I rented a place on Twelfth and Maple and then rented around there two +or three times, and finally bought a place at 3704 West Twelfth Street. +I moved to Little Rock March 18, 1911. That was twenty-seven years ago. + + +Parents + +"My father was named Henry Parnell. He died in the year 1917 in the time +of the great war. He was ninety-five years old when he died. His master +had the same name. My mother's name was Priscilla Parnell. She belonged +to the same family as he did. They married before freedom. My father was +a farmer and my mother was a housewife and she'd work in the field too. + +"My grandmother on my mother's side was named Hester Parnell. I don't +know what her husband's name was. My mother, father, and grandmother +were all from North Carolina. My grandmother did house and field work. + + +House + +"My mother and father lived in a two-room house hewed out of big +logs--great big logs. The logs were about four inches thick and twelve +inches wide. It didn't take many of them to build a wall--about ten or +twelve of them on a side. They were notched down so as to almost come +together. They chinked up the cracks with mud and covered it with a +board. + +"I laid in bed many a night and looked up through the cracks in the +roof. Snow would come through there when it snowed and cover the bed +covers. We thought you couldn't build a roof so that it would keep out +rain and snow, but we were mistaken. Before you would make a fire in +them days, you had to sweep out the snow so that it wouldn't melt up in +the house and make a mess. But we kept healthy just the same. Didn't +have no pneumonia in those days. + +"The house had two rooms about eight feet apart. The rooms were +connected by a hall which we called a gallery in those days. The hall +was covered by the same roof as the house and it had the same floor. The +house sot east and west and had a chimney in each end. The chimneys were +made out of sticks and mud. I can build a chimney now like that. + +"It was large at the bottom and tapered at the top. It was about six or +seven feet square at the bottom. It grew smaller as it went toward the +top. You could get a piece of wood three and a half or four feet long in +the boddom of it. Sometimes the wood would be too large to carry and you +would just have to roll it in. + +"The floors was boards about one by twelve. There were two doors in each +room--one leading outside and the other to the hall. If there were any +windows, I can't remember them. We didn't need no windows for +ventilation. + +"This was the house that I remember first after freedom. I remember +living in it. That was about seven or eight years after freedom. My +father rented it from the big man named Alf George for whom he worked. +Mr. George used to come out and eat breakfast with us. We'd get that +hoecake out of the ashes and wash it off until it looked like it was as +clean as bread cooked in a skillet. I have seen my grandmother cook a +many a one in the fire. We didn't use no skillet for corn bread. The +bread would have a good firm crust on it. But it didn't get too hard to +eat and enjoy. + +"She'd take a poker before she put the bread in and rake the ashes off +the hearth down to the solid stone or earth bottom, and the ashes would +be banked in two hills to one side and the other. Then she would put the +batter down on it; the batter would be about an inch thick and about +nine inches across. She'd put down three cakes at a time and let 'em +stay there till the cakes were firm--about five minutes on the bare hot +hearth. They would almost bake before she covered them up. Sometimes she +would lay down as many as four at a time. The cakes had to be dry before +they were covered up, because if the ashes ever stuck to them while they +were wet, there would be ashes in them when you would take them out to +eat. She'd take her poker then and rake the ashes back on the top of the +cakes and let 'em stay there till the cakes were done. I don't know just +how long--maybe about ten or twelve minutes. She knew how long to cook +them. Then she'd rake down the hearth gently, backward and forward, with +the poker till she got down to them and then she'd put the poker under +them and lift them out. That poker was a kind of flat iron. It wasn't a +round one. Then we'd wash 'em off like I told you and they be ready to +eat. + +"Mr. George would eat the ash cake and drink sweet milk. 'Auntie, I want +some of that ash cake and some of that good sweet milk.' We had plenty +of cows. + +"Two-thirds of the water used in the ash cake was hot water, and that +made the batter stick together like it was biscuit dough. She could put +it together and take it in her hand and pat it out flat and lay it on +the hearth. It would be just as round! That was the art of it! + +"When I go back to Mississippi, I'm going back to that house again. I +don't remember seeing the house I was born in. But I was told it was an +ordinary log house just like those all the other slaves had,--just a +one-room log house. + + +Freedom + +"My father went to the War. He was on the Confederate side. They carried +him there as a worker. They cut down all the timber 'round the place +where they were to keep the Yankee gunboats from shelling them and +knocking the logs down on them. But them Yankees were sharp. They stayed +away till everything got dry as a chip. Then they come down and set all +that wood afire with their shells, and the wind seemed to be in their +favor. The Rebels had to get away from there. + +"He got sick before the War closed and he had to come home. His young +master and the other folks stayed there four or five months longer. His +young master was named Tom. When Tom came home, he waited about five or +six months before he would tell them they was free. Then he said, 'You +all free as I am. You can stay here if you want or you can go. You are +free.' They all got together and told him that if he would treat them +right he wouldn't have to do no work. They would stay and do his work +and theirs too. They would work the land and he would give them their +part. I don't know just what the agreement was. I think it was about a +third. Anyway, they worked on shares. When the landlord furnished a team +usually it was halves. But when the worker furnished his own team, it +was usually two-thirds or three-fourths that the worker got. But none of +them owned teams at that time. They were just turned loose. We stayed +there with them people a good while. I don't know just how long, but it +was several years. + + +Catching a Hog + +"One time a slave went to steal a hog. I don't know the name of the man; +I just hear my father tell what happened, and I'm repeating it. It was a +great big hog and kind of wild. His plan to catch the hog was to climb a +tree and carry a yeer of corn up the tree and at the same time he'd +carry a long rope. He had put a running noose in the end of the rope and +laid it on the ground and shelled the corn into the ring. He had the +other end of the rope tied around himself; he was up the tree. About the +time he got the noose pulled up around the hog so that he could tighten +up on it, he dropped his hat and scared the hog. The hog didn't know he +was around until the hat fell, and the falling of the hat scared it so +that it made a big jump and ran a little ways off. That jerked the man +out of the tree. Him falling scared the hog a second time and got him to +running right. He was a big stout hog, and the man's weight didn't hold +him back much. The man didn't know what to do to stop the hog. The hog +was running draggin' him along, snatching him over logs. There was +nothin' else he could do, so he tried prayer. But the hog didn't stop. +Seemed like even the Lord couldn't stop him. Then he questioned the +Lord; he said, 'Lawd, what sawt [HW: sort] of a Lawd is you? You can +stop the wind; you can stop the rain; you can stop the ocean; but you +can't stop this hog.' + +"The hog ran till he came to a big ditch. He jumped the ditch, but the +man fell in it, and that compelled the hog to stop. The man's hollering +made somebody hear him and come and git him loose from the hog. He was +so glad to git loose, he didn't mind losing the hog and gettin' +punished. He didn't get the hog. He just got a lot of bruises. I don't +remember just how they punished him. + + +Ku Klux Klan + +"Once after the War there was a lot of colored people at a prayer +meeting. It was in the winter and they had a fire. The Ku Klux come up. +They just stood outside the door, but the people thought they were +coming in and they got scared. They didn't know hardly how to get out. +One man got a big shovelful of hot coals and ashes out of the fireplace +and threw it out over them, and while they was dusting off the ashes and +coals, the niggers all got away. + + +Patrollers + +"I remember my father telling tales about the patrollers, but I can't +remember them just now. There was an old song about them. Part of it +went like this: + + 'Run, nigger, run + The pateroles'll get you. + + That nigger run + That nigger flew + That nigger bust + His Sunday shoe. + + Run, nigger, run + The pateroles'll get you.' + +That's all I know of that. There is more to it. I used to hear the boys +sing it, and I used to hear 'em pick it out on the banjo and the guitar. + + +Old Massa Goes 'Way + +"Old massa went off one time and left the niggers. He told 'em that he +was goin' to New York. He jus' wanted to see what they would do if they +thought he was away. The niggers couldn't call the name New York, and +they said, 'Old massa's gone to PhilameYawk.' + +"They went in the pantry and got everything they wanted to eat. And they +had a big feast. While they were feasting, the old man came in disguised +as a tramp--face smutty and clothes all dirty and raggedy. They couldn't +tell who he was. He walked up just as though he wanted to eat and begged +the boys for something to eat. The boys said to him, 'Stan' back, you +shabby rascal, you; _if'n_ they's anything left, you get some; _if'n_ +they ain't none left, you get none. This is our time. Old massa done +gone to PhilameYawk and we're having a big time.' + +"After they were through, they did give him a little something but they +still didn't know him. I never did learn the details about what happened +after they found out who the tramp was. My father told me about it. + + +Whipping a Slave + +"I heard my father say his old master give him two licks with a whip +once. Him and another man had been off and they came in. Master drove up +in a double surrey. He had been to town and had bought the boys a pair +of boots apiece. He told them as he got out of the surrey to take his +horses out and feed them. My father's friend was there with him and he +said: 'Le's get our boots before we feed the horses.' After that the +master walked out on the porch and he had on crying boots. The horses +heard them squeaking and they nickered. + +"Master said, 'Henry, I thought I told you to feed them horses. Henry +was so taken aback that he couldn't say a thing. Henry was my father, +you know. Master went and got his cowhide. He said, 'Are you going to +obey my orders?' About the time he said that, he hit my father twice +with the cowhide, and my father said, 'Oh pray, master, oh pray,' and he +let him go. He beat the other fellow pretty bad because he told him to +'Le's get the boots first.' + +"Old master would get drunk sometimes and get on the niggers and beat +them up. He would have them stark naked and would be beating them. Then +old missis would come right out there and stop him. She would say, 'I +didn't come all the way here from North Carolina to have my niggers beat +up for nothin'.' She'd take hold of the cowhide, and he would have to +quit. My father had both her picture and the old man's. + + +Prayer + +"I can remember how my mother used to pray out in the field. We'd be +picking cotton. She would go off out there in the ditch a little ways. +It wouldn't be far, and I would listen to her. She would say to me: +'Pray, son,' and I would say, 'Mother, I don't know how to pray,' and +she would say, 'Well, just say Lord have mercy.' That gave me religious +inclinations. I cultivated religion from that time on. I would try to +pray and finally I learned. One day I was out in the field and it was +pouring down rain, and I was standing up with tears in my eyes trying to +pray as she taught me to. We weren't picking cotton then. I was just +walking out. My mother was dead. I would be walking out and whenever I +would get the notion I would stop right there and go to praying. + +"In slave times, they would have a prayer meeting out in some of the +places and they would turn a pot down out in front of the door. It would +be on a stick or something and raised up a short distance from the +ground so that it wouldn't set flat on the ground. It seems that that +would catch the sound and keep it right around there. They would sing +that old song: + + 'We will camp awhile in the wilderness + And then I'm going home.' + +I don't know any more of the words of that song. + + +Early Schooling + +"I started to school when I was about six or seven years old. I didn't +get to school regular because my father had plenty of work and he had a +habit of taking me out to help him when he needed me in his work. + +"My first teacher was a white man named Jones. I don't remember his +first name. He was a northerner and a Republican. He taught in the +public school with us. His boy, John, and his girl, Louisa, went to the +same school, and were in classes with us. The kids would beat them up +sometimes but he didn't cut up about it. He was pretty good man. + +"After him, I had a colored man named M.E. Davis as a teacher. He would +say to my father, 'Henry, that is a bright boy; he will be a credit to +you if you will keep him at school and give him a chance. Don't make him +lose so much time.' My father would say, 'Yes, that is right.' But as +soon as another job came up, he would keep me out again. + +"I soon got so my learning was a help to him in his work. Whenever any +figuring was to be done, I had to do it if it was done right. He never +had a chance to get any schooling and he couldn't figure well. So they +used to beat him out of plenty when he would work for them. One day we +had picked cotton for a white man and when the time came to pay off, the +man paid father, but I noticed that he didn't give him all he should +have. I didn't say anything while we was standing there but after we got +away I said, 'Papa, he didn't give you the right money.' + +"Papa said, 'How much should he have given me?' + +"I told him, and he said to me, 'Will you say that to him?' + +"I said, 'Yes, papa.' + +"He turned 'round and we went on back to the place and pa said, 'My boy +says you didn't pay me all that was comin' to me.' + +"The white man turned to me at once and said, 'How much was coming to +him?' + +"I told him. + +"He said, 'What makes you think that?' + +"I said, 'We picked so many pounds of cotton at so much per hundred +pounds, and that would amount to so many dollars and so many cents.' + +"When I said that, he fell over on the ground and like to killed his +self laughing. He counted out the right money to my father and said, +'Henry, you better watch that little skinny-eyed nigger; he knows +something.' + + +Present Support + +"I don't got anything from the government. I live by what little I make +at odd jobs." + + +Note: In this interview this man used correct English most of the time +and the interview is given in his own words. Lapses into dialect will be +noticed. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Ben Parr, Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 85 next March (1938) + + +"I was born in Tennessee close to Ripley. My master was Charles Warpoo +and Catherine Warpoo. They had three boys and two girls. They owned my +mama and me and Gentry was the oldest child. He died last year. My mama +raised twelve children. My papa belong to people over on the Mississippi +River. Their name was Parr but I couldn't tell a thing about them. When +I come to know about them was after freedom. There was Jim Parr, Dick +Parr, Columbus Parr. We lived on their place. Both my parents was farm +hands, and all twelve children wid them. + +"Well, the first I recollect is that we lived on the five acre lot, the +big house, and some of the slaves lived in houses around the big yard +all fenced with pailings and nice pickett fence in front of Charlie +Warpoo's house. We played around under the trees all day. The soldiers +come nearly every day and nearly et us out of house and home. The blue +coats seemed the hungriest or greediest pear lack. They both come. +Master didn't go to war; his boys was too young to go, so we was all at +home. My papa shunned the war. He said he didn't give a pickayune +whether he be free or not, it wouldn't do no good if he be dead nohow. +He didn't live with us doe (though). They kept papa pretty well hid out +with stock in the Mississippi River bottoms. He wasn't scared ceptin' +when he come over to see my mama and us. When we come to know anything +we was free. + +"I never seen nobody sold. None of my folks was sold. The folks raised +my mama and they didn't want her to leave. The folks raised papa what +had him at freedom. He said him and mama was married long before the war +sprung up. I don't know how they married nor where. She was young when +they married. + +"I remember hearing mama say when you went to preaching you sit in the +back of the church and sit still till the preaching was all over. They +had no leaving. + +"I know when I was a child people raised children, now they let them +grow up. Children was sent off or out to play, not sit and listen to +what grown folks had to say. Now the children is educated and too smart +to listen to good advice. They are going to ruination. Mama used to have +our girls knit at night and she spin, weave, sew. They would tell us how +to be polite and honest and how to work. Young folks too smart to take +advice now. + +"Mama was cooking at the Warpoo's house; she cooked breakfast. One +morning I woke up and here was a yard full of 'Feds.' I was hungry. I +went through the whole regiment--a yard full--to mama hard as I could +split. They didn't bother me. I was afraid they would carry me off +sometimes. They was great hands to tease and worry the little Negro +children. + +"Over at Dyersburg, Tennessee the Ku Klux was bad. Jefferie Segress was +pretty prosperous, owned his own home. John Carson whooped him, cut his +ear off, treated him bad. High Sheriff they said was a 'Fed.' He put +twenty-four buck shots in John Carson. That was the last of the Ku Klux +at Dyersburg. The Negroes all left Dyersburg. They kept leaving. The +'Feds' was meaner to them than the owners. In 1886, three weeks before +Christmas, one hundred head of Negroes got off the train here at +Brinkley. The Ku Klux was the tail end of the war, whooping around. It +was a fight between the 'Feds' and the old owners--both sides telling +the Negroes what to do. The best way was stay at home and work to keep +out of trouble. + +"The bushwhackers killed Raymond Jones (black man) before the war +closed. Well, I don't know what they ambushed for. + +"I paid my own way to Arkansas. I brought my wife. Mama was dead. + +"If the Negro is a taxpayer he ought to vote like white folks. But they +can't run the government. That was tried out after that war we been +talking about. Our color has faith in white folks and this is their +country. I vote some. We got a good right to vote. We helped clear out +the country. It is our home now. + +"The present times is too fast. I can't place this young generation. + +"This is my second wife I'm living wid now. She's got children. I never +had a child. We gets $10 off of the Welfare and I work around at pick-up +jobs. I farmed all my whole life." + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Frank A. Patterson + 906 Chester Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 88 + + +"I was born in Raleigh, North Carolina in 1850. My father was born in +Baltimore, Maryland. My mother and father was sold into Bibb County, +Georgia. I don't know how much they sold for. I don't know how much they +paid for them. I don't know how much the speculator asked for them. Used +to have them in droves and you would go in and pick 'em out and pay +different amounts for them. + +"I was never sold. My old boss didn't believe in selling slaves. He +would buy 'em but he wouldn't sell 'em. I'll say that much for him. + + +Master + +"I belonged to a man named Thomas Johnson Cater. + + +Houses + +"They lived in log houses. Some of them had weatherboard houses but the +majority of them was log houses. Two doors and one window. Some of them +had plank floors. Some of them had floors what was hewed, you know, +sills. They had stick and dirt chimneys. Some of them had brick +chimneys. It depended on the master--on the situation of the master. + + +Furniture + +"They just had bunks built up side the wall. The best experienced +colored people had these teester beds. Didn't have no slats. Had ropes. +They called 'em cord beds sometimes. They had tables just like we have +now what they made themselves. Chairs were long benches made out of +planks. Little kids had big blocks to sit on where they sawed off +timber. + +"They had what they called a cupboard to keep the food in. Some of them +had chests made out of planks, you know. That is the way they kept it. +They put a hasp and steeple on it so as to keep the children out when +they was gone to the field. + + +Food + +"They give 'em three pounds of meat a week, peck of meal, pint of +molasses; some of them give 'em three to five pounds of flour on a +Sunday morning according to the size of the family. The majority of them +had shorts from the wheat. Some of the slaves would clean up a flat in +the bottoms and plant rice in it. That was where they would allow the +slaves to have truck patches. + +"Some few of them had chickens that was allowed to have them. Same of +them had owners that wouldn't allow their slaves to own chickens. They +never allowed them to have hogs or cows. Wherever there was a family +that had a whole lot of children they would allow them to have a cow to +milk for to get milk for their children. They claimed the cow, but the +master was the owner of it. It belonged to him. He would just let them +milk it. He would just let them raise their children off of the milk it +gave. + + +Clothes + +"There was no child ever had a pair of shoes until he got old enough to +go in the field. That was when he was twelve years old. That is about +all I know about it. + + +Schooling + +"I never went to school in my life. I got hold of one of them old blue +back spelling books. My young boss gave it to me after I was free. He +told me that I was free now and I had to think and act for myself. + + +Signs of War + +"Before the War I saw the elements all red as blood and I saw after that +a great comet; and they said there was going to be a war. + + +Memories of the Pre-War Campaign + +"When Fillmore, Buchanan, and Lincoln ran for President one of my old +bosses said, 'Hurrah for Buchanan,' and I said, 'Hurrah for Lincoln.' +One of my mistresses said, 'Why do you say, 'Hurrah for Lincoln?' And I +said, 'Because he's goin' to set me free.' + +"During that campaign, Lincoln came to North Carolina and ate breakfast +with my master. In those days, the kitchen was off from the house. They +had for breakfast ham with cream gravy made out of sweet milk and they +had biscuits, poached eggs on toast, coffee and tea, and grits. They had +waffles and honey and maple syrup. That was what they had for breakfast. + +"He told my old boss that our sons are 'ceivin' children by slaves and +buyin' and sellin' our own blood and it will have to be stopped. And +that is what I know about that. + + +Refugeeing + +"At the close of the War, we had refugeed down in Houston County in +Georgia. + + +War Memories + +"Sherman's army came through there looking for Jeff Davis, and they told +me that they wasn't fightin' any more,--that I was free. + +"They said, 'You ain't got no master and no mistress.' They et dinner +there. All the old folks went upstairs and turned the house over to me +and the cook. And they et dinner. One of them said, 'My little man, +bring your hat 'round now and we are going to pay you,' and they passed +the hat 'round and give me a hat full of money. I thought it wasn't no +good and I carried it and give it to my old mistress, but it was good. + +"They asked me if I had ever seen Jeff Davis. I said 'No.' Then they +said, 'That's him sittin' there.' He had on a black dress and a pair of +boots and a mantilla over his shoulders and a Quaker bonnet and a black +veil. + +"They got up from the dining table and Sherman ordered them to 'Recover +arms.' He had on a big black hat full of eagles and he had stars and +stripes all over him. That was Sherman's artillery. They had mules with +pots and skillets, and frying pans, and axes, and picks, grubbing hoes, +and spades, and so on, all strapped on those mules. And the mules didn't +have no bridles but they went on just as though they had bridles. One of +the Yanks started a song when he picked up his gun. + + 'Here's my little gun + His name is number one + Four and five rebels + We'll slay 'em as they come + Join the ban' + The rebels understan' + Give up all the lan' + To my brother Abraham + Old Gen'l Lee + Who is he? + He's not such a man + As our Gen'l Grant + Snap Poo, Snap Peter + Real rebel eater + I left my ply stock + Standin' in the mould + I left my family + And silver and gold + Snap Poo, Snap Peter + Real rebel eater + Snap Poo, Snap Peter.' + +"And General Sherman gave the comman', 'Silence', and 'Silence' roared +one man, and it rolled all down the line, 'Silence, silence, silence, +silence.' And they all got silent. + + +How Freedom Came + +"They had a notification for a big speaking and that was in Perry, +Georgia. Everybody that was able throughout the State went to that +convention where that speaking was. And that is where peace was +declared. Every man was his own free agent. 'No more master, no more +mistress. You are your own free moral agent. Think and act for +yourself.' That is how it was declared. I didn't go to the meeting. I +was right there in the town. There was too many people there. You +couldn't stir them with hot fire. But my mother and father went. + + +What the Slaves Expected + +"They didn't expect anything but freedom. Some of them didn't have sense +enough to secure a home for themselves. They didn't have no sense. Some +of them wasn't eligible to speak for themselves. They wanted somebody to +speak for them. + + +What They Got + +"I don't know that they got anything. + + +Immediately After the War + +"Right after the War, I stayed with the people that owned me and worked. +They give me two dollars a month and my food and clothes. I stayed with +them five years and then I quit. I had sense enough to quit and I went +to work for wages. I got five dollars a month. And I thought that was a +big salary. I didn't know no better. I learnt better by experience. + + +Negroes in Politics + +"Just after the War, the Republicans used to have representatives at the +state convention. After the Democrats got in power, they knocked all +that in the head. Colored people used to be on juries. But they won't +let them serve now. (Negroes served on local grand jury last year.) + +"I knew one nigger politician in Georgia named I.B. Simons. He was a +school-teacher. He never held any office. I knowed a nigger politician +here by the name of John Bush. He had the United States Land Office. +When the Democrats got in power they put him out. I knowed another +fellow used to be here named Crockett Brown. He lived in Lee County, +Arkansas. He was a Congressman. I don't know whether he ever got to the +White House or not. I ain't never seen no account of it. I can't tell +you all any more now. + + +Memories of Fred Douglass + +"I knowed Fred Douglass. I shook hands with him and talked with him here +in Little Rock. They give him the opera house. We had the first floor. +The white folks had the gallery. That was when the Republicans were in +power. + +"He said: 'They all seem to be amazed and dumbfounded over me having a +white woman for a wife.' He said, 'You all don't know that my father was +my mother's master and she was as black as a crow. Don't it seem natural +that history should repeat itself? have often wondered why he liked such +a black woman as my mother. I was jus' a chip off the old block.' + + +Voting + +"I voted for U.S. Grant. He was the first President we had after the +Civil War. I shook hands with him twice in Little Rock. He put up at the +Capitol Hotel and I was a-cooking there. + +"I voted for McKinley. I saw him too. I had a walking cane with his head +on it. That is about all I remember right now. He was the one that got +up this gold standard. He liked to put this state under bayonet laws +when he was working under that gold standard. The South was bitterly +against him. + + +Occupation + +"I followed cooking all my life. I have had the white peoples' lives in +my hand all my life. I worked on the Government boat, _Wichita_. It went +out of season and they built a boat called the _Arkansas_. I cooked on +it. Captain Griffin was the master of it. When it went out of service, +Captain Newcome from the War Department transferred me over to the +Mississippi River on the _Arthur Hider_ (?). My headquarters were in +Greenville, Mississippi. It was far from home, so after nine months I +quit and came home (Little Rock). Captain Van Frank give me a position +on a dredge boat and the people were so bad on there I wouldn't stay. I +came away. I wouldn't stay 'mongst 'em. + + +Religion + +"I want you to know that I am a Christian and I want you to know I ain't +got no compromise with nobody on God's word. I ain't got but one way and +that is the way Jesus said: + +Come unto me all ye that are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. +He that believeth on me shall be saved. + +You all fix anything anyway you want. I ain't bothered 'bout you. + +"My people were good Christian people." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: John Patterson, Helena, Arkansas +Age: 74 + + +"I was born near Paducah, Kentucky. Mother was never sold. She belong to +Master Arthur Patterson. Mother was what folks called black folks. I +never seen a father to know. I never heard mother say a thing about my +father if I had one. He never was no use to me nor her neither. Mother +brought me here in time of the Civil War. I was four years old. We come +here to be kept from the Yankee soldiers. We was sent with some of the +Pattersons. At the end of the war mother cooked for Nick Rightor (?) and +his wife here in North Helena. He was a farmer but his son is a ear, +eye, nose specialist. + +"I farmed, cleaned house and yards for these Helena people. I was +janitor at the Episcopal church in Helena sixteen years and four months. +They paid me forty-five dollars a month. + +"Yes ma'am, I have heard about the Ku Klux. Heard talk but never seen +one. + +"I never been in jail. I never been drunk. Folks in Helena will tell you +John Patterson can be trusted. + +"I saved up one thousand dollars, just let it slip. The present times +are hard. Times are hard. I get ten dollars and comissary helps. I got +one in family. + +"I think mother said she was treated very good in slavery. She didn't +tell me much about it. + +"I own a home. It come through a will from my aunt. My uncle was a +drayman here in Helena and a close liver. I want to hold to it if I can. + +"If you'd ask me what all ain't took place since I been here I could +come nigh telling you. We had colored officers here. Austin Barrer was +sheriff. Half of the officers was colored at one time. John Jones was +police. No, they wasn't friends of mine. I seen these levies built. One +was here in 1897. It was rebuilt then. + +"It seems to me the country is going down. When they put in the Stock +Law people had to sell so much stock. Milch cows sold for six dollars a +head. People that want and need stock have no place to raise it. People +are not as industrious as they was and they accumolate more it seems to +me. We used to make our living at home. I think that is the best way. + +"I voted a Republican ticket years ago. I don't believe in women voting. +The Lord don't believe in that. I belong to the Baptist church. + +"Young folks don't act on education principles. Folks used to fight with +fist. Now one shoots the other down. Times are not improving morally. +Folks don't even think it is wrong to take things; that is stealing. +They drink up all the money they can get. I don't see no colored folks +ever save a dollar. They did long time ago. Thaes worse in some ways. + +"I forgot our plough songs: + + 'I wonder where my darling is.' + + 'Nigger makes de cotton and de + White man gets the money.' + +"Everybody used to sing. We worked from sun to sun; we courted and was +happy. People not happy now. They are craving now. About four o'clock we +all start up singing. Sing till dark." + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Sarah Jane Patterson + 2611 Orange Street, North Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 90 + + +"I was born in Bartow County, Georgia, January 17, 1848. You can go +there and look in that Bible over there and you will find it all written +down. My mama kept a record of all our ages. Her old mistress kept the +record and gave it to my mother after freedom. + + +Parents + +"My parents were Joe Patterson and Mary Adeline Patterson. My mother's +name before she married was Mary Adeline Huff. My grandfather on my +mother's side was named Huff. My mother's sisters were Mahala, and +Sallie. And them's the onliest two I remember. She had two brothers but +I don't remember their names. + + +How Freedom Came + +"I was living in Bartow County in north Georgia when freedom came. I +don't remember how the slaves found it out. I remember them saying, +'Well, they's all free.' And that is all I remember. And I remember some +one saying--asking a question, 'You got to say master?' And somebody +answered and said, 'Naw.' But they said it all the same. They said it +for a long time. But they learned better though. + + +Family + +"I have brother Willis, Lizzie, Mary, Maud, and myself. There was four +sisters and one brother. I had just one child--a boy. He lived to be a +grown man and raised a family. His wife had three children and all of +them is gone. The father, the mother, and the children. I was a woman. I +wasn't no man. I just had one child, but the Lord blessed me. I have +three sisters and a brother dead. + + +Master + +"My old master's name was John Patterson and my old mistress was named +Lucy Patterson. She had a son named Bill and a son named Tommy and a son +named Charles, and a boy named Bob, and a girl named Marion. We are so +for apart they can't help me none. I know Bob's boys are dead because +they got killed in a fight in Texas. + + +Crippled in Slave Time + +"I been crippled all my life. We was on the lawn playing and the white +boy had been to the pond to water the horses. He came back and said he +was going to run over us. We all ran and climbed up on the top of a ten +rail fence. The fence gave 'way and broke and fell down with us. I +caught the load. They all fell on me. It knocked the knee out of place. +They carried me to Stilesboro to Dr. Jeffrey, a white doctor in slavery +time. I don't know what he did, but he left me with my knee out of joint +after he treated it. I can't work my toes and I have to walk with that +stick. + + +Soldiers + +"I was a tot when I seen the soldiers coming dressed in blue, and I run. +They was very nice to the colored people, never beat 'em or nothin'. I +was in Bartow County when they come through. They took a lot of things, +but I can't remember exactly what it was. I 'tended to the children +then--both the white and colored children, but mostly the white. + + +Good Masters + +"My old master, John Patterson, never beat up the women and men he +bossed. + + +Patrollers + +"I have heard people talk about the pateroles raising sand with the +niggers. Some of the niggers would say they got whipped. I was small. I +would hear 'em say, 'The pateroles is out tonight.' + + +Ku Klux Klan + +"I have seed the old Ku Klux. That was after freedom. They came 'round +to my old master where my mama stayed. They were just after whipping +folks. Some of them they couldn't whip. + + +Support + +"I used to get a little money from Mr. Dent long as he was living. I +would go over there and he would give me a dollar or two. Since he's +been dead, his wife don't have much to give me. She gives me something +to eat sometimes but she doesn't have any money now that her husband is +dead. + +"I can't get up to the Welfare. Crippled as I am, I can't walk up and +down those stairs, and I can't git there nohow. I been tryin' to git +some one to take me up there. + +"Mr. Pratt helps me from time to time, but he ain't sent me nothin' now +in a good while. He's right smart busy, but if I go to him, I spect +he'll stir up somethin' for me. + + +Travels + +"I wouldn't never a left Bartow County, but the white people made out +that this was a rich country and you could make so much out here, and we +moved out here. We was young then. We came out on the train. It was a +long time back but it was too far to came on a wagon. I don't remember +just how long ago it was. + + +Occupation + +"I used to quilt until my fingers got too stiff. I got some patterns in +there now if you want to see them." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +The old lady took me in the house and showed me about a dozen quilts, +beautifully patterned and made. She had also some unfinished tops. She +says that she does not have much of a sale for them now because the +"quality of folks" who liked such things well enough to buy them "is +just about gone." + +She is crippled and unable to walk with facility. She has a great deal +of difficulty in getting off and on her porch. Still she does not +impress one as feeble so much as just disabled in one or two +particulars. She has a crippled knee, and both of her hands are +peculiarly stiff in the finger joints, one more so than the other. If it +were not for the disabilities, as old as she is, I believe that she +could give a good account of herself. + +I didn't have the heart to tell the old lady that her Bible record is +not what she thinks it is. It is not the old original record which her +mistress possessed. Neither is it the copy of the record of her mistress +which her mother kept. From questioning, I gather that the old mistress +dictated the original record to some one connected with her mother, +might have written it out herself on a sheet of paper. From time to +time, as new deaths and births occurred, scraps of paper containing them +were added to the first paper, and as the papers got worn, blurred, and +dog-eared, they were copied--probably not without errors. Time came when +the grandchildren up in the grades and with _semi-modern_[HW:?] ideas +copied the scraps into the family Bible. By that time aging and blurring +of the original lead pencil notes, together with recopying, had +invalidated the record till it is no longer altogether reliable. + +The births recorded in the Bible are as follows and in the exact order +given below: + + Mary Patterson 10-11-1866 + Harris Donesson 3-13- 72 + Lilley Donesson 7-21- 85 + Pearly Donesson 3-29- 92 + Silvay Williams 8-29- 84 + Beney Williams 11-24- 85 + Millia A. Williams 12-30- 88 + Joe Patterson 10- 3- 77 + H. Patterson 7-29- 79 + Maria E. Patterson 11-19- 81 + Jennie Patterson 12-24- 84 + Alex Patterson 7- 5- 86 + James Patterson 6-20- 90 + Janie Patterson 1-27- 60 + Amanda Patterson 1-28- 63 + James Rafield Walker 8-11- 99 + Cornelius Walker 7-21-1902 + Willie Walker 11-20- 03 + Elias Walker 7-21- 11 + Emmet Brown 1-23- 22 + Leon Harris 12-13- 21 + +The following marriages were given: + + May Lee Brown 2-26-1926 + James Walker Brown 2-21- 35 + Jennie Walker 6-20- 15 + Lillie Jean Walker 12-6- 36 + +The name of Sarah Jane Patterson is not in the list. The list itself is +not chronological. It is written in ink but in the stiff cramped hand to +be expected of a school child not yet thoroughly familiar with the pen. +The eye fixes on the name of Janie Patterson, 1-27-1860. It does not +seem probable that this is correct if it is meant to be Sarah Jane. +Sarah Jane could give no help except to answer questions about the +manner in which the record was made. + +These considerations led me to set the record aside in my own mind so +far as Sarah Jane Patterson's age is concerned and to take her word. She +has a very clear conception of the change from slavery to freedom. Her +memories are blurred and indistinct, but she recollects that this matter +was during slavery times and that during freedom. It seems that she had +the care of the smaller children during slavery time--at the time she +saw the soldiers marching through. This was not during the time of +freedom, because she distinguished clearly the Ku Klux time. She would +have to be at least eighty to have cared for children. Her tenacious +memory of ninety may have some foundation, therefore. + +Moreover where writing is done in lead pencil and hurriedly, six is +often made to look like four and a part of eight may become blurred till +it looks like a zero. That would account for 1848 being transcribed as +1860. There would be nothing unusual, however, in a Sarah Jane and a +Jane. I neglected to cover that point in a question. + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Solomon P. Pattillo + 1502 Martin Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 76 +Occupation: Formerly farmer, teacher, and small dealer--now blind + + +"I was born November 1862. I was three years old at the time of the +surrender. I was born right here in Arkansas--right down here in Tulip, +Dallas County, Arkansas. I have never been out of the state but twice. + + +Refugeeing + +"My daddy carried me out once when they took him to Texas during the war +to keep the Yanks from setting him free. + +"Then I went out once long after slavery to get a load of sand. On the +way back, my boat nearly sank. Those are the only two times I ever left +the state. + + +Parents + +"My father's name was Thomas Smith, but the Pattillos bought him and he +took the name of Pattillo. I don't know how much he sold for. That was +the only time he was ever sold. I believe that my father was born in +North Carolina. It seems like to me I recollect that is where he said he +was born. + +"My mother was born in Virginia. I don't know how she got here unless +she was sold like my father was. I don't know her name before she got +married. Yes, I do; her name was Fannie Smith, I believe. + + +Houses + +"We lived in old log cabins. We had bedsteads nailed to the wall. Then +we had them old fashioned cordboard springs. They had ropes made into +springs. That was a high class bed. People who had those cord springs +felt themselves. They made good sleeping. My father had one. Ropes were +woven back and forth across the bed frame. + +"We had those old spinning wheels. Three cuts was a day's work. A cut +was so many threads. It was quite a day to make them. They had hanks +too. The threads were all linked together. + +"My mother was a spinner. My father was a farmer. Both of them worked +for their master,--old Massa, they called him, or Massa, Mass Tom, Mass +John or Massta. + + +War Recollections + +"I remember during the war when I was in Texas with a family of Moody's +how old Mistiss had me packing rocks out of the yard in a basket and +cleaning the yard. I didn't know it then, but my daddy told me later +that that was when I was in Texas,--during the war. I remember that I +used to work in my shirt tail. + +"The soldiers used to come in the house somewhere and take anything they +could get or wanted to take. + + +Pateroles + +"When I was a boy they had a song, 'Run, Nigger, run; The Pateroles will +get you.' They would run you in and I have been told they would whip +you. If you overstayed your time when your master had let you go out, he +would notify the pateroles and they would hunt you up and turn you over +to him. + + +Church Meetings + +"Way long then, my father and mother used to say that man doesn't serve +the Lord--the true and living God and let it be known. A bunch of them +got together and resolved to serve Him any way. First they sang in a +whisper, 'Come ye that love the Lord.' Finally they got bold and began +to sing in tones that could be heard everywhere, 'Oh for a thousand +tongues to sing my Great Redeemer's praise.' + + +After the War + +"After the war my father fanned--made share crops. I remember once how +some one took his horse and left an old tired horse in the stable. She +looked like a nag. When she got rested up she was better than the one +that was took. + +"His first farm was down here in Dallas County. He made a share crop +with his former master, Pattillo. He never had no trouble with him. + + +Ku Klux + +"I heard a good deal of talk about the Ku Klux Klan, but I don't know +anything much about it. They never bothered my father and mother. My +father was given the name of being an obedient servant--among the best +help they had. + +"My father farmed all his life. He died at the age of seventy-two in +Tulip, near the year 1885, just before Cleveland's inauguration. He died +of typhoid pneumonia. My mother was ninety-six years old when she died +in 1909. + + +Little Rock + +"I came to Little Rock in 1894. I came up here to teach in Fourche Dam. +Then I moved here. I taught my first school in this county at Cato. I +quit teaching because my salary was so poor and then I went into the +butcher's business, and in the wood business. I farmed all the while. + +"I taught school for twenty-one years. I always was a successful +teacher. I did my best. If you contract to do a job for ten dollars, do +as much as though you were getting a hundred. That will always help you +to get a better job. + +"I have farmed all my life in connection with my teaching. I went into +other businesses like I said a moment ago. I was a caretaker at the +Haven of Rest Cemetery for sometime. + +"I was postmaster from 1904 to 1911 at Sweet Home. At one time I was +employed on the United States Census. + +"I get a little blind pension now. I have no other means of support. + + +Loss of Eyes + +"The doctor says I lost my eyesight on account of cataracts. I had an +operation and when I came home, I got to stirring around and it caused +me to have a hemorrhage of the eye. You see I couldn't stay at the +hospital because it was costing me $3 a day and I didn't have it. They +had to take one eye clean out. Nothing can be done for them, but somehow +I feel that the lord's going to let me see again. That's the way I feel +about it. + +"I have lived here in this world this long and never had a fight in my +life. I have never been mistreated by a white man in my life. I always +knew my place. Some fellows get mistreated because they get out of their +place. + +"I was told I couldn't stay in Benton because that was a white man's +town. I went there and they treated me white. I tried to stay with a +colored family way out. They were scared to take me. I had gone there to +attend to some business. Then I went to the sheriff and he told me that +if they were scared to have me stay at their home, I could stay at the +hotel and put my horse in the livery stable. I stayed out in the wagon +yard. But I was invited into the hotel. They took care of my horse and +fed it and they brought me my meals. The next morning, they cleaned and +curried and hitched my horse for me. + +"I have voted all my life. I never had any trouble about it. + +"The Ku Klux never bothered me. Nobody else ever did. If we live so that +everybody will respect us, the better class will always try to help us." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Carry Allen Patton + Forrest City, Arkansas +Age: 71 + + +"I was born in Shelby County, Tennessee. My parents was Tillie Watts and +Pierce Allen. He come from Louisiana reckly (directly) after the +surrender. My mother come from Virginia. She was sold in Virginia and +brought to middle Tennessee close to Murfreesboro and then brought to +Memphis and sold. She was dark and my father was too. They was living +close to Wilmar, Arkansas when the yellow fever was so bad. I don't +remember it. Heard them talk about it. + +"I heard my mother say how Mr. Jake Watts saved his money from the +Yankees. They had a great big rock flat on both sides. They put on the +joints of big meat to weight it down when they salted it down in a +barrel. They didn't unjoint the meat and in the joint is where it +started to spoil. Well, he put his silver and gold in a pot. It was a +big round pot and was smaller around the top. He dug a hole after +midnight. He and his two boys James and Dock put the money in this hole +in the back yard. They covered the pot with the big flat rock and put +dirt on that and next morning they planted a good big cedar tree over +the rock, money and all. + +"Old Master Jake died during the War and their house was burned but +James lived in one of the cabins in the yard. Dock went to the War. My +mother said when they left, that tree was standing. + +"My mother run off. She thought she would go cook for the men in the +camps but before she got to the camps a wagon overtook her and they +stole her. They brought her to Memphis and sold her on a block. They +guarded her. She never did know who they was nor what become of them. +They kept her in the wagon on the outskirts of the city nearly a month. +One man always stayed to watch her. She was scared to death of both of +them. One of the men kept a jug of whiskey in the wagon and drunk it but +he never would get dead drunk so she could slip off. + +"Mr. Johnson bought her and when the surrender come on, Master Johnson +took his family and went to Texas. She begged him to take her to nurse +but he said if it wasn't freedom he would send her back to Master James +Watts and he would let her go back then. He give her some money but she +never went back. She was afraid to start walking and before her money +give clear out she met up with my father and he talked her out of going +back. + +"She had a baby pretty soon. It was by them men that stole her. He was +light. He died when he got nearly grown. I recollect him good. I was +born close to Memphis, the boy died of dysentery. + +"When my mother was sold in Virginia she was carried in a wagon to the +block and thought she was going to market. She never seen her folks no +more. They let them go along to market sometimes and set in the wagon. +She had a little pair of gloves she wore when she was sold her grandma +had knit for her. They was white, had half thumb and no fingers. When +she died I put them in her coffin. She had twins born dead besides me. +They was born close to Wilmar, Arkansas. + +"We farmed all my life in Arkansas and Mississippi. I married in +Mississippi and we come back here before Joe died. I live out here and +in Memphis. My son is a janitor at the Sellers Brothers Store in +Memphis. My daughter cooks about here in town and I keep her children. I +rather farm if I was able. + +"I think young folks, both colors, shuns work. Times is running away +with itself. Folks is living too fast. They ride too fast and drinks and +do all kinds of meanness. + +"My father was a mighty poor hand at talking. He said he was sold in a +gang shipped to Memphis from New Orleans. Master Allen bought him. He +was a boy. I don't know how big. He cleaned fish--scaled them. He +butchered and in a few months Mr. Allen set him free. It was surrender +when he was sold but Mr. Allen didn't know it or else he meant to keep +him on a few years. When he got loose he started farming and farmed till +he died. He farmed in Tennessee, Mississippi, and Arkansas. He owned a +place but a drouth come along. He got in debt and white folks took it. + +"I married in Mississippi. My husband immigrated from South Carolina. He +was Joe Patton. I washed and ironed and farmed. I rather farm now if I +was able. + +"I never got no gov'ment help. I ain't posing it. It is a fine thing. I +was in Tennessee when it come on. They said I'd have to stay here six +months. I never do stay." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Annie L. LaCotts +Person interviewed: Harriett McFarlin Payne + Dewitt, Arkansas +Age: 83 + + +"Aunt Harriett, were you born in slavery time?" + +"Yes, mam! I was big enough to remember well, us coming back from Texas +after we refugeed there when the fighting of the war was so bad at St. +Charles. We stayed in Texas till the surrender, then we all come back in +lots of wagons. I was sick but they put me on a little bed and me and +all the little chillun rode in a 'Jersey' that one of the old Negro +mammies drove, along behind the wagons, and our young master, Colonel +Bob Chaney rode a great big black horse. Oh! he nice-looking on dat +horse! Every once and awhile he'd ride back to the last wagon to see if +everything was all right. I remember how scared us chillun was when we +crossed the Red River. Aunt Mandy said, 'We crossin' you old Red River +today, but we not going to cross you any more, cause we are going home +now, back to Arkansas.' That day when we stopped to cook our dinner I +picked up a lot little blackjack acorns and when my mammy saw them she +said, 'Throw them things down, chile. They'll make you wormy.' (I cried +because I thought they were chinquapins.) I begged my daddy to let's go +back to Texas, but he said, 'No! No! We going with our white folks.' My +mama and daddy belonged to Col. Jesse Chaney, much of a gentleman, and +his wife Miss Sallie was the best mistress anybody ever had. She was a +Christian. I can hear her praying yet! She wouldn't let one of her +slaves hit a tap on Sunday. They must rest and go to church. They had +preaching at the cabin of some one of the slaves, and in the Summertime +sometimes they had it out in the shade under the trees. Yes, and the +slaves on each plantation had their own church. They didn't go +galavanting over the neighborhood or country like niggers do now. Col. +Chaney had lots and lots of slaves and all their houses were in a row, +all one-room cabins. Everything happened in that one room,--birth, +sickness, death and everything, but in them days niggers kept their +houses clean and their door yards too. These houses where they lived was +called 'the quarters'. I used to love to walk down by that row of +houses. It looked like a town and late of an evening as you'd go by the +doors you could smell meat a frying, coffee making and good things +cooking. We were fed good and had plenty clothes to keep us dry and +warm. + +"Along about time for de surrender, Col. Jesse, our master, took sick +and died with some kind of head trouble. Then Col. Bob, our young +master, took care of his mama and the slaves. All the grown folks went +to the field to work and the little chillun would be left at a big room +called the nursing home. All us little ones would be nursed and fed by +an old mammy, Aunt Mandy. She was too old to go to the field, you know. +We wouldn't see our mammy and daddy from early in the morning till night +when their work was done, then they'd go by Aunt Mandy's and get their +chillun and go home till work time in the morning. + +"Some of the slaves were house negroes. They didn't go to work in the +fields, they each one had their own job around the house, barn, orchard, +milk house, and things like that. + +"When washday come, Lord, the pretty white clothes! It would take three +or four women a washing all day. + +"When two of de slaves wanted to get married, they'd dress up nice as +they could and go up to the big house and the master would marry them. +They'd stand up before him and he'd read out of a book called the +'discipline' and say, 'Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy +heart, all thy strength, with all thy might and thy neighbor as +thyself.' Then he'd say they were man and wife and tell them to live +right and be honest and kind to each other. All the slaves would be +there too, seeing the 'wedden'. + +"Our Miss Sallie was the sweetest best thing in the world! She was so +good and kind to everybody and she loved her slaves, too. I can remember +when Uncle Tony died how she cried! Uncle Tony Wadd was Miss Sallie's +favorite servant. He stayed in a little house in the yard and made fires +for her, brought in wood and water and just waited on the house. He was +a little black man and white-headed as cotton, when he died. Miss Sallie +told the niggers when they come to take him to the grave yard, to let +her know when they got him in his coffin, and when they sent and told +her she come out with all the little white chillun, her little +grandchillun, to see Uncle Tony. She just cried and stood for a long +time looking at him, then she said, 'Tony, you have been a good and +faithful servant.' Then the Negro men walked and carried him to the +graveyard out in a big grove in de field. Every plantation had its own +graveyard and buried its own folks, and slaves right on the place. + +"If all slaves had belonged to white folks like ours, there wouldn't +been any freedom wanted." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: John Payne + Brinkley, Ark. +Age: 74 + + +"I was born in Georgia, close to Bowles Spring, in Franklin County. My +mama's master was Reverend David Payne. He was a Baptist preacher. My +mama said my father was Monroe Glassby. He was a youngster on a +neighboring plantation. He was white. His father was a landowner. I +think she said it was 70 miles east of Atlanta where they went to trade. +They went to town two or three times a year. It took about a week to go +and come. + +"From what Mama said they didn't know it was freedom for a long time. +They worked on I know till that crop was made and gathered. Somebody +sent word to the master, Rev. David, he better turn them slaves loose. +Some of the hands heard the message. That was the first they knowed it +was freedom. My mama said she seen soldiers and heard fighting. She had +heard that if the Yankees won the war all the slaves be free. She set to +studyin' what she would do. She didn't know what to do. So when she +heard it she asked If she had to be free. She told Rev. David she wanted +to stay like she had been staying. After I was up a good size boy we +went to Banks County. She done house work and field work too and I done +farm work. All kinds and from sun-up till dark every day. Sometimes I +get in so late I have to make a torch light to see how to put the feed +in the troughs. We had plenty litard--pine knots--they was rich to burn. + +"I used to vote but I quit since I come to Arkansas. I come in 1902. I +paid my own way and wrote back for my family. I paid their way too. I +got one little grandaughter, 20 years old. She is off trying to make her +way through college. My wife had a stroke and she can't do much no more. +I got a piece of a house. It need repairs. I can't hardly pay my taxes. +I can't work much. I got two cows and six little pigs. I got eighty +acres land. I worked fourteen years for John Gazolla and that is when I +made enough to buy my place. I am in debt but I am still working. Seems +like one old man can't make much." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person Interviewed: Larkin Payne + Brinkley, Ark. +Age: 85 + + +"I was born in North Carolina. I don't recall my moster's name. My +parents was Sarah Hadyn and John Payne. They had seven children. None of +them was sold. My pa was sold. He had three sons in the Civil War. None +of em was killed. One was in the war four years, the others a good +portion of two years. They was helpers. + +"Grandma bought grandpa's, freedom. My great grandma was an Indian +woman. My mother was dark brown. My father was tolerable light. When I +was small child they come in and tell bout people being sold. I heard a +whole lot about it that way. It was great grandma Hadyn that was the +Indian. My folks worked in the field or anywhere as well as I recollect. + +"When freedom come on my folks moved to East Tennessee. I don't know +whether they got good treatment or not. They was freedom loving folks. +The Ku Klux never bothered us at home. I heard a lot of em. They was +pretty hot further south. I had two brothers scared pretty bad. They +went wid some white men to South Carolina and drove hogs. The white men +come back in buggies or on the train--left them to walk back. The Ku +Klux got after them. They had a hard time getting home. I heard the Ku +Klux was bad down in Alabama. They had settled down fore I went to +Alabama. I owned a home in Alabama. I took stock for it. Sold the stock +and come to Arkansas. I had seven children. We raised three. + +"When my folks was set free they never got nothing. The mountain folks +raised corn and made whiskey. They made red corn cob molasses; it was +good. They put lye in the whiskey; it would kill you. They raised hogs +plenty. My folks raised hogs and corn. They didn't make no whiskey. I +seen em make it and sell it too. + +"I heard folks say they rather be under the home men overseers than +Northern overseers. They was kinder to em it seem like. I was jes +beginnin' to go to the field when freedom come on. I helped pile brush +to be burned before freedom. I farmed when I was a boy; pulled fodder +and bundled it. I shucked corn, slopped pigs, milked, plowed a mule over +them rocks, thinned out corn. I worked twenty days in East Tennessee on +the section. I cut and haul wood all winter. + +"My parents both died in Arkansas. We come here to get to a fine farmin' +country. We did like it fine. I'm still here. + +"I have voted. I vote if I'm needed. The white folks country and they +been runnin' it. I don't want no enemies. They been good to me. I got no +egercation much. I sorter follows bout votin'. We look to the white +folks to look after our welfare. + +"I get $8.00 and commodities. I work all I can git to do." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Cella Perkins + Marvell and Palestine, Arkansas +Age: 67 + + +"I was born close to Macon, Georgia. Mama's old mistress, Miss Mari +(Maree) Beth Woods, brung her there from fifteen miles outer Atlanta. + +"After emancipation Miss Mari Beth's husband got killed. A horse kicked +him to death. It shyed at something and it run in front of the horse. He +held the horse so it couldn't run. It kicked the foot board clean off, +kicked him in the stomach. His boy crawled out of the buggy. That's the +way we knowed how it happened. She didn't hurt the boy. His name was +Benjamin Woods. + +"Pa went to war with his master and he never come back to mama. She +never heard from him after freedom. He got captured and got to be a +soldier and went 'way off. She didn't never know if he got killed or +lost his way back home. + +"Mama cooked and kept up the house. Miss Mari Beth kept a boarding house +in Macon till way after I was a big girl. I stood on a box and washed +dishes and dried them for mama. + +"Mr. Ben was grown when we come to Arkansas. He got his ma to go to +Kentucky with him and I heard about Arkansas. Me and mama come to +Palestine. We come in a crowd. A man give us tickets and we come by our +lone selves till we got to Tennessee. A big crowd come from Dyersburg, +Tennessee. Ma got to talking and found out we was headed fo' the same +place in Arkansas. + +"Ma talked a whole heap at tines more 'an others (times) about slavery +times. Her master didn't take on over her much when he found out she was +a barren woman. The old man Crumpton give her to his youngest daughter, +Miss Mari Beth. She always had to do all kinds of work and house turns. + +"After mama's slavery husband didn't come back and she was living in +Macon, she fell in love with another man and I was a picked-up baby. +Mama said Miss Mari Beth lost faith in her when I was born but she +needed her and kept her on. Said seem like she thought she was too old +to start up when she never had children when her papa owned her. They +didn't like me. She said she could trust mama but she didn't know my +stock. He was a black man. Mama was black as I is. + +"Miss Mari Beth had a round double table. The top table turned with the +victuals on it. I knocked flies three times a day over that table. + +"I never had a store-bought dress in my life till mama bought me one at +Madison, Arkansas. I wanted a pure white dress. She said if we made a +good crop she was going to give me a dress. All the dresses I ever had +was made out of Miss Mari Beth's dresses but I never had a pure white +one. I never had one bought for me till I was nearly grown. I was so +proud of it. When I would go and come back, I would pull it off and put +it away. I wore it one summer white and the next summer I blued it and +had a new dress. I had a white dress nearly every year till I got too +old to dress up gay now. I got a white bonnet and apron I wears right +now. + +"Mama said Master Crumpton bought up babies to raise. She was taken away +from her folks so soon she never heard of them. Aunt Mat raised her up +in Atlanta and out on his place. He had a place in town but kept them on +a place in the country. He had a drove of them. He hired them out. He +hired mama once to a doctor, Dr. Willbanks. Mama said old master thought +she would learn how to have children from him the reason he sent her +there so much. When they had big to-dos old master sent mama over there. +She never seen no money till about freedom. She loved to get hired out +to be off from him. They all had young babies about but her. He was +cross and her husband was cross. She had pleasure hired out. She said he +didn't whoop much. He stamped his foot. They left right now. + +"I hab three girls living; one here (Palestine), one at Marvell, and one +in St. Louis. My youngest girl teaches music at a big colored school. +She sends me my money and I lives with these girls. I been up there and +I sure don't aim to live in no city old as I is. It's too dangerous slow +as I got to be and so much racket I never slept a night I was there. I +was there a month. She brung me home and I didn't go back. + +"I cooked and washed and ironed and worked in the field. I do some work +yet. I helps out where I am. + +"The times is better I think from accounts I hear. This generation all +living too fast er lives. They don't never be still a minute." + + + + +Pine Bluff District +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of Interviewer: Martin & Barker +Subject: Ex-Slaves--Slavery Times + +This Information given by: Maggie Perkins +Place of Residence: W. 6th. St. +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] + + +My folks lived in S. Carolina and belonged to Col. Bob Baty and his +family. + +If I should lay down tonight I could tell when my folks were going to +die, because the Lawd would tell me in a vision. + +Just before my grandmother died, I got up one morning and told my aunt +that granma was dead. Aunt said she did not want me telling lies. + +Then I saw another aunt laying on the bed, and she had her hand under +her jaw. She was smiling. The house was full of people. After awhile +they heard that her aunt was dead too, and after that they paid +attention to me when I told them somebody was going to die. + +I'se a member of the Holiness Church. I believes step up right and keep +the faith. + +I seen my aunt walking up and down on a glass. The Lawd tells me in a +vision to step right up and see the faith. + +I am living in Jesus. He is coming to Pine Bluff soon. He is going to +separate the lions from the sheep. + +I was born in slavery times. I member folks riding around on horses. + +Them days I used to wash my mistis feet and legs, and sometimes I would +fall asleep against my mistis knees. I tells the young fry to give honor +to the white folks, and my preacher tell 'em to obey the white folks, +dat dey are our best friends, dey is our dependence and it would be hard +getting on if we didn't have em to help us. + +Spirits--Me and my husband moved into a house that a man, "uncle Bill" +Hearn died in, and we wanted dat house so bad we moved right in as soon +as he was taken out, we ate supper and went to bed. + +By the time we got to sleep we heard sounds like someone was emptying +shelled corn, and I hunched up under my husband scared to death and then +moved out the next day. The dead haven't gone to Heaven. When death +comes, he comes to your heart. He has your number and knows where to +find you. He won't let you off, he has the key. + +Death comes and unlocks the heart and twists the breath out of that +heart and carries it back to God. + +Nobody has gone to Heaven, no one can get pass Jesus until the day of +his redemption, which is judgement day. + +We can't pass the door without being judged. On the day of ressurection +the trumpet will sound and us will wake up out of he graveyard, and come +forth to be judged. The sea shall give up its dead. Every nation will +have to appear before God and be judged in a twinklin of an eye. If you +aren't prepared before Jesus comes, it will be too late. God is +everywhere, he is the almight. God is a nice God, he is a clean God, he +is a good God. I would be afraid to tell you a lie for God would strike +me down. + +Eight years ago I couldn't see, I wore specs 3 years. I forgot my specs +one morning, I prayed for my eyesight and it was restored that morning. + +Our marster was a good man. De overseers sometimes wuz bad, but dey did +not let marsters know how dey treated their girl slaves. My grandmother +was whipped by de overseers one time, it made welts on her back. My +sister Mary had a child by a white man. + +To get joy in de morning, get up and pray and ask Him to bless you. God +will feed all alike, he is no respector of persons. He shows no extra +favors twixt de rich and de poor. + + + + +Interviewer: Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Marguerite Perkins + West Sixth and Catalpa Streets, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 81 + + +"I was born in slavery times, Miss. I was born in South Carolina, Union +County. I was born in May. + +"I know I 'member old Missy. I just been washin' her feet and legs when +they said the Yankees was comin. Old Miss' name was Miss Sally. Her +husband was a colonel. What is a colonel? + +"I got some white cousins. They tell me they was the boss man's chillun. + +"Yes'm, I reckon Miss Sally was good to me. I'm a old nigger. All us +niggers belonged to Colonel Beatty. I went to school a little while but +I didn't learn nothin'. + +"I use to be a nurse girl and sleep right upstairs. + +"Missus, you know people just walkin along the street droppin dead with +heart trouble and white women killin men. I tell you lady it's awful. + +"I been married just once. The Lord took him out o' my house one Sunday +morning 'fore day. + +"The thing about it is I got that high blood pressure. Well, Missus, I +had it five years ago and I went to Memphis and the Lord healed me. All +we got to do is believe in the Lord and He will put you on your feet. + +"I had four sisters and three brothers and all of 'em dead but me, +darlin. + +"Now let me tell you somethin'. Old as I is, I ain't never been to but +one picture show in my life. Old as I is, I never was on a base ball +ground in my life. The onliest place I go now is to church." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Rachel Perkins, Goodwin, Arkansas +Age: ? Baby during the Civil War + + +"I was born in Greensboro, Alabama. Sallie Houston and Peter Houston was +my parents. They had two girls and a boy. They died when they was small, +but me. They always told me mother died when I was three days old in the +cradle. I don't fur a fact know much about my own people. Miss Agnes +took me to raise me fur a house girl. She nursed me wid her Mary. My +mother's and father's owners was Alonso Brown and Miss Agnes Brown. +Their two girls was Mary and Lucy and their three boys was Bobby, Jesse, +and Frank. Miss Agnes rocked the babies to sleep in a big chair out on +the gallery. We slept there all night. Company come and say, 'Where the +babies?' Miss Agnes take them back and show us off. They say, 'Where the +little black chile?' They'd try to get me to come go live wid them. They +say they be good to me. I'd tell 'em, 'No, I stay here.' It was good a +home as I wanted. We slept on the front gallery till Lucy come on, then +we had sheep skin pallets. She got the big chair. She put us out there +because it was cool. + +"I left Miss Agnes when I got to be my own woman. Didn't nobody toll me +off. I knowed I ought to go to my own race of people. They come after me +once. Then they sent the baby boy after me what I had nursed. I wanted +to go but I never went. Miss Lucy and Miss Mary both in college. It was +lonesome for me. I wanted to go to my color. I jus' picked up and walked +on off. + +"My girl is half Indian. I'm fifteen years older than my girl. Then I +married Wesley Perkins, my husband. He is black fur a fact. He died last +fall. I married at my husband's brother's by a colored preacher. Tom +Screws was his name. He was a Baptist preacher. + +"I never went to school a day in my life. I can't read. I can count +money. Seem lack it jus' come natural. I never learned it at no one +time. It jus' come to me. + +"In warm weather I slept on the gallery and in cold weather I slept by +the fire. I made down my own bed. I cleaned the house. I took the cows +off to the pasture. I nursed the babies, washed and dried the dishes. I +made up the beds and cleaned the yards. + +"Master Brown owned two farms. He had plenty hands on his farms. I did +never go down to the farms much but I knowed the hands. On Saturday +little later than other days they brought the stock to the house and +fed. Then they went to the smokehouse for their rations. He had a great +big garden, strawberries, and grape arbors. + +"One thing I had to do was worm the plants. I put the worms in a bottle +and leave it in the row where the sun would dry the worms up. When a +light frost come I would water the plants that would wilt before the sun +riz and ag'in at night. Then the plants never felt the frost. Certainly +it didn't kill 'em. It didn't hurt 'em. + +"Julane was the regular milk woman. She milked and strained the milk. I +churned and 'tended to the chickens. Miss Agnes sot the hens her own +self. She marked the eggs with a piece of charcoal to see if other hens +laid by the setting hen. If they did she'd take the new egg out of the +nest. + +"We had flower gardens. We had mint, rosemary, tansy, sage, mullen, +catnip, horseradish, artichokes, hoarhound--all good home remedies. + +"I never knowed when we moved to that farm. I was so small. I heard Miss +Agnes Brown say I was a baby when they moved to Boldan depot, not fur +from Clinton, Mississippi. + +"When I left Miss Agnes I went to some folks my own color on another +farm 'joining to their farm. Of course I took my baby. I took Anna and I +been living with Anna ever since. What I'd do now without her. (Anna is +an Indian and very proud of being half Indian.) My husband done dead. + +"I get eight dollars welfare help. And I do get some commodities. Anna +does all right but she got hit on the shoulder and about lost use of her +arm. One of the railroad hands up here got mad and hit her. I had +doctors. They done it a little good. It's been hurt three years or more +now. + +"I wisht I knowd where to find a bed of mullen. Boil it down to a syrup +and add some molasses, boil that down. It makes a good syrup for coughs +and colds. + +"I never went to white folks' church none hardly. Miss Agnes sent me +along with her cook to my own color's church. + +"My husband sure was good to me. We never had but one fight. Neither one +whooped. + +"This young generation is going backward. They tired of training. They +don't want no advice. They don't want to work out no more. They don't +know what they want. I think folks is trifling than they was when I come +on. The times is all right and some of the people. I'm talking about +mine and yo' color both." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Dinah Perry + 1800 Ohio Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 78 + + +"Yes ma'am, I lived in slavery times. They brought me from Alabama, a +baby, right here to this place where I am at, Mr. Sterling Cockril. + +"I don't know zackly when I was born but I member bout the slave times. +Yes ma'am, I do. After I growed up some, I member the overseer--I do. I +can remember Mr. Burns. I member when he took the hands to Texas. Left +the chillun and the old folks here. + +"Oh Lord, this was a big plantation. Had bout four or five hundred head +of niggers. + +"My mother done the milkin' and the weavin'. After free times, I wove me +a dross. My mother fixed it for me and I wove it. They'd knit stockin's +too. But now they wear silk. Don't keep my legs warm. + +"I member when they fit here in Pine Bluff. I member when 'Marmajuke' +sent word he was gain' to take breakfast with Clayton that mornin' and +they just fit. I can remember that was 'Marmajuke.' It certainly was +'Marmajuke.' The Rebels tried to carry me away but the wagon was so full +I didn't get in and I was glad they didn't. My mother was runnin' from +the Rebels and she hid under the cotehouse. After the battle was over +she come back hero to the plantation. + +"I had three brothers and three sisters went to Texas and I know I +didn't know em when they come back. + +"I member when they fit here a bum shell fell right in the yard. It was +big around as this stovepipe and was all full of chains and things. + +"After free time my folks stayed right here and worked on the shares. I +was the baby chile and never done no work till I married when I was +fifteen. + +"After the War I went to school to white teachers from the North. I +never went to nothin' but them. I went till I was in the fifth grade. + +"My daddy learned me to spell 'lady' and 'baker' and 'shady' fore I went +to school. I learned all my ABC's too. I got out of the first reader the +second day. I could just read it right on through. I could spell and +just stand at the head of the class till the teacher sent me to the foot +all the time. + +"My daddy was his old mistress' pet. He used to carry her to school all +the time and I guess that's where he got his learnin'. + +"After I was married I worked in the field. Rolled logs, cut brush, +chopped and picked cotton. + +"I member when they had that 'Bachelor' (Brooks-Baxter) War up here at +Little Rock. + +"After my chillun died, I never went to the field no more. I just stayed +round mongst the white folks nussin'. All the chillun I nussed is +married and grown now. + +"All this younger generation--white and colored--I don't know what's +gwine come of em. The poet says: + + 'Each gwine a different way + And all the downward road.'" + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Dinah Perry + 1002 Indiana, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 78 +[TR: Appears to be same as last informant despite different address.] + + +"I'se bawn in Alabama and brought here to Arkansas a baby. I couldn't +tell what year I was bawn 'cause I was a baby. A chile can't tell what +year he was bawn 'less they tells him and they sure didn't tell me. + +"When I'd wake up in the mawnin' my mother would be gone to the field. + +"Some things I can remember good but you know old folks didn't 'low +chillun to stand around when they was talkin' in dem days. They had to +go play. They had to be mighty particular or they'd get a whippin'. + +"Chillun was better in them days 'cause the old folks was strict on 'em. +Chillun is raisin' theirselves today. + +"I 'member one song they used to sing + + 'We'll land over shore + We'll land over shore; + And we'll live forever more.' + +"They called it a hymn. They'd sing it in church, then they'd all get to +shoutin'. + +"Superstitions? Well, I seen a engineer goin' to work the other day and +a black cat run in front of him, and he went back 'cause he said he +would have a wreck with his train if he didn't. So you see, the white +folks believes in things like that too. + +"I never was any hand to play any games 'cept 'Chick. Chick.' You'd +ketch 'hold a hands and ring up. Had one outside was the hawk and some +inside was the hen and chickens. The old mother hen would say + + 'Chick-a-ma, chick-a-ma, craney crow, + Went to the well to wash my toe; + When I come back my chicken was gone, + What time is it, old witch?' + +One chicken was s'posed to get out and then the hawk would try to ketch +him. + +"We was more 'ligious than the chillun nowadays. We used to play +preachin' and baptisin'. We'd put 'em down in the water and souse 'em +and we'd shout just like the old folk. Yes ma'am." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Alfred Peters, 1518 Bell Street, + Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 78 + + +"I was born seven miles from Camden. + +"I was 'leven months old when they carried us to Texas. First thing I +remember I was in Texas. + +"Lucius Grimm was old master. He's been dead a long time. His wife died +'bout two years after the Civil War and he died twenty-five years after. + +"I 'member durin' of the war he buried his stuff---silverware and +stuff--and he never took it up. And after he died his brother's son +lived in California, and he come back and dug it up. + +"The Yankees burned up four hundred bales of cotton and taken the meat +and two cribs of corn. + +"I heard 'em talk 'bout the Ku Klux but I never did see 'em. + +"My mother said old Mars Lucius was good to his folks. She said he first +bought her and then she worried so 'bout my father, he paid twenty-five +hundred dollars for him. + +"Biggest part of my life I farmed, and then I done carpenter work. + +"I been blind four years. The doctor says it's cataracts. + +"I think the younger generation goin' to cause another war. They ain't +studyin' nothin' but pleasure." + + + + +Interviewer: S.S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Mary Estes Peters, + 3115 W. 17th Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 78 + + +Biographical + +Mary Estes Peters was born a slave January 30, 1860 in Missouri +somewhere. Her mother was colored and her father white, the white +parentage being very evident in her color and features and hair. She is +very reticent about the facts of her birth. The subject had to be +approached from many angles and in many ways and by two different +persons before that part of the story could be gotten. + +Although she was born in Missouri, she was "refugeed" first to +Mississippi and then here, Arkansas. She is convinced that her mother +was sold at least twice after freedom,--once into Mississippi, one into +Helena, and probably once more after reaching Arkansas, Mary herself +being still a very small child. + +I think she is mistaken on this point. I did not debate with her but I +cross-examined her carefully and it appears to me that there was +probably in her mother's mind a confused knowledge of the issuance of +the Emancipation Proclamation in 1862. Lincoln's Compensation +Emancipation plan advocated in March 1863, the Abolition in the District +of Columbia in 1862 in April, the announcement of Lincoln's Emancipation +intention in July 1862, the prohibition of slavery in present and future +territories, June 19, 1862, together with the actual issuance of the +Emancipation in September 1862, and the effectiveness of the +proclamation in January 1, 1863, would well give rise to an impression +among many slaves that emancipation had been completed. + +As a matter of fact, Missouri did not secede; the Civil War which +nevertheless ensued would find some slaveholders exposed to the full +force of the 1862 proclamation in 1863 at the time of its first +effectiveness. Naturally it did not become effective in many other +places till 1865. It would very naturally happen then that a sale in +Missouri in the latter part of 1862 or any time thereafter might be well +construed by ex-slaves as a sale after emancipation, especially since +they do not as a rule pay as much attention to the dates of occurrences +as to their sequence. This interpretation accords with the story. Only +such an explanation could make probable a narrative which places the +subject as a newborn babe in 1860 and sold after slavery had ceased +while still too young to remember. Her earliest recollections are +recollections of Arkansas. + +She has lived in Arkansas ever since the Civil War and in Little Rock +ever since 1879. She made a living as a seamstress for awhile but is now +unable to sew because of fading eyesight. She married in 1879 and led a +long and contented married life until the recent death of her husband. +She lives with her husband's nephew and ekes out a living by fragmentary +jobs. She has a good memory and a clear mind for her age. + + +Slave After Freedom + +"My mother was sold after freedom. It was the young folks did all that +devilment. They found they could get some money out of her and they did +it. She was put on the block in St. Louis and sold down into Vicksburg, +Mississippi. Then they sold her into Helena, Arkansas. After that they +carried her down into Trenton (?), Arkansas. I don't know whether they +sold her that time or not, but I reckon they did. Leastways, they +carried her down there. All this was done after freedom. My mother was +only fifteen years old when she was sold the first time, and I was a +baby in her arms. I don't know nothing about it myself, but I have heard +her tell about it many and many a time. It was after freedom. Of course, +she didn't know she was free. + +"It was a good while before my mother realized she was free. She noticed +the other colored people going to and fro and she wondered about it. +They didn't allow you to go round in slave times. She asked them about +it and they told her, 'Don't you know you are free?' Some of the white +people too told her that she was free. After that, from the way she +talked, I guess she stayed around there until she could go some place +and get wages for her work. She was a good cook. + + +Mean Mistress + +"I have seen many a scar on my mother. She had mean white folks. She had +one big scar on the side of her head. The hair never did grow back on +that place. She used to comb her hair over it so that it wouldn't show. +The way she got it was this: + +"One day her mistress went to high mass and left a lot of work for my +mother to do. She was only a girl and it was too much. There was more +work than she could get done. She had too big a task for a child to get +done. When her old mistress came back and her work was not all done, she +beat my mother down to the ground, and then she took one of the skillets +and bust her over the head with it--trying to kill her, I reckon. I have +seen the scar with my own eyes. It was an awful thing. + +"My mother was a house servant in Missouri and Mississippi. Never done +no hard work till she came here (Arkansas). When they brought her here +they tried to make a field hand out of her. She hadn't been used to +chopping cotton. When she didn't chop it fast as the others did, they +would beat her. She didn't know nothing about no farmwork. She had all +kinds of trouble. They just didn't treat her good. She used to have good +times in Missouri and Mississippi but not in Arkansas. They just didn't +treat her good. In them days, they'd whip anybody. They'd tie you to the +bed or have somebody hold you down on the floor and whip you till the +blood ran. + +"But, Lawd, my mother never had no use for Catholics because it was a +Catholic that hit her over the head with that skillet--right after she +come from mass. + + +Food + +"My mother said that they used to pour the food into troughs and give it +to the slaves. They'd give them an old, wooden spoon or something and +they all eat out of the same dish or trough. They wouldn't let the +slaves eat out of the things they et out of. Fed them just like they +would hogs. + +"When I was little, she used to come to feed me about twelve o'clock +every day. She hurry in, give me a little bowl of something, and then +hurry right on out because she had to go right back to her work. She +didn't have time to stay and see how I et. If I had enough, it was all +right. If I didn't have enough, it was all right. It might be pot liquor +or it might be just anything. + +"One day she left me alone and I was lying on the floor in front of the +fireplace asleep. I didn't have no bed nor nothing then. The fire must +have popped out and set me on fire. You see they done a whole lot of +weaving in them days. And they put some sort of lint on the children. + +"I don't reckon children them days knowed what a biscuit was. They just +raked up whatever was left off the table and brung it to you. Children +have a good time nowadays. + +"People goin' to work heard me hollering and came in and put out the +fire. I got scars all round my waist today I could show you. + +"Another time my mother had to go off and leave me. I was older then. I +guess I must have gotten hungry and wanted to get somethin' to eat. So I +got up and wandered off into the woods. There weren't many people living +round there then. (This was in Trenton (?), Arkansas, a small place not +far from Helena.) And the place was [HW: not] built up much then and they +had lots of wolves. Wolves make a lot of noise when they get to trailin' +anything. I got about a half mile from the road and the wolves got after +me. I guess they would have eat me up but a man heard them howling, and +he knew there wasn't no house around there but ours, and he came to see +what was up, and he beat off the wolves and carried me back home. There +wasn't nare another house round there but ours and he knew I must have +come from there. + +"Mother was working then. It was night though. They brung the news to +her and they wouldn't let her come to me. Mother said she felt like +getting a gun and killin' them. Her child out like that and they +wouldn't let her go home. + +"That must have happened after freedom, because it was the last mistress +she had. Almost all her beatings and trouble came from her last +mistress. That woman sure gave her a lot of trouble. + + +Age, Good Masters + +"All I know about my age is what my mother told me. + +"The first people that raised my mother had her age in the Bible. She +said she was about fifteen years old when I was born. From what she told +me, I must be about seventy-eight years old. She taught me that I was +born on Sunday, on the thirtieth of January, in the year before the War. + +"My mother's name was Myles. I don't know what her first master's name +was. She told me I was born in Phelps County, Missouri; I guess you'd +call it St. Louis now. I am giving you the straight truth just as she +gave it to me. + +"From the way she talked, the people what raised her from a child were +good to her. They raised her with their children. Them people fed her +just like they fed their own children. + + +Color and Birth + +"There was a light brownskin boy around there and they give him anything +that he wanted. But they didn't like my mother and me--on account of my +color. They would talk about it. They tell their children that when I +got big enough, I would think I was good as they was. I couldn't help my +color. My mother couldn't either. + +"My mother's mistress had three boys, one twenty-one, one nineteen, and +one seventeen. Old mistress had gone away to spend the day one day. +Mother always worked in the house. She didn't work on the farm in +Missouri. While she was alone, the boys came in and threw her down on +the floor and tied her down so she couldn't struggle, and one after the +other used her as long as they wanted for the whole afternoon. Mother +was sick when her mistress came home. When old mistress wanted to know +what was the matter with her, she told her what the boys had done. She +whipped them and that's the way I came to be here. + + +Sales and Separations + +"My mother was separated from her mother when she was three years old. +They sold my mother away from my grandmother. She don't know nothing +about her people. She never did see her mother's folks. She heard from +them. It must have been after freedom. But she never did get no full +understanding about them. Some of them was in Kansas City, Kansas. My +grandmother, I don't know what became of her. + +"When my mother was sold into St. Louis, they would have sold me away +from her but she cried and went on so that they bought me too. I don't +know nothing about it myself, but my mother told me. I was just nine +months old then. They would call it refugeeing. These people that had +raised her wanted to get something out of her because they found out +that the colored people was going to be free. Those white people in +Missouri didn't have many slaves. They just had four slaves--my mother, +myself, another woman and an old colored man called Uncle Joe. They +didn't get to sell him because he bought hisself. He made a little money +working on people with rheumatism. They would ran the niggers from state +to state about that time to keep them from getting free and to get +something out of them. My mother was sold into Mississippi after +freedom. Then she was refugeed from one place to another through Helena +to Trenton (?), Arkansas. + + +Marriages + +"My mother used to laugh at that. The master would do all the marryin'. +I have heard her say that many a time. They would call themselves +jumpin' the broom. I don't know what they did. Whatever the master said +put them together. I don't know just how it was fixed up, but they helt +the broom and master would say, 'I pronounce you man and wife' or +something like that. + + +Ku Klux + +"My mother talked about the Ku Klux but I don't know much about them. +She talked about how they would ride and how they would go in and +destroy different people's things. Go in the smoke house and eat the +people's stuff. She said that they didn't give the colored people much +trouble. Sometimes they would give them something to eat. + +"When they went to a place where they didn't give the colored people +much to eat, what they didn't destroy they would say, 'Go get it.' I +don't know how it was but the Ku Klux didn't have much use for certain +white people and they would destroy everything they had. + +"I have lived in Arkansas about all my life. I have been in Little Rock +ever since January 30, 1879. I don't know how I happened to move on my +birthday. My husband brought me here for my rheumatism. + +"I married in 1879 and moved here from Marianna. I had lived in Helena +before Marianna. + + +Voting + +"The niggers voted in Marianna and in Helena. They voted in Little Rock +too. I didn't know any of them. It seems like some of the people didn't +make so much talk about it. They did, I guess, though. Many of the +farmers would tell their hands who they wanted them to vote for, and +they would do it. + +"Them was critical times. A man would kill you if he got beat. They +would say, 'So and so lost the lection,' and then somebody would go to +Judgment. I remember once they had a big barbecue in Helena just after +the 'lection. They had it for the white and for the colored alike. We +didn't know there was any trouble. The shooting started on a hill where +everybody could see. First thing you know, one man fell dead. Another +dropped down on all fours bleeding, but he retch in under him and +dragged out a pistol and shot down the man that shot him. That was a sad +time. Niggers and white folks were all mixed up together and shooting. +It was the first time I had ever been out. My mother never would let me +go out before that. + + +Seamstress + +"I ain't able to do much of anything now. I used to make a good living +as a dressmaker. I can't sew now because of my eyes. I used to make many +a dollar before my eyes got to failing me. Make pants, dresses, +anything. When you get old, you fail in what you been doing. I don't get +anything from the government. They don't give me any kind of help." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: John Peterson, 1810 Eureka Street, + Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 80 + + +"I was small but I can remember some 'bout slavery days. I was born down +here in Louisiana. + +"I seed dem Yankees come through. Dey stopped dere and broke up all de +bee gums. Just tore 'em up. And took what dey could eat and went on. Dey +was doin' all dey _could_ do. No tellin' what dey _didn't_ do. People +what owned de place just run off and left. Yankees come dere in de +night. I 'member dat. Had ever'thing excited, so my white folks just +skipped out. Oh, yes, dey come back after the Yankees had gwine on. + +"You could hear dem guns shootin' around. I heered my mother and father +say de Yankees was fightin' to free slavery. + +"Run off? Oh Lawd, yes ma'am, I heered 'em say dey was plenty of 'em run +off. + +"George Swapsy was our owner. I know one thing, dey beat me enough. Had +me watchin' de garden to keep de chickens out. And sometimes I'd git to +playin' and fergit and de chickens would git in de garden, and I'd pay +for it too. I can 'member dat. Yes'm, dat was before freedom. Dey was +whippin' all de colored people--and me too. + +"Yes'm, dey give us plenty to eat, but dey didn't give us no clothes. I +was naked half my time. Dat was when I was a little fellow. + +"We all belonged to de same man. Dey never did 'part us. But my mother +was sold away from her people--and my father, too. He come from +Virginia. + +"No ma'am, dey didn't have a big plantation--just a little place cleared +up in the woods. + +"He didn't have no wife--just two grown sons and dey bof went to the +war. + +"Mars George died 'fore peace declared. He was a old fellow--and mean as +he could be. + +"I never went to school till I was sixteen or seventeen years old. Dere +was a colored fellow had a little learnin' and we hired him two nights +in de week for three dollars a month. Did it for three years. I can read +a little and write my own name and sort of 'tend to my own business. + +"Yes'm, I used to vote after I got grown. Yes'm, I did vote Republican. +But de white people stopped us from votin'. Dat was when Seymour and +Blair was runnin', and I ain't voted none since--I just quit. I've known +white people to go to the polls wif der guns and keep de colored folks +from votin'. + +"Oh, dey was plenty of Ku Klux. I've known 'em to ketch people and whip +'em and kill 'em. Dey didn't bother me--I didn't give 'em a chance. Ku +Klux--I sure 'member dem. + +"Younger generation? Well, Miss, you're a little too hard for me. Hard +to tell what'll become of 'em. I know one thing--dey is wiser. Oh, my +Lawd! A chile a year old know more'n I did when I was ten. We didn't +have no chance. Didn't have nobody to learn us nothin'. People is just +gittin' wuss ever' day. Killin' 'em up ever' day. Wuss now than dey was +ten years ago." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Louise Pettis, Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 59 + + +"My mama was born at Aiken, South Carolina. She was Frances Rotan. I was +born at Elba, South Carolina, forty miles below Augusta, Georgia. My +papa was born at Macon, Georgia. Both my parents was slaves. He farmed +and was a Baptist preacher. Mama was a cook. + +"Mama was owned by some of the Willis. There was three; Mike, Bill, and +Logie Willis, all brothers, and she lived with them all but who owned +her I don't know. She never was sold. Papa wasn't either. Mama lived at +Aiken till papa married her. She belong to some of the Willis. They +married after freedom. She had three husbands and fifteen children. + +"Mama had a soldier husband. He took her to James Island. She runned off +from him. Got back across the sea to Charleston to Aunt Anette's. She +was mama's sister. Mama sent back to Aiken and they got her back to her +folks. Aunt Anette had been sold to folks at Charleston. + +"Grandma was Rachel Willis. She suckled some of the Willis children. +Mama suckled me and Mike Willis together. His mama got sick and my mama +took him and raised him. She got well but their names have left me. When +we got sick the Willis women would send a hamper basket full of +provisions, some cooked and some to be cooked. I used to sweep their +yards. They was white sand and not a sprig of grass nor a weed in there. + +"Mama and papa was both slavery niggers and they spoke mighty well of +their owners. + +"Papa said in slavery times about two nights in a week they would have a +dance. He would slip off and go. Sometimes he would get a pass. He was a +figger caller till he 'fessed religion. One time the pattyrollers come +in. They said, 'All got passes tonight.' When they had about danced down +my daddy got a shovelful of live coals and run about scattering it on +the floor. All the niggers run out and he was gone too. It was a dark +night. A crowd went up the road and here come the pattyrollers. One run +into grapevines across the road and tumbled off his horse. The niggers +took to the woods then. Pa tole us about how he studied up a way to get +himself and several others outer showing their passes that night. Master +never found that out on him. + +"During the War they sent a lot of the meat to feed the soldiers on and +kept the skins and sides. They tole them if the Yankees ask them if they +had enough to eat say, 'See how greasy and slick I is.' They greased +their legs and arms to make them shine and look fat. The dust made the +chaps look rusty. + +"Papa saved his young mistress' life. His master was gone to war. He had +promised with others to take care of her. The Yankees come and didn't +find meat. It was buried. They couldn't find much. They got mad and +burned the house. Pa was a boy. He run up there and begged folks not to +burn the house; they promised to take care of everything. Papa begged to +let him get his mistress and three-day-old baby. They cursed him but he +run in and got her and the baby. The house fell in before they got out +of the yard. He took her to the quarters. Papa was overstrained carrying +a log and limped as long as he lived. + +"Pa was hired out and they was goner whoop him and he run off and got +back to the master. Ma nor pa was never sold. + +"We had a reason to come out here to Arkansas. A woman had a white +husband and a black one too. The black husband told the white husband +not come about there no more. He come on. The black man killed the white +man at his door. They lynched six or seven niggers. They sure did kill +him. That dissatisfied all the niggers. That took place in Barnwell +County, South Carolina. Three train loads of us left. There was fifteen +in our family. We was doing well. My pa had cattle and money. They +stopped the train befo' and behind us--the train we was on. Put the +Arkansas white man in Augusta jail. They stopped us all there. We got to +come on. We was headed for Pine Bluff. We got down there 'bout Altheimer +and they was living in tents. Pa said he wasn't goiner tent, he didn't +run away from South Carolina and he'd go straight back. Mr. Aydelott got +eight families on track at Rob Roy to come to Biscoe. We got a house +here. Pa was old and they would listen at what he said. He made a speech +at Rob Roy and told them let's come to Biscoe. Eleven families come. He +had two hundred or three hundred dollars then in his pocket to rattle. +He could get more. He grieved for South Carolina, so he went back and +took us but ma wanted to coma back. They stayed back there a year or +two. We made a crop. Pa was the oldest boss in his crowd. We all come +back. There was more room out here and so many of us. + +"The schools was better out there. I went to Miss Scofield's College. +All the teachers but three was colored. There was eight or ten colored +teachers. It was at Aiken, South Carolina. Miss Criley was our sewing +mistress. Miss Criley was white and Miss Scofield was too. I didn't have +to pay. Rich folks in the North run the school. No white children went +there. I think the teachers was sent there. + +"I taught school out here at Blackton and Moro and in Prairie County +about. I got tired of it. I married and settled down. + +"We owns my home here. My husband was a railroad man. We lives by the +hardest. + +"I don't know what becoming of the young generation. They shuns the +field work. Times is faster than I ever seen them. I liked the way times +was before that last war (World War). Reckon when will they get back +like that?" + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Henry C. Pettus, Marianna, Arkansas +Age: 80 + + +"I was born in Wilkes County, near Washington, Georgia. My mother's +owners was Dr. Palmer and Sarah Palmer. They had three boys; Steve, +George, and Johnie. They lived in Washington and the farm I lived on was +five miles southeast of town. It was fifty miles from Augusta, Georgia. +He had another farm on the Augusta Road. He had a white man overseer. +His name was Tom Newsom and his nephew, Jimmie Newsom, helped. He was +pretty smooth most of the time. He got rough sometimes. Tom's wife was +named Susie Newsom. + +"Dick Gilbert had a place over back of ours. They sent things to the +still at Dick Gilbert's. Sent peaches and apples and surplus corn. The +still was across the hill from Dr. Palmer's farm. He didn't seem to +drink much but the boys did. All three did. Dr. Palmer died in 1861. +People kept brandy and whiskey in a closet and some had fancy bottles +they kept, one brandy, one whiskey, on their mantel. Some owners passed +drinks around like on Sunday morning. Dr. Palmer didn't do that but it +was done on some places before the Civil War. It wasn't against the law +to make spirits for their own use. That is the way it was made. Meal and +flour was made the same way then. + +"Mother lived in Dr. Palmer's office in Warren County. It was a very +nice log house and had a fence to make the front on the road and the +back enclosed like. Inside the fence was a tanyard and house at some +distance and a very nice log house where Mr. Hudson lived. Dr. Palmer +and Mr. Hudson had that place together. The shoemaker lived in +Washington in Dr. Palmer's back yard. He had his office and home all in +the same. Mr. Anthony made all the shoes for Dr. Palmer's slaves and for +white folks in town. He made fine nice shoes. He was considered a high +class shoemaker. + +"Mother was a field hand. She wasn't real black. My father never did do +much. He was a sort of a foreman. He rode around. He was lighter than I +am. He was old man Pettus' son. Old man Pettus had a great big +farm--land! land! land! Wiley and Milton Roberts had farms between Dr. +Palmer and old man Pettus' farm. Mother originally belong to old man +Pettus. He give Miss Sarah Palmer her place on the Augusta Road and his +son the place on which his own home was. They was his white children. He +had two. Mother was hired by her young mistress, Dr. Palmer's wife, Miss +Sarah. Father rode around, upheld by the old man Pettus. He never worked +hard. I don't know if old man Pettus raised grandma or not; he never +grandpa. He was a Terral. He died when I was small. Grandpa was a field +hand. He was the only colored man on the place allowed to have a dog. He +was Dr. Palmer's stock man. They raised their own stock; sheep, goats, +cows, hogs, mules, and horses. + +"None of us was ever sold that I know of. Mother had three boys and +three girls. One sister died in infancy. One sister was married and +remained in Georgia. Two of my brothers and one sister come to Arkansas. +Mother brought us boys to a new country. Father got shot and died from +the womb. He was a captain in the war. He was shot accidentally. Some of +them was drinking and pranking with the guns. We lived on at Dr. +Palmer's place till 1866. That was our first year in Arkansas. That was +nearly two years. We never was abused. My early life was very favorable. + +"The quarters was houses built on each side of the road. Some set off in +the field. They must have had stock law. We had pastures. The houses was +joining the pasture. Mr. Pope had a sawmill on his place. The saw run +perpendicularly up and down. He had a grist mill there too. I like to go +to mill. It was dangerous for young boys. Mr. Pope's farm joined us on +one side. Oxen was used as team for heavy loads. Such a contrast in less +than a century as trucks are in use now. I learned about oxen. They +didn't go fast 'ceptin' when they ran away. They would run at the sight +of water in hot weather. They was dangerous if they saw the river and +had to go down a steep bank, load or no load the way they went. If it +was shallow they would wade but if it was deep they would swim unless +the load was heavy enough to pull them down. Oxen was interesting to me +always. + +"Children didn't stay in town like they do now. They was left to think +more for themselves. They hardly ever got to go to town. + +"We raised a pet pig. Nearly every year we raised a pet pig. When mother +would be out that pig would get my supper in spite of all I could do. +The pig was nearly as large as I was. I couldn't do anything. We had a +watermelon patch and sometimes sold Dr. Palmer melons. He let us have a +melon patch and a cotton patch our own to work. Mother worked in +moonlight and at odd times. They give that to her extra. We helped her +work it. They give old people potato patches and let the children have +goober rows. Land was plentiful. Dr. Palmer wasn't stingy with his +slaves--very liberal. He was a man willing to live and let live so far +as I can know of him. + +"During the Civil War things was quiet like where I was. The soldiers +didn't come through till after the war was over. Then the Union soldiers +took Washington. They come there after the surrender. + + +Freedom + +"The Union soldiers came in a gang out from Washington all over the +surrounding country, scouting about, and notified all the black folks of +freedom. My folks made arrangements to stay on. Two colored men went +through the country getting folks to move to southwest Georgia but +before mother decided to move anywhere along come two men and they had a +helper, Mr. Allen. It was Mr. William H. Wood and Mr. Peters over here +on Cat Island. They worked from Washington, Georgia. We consented to +leave and come to Arkansas. We started and went to Barnetts station to +Augusta, to Atlanta. There was so many tracks out of order, bridges been +burnt. We crossed the river at Chattanooga, then to Nashville, then to +Johnsonville. We took a boat to Cairo, then to Memphis, then on to some +landing out here. Well, I never heard. We went to the Woods' place and +made a crop here in Arkansas in 1866. I worked with John I. Foreman till +1870 and went back to the Woods' farm till 1880. Then I went to the Bush +place (now McCullough farm). I farmed all along through life till the +last twelve years. I started preaching in 1875. I preach yet +occasionally. I preached here thirty-six years in the Marianna Baptist +church. I quit last year. My health broke down. + +"Chills was my worst worry in these swamps. We made fine crops. In 1875 +yellow fever come on. Black folks didn't have yellow fever at first but +they later come to have it. Some died of it. White folks had died in +piles. It was hard times for some reason then. It was hard to get +something to eat. We couldn't get nothing from Memphis. Arrangements was +made to get supplies from St. Louis to Little Rock and we could go get +them and send boats out here. + +"In 1875 was the tightest, hardest time in all my life, A chew of +tobacco cost ten cents. In 1894-'95 hard times struck me again. Cotton +was four and five cents a pound, flour three dollars a barrel, and meat +four and five cents a pound. We raised so much of our meat that didn't +make much difference. Money was so scarce. + +"Ku Klux--I never was in the midst of them. They was pretty bad in +Georgia and in northeast part of this county. They was bad so I heard. +They sent for troops at Helena to settle things up at about Marion, +Arkansas now. I heard more of the Ku Klux in Georgia than I heard after +we come here. And as time went on and law was organized the Ku Klux +disbanded everywhere. + +"Traveling conditions was bad when we came to Arkansas. We rode in box +cars, shabby passenger coaches. The boats was the best riding. As I told +you we went way around on account of burnt out and torn up bridges. The +South looked shabby. + +"I haven't voted since 1927 except I voted in favor of the Cotton +Control Saturday before last. + +"Times has come up to a most deplorable condition. Craving exists. +Ungratefulness. People want more than they can make. Some don't work +hard and some won't work at all. I don't know how to improve conditions +except by work except economical living. Some would work if they could. +Some can work but won't. Some do work hard. I believe in bread by the +sweat of the brow, and all work. + +"The slaves didn't expect anything. They didn't expect war. It was going +on a while before my parents heard of it. I was a little boy. They +didn't know what it was for except their freedom. They didn't know what +freedom was. They couldn't read. They never seen a newspaper like I take +the Commercial Appeal now. I went to school a little in Arkansas. My +father being old man Pettus' son as he was may have been given something +by Miss Sarah or Dr. Palmer or by his white son, but the old man was +dead and I doubt that. Father was killed and mother left. Mother knew +she had a home on Dr. Palmer's land as long as she needed one but she +left to do better. In some ways we have done better but it was hard to +live in these bottoms. It is a fine country now. + +"I own eighty acres of land and this house. (Good house and furnished +well.) We made six bales of cotton last year. My son lives here and his +wife--a Chicago reared mulatto, a cook. He runs my farm. I live very +well." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Dolly Phillips, Clarendon, Arkansas +Age: 67 + + +"I ain't no ex-slave. I am 67 years old. I was born out here on the +Mullins place. My mother's master was Mr. Ricks and Miss Emma Ricks. + +"My mother named Diana and my father Henry Mullins. I never saw my grand +fathers and I seen one grandma I remembers. My mother had ten children. +My father said he never owned nuthin' in his life but six horses. When +they was freed they got off to their selves and started farming. See +they belong to different folks. My father's master was a captain of a +mixed regiment. They was in the war four years. I heard 'em say they +went to Galveston, Texas. The Yankees was after 'em. But I don't know +how it was. + +"I heard 'em say they put their heads under big black pot to pray. They +say sing easy, pray easy. I forgot whut all she say. + +"I lives wid my daughter. I gets commodities from the Welfare some. The +young folks drinks a heap now. It look lack a waste of money to me." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person Interviewed: Tony Piggy + Brinkley, Ark. +Age: 75 + + +"I was born near Selma, Alabama, but I was raised in Mississippi. My +grandpa was sold from South Carolina to Moster Alexander Piggy. He +didn't talk plain but my papa didn't nother. Moster Piggy bought a gang +of black folks in South Carolina and brought em into the state of +Alabama. My papa was mighty near full-blood African, I'll tell you. Now +ma was mixed. + +"I'm most too young to recollect the war. Right after the war we had +small pox. My uncle died and there was seven children had em at one +time. The bushwhackers come in and kicked us around--kicked my uncle +around. We lived at Union Town, Alabama then. + +"Aunt Connie used to whip us. Mama had no time; she was a chambermaid +(housewoman). The only thing I recollect bout slavery time to tell is +Old Mistress pour out a bushell of penders (peanuts) on the grass to see +us pick em up and set out eating em. When they went to town they would +bring back things like cheese good to eat. We got some of what they had +most generally. She wasn't so good; she whoop me with a cow whip. She'd +make pull candy for us too. I got a right smart of raisin' in a way but +I growed up to be a wild young man. I been converted since then. + +"Well, one day pa come to our house and told mama, 'We free, don't have +to go to the house no more, git ready, we all goin' to Mississippi. +Moster Piggy goiner go. He goner rent us twenty acres and we goner take +two cows and a mule.' We was all happy to be free and goin' off +somewhere. Moster Piggy bought land in Mississippi and put families +renters on it. Moster Piggy was rough on the grown folks but good to the +children. The work didn't let up. We railly had more clearin' and fences +to make. His place in Alabama was pore and that was new ground. + +"There was all toll nine children in my family. Ma was named Matty +Piggy. Papa was named Ezra Piggy. Moster Alexander Piggy's wife named +Harriett. I knowed Ed, Charley, Bowls, Ells, and Liza. That's all I ever +knowd. + +"I have done so many things. I run on a steamboat from Cairo to New +Orleans--Kate Adams and May F. Carter. They called me a Rouster--that +means a working man. I run on a boat from Newport to Memphis. Then I +farmed, done track work on the railroad, and farmed some more. + +"The young generation ain't got respect for old people and they tryin' +to live without work. I ain't got no fault to find with the times if I +was bout forty years younger than I is now I could work right ahead." + + + + +Interviewer: Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Ella Pittman + 2409 West Eleventh Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 84 + + +"Yes ma'm, I was born in slavery days. I tell you I never had no name. +My old master named me--Just called me 'Puss? and said I could name +myself when I got big enough. + +"My old master was named Mac Williams. But where I got free at was at +Stricklands. Mac Williams' daughter married a Strickland and she drawed +me. She was tollable good to me but her husband wa'nt. + +"In slavery times I cleaned up the house and worked in the house. I +worked in the field a little but she kept me busy in the house. I was +busy night and day. + +"No ma'm, I never did go to school--never did go to school. + +"After I got grown I worked in the farm. When I wasn't farmin' I was +doin' other kinds of work. I used to cut and sew and knit and crochet. I +stayed around the white folks so much they learned me to do all kinds of +work. I never did buy my children any stockins--I knit 'em myself. + +"After old Master died old Miss hired us out to Ben Deans, but he was so +cruel mama run away and went back to old Miss. I know we stayed at Ben +Deans till they was layin the crop by and I think he whipped mama that +morning so she run away. + +"Yes ma'm, I sho do member bout the Klu Klux--sho do. They looked +dreadful--nearly scare you to death. The Klu Klux was bad, and the +paddyrollers too. + +"I can't think of nothin' much to tell you now but I know all about +slavery. They used to build 'little hell', made something like a +barbecue pit and when the niggers didn't do like they wanted they'd lay +him over that 'little hell'. + +"I've done ever kind of work--maulin rails, clearin up new ground. They +was just one kind of work I didn't do and that was workin' with a +grubbin' hoe. I tell you I just worked myself to death till now I ain't +able to do nothin'." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +Ella Pittman's son, Almira Pittman was present when I interviewed his +mother. He was born in 1884. He added this information to what Ella told +me: + +"She is the mother of nine children--three living. I use to hear mama +tell about how they did in slavery times. If she could hear good now she +could map it out to you." + +I asked him why he didn't teach his mother to read and write and he +said, "Well, I tell you, mama is high strung. She didn't have no real +name till she went to Louisiana." + +These people live in a well-furnished home. The living room had a rug, +overstuffed furniture and an organ. Ella was clean. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Ella Pittman + 2417 W. Eleventh Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 84 +[TR: Appears to be same as last informant despite different address.] + + +"Here's one that lived then. I can remember fore the Civil War started. +That was in the State of North Carolina where I was bred and born in +March 1853. Mac Williams, he was my first owner and John Strickland was +my last owner. That was durin' of the war. My white folks told me I was +thirteen when peace was declared. They told me in April if I make no +mistake. That was in North Carolina. I grewed up there and found my +childun there. That is--seven of them. And then I found two since I been +down in here. I been in Arkansas about forty years. + +"When the war come I heard em say they was after freein' the people. + +"My mother worked in the field and old mistress kep' me in the house. +She married a widow-man and he had four childun and then she had one so +there was plenty for me to do. Yes ma'm! + +"I ain't never been to school a day in my life. They didn't try to send +me after freedom. I had a very, very bad, cruel stepfather and he sent +all his childun to school but wouldn't send me. I stayed there till I +was grown. I sho did. Then I married. Been married just once. Never had +but that one man in my life. He was a very good man, too. Cose he was a +poor man but he was good to me. + +"Yes ma'm, I sho did see the Ku Klux and the paddyrollers, too. They +done em bad I tell you. + +"I know they was a white man they called Old Man Ford. He dug a pit just +like a barbecue pit, and he would burn coals just like you was goin' to +barbecue. Then he put sticks across the top and when any of his niggers +didn't do right, he laid em across that pit. I member they called it Old +Ford's Hell. + +"I had a bad time fore freedom and a bad time after freedom till after I +married. I'm doin' tollably well now. I lives with my son and his wife +and she treats me very well. I can't live alone cause I'se subject to +inagestin' and I takes sick right sudden. + +"I'm just as thankful as I can be that I'm gettin' along as well as I +is. + +"I stayed in the North in Detroit one year. I liked it very well. I +liked the white people very well. They was so sociable. My son lives +there and works for Henry Ford. My oldest son stays in Indiana. + +"It was so cold I come back down here. I'se gettin' old and I needs to +be warm. Good-bye." + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Sarah Pittman + 1320 W. Twentieth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: About 82 + + +"I never saw nothing between white folks and colored folks. My white +folks were good to us. My daddy's white folks were named Jordan--Jim +Jordan--and my mama's folks were Jim Underwood. And they were good. My +mama's and father's folks both were good to the colored folks. As the +song goes, 'I can tell it everywhere I go.' And thank the Lord, +I'm here to tell it too. I raised children, grandchildren, and +great-grandchildren you see there. That is my great-grandson playing +there. He is having the time of his life. I raised him right too. You +see how good he minds me. He better not do nothin' different. He's about +two years old. + +"I was born in Union Parish, Louisiana way up yonder in them hills, me +and my folks, and they come down here. + +"Jim Jordan married one of the Taylor girls--Jim Taylor's daughter. The +old folks gave mama to them to do their housework. My father and mama +didn't belong to the same masters. He died the first year of the +surrender. He was a wonderful man. He was a Jackson. On Saturday night +he would stay with us till Sunday. On Sunday night he would go home. He +would play with us. Now he and mama both are dead. They are gone home +and I am waiting to go. They're waiting for me in the kingdom there. As +the song says, 'I am waiting on the promises of God.' + +"My mama did housework in slave time. I don't know what my father did. +In them days you done some working from plantation to plantation. Them +folks is all gone in now near about. Guess mine will be the next time. + + +Early Childhood + +"First thing I remember is staying at the house. We et at the white +folks' house. We would go there in the evening before sundown and git +our supper. One time Jim Underwood made me mad. Mama said something he +didn't like. And he tied her thumbs together and tied them to a limb. +Her feet could touch the ground--they weren't off the ground. He said +she could stay there till she thought better of it. + +"Before the surrender I didn't do nothing in the line of work 'cept +'tend to my mother's children. I didn't do no work at all 'cept that. My +white folks were good to me. All my folks 'cept me are gone. My grandmas +and uncles and things all settin' up yonder. All my children what is +dead, they're up yonder. I ain't got but three living, and they're on +their way. Minnie and Mamie and Annie, that is all I got. Mamie's the +youngest and she's got grandchildren. + + +How Freedom Came + +"The way we learned that freedom had come, my uncle come to the fence +and told my mama we were free and I went with her. Sure he'd been to the +War. He come back with his budget. Don't you know what a budget is? You +ain't never been to war, have you? Well, you oughter know what a budget +is. That's a knapsack. It had a pocket on each side and a water can on +each shoulder. He come home with his budget on his back, and he come to +the fence and told mama we was free and I heered him. + + +Right After Freedom + +"Right after freedom my mama and them stayed with the same people they +had been with. The rest of the people scattered wherever they wanted to +But my uncle come there and got mama. They moved back to the Taylors +then where my grandma was. Wouldn't care if I had some of that good old +spring water now where my grandma lived! + +"None of my people were ever bothered by the pateroles or the Ku Klux. + +"We come to Arkansas because we had kinfolks down here. Just picked up +and come on. I been here a long time. I don't know how long, I don't +keep up with nothing like that. When my husband was living I just +followed him. He said that this was a good place and we could make a +good living. So I just come on. When he died, those gravediggers dug his +grave deep enough to put another man on top of him. But that don't hurt +him none. He's settin' in the kingdom. He was a deacon in the church and +his word went. The whole plantation would listen to him and do what he +said. Everybody respected him because he was right. I was just married +once and no man can take his place. He was the first one and the best +one and the last one. He was heaven bound and he went on there. I don't +know just how long I was married. It is in the Bible. It is in there in +big letters. I can't get that right now. It's so big and heavy. But it's +in there. I think we left it in Detroit when I was there, and it ain't +come back here yet. But I know we lived together a long time. + +"I remember the old slave-time songs but I can't think of them just now. +'Come to Jesus' is one of them. 'Where shall I be when the first trumpet +sounds?', that's another one. Another one is: 'If I could, I surely +would; Set on the rock where Moses stood--first verse or stanza. All of +my sins been taken away, taken away--chorus. Mary wept and Martha +moaned, Mary's gone to a world unknown--second verse or stanza. All of +my sins are taken away, taken away--chorus." + +"I don't think nothing 'bout these young folks. When they was turned +loose a lot of them went wild and the young folks followed their +leaders. But mine followed me and my daddy. + +"My grandmother had a big old bay horse and she was midwife for the +white and the colored folks. She would put her side saddle on the old +horse and get up and go, bless her heart; and me and my cousin had to +stay there and take care of things. She's gone now. The Lord left me +here for some reason. And I'm enjoyin' it too. I have got my first +cussin' to do. I don't like to hear nobody cuss. I belong to the church. +I belong to the Baptist church and I go to the Arch Street Church." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Mary Poe, Forrest City, Arkansas +Age: 60 + + +"My papa used to tell about two men he knowd stealing a hog. He was +Wyatt Alexander. He was feeding one evening and the master was out there +too that evening. They overheard two colored men inside the crib lot +house. They was looking at the hogs. They planned to come back after +dark and get a hog. The way it turned out master dressed up ragged and +got inside that night. The first man come. They got a shoat and killed +it, knocked it in the head. The master took it on his back to the log +cabin. When he knocked, his wife opened the door. She seen who it was. +She nearly fell out and when he seen who it was he run off. The master +throwed the hog down. They all got the hot water and went to work. He +left a third there and took part to the other man. He done gone to bed +and he took a third on home. He said he wanted to see if they needed +meat or wanted to keep in stealing practice. He didn't want them to +waste his big hog meat neither. Said that man never come home for two +weeks, 'fraid he'd get a whooping. No, they said he never got a whooping +but the meat was near by gone. + +"Seem lack hog stealing was common in North Carolina in them days from +the way he talked. + +"Papa said he went down in the pasture one night to get a shoat. He said +they had a fine big drove. He got one knocked over an' was carrying it +out across the fence to the field. He seen another man. He couldn't see. +It was dark. He throwed the hog over on him. The man took the shoat on +to his house and papa was afraid to say much about it. He said way 'long +towards day this man come bringing about half of that hog cleaned and +ready to salt away. They got up and packed it away out of sight. + +"My mother was named Lucy Alexander, too." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: W.L. Pollacks + Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 68 + + +"I was born in Shelby County Tennessee. My folks all come from Richmond, +Virginia. They come to Kentucky and then on to Tennessee. I am 68 years +old. My father's master was Joe Rollacks and Mrs. Chicky they called his +wife. My mother's master was Joe Ricks and they all called his wife Miss +Fee. I guess it was Pheobe or Josephine but they never called her by +them names. Seemed like they was all kin folks. I heard my mother say +she dress up in some of the white folks dresses and hitch up the buggy, +take dinner and carry two girls nearly grown out to church and to big +picnics. She liked that. The servants would set the table and help the +white folks plates at the table. Said they had a heap good eating. She +had a plenty work to do but she got to take the girls places where the +parents didn't want to go. She said they didn't know what to do wid +freedom. She said it was like weening a child what never learned to eat +yet. I forgot what they did do. She said work was hard to find and money +scarce. They find some white folks feed em to do a little work. She said +a nickle looked big as a dollar now. They couldn't buy a little bit. +They like never get nough money to buy a barrel of flour. It was so +high. Seem like she say I was walking when they got a barrel of flour. +So many colored folks died right after freedom. They caught consumption. +My mother said they was exposed mo than they been used to and mixing up +in living quarters too much what caused it. My father voted a Republican +ticket. I ain't voted much since I come to Arkansas. I been here 32 +years. My farm failed over in Tennessee. I was out lookin' round for +farmin' land, lookin' round for good work. I farmed then I worked seven +or eight years on the section, then I helped do brick work till now I +can't do but a mighty little. I had three children but they all dead. I +got sugar dibeates. + +"The present times are tough on sick people. It is hard for me to get a +living. I find the young folks all for their own selves. If I was well I +could get by easy. If a man is strong he can get a little work along. + +"The times and young generation both bout to run away wid themselves, +and the rest of the folks can't stop em 'pears to me like." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: "Doc" John Pope, Biscoe, Arkansas +Age: 87 + + +I am 87 years old for a fact. I was born in De Soto County, Mississippi, +eight miles south of Memphis, Tennessee. No I didn't serve in de War but +my father Gus Pope did. He served in de War three years and never came +home. He served in 63rd Regiment Infantry of de Yankee army. He died +right at the surrender. I stayed on de farm till the surrender. We +scattered around den. My father was promised $300.00 bounty and 160 +acres of land. Dey was promised dat by the Constitution of the United +States. Every soldier was promised dat. No he never got nary penny nor +nary acre of land. We ain't got nuthin. De masters down in Mississippi +did help 'em where they stayed on. I never stayed on. I left soon as de +fightin was gone. I was roamin round in Memphis and man asked me if I +wanted to go to college. He sent a train load to Fitz (Fisk) University. +I stayed there till I graduated. I studied medicine generally. Sandy +Odom, the preacher at Brinkley, was there same time as I was. He show is +old. He's up in ninety now. He had a brother here till he died. He was a +fine doctor. He got more practice around here than any white doctor in +this portion of de county. Fitz University was a fine college. It was +run by rich folks up north. I don't know how long I stayed there. It was +a good while. I went to Isaac Pope, my uncle. He was farming. Briscoe +owned the Pope niggers at my first recollection. He brought my uncle and +a lot more over here where he owned a heap of dis land. It was all +woods. Dats how I come here. + +After de Civil War? Dey had to "Root hog or die". From 1860-1870 the +times was mighty hard. People rode through the county and killed both +white and black. De carpet bagger was bout as bad as de Ku Kluck. + +I came here I said wid John Briscoe. They all called him Jack Briscoe, +in 1881. I been here ever since cept W.T. Edmonds and P.H. Conn sent me +back home to get hands. I wrote 'em how many I had. They wired tickets +to Memphis. I fetched 52 families back. I been farmin and practicin all +my life put near. + +I show do vote. I voted the last time for President Hoover. The first +time I voted was at the General Grant election. I am a Republican, +because it is handed down to me. That's the party of my race. I ain't +going to change. That's my party till I dies. We has our leader what +instructs us how to vote. + +Dey say dey goiner pay 60 cents a hundred but I ain't able to pick no +cotton. No I don't get no help from de relief. I think the pore class of +folks in a mighty bad fix. Is what I think. The nigger is hard hit and +the pore trash dey call 'em is too. I don't know what de cause is. It's +been jess this way ever since I can recollect. No times show ain't one +bit better. I owns dis house and dats all. I got one daughter. + +I went to Fitz (Fisk) University in 1872. The folks I told you about was +there then too. Their names was Dr. E.B. Odom of Biscoe and his brother +Sandy Odom. He preaches at Brinkley now. Doc Odom is dead. He served on +the Biscoe School Board a long time wid two white men. + +I don't know much about the young generation. They done got too smart +for me to advise. The young ones is gettin fine educations but it ain't +doin 'em no good. Some go north and cook. It don't do the balance of 'em +no good. If they got education they don't lack de farm. De sun too hot. +No times ain't no better an de nigger ain't no better off en he used to +be. A little salary dun run 'em wild. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: William Porter + 1818 Louisiana Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 81 +Occupation: Janitor of church + + +"Yes'm I lived in slavery times. I was born in 1856. I was borned in +Tennessee but the most of my life has been in Arkansas. + +"I remember when Hood's raid was. That was the last fight of the war. I +recollect seein' the soldiers marchin' night and day for two days. I saw +the cavalry men and the infant men walking. I heard em say the North was +fightin' the South. They called the North Yankees and the South Rebels. + +"Some of the Tennessee niggers was called free niggers. There was a +colored man in Pulaski, Tennessee who owned slaves. + +"My father was workin' to buy his freedom and had just one more year to +work when peace come. His master gave him a chance to buy his freedom. +He worked for old master in the daytime and at night he worked for +himself. He split rails and raised watermelons. + +"My father's master was named Tom Gray at that time. Considering the +times he was a very fair man. + +"When the war broke up I was workin' around a barber shop in Nashville, +Tennessee. + +"The Queen of England offered to buy the slaves and raise them till they +were grown, then give them a horse, a plow and so many acres of ground +but the South wouldn't accept this offer. + +"It was the rule of the South to keep the people as ignorant as +possible, but my mother had a little advantage over some. The white +children learned her to read and write, and when freedom came she could +write her name and even scribble out a letter. She gave me my first +lesson, and I started to school in '67. The North sent teachers down +here after the war. They were government schools. + +"I was pretty apt in figgers--studied Bay's Arithmetic through the third +book. I was getting along in school, but I slipped away from my people +and was goin' to get a pocket full of money and then go back. First man +I worked for was a colored man and I kept his books for him and was to +get one-fourth of the crop. The first year he settled with me I had $165 +clear after I paid all my debts. I done very well. I farmed one more +year, then I come to Pine Bluff and did government work along the +Arkansas River. + +"I've done carpenter work and concrete work. I learned it by doing it. I +followed concrete work for a long time. I've hoped to build several +houses here in Pine Bluff and a lot of these streets. + +"I have a brother and sister who graduated from Fisk University. + +"I think one thing about the younger generation is they need to be more +educated in the way of manners and to have race pride and to be subject +to the laws." + + + + +Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lacy +Person interviewed: Bob Potter, Russellville, Arkansas +Age: 65 + + +"Sure, you oughter remember me--Bob Potter. Used to know you when you +was a boy passin' de house every day go in' down to de old Democrat +printin' office. Knowed yo' brother and all yo' folks. Knowed yo' pappy +mighty well. Is yo' ma and pa livin' now? No suh, I reckin not. + +"I was born de seventeenth of September, 1873 right here in +Russellville. Daddy's name was Dick, and mudder's was Ann Potter. Daddy +died before I was born, and I never seed him. Mudder's been dead about +eighteen years. Dey master was named Hale, and he lived up around Dover +somewheres on his farm, but I dunno how dey come by de name Potter. +Well, now, lemme see--oh, yes, dey was freed at Dover after dey come +dere from North Ca'liny. I think my ma was born in West Virginia, and +den dey went to North Ca'liny and den to South Ca'liny, and den come to +Arkansas. + +"I raised seven boys and lost five chillen. Dere was three girls and +nine boys. All dat's livin' is here except one in Fresno, California. My +old woman here, she tells fortunes for de white folks and belongs to de +Holiness church but I don't belong to none; I let her look after de +religion for de fambly." (Interjection from Mrs. Potter: "Yes suh, you +bet I belongs to de Holiness chu'ch. You got to walk in de light to be +saved, and if you do walk in de light you can't sin. I been saved for a +good many yeahs and am goin' on in de faith. Praise de Lawd!") + +"My mudder was sold once for a hundud dollahs and once ag'in for +thirty-eight hundud dollahs. Perhaps dis was jist before dey left West +Virginia and was shipped to North Ca'liny. De master put her upon a box, +she said, made her jump up and pop her heels together three times and +den turn around and pop her heels again to show how strong she was. She +sure was strong and a hard worker. She could cut wood, tote logs, plow, +hoe cotton, and do ever'thing on de place, and lived to be about +ninety-five yeahs old. Yas suh, she was as old or older dan Aunt Joan is +when she died. + +"No suh, I used to vote but I quit votin', for votin' never did git me +nothin'; I quit two yeahs ago. You see, my politics didn't suit em. +Maybe I shouldn't be tellin' you but I was a Socialist, and I was +runnin' a mine and wo'kin' fifteen men, and dey was all Socialists, and +de Republicans and Democrats sure put me out of business--dey put me to +de bad. + +"Dat was about twelve yeahs ago when I run de mine. I been tryin' to git +me a pension but maybe dat's one reason I can't git it. Oh yes, I owns +my home--dat is, I did own it, but---- + +"Oh Lawd, yes, I knows a lot of dem old songs like 'Let Our Light +Shine,' and 'De Good Old Gospel Way,' and 'Hark From de Tomb.' Listen, +you oughter hear Elder Beam sing dat one. He's de pastor of de Baptis' +Chu'ch at Fort Smith. He can sure make it ring! + +"De young folks of today compa'ed to dem when we was boys? Huh! You jist +can't compaih em--can't be done. Why, a fo'-yeah-old young'un knows mo' +today dan our grandmammies knowed. And in dem days de boys and gals +could go out and play and swing togedder and behave deyselves. We went +in our shu'ttails and hit was all right; we had two shu'ts to weah--one +for every day and one for Sunday--and went in our shu'ttails both every +day and Sunday and was respected. And if you didn't behave you sure got +whupped. Dey didn't put dey arms around you and hug you and den put you +off to sleep. Dey whupped you, and it was real whuppin'. + +"Used to hear my mudder talk about de Ku Klux Klan puttin' cotton +between her toes and whuppin' her, and dat's de way dey done us +young'uns when we didn't behave. And we used to have manners den, both +whites and blacks. I wish times was like dem days, but dey's gone. + +"Yes, we used to have our tasks to do befo' goin' to bed. We'd have a +little basket of cotton and had to pick de seeds all out of dat cotton +befo' we went to bed. And we could all ca'd and spin--yes suh--make dat +old spinnin' wheel go Z-z-z-z as you walked back and fo'f a-drawin' out +de spool of ya'n. And you could weave cloth and make all yo' own +britches, too. (Here his wife interpolated a homely illustration of the +movement of "de shettle" in the loom weaving--ed.) + +"Yes, I mind my mudder tellin' many a time about dem Klan-men, and how +dey whupped white women to make em give up de money dey had hid, and how +dey used to burn dey feet. Yes suh, ain't no times like dem old days, +and I wish we had times like em now. Yes suh, I'll sure come to see you +in town one of dese days. Good mornin'." + + +NOTE: Bob Potter is a most interesting Negro character--one of the most +genial personalities of the Old South that the interviewer has met +anywhere. His humor is infectious, his voice boisterous, but delightful, +and his uproarious laugh just such as one delights to listen to. And his +narrations seem to ring with veracity. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Louise Prayer + 3401 Short West Third, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 80 + + +"I can member seein' the Yankees. My mother died when I was a baby and +my grandmother raised me. I'se goin' on eighty. + +"When the Yankees come we piled boxes and trunks in front of the doors +and windows. She'd say, 'You chillun get in the house; the Yankees are +comin'.' I didn't know what 'twas about--I sure didn't. + +"I'm honest in mind. You know the Yankees used to come in and whip the +folks. I know they come in and whipped my grandma and when they come in +we chillun went under the bed. Didn't know no better. Why did they whip +her? Oh my God, I don't know bout dat. You know when we chillun saw em +ridin' in a hurry we went in the house and under the bed. I specks +they'd a killed me if they come up to me cause they'd a scared me to +death. + +"We lived on the Williams' place. All belonged to the same people. They +give us plenty to eat such as 'twas. But in them days they fed the +chillun mostly on bread and syrup. Sometimes we had greens and +dumplin's. Jus' scald some meal and roll up in a ball and drop in with +the greens. Just a very few chickens we had. I don't love chicken +though. If I can jus' get the liver I'm through with the chicken. + +"When I got big enough my grandmother had me in the field. I went to +school a little bit but I didn't learn nothin'. Didn't go long enough. +That I didn't cause the old man had us in the field. + +"If we chillun in them days had had the sense these got now, I could +remember more bout things. + +"I was a young missy when I married. + +"I told you the best I could--that's all I know. I been treated pretty +good." + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Slave Narratives: A Folk History of +Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves, by Work Projects Administration + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 11544 *** diff --git a/11544-h/11544-h.htm b/11544-h/11544-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c195321 --- /dev/null +++ b/11544-h/11544-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,10925 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8"> +<title>Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-1938: +Arkansas Narratives, Volume II, Part 5</title> +<meta name="author" content="Federal Writers' Project"> +</head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 11544 ***</div> + +<p>[TR: ***] = Transcriber Note</p> +<p>[HW: ***] = Handwritten Note</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;"><br><br> + + +<h1>SLAVE NARRATIVES</h1> +<br> + +<h2><i>A Folk History of Slavery in the United States<br> +From Interviews with Former Slaves</i></h2> +<br> + +<h4>TYPEWRITTEN RECORDS PREPARED BY<br> +THE FEDERAL WRITERS' PROJECT<br> +1936-1938<br> +ASSEMBLED BY<br> +THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS PROJECT<br> +WORK PROJECTS ADMINISTRATION<br> +FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA<br> +SPONSORED BY THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS</h4> +<br> +<br> + +<p>WASHINGTON 1941</p> +<br><br><br> + +<h2>VOLUME II</h2> + +<h2>ARKANSAS NARRATIVES</h2> + +<h2>PART 5</h2> + + +<h3>Prepared by<br> +the Federal Writers' Project of<br> +the Works Progress Administration<br> +for the State of Arkansas +</h3> +<br><br><br> + +<h2>INFORMANTS</h2> + +<a href="#McClendonCharlie">McClendon, Charlie</a><br> +<a href="#McCloudLizzie">McCloud, Lizzie</a><br> +<a href="#McCloudLizzie2">McCloud, Lizzie</a> + [TR: second interview]<br> +<a href="#McConicoAvelina">McConico, Avalena</a><br> +<a href="#McCoyIke">McCoy, Ike</a><br> +<a href="#McDanielRichardH">McDaniel, Richard H.</a><br> +<a href="#McIntoshWaters">McIntosh, Waters</a><br> +<a href="#MackCresa">Mack, Cresa</a><br> +<a href="#McKinneyWarren">McKinney, Warren</a> + [TR: interview]<br> +<a href="#McKinneyWarren2">McKinney, Warren</a> + [TR: story]<br> +<a href="#McMullenVictoria">McMullen, Victoria</a><br> +<a href="#MaddenNannieP">Madden, Nannie P.</a><br> +<a href="#MaddenPerry">Madden, Perry</a><br> +<a href="#MannLewis">Mann, Lewis</a><br> +<a href="#MartinAngeline">Martin, Angeline</a><br> +<a href="#MartinJosie">Martin, Josie</a><br> +<a href="#MathisBeth">Mathis, Bess</a><br> +<a href="#MatthewsCaroline">Matthews, Caroline</a><br> +<a href="#MaxwellMalindy">Maxwell, Malindy</a><br> +<a href="#MaxwellNellie">Maxwell, Nellie</a><br> +<a href="#MayAnn">May, Ann</a><br> +<a href="#MayesJoe">Mayes, Joe</a><br> +<a href="#MeeksJesse">Meeks, Rev. Jesse</a> + [TR: interview]<br> +<a href="#MeeksJesse2">Meeks, Rev. Jesse</a> + [TR: story]<br> +<a href="#MetcalfJeff">Metcalf, Jeff</a><br> +<a href="#MillerHardy">Miller, Hardy</a><br> +<a href="#MillerHK">Miller, H.K. (Henry Kirk)</a><br> +<a href="#MillerHenryKirk">Miller, Henry Kirk</a> + [TR: second interview]<br> +<a href="#MillerMatilda">Miller, Matilda</a><br> +<a href="#MillerNathan">Miller, Nathan</a><br> +<a href="#MillerSam">Miller, Sam</a><br> +<a href="#MillerWD">Miller, W.D.</a><br> +<a href="#MinserMose">Minser, Mose</a><br> +<a href="#MintonGip">Minton, Gip</a><br> +<a href="#MitchellAJ">Mitchell, A.J.</a><br> +<a href="#MitchellGracie">Mitchell, Gracie</a><br> +<a href="#MitchellHettie">Mitchell, Hettie</a><br> +<a href="#MitchellMary">Mitchell, Mary</a><br> +<a href="#MitchellMoses">Mitchell, Moses</a><br> +<a href="#MoonBen">Moon, Ben</a><br> +<a href="#MooreEmma">Moore, Emma</a><br> +<a href="#MoorePatsy">Moore, Patsy</a><br> +<a href="#MooreheadAda">Moorehead, Ada</a><br> +<a href="#MooremanMaryJane">Mooreman, Mary Jane (Mattie)</a><br> +<a href="#MorganEvelina">Morgan, Evelina</a><br> +<a href="#MorganJames">Morgan, James</a><br> +<a href="#MorganOlivia">Morgan, Olivia</a><br> +<a href="#MorganTom">Morgan, Tom</a><br> +<a href="#MorrisCharity">Morris, Charity</a><br> +<a href="#MorrisEmma">Morris, Emma</a><br> +<a href="#MossClaiborne">Moss, Claiborne</a><br> +<a href="#MossFrozie">Moss, Frozie</a><br> +<a href="#MossMose">Moss, Mose</a><br> +<a href="#MullinsSO">Mullins, S.O.</a><br> +<a href="#MurdockAlex">Murdock, Alex</a><br> +<a href="#MyersBessie">Myers, Bessie</a><br> +<a href="#MyhandMary">Myhand, Mary</a><br> +<a href="#MyraxGriffin">Myrax, Griffin</a><br> +<br><br> +<a href="#NealTomWylie">Neal, Tom Wylie</a><br> +<a href="#NealySally">Nealy (Neely), Sally</a> + [TR: interview]<br> +<a href="#NeelySally">Neely, Sally</a> + [TR: songs]<br> +<a href="#NealyWylie">Nealy, Wylie</a><br> +<a href="#NelandEmaline">Neland, Emaline</a><br> +<a href="#NelsonHenry">Nelson, Henry</a><br> +<a href="#NelsonHenry2">Nelson, Henry</a> + [TR: second interview]<br> +<a href="#NelsonIran">Nelson, Iran</a><br> +<a href="#NelsonJamesHenry">Nelson, James Henry</a><br> +<a href="#NelsonJohn">Nelson, John</a><br> +<a href="#NelsonLettie">Nelson, Lettie</a><br> +<a href="#NelsonMattie">Nelson, Mattie</a><br> +<a href="#NewbornDan">Newborn, Dan</a><br> +<a href="#NewsomSallie">Newsom, Sallie</a><br> +<a href="#NewtonPete">Newton, Pete</a><br> +<a href="#NorrisCharlie">Norris, Charlie</a><br> +<br><br> +<a href="#OatsEmma">Oats, Emma</a><br> +<a href="#OdomHelen">Odom, Helen</a> + [TR: and Sarah Odom]<br> +<a href="#OliverJane">Oliver, Jane</a><br> +<a href="#OsborneIvory">Osborne, Ivory</a><br> +<a href="#OsbrookJane">Osbrook, Jane</a><br> +<br><br> +<a href="#PageAnnie">Page, Annie</a><br> +<a href="#PageAnnie2">Page, Annie</a> + [TR: second interview]<br> +<a href="#PageAnnie3">Page, Annie</a> + [TR: stories]<br> +<a href="#ParkerFannie">Parker, Fannie</a><br> +<a href="#ParkerJM">Parker, J.M.</a><br> +<a href="#ParkerJudy">Parker, Judy</a><br> +<a href="#ParkerRF">Parker, R.F.</a><br> +<a href="#ParksAnnie">Parks, Annie</a><br> +<a href="#ParnellAustinPen">Parnell, Austin Pen</a><br> +<a href="#ParrBen">Parr, Ben</a><br> +<a href="#PattersonFrankA">Patterson, Frank A.</a><br> +<a href="#PattersonJohn">Patterson, John</a><br> +<a href="#PattersonSarahJane">Patterson, Sarah Jane</a><br> +<a href="#PattilloSolomonP">Pattillo, Solomon P.</a><br> +<a href="#PattonCarryAllen">Patton, Carry Allen</a><br> +<a href="#PayneHarriettMcFarlin">Payne, Harriett McFarlin</a><br> +<a href="#PayneJohn">Payne, John</a><br> +<a href="#PayneLarkin">Payne, Larkin</a><br> +<a href="#PerkinsCella">Perkins, Cella</a><br> +<a href="#PerkinsMaggie">Perkins, Marguerite (Maggie</a>) + [TR: story]<br> +<a href="#PerkinsMarguerite">Perkins, Marguerite</a> + [TR: interview]<br> +<a href="#PerkinsRachel">Perkins, Rachel</a><br> +<a href="#PerryDinah">Perry, Dinah</a><br> +<a href="#PerryDinah2">Perry, Dinah</a> + [TR: second interview]<br> +<a href="#PetersAlfred">Peters, Alfred</a><br> +<a href="#PetersMaryEstes">Peters, Mary Estes</a><br> +<a href="#PetersonJohn">Peterson, John</a><br> +<a href="#PettisLouise">Pettis, Louise</a><br> +<a href="#PettusHenryC">Pettus, Henry C.</a><br> +<a href="#PhillipsDolly">Phillips, Dolly</a><br> +<a href="#PiggyTony">Piggy, Tony</a><br> +<a href="#PittmanElla">Pittman, Ella</a><br> +<a href="#PittmanElla2">Pittman, Ella</a> + [TR: second interview]<br> +<a href="#PittmanSarah">Pittman, Sarah</a><br> +<a href="#PoeMary">Poe, Mary</a><br> +<a href="#PollacksWL">Pollacks, W.L.</a><br> +<a href="#PopeJohn">Pope, John (Doc)</a><br> +<a href="#PorterWilliam">Porter, William</a><br> +<a href="#PotterBob">Potter, Bob</a><br> +<a href="#PrayerLouise">Prayer, Louise</a><br> + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McClendonCharlie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Charlie McClendon<br> + 708 E. Fourth Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 77</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I don't know exactly how old I am. I was six or seven when the war +ended. I member dis—my mother said I was born on Christmas day. Old +master was goin' to war and he told her to take good care of that +boy—he was goin' to make a fine little man.</p> + +<p>"Did I live up to it? I reckon I was bout as smart a man as you could +jump up. The work didn't get too hard for <u>me</u>. I farmed and I +sawmilled a lot. Most of my time was farmin'.</p> + +<p>"I been in Jefferson County all my life. I went to school three or four +sessions.</p> + +<p>"About the war, I member dis—I member they carried us to Camden and I +saw the guards. I'd say, 'Give me a pistol.' They'd say, 'Come back +tomorrow and we'll give you one.' They had me runnin' back there every +day and I never did get one. They was Yankee soldiers.</p> + +<p>"Our folks' master was William E. Johnson. Oh Lord, they was just as +good to us as could be to be under slavery.</p> + +<p>"After they got free my people stayed there a year or two and then our +master broke up and went back to South Carolina and the folks went in +different directions. Oh Lord, my parents sho was well treated. Yes +ma'm. If he had a overseer, he wouldn't low him to whip the folks. He'd +say, 'Just leave em till I come home.' Then he'd give em a light +breshin'.</p> + +<p>"My father run off and stay in the woods one or two months. Old master +say, 'Now, Jordan, why you run off? Now I'm goin' to give you a light +breshin' and don't you run off again.' But he'd run off again after +awhile.</p> + +<p>"He had one man named Miles Johnson just stayed in the woods so he put +him on the block and sold him.</p> + +<p>"I seed the Ku Klux. We colored folks had to make it here to Pine Bluff +to the county band. If the Rebels kotch you, you was dead.</p> + +<p>"Oh Lord yes, I voted. I voted the Publican ticket, they called it. You +know they had this Australia ballot. You was sposed to go in the caboose +and vote. They like to scared me to death one time. I had a description +of the man I wanted to vote for in my pocket and I was lookin' at it so +I'd be sure to vote for the right man and they caught me. They said, +'What you doin' there? We're goin' to turn you over to the sheriff after +election!' They had me scared to death. I hid out for a long time till I +seed they wasn't goin' to do nothin'.</p> + +<p>"My wife's brother was one of the judges of the election. Some of the +other colored folks was constables and magistrates—some of em are +now—down in the country.</p> + +<p>"I knew a lot about things but I knew I was in the United States and had +to bow to the law. There was the compromise they give the colored +folks—half of the offices and then they got em out afterwards. John M. +Clayton was runnin' for the senate and say he goin' to see the colored +people had equal rights, but they killed him as he was gwine through the +country speakin'.</p> + +<p>"The white people have treated me very well but they don't pay us +enough for our work—just enough to live on and hardly that. I can say +with a clear conscience that if it hadn't been for this relief, I don't +know what I'd do—I'm not able to work. I'm proud that God Almighty put +the spirit in the man (Roosevelt) to help us."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McCloudLizzie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Lizzie McCloud<br> + 1203 Short 13th Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 120?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was one of 'em bless your heart. Yes ma'm, Yes ma'm, I wouldn't tell +you a lie 'bout that. If I can't tell you the truth I'm not goin' tell +you nothin'!</p> + +<p>"Oh yes, I was a young lady in slavery times—bred and born in +Tennessee. Miss Lizzie and Marse John Williams—I belonged to them—sho +did! I was scared to death of the white folks. Miss Lizzie—she mean as +the devil. She wouldn't step her foot on the ground, she so rich. No +ma'm wouldn't put her foot on the ground. Have her carriage drive up to +the door and have that silk carpet put down for her to walk on. Yes +Lord. Wouldn't half feed us and they went and named me after her.</p> + +<p>"I know all about the stars fallin'. I was out in the field and just +come in to get our dinner. Got so dark and the stars begin to play +aroun'. Mistress say, 'Lizzie, it's the judgment.' She was just a +hollerin'. Yes ma'm I was a young woman. I been here a long time, yes +ma'm, I been here a long time. Worked and whipped, too. I run off many a +time. Run off to see my mammy three or four miles from where I was.</p> + +<p>"I never was sold but they took we young women and brought us down in +the country to another plantation where they raised corn, wheat, and +hay. Overseer whipped us too. Marse John had a brother named Marse +Andrew and he was a good man. He'd say to the overseer, 'Now don't whip +these girls so much, they can't work.' Oh, he was a good man. Oh, white +folks was the devil in slavery tines. I was scared to death of 'em. +They'd have these long cow hide whips. Honey, I was treated bad. I seen +a time in this world.</p> + +<p>"Oh Lord, yes, that was long 'fore the war. I was right down on my +master's place when it started. They said it was to free the niggers. Oh +Lord, we was right under it in Davidson County where I come from. Oh +Lord, yes, I knowed all about when the war started. I'se a young woman, +a young woman. We was treated just like dogs and hogs. We seed a hard +time—I know what I'm talkin' about.</p> + +<p>"Oh God, I seed the Yankees. I saw it all. We was so scared we run under +the house and the Yankees called 'Come out Dinah' (didn't call none of +us anything but Dinah). They said 'Dinah, we're fightin' to free you and +get you out from under bondage.' I sure understood that but I didn't +have no better sense than to go back to mistress.</p> + +<p>"Oh Lord, yes, I seed the Ku Klux. They didn't bother me cause I didn't +stay where they could; I was way under the house.</p> + +<p>"Yankees burned up everything Marse John had. I looked up the pike and +seed the Yankees a coming'. They say 'We's a fightin' for you, Dinah!' +Yankees walked in, chile, just walked right in on us. I tell you I've +seed a time. You talkin' 'bout war—you better wish no more war come. I +know when the war started. The Secessors on this side and the Yankees on +that side. Yes, Miss, I seen enough. My brother went and jined the +Secessors and they killed him time he got in the war.</p> + +<p>"No, Missy, I never went to no school. White folks never learned me +nothin'. I believes in tellin' white folks the truth.</p> + +<p>"White folks didn't 'low us to marry so I never married till I come to +Arkansas and that was one year after surrender.</p> + +<p>"First place I landed on was John Clayton's place. Mr. John Clayton was +a Yankee and he was good to us. We worked in the field and stayed there +two years. I been all up and down the river and oh Lord, I had a good +time after I was free. I been treated right since I was free. My color +is good to me and the white folks, too. I ain't goin' to tell only the +truth. Uncle Sam goin' send me 'cross the water if I don't tell the +truth. Better <u>not fool</u> with dat man!"</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McCloudLizzie2"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Lizzie McCloud<br> + 1203 E. Short 13th Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 103</h3> +<p>[TR: Appears to be same as previous informant despite age discrepancy.]</p> +<br> + +<p>"Well, where you been? I been wonderin' 'bout you. Yes Lawd. You sure is +lookin' fine.</p> + +<p>"Yes, honey, I was bred and bawn in Davidson County, Tennessee. Come +here one year after surrender.</p> + +<p>"My daughter there was a baby jus' sittin' alone, now, sittin' alone +when I come here to this Arkansas. I know what I'm talkin' about.</p> + +<p>"Lizzie Williams, my old missis, was rich as cream. Yes Lawd! I know all +about it 'cause I worked for 'em.</p> + +<p>"I was a young missis when the War started. I was workin' for my owners +then. I knowed when they was free—when they said they was free.</p> + +<p>"The Yankees wouldn't call any of the colored women anything but Dinah. +I didn't know who they was till they told us. Said, 'Dinah, we's comin' +to free you.'</p> + +<p>"The white folks didn't try to scare us 'bout the Yankees 'cause they +was too scared theirselves. Them Yankees wasn't playin'; they was +fitin'. Yes, Jesus!</p> + +<p>"Had to work hard—and whipped too. Wasn't played with. Mars Andrew come +in the field a heap a times and say, 'Don't whip them women so hard, +they can't work.' I thought a heap of Mars Andrew.</p> + +<p>"I used to see the Yankees ridin' hosses and them breastplates a +shining'. Yes Lawd. I'd run and they'd say, 'Dinah, we ain't gwine hurt +you.' Lawd, them Yankees didn't care for nothin'. Oh, they was fine.</p> + +<p>"My husband was a soldier—a Yankee. Yes ma'am. They sends me thirty +dollars every month, before the fourth. Postman brings it right to me +here at the house. They treats me nice.</p> + +<p>"When I come here, I landed on John Clayton's place. He was a Yankee and +he was a good white man too.</p> + +<p>"I'm the onliest one left now in my family."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McConicoAvelina"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Irene Robertson<br> +Person Interviewed: Avalena McConico<br> + on the [---- ----] west of Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 40[?]</h3> +<p>[TR: Much of this interview smeared and difficult to decipher; +illegible words indicated by [----], questionable words followed by [?].]</p> +<br> + +<p>"Grandma was a slave woman. Her name was Emma Harper. She was born in +Chesterville, Mississippi. Her young master was Jim and Miss Corrie +Burton. The old man was John Burton. I aimed[?] to see them once. I +seen both Miss Corrie and Mr. Jim. My grandparents was never sold. They +left out after freedom. They stayed there a long time but they left.</p> + +<p>"The first of the War was like dis: Our related folks was having a +dance. The Yankees come in and was dancing. Some "fry boys" [---- +----] them. The next day they were all in the field and heard something. +They went to the house and told the white folks there was [----] a +fire. They heard it. [----] he [----] about. Master told them it +was war. Miss Burton was crying. They heard about [----] in [----] at Harrisburg where they could hear the shooting.</p> + +<p>"They put the slaves to digging. They dug two weeks. They buried their +meat and money and a whole heap of things. They never found it. A little +white,[?] Mollita[?], was out where they were digging. She went +in the house. She said, Mama, is the devil coming? They said he was." +Master had them come to him. He questioned them. They told him they got +so tired [----] of them said he [----] he [---- ----] the +[----] Yankees come he'd tell them where all this was, but he was +just talking. But when the Yankees did come they was so scared they +never got close to a Yankee. They was scared to death. They never found +the meat and money. They [----] and cut the turkeys' heads off and +the turkey fell off the rail fence, the head drop on one side and the +body on the other. They milked a cow and cut both hind quarters off and +leave the rest of the cow there and the cow not dead yet.</p> + +<p>"Mr. South[?] Strange at Chesterville, Mississippi had a pony named +Zane. The Yankees hemmed him and four more men in at Malone Creek and +killed the four men. Zane rared up on hind legs and went up a steep +cliff and ran three miles. Mr. Strange's coat was cut off from him. It +was a gray coat. Mr. Strange was a white man.</p> + +<p>"Uncle Frank Jones was forty years old when they gathered him up out of +the woods and put him in the battle lines. All the runaway black folks +in the woods was hunted out and put in the Yankee lines. Uncle Frank +lived in a cave up till about then. His master made him mean. He got +better as he got old. His master would sell him and tell him to run away +and come back to his cave. He'd feed him. He never worked and he went up +for his provisions. He was sold over and over and over. His master +learnt him in books and to how to cuss. He learnt him how to trick the +dogs and tap trees like a coon. At the end of the trail the dogs would +turn on the huntsman. Uncle Frank was active when he was old. He was +hired out to race other boys sometimes. He never wore glasses. He could +see well when he was old. He told me he was raised out from England, +Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"When freedom was told 'em Uncle Frank said all them in the camps +hollered and danced, and marched and sung. They was so glad the War was +done and so glad they been freed.</p> + +<p>"Grandma was sold in South Carolina to Mississippi and sold again to Dr. +Shelton. Now that was my father's father and mother. She said they rode +and walked all the way. They came on ox wagons. She said on the way +they passed some children. They was playing. A little white boy was up +in a persimmon tree settin' on a limb eating persimmons. He was so +pretty and clean. Grandma says, 'You think you is some pumpkin, don't +you, honey child.' He says, 'Some pumpkin and some 'simmon too.' Grandma +was a house girl. She got to keep her baby and brought him. He was my +father. Uncle was born later. Then they was freed. Grandma lived to be +ninety-five years old. Mrs. Dolphy Wooly and Mrs. Shelton was her young +mistresses. They kept her till she died. They kept her well.</p> + +<p>"Grandma told us about freedom. She was hired out to the Browns to make +sausage and dry out lard. Five girls was in the field burning brush. +They was white girls—Mrs. Brown's girls. They come to the house and +said some Blue Coats come by and said, 'You free.' They told them back, +'That's no news, we was born free.' Grandma said that night she melted +pewter and made dots on her best dress. It was shiny. She wore it home +next day 'cause she was free, and she never left from about her own +white folks till she died and left them.</p> + +<p>"Times seem very good on black folks till hard cold winter and spring +come, then times is mighty, mighty bad. It is so hard to keep warm fires +and enough to eat. Times have been good. Black folks in the young +generation need more heart training and less book learning. Times is so +fast the young set is too greedy. They is wasteful too. Some is hard +workers and tries to live right.</p> + +<p>"I wash and irons and keep a woman's little chile so she can work. I +owns my home."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McCoyIke"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Irene Robertson<br> +Person Interviewed: Ike McCoy, Biscoe, Arkansas<br> +Age: 65</h3> +<p>[TR: Illegible words indicated by [----], questionable words followed by [?].]</p> +<br> + +<p>"My parents named Harriett and Isaac McCoy. Far as I knew they was +natives of North Kaline (Carolina). He was a farmer. He raised corn and +cabbage, a little corn and wheat. He had tasks at night in winter I +heard him say. She muster just done anything. She knit for us here in +the last few years. She died several years ago. Now my oldest sister was +born in slavery. I was next but I came way after slavery.</p> + +<p>"In war time McCoys hid their horses in the woods. The Yankees found +them and took all the best ones and left their [----] (nags). Old +boss man McCoy hid in the closet and locked himself up. The +Yankees found him, broke in on him and took him out and they nearly +killed him beating him so bad. He told all of 'em on the place he was +going off. They wore him out. He didn't live long after that.</p> + +<p>"Things got lax. I heard her say one man sold all his slaves. The War +broke out. They run away and went back to him. She'd see 'em pass going +back home. They been sold and wouldn't stay. Folks got to running off to +war. They thought it look like a frolic. I heard some of them say they +wish they hadn't gone off to war 'fore it was done. Niggers didn't know +that[?] war no freedom was 'ceptin' the Yankees come tell them +something and then they couldn't understand how it all be. Black folks +was mighty ignant then. They is now for that matter. They look to white +folks for right kind of doings[?].</p> + +<p>"Ma said every now and then see somebody going back to that man tried +to get rid of them. They traveled by night and beg along from black +folks. In daytime they would stay in the woods so the pettyrollers +wouldn't run up on them. The pettyrollers would whoop 'em if they catch +'em.</p> + +<p>"Ma told about one day the Yankees come and made the white women came +help the nigger women cook up a big dinner. Ma was scared so bad she +couldn't see nothing she wanted. She said there was no talking. They was +too scared to say a word. They sot the table and never a one of them +told 'em it was ready.</p> + +<p>"She said biscuits so scarce after the War they took 'em 'round in their +pockets to nibble on they taste so good.</p> + +<p>"I was eighteen years old when pa and ma took the notion to come out +here. All of us come but one sister had married, and pa and one brother +had a little difference. Pa had children ma didn't have. They went +together way after slavery. We got transportation to Memphis by train +and took a steamboat to Pillowmount. That close to Forrest City. Later +on I come to Biscoe. They finally come too.</p> + +<p>"I been pretty independent all my life till I getting so feeble. I work +a sight now. I'm making boards to kiver my house out at the lot now. I +goiner get somebody to kiver it soon as I get my boards made.</p> + +<p>"We don't get no PWA aid 'ceptin' for two orphant babies we got. They +are my wife's sister's little boys.</p> + +<p>"Well sir-ree, folks could do if the young ones would. Young folks don't +have no consideration for the old wore-out parents. They dance and drink +it bodaciously out on Saturday ebening and about till Sunday night. I +may be wrong but I sees it thater way. Whan we get old we get helpless. +I'm getting feebler every year. I see that. Times goiner be hard ag'in +this winter and next spring. Money is scarce now for summer time and +craps laid by. I feels that my own self now. Every winter times get +tough."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McDanielRichardH"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Richard H. McDaniel, Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 73</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Newton County, Mississippi the first year of the +surrender. I don't think my mother was sold and I know my father was +never sold. Jim McDaniel raised my father and one sister after his +mother died. One sister was married when she died. I heard him say when +he got mad he would quit work. He said old master wouldn't let the +mistress whoop him and she wouldn't let him whoop my father. My father +was a black man but my mother was light. Her father was a white man and +her mother part Indian and white mixed, so what am I? My mother was +owned by people named Wash. Dick Wash was her young master. My parents' +names was Willis and Elsie McDaniel. When it was freedom I heard them +say Moster McDaniel told them they was free. He was broke. If they could +do better go on, he didn't blame them, he couldn't promise them much +now. They moved off on another man's place to share crop. They had to +work as hard and didn't have no more than they had in slavery. That is +what they told me. They could move around and visit around without +asking. They said it didn't lighten the work none but it lightened the +rations right smart. Moster McDaniel nor my father neither one went to +war.</p> + +<p>"From the way I always heard it, the Ku Klux was the law like night +watchman. When I was a boy there was a lot of stealing and bushwhacking. +Folks meet you out and kill you, rob you, whoop you. A few of the black +men wouldn't work and wanted to steal. That Ku Klux was the law watching +around. Folks was scared of em. I did see them. I would run hide.</p> + +<p>"I farmed up till 1929. Then I been doing jobs. I worked on relief till +they turned me off, said I was too old to work but they won't give me +the pension. I been trying to figure out what I am to do. Lady, could +you tell me? Work at jobs when I can get them.</p> + +<p>"I allus been voting till late years. If they let some folks vote in the +first lection, they would be putting in somebody got no business in the +gover'ment. All the fault I see in white folks running the gover'ment is +we colored folks ain't got work we can do all the time to live on. I +thought all the white folks had jobs what wanted jobs. The conditions is +hard for old men like me. I pay $3 for a house every month. It is a cold +house.</p> + +<p>"This present generation is living a fast life. What all don't they do?"</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McIntoshWaters"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Waters McIntosh<br> + 1900 Howard Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 76</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born July 4, 1862 at 2:08 in the morning at Lynchburg, Sumter +County, South Carolina.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Parents</b></p> + +<p>"My mother was named Lucy Sanders. My father was named Sumter Durant. +Our owner was Dr. J.M. Sanders, the son of Mr. Bartlett Sanders. Sumter +Durant was a white man. My mother was fourteen years old when I was born +I was her second child. Durant was in the Confederate army and was +killed during the War in the same year I was born, and before my birth.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Sold</b></p> + +<p>"When I was a year old, my mother was sold for $1500 in gold, and I was +sold for $500 in gold to William Carter who lived about five miles south +of Cartersville. The payment was made in fine gold. I was sold because +my folk realized that freedom was coming and they wanted to obtain the +cash value of their slaves.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Name</b></p> + +<p>"My name is spelled 'Waters' but it is pronounced 'Waiters.' When I was +born, I was thought to be a very likely child and it was proposed that I +should be a waiter. Therefore I was called Waters (but it was pronounced +Waiters). They did not spell it w-a-i-t-e-r-s, but they pronounced it +that way.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>How Freedom Came</b></p> + +<p>"My mother said that they had been waiting a long time to hear what had +become of the War, perhaps one or two weeks. One day when they were in +the field moulding corn, going round the corn hoeing it and putting a +little hill around it, the conk sounded at about eleven o'clock, and +they knew that the long expected time had come. They dropped their hoes +and went to the big house. They went around to the back where the master +always met the servants and he said to them, 'You are all free, free as +I am. You can go or come as you please. I want you to stay. If you will +stay, I will give you half the crop.' That was the beginning of the +share cropping system.</p> + +<p>"My mother came at once to the quarters, and when she found me she +pulled the end out of a corn sack, stuck holes on the sides, put a cord +through the top, pulled out the end, put it on me, put on the only dress +she had, and made it back to the old home (her first master's folk).</p> +<br> + +<p><b>What the Slaves Expected</b></p> + +<p>"When the slaves were freed, they got what they expected. They were glad +to get it and get away with it, and that was what mother and them did.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Slave Time Preaching</b></p> + +<p>"One time when an old white man come along who wanted to preach, the +white people gave him a chance to preach to the niggers. The substance +of his sermon was this:</p> + +<p>"'Now when you servants are working for your masters, you must be +honest. When you go to the mill, don't carry along an extra sack and put +some of the meal or the flour in for yourself. And when you women are +cooking in the big house, don't make a big pocket under your dress and +put a sack of coffee and a sack of sugar and other things you want in +it."</p> + +<p>"They took him out and hanged him for corrupting the morals of the +slaves.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Conditions After the War</b></p> + +<p>"Immediately after the War, there was a great scarcity of food. Neither +Negroes nor white folk had anything to eat. The few white people who did +have something wouldn't let it be known. My grandmother who was +sixty-five years old and one of the old and respected inhabitants of +that time went out to find something for us to eat. A white woman named +Mrs. Burton gave her a sack of meal and told her not to tell anybody +where she got it.</p> + +<p>"My grandmother brought the meal home and cooked it in a large skillet +in a big cake. When it got done, she cut it into slices in the way you +would cut up a pie and divided it among us. That all we had to eat.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>House</b></p> + +<p>"The white people in those days built their houses back from the front. +In South Carolina, there were lots of farms that had four to twelve +thousand acres. From what mother told me, Master Bill's place set back +from the road. Then there was a great square place they called the yard. +A fence divided the house and the yard adjoining it from that part of +the grounds which held the barn. The yard in front and back of the house +held a grove.</p> + +<img src="images/025.jpg" align="left" width="140" height="116" + alt="plot of the square"> + +<p>The square around the house and the Negro quarters were all enclosed so +that the little slaves could not get out while parents were at work. The +Negroes assembled on the porch when the gong called them in the morning. +The boss gave orders from the porch. There was an open space between the +quarters and the court (where the little slaves played). There was a +gate between the court and the big house.</p> + +<p>"On the rear of the house, there was a porch from which the boss gave +orders usually about four o'clock in the morning and at which they would +disband in the evening between nine and ten—no certain time but more or +less not earlier than nine and not often later than ten. Back of the +house and beyond it was a fence extending clear across the yard. In one +corner of this fence was a gate leading into the court. Leading out of +the court was an opening surrounded by a semi-circular fence which +enclosed the Negro quarters.</p> + +<p>"The cabins were usually built on the ground—no floors. The roofs were +covered with clapboards.</p> + +<p>"When I was a boy we used to sing, 'Rather be a nigger than a poor white +man.' Even in slavery they used to sing that. It was the poor white man +who was freed by the War, not the Negroes.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Furniture</b></p> + +<p>"There wasn't any furniture. Beds were built with one post out and the +other three <u>sides</u> fastened to the sides of the house.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Marrying Time</b></p> + +<p>"I remember one night the people were gone to marry. That was when all +the people in the community married immediately after slavery.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Ghosts</b></p> + +<p>"We had an open fireplace. That was at Bartlett Sanders' place. He had +close on to three thousand acres. Every grown person had gone to the +marrying, and I was at home in the bed I just described.</p> + +<p>"My grandfather's mother[HW: ?] had a chair and that was hers only. She +was named Senia and was about eighty years old. We burned nothing but +pine knots in the hearth. You would put one or two of those on the fire +and they would burn for hours. We were all in bed and had been for an +hour or two. There were some others sleeping in the same room. There +came a peculiar knocking on grandmother's[HW: great grandmother?] chair. +It's hard to describe it. It was something like the distant beating of a +drum. Grandmother was dead, of course. The boys got up and ran out and +brought in some of the hands. When they came in, a little thing about +three and a half feet high with legs about six or eight inches long ran +out of the room.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Ku Klux Klan</b></p> + +<p>"Whenever there was a man of influence, they terrorized him. They were +at their height about the time of Grant's election. Many a time my +mother and I have watched them pass our door. They wore gowns and some +kind of helmet. They would be going to catch same leading Negro and whip +him. There was scarcely a night they couldn't take a leading Negro out +and whip him if they would catch him alone. On that account, the Negro +men did not stay at home in Sumter County, South Carolina at night. +They left home and stayed together. The Ku Klux very seldom interfered +with a woman or a child.</p> + +<p>"They often scared colored people by drinking large quantities of water. +They had something that held a lot of water, and when they would raise +the bucket to their mouths to drink, they would slip the water into it.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>White Caps</b></p> + +<p>"The white caps operated further to the northwest of where I lived. I +never came in contact with them. They were not the same thing as the Ku +Klux.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Voting</b></p> + +<p>"In South Carolina under the Reconstruction, we voted right along. In +1868 there were soldiers at all of the election places to see that you +did vote.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Career Since the War</b></p> + +<p>"In 1881 I married. The year after that, in '83,[HW: ?] I merchandised a +little. Then I got converted. I got it in my head that it was wrong to +take big profits from business, so I sold out. Then I was asked to +assist the keeper of the jail.</p> + +<p>"In 1888 I went to school for the first time. I was then twenty-six +years old. By the end of the first term, I knew all that the teacher +could teach, so he sent me to Claflin University. I left there in the +third year normal.</p> + +<p>"When I returned home, I taught school, at first in a private school and +later in a public school for $15 a month.</p> + +<p>"A man named Boyle told me that he had some ground to sell. I saved up +$45, the price he asked for it. When I offered it to him, he said that +he had decided not to sell it. I went to town and spent my $45. A few +days later, he met me and offered me the place again. I told him I had +spent my money. He then offered it to me on time. There was plenty of +timber on the place, so I got some contracts with a man named Roland and +delivered wood to him. When I went to collect the money, he said he +would not pay me in money.</p> + +<p>"A man named Pennington offered me 20¢ a day for labor. I asked if he +would pay in money.</p> + +<p>"He replied, 'If you're looking for money, don't come.'</p> + +<p>"I went home and said to my wife, 'I am going to leave here.'</p> + +<p>"I came to Forrest City, Arkansas January 28, 1888. I farmed in Forrest +City, making one crop, and then I entered the ministry, and then I +preached at Spring Park for two years.</p> + +<p>"Then I entered Philander Smith College where I stayed from 1891-1897. I +preached from the time I left Philander until 1913.</p> + +<p>"Then I studied law and completed the American Correspondence course in +Law when I was fifty years old. I am still practicing.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Wife and Family</b></p> + +<p>"In 1897, when I graduated from Philander, my wife and six children were +sitting on the front seat.</p> + +<p>"I have eleven sons and daughters, of whom six are living. I had seven +brothers and sisters.</p> + +<p>"My wife and I have been married fifty-six years. I had to steal her +away from her parents, and she has never regretted coming to me nor I +taking her."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>"Brother Mack" as he is familiarly and affectionately known to his +friends is a man keen and vigorous, mentally and physically. He attends +Sunday school, church both in the morning and evening, and all +departments of the Epworth League. He takes the Epworth Herald, the +Southwestern Christian Advocate, the Literary Digest, some poultry and +farm magazines, the Arkansas Gazette, and the St. Louis Democrat, and +several other journals. He is on omnivorous reader and a clear thinker. +He raises chickens and goats and plants a garden as avocations. He has +on invincible reputation for honesty as well as for thrift and thought.</p> + +<p>Nothing is pleasanter than to view the relationship between him and his +wife. They have been married fifty-six years and seem to have achieved a +perfect understanding. She is an excellent cook and is devoted to her +home. She attends church regularly. Seems to be four or five years +younger than her husband. Like him, however, she seems to enjoy +excellent health.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MackCresa"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Cresa Mack<br> + 1417 Short Indiana St., Pine Bluff, Ark.<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I can tell you something about slavery days. I was born at South Bend, +Arkansas on the old Joe Clay place. I 'member they used to work 'em +scandalous. They used me at the house and I used to wait on old +mistress' brother. He was a old man named Cal Fletcher.</p> + +<p>"I 'member when they said the Yankees was comin' the boss man put us in +wagons and runned us to Texas. They put the women and chillun in the +wagons but the men had to walk. I know I was something over twelve years +old.</p> + +<p>"Old mistress, Miss Sarah Clay, took her chillun and went to Memphis.</p> + +<p>"My white folks treated us very well. I never seed 'em whip my mother +but once, but I seen some whipped till they's speechless. Yes ma'm I +have.</p> + +<p>"I can 'member a lot 'bout the war. The Lord have mercy, I'se old. I +'member they used to sing</p> + +<pre> +'Run nigger run, +The paddyrollers'll ketch you, +Run nigger run.' +</pre> + +<p>"Corse if they ketch you out without a pass they'd beat you nearly to +death and tell you to go home to your master.</p> + +<p>"One time I was totin' water for the woman what did the washin'. I was +goin' along the road and seed somethin' up in a tree that look like a +dog. I said 'Look at that dog.' The overseer was comin' from the house +and said 'That ain't no dog, that's a panther. You better not stop' and +he shot it out. Then I've seen bears out in the cane brakes. I thought +they was big black bulls. I was young then—yes mam, I was young.</p> + +<p>"When the Yankees come through they sot the house afire and the gin and +burned up 'bout a hundred bales a cotton. They never bothered the +niggers' quarters. That was the time the overseer carried us to Texas to +get rid of the Yankees.</p> + +<p>"After the surrender the Yankees told the overseer to bring us all up in +the front yard so he could read us the ceremony and he said we was as +free as any white man that walked the ground. I didn't know what 'twas +about much cause I was too busy playin'.</p> + +<p>"I didn't know what school was 'fore freedom, but I went about a month +after peace was declared. Then papa died and mama took me out and put me +in the field.</p> + +<p>"I was grown, 'bout twenty-four or five, when I married. Now my chillun +and grand chillun takes care of me."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McKinneyWarren"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Warren McKinney, Hazen, Arkansas<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<br> + +<p>I was born in Edgefield County, South Carolina. I am eighty-five years +old. I was born a slave of George Strauter. I remembers hearing them say +"Thank God Ize free as a jay bird." My ma was a slave in the field. I +was eleven years old when freedom was declared. When I was little, Mr. +Strauter whipped my ma. It hurt me bad as it did her. I hated him. She +was crying. I chunked him with rocks. He run after me, but he didn't +catch me. There was twenty-five or thirty hands that worked in the +field. They raised wheat, corn, oats, barley, and cotton. All the +children that couldn't work stayed at one house. Aunt Mat kept the +babies and small children that couldn't go to the field. He had a gin +and a shop. The shop was at the fork of the roads. When de war come on +my papa went to build forts. He quit ma and took another woman. When de +war closed ma took her four children, bundled em up and went to Augusta. +The government give out rations there. My ma washed and ironed. People +died in piles. I don't know till yet what was de matter. They said it +was the change of living. I seen five or six wooden, painted coffins +piled up on wagons pass by our house. Loads passed every day lack you +see cotton pass here. Some said it was cholorea and some took +consumption. Lots of de colored people nearly starved. Not much to get +to do and not much house room. Several families had to live in one +house. Lots of the colored folks went up north and froze to death. They +couldn't stand the cold. They wrote back about them dieing. No they +never sent them back. I heard some sent for money to come back. I heerd +plenty bout the Ku Klux. They scared the folks to death. People left +Augusta in droves. About a thousand would all meet and walk going to +hunt work and new homes. Some of them died. I had a sister and brother +lost that way. I had another sister come to Louisiana that way. She +wrote back.</p> + +<p>I don't think the colored folks looked for a share of land. They never +got nothing cause the white folks didn't have nothing but barren hills +left. About all the mules was wore out hauling provisions in the army. +Some folks say they ought to done more for de colored folks when dey +left, but dey say dey was broke. Freeing all de slaves left em broke.</p> + +<p>That reconstruction was a mighty hard pull. Me and ma couldn't live. A +man paid our ways to Carlisle, Arkansas and we come. We started working +for Mr. Emenson. He had a big store, teams, and land. We liked it fine, +and I been here fifty-six years now. There was so much wild game living +was not so hard. If a fellow could get a little bread and a place to +stay he was all right. After I come to dis state I voted some. I have +farmed and worked at odd jobs. I farmed mostly. Ma went back to her old +master. He persuaded her to come back home. Me and her went back and run +a farm four or five years before she died. Then I come back here. I +first had 300 acres at Carlisle. I sold it and bought 80 acres at Green +Grove. I married in South Carolina. We had a fine weddin, home weddin. +Each of our families furnished the weddin supper. We had 24 waiters. +That is all the wife I ever had. We lived together 57 years. It is hard +for me to keep up with my mind since she died. She been dead five years +nearly now. I used to sing but I forgot all the songs. We had song +books. I joined the church when I was twelve years old.</p> + +<p>I think the times are worse than they use to be. The people is living +mighty fast I tell you. I don't get no help from the government. They +won't give me the pension. I can't work and I can't pay taxes on my +place. They just don't give me nothing but a little out of the store. I +can't get no pension.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McKinneyWarren2"></a> +<h3>Little Rock District<br> +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of Interviewer: Irene Robertson<br> +Subject: Ex-Slave—History<br> +Story—Information<br> +<br> +This Information given by: Warren McKinney<br> +Place of Residence: Hazen, Green Grove Settlement, Arkansas<br> +Occupation: Farming<br> +Age: 84</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>Warren McKinney was born in Edgefield County, South Carolina. He was +born a slave. His master was George Strauter. He had a big plantation +and worked twenty-five or thirty work hands. There were twenty-five or +thirty children too small to work in the field. They raised cotton, +corn, oats, and wheat. His mother washed and ironed and cooked. He was +small but well remembers once when his mother had been sick and had just +gotten out. George Strauter whipped her with a switch on her legs. +Warren did not approve of it. Rocks were plentiful and he began throwing +at him. He said Mr. George took out after him but didn't catch or whip +him.</p> + +<p>George Strauter tried to teach them all how to be good farmers and be +saving. Warren knew war was going on but he didn't see any of it. His +father came home several times. He was off building forts. He said he +remembered a big "hurly-burly" and he heard 'em saying, "Thank God I'ze +free as a jay bird." He didn't know why they were fighting so he didn't +know then why they were saying that.</p> + +<p>George Strauter had a shop at the fork of the roads. He had his own gin. +They sold cotton and bought provisions at Augusta, Georgia. They made +some of their meal and flour and raised all their meat and made enough +lard to do the year around.</p> + +<p>He heard them talking about the "Yankees" burning up Augusta, but he saw +where they had burned Hamburg, South Carolina or North Augusta they call +it.</p> + +<p>After they were free he remembers his mother bundling up her things and +her family and them all going in an ox cart to Augusta to live. Warren's +mother washed, cooked and ironed for a living. Her husband went off and +lived with another woman after freedom. Warren was about eleven years +old then. The Government furnished food for them too. One thing that +distressed Warren was <u>the way people died for more than a year</u>. +He saw five or six coffins piled up on a wagon being taken out to be +buried. He thought it was changing houses and changing ways of living. +They didn't have shoes and warm clothes and weren't fed from white folks +smoke house. <u>Lots of the slaves had Consumption and died right +now</u>. Stout men and women didn't live two years after they were +freed. Lots of them said they didn't like that freedom and wanted to go +back but the masters were broke and couldn't keep many of them if they +went back.</p> + +<p>When Warren was about fifteen years old, there was a white man or two, +but colored leaders mostly got about a thousand colored people to start +for the West walking. Warren had sisters and brothers who started on +this trip. Warren had some fussy brothers, his mother was afraid would +get in jail. They kept her uneasy. They shipped their "stuff" by boat +and train. He never saw them any more but he heard from them in +Louisiana. Louisiana had a bad name in those days.</p> + +<p>When Warren was about fourteen and fifteen, his mother had them on a +farm, farming near Hamburg.</p> + +<p>When he was sixteen or seventeen, his mother and the other children came +on the train to about where Carlisle now is but it wasn't called by that +name. There were very few houses of any kind. Mr. Emerson had a big +store and lots of land. He worked black and white. Mr. Emerson let them +have seven or eight mules and wagons and they farmed near there. He +remembers pretty soon there was a depot where the depot now stands, a +bank, a post office, and two or three more stores, all small buildings. +He liked coming to Arkansas because he got to ride on the train a long +ways. It was easy to live here. There were lots of game and fish.</p> + +<p>Warren never shot anything in his life. He was no hunter. <u>Nats</u> +were awful. Warren made smoke to run the nats from the cows. Four or +five deer would come to the smoke. Cows were afraid of them and would +leave the smoke. When he would go the deer would leap four or five feet +in the air at the sight of him.</p> + +<p>When Warren lived in Augusta, Georgia, they had schools a month at a +time but Warren never did get to go to any, so he can't read or write. +But he learned to save his money. He joined a church when he was twelve +years old in South Carolina and belongs to the Baptist church at Green +Grove now.</p> + +<p>The old master in South Carolina persuaded his mother to come back. They +all went back four or five years before his mother died. While Warren +was there he married a woman on a joining farm.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McMullenVictoria"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Victoria McMullen<br> + 1416 E. Valmar, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 54<br> +Occupation: Seamstress</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My mother was born March 16, 1865, and knew nothing of slavery.</p> + +<p>"Both my grandmothers and both grandfathers were slaves. My father was +born in the same year as my mother and like my mother knew nothing of +slavery although both of them might have been born slaves.</p> + +<p>"I knew my mother's mother and father and my father's mother, but I +didn't know my father's father.</p> + +<p>"He was from Texas and he always stayed there. He never did come out to +Louisiana where I was born. My mother was born in Louisiana, but my +father was born in Texas. I don't know what county or city my father was +born in. I just heard my grandmother on his side say he was born in +Texas.</p> + +<p>"During the War (he was born in '65 when the War ceased), Grandmother +Katy—that was her name, Katy, Katy Elmore—she was in Louisiana at +first—she was run out in Texas, I suppose, to be hidden from the +Yankees. My father was born there and my grandfather stayed there. He +died in Texas and then Grandma Katy come back to Louisiana with my +father and settled in Ouachita Parish.</p> + +<p>"Grandma Katy was sold from South Carolina into Louisiana to Bob +McClendon, and she kept the name of Elmore who was her first owner in +South Carolina. It was Bob McClendon who run her out in Texas to hide +her from the Yankees. My grandfather in Texas kept the name of Jamison. +That was the name of his master in Texas. But grandma kept the name of +Elmore from South Carolina because he was good to her. He was better +than Bob McClendon. The eastern states sold their slaves to the +southern states and got all the money, then they freed the slaves and +that left the South without anything.</p> + +<p>"Grandma Katy had Creek Indian blood in her. She was of medium size and +height, copper colored, high cheek bones, small squinchy eyes, black +curly hair. Her hair was really pretty but she didn't curl it. It was +just naturally curly. She was a practical nurse as they call it, but she +did more of what some people call a midwife. They call it something else +now. They got a proper word for it.</p> + +<p>"They got it in these government agencies. That is what she was even in +slavery times. She worked for colored people and white people both. That +was after she was freed until she went blind. She went blind three years +before she died. She died at the age of exactly one hundred years. She +treated women and babies. They said she was a real good doctor in her +day. That is been fifty-four years ago. [I will be fifty-four years old +tomorrow—September 18, 1938.] In slavery times my grandma was almost as +free as she was in freedom because of her work.</p> + +<p>"She said that Bob McClendon was cruel to her. Sometimes he'd get angry +and take the shovel and throw hot ashes on the slaves. And then he'd see +them with blisters on them and he would take a handsaw or a flat plank +and bust the blisters. Louisiana was a warm country and they wouldn't +have much clothes on. When the slaves were freed, he went completely +broke. He had scarcely a place to live.</p> + +<p>"I seen him once. Be look like on old possum. He had a long beard down +to his waist and he had long side burns too. Just a little of his face +showed. He was tall and stooping and he wore his hair long and uncut +down on his neck. You know about what he looked like. He had on blue +jeans pants and brogan shoes and a common shirt—a work shirt. He wore +very common clothes. When they freed the Negroes, it broke him up +completely. He had been called a 'big-to-do' in his life but he wasn't +nothing then. He owned Grandma Katy.</p> + +<p>"Grandma Katy had a sister named Maria and a brother named Peter. He +owned all three of them. I have seen all of them. Grandma Katy was the +oldest. She and Uncle Peter stayed close together. He didn't have no +wife and she didn't have no husband. But Aunt Maria had a husband. She +lived off from them after freedom. It was about twelve miles away. My +great-aunt and great-uncle—they were Maria and Peter—that was what +they were. Uncle Peter died first before I left Louisiana, but Aunt +Maria and Grandma Katy died after I came to Arkansas. Grandma Katy lived +four years after I came here.</p> + +<p>"After they was free and my father had gotten large enough to work and +didn't have no horse, my grandma was going 'round waiting on women—that +is all she did—all the rest of the people had gotten large and left +home. Papa made a crop with a hoe. He made three bales of cotton and +about twelve loads of corn with that hoe. He used to tell me, 'You don't +know nothin' 'bout work. You oughter see how I had to work.' After that +he bought him a horse. Money was scarce then and it took something to +buy the place and the horse both. They were turned loose from slavery +without anything. Hardly had a surname—just Katy, Maria, and Peter.</p> + +<p>"I knew more about the slave-time history of my mother's folks than I +did about my father's but I'll tell you that some other time. My +grandmother on my mother's side was born in Richmond, Virginia. She was +owned by a doctor but I can't call his name. She gets her name from her +husband's owners. They came from Virginia. They didn't take the name of +their owners in Louisiana. They took the name of the owners in Virginia. +She was a twin—her twin was a boy named June and her name was Hetty. +Her master kept her brother to be a driver for him. She was sent from +Virginia to Louisiana to people that were related to her Virginia +people. She called her Louisiana mistress 'White Ma;' she never did call +her 'missis.' The white folks and the colored folks too called her +Indian because she was mixed with Choctaw. That's the Indian that has +brown spots on the jaw. They're brownskin. It was an Indian from the +Oklahoma reservation that said my mother belonged to the Choctaws.</p> + +<p>"She rode from Virginia to Louisiana on a boat at the age of twelve +years. She was separated from her mother and brothers and sisters and +never did see them again. She was kept in the house for a nurse. She was +not a midwife. She nursed the white babies. That was what she was sent +to Louisiana for—to nurse the babies. The Louisiana man that owned her +was named George Dorkins. But I think this white woman came from +Virginia. She married this Louisiana man, then sent back to her father's +house and got grandma; she got her for a nurse. She worked only a year +and a half in the field before peace was declared. After she got grown +and married, my grandfather—she had to stay with him and cook and keep +house for him. That was during slavery time but after George Dorkins +died. Dorkins went and got hisself a barrel of whiskey—one of these +great big old barrels—and set it up in his house, and put a faucet in +it and didn't do nothin' but drink whiskey. He said he was goin' to +drink hisself to death. And he did.</p> + +<p>"He was young enough to go to war and he said he would drink hisself to +death before he would go, and he did. My grandma used to steal +newspapers out of his house and take them down to the quarters and leave +them there where there were one or two slaves that could read and tell +how the War was goin' on. I never did learn how the slaves learned to +read. But she was in the house and she could steal the papers and send +them down. Later she could slip off and they would tell her the news, +and then she could slip the papers back.</p> + +<p>"Her master drank so much he couldn't walk without falling and she would +have to help him out. Her mistress was really good. She never allowed +the overseer to whip her. She was only whipped once in slave time while +my father's mother was whipped more times than you could count.</p> + +<p>"Her master often said, 'I'll drink myself to death before I'll go to +war and be shot down like a damn target.' She said in living with them +in the house, she learned to cuss from him. She said she was a cussin' +soul until she became a Christian. She wasn't 'fraid of them because she +was kin to them in some way. There was another woman there who was some +kin to them and she looked enough like my grandma for them to be kin to +each other. We talked it over several times and said we believed we were +related; but none of us know for sure.</p> + +<p>"When the slaves wanted something said they would have my grandma say it +because they knew she wouldn't be whipped for it. 'White Ma' wouldn't +let nobody whip her if she knew it. She cussed the overseer out that +time for whipping her.</p> + +<p>"When grandma was fourteen or fifteen years old they locked her up in +the seed house once or twice for not going to church. You see they let +the white folks go to the church in the morning and the colored folks in +the evening, and my grandma didn't always want to go. She would be +locked up in the seed bin and she would cuss the preacher out so he +could hear her. She would say, 'Master, let us out.' And he would say, +'You want to go to church?' And she would say, 'No, I don't want to hear +that same old sermon: "Stay out of your missis' and master's hen house. +Don't steal your missis' and master's chickens. Stay out of your +missis' and master's smokehouse. Don't steal your missis' and master's +hams." I don't steal nothing. Don't need to tell me not to.'</p> + +<p>"She was tellin' the truth too. She didn't steal because she didn't have +to. She had plenty without stealin'! She got plenty to eat in the house. +But the other slaves didn't git nothin' but fat meat and corn bread and +molasses. And they got tired of that same old thing. They wanted +something else sometimes. They'd go to the hen house and get chickens. +They would go to the smokehouse and get hams and lard. And they would +get flour and anything else they wanted and they would eat something +they wanted. There wasn't no way to keep them from it.</p> + +<p>"The reason she got whipped that time, the overseer wanted her to help +get a tree off the fence that had been blown down by a storm. She told +him that wasn't her work and she wasn't goin' to do it. Old miss was +away at that time. He hit her a few licks and she told old miss when she +came back. Old 'White Ma' told the overseer, 'Don't never put your hands +on her no more no matter what she does. That's more than I do. I don't +hit her and you got no business to do it.'</p> + +<p>"Her husband, my grandfather, was a blacksmith, and he never did work in +the field. He made wagons, plows, plowstocks, buzzard wings—they call +them turning plows now. They used to make and put them on the stocks. He +made anything-handles, baskets. He could fill wagon wheels. He could +sharpen tools. Anything that come under the line of blacksmith, that is +what he did. He used to fix wagons all the time I knowed him. In harvest +time in the fall he would drive from Bienville where they were slaves to +Monroe in Ouachita Parish. He kept all the plows and was sharpening and +fixing anything that got broke. He said he never did get no whipping.</p> + +<p>"His name was Tom Eldridge. They called him 'Uncle Tom'. They was the +mother and father of twelve children. Six lived and six died. One boy +and five girls lived. And one girl and five boys died—half and half. He +died at the age of seventy-five, June 6, 1908. She died January 1920.</p> + +<p>"I came out here in January 1907. I lived in Pine Bluff. From Louisiana +I came to Pine Bluff in 1906. In 1907 I went to Kerr in Lonoke County +and lived there eight years and then I came to Little Rock. I farmed at +Kerr and just worked 'round town those few months in Pine Bluff. +Excusing the time I was in Pine Bluff and Little Rock I farmed. I farmed +in Ouachita Parish, Louisiana."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MaddenNannieP"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Nannie P. Madden,<br> + West Memphis, Arkansas<br> +Age: 69</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I am Martha Johnson's sister. I was born at Lake Village, Arkansas. I +am 69 years old. I was born on Mr. Ike Wethingtons place. Pa was +renting. Mother died in 1876 on this farm. We called it Red Leaf +plantation. Father died at Martha Johnson's here in West Memphis when he +was 88 years old.</p> + +<p>"Mother was not counted a slave. Her master's Southern wife (white wife) +disliked her very much but kept her till her death. Mother had three +white children by her master. After freedom she married a black man and +had four children by him. We are in the last set.</p> + +<p>"We was born after slavery and all we know is from hearing our people +talk. Father talked all time about slavery. He was a soldier. I couldn't +tell you straight. I can give you some books on slavery:</p> + +<pre> +Booker T. Washington's Own Story of His Life and Work, +64 page supplement, by Albon L. Holsey + + Authentic Edition--in office of Library of Congress, + Washington, D.C., 1915, copywrighted by J.L. Nichols Co. + +The Master Mind of a Child of Slavery--Booker T. Washington, +by Frederick E. Drinker, Washington, D.C. +</pre> + +<p>I have read them both. Yes, they are my own books.</p> + +<p>"I farmed and cooked all my life."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MaddenPerry"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Perry Madden, Thirteenth Street, south side,<br> + one block east of Boyle Park Road, Route 6,<br> + Care L.G. Cotton, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: About 79</h3> +<br> + +<p><b>Birth and Age</b></p> + +<p>"I have been here quite a few years. This life is short. A man ought to +prepare for eternity. I had an uncle who used to say that a person who +went to torment stayed as long as there was a grain of sand on the sea.</p> + +<p>"I was a little boy when slavery broke. I used to go out with my +brother. He watched gaps. I did not have to do anything; I just went out +with him to keep him company. I was scared of the old master. I used to +call him the 'Big Bear.' He was a great big old man.</p> + +<p>"I was about six years old when the War ended, I guess. I don't know how +old I am. The insurance men put me down as seventy-three. I know I was +here in slavery time, and I was just about six years old when the War +ended.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Schooling</b></p> + +<p>"I got my first learning in Alabama. I didn't learn anything at all in +slavery times. I went to school. I would go to the house in slavery +tine, and there wouldn't be nobody home, and I would go to the bed and +get under it because I was scared. When I would wake up it would be way +in the night and dark, and I would be in bed.</p> + +<p>"I got my schooling way after the surrender. We would make crops. The +third time we moved, dad started me to school. I had colored teachers. I +was in Talladega County. I made the fifth grade before I stopped. My +father died and then I had to stop and take care of my mother.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>An "Aunt Caroline" Story</b></p> + +<p>"I know that some people can tell things that are goin' to happen. Old +man Julks lived at Pumpkin Bend. He had a colt that disappeared. He went +to 'Aunt Caroline'—that's Caroline Dye. She told him just where the +colt was and who had it and how he had to get it back. She described the +colt and told him that was what he come to find out about before he had +a chance to ask her anything. She told him that white people had it and +told him where they lived and told him he would have to have a white man +go and git it for him. He was working for a good man and he told him +about it. He advertised for the colt and the next day, the man that +stole it came and told him that a colt had been found over on his place +and for him to come over and arrange to git it. But he said, 'No, I've +placed that matter in the hands of my boss.' He told his boss about it, +but the fellow brought the horse and give it to the boss without any +argument.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Family and Masters</b></p> + +<p>"My old master's slaves were called free niggers. He and his wife never +mistreated their slaves. When any of Madden's slaves were out and the +pateroles got after them, if they could make it home, that ended it. +Nobody beat Madden's niggers.</p> + +<p>"My father's name was Allen Madden and my mother's name was Amy Madden. +I knew my grandfather and grandmother on my mother's side. My +grandfather and grandmother never were 'round me though that I can +remember.</p> + +<p>"When the old man died, the Negroes were divided out. This boy got so +many and that one got so many. The old man, Mabe Madden, had two sons, +John and Little Mabe. My mother and father went to John. They were in +Talladega because John stayed there.</p> + +<p>"My father's mother and father fell to Little Mabe Madden. They never +did come to Alabama but I have heard my father talk about them so much. +My father's father was named Harry. His last name must have been Madden.</p> + +<p>"My grandfather on my mother's side was named Charlie Hall. He married +into the Madden family. He belonged to the Halls before he married. Old +man Charlie, his master, had a plantation that wasn't far from the +Madden's plantation. In those days, if you met a girl and fell in love +with her, you could git a pass and go to see her if you wanted to. You +didn't have to be on the same plantation at all. And you could marry her +and go to see her, and have children by her even though you belonged to +different masters. The Maddens never did buy Hall. Grandma never would +change her name to Hall. He stayed at my house after we married, stayed +with me sometimes, and stayed with his other son sometimes.</p> + +<p>"My mother was born a Madden. She was born right at Madden's place. When +grandma married Hall, like it is now, she would have been called Hall. +But she was born a Madden and stayed Madden and never did change to her +husband's name. So my mother was born a Madden although her father's +name was Hall.</p> + +<p>"I don't know what sort of man Mabe was, and I only know what my parents +said about John. They said he was a good man and I have to say what they +said. He didn't let nobody impose on his niggers. Pateroles did git +after them and bring them in with the hounds, but when they got in, that +settled it. Madden never would allow white people to beat on his +niggers.</p> + +<p>"They tried to git my daddy out so that they could whip him, but they +couldn't catch him. They shot him—the pateroles did—but he whipped +them. My daddy was a coon. I mean he was a good man.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Early Life</b></p> + +<p>"My brother was big enough to mind gaps. That was in slavery times. They +had good fences around the field. They didn't have gates like they do +now. They had gaps. The fence would zigzag, and the rails could be +lifted down at one section, and that would leave a gap. If you left a +gap, the stock would go into the field. When there was a gap, my brother +would stay in it and keep the stock from passing. When the folks would +come to dinner, he would go in and eat dinner with them just as big as +anybody. When they would leave, the gap would stay down till night. It +stayed down from morning till noon and from one o'clock till the men +come in at night. The gap was a place in the rails like I told you where +they could take down the rails to pass. It took time to lay the rails +down and more time to place then back up again. They wouldn't do it. +They would leave them down till they come back during the work hours and +a boy that was too small to do anything else was put to mind them. My +brother used to do that and I would keep him company. When I heard old +master coming there, I'd be gone, yes siree. I would see him when he +left the house and when he got to the gap, I would be home or at my +grandfather's.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Occupational Experiences</b></p> + +<p>"I have followed farming all my life. That is the sweetest life a man +can lead. I have been farming all my life principally. My occupation is +farming. That is it was until I lost my health. I ain't done nothin' for +about four years now. I would follow public work in the fall of the year +and make a crop every year. Never failed till I got disabled. I used to +make all I used and all I needed to feed my stock. I even raised my own +wheat before I left home in Alabama. That is a wheat country. They don't +raise it out here.[HW: ?]</p> + +<p>"I came here—lemme see, about how many years ago did I come here. I +guess I have been in Arkansas about twenty-eight years since the first +time I come here. I have gone in and out as I got a chance to work +somewheres. I have been living in this house about three years.</p> + +<p>"I preached for about twenty or more years. I don't know that I call +myself a preacher. I am a pretty good talker sometimes. I have never +pastored a church; somehow or 'nother the word come to me to go and I go +and talk. I ain't no pulpit chinch. I could have taken two or three +men's churches out from under them, but I didn't.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Freedom and Soldiers</b></p> + +<p>"I can't remember just how my father got freed. Old folks then didn't +let you stan' and listen when they talked. If you did it once, you +didn't do it again. They would talk while they were together, but the +children would have business outdoors. Yes siree, I never heard them say +much about how they got freedom.</p> + +<p>"I was there when the Yankees come through. That was in slave time. They +marched right through old man Madden's grove. They were playing the +fifes and beating the drums. And they were playing the fiddle. Yes sir, +they were playing the fiddle too. It must have been a fiddle; it sounded +just like one. The soldiers were all just a singin'. They didn't bother +nobody at our house. If they bothered anything, nothing was told me +about it. I heard my uncle say they took a horse from my old manager. I +didn't see it. They took the best horse in the lot my uncle said. Pardon +me, they didn't take him. A peckerwood took him and let the Yankees get +him. I have heard that they bothered plenty of other places. Took the +best mules, and left old broken down ones and things like that. Broke +things up. I have heard that about other places, but I didn't see any of +it.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Right after the War</b></p> + +<p>"Right after the War, my father went to farming—renting land. I mean he +sharecropped and done around. Thing is come way up from then when the +Negroes first started. They didn't have no stock nor nothin' then. They +made a crop just for the third of it. When they quit the third, they +started givin' them two-fifths. That's more than a third, ain't it? Then +they moved up from that, and give them half, and they are there yet. If +you furnish, they give you two-thirds and take one-third. Or they give +you so much per acre or give him produce in rent.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Marriage</b></p> + +<p>"I was married in 1883. My wife's name was Mary Elston. Her mother died +when she was an infant. Her grandmother was an Elston at first. Then she +changed her name to Cunningham. But she always went in the name of +Elston, and was an Elston when she married me. My wife I mean. I married +on a Thursday in the Christmas week. This December I will be married +fifty-five years. This is the only wife I have ever had. We had three +children and all of them are dead. All our birthed children are dead. +One of them was just three months old when he died. My baby girl had +three children and she lived to see all of them married.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Opinions</b></p> + +<p>"Our own folks is about the worst enemies we have. They will come and +sweet talk you and then work against you. I had a fellow in here not +long ago who came here for a dollar, and I never did hear from him again +after he got it. He couldn't get another favor from me. No man can fool +me more than one time. I have been beat out of lots of money and I have +got hurt trying to help people.</p> + +<p>"The young folks now is just gone astray. I tell you the truth, I +wouldn't give you forty cents a dozen for these young folks. They are +sassy and disrespectful. Don't respect themselves and nobody else. When +they get off from home, they'll respect somebody else better 'n they +will their own mothers.</p> + +<p>"If they would do away with this stock law, they would do better +everywhere. If you would say fence up your place and raise what you +want, I could get along. But you have to keep somebody to watch your +stock. If you don't, you'll have to pay something out. It's a bad old +thing this stock law. It's detrimental to the welfare of man."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MannLewis"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Lewis Mann<br> + 1501 Bell Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 81</h3> +<br> + +<p>"As nigh as I can come at it, I was bout five or six time of the war. I +remember when the war ceasted. I was a good-sized chap.</p> + +<p>"Durin' the war my mother's master sent us to Texas; western Texas is +whar they stopped me. We stayed there two years and then they brought us +back after surrender.</p> + +<p>"I remember when the war ceasted and remember the soldiers refugeein' +through the country. I'm somewhar round eighty-one. I'm tellin' you the +truf. I ain't just now come here.</p> + +<p>"I was born right here in Arkansas. My mother's master was old B.D. +Williams of Tennessee and we worked for his son Mac H. Williams here in +Arkansas. They was good to my mother. Always had nurses for the colored +childrun while the old folks was in the field.</p> + +<p>"After the war I used to work in the house for my white folks—for Dr. +Bob Williams way up there in the country on the river. I stayed with his +brother Mac Williams might near twenty-five or thirty years. Worked +around the house servin' and doin' arrands different places.</p> + +<p>"I went to school a little bit a good piece after the war and learned to +read and write.</p> + +<p>"I've heard too much of the Ku Klux. I remember when they was Ku Kluxin' +all round through here.</p> + +<p>"Lord! I don't know how many times I ever voted. I used to vote every +time they had an election. I voted before I could read. The white man +showed me how to vote and asked me who I wanted to vote for. Oh Lord, I +was might near grown when I learned to read.</p> + +<p>"I been married just one time in my life and my wife's been dead +thirteen years.</p> + +<p>"I tell you, Miss, I don't know hardly what to think of things now. +Everything so changeable I can't bring nothin' to remembrance to hold +it.</p> + +<p>"I didn't do nothin' when I was young but just knock around with the +white folks. Oh Lord, when I was young I delighted in parties. Don't +nothin' like that worry me now. Don't go to no parades or nothin'. Don't +have that on my brain like I did when I was young. I goes to church all +the place I does go.</p> + +<p>"I ain't never had no accident. Don't get in the way to have no accident +cause I know the age I is if I injure these bones there ain't anything +more to me.</p> + +<p>"My mother had eight childrun and just my sister and me left. I can't do +a whole day's work to save my life. I own this place and my +sister-in-law gives me a little somethin' to eat. I used to be on the +bureau but they took me off that."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MartinAngeline"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Angeline Martin, Kansas City, Missouri<br> + Visiting at 1105 Louisiana St., Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age 80</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Well, I was livin' then. I was born in Georgia. Honey, I don't know +what year. I was born before the war. I was about ten when freedom come. +I don't remember when it started but I remember when it ended. I think +I'm in the 80's—that's the way I count it.</p> + +<p>"My master was dead and my mistress was a widow—Miss Sarah Childs. She +had a guardeen.</p> + +<p>"When the war come, old mistress and her daughter refugeed to +Mississippi. The guardeen wouldn't let me go, said I was too young.</p> + +<p>"My parents stayed on the plantation. My white folks' house was vacant +and the Yankees come and used it for headquarters. They never had put +shoes on me and when the Yankees shot the chickens I'd run and get em. +They didn't burn up nothin', just kill the hogs and chickens and give us +plenty.</p> + +<p>"I didn't know what the war was about. You know chillun in them days +didn't have as much sense as they got now.</p> + +<p>"After freedom, my folks stayed on the place and worked on the shares. I +want to school right after the war. I went every year till we left +there. We come to this country in seventy something. We come here and +stopped at the Cummins place. I worked in the field till I come to town +bout fifty years ago. Since then I cooked some and done laundry work.</p> + +<p>"I married when I was seventeen. Had six children. I been livin' in +Kansas City twenty-three years. Followed my boy up there. I like it up +there a lot better than I do here. Oh lord, yes, there are a lot of +colored people in Kansas City."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MartinJosie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Josie Martin<br> + R.F.D., Madison, Arkansas<br> +Age: 86</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born up near Cotton Plant but took down near Helena to live. My +parents named Sallie and Bob Martin. They had seven children. I heard +mother say she was sold on a block in Mississippi when she was twelve +years old. My father was a Creek Indian; he was dark. Mother was a +Choctaw Indian; she was bright. Mother died when I was but a girl and +left a family on my hands. I sent my baby brother and sister to school +and I cooked on a boarding train. The railroad hands working on the +tracks roomed and et on the train. They are all dead now and I'm 'lone +in the world.</p> + +<p>"My greatest pleasure was independence—make my money, go and spend it +as I see fit. I wasn't popular with men. I never danced. I did sell +herbs for diarrhea and piles and 'what ails you.' I don't sell no more. +Folks too close to drug stores now. I had long straight hair nearly to +my knees. It come out after a spell of typhoid fever. It never come in +to do no good." (Baldheaded like a man and she shaves. She is a +hermaphrodite, reason for never marrying.) "I made and saved up at one +time twenty-three thousand dollars cooking and field work. I let it slip +out from me in dribs.</p> + +<p>"I used to run from the Yankees. I've seen them go in droves along the +road. They found old colored couple, went out, took their hog and made +them barbecue it. They drove up a stob, nailed a piece to a tree stacked +their guns. They rested around till everything was ready. They et at +one o'clock at night and after the feast drove on. They wasn't so good +to Negroes. They was good to their own feelings. They et up all that old +couple had to eat in their house and the pig they raised. I reckon their +owners give them more to eat. They lived off alone and the soldiers +stopped there and worked the old man and woman nearly to death.</p> + +<p>"Our master told us about freedom. His name was Master Martin. He come +here from Mississippi. I don't recollect his family.</p> + +<p>"I get help from the Welfare. I had paralysis. I never got over my +stroke. I ain't no 'count to work."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MathisBeth"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Bess Mathis, Hazen, Arkansas<br> +Age: 82</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in De Sota County, Mississippi. My parents' owners was Mars +Hancock. Mama was a cook and field hand. Papa milked and worked in the +field. Mama had jes' one child, that me. I had six childern. I got five +livin'. They knowed they free. It went round from mouth to mouth. Mama +said Mars Hancock was good er slave holder as ever lived she recken. I +heard her come over that er good many times. But they wanted to be free. +I jes' heard em talk bout the Ku Klux. They said the Ku Klux made lot of +em roamin' round go get a place to live and start workin'. They tell how +they would ride at night and how scarry lookin' they was. I heard em say +if Mars Hancock didn't want to give em meat they got tree a coon or +possum. Cut the tree down or climb it and then come home and cook it. +They had no guns. They had dogs or could get one. Game helps out lots.</p> + +<p>"The women chewed for their children after they weaned em. They don't +none of em do that way now. Women wouldn't cut the baby's finger nails. +They bite em off. They said if you cut its nails off he would steal. +They bite its toe nails off, too. And if they wanted the children to +have long pretty hair, they would trim the ends off on the new of the +moon. That would cause the hair to grow long. White folks and darkies +both done them things.</p> + +<p>"I been doin' whatever come to hand—farmin', cookin', washin', ironin'.</p> + +<p>"I never expects to vote neither. I sure ain't voted.</p> + +<p>"Conditions pretty bad sometimes. I don't know what cause it. You got +beyond me now. I don't know what going become of the young folks, and +they ain't studyin' it. They ain't kind. Got no raisin' I call it. I +tried to raise em to work and behave. They work some. My son is takin' +care of me now."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MatthewsCaroline"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Caroline Matthews<br> + 812 Spruce Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 79</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes'm, I was born in slavery times in Mississippi. Now, the only thing +I remember was some soldiers come along on some mules. I remember my +mother and father was sittin' on the gallery and they say, 'Look a +there, them's soldiers.'</p> + +<p>"And I remember when my parents run off. I was with 'em and I cried for +'em to tote me.</p> + +<p>"My mother's first owner was named Armstrong. She said she was about +eleven years old when he bought her. I heard her say they just changed +around a lot.</p> + +<p>"Freedom was comin' and her last owners had carried her to a state where +it hadn't come yet. That's right—it was Texas.</p> + +<p>"Her first owners was good. She said they wouldn't 'low the overseer to +'buke the women at all.</p> + +<p>"But her last owners was cruel. She said one day old missis was out in +the yard and backed up and fell into a pan of hot water and when her +husband come she told him and he tried to 'buke my mother. You know if +somebody tryin' to get the best of you and you can help yourself, you +gwine do it. So mama throwed up her arm and old master hit it with a +stick and cut it bad. So my parents run off. That was in Texas.</p> + +<p>"She said we was a year comin' back and I know they stopped at the +Dillard place and made a crop. And they lost one child on the way—that +was Kittie.</p> + +<p>"I heard mama say they got back here to Arkansas and got to the bureau +and they freed 'em. I know the War wasn't over yet 'cause I know I heard +mama say, 'Just listen to them guns at Vicksburg.'</p> + +<p>"When I was little, I was so sickly. I took down with the whoopin' cough +and I was sick so long. But mama say to the old woman what stayed with +me, 'This gal gwine be here to see many a winter 'cause she so stout in +the jaws I can't give her no medicine.'</p> + +<p>"When I commenced to remember anything, I heered 'em talkin' 'bout Grant +and Colfax. Used to wear buttons with Grant and Colfax.</p> + +<p>"But I was livin' in Abraham Lincoln's time. Chillun them days didn't +know nothin'. Why, woman, I was twelve years old 'fore I knowed babies +didn't come out a holler log. I used to go 'round lookin' in logs for a +baby.</p> + +<p>"I had seven sisters and three brothers and they all dead but me. Had +three younger than me. They was what they called freeborn chillun.</p> + +<p>"After freedom my parents worked for Major Ross. I know when mama fixed +us up to go to Sunday-school we'd go by Major Ross for him to see us. I +know we'd go so early, sometimes he'd still be in his drawers.</p> + +<p>"I know one thing—when I was about sixteen years old things was good +here. Ever'body had a good living."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MaxwellMalindy"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Malindy Maxwell, Madison, Arkansas<br> +Age: Up in 80's</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born close to Como and Sardis, Mississippi. My master and +mistress was Sam Shans and Miss Cornelia Shans. I was born a slave. They +owned mama and Master Rube Sanders owned pa. Neither owner wouldn't sell +but they agreed to let ma and pa marry. They had a white preacher and +they married out in the yard and had a big table full of weddin' supper, +and the white folks et in the house. They had a big supper too. Ma said +they had a big crowd. The preacher read the ceremony. Miss Cornelia give +her a white dress and white shoes and Miss Cloe Wilburn give her a veil. +Miss Cloe was some connection of Rube Sanders.</p> + +<p>"They had seven children. I'm the oldest—three of us living.</p> + +<p>"After 'mancipation pa went to see about marrying ma over agen and they +told him that marriage would stand long as ever he lived.</p> + +<p>"Mama was sold at twelve years old in Atlanta, Georgia. Ma and pa was +always field hands. Grandma got to be one of John Sanders' leading hands +to work mong the women folks. They said John Sanders was meanest man +ever lived or died. According to pa's saying, Mars Ruben was a good +sorter man. Pa said John Sanders was too mean a man to have a wife. He +was mean to Miss Sarah. They said he beat her, his wife, like he beat a +nigger woman.</p> + +<p>"Miss Sarah say, 'Come get your rations early Saturday morning, clean +up your house, wash and iron, and we'll go to preaching +tomorrow—Sunday. I want you to all come out clean Monday morning.' They +go ask Mars John Sanders if they could go to preaching. I recken from +what they said they walked. Mars John, when they git their best clothes +on, make them turn round and go to the field and work all day long. He +was just that mean. Work all day long Sunday.</p> + +<p>"Miss Sarah was a Primitive Baptist and that is what I am till this day. +Some folks call us Hardshell Baptist. The colored folks set in the back +of the church. The women all set on one side and the men on the other. +If they had a middle row, there was a railing dividing mens' seats from +the womens' seats on the very same benches.</p> + +<p>"Miss Cloe, Miss Cornelia, and Miss Sarah cook up a whole lot of good +things to eat and go to camp meeting. Sometimes they would stay a week +and longer. They would take time bout letting the colored folks go long. +We had big times. My grandpa took a gingercake cutter with him and sold +gingercakes when they come out of the church. He could keep that money +his own. I don't know how he sold them. My sister has the cutter now I +expect. My girl has seen it. It was a foot long, this wide (5 inches), +and fluted all around the edges, and had a handle like a biscuit cutter. +They was about an inch thick. He made good ones and he sold all he could +ever make. Grandpa took carpet sacks to carry his gingercakes in to sell +them. I remember that mighty well. (The shape of the cutter was like +this: <img src="images/063.jpg" width="40" height="20" +alt="cutter"> ) He purt nigh always got to go to all the camp +meetings. Folks got happy and shouted in them days. It would be when +somebody got religion. At some big meetings they didn't shout.</p> + +<p>"When I was born they had a white mid-wife, Miss Martin. My mistress +was in the cabin when I was born. I was born foot foremost and had a +veil on my face and down on my body a piece. They call it a 'caul.' +Sometimes I see forms and they vanish. I can see some out of one eye +now. But I've always seen things when my sight was good. It is like when +you are dreaming at night but I see them at times that plain in day.</p> + +<p>"I don't know how old I am but I was a good size girl when 'mancipation +come on. Miss Cornelia had my age in her Bible. They done took me from +the cabin and I was staying at the house. I slept on a trundle bed under +Miss Cornelia's bed. Her bed was a teaster—way high up, had a big stool +to step on to go up in there and she had it curtained off. I had a good +cotton bed and I slept good up under there. Her bed was corded with sea +grass rope. It didn't have no slats like beds do now.</p> + +<p>"Colored folks slept on cotton beds and white folks—some of em at +least—picked geese and made feather beds and down pillows. They carded +and washed sheep's wool and put in their quilts. Some of them, they'd be +light and warm. Colored folks' bed had one leg. Then it was holes hewed +in the wall on the other three sides and wooden slats across it. Now +that wasn't no bad bed. Some of them was big enough for three to sleep +on good. When the children was small four could sleep easy cross ways, +and they slept that way.</p> + +<p>"They had shelves and tables and chairs. They made chests and put things +in there and set on top of it too. White folks had fine chests to keep +their bed clothes in. Some of them was made of oak, and pine, and +cypress. They would cook walnut hulls and bark and paint them dark with +the tea.</p> + +<p>"I recollect a right smart of the Civil War. We was close nough to hear +the roar and ramble and the big cannons shake the things in the house. I +don't know where they was fighting—a long ways off I guess.</p> + +<p>"I saw the soldiers scouting. They come most any time. They go in and +take every drop of milk out of the churn. They took anything they could +find and went away with it. I seen the cavalry come through. I thought +they looked so pretty. Their canteens was shining in the sun. Miss +Cornelia told me to hide, the soldiers might take me on with them. I +didn't want to go. I was very well pleased there at Miss Cornelia's.</p> + +<p>"I seen the cavalry come through that raised the 'white sheet.' I know +now it must have been a white flag but they called it a white sheet to +quit fighting. It was raised a short time after they passed and they +said they was the ones raised it. I don't know where it was. I reckon it +was a big white flag they rared up. It was so they would stop fighting.</p> + +<p>"Mars Sam Shan didn't go to no war; he hid out. He said it was a useless +war, he wasn't going to get shot up for no use a tall, and he never went +a step. He hid out. I don't know where. I know Charles would take the +baskets off. Charles tended to the stock and the carriage. He drove the +wagon and carriage. He fetched water and wood. He was a black boy. Mars +Sam Shan said he wasn't goiner loose his life for nothing.</p> + +<p>"Miss Cornelia would cook corn light bread and muffins and anything else +they had to cook. Rations got down mighty scarce before it was done wid. +They put the big round basket nearly big as a split cotton basket out on +the back portico. Charles come and disappear with it.</p> + +<p>"Chess and Charles was colored overseers. He didn't have white +overseers. Miss Cornelia and Miss Cloe would walk the floor and cry and +I would walk between. I would cry feeling sorry for them, but I didn't +know why they cried so much. I know now it was squally times. War is +horrible.</p> + +<p>"Mars Sam Shan come home, went down to the cabins—they was scattered +over the fields—and told them the War was over, they was free but that +they could stay. Then come some runners, white men. They was Yankee men. +I know that now. They say you must get pay or go off. We stayed that +year. Another man went to pa and said he would give him half of what he +made. He got us all up and we went to Pleasant Hill. We done tolerable +well.</p> + +<p>"Then he tried to buy a house and five acres and got beat out of it. The +minor heirs come and took it. I never learnt in books till I went to +school. Seem like things was in a confusion after I got big nough for +that. I'd sweep and rake and cook and wash the dishes, card, spin, hoe, +scour the floors and tables. I would knit at night heap of times. We'd +sing some at night.</p> + +<p>"Colored folks couldn't read so they couldn't sing at church lessen they +learnt the songs by hearing them at home. Colored folks would meet and +sing and pray and preach at the cabins.</p> + +<p>"My first teacher was a white man, Mr. Babe Willroy. I went to him +several short sessions and on rainy days and cold days I couldn't work +in the field. I worked in the field all my life. Cook out in the winter, +back to the field in the spring till fall again.</p> + +<p>"Well, I jes' had this one girl. I carried her along with me. She would +play round and then she was a heap of help. She is mighty good to me +now.</p> + +<p>"I never seen a Ku Klux in my life. Now, I couldn't tell you about +them.</p> + +<p>"My parents' names was Lou Sanders and Anthony Sanders. Ma's mother was +a Rockmore and her husband was a Cherokee Indian. I recollect them well. +He was a free man and was fixing to buy her freedom. Her young mistress +married Mr. Joe Bues and she heired her. Mr. Joe Bues drunk her up and +they come and got her and took her off. They run her to Memphis before +his wife could write to her pa. He was Mars Rockmore.</p> + +<p>"Grandma was put on a block and sold fore grandpa could cumerlate nough +cash to buy her for his wife. Grandma never seen her ma no more. Grandpa +followed her and Mr. Sam Shans bought her and took her to Mississippi +with a lot more he bought.</p> + +<p>"My pa's ma b'long to John Sanders and grandpa b'long to Rube Sanders. +They was brothers. Rube Sanders bought grandpa from Enoch Bobo down in +Mississippi. The Bobo's had a heap of slaves and land. Now, he was the +one that sold gingercakes. He was a blacksmith too. Both my grandpas was +blacksmiths but my Indian grandpa could make wagons, trays, bowls, +shoes, and things out of wood too. Him being a free man made his living +that way. But he never could cumolate enough to buy grandma.</p> + +<p>"My other grandma was blacker than I am and grandpa too. When grandpa +died he was carried back to the Bobo graveyard and buried on Enoch +Bobo's place. It was his request all his slaves be brought back and +buried on his land. I went to the burying. I recollect that but ma and +pa had to ask could we go. We all got to go—all who wanted to go. It +was a big crowd. It was John Sanders let us go mean as he was.</p> + +<p>"Miss Cornelia had the cistern cleaned out and they packed up their +pretty china dishes and silver in a big flat sorter box. Charles took +them down a ladder to the bottom of the dark cistern and put dirt over +it all and then scattered some old rubbish round, took the ladder out. +The Yankees never much as peared to see that old open cistern. I don't +know if they buried money or not. They packed up a lot of nice things. +It wasn't touched till after the War was over.</p> + +<p>"I been farming and cooking all my life. I worked for Major Black, Mr. +Ben Tolbert, Mr. Williams at Pleasant Hill, Mississippi. I married and +long time after come to Arkansas. They said you could raise stock +here—no fence law.</p> + +<p>"I get $8 and commodities because I am blind. I live with my daughter +here."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MaxwellNellie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Nellie Maxwell, Biscoe, Arkansas<br> +Age: 63</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Mama was Harriett Baldwin. She was born in Virginia. Her owners was +Mistress Mollie Fisher and Master Coon Fisher. It was so cold one winter +that they burned up their furniture keeping a fire. Said seemed like +they would freeze in spite of what all they could do.</p> + +<p>"Grandpa was sold away from grandma and three children. He didn't want +to be sold nary bit. When they would be talking about selling him he go +hide under the house. They go on off. He'd come out. When he was sold he +went under there. He come out and went on off when they found him and +told him he was sold to this man. Grandma said he was obedient. They +never hit him. He was her best husband. They never sold grandma and she +couldn't 'count for him being let go. Grandma had another husband after +freedom and two more children. They left there in a crowd and all come +to Arkansas. Grandma was a cook for the field hands. She had charge of +ringing a big dinner-bell hung up in a tree. She was black as charcoal. +Mama and grandma said Master Coon and old Mistress Mollie was good to +them. That the reason grandpa would go under the house. He didn't want +to be sold. He never was seen no more by them.</p> + +<p>"Grandma said sometimes the meals was carried to the fields and they fed +the children out of troughs. They took all the children to the spring +set them in a row. They had a tubful of water and they washed them dried +them and put on their clean clothes. They used homemade lye soap and +greased them with tallow and mutton suet. That made them shine. They +kept them greased so their knees and knuckles would ruff up and bleed.</p> + +<p>"Grandma and mama stopped at Fourche Dam. They was so glad to be free +and go about. Then it scared them to hear talk of being sold. It divided +them and some owners was mean.</p> + +<p>"In my time if I done wrong most any grown person whoop me. Then mama +find it out, she give me another one. I got a double whooping.</p> + +<p>"Times is powerful bad to raise up a family. Drinking and gambling, and +it takes too much to feed a family now. Times is so much harder that way +then when I was growing."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MayAnn"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Sallie C. Miller<br> +Person interviewed: Ann May, Clarksville, Arkansas<br> +Age: 82</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born at Cabin Creek (Lamar now, but I still call it Cabin Creek. +I can't call it anything else). I was sold with my mother when I was a +little girl and lived with our white folks until after the war and was +freed. We lived on a farm. My father belong to another family, a +neighbor of ours. We all lived with the white folks. My mother took care +of all of them. They was always as good as they could be to us and after +the war we stayed on with the white folks who owned my father and worked +on the farm for him. His master gave us half of everything we made until +we could get started our selves, then our white folks told my father to +homestead a place near him, and he did. We lived there until after +father died. We paid taxes and lived just like the white folks. We did +what the white folks told us to do and never lost a thing by doing it. +After I married my husband worked at the mill for your father and made a +living for me and I worked for the white folks. Now I am too old to cook +but I have a few washin's for the white folks and am getting my old age +pension that helps me a lot.</p> + +<p>"I don't know what I think about the young generation. I aim at my +stopping place.</p> + +<p>"The songs we sang were</p> + +<pre> +'Come ye that love the Lord and let your Joys be known' +'When You and I Were Young, Maggie' +'Juanita' +'Just Before the Battle, Mother' +'Darling Nellie Gray' +'Carry Me Back to Old Virginia' +'Old Black Joe' +</pre> + +<p>Of course we sang 'Dixie.' We had to sing that, it was the leading +song."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MayesJoe"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Joe Mayes, Madison, Arkansas<br> +Age: ?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born a slave two years. I never will forget man come and told +mother she was free. She cooked. She never worked in the field till +after freedom. In a few days another man come and made them leave. They +couldn't hold them in Kentucky. The owners give her provisions, meat, +lasses, etc. They give her her clothes. She had four children and I was +her youngest. The two oldest was girls. Father was dead. I don't +remember him. Mother finally made arrangements to go to Will Bennett's +place.</p> + +<p>"Another thing I remember: Frank Hayes sold mother to Isaac Tremble +after she was free. She didn't know she was free. Neither did Isaac +Tremble. I don't know whether Frank Mayes was honest or not. The part I +remember was that us boys stood on the block and never was parted from +her. We had to leave our sisters. One was sold to Miss Margaret Moxley, +the other to Miss Almyra Winder. (He said "Miss" but they may have been +widows. He didn't seem to know—ed.) Father belong to a Master Mills. +All our family got together after we found out we had been freed.</p> + +<p>"The Ku Klux: I went to the well little after dark. It was a good piece +from our house. I looked up and saw a man with a robe and cap on. It +scared me nearly to death. I nearly fell out. I had heard about the +'booger man' and learned better then. But there he was. I had heard a +lot about Ku Klux.</p> + +<p>"There was a big gourd hanging up by the well. We kept it there. There +was a bucket full up. He said, 'Give me water.' I handed over the gourd +full. He done something with it. He kept me handing him water. He said, +'Hold my crown and draw me up another bucket full.' I was so scared I +lit out hard as I could run. It was dark enough to hide me when I got a +piece out of his way.</p> + +<p>"The owners was pretty good to mother to be slavery. She had clothes and +enough to eat all the time. I used to go back to see all our white folks +in Kentucky. They are about all dead now I expect. Mother was glad to be +free but for a long time her life was harder.</p> + +<p>"After we got up larger she got along better. I worked on a steamboat +twelve or thirteen years. I was a roustabout and freight picker. I was +on passenger boats mostly but they carried freight. I went to school +some. I always had colored teachers. I farmed at Hughes and Madison ever +since excepting one year in Mississippi.</p> + +<p>"I live alone. I get $8 and commodities from the Sociable Welfare.</p> + +<p>"The young folks would do better, work better, if they could get work +all time. It is hard at times to get work right now. The times is all +right. Better everything but work. I know colored folks is bad managers. +That has been bad on us always.</p> + +<p>"I worked on boats from Evansville, St. Louis, Memphis to New Orleans +mostly. It was hard work but a fine living. I was stout then."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MeeksJesse"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Jesse Meeks<br> + 707 Elm Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 76<br> +Occupation: Minister</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I am seventy-six. 'Course I was young in slavery times, but I can +remember some things. I remember how they used to feed us. Put milk and +bread or poke salad and corn-meal dumplin's in a trough and give you a +wooden spoon and all the children eat together.</p> + +<p>"We stayed with our old master fourteen years. They were good folks and +treated us right. My old master's name was Sam Meeks—in Longview, Drew +County, Arkansas, down here below Monticello.</p> + +<p>"I got a letter here about a month ago from the daughter of my young +mistress. I wrote to my young mistress and she was dead, so her daughter +got the letter. She answered it and sent me a dollar and asked me was I +on the Old Age Pension list.</p> + +<p>"As far as I know, I am the onliest one of the old darkies living that +belonged to Sam Meeks.</p> + +<p>"I remember when the Ku Klux run in on my old master. That was after the +War. He was at the breakfast table with his wife. You know in them days +they didn't have locks and keys. Had a hole bored through a board and +put a peg in it, and I know the Ku Klux come up and stuck a gun through +the auger hole and shot at old master but missed him. He run to the door +and shot at the Ku Klux. I know us children found one of 'em down at the +spring bathin' his leg where old master had shot him.</p> + +<p>"Oh! they were good folks and treated us right."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MeeksJesse2"></a> +<h3>FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Subject: Superstitions<br> +Story:—Information<br> +<br> +This information given by: Jesse Meeks<br> +Place of residence: 707 Elm Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Occupation: Minister<br> +Age: 76</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>"I remember there was on old man called Billy Mann lived down here at +Noble lake. He said he could 'give you a hand.' If you and your wife +wasn't gettin' along very well and you wanted to get somebody else, he +said he could 'give you a hand' and that would enable you to get anybody +you wanted. That's what he said.</p> + +<p>"And I've heard 'em say they could make a ring around you and you +couldn't get out.</p> + +<p>"I don't believe in that though 'cause I'm in the ministerial work and +it don't pay me to believe in things like that. That is the work of the +devil."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MetcalfJeff"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Jeff Metcalf<br> + R.F.D., Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 73</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My mother's name was Julia Metcalf and my father's name was Jim +Metcalf. They belong to an old bachelor named Bill Metcalf. I think I +was born in Lee County, Mississippi. They did not leave when the war was +over. They stayed on the Bill Metcalf place till they died. I reckon I +do remember him.</p> + +<p>"I can't tell you 'bout the war nor slavery. I don't know a thing 'bout +it. I heard but I couldn't tell you it been so long ago. They didn't +expect nothing but freedom. They got along in the Reconstruction days +about like they had been getting along. Seemed like they didn't know +much about the war. They heard they was free. I don't remember the Ku +Klux Klan. I heard old folks talk 'bout it.</p> + +<p>"I don't know if my father ever voted but I guess he did. I have voted +but I don't vote now. In part I 'proves of the women votin'. I think the +men outer vote and support his family fur as he can.</p> + +<p>"I come here in 1914 from Mississippi. I got busted farmin'. I knowed a +heap o' people said they was doing so well I come too. I come on the +train.</p> + +<p>"I ain't got no home, no land. I got a hog. No garden. Two times in the +year now is hard—winter and simmer. In some ways times is better. In +some ways they is worser. When a trade used to be made to let you have +provisions, you know you would not starve. Now if you can't get work you +'bout starve and can't get no credit. Crops been good last few years and +prices fair fur it. But money won't buy nothin' now. Everything is so +high. Meat is so high. Working man have to eat meat. If he don't he get +weak.</p> + +<p>"The young folks do work. They can't save much farmin'. If they could do +public work between times it be better. I had a hard time in July and +August. I got six children, they grown and gone. My wife is 72 years +old. She ain't no 'count for work no more. The Government give me an' +her $10 a month between us two. Her name is Hannah Metcalf.</p> + +<p>"I wish I did know somethin' to tell you, lady, 'bout the Civil War and +the slavery times. I done forgot 'bout all I heard 'em talkin'. When you +see Hannah she might know somethin'."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MillerHardy"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Hardy Miller<br> + 702-1/2 W. Second Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 85<br> +Occupation: Yardman</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Mistress, I'll tell you what my mother said. She said she birthed me on +Christmas morning in 1852 in Sumpter County, Georgia. It was on her old +master's place. Bright Herring was his name. Old mistress' name was Miss +Lizzie. My father belonged to a different owner.</p> + +<p>"Mac McClendon and John Mourning was two nigger traders and they brought +my mother and sister Nancy and sister Liza and my sister Anna and Hardy +Miller—that's me—out here on the train from Americus, Georgia to +Memphis and put us on a steamboat and brought us here to Pine Bluff and +sold me to Dr. Pope. He was a poor white man and he wanted a pair of +niggers. He bought me and Laura Beckwith. In them days a doctor examined +you and if your heart was sound and your lungs was sound and you didn't +have no broken bones—have to pay one hundred dollars for every year you +was old. That was in 1862 and I was ten years old so they sold me for +one thousand dollars and one thousand dollars for Laura cause she was +sound too. Carried us down to Monticello and when I got free my mammy +come after me.</p> + +<p>"Fore I left Georgia, my daddy belonged to a man named Bill Ramsey. You +see niggers used the name of their masters.</p> + +<p>"I can remember when I was a boy Bill Ramsey set my father free and give +him a free pass and anybody hire him have to pay just like they pay a +nigger now. My daddy hired my mammy from her master. My mammy was her +master's daughter by a colored woman.</p> + +<p>"My daddy had a hoss named Salem and had a cart and he would take me +and my mammy and my sister Liza and go to Americus and buy rations for +the next week.</p> + +<p>"I member when the war started in 1861 my mammy hired me out to Mrs. +Brewer and she used to git after me and say, 'You better do that good or +I'll whip you. My husband gone to war now on account of you niggers and +it's a pity you niggers ever been cause he may get killed and I'll never +see him again.'</p> + +<p>"I member seein' General Bragg's men and General Steele and General +Marmaduke. Had a fight down at Mark's Mill. We just lived six miles from +there. Seen the Yankees comin' by along the big public road. The Yankees +whipped and fought em so strong they didn't have time to bury the dead. +We could see the buzzards and carrion crows. I used to hear old mistress +say, 'There goes the buzzards, done et all the meat off.' I used to go +to mill and we could see the bones. Used to got out and look at their +teeth. No ma'm, I wasn't scared, the white boys was with me.</p> + +<p>"Dr. Pope was good to me, better to me than he was to Master Walter and +Master Billy and my young Miss, Aurelia, cause me and Laura was scared +of em and we tried to do everything they wanted.</p> + +<p>"When the war ended in 1865 we was out in the field gettin' pumpkins. +Old master come out and said, 'Hardy, you and Laura is free now. You can +stay or you can go and live with somebody else.' We stayed till 1868 and +then our mammies come after us. I was seventeen.</p> + +<p>"After freedom my mammy sent me to school. Teacher's name was W.H. +Young. Name was William Young but he went under the head of W.H. Young.</p> + +<p>"I went to school four years and then I got too old. I learned a whole +lot. Learned to read and spell and figger. I done pretty good. I learned +how to add and multiply and how to cancel and how to work square root.</p> + +<p>"What I've been doin' all my life is farmin' down at Fairfield on the +Murphy place.</p> + +<p>"Vote? Good lord! I done more votin'. Voted for all the Presidents. +Yankees wouldn't let us vote Democrat, had to vote Republican. They'd be +there agitatin'. Stand right there and tell me the ones to vote for. I +done quit votin'. I voted for Coolidge—we called him College—that's +the last votin' I did. One of my friends, Levi Hunter, he was a colored +magistrate down at Fairfield.</p> + +<p>"Ku Klux? What you talkin' about? Ku Klux come to our house. My sister +Ellen's husband went to war on the Yankee side durin' the war—on the +Republican side and fought the Democrats.</p> + +<p>"After the war the Ku Klux came and got the colored folks what fought +and killed em. I saw em kill a nigger right off his mule. Fell off on +his sack of corn and the old mule kep' on goin'.</p> + +<p>"Ku Klux used to wear big old long robe with bunches of cotton sewed all +over it. I member one time we was havin' church and a Ku Klux was hid up +in the scaffold. The preacher was readin' the Bible and tellin' the +folks there was a man sent from God and say an angel be here directly. +Just then the Ku Klux fell down and the niggers all thought 'twas the +angel and they got up and flew.</p> + +<p>"Ku Klux used to come to the church well and ask for a drink and say, 'I +ain't had a bit of water since I fought the battle of Shiloh.'</p> + +<p>"Might as well tell the truth—had just as good a time when I was a +slave as when I was free. Had all the hog meat and milk and everything +else to eat.</p> + +<p>"I member one time when old master wasn't at home the Yankees come and +say to old mistress, 'Madam, we is foragin'.' Old mistress say, 'My +husband ain't home; I can't let you.' Yankees say, 'Well, we're goin' to +anyway.' They say, 'Where you keep your milk and butter?' Old mistress +standin' up there, her face as red as blood and say, 'I haven't any milk +or butter to spare.' But the Yankees would hunt till they found it.</p> + +<p>"After a battle when the dead soldiers was layin' around and didn't have +on no uniform cause some of the other soldiers took em, I've heard the +old folk what knowed say you could tell the Yankees from the Rebels +cause the Yankees had blue veins on their bellies and the Rebels didn't.</p> + +<p>"Now you want me to tell you bout this young nigger generation? I never +thought I'd live to see this young generation come out and do as well as +they is doin'. I'm goin' tell you the truth. When I was young, boys and +girls used to wear long white shirt come down to their ankles, cause it +would shrink, with a hole cut out for their head. I think they is doin' +a whole lot better. Got better clothes. Almost look as well as the white +folks. I just say the niggers dressin' better than the white folks used +to.</p> + +<p>"Then I see some niggers got automobiles. Just been free bout +seventy-two years and some of em actin' just like white folks now.</p> + +<p>"Well, good-bye—if I don't see you again I'll meet you in Heaven."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MillerHK"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Beulah Sherwood Hagg<br> +Person interviewed: [HW: Henry Kirk] H.K. Miller<br> + 1513 State Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 86</h3> +<br> + +<p>"No ma'am, it will not bother me one bit if you want to have a long +visit with me.... Yes, I was a little busy, but it can wait. I was +getting my dishes ready for a party tomorrow night.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, I was born during slavery. I was born at a little place +called Fort Valley in Georgia, July 25, 1851. Fort Valley is about 30 +miles from Macon. I came to Little Rock in 1873. My old mistress was a +widow. As well as I can remember she did not have any slaves but my +father and mother and the six children. No ma'am, her name was not +Miller, it was Wade.... Where did I get my name, then? It came from my +grandfather on my father's side.... Well, now, Miss, I can't tell you +where he got that name. From some white master, I reckon.</p> + +<p>"We got free in Georgia June 15, 1865. I'll never forget that date. What +I mean is, that was the day the big freedom came. But we didn't know it +and just worked on. My father was a shoemaker for old mistress. Only one +in town, far as I recollect. He made a lot of money for mistress. Mother +was houseworker for her. As fast as us children got big enough to hire +out, she leased us to anybody who would pay for our hire. I was put out +with another widow woman who lived about 20 miles. She worked me on her +cotton plantation. Old mistress sold one of my sisters; took cotton for +pay. I remember hearing them tell about the big price she brought +because cotton was so high. Old mistress got 15 bales of cotton for +sister, and it was only a few days till freedom came and the man who had +traded all them bales of cotton lost my sister, but old mistress kept +the cotton. She was smart, wasn't she? She knew freedom was right there. +Sister came right back to my parents.</p> + +<p>"Just give me time, miss, and I'll tell you the whole story. This woman +what had me hired tried to run away and take all her slaves along. I +don't remember just how many, but a dozen or more. Lots of white folks +tried to run away and hide their slaves until after the Yankee soldiers +had been through the town searching for them what had not been set free. +She was trying to get to the woods country. But she got nervous and +scared and done the worst thing she could. She run right into a Yankee +camp. Course they asked where we all belonged and sent us where we +belonged. They had always taught us to be scared of the Yankees. I +remember just as well when I got back to where my mother was she asked +me: "Boy, why you come here? Don't you know old mistress got you rented +out? You're goin' be whipped for sure." I told her, no, now we got +freedom. That was the first they had heard. So then she had to tell my +father and mother. She tole them how they have no place to go, no +money,—nothing to start life on; they better stay on with her. So my +father and mother kept on with her; she let them have a part of what +they made; she took some for board, as was right. The white ladies what +had me between them fixed it up that I would serve out the time I was +rented out for. It was about six months more. My parents saved money and +we all went to a farm. I stayed with them till I was 19 years old. Of +course they got all the money I made. I married when I was 20, still +living in Georgia. We tried to farm on shares. A man from Arkansas came +there, getting up a colony of colored to go to Arkansas to farm. Told +big tales of fine land with nobody to work it. Not half as many Negroes +in Arkansas as in Georgia. Me and my wife joined up to go.</p> + +<p>"Well, ma'am, I didn't get enough education to be what you call a +educated man. My father paid for a six months night course for me after +peace. I learned to read and write and figure a little. I have used my +tablespoon full of brains ever since, always adding to that start. I +learned everything I could from the many white friends I have had. Any +way, miss, I have known enough to make a good living all these years.</p> + +<p>"Now I'll get on with the story. First work I got in Arkansas was +working on a farm; me and her both; we always tried to stay together. We +could not make anything on the Garner farm, and it was mighty unhealthy +down in Fourche bottoms. I carried her back to Little Rock and I got +work as house man in the Bunch home. From there I went to the home of +Dudley E. Jones and stayed there 28 years. That was the beginning of my +catering. I just naturally took to cooking and serving. White folks was +still used to having colored wait on them and they liked my style. Mr. +Jones was so kind. He told his friends about how I could plan big +dinners and banquets; then cook and serve them. Right soon I was +handling most of the big swell weddings for the society folks. Child, if +I could call off the names of the folks I have served, it would be +mighty near everybody of any consequence in Little Rock for more than +55 years. Yes ma'am, I'm now being called on to serve the grandchildren +of my first customers.</p> + +<p>"During the 28 years I lived in Mr. Jones' family I was serving +banquets, big public dinners, all kinds of big affairs. I have had the +spring and fall banquets for the Scottish Rite Masons for more than 41 +years. I have served nearly all the Governor's banquets, college +graduation and reunion parties; I took care of President Roosevelt—not +this one, but Teddy----. Served about 600 that day. Any big parties for +colored people?... Yes ma'am! Don't you remember when Booker T. +Washington was here?... No ma'am. White folks didn't have a thing to do +with it, excepting the city let us have the new fire station. It was +just finished but the fire engines ain't moved in yet. I served about +600 that time. Yes ma'am, there was a lot of white folks there. Then, I +have been called to other places to do the catering. Lonoke, Benton, +Malvern, Conway—a heap of places like that.</p> + +<p>"No miss, I didn't always have all the catering business; oh, no. There +was Mr. Rossner. He was a fine man. White gentleman. I used to help him +a lot. But when he sold out to Bott, I got a lot of what business Mr. +Rossner had had, Mr. Bott was a Jew. All that time my wife was my best +helper. I took a young colored fellow named Freeling Alexander and +taught him the business. He never been able to make it go on his own, +but does fine working on salary. He has a cafeteria now.</p> + +<p>"Well thank you miss, speaking about my home like that. Yes ma'am, I +sure do own it. Fifty-two years I been living right here. First I +bought the lot; it took me two years to pay for it. Next I build a +little house. The big pin oak trees out front was only saplings when I +set them out. Come out in the back yard and see my pecan tree.... It is +a giant, ain't it? Yes ma'am, it was a tiny thing when I set it out +fifty-two years ago. Our only child was born in this house,—a dear +daughter—and her three babies were born here too. After my wife and +daughter died, me and the children kept on trying to keep the home +together. I have taught them the catering business. Both granddaughters +are high school graduates. The boy is in Mexico. Before he went he +signed his name to a check and said: "Here, grandpa. You ain't going to +want for a thing while I'm gone. If something happens to your catering +business, or you get so you can't work, fill this in for whatever you +need." But thank the good Lord, I'm still going strong. Nobody has ever +had to take care of H.K. Miller. Now let me tell you something else +about this place. For more than ten years I have been paying $64.64 +every year for my part of that asphalt paving you see out in front. Yes +ma'am, the lot is 50 foot front, and I am paying for only half of it; +from my curb line to the middle of the street. Maybe if I live long +enough I'll get it paid for sometime.</p> + +<p>"I haven't tried to lay by much money. I don't suppose there is any +other colored man—uneducated like me—what has done more for his +community. I have given as high as $80 and $100 at one time to help out +on the church debt or when they wanted to build. I always help in times +of floods and things like that. I've helped many white persons in my +lifetime.</p> + +<p>"Well, now, I'll tell you what I think about the voting system. I think +this. Of course we are still in subjection to the white people; they are +in the majority and have most of the government on their side. But I +think that, er,—er,—well I'll tell you, while it is all right for them +to be at the head of things, they ought to do what is right. Being +educated, they ought to know right from wrong. I believe in the Bible, +miss. Look here. This little book—Gospel of St. John—has been carried +in my pocket every day for years and years. And I never miss a day +reading it. I don't see how some people can be so unjust. I guess they +never read their Bible. The reason I been able to make my three-score +years and ten is because I obeys what the Good Book says.</p> + +<p>"Now, let me see. I can remember that I been voting mighty near ever +since I been here. I never had any trouble voting. I have never been +objected from voting that I remember of.</p> + +<p>"Now you ask about what I think of the young people. Well, I tell you. I +think really that the young people of today had better begin to check +up, a little. They are going too fast. They don't seem to have enough +consideration. When I see so many killed in automobile accidents, and +know that drinking is the cause of so many car accidents,—well, yes +ma'am, drinking sure does have a lot to do with it. I think they should +more consider the way they going to make a living. Make a rule to look +before they act. Another thing—the education being given them—they are +not taking advantage of it. If they would profit by what they learn they +could benefit theirselves. A lot of them now spend heap of time trying +to get to be doctors and lawyers and like that. That is a mistake. There +is not enough work among colored people to support them. I know. +Negroes do not have confidence in their race for this kind of business. +No ma'am. Colored will go for a white doctor and white lawyer 'cause +they think they know more about that kind of business. I would recommend +as the best means of making a living for colored young people is to +select some kind of work that is absolutely necessary to be done and +then do it honestly. The trades, carpentering, paper hanging, painting, +garage work. Some work that white people need to have done, and they +just as soon colored do it as white. White folks ain't never going to +have Negro doctors and lawyers, I reckon. That's the reason I took up +catering—even that long ago. Fifty-five years ago I knew to look around +and find some work that white folks would need done. There's where your +living comes from.</p> + +<p>"Yes, miss, my business is slack—falling off, as you say. Catering is +not what it used to be. You see, 30 or 40 years ago, people's homes were +grand and big; big dining rooms, built for parties and banquets. But for +the big affairs with 500 or 600 guests, they went to the hotels. Even +the hotels had to rent my dishes, silver and linens.... Oh, lord, yes, +miss. I always had my own. It took me ten years to save enough money to +start out with my first 500 of everything.... You want to see them?... +Sure, I keep them here at home.... Look. Here's my silver chests, all +packed to go. I have them divided into different sizes. This one has +fifty of every kind of silver, so if fifty guests are to be provided +for. I keep my linens, plates of different sizes, glasses and everything +the same way. A 200-guest outfit is packed in those chests over there. +No, ma'am, I don't have much trouble of losing silver, because it all +has my initials on; look: H.K.M. on every piece. Heap of dishes are +broken every time I have a big catering. I found one plate +yesterday—the last of a full pattern I had fifteen years ago. About +every ten years is a complete turnover of china. Glassware goes faster, +and of course, the linen is the greatest overhead. Yes ma'am, as I was +telling you, catering is slack because of clubs. So many women take +their parties to clubs now. Another thing, the style of food has +changed. In those old days, the table was loaded with three four meats, +fish, half dozen vegetable dishes, entrees, different kinds of wine, and +an array of desserts. Now what do they have? Liquid punch, frozen punch +and cakes. In June I had a wedding party for 400, and that's all they +served. I had to have 30 punch bowls, but borrowed about half from my +white friends.</p> + +<p>"You have got that wrong about me living with my grandchildren. No +ma'am! They are living with me. They make their home with me. I don't +expect ever to marry again. I'm 86. In my will I am leaving everything I +have to my three grandchildren.</p> + +<p>"Well, miss, you're looking young and blooming. Guess your husband is +right proud of you? Say you're a widow? Well, now, my goodness. Some of +these days a fine man going to find you and then, er—er, lady, let me +cater for the wedding?"</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MillerHenryKirk"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Henry Kirk Miller [HW: Same as H.K. Miller]<br> + 1513 State Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age 87 [HW: 86]</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I am eighty-six years old-eighty-six years and six months. I was born +July 25, 1851. I was a slave. Didn't get free till June 1865. I was a +boy fifteen years old when I got free.</p> + +<p>"I have been living in this house fifty years. I have been living in +Arkansas ever since 1873. That makes about sixty-five years.</p> + +<p>"The engineer who got killed in that wreck the other day (a wreck which +occurred February 7, 1938, Monday morning at three and in which the +engineer and five other people were killed) came right from my town, +Fort Valley, Georgia. I came here from there in 1873. I don't know +anybody living in Fort Valley now unless it's my own folks. And I don't +'spect I'd know them now. When I got married and left there, I was only +twenty-one years old.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Parents and Relatives</b></p> + +<p>"My mother and father were born in South Carolina. After their master +and missis married they came to Georgia. Back there I don't know. When I +remember anything they were in Georgia. They said they came from South +Carolina to Georgia. I don't know how they came. Both of my parents were +Negroes. They came to Arkansas ahead of me. I have their pictures." (He +carried me into the parlor and showed me life-sized bust portraits of +his mother and father.)</p> + +<p>"There were eighteen of us: six boys and twelve girls. They are all +dead now but myself and one sister. She lives in Atlanta, Georgia. I am +older than she is.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Occupation</b></p> + +<p>"I am a caterer. I have been serving the Scottish Rite Masons in their +annual reunion every six months for forty-one years. We are going to the +Seventh Street Entrance this Friday. One of the orders will have a +dinner and I am going down to serve it. I served the dinner for Teddy +Roosevelt there, thirty years ago. This Roosevelt is a cousin of his.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Masters</b></p> + +<p>"My parents' master was named Wade. When he died, I was so little that +they had to lift me up to let me see into the coffin so I could look at +him. I went to his daughter. My name is after my father's father. My +grandfather was named Miller. I took his name. He was a white man.</p> + +<p>"Wade's daughter was named Riley, but I keep my grandfather's name. My +mother and father were then transferred to the Rileys too, and they took +the name of Riley. It was after freedom that I took the name Miller from +my original people. Haven Riley's father was my brother." (Haven Riley +lives in Little Rock and was formerly an instructor at Philander Smith +College. Now he is a public stenographer and a private teacher.)</p> + +<p>"Wade owned all of my brothers and sisters and parents and some of my +kin—father's sister and brother. There might have been some more I +can't remember. Wade was a farmer.</p> + +<p>"I remember once when my mother and father were going to the field to +work, I went with them as usual. That was before Wade died and his +daughter drew us.</p> + +<p>"My wife died six years ago. If she had lived till tomorrow, she would +have been married to me sixty years. She died on the tenth of February +and we were married on the sixth. We just lacked five years of being +married sixty years when she died.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Food</b></p> + +<p>"For food, I don't know anything more than bread and meat. Meal, meat, +molasses were the only rations I saw. In those times the white people +had what was known as the white people's house and then what was known +as nigger quarters. The children that weren't big enough to work were +fed at the white people's house. We got milk and mush for breakfast. +When they boiled cabbage we got bread and pot-liquor. For supper we got +milk and bread. They had cows and the children were fed mostly on milk +and mush or milk and bread. We used to bake a corn cake in the ashes, +ash cake, and put it in the milk.</p> + +<p>"The chickens used to lay out in the barn. If we children would find the +nests and bring the eggs in our missis would give us a biscuit, and we +always got biscuits for Christmas.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Houses in the Negro Quarters</b></p> + +<p>"In the nigger quarters there were nothing but log houses. I don't +remember any house other than a log house. They'd just go out in the +woods and get logs and put up a log house. Put dirt and mud or clay in +the cracks to seal it. Notch the logs in the end to hitch them at +corners. Nailed planks at the end of the logs to make a door frame.</p> + +<p>"My people all ate and cooked and lived in the same room. Some of the +slaves had dirt floors and some of them had plank floors.</p> + +<p>"Food was kept in the house in a sort of box or chest, built in the +wall sometimes. Mostly it was kept on the table.</p> + +<p>"In cooking they had a round oven made like a pot only the bottom would +be flat. It had an iron top. The oven was a bought oven. It was shaped +like a barrel. The top lifted up. Coal was placed under the oven and a +little on top.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Tables and Chairs</b></p> + +<p>"Tables were just boards nailed together. Nothing but planks nailed +together. I don't remember nothing but homemade benches for chairs. They +sometimes made platted or split-bottom chairs out of white oak. Strips +of oak were seven feet long. They put them in water so they would bend +easily and wove them while they were flexible and fresh. The whole chair +bottom was made out of one strip just like in caning. Those chairs were +stouter than the chairs they make now."</p> + +<p>(To be continued) [TR: No continuation found.]</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MillerMatilda"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Annie L. LaCotts<br> +Person interviewed: Matilda Miller<br> + Humphrey, Ark.<br> +Age: 79</h3> +<br> + +<p>The day of the interview Matilda, a nice clean-looking Negro woman, was +in bed, suffering from some kind of a pain in her head. She lives in a +little two-room unpainted boxed house beside the highway in Humphrey. +Her house is almost in the shadow of the big tank which was put up +recently when the town acquired its water system.</p> + +<p>When told that the visitor wanted to talk with her about her early life, +Matilda said, "Well, honey, I'll tell you all I can, but you see, I was +just a little girl when the war was, but I've heard my mother tell lots +of things about then.</p> + +<p>"I was born a slave; my mother and daddy both were owned by Judge +Richard Gamble at Crockett's Bluff. I was born at Boone Hill—about +twelve miles north of DeWitt—and how come it named Boone Hill, that +farm was my young mistress's. Her papa give it to her, just like he give +me to her when I was little, and after she married Mr. Oliver Boone and +lived there the farm always went by the name of 'Boone Hill.' The house +is right on top of a hill, you know, it shure was a pretty place when +Miss Georgia lived there, with great big Magnolia trees in the front +yard. I belonged to Miss Georgia, my young mistress, and when the +niggers were freed my mamma staid on with her. She was right there when +both of his chillun were born, Mr. John Boone and Miss Mary, too. I +nursed <u>both</u> of them chillun. You know who Miss Mary is now, don't +you? Yes'um, she's Mr. Lester Black's wife and he's good, too.</p> + +<p>"I was de oney child my mother had till twelve years after the +surrender. You see, my papa went off with Yankees and didn't come back +till twelve years after we was free, and then I had some brothers and +sisters. Exactly nine months from the day my daddy come home, I had a +baby brother born. My mother said she knew my daddy had been married or +took up with some other woman, but she hadn't got a divorce and still +counted him her husband. They lived for a long time with our white +folks, for they were good to us, but you know after the boys and girls +got grown and began to marry and live in different places, my parents +wanted to be with them and left the white folks.</p> + +<p>"No mam, I didn't see any fighting, but we could hear the big guns +booming away off in the distance. I was married when I was 21 to Henry +Miller and lived with him 51 years and ten months; he died from old age +and hard work. We had two chillun, both girls. One of them lives here +with me in that other room. Mamma said the Yankees told the Negroes when +they got em freed they'd give em a mule and a farm or maybe a part of +the plantation they'd been working on for their white folks. She thought +they just told em that to make them dissatisfied and to get more of them +'to join up with em' and they were dressed in pretty blue clothes and +had nice horses and that made lots of the Negro men go with them. None +of em ever got anything but what their white folks give em, and just +lots and lots of em never come back after the war cause the Yankees put +them in front where the shooting was and they was killed. My husband +Henry Miller died four years ago. He followed public work and made +plenty of money but he had lots of friends and his money went easy too. +I don't spect I'll live long for this hurtin' in my head is awful bad +sometime."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MillerNathan"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Nathan Miller, Madison, Arkansas<br> +Age: Born in 1868</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Lady, I'll tell you what I know but it won't nigh fill your book.</p> + +<p>"I was born in 1862 south of Lockesburg, Arkansas. My parents was +Marther and Burl Miller.</p> + +<p>"They told me their owners come here from North Carolina in 1820. They +owned lots of slaves and lots of land. Mother was medium light—about my +color. See, I'm mixed. My hair is white. I heard mother say she never +worked in the field. Father was a blacksmith on the place. He wasn't a +slave. His grandfather willed him free at ten years of age. It was tried +in the Supreme Court. They set him free. Said they couldn't break the +dead man's will.</p> + +<p>"My father was a real bright colored man. It caused some disturbance. +Father went back and forth to Kansas. They tried to make him leave if he +was a free man. They said I would have to be a slave several years or +leave the State. Freedom settled that for me.</p> + +<p>"My great grandmother on my mother's side belong to Thomas Jefferson. He +was good to her. She used to tell me stories on her lap. She come from +Virginia to Tennessee. They all cried to go back to Virginia and their +master got mad and sold them. He was a meaner man. Her name was Sarah +Jefferson. Mariah was her daughter and Marther was my mother. They was +real dark folks but mother was my color, or a shade darker.</p> + +<p>"Grandmother said she picked cotton from the seed all day till her +fingers nearly bled. That was fore gin day. They said the more hills of +tobacco you could cultivate was how much you was worth.</p> + +<p>"I don't remember the Ku Klux. They was in my little boy days but they +never bothered me.</p> + +<p>"All my life I been working hard—steamboat, railroad, farming. Wore +clean out now.</p> + +<p>"Times is awful hard. I am worn clean out. I am not sick. I'm ashamed to +say I can't do a good day's work but I couldn't. I am proud to own I get +commodities and $8 from the Relief."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MillerSam"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lacy<br> +Person interviewed: Sam Miller, Morrilton, Arkansas<br> +Age: 98</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I is ninety-eight years old, suh. My name's Sam Miller, and I was born +in Texas in 1840—don't know de month nor de day. My parents died when I +was jes' a little chap, and we come to Conway County, Arkansas fifty +years ago; been livin' here ever since. My wife's name was Annie +Williamson. We ain't got no chillun and never had none. I don't belong +to no chu'ch, but my wife is a Baptis'.</p> + +<p>"Can't see to git around much now. No, suh, I can't read or write, +neither. My memory ain't so good about things when I was little, away +back yonder, but I sure members dem Ku Klux Klans and de militia. They +used to ketch people and take em out and whup em.</p> + +<p>"Don't rickolleck any of de old songs but one or two—oh, yes, dey used +to sing 'Old time religion's good enough for me' and songs like dat.</p> + +<p>"De young people! Lawzy, I jest dunno how to take em. Can't understand +em at all. Dey too much for me!"</p> +<br> + +<p>NOTE: The old fellow chuckled and shook his head but said very little +more. He could have told much but for his faulty memory, no doubt. He +was almost non-committal as to facts of slavery days, the War between +the States, and Reconstruction period. Has the sense of humor that seems +to be a characteristic of most of the old-time Negroes, but aside from a +whimsical chuckle shows little of the interest that is usually +associated with the old generation of Negroes.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MillerWD"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: W.D. Miller, West Memphis, Arkansas<br> +Age: 65?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Grandpa was sold twice in Raleigh, North Carolina. He was sold twice to +the same people, from the Millers to the Robertsons (Robersons, +Robinsons, etc.?). He said the Robertsons were not so very good to him +but the Millers were. Grandma was washing when a Yank come and told them +they had been sot free. They quit washing and went from house to house +rejoicing. My parents' names was Jesse and Mary Miller, and Grandma +Agnes and Grandpa Peter Miller. The Robertsons was hill wheat farmers. +The Millers had a cloth factory. Dan Miller owned it and he raised +wheat. Mama was a puny woman and they worked her in the factory. She +made cloth and yarn.</p> + +<p>"I was born in Raleigh, North Carolina or close by there. My father's +uncle John House brought about one hundred families from North Carolina +to Quittenden County, Mississippi. I was seven years old. He said they +rode mules to pick cotton, it growed up like trees. We come in car +boxes. I came to Heath and Helena eleven years ago. Papa stayed with his +master Dan Miller till my uncle tolled him away. He died with smallpox +soon after we come to Mississippi.</p> + +<p>"It is a very good country but they don't pick cotton riding on mules, +at least I ain't seed none that way."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MinserMose"></a> +<h3>El Dorado District<br> +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of Interviewer: Pernella Anderson<br> +Subject: Slavery Customs<br> +Story:—Information<br> +<br> +Information given by: Mose Minser—Farmer—Age—78<br> +Place of Residence: 5 miles from El Dorado—Section 8</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>Ah use ter could tawk an tell a thing plum well but ah been broke up by +a cah. Cah run ovah mah haid an ah couldn' tawk fuh 30 days. So now ah +aint no good fuh nothin. Ah recollect one night ah dream a dream. De +dream at ah dreamt, next morning dat dream come true. Jes like ah dreamt +hit. Yes hit did. Ah wuz heah in slavery time. Ah membuh when dey freed +us niggers. Se here, ah wuz a purty good size kid when dey free us. Ah +kin membuh our house. Sot dis way. An ole Marster called all his niggers +up. Dey all come along roun in a squad on de porch. Ah did not heah whut +he said tuh em. But mah step-pa wuz dere an tole us we wuz free. Ah +atter dey freed mah step-pa ah recollect he went on home and fried some +aigs (eggs) in de ubben. Know we didn have no stove we cooked on de +fiuhplace. As ah said cook dem aigs, gimme some uv hit, an he lef' den. +Went east and ah aint nevah seed dat man since. Ah membuhs once ah got a +whoopin bout goin tuh de chinquepin tree. Some uv um tole me ole master +wuz gwianter let us quit at dinnuh an so in place uv me goin ter dinnuh +ah went on by de chinquepin tree tuh git some chanks. Ah had a brothuh +wid me. So ah come tuh fine out dat dey gin tuh callin us. Dey hollered +tuh come on dat we wuz gointer pick cotton. So in place uv us goin on +tuh de house we went on back tuh de fiel'. Our fiel wuz bout a mile fum +de house. Ole Moster waited down dere at de gate. He call me when ah got +dere an wanted tuh know why ah didn come and git mah dinnah sos ah could +pick cotton. So he taken mah britches down dat day. Mah chinks all run +out on de groun' an he tole mah brothah tuh pick um up. Ah knocked mah +brothuh ovah fuh pickin um up an aftuh ah done dat ole moster taken his +red pocket han'cher out and tied hit ovah mah eyes tuh keep me fum seein +mah brothuh pick um up.</p> + +<p>So when he got through wid me and put mah britches back on me ah went +on tuh de fiel and went tuh pickin cotton. Dat evenin when us stop +pickin cotton ah took mah brothah down and taken mah chinquapins.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MintonGip"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Gip Minton, Des Arc, Arkansas<br> +Age: 84</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born at Jackson, Alabama on the Tennessee River. It was sho a +putty river. I never did know my grandfolks. I think my father was a +soldier. My master was a soldier, I think. He was in de war. I do +remember the Civil War. I remember the last battle at Scottsboro. There +was several but one big battle and they got to Belfontain. That is where +it seemed they were trying to go. I don't recollect who won the battle. +I heard them fighting and saw the smoke and after they went on saw the +bodies dead and all that was left was like a cyclone had swept by. There +was a big regiment stationed at Scottsboro. It was just like any war +fought with guns and they lived in tents. They took everything they +could find. Looked like starvation was upon de land.</p> + +<p>"I had two sisters and one brother and my mother died when I was a baby. +I come out here to Arkansas with my mothers old master and mistress and +never did see nor hear of none of them. No I never did hear from none of +them. I come out here when I was ten or twelve years old. It was, it was +right after the war. I recken I was freed, but I was raised by white +folks and I stayed right on wid em. Dat freedom ain't never bothered me.</p> + +<p>"My master and mistress names was Master Alfred Minton. Dey call me Gip +for him. Gip Minton is what they always called me. My mistress was Miss +Annie Minton. I stayed right wid em. They raised me and I come on here +wid em. I don't know nothin about that freedom.</p> + +<p>"I recken they was good to me. I et in de kitchen when they got through +or on a table out in de back yard sometimes. I slept in an outhouse they +fixed up mostly, when I got up big.</p> + +<p>"We come on the train to Memphis and they come on thater way to Lonoke +whar we settled. Don Shirley was the man I come on horseback with from +Memphis to Lonoke. He was a man what dealt in horses. Sure he was a +white man. He's where we got some horses. I don't remember if he lived +at Lonoke or not.</p> + +<p>"I have voted, yes ma'am, a heap of times. I don't remember what kind er +ticket I votes. I'm a Democrat, I think so. I ain't voted fur sometime +now. I don't know if I'll vote any more times or not. I don't know what +is right bout votin and what ain't right.</p> + +<p>"When I was a boy I helped farm. We had what we made. I guess it was +plenty. I had more to eat and I didn't have as many changes of clothes +as folks has to have nowdays bout all de difference. They raised lots +more. They bought things to do a year and didn't be allus goin to town. +It was hard to come to town. Yes mam it did take a long time, sometimes +in a ox wagon. The oxen pulled more over muddy roads. Took three days to +come to town and git back. I farmed one-half-for-the-other and on shear +crop. Well one bout good as the other. Bout all anybody can make farmin +is plenty to eat and a little to wear long time ago and nows the same +way. The most I reckon I ever did make was on Surrounded Hill (Biscoe) +when I farmed one-half-fur-de-udder for Sheriff Reinhardt. The ground +was new and rich and the seasons hit just fine. No maam I never owned no +farm, no livestock, no home. The only thing I owned was a horse one +time. I worked 16 or 17 years for Mr. Brown and for Mr. Plunkett and +Son. I drayed all de time fur em. Hauled freight up from the old depot +(wharf) down on the river. Long time fore a railroad was thought of. I +helped load cotton and hides on the boats. We loaded all day and all +night too heap o'nights. We worked till we got through and let em take +the ship on.</p> + +<p>"The times is critical for old folks, wages low and everything is so +high. The young folks got heap better educations but seems like they +can't use it. They don't know how to any avantage. I know they don't +have as good chances at farmin as de older folks had. I don't know why +it is. My son works up at the lumber yard. Yes he owns this house. +That's all he owns. He make nough to get by on, I recken. He works hard, +yes maam. He helps me if he can. I get $4 a month janitor at the Farmers +and Merchants Bank (Des Arc). I works a little garden and cleans off +yards. No maam it hurts my rheumatism to run the yard mower. I works +when I sho can't hardly go. Nothin matter cept I'm bout wo out. I plied +for the old folks penshun but I ain't got nuthin yet. I signed up at the +bank fur it agin not long ago. I has been allus self sportin. Didn't +pend on no livin soul but myself."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MitchellAJ"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: A.J. Mitchell<br> + 419 E. 11th Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 78<br> +Occupation: Garbage hauler</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was 'bout seven when they surrendered. I can remember when my old +master sold Aunt Susan. She raised me. I seen old master when he was +tryin' to whip old Aunt Susan. She was the cook. She said, 'I ain't +goin' let you whip me' and I heard my sister say next day he done sold +Aunt Susan. I ain't seed her since. I called her ma. My mother died when +I was two years old. She was full Injun. My father was black but his +hair was straight. His face was so black it shined. Looked like it was +greased. My father said he was freeborn and I've seen stripes on his +back look like the veins on back of my hand where they whipped him +tryin' to make him disown his freedom.</p> + +<p>"Old Jack Clifton was my master. Yes ma'm, that was his name.</p> + +<p>"I 'member when they had those old looms—makin' cloth and old shuttle +to put the thread on. I can see 'em now.</p> + +<p>"I can 'member when this used to be a Injun place. I've seen old Injun +mounds. White folks come and run 'em out and give 'em Injun Territory.</p> + +<p>"I heered the guns in the war and seed the folks comin' home when the +war broke. They said they was fitin' 'bout freedom, tryin' to free the +people. I 'member when they was fitin' at Marks Mill. I know some of the +people said that was where they was sot free.</p> + +<p>"I don't know as I seed any Ku Klux when they was goin' round. Hearin' +'bout 'em scared me. I have a good recollection. I can remember the +first dream I ever had and the first time I whistled. I can remember +when I was two or three years old. Remember when they had a big old +conch shell. Old master would blow it at twelve o'clock for 'em to come +in.</p> + +<p>"Old master was good to us but I 'member he had a leather strap and if +we chillun had done anything he'd make us younguns put our head 'tween +his legs and put that strap on us. My goodness! He called me Pat and +called his own son Bug—his own son Junie. We played together. Old +master had nicknames for everybody.</p> + +<p>"My first mistress was named Miss Mary but she died. I 'member when old +master married and brought Miss Becky home.</p> + +<p>"Marse John (he was old master's oldest son) he used to tote me about in +his saddle bags. He was the overseer.</p> + +<p>"I 'member old master's ridin' hoss—a little old bay pony—called him +Hardy. I never remember nobody else bein' on it—that was his ridin' +hoss.</p> + +<p>"Old master had dogs. One was Gus and one named Brute (he was a red bone +hound). And one little dog they called Trigger. Old master's head as +white as cotton.</p> + +<p>"I do remember the day they said the people was free—after the war +broke. My father come and got me.</p> + +<p>"Now I'm givin' you a true statement. I've been stayin' by myself +twenty-three years. I been here in Pine Bluff—well I jest had got here +when the people was comin' back from that German war.</p> + +<p>"My God, we had the finest time when we killed hogs—make sausage. We'd +eat cracklin's—oh, we thought they wasn't nothin' like cracklin's. The +Lord have mercy, there was an old beech tree set there in my master's +yard. You could hear that old tree pop ever' day bout the same time, +bout twelve o'clock. We used to eat beech mass. Good? Yes ma'm! I think +about it often and wonder why it was right in old master's yard.</p> + +<p>"I've cast a many a vote. Not a bit of trouble in the world. Hope elect +most all the old officers here in town. I had a brother was a constable +under Squire Gaines. Well of course, Miss, I don't think it's right when +they disfranchised the colored people. I tell you, Miss, I read the +Bible and the Bible says every man has his rights—the poor and the free +and the bound. I got good sense from the time I leaped in this world. I +'member well I used to go and cast my vote just that quick but they got +so they wouldn't let you vote unless you could read.</p> + +<p>"I've had 'em to offer me money to vote the Democrat ticket. I told him, +no. I didn't think that was principle. The colored man ain't got no +representive now. Colored men used to be elected to the legislature and +they'd go and sell out. Some of 'em used to vote the Democrat ticket. +God wants every man to have his birthright.</p> + +<p>"I tell you one thing they did. This here no fence law was one of the +lowest things they ever did. I don't know what the governor was studyin' +'bout. If they would let the old people raise meat, they wouldn't have +to get so much help from the government. God don't like that, God wants +the people to raise things. I could make a livin' but they won't let me.</p> + +<p>"The first thing I remember bout studyin' was Junie, old master's son, +studyin' his book and I heard 'em spell the word 'baker'. That was when +they used the old Blue Back Speller.</p> + +<p>"I went to school. I'm goin' tell you as nearly as I can. That was, +madam, let me see, that was in sixty-nine as near as I can come at it. +Miss, I don't know how long I went. My father wouldn't let me. I didn't +know nothin' but work. I weighed cotton ever since I was a little boy. I +always wanted to be weighin'. Looked like it was my gift—weighin' +cotton.</p> + +<p>"I'm a Missionary Baptist preacher. Got a license to preach. You go down +and try to preach without a license and they put you up.</p> + +<p>"Madam, you asked me a question I think I can answer with knowledge and +understanding. The young people is goin' too fast. The people is growin' +weaker and wiser. You take my folks—goin' to school but not doin' +anything. I don't think there's much to the younger generation. Don't +think they're doin' much good. I was brought up with what they called +fireside teachin'."</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 65%;"><br><br> +<a name="MitchellGracie"></a> +<h3>STATE—Arkansas<br> +NAME OF WORKER—Bernice Bowden<br> +ADDRESS—1006 Oak Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +DATE—November 2, 1938<br> +SUBJECT—Exslaves</h3> +<p>[TR: Repetitive information deleted from subsequent pages.]</p> +<br> +<p><b>Circumstances of Interview</b></p> + +<p>1. Name and address of informant—<big><b>Gracie Mitchell</b></big></p> + +<p>2. Date and time of interview—November 1, 1938, 3:00 p.m.</p> + +<p>3. Place of interview—117 Worthen Street</p> + +<p>4. Name and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with +informant—Bernice Wilburn, 101 Miller Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas</p> + +<p>5. Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you—None</p> + +<p>6. Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.—A frame house +(rented), bare floors, no window shades; a bed and some boxes and three +straight chairs. In an adjoining room were another bed, heating stove, +two trunks, one straight chair, one rocking chair. A third room the +kitchen, contained cookstove and table and chairs.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Text of Interview</b></p> + +<p>"They said I was born in Alabama. My mother's name was Sallie and my +father was Andrew Wheeler. I couldn't tell when I was born—my folks +never did tell me that. Belonged to Dr. Moore and when his daughter +married he give my mother to her and she went to Mobile. They said I +wasn't weaned yet. My grandmother told me that. She is dead now. Don't +know nothin' bout nary one o' my white folks. I don't recollect nothin' +bout a one of 'em 'cept my old boss. He took us to Texas and stayed till +the niggers was all free and then he went back. Good to me? No ma'm—no +good there. And if you didn't work he'd see what was the matter. Lived +near Coffeyville in Upshaw county. That's whar my husband found me. I +was living with my aunt and uncle. They said the reason I had such a +good gift makin' quilts was cause my mother was a seamstress.</p> + +<p>"I cooked 'fore I married and I could make my own dresses, piece quilts +and quilt. That's mostly what I done. No laundry work. I never did farm +till I was married. After we went to Chicago in 1922, I took care of +other folks chillun, colored folks, while they was working in laundries +and factories. I sure has worked. I ain't nobody to what I was when I +was first married. I knowed how to turn, but I don't know whar to turn +now—I ain't able.</p> + +<p>"I use to could plow just as good as any man. I could put that dirt up +against that cotton and corn. I'd mold it up. Lay it by? Yes ma'm I'd +lay it by, too.</p> + +<p>"They didn't send me to school but they learned me how to work.</p> + +<p>"I had a quilt book with a lot o' different patterns but I loaned it to +a woman and she carried it to Oklahoma. Mighty few people you can put +confidence in nowdays.</p> + +<p>"I don't go out much 'cept to church—folks is so critical.</p> + +<pre> +"You have to mind how you walk on the cross; +If you don't, your foot will slip, +And your soul will be lost." +</pre> + +<p>"I was a motherless chile but the Lord made up for it by givin' me a +good husband and I don't want for anything."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>According to her husband, Gracie spends every spare moment piecing +quilts. He said they use to go fishing and that Gracie always took her +quilt pieces along and if the fish were not biting she would sew. She +showed me twenty-two finished quilt tops, each of a different design and +several of the same design, or about thirty quilts in all. Two were +entirely of silk, two of applique design which called "laid work". They +were folded up in a trunk and as she took them out and spread them on +the bed for me to see she told me the name of the design. The following +are the names of the designs:</p> + +<pre> + 1. Breakfast Dish + 2. Sawtooth (silk) + 3. Tulip design (Laid work) + 4. "Prickle" Pear + 5. Little Boy's Breeches + 6. Birds All Over the Elements + 7. Drunkard's Path + 8. Railroad Crossing + 9. Cocoanut Leaf ("That's Laid Work") +10. Cotton Leaf +11. Half an Orange +12. Tree of Paradise +13. Sunflower +14. Ocean Wave (silk) +15. Double Star +16. Swan's Nest +17. Log Cabin in the Lane +18. Reel +19. Lily in de Valley (Silk) +20. Feathered Star +21. Fish Tail +22. Whirligig +</pre> + +<p>Gracie showed me her winter coat bought in Chicago of fur fabric called +moleskin, and with fur collar and cuffs.</p> + +<p>She sells the quilt tops whenever she can. Many are made of new material +which they buy.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Personal History of Informant</b></p> + +<p>1. Ancestry—Father, Andrew Wheeler; Sallie Wheeler, mother.</p> + +<p>2. Place and date of birth—Alabama. No date known, about 80 years old.</p> + +<p>3. Family—Husband and one grown son.</p> + +<p>4. Places lived in, with dates—Alabama, Texas till 1897, Arkansas +1897-1922, Chicago, 1922 to 1930. Arkansas 1930 to date.</p> + +<p>5. Education, with dates—No education.</p> + +<p>6. Occupations and accomplishments, with dates—Cooked before marriage +at 16; farmed after marriage; home sewing.</p> + +<p>7. Special skills and interests—Quilt making and knitting.</p> + +<p>8. Community and religious activities—Assisted husband in ministry.</p> + +<p>9. Description of informant—Hair divided into many pigtails and wrapped +with rags. Skin, dark. Medium height, slender, clothing soiled.</p> + +<p>10. Other points gained in interview—Spends all her time piecing +quilts, aside from housework.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MitchellHettie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Hettie Mitchell (mulatto)<br> + Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 69</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I am sixty-nine years old. I was raised in Dyersburg, Tennessee. I can +tell you a few things mother told us. My own grandma on mother's side +was in South Carolina. She was stole when a child and brought to +Tennessee in a covered wagon. Her mother died from the grief of it. She +was hired out to nurse for these people. The people that stole her was +named Spence. She was a house woman for them till freedom. She was never +sold. Spences was not cruel people. Mother was never sold. She was the +mother of twelve and raised nine to a good age—more than grown. The +Spences seemed to always care for her children. When I go to Dyersburg +they always want us to come to see them and they treat us mighty well.</p> + +<p>"Mother was light. She said she had Indian strain (blood) but father was +very light and it was white blood but he never discussed it before his +children. So I can't tell you excepting he said he was owned by the +Brittians in South Carolina. He said his mother died soon after he was +sold. He was sold to a nigger trader and come in the gang to Memphis, +Tennessee and was put on the block and auctioned off to the highest +bidder. He was a farm hand.</p> + +<p>"Mother married father when she was nineteen years old. She was a house +girl. She lived close to her old mistress. She was very, very old before +she died she nearly stayed at my mother's house. Her mind wasn't right +and mother understood how to take care of her and was kind to her. The +Spences heard about grandma. They wrote and visited years after when +mother was a girl.</p> + +<p>"The way that father found out about his kin folks was this: One day a +creek was named and he told the white man, 'I was born close to that +creek and played there in the white sand and water when I was a little +boy.' The white man asked his name, said he knew the creek well too. +Father told him he never was named till he was sold and they named him +Sam—Sam Barnett. He was sold to Barnett in Memphis. But his dear own +mother called him 'Candy.' The white man found out about his people for +him and they found out his own dear mother died that same year he was +taken from South Carolina from grief. He heard from some of his people +from that time on till he died.</p> + +<p>"I worked on the farm in Tennessee till I married. I ironed, washed, and +have kept my own house and done the work that goes along with raising a +small family. We own our home. We have saved all we could along. I have +never had a real hard time like some I know. I guess my time is at hand +now. I don't know which way to turn since my husband got down sick.</p> + +<p>"I don't vote. Seem like it used to not be a nice place for women to go +where voting was taking place. Now they go mix up and vote. That is one +big change. Time is changing and changing the people. Maybe it is the +people is changing up the world as time goes by. We colored folks look +to the white folks to know the way to do. We have always done it."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MitchellMary"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Mary Mitchell, Hazen, Arkansas<br> +Age: 60</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Trenton, Tennessee. My parents had five children. They +were named William and Charlotte Wells. My father ran away and left my +mother with all the children to raise. By birth mother was a +Mississippian. She had been a nurse and my father was a timber man and +farmer. My mother said she had her hardest time raising her little +children. She was taken from her parents when a small girl and put on a +block and sold. She never said if her owners was bad to her, but she +said they was rough on Uncle Peter. He would fight. She said they would +tie Uncle Peter and whoop him with a strap. From what she said there was +a gang of slaves on Mr. Wade's place. He owned her. I never heard her +mention freedom but she said they had a big farm bell on a tall post in +the back yard and they had a horn to blow. It was a whistle made of a +cow's horn.</p> + +<p>"She said they was all afraid of the Ku Klux. They would ride across the +field and they could see that they was around, but they never come up +close to them."</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 65%;"><br><br> +<a name="MitchellMoses"></a> +<h3>STATE—Arkansas<br> +NAME OF WORKER—Bernice Bowden<br> +ADDRESS—1006 Oak Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +DATE—November 3, 1938<br> +SUBJECT—Exslaves +</h3> +<p>[TR: Repetitive information deleted from subsequent pages.]</p> +<br> +<p><b>Circumstances of Interview</b></p> + +<p>1. Name and address of informant—<big><b>Moses Mitchell</b></big>, +117 Worthen Street</p> + +<p>2. Date and time of interview—November 1, 1938, 1:00 p.m.</p> + +<p>3. Place of interview—117 Worthen Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas</p> + +<p>4. Place and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with +informant—Bernice Wilburn, 101 Miller Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas</p> + +<p>5. Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you—None</p> + +<p>6. Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.—A frame house +(rented), bare floors, no window shades; a bed and some boxes and three +straight chairs. In an adjoining room were another bed, heating stove, +two trunks, one straight chair, one rocking chair. A third room, the +kitchen, contained cookstove and table and chairs.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Text of Interview</b></p> + +<p>"I was born down here on White River near Arkansas Post, August, 1849. I +belonged to Thomas Mitchel and when they (Yankees) took Arkansas Post, +our owners gathered us up and my young master took us to Texas and he +sold me to an Irishman named John McInish in Marshall for $1500. $500 in +gold and the rest in Confederate money. They called it the new issue.</p> + +<p>"I was twelve years old then and I stayed in Texas till I was +forty-eight. I was at Tyler, Texas when they freed us. When they took us +to Texas they left my mother and baby sister here in Arkansas, down here +on Oak Log Bayou. I never saw her again and when I came back here to +Arkansas, they said she had been dead twenty-eight years. Never did hear +of my father again.</p> + +<p>"I'm supposed to be part Creek Indian. Don't know how much. We have one +son, a farmer, lives across the river. Married this wife in 1873.</p> + +<p>"My wife and I left Texas forty-one years ago and came back here to +Arkansas and stayed till 1922. Then we went to Chicago and stayed till +1930, and then came back here. I'd like to go back up there, but I guess +I'm gettin' too old. While I was there I preached and I worked all the +time. I worked on the streets and the driveways in Lincoln Park. I was +in the brick and block department. Then I went from there to the asphalt +department. There's where I coined the money. Made $6.60 in the brick +and block and $7.20 a day in the asphalt. Down here they don't know no +more about asphalt than a pig does about a holiday. <u>A man that's from +the South and never been nowhere, don't know nothin', a woman +either</u>.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'm, I'm a preacher. Just a local preacher, wasn't ordained. The +reason for that was, in Texas a man over forty-five couldn't join the +traveling connection. I was licensed, but of course I couldn't perform +marriage ceremonies. I was just within one step of that.</p> + +<p>"I went to school two days in my life. I was privileged to go to the +first free school in Texas. Had a teacher named Goldman. Don't know what +year that was but they found out me and another fellow was too old so +they wouldn't let us go no more. But I caught my alphabet in them two +days. So I just caught what education I've got, here and there. I can +read well—best on my Bible and Testament and I read the newspapers. I +can sorta scribble my name.</p> + +<p>"I've been a farmer most of my life and a preacher for fifty-five years. +I can repair shoes and use to do common carpenter work. I can help build +a house. I only preach occasionally now, here and there. I belong to the +Allen Temple in Hoboken (East Pine Bluff).</p> + +<p>"I think the young generation is gone to naught. They're a different cut +to what they was in my comin' up."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>This man and his wife live in the outskirts of West pine Bluff. They +receive a small sum of money and commodities from the County Welfare +Department. He has a very pleasant personality, a good memory and +intelligence above the ordinary. Reads the Daily Graphic and Arkansas +Gazette. Age 89. He said, "<u>Here's the idea, freedom is worth it +all</u>."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Personal History of Informant</b></p> + +<p>1. Ancestry—Father, Lewis Mitchell; Mother, Rhoda Mitchell</p> + +<p>2. Place and date of birth—Oak Log Bayou, White River, near Arkansas +Post, Ark.</p> + +<p>3. Family—Wife and one grown son.</p> + +<p>4. Places lived in, with dates—Taken to Texas by his young master and +sold in Marshall during the war. Lived in Tyler, Texas until forty-eight +years of age; came back to Arkansas in 1897 and stayed until 1922; went +to Chicago and lived until 1930; back to Jefferson County, Arkansas.</p> + +<p>5. Education, with dates—Two days after twenty-one years of age. No +date.</p> + +<p>6. Occupations and accomplishments, with dates—Farmer, preacher, common +carpenter, cobbler, public work on streets in Chicago, farmed and +preached until he went to Chicago in 1922. The he worked in the +maintenance department of city streets of Chicago and of Lincoln Park, +Chicago.</p> + +<p>7. Special skills and interests—Asphalt worker</p> + +<p>8. Community and religious activities—Licensed Methodist Preacher. No +assignment now.</p> + +<p>9. Description of informant—Five feet eight inches tall; weight, 165 +pounds, nearly bald. Very prominent cheek bones. Keen intelligence. +Neatly dressed.</p> + +<p>10. Other points gained in interview—Reads daily papers; knowledge of +world affairs.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MoonBen"></a> +<h3>Pine Bluff District<br> +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of Interviewer: Martin - Barker<br> +Subject: Negro Customs<br> +<br> +Information by: Ben Moon</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of second page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>I was born on the Walker place, in 1869. My father was a slave to Mr. +Bob. I used to drive Miss Lelia (Eulalie) to the Catholic church here in +Pine Bluff. She used to let me go barefooted, and bare headed.</p> + +<p>Miss Lelia was the daughter of Col. Creed Taylor. All during slavery +time I drove her gins. We had eight mules. Eight at a time hitched to +each lever, they would weave in an out but they was so hitched that they +never got in any body's way. They just walked around and round like they +did in those days. We had herds of sheep, we sheared them and wove yarn +for socks. We raised wheat, when it was ripe we laid a canvas cloth on +the ground and put wheat on it, then men and women on horse back rode +over it, and thrashed it that way. They called it treading it. Then we +took it to the mill and ground it and made it into flour. For breakfast, +(we ate awful soon in the morning), about 4 AM, then we packed lunch in +tin buckets and eat again at daylight. Fat meat, cornbread and molasses. +Some would have turnip greens for breakfast.</p> + +<p>Summertime, Miss Lelia would plant plenty of fruit, and we would have +fried apples, stewed peaches and things.</p> + +<p>Sunday mornings we would have biscuit, butter, molasses, chicken, etc.</p> + +<p>For our work they paid us seventy-five cents a day and when come cotton +picking time old rule, seventy five cents for pickin cotton. Christmas +time, plenty of fireworks, plenty to eat, drink and everything. We would +dance all Christmas.</p> + +<p>All kind of game was plentiful, plenty of coon, possum, used up +everything that grew in the woods. Plenty of corn, we took it to the +grist mill every Saturday.</p> + +<p>Ark. riv. boats passed the Walker place, and dey was a landing right at +dere place, and one at the Wright place, that is where the airport is +now.</p> + +<p>All de white folks had plenty of cattle den and in de winter time dey +was all turned in on the fields and with what us niggers had, that made +a good many, and you know yorself dat was good for de ground.</p> + +<p>Mother was a slave on the Merriweather place, her marster was Mick[TR: +name not clear] Merriweather. My granma was Gusta Merriweather, my +mother Lavina and lived on the Merriweather place in what was then +Dorsey county, near Edinburg, now Cleveland Co. My grandfather was Louis +Barnett, owned by Nick Barnett of Cleveland co., then Dorsey co. Fathers +people was owned by Marse Bob Walker. Miss Lelia (Eulalie) was mistis. +Miss Maggie Benton was young mistis.</p> + +<p>I dont believe in ghosts or spirits.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MooreEmma"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Emma Moore<br> + 3715 Short West Second, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 80<br> +Occupation: Laundry work</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I'se born in slavery times. When my daddy come back from the War, he +said I was gwine on seven or eight.</p> + +<p>"He stayed in the War three years and six months. I know that's what he +always told us. He went with his master, Joe Horton. Looks like I can +see old Marse Joe now. Had long sandy whiskers. The las' time I seed him +he come to my uncle's house. We was all livin' in a row of houses. +Called em the quarters. I never will fergit it.</p> + +<p>"I was born on Horton's Island here in Arkansas. That's what they told +me.</p> + +<p>"I know when my daddy went to war and when he come back, he put on his +crudiments (accoutrements) to let us see how he looked.</p> + +<p>"I seed the soldiers gwine to war and comin' back. Look like to me I was +glad to see em till I seed too many of em.</p> + +<p>"Yankees used to come down and take provisions. Yes, 'twas the Yankees!</p> + +<p>"My granddaddy was the whippin' boss. Had a white boss too named Massa +Fred.</p> + +<p>"Massa Joe used to come down and play with us chillun. His name was Joe +Horton. Ever'body can tell you that was his name. Old missis named Miss +Mary. She didn't play with us much.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, they sure did take us to Texas durin' of the War—in a ox +wagon. Stayed down there a long time.</p> + +<p>"We didn't have plenty to eat but we had to eat what we did. I member +they wouldn't give us chillun no meat, jus' grease my mouf and make my +mother think we had meat.</p> + +<p>"Now my mother told me, at night some of the folks used to steal one of +old massa's shoats and cook it at night. I know when that pot was on the +rack but you better not say nothin' bout it.</p> + +<p>"All us chillun stayed in a big long log house. Dar is where us chillun +stayed in the daytime, right close to Miss Mary.</p> + +<p>"I used to sit on the lever at the gin. You know that was glory to me to +ride. I whipped the old mule. Ever' now and then I'd give him a tap.</p> + +<p>"When they pressed the cotton, they wet the press and I member one time +they wet it too much. I don't say they sont it back but I think they +made em pay for it. And they used to put chunks in the bale to make it +weigh heavy. Right there on that lake where I was born.</p> + +<p>"Used to work in the field. These white folks can tell you I loved to +work. I used to get as much as the men. My mammy was a worker and as the +sayin' is, I was a chip off the old block.</p> + +<p>"The first teacher I went to school to was named Mr. Cushman. Didn't go +only on rainy days. That was the first school and you might say the las' +one cause I had to nuss them chillun.</p> + +<p>"You know old massa used to keep all our ages and my daddy said I was +nineteen when I married, but I don't know what year 'twas—honest I +don't.</p> + +<p>"I been married three times.</p> + +<p>"I member one time I was goin' to a buryin'. I was hurryin' to get +dressed. I wanted to be ready when they come by for me cause they say +it's bad luck to stop a corpse. If you don't know that I do—you know if +they had done started from the house.</p> + +<p>"My mama and daddy said they was born in Tennessee and was bought and +brought here.</p> + +<p>"I been goin' to one of these gov'ment schools and got my eyes so weak I +can't hardly see to thread a needle. I'se crazy bout it I'm tellin' you. +I sit up here till God knows how long. They give me a copy to practice +and they'd brag on me and that turned me foolish. I jus' thought I was +the teacher herself almos'. That's the truf now.</p> + +<p>"I can't read much. I don't fool with no newspaper. I wish I could, +woman—I sure do.</p> + +<p>"I keep tellin' these young folks they better learn somethin'. I tell em +they better take this chance. This young generation—I don't know much +bout the whites—I'm tellin' you these colored is a sight.</p> + +<p>"Well, I'm gwine away from here d'rectly—ain't gwine be here much +longer. If I don't see you again I'll meet you in heaven."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<h3><a name="MoorePatsy"></a> +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Patsy Moore, Madison, Arkansas<br> +Age: 74</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My mother was sold in Jamestown, Virginia to Daphney Hull. Her white +folks got in debt. My papa was born in Georgia. Folks named Williams +owned him. Ma never seen her ma no more but William Hull went to +Virginia and bought her two sisters.</p> + +<p>"I was named Patsy after grandma in Virginia. She had twenty-one +children to ma's knowing. Ma was a light color. Pa was a Molly Glaspy +man. That means he was Indian and African. Molly Glaspy folks was nearly +always free folks. Ma was named Mattie. If they would have no children +they got trafficked about.</p> + +<p>"Daphney Hull was good but William Hull and his wife was both mean. They +lived on the main road to Holly Springs. Daphney Hull was a Methodist +man, kind-hearted and good. He was a bachelor I think. He kept a woman +to cook and keep his house. Auntie said the Yankees was mean to Mr. +William Hull's wife. They took all their money and meat. They had their +money hid and some of the black folks let the Yankees find out where it +was. They got it.</p> + +<p>"Papa was a soldier. He sent for us. We come to Memphis, Tennessee in a +wagon. We lived there five or six years. Pa got a pension till he died. +Both my parents was field hands in slavery. Ma took in washing and +ironing in Memphis.</p> + +<p>"I was born in De Sota County, Mississippi. I remember Forrest's battle +in Memphis. I didn't have sense to be scared. I seen black and white +dead in the streets and alleys. We went to the magazine house for +protection, and we played and stayed there. They tried to open the +magazine house but couldn't.</p> + +<p>"When freedom come, folks left home, out in the streets, crying, +praying, singing, shouting, yelling, and knocking down everything. Some +shot off big guns. Den come the calm. It was sad then. So many folks +done dead, things tore up and nowheres to go and nothing to eat, nothing +to do. It got squally. Folks got sick, so hungry. Some folks starved +nearly to death. Times got hard. We went to the washtub onliest way we +all could live. Ma was a cripple woman. Pa couldn't find work for so +long when he mustered out.</p> + +<p>"I do recollect the Civil War well.</p> + +<p>"I live with my daughter. I have a cough since I had flu and now I have +chills and fever. My daughter helps me all I get. She lives with me.</p> + +<p>"Some of the young folks is mighty good. I reckon some is too loose +acting. Times is hard. Harder in the winter than in summer time. We has +our garden and chickens to help us out in summer."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MooreheadAda"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Ada Moorehead<br> + 2300 E. Barraque, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 82?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was here in slavery times, honey, but I don't know exactly how old I +am. I was born in Huntsville, Alabama but you know in them days old +folks didn't tell the young folks no thin' and I was so small when they +brought me here. I don't know what year I was born but I believe I'm +about eighty-two. You know when a person ain't able to work and dabble +out his own clothes, you know he's gone a long ways.</p> + +<p>"My white folks was Ad White what owned me. Called him Marse Ad. Don't +call folks marse much now-days.</p> + +<p>"My father was sold away from us in Alabama and we heard he was here in +Pine Bluff so Aunt Fanny brought us here. She just had a road full of us +and brought us here to Arkansas. We walked. We was a week on the road. I +know we started here on Monday morning and we got here to the courthouse +on the next Monday round about noon. That was that old courthouse. I +reckon that ground is in the river now.</p> + +<p>"When we got here I saw my father. He took me to his sister—that was my +Aunt Savannah—and dropped me down.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Reynolds raised me. She come to Aunt Savannah's house and hired me +the very same day I got here. I nursed Miss Katie. She was bout a month +old. You know—a little long dress baby. Don't wear then long dresses +now—gettin' wiser.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Reynolds she was good to me. And since she's gone looks like I'm +gone too—gone to the dogs. Cause when Mrs. Reynolds got a dress for +Miss Katie—got one for me too.</p> + +<p>"My father was a soldier in the war. Last time I heard from him I know +he was hauling salt to the breastworks. Yes, I was here in the war. That +was all right to me but I wished a many a time I wasn't here.</p> + +<p>"I went to school two or three days in a week for about a term. But I +didn't learn to read much. Had to hire out and help raise my brother and +sister. I'm goin' to this here government school now. I goes every +afternoon.</p> + +<p>"Since I got old I can think bout the old times. It comes to me. I +didn't pay attention to nothin' much when I was young.</p> + +<p>"Oh Lord, I don't know what's goin' to become of us old folks. Wasn't +for the Welfare, I don't know what I'd do.</p> + +<p>"I was sixteen when I married. I sure did marry young. I married young +so I could see my chillun grown. I never married but once and I stayed a +married woman forty-nine years to the very day my old man died. Lived +with one man forty-nine years. I had my hand and heart full. I had a +home of my own. How many chillun? Me? I had nine of my own and I raised +other folks' chillun. Oh, I been over this world right smart—first one +thing and then another. I know a lot of white folks. They all been +pretty good to me."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MooremanMaryJane"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mary D. Hudgins<br> +Person Interviewed: Mrs. Mary Jane (Mattie) Mooreman<br> +Home: with son<br> +Age: 90</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes, ma'am. I've been in Hot Springs, been in Hot Springs 57 years. +That's a long time. Lots of changes have come—I've seen lots of changes +here—changed from wooden sidewalks and little wood buildings.</p> + +<p>"Your name's Hudgins? I knew the Hudginses—knew Miss Nora well. What's +that? Did I know Adeline? Did I know Adeline! Do you mean to tell me +she's still alive? Adeline! Why Miss Maud," (addressing Mrs. Eisele, for +whom she works—and who sat nearby to help in the interview) "Miss +Maude, I tell you Adeline's WHITE, she's white clean through!" (see +interview with Adeline Blakeley, who incidentally is as black as "the +ace of spades"—in pigmentation.) "Miss Maude, you never knew anybody +like Adeline. She bossed those children and made them mind—just like +they was hers. She took good care of them." (Turning to the +interviewer) "You know how the Hudgins always was about their children. +Adeline thought every one of 'em was made out of gold---made out of pure +GOLD.</p> + +<p>"She made 'em mind. I remember once, she was down on Central Avenue with +Ross and he did southing or other that, wasn't nice. She walked over to +the umbrella stand, you remember how they used to have umbrellas for +sale out in front of the stores. She grabbed an umbrella and she whipped +Ross with it--she didn't hurt him. Then she put it back in the stand +and said to the man who ran the store, 'If that umbrella's hurt, just +charge it to Harve Hudgins.' That's the way Adeline was. So she's still +alive. Law how I'd like to see her. Bring me a picture of her. Oh Miss +Mary, I'd love to have it.</p> + +<p>"Me? I was born on Green river near Hartford, Kentucky. Guess I was +about a year and a half, from what they told me when my mistress +married. Don't know how she ever met my master. She was raised in a +convent and his folks lived a long way from hers. But anyhow she did. +She was just 13 when she married. The man she married was named Charles +Mooreman M-O-O-R-E-M-A-N. They had a son called Charles Wycliff +Mooreman. He was named for his mother's people. I got a son I called +Charles Wycliff too. He works at the Arlington. He's a waiter. They say +he looks just like me. Mr. Charles Wycliff Mooreman--back in Kentucky. +I still gets letters from him.</p> + +<p>"Miss Mary I guess I had a pretty easy time in slavery days. They was +good to us. Besides I was a house niggah." (Those who have been "house +niggahs" never quibble at the word slave or negro. A subtle social +distinction brewed in the black race to separate house servants from +field hands as far as wealthy planters from "poor white trash.".) "Once +I heard a man say of my mother, 'You could put on a white boiled shirt +and lie flat down on the floor in her kitchen and not get dirty.'"</p> + +<p>"Cook? No, ma'am!" (with dignity and indignation) "I never cooked until +after I was married, and I never washed, never washed so much as a rag. +All I washed was the babies and maybe my mistress's feet. I was a lady's +maid. I'd wait on my mistress and I'd knit sox for all the folks. When +they would sleep it was our duty—us maids—to fan 'em with feathers +made out of turkey feathers—feather fans. Part of it was to keep 'em +cool. Then they didn't have screens like we have today. So part of it +was to keep the flies off. I remember how we couldn't stomp our feet to +keep the flies from biting for fear of waking 'em up.</p> + +<p>"No, Miss Mary, we didn't get such, good food. Nobody had all the kinds +of things we have today. We had mostly buttermilk and cornbread and fat +meat. Cake? 'Deed we didn't. I remember once they baked a cake and Mr. +Charles Wycliff—he was just a little boy—he got in and took a whole +fistful out of the cake. When Miss found out about it, she give us all +doses of salts—enough to make us all throw up. She gave it to all the +niggahs and the children—the white children. And what did she find out? +It was her own child who had done it.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am we learned to read and write. Oh, Miss Maude now—I don't +want to recite. I don't want to." (But she did "Twinkle, Twinkle Little +Star" and "The Playful Kitten"—the latter all of 40 lines.) "I think, I +think they both come out of McGuffey's second Reader. Yes ma'am I +remember's McGuffey's and the Blueback speller too.</p> + +<p>"No, Miss Mary, there wasn't so much of the war that was fought around +us. I remember that old Master used to go out in the front yard and +stand by a locust tree and put his ear against it. He said that way he +could hear the cannon down to Bowling Green. No, I didn't never hear any +shooting from the war myself.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, the Confederates used to come through lots. I remember how +we used to go to the spring for water for 'em. Then we'd stand with the +buckets on our heads while they drank—drank out of a big gourd. When +the buckets was empty we'd go back to the spring for more water.</p> + +<p>"Once the Yankees come by the place. It was at night. They went out to +the quarters and they tried to get 'em to rise up. Told 'em to come on +in the big house and take what they wanted. Told 'em to take anything +they wanted to take, take Master's silver spoons and Miss' silk dress. +'If they don't like it, we'll shoot their brains out,' they said. Next +morning they told Master. He got scared and moved. At that time we was +living at Cloverport.</p> + +<p>"It was near the end of the war and we was already free, only we didn't +know it. He moved on up to Stephensport. That's on the Ohio too. He took +me and a brother of mine and another black boy. While we was there I +remember he took me to a circus. I remember how the lady—she was +dressed in pink come walking down a wire—straight on down to the +ground. She was carrying a long pole. I won't never forget that.</p> + +<p>"Not long afterwards I was married. We was all free then. My husband +asked my master if he could marry me. He told him 'You're a good man. +You can come and live on my farm and work for me, but you can't have +Mattie.' So we moved off to his Master's farm.</p> + +<p>"A little while after that his Master bought a big farm in Arkansas. He +wanted to hire as many people as he could. So we went with him. He +started out well, but the first summer he died. So everything had to be +sold. A man what come down to bid on some of the farm tools and +stock—come to the auction, he told us to come on up to Woodruff county +and work for him. We was there 7 years and he worked the farm and I took +care of myself and my babies. Then he went off and left me.</p> + +<p>"I went in to Cotton Plant and started working there. Finally he wrote +me and tried to get me to say we hadn't never been married. Said he +wanted to marry another woman. The white folks I worked for wouldn't let +me. I'd been married right and they wouldn't let me disgrace myself by +writing such a letter.</p> + +<p>"Finally I came on to Hot Springs. For a while I cooked and washed. Then +I started working for folks, regular. For 9 years, tho, I mostly washed +and ironed.</p> + +<p>"I came to Hot Springs on the 7th of February—I think it was 57 years +ago. You remember Miss Maud—it was just before that big hail storm. You +was here, don't you remember—that hail storm that took all the windows +out of all the houses, tore off roofs and swept dishes and table-cloths +right off the tables. Can't nobody forget that who's seen it.</p> + +<p>"Miss Mary, do you know Miss Julia Huggins? I worked for her a long +time. Worked for her before she went away and after she came back. +Between times I cooked for Mrs. Button (Burton—but called Button by +everyone) Housley. When Miss Julia come back she marches right down to +Mrs. Housley's and tells me she wants me to work for her again. 'Can't +get her now,' says Mrs. Housley, 'Mattie's done found out she's black.' +But anyhow I went to see her, and I went back to work for her, pretty +foxy Miss Julia was.</p> + +<p>"I been working for Mrs. Eisele pretty near twenty five years. Saw her +children grow up and the grand children. Lancing, he's my heart. Once +when Mr. and Mrs. Eisele went to see Mrs. Brown, Lancing's mother, they +took me with them. All the way to Watertown, Wisconsin. There wasn't any +more niggas in the town and all the children thought I was somthing to +look at. They'd come to see me and they'd bring their friends with 'em. +Once while we was there, a circus come to town. The children wanted me +to see it. Told me there was a negro boy in it. Guess they thought it +would be a treat to me to see another niggah. I told 'em, 'Law, don't +you think I see lots, lots more than I wants, everyday when I is at +home?'</p> + +<p>"It used to scare me. The folks would go off to a party or a show and +leave me alone with the baby. No, Miss Mary, I wasn't scared for myself. +I thought somebody might come in and kidnap that baby. No matter how +late they was I'd sit on the top step of the stairs leading +upstairs—just outside the door where Lansing was asleep. No matter what +time they come home they'd find me there. 'Why don't you go on in your +bedroom and lie down?' they'd ask me. 'No,' I'd tell 'em, 'somebody +might come in, and they would have to get that baby over my dead body.'</p> + +<p>"Jonnie, that's my daughter" (Mrs. D.G. Murphy, 338 Walnut Street, a +large stucco house with well cared for lawn) "she wants me to quit work. +I told her, 'You put that over on Mrs. Murphy—you made her quit work +and took care of her. What happened to her? She died! You're not going +to make me old.'</p> + +<p>"Twice she's got me to quit work. Once, she told me it was against the +law. Told me there was a law old folks couldn't work. I believed her and +I quit. Then I come on down and I asked Mr. Eisele" (an important +business executive and prominent in civic affairs, [HW: aged 83]) "He +rared back and he said, 'I'd like to see anybody stop me from working.' +So I come on back.</p> + +<p>"Another time, it was when the old age pensions come in. They tried to +stop me again. Told me I had to take it. I asked Mr. Eisele if I could +work just the same. 'No,' he says 'if you take it, you'll have to quit +work.' So I stamped my foot and I says, 'I won't take nobody's pension.'</p> + +<p>"The other day Jonnie called up here and she started to crying. Lots of +folks write her notes and say she's bad to let me work. Somebody told +her that they had seen me going by to work at 4 o'clock in the morning. +It wasn't no such. I asked a man when I was on the way and it was 25 +minutes until 5. Besides, my clock had stopped and I couldn't tell what +time it was. Yes, Miss Mary, I does get here sort of early, but then I +like it. I just sit in the kitchen until the folks get up.</p> + +<p>"You see that picture over there, it's Mr. Eisele when he was 17. I'd +know that smiling face anywhere. He's always good to me. When they go +away to Florida I can go to the store and get money whenever I need it. +But it's always good to see them come back. Miss Maud says I'm sure to +go to Heaven, I'm such a good worker. No, Miss Mary, I'm not going to +quit work. Not until I get old."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MorganEvelina"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Evelina Morgan<br> + 1317 W. Sixteenth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: App. 81</h3> +<p>[TR: Original first page moved to follow second page per<br> + HW: Insert this page before Par. 1, P. 3]</p> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Wedgeboro, North Carolina, on the plantation of—let me +see what that man's name was. He was an old lawyer. I done forgot that +old white man's name. Old Tom Ash! Senator Ash—that's his name. He was +good to his slaves. He had so many niggers he didn't know them all.</p> + +<p>"My father's name was Alphonso Dorgens and my mother's name was Lizzie +Dorgens. Both of them dead. I don't know what her name was before she +married. My pa belonged to the Dorgens' and he married my ma. That is +how she come to be a Dorgen. Old Man Ash never did buy him. He just +visited my mother. They all was in the same neighborhood. Big +plantations. Both of them had masters that owned lots of land. I don't +know how often he visited my mother after he married her. He was over +there all the time. They were right adjoining plantations.</p> + +<p>"I was born in a frame house. I don't know nothin' about it no more than +that. It was j'ined to the kitchen. My mother had two rooms j'ined to +the kitchen. She was the old mistress' cook. She could come right out of +the kitchen and go on in her room.</p> + +<p>"My father worked on the farm. They fed the slaves meat and bread. That +is all I remember—meat and bread and potatoes. They made lots of +potatoes. They gave 'em what they raised. You could raise stuff for +yourself if you wanted to.</p> + +<p>"My mother took care of her children. We children was on the place there +with her. She didn't have nobody's children to take care of but us.</p> + +<p>"I was six years old during of the War. My ma told me my age, but I +forgot it; I never did have it put down. The only way I gits a pension, +I just tells 'em I was six years old during of the War, and they figures +out the age. Sorta like that. But I know I was six years old when the +Rebels and the Yankees was fighting.</p> + +<p>"I seed the Yankees come through. I seed that. They come in the time old +master was gone. He run off—he run away. He didn't let 'em git him. I +was a little child. They stayed there all day breaking into +things—breaking into the molasses and all like that. Old mistress +stayed upstairs hiding. The soldiers went down in the basement and +throwed things around. Old master was a senator; they wanted to git him. +They sure did cuss him: 'The ----, ----, ----, old senator,' they would say. He took his +finest horses and all the gold and silver with him somewheres. They couldn't git 'im. +They was after senators and high-ups like that.</p> + +<p>"The soldiers tickled me. They sung. The white people's yard was jus' +full of them playing 'Yankee Doodle' and 'Hang Jeff Davis on a Sour +Apple Tree.'</p> + +<p>"All the white people gone! Funny how they run away like that. They had +to save their selves. I 'member they took one old boss man and hung him +up in a tree across a drain of water, jus' let his foot touch—and +somebody cut him down after 'while. Those white folks had to run away.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Patrollers</b></p> + +<p>"I used to hear them all talk about the patrollers. I used to hear my +mother talking about them. My ma said my master wouldn't let the +patrollers come on his place. They could go on anybody else's place but +he never did let them come on his place. Some of the slaves were treated +very bad. But my ma said he didn't allow a patroller on the place and he +didn't allow no other white man to touch his niggers. He was a big white +man—a senator. He didn't know all his Negroes but he didn't allow +nobody to impose on them. He didn't let no patroller and nobody else +beat up his niggers.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>How Freedom Came</b></p> + +<p>"I don't know how freedom came. I know the Yankees came through and +they'd pat we little niggers on the head and say, 'Nigger, you are just +as free as I am.' And I would say, 'Yes'm.'</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Right After Freedom</b></p> + +<p>"Right after the War my mother and father moved off the place and went +on another plantation somewheres—I don't know where. They share +cropped. I don't know how long. Old mistress didn't want them to move at +all. I never will forget that.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Present Occupation and Opinions</b></p> + +<p>"I used to cook out all the time when I got grown. I couldn't tell you +when I married. You got enough junk down there now. So I ain't giving +you no more. My husband's been dead about seven years. I goes to the +Methodist church on Ninth and Broadway. I ain't able to do no work now. +I gets a little pension, and the Lord takes care of me. I have a hard +time sometime.</p> + +<p>"I ain't bothered about these young folks. They is <u>somethin' +awful</u>. It would be wonderful to write a book from that. They ought +to git a history of these young people. You could git a wonderful book +out of that.</p> + +<p>"The colored folks have come a long way since freedom. And if the white +folks didn't pin 'em down they'd go further. Old Jeff Davis said when +the niggers was turned loose, 'Dive up your knives and forks with them.' +But they didn't do it.</p> + +<p>"Some niggers was sharp and got something. And they lost it just like +they got it. Look at Bush. I know two or three big niggers got a lot and +ain't got nothin' left now. Well, I ain't got no time for no more junk. +You got enough down there. You take that and go on."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>During the interview, a little "pickaninny" came in with his mother. His +grandmother and a forlorn little dog were also along. "Tell grandma what +you want," his mother prompted. "Is that your grandson?" I interrupted. +"No," she said, "He ain't no kin to me, but he calls me 'ma' and acts as +if I was his grandma." The little fellow hung back. He was just about +twenty-two months old, but large and mature for that age.</p> + +<p>"Tell 'ma' what you want," his grandmother put in. Finally, he made up +his mind and stood in front of her and said, "Buh—er." His mother +explained, "I've done made him some corn bread, but he ain't got no +butter to put on it and he wants you to give him some."</p> + +<p>Sister Morgan sat silent awhile. Then she rose deliberately and went +slowly to the ancient ice-box, opened it and took out a tin of butter +which she had evidently churned herself in some manner and carefully cut +out a small piece and wrapped it neatly and handed it to the little one. +After a few amenities, they passed out.</p> + +<p>Even with her pitiful and meagre lot, the old lady evidently means to +share her bare necessities with others.</p> + +<p>The manner of her calculation of her age is interesting. She was six +years old when the War was going on. She definitely remembers seeing +Sherman's army and Wheeler's cavalry after she was six. Since they were +in her neighborhood in 1864, she is undoubtedly more than eighty. +Eighty-one is a fair estimate.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MorganJames"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: James Morgan<br> + 819 Rice Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 65</h3> +<br> + +<p>"During the slave time, the pateroles used to go from one plantation to +the other hunting Negroes. They would catch them at the door and throw +hot ashes in their faces. You could go to another plantation and steal +or do anything you wanted if you could manage to get back to your old +master's place. But if you got caught away from your plantation, they +would get you. Sometimes a nigger didn't want to get caught and beat, so +he would throw a shovel of hot ashes in the pateroles' faces and beat it +away.</p> + +<p>"My daddy used to tell lots of stories about slavery times. He's been +dead forty-three years and my mother has been dead forty-one +years—forty-one years this May. I was quite young and lots of the +things they told me, I remember, and some of them, I don't.</p> + +<p>"I was born in 1873. That was eight years after the War ended. My +father's name was Aaron and my mother's name was Rosa. Both of them was +in slavery. [TR: sentence lined out.] I got a brother that was a baby in +her lap when the Yankee soldiers got after a chicken. The chicken flew +up in her lap and they never got that one. The white folks lost it, but +the Yankees didn't get it. I have heard my mother tell all sorts of +things. But they just come to me at times. The soldiers would take +chickens or anything they could get their hands on—those soldiers +would.</p> + +<p>"My mother married the first time in slavery. Her first husband was sold +in slavery. That is the onliest brother I'm got living now out of +ten—that one that was settin' in her lap when the soldiers come +through. He's in Boydell, Arkansas now. It used to be called Morrell. +It is about one hundred twenty-one miles from here, because Dermott is +one hundred nine and Boydell is about twelve miles further on. It's in +Nashville[HW:?] County. My brother was a great big old baby in slavery +times. He was my mother's child by her first husband. All the rest of +them is dead and he is the onliest one that is living.</p> + +<p>"I was a section foreman for the Missouri Pacific for twenty-two years. +I worked there altogether for thirty-five years, but I was section +foreman for twenty-two years. There's my card. Lots of men stayed on the +job till it wore them out. Lewis Holmes did that. It would take him two +hours to walk from here to his home—if he ever managed it at all.</p> + +<p>"It's warm today and it will bring a lot of flies. Flies don't die in +the winter. Lots of folks think they do. They go up in cracks and little +places like that under the weatherboard there—any place where it is +warm—and there they huddle up and stay till it gets warm. Then they +come out and get something to eat and go back again when it cools off. +They live right on through the winter in their hiding places.</p> + +<p>"Both of my parents said they always did their work whatever the task +might be. And my daddy said he never got no whipping at all. You know +they would put a task on you and if you didn't do it, you would get a +whipping. My daddy wouldn't stand to be whipped by a paterole, and he +didn't have to be whipped by nobody else, because he always did his +work.</p> + +<p>"He was one of the ones that the pateroles couldn't catch. When the +pateroles would be trying to break in some place where he was, and the +other niggers would be standing 'round frightened to death and wonderin' +what to do, he would be gettin' up a shovelful of ashes. When the door +would be opened and they would be rushin' in, he would scatter the ashes +in their faces and rush out. If he couldn't find no ashes, he would +always have a handful of pepper with him, and he would throw that in +their faces and beat it.</p> + +<p>"He would fool dogs that my too. My daddy never did run away. He said he +didn't have no need to run away. They treated him all right. He did his +work. He would get through with everything and sometimes he would be +home before six o'clock. My mother said that lots of times she would +pick cotton and give it to the others that couldn't keep up so that they +wouldn't be punished. She had a brother they used to whip all the time +because he didn't keep up.</p> + +<p>"My father told me that his old master told him he was free. He stayed +with his master till he retired and sold the place. He worked on shares +with him. His old master sold the place and went to Monticello and died. +He stayed with him about fifteen or sixteen years after he was freed, +stayed on that place till the Government donated him one hundred sixty +acres and charged him only a dollar and sixty cents for it. He built a +house on it and cleared it up. That's what my daddy did. Some folks +don't believe me when I tell 'em the Government gave him a hundred and +sixty acres of land and charged him only a dollar and sixty cents for +it—a penny a acre.</p> + +<p>"I am retired now. Been retired since 1938. The Government took over the +railroad pension and it pays me now. That is under the Security Act. +Each and every man on the railroad pays in to the Government.</p> + +<p>"I have been married right around thirty-nine years.</p> + +<p>"I was born in Chicot County, Arkansas.[TR: sentence lined out.] My +father was born in Georgia and brought here by his master. He come here +in a old covered ox wagon. I don't know how they happened to decide to +come here. My mother was born in South Carolina. She met my father here +in Arkansas. They sold her husband and she was brought here. After peace +was declared she met my daddy. Her first husband was sold in South +Carolina and she never did know that became of him. They put him up on +the block and sold him and she never did know which way he went. He left +her with two boys right then. She had a sister that stayed in South +Carolina. Somebody bought her there and kept her and somebody bought my +mother and brought her here. My father's master was named McDermott. My +mother's last master was named Belcher or something like that.</p> + +<p>"I don't belong to any church. I have always lived decent and kept out +of trouble."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>When Morgan said "there is my record", he showed me a pass for the year +1938-39 for himself and his wife between all stations on the Missouri +Pacific lines signed by L.W. Baldwin, Chief Executive Officer.</p> + +<p>He is a good man even if he is not a Christian as to church membership.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MorganOlivia"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person Interviewed: Olivia Morgan<br> + Hazen, Ark.<br> +Age: 62</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I am 62 years old. I was born in Lafayette County close to New +Lewisville. I heard mama say many a time she was named after her +state—North Carolina. Her name was Carolina Alexandria. They brought +her a slave girl to this new country. She and papa must of met up +toreckly after freedom. She had some children and I'm one of my papa's +oldest children.</p> + +<p>"Papa come here long fore the war started. The old master in Atlanta, +Georgia—Abe Smith—give his son three boys and one girl. He emigrated +to Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"Mama said her first husband and the young master went off and he never +come back as she knowed of. Young master played with mama's second girl +a whole heap. One day they was playing hiding round. Just as she come +running to the base from round the house, young master hit her on the +forehead with a rock. It killed her. Old master tried to school him but +he worried so they sent him off—thought it would do his health good to +travel. I don't think they ever come back.</p> + +<p>"After freedom mama married and went over to papa's master's. Papa +stayed round there a long time. They got news some way they was to get +forty acres land and a mule to start out with but they said they never +got nothing.</p> + +<p>"My papa said he knowed it to be a fact, the Ku Klux cut a colored +woman's breast off. I don't recollect why he said they got after her. +The Jayhawkers was bad too. They all went wild; some of em left men +hanging up in trees. They needed a good master to protect em worse after +the war than they needed em before. They said they had a Yankee +government then was reason of the Ku Klux. They run the Jayhawkers out +and made the Yankees go on home. Everybody had a hard time. Bread was +mighty scarce when I was a child. Times was hard. Men that had land had +to let it lay out. They had nothin' to feed the hands on, no money to +pay, no seed, no stock to work. The fences all went to rack and all the +houses nearly down. When I was a child they was havin' hard times.</p> + +<p>"I'm a country woman. I farmed all my life. I been married two times; I +married Holmes, then Morgan. They dead. I washed, ironed, cooked, all at +Mr. Jim Buchannan's sawmill close to Lewisville two years and eight +months; then I went back to farmin' up at Pine Bluff. My oldest sister +washed and ironed for Mrs. Buchannan till she moved from the sawmill to +Texarkana. He lived right at the sawmill ground.</p> + +<p>"My papa voted a Republican ticket. I don't vote. My husbands have voted +along. If the women would let the men have the business I think times +would be better. I don't believe in women voting. The men ought to make +the livings for the families, but the women doing too much. They +crowding the men out of work.</p> + +<p>"Some folks is sorry in all colors. Seems like the young folks ain't got +no use for quiet country life. They buying too much. They say they have +to buy everything. I ain't had no depression yet. I been at work and we +had crop failures but I made it through. Some folks good and some ain't. +Times is bout to run away with some of the folks. They all say times is +better than they been since 1928. I hope times is on the mend."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MorganTom"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Tom Morgan, Madison, Arkansas<br> +Age: 71</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My mother was the mother of fourteen of us children. Their names was +Sarah and Richard Morgan.</p> + +<p>"My great-grandfather b'long to Bill Woods. They had b'long to the +Morgans and when freedom come they changed their names back. Some of +them still owned by Morgans.</p> + +<p>"Mother's owners was Auris and Lucella Harris. They had a boy named +Harley Harris and a girl. He had a small farm.</p> + +<p>"Mother said her master wasn't bad, but my father said his owner was +tough on him—tough on all of them. They was all field hands. They had +to git up and be doing. He said they fed by torch morning and night and +rested in the heat of the day two or three hours. Feed the oxen and +mules. In them days stock and folks all et three times a day. I does +real well now to get two meals a day, sometimes but one. They done some +kind of work all the year 'round. He said they had tasks. They better +git the task done or they would get a beating.</p> + +<p>"I haven't voted in so long a time. I voted Republican. I thought I did.</p> + +<p>"I worked at the railroad till they put me off. They put me off on +disability. Trying to git my papers fixed up to work or get something +one. Back on the railroad job. I farmed when I was young."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MorrisCharity"></a> +<h3>El Dorado District<br> +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of Interviewer: Pernella Anderson<br> +Subject: Slavery Days—Cruel Master Murdered by Slaves<br> +Story:—Information<br> +<br> +This Information given by: Charity Morris<br> +Place of Residence: Camden, Arkansas<br> +Age: 90</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>Ah wuz born in Carolina uh slave an ah was de eldest daughtuh of +Christiana Webb whose owner wuz Master Louis Amos. Mah mammy had lots uv +chillun an she also mammied de white chillun, whut wuz lef' mammyless. +When ah wuz very small dey rented me out tuh some very po' white fokes. +Dey wuzn use tuh slaves so mah marster made him promise [HW: not] tuh +beat me or knock me bout. Dey promise dey wouldn. Dey cahried me home an +ah clare dey wuz so mean tuh me till ah run off an tried tuh fin' de way +back tuh mah marster. Night caught me in de woods. Ah sho' wuz skeered. +Ah wuz skeered uv bears an panthers so ah crawled up in a ole bandoned +crib an crouched down gainst de loft. Ah went off tuh sleep but wuz woke +by somethin scratchin on de wall below. Ah stayed close as ah could tuh +de wall an 'gin er prayin. Dat things scratched all night an ah prayed +all night. De nex' mawnin dese white fokes sent word tuh Marster dat ah +had lef' so Marster foun' me an took me home and let me stay dar too. Ah +didn' work in de fiel' ah worked in de house. We lived in uh log cabin. +Evah Sunda mawnin Marster Louis would have all us slaves tuh de house +while he would sing an pray an read de Bible tuh us all.</p> + +<p>De people dat owned de plantation near us had lots of slaves. Dey owned +lots uv mah kin fokes. Dey marster would beat dem at night when dey come +fum de fiel' an lock em up. He'd whoop um an sen' um tuh de fiel'. Dey +couldn' visit no slaves an no slaves was 'lowed tuh visit em. So mah +cousin Sallie watched him hide de key so she moved dem a li'l further +back so dat he had tuh lean ovah tuh reach dem. Dat mawnin soon when he +come tuh let em out she cracked him in de haid wid de poker an made +little Joe help put his haid in de fiuh place. Dat day in de fiel' +Little Joe made er song; "If yo don' bleave Aunt Sallie kilt Marse Jim +de blood is on huh under dress". He jes hollered hit. "Aunt Sallie kilt +Marse Jim." Dey zamined Aunt Sallie's under dress so dey put huh in jail +till de baby come den dey tried huh an sentenced huh tuh be hung an she +wuz.</p> + +<p>Our Marster use tuh tell us if we left de house de patarollers would +catch us. One night de patarollers run mah two brothers home, Joe an +Henry.</p> + +<p>When de ole haid died out dey chillun got de property. Yo see we slaves +wuz de property. Den we got separated. Some sent one way an some nother. +Hit jes happent dat Marse Jim drawed me.</p> + +<p>When de Wah broke out we could heah li'l things bein said. We couldn' +make out. So we begin tuh move erbout. Later we learnt we wuz runnin fum +de wah. In runnin we run intuh a bunch uv soldiers dat had got kilt. Oh +dat wuz terrible. Aftuh mah brudders foun out dat dey wuz fightin tuh +free us dey stole hosses an run erway tuh keep fum bein set free. Aftuh +we got tuh Morris Creek hit wuz bloody an dar wuz one uv de hosses +turnin roun an roun in de watuh wid his eyes shot out. We nevah saw +nuthin else uv Joe nor Henry nor de othuh horse from dat day tuh dis +one. But we went on an on till we come tuh a red house and dat red house +represented free. De white fokes wouldn go dat way cause dey hated tuh +give us up. Dey turnt an went de othuh way but hit wuz too late. De news +come dat Mr. Lincoln had signed de papuhs dat made us all free an dere +wuz some 'joicing ah tells yo. Ah wuz a grown woman at dat time. Ole +Moster Amos brought us on as fur as Fo'dyce an turnt us a loose. Dat's +wha' dey settled. Some uv de slaves stayed wid em an some went tuh othuh +places. Me an mah sistuh come tuh Camden an settled. Ah mahried George +Morris. We havn' seen our pa an ma since we wuz 'vided and since we wuz +chillun. When we got tuh Camden and settled down we went tuh work an +sont back tuh de ole country aftuh ma an pa. Enroute tuh dis country we +come through Tennessee an ah membuh comin through Memphis an Pine Bluff +to Fordyce.</p> + +<p>As we wuz comin we stopped at de Mississippi Rivuh. Ah wuz standin on de +bank lookin at de great roll uv watuh high in de air. Somebody snatched +me back and de watuh took in de bank wha ah wuz standin. Yo cound'n +stand too close tuh de rivuh 'count uv de waves.</p> + +<p>Der wuz a col' wintuh and at night we would gather roun a large camp +fire an play sich games as "Jack-in-de-bush cut him down" an "Ole gray +mule-out ride him." Yaul know dem games ah know. An in de summer times +at night we played <u>Julands</u>. On our way tuh Arkansas we drove +ox-teams, jinnie teams, donkey teams, mule teams an horse teams. We sho +had a good time.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MorrisEmma"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Emma Morris, Forrest City, Arkansas<br> +Age: 71</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My parents was Jane and Sam McCaslin. They come from close to Atlanta, +Georgia to Hernando, Mississippi after slavery. Ma was heired and they +bought pa before they left North Carolina. They bought pa out of a +nigger drove after he was grown. He raised tobacco and corn. Pa helped +farm and they raised hogs. He drove hogs to sell. He didn't say where +they took the hogs, only they would have to stay up all night driving +the hogs, and they rode horses and walked too and had shepherd dogs to +keep them in a drove.</p> + +<p>"Pa was a Böwick (B(our)ick) but I never heard him say nothing bout +Master Bowick, so I don't know his other name. He said they got in a +tight [TR: missing word?] and had to sell some of the slaves and he +being young would bring more than one of the older men. He was real +black. Ma was lighter but not very light.</p> + +<p>"McCaslin was a low heavy set man and he rented out hacks and horses in +Atlanta and pa drove, greased the harness and curried and sheared the +horses. Master McCaslin brought them in town and rented them out. He +didn't have a livery stable. He just furnished conveyances. I heard him +tell about a good hitching post where he could more than apt rent out +his rig and how he always stopped and fed the horses when eating time +come. He took a feed box all the time. Master McCaslin would tell him to +not drive too hard when he had to make long drives. He never would let +him take a whoop.</p> + +<p>"He had some girls I heard him say. May and Alice was their names. He +didn't say much about the family. He took a basket of provision with him +to eat Miss May and Miss Alice fixed up. The basket was close wove and +had a lid. The old man farmed. He drove too. He drove a hack. Ma worked +in the field. I heard her tell about the cockleburs. Well, she said they +would stick on your dress and stick your legs and you would have to pick +them off and sometimes the beggar's-lice would be thick on their clothes +and they would pick them off.</p> + +<p>"When they would clean out the fence corners (rail fence) they would +leave every little wild plum tree and leave a whole lot of briers so +they would have wild plums and berries. They raised cotton. Sometime +during the War old Master McCaslin took all his slaves and stock way +back in the bottoms. The cane was big as ma's wrist she said. They put +up some cabins to live in and shelter the stock. Pa said some of em went +in the army. He didn't want to go. They worked a corn crop over in +there.</p> + +<p>"They left soon as they was freed. I don't know how they found it out. +They walked to way over in Alabama and pa made terms with a man, to come +to Mississippi. Then they come in a wagon and walked too. She had three +little children. I was [HW: born] close to Montgomery, Alabama in +September but I don't know how long it was after the War. I was the +first girl. There was two more boys and three more girls after me. Ma +had children born in three states.</p> + +<p>"Ma died with the typhoid fever. Then two sisters and a brother died. Pa +had it all summer and he got well. Miss (Mrs.) Betty Chamlin took us +children to a house and fed us away from ma and the sick girls and boy. +We was on her place. She had two families then. We got water from a +spring. It was a pretty spring under a big hill. We would wade where +the spring run off. She moved us out of that house.</p> + +<p>"Miss Betty was a widow. She had several boys. They worked in the field +all the time. We stayed till the boys left and she sold her place. She +went back to her folks. I never did see her no more. We scattered out. +Pa lived about wid us till he died. I got three girls living. I got five +children dead. I got one girl out here from town and one girl at +Meridian and my oldest girl in Memphis. I takes it time around wid em.</p> + +<p>"I seen the Ku Klux but they never bothered us. I seen them in Alabama, +I recken it was. I was so small I jes' do remember seeing them. I was +the onliest child born in Alabama. Pa made one crop. I don't know how +they got along the rest of the time there. We started share cropping in +Mississippi. Pa was always a good hand with stock. If they got sick they +sent for him to tell them what to do. He never owned no land, no home +neither.</p> + +<p>"I farmed all my life. I used to make a little money along during the +year washing and ironing. I don't get no help. I live with the girls. My +girl in Memphis sends me a little change to buy my snuff and little +things I have to have. She cooks for a lawyer now. She did take care of +an lady. She died since I been here and she moved. I rather work in the +field than do what she done when that old lady lived. She was like a +baby to tend to. She had to stay in that house all the time.</p> + +<p>"The young folks don't learn manners now like they used to. Times is +better than I ever seen em. Poor folks have a hard time any time. Some +folks got a lot and some ain't got nothing everywhere."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MossClaiborne"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Claiborne Moss<br> + 1812 Marshall Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 81</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Washington County, Georgia, on Archie Duggins' +plantation, fifteen miles from Sandersville, the county-seat, June 18, +1857.</p> + +<p>"My mother's name was Ellen Moss. She was born in Georgia too, in +Hancock County, near Sparta, the county-seat. My father was Fluellen +Moss. He, too, was born in Hancock County. Bill Moss was his owner. +Jesse Battle was my mother's owner before she married. My mother and +father had ten children, none of them living now but me, so far as I +know. I was the fifth in line. There were four older than I. The oldest +was ten years older than I.</p> + +<p>"Bill Moss' and Jesse Battle's plantations ware not far apart. I never +heard my father say how he first met my mother. I was only eight years +old when he died. They were all right there in the same neighborhood, +and they would go visiting. Battle and Moss and Evans all had +plantations in the same neighborhood and they would go from one place to +the other.</p> + +<p>"When Bill Moss went to Texas, he gave my mother and father to Mrs. +Beck. Mrs. Beck was Battle's daughter and Mrs. Beck bought my father +from Moss and that kept them together. He was that good. Moss sold out +and went to Texas and all his slaves went walking while he went on the +train. He had about a hundred of them. When he got there, he couldn't +hear from them. He didn't know where they was—they was walking and he +had got on the train—so he killed hisself. When they got there, just +walking along, they found him dead.</p> + +<p>"Moss' nephew, Whaley, got two parts of all he had. Another fellow—I +can't call his name—got one part. His sister, they sent her back +five—three of my uncles and two of my aunties.</p> + +<p>"Where I was raised, Duggins wasn't a mean man. His slaves didn't get +out to work till after sunup. His brother, who lived three miles out +from us, made his folks get up before sunup. But Duggins didn't do that. +He seemed to think something of his folks. Every Saturday, he'd give +lard, flour, hog meat, syrup. That was all he had to give. That was +extra. War was going on and he couldn't get nothing else. On Wednesday +night he'd give it to them again. Of course, they would get corn-meal +and other things from the kitchen. They didn't eat in the kitchen or any +place together. Everybody got what there was on the place and cooked it +in his cabin.</p> + +<p>"Before I was born, Beck sold my mother and father to Duggins. I don't +know why he sold them. They had an auction block in the town, but out in +the country they didn't have no block. If I had seen a nigger and wanted +to buy him, I would just go up to the owner and do business with him. +That was the way it was with Beck and Duggins. Selling my mother and +father was just a private transaction between them.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Rations</b></p> + +<p>"Twice a week, flour, syrup, meat, and lard were given to the slaves. +you got other food from the kitchen. Meat, vegetables, milk,—all the +milk you wanted—bread.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>A Mean Owner</b></p> + +<p>"Beck, Moss, Battle, and Duggins, they was all good people. But Kenyon +Morps, now talk about a mean man, there was one. He lived on a hill a +little off from the Duggins plantation. His women never give birth to +children in the house. He'd never let 'em quit work before the time. He +wanted them to work—work right up to the last minute. Children were all +born in the field and in fence corners. Then he had to let 'em stay in +about a week. Last I seen him, he didn't have nothin', and was ragged as +a jay bird.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Houses</b></p> + +<p>"Our house was a log house. It had a large room, and then it had another +room as large as that one or larger built on to it. Both of these rooms +were for our use. My mother and father slept in the log cabin and the +kids slept back in the other room. My sister stayed with Joe Duggins. +Her missis was a school-teacher, and she loved sister. My master gave my +sister to Joe Duggins. Mrs. Duggins taught my sister, Fannie, to read +and spell but not to write. If there was a slave man that knowed how to +write, they used to cut off his thumb so that he couldn't write.</p> + +<p>"There was some white people wouldn't have the darkies eating butter; +our white people let us have butter, biscuits, and ham every day. They +would put it up for me.</p> + +<p>"I had more sense than any kid on the plantation. I would do anything +they wanted done no matter how hard it was. I walked five miles through +the woods once on an errand. The old lady who I went to said:</p> + +<p>"'You walk way down here by yourself?'</p> + +<p>"I told her, 'yes'.</p> + +<p>"She said, 'Well, you ain't going back by yo'self because you're too +little,' and she sent her oldest son back with me. He was white.</p> + +<p>"My boss was sick once, and he wanted to get his mail. The post office +was five miles away. He said to me:</p> + +<p>"'Can't you get my mail if I let you ride on my horse?'</p> + +<p>"I said, 'Yes sir.' I rode up to the platform on the horse. They run out +and took me off the horse and filled up the saddle bags. Then they put +me back on and told me not to get off until I reached my master. When I +got back, everybody was standing out watching for me. When my boss heard +me coming, he jumped out the bed and ran out and took me off the horse +and carried me and the sacks and all back into the house.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Soldiers</b></p> + +<p>"I saw all of Wheeler's cavalry. Sherman come through first. He came and +stayed all night. Thousands and thousands of soldiers passed through +during the night. Cooper Cuck was with them. He was a fellow that used +to peddle around in all that country before the War. He went all through +the South and learned everything. Then he joined up with the Yankees. He +come there. Nobody seen him that night. He knowed everybody knowed him. +He went and hid under something somewhere. He was under the hill at +daybreak, but nobody seen him. When the last of the soldiers was going +out in the morning, one fellow lagged behind and rounded a corner. Then +he galloped a little ways and motioned with his arms. Cooper Cuck come +out from under the hill, and he and Cooper Cuck both came back and stole +everything that they could lay their hands on—all the gold and silver +that was in the house, and everything they could carry.</p> + +<p>"Wheeler's cavalry was about three days behind Sherman. They caught up +with Sherman, but it would have been better if they hadn't, 'cause he +whipped 'em and drove 'em back and went right on. They didn't have much +fighting in my country. They had a little scrimmage once—thirty-six men +was all they was in it. One of the Yankees got lost from his company. He +come back and inquired the way to Louisville. The old boss pointed the +way with his left hand and while the fellow was looking that way, he +drug him off his horse and cut his throat and took his gun off'n him and +killed him.</p> + +<p>"Sherman's men stayed one night and left. I mean, his officers stayed. +We had to feed them. They didn't pay nothing for what they was fed. The +other men cooked and ate their own grub. They took every horse and mule +we had. I was sitting beside my old missis. She said:</p> + +<p>"'Please don't let 'em take all our horses.'</p> + +<p>"The fellows she was talking to never looked around. He just said: +'Every damn horse goes.'</p> + +<p>"The Yankees took my Uncle Ben with them when they left. He didn't stay +but a couple of days. They got in a fight. They give Uncle Ben five +horses, five sacks of silverware, and five saddles. The goods was taken +in the fight. Uncle Ben brought it back with him. The boss took all that +silver away from him. Uncle Ben didn't know what to do with it. The +Yankees had taken all my master's and he took Ben's. Ben give it to him. +He come back 'cause he wanted to.</p> + +<p>"When Wheeler's cavalry came through they didn't take nothing—nothing +but what they et. I heard a fellow say, 'Have you got anything to eat?'</p> + +<p>"My mother said, 'I ain't got nothin' but some chitlins.'</p> + +<p>"He said, 'Gimme some of those; I love chitlins.' "Mother gave 'em to +me to carry to him. I didn't get half way to him before the rest of the +men grabbed me and took 'em away from me and et 'em up. The man that +asked for them didn't get a one.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Slave Money</b></p> + +<p>"The slaves would sometimes have five or six dollars. Mostly, they would +make charcoal and sell it to get money.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Patrollers</b></p> + +<p>"I seen patrollers. They come to our house. They didn't whip nobody. Our +folks didn't care nothin' about 'em. They come looking for keys and +whiskey. They couldn't whip nobody on my master's plantation. When they +would come there, he would be sitting up with 'em. He would sit there in +his back door and look at 'em. Wouldn't let 'em hit nobody.</p> + +<p>"Them colored women had more fun that enough—laughing at them +patrollers. Fool 'em and then laugh at 'em. Make out like they was +trying to hide something and the patrollers would come running up, grab +'em and try to see what it was. And the women would laugh and show they +had nothing. Couldn't do nothin' about it. Never whipped anybody 'round +there. Couldn't whip nobody on our place; couldn't whip nobody on Jessie +Mills' place; couldn't whip nobody on Stephen Mills' place; couldn't +whip nobody on Betsy Geesley's place; couldn't whip nobody on Nancy +Mills' place; couldn't whip nobody on Potter Duggins' place. Potter +Duggins was a cousin to my master. Nobody run them peoples' plantations +but theirselves.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Social Life</b></p> + +<p>"When slaves wanted to, they would have dances. They would have dances +from one plantation to the other. The master didn't object. They had +fiddles, banjo and quills. They made the quills and blowed 'em to beat +the band. Good music. They would make the quills out of reeds. Those +reeds would sound just like a piano. They didn't have no piano. They +didn't serve nothing. Nothing to eat and nothing to drink except them +that brought whiskey. The white folks made the whiskey, but the colored +folks would get it.</p> + +<p>"We had church twice a month. The Union Church was three miles away from +us. My father and I would go when they had a meeting. Bethlehem Church +was five miles away. Everybody on the plantation belonged to that +church. Both the colored and the white belonged and went there. They had +the same pastor for Bethlehem, Union, and Dairy Ann. His name was Tom +Adams. He was a white man. Colored folks would go to Dairy Ann +sometimes. They would go to Union too.</p> + +<p>"Sometimes they would have meetings from house to house, the colored +folks. The colored folks had those house to house meetings any time they +felt like it. The masters didn't care. They didn't care how much they +prayed.</p> + +<p>"Sometimes they had corn shuckings. That was where they did the serving, +and that was where they had the big eatings. They'd lay out a big pile +of corn. Everybody would get down and throw the corn out as they shucked +it. They would have a fellow there they would call the general. He would +walk from one person to another and from one end of the pile to the +other and holler and the boys would answer. His idea was to keep them +working. If they didn't do something to keep them working, they wouldn't +get that corn shucked that night. Them people would be shucking corn! +There would be a prize to the one who got the most done or who would be +the first to get done. They would sing while they were shucking. They +had one song they would sing when they were getting close to the finish. +Part of it went like this:</p> + +<pre> +'Red shirt, red shirt +Nigger got a red shirt.' +</pre> + +<p>After the shucking was over, they would have pies, beef, biscuits, corn +bread, whiskey if you wanted it. I believe that was the most they had. +They didn't have any ice-cream. They didn't use ice-cream much in those +days. Didn't have no ice down there in the country. Not a bit of ice +there. If they had anything they wanted to save, they would let it down +in the well with a rope and keep it cool down there. They used to do +that here until they stopped them from having the wells.</p> + +<p>"Ring plays too. Sometimes when they wanted to amuse themselves, they +would play ring plays. They all take hands and form a ring and there +would be one in the center of the ring. Now he is got to get out. He +would come up and say, 'I am in this lady's garden, and I'll bet you +five dollars I can get out of here.' And d'reckly he would break +somebody's hands apart and get out.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>How Freedom Came</b></p> + +<p>"The old boss called 'em up to the house and told 'em, 'You are free as +I am.' That was one day in June. I went on in the house and got +something to eat. My mother and father, he hired them to stay and look +after the crop. Next year, my mother and father went to Ben Hook's place +and farmed on shares. But my father died there about May. Then it wasn't +nobody working but me and my sister and mother.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>What the Slaves Got</b></p> + +<p>"The slaves never got nothing. Alexander Stephens, the Vice-President of +the Confederacy, divided his plantation up and gave it to his darkies +when he died. I knew him and his brother too. Alexander[HW: *] never +did walk. He was deformed. Big headed rascal, but he had sense! His +brother was named Leonard[HW: *]. He was a lawyer. He really killed +himself. He was one of these die-hard Southerners. He did something and +they arrested him. It made him so mad. He'd bought him a horse. He got +on that horse and fell off and broke his neck. That was right after the +War. They kept garrisons in all the counties right after the War.</p> + +<p>"I was in Hancock County when I knew Vice-President Stephens. I don't +know where he was born but he had a plantation in Toliver [HW: +Taliaferro] County. Most of the Stephenses was lawyers. He was a lawyer +too, and he would come to Sparta. That is where I was living then. There +was more politics and political doings in Sparta than there was in +Crawfordville where he lived. He lived between Montgomery and Richmond +during the War, for the capital of the Confederacy was at Montgomery one +time and Richmond another.</p> + +<p>"After the War, the Republicans nominated Alexander Stephens for +governor. The Democrats knew they couldn't beat him, so they turned +'round and nominated him too. He had a lot of sense. He said, 'What we +lost on the battle-field, we will get it back at the ballot box.' Seeb +Reese, United States Senator from Hancock County, said, 'If you let the +nigger have four or five dollars in his pocket he never will steal.'</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Life Since Freedom</b></p> + +<p>"After my father died, my mother stayed where she was till Christmas. +Then she moved back to the place she came from. We went to farming. My +brother and my uncle went and farmed up in Hancock County; so the next +year we moved up there. We stayed there and farmed for a long while. My +mother married three years afterwards. We still farmed. After awhile, I +got to be sixteen years old and I wouldn't work with my stepfather, I +told my mother to hire me out; if she didn't I would be gone. She hired +me out all right. But the old man used all my money. The next year I +made it plain to her that I wanted her to hire me out again but that +nobody was to use a dollar of my money. My mother could get as much of +it as she wanted but he couldn't. The first year I bought a buggy for +them. The old man didn't want me to use it at all. I said, 'Well then, +he can't use my money no more.' But I didn't stop helping him and giving +him things. I would buy beef and give it to my mother. I knew they would +all eat it. He asked me for some wheat. I wouldn't steal it like he +wanted me to but I asked the man I was working for for it. He said, +'Take just as much as you want.' So I let him come up and get it. He +would carry it to the mill.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Ku Klux Klan</b></p> + +<p>"The Ku Klux got after Uncle Will once. He was a brave man. He had a +little mare that was a race horse. Will rode right through the bunch +before they ever realized that it was him. He got on the other side of +them. She was gone! They kept on after him. They went down to his house +one night. He wouldn't run for nothing. He shot two of them and they +went away. Then he was out of ammunition. People urged him to leave, for +they knew he didn't have no more bullets; but he wouldn't and they came +back and killed him.</p> + +<p>"They came down to Hancock County one night and the boys hid on both +sides of the bridge. When they got in the middle of the bridge, the boys +commenced to fire on them from both sides, and they jumped into the +river. The darkies went on home when they got through shooting at them; +but there wasn't no more Ku Klux in Hancock County. The better thinking +white folks got together and stopped it.</p> + +<p>"The Ku Klux kept the niggers scared. They cowed them down so that they +wouldn't go to the polls. I stood there one night when they were +counting ballots. I belonged to the County Central Committee. I went in +and stood and looked. Our ballot was long; theirs was short. I stood and +seen Clait Turner calling their names from our ballots. I went out and +got Rube Turner and then we both went back. They couldn't call the votes +that they had put down they had. Rube saw it.</p> + +<p>"Then they said, 'Are you going to test this?'</p> + +<p>"Rube said, 'Yes.' But he didn't because it would have cost too much +money. Rube was chairman of the committee.</p> + +<p>"The Ku Klux did a whole lot to keep the niggers away from the polls in +Washington and Baldwin counties. They killed a many a nigger down there.</p> + +<p>"They hanged a Ku Klux for killing his wife and he said he didn't mind +being hung but he didn't want a damn nigger to see him die.</p> + +<p>"But they couldn't keep the niggers in Hancock County away from the +polls. There was too many of them.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Work in Little Rock</b></p> + +<p>"I came to Little Rock, November 1, 1903. I came here with surveyors. +They wanted to send me to Miami but I wouldn't go. Then I went to the +mortar box and made mortar. Then I went to the school board. After that +I ain't had no job. I was too old. I get a little help from the +government.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Opinions of the Present</b></p> + +<p>"I think that the young folks ought to make great men and women. But I +don't see that they are making that stride. Most of them is dropping +below the mark. I think we ought to have some powerful men and women but +what I see they don't stand up like they should.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Own Family</b></p> + +<p>"I have three daughters, no sons. These three daughters have twelve +grandchildren."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MossFrozie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Frozie Moss (dark mulatto), Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 69</h3> +<br> + +<p>"When my grandma whut raised me got free she and grandpa come to Memphis +and didn't stay there long till they went to Crittenden County on a +man's farm. My grandma was born in Alabama and my grandpa in Virginia. I +know he wasn't in the Nat Turner rebellion, for my mother had nine +children and all but me at Holly Grove, Mississippi. I was born up in +Crittenden County. She died. I remember very little about my father. I +jes' remember father a little. He died too. My grand parents lived at +Holly Grove all during the war. They used to talk about how they did. +She said hardest time she ever lived through was at Memphis. Nothing to +do, nothing to eat and no places to stay. I don't know why they left and +come on to Memphis. She said her master's name was Pig'ge. He wasn't +married. He and his sisters lived together. My grandmother was a slave +thirty years. She was a field hand. She said she would be right back in +the field when her baby was two weeks old. They didn't wont the slaves +to die, they cost too much money, but they give them mighty hard work to +do sometimes. Grandma and grandpa was heap stronger I am at my age. They +didn't know how old they was. Her master told her how long he had her +when they left him and his father owned her before he died. I think they +had a heap easier time after they come to Arkansas from what she said. I +can't answer yo questions because I'm just tellin' you what I remembers +and I was little when they used to talk so much.</p> + +<p>"If the young generation would save anything for the time when they +can't work I think they would be all right. I don't hear about them +saving. They buys too much. That their only trouble. They don't know how +to see ahead.</p> + +<p>"I owns this house is all. I been sick a whole heap, spent a lot on my +medicines and doctor bill. I worked on the farm till after I come to +Brinkley. We bought this place here and I cooks. I cooked for Miss Molly +Brinkkell, Mr. Adams and Mrs. Fowler. I washes and irons some when I can +get it. Washing and ironing 'bout gone out of fashion now. I don't get +no moneys. I get commodities from the Sociable Welfare. My son works and +they don't give me no money."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MossMose"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lucy<br> +Person interviewed: Mose Moss, Russellville, Arkansas<br> +Age: 65</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Mose Moss is my name, suh, and I was born in 1875 in Yell County. My +father was born in old Virginny in 1831 and died in Yell County, +Arkansas, eight miles from Dardanelle, in 1916. Yes suh, I've lived in +Pope County a good many years. I recollects some things pretty well and +some not so good.</p> + +<p>"Yes suh, my father used to talk a heap about the Ku Klux Klan, and a +lot of the Negroes were afraid of em and would run when they heard they +was comin' around.</p> + +<p>"My father's name was Henry Moss. He run away from the plantation in +Virginia before the War had been goin' on very long, and he j'ined the +army in Tennessee—yes suh, the Confedrit army. Ho suh, his name was +never found on the records, so didn't never draw no pension.</p> + +<p>"After he was freed he always voted the Republican ticket till he died.</p> + +<p>"After the War he served as Justice of the Peace in his township in Yell +County. Yes suh, that was the time they called the Re-con-struc-tion.</p> + +<p>"I vote the Republican ticket, but sometimes I don't vote at the reg'lar +elections. No, I've never had any trouble with my votin'.</p> + +<p>"I works at first one thing and another but ain't doin' much now. Work +is hard to get. Used to work mostly at the mines. Not able to do much of +late years.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, I remember some of the old songs they used to sing when my +parents was living: 'Old-Time Religion' was one of em, and 'Swing Low, +Sweet Chariot' was another one we liked to sing."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MullinsSO"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: S.O. Mullins, Clarendon, Arkansas<br> + Janitor for Masonic Hall<br> + He wears a Masonic ring<br> +Age: 80</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My master was B.F. Wallace—Benjamin Franklin Wallace and Katie +Wallace. They had no children to my recollection.</p> + +<p>"I was born at Brittville, Alabama. My parents' names was George W. +Mullins and Millie. They had, to my recollection, one girl and three +boys. Mr. Wallace moved to Arkansas before the Civil War. They moved to +Phillips County. My mother and father both farm hands and when my +grandmother was no longer able to do the cookin' my mother took her +place. I was rally too little to recollect but they always praised +Wallace. They said he never whipped one of his slaves in his life. His +slaves was about free before freedom was declared. They said he was a +good man. Well when freedom was declared all the white folks knowed it +first. He come down to the cabins and told us. He said you can stay and +finish the crops. I will feed and clothe you and give you men $10 and +you women $5 apiece Christmas. That was more money then than it is now. +We all stayed on and worked on shares the next year. We stayed around +Poplar Grove till he died. When I was nineteen I got a job, porter on +the railroad. I brought my mother to Clarendon to live with me. I was in +the railroad service at least fifteen years. I was on the passenger +train. Then I went to a sawmill here and then I farmed, I been doing +every little thing I find to do since I been old. All I owns is a little +house and six lots in the new addition. I live with my wife. She is my +second wife. Cause I am old they wouldn't let me work on the levy. If I +been young I could have got work. My age knocks me out of 'bout all the +jobs. Some of it I could do. I sure don't get no old age pension. I gets +$4 every two months janitor of the Masonic Hall.</p> + +<p>"I have a garden. No place for hog nor cow.</p> + +<p>"My boys in Chicago. They need 'bout all they can get. They don't help.</p> + +<p>"The present conditions seem good. They can get cotton to pick and two +sawmills run in the winter (100 men each) where folks can get work if +they hire them. The stay (stave) mill is shut down and so is the button +factory. That cuts out a lot of work here. The present generation is +beyond me. Seems like they are gone hog wild."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Note</b></p> + +<p>The next afternoon he met me and told me the following story:——</p> + +<p>"One night the servants quarters was overflowin' wid Yankee soldiers. I +was scared nearly to death. My mother left me and my little brother +cause she didn't wanter sleep in the house where the soldiers was. We +slept on the floor and they used our beds. They left next mornin'. They +camped in our yard under the trees. Next morning they was ridin' out +when old mistress saw 'em. She said they'd get it pretty soon. When they +crossed the creek—Big Creek—half mile from our cabins I heard the guns +turn in on 'em. The neighbors all fell out wid my master. They say he +orter go fight too. He was sick all time. Course he wasn't sick. They +come and took off 25 mules and all the chickens and he never got up. +They took two fine carriage horses weighed 2,000 pounds apiece I speck. +One named Lee and one Stone Wall. He never went out there. He claimed +he was sick all time. One of the carriage horses was a fine big white +horse and had a bay match. Folks didn't like him—said he was a coward. +When I went over cross the creek after the fightin' was over, men just +lay like dis[A] piled on top each other."</p> +<p>[A: <img src="images/177.jpg" width="60" height="33" alt="sketch of stacked +fingers"> He used his fingers to show me how the soldiers were crossed.]</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MurdockAlex"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Alex Murdock, Edmondson, Arkansas<br> +Age: 65</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My owner or least my folks was owned by Dr. [HW: 'Murder'] (Murdock). +He had a big farm. He was a widower. He had no children as ever I knowed +of. Dr. 'Murder' raised my father's mother. He bought her at Tupelo, +Mississippi. He raised mother too. She was bright color. I'm sure they +stayed on after freedom 'cause I stayed there till we come to Arkansas. +Father was a teamster. He followed that till he died. He owned a dray +and died at Brinkley. He was well-known and honorable.</p> + +<p>"I worked in the oil mill at Brinkley-American Oil Company.</p> + +<p>"Mother was learned durin' slavery but I couldn't say who done it. She +taught school 'round Buena Vista and Okolona, Mississippi. She learned +me. I was born 1874—November 25, 1874. I heard her say she worked in +the field one year. They give her some land and ploughed it so she could +have a patch. It was all she could work. I don't know how much. It was +her patch. Our depot was Prairie Station, Mississippi. My parents was +Monroe [HW: 'Murder'] Murdock [TR: lined out] and Lucy Ann Murdock [TR: +lined out] [HW: Murder]. It is spelled M-u-r-d-o-c-k.</p> + +<p>"I farmed all my whole life. Oil milling was the surest, quickest living +but I likes farmin' all right.</p> + +<p>"I never contacted the Ku Kluxes. They was 'bout gone when I come on.</p> + +<p>"I voted off an' on. This is the white folks' country and they going to +run their gov'mint. The thing balls us up is, some tells us one way and +some more tells us a different way to do. And we don't know the best +way. That balls us up. Times is better than ever I seen them, for the +man that wants to work.</p> + +<p>"I get $8 a month. I work all I can."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MyersBessie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Bessie Myers, Brassfield, Arkansas<br> +Age: 50? didn't know</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My mother was named Jennie Bell. She was born in North Ca'lina +(Carolina). She worked about the house. She said there was others at the +house working all the time with her.</p> + +<p>"She said they daresn't to cross the fence on other folks' land or go +off up the road 'lessen you had a writing to show. One woman could +write. She got a pass and this woman made some more. She said couldn't +find nothing to make passes on. It happened they never got caught up. +That woman didn't live very close by. She talked like she was free but +was one time a slave her own self.</p> + +<p>"Mother said she would run hide every time the Yankee men come. She said +she felt safer in the dark. They took so many young women to wait on +them and mother was afraid every time they would take her.</p> + +<p>"She said she had been at the end of a corn row at daylight ready to +start chopping it over, or pull fodder, or pull ears either. She said +they thought to lie in bed late made you weak. Said the early fresh air +what made children strong.</p> + +<p>"On wash days they all met at a lake and washed. They had good times +then. They put the clothes about on the bushes and briers and rail +fences. Some one or two had to stay about to keep the clothes from a +stray hog or goat till they dried. And they would forage about in the +woods. It was cool and pleasant. They had to gather up the clothes in +hamper baskets and bring them up to iron. Mother said they didn't mind +work much. They got used to it.</p> + +<p>"Mother told about men carried money in sacks. When they bought a slave, +they open up a sack and pull out gold and silver.</p> + +<p>"The way she talked she didn't mind slavery much. Papa lived till a few +years ago but he never would talk about slavery at all. His name was +Willis Bell."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MyhandMary"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Sallie C. Miller<br> +Person interviewed: Mary Myhand, Clarksville, Arkansas<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My mammie died when I was a little girl She had three children and our +white folks took us in their house and raised us. Two of us had fever +and would have died if they hadn't got us a good doctor. The doctor they +had first was a quack and we were getting worse until they called the +other doctor, then we commence to get well. I don't know how old I am. +Our birthdays was down in the mistress' Bible and when the old war come +up, the house was burned and lost everything but I know I am at least 83 +or 84 years old. Our white folks was so good to us. They never whipped +us, and we eat what they eat and when they eat. I was born in White +County, Tennessee and moved to Missouri but the folks did not like it +there so we come to Benton County, Arkansas. One side of the road was +Benton County and the other side was Washington County but we always had +to go to Bentonville, the county seat, to tend to business. I was a +little tod of a girl when the war come up. One day word come that the +'Feds' were coming through and kill all of the old men and take all the +boys with them, so master took my brother and a grandson of his and +started South. I was so scared. I followed them about a half mile before +they found me and I begged so hard they took me with them. We went to +Texas and was there about one year when the Feds gave the women on our +place orders to leave their home. Said they owned it now. They had just +got to Texas where we was when the South surrendered and we all come +back home.</p> + +<p>"We stayed with our white folks for about twenty years after the war. +They shore was good to me. I worked for them in the house but never +worked in the field. I came across the mountain to Clarksville with a +Methodist preacher and his family and married here. My husband worked in +a livery stable until he died, then I worked for the white folks until I +fell and hurt my knee and got too old. I draws my old age pension.</p> + +<p>"I do not know about the young generation. I am old and crippled and +don't go out none."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MyraxGriffin"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Griffin Myrax<br> + 913 Missouri Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age 77?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I don't know my age exactly. You know in them days people didn't take +care of their ages like they do now. I couldn't give you any trace of +the war, but I do remember when the Ku Klux was runnin' around.</p> + +<p>"Oh Lord, so much of the time I heard my mother talk about the slavery. +I was born in Oklahoma and my grandfather was a full-blooded Crete +Indian. He was very much of a man and lived to be one hundred thirty +years old. All Crete Indians named after some herb—that's what the name +Myrax means.</p> + +<p>"I heard my mother say that in slavery times the man worked all day with +weights on their feet so when night come they take them off and their +feet feel so light they could outran the Ku Klux. Now I heard her tell +that.</p> + +<p>"My parents moved from Oklahoma to Texas and I went to school in +Marshall, Texas. All my schoolin' was in Texas—my people was tied up +there. My last schoolin' was in Buchanan, Texas. The professor told my +mother she would have to take me out of school for awhile, I studied too +hard. I treasured my books. When other children was out playin' I was +studyin'.</p> + +<p>"There was some folks in that country that didn't get along so well. I +remember there was a blind woman that the folks sent something to eat by +another colored woman. But she eat it up and cooked a toadfrog for the +old blind woman. That didn't occur on our place but in the neighborhood. +When the people found it out they whipped her sufficient.</p> + +<p>"When my grandfather died he didn't have a decayed tooth in his head. +They was worn off like a horse's teeth but he had all of them.</p> + +<p>"I always followed sawmill work and after I left that I followed +railroading. I liked railroading. I more or less kept that in my view.</p> + +<p>"About this slavery—I couldn't hardly pass my sentiments on it. The +world is so far gone, it would be the hardest thing to put the bridle on +some of the people that's runnin' wild now."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NealTomWylie"></a> +<h3>Name of Interviewer: Irene Robertson<br> +Subject: Ex-slaves—Dreams—Herbs: Cures and Remedies<br> +Story:—<br> +<br> +This information given by: Tom Wylie Neal<br> +Place of Residence: Hazen, Arkansas—Near Green Grove<br> +Occupation: Farmer—Feeds cattle in the winter for a man in Hazen.<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>His father and mother belonged to Tom Neal at Calhoun, Georgia. He +remembers the big battle at Atlanta Ga. He was eight years old. He saw +the lights, [saw the bullets in the air at night] and heard the boom, +boom of guns and cannons. They passed along with loaded wagons and in +uniforms. The horses were beautiful, and he saw lots of fine saddles and +bridles. His mistress' name was Mrs. Tom Neal. She had the property and +married Tom Neal. She had been married before and her first husband died +but her first husband's name can't be recalled. She had two +children—girls—by her first husband. Her second husband just married +her to protect them all he could. He didn't do anything unless the old +mistress told him to do it and how to do it. Wylie Neal was raised up +with the old mistress' children. He was born a slave and lived to +thirteen years. "The family had some better to eat and lots more to +wear, but they gave me plenty and never did mistreat me. They had a +peafowl. That was good luck, to keep some of them about on the place." +They had guineas, chickens and turkeys. They never had a farm bell. He +never saw one till he came to Arkansas. They blew a big "Conch shell" +instead. Mistress had cows and she would pour milk or pot-liquor out in +a big pewter bowl on a stump and the children would come up there from +the cabins and eat [till the field hands had time to cook a meal.][HW:?] +Wylie's mother was a field hand. They drank out of tin cans and gourds. +The master mated his hands. Some times he would ask his young man or +woman if they knew anybody they would like to marry that he was going to +buy more help and if they knew anybody he would buy them if he could. +The way they met folks they would get asked to corn shuckings and log +rollings and Mrs. Neal always took some of her colored people to church +to attend to the stock, tie the horses and hitch up, maybe feed and to +nurse her little girls at church. The colored folks sat on the back +seats over in a corner together. If they didn't behave or talked out +they got a whipping or didn't go no more. "They kept the colored people +scared to be bad."</p> + +<p>The colored folks believed in hoodoo and witches. Heard them talking +lots about witches. They said if they found anybody was a witch they +would kill them. Witches took on other forms and went out to do meaness. +They said sometimes some of them got through latch holes. They used +buttons and door knobs whittled out of wood, and door latches with +strings.</p> + +<p>People married early in "Them days"—when Mistress' oldest girl married +she gave her Sumanthy, Wylie's oldest sister when they come home [they +would let her come.] They sent their children to school some but the +colored folks didn't go because it was "pay school." Every year they had +"pertracted meeting." Looked like a thousand people come and stayed two +or three weeks along in August, in tents. "We had a big time then and +some times we'd see a colored girl we'd ask the master to buy. They'd +preach to the colored folks some days. Tell them the law. How to behave +and serve the Lord." When Wylie was twelve years old the "Yanks" came +and tore up the farm. "It was just like these cyclones that is [TR: +illegible word] around here in Arkansas, exactly like that."</p> + +<p>His mistress left and he never saw her again. General [HW: John Bell] +Hood was the [TR: illegible word] he thinks, but he was given to Captain +Condennens to wait on him. They went to Marietta, Ga., and Kingston, Ga. +"Rumors came about that we were free and everybody was drifting around. +The U.S. Government gave us food then like they do now and we hunted +work. Everybody nearly froze and starved. We wore old uniforms and slept +anywhere we could find, an old house or piece of a house. In +1865-1869—the Ku Klux was miserable on the colored folks. Lots of folks +died out of consumption in the spring and pneumonia all winter.</p> + +<p>"There wasn't any doctors seeing after colored folks for they had no +money and they used herbs—only medicine they could get."</p> + +<p>Only herbs he remembers he used is: chew black snake roots to settle +sick stomach. Flux weed tea for disordered stomach. People eat so much +"messed up food" lot of them got sick.</p> + +<p>Wylie Neal wandered about and finally came to Chattanooga. They got old +uniforms and victuals from the "Yanks" about a year.</p> + +<p>Colonel Stocker come and got up a lot of hands and paid their way to +Memphis on the train. From there they were put on the <u>Molly +Hamilton</u> boat and went to Linden, Arkansas, on the St. Francis +River. "He fared fine" there. In 1906[TR: ?] he came to Hazen and since +then he has owned small farms at Biscoe and forty acres near Hazen. It +was joining the old Joe Perry place. Dr. ---- got a mortgage on it and +took it. Wylie Neal lives with his niece and she is old too so they get +relief and a pension.</p> + +<p>"He don't believe in dreams but some dreams like when you dream of the +dead there's sho' goner be falling weather." He "don't dream much" he +says.</p> + +<p>He has a birthmark on his leg. It looks like a bunch of berries. He +never heard what caused it. It has always been there.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NealySally"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Sally Nealy<br> + 105 Mulberry Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 91</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes mam, I was a slave! I was sixteen years old when the war begun. I +was born in Texas.</p> + +<p>"My old master was John Hall and my young master was Marse Dick. Marse +John went to war the 5th day of May in 1861 and he was killed in June. +They wasn't nothin' left to bring home but his right leg and his left +arm. They knowed it was him cause his name was tattooed on his leg.</p> + +<p>"He was a mean rascal. He brought us up from the plantation and pat us +on the head and give us a little whisky and say 'Your name is Sally or +Mary or Mose' just like we was dogs.</p> + +<p>"My old mistress, Miss Caroline, was a mean one too. She was the mother +of eight children—five girls and three boys. When she combed her hair +down low on her neck she was all right but when she come down with it +done up on the top of her head—look out.</p> + +<p>"It was my job to scrub the big cedar churns with brick dust and Irish +potato and polish the knives and forks the same way. Then every other +day I had to mold twelve dozen candles and sweep the yard with a dogwood +bresh broom.</p> + +<p>"She didn't give us no biscuits or sugar 'cept on Christmas. Jest +shorts and molasses for our coffee. When the Yankee soldiers come +through old mistress run and hide in the cellar but the Yankees went +down in the collar too and took all the hams and honey and brandied +peaches she had.</p> + +<p>"They didn't have no doctors for the niggers then. Old mistress just +give us some blue mass and castor oil and they didn't give you nothin' +to take the taste out your mouth either.</p> + +<p>"Oh lord, I know 'bout them Ku Klux. They wore false faces and went +around whippin' people.</p> + +<p>"After the surrender I went to stay with Miss Fulton. She was good to me +and I stayed with her eleven years. She wanted to know how old I was so +my father went to Miss Caroline and she say I 'bout twenty now.</p> + +<p>"Some white folks was good to their slaves. I know one man, Alec Yates, +when he killed hogs he give the niggers five of 'em. Course he took the +best but that was all right.</p> + +<p>"After freedom the Yankees come and took the colored folks away to the +marshal's yard and kept them till they got jobs for 'em. They went to +the white folks houses and took things to feed the niggers.</p> + +<p>"I ain't been married but once. I thought I was in love but I wasn't. +Love is a itchin' 'round the heart you can't get at to scratch.</p> + +<p>"I 'member one song they sung durin' the war</p> + +<pre> +'The Yankees are comin' through +By fall sez I +We'll all drink stone blind +Johnny fill up the bowl.'" +</pre> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NeelySally"></a> +<h3>FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Subject: Songs of Civil War Days<br> +Story:—Information<br> +<br> +This information given by: Sally Neeley<br> +Place of residence: 105 N. Mulberry, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Occupation: None<br> +Age: 90</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]<br> +[TR: Same as previous informant (Sally Nealy).]</p> +<br> + + +<pre> +(1) +"In eighteen hundred and sixty-one +Football (?) sez I; +In eighteen hundred and sixty-one +That's the year the war begun +We'll all drink stone blind, +Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(2) +"In eighteen hundred and sixty-two +Football (?) sez I; +In eighteen hundred and sixty-two +That's the year we put 'em through +We'll all drink stone blind, +Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(3) +"In eighteen hundred and sixty-three +Football (?) sez I; +In eighteen hundred and sixty-three +That's the year we didn't agree +We'll all drink stone blind. +Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(4) +"In eighteen hundred and sixty-four +Football (?) sez I; +In eighteen hundred and sixty-four +We'll all go home and fight no more +We'll all drink stone blind. +Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(5) +"In eighteen hundred and sixty-five +Football (?) sez I; +In eighteen hundred and sixty-five +We'll have the Rebels dead or alive +We'll all drink stone blind, +Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(6) +"In eighteen hundred and sixty-six +Football (?) sez I; +In eighteen hundred and sixty-six +We'll have the Rebels in a helava fix +We'll all drink stone blind, +Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(7) +"In eighteen hundred and sixty-seven +Football (?) sez I; +In eighteen hundred and sixty-seven +We'll have the Rebels dead and at the devil +We'll all drink stone blind. +Johnny, came fill up the bowl." +</pre> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>The word "football" doesn't sound right in this song, but I was unable +to find it in print, and Sally seemed to think it was the right word.</p> + +<p>Sally is a very wicked old woman and swears like a sailor, but she has a +remarkable memory.</p> + +<p>She was "bred and born" in Rusk County, Texas and says she came to Pine +Bluff when it was "just a little pig."</p> + +<p>Says she was sixteen when the Civil War began.</p> + +<p>I have previously reported an interview with her.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NealyWylie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Wylie Nealy [HW: Biscoe Arkansas?]<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<br> + +<p>I was born in 1852. I am 85 years old. I was born in Gordon County. The +closest town was Calhoun, South Carolina. My sister died in '59. That's +the first dead, person I ever saw. One of my sisters was give away and +another one was sold before the Civil War started. Sister Mariah was +give to the young mistress, Miss Ella Conley. I didn't see her sold. I +never seed nobody sold but I heard 'em talking about it. I had five +sisters and one brother. My father was a free man always. He was a +Choctaw Indian. Mother was part Cherokee Indian. My mother's mistress +was Mrs. Martha Christian. He died and she married Tom Nealy, the one +they call me fur, Wylie Nealy.</p> + +<p>Liberty and Freedom was all I ever heard any colored folks say dey +expected to get out of de war, and mighty proud of dot. Nobody knowed +they was goin to have a war till it was done broke out and they was +fightin about it. Didn't nobody want land, they jess wanted freedom. I +remembers when Lincoln was made the President both times and when he was +killed. I recollects all that like yesterday.</p> + +<p>The army had been through and swept out everything. There wasn't a +chicken or hog nowhere to be had, took the stock and cattle and all the +provisions. So de slaves jess had to scatter out and leave right now. +And after de army come through. I was goin back down to the old place +and some soldiers passed riding along and one said "Boy where you goin? +Said nothing up there." I says, "I knows it." Then he say "Come on here, +walk along back there" and I followed him. I was twelve years old. He +was Captain McClendenny. Then when I got to the camp wid him he say "You +help around here." I got sick and they let me go back home then to +Resacca, Georgia and my mother died. When I went back they sent me to +Chattanooga with Captain Story. I was in a colored regiment nine months, +I saw my father several times while I was at Chattanooga. We was in +Shermans army till it went past Atlanta. They burned up the city. Two of +my masters come out of the war alive and two dead. I was mustered out in +August 1865. I stayed in camp till my sisters found a cabin to move in. +Everybody got rations issued out. It was a hard time. I got hungry lots +times. No plantations was divided and the masters didn't have no more +than the slaves had when the war was done. After the Yankees come in and +ripped them up old missus left and Mr. Tom Nealy was a Home Guard. He +had a class of old men. Never went back or seen any more of them. +Everybody left and a heap of the colored folks went where rations could +be issued to them and some followed on in the armies. After I was +mustered out I stayed around the camps and went to my sister's cabin +till we left there. Made anything we could pick up. Men come in there +getting people to go work for them. Some folks went to Chicago. A heap +of the slaves went to the northern cities. Colonel Stocker, a officer in +the Yankee army, got us to come to a farm in Arkansas. We wanted to stay +together is why we all went on the farm. May 1866, when we come to +Arkansas is the first farmin I had seen done since I left Tom Nealy's +place. Colonel Stocker is mighty well known in St. Francis County. He +brought lots of families, brought me and my brother, my two brothers and +a nephew. We come on the train. It took four or five days. When we got +to Memphis we come to Linden on a boat "Molly Hamilton" they called it. +I heard it was sunk at Madison long time after that. Colonel Stocker +promised to pay $6 a month and feed us. When Christmas come he said all +I was due was $12.45. We made a good crop. That wasn't it. Been there +since May. Had to stay till got all the train and boat fare paid. There +wasn't no difference in that and slavery 'cept they couldn't sell us.</p> + +<p>I heard a heap about the Ku Klux but I nebber seed them. Everybody was +scared of them.</p> + +<p>The first votin I ever heard of was in Grant's election. Both black and +white voted. I voted Republican for Grant. Lot of the southern soldiers +was franchised and couldn't vote. Just the private soldiers could vote +at tall. I don't know why it was. I was a slave for thirteen years from +birth. Every slave could vote after freedom. Some colored folks held +office. I knew several magistrates and sheriffs. There was one at Helena +(Arkansas) and one at Marianna. He was a High Sheriff. I voted some +after that but I never voted in the last Presidento election. I heard +'em say it wasn't no use, this man would be elected anyhow. I sorter +quit off long time ago.</p> + +<p>In 1874 and 1875 I worked for halves and made nough to buy a farm in St. +Francis County. It cost $925. I bought it in 1887. Eighty acres to be +cleared down in the bottoms. My family helped and when my help got +shallow, the children leaving me, I sold it for $2,000, in 1904. I was +married jess once and had eight children; five livin and three dead. Me +and the old woman went to Oklahoma. We went in January and come back to +Biscoe (Arkansas) in September. It wasn't no place for farming. I bought +40 acres from Mr. Aydelott and paid him $500. I sold it and come to Mr. +Joe Perry's place, paid $500 for 40 acres of timber land. We cleared it +and I got way in debt and lost it. Clear lost it! Ize been working +anywhere I could make a little since then. My wife died and I been doing +little jobs and stays about with my children. The Welfare gives me a +little check and some supplies now and then.</p> + +<p>No maam, I can't read much. I was not learnt. I could figure a little +before my eyes got bad. The white folks did send their children to pay +schools but we colored children had to stay around the house and about +in the field to work. I never got no schoolin. I went with old missus to +camp meeting down in Georgia one time and got to go to white church +sometimes. At the camp meeting there was a big tent and all around it +there was brush harbors and tents where people stayed to attend the +meetins. They had four meetins a day. Lots of folk got converted and +shouted. They had a lot of singings They had a lots to eat and a big +time.</p> + +<p>I don't think much about these young folks now. It seems lack everybody +is having a hard time to live among us colored folks. Some white folks +has got a heap and fine cars to get about in. I don't know what go in to +become of 'em.</p> + +<p>People did sing more than I hear them now but I never could sing. They +sing a lot of foolish songs and mostly religious songs.</p> + +<p>I don't recollect of any slave uprising. I never heard of any. We didn't +know they was going to have a war till they was fighting. Yes maam, they +heard Lincoln was going to set 'em free, but they didn't know how he was +going to do it. Everybody wanted freedom. Mr. Hammond (white) ask me not +long ago if I didn't think it best to bring us from Africa and be slaves +than like wild animals in Africa. He said we was taught about God and +the Gospel over here if we was slaves. I told him I thought dot freedom +was de best anywhere.</p> + +<p>We had a pretty hard time before freedom. My mother was a field woman. +When they didn't need her to work they hired her out and they got the +pay. The master mated the colored people. I got fed from the white folks +table whenever I curried the horses. I was sorter raised up with Mr. +Nealy's children. They didn't mistreat me. On Saturday the mistress +would blow a cone shell and they knowed to go and get the rations. We +got plenty to eat. They had chickens and ducks and geese and plenty +milk. They did have hogs. They had seven or eight guineas and a lot of +peafowls. I never heard a farm bell till I come to Arkansas. The +children et from pewter bowls or earthen ware. Sometimes they et greens +or milk from the same bowl, all jess dip in. The Yankees took me to +General Hood's army and I was Captain McCondennen's helper at the +camps.[HW: ?] We went down through Marietta and Atlanta and through +Kingston. Shells come over where we lived. I saw 'em fight all the +time. Saw the light and heard the roaring of de guns miles away. It +looked like a storm where the army went along. They tramped the wheat +and oats and cotton down and turned the horses in on the corn. The +slaves show did hate to see the Yankees waste everything. They promised +a lot and wasn't as good as the old masters. All dey wanted was to be +waited on too. The colored folks was freed when the Yankees took all the +stock and cattle and rations. Everybody had to leave and let the +government issue them rations. Everybody was proud to be free. They +shouted and sung. They all did pretty well till the war was about to end +then they was told to scatter and no whars to go. Cabins all tore down +or burned. No work to do. There was no money to pay. I wore old uniforms +pretty well till I come to Arkansas. I been here in Hazen since 1906. I +come on a boat from Memphis to Linden. Colonel Stocker brought a lot of +us on the train. The name of the boat was Molly Hamilton. It was a big +boat and we about filled it. I show was glad to get back on a farm.</p> + +<p>I don't know what is goin to become of the young folks. Everything is so +different now and when I was growin up I don't know what will become of +the younger generation.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelandEmaline"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Emaline Neland, Marianna, Arkansas<br> +Age: Born 1859</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born two years before the War. I was born in Murray County, +Tennessee. It was middle Tennessee. When I come to remembrance I was in +Grant County, Arkansas. When I remember they raised wheat and corn and +tobacco. Mother's master was Dr. Harrison. His son was married and me +and my brother Anderson was give to him. He come to Arkansas 'fore ever +I could remember. He was a farmer but I never seen him hit a lick of +work in my life. He was good to me and my brother. She was good too. I +was the nurse. They had two children. Brother was a house boy. Me and +her girl was about the same size but I was the oldest. Being with the +other children I called her mother too. I didn't know no other mother +till freedom.</p> + +<p>"Freedom! Well, here is the very way it all was: Old master told her +(mother) she was free. He say, 'Go get your children, you free as I is +now.' Ain't I heard her say it many a time? Well, mother come in a ox +wagon what belong to him and got us. They run me down, caught me and got +me in the wagon. They drove twenty-five miles. Old Dr. Harrison had +moved to Arkansas. Being with the other children I soon learnt to call +her ma. She had in all ten or eleven children. She was real dark.</p> + +<p>"Pa was a slave too. He was a low man. He was a real bright man. He was +brighter than I is. He belong to a widow woman named Tedford. He renamed +his self after freedom. He took the name Brown 'stead of Tedford. I +never heard him say why he wasn't satisfied with his own name. He was a +soldier. He worked for the Yankees.</p> + +<p>"After the War pa and ma got back together and lived together till she +died. There was five days' difference in their deaths. They died of +pneumonia. He was 64 years old and she was 54 years old. I was at home +when pa come from the War. All my sisters was light, one sister had +sandy hair like pa. She was real light. Ma was a good all 'round woman. +She cooked more than anything else. She nursed. Dr. Harrison told her to +stay till her husband come back or all the time if he didn't ever come +back. Ma never worked in the field. When pa come he moved us on a place +to share crop. Ma never worked in the field. He was buying a home in +Grant County. He started to Mississippi and stopped close to Helena and +ten or twelve miles from Marianna. He had a soldier friend wouldn't let +him go. He told him this was a better country. He decided to stay down +in here.</p> + +<p>"I heard a whole heap about the Ku Klux. One time when a crowd was going +to church, we heard horse's feet coming; sound like they would run over +us. We all got clear out of reach so they wouldn't run over us. They had +on funny caps was all I could see, they went so fast. We give them the +clear road and they went on. That is all I ever seen of the Ku Klux.</p> + +<p>"I seen Dr. Harrison's wife. She was a little old lady but we left after +I went there.</p> + +<p>"I used to sew for the public. Yes, white and colored folks. I learnt my +own self to sew. I never had but one boy in my life. He died at seven +weeks old. I raised a stepson. I married twice. I married at home both +times. Just a quiet marriage and a colored preacher married me both +times.</p> + +<p>"The present conditions is hard. I want things and can't get 'em. If I +had the strength to hold out to work I could get along.</p> + +<p>"The present generation—young white and black—blinds me. They turns +corners too fast. They going so fast they don't have time to take +advice. They promise to do better but they don't. They do like they want +to do and don't tell nobody till they done it. I say they just running +way with their selves.</p> + +<p>"I get $8 and a little help along. I'm thankful for it. It is a blessing +I tell you."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelsonHenry"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Henry Nelson<br> + 904 E. Fifth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: About 70</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My name is Henry Nelson. I was born in Arkansas—Crittenden County near +Memphis, Tennessee. I was born not far from Memphis but on this side.</p> + +<p>"My mother's name was Adeline Taylor. That was her old slavery folks' +name. She was a Taylor before she married my father—Nelson. My father's +first name was Green. I don't remember none of my grandparents. My +father's mother died before I come to remember and I know my mother's +mother died before I could remember.</p> + +<p>"My father was born in Mississippi—Sardis, Mississippi—and my mother +was a Tennesseean—<u>Cartersville</u>[HW:?] Tennessee, twenty-five +miles above Memphis. [HW: Carter, in Carter County, about 35 m. north of +Memphis, but no Cartersville.] [TR: moved from bottom of following +page.]</p> + +<p>"After peace was declared, they met in Tennessee. That was where my +mother was born, you know. They fell in love with one another in Shelby +County, and married there. My mother had been married once before during +slavery time. She had been made to marry by her master. Her first +husband was named Eli. He was my oldest sister's father. Him and my +mother had the same master and missis. She was made to marry him. She +was only thirteen years old when she married him. She was fine and stout +and her husband was fine and stout, and they wanted more from that +stock. I don't know how old he was but he was a lot older than she was. +He was a kind of an elderly man. She had just one child by him—my +oldest sister, Georgia. She was only married a short time before freedom +came.</p> + +<p>"My father farmed. He was always a farmer—raised cotton and corn. My +mother was a farmer too. Both of them—that is both of her +husbands—were farmers.</p> + +<p>"My mother and father used to go off to places to dance and the +pateroles would get after them. You had to have a pass to go off your +place and if you didn't have a pass, they would make you warm. Some of +them would get caught sometimes and the pateroles would whip them. They +would sure got whipped if they didn't have a pass.</p> + +<p>"The old master come out and told them they were free when peace was +declared. He said, 'You are free this morning—free as I am.'</p> + +<p>"Right after the War, my mother come further down in Tennessee, and that +is how she met my father where she was when she was married. They went +farming. They farmed on shares—sharecropped. They were on a big place +called Ensley place. The man that owned the place was called Nuck +Ensley.</p> + +<p>"My mother and father didn't have no schooling. I never heard that they +were bothered by the Ku Klux.</p> + +<p>"She didn't live with her first husband after slavery. She left him when +she was freed. She never did intend to marry him. She was forced to +that."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>Nelson evidently rents rooms. A yellow sallow-faced, cadaverous, and +dissatisfied looking "gentleman" went into the house eyeing me +suspiciously as he passed. In a moment he was out again interrupting the +old man with pointless remarks. In—out again—standing over +me—peering on my paper in the offensive way that ill-bred people have. +He straightened up with a disgusted look on his face. He couldn't read +shorthand.</p> + +<p>"What's that you're writin'?"</p> + +<p>"Shorthand."</p> + +<p>"What's that about?"</p> + +<p>"History."</p> + +<p>"History uv whut?"</p> + +<p>"Slavery."</p> + +<p>"He don't know nothin' about slavery."</p> + +<p>"Thank you. However, if he says he does, I'll just continue to listen to +him if you don't mind."</p> + +<p>"Humph," and the "yellow gentleman" passed in.</p> + +<p>Out again—eyeing both the old man and me with disgust that was +unconcealed. To him, "You don't know whutchu're doin'."</p> + +<p>Deep silence by all. Exit the yellow brother.</p> + +<p>To the old man, I said, "Is that your son?"</p> + +<p>"Lawd, no, that's jus' a roomer."</p> + +<p>Out came the yellow brother again. "See here, Uncle, if you want me to +fix that fence you'd bettuh come awn out heah now. It's gettin' dark."</p> + +<p>I closed my notebook and arose. "Don't let me interfere with your +program, Brother Nelson."</p> + +<p>The old man settled back in his chair. His eyes inspected the sky, his +jaw "sorta" set. The yellow brother looked at him a minute and passed +on.</p> + +<p>Five minutes later. Enter, the Madam. She also was of the yellow variety +with the suspicious and spiteful look of an undersized black Belgian +police dog. A moment of silence—a word to him.</p> + +<p>"You don't know whutchu're doin'." Silence all around. To me, "You're +upsettin' my work."</p> + +<p>I arose. "Madam, I'm sorry."</p> + +<p>The old man spoke, "You ain't keepin' me from nothin'."</p> + +<p>"Well, I said, you've given me a nice start; I'll come again and get the +rest."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelsonHenry2"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Henry Nelson, Edmondson, Arkansas<br> +Age: 70</h3> +<p>[TR: Appears to be same as last informant despite different address.]</p> +<br> + +<p>"My mother belong to the Taylors close to Carterville, Tennessee. My +father never was sold. He belong to the Nelsons. My parents married +toreckly after the surrender and come on to this state. I was born ten +miles from Edmondson. Their names was Adeline and Green Nelson. They +didn't get nothing after freedom like land or a horse. I'm seventy years +old and I would have known.</p> + +<p>"I was at Alton, Illinois in the lead works thirteen years ago and I had +a stroke. I been cripple ever since.</p> + +<p>"My folks never spoke of being nothing but field hands. Folks used to be +proud of their crops, go look over them on Sunday when company come. Now +if they got a garden they hide it and don't mention it. Times is changed +that way.</p> + +<p>"Clothes ain't as lasty as they used to be. People has a heap more money +to spend and don't raise and have much at home as they did when I was a +child. Times is all turned around and folks too. I always had plenty +till I couldn't do hard work. I farmed my early life. We didn't have +much money but we had rations and warm clothes. I cleared new ground, +hauled wood, big logs. I steamboated on the Sun, Kate Adams, and One Arm +John. I helped with the freight. I railroaded with pick and shovel and +in the lead mines. I worked from Memphis to Helena on boats a good +while. I come back here to farm. Time is changed and I'm changed.</p> + +<p>"It has been so long since I heard my parents tell about slavery I +couldn't tell you straight. She told till she died, talked about how the +Yankees done when they come through. They took axes and busted up good +furniture. They et up and wasted the rations, then humor up the black +folks like they was in their favor when they was settin' out wasting +their living. They done made it to live on. Some followed them and some +stayed on. They wanted freedom but it wasn't like they thought it would +be. They didn't know how it would be. They didn't know it meant <u>set +out</u>. Seem like they left. In some ways times was better and some +ways it was worse. They had to work or starve is what they told me. +That's the way I found freedom. 'Course their owners made them work and +he looked out for the ration and in slavery.</p> + +<p>"I keeps up my own self all I can. I don't get help."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelsonIran"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Iran Nelson<br> + 603 E. Fourteenth Ave., Pine Bluff, Ark.<br> +Age: 77</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes ma'm, they fotch me from Mississippi to Arkansas on the +steamboat—you know they didn't have railroads then. They fotch my +mother and they went back after grandfather and grandmother too.</p> + +<p>"Dr. Noell was our master and he had us under mortgage to his +brother-in-law. They fotched us here till he could get straight from +that debt, but fore that could be, we got free.</p> + +<p>"I knowed slavery times. I member seem' em lash some of the rest but you +know I wasn't big enough to put in the fields. Old mistress say when I +got big enough, she goin' take me for a house girl. When they fotched +mama and grandmother here they had eighty some odd head of niggers. They +was gwine carry em back home after they got that mortgage paid but the +war come.</p> + +<p>"I member when the Yankees come, my white folks would run and hide and +hide us colored folks too. Boss man had the colored folks get all the +meat out of the smokehouse and hide it in the peach orchard in the +grass.</p> + +<p>"I used to play with old mistress daughter Addie. We would play in the +parlor and after we moved to town some of the little girls would pick up +and go home. You know these town folks didn't believe in playin' with +the colored folks.</p> + +<p>"After mama was free she stayed right there on the place and made a +crop. Raised eight hundred bales and the average was nine. Mama plowed +and hoed too. I had to work right with her too.</p> + +<p>"I never went to school but once. I learned my ABC's but couldn't read. +My next ABC's was a hoe in my hand. Mama had a switch right under her +belt. I worked but I couldn't keep up. Just seein' that switch was +enough. I had a pretty good time when I was young, but I had to go all +the time."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelsonJamesHenry"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: James Henry Nelson<br> + 1103 Orange, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 82<br> +Occupation: Gardener</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I member all about the war—why of cose. I saddled many a cavalry hoss. +I tell you how I know how old I am. Old master, Henry Stanley of Athens, +Alabama, moved to Palaski, Tennessee and left me with young mistress to +take care of things. One day we was drivin' up some stock and I said, +'Miss Nannie, how old is you?' And she said, 'I'm seventeen.' I was old +enough to have the knowledge she would know how old I was and I said, +'How old am I?' And she said, 'You is seven years old.' That was durin' +the war.</p> + +<p>"I remember the soldiers comin' and stoppin' at our building—Yankees +and Southern soldiers, too. They fit all around our plantation.</p> + +<p>"The Yankees taken me when I was a little fellow. About two years after +the war started, young Marse Henry went to war and took a colored man +with him but he ran away—he wouldn't stay with the Rebel army. So young +Marse Henry took me. I reckon I was bout ten. I know I was big enough to +saddle a cavalry hoss. We carried three horses—his hoss, my hoss and a +pack hoss. You know chillun them days, they made em do a man's work. I +studied bout my mother durin' the war, so they let me go home.</p> + +<p>"One day I went to mill. They didn't low the chillun to lay around, and +while I was at the mill a Yankee soldier ridin' a white hoss captured me +and took me to Pulaski, Tennessee and then I was in the Yankee army. I +wasn't no size and I don't think he would a took me if it hadn't been +for the hoss.</p> + +<p>"We come back to Athens and the Rebels captured the whole army. Colonel +Camp was in charge and General Forrest captured us and I was carried +south. We was marchin' along the line and a Rebel soldier said, 'Don't +you want to go home and stay with my wife?' And so I went there, to +Millville, Alabama. Then he bound me to a friend of his and I stayed +there till the war bout ended. I was getting along very well but a older +boy 'suaded me to run away to Decatur, Alabama.</p> + +<p>"Oh I seen lots of the war. Bof sides was good to me. I've seen many a +scout. The captain would say 'By G----, close the ranks.' Captains is +right crabbed. I stayed back with the hosses.</p> + +<p>"After the war I worked about for this one and that one. Some paid me +and some didn't.</p> + +<p>"I can remember back to Breckenridge; and I can remember hearin' em say +'Hurrah for Buchanan!' I'm just tellin' you to show how fur back I can +remember. I used to have a book with a picture of Abraham Lincoln with +an axe on his shoulder and a picture of that log cabin, but somebody +stole my book.</p> + +<p>"I worked for whoever would take me—I had no mother then. If I had had +parents to make me go to school, but I got along very well. The white +folks taught me not to have no bad talk. They's all dead now and if they +wasn't I'd be with them.</p> + +<p>"I'm a natural born farmer—that's all I know. The big overflow drownded +me out and my wife died with pellagra in '87. She was a good woman and +nice to white folks. I'm just a bachin' here now. I did stay with my +daughter but she is mean to me, so I just picked up my rags and moved +into this room where I can live in peace. I'm a christian man, and I +can't live right with her. When colored folks is mean, they's meaner +than white folks.</p> + +<p>"I'm gettin' along very well now. I been with white folks all my +day—and it's hard for me to get along with my folks.</p> + +<p>"In one way the world is crueler than they used to be. They don't +appreciate things like they used to. They have no feelin's and don't +care nothin' bout the olden people.</p> + +<p>"Well, good-bye, I'm proud of you."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelsonJohn"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: John Nelson, Holly Grove, Arkansas<br> +Age: 76</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My parents was Jazz Nelson and Mahaney Nelson. He come from Louisiana +durin' slavery. She come from Richmond, Virginia. I think from what they +said he come to Louisiana from there too. They was plain field hands.</p> + +<p>"My folks belong to Miss Mary Ann Richardson and Massa Harve Richardson. +They had five children and every one dead now. They lived at Duncan +Station.</p> + +<p>"The white folks told em they was free. They had no place to go and they +been workin' the crop. White folks glad for em to stay and work on. And +the truth is they was glad to git to stay on cause they had no place to +go. They kept stayin' on a long time.</p> + +<p>"I was so small I don't know if the Ku Klux ever did come bout our place +at tall."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelsonLettie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Lettie Nelson<br> + St. Marys Street, Helena, Arkansas<br> +Age: 55 or 56?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Grandma was Patsy Smith. She said in slavery they had a certain amount +of cotton to pick. If they didn't have that amount they would put their +heads between the rails of the fences and whoop them. They whooped them +in the ebenin' when they weighed up the cotton. Grandma was raised in +Virginia. She was light. Mama was light. They was carried from Virginia +to Louisiana in wagons. They found clothes along the road people had +lost. She said several bundles of good clothes. They thought they had +dropped off of wagons ahead of them. They washed and wore the clothes. +Some of 'em fit so they wore them. Mama left her husband and brother in +Virginia. Ed Smith was her second husband. He was a light man. My +grandpa was a field man. I never heard if grandpa was sold. Jimmie +Stansberry was the man that bought or brought mama and grandma to +Louisiana. Mama cooked and worked in the field both. Grandma did too. +She cooked in Louisiana more than mama. They belong to Lou and Jimmie +Stansberry and they had two boys. They lived close to Minden, Louisiana. +I don't know so much about my parents and grandma talked but we didn't +pay enough attention to remember it all. She was old and got things +confused.</p> + +<p>"They was glad when freedom come but they lived on with Jimmie +Stansberry. I remember them. Grandma raised me after my parents died. +Then she lived with me till she died. She was awful old when she died. +They would talk about how different Virginia and Louisiana was. It took +them a long time to make that trip."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelsonMattie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Mattie Nelson<br> + 710 E. Fourth Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 72</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Chicot County, Arkansas in '65. They said I was born on +the roadside while we was on our way here from Texas. They had to camp +they said. Some people called it emigrate. Now that's the straightest +way I can tell it.</p> + +<p>"Our mistress and master was named Chapman. I member when I was a child +mistress used to be so good to us. After surrender my parents stayed +right on there with the Chapmans, stayed right on the place till they +died.</p> + +<p>"My mudder and pappy neither one of em could read or write, but I went +to school. I always was apt. I am now. I always was one to work—yes +ma'm—rolled logs, hope clean up new ground—yes ma'm. When we was +totin' logs, I'd say, "Put the big end on me" but they'd say, "No, +you're a woman." Yes ma'm I been here a long time. I do believe in +stirrin' work for your livin', yes ma'm, that's what I believe in.</p> + +<p>"I been workin' ever since I was six years old. My daughter was just +like me—she had a gift, but she died. I seen all my folks die and that +lets me know I got to die too.</p> + +<p>"White folks used to come along in buggies, and hoss back too, and stop +and watch me plow. Seem like the hotter the sun was the better I liked +it.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'm, I done all kinds a work and I feels it now, too."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NewbornDan"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Dan Newborn<br> + 1000 Louisiana, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 78</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in 1860. Born in Knoxville, Tennessee. I suppose it was in +the country.</p> + +<p>"Solomon Walton was my mother's owner and my father belonged to the +Newborns. My grandmother belonged to the Buggs in Richmond, Virginia and +she was sold to the Waltons. When my mother died in '65 my grandmother +raised me. After she was freed she went to the Powell Clayton place. Her +daughter lived there and she sent up the river and got her. I went too. +Me and two more boys.</p> + +<p>"I never went to school but about thirty days. Hardly learned my +alphabet.</p> + +<p>"In '66, my grandmother bound two of us to Powell Clayton for our +'vittils' and clothes and schoolin', but I didn't get no schoolin'. I +waited in the house. Stayed there three years, then we come back to the +Walton place.</p> + +<p>"My grandmother said the Waltons treated her mean. Beat her on the head +and that was part of her death. Every spring her head would run. She +said they didn't get much of somethin' to eat.</p> + +<p>"I was married 'fore my grandmother died—to this wife that died two +months ago. We stayed together fifty-seven years.</p> + +<p>"To my idea, this younger generation is too wild—not near as settled as +when I was comin' up. They used to obey. Why, I slept in the bed with +my grandmother till I was married. She whipped me the day before I was +married. It was 'cause I had disobeyed her. Children will resist their +mothers now.</p> + +<p>"I think the colored people is better off now 'cause they got more +privilege, but the way some of 'em use their privilege, I think they +ought to be slaves.</p> + +<p>"My grandmother taught me not to steal. My white folks here have trusted +me with two and three hundred dollars. I don't want nothin' in the world +but mine.</p> + +<p>"I been workin' here for Fox Brothers thirty-eight years and they'll +tell you there's not a black mark against me.</p> + +<p>"I used to be a mortar maker and used to sample cotton. Then I worked at +the Cotton Belt Shops eight years.</p> + +<p>"I've bought me a home that cost $780.</p> + +<p>"I don't mind tellin' about myself 'cause I've been honest and you can +go up the river and get my record.</p> + +<p>"Out of all due respect to everybody, the Yankees is the ones I like.</p> + +<p>"Vote? Oh yes, Republican ticket. I like Roosevelt's administration. If +I could vote now, I'd vote for him. He has done a whole lot of good."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NewsomSallie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person Interviewed: Sallie Newsom<br> + Brinkley, Ark.<br> +Age 75?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Miss, I don't know my age, but I know I is old. I'm sick now.</p> + +<p>"My grandma's mistress and mama's mistress and my mistress was Miss +Jennie Brawner at Thomasville, Georgia. Me and my oldest sister was born +in Atlanta. Then freedom come on. My own papa wanted mama to follow him +to Mississippi. He had a wife there. She wouldn't go. She stayed on a +while with Mr. Acy and Miss Jennie. They come from Virginia. Her name +was Catherine.</p> + +<p>"Grandma toted her big hoop dresses about and carried her trains up off +the floor. Combed her long glossy hair. Mama was a house girl too, but +then grandma took to the kitchen. She was the cook then.</p> + +<p>"Old Miss Jennie wanted mama to give her my oldest sister Lulu, so mama +gave her to her. Then when we started to come to Holly Grove, +Mississippi, Miss Jennie still wanted her. Mama didn't want to part from +her. She was married again and brought me but my aunts told mama to +leave her there, she would have a good home and be educated, so she +'greed to leave her two years. She sent back for her at the end of two +years; she wrote and didn't want to come. She was still at Miss +Jennie's. I haben seen her from the day we left Atlanta till this very +day. A woman, colored woman, was here in Brinkley once seen her. Said +she was so fine and nice. Had nice soft skin and was well to do. I have +wrote but my letters come back. I know Miss Jennie is dead, and my +sister may be by now.</p> + +<p>"My papa was Abe Brooks. His master was Mars Jonas Brooks. Old master +give him to the young master. He was rich, rich, and traveled all time. +His pa give him a servant. He cooked for him, drove his carriage—they +called it a brake in them days—followed him to the hotels and +bar-rooms. He drink and give him a dram. When he was freed he come to +Mississippi with the Brooks to farm for them. I went to see my papa at +Waterford, Miss.</p> + +<p>"When we was at Holly Springs, Mississippi my cousin was a railroad man +so he helped me run away. He paid my way. I come to Clarendon. I cooked, +washed and ironed. In two or three years I went back to see mama. They +was glad to see me. They had eight children.</p> + +<p>"I couldn't guarantee you about the eight younger children, but there +ain't a speck of no kind of blood about me and Lulu Violet but African. +We are slick black Negroes. (She is very black, large and bony.)</p> + +<p>"Miss Jennie Brawner had one son—Gus Brawner—and he may be living now +in Atlanta.</p> + +<p>"My uncle said he seen the Yankees come through Thomasville, Georgia. I +never seen an army of them. I seen soldiers, plenty of em. None of the +Brooks or Brawners went to war that I heard of. I was kept close and too +young to know much of what happened. I heard about the Ku Klux but I +never seen them.</p> + +<p>"I know Miss Jennie Brawner come from Virginia but I don't brought +grandma with her or bought her. She never did say.</p> + +<p>"I don't vote. My husband voted, I don't know how he voted.</p> + +<p>"Since I been sick, I get a check and commodities."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NewtonPete"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Sallie C. Miller<br> +Person interviewed: Pete Newton, Clarksville, Arkansas<br> +Age: 83 [TR: 85?]<br> +Occupation: Farmer and day laborer</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My white folks was as good to me as they could be. I ain't got no kick +to make about my white people. The boys was all brave. I was raised on +the farm. I staid with my boss till I was nearly grown. When the war got +so hot my boss was afraid the 'Feds' would get us. He sent my mammy to +Texas and sent me in the army with Col. Bashom, to take care of his +horses. I was about eleven or twelve years old. Col. Bashom was always +good to me. He always found a place for me to sleep and eat. Sometimes +after the colonel left the folks would run as off and not let me stay +but I never told the colonel. I went to Boston, Texas with the colonel +and his men and when he went on the big raid into Missouri he left me in +Sevier County, Arkansas with his horses 'Little Baldy' and 'Orphan Boy'. +They was race horses. The colonel always had race horses. He was killed +at Pilot Knob, Missouri. After the colonel was killed his son George (I +shore did think a lot of George) come after me and the horses and +brough' us home.</p> + +<p>"While I was in Arkadelphia with Col. Bashom's horses, I went down to +the spring to water the horses. The artillery was there cleaning a big +cannon they called 'Old Tom'. Of course I went up to watch them. One of +the men saw me and hollered, 'Stick his head in the cannon.' It liked to +scared me to death. I jumped on that race horse and run. I reconed I +would have been killed but my uncle was there and saw me and stopped the +horse.</p> + +<p>"Another time we went to a place and me and another colored boy was +taking care of the horses while our masters eat dinner. I saw some +watermelons in the garden with a paling fence around it. I said if the +other boy would pull a paling off I would crawl through and get us a +watermelon. He did but the man who owned the place saw me just as I got +the melon and whipped us and told us if we hollered he would kill us. We +didn't holler and we never told Col. Bashom either.</p> + +<p>"After the war my mammie come back from Texas and took me over to Dover +to live but my old boss told her if she would let him have me he would +raise and educate me like his own children. When I got back the old boss +already had a boy so I went to live with one of his sons. He told me it +was time for me to learn how to work. My boss was rough but he was good +to me and taught me how to work. The old boss had five sons in the army +and all was wounded except one. One of them was shot through and through +in the battle of Oak Hill. He got a furlough and come back and died. I +left my white folks in 1869 and went to farming for myself up in Hartman +bottom. I married when I was about seventeen years old.</p> + +<p>"They though' a house near us was hainted. Nobody wanted to live in it +so they went to see what the noise was. They found a pet coon with a +piece of chain around his neck. The coon would run across the floor and +drag the chain.</p> + +<p>"The children now are bad. No telling that will be in the next twenty or +thirty years everything is so changed now.</p> + +<p>"I learnt to sing the hymns but never sang in the choir. We sang +'Dixie', 'John Brown's Body Lies, etc.', 'Juanita', 'Just Before the +Battle, Mother', 'Old Black Joe'."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NorrisCharlie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Charlie Norris<br> + 122 Miller Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 81</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Born in slavery times? That's me, I reckon. I was born October 1, 1857 +in Arkansas in Union County. Tom Murphy was old master's name.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, I remember the first regiment left Arkansas—went to +Virginia. I member our white folks had us packin' grub out in the woods +cause they was spectin' the Yankees.</p> + +<p>"I member when the first regiment started out. The music boat come to +the landin' and played 'Yankee Doodle.' They carried all us chillun out +there.</p> + +<p>"After they fit they just come by from daylight till dark to eat. They +was death on bread. My mother and Susan Murphy, that was the old lady +herself, cooked bread for em.</p> + +<p>"I stayed with the Murphys—round on the plantation amongst em for five +or six years after freedom. Andrew Norris, my father's old master, was +the first sheriff of Ouachita County.</p> + +<p>"My mother belonged to the Murphys and my father belonged to the +Norrises and after freedom they never did go back together.</p> + +<p>"My mother told me that Susan Murphy would suckle me when my mother was +out workin' and then my mother would suckle her daughter.</p> + +<p>"I was raised up in the house you might say till I was a big nigger. Had +plenty to eat. That's one thing they did do. I lived right amongst a +settlement of what they called free niggers cause they was treated so +well.</p> + +<p>"Sometimes Susan Murphy got after me and whipped me and old Marse Tom +would tell me to run and not let her whip me. You see, I was worth +$1,500 to him and he thought a lot of us black kids.</p> + +<p>"Old man Tom Murphy raised me up to a big nigger and never did whip me +but twice and that was cause I got drunk on tobacco and turned out his +horse.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, I voted till bout two or three years ago. Oh Lawd, the +colored used to hold office down in the country. I've voted for white +and black.</p> + +<p>"Some of the colored folks better off free and some not. That's what I +think but they don't."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="OatsEmma"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person Interviewed: Emma Oats (Mulatto)<br> + Holly Grove, Ark.<br> +Age: 90 or older</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in St. Louis. My mother died when I was little. I never +knowed no father. (He was probably a white man.) Jack Oats raised me. +Jim Oats at Helena was his son. He is still living. He come through here +(Holly Grove) not long ago. I was raised on the Esque place.</p> + +<p>"I was fraid of my grandma. I wouldn't live with her. I know'd her. She +was a big woman, big white eyes, big thick lips, and had 'Molly Glaspy +hair,' long straight soft hair. She was a African woman. She made my +clothes. I was fraid of her. I never lived with her. My folks was all +free folks. When my mother died my uncle took us—me and brother. He +hired us out and we got stole. Gene Oglesby stole us and brought us to +Memphis to Joe Nivers. I recken he sold us then. Then they stood me up +in the parlor and sold me to Jack Oats. They said I was 'good pluck.' +Joe Nivers sold me to Jack Oats for $1,150.00 when I was four years old. +My brother was name Milton Smith. I ain't seen him from that day till +this. Joe Nivers kept him, I recken. I come here on a 'legal +tender'—name of the boat I recken. I know that. I recken it was name of +a boat. I got off and Thornton Walls, old colored man, toted me cross +every mud hole we come to. He belong to Bud Walls' (white man at Holly +Grove) daddy. When we got home Jack Oats and all of em was there.</p> + +<p>"I slept on a pallet and lounge and took care of their children. I +played round. Done bout as I pleased. They had a cook they called Aunt +Joe—Joe Oats. We had plenty to eat and wear. They dressed me like one +their children. We had good flannel clothes. When she washed her +children she washed me too. When she combed their hair she combed mine +too. She kept working with it till I had pretty hair. Some of her +children died. It hurt me bad as it did them. All I done was play with +em and see after em. Their names was Sam, John, Dixie, Sallie, Jim. I +went in the hack to church; if she took the children, she took me. I was +a good size girl when she died. The last word she spoke was to me; she +said, 'Emma, take care of my children.' Dr. John Chester was her doctor.</p> + +<p>"Oats come here from North Alabama. Will Oats, Wyatt Oats, and Jack +Oats—all brothers.</p> + +<p>"When mistress living we took a bath every Friday in a sawed-intwo +barrel (wooden tub). The cook done our washing. We had clean fresh +clothes. We had to dress up every few days. If we get dirty she say she +would give us lashes. She never give me none, I never was sassy (saucy). +That what most of em got 10 lashes, 25, 50 lashes for.</p> + +<p>"When I was bout grown I went to school a little bit to James A. Kerr +here at Holly Grove. I was good and grown too.</p> + +<p>"I was settin' on the gate post—they had a picket fence. I seen some +folks coming to our house. I run in the house and says, 'Miss Mai Liza, +the Yankees coming here!' She told her husband to get in the bed. He +says, 'Oh God, what she know bout Yankees?' Miss Mai Liza say, 'I don't +know; she's one of em, I speck she knows em.' One of the officers come +in and asked him what was the matter. He said he was sick. He had boils +bout on him. He had a Masonic pin on his shirt. He showed it to the +officer. He asked Lou and Becky and all the servants if he hadn't been +bushwhacking. They all said, 'No.' He said he wanted something to eat. +They went to the well house and got him some milk.</p> + +<p>"They camped below the house. They went to their store house and brought +more rations up there in a wagon. Lou cooked and she had help. She set a +big table and they had the biggest dinner. They had more hams. They had +'Lincoln Coffee' there that day. It was a jolly day. They never et up +there no more or bothered round our house no more. The officer had +something on his bare arm he showed. He said, when he went to leave, +'Aunt Lou, you shall not be hurt.'</p> + +<p>"Mr. Oats had taken long before that day all his slaves to Texas. He +took all but Wash Martin. They went in wagons and none of them ever come +back.</p> + +<p>"Miss Callie Edwards was older than Miss Henrietta Jackson. They kept +Wash Martin going through the bottoms nearly all time from their houses +at Golden Hill to Indian Bay. They kept him from one place to the other +to keep him out of the war. They hired him out to school Miss Henrietta. +Miss Callie Edwards died then they give him to Miss Henrietta.</p> + +<p>"During the war Mrs. Keeps come up to our house. They heard a gun. She +was jes visiting Mrs. Oats. Mrs. Keeps went home and the bushwhackers +had killed him. He was dead.</p> + +<p>"I never seen no Ku Klux in my whole life.</p> + +<p>"I remember the stage coach that run every two or three days from Helena +to Clarendon.</p> + +<p>"I don't remember bout freedom. Dr. Green, Hall Green's daddy, told his +colored folks they was free. They told our folks. I heard em talking +bout it. I was kept quiet. It was done freedom, fore I knowed it. I +stayed on and done like I been doin'. I stayed on and on.</p> + +<p>"When I was grown I come here to school and soon married. I washed and +ironed and cooked all over Holly Grove. I was waiting on the table at +the boarding house here at Holly Grove. Mr. Oats was talking bout naming +the town. They had put the railroad through. I ask em why didn't they +name the town Holly Grove. It was thick with holly trees. They named it +that, and put it up on the side of the depot. That way I named the town.</p> + +<p>"My folks give me five acres of land and Julia Woolfolk give a blind +woman on the place five acres. I didn't know what to do wid it. I didn't +have no husband. I was young and foolish. I let it be.</p> + +<p>"My husband farmed. I raised my family, chopped and picked cotton and +done other things along with that. I have worked all my life till way +after my husband died.</p> + +<p>"My husband could jump up, knock heels together three times before he +come down. He died May 12, 1909. He was 83 years old February 16, 1909.</p> + +<p>"I never voted. I never heard my husband say much bout voting. I know +some colored folks sold their voting rights. That was wrong.</p> + +<p>"I lived at Baptist Bottoms two years. It lack to killed me."</p> + +<p>Wyatt Oats and Miss Callie Edwards owned the husband of Emma Oats. She +was married once and had two girls and two boys—one boy dead now. Emma +lives at one of her daughters' homes.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="OdomHelen"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Helen Odom and mother, Sarah Odom<br> + Biscoe, Arkansas<br> +Age: 30?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Great-grandmother was part African, Indian, and Caucasian. She had two +girls before slavery ended by her own master—Master Temple. He was also +Caucasian (white). She was cook and housemaid at his home. He was a +bachelor. Grandmother's name was Rachael and her sister's name was +Gilly. Before freedom Master Temple had another wife. By her he had one +boy and two girls. He never had a Caucasian wife. In fact he was always +a bachelor. Grandmother was a field hand and so was her sister, Gilly.</p> + +<p>"But after freedom grandmother married a Union soldier. His took-on name +was George Washington Tomb. He was generally called Parson Tomb +(preacher). He met Grandmother Rachael in Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"When Master Temple died his nearest relative was Jim McNeilly. He made +a will leaving everything he possessed to Master McNeilly. The estate +had to be settled, so he brought the two sisters to Little Rock we think +to be sold. They rode horseback and walked and brought wagons with +bedding and provisions to camp along the road. The blankets were frozen +and stood alone. It was so cold. Grandmother was put up on the block to +be auctioned off and freedom was declared! Aunt Gilly never got to the +block. Grandmother married and was separated from her sister.</p> + +<p>"Whether the other three children were brought to Arkansas then I don't +know but this I know that they went by the name McNeilly. They changed +their names or it was done for them. They are all dead now and my own +mother is the only one now living. Their names were John, Tom, and +Netline. Mother says they were sold to Johnson, and went by that name +too as much as McNeilly. They remained with Johnson till freedom, in +Tennessee.</p> + +<p>"My mother's name is Sarah.</p> + +<p>"They seem to think they were treated good till Master Temple died. They +nearly froze coming to Arkansas to be sold.</p> + +<p>"I heard this told over and over so many, many times before grandmother +died. Seemed it was the greatest event of her life. She told other +smaller things I can't remember to tell with sense at all. Nothing so +important as her master and own father's death and being sold.</p> + +<p>"Times are good, very good with me. Our African race is advancing with +the times."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> +<br> + +<p>Teacher in Biscoe school. Father was a graduate doctor of medicine and +in about 1907, '08, '09 school director at Biscoe.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="OliverJane"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Jane Oliver<br> + Route 4, near airport, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 81</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I'm certainly one of em, cause I was in the big house. When Miss Liza +married they give sister to her and I stayed with Miss Netta. Her name +was Drunetta Rawls. That was in Mississippi. We come to Arkansas when I +was small.</p> + +<p>"I remember when they run us to Texas, and we stayed there till freedom +come. I remember hearin' em read the free papers. Mama died in Texas and +they buried her the day they read the free papers. I know. I was out +playin' and Miss Lucy, that was my young mistress, come out and say, +'Jane, you go in and see your mother, she wants you.' I was busy playin' +and didn't want to go in and I member Miss Lucy say, 'Poor little fool +nigger don't know her mother's dyin'.' I went in then and said, 'Mama, +is you dyin'?' She say, 'No, I ain't; I died when you was a baby.' You +know, she meant she had died in sin. She was a christian.</p> + +<p>"Me and Lucy played together all the time—round about the house and in +the kitchen. Little Marse Henry, that was big old Marse Henry's son, he +was a captain in the army. We all called him Little Marse Henry. Old +mistress was good to us. Us chillun called her Miss Netta. Best woman I +ever seed. Me and Lucy growed up together. Looks like I can see just the +way the house looked and how we used to go down to the big gate and +play. I sits here and studies and wonders if I'd know that place today. +That's what I study bout.</p> + +<p>"I used to hear em say we only stayed in Texas nine months and the +white folks brought us back.</p> + +<p>"My uncle Simon Rawls, he took me after the war. Then I worked for Mrs. +Adkins.</p> + +<p>"I went to school a little and learned to read prints. The teacher tried +to get me to write but I wouldn't do it. And since then I have wished so +much I had learned to write. Oh mercy! Old folks would tell me, 'Well, +when you get up the road, you'll wish you had.' I didn't know what they +meant but I know now they meant when I got old.</p> + +<p>"I was married when I was young—I don't think I was fifteen.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, I've worked hard. I've always lived in the country.</p> + +<p>"I can remember when the white folks refugeed us to Texas. Oh we did +hate the Yankees. If I ever seed a Yankee I didn't know it but I heard +the white folks talkin' bout em.</p> + +<p>"I used to hear em talk bout old Jeff Davis and Abe Lincoln.</p> + +<p>"Bradley County was where we lived fore we went to Texas and afterward. +Colonel Ed Hampton's plantation jined the Rawls plantation on the +Arkansas River where it overflowed the land. I loved that better than +any place I ever seed in my life.</p> + +<p>"I couldn't say what I think of the young folks now. They is different +from what we was. Yes, Lord, they is different. Sometimes I think they +is better and sometimes wuss. I just thanks the Lord that I'm here—have +come this far.</p> + +<p>"When I bought this place from Mr. R.M. Knox he said, 'When I'm in my +grave you'll thank me that you took my advice and put your savings in a +Home.' I do thank him. I been here thirty years and I get along. God +bless you."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="OsborneIvory"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Ivory Osborne<br> + Route 5, Box 158, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Know about slavery? Sho I do—I was born in '52. Born in Arkansas? No +ma'm, born in Texas.</p> + +<p>"Oh yes, indeed, I had a good master. Good to me, indeed. I was that +high when the war started. I member everything. Take me from now till +dark to tell you everything I know bout slavery.</p> + +<p>"I put in three years and five months, choppin' cotton and corn. I +member the very day, on the 10th of May, old mistress blowed the conk +and told us we was free.</p> + +<p>"Oh Lord, I had a good time.</p> + +<p>"I never was whipped.</p> + +<p>"Ku Klux used to run me. Run me clear from the plum orchard bout a mile +from the house. Run to my mistress at the big house.</p> + +<p>"Miss Ann had eight darkies and told her stepmother, 'Don't you put your +hand on em.' She didn't either.</p> + +<p>"I went to school since 'mancipation in Nacitosh. Learned to read and +write. Was in the eighth grade when I left. Stood at the head of every +class. They couldn't get me down. I done got old and forgot now.</p> + +<p>"I didn't know the difference between slavery and free, I never was +whipped.</p> + +<p>"Did I ever vote? You know I voted, old as I am. Ain't voted in over +forty years. I ain't nobody. My wife's eighty. I've had her forty years. +<u>Cose</u> I voted the Republican ticket. You never seed a colored +person a Democrat in your life.</p> + +<p>"In slavery days we killed seventy-five or eighty hogs every year. And I +don't mean shoats, I mean hogs. I ain't lost my membrance."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="OsbrookJane"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Jane Osbrook<br> + 602 E. 21st Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 90</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes ma'm, I was livin' in slavery days. I was borned in Arkansas I +reckon. I was borned within three, miles of Camden but I wasn't raised +there. We moved to Saline County directly after peace was declared.</p> + +<p>"I don't know what year I was born because you see I'm not educated but +I was ninety the 27th of this last past May. Yes ma'm, I'm a old bondage +woman. I can say what a heap of em can't say—I can tell the truth bout +it. I believe in the truth. I was brought up to tell the truth. I'm no +young girl.</p> + +<p>"My old master was Adkison Billingsly. My old mistress treated us just +like her own children. She said we had feelin's and tastes. I visited +her long after the war. Went there and stayed all night.</p> + +<p>"I member when they had the fight at Jenkins Ferry. Old Steele had +30,000 and he come down to take Little Rock, Pine Bluff and others. +Captain Webb with 1,500 Rebels was followin' him and when they got to +Saline River they had a battle.</p> + +<p>"The next Sunday my father carried all us children and some of the white +folks to see the battle field. I member the dead was lyin' in graves, +just one row after another and hadn't even been covered up.</p> + +<p>"Oh yes, I can tell all bout that. Nother time there was four hundred +fifty colored and five white Yankee soldiers come and ask my father if +old mistress treated us right. We told em we had good owners. I never +was so scared in my life. Them colored soldiers was so tall and so black +and had red eyes. Oh yes ma'm, they had on the blue uniforms. Oh, we +sure was fraid of em—you know them eyes.</p> + +<p>"They said, 'Now uncle, we want you to tell the truth, does she feed you +well?' My ma did all the cookin' and we had good livin'. I tole my +daughter we fared ten thousand times better than now.</p> + +<p>"I come up in the way of obedience. Any time I wanted to go, had to go +to old mistress and she say, 'Don't let the sun go down on you.' And +when we come home the sun was in the trees. If you seed the sun was +goin' down on you, you run.</p> + +<p>"I ain't goin' tell nothin' but the truth. Truth better to live with and +better to die with.</p> + +<p>"Some of the folks said they never seed a biscuit from Christmas to +Christmas but we had em every day. Never seed no sodie till peace was +declared—used saleratus.</p> + +<p>"In my comin' up it was Whigs and Democrats. Never heard of no +Republicans till after the war. I've seed a man get upon that platform +and wipe the sweat from his brow. I've seed em get to fight in' too. +That was done at our white folks house—arguin' politics.</p> + +<p>"I never did go to school. I married right after the war you know. What +you talkin' bout—bein' married and goin' to school? I was housekeepin': +Standin' right in my own light and didn't know it."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PageAnnie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Annie Page<br> + 412-1/2 Pullen Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 86</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born 1852, they tell me, on the fifteenth of March. I was workin' +a good while 'fore surrender.</p> + +<p>"Bill Jimmerson was my old master. He was a captain in Marmaduke's army. +Come home on thirty days furlough once and he and Daniel Carmack got +into some kind of a argument 'bout some whisky and Daniel Carmack +stabbed him with a penknife. Stabbed him three times. He was black as +tar when they brought him home. The blood had done settled. Oh Lawd, +that was a time.</p> + +<p>"My eyes been goin' blind 'bout six years till I got so I can't excern +(discern) anything.</p> + +<p>"Old miss used to box me over the head mightily and the colored folks +used to hit me over the head till seem like I could hear a bell for two +or three days. Niggers ain't got no sense. Put 'em in authority and they +gits so uppity.</p> + +<p>"My brother brought me here and left me here with a colored woman named +Rachael Ross. And oh Lawd, she was hard on me. Never had to do in +slavery times what I had to do then.</p> + +<p>"But the devil got her and all her chillun now I reckon. They tell me +when death struck her, they asked if the Lawd called her, and they say +she just turned over and over in the bed like a worm in hot ashes."</p> + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PageAnnie2"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Annie Page<br> + 400 Block West Pullen, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes'm I 'member the war. I never knowed why they called it the Civil +War though.</p> + +<p>"I was born in Union County, Arkansas, 'bout a mile from Bear Creek, in +1852. That's what my old mistress tole me the morning we was sot free.</p> + +<p>"My mistress was a Democrat. Old master was a captain in Marmaduke's +army.</p> + +<p>"I used to hope (help) spin the thread to make the soldiers' clothes. +Old mistress cared for me. Lacy Jimmerson—the onliest mistress I ever +had. She wanted to send us away to Texas but old master say it want no +use. Cause if the Yankees won, they have to bring us back, so we didn't +go.</p> + +<p>"Did they <u>whip</u> us? Why I bet I can show you scars now. Old Miss +whip me when she feel like fightin'. Her granddaughter, Mary Jane, tried +to learn me my ABC's out of the old Blue Back Speller. We'd be out on +the seesaw, but old Miss didn't know what we doin'. Law, she pull our +hair. Directly she see us and say 'What you doin'? Bring that book +here!'</p> + +<p>"One day old master come home on a thirty-day furlough. He was awful +hot-headed and he got into a argument with Daniel Carmack and old +Daniel stobbed him right in the heart. Fore he die he say to bury him by +the side of the road so he can see the niggers goin' to work.</p> + +<p>"I never seen no Ku Klux but I heard of 'em 'rectly after the war.</p> + +<p>"I'se blind. I jest can see enough to get around. The Welfare gives me +eight dollars a month.</p> + +<p>"My mother died soon after the war ended and after that I was jest +knocked over the head. I went to Camblin and worked for Mrs. Peters. +Then I runned away and married my first husband Mike Samson. I been +married twice and had two children but they all dead now.</p> + +<p>"Law, I jest scared of these young ones as I can be. I don't have no +dealins with 'em."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PageAnnie3"></a> +<h3>FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Subject: Apparitions<br> +Subject: Superstitions<br> +Subject: Birthmarks<br> +Story:—Information<br> +<br> +This information given by: Annie Page<br> +Place of residence: 412-1/2 Pullen Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Occupation: None Age: 86</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]<br> +[TR: Repetitive information deleted from subsequent pages.]</p> +<br> + +<p>"I told 'bout old master's death. Mama had done sent me out to feed the +chickens soon of a morning.</p> + +<p>"Here was the smokehouse and there was a turkey in a coop. And when I +throwed it the feed I heard somethin' sounded just like you was draggin' +a brush over leaves. It come around the corner of the smokehouse and +look like a tall woman. It kept on goin' toward the house till it got to +the hickory nut tree and still sound like draggin' a brush. When it got +to the hickory nut tree it changed and look like a man. I looked and I +said, 'It's old master.' And the next day he got killed. I run to the +house and told mama, 'Look at that man.' She said, 'Shut your mouth, you +don't see no man.' Old miss heard and said, 'Who do you s'pose it could +be?' But mama wouldn't let me talk.</p> + +<p>"But I know it was a sign that old master was goin' to die."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Superstitions</b></p> + +<p>"I was born with a caul over my face. Old miss said it hung from the top +of my head half way to my waist.</p> + +<p>"She kept it and when I got big enough she said, 'Now that's your veil, +you play with it.'</p> + +<p>"But I lost it out in the orchard one day.</p> + +<p>"They said it would keep you from seein' ha'nts."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Birthmarks</b></p> + +<p>"William Jimmerson's wife had a daughter was born blind, and she said it +was her husband's fault. She was delicate, you know, and one afternoon +she was layin' down and I was sittin' there fannin' her with a peafowl +fan. Her husband was layin' there too and I guess I must a nodded and +let the fan drop down in his face. He jumped up and pressed his thumbs +on my eyes till they was all bloodshot and when he let loose I fell down +on the floor. Miss Phenie said, 'Oh, William, don't do that.' I can +remember it just as well.</p> + +<p>"My eyes like to went out and do you know, when her baby was born it was +blind. It's eyes just looked like two balls of blood. It died though, +just lived 'bout two weeks."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="ParkerFannie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Fannie Parker<br> + 1908 W. Sixth Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 90?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes, honey, this is old Fannie. I'se just a poor old nigger waitin' for +Jesus to come and take me to Heaven.</p> + +<p>"I was just a young strip of a girl when the war come. Dr. M.C. Comer +was my owner. His wife was Elizabeth Comer. I said Marse and Mistis in +them days and when old mistress called me I went runnin' like a turkey. +They called her Miss Betsy. Yes Lord, I was in slavery days. Master and +mistress was bossin' me then. We all come under the rules. We lived in +Monticello—right in the city of Monticello.</p> + +<p>"All I can tell you is just what I remember. I seed the Yankees. I +remember a whole host of 'em come to our house and wanted something to +eat. They got it too! They cooked it them selves and then they burned +everything they could get their hands on. They said plenty to me. They +said so much I don't know what they said. I know one thing they said I +belonged to the Yankees. Yes Lord, they wanted me to tell 'em if I was +free. I told 'em I was free indeed and that I belonged to Miss Betsy. I +didn't know what else to say. We had plenty to eat, plenty of hog meat +and buttermilk and cornbread. Yes ma'm—don't talk about that now.</p> + +<p>"Don't tell me 'bout old Jeff Davis—he oughta been killed. Abraham +Lincoln thought what was right was right and what was wrong was wrong. +Abraham was a great man cause he was the President. When the rebels +ceded from the Union he made 'em fight the North. Abraham Lincoln +studied that and he had it all in his mind. He wasn't no fighter but he +carried his own and the North give 'em the devil. Grant was a good man +too. They tried to kill him but he was just wrapped up in silver and +gold.</p> + +<p>"I remember when the stars fell. Yes, honey, I know I was ironin' and it +got so dark I had to light the lamp. Yes, I did!</p> + +<p>"It's been a long time and my mind's not so good now but I remember old +Comer put us through. Good-bye and God bless you!"</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="ParkerJM"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Subject: Ex-slavery<br> +Story: Birth, Parents, Master.<br> +<br> +Person Interviewed: J.M. Parker, (dark brown)<br> +Address: 1002 Ringo Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Occupation: Formerly a carpenter<br> +Age: 76</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in South Carolina, Waterloo, in Lawrence County, [HW: +Laurens Co.] in 1861, April 5th. Waterloo is a little town in South +Carolina. I believe that fellow shot the first gun of the war when I was +born. I knew then I was going to be free. Of course that is just a lie. +I made that up. Anyway I was born in 1861.</p> + +<p>"Colonel Rice was our master. He was in the war too. The name Parker +came in by intermarriage, you see. My mother belonged to Rice. She could +have been a Simms before she married. My father's name was Edmund +Parker. He belonged to the Rices also. That was his master; Colonel Rice +and him were boys together. He went down there to Charleston, South +Carolina to build breastworks. While down there, he slipped off and +brought a hundred men away from Charleston back to Lawrence County where +the men was that owned them. He was a business man, father was. Brought +'em all through the swamps. They were slaves and he brought 'em all back +home. They all followed his advice.</p> + +<p>"My mother's name was Rowena Parker after she married.</p> + +<p>"Colonel Rice was a pretty fair man—a pretty good fellow. He was a +colonel in the war and stood pretty high. Bound to be that way by him +being a colonel. Seemed like him and my father had about the same number +of kids. He thought there was nobody like my mother. He never <u>whipped +the slaves himself</u> but his <u>overseer would sometimes jump on +them</u>. The Rice family was very good to our people. The men being +gone they were left in the hands of the mistress. She never touched +anybody. She never had no reason to.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Pateroles</b></p> + +<p>"Patterollers didn't bother us, but we were in that country. During the +war, most of the men that amounted to anything were in the war and the +patrolers didn't bother you much. The overseer didn't have so much power +over me than. That pretty well left the colored people to come up +without being abused during the war. The white folks was forced to go to +the war. They drafted them just like they do now. They'd shoot a +<u>po'</u> white man if he didn't come.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Breeding</b></p> + +<p>"My master didn't force men and women to marry. <u>He didn't</u> put 'em +together just to get more slave. Some times other people would have +women and men just for that purpose. But there wasn't much of it in my +country.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>House, Stock, Parents' Occupations</b></p> + +<p>"Our house was a frame building, boxed in with one-by-twelve like we +have here in the country. That was a good house with regular flooring, +tongue and groove. We was raised up in a good house. Old Colonel Rice +had to protect his standing. He had good stock. My father was a carriage +man. He had to keep those horses clean and they always looked good. That +carriage had to shine too. Colonel Rice was a high stepper. He'd take +his handkerchief and rub it over the horses hair to see if they were +really clean. He would always find 'em clean though when the old man got +through with them. He would drive fine stock. Had some fine horses. +Couldn't trust 'em with just anybody.</p> + +<p>"My mother was cook. She helped Mrs. Rice take care of the kids, and +cooked around the house. She took care of her kids, too.</p> + +<p>"The house we was born and bred in was built for a carriage house, but +somehow or 'nother they give it to us to live in. My mother being a +cook, she got what she wanted. That was a good house too. It was sealed. +It had good floors. It had two rooms. It had about three windows and +good doors to each room.</p> + +<p>"We had just common furniture. Niggers didn't have much then. My father +was a good mechanic though and he would make anything he wanted. We +didn't have much, just common things. But all my people were mechanics, +harness makers, shoemakers,—they could make anything. Young Sam Parker +could make any kind of shoe. He made shoes for the white folks; Young +Jacob was a blacksmith; he made horseshoes and anything else out of +iron. He may still be living. In fact, he made anything he could get his +hands on. My young uncles on my mother's side, I don't know much about +them, because they were all mechanics. My grandfather on my mother's +side could make baskets—any kind—could make baskets that would hold +water.</p> + +<p>"My father had thirteen children. Three of them are living now. My +brother lives here in the city. He was born during the war and his +mother was supposed to be free when he was born.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Right After the War</b></p> + +<p>"That's what my mother told me. I can remember a long ways back myself. +After the war, it wasn't long before they began to open up schools. They +used to run school three or four months a year. Both white and colored +in the country had about three or four months. That is all they had. +There weren't so very many white folks that took an interest in +education during slave time. Colored people got just about as much as +they did right after the war. What time we went to school we went the +whole day. We would come home and work in the evening like. We had +pretty fair teachers. All white then at first. They didn't have no +colored till afterwards. If they did, they had so few, I never heard of +them.</p> + +<p>"The first teacher I had was Katie Whitefold (white). That was in +Waterloo. Miss Richardson was our next teacher. She was white too. We +went to school two terms under white women. After that we began to get +teachers from Columbia, South Carolina, where the normal school was.</p> + +<p>"The white teachers who taught us were people who had been raised right +around Waterloo. We never had no Northern teachers as I knows of. Our +first colored teacher was Murry Evans. He a preacher. He was one of our +leading preachers too. After him our colored women began to come in and +stand examination wasn't so hard at that time, but they made a good +showing. There were good scholars.</p> + +<p>"I went to school too much. I went to school at Philander Smith College +some, too. I went a good piece in school. Come pretty near finishing the +English course (high school). I finished Good[HW: sp.?] Brown's 'Grammer +of Grammers'. Professor Backensto (the spelling is the interviewer's) +sent away and got it and sold it to us. We was his students. He was a +white man from the North and a good scholar. We got in those grammars +and got the same lessons they give him when he was in school—nine pages +a lesson and we had to repeat that lesson three times. When my mother +died, I was off in the normal school.</p> + +<p>"Right after the war, my parents farmed. He followed his trade. That +always gave us something to eat you know. When we farmed, we +sharecropped—a third and a fourth—that is, we got a third of the +cotton and a fourth of the corn. Potatoes and things like that went +free. All women got an acre free. My mother always got an acre and she +worked it good too. She always had her bale of cotton. And if she didn't +have a bale, she laid it next to the white folks' and made it out. They +knew it and they didn't care. She stood well with the white people. +Helped all of 'em raise their children, and they all liked that.</p> + +<p>"I went along with my father whenever he had a big job and needed help. +I got to be as good a carpenter as he was.</p> + +<p>"I married out here. About eighty-five. People were emigrating to this +country. There was a boom to emigrating then. Emigrating was a little +dangerous when a man was trying to get hands. White folks would lay +traps and kill men that were taking away their hands—they would kill +white just as quick as they would black. I started out under a white +man—I can't remember his name. He turned me over to Madden, a colored +man who was raised in Waterloo. We came from there to Greenwood, South +Carolina where everything was straight. After that we had nothing to do +but get on the train and keep coming. We was with our agent then and we +had no more trouble after that.</p> + +<p>"I got off at Brinkley over at Minor Gregory's farm. He needed hands +then and was glad to get us. He is dead now. I stayed in Brinkley the +space of about a year. Then he gave us transportation to Little Rock. +The train came from Memphis, and we struck out for Little Rock. I +married after I come to Little Rock. I forget what year. But anyway my +wife is dead and gone and all the children. So I'm single now.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Opinions of the Present</b></p> + +<p>"I think times are about dead now. Things ought to get better. I believe +things are going to get better for all of us. People have got to think +more. People have got to get together more. War doesn't always make +thing better. It didn't after the Civil War. And it didn't after the +World War. The young people are all right in their way. It would just +take another war to learn 'em a lesson.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Support</b></p> + +<p>"I can't do any work now. I get a little help from the welfare. It +doesn't come regular. I need a check right now. I think it's due now. +But they haven't sent it out yet. That is, I haven't got it.</p> + +<p>"I'm a Christian. All my family were Methodists. I belong to Wesley.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="ParkerJudy"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mary D. Hudgins<br> +Person Interviewed: Judy Parker<br> +Home: 618 Wade Street, Hot Springs, Ark.<br> +Aged: 77</h3> +<br> + +<p>For location of Wade Street, see interview with Emma Sanderson.</p> + +<p>As the interviewer walked down Silver Street a saddle colored girl came +out on a porch for a load of wood.</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon," she began, pausing, "can you tell me where I will +find Emma Sanderson?"</p> + +<p>"I sure can." The girl left the porch and came out to the street. "I'll +walk down with you and show you. That way it'll be easier. Kind of cold, +ain't it?"</p> + +<p>"It surely is," this from the interviewer. "Isn't it too cold for you, +can't you just tell me? I think I can find it." The girl had expected to +be only on the porch and didn't have a coat.</p> + +<p>"No, ma'am. It's all right. Now we're far enough for you to see. You see +those two houses jam up against one and 'tother? Well Miz Parker lives +in the one this way. I goes down to look after her most every day. +That's where you'll find her.—No ma'am—'twaren't no bother."</p> + +<p>The gate sagged slightly at the house "this way" of the "two jam up +against one and 'tother." A large slab from an oak log in the front yard +near a woodpile bore mute evidence of many an ax blow. (Stove wood is +generally split in the rural South—one end of the "stick" resting +against the ground, the other atop a small log.)</p> + +<p>Up a couple of rickety steps the interviewer climbed. She knocked three +times. When she was bade to enter she opened the door to find an old +woman sitting near a wood stove combing her long, white hair.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Parker was expecting the visit. A few days before the interviewer +had had a visit from a couple of colored women who had "heard tell how +you is investigating the old people.—been trying to get on old age +pension for a long time—glad you come to get us on.——No? Oh, I see +you is the Townsend woman." (An explanation of her true capacity was +almost impossible for the interviewer.)</p> + +<p>Mrs. Parker, however, seemed to comprehend the idea perfectly. She +expected nothing save the chance to tell her story. Her joy at the gift +of a quarter (the amount the interviewer set aside from her salary for +each interviewee) was pitiful. Evidently it had been a long time since +she had possessed a similar sum to spend exactly as she pleased.</p> + +<p>"I don't rightly know how old I is. My mother used to tell me that I +was a little baby, six months old when our master, Joe Potts was his +name, got ready to clear out of Florida. You see he had heard tell of +the war scare. So he started drifting out of the way. Bet it didn't take +him long after he made up his mind. He was a right decided man. Mister +Joe was.</p> + +<p>"How did we like him? Well, he was always good to us. He was well +thought of. Seemed to be a pretty clever man, Mr. Joe did." ("Clever" in +plantation language like "smart" refers more to muscular than mental +activity. They might almost be used as synonyms for "hard working" on +the labor level.)</p> + +<p>"So Mr. Joe got ready to go to Texas. Law, Miss, I don't rightly know +whether he had a family or not. Never heard my Mother say. Anyhow he +come through Arkansas intending to drift on out into Texas. But when he +got near the border 'twix't and between Arkansas and Texas he stopped. +The talk about war had about settled down. So he stopped. He stopped +near where the big bridge is. You know where Little River County is +don't you? He stopped and he started to work. Started to make a crop. +'Course I can't remember none about that. Just what my Mother told me. +But I remembers him from later.</p> + +<p>"He went at it the good way. Settled down and tried to open up a home. +They put in a crop and got along pretty good. Time passed and the war +talk started floating again. That time he didn't pay much attention and +it got him. It was on a Sunday morning when he went away. I never knew +whether they made him go or not. But I kind of think they must of. Cause +he wouldn't have moved off from Florida if he had wanted to go to war.</p> + +<p>"He took my daddy with him! Ma'am—did he take him to fight or to wait +on him—Don't know ma'am, but I sort of think he took him to wait on +him. But he didn't bring him back. My daddy got killed in the war. No +ma'am. I don't rightly know how he got killed. Never heard nobody say. I +was just a little girl—nobody bothered to tell me much.</p> + +<p>"Yes, that we did. We stayed on on the farm and we made a crop—the old +folks did. Mr. Joe, when he went off, said "Now you stay on here, you +make a crop and you use all you need. Then you put up the rest and save +for me." He was a right good man, Mr. Joe was.</p> + +<p>"No, we didn't never see no fighting. There wasn't nothing to be scared +of. Didn't see no Yankees until the war was through. Then they started +passing. Lawsey, I couldn't tell how many of them there was. More than +you could count.</p> + +<p>"We had all stayed on. I was the oldest of my mother's children. But she +had two more after me. There was our family and my two uncles and my +grandmother. Then there was some other colored folks. But we wasn't +scared of the Yankees. Mr. Joe was there by that time. They camped all +around in the woods near us. They got us to do their washing. Lawsey +they was as filthy as hogs. I never see such folks. They asked Mr. Joe +if we could do their washing. Everything on the place that come near +those clothes got lousey. Those men was covered with them. I never see +nothing like it. We got covered with them. No, ma'am, we got rid of 'em +pretty easy. They ain't so hard to get rid of, if you keep clean.</p> + +<p>"After it was all over Master Joe got ready to go back to Florida. He +took Warley and Jenny with him. They was children he had had by a black +woman—you know folks did such things in them days. He asked the rest of +us if they wanted to go back too. But my folks made up their minds they +didn't. You see, they didn't know how they'd get along and how long it +would take them to pay for the trip back, so they stayed right where +they was.</p> + +<p>"Lots of 'em went to Rondo and some of us worked for Herb Jeans—he +lived farther up Red River. After my mother died I was with my +grandmother. She washed and cooked for Herb Jeans's family. I stayed on +with her, helped out until I got married. I was about fifteen when that +time come.</p> + +<p>"My man owned his place. Sure he did. Owned it when I married him. He +owned it himself and farmed it good. Yes ma'am we stayed with the land. +He made good crops—corn and cotton, mostly. Course we raised potatoes +and the truck we needed—all stuff like that. Yes, ma'am we had thirteen +children. Just three of them's living. All of them is boys.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am we got along good. My husband made good crops and we got +along just good. But 'bout eight years ago my husband he got sick. So he +sold out the farm—sold out everything. Then he come here.</p> + +<p>"Before he died he spent every last cent—every last cent—left me to +get along the very best way I kin. I stays with my son. He takes care of +me. He don't make much, but he does the best he kin.</p> + +<p>"No ma'am, I likes living down in the country. Down there near Red River +it's soft and sandy. Up here in Hot Springs the rocks tear up your feet. +If you's country raised—you like the country. Yes ma'am, you like the +country."</p> + +<p>As she left the interviewer handed her a quarter. At first the old +woman's face was expressionless. But she moved the coin nearer to her +eyes and a smile broke and widened until her whole face was a wrinkle of +joy. When she turned in the doorway, the interviewer noticed that the +hand jammed into an apron pocket was clutched into a possessive fist, +cradling the precious twenty five cents.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="ParkerRF"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: R.F. Parker<br> + 619 N. Hickory, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 76</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in '62. I reckon I was born in slavery times. Born in Ripley +County, Missouri. Old man Billy Parker was my master, and my young +master was Jim Parker.</p> + +<p>"They bought my mother in Tennessee when she was a child. I wasn't big +enough to remember much about slavery but I was big enough to know when +they turned my mother loose, and we come to Lawrence County, Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"I remember my mother sayin' she had to plow while her young master, Jim +Parker, was off to war, but I don't know what side he was on.</p> + +<p>"I remember seein' some soldiers ridin' down the road, about +seventy-five of 'em. I know I run under a corn pen and hid. I thought +they was after me. They stopped right there and turned their horses +loose 'round that pen. I can remember that all right. They went in the +white folks' house and took a shotgun. I know I remember hearin' mama +talk about it. I think they had on blue clothes.</p> + +<p>"I was goin' on seven when we come to Arkansas. I know I'd walk a while +and she'd tote me a while. But we was lucky enough to get in with some +white people that was movin' to Arkansas. We was comin' to a place +called 'The Promised Land.' We stayed there till '92.</p> + +<p>"I have farmed and done public work. I worked nine years at that heading +factory in the east end (of Pine Bluff).</p> + +<p>"I used to vote. When I was in north Arkansas, I voted in all kinds of +elections. But after I come down here to Jefferson County, I couldn't +vote in nothin' but the presidential elections.</p> + +<p>"I don't think the young people are goin' to amount to much. They are a +heap wilder than when I was young. They got a chance to graduate +now—something I didn't get to do.</p> + +<p>"I never went to school a day in my life, but the white people where I +worked learned me to read and write."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>This man could easily pass for a white person.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="ParksAnnie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Annie Parks<br> + 720 Pulaski Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: About 80<br> +Occupation: Formerly house and field work</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born and raised in Mer Rouge, Louisiana. That is between here and +Monroe. I have been here in Little Rock more than twenty-five years.</p> + +<p>"My mother's name was Sarah Mitchell. That was her married name. I don't +know what her father's name was. My father's name was Willis Clapp. He +was killed in the first war—the Civil War. My father went to the war +from Mer Rouge, Louisiana. I don't remember him at all. But that is what +my mother told me about him. My mother said he had very good people. +After he married my mother, old man Offord bought him. Offord's name was +Warren Offord. They buried him while I was still there in Mer Rouge. He +was a old-time Mason. That was my mother's master—in olden days.</p> + +<p>"His grandmother took my mother across the seas with her. She (his +grandmother) died on shipboard, and they throwed her body into the +water. There's people denies it, but my mother told me it was so. Young +Davenport is still living. He is a relative of Offords. My mother never +did get no pension for my father.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Slave House and Occupation</b></p> + +<p>"I was born in a log house. There were two doors—a front and a +back—and there were two windows. My mother had no furniture 'cept an +old-time wooden bed—big bed. She was a nurse all the time in the house. +I heard her say she milked and waited on them in the house. My father's +occupation was farming during slavery times.</p> + +<p>"My mother always said she didn't have no master to beat on her. I like +to tell the truth. My mother's master never let no overseer beat his +slaves around. She didn't say just what we had to eat. But they always +give us a plenty, and there wasn't none of us mistreated.</p> + +<p>"My father could have an extra patch and make a bale of cotton or +whatever he wanted to on it. That was so that he could make a little +money to buy things for hisself and his family. And if he raised a bale +of cotton on his patch and wanted to sell it to the agent, that was all +right.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Family</b></p> + +<p>"I have a brother named Manuel Clayton. If he's living still, he is +younger than I am. He is the baby boy. I doesn't remember his father at +all. I had five sisters with myself and two brothers. All of them were +older than me except Manuel. My mother had one brother and two sisters. +Her brother's name was Lin Urbin. We always called him Big Buddy. He +hasn't been so long died. My older brother is named Willis Clayton—if +he's still living. Willis has a half dozen sons. He is my oldest +brother. He lives way out in the country 'round Mer Rouge.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Freedom</b></p> + +<p>"My mother said they promised to them money when they were freed. Some +of them gave them something, and some of them didn't. My mother's folks +didn't give her nothin'. The Government didn't give her nothin' either. +I don't know just who told her she was free nor how. I don't remember +myself.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Patrollers and Ku Klux</b></p> + +<p>"I never heard much about pateroles. My mother said they used to whip +you if they would catch you out without a pass. I heard her talk about +the Ku Klux after freedom.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Slave Worship</b></p> + +<p>"My mother could always go to church on Sunday. Her slave-time preacher +was Tom Johnson. Henry Soates and Watt Taylor were slavery-time +preachers too. Old man Jacob Anderson too was a great preacher in slave +time. There was a big arbor where they held church. That was outdoors. +There was just a wood frame and green leaves laid over it. Hundreds of +people sat under there and heard the Gospel preached. The Offords didn't +care how much you worshipped. If I was with them, I wouldn't have no +trouble.</p> + +<p>"In the winter time they had a small place to meet in. They built a +church after the war. When I went home, eight or nine years ago, I +walked all 'round and looked at all the old places.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Health</b></p> + +<p>"You know my remembrance comes and goes. I ain't had no good remembrance +since I been sick. I been mighty sick with high blood pressure. I can't +work and I can't even go out. I'm 'fraid I'll fall down and get myself +hurt or run over.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Support</b></p> + +<p>"I don't get no help 'cept what my daughter gives me. I can't get no Old +Age Pension. I never did get nothin' for my father. My mother didn't +either. He was killed in the war, but they didn't give nobody nothin' +for his death. They told me they'd give me something and then they told +me they wouldn't. I'm dependent on what my daughter does for me. If I +was back in Mer Rouge, I wouldn't have no trouble gettin' a pension, nor +nothin' else.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Slave Marriages on the Offord Plantation</b></p> + +<p>"My mother said they just read 'em together, slavery times. I think she +said that the preacher married them on the Offord plantation. They +didn't get no license.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Amusements</b></p> + +<p>"They had quiltings and corn shuckings. I don't know what other +amusements they had, but I know everything was pleasant on the Offord +plantation.</p> + +<p>"If slaves went out without a pass, my mother said her master wouldn't +allow them to beat on them when they come in. They had plenty to eat, +and they had substantial clothes, and they had a good fire.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Age</b></p> + +<p>"I don't know how old I am. I was born before the war. My father went to +the war when it begun. I had another brother that was born before the +war. He don't remember nothin' about my father. I don't neither. I was +too young."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>Allowing for a year's difference between the two youngest children, and +allowing that the boy was born immediately before the War, the girl +could not be younger than seventy-eight. She could be older. She states +all facts as through her mother, but she seems to have experienced some +of the things she relates. Her memory is fading. Failure to get pension +or old age assistance oppresses her mind. She comes back to it again and +again. She carries her card and her commodity order with her in her +pocketbook.</p> + +<p>She had asked me to write some letters for her when her daughter +interfered and said that she didn't want it done. She said that she had +told the case worker that her husband worked at the Missouri Pacific +Shop and that the case worker had asked her if she wouldn't provide for +her mother. They live in a neat rented house. The mother weighs about a +hundred and ten pounds and is tall. The daughter is about the same +height but weighs about two hundred and fifty. Time and again, the old +lady tried to convey to me a message that she didn't want her daughter +to hear, but I could not make it out. The daughter was belligerent, as +is sometimes the case, and it was only by walking in the very middle of +the straight and narrow path that I managed to get my story.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="ParnellAustinPen"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Austin Pen Parnell<br> + 4314 W. Seventeenth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 73<br> +Occupation: Carpenter</h3> +<br> + +<p><b>Birth and General Fact About Life</b></p> + +<p>"I was born April fifteenth, 1865, the day Lincoln was assassinated, in +Carroll County, Mississippi, about ten miles from Grenada. It's about +half the distance between Grenada and Carrollton. Carrollton is our +county seat but we went to Grenada more than we went to Carrollton.</p> + +<p>"When I got older, I moved to Grenada and I come from there here. I was +about thirty-five years old when I moved to Grenada. About 160 acres of +land in Grenada was mine. I bought it, but heirs claimed the place and I +had to leave. I had no land then, only a lot here and I came over here +to look it over. A lady had come to Mississippi selling property and she +had a plat which she said was in Little Rock not far from the capitol. +Her name was Mrs. Putman. The place was on the other side of the +Fourche. But I didn't know that until I came here. She misguided me. I +came to Arkansas and looked at the lot and didn't want it. I made a trip +over here twice before I settled on living in Little Rock. I told the +others who had bought property from her the truth about its location. +They asked me and I hate to lie. I didn't knock; I just answered +questions and didn't volunteer nothing. They all quit making their +payments, Just like I did. My land had a rock on it as big as a bale of +cotton.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Herring thought hard of me because I told the others the truth. I +went into the office one day and Mr. Herring said, 'Parnell, I +understand you have been knocking on me.' I said, 'Well, I'll tell you, +Mr. Herring, if telling the truth about things is knocking on them, I +certainly did.' He never said anything more about it, and I didn't +either.</p> + +<p>"I rented a place on Twelfth and Maple and then rented around there two +or three times, and finally bought a place at 3704 West Twelfth Street. +I moved to Little Rock March 18, 1911. That was twenty-seven years ago.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Parents</b></p> + +<p>"My father was named Henry Parnell. He died in the year 1917 in the time +of the great war. He was ninety-five years old when he died. His master +had the same name. My mother's name was Priscilla Parnell. She belonged +to the same family as he did. They married before freedom. My father was +a farmer and my mother was a housewife and she'd work in the field too.</p> + +<p>"My grandmother on my mother's side was named Hester Parnell. I don't +know what her husband's name was. My mother, father, and grandmother +were all from North Carolina. My grandmother did house and field work.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>House</b></p> + +<p>"My mother and father lived in a two-room house hewed out of big +logs—great big logs. The logs were about four inches thick and twelve +inches wide. It didn't take many of them to build a wall—about ten or +twelve of them on a side. They were notched down so as to almost come +together. They chinked up the cracks with mud and covered it with a +board.</p> + +<p>"I laid in bed many a night and looked up through the cracks in the +roof. Snow would come through there when it snowed and cover the bed +covers. We thought you couldn't build a roof so that it would keep out +rain and snow, but we were mistaken. Before you would make a fire in +them days, you had to sweep out the snow so that it wouldn't melt up in +the house and make a mess. But we kept healthy just the same. Didn't +have no pneumonia in those days.</p> + +<p>"The house had two rooms about eight feet apart. The rooms were +connected by a hall which we called a gallery in those days. The hall +was covered by the same roof as the house and it had the same floor. The +house sot east and west and had a chimney in each end. The chimneys were +made out of sticks and mud. I can build a chimney now like that.</p> + +<p>"It was large at the bottom and tapered at the top. It was about six or +seven feet square at the bottom. It grew smaller as it went toward the +top. You could get a piece of wood three and a half or four feet long in +the boddom of it. Sometimes the wood would be too large to carry and you +would just have to roll it in.</p> + +<p>"The floors was boards about one by twelve. There were two doors in each +room—one leading outside and the other to the hall. If there were any +windows, I can't remember them. We didn't need no windows for +ventilation.</p> + +<p>"This was the house that I remember first after freedom. I remember +living in it. That was about seven or eight years after freedom. My +father rented it from the big man named Alf George for whom he worked. +Mr. George used to come out and eat breakfast with us. We'd get that +hoecake out of the ashes and wash it off until it looked like it was as +clean as bread cooked in a skillet. I have seen my grandmother cook a +many a one in the fire. We didn't use no skillet for corn bread. The +bread would have a good firm crust on it. But it didn't get too hard to +eat and enjoy.</p> + +<p>"She'd take a poker before she put the bread in and rake the ashes off +the hearth down to the solid stone or earth bottom, and the ashes would +be banked in two hills to one side and the other. Then she would put the +batter down on it; the batter would be about an inch thick and about +nine inches across. She'd put down three cakes at a time and let 'em +stay there till the cakes were firm—about five minutes on the bare hot +hearth. They would almost bake before she covered them up. Sometimes she +would lay down as many as four at a time. The cakes had to be dry before +they were covered up, because if the ashes ever stuck to them while they +were wet, there would be ashes in them when you would take them out to +eat. She'd take her poker then and rake the ashes back on the top of the +cakes and let 'em stay there till the cakes were done. I don't know just +how long—maybe about ten or twelve minutes. She knew how long to cook +them. Then she'd rake down the hearth gently, backward and forward, with +the poker till she got down to them and then she'd put the poker under +them and lift them out. That poker was a kind of flat iron. It wasn't a +round one. Then we'd wash 'em off like I told you and they be ready to +eat.</p> + +<p>"Mr. George would eat the ash cake and drink sweet milk. 'Auntie, I want +some of that ash cake and some of that good sweet milk.' We had plenty +of cows.</p> + +<p>"Two-thirds of the water used in the ash cake was hot water, and that +made the batter stick together like it was biscuit dough. She could put +it together and take it in her hand and pat it out flat and lay it on +the hearth. It would be just as round! That was the art of it!</p> + +<p>"When I go back to Mississippi, I'm going back to that house again. I +don't remember seeing the house I was born in. But I was told it was an +ordinary log house just like those all the other slaves had,—just a +one-room log house.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Freedom</b></p> + +<p>"My father went to the War. He was on the Confederate side. They carried +him there as a worker. They cut down all the timber 'round the place +where they were to keep the Yankee gunboats from shelling them and +knocking the logs down on them. But them Yankees were sharp. They stayed +away till everything got dry as a chip. Then they come down and set all +that wood afire with their shells, and the wind seemed to be in their +favor. The Rebels had to get away from there.</p> + +<p>"He got sick before the War closed and he had to come home. His young +master and the other folks stayed there four or five months longer. His +young master was named Tom. When Tom came home, he waited about five or +six months before he would tell them they was free. Then he said, 'You +all free as I am. You can stay here if you want or you can go. You are +free.' They all got together and told him that if he would treat them +right he wouldn't have to do no work. They would stay and do his work +and theirs too. They would work the land and he would give them their +part. I don't know just what the agreement was. I think it was about a +third. Anyway, they worked on shares. When the landlord furnished a team +usually it was halves. But when the worker furnished his own team, it +was usually two-thirds or three-fourths that the worker got. But none of +them owned teams at that time. They were just turned loose. We stayed +there with them people a good while. I don't know just how long, but it +was several years.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Catching a Hog</b></p> + +<p>"One time a slave went to steal a hog. I don't know the name of the man; +I just hear my father tell what happened, and I'm repeating it. It was a +great big hog and kind of wild. His plan to catch the hog was to climb +a tree and carry a yeer of corn up the tree and at the same time he'd +carry a long rope. He had put a running noose in the end of the rope and +laid it on the ground and shelled the corn into the ring. He had the +other end of the rope tied around himself; he was up the tree. About the +time he got the noose pulled up around the hog so that he could tighten +up on it, he dropped his hat and scared the hog. The hog didn't know he +was around until the hat fell, and the falling of the hat scared it so +that it made a big jump and ran a little ways off. That jerked the man +out of the tree. Him falling scared the hog a second time and got him to +running right. He was a big stout hog, and the man's weight didn't hold +him back much. The man didn't know what to do to stop the hog. The hog +was running draggin' him along, snatching him over logs. There was +nothin' else he could do, so he tried prayer. But the hog didn't stop. +Seemed like even the Lord couldn't stop him. Then he questioned the +Lord; he said, 'Lawd, what sawt [HW: sort] of a Lawd is you? You can +stop the wind; you can stop the rain; you can stop the ocean; but you +can't stop this hog.'</p> + +<p>"The hog ran till he came to a big ditch. He jumped the ditch, but the +man fell in it, and that compelled the hog to stop. The man's hollering +made somebody hear him and come and git him loose from the hog. He was +so glad to git loose, he didn't mind losing the hog and gettin' +punished. He didn't get the hog. He just got a lot of bruises. I don't +remember just how they punished him.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Ku Klux Klan</b></p> + +<p>"Once after the War there was a lot of colored people at a prayer +meeting. It was in the winter and they had a fire. The Ku Klux come up. +They just stood outside the door, but the people thought they were +coming in and they got scared. They didn't know hardly how to get out. +One man got a big shovelful of hot coals and ashes out of the fireplace +and threw it out over them, and while they was dusting off the ashes and +coals, the niggers all got away.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Patrollers</b></p> + +<p>"I remember my father telling tales about the patrollers, but I can't +remember them just now. There was an old song about them. Part of it +went like this:</p> + +<pre> +'Run, nigger, run +The pateroles'll get you. + +That nigger run +That nigger flew +That nigger bust +His Sunday shoe. + +Run, nigger, run +The pateroles'll get you.' +</pre> + +<p>That's all I know of that. There is more to it. I used to hear the boys +sing it, and I used to hear 'em pick it out on the banjo and the guitar.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Old Massa Goes 'Way</b></p> + +<p>"Old massa went off one time and left the niggers. He told 'em that he +was goin' to New York. He jus' wanted to see what they would do if they +thought he was away. The niggers couldn't call the name New York, and +they said, 'Old massa's gone to PhilameYawk.'</p> + +<p>"They went in the pantry and got everything they wanted to eat. And they +had a big feast. While they were feasting, the old man came in disguised +as a tramp—face smutty and clothes all dirty and raggedy. They couldn't +tell who he was. He walked up just as though he wanted to eat and +begged the boys for something to eat. The boys said to him, 'Stan' back, +you shabby rascal, you; <u>if'n</u> they's anything left, you get some; +<u>if'n</u> they ain't none left, you get none. This is our time. Old +massa done gone to PhilameYawk and we're having a big time.'</p> + +<p>"After they were through, they did give him a little something but they +still didn't know him. I never did learn the details about what happened +after they found out who the tramp was. My father told me about it.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Whipping a Slave</b></p> + +<p>"I heard my father say his old master give him two licks with a whip +once. Him and another man had been off and they came in. Master drove up +in a double surrey. He had been to town and had bought the boys a pair +of boots apiece. He told them as he got out of the surrey to take his +horses out and feed them. My father's friend was there with him and he +said: 'Le's get our boots before we feed the horses.' After that the +master walked out on the porch and he had on crying boots. The horses +heard them squeaking and they nickered.</p> + +<p>"Master said, 'Henry, I thought I told you to feed them horses. Henry +was so taken aback that he couldn't say a thing. Henry was my father, +you know. Master went and got his cowhide. He said, 'Are you going to +obey my orders?' About the time he said that, he hit my father twice +with the cowhide, and my father said, 'Oh pray, master, oh pray,' and he +let him go. He beat the other fellow pretty bad because he told him to +'Le's get the boots first.'</p> + +<p>"Old master would get drunk sometimes and get on the niggers and beat +them up. He would have them stark naked and would be beating them. Then +old missis would come right out there and stop him. She would say, 'I +didn't come all the way here from North Carolina to have my niggers beat +up for nothin'.' She'd take hold of the cowhide, and he would have to +quit. My father had both her picture and the old man's.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Prayer</b></p> + +<p>"I can remember how my mother used to pray out in the field. We'd be +picking cotton. She would go off out there in the ditch a little ways. +It wouldn't be far, and I would listen to her. She would say to me: +'Pray, son,' and I would say, 'Mother, I don't know how to pray,' and +she would say, 'Well, just say Lord have mercy.' That gave me religious +inclinations. I cultivated religion from that time on. I would try to +pray and finally I learned. One day I was out in the field and it was +pouring down rain, and I was standing up with tears in my eyes trying to +pray as she taught me to. We weren't picking cotton then. I was just +walking out. My mother was dead. I would be walking out and whenever I +would get the notion I would stop right there and go to praying.</p> + +<p>"In slave times, they would have a prayer meeting out in some of the +places and they would turn a pot down out in front of the door. It would +be on a stick or something and raised up a short distance from the +ground so that it wouldn't set flat on the ground. It seems that that +would catch the sound and keep it right around there. They would sing +that old song:</p> + +<pre> +'We will camp awhile in the wilderness +And then I'm going home.' +</pre> + +<p>I don't know any more of the words of that song.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Early Schooling</b></p> + +<p>"I started to school when I was about six or seven years old. I didn't +get to school regular because my father had plenty of work and he had a +habit of taking me out to help him when he needed me in his work.</p> + +<p>"My first teacher was a white man named Jones. I don't remember his +first name. He was a northerner and a Republican. He taught in the +public school with us. His boy, John, and his girl, Louisa, went to the +same school, and were in classes with us. The kids would beat them up +sometimes but he didn't cut up about it. He was pretty good man.</p> + +<p>"After him, I had a colored man named M.E. Davis as a teacher. He would +say to my father, 'Henry, that is a bright boy; he will be a credit to +you if you will keep him at school and give him a chance. Don't make him +lose so much time.' My father would say, 'Yes, that is right.' But as +soon as another job came up, he would keep me out again.</p> + +<p>"I soon got so my learning was a help to him in his work. Whenever any +figuring was to be done, I had to do it if it was done right. He never +had a chance to get any schooling and he couldn't figure well. So they +used to beat him out of plenty when he would work for them. One day we +had picked cotton for a white man and when the time came to pay off, the +man paid father, but I noticed that he didn't give him all he should +have. I didn't say anything while we was standing there but after we got +away I said, 'Papa, he didn't give you the right money.'</p> + +<p>"Papa said, 'How much should he have given me?'</p> + +<p>"I told him, and he said to me, 'Will you say that to him?'</p> + +<p>"I said, 'Yes, papa.'</p> + +<p>"He turned 'round and we went on back to the place and pa said, 'My boy +says you didn't pay me all that was comin' to me.'</p> + +<p>"The white man turned to me at once and said, 'How much was coming to +him?'</p> + +<p>"I told him.</p> + +<p>"He said, 'What makes you think that?'</p> + +<p>"I said, 'We picked so many pounds of cotton at so much per hundred +pounds, and that would amount to so many dollars and so many cents.'</p> + +<p>"When I said that, he fell over on the ground and like to killed his +self laughing. He counted out the right money to my father and said, +'Henry, you better watch that little skinny-eyed nigger; he knows +something.'</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Present Support</b></p> + +<p>"I don't got anything from the government. I live by what little I make +at odd jobs."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Note:</b> In this interview this man used correct English most of the time +and the interview is given in his own words. Lapses into dialect will be +noticed.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="ParrBen"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Ben Parr, Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 85 next March (1938)</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Tennessee close to Ripley. My master was Charles Warpoo +and Catherine Warpoo. They had three boys and two girls. They owned my +mama and me and Gentry was the oldest child. He died last year. My mama +raised twelve children. My papa belong to people over on the Mississippi +River. Their name was Parr but I couldn't tell a thing about them. When +I come to know about them was after freedom. There was Jim Parr, Dick +Parr, Columbus Parr. We lived on their place. Both my parents was farm +hands, and all twelve children wid them.</p> + +<p>"Well, the first I recollect is that we lived on the five acre lot, the +big house, and some of the slaves lived in houses around the big yard +all fenced with pailings and nice pickett fence in front of Charlie +Warpoo's house. We played around under the trees all day. The soldiers +come nearly every day and nearly et us out of house and home. The blue +coats seemed the hungriest or greediest pear lack. They both come. +Master didn't go to war; his boys was too young to go, so we was all at +home. My papa shunned the war. He said he didn't give a pickayune +whether he be free or not, it wouldn't do no good if he be dead nohow. +He didn't live with us doe (though). They kept papa pretty well hid out +with stock in the Mississippi River bottoms. He wasn't scared ceptin' +when he come over to see my mama and us. When we come to know anything +we was free.</p> + +<p>"I never seen nobody sold. None of my folks was sold. The folks raised +my mama and they didn't want her to leave. The folks raised papa what +had him at freedom. He said him and mama was married long before the war +sprung up. I don't know how they married nor where. She was young when +they married.</p> + +<p>"I remember hearing mama say when you went to preaching you sit in the +back of the church and sit still till the preaching was all over. They +had no leaving.</p> + +<p>"I know when I was a child people raised children, now they let them +grow up. Children was sent off or out to play, not sit and listen to +what grown folks had to say. Now the children is educated and too smart +to listen to good advice. They are going to ruination. Mama used to have +our girls knit at night and she spin, weave, sew. They would tell us how +to be polite and honest and how to work. Young folks too smart to take +advice now.</p> + +<p>"Mama was cooking at the Warpoo's house; she cooked breakfast. One +morning I woke up and here was a yard full of 'Feds.' I was hungry. I +went through the whole regiment—a yard full—to mama hard as I could +split. They didn't bother me. I was afraid they would carry me off +sometimes. They was great hands to tease and worry the little Negro +children.</p> + +<p>"Over at Dyersburg, Tennessee the Ku Klux was bad. Jefferie Segress was +pretty prosperous, owned his own home. John Carson whooped him, cut his +ear off, treated him bad. High Sheriff they said was a 'Fed.' He put +twenty-four buck shots in John Carson. That was the last of the Ku Klux +at Dyersburg. The Negroes all left Dyersburg. They kept leaving. The +'Feds' was meaner to them than the owners. In 1886, three weeks before +Christmas, one hundred head of Negroes got off the train here at +Brinkley. The Ku Klux was the tail end of the war, whooping around. It +was a fight between the 'Feds' and the old owners—both sides telling +the Negroes what to do. The best way was stay at home and work to keep +out of trouble.</p> + +<p>"The bushwhackers killed Raymond Jones (black man) before the war +closed. Well, I don't know what they ambushed for.</p> + +<p>"I paid my own way to Arkansas. I brought my wife. Mama was dead.</p> + +<p>"If the Negro is a taxpayer he ought to vote like white folks. But they +can't run the government. That was tried out after that war we been +talking about. Our color has faith in white folks and this is their +country. I vote some. We got a good right to vote. We helped clear out +the country. It is our home now.</p> + +<p>"The present times is too fast. I can't place this young generation.</p> + +<p>"This is my second wife I'm living wid now. She's got children. I never +had a child. We gets $10 off of the Welfare and I work around at pick-up +jobs. I farmed all my whole life."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PattersonFrankA"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Frank A. Patterson<br> + 906 Chester Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 88</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Raleigh, North Carolina in 1850. My father was born in +Baltimore, Maryland. My mother and father was sold into Bibb County, +Georgia. I don't know how much they sold for. I don't know how much they +paid for them. I don't know how much the speculator asked for them. Used +to have them in droves and you would go in and pick 'em out and pay +different amounts for them.</p> + +<p>"I was never sold. My old boss didn't believe in selling slaves. He +would buy 'em but he wouldn't sell 'em. I'll say that much for him.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Master</b></p> + +<p>"I belonged to a man named Thomas Johnson Cater.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Houses</b></p> + +<p>"They lived in log houses. Some of them had weatherboard houses but the +majority of them was log houses. Two doors and one window. Some of them +had plank floors. Some of them had floors what was hewed, you know, +sills. They had stick and dirt chimneys. Some of them had brick +chimneys. It depended on the master—on the situation of the master.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Furniture</b></p> + +<p>"They just had bunks built up side the wall. The best experienced +colored people had these teester beds. Didn't have no slats. Had ropes. +They called 'em cord beds sometimes. They had tables just like we have +now what they made themselves. Chairs were long benches made out of +planks. Little kids had big blocks to sit on where they sawed off +timber.</p> + +<p>"They had what they called a cupboard to keep the food in. Some of them +had chests made out of planks, you know. That is the way they kept it. +They put a hasp and steeple on it so as to keep the children out when +they was gone to the field.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Food</b></p> + +<p>"They give 'em three pounds of meat a week, peck of meal, pint of +molasses; some of them give 'em three to five pounds of flour on a +Sunday morning according to the size of the family. The majority of them +had shorts from the wheat. Some of the slaves would clean up a flat in +the bottoms and plant rice in it. That was where they would allow the +slaves to have truck patches.</p> + +<p>"Some few of them had chickens that was allowed to have them. Same of +them had owners that wouldn't allow their slaves to own chickens. They +never allowed them to have hogs or cows. Wherever there was a family +that had a whole lot of children they would allow them to have a cow to +milk for to get milk for their children. They claimed the cow, but the +master was the owner of it. It belonged to him. He would just let them +milk it. He would just let them raise their children off of the milk it +gave.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Clothes</b></p> + +<p>"There was no child ever had a pair of shoes until he got old enough to +go in the field. That was when he was twelve years old. That is about +all I know about it.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Schooling</b></p> + +<p>"I never went to school in my life. I got hold of one of them old blue +back spelling books. My young boss gave it to me after I was free. He +told me that I was free now and I had to think and act for myself.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Signs of War</b></p> + +<p>"Before the War I saw the elements all red as blood and I saw after that +a great comet; and they said there was going to be a war.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Memories of the Pre-War Campaign</b></p> + +<p>"When Fillmore, Buchanan, and Lincoln ran for President one of my old +bosses said, 'Hurrah for Buchanan,' and I said, 'Hurrah for Lincoln.' +One of my mistresses said, 'Why do you say, 'Hurrah for Lincoln?' And I +said, 'Because he's goin' to set me free.'</p> + +<p>"During that campaign, Lincoln came to North Carolina and ate breakfast +with my master. In those days, the kitchen was off from the house. They +had for breakfast ham with cream gravy made out of sweet milk and they +had biscuits, poached eggs on toast, coffee and tea, and grits. They had +waffles and honey and maple syrup. That was what they had for breakfast.</p> + +<p>"He told my old boss that our sons are 'ceivin' children by slaves and +buyin' and sellin' our own blood and it will have to be stopped. And +that is what I know about that.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Refugeeing</b></p> + +<p>"At the close of the War, we had refugeed down in Houston County in +Georgia.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>War Memories</b></p> + +<p>"Sherman's army came through there looking for Jeff Davis, and they told +me that they wasn't fightin' any more,—that I was free.</p> + +<p>"They said, 'You ain't got no master and no mistress.' They et dinner +there. All the old folks went upstairs and turned the house over to me +and the cook. And they et dinner. One of them said, 'My little man, +bring your hat 'round now and we are going to pay you,' and they passed +the hat 'round and give me a hat full of money. I thought it wasn't no +good and I carried it and give it to my old mistress, but it was good.</p> + +<p>"They asked me if I had ever seen Jeff Davis. I said 'No.' Then they +said, 'That's him sittin' there.' He had on a black dress and a pair of +boots and a mantilla over his shoulders and a Quaker bonnet and a black +veil.</p> + +<p>"They got up from the dining table and Sherman ordered them to 'Recover +arms.' He had on a big black hat full of eagles and he had stars and +stripes all over him. That was Sherman's artillery. They had mules with +pots and skillets, and frying pans, and axes, and picks, grubbing hoes, +and spades, and so on, all strapped on those mules. And the mules didn't +have no bridles but they went on just as though they had bridles. One of +the Yanks started a song when he picked up his gun.</p> + +<pre> +'Here's my little gun +His name is number one +Four and five rebels +We'll slay 'em as they come +Join the ban' +The rebels understan' +Give up all the lan' +To my brother Abraham +Old Gen'l Lee +Who is he? +He's not such a man +As our Gen'l Grant +Snap Poo, Snap Peter +Real rebel eater +I left my ply stock +Standin' in the mould +I left my family +And silver and gold +Snap Poo, Snap Peter +Real rebel eater +Snap Poo, Snap Peter.' +</pre> + +<p>"And General Sherman gave the comman', 'Silence', and 'Silence' roared +one man, and it rolled all down the line, 'Silence, silence, silence, +silence.' And they all got silent.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>How Freedom Came</b></p> + +<p>"They had a notification for a big speaking and that was in Perry, +Georgia. Everybody that was able throughout the State went to that +convention where that speaking was. And that is where peace was +declared. Every man was his own free agent. 'No more master, no more +mistress. You are your own free moral agent. Think and act for +yourself.' That is how it was declared. I didn't go to the meeting. I +was right there in the town. There was too many people there. You +couldn't stir them with hot fire. But my mother and father went.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>What the Slaves Expected</b></p> + +<p>"They didn't expect anything but freedom. Some of them didn't have sense +enough to secure a home for themselves. They didn't have no sense. Some +of them wasn't eligible to speak for themselves. They wanted somebody to +speak for them.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>What They Got</b></p> + +<p>"I don't know that they got anything.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Immediately After the War</b></p> + +<p>"Right after the War, I stayed with the people that owned me and worked. +They give me two dollars a month and my food and clothes. I stayed with +them five years and then I quit. I had sense enough to quit and I went +to work for wages. I got five dollars a month. And I thought that was a +big salary. I didn't know no better. I learnt better by experience.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Negroes in Politics</b></p> + +<p>"Just after the War, the Republicans used to have representatives at the +state convention. After the Democrats got in power, they knocked all +that in the head. Colored people used to be on juries. But they won't +let them serve now. (Negroes served on local grand jury last year.)</p> + +<p>"I knew one nigger politician in Georgia named I.B. Simons. He was a +school-teacher. He never held any office. I knowed a nigger politician +here by the name of John Bush. He had the United States Land Office. +When the Democrats got in power they put him out. I knowed another +fellow used to be here named Crockett Brown. He lived in Lee County, +Arkansas. He was a Congressman. I don't know whether he ever got to the +White House or not. I ain't never seen no account of it. I can't tell +you all any more now.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Memories of Fred Douglass</b></p> + +<p>"I knowed Fred Douglass. I shook hands with him and talked with him here +in Little Rock. They give him the opera house. We had the first floor. +The white folks had the gallery. That was when the Republicans were in +power.</p> + +<p>"He said: 'They all seem to be amazed and dumbfounded over me having a +white woman for a wife.' He said, 'You all don't know that my father was +my mother's master and she was as black as a crow. Don't it seem natural +that history should repeat itself? have often wondered why he liked +such a black woman as my mother. I was jus' a chip off the old block.'</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Voting</b></p> + +<p>"I voted for U.S. Grant. He was the first President we had after the +Civil War. I shook hands with him twice in Little Rock. He put up at the +Capitol Hotel and I was a-cooking there.</p> + +<p>"I voted for McKinley. I saw him too. I had a walking cane with his head +on it. That is about all I remember right now. He was the one that got +up this gold standard. He liked to put this state under bayonet laws +when he was working under that gold standard. The South was bitterly +against him.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Occupation</b></p> + +<p>"I followed cooking all my life. I have had the white peoples' lives in +my hand all my life. I worked on the Government boat, <u>Wichita</u>. It +went out of season and they built a boat called the <u>Arkansas</u>. I +cooked on it. Captain Griffin was the master of it. When it went out of +service, Captain Newcome from the War Department transferred me over to +the Mississippi River on the <u>Arthur Hider</u> (?). My headquarters +were in Greenville, Mississippi. It was far from home, so after nine +months I quit and came home (Little Rock). Captain Van Frank give me a +position on a dredge boat and the people were so bad on there I wouldn't +stay. I came away. I wouldn't stay 'mongst 'em.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Religion</b></p> + +<p>"I want you to know that I am a Christian and I want you to know I ain't +got no compromise with nobody on God's word. I ain't got but one way and +that is the way Jesus said:</p> + +Come unto me all ye that are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.<br> +He that believeth on me shall be saved.<br> + +<p>You all fix anything anyway you want. I ain't bothered 'bout you.</p> + +<p>"My people were good Christian people."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PattersonJohn"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: John Patterson, Helena, Arkansas<br> +Age: 74</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born near Paducah, Kentucky. Mother was never sold. She belong to +Master Arthur Patterson. Mother was what folks called black folks. I +never seen a father to know. I never heard mother say a thing about my +father if I had one. He never was no use to me nor her neither. Mother +brought me here in time of the Civil War. I was four years old. We come +here to be kept from the Yankee soldiers. We was sent with some of the +Pattersons. At the end of the war mother cooked for Nick Rightor (?) and +his wife here in North Helena. He was a farmer but his son is a ear, +eye, nose specialist.</p> + +<p>"I farmed, cleaned house and yards for these Helena people. I was +janitor at the Episcopal church in Helena sixteen years and four months. +They paid me forty-five dollars a month.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, I have heard about the Ku Klux. Heard talk but never seen +one.</p> + +<p>"I never been in jail. I never been drunk. Folks in Helena will tell you +John Patterson can be trusted.</p> + +<p>"I saved up one thousand dollars, just let it slip. The present times +are hard. Times are hard. I get ten dollars and comissary helps. I got +one in family.</p> + +<p>"I think mother said she was treated very good in slavery. She didn't +tell me much about it.</p> + +<p>"I own a home. It come through a will from my aunt. My uncle was a +drayman here in Helena and a close liver. I want to hold to it if I can.</p> + +<p>"If you'd ask me what all ain't took place since I been here I could +come nigh telling you. We had colored officers here. Austin Barrer was +sheriff. Half of the officers was colored at one time. John Jones was +police. No, they wasn't friends of mine. I seen these levies built. One +was here in 1897. It was rebuilt then.</p> + +<p>"It seems to me the country is going down. When they put in the Stock +Law people had to sell so much stock. Milch cows sold for six dollars a +head. People that want and need stock have no place to raise it. People +are not as industrious as they was and they accumolate more it seems to +me. We used to make our living at home. I think that is the best way.</p> + +<p>"I voted a Republican ticket years ago. I don't believe in women voting. +The Lord don't believe in that. I belong to the Baptist church.</p> + +<p>"Young folks don't act on education principles. Folks used to fight with +fist. Now one shoots the other down. Times are not improving morally. +Folks don't even think it is wrong to take things; that is stealing. +They drink up all the money they can get. I don't see no colored folks +ever save a dollar. They did long time ago. Thaes worse in some ways.</p> + +<p>"I forgot our plough songs:</p> + +<pre> +'I wonder where my darling is.' + +'Nigger makes de cotton and de +White man gets the money.' +</pre> + +<p>"Everybody used to sing. We worked from sun to sun; we courted and was +happy. People not happy now. They are craving now. About four o'clock we +all start up singing. Sing till dark."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PattersonSarahJane"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Sarah Jane Patterson<br> + 2611 Orange Street, North Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 90</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Bartow County, Georgia, January 17, 1848. You can go +there and look in that Bible over there and you will find it all written +down. My mama kept a record of all our ages. Her old mistress kept the +record and gave it to my mother after freedom.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Parents</b></p> + +<p>"My parents were Joe Patterson and Mary Adeline Patterson. My mother's +name before she married was Mary Adeline Huff. My grandfather on my +mother's side was named Huff. My mother's sisters were Mahala, and +Sallie. And them's the onliest two I remember. She had two brothers but +I don't remember their names.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>How Freedom Came</b></p> + +<p>"I was living in Bartow County in north Georgia when freedom came. I +don't remember how the slaves found it out. I remember them saying, +'Well, they's all free.' And that is all I remember. And I remember some +one saying—asking a question, 'You got to say master?' And somebody +answered and said, 'Naw.' But they said it all the same. They said it +for a long time. But they learned better though.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Family</b></p> + +<p>"I have brother Willis, Lizzie, Mary, Maud, and myself. There was four +sisters and one brother. I had just one child—a boy. He lived to be a +grown man and raised a family. His wife had three children and all of +them is gone. The father, the mother, and the children. I was a woman. I +wasn't no man. I just had one child, but the Lord blessed me. I have +three sisters and a brother dead.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Master</b></p> + +<p>"My old master's name was John Patterson and my old mistress was named +Lucy Patterson. She had a son named Bill and a son named Tommy and a son +named Charles, and a boy named Bob, and a girl named Marion. We are so +for apart they can't help me none. I know Bob's boys are dead because +they got killed in a fight in Texas.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Crippled in Slave Time</b></p> + +<p>"I been crippled all my life. We was on the lawn playing and the white +boy had been to the pond to water the horses. He came back and said he +was going to run over us. We all ran and climbed up on the top of a ten +rail fence. The fence gave 'way and broke and fell down with us. I +caught the load. They all fell on me. It knocked the knee out of place. +They carried me to Stilesboro to Dr. Jeffrey, a white doctor in slavery +time. I don't know what he did, but he left me with my knee out of joint +after he treated it. I can't work my toes and I have to walk with that +stick.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Soldiers</b></p> + +<p>"I was a tot when I seen the soldiers coming dressed in blue, and I run. +They was very nice to the colored people, never beat 'em or nothin'. I +was in Bartow County when they come through. They took a lot of things, +but I can't remember exactly what it was. I 'tended to the children +then—both the white and colored children, but mostly the white.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Good Masters</b></p> + +<p>"My old master, John Patterson, never beat up the women and men he +bossed.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Patrollers</b></p> + +<p>"I have heard people talk about the pateroles raising sand with the +niggers. Some of the niggers would say they got whipped. I was small. I +would hear 'em say, 'The pateroles is out tonight.'</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Ku Klux Klan</b></p> + +<p>"I have seed the old Ku Klux. That was after freedom. They came 'round +to my old master where my mama stayed. They were just after whipping +folks. Some of them they couldn't whip.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Support</b></p> + +<p>"I used to get a little money from Mr. Dent long as he was living. I +would go over there and he would give me a dollar or two. Since he's +been dead, his wife don't have much to give me. She gives me something +to eat sometimes but she doesn't have any money now that her husband is +dead.</p> + +<p>"I can't get up to the Welfare. Crippled as I am, I can't walk up and +down those stairs, and I can't git there nohow. I been tryin' to git +some one to take me up there.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Pratt helps me from time to time, but he ain't sent me nothin' now +in a good while. He's right smart busy, but if I go to him, I spect +he'll stir up somethin' for me.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Travels</b></p> + +<p>"I wouldn't never a left Bartow County, but the white people made out +that this was a rich country and you could make so much out here, and +we moved out here. We was young then. We came out on the train. It was a +long time back but it was too far to came on a wagon. I don't remember +just how long ago it was.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Occupation</b></p> + +<p>"I used to quilt until my fingers got too stiff. I got some patterns in +there now if you want to see them."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>The old lady took me in the house and showed me about a dozen quilts, +beautifully patterned and made. She had also some unfinished tops. She +says that she does not have much of a sale for them now because the +"quality of folks" who liked such things well enough to buy them "is +just about gone."</p> + +<p>She is crippled and unable to walk with facility. She has a great deal +of difficulty in getting off and on her porch. Still she does not +impress one as feeble so much as just disabled in one or two +particulars. She has a crippled knee, and both of her hands are +peculiarly stiff in the finger joints, one more so than the other. If it +were not for the disabilities, as old as she is, I believe that she +could give a good account of herself.</p> + +<p>I didn't have the heart to tell the old lady that her Bible record is +not what she thinks it is. It is not the old original record which her +mistress possessed. Neither is it the copy of the record of her mistress +which her mother kept. From questioning, I gather that the old mistress +dictated the original record to some one connected with her mother, +might have written it out herself on a sheet of paper. From time to +time, as new deaths and births occurred, scraps of paper containing them +were added to the first paper, and as the papers got worn, blurred, and +dog-eared, they were copied—probably not without errors. Time came when +the grandchildren up in the grades and with <u>semi-modern</u>[HW:?] +ideas copied the scraps into the family Bible. By that time aging and +blurring of the original lead pencil notes, together with recopying, had +invalidated the record till it is no longer altogether reliable.</p> + +<p>The births recorded in the Bible are as follows and in the exact order +given below:</p> + +<pre> +Mary Patterson 10-11-1866 +Harris Donesson 3-13- 72 +Lilley Donesson 7-21- 85 +Pearly Donesson 3-29- 92 +Silvay Williams 8-29- 84 +Beney Williams 11-24- 85 +Millia A. Williams 12-30- 88 +Joe Patterson 10- 3- 77 +H. Patterson 7-29- 79 +Maria E. Patterson 11-19- 81 +Jennie Patterson 12-24- 84 +Alex Patterson 7- 5- 86 +James Patterson 6-20- 90 +Janie Patterson 1-27- 60 +Amanda Patterson 1-28- 63 +James Rafield Walker 8-11- 99 +Cornelius Walker 7-21-1902 +Willie Walker 11-20- 03 +Elias Walker 7-21- 11 +Emmet Brown 1-23- 22 +Leon Harris 12-13- 21 +</pre> + +<p>The following marriages were given:</p> + +<pre> +May Lee Brown 2-26-1926 +James Walker Brown 2-21- 35 +Jennie Walker 6-20- 15 +Lillie Jean Walker 12-6- 36 +</pre> + +<p>The name of Sarah Jane Patterson is not in the list. The list itself is +not chronological. It is written in ink but in the stiff cramped hand +to be expected of a school child not yet thoroughly familiar with the +pen. The eye fixes on the name of Janie Patterson, 1-27-1860. It does +not seem probable that this is correct if it is meant to be Sarah Jane. +Sarah Jane could give no help except to answer questions about the +manner in which the record was made.</p> + +<p>These considerations led me to set the record aside in my own mind so +far as Sarah Jane Patterson's age is concerned and to take her word. She +has a very clear conception of the change from slavery to freedom. Her +memories are blurred and indistinct, but she recollects that this matter +was during slavery times and that during freedom. It seems that she had +the care of the smaller children during slavery time—at the time she +saw the soldiers marching through. This was not during the time of +freedom, because she distinguished clearly the Ku Klux time. She would +have to be at least eighty to have cared for children. Her tenacious +memory of ninety may have some foundation, therefore.</p> + +<p>Moreover where writing is done in lead pencil and hurriedly, six is +often made to look like four and a part of eight may become blurred till +it looks like a zero. That would account for 1848 being transcribed as +1860. There would be nothing unusual, however, in a Sarah Jane and a +Jane. I neglected to cover that point in a question.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PattilloSolomonP"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Solomon P. Pattillo<br> + 1502 Martin Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 76<br> +Occupation: Formerly farmer, teacher, and small dealer—now blind</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born November 1862. I was three years old at the time of the +surrender. I was born right here in Arkansas—right down here in Tulip, +Dallas County, Arkansas. I have never been out of the state but twice.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Refugeeing</b></p> + +<p>"My daddy carried me out once when they took him to Texas during the war +to keep the Yanks from setting him free.</p> + +<p>"Then I went out once long after slavery to get a load of sand. On the +way back, my boat nearly sank. Those are the only two times I ever left +the state.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Parents</b></p> + +<p>"My father's name was Thomas Smith, but the Pattillos bought him and he +took the name of Pattillo. I don't know how much he sold for. That was +the only time he was ever sold. I believe that my father was born in +North Carolina. It seems like to me I recollect that is where he said he +was born.</p> + +<p>"My mother was born in Virginia. I don't know how she got here unless +she was sold like my father was. I don't know her name before she got +married. Yes, I do; her name was Fannie Smith, I believe.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Houses</b></p> + +<p>"We lived in old log cabins. We had bedsteads nailed to the wall. Then +we had them old fashioned cordboard springs. They had ropes made into +springs. That was a high class bed. People who had those cord springs +felt themselves. They made good sleeping. My father had one. Ropes were +woven back and forth across the bed frame.</p> + +<p>"We had those old spinning wheels. Three cuts was a day's work. A cut +was so many threads. It was quite a day to make them. They had hanks +too. The threads were all linked together.</p> + +<p>"My mother was a spinner. My father was a farmer. Both of them worked +for their master,—old Massa, they called him, or Massa, Mass Tom, Mass +John or Massta.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>War Recollections</b></p> + +<p>"I remember during the war when I was in Texas with a family of Moody's +how old Mistiss had me packing rocks out of the yard in a basket and +cleaning the yard. I didn't know it then, but my daddy told me later +that that was when I was in Texas,—during the war. I remember that I +used to work in my shirt tail.</p> + +<p>"The soldiers used to come in the house somewhere and take anything they +could get or wanted to take.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Pateroles</b></p> + +<p>"When I was a boy they had a song, 'Run, Nigger, run; The Pateroles will +get you.' They would run you in and I have been told they would whip +you. If you overstayed your time when your master had let you go out, he +would notify the pateroles and they would hunt you up and turn you over +to him.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Church Meetings</b></p> + +<p>"Way long then, my father and mother used to say that man doesn't serve +the Lord—the true and living God and let it be known. A bunch of them +got together and resolved to serve Him any way. First they sang in a +whisper, 'Come ye that love the Lord.' Finally they got bold and began +to sing in tones that could be heard everywhere, 'Oh for a thousand +tongues to sing my Great Redeemer's praise.'</p> +<br> + +<p><b>After the War</b></p> + +<p>"After the war my father fanned—made share crops. I remember once how +some one took his horse and left an old tired horse in the stable. She +looked like a nag. When she got rested up she was better than the one +that was took.</p> + +<p>"His first farm was down here in Dallas County. He made a share crop +with his former master, Pattillo. He never had no trouble with him.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Ku Klux</b></p> + +<p>"I heard a good deal of talk about the Ku Klux Klan, but I don't know +anything much about it. They never bothered my father and mother. My +father was given the name of being an obedient servant—among the best +help they had.</p> + +<p>"My father farmed all his life. He died at the age of seventy-two in +Tulip, near the year 1885, just before Cleveland's inauguration. He died +of typhoid pneumonia. My mother was ninety-six years old when she died +in 1909.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Little Rock</b></p> + +<p>"I came to Little Rock in 1894. I came up here to teach in Fourche Dam. +Then I moved here. I taught my first school in this county at Cato. I +quit teaching because my salary was so poor and then I went into the +butcher's business, and in the wood business. I farmed all the while.</p> + +<p>"I taught school for twenty-one years. I always was a successful +teacher. I did my best. If you contract to do a job for ten dollars, do +as much as though you were getting a hundred. That will always help you +to get a better job.</p> + +<p>"I have farmed all my life in connection with my teaching. I went into +other businesses like I said a moment ago. I was a caretaker at the +Haven of Rest Cemetery for sometime.</p> + +<p>"I was postmaster from 1904 to 1911 at Sweet Home. At one time I was +employed on the United States Census.</p> + +<p>"I get a little blind pension now. I have no other means of support.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Loss of Eyes</b></p> + +<p>"The doctor says I lost my eyesight on account of cataracts. I had an +operation and when I came home, I got to stirring around and it caused +me to have a hemorrhage of the eye. You see I couldn't stay at the +hospital because it was costing me $3 a day and I didn't have it. They +had to take one eye clean out. Nothing can be done for them, but somehow +I feel that the lord's going to let me see again. That's the way I feel +about it.</p> + +<p>"I have lived here in this world this long and never had a fight in my +life. I have never been mistreated by a white man in my life. I always +knew my place. Some fellows get mistreated because they get out of their +place.</p> + +<p>"I was told I couldn't stay in Benton because that was a white man's +town. I went there and they treated me white. I tried to stay with a +colored family way out. They were scared to take me. I had gone there to +attend to some business. Then I went to the sheriff and he told me that +if they were scared to have me stay at their home, I could stay at the +hotel and put my horse in the livery stable. I stayed out in the wagon +yard. But I was invited into the hotel. They took care of my horse and +fed it and they brought me my meals. The next morning, they cleaned and +curried and hitched my horse for me.</p> + +<p>"I have voted all my life. I never had any trouble about it.</p> + +<p>"The Ku Klux never bothered me. Nobody else ever did. If we live so that +everybody will respect us, the better class will always try to help us."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PattonCarryAllen"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Carry Allen Patton<br> + Forrest City, Arkansas<br> +Age: 71</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Shelby County, Tennessee. My parents was Tillie Watts and +Pierce Allen. He come from Louisiana reckly (directly) after the +surrender. My mother come from Virginia. She was sold in Virginia and +brought to middle Tennessee close to Murfreesboro and then brought to +Memphis and sold. She was dark and my father was too. They was living +close to Wilmar, Arkansas when the yellow fever was so bad. I don't +remember it. Heard them talk about it.</p> + +<p>"I heard my mother say how Mr. Jake Watts saved his money from the +Yankees. They had a great big rock flat on both sides. They put on the +joints of big meat to weight it down when they salted it down in a +barrel. They didn't unjoint the meat and in the joint is where it +started to spoil. Well, he put his silver and gold in a pot. It was a +big round pot and was smaller around the top. He dug a hole after +midnight. He and his two boys James and Dock put the money in this hole +in the back yard. They covered the pot with the big flat rock and put +dirt on that and next morning they planted a good big cedar tree over +the rock, money and all.</p> + +<p>"Old Master Jake died during the War and their house was burned but +James lived in one of the cabins in the yard. Dock went to the War. My +mother said when they left, that tree was standing.</p> + +<p>"My mother run off. She thought she would go cook for the men in the +camps but before she got to the camps a wagon overtook her and they +stole her. They brought her to Memphis and sold her on a block. They +guarded her. She never did know who they was nor what become of them. +They kept her in the wagon on the outskirts of the city nearly a month. +One man always stayed to watch her. She was scared to death of both of +them. One of the men kept a jug of whiskey in the wagon and drunk it but +he never would get dead drunk so she could slip off.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Johnson bought her and when the surrender come on, Master Johnson +took his family and went to Texas. She begged him to take her to nurse +but he said if it wasn't freedom he would send her back to Master James +Watts and he would let her go back then. He give her some money but she +never went back. She was afraid to start walking and before her money +give clear out she met up with my father and he talked her out of going +back.</p> + +<p>"She had a baby pretty soon. It was by them men that stole her. He was +light. He died when he got nearly grown. I recollect him good. I was +born close to Memphis, the boy died of dysentery.</p> + +<p>"When my mother was sold in Virginia she was carried in a wagon to the +block and thought she was going to market. She never seen her folks no +more. They let them go along to market sometimes and set in the wagon. +She had a little pair of gloves she wore when she was sold her grandma +had knit for her. They was white, had half thumb and no fingers. When +she died I put them in her coffin. She had twins born dead besides me. +They was born close to Wilmar, Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"We farmed all my life in Arkansas and Mississippi. I married in +Mississippi and we come back here before Joe died. I live out here and +in Memphis. My son is a janitor at the Sellers Brothers Store in +Memphis. My daughter cooks about here in town and I keep her children. I +rather farm if I was able.</p> + +<p>"I think young folks, both colors, shuns work. Times is running away +with itself. Folks is living too fast. They ride too fast and drinks and +do all kinds of meanness.</p> + +<p>"My father was a mighty poor hand at talking. He said he was sold in a +gang shipped to Memphis from New Orleans. Master Allen bought him. He +was a boy. I don't know how big. He cleaned fish—scaled them. He +butchered and in a few months Mr. Allen set him free. It was surrender +when he was sold but Mr. Allen didn't know it or else he meant to keep +him on a few years. When he got loose he started farming and farmed till +he died. He farmed in Tennessee, Mississippi, and Arkansas. He owned a +place but a drouth come along. He got in debt and white folks took it.</p> + +<p>"I married in Mississippi. My husband immigrated from South Carolina. He +was Joe Patton. I washed and ironed and farmed. I rather farm now if I +was able.</p> + +<p>"I never got no gov'ment help. I ain't posing it. It is a fine thing. I +was in Tennessee when it come on. They said I'd have to stay here six +months. I never do stay."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PayneHarriettMcFarlin"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Annie L. LaCotts<br> +Person interviewed: Harriett McFarlin Payne<br> + Dewitt, Arkansas<br> +Age: 83</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Aunt Harriett, were you born in slavery time?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, mam! I was big enough to remember well, us coming back from Texas +after we refugeed there when the fighting of the war was so bad at St. +Charles. We stayed in Texas till the surrender, then we all come back in +lots of wagons. I was sick but they put me on a little bed and me and +all the little chillun rode in a 'Jersey' that one of the old Negro +mammies drove, along behind the wagons, and our young master, Colonel +Bob Chaney rode a great big black horse. Oh! he nice-looking on dat +horse! Every once and awhile he'd ride back to the last wagon to see if +everything was all right. I remember how scared us chillun was when we +crossed the Red River. Aunt Mandy said, 'We crossin' you old Red River +today, but we not going to cross you any more, cause we are going home +now, back to Arkansas.' That day when we stopped to cook our dinner I +picked up a lot little blackjack acorns and when my mammy saw them she +said, 'Throw them things down, chile. They'll make you wormy.' (I cried +because I thought they were chinquapins.) I begged my daddy to let's go +back to Texas, but he said, 'No! No! We going with our white folks.' My +mama and daddy belonged to Col. Jesse Chaney, much of a gentleman, and +his wife Miss Sallie was the best mistress anybody ever had. She was a +Christian. I can hear her praying yet! She wouldn't let one of her +slaves hit a tap on Sunday. They must rest and go to church. They had +preaching at the cabin of some one of the slaves, and in the Summertime +sometimes they had it out in the shade under the trees. Yes, and the +slaves on each plantation had their own church. They didn't go +galavanting over the neighborhood or country like niggers do now. Col. +Chaney had lots and lots of slaves and all their houses were in a row, +all one-room cabins. Everything happened in that one room,—birth, +sickness, death and everything, but in them days niggers kept their +houses clean and their door yards too. These houses where they lived was +called 'the quarters'. I used to love to walk down by that row of +houses. It looked like a town and late of an evening as you'd go by the +doors you could smell meat a frying, coffee making and good things +cooking. We were fed good and had plenty clothes to keep us dry and +warm.</p> + +<p>"Along about time for de surrender, Col. Jesse, our master, took sick +and died with some kind of head trouble. Then Col. Bob, our young +master, took care of his mama and the slaves. All the grown folks went +to the field to work and the little chillun would be left at a big room +called the nursing home. All us little ones would be nursed and fed by +an old mammy, Aunt Mandy. She was too old to go to the field, you know. +We wouldn't see our mammy and daddy from early in the morning till night +when their work was done, then they'd go by Aunt Mandy's and get their +chillun and go home till work time in the morning.</p> + +<p>"Some of the slaves were house negroes. They didn't go to work in the +fields, they each one had their own job around the house, barn, orchard, +milk house, and things like that.</p> + +<p>"When washday come, Lord, the pretty white clothes! It would take three +or four women a washing all day.</p> + +<p>"When two of de slaves wanted to get married, they'd dress up nice as +they could and go up to the big house and the master would marry them. +They'd stand up before him and he'd read out of a book called the +'discipline' and say, 'Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy +heart, all thy strength, with all thy might and thy neighbor as +thyself.' Then he'd say they were man and wife and tell them to live +right and be honest and kind to each other. All the slaves would be +there too, seeing the 'wedden'.</p> + +<p>"Our Miss Sallie was the sweetest best thing in the world! She was so +good and kind to everybody and she loved her slaves, too. I can remember +when Uncle Tony died how she cried! Uncle Tony Wadd was Miss Sallie's +favorite servant. He stayed in a little house in the yard and made fires +for her, brought in wood and water and just waited on the house. He was +a little black man and white-headed as cotton, when he died. Miss Sallie +told the niggers when they come to take him to the grave yard, to let +her know when they got him in his coffin, and when they sent and told +her she come out with all the little white chillun, her little +grandchillun, to see Uncle Tony. She just cried and stood for a long +time looking at him, then she said, 'Tony, you have been a good and +faithful servant.' Then the Negro men walked and carried him to the +graveyard out in a big grove in de field. Every plantation had its own +graveyard and buried its own folks, and slaves right on the place.</p> + +<p>"If all slaves had belonged to white folks like ours, there wouldn't +been any freedom wanted."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PayneJohn"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: John Payne<br> + Brinkley, Ark.<br> +Age: 74</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Georgia, close to Bowles Spring, in Franklin County. My +mama's master was Reverend David Payne. He was a Baptist preacher. My +mama said my father was Monroe Glassby. He was a youngster on a +neighboring plantation. He was white. His father was a landowner. I +think she said it was 70 miles east of Atlanta where they went to trade. +They went to town two or three times a year. It took about a week to go +and come.</p> + +<p>"From what Mama said they didn't know it was freedom for a long time. +They worked on I know till that crop was made and gathered. Somebody +sent word to the master, Rev. David, he better turn them slaves loose. +Some of the hands heard the message. That was the first they knowed it +was freedom. My mama said she seen soldiers and heard fighting. She had +heard that if the Yankees won the war all the slaves be free. She set to +studyin' what she would do. She didn't know what to do. So when she +heard it she asked If she had to be free. She told Rev. David she wanted +to stay like she had been staying. After I was up a good size boy we +went to Banks County. She done house work and field work too and I done +farm work. All kinds and from sun-up till dark every day. Sometimes I +get in so late I have to make a torch light to see how to put the feed +in the troughs. We had plenty litard—pine knots—they was rich to +burn.</p> + +<p>"I used to vote but I quit since I come to Arkansas. I come in 1902. I +paid my own way and wrote back for my family. I paid their way too. I +got one little grandaughter, 20 years old. She is off trying to make her +way through college. My wife had a stroke and she can't do much no more. +I got a piece of a house. It need repairs. I can't hardly pay my taxes. +I can't work much. I got two cows and six little pigs. I got eighty +acres land. I worked fourteen years for John Gazolla and that is when I +made enough to buy my place. I am in debt but I am still working. Seems +like one old man can't make much."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PayneLarkin"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person Interviewed: Larkin Payne<br> + Brinkley, Ark.<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in North Carolina. I don't recall my moster's name. My +parents was Sarah Hadyn and John Payne. They had seven children. None of +them was sold. My pa was sold. He had three sons in the Civil War. None +of em was killed. One was in the war four years, the others a good +portion of two years. They was helpers.</p> + +<p>"Grandma bought grandpa's, freedom. My great grandma was an Indian +woman. My mother was dark brown. My father was tolerable light. When I +was small child they come in and tell bout people being sold. I heard a +whole lot about it that way. It was great grandma Hadyn that was the +Indian. My folks worked in the field or anywhere as well as I recollect.</p> + +<p>"When freedom come on my folks moved to East Tennessee. I don't know +whether they got good treatment or not. They was freedom loving folks. +The Ku Klux never bothered us at home. I heard a lot of em. They was +pretty hot further south. I had two brothers scared pretty bad. They +went wid some white men to South Carolina and drove hogs. The white men +come back in buggies or on the train—left them to walk back. The Ku +Klux got after them. They had a hard time getting home. I heard the Ku +Klux was bad down in Alabama. They had settled down fore I went to +Alabama. I owned a home in Alabama. I took stock for it. Sold the stock +and come to Arkansas. I had seven children. We raised three.</p> + +<p>"When my folks was set free they never got nothing. The mountain folks +raised corn and made whiskey. They made red corn cob molasses; it was +good. They put lye in the whiskey; it would kill you. They raised hogs +plenty. My folks raised hogs and corn. They didn't make no whiskey. I +seen em make it and sell it too.</p> + +<p>"I heard folks say they rather be under the home men overseers than +Northern overseers. They was kinder to em it seem like. I was jes +beginnin' to go to the field when freedom come on. I helped pile brush +to be burned before freedom. I farmed when I was a boy; pulled fodder +and bundled it. I shucked corn, slopped pigs, milked, plowed a mule over +them rocks, thinned out corn. I worked twenty days in East Tennessee on +the section. I cut and haul wood all winter.</p> + +<p>"My parents both died in Arkansas. We come here to get to a fine farmin' +country. We did like it fine. I'm still here.</p> + +<p>"I have voted. I vote if I'm needed. The white folks country and they +been runnin' it. I don't want no enemies. They been good to me. I got no +egercation much. I sorter follows bout votin'. We look to the white +folks to look after our welfare.</p> + +<p>"I get $8.00 and commodities. I work all I can git to do."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PerkinsCella"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Cella Perkins<br> + Marvell and Palestine, Arkansas<br> +Age: 67</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born close to Macon, Georgia. Mama's old mistress, Miss Mari +(Maree) Beth Woods, brung her there from fifteen miles outer Atlanta.</p> + +<p>"After emancipation Miss Mari Beth's husband got killed. A horse kicked +him to death. It shyed at something and it run in front of the horse. He +held the horse so it couldn't run. It kicked the foot board clean off, +kicked him in the stomach. His boy crawled out of the buggy. That's the +way we knowed how it happened. She didn't hurt the boy. His name was +Benjamin Woods.</p> + +<p>"Pa went to war with his master and he never come back to mama. She +never heard from him after freedom. He got captured and got to be a +soldier and went 'way off. She didn't never know if he got killed or +lost his way back home.</p> + +<p>"Mama cooked and kept up the house. Miss Mari Beth kept a boarding house +in Macon till way after I was a big girl. I stood on a box and washed +dishes and dried them for mama.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Ben was grown when we come to Arkansas. He got his ma to go to +Kentucky with him and I heard about Arkansas. Me and mama come to +Palestine. We come in a crowd. A man give us tickets and we come by our +lone selves till we got to Tennessee. A big crowd come from Dyersburg, +Tennessee. Ma got to talking and found out we was headed fo' the same +place in Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"Ma talked a whole heap at tines more 'an others (times) about slavery +times. Her master didn't take on over her much when he found out she was +a barren woman. The old man Crumpton give her to his youngest daughter, +Miss Mari Beth. She always had to do all kinds of work and house turns.</p> + +<p>"After mama's slavery husband didn't come back and she was living in +Macon, she fell in love with another man and I was a picked-up baby. +Mama said Miss Mari Beth lost faith in her when I was born but she +needed her and kept her on. Said seem like she thought she was too old +to start up when she never had children when her papa owned her. They +didn't like me. She said she could trust mama but she didn't know my +stock. He was a black man. Mama was black as I is.</p> + +<p>"Miss Mari Beth had a round double table. The top table turned with the +victuals on it. I knocked flies three times a day over that table.</p> + +<p>"I never had a store-bought dress in my life till mama bought me one at +Madison, Arkansas. I wanted a pure white dress. She said if we made a +good crop she was going to give me a dress. All the dresses I ever had +was made out of Miss Mari Beth's dresses but I never had a pure white +one. I never had one bought for me till I was nearly grown. I was so +proud of it. When I would go and come back, I would pull it off and put +it away. I wore it one summer white and the next summer I blued it and +had a new dress. I had a white dress nearly every year till I got too +old to dress up gay now. I got a white bonnet and apron I wears right +now.</p> + +<p>"Mama said Master Crumpton bought up babies to raise. She was taken away +from her folks so soon she never heard of them. Aunt Mat raised her up +in Atlanta and out on his place. He had a place in town but kept them on +a place in the country. He had a drove of them. He hired them out. He +hired mama once to a doctor, Dr. Willbanks. Mama said old master thought +she would learn how to have children from him the reason he sent her +there so much. When they had big to-dos old master sent mama over there. +She never seen no money till about freedom. She loved to get hired out +to be off from him. They all had young babies about but her. He was +cross and her husband was cross. She had pleasure hired out. She said he +didn't whoop much. He stamped his foot. They left right now.</p> + +<p>"I hab three girls living; one here (Palestine), one at Marvell, and one +in St. Louis. My youngest girl teaches music at a big colored school. +She sends me my money and I lives with these girls. I been up there and +I sure don't aim to live in no city old as I is. It's too dangerous slow +as I got to be and so much racket I never slept a night I was there. I +was there a month. She brung me home and I didn't go back.</p> + +<p>"I cooked and washed and ironed and worked in the field. I do some work +yet. I helps out where I am.</p> + +<p>"The times is better I think from accounts I hear. This generation all +living too fast er lives. They don't never be still a minute."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PerkinsMaggie"></a> +<h3>Pine Bluff District<br> +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of Interviewer: Martin & Barker<br> +Subject: Ex-Slaves—Slavery Times<br> +<br> +This Information given by: Maggie Perkins<br> +Place of Residence: W. 6th. St.</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>My folks lived in S. Carolina and belonged to Col. Bob Baty and his +family.</p> + +<p>If I should lay down tonight I could tell when my folks were going to +die, because the Lawd would tell me in a vision.</p> + +<p>Just before my grandmother died, I got up one morning and told my aunt +that granma was dead. Aunt said she did not want me telling lies.</p> + +<p>Then I saw another aunt laying on the bed, and she had her hand under +her jaw. She was smiling. The house was full of people. After awhile +they heard that her aunt was dead too, and after that they paid +attention to me when I told them somebody was going to die.</p> + +<p>I'se a member of the Holiness Church. I believes step up right and keep +the faith.</p> + +<p>I seen my aunt walking up and down on a glass. The Lawd tells me in a +vision to step right up and see the faith.</p> + +<p>I am living in Jesus. He is coming to Pine Bluff soon. He is going to +separate the lions from the sheep.</p> + +<p>I was born in slavery times. I member folks riding around on horses.</p> + +<p>Them days I used to wash my mistis feet and legs, and sometimes I would +fall asleep against my mistis knees. I tells the young fry to give honor +to the white folks, and my preacher tell 'em to obey the white folks, +dat dey are our best friends, dey is our dependence and it would be hard +getting on if we didn't have em to help us.</p> + +<p>Spirits—Me and my husband moved into a house that a man, "uncle Bill" +Hearn died in, and we wanted dat house so bad we moved right in as soon +as he was taken out, we ate supper and went to bed.</p> + +<p>By the time we got to sleep we heard sounds like someone was emptying +shelled corn, and I hunched up under my husband scared to death and then +moved out the next day. The dead haven't gone to Heaven. When death +comes, he comes to your heart. He has your number and knows where to +find you. He won't let you off, he has the key.</p> + +<p>Death comes and unlocks the heart and twists the breath out of that +heart and carries it back to God.</p> + +<p>Nobody has gone to Heaven, no one can get pass Jesus until the day of +his redemption, which is judgement day.</p> + +<p>We can't pass the door without being judged. On the day of ressurection +the trumpet will sound and us will wake up out of he graveyard, and come +forth to be judged. The sea shall give up its dead. Every nation will +have to appear before God and be judged in a twinklin of an eye. If you +aren't prepared before Jesus comes, it will be too late. God is +everywhere, he is the almight. God is a nice God, he is a clean God, he +is a good God. I would be afraid to tell you a lie for God would strike +me down.</p> + +<p>Eight years ago I couldn't see, I wore specs 3 years. I forgot my specs +one morning, I prayed for my eyesight and it was restored that morning.</p> + +<p>Our marster was a good man. De overseers sometimes wuz bad, but dey did +not let marsters know how dey treated their girl slaves. My grandmother +was whipped by de overseers one time, it made welts on her back. My +sister Mary had a child by a white man.</p> + +<p>To get joy in de morning, get up and pray and ask Him to bless you. God +will feed all alike, he is no respector of persons. He shows no extra +favors twixt de rich and de poor.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PerkinsMarguerite"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Marguerite Perkins<br> + West Sixth and Catalpa Streets, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 81</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in slavery times, Miss. I was born in South Carolina, Union +County. I was born in May.</p> + +<p>"I know I 'member old Missy. I just been washin' her feet and legs when +they said the Yankees was comin. Old Miss' name was Miss Sally. Her +husband was a colonel. What is a colonel?</p> + +<p>"I got some white cousins. They tell me they was the boss man's chillun.</p> + +<p>"Yes'm, I reckon Miss Sally was good to me. I'm a old nigger. All us +niggers belonged to Colonel Beatty. I went to school a little while but +I didn't learn nothin'.</p> + +<p>"I use to be a nurse girl and sleep right upstairs.</p> + +<p>"Missus, you know people just walkin along the street droppin dead with +heart trouble and white women killin men. I tell you lady it's awful.</p> + +<p>"I been married just once. The Lord took him out o' my house one Sunday +morning 'fore day.</p> + +<p>"The thing about it is I got that high blood pressure. Well, Missus, I +had it five years ago and I went to Memphis and the Lord healed me. All +we got to do is believe in the Lord and He will put you on your feet.</p> + +<p>"I had four sisters and three brothers and all of 'em dead but me, +darlin.</p> + +<p>"Now let me tell you somethin'. Old as I is, I ain't never been to but +one picture show in my life. Old as I is, I never was on a base ball +ground in my life. The onliest place I go now is to church."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PerkinsRachel"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Rachel Perkins, Goodwin, Arkansas<br> +Age: ? Baby during the Civil War</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Greensboro, Alabama. Sallie Houston and Peter Houston was +my parents. They had two girls and a boy. They died when they was small, +but me. They always told me mother died when I was three days old in the +cradle. I don't fur a fact know much about my own people. Miss Agnes +took me to raise me fur a house girl. She nursed me wid her Mary. My +mother's and father's owners was Alonso Brown and Miss Agnes Brown. +Their two girls was Mary and Lucy and their three boys was Bobby, Jesse, +and Frank. Miss Agnes rocked the babies to sleep in a big chair out on +the gallery. We slept there all night. Company come and say, 'Where the +babies?' Miss Agnes take them back and show us off. They say, 'Where the +little black chile?' They'd try to get me to come go live wid them. They +say they be good to me. I'd tell 'em, 'No, I stay here.' It was good a +home as I wanted. We slept on the front gallery till Lucy come on, then +we had sheep skin pallets. She got the big chair. She put us out there +because it was cool.</p> + +<p>"I left Miss Agnes when I got to be my own woman. Didn't nobody toll me +off. I knowed I ought to go to my own race of people. They come after me +once. Then they sent the baby boy after me what I had nursed. I wanted +to go but I never went. Miss Lucy and Miss Mary both in college. It was +lonesome for me. I wanted to go to my color. I jus' picked up and walked +on off.</p> + +<p>"My girl is half Indian. I'm fifteen years older than my girl. Then I +married Wesley Perkins, my husband. He is black fur a fact. He died last +fall. I married at my husband's brother's by a colored preacher. Tom +Screws was his name. He was a Baptist preacher.</p> + +<p>"I never went to school a day in my life. I can't read. I can count +money. Seem lack it jus' come natural. I never learned it at no one +time. It jus' come to me.</p> + +<p>"In warm weather I slept on the gallery and in cold weather I slept by +the fire. I made down my own bed. I cleaned the house. I took the cows +off to the pasture. I nursed the babies, washed and dried the dishes. I +made up the beds and cleaned the yards.</p> + +<p>"Master Brown owned two farms. He had plenty hands on his farms. I did +never go down to the farms much but I knowed the hands. On Saturday +little later than other days they brought the stock to the house and +fed. Then they went to the smokehouse for their rations. He had a great +big garden, strawberries, and grape arbors.</p> + +<p>"One thing I had to do was worm the plants. I put the worms in a bottle +and leave it in the row where the sun would dry the worms up. When a +light frost come I would water the plants that would wilt before the sun +riz and ag'in at night. Then the plants never felt the frost. Certainly +it didn't kill 'em. It didn't hurt 'em.</p> + +<p>"Julane was the regular milk woman. She milked and strained the milk. I +churned and 'tended to the chickens. Miss Agnes sot the hens her own +self. She marked the eggs with a piece of charcoal to see if other hens +laid by the setting hen. If they did she'd take the new egg out of the +nest.</p> + +<p>"We had flower gardens. We had mint, rosemary, tansy, sage, mullen, +catnip, horseradish, artichokes, hoarhound—all good home remedies.</p> + +<p>"I never knowed when we moved to that farm. I was so small. I heard Miss +Agnes Brown say I was a baby when they moved to Boldan depot, not fur +from Clinton, Mississippi.</p> + +<p>"When I left Miss Agnes I went to some folks my own color on another +farm 'joining to their farm. Of course I took my baby. I took Anna and I +been living with Anna ever since. What I'd do now without her. (Anna is +an Indian and very proud of being half Indian.) My husband done dead.</p> + +<p>"I get eight dollars welfare help. And I do get some commodities. Anna +does all right but she got hit on the shoulder and about lost use of her +arm. One of the railroad hands up here got mad and hit her. I had +doctors. They done it a little good. It's been hurt three years or more +now.</p> + +<p>"I wisht I knowd where to find a bed of mullen. Boil it down to a syrup +and add some molasses, boil that down. It makes a good syrup for coughs +and colds.</p> + +<p>"I never went to white folks' church none hardly. Miss Agnes sent me +along with her cook to my own color's church.</p> + +<p>"My husband sure was good to me. We never had but one fight. Neither one +whooped.</p> + +<p>"This young generation is going backward. They tired of training. They +don't want no advice. They don't want to work out no more. They don't +know what they want. I think folks is trifling than they was when I come +on. The times is all right and some of the people. I'm talking about +mine and yo' color both."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PerryDinah"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Dinah Perry<br> + 1800 Ohio Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 78</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, I lived in slavery times. They brought me from Alabama, a +baby, right here to this place where I am at, Mr. Sterling Cockril.</p> + +<p>"I don't know zackly when I was born but I member bout the slave times. +Yes ma'am, I do. After I growed up some, I member the overseer—I do. I +can remember Mr. Burns. I member when he took the hands to Texas. Left +the chillun and the old folks here.</p> + +<p>"Oh Lord, this was a big plantation. Had bout four or five hundred head +of niggers.</p> + +<p>"My mother done the milkin' and the weavin'. After free times, I wove me +a dross. My mother fixed it for me and I wove it. They'd knit stockin's +too. But now they wear silk. Don't keep my legs warm.</p> + +<p>"I member when they fit here in Pine Bluff. I member when 'Marmajuke' +sent word he was gain' to take breakfast with Clayton that mornin' and +they just fit. I can remember that was 'Marmajuke.' It certainly was +'Marmajuke.' The Rebels tried to carry me away but the wagon was so full +I didn't get in and I was glad they didn't. My mother was runnin' from +the Rebels and she hid under the cotehouse. After the battle was over +she come back hero to the plantation.</p> + +<p>"I had three brothers and three sisters went to Texas and I know I +didn't know em when they come back.</p> + +<p>"I member when they fit here a bum shell fell right in the yard. It was +big around as this stovepipe and was all full of chains and things.</p> + +<p>"After free time my folks stayed right here and worked on the shares. I +was the baby chile and never done no work till I married when I was +fifteen.</p> + +<p>"After the War I went to school to white teachers from the North. I +never went to nothin' but them. I went till I was in the fifth grade.</p> + +<p>"My daddy learned me to spell 'lady' and 'baker' and 'shady' fore I went +to school. I learned all my ABC's too. I got out of the first reader the +second day. I could just read it right on through. I could spell and +just stand at the head of the class till the teacher sent me to the foot +all the time.</p> + +<p>"My daddy was his old mistress' pet. He used to carry her to school all +the time and I guess that's where he got his learnin'.</p> + +<p>"After I was married I worked in the field. Rolled logs, cut brush, +chopped and picked cotton.</p> + +<p>"I member when they had that 'Bachelor' (Brooks-Baxter) War up here at +Little Rock.</p> + +<p>"After my chillun died, I never went to the field no more. I just stayed +round mongst the white folks nussin'. All the chillun I nussed is +married and grown now.</p> + +<p>"All this younger generation—white and colored—I don't know what's +gwine come of em. The poet says:</p> + +<pre> +'Each gwine a different way +And all the downward road.'" +</pre> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PerryDinah2"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Dinah Perry<br> + 1002 Indiana, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 78</h3> +<p>[TR: Appears to be same as last informant despite different address.]</p> +<br> + +<p>"I'se bawn in Alabama and brought here to Arkansas a baby. I couldn't +tell what year I was bawn 'cause I was a baby. A chile can't tell what +year he was bawn 'less they tells him and they sure didn't tell me.</p> + +<p>"When I'd wake up in the mawnin' my mother would be gone to the field.</p> + +<p>"Some things I can remember good but you know old folks didn't 'low +chillun to stand around when they was talkin' in dem days. They had to +go play. They had to be mighty particular or they'd get a whippin'.</p> + +<p>"Chillun was better in them days 'cause the old folks was strict on 'em. +Chillun is raisin' theirselves today.</p> + +<p>"I 'member one song they used to sing</p> + +<pre> +'We'll land over shore +We'll land over shore; +And we'll live forever more.' +</pre> + +<p>"They called it a hymn. They'd sing it in church, then they'd all get to +shoutin'.</p> + +<p>"Superstitions? Well, I seen a engineer goin' to work the other day and +a black cat run in front of him, and he went back 'cause he said he +would have a wreck with his train if he didn't. So you see, the white +folks believes in things like that too.</p> + +<p>"I never was any hand to play any games 'cept 'Chick. Chick.' You'd +ketch 'hold a hands and ring up. Had one outside was the hawk and some +inside was the hen and chickens. The old mother hen would say</p> + +<pre> +'Chick-a-ma, chick-a-ma, craney crow, +Went to the well to wash my toe; +When I come back my chicken was gone, +What time is it, old witch?' +</pre> + +<p>One chicken was s'posed to get out and then the hawk would try to ketch +him.</p> + +<p>"We was more 'ligious than the chillun nowadays. We used to play +preachin' and baptisin'. We'd put 'em down in the water and souse 'em +and we'd shout just like the old folk. Yes ma'am."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PetersAlfred"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Alfred Peters, 1518 Bell Street,<br> + Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 78</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born seven miles from Camden.</p> + +<p>"I was 'leven months old when they carried us to Texas. First thing I +remember I was in Texas.</p> + +<p>"Lucius Grimm was old master. He's been dead a long time. His wife died +'bout two years after the Civil War and he died twenty-five years after.</p> + +<p>"I 'member durin' of the war he buried his stuff---silverware and +stuff—and he never took it up. And after he died his brother's son +lived in California, and he come back and dug it up.</p> + +<p>"The Yankees burned up four hundred bales of cotton and taken the meat +and two cribs of corn.</p> + +<p>"I heard 'em talk 'bout the Ku Klux but I never did see 'em.</p> + +<p>"My mother said old Mars Lucius was good to his folks. She said he first +bought her and then she worried so 'bout my father, he paid twenty-five +hundred dollars for him.</p> + +<p>"Biggest part of my life I farmed, and then I done carpenter work.</p> + +<p>"I been blind four years. The doctor says it's cataracts.</p> + +<p>"I think the younger generation goin' to cause another war. They ain't +studyin' nothin' but pleasure."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PetersMaryEstes"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: S.S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Mary Estes Peters,<br> + 3115 W. 17th Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 78</h3> +<br> + +<p><b>Biographical</b></p> + +<p>Mary Estes Peters was born a slave January 30, 1860 in Missouri +somewhere. Her mother was colored and her father white, the white +parentage being very evident in her color and features and hair. She is +very reticent about the facts of her birth. The subject had to be +approached from many angles and in many ways and by two different +persons before that part of the story could be gotten.</p> + +<p>Although she was born in Missouri, she was "refugeed" first to +Mississippi and then here, Arkansas. She is convinced that her mother +was sold at least twice after freedom,—once into Mississippi, one into +Helena, and probably once more after reaching Arkansas, Mary herself +being still a very small child.</p> + +<p>I think she is mistaken on this point. I did not debate with her but I +cross-examined her carefully and it appears to me that there was +probably in her mother's mind a confused knowledge of the issuance of +the Emancipation Proclamation in 1862. Lincoln's Compensation +Emancipation plan advocated in March 1863, the Abolition in the District +of Columbia in 1862 in April, the announcement of Lincoln's Emancipation +intention in July 1862, the prohibition of slavery in present and future +territories, June 19, 1862, together with the actual issuance of the +Emancipation in September 1862, and the effectiveness of the +proclamation in January 1, 1863, would well give rise to an impression +among many slaves that emancipation had been completed.</p> + +<p>As a matter of fact, Missouri did not secede; the Civil War which +nevertheless ensued would find some slaveholders exposed to the full +force of the 1862 proclamation in 1863 at the time of its first +effectiveness. Naturally it did not become effective in many other +places till 1865. It would very naturally happen then that a sale in +Missouri in the latter part of 1862 or any time thereafter might be well +construed by ex-slaves as a sale after emancipation, especially since +they do not as a rule pay as much attention to the dates of occurrences +as to their sequence. This interpretation accords with the story. Only +such an explanation could make probable a narrative which places the +subject as a newborn babe in 1860 and sold after slavery had ceased +while still too young to remember. Her earliest recollections are +recollections of Arkansas.</p> + +<p>She has lived in Arkansas ever since the Civil War and in Little Rock +ever since 1879. She made a living as a seamstress for awhile but is now +unable to sew because of fading eyesight. She married in 1879 and led a +long and contented married life until the recent death of her husband. +She lives with her husband's nephew and ekes out a living by fragmentary +jobs. She has a good memory and a clear mind for her age.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Slave After Freedom</b></p> + +<p>"My mother was sold after freedom. It was the young folks did all that +devilment. They found they could get some money out of her and they did +it. She was put on the block in St. Louis and sold down into Vicksburg, +Mississippi. Then they sold her into Helena, Arkansas. After that they +carried her down into Trenton (?), Arkansas. I don't know whether they +sold her that time or not, but I reckon they did. Leastways, they +carried her down there. All this was done after freedom. My mother was +only fifteen years old when she was sold the first time, and I was a +baby in her arms. I don't know nothing about it myself, but I have heard +her tell about it many and many a time. It was after freedom. Of course, +she didn't know she was free.</p> + +<p>"It was a good while before my mother realized she was free. She noticed +the other colored people going to and fro and she wondered about it. +They didn't allow you to go round in slave times. She asked them about +it and they told her, 'Don't you know you are free?' Some of the white +people too told her that she was free. After that, from the way she +talked, I guess she stayed around there until she could go some place +and get wages for her work. She was a good cook.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Mean Mistress</b></p> + +<p>"I have seen many a scar on my mother. She had mean white folks. She had +one big scar on the side of her head. The hair never did grow back on +that place. She used to comb her hair over it so that it wouldn't show. +The way she got it was this:</p> + +<p>"One day her mistress went to high mass and left a lot of work for my +mother to do. She was only a girl and it was too much. There was more +work than she could get done. She had too big a task for a child to get +done. When her old mistress came back and her work was not all done, she +beat my mother down to the ground, and then she took one of the skillets +and bust her over the head with it—trying to kill her, I reckon. I have +seen the scar with my own eyes. It was an awful thing.</p> + +<p>"My mother was a house servant in Missouri and Mississippi. Never done +no hard work till she came here (Arkansas). When they brought her here +they tried to make a field hand out of her. She hadn't been used to +chopping cotton. When she didn't chop it fast as the others did, they +would beat her. She didn't know nothing about no farmwork. She had all +kinds of trouble. They just didn't treat her good. She used to have good +times in Missouri and Mississippi but not in Arkansas. They just didn't +treat her good. In them days, they'd whip anybody. They'd tie you to the +bed or have somebody hold you down on the floor and whip you till the +blood ran.</p> + +<p>"But, Lawd, my mother never had no use for Catholics because it was a +Catholic that hit her over the head with that skillet—right after she +come from mass.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Food</b></p> + +<p>"My mother said that they used to pour the food into troughs and give it +to the slaves. They'd give them an old, wooden spoon or something and +they all eat out of the same dish or trough. They wouldn't let the +slaves eat out of the things they et out of. Fed them just like they +would hogs.</p> + +<p>"When I was little, she used to come to feed me about twelve o'clock +every day. She hurry in, give me a little bowl of something, and then +hurry right on out because she had to go right back to her work. She +didn't have time to stay and see how I et. If I had enough, it was all +right. If I didn't have enough, it was all right. It might be pot liquor +or it might be just anything.</p> + +<p>"One day she left me alone and I was lying on the floor in front of the +fireplace asleep. I didn't have no bed nor nothing then. The fire must +have popped out and set me on fire. You see they done a whole lot of +weaving in them days. And they put some sort of lint on the children.</p> + +<p>"I don't reckon children them days knowed what a biscuit was. They just +raked up whatever was left off the table and brung it to you. Children +have a good time nowadays.</p> + +<p>"People goin' to work heard me hollering and came in and put out the +fire. I got scars all round my waist today I could show you.</p> + +<p>"Another time my mother had to go off and leave me. I was older then. I +guess I must have gotten hungry and wanted to get somethin' to eat. So I +got up and wandered off into the woods. There weren't many people living +round there then. (This was in Trenton (?), Arkansas, a small place not +far from Helena.) And the place was [HW: not] built up much then and they +had lots of wolves. Wolves make a lot of noise when they get to trailin' +anything. I got about a half mile from the road and the wolves got after +me. I guess they would have eat me up but a man heard them howling, and +he knew there wasn't no house around there but ours, and he came to see +what was up, and he beat off the wolves and carried me back home. There +wasn't nare another house round there but ours and he knew I must have +come from there.</p> + +<p>"Mother was working then. It was night though. They brung the news to +her and they wouldn't let her come to me. Mother said she felt like +getting a gun and killin' them. Her child out like that and they +wouldn't let her go home.</p> + +<p>"That must have happened after freedom, because it was the last mistress +she had. Almost all her beatings and trouble came from her last +mistress. That woman sure gave her a lot of trouble.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Age, Good Masters</b></p> + +<p>"All I know about my age is what my mother told me.</p> + +<p>"The first people that raised my mother had her age in the Bible. She +said she was about fifteen years old when I was born. From what she told +me, I must be about seventy-eight years old. She taught me that I was +born on Sunday, on the thirtieth of January, in the year before the War.</p> + +<p>"My mother's name was Myles. I don't know what her first master's name +was. She told me I was born in Phelps County, Missouri; I guess you'd +call it St. Louis now. I am giving you the straight truth just as she +gave it to me.</p> + +<p>"From the way she talked, the people what raised her from a child were +good to her. They raised her with their children. Them people fed her +just like they fed their own children.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Color and Birth</b></p> + +<p>"There was a light brownskin boy around there and they give him anything +that he wanted. But they didn't like my mother and me—on account of my +color. They would talk about it. They tell their children that when I +got big enough, I would think I was good as they was. I couldn't help my +color. My mother couldn't either.</p> + +<p>"My mother's mistress had three boys, one twenty-one, one nineteen, and +one seventeen. Old mistress had gone away to spend the day one day. +Mother always worked in the house. She didn't work on the farm in +Missouri. While she was alone, the boys came in and threw her down on +the floor and tied her down so she couldn't struggle, and one after the +other used her as long as they wanted for the whole afternoon. Mother +was sick when her mistress came home. When old mistress wanted to know +what was the matter with her, she told her what the boys had done. She +whipped them and that's the way I came to be here.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Sales and Separations</b></p> + +<p>"My mother was separated from her mother when she was three years old. +They sold my mother away from my grandmother. She don't know nothing +about her people. She never did see her mother's folks. She heard from +them. It must have been after freedom. But she never did get no full +understanding about them. Some of them was in Kansas City, Kansas. My +grandmother, I don't know what became of her.</p> + +<p>"When my mother was sold into St. Louis, they would have sold me away +from her but she cried and went on so that they bought me too. I don't +know nothing about it myself, but my mother told me. I was just nine +months old then. They would call it refugeeing. These people that had +raised her wanted to get something out of her because they found out +that the colored people was going to be free. Those white people in +Missouri didn't have many slaves. They just had four slaves—my mother, +myself, another woman and an old colored man called Uncle Joe. They +didn't get to sell him because he bought hisself. He made a little money +working on people with rheumatism. They would ran the niggers from state +to state about that time to keep them from getting free and to get +something out of them. My mother was sold into Mississippi after +freedom. Then she was refugeed from one place to another through Helena +to Trenton (?), Arkansas.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Marriages</b></p> + +<p>"My mother used to laugh at that. The master would do all the marryin'. +I have heard her say that many a time. They would call themselves +jumpin' the broom. I don't know what they did. Whatever the master said +put them together. I don't know just how it was fixed up, but they helt +the broom and master would say, 'I pronounce you man and wife' or +something like that.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Ku Klux</b></p> + +<p>"My mother talked about the Ku Klux but I don't know much about them. +She talked about how they would ride and how they would go in and +destroy different people's things. Go in the smoke house and eat the +people's stuff. She said that they didn't give the colored people much +trouble. Sometimes they would give them something to eat.</p> + +<p>"When they went to a place where they didn't give the colored people +much to eat, what they didn't destroy they would say, 'Go get it.' I +don't know how it was but the Ku Klux didn't have much use for certain +white people and they would destroy everything they had.</p> + +<p>"I have lived in Arkansas about all my life. I have been in Little Rock +ever since January 30, 1879. I don't know how I happened to move on my +birthday. My husband brought me here for my rheumatism.</p> + +<p>"I married in 1879 and moved here from Marianna. I had lived in Helena +before Marianna.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Voting</b></p> + +<p>"The niggers voted in Marianna and in Helena. They voted in Little Rock +too. I didn't know any of them. It seems like some of the people didn't +make so much talk about it. They did, I guess, though. Many of the +farmers would tell their hands who they wanted them to vote for, and +they would do it.</p> + +<p>"Them was critical times. A man would kill you if he got beat. They +would say, 'So and so lost the lection,' and then somebody would go to +Judgment. I remember once they had a big barbecue in Helena just after +the 'lection. They had it for the white and for the colored alike. We +didn't know there was any trouble. The shooting started on a hill where +everybody could see. First thing you know, one man fell dead. Another +dropped down on all fours bleeding, but he retch in under him and +dragged out a pistol and shot down the man that shot him. That was a sad +time. Niggers and white folks were all mixed up together and shooting. +It was the first time I had ever been out. My mother never would let me +go out before that.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Seamstress</b></p> + +<p>"I ain't able to do much of anything now. I used to make a good living +as a dressmaker. I can't sew now because of my eyes. I used to make many +a dollar before my eyes got to failing me. Make pants, dresses, +anything. When you get old, you fail in what you been doing. I don't get +anything from the government. They don't give me any kind of help."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PetersonJohn"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: John Peterson, 1810 Eureka Street,<br> + Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 80</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was small but I can remember some 'bout slavery days. I was born down +here in Louisiana.</p> + +<p>"I seed dem Yankees come through. Dey stopped dere and broke up all de +bee gums. Just tore 'em up. And took what dey could eat and went on. Dey +was doin' all dey <u>could</u> do. No tellin' what dey <u>didn't</u> do. +People what owned de place just run off and left. Yankees come dere in +de night. I 'member dat. Had ever'thing excited, so my white folks just +skipped out. Oh, yes, dey come back after the Yankees had gwine on.</p> + +<p>"You could hear dem guns shootin' around. I heered my mother and father +say de Yankees was fightin' to free slavery.</p> + +<p>"Run off? Oh Lawd, yes ma'am, I heered 'em say dey was plenty of 'em run +off.</p> + +<p>"George Swapsy was our owner. I know one thing, dey beat me enough. Had +me watchin' de garden to keep de chickens out. And sometimes I'd git to +playin' and fergit and de chickens would git in de garden, and I'd pay +for it too. I can 'member dat. Yes'm, dat was before freedom. Dey was +whippin' all de colored people—and me too.</p> + +<p>"Yes'm, dey give us plenty to eat, but dey didn't give us no clothes. I +was naked half my time. Dat was when I was a little fellow.</p> + +<p>"We all belonged to de same man. Dey never did 'part us. But my mother +was sold away from her people—and my father, too. He come from +Virginia.</p> + +<p>"No ma'am, dey didn't have a big plantation—just a little place +cleared up in the woods.</p> + +<p>"He didn't have no wife—just two grown sons and dey bof went to the +war.</p> + +<p>"Mars George died 'fore peace declared. He was a old fellow—and mean as +he could be.</p> + +<p>"I never went to school till I was sixteen or seventeen years old. Dere +was a colored fellow had a little learnin' and we hired him two nights +in de week for three dollars a month. Did it for three years. I can read +a little and write my own name and sort of 'tend to my own business.</p> + +<p>"Yes'm, I used to vote after I got grown. Yes'm, I did vote Republican. +But de white people stopped us from votin'. Dat was when Seymour and +Blair was runnin', and I ain't voted none since—I just quit. I've known +white people to go to the polls wif der guns and keep de colored folks +from votin'.</p> + +<p>"Oh, dey was plenty of Ku Klux. I've known 'em to ketch people and whip +'em and kill 'em. Dey didn't bother me—I didn't give 'em a chance. Ku +Klux—I sure 'member dem.</p> + +<p>"Younger generation? Well, Miss, you're a little too hard for me. Hard +to tell what'll become of 'em. I know one thing—dey is wiser. Oh, my +Lawd! A chile a year old know more'n I did when I was ten. We didn't +have no chance. Didn't have nobody to learn us nothin'. People is just +gittin' wuss ever' day. Killin' 'em up ever' day. Wuss now than dey was +ten years ago."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PettisLouise"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Louise Pettis, Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 59</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My mama was born at Aiken, South Carolina. She was Frances Rotan. I was +born at Elba, South Carolina, forty miles below Augusta, Georgia. My +papa was born at Macon, Georgia. Both my parents was slaves. He farmed +and was a Baptist preacher. Mama was a cook.</p> + +<p>"Mama was owned by some of the Willis. There was three; Mike, Bill, and +Logie Willis, all brothers, and she lived with them all but who owned +her I don't know. She never was sold. Papa wasn't either. Mama lived at +Aiken till papa married her. She belong to some of the Willis. They +married after freedom. She had three husbands and fifteen children.</p> + +<p>"Mama had a soldier husband. He took her to James Island. She runned off +from him. Got back across the sea to Charleston to Aunt Anette's. She +was mama's sister. Mama sent back to Aiken and they got her back to her +folks. Aunt Anette had been sold to folks at Charleston.</p> + +<p>"Grandma was Rachel Willis. She suckled some of the Willis children. +Mama suckled me and Mike Willis together. His mama got sick and my mama +took him and raised him. She got well but their names have left me. When +we got sick the Willis women would send a hamper basket full of +provisions, some cooked and some to be cooked. I used to sweep their +yards. They was white sand and not a sprig of grass nor a weed in there.</p> + +<p>"Mama and papa was both slavery niggers and they spoke mighty well of +their owners.</p> + +<p>"Papa said in slavery times about two nights in a week they would have +a dance. He would slip off and go. Sometimes he would get a pass. He was +a figger caller till he 'fessed religion. One time the pattyrollers come +in. They said, 'All got passes tonight.' When they had about danced down +my daddy got a shovelful of live coals and run about scattering it on +the floor. All the niggers run out and he was gone too. It was a dark +night. A crowd went up the road and here come the pattyrollers. One run +into grapevines across the road and tumbled off his horse. The niggers +took to the woods then. Pa tole us about how he studied up a way to get +himself and several others outer showing their passes that night. Master +never found that out on him.</p> + +<p>"During the War they sent a lot of the meat to feed the soldiers on and +kept the skins and sides. They tole them if the Yankees ask them if they +had enough to eat say, 'See how greasy and slick I is.' They greased +their legs and arms to make them shine and look fat. The dust made the +chaps look rusty.</p> + +<p>"Papa saved his young mistress' life. His master was gone to war. He had +promised with others to take care of her. The Yankees come and didn't +find meat. It was buried. They couldn't find much. They got mad and +burned the house. Pa was a boy. He run up there and begged folks not to +burn the house; they promised to take care of everything. Papa begged to +let him get his mistress and three-day-old baby. They cursed him but he +run in and got her and the baby. The house fell in before they got out +of the yard. He took her to the quarters. Papa was overstrained carrying +a log and limped as long as he lived.</p> + +<p>"Pa was hired out and they was goner whoop him and he run off and got +back to the master. Ma nor pa was never sold.</p> + +<p>"We had a reason to come out here to Arkansas. A woman had a white +husband and a black one too. The black husband told the white husband +not come about there no more. He come on. The black man killed the white +man at his door. They lynched six or seven niggers. They sure did kill +him. That dissatisfied all the niggers. That took place in Barnwell +County, South Carolina. Three train loads of us left. There was fifteen +in our family. We was doing well. My pa had cattle and money. They +stopped the train befo' and behind us—the train we was on. Put the +Arkansas white man in Augusta jail. They stopped us all there. We got to +come on. We was headed for Pine Bluff. We got down there 'bout Altheimer +and they was living in tents. Pa said he wasn't goiner tent, he didn't +run away from South Carolina and he'd go straight back. Mr. Aydelott got +eight families on track at Rob Roy to come to Biscoe. We got a house +here. Pa was old and they would listen at what he said. He made a speech +at Rob Roy and told them let's come to Biscoe. Eleven families come. He +had two hundred or three hundred dollars then in his pocket to rattle. +He could get more. He grieved for South Carolina, so he went back and +took us but ma wanted to coma back. They stayed back there a year or +two. We made a crop. Pa was the oldest boss in his crowd. We all come +back. There was more room out here and so many of us.</p> + +<p>"The schools was better out there. I went to Miss Scofield's College. +All the teachers but three was colored. There was eight or ten colored +teachers. It was at Aiken, South Carolina. Miss Criley was our sewing +mistress. Miss Criley was white and Miss Scofield was too. I didn't have +to pay. Rich folks in the North run the school. No white children went +there. I think the teachers was sent there.</p> + +<p>"I taught school out here at Blackton and Moro and in Prairie County +about. I got tired of it. I married and settled down.</p> + +<p>"We owns my home here. My husband was a railroad man. We lives by the +hardest.</p> + +<p>"I don't know what becoming of the young generation. They shuns the +field work. Times is faster than I ever seen them. I liked the way times +was before that last war (World War). Reckon when will they get back +like that?"</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PettusHenryC"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Henry C. Pettus, Marianna, Arkansas<br> +Age: 80</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Wilkes County, near Washington, Georgia. My mother's +owners was Dr. Palmer and Sarah Palmer. They had three boys; Steve, +George, and Johnie. They lived in Washington and the farm I lived on was +five miles southeast of town. It was fifty miles from Augusta, Georgia. +He had another farm on the Augusta Road. He had a white man overseer. +His name was Tom Newsom and his nephew, Jimmie Newsom, helped. He was +pretty smooth most of the time. He got rough sometimes. Tom's wife was +named Susie Newsom.</p> + +<p>"Dick Gilbert had a place over back of ours. They sent things to the +still at Dick Gilbert's. Sent peaches and apples and surplus corn. The +still was across the hill from Dr. Palmer's farm. He didn't seem to +drink much but the boys did. All three did. Dr. Palmer died in 1861. +People kept brandy and whiskey in a closet and some had fancy bottles +they kept, one brandy, one whiskey, on their mantel. Some owners passed +drinks around like on Sunday morning. Dr. Palmer didn't do that but it +was done on some places before the Civil War. It wasn't against the law +to make spirits for their own use. That is the way it was made. Meal and +flour was made the same way then.</p> + +<p>"Mother lived in Dr. Palmer's office in Warren County. It was a very +nice log house and had a fence to make the front on the road and the +back enclosed like. Inside the fence was a tanyard and house at some +distance and a very nice log house where Mr. Hudson lived. Dr. Palmer +and Mr. Hudson had that place together. The shoemaker lived in +Washington in Dr. Palmer's back yard. He had his office and home all in +the same. Mr. Anthony made all the shoes for Dr. Palmer's slaves and for +white folks in town. He made fine nice shoes. He was considered a high +class shoemaker.</p> + +<p>"Mother was a field hand. She wasn't real black. My father never did do +much. He was a sort of a foreman. He rode around. He was lighter than I +am. He was old man Pettus' son. Old man Pettus had a great big +farm—land! land! land! Wiley and Milton Roberts had farms between Dr. +Palmer and old man Pettus' farm. Mother originally belong to old man +Pettus. He give Miss Sarah Palmer her place on the Augusta Road and his +son the place on which his own home was. They was his white children. He +had two. Mother was hired by her young mistress, Dr. Palmer's wife, Miss +Sarah. Father rode around, upheld by the old man Pettus. He never worked +hard. I don't know if old man Pettus raised grandma or not; he never +grandpa. He was a Terral. He died when I was small. Grandpa was a field +hand. He was the only colored man on the place allowed to have a dog. He +was Dr. Palmer's stock man. They raised their own stock; sheep, goats, +cows, hogs, mules, and horses.</p> + +<p>"None of us was ever sold that I know of. Mother had three boys and +three girls. One sister died in infancy. One sister was married and +remained in Georgia. Two of my brothers and one sister come to Arkansas. +Mother brought us boys to a new country. Father got shot and died from +the womb. He was a captain in the war. He was shot accidentally. Some of +them was drinking and pranking with the guns. We lived on at Dr. +Palmer's place till 1866. That was our first year in Arkansas. That was +nearly two years. We never was abused. My early life was very favorable.</p> + +<p>"The quarters was houses built on each side of the road. Some set off +in the field. They must have had stock law. We had pastures. The houses +was joining the pasture. Mr. Pope had a sawmill on his place. The saw +run perpendicularly up and down. He had a grist mill there too. I like +to go to mill. It was dangerous for young boys. Mr. Pope's farm joined +us on one side. Oxen was used as team for heavy loads. Such a contrast +in less than a century as trucks are in use now. I learned about oxen. +They didn't go fast 'ceptin' when they ran away. They would run at the +sight of water in hot weather. They was dangerous if they saw the river +and had to go down a steep bank, load or no load the way they went. If +it was shallow they would wade but if it was deep they would swim unless +the load was heavy enough to pull them down. Oxen was interesting to me +always.</p> + +<p>"Children didn't stay in town like they do now. They was left to think +more for themselves. They hardly ever got to go to town.</p> + +<p>"We raised a pet pig. Nearly every year we raised a pet pig. When mother +would be out that pig would get my supper in spite of all I could do. +The pig was nearly as large as I was. I couldn't do anything. We had a +watermelon patch and sometimes sold Dr. Palmer melons. He let us have a +melon patch and a cotton patch our own to work. Mother worked in +moonlight and at odd times. They give that to her extra. We helped her +work it. They give old people potato patches and let the children have +goober rows. Land was plentiful. Dr. Palmer wasn't stingy with his +slaves—very liberal. He was a man willing to live and let live so far +as I can know of him.</p> + +<p>"During the Civil War things was quiet like where I was. The soldiers +didn't come through till after the war was over. Then the Union soldiers +took Washington. They come there after the surrender.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Freedom</b></p> + +<p>"The Union soldiers came in a gang out from Washington all over the +surrounding country, scouting about, and notified all the black folks of +freedom. My folks made arrangements to stay on. Two colored men went +through the country getting folks to move to southwest Georgia but +before mother decided to move anywhere along come two men and they had a +helper, Mr. Allen. It was Mr. William H. Wood and Mr. Peters over here +on Cat Island. They worked from Washington, Georgia. We consented to +leave and come to Arkansas. We started and went to Barnetts station to +Augusta, to Atlanta. There was so many tracks out of order, bridges been +burnt. We crossed the river at Chattanooga, then to Nashville, then to +Johnsonville. We took a boat to Cairo, then to Memphis, then on to some +landing out here. Well, I never heard. We went to the Woods' place and +made a crop here in Arkansas in 1866. I worked with John I. Foreman till +1870 and went back to the Woods' farm till 1880. Then I went to the Bush +place (now McCullough farm). I farmed all along through life till the +last twelve years. I started preaching in 1875. I preach yet +occasionally. I preached here thirty-six years in the Marianna Baptist +church. I quit last year. My health broke down.</p> + +<p>"Chills was my worst worry in these swamps. We made fine crops. In 1875 +yellow fever come on. Black folks didn't have yellow fever at first but +they later come to have it. Some died of it. White folks had died in +piles. It was hard times for some reason then. It was hard to get +something to eat. We couldn't get nothing from Memphis. Arrangements was +made to get supplies from St. Louis to Little Rock and we could go get +them and send boats out here.</p> + +<p>"In 1875 was the tightest, hardest time in all my life, A chew of +tobacco cost ten cents. In 1894-'95 hard times struck me again. Cotton +was four and five cents a pound, flour three dollars a barrel, and meat +four and five cents a pound. We raised so much of our meat that didn't +make much difference. Money was so scarce.</p> + +<p>"Ku Klux—I never was in the midst of them. They was pretty bad in +Georgia and in northeast part of this county. They was bad so I heard. +They sent for troops at Helena to settle things up at about Marion, +Arkansas now. I heard more of the Ku Klux in Georgia than I heard after +we come here. And as time went on and law was organized the Ku Klux +disbanded everywhere.</p> + +<p>"Traveling conditions was bad when we came to Arkansas. We rode in box +cars, shabby passenger coaches. The boats was the best riding. As I told +you we went way around on account of burnt out and torn up bridges. The +South looked shabby.</p> + +<p>"I haven't voted since 1927 except I voted in favor of the Cotton +Control Saturday before last.</p> + +<p>"Times has come up to a most deplorable condition. Craving exists. +Ungratefulness. People want more than they can make. Some don't work +hard and some won't work at all. I don't know how to improve conditions +except by work except economical living. Some would work if they could. +Some can work but won't. Some do work hard. I believe in bread by the +sweat of the brow, and all work.</p> + +<p>"The slaves didn't expect anything. They didn't expect war. It was going +on a while before my parents heard of it. I was a little boy. They +didn't know what it was for except their freedom. They didn't know what +freedom was. They couldn't read. They never seen a newspaper like I take +the Commercial Appeal now. I went to school a little in Arkansas. My +father being old man Pettus' son as he was may have been given something +by Miss Sarah or Dr. Palmer or by his white son, but the old man was +dead and I doubt that. Father was killed and mother left. Mother knew +she had a home on Dr. Palmer's land as long as she needed one but she +left to do better. In some ways we have done better but it was hard to +live in these bottoms. It is a fine country now.</p> + +<p>"I own eighty acres of land and this house. (Good house and furnished +well.) We made six bales of cotton last year. My son lives here and his +wife—a Chicago reared mulatto, a cook. He runs my farm. I live very +well."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PhillipsDolly"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Dolly Phillips, Clarendon, Arkansas<br> +Age: 67</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I ain't no ex-slave. I am 67 years old. I was born out here on the +Mullins place. My mother's master was Mr. Ricks and Miss Emma Ricks.</p> + +<p>"My mother named Diana and my father Henry Mullins. I never saw my grand +fathers and I seen one grandma I remembers. My mother had ten children. +My father said he never owned nuthin' in his life but six horses. When +they was freed they got off to their selves and started farming. See +they belong to different folks. My father's master was a captain of a +mixed regiment. They was in the war four years. I heard 'em say they +went to Galveston, Texas. The Yankees was after 'em. But I don't know +how it was.</p> + +<p>"I heard 'em say they put their heads under big black pot to pray. They +say sing easy, pray easy. I forgot whut all she say.</p> + +<p>"I lives wid my daughter. I gets commodities from the Welfare some. The +young folks drinks a heap now. It look lack a waste of money to me."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PiggyTony"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person Interviewed: Tony Piggy<br> + Brinkley, Ark.<br> +Age: 75</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born near Selma, Alabama, but I was raised in Mississippi. My +grandpa was sold from South Carolina to Moster Alexander Piggy. He +didn't talk plain but my papa didn't nother. Moster Piggy bought a gang +of black folks in South Carolina and brought em into the state of +Alabama. My papa was mighty near full-blood African, I'll tell you. Now +ma was mixed.</p> + +<p>"I'm most too young to recollect the war. Right after the war we had +small pox. My uncle died and there was seven children had em at one +time. The bushwhackers come in and kicked us around—kicked my uncle +around. We lived at Union Town, Alabama then.</p> + +<p>"Aunt Connie used to whip us. Mama had no time; she was a chambermaid +(housewoman). The only thing I recollect bout slavery time to tell is +Old Mistress pour out a bushell of penders (peanuts) on the grass to see +us pick em up and set out eating em. When they went to town they would +bring back things like cheese good to eat. We got some of what they had +most generally. She wasn't so good; she whoop me with a cow whip. She'd +make pull candy for us too. I got a right smart of raisin' in a way but +I growed up to be a wild young man. I been converted since then.</p> + +<p>"Well, one day pa come to our house and told mama, 'We free, don't have +to go to the house no more, git ready, we all goin' to Mississippi. +Moster Piggy goiner go. He goner rent us twenty acres and we goner take +two cows and a mule.' We was all happy to be free and goin' off +somewhere. Moster Piggy bought land in Mississippi and put families +renters on it. Moster Piggy was rough on the grown folks but good to the +children. The work didn't let up. We railly had more clearin' and fences +to make. His place in Alabama was pore and that was new ground.</p> + +<p>"There was all toll nine children in my family. Ma was named Matty +Piggy. Papa was named Ezra Piggy. Moster Alexander Piggy's wife named +Harriett. I knowed Ed, Charley, Bowls, Ells, and Liza. That's all I ever +knowd.</p> + +<p>"I have done so many things. I run on a steamboat from Cairo to New +Orleans—Kate Adams and May F. Carter. They called me a Rouster—that +means a working man. I run on a boat from Newport to Memphis. Then I +farmed, done track work on the railroad, and farmed some more.</p> + +<p>"The young generation ain't got respect for old people and they tryin' +to live without work. I ain't got no fault to find with the times if I +was bout forty years younger than I is now I could work right ahead."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PittmanElla"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Ella Pittman<br> + 2409 West Eleventh Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 84</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes ma'm, I was born in slavery days. I tell you I never had no name. +My old master named me—Just called me 'Puss? and said I could name +myself when I got big enough.</p> + +<p>"My old master was named Mac Williams. But where I got free at was at +Stricklands. Mac Williams' daughter married a Strickland and she drawed +me. She was tollable good to me but her husband wa'nt.</p> + +<p>"In slavery times I cleaned up the house and worked in the house. I +worked in the field a little but she kept me busy in the house. I was +busy night and day.</p> + +<p>"No ma'm, I never did go to school—never did go to school.</p> + +<p>"After I got grown I worked in the farm. When I wasn't farmin' I was +doin' other kinds of work. I used to cut and sew and knit and crochet. I +stayed around the white folks so much they learned me to do all kinds of +work. I never did buy my children any stockins—I knit 'em myself.</p> + +<p>"After old Master died old Miss hired us out to Ben Deans, but he was so +cruel mama run away and went back to old Miss. I know we stayed at Ben +Deans till they was layin the crop by and I think he whipped mama that +morning so she run away.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'm, I sho do member bout the Klu Klux—sho do. They looked +dreadful—nearly scare you to death. The Klu Klux was bad, and the +paddyrollers too.</p> + +<p>"I can't think of nothin' much to tell you now but I know all about +slavery. They used to build 'little hell', made something like a +barbecue pit and when the niggers didn't do like they wanted they'd lay +him over that 'little hell'.</p> + +<p>"I've done ever kind of work—maulin rails, clearin up new ground. They +was just one kind of work I didn't do and that was workin' with a +grubbin' hoe. I tell you I just worked myself to death till now I ain't +able to do nothin'."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>Ella Pittman's son, Almira Pittman was present when I interviewed his +mother. He was born in 1884. He added this information to what Ella told +me:</p> + +<p>"She is the mother of nine children—three living. I use to hear mama +tell about how they did in slavery times. If she could hear good now she +could map it out to you."</p> + +<p>I asked him why he didn't teach his mother to read and write and he +said, "Well, I tell you, mama is high strung. She didn't have no real +name till she went to Louisiana."</p> + +<p>These people live in a well-furnished home. The living room had a rug, +overstuffed furniture and an organ. Ella was clean.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PittmanElla2"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Ella Pittman<br> + 2417 W. Eleventh Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 84</h3> +<p>[TR: Appears to be same as last informant despite different address.]</p> +<br> + +<p>"Here's one that lived then. I can remember fore the Civil War started. +That was in the State of North Carolina where I was bred and born in +March 1853. Mac Williams, he was my first owner and John Strickland was +my last owner. That was durin' of the war. My white folks told me I was +thirteen when peace was declared. They told me in April if I make no +mistake. That was in North Carolina. I grewed up there and found my +childun there. That is—seven of them. And then I found two since I been +down in here. I been in Arkansas about forty years.</p> + +<p>"When the war come I heard em say they was after freein' the people.</p> + +<p>"My mother worked in the field and old mistress kep' me in the house. +She married a widow-man and he had four childun and then she had one so +there was plenty for me to do. Yes ma'm!</p> + +<p>"I ain't never been to school a day in my life. They didn't try to send +me after freedom. I had a very, very bad, cruel stepfather and he sent +all his childun to school but wouldn't send me. I stayed there till I +was grown. I sho did. Then I married. Been married just once. Never had +but that one man in my life. He was a very good man, too. Cose he was a +poor man but he was good to me.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'm, I sho did see the Ku Klux and the paddyrollers, too. They +done em bad I tell you.</p> + +<p>"I know they was a white man they called Old Man Ford. He dug a pit +just like a barbecue pit, and he would burn coals just like you was +goin' to barbecue. Then he put sticks across the top and when any of his +niggers didn't do right, he laid em across that pit. I member they +called it Old Ford's Hell.</p> + +<p>"I had a bad time fore freedom and a bad time after freedom till after I +married. I'm doin' tollably well now. I lives with my son and his wife +and she treats me very well. I can't live alone cause I'se subject to +inagestin' and I takes sick right sudden.</p> + +<p>"I'm just as thankful as I can be that I'm gettin' along as well as I +is.</p> + +<p>"I stayed in the North in Detroit one year. I liked it very well. I +liked the white people very well. They was so sociable. My son lives +there and works for Henry Ford. My oldest son stays in Indiana.</p> + +<p>"It was so cold I come back down here. I'se gettin' old and I needs to +be warm. Good-bye."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PittmanSarah"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Sarah Pittman<br> + 1320 W. Twentieth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: About 82</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I never saw nothing between white folks and colored folks. My white +folks were good to us. My daddy's white folks were named Jordan—Jim +Jordan—and my mama's folks were Jim Underwood. And they were good. My +mama's and father's folks both were good to the colored folks. As the +song goes, 'I can tell it everywhere I go.' And thank the Lord, I'm here +to tell it too. I raised children, grandchildren, and +great-grandchildren you see there. That is my great-grandson playing +there. He is having the time of his life. I raised him right too. You +see how good he minds me. He better not do nothin' different. He's about +two years old.</p> + +<p>"I was born in Union Parish, Louisiana way up yonder in them hills, me +and my folks, and they come down here.</p> + +<p>"Jim Jordan married one of the Taylor girls—Jim Taylor's daughter. The +old folks gave mama to them to do their housework. My father and mama +didn't belong to the same masters. He died the first year of the +surrender. He was a wonderful man. He was a Jackson. On Saturday night +he would stay with us till Sunday. On Sunday night he would go home. He +would play with us. Now he and mama both are dead. They are gone home +and I am waiting to go. They're waiting for me in the kingdom there. As +the song says, 'I am waiting on the promises of God.'</p> + +<p>"My mama did housework in slave time. I don't know what my father did. +In them days you done some working from plantation to plantation. Them +folks is all gone in now near about. Guess mine will be the next time.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Early Childhood</b></p> + +<p>"First thing I remember is staying at the house. We et at the white +folks' house. We would go there in the evening before sundown and git +our supper. One time Jim Underwood made me mad. Mama said something he +didn't like. And he tied her thumbs together and tied them to a limb. +Her feet could touch the ground—they weren't off the ground. He said +she could stay there till she thought better of it.</p> + +<p>"Before the surrender I didn't do nothing in the line of work 'cept +'tend to my mother's children. I didn't do no work at all 'cept that. My +white folks were good to me. All my folks 'cept me are gone. My grandmas +and uncles and things all settin' up yonder. All my children what is +dead, they're up yonder. I ain't got but three living, and they're on +their way. Minnie and Mamie and Annie, that is all I got. Mamie's the +youngest and she's got grandchildren.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>How Freedom Came</b></p> + +<p>"The way we learned that freedom had come, my uncle come to the fence +and told my mama we were free and I went with her. Sure he'd been to the +War. He come back with his budget. Don't you know what a budget is? You +ain't never been to war, have you? Well, you oughter know what a budget +is. That's a knapsack. It had a pocket on each side and a water can on +each shoulder. He come home with his budget on his back, and he come to +the fence and told mama we was free and I heered him.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Right After Freedom</b></p> + +<p>"Right after freedom my mama and them stayed with the same people they +had been with. The rest of the people scattered wherever they wanted to +But my uncle come there and got mama. They moved back to the Taylors +then where my grandma was. Wouldn't care if I had some of that good old +spring water now where my grandma lived!</p> + +<p>"None of my people were ever bothered by the pateroles or the Ku Klux.</p> + +<p>"We come to Arkansas because we had kinfolks down here. Just picked up +and come on. I been here a long time. I don't know how long, I don't +keep up with nothing like that. When my husband was living I just +followed him. He said that this was a good place and we could make a +good living. So I just come on. When he died, those gravediggers dug his +grave deep enough to put another man on top of him. But that don't hurt +him none. He's settin' in the kingdom. He was a deacon in the church and +his word went. The whole plantation would listen to him and do what he +said. Everybody respected him because he was right. I was just married +once and no man can take his place. He was the first one and the best +one and the last one. He was heaven bound and he went on there. I don't +know just how long I was married. It is in the Bible. It is in there in +big letters. I can't get that right now. It's so big and heavy. But it's +in there. I think we left it in Detroit when I was there, and it ain't +come back here yet. But I know we lived together a long time.</p> + +<p>"I remember the old slave-time songs but I can't think of them just now. +'Come to Jesus' is one of them. 'Where shall I be when the first trumpet +sounds?', that's another one. Another one is: 'If I could, I surely +would; Set on the rock where Moses stood—first verse or stanza. All of +my sins been taken away, taken away—chorus. Mary wept and Martha +moaned, Mary's gone to a world unknown—second verse or stanza. All of +my sins are taken away, taken away—chorus."</p> + +<p>"I don't think nothing 'bout these young folks. When they was turned +loose a lot of them went wild and the young folks followed their +leaders. But mine followed me and my daddy.</p> + +<p>"My grandmother had a big old bay horse and she was midwife for the +white and the colored folks. She would put her side saddle on the old +horse and get up and go, bless her heart; and me and my cousin had to +stay there and take care of things. She's gone now. The Lord left me +here for some reason. And I'm enjoyin' it too. I have got my first +cussin' to do. I don't like to hear nobody cuss. I belong to the church. +I belong to the Baptist church and I go to the Arch Street Church."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PoeMary"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Mary Poe, Forrest City, Arkansas<br> +Age: 60</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My papa used to tell about two men he knowd stealing a hog. He was +Wyatt Alexander. He was feeding one evening and the master was out there +too that evening. They overheard two colored men inside the crib lot +house. They was looking at the hogs. They planned to come back after +dark and get a hog. The way it turned out master dressed up ragged and +got inside that night. The first man come. They got a shoat and killed +it, knocked it in the head. The master took it on his back to the log +cabin. When he knocked, his wife opened the door. She seen who it was. +She nearly fell out and when he seen who it was he run off. The master +throwed the hog down. They all got the hot water and went to work. He +left a third there and took part to the other man. He done gone to bed +and he took a third on home. He said he wanted to see if they needed +meat or wanted to keep in stealing practice. He didn't want them to +waste his big hog meat neither. Said that man never come home for two +weeks, 'fraid he'd get a whooping. No, they said he never got a whooping +but the meat was near by gone.</p> + +<p>"Seem lack hog stealing was common in North Carolina in them days from +the way he talked.</p> + +<p>"Papa said he went down in the pasture one night to get a shoat. He said +they had a fine big drove. He got one knocked over an' was carrying it +out across the fence to the field. He seen another man. He couldn't see. +It was dark. He throwed the hog over on him. The man took the shoat on +to his house and papa was afraid to say much about it. He said way 'long +towards day this man come bringing about half of that hog cleaned and +ready to salt away. They got up and packed it away out of sight.</p> + +<p>"My mother was named Lucy Alexander, too."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PollacksWL"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: W.L. Pollacks<br> + Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 68</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Shelby County Tennessee. My folks all come from Richmond, +Virginia. They come to Kentucky and then on to Tennessee. I am 68 years +old. My father's master was Joe Rollacks and Mrs. Chicky they called his +wife. My mother's master was Joe Ricks and they all called his wife Miss +Fee. I guess it was Pheobe or Josephine but they never called her by +them names. Seemed like they was all kin folks. I heard my mother say +she dress up in some of the white folks dresses and hitch up the buggy, +take dinner and carry two girls nearly grown out to church and to big +picnics. She liked that. The servants would set the table and help the +white folks plates at the table. Said they had a heap good eating. She +had a plenty work to do but she got to take the girls places where the +parents didn't want to go. She said they didn't know what to do wid +freedom. She said it was like weening a child what never learned to eat +yet. I forgot what they did do. She said work was hard to find and money +scarce. They find some white folks feed em to do a little work. She said +a nickle looked big as a dollar now. They couldn't buy a little bit. +They like never get nough money to buy a barrel of flour. It was so +high. Seem like she say I was walking when they got a barrel of flour. +So many colored folks died right after freedom. They caught +consumption. My mother said they was exposed mo than they been used to +and mixing up in living quarters too much what caused it. My father +voted a Republican ticket. I ain't voted much since I come to Arkansas. +I been here 32 years. My farm failed over in Tennessee. I was out +lookin' round for farmin' land, lookin' round for good work. I farmed +then I worked seven or eight years on the section, then I helped do +brick work till now I can't do but a mighty little. I had three children +but they all dead. I got sugar dibeates.</p> + +<p>"The present times are tough on sick people. It is hard for me to get a +living. I find the young folks all for their own selves. If I was well I +could get by easy. If a man is strong he can get a little work along.</p> + +<p>"The times and young generation both bout to run away wid themselves, +and the rest of the folks can't stop em 'pears to me like."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PopeJohn"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: "Doc" John Pope, Biscoe, Arkansas<br> +Age: 87</h3> +<br> + +<p>I am 87 years old for a fact. I was born in De Soto County, Mississippi, +eight miles south of Memphis, Tennessee. No I didn't serve in de War but +my father Gus Pope did. He served in de War three years and never came +home. He served in 63rd Regiment Infantry of de Yankee army. He died +right at the surrender. I stayed on de farm till the surrender. We +scattered around den. My father was promised $300.00 bounty and 160 +acres of land. Dey was promised dat by the Constitution of the United +States. Every soldier was promised dat. No he never got nary penny nor +nary acre of land. We ain't got nuthin. De masters down in Mississippi +did help 'em where they stayed on. I never stayed on. I left soon as de +fightin was gone. I was roamin round in Memphis and man asked me if I +wanted to go to college. He sent a train load to Fitz (Fisk) University. +I stayed there till I graduated. I studied medicine generally. Sandy +Odom, the preacher at Brinkley, was there same time as I was. He show is +old. He's up in ninety now. He had a brother here till he died. He was a +fine doctor. He got more practice around here than any white doctor in +this portion of de county. Fitz University was a fine college. It was +run by rich folks up north. I don't know how long I stayed there. It was +a good while. I went to Isaac Pope, my uncle. He was farming. Briscoe +owned the Pope niggers at my first recollection. He brought my uncle and +a lot more over here where he owned a heap of dis land. It was all +woods. Dats how I come here.</p> + +<p>After de Civil War? Dey had to "Root hog or die". From 1860-1870 the +times was mighty hard. People rode through the county and killed both +white and black. De carpet bagger was bout as bad as de Ku Kluck.</p> + +<p>I came here I said wid John Briscoe. They all called him Jack Briscoe, +in 1881. I been here ever since cept W.T. Edmonds and P.H. Conn sent me +back home to get hands. I wrote 'em how many I had. They wired tickets +to Memphis. I fetched 52 families back. I been farmin and practicin all +my life put near.</p> + +<p>I show do vote. I voted the last time for President Hoover. The first +time I voted was at the General Grant election. I am a Republican, +because it is handed down to me. That's the party of my race. I ain't +going to change. That's my party till I dies. We has our leader what +instructs us how to vote.</p> + +<p>Dey say dey goiner pay 60 cents a hundred but I ain't able to pick no +cotton. No I don't get no help from de relief. I think the pore class of +folks in a mighty bad fix. Is what I think. The nigger is hard hit and +the pore trash dey call 'em is too. I don't know what de cause is. It's +been jess this way ever since I can recollect. No times show ain't one +bit better. I owns dis house and dats all. I got one daughter.</p> + +<p>I went to Fitz (Fisk) University in 1872. The folks I told you about was +there then too. Their names was Dr. E.B. Odom of Biscoe and his brother +Sandy Odom. He preaches at Brinkley now. Doc Odom is dead. He served on +the Biscoe School Board a long time wid two white men.</p> + +<p>I don't know much about the young generation. They done got too smart +for me to advise. The young ones is gettin fine educations but it ain't +doin 'em no good. Some go north and cook. It don't do the balance of 'em +no good. If they got education they don't lack de farm. De sun too hot. +No times ain't no better an de nigger ain't no better off en he used to +be. A little salary dun run 'em wild.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PorterWilliam"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: William Porter<br> + 1818 Louisiana Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 81<br> +Occupation: Janitor of church</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes'm I lived in slavery times. I was born in 1856. I was borned in +Tennessee but the most of my life has been in Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"I remember when Hood's raid was. That was the last fight of the war. I +recollect seein' the soldiers marchin' night and day for two days. I saw +the cavalry men and the infant men walking. I heard em say the North was +fightin' the South. They called the North Yankees and the South Rebels.</p> + +<p>"Some of the Tennessee niggers was called free niggers. There was a +colored man in Pulaski, Tennessee who owned slaves.</p> + +<p>"My father was workin' to buy his freedom and had just one more year to +work when peace come. His master gave him a chance to buy his freedom. +He worked for old master in the daytime and at night he worked for +himself. He split rails and raised watermelons.</p> + +<p>"My father's master was named Tom Gray at that time. Considering the +times he was a very fair man.</p> + +<p>"When the war broke up I was workin' around a barber shop in Nashville, +Tennessee.</p> + +<p>"The Queen of England offered to buy the slaves and raise them till they +were grown, then give them a horse, a plow and so many acres of ground +but the South wouldn't accept this offer.</p> + +<p>"It was the rule of the South to keep the people as ignorant as +possible, but my mother had a little advantage over some. The white +children learned her to read and write, and when freedom came she could +write her name and even scribble out a letter. She gave me my first +lesson, and I started to school in '67. The North sent teachers down +here after the war. They were government schools.</p> + +<p>"I was pretty apt in figgers—studied Bay's Arithmetic through the third +book. I was getting along in school, but I slipped away from my people +and was goin' to get a pocket full of money and then go back. First man +I worked for was a colored man and I kept his books for him and was to +get one-fourth of the crop. The first year he settled with me I had $165 +clear after I paid all my debts. I done very well. I farmed one more +year, then I come to Pine Bluff and did government work along the +Arkansas River.</p> + +<p>"I've done carpenter work and concrete work. I learned it by doing it. I +followed concrete work for a long time. I've hoped to build several +houses here in Pine Bluff and a lot of these streets.</p> + +<p>"I have a brother and sister who graduated from Fisk University.</p> + +<p>"I think one thing about the younger generation is they need to be more +educated in the way of manners and to have race pride and to be subject +to the laws."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PotterBob"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lacy<br> +Person interviewed: Bob Potter, Russellville, Arkansas<br> +Age: 65</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Sure, you oughter remember me—Bob Potter. Used to know you when you +was a boy passin' de house every day go in' down to de old Democrat +printin' office. Knowed yo' brother and all yo' folks. Knowed yo' pappy +mighty well. Is yo' ma and pa livin' now? No suh, I reckin not.</p> + +<p>"I was born de seventeenth of September, 1873 right here in +Russellville. Daddy's name was Dick, and mudder's was Ann Potter. Daddy +died before I was born, and I never seed him. Mudder's been dead about +eighteen years. Dey master was named Hale, and he lived up around Dover +somewheres on his farm, but I dunno how dey come by de name Potter. +Well, now, lemme see—oh, yes, dey was freed at Dover after dey come +dere from North Ca'liny. I think my ma was born in West Virginia, and +den dey went to North Ca'liny and den to South Ca'liny, and den come to +Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"I raised seven boys and lost five chillen. Dere was three girls and +nine boys. All dat's livin' is here except one in Fresno, California. My +old woman here, she tells fortunes for de white folks and belongs to de +Holiness church but I don't belong to none; I let her look after de +religion for de fambly." (Interjection from Mrs. Potter: "Yes suh, you +bet I belongs to de Holiness chu'ch. You got to walk in de light to be +saved, and if you do walk in de light you can't sin. I been saved for a +good many yeahs and am goin' on in de faith. Praise de Lawd!")</p> + +<p>"My mudder was sold once for a hundud dollahs and once ag'in for +thirty-eight hundud dollahs. Perhaps dis was jist before dey left West +Virginia and was shipped to North Ca'liny. De master put her upon a box, +she said, made her jump up and pop her heels together three times and +den turn around and pop her heels again to show how strong she was. She +sure was strong and a hard worker. She could cut wood, tote logs, plow, +hoe cotton, and do ever'thing on de place, and lived to be about +ninety-five yeahs old. Yas suh, she was as old or older dan Aunt Joan is +when she died.</p> + +<p>"No suh, I used to vote but I quit votin', for votin' never did git me +nothin'; I quit two yeahs ago. You see, my politics didn't suit em. +Maybe I shouldn't be tellin' you but I was a Socialist, and I was +runnin' a mine and wo'kin' fifteen men, and dey was all Socialists, and +de Republicans and Democrats sure put me out of business—dey put me to +de bad.</p> + +<p>"Dat was about twelve yeahs ago when I run de mine. I been tryin' to git +me a pension but maybe dat's one reason I can't git it. Oh yes, I owns +my home—dat is, I did own it, but——</p> + +<p>"Oh Lawd, yes, I knows a lot of dem old songs like 'Let Our Light +Shine,' and 'De Good Old Gospel Way,' and 'Hark From de Tomb.' Listen, +you oughter hear Elder Beam sing dat one. He's de pastor of de Baptis' +Chu'ch at Fort Smith. He can sure make it ring!</p> + +<p>"De young folks of today compa'ed to dem when we was boys? Huh! You jist +can't compaih em—can't be done. Why, a fo'-yeah-old young'un knows mo' +today dan our grandmammies knowed. And in dem days de boys and gals +could go out and play and swing togedder and behave deyselves. We went +in our shu'ttails and hit was all right; we had two shu'ts to weah—one +for every day and one for Sunday—and went in our shu'ttails both every +day and Sunday and was respected. And if you didn't behave you sure got +whupped. Dey didn't put dey arms around you and hug you and den put you +off to sleep. Dey whupped you, and it was real whuppin'.</p> + +<p>"Used to hear my mudder talk about de Ku Klux Klan puttin' cotton +between her toes and whuppin' her, and dat's de way dey done us +young'uns when we didn't behave. And we used to have manners den, both +whites and blacks. I wish times was like dem days, but dey's gone.</p> + +<p>"Yes, we used to have our tasks to do befo' goin' to bed. We'd have a +little basket of cotton and had to pick de seeds all out of dat cotton +befo' we went to bed. And we could all ca'd and spin—yes suh—make dat +old spinnin' wheel go Z-z-z-z as you walked back and fo'f a-drawin' out +de spool of ya'n. And you could weave cloth and make all yo' own +britches, too. (Here his wife interpolated a homely illustration of the +movement of "de shettle" in the loom weaving—ed.)</p> + +<p>"Yes, I mind my mudder tellin' many a time about dem Klan-men, and how +dey whupped white women to make em give up de money dey had hid, and how +dey used to burn dey feet. Yes suh, ain't no times like dem old days, +and I wish we had times like em now. Yes suh, I'll sure come to see you +in town one of dese days. Good mornin'."</p> +<br> +<p><b>NOTE:</b> Bob Potter is a most interesting Negro character—one of the +most genial personalities of the Old South that the interviewer has met +anywhere. His humor is infectious, his voice boisterous, but delightful, +and his uproarious laugh just such as one delights to listen to. And his +narrations seem to ring with veracity.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PrayerLouise"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Louise Prayer<br> + 3401 Short West Third, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 80</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I can member seein' the Yankees. My mother died when I was a baby and +my grandmother raised me. I'se goin' on eighty.</p> + +<p>"When the Yankees come we piled boxes and trunks in front of the doors +and windows. She'd say, 'You chillun get in the house; the Yankees are +comin'.' I didn't know what 'twas about—I sure didn't.</p> + +<p>"I'm honest in mind. You know the Yankees used to come in and whip the +folks. I know they come in and whipped my grandma and when they come in +we chillun went under the bed. Didn't know no better. Why did they whip +her? Oh my God, I don't know bout dat. You know when we chillun saw em +ridin' in a hurry we went in the house and under the bed. I specks +they'd a killed me if they come up to me cause they'd a scared me to +death.</p> + +<p>"We lived on the Williams' place. All belonged to the same people. They +give us plenty to eat such as 'twas. But in them days they fed the +chillun mostly on bread and syrup. Sometimes we had greens and +dumplin's. Jus' scald some meal and roll up in a ball and drop in with +the greens. Just a very few chickens we had. I don't love chicken +though. If I can jus' get the liver I'm through with the chicken.</p> + +<p>"When I got big enough my grandmother had me in the field. I went to +school a little bit but I didn't learn nothin'. Didn't go long enough. +That I didn't cause the old man had us in the field.</p> + +<p>"If we chillun in them days had had the sense these got now, I could +remember more bout things.</p> + +<p>"I was a young missy when I married.</p> + +<p>"I told you the best I could—that's all I know. I been treated pretty +good."</p> + +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 11544 ***</div> +</body> +</html> + + diff --git a/11544-h/images/025.jpg b/11544-h/images/025.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..4f4f9c1 --- /dev/null +++ b/11544-h/images/025.jpg diff --git a/11544-h/images/063.jpg b/11544-h/images/063.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..dfa89c4 --- /dev/null +++ b/11544-h/images/063.jpg diff --git a/11544-h/images/177.jpg b/11544-h/images/177.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..d937625 --- /dev/null +++ b/11544-h/images/177.jpg diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f45122a --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #11544 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/11544) diff --git a/old/11544-h.zip b/old/11544-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a1fcea8 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/11544-h.zip diff --git a/old/11544-h/11544-h.htm b/old/11544-h/11544-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7fb9fd5 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/11544-h/11544-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,11379 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"> +<title>Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers' Project, 1936-1938: +Arkansas Narratives, Volume II, Part 5</title> +<meta name="author" content="Federal Writers' Project"> +</head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery +in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves, by Work Projects Administration + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves + Arkansas Narratives, Part 5 + +Author: Work Projects Administration + +Release Date: March 11, 2004 [EBook #11544] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SLAVE NARRATIVES *** + + + + +Produced by Andrea Ball and PG Distributed Proofreaders. Produced from +images provided by the Library of Congress, Manuscript Division. + + + + + + +</pre> + + + + +<p>[TR: ***] = Transcriber Note</p> +<p>[HW: ***] = Handwritten Note</p> + +<hr style="width: 65%;"><br><br> + + +<h1>SLAVE NARRATIVES</h1> +<br> + +<h2><i>A Folk History of Slavery in the United States<br> +From Interviews with Former Slaves</i></h2> +<br> + +<h4>TYPEWRITTEN RECORDS PREPARED BY<br> +THE FEDERAL WRITERS' PROJECT<br> +1936-1938<br> +ASSEMBLED BY<br> +THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS PROJECT<br> +WORK PROJECTS ADMINISTRATION<br> +FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA<br> +SPONSORED BY THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS</h4> +<br> +<br> + +<p>WASHINGTON 1941</p> +<br><br><br> + +<h2>VOLUME II</h2> + +<h2>ARKANSAS NARRATIVES</h2> + +<h2>PART 5</h2> + + +<h3>Prepared by<br> +the Federal Writers' Project of<br> +the Works Progress Administration<br> +for the State of Arkansas +</h3> +<br><br><br> + +<h2>INFORMANTS</h2> + +<a href="#McClendonCharlie">McClendon, Charlie</a><br> +<a href="#McCloudLizzie">McCloud, Lizzie</a><br> +<a href="#McCloudLizzie2">McCloud, Lizzie</a> + [TR: second interview]<br> +<a href="#McConicoAvelina">McConico, Avalena</a><br> +<a href="#McCoyIke">McCoy, Ike</a><br> +<a href="#McDanielRichardH">McDaniel, Richard H.</a><br> +<a href="#McIntoshWaters">McIntosh, Waters</a><br> +<a href="#MackCresa">Mack, Cresa</a><br> +<a href="#McKinneyWarren">McKinney, Warren</a> + [TR: interview]<br> +<a href="#McKinneyWarren2">McKinney, Warren</a> + [TR: story]<br> +<a href="#McMullenVictoria">McMullen, Victoria</a><br> +<a href="#MaddenNannieP">Madden, Nannie P.</a><br> +<a href="#MaddenPerry">Madden, Perry</a><br> +<a href="#MannLewis">Mann, Lewis</a><br> +<a href="#MartinAngeline">Martin, Angeline</a><br> +<a href="#MartinJosie">Martin, Josie</a><br> +<a href="#MathisBeth">Mathis, Bess</a><br> +<a href="#MatthewsCaroline">Matthews, Caroline</a><br> +<a href="#MaxwellMalindy">Maxwell, Malindy</a><br> +<a href="#MaxwellNellie">Maxwell, Nellie</a><br> +<a href="#MayAnn">May, Ann</a><br> +<a href="#MayesJoe">Mayes, Joe</a><br> +<a href="#MeeksJesse">Meeks, Rev. Jesse</a> + [TR: interview]<br> +<a href="#MeeksJesse2">Meeks, Rev. Jesse</a> + [TR: story]<br> +<a href="#MetcalfJeff">Metcalf, Jeff</a><br> +<a href="#MillerHardy">Miller, Hardy</a><br> +<a href="#MillerHK">Miller, H.K. (Henry Kirk)</a><br> +<a href="#MillerHenryKirk">Miller, Henry Kirk</a> + [TR: second interview]<br> +<a href="#MillerMatilda">Miller, Matilda</a><br> +<a href="#MillerNathan">Miller, Nathan</a><br> +<a href="#MillerSam">Miller, Sam</a><br> +<a href="#MillerWD">Miller, W.D.</a><br> +<a href="#MinserMose">Minser, Mose</a><br> +<a href="#MintonGip">Minton, Gip</a><br> +<a href="#MitchellAJ">Mitchell, A.J.</a><br> +<a href="#MitchellGracie">Mitchell, Gracie</a><br> +<a href="#MitchellHettie">Mitchell, Hettie</a><br> +<a href="#MitchellMary">Mitchell, Mary</a><br> +<a href="#MitchellMoses">Mitchell, Moses</a><br> +<a href="#MoonBen">Moon, Ben</a><br> +<a href="#MooreEmma">Moore, Emma</a><br> +<a href="#MoorePatsy">Moore, Patsy</a><br> +<a href="#MooreheadAda">Moorehead, Ada</a><br> +<a href="#MooremanMaryJane">Mooreman, Mary Jane (Mattie)</a><br> +<a href="#MorganEvelina">Morgan, Evelina</a><br> +<a href="#MorganJames">Morgan, James</a><br> +<a href="#MorganOlivia">Morgan, Olivia</a><br> +<a href="#MorganTom">Morgan, Tom</a><br> +<a href="#MorrisCharity">Morris, Charity</a><br> +<a href="#MorrisEmma">Morris, Emma</a><br> +<a href="#MossClaiborne">Moss, Claiborne</a><br> +<a href="#MossFrozie">Moss, Frozie</a><br> +<a href="#MossMose">Moss, Mose</a><br> +<a href="#MullinsSO">Mullins, S.O.</a><br> +<a href="#MurdockAlex">Murdock, Alex</a><br> +<a href="#MyersBessie">Myers, Bessie</a><br> +<a href="#MyhandMary">Myhand, Mary</a><br> +<a href="#MyraxGriffin">Myrax, Griffin</a><br> +<br><br> +<a href="#NealTomWylie">Neal, Tom Wylie</a><br> +<a href="#NealySally">Nealy (Neely), Sally</a> + [TR: interview]<br> +<a href="#NeelySally">Neely, Sally</a> + [TR: songs]<br> +<a href="#NealyWylie">Nealy, Wylie</a><br> +<a href="#NelandEmaline">Neland, Emaline</a><br> +<a href="#NelsonHenry">Nelson, Henry</a><br> +<a href="#NelsonHenry2">Nelson, Henry</a> + [TR: second interview]<br> +<a href="#NelsonIran">Nelson, Iran</a><br> +<a href="#NelsonJamesHenry">Nelson, James Henry</a><br> +<a href="#NelsonJohn">Nelson, John</a><br> +<a href="#NelsonLettie">Nelson, Lettie</a><br> +<a href="#NelsonMattie">Nelson, Mattie</a><br> +<a href="#NewbornDan">Newborn, Dan</a><br> +<a href="#NewsomSallie">Newsom, Sallie</a><br> +<a href="#NewtonPete">Newton, Pete</a><br> +<a href="#NorrisCharlie">Norris, Charlie</a><br> +<br><br> +<a href="#OatsEmma">Oats, Emma</a><br> +<a href="#OdomHelen">Odom, Helen</a> + [TR: and Sarah Odom]<br> +<a href="#OliverJane">Oliver, Jane</a><br> +<a href="#OsborneIvory">Osborne, Ivory</a><br> +<a href="#OsbrookJane">Osbrook, Jane</a><br> +<br><br> +<a href="#PageAnnie">Page, Annie</a><br> +<a href="#PageAnnie2">Page, Annie</a> + [TR: second interview]<br> +<a href="#PageAnnie3">Page, Annie</a> + [TR: stories]<br> +<a href="#ParkerFannie">Parker, Fannie</a><br> +<a href="#ParkerJM">Parker, J.M.</a><br> +<a href="#ParkerJudy">Parker, Judy</a><br> +<a href="#ParkerRF">Parker, R.F.</a><br> +<a href="#ParksAnnie">Parks, Annie</a><br> +<a href="#ParnellAustinPen">Parnell, Austin Pen</a><br> +<a href="#ParrBen">Parr, Ben</a><br> +<a href="#PattersonFrankA">Patterson, Frank A.</a><br> +<a href="#PattersonJohn">Patterson, John</a><br> +<a href="#PattersonSarahJane">Patterson, Sarah Jane</a><br> +<a href="#PattilloSolomonP">Pattillo, Solomon P.</a><br> +<a href="#PattonCarryAllen">Patton, Carry Allen</a><br> +<a href="#PayneHarriettMcFarlin">Payne, Harriett McFarlin</a><br> +<a href="#PayneJohn">Payne, John</a><br> +<a href="#PayneLarkin">Payne, Larkin</a><br> +<a href="#PerkinsCella">Perkins, Cella</a><br> +<a href="#PerkinsMaggie">Perkins, Marguerite (Maggie</a>) + [TR: story]<br> +<a href="#PerkinsMarguerite">Perkins, Marguerite</a> + [TR: interview]<br> +<a href="#PerkinsRachel">Perkins, Rachel</a><br> +<a href="#PerryDinah">Perry, Dinah</a><br> +<a href="#PerryDinah2">Perry, Dinah</a> + [TR: second interview]<br> +<a href="#PetersAlfred">Peters, Alfred</a><br> +<a href="#PetersMaryEstes">Peters, Mary Estes</a><br> +<a href="#PetersonJohn">Peterson, John</a><br> +<a href="#PettisLouise">Pettis, Louise</a><br> +<a href="#PettusHenryC">Pettus, Henry C.</a><br> +<a href="#PhillipsDolly">Phillips, Dolly</a><br> +<a href="#PiggyTony">Piggy, Tony</a><br> +<a href="#PittmanElla">Pittman, Ella</a><br> +<a href="#PittmanElla2">Pittman, Ella</a> + [TR: second interview]<br> +<a href="#PittmanSarah">Pittman, Sarah</a><br> +<a href="#PoeMary">Poe, Mary</a><br> +<a href="#PollacksWL">Pollacks, W.L.</a><br> +<a href="#PopeJohn">Pope, John (Doc)</a><br> +<a href="#PorterWilliam">Porter, William</a><br> +<a href="#PotterBob">Potter, Bob</a><br> +<a href="#PrayerLouise">Prayer, Louise</a><br> + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McClendonCharlie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Charlie McClendon<br> + 708 E. Fourth Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 77</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I don't know exactly how old I am. I was six or seven when the war +ended. I member dis—my mother said I was born on Christmas day. Old +master was goin' to war and he told her to take good care of that +boy—he was goin' to make a fine little man.</p> + +<p>"Did I live up to it? I reckon I was bout as smart a man as you could +jump up. The work didn't get too hard for <u>me</u>. I farmed and I +sawmilled a lot. Most of my time was farmin'.</p> + +<p>"I been in Jefferson County all my life. I went to school three or four +sessions.</p> + +<p>"About the war, I member dis—I member they carried us to Camden and I +saw the guards. I'd say, 'Give me a pistol.' They'd say, 'Come back +tomorrow and we'll give you one.' They had me runnin' back there every +day and I never did get one. They was Yankee soldiers.</p> + +<p>"Our folks' master was William E. Johnson. Oh Lord, they was just as +good to us as could be to be under slavery.</p> + +<p>"After they got free my people stayed there a year or two and then our +master broke up and went back to South Carolina and the folks went in +different directions. Oh Lord, my parents sho was well treated. Yes +ma'm. If he had a overseer, he wouldn't low him to whip the folks. He'd +say, 'Just leave em till I come home.' Then he'd give em a light +breshin'.</p> + +<p>"My father run off and stay in the woods one or two months. Old master +say, 'Now, Jordan, why you run off? Now I'm goin' to give you a light +breshin' and don't you run off again.' But he'd run off again after +awhile.</p> + +<p>"He had one man named Miles Johnson just stayed in the woods so he put +him on the block and sold him.</p> + +<p>"I seed the Ku Klux. We colored folks had to make it here to Pine Bluff +to the county band. If the Rebels kotch you, you was dead.</p> + +<p>"Oh Lord yes, I voted. I voted the Publican ticket, they called it. You +know they had this Australia ballot. You was sposed to go in the caboose +and vote. They like to scared me to death one time. I had a description +of the man I wanted to vote for in my pocket and I was lookin' at it so +I'd be sure to vote for the right man and they caught me. They said, +'What you doin' there? We're goin' to turn you over to the sheriff after +election!' They had me scared to death. I hid out for a long time till I +seed they wasn't goin' to do nothin'.</p> + +<p>"My wife's brother was one of the judges of the election. Some of the +other colored folks was constables and magistrates—some of em are +now—down in the country.</p> + +<p>"I knew a lot about things but I knew I was in the United States and had +to bow to the law. There was the compromise they give the colored +folks—half of the offices and then they got em out afterwards. John M. +Clayton was runnin' for the senate and say he goin' to see the colored +people had equal rights, but they killed him as he was gwine through the +country speakin'.</p> + +<p>"The white people have treated me very well but they don't pay us +enough for our work—just enough to live on and hardly that. I can say +with a clear conscience that if it hadn't been for this relief, I don't +know what I'd do—I'm not able to work. I'm proud that God Almighty put +the spirit in the man (Roosevelt) to help us."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McCloudLizzie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Lizzie McCloud<br> + 1203 Short 13th Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 120?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was one of 'em bless your heart. Yes ma'm, Yes ma'm, I wouldn't tell +you a lie 'bout that. If I can't tell you the truth I'm not goin' tell +you nothin'!</p> + +<p>"Oh yes, I was a young lady in slavery times—bred and born in +Tennessee. Miss Lizzie and Marse John Williams—I belonged to them—sho +did! I was scared to death of the white folks. Miss Lizzie—she mean as +the devil. She wouldn't step her foot on the ground, she so rich. No +ma'm wouldn't put her foot on the ground. Have her carriage drive up to +the door and have that silk carpet put down for her to walk on. Yes +Lord. Wouldn't half feed us and they went and named me after her.</p> + +<p>"I know all about the stars fallin'. I was out in the field and just +come in to get our dinner. Got so dark and the stars begin to play +aroun'. Mistress say, 'Lizzie, it's the judgment.' She was just a +hollerin'. Yes ma'm I was a young woman. I been here a long time, yes +ma'm, I been here a long time. Worked and whipped, too. I run off many a +time. Run off to see my mammy three or four miles from where I was.</p> + +<p>"I never was sold but they took we young women and brought us down in +the country to another plantation where they raised corn, wheat, and +hay. Overseer whipped us too. Marse John had a brother named Marse +Andrew and he was a good man. He'd say to the overseer, 'Now don't whip +these girls so much, they can't work.' Oh, he was a good man. Oh, white +folks was the devil in slavery tines. I was scared to death of 'em. +They'd have these long cow hide whips. Honey, I was treated bad. I seen +a time in this world.</p> + +<p>"Oh Lord, yes, that was long 'fore the war. I was right down on my +master's place when it started. They said it was to free the niggers. Oh +Lord, we was right under it in Davidson County where I come from. Oh +Lord, yes, I knowed all about when the war started. I'se a young woman, +a young woman. We was treated just like dogs and hogs. We seed a hard +time—I know what I'm talkin' about.</p> + +<p>"Oh God, I seed the Yankees. I saw it all. We was so scared we run under +the house and the Yankees called 'Come out Dinah' (didn't call none of +us anything but Dinah). They said 'Dinah, we're fightin' to free you and +get you out from under bondage.' I sure understood that but I didn't +have no better sense than to go back to mistress.</p> + +<p>"Oh Lord, yes, I seed the Ku Klux. They didn't bother me cause I didn't +stay where they could; I was way under the house.</p> + +<p>"Yankees burned up everything Marse John had. I looked up the pike and +seed the Yankees a coming'. They say 'We's a fightin' for you, Dinah!' +Yankees walked in, chile, just walked right in on us. I tell you I've +seed a time. You talkin' 'bout war—you better wish no more war come. I +know when the war started. The Secessors on this side and the Yankees on +that side. Yes, Miss, I seen enough. My brother went and jined the +Secessors and they killed him time he got in the war.</p> + +<p>"No, Missy, I never went to no school. White folks never learned me +nothin'. I believes in tellin' white folks the truth.</p> + +<p>"White folks didn't 'low us to marry so I never married till I come to +Arkansas and that was one year after surrender.</p> + +<p>"First place I landed on was John Clayton's place. Mr. John Clayton was +a Yankee and he was good to us. We worked in the field and stayed there +two years. I been all up and down the river and oh Lord, I had a good +time after I was free. I been treated right since I was free. My color +is good to me and the white folks, too. I ain't goin' to tell only the +truth. Uncle Sam goin' send me 'cross the water if I don't tell the +truth. Better <u>not fool</u> with dat man!"</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McCloudLizzie2"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Lizzie McCloud<br> + 1203 E. Short 13th Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 103</h3> +<p>[TR: Appears to be same as previous informant despite age discrepancy.]</p> +<br> + +<p>"Well, where you been? I been wonderin' 'bout you. Yes Lawd. You sure is +lookin' fine.</p> + +<p>"Yes, honey, I was bred and bawn in Davidson County, Tennessee. Come +here one year after surrender.</p> + +<p>"My daughter there was a baby jus' sittin' alone, now, sittin' alone +when I come here to this Arkansas. I know what I'm talkin' about.</p> + +<p>"Lizzie Williams, my old missis, was rich as cream. Yes Lawd! I know all +about it 'cause I worked for 'em.</p> + +<p>"I was a young missis when the War started. I was workin' for my owners +then. I knowed when they was free—when they said they was free.</p> + +<p>"The Yankees wouldn't call any of the colored women anything but Dinah. +I didn't know who they was till they told us. Said, 'Dinah, we's comin' +to free you.'</p> + +<p>"The white folks didn't try to scare us 'bout the Yankees 'cause they +was too scared theirselves. Them Yankees wasn't playin'; they was +fitin'. Yes, Jesus!</p> + +<p>"Had to work hard—and whipped too. Wasn't played with. Mars Andrew come +in the field a heap a times and say, 'Don't whip them women so hard, +they can't work.' I thought a heap of Mars Andrew.</p> + +<p>"I used to see the Yankees ridin' hosses and them breastplates a +shining'. Yes Lawd. I'd run and they'd say, 'Dinah, we ain't gwine hurt +you.' Lawd, them Yankees didn't care for nothin'. Oh, they was fine.</p> + +<p>"My husband was a soldier—a Yankee. Yes ma'am. They sends me thirty +dollars every month, before the fourth. Postman brings it right to me +here at the house. They treats me nice.</p> + +<p>"When I come here, I landed on John Clayton's place. He was a Yankee and +he was a good white man too.</p> + +<p>"I'm the onliest one left now in my family."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McConicoAvelina"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Irene Robertson<br> +Person Interviewed: Avalena McConico<br> + on the [---- ----] west of Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 40[?]</h3> +<p>[TR: Much of this interview smeared and difficult to decipher; +illegible words indicated by [----], questionable words followed by [?].]</p> +<br> + +<p>"Grandma was a slave woman. Her name was Emma Harper. She was born in +Chesterville, Mississippi. Her young master was Jim and Miss Corrie +Burton. The old man was John Burton. I aimed[?] to see them once. I +seen both Miss Corrie and Mr. Jim. My grandparents was never sold. They +left out after freedom. They stayed there a long time but they left.</p> + +<p>"The first of the War was like dis: Our related folks was having a +dance. The Yankees come in and was dancing. Some "fry boys" [---- +----] them. The next day they were all in the field and heard something. +They went to the house and told the white folks there was [----] a +fire. They heard it. [----] he [----] about. Master told them it +was war. Miss Burton was crying. They heard about [----] in [----] at Harrisburg where they could hear the shooting.</p> + +<p>"They put the slaves to digging. They dug two weeks. They buried their +meat and money and a whole heap of things. They never found it. A little +white,[?] Mollita[?], was out where they were digging. She went +in the house. She said, Mama, is the devil coming? They said he was." +Master had them come to him. He questioned them. They told him they got +so tired [----] of them said he [----] he [---- ----] the +[----] Yankees come he'd tell them where all this was, but he was +just talking. But when the Yankees did come they was so scared they +never got close to a Yankee. They was scared to death. They never found +the meat and money. They [----] and cut the turkeys' heads off and +the turkey fell off the rail fence, the head drop on one side and the +body on the other. They milked a cow and cut both hind quarters off and +leave the rest of the cow there and the cow not dead yet.</p> + +<p>"Mr. South[?] Strange at Chesterville, Mississippi had a pony named +Zane. The Yankees hemmed him and four more men in at Malone Creek and +killed the four men. Zane rared up on hind legs and went up a steep +cliff and ran three miles. Mr. Strange's coat was cut off from him. It +was a gray coat. Mr. Strange was a white man.</p> + +<p>"Uncle Frank Jones was forty years old when they gathered him up out of +the woods and put him in the battle lines. All the runaway black folks +in the woods was hunted out and put in the Yankee lines. Uncle Frank +lived in a cave up till about then. His master made him mean. He got +better as he got old. His master would sell him and tell him to run away +and come back to his cave. He'd feed him. He never worked and he went up +for his provisions. He was sold over and over and over. His master +learnt him in books and to how to cuss. He learnt him how to trick the +dogs and tap trees like a coon. At the end of the trail the dogs would +turn on the huntsman. Uncle Frank was active when he was old. He was +hired out to race other boys sometimes. He never wore glasses. He could +see well when he was old. He told me he was raised out from England, +Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"When freedom was told 'em Uncle Frank said all them in the camps +hollered and danced, and marched and sung. They was so glad the War was +done and so glad they been freed.</p> + +<p>"Grandma was sold in South Carolina to Mississippi and sold again to Dr. +Shelton. Now that was my father's father and mother. She said they rode +and walked all the way. They came on ox wagons. She said on the way +they passed some children. They was playing. A little white boy was up +in a persimmon tree settin' on a limb eating persimmons. He was so +pretty and clean. Grandma says, 'You think you is some pumpkin, don't +you, honey child.' He says, 'Some pumpkin and some 'simmon too.' Grandma +was a house girl. She got to keep her baby and brought him. He was my +father. Uncle was born later. Then they was freed. Grandma lived to be +ninety-five years old. Mrs. Dolphy Wooly and Mrs. Shelton was her young +mistresses. They kept her till she died. They kept her well.</p> + +<p>"Grandma told us about freedom. She was hired out to the Browns to make +sausage and dry out lard. Five girls was in the field burning brush. +They was white girls—Mrs. Brown's girls. They come to the house and +said some Blue Coats come by and said, 'You free.' They told them back, +'That's no news, we was born free.' Grandma said that night she melted +pewter and made dots on her best dress. It was shiny. She wore it home +next day 'cause she was free, and she never left from about her own +white folks till she died and left them.</p> + +<p>"Times seem very good on black folks till hard cold winter and spring +come, then times is mighty, mighty bad. It is so hard to keep warm fires +and enough to eat. Times have been good. Black folks in the young +generation need more heart training and less book learning. Times is so +fast the young set is too greedy. They is wasteful too. Some is hard +workers and tries to live right.</p> + +<p>"I wash and irons and keep a woman's little chile so she can work. I +owns my home."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McCoyIke"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Irene Robertson<br> +Person Interviewed: Ike McCoy, Biscoe, Arkansas<br> +Age: 65</h3> +<p>[TR: Illegible words indicated by [----], questionable words followed by [?].]</p> +<br> + +<p>"My parents named Harriett and Isaac McCoy. Far as I knew they was +natives of North Kaline (Carolina). He was a farmer. He raised corn and +cabbage, a little corn and wheat. He had tasks at night in winter I +heard him say. She muster just done anything. She knit for us here in +the last few years. She died several years ago. Now my oldest sister was +born in slavery. I was next but I came way after slavery.</p> + +<p>"In war time McCoys hid their horses in the woods. The Yankees found +them and took all the best ones and left their [----] (nags). Old +boss man McCoy hid in the closet and locked himself up. The +Yankees found him, broke in on him and took him out and they nearly +killed him beating him so bad. He told all of 'em on the place he was +going off. They wore him out. He didn't live long after that.</p> + +<p>"Things got lax. I heard her say one man sold all his slaves. The War +broke out. They run away and went back to him. She'd see 'em pass going +back home. They been sold and wouldn't stay. Folks got to running off to +war. They thought it look like a frolic. I heard some of them say they +wish they hadn't gone off to war 'fore it was done. Niggers didn't know +that[?] war no freedom was 'ceptin' the Yankees come tell them +something and then they couldn't understand how it all be. Black folks +was mighty ignant then. They is now for that matter. They look to white +folks for right kind of doings[?].</p> + +<p>"Ma said every now and then see somebody going back to that man tried +to get rid of them. They traveled by night and beg along from black +folks. In daytime they would stay in the woods so the pettyrollers +wouldn't run up on them. The pettyrollers would whoop 'em if they catch +'em.</p> + +<p>"Ma told about one day the Yankees come and made the white women came +help the nigger women cook up a big dinner. Ma was scared so bad she +couldn't see nothing she wanted. She said there was no talking. They was +too scared to say a word. They sot the table and never a one of them +told 'em it was ready.</p> + +<p>"She said biscuits so scarce after the War they took 'em 'round in their +pockets to nibble on they taste so good.</p> + +<p>"I was eighteen years old when pa and ma took the notion to come out +here. All of us come but one sister had married, and pa and one brother +had a little difference. Pa had children ma didn't have. They went +together way after slavery. We got transportation to Memphis by train +and took a steamboat to Pillowmount. That close to Forrest City. Later +on I come to Biscoe. They finally come too.</p> + +<p>"I been pretty independent all my life till I getting so feeble. I work +a sight now. I'm making boards to kiver my house out at the lot now. I +goiner get somebody to kiver it soon as I get my boards made.</p> + +<p>"We don't get no PWA aid 'ceptin' for two orphant babies we got. They +are my wife's sister's little boys.</p> + +<p>"Well sir-ree, folks could do if the young ones would. Young folks don't +have no consideration for the old wore-out parents. They dance and drink +it bodaciously out on Saturday ebening and about till Sunday night. I +may be wrong but I sees it thater way. Whan we get old we get helpless. +I'm getting feebler every year. I see that. Times goiner be hard ag'in +this winter and next spring. Money is scarce now for summer time and +craps laid by. I feels that my own self now. Every winter times get +tough."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McDanielRichardH"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Richard H. McDaniel, Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 73</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Newton County, Mississippi the first year of the +surrender. I don't think my mother was sold and I know my father was +never sold. Jim McDaniel raised my father and one sister after his +mother died. One sister was married when she died. I heard him say when +he got mad he would quit work. He said old master wouldn't let the +mistress whoop him and she wouldn't let him whoop my father. My father +was a black man but my mother was light. Her father was a white man and +her mother part Indian and white mixed, so what am I? My mother was +owned by people named Wash. Dick Wash was her young master. My parents' +names was Willis and Elsie McDaniel. When it was freedom I heard them +say Moster McDaniel told them they was free. He was broke. If they could +do better go on, he didn't blame them, he couldn't promise them much +now. They moved off on another man's place to share crop. They had to +work as hard and didn't have no more than they had in slavery. That is +what they told me. They could move around and visit around without +asking. They said it didn't lighten the work none but it lightened the +rations right smart. Moster McDaniel nor my father neither one went to +war.</p> + +<p>"From the way I always heard it, the Ku Klux was the law like night +watchman. When I was a boy there was a lot of stealing and bushwhacking. +Folks meet you out and kill you, rob you, whoop you. A few of the black +men wouldn't work and wanted to steal. That Ku Klux was the law watching +around. Folks was scared of em. I did see them. I would run hide.</p> + +<p>"I farmed up till 1929. Then I been doing jobs. I worked on relief till +they turned me off, said I was too old to work but they won't give me +the pension. I been trying to figure out what I am to do. Lady, could +you tell me? Work at jobs when I can get them.</p> + +<p>"I allus been voting till late years. If they let some folks vote in the +first lection, they would be putting in somebody got no business in the +gover'ment. All the fault I see in white folks running the gover'ment is +we colored folks ain't got work we can do all the time to live on. I +thought all the white folks had jobs what wanted jobs. The conditions is +hard for old men like me. I pay $3 for a house every month. It is a cold +house.</p> + +<p>"This present generation is living a fast life. What all don't they do?"</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McIntoshWaters"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Waters McIntosh<br> + 1900 Howard Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 76</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born July 4, 1862 at 2:08 in the morning at Lynchburg, Sumter +County, South Carolina.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Parents</b></p> + +<p>"My mother was named Lucy Sanders. My father was named Sumter Durant. +Our owner was Dr. J.M. Sanders, the son of Mr. Bartlett Sanders. Sumter +Durant was a white man. My mother was fourteen years old when I was born +I was her second child. Durant was in the Confederate army and was +killed during the War in the same year I was born, and before my birth.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Sold</b></p> + +<p>"When I was a year old, my mother was sold for $1500 in gold, and I was +sold for $500 in gold to William Carter who lived about five miles south +of Cartersville. The payment was made in fine gold. I was sold because +my folk realized that freedom was coming and they wanted to obtain the +cash value of their slaves.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Name</b></p> + +<p>"My name is spelled 'Waters' but it is pronounced 'Waiters.' When I was +born, I was thought to be a very likely child and it was proposed that I +should be a waiter. Therefore I was called Waters (but it was pronounced +Waiters). They did not spell it w-a-i-t-e-r-s, but they pronounced it +that way.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>How Freedom Came</b></p> + +<p>"My mother said that they had been waiting a long time to hear what had +become of the War, perhaps one or two weeks. One day when they were in +the field moulding corn, going round the corn hoeing it and putting a +little hill around it, the conk sounded at about eleven o'clock, and +they knew that the long expected time had come. They dropped their hoes +and went to the big house. They went around to the back where the master +always met the servants and he said to them, 'You are all free, free as +I am. You can go or come as you please. I want you to stay. If you will +stay, I will give you half the crop.' That was the beginning of the +share cropping system.</p> + +<p>"My mother came at once to the quarters, and when she found me she +pulled the end out of a corn sack, stuck holes on the sides, put a cord +through the top, pulled out the end, put it on me, put on the only dress +she had, and made it back to the old home (her first master's folk).</p> +<br> + +<p><b>What the Slaves Expected</b></p> + +<p>"When the slaves were freed, they got what they expected. They were glad +to get it and get away with it, and that was what mother and them did.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Slave Time Preaching</b></p> + +<p>"One time when an old white man come along who wanted to preach, the +white people gave him a chance to preach to the niggers. The substance +of his sermon was this:</p> + +<p>"'Now when you servants are working for your masters, you must be +honest. When you go to the mill, don't carry along an extra sack and put +some of the meal or the flour in for yourself. And when you women are +cooking in the big house, don't make a big pocket under your dress and +put a sack of coffee and a sack of sugar and other things you want in +it."</p> + +<p>"They took him out and hanged him for corrupting the morals of the +slaves.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Conditions After the War</b></p> + +<p>"Immediately after the War, there was a great scarcity of food. Neither +Negroes nor white folk had anything to eat. The few white people who did +have something wouldn't let it be known. My grandmother who was +sixty-five years old and one of the old and respected inhabitants of +that time went out to find something for us to eat. A white woman named +Mrs. Burton gave her a sack of meal and told her not to tell anybody +where she got it.</p> + +<p>"My grandmother brought the meal home and cooked it in a large skillet +in a big cake. When it got done, she cut it into slices in the way you +would cut up a pie and divided it among us. That all we had to eat.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>House</b></p> + +<p>"The white people in those days built their houses back from the front. +In South Carolina, there were lots of farms that had four to twelve +thousand acres. From what mother told me, Master Bill's place set back +from the road. Then there was a great square place they called the yard. +A fence divided the house and the yard adjoining it from that part of +the grounds which held the barn. The yard in front and back of the house +held a grove.</p> + +<img src="images/025.jpg" align="left" width="140" height="116" + alt="plot of the square"> + +<p>The square around the house and the Negro quarters were all enclosed so +that the little slaves could not get out while parents were at work. The +Negroes assembled on the porch when the gong called them in the morning. +The boss gave orders from the porch. There was an open space between the +quarters and the court (where the little slaves played). There was a +gate between the court and the big house.</p> + +<p>"On the rear of the house, there was a porch from which the boss gave +orders usually about four o'clock in the morning and at which they would +disband in the evening between nine and ten—no certain time but more or +less not earlier than nine and not often later than ten. Back of the +house and beyond it was a fence extending clear across the yard. In one +corner of this fence was a gate leading into the court. Leading out of +the court was an opening surrounded by a semi-circular fence which +enclosed the Negro quarters.</p> + +<p>"The cabins were usually built on the ground—no floors. The roofs were +covered with clapboards.</p> + +<p>"When I was a boy we used to sing, 'Rather be a nigger than a poor white +man.' Even in slavery they used to sing that. It was the poor white man +who was freed by the War, not the Negroes.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Furniture</b></p> + +<p>"There wasn't any furniture. Beds were built with one post out and the +other three <u>sides</u> fastened to the sides of the house.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Marrying Time</b></p> + +<p>"I remember one night the people were gone to marry. That was when all +the people in the community married immediately after slavery.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Ghosts</b></p> + +<p>"We had an open fireplace. That was at Bartlett Sanders' place. He had +close on to three thousand acres. Every grown person had gone to the +marrying, and I was at home in the bed I just described.</p> + +<p>"My grandfather's mother[HW: ?] had a chair and that was hers only. She +was named Senia and was about eighty years old. We burned nothing but +pine knots in the hearth. You would put one or two of those on the fire +and they would burn for hours. We were all in bed and had been for an +hour or two. There were some others sleeping in the same room. There +came a peculiar knocking on grandmother's[HW: great grandmother?] chair. +It's hard to describe it. It was something like the distant beating of a +drum. Grandmother was dead, of course. The boys got up and ran out and +brought in some of the hands. When they came in, a little thing about +three and a half feet high with legs about six or eight inches long ran +out of the room.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Ku Klux Klan</b></p> + +<p>"Whenever there was a man of influence, they terrorized him. They were +at their height about the time of Grant's election. Many a time my +mother and I have watched them pass our door. They wore gowns and some +kind of helmet. They would be going to catch same leading Negro and whip +him. There was scarcely a night they couldn't take a leading Negro out +and whip him if they would catch him alone. On that account, the Negro +men did not stay at home in Sumter County, South Carolina at night. +They left home and stayed together. The Ku Klux very seldom interfered +with a woman or a child.</p> + +<p>"They often scared colored people by drinking large quantities of water. +They had something that held a lot of water, and when they would raise +the bucket to their mouths to drink, they would slip the water into it.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>White Caps</b></p> + +<p>"The white caps operated further to the northwest of where I lived. I +never came in contact with them. They were not the same thing as the Ku +Klux.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Voting</b></p> + +<p>"In South Carolina under the Reconstruction, we voted right along. In +1868 there were soldiers at all of the election places to see that you +did vote.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Career Since the War</b></p> + +<p>"In 1881 I married. The year after that, in '83,[HW: ?] I merchandised a +little. Then I got converted. I got it in my head that it was wrong to +take big profits from business, so I sold out. Then I was asked to +assist the keeper of the jail.</p> + +<p>"In 1888 I went to school for the first time. I was then twenty-six +years old. By the end of the first term, I knew all that the teacher +could teach, so he sent me to Claflin University. I left there in the +third year normal.</p> + +<p>"When I returned home, I taught school, at first in a private school and +later in a public school for $15 a month.</p> + +<p>"A man named Boyle told me that he had some ground to sell. I saved up +$45, the price he asked for it. When I offered it to him, he said that +he had decided not to sell it. I went to town and spent my $45. A few +days later, he met me and offered me the place again. I told him I had +spent my money. He then offered it to me on time. There was plenty of +timber on the place, so I got some contracts with a man named Roland and +delivered wood to him. When I went to collect the money, he said he +would not pay me in money.</p> + +<p>"A man named Pennington offered me 20¢ a day for labor. I asked if he +would pay in money.</p> + +<p>"He replied, 'If you're looking for money, don't come.'</p> + +<p>"I went home and said to my wife, 'I am going to leave here.'</p> + +<p>"I came to Forrest City, Arkansas January 28, 1888. I farmed in Forrest +City, making one crop, and then I entered the ministry, and then I +preached at Spring Park for two years.</p> + +<p>"Then I entered Philander Smith College where I stayed from 1891-1897. I +preached from the time I left Philander until 1913.</p> + +<p>"Then I studied law and completed the American Correspondence course in +Law when I was fifty years old. I am still practicing.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Wife and Family</b></p> + +<p>"In 1897, when I graduated from Philander, my wife and six children were +sitting on the front seat.</p> + +<p>"I have eleven sons and daughters, of whom six are living. I had seven +brothers and sisters.</p> + +<p>"My wife and I have been married fifty-six years. I had to steal her +away from her parents, and she has never regretted coming to me nor I +taking her."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>"Brother Mack" as he is familiarly and affectionately known to his +friends is a man keen and vigorous, mentally and physically. He attends +Sunday school, church both in the morning and evening, and all +departments of the Epworth League. He takes the Epworth Herald, the +Southwestern Christian Advocate, the Literary Digest, some poultry and +farm magazines, the Arkansas Gazette, and the St. Louis Democrat, and +several other journals. He is on omnivorous reader and a clear thinker. +He raises chickens and goats and plants a garden as avocations. He has +on invincible reputation for honesty as well as for thrift and thought.</p> + +<p>Nothing is pleasanter than to view the relationship between him and his +wife. They have been married fifty-six years and seem to have achieved a +perfect understanding. She is an excellent cook and is devoted to her +home. She attends church regularly. Seems to be four or five years +younger than her husband. Like him, however, she seems to enjoy +excellent health.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MackCresa"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Cresa Mack<br> + 1417 Short Indiana St., Pine Bluff, Ark.<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I can tell you something about slavery days. I was born at South Bend, +Arkansas on the old Joe Clay place. I 'member they used to work 'em +scandalous. They used me at the house and I used to wait on old +mistress' brother. He was a old man named Cal Fletcher.</p> + +<p>"I 'member when they said the Yankees was comin' the boss man put us in +wagons and runned us to Texas. They put the women and chillun in the +wagons but the men had to walk. I know I was something over twelve years +old.</p> + +<p>"Old mistress, Miss Sarah Clay, took her chillun and went to Memphis.</p> + +<p>"My white folks treated us very well. I never seed 'em whip my mother +but once, but I seen some whipped till they's speechless. Yes ma'm I +have.</p> + +<p>"I can 'member a lot 'bout the war. The Lord have mercy, I'se old. I +'member they used to sing</p> + +<pre> +'Run nigger run, +The paddyrollers'll ketch you, +Run nigger run.' +</pre> + +<p>"Corse if they ketch you out without a pass they'd beat you nearly to +death and tell you to go home to your master.</p> + +<p>"One time I was totin' water for the woman what did the washin'. I was +goin' along the road and seed somethin' up in a tree that look like a +dog. I said 'Look at that dog.' The overseer was comin' from the house +and said 'That ain't no dog, that's a panther. You better not stop' and +he shot it out. Then I've seen bears out in the cane brakes. I thought +they was big black bulls. I was young then—yes mam, I was young.</p> + +<p>"When the Yankees come through they sot the house afire and the gin and +burned up 'bout a hundred bales a cotton. They never bothered the +niggers' quarters. That was the time the overseer carried us to Texas to +get rid of the Yankees.</p> + +<p>"After the surrender the Yankees told the overseer to bring us all up in +the front yard so he could read us the ceremony and he said we was as +free as any white man that walked the ground. I didn't know what 'twas +about much cause I was too busy playin'.</p> + +<p>"I didn't know what school was 'fore freedom, but I went about a month +after peace was declared. Then papa died and mama took me out and put me +in the field.</p> + +<p>"I was grown, 'bout twenty-four or five, when I married. Now my chillun +and grand chillun takes care of me."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McKinneyWarren"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Warren McKinney, Hazen, Arkansas<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<br> + +<p>I was born in Edgefield County, South Carolina. I am eighty-five years +old. I was born a slave of George Strauter. I remembers hearing them say +"Thank God Ize free as a jay bird." My ma was a slave in the field. I +was eleven years old when freedom was declared. When I was little, Mr. +Strauter whipped my ma. It hurt me bad as it did her. I hated him. She +was crying. I chunked him with rocks. He run after me, but he didn't +catch me. There was twenty-five or thirty hands that worked in the +field. They raised wheat, corn, oats, barley, and cotton. All the +children that couldn't work stayed at one house. Aunt Mat kept the +babies and small children that couldn't go to the field. He had a gin +and a shop. The shop was at the fork of the roads. When de war come on +my papa went to build forts. He quit ma and took another woman. When de +war closed ma took her four children, bundled em up and went to Augusta. +The government give out rations there. My ma washed and ironed. People +died in piles. I don't know till yet what was de matter. They said it +was the change of living. I seen five or six wooden, painted coffins +piled up on wagons pass by our house. Loads passed every day lack you +see cotton pass here. Some said it was cholorea and some took +consumption. Lots of de colored people nearly starved. Not much to get +to do and not much house room. Several families had to live in one +house. Lots of the colored folks went up north and froze to death. They +couldn't stand the cold. They wrote back about them dieing. No they +never sent them back. I heard some sent for money to come back. I heerd +plenty bout the Ku Klux. They scared the folks to death. People left +Augusta in droves. About a thousand would all meet and walk going to +hunt work and new homes. Some of them died. I had a sister and brother +lost that way. I had another sister come to Louisiana that way. She +wrote back.</p> + +<p>I don't think the colored folks looked for a share of land. They never +got nothing cause the white folks didn't have nothing but barren hills +left. About all the mules was wore out hauling provisions in the army. +Some folks say they ought to done more for de colored folks when dey +left, but dey say dey was broke. Freeing all de slaves left em broke.</p> + +<p>That reconstruction was a mighty hard pull. Me and ma couldn't live. A +man paid our ways to Carlisle, Arkansas and we come. We started working +for Mr. Emenson. He had a big store, teams, and land. We liked it fine, +and I been here fifty-six years now. There was so much wild game living +was not so hard. If a fellow could get a little bread and a place to +stay he was all right. After I come to dis state I voted some. I have +farmed and worked at odd jobs. I farmed mostly. Ma went back to her old +master. He persuaded her to come back home. Me and her went back and run +a farm four or five years before she died. Then I come back here. I +first had 300 acres at Carlisle. I sold it and bought 80 acres at Green +Grove. I married in South Carolina. We had a fine weddin, home weddin. +Each of our families furnished the weddin supper. We had 24 waiters. +That is all the wife I ever had. We lived together 57 years. It is hard +for me to keep up with my mind since she died. She been dead five years +nearly now. I used to sing but I forgot all the songs. We had song +books. I joined the church when I was twelve years old.</p> + +<p>I think the times are worse than they use to be. The people is living +mighty fast I tell you. I don't get no help from the government. They +won't give me the pension. I can't work and I can't pay taxes on my +place. They just don't give me nothing but a little out of the store. I +can't get no pension.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McKinneyWarren2"></a> +<h3>Little Rock District<br> +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of Interviewer: Irene Robertson<br> +Subject: Ex-Slave—History<br> +Story—Information<br> +<br> +This Information given by: Warren McKinney<br> +Place of Residence: Hazen, Green Grove Settlement, Arkansas<br> +Occupation: Farming<br> +Age: 84</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>Warren McKinney was born in Edgefield County, South Carolina. He was +born a slave. His master was George Strauter. He had a big plantation +and worked twenty-five or thirty work hands. There were twenty-five or +thirty children too small to work in the field. They raised cotton, +corn, oats, and wheat. His mother washed and ironed and cooked. He was +small but well remembers once when his mother had been sick and had just +gotten out. George Strauter whipped her with a switch on her legs. +Warren did not approve of it. Rocks were plentiful and he began throwing +at him. He said Mr. George took out after him but didn't catch or whip +him.</p> + +<p>George Strauter tried to teach them all how to be good farmers and be +saving. Warren knew war was going on but he didn't see any of it. His +father came home several times. He was off building forts. He said he +remembered a big "hurly-burly" and he heard 'em saying, "Thank God I'ze +free as a jay bird." He didn't know why they were fighting so he didn't +know then why they were saying that.</p> + +<p>George Strauter had a shop at the fork of the roads. He had his own gin. +They sold cotton and bought provisions at Augusta, Georgia. They made +some of their meal and flour and raised all their meat and made enough +lard to do the year around.</p> + +<p>He heard them talking about the "Yankees" burning up Augusta, but he saw +where they had burned Hamburg, South Carolina or North Augusta they call +it.</p> + +<p>After they were free he remembers his mother bundling up her things and +her family and them all going in an ox cart to Augusta to live. Warren's +mother washed, cooked and ironed for a living. Her husband went off and +lived with another woman after freedom. Warren was about eleven years +old then. The Government furnished food for them too. One thing that +distressed Warren was <u>the way people died for more than a year</u>. +He saw five or six coffins piled up on a wagon being taken out to be +buried. He thought it was changing houses and changing ways of living. +They didn't have shoes and warm clothes and weren't fed from white folks +smoke house. <u>Lots of the slaves had Consumption and died right +now</u>. Stout men and women didn't live two years after they were +freed. Lots of them said they didn't like that freedom and wanted to go +back but the masters were broke and couldn't keep many of them if they +went back.</p> + +<p>When Warren was about fifteen years old, there was a white man or two, +but colored leaders mostly got about a thousand colored people to start +for the West walking. Warren had sisters and brothers who started on +this trip. Warren had some fussy brothers, his mother was afraid would +get in jail. They kept her uneasy. They shipped their "stuff" by boat +and train. He never saw them any more but he heard from them in +Louisiana. Louisiana had a bad name in those days.</p> + +<p>When Warren was about fourteen and fifteen, his mother had them on a +farm, farming near Hamburg.</p> + +<p>When he was sixteen or seventeen, his mother and the other children came +on the train to about where Carlisle now is but it wasn't called by that +name. There were very few houses of any kind. Mr. Emerson had a big +store and lots of land. He worked black and white. Mr. Emerson let them +have seven or eight mules and wagons and they farmed near there. He +remembers pretty soon there was a depot where the depot now stands, a +bank, a post office, and two or three more stores, all small buildings. +He liked coming to Arkansas because he got to ride on the train a long +ways. It was easy to live here. There were lots of game and fish.</p> + +<p>Warren never shot anything in his life. He was no hunter. <u>Nats</u> +were awful. Warren made smoke to run the nats from the cows. Four or +five deer would come to the smoke. Cows were afraid of them and would +leave the smoke. When he would go the deer would leap four or five feet +in the air at the sight of him.</p> + +<p>When Warren lived in Augusta, Georgia, they had schools a month at a +time but Warren never did get to go to any, so he can't read or write. +But he learned to save his money. He joined a church when he was twelve +years old in South Carolina and belongs to the Baptist church at Green +Grove now.</p> + +<p>The old master in South Carolina persuaded his mother to come back. They +all went back four or five years before his mother died. While Warren +was there he married a woman on a joining farm.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="McMullenVictoria"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Victoria McMullen<br> + 1416 E. Valmar, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 54<br> +Occupation: Seamstress</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My mother was born March 16, 1865, and knew nothing of slavery.</p> + +<p>"Both my grandmothers and both grandfathers were slaves. My father was +born in the same year as my mother and like my mother knew nothing of +slavery although both of them might have been born slaves.</p> + +<p>"I knew my mother's mother and father and my father's mother, but I +didn't know my father's father.</p> + +<p>"He was from Texas and he always stayed there. He never did come out to +Louisiana where I was born. My mother was born in Louisiana, but my +father was born in Texas. I don't know what county or city my father was +born in. I just heard my grandmother on his side say he was born in +Texas.</p> + +<p>"During the War (he was born in '65 when the War ceased), Grandmother +Katy—that was her name, Katy, Katy Elmore—she was in Louisiana at +first—she was run out in Texas, I suppose, to be hidden from the +Yankees. My father was born there and my grandfather stayed there. He +died in Texas and then Grandma Katy come back to Louisiana with my +father and settled in Ouachita Parish.</p> + +<p>"Grandma Katy was sold from South Carolina into Louisiana to Bob +McClendon, and she kept the name of Elmore who was her first owner in +South Carolina. It was Bob McClendon who run her out in Texas to hide +her from the Yankees. My grandfather in Texas kept the name of Jamison. +That was the name of his master in Texas. But grandma kept the name of +Elmore from South Carolina because he was good to her. He was better +than Bob McClendon. The eastern states sold their slaves to the +southern states and got all the money, then they freed the slaves and +that left the South without anything.</p> + +<p>"Grandma Katy had Creek Indian blood in her. She was of medium size and +height, copper colored, high cheek bones, small squinchy eyes, black +curly hair. Her hair was really pretty but she didn't curl it. It was +just naturally curly. She was a practical nurse as they call it, but she +did more of what some people call a midwife. They call it something else +now. They got a proper word for it.</p> + +<p>"They got it in these government agencies. That is what she was even in +slavery times. She worked for colored people and white people both. That +was after she was freed until she went blind. She went blind three years +before she died. She died at the age of exactly one hundred years. She +treated women and babies. They said she was a real good doctor in her +day. That is been fifty-four years ago. [I will be fifty-four years old +tomorrow—September 18, 1938.] In slavery times my grandma was almost as +free as she was in freedom because of her work.</p> + +<p>"She said that Bob McClendon was cruel to her. Sometimes he'd get angry +and take the shovel and throw hot ashes on the slaves. And then he'd see +them with blisters on them and he would take a handsaw or a flat plank +and bust the blisters. Louisiana was a warm country and they wouldn't +have much clothes on. When the slaves were freed, he went completely +broke. He had scarcely a place to live.</p> + +<p>"I seen him once. Be look like on old possum. He had a long beard down +to his waist and he had long side burns too. Just a little of his face +showed. He was tall and stooping and he wore his hair long and uncut +down on his neck. You know about what he looked like. He had on blue +jeans pants and brogan shoes and a common shirt—a work shirt. He wore +very common clothes. When they freed the Negroes, it broke him up +completely. He had been called a 'big-to-do' in his life but he wasn't +nothing then. He owned Grandma Katy.</p> + +<p>"Grandma Katy had a sister named Maria and a brother named Peter. He +owned all three of them. I have seen all of them. Grandma Katy was the +oldest. She and Uncle Peter stayed close together. He didn't have no +wife and she didn't have no husband. But Aunt Maria had a husband. She +lived off from them after freedom. It was about twelve miles away. My +great-aunt and great-uncle—they were Maria and Peter—that was what +they were. Uncle Peter died first before I left Louisiana, but Aunt +Maria and Grandma Katy died after I came to Arkansas. Grandma Katy lived +four years after I came here.</p> + +<p>"After they was free and my father had gotten large enough to work and +didn't have no horse, my grandma was going 'round waiting on women—that +is all she did—all the rest of the people had gotten large and left +home. Papa made a crop with a hoe. He made three bales of cotton and +about twelve loads of corn with that hoe. He used to tell me, 'You don't +know nothin' 'bout work. You oughter see how I had to work.' After that +he bought him a horse. Money was scarce then and it took something to +buy the place and the horse both. They were turned loose from slavery +without anything. Hardly had a surname—just Katy, Maria, and Peter.</p> + +<p>"I knew more about the slave-time history of my mother's folks than I +did about my father's but I'll tell you that some other time. My +grandmother on my mother's side was born in Richmond, Virginia. She was +owned by a doctor but I can't call his name. She gets her name from her +husband's owners. They came from Virginia. They didn't take the name of +their owners in Louisiana. They took the name of the owners in Virginia. +She was a twin—her twin was a boy named June and her name was Hetty. +Her master kept her brother to be a driver for him. She was sent from +Virginia to Louisiana to people that were related to her Virginia +people. She called her Louisiana mistress 'White Ma;' she never did call +her 'missis.' The white folks and the colored folks too called her +Indian because she was mixed with Choctaw. That's the Indian that has +brown spots on the jaw. They're brownskin. It was an Indian from the +Oklahoma reservation that said my mother belonged to the Choctaws.</p> + +<p>"She rode from Virginia to Louisiana on a boat at the age of twelve +years. She was separated from her mother and brothers and sisters and +never did see them again. She was kept in the house for a nurse. She was +not a midwife. She nursed the white babies. That was what she was sent +to Louisiana for—to nurse the babies. The Louisiana man that owned her +was named George Dorkins. But I think this white woman came from +Virginia. She married this Louisiana man, then sent back to her father's +house and got grandma; she got her for a nurse. She worked only a year +and a half in the field before peace was declared. After she got grown +and married, my grandfather—she had to stay with him and cook and keep +house for him. That was during slavery time but after George Dorkins +died. Dorkins went and got hisself a barrel of whiskey—one of these +great big old barrels—and set it up in his house, and put a faucet in +it and didn't do nothin' but drink whiskey. He said he was goin' to +drink hisself to death. And he did.</p> + +<p>"He was young enough to go to war and he said he would drink hisself to +death before he would go, and he did. My grandma used to steal +newspapers out of his house and take them down to the quarters and leave +them there where there were one or two slaves that could read and tell +how the War was goin' on. I never did learn how the slaves learned to +read. But she was in the house and she could steal the papers and send +them down. Later she could slip off and they would tell her the news, +and then she could slip the papers back.</p> + +<p>"Her master drank so much he couldn't walk without falling and she would +have to help him out. Her mistress was really good. She never allowed +the overseer to whip her. She was only whipped once in slave time while +my father's mother was whipped more times than you could count.</p> + +<p>"Her master often said, 'I'll drink myself to death before I'll go to +war and be shot down like a damn target.' She said in living with them +in the house, she learned to cuss from him. She said she was a cussin' +soul until she became a Christian. She wasn't 'fraid of them because she +was kin to them in some way. There was another woman there who was some +kin to them and she looked enough like my grandma for them to be kin to +each other. We talked it over several times and said we believed we were +related; but none of us know for sure.</p> + +<p>"When the slaves wanted something said they would have my grandma say it +because they knew she wouldn't be whipped for it. 'White Ma' wouldn't +let nobody whip her if she knew it. She cussed the overseer out that +time for whipping her.</p> + +<p>"When grandma was fourteen or fifteen years old they locked her up in +the seed house once or twice for not going to church. You see they let +the white folks go to the church in the morning and the colored folks in +the evening, and my grandma didn't always want to go. She would be +locked up in the seed bin and she would cuss the preacher out so he +could hear her. She would say, 'Master, let us out.' And he would say, +'You want to go to church?' And she would say, 'No, I don't want to hear +that same old sermon: "Stay out of your missis' and master's hen house. +Don't steal your missis' and master's chickens. Stay out of your +missis' and master's smokehouse. Don't steal your missis' and master's +hams." I don't steal nothing. Don't need to tell me not to.'</p> + +<p>"She was tellin' the truth too. She didn't steal because she didn't have +to. She had plenty without stealin'! She got plenty to eat in the house. +But the other slaves didn't git nothin' but fat meat and corn bread and +molasses. And they got tired of that same old thing. They wanted +something else sometimes. They'd go to the hen house and get chickens. +They would go to the smokehouse and get hams and lard. And they would +get flour and anything else they wanted and they would eat something +they wanted. There wasn't no way to keep them from it.</p> + +<p>"The reason she got whipped that time, the overseer wanted her to help +get a tree off the fence that had been blown down by a storm. She told +him that wasn't her work and she wasn't goin' to do it. Old miss was +away at that time. He hit her a few licks and she told old miss when she +came back. Old 'White Ma' told the overseer, 'Don't never put your hands +on her no more no matter what she does. That's more than I do. I don't +hit her and you got no business to do it.'</p> + +<p>"Her husband, my grandfather, was a blacksmith, and he never did work in +the field. He made wagons, plows, plowstocks, buzzard wings—they call +them turning plows now. They used to make and put them on the stocks. He +made anything-handles, baskets. He could fill wagon wheels. He could +sharpen tools. Anything that come under the line of blacksmith, that is +what he did. He used to fix wagons all the time I knowed him. In harvest +time in the fall he would drive from Bienville where they were slaves to +Monroe in Ouachita Parish. He kept all the plows and was sharpening and +fixing anything that got broke. He said he never did get no whipping.</p> + +<p>"His name was Tom Eldridge. They called him 'Uncle Tom'. They was the +mother and father of twelve children. Six lived and six died. One boy +and five girls lived. And one girl and five boys died—half and half. He +died at the age of seventy-five, June 6, 1908. She died January 1920.</p> + +<p>"I came out here in January 1907. I lived in Pine Bluff. From Louisiana +I came to Pine Bluff in 1906. In 1907 I went to Kerr in Lonoke County +and lived there eight years and then I came to Little Rock. I farmed at +Kerr and just worked 'round town those few months in Pine Bluff. +Excusing the time I was in Pine Bluff and Little Rock I farmed. I farmed +in Ouachita Parish, Louisiana."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MaddenNannieP"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Nannie P. Madden,<br> + West Memphis, Arkansas<br> +Age: 69</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I am Martha Johnson's sister. I was born at Lake Village, Arkansas. I +am 69 years old. I was born on Mr. Ike Wethingtons place. Pa was +renting. Mother died in 1876 on this farm. We called it Red Leaf +plantation. Father died at Martha Johnson's here in West Memphis when he +was 88 years old.</p> + +<p>"Mother was not counted a slave. Her master's Southern wife (white wife) +disliked her very much but kept her till her death. Mother had three +white children by her master. After freedom she married a black man and +had four children by him. We are in the last set.</p> + +<p>"We was born after slavery and all we know is from hearing our people +talk. Father talked all time about slavery. He was a soldier. I couldn't +tell you straight. I can give you some books on slavery:</p> + +<pre> +Booker T. Washington's Own Story of His Life and Work, +64 page supplement, by Albon L. Holsey + + Authentic Edition--in office of Library of Congress, + Washington, D.C., 1915, copywrighted by J.L. Nichols Co. + +The Master Mind of a Child of Slavery--Booker T. Washington, +by Frederick E. Drinker, Washington, D.C. +</pre> + +<p>I have read them both. Yes, they are my own books.</p> + +<p>"I farmed and cooked all my life."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MaddenPerry"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Perry Madden, Thirteenth Street, south side,<br> + one block east of Boyle Park Road, Route 6,<br> + Care L.G. Cotton, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: About 79</h3> +<br> + +<p><b>Birth and Age</b></p> + +<p>"I have been here quite a few years. This life is short. A man ought to +prepare for eternity. I had an uncle who used to say that a person who +went to torment stayed as long as there was a grain of sand on the sea.</p> + +<p>"I was a little boy when slavery broke. I used to go out with my +brother. He watched gaps. I did not have to do anything; I just went out +with him to keep him company. I was scared of the old master. I used to +call him the 'Big Bear.' He was a great big old man.</p> + +<p>"I was about six years old when the War ended, I guess. I don't know how +old I am. The insurance men put me down as seventy-three. I know I was +here in slavery time, and I was just about six years old when the War +ended.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Schooling</b></p> + +<p>"I got my first learning in Alabama. I didn't learn anything at all in +slavery times. I went to school. I would go to the house in slavery +tine, and there wouldn't be nobody home, and I would go to the bed and +get under it because I was scared. When I would wake up it would be way +in the night and dark, and I would be in bed.</p> + +<p>"I got my schooling way after the surrender. We would make crops. The +third time we moved, dad started me to school. I had colored teachers. I +was in Talladega County. I made the fifth grade before I stopped. My +father died and then I had to stop and take care of my mother.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>An "Aunt Caroline" Story</b></p> + +<p>"I know that some people can tell things that are goin' to happen. Old +man Julks lived at Pumpkin Bend. He had a colt that disappeared. He went +to 'Aunt Caroline'—that's Caroline Dye. She told him just where the +colt was and who had it and how he had to get it back. She described the +colt and told him that was what he come to find out about before he had +a chance to ask her anything. She told him that white people had it and +told him where they lived and told him he would have to have a white man +go and git it for him. He was working for a good man and he told him +about it. He advertised for the colt and the next day, the man that +stole it came and told him that a colt had been found over on his place +and for him to come over and arrange to git it. But he said, 'No, I've +placed that matter in the hands of my boss.' He told his boss about it, +but the fellow brought the horse and give it to the boss without any +argument.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Family and Masters</b></p> + +<p>"My old master's slaves were called free niggers. He and his wife never +mistreated their slaves. When any of Madden's slaves were out and the +pateroles got after them, if they could make it home, that ended it. +Nobody beat Madden's niggers.</p> + +<p>"My father's name was Allen Madden and my mother's name was Amy Madden. +I knew my grandfather and grandmother on my mother's side. My +grandfather and grandmother never were 'round me though that I can +remember.</p> + +<p>"When the old man died, the Negroes were divided out. This boy got so +many and that one got so many. The old man, Mabe Madden, had two sons, +John and Little Mabe. My mother and father went to John. They were in +Talladega because John stayed there.</p> + +<p>"My father's mother and father fell to Little Mabe Madden. They never +did come to Alabama but I have heard my father talk about them so much. +My father's father was named Harry. His last name must have been Madden.</p> + +<p>"My grandfather on my mother's side was named Charlie Hall. He married +into the Madden family. He belonged to the Halls before he married. Old +man Charlie, his master, had a plantation that wasn't far from the +Madden's plantation. In those days, if you met a girl and fell in love +with her, you could git a pass and go to see her if you wanted to. You +didn't have to be on the same plantation at all. And you could marry her +and go to see her, and have children by her even though you belonged to +different masters. The Maddens never did buy Hall. Grandma never would +change her name to Hall. He stayed at my house after we married, stayed +with me sometimes, and stayed with his other son sometimes.</p> + +<p>"My mother was born a Madden. She was born right at Madden's place. When +grandma married Hall, like it is now, she would have been called Hall. +But she was born a Madden and stayed Madden and never did change to her +husband's name. So my mother was born a Madden although her father's +name was Hall.</p> + +<p>"I don't know what sort of man Mabe was, and I only know what my parents +said about John. They said he was a good man and I have to say what they +said. He didn't let nobody impose on his niggers. Pateroles did git +after them and bring them in with the hounds, but when they got in, that +settled it. Madden never would allow white people to beat on his +niggers.</p> + +<p>"They tried to git my daddy out so that they could whip him, but they +couldn't catch him. They shot him—the pateroles did—but he whipped +them. My daddy was a coon. I mean he was a good man.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Early Life</b></p> + +<p>"My brother was big enough to mind gaps. That was in slavery times. They +had good fences around the field. They didn't have gates like they do +now. They had gaps. The fence would zigzag, and the rails could be +lifted down at one section, and that would leave a gap. If you left a +gap, the stock would go into the field. When there was a gap, my brother +would stay in it and keep the stock from passing. When the folks would +come to dinner, he would go in and eat dinner with them just as big as +anybody. When they would leave, the gap would stay down till night. It +stayed down from morning till noon and from one o'clock till the men +come in at night. The gap was a place in the rails like I told you where +they could take down the rails to pass. It took time to lay the rails +down and more time to place then back up again. They wouldn't do it. +They would leave them down till they come back during the work hours and +a boy that was too small to do anything else was put to mind them. My +brother used to do that and I would keep him company. When I heard old +master coming there, I'd be gone, yes siree. I would see him when he +left the house and when he got to the gap, I would be home or at my +grandfather's.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Occupational Experiences</b></p> + +<p>"I have followed farming all my life. That is the sweetest life a man +can lead. I have been farming all my life principally. My occupation is +farming. That is it was until I lost my health. I ain't done nothin' for +about four years now. I would follow public work in the fall of the year +and make a crop every year. Never failed till I got disabled. I used to +make all I used and all I needed to feed my stock. I even raised my own +wheat before I left home in Alabama. That is a wheat country. They don't +raise it out here.[HW: ?]</p> + +<p>"I came here—lemme see, about how many years ago did I come here. I +guess I have been in Arkansas about twenty-eight years since the first +time I come here. I have gone in and out as I got a chance to work +somewheres. I have been living in this house about three years.</p> + +<p>"I preached for about twenty or more years. I don't know that I call +myself a preacher. I am a pretty good talker sometimes. I have never +pastored a church; somehow or 'nother the word come to me to go and I go +and talk. I ain't no pulpit chinch. I could have taken two or three +men's churches out from under them, but I didn't.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Freedom and Soldiers</b></p> + +<p>"I can't remember just how my father got freed. Old folks then didn't +let you stan' and listen when they talked. If you did it once, you +didn't do it again. They would talk while they were together, but the +children would have business outdoors. Yes siree, I never heard them say +much about how they got freedom.</p> + +<p>"I was there when the Yankees come through. That was in slave time. They +marched right through old man Madden's grove. They were playing the +fifes and beating the drums. And they were playing the fiddle. Yes sir, +they were playing the fiddle too. It must have been a fiddle; it sounded +just like one. The soldiers were all just a singin'. They didn't bother +nobody at our house. If they bothered anything, nothing was told me +about it. I heard my uncle say they took a horse from my old manager. I +didn't see it. They took the best horse in the lot my uncle said. Pardon +me, they didn't take him. A peckerwood took him and let the Yankees get +him. I have heard that they bothered plenty of other places. Took the +best mules, and left old broken down ones and things like that. Broke +things up. I have heard that about other places, but I didn't see any of +it.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Right after the War</b></p> + +<p>"Right after the War, my father went to farming—renting land. I mean he +sharecropped and done around. Thing is come way up from then when the +Negroes first started. They didn't have no stock nor nothin' then. They +made a crop just for the third of it. When they quit the third, they +started givin' them two-fifths. That's more than a third, ain't it? Then +they moved up from that, and give them half, and they are there yet. If +you furnish, they give you two-thirds and take one-third. Or they give +you so much per acre or give him produce in rent.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Marriage</b></p> + +<p>"I was married in 1883. My wife's name was Mary Elston. Her mother died +when she was an infant. Her grandmother was an Elston at first. Then she +changed her name to Cunningham. But she always went in the name of +Elston, and was an Elston when she married me. My wife I mean. I married +on a Thursday in the Christmas week. This December I will be married +fifty-five years. This is the only wife I have ever had. We had three +children and all of them are dead. All our birthed children are dead. +One of them was just three months old when he died. My baby girl had +three children and she lived to see all of them married.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Opinions</b></p> + +<p>"Our own folks is about the worst enemies we have. They will come and +sweet talk you and then work against you. I had a fellow in here not +long ago who came here for a dollar, and I never did hear from him again +after he got it. He couldn't get another favor from me. No man can fool +me more than one time. I have been beat out of lots of money and I have +got hurt trying to help people.</p> + +<p>"The young folks now is just gone astray. I tell you the truth, I +wouldn't give you forty cents a dozen for these young folks. They are +sassy and disrespectful. Don't respect themselves and nobody else. When +they get off from home, they'll respect somebody else better 'n they +will their own mothers.</p> + +<p>"If they would do away with this stock law, they would do better +everywhere. If you would say fence up your place and raise what you +want, I could get along. But you have to keep somebody to watch your +stock. If you don't, you'll have to pay something out. It's a bad old +thing this stock law. It's detrimental to the welfare of man."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MannLewis"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Lewis Mann<br> + 1501 Bell Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 81</h3> +<br> + +<p>"As nigh as I can come at it, I was bout five or six time of the war. I +remember when the war ceasted. I was a good-sized chap.</p> + +<p>"Durin' the war my mother's master sent us to Texas; western Texas is +whar they stopped me. We stayed there two years and then they brought us +back after surrender.</p> + +<p>"I remember when the war ceasted and remember the soldiers refugeein' +through the country. I'm somewhar round eighty-one. I'm tellin' you the +truf. I ain't just now come here.</p> + +<p>"I was born right here in Arkansas. My mother's master was old B.D. +Williams of Tennessee and we worked for his son Mac H. Williams here in +Arkansas. They was good to my mother. Always had nurses for the colored +childrun while the old folks was in the field.</p> + +<p>"After the war I used to work in the house for my white folks—for Dr. +Bob Williams way up there in the country on the river. I stayed with his +brother Mac Williams might near twenty-five or thirty years. Worked +around the house servin' and doin' arrands different places.</p> + +<p>"I went to school a little bit a good piece after the war and learned to +read and write.</p> + +<p>"I've heard too much of the Ku Klux. I remember when they was Ku Kluxin' +all round through here.</p> + +<p>"Lord! I don't know how many times I ever voted. I used to vote every +time they had an election. I voted before I could read. The white man +showed me how to vote and asked me who I wanted to vote for. Oh Lord, I +was might near grown when I learned to read.</p> + +<p>"I been married just one time in my life and my wife's been dead +thirteen years.</p> + +<p>"I tell you, Miss, I don't know hardly what to think of things now. +Everything so changeable I can't bring nothin' to remembrance to hold +it.</p> + +<p>"I didn't do nothin' when I was young but just knock around with the +white folks. Oh Lord, when I was young I delighted in parties. Don't +nothin' like that worry me now. Don't go to no parades or nothin'. Don't +have that on my brain like I did when I was young. I goes to church all +the place I does go.</p> + +<p>"I ain't never had no accident. Don't get in the way to have no accident +cause I know the age I is if I injure these bones there ain't anything +more to me.</p> + +<p>"My mother had eight childrun and just my sister and me left. I can't do +a whole day's work to save my life. I own this place and my +sister-in-law gives me a little somethin' to eat. I used to be on the +bureau but they took me off that."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MartinAngeline"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Angeline Martin, Kansas City, Missouri<br> + Visiting at 1105 Louisiana St., Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age 80</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Well, I was livin' then. I was born in Georgia. Honey, I don't know +what year. I was born before the war. I was about ten when freedom come. +I don't remember when it started but I remember when it ended. I think +I'm in the 80's—that's the way I count it.</p> + +<p>"My master was dead and my mistress was a widow—Miss Sarah Childs. She +had a guardeen.</p> + +<p>"When the war come, old mistress and her daughter refugeed to +Mississippi. The guardeen wouldn't let me go, said I was too young.</p> + +<p>"My parents stayed on the plantation. My white folks' house was vacant +and the Yankees come and used it for headquarters. They never had put +shoes on me and when the Yankees shot the chickens I'd run and get em. +They didn't burn up nothin', just kill the hogs and chickens and give us +plenty.</p> + +<p>"I didn't know what the war was about. You know chillun in them days +didn't have as much sense as they got now.</p> + +<p>"After freedom, my folks stayed on the place and worked on the shares. I +want to school right after the war. I went every year till we left +there. We come to this country in seventy something. We come here and +stopped at the Cummins place. I worked in the field till I come to town +bout fifty years ago. Since then I cooked some and done laundry work.</p> + +<p>"I married when I was seventeen. Had six children. I been livin' in +Kansas City twenty-three years. Followed my boy up there. I like it up +there a lot better than I do here. Oh lord, yes, there are a lot of +colored people in Kansas City."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MartinJosie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Josie Martin<br> + R.F.D., Madison, Arkansas<br> +Age: 86</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born up near Cotton Plant but took down near Helena to live. My +parents named Sallie and Bob Martin. They had seven children. I heard +mother say she was sold on a block in Mississippi when she was twelve +years old. My father was a Creek Indian; he was dark. Mother was a +Choctaw Indian; she was bright. Mother died when I was but a girl and +left a family on my hands. I sent my baby brother and sister to school +and I cooked on a boarding train. The railroad hands working on the +tracks roomed and et on the train. They are all dead now and I'm 'lone +in the world.</p> + +<p>"My greatest pleasure was independence—make my money, go and spend it +as I see fit. I wasn't popular with men. I never danced. I did sell +herbs for diarrhea and piles and 'what ails you.' I don't sell no more. +Folks too close to drug stores now. I had long straight hair nearly to +my knees. It come out after a spell of typhoid fever. It never come in +to do no good." (Baldheaded like a man and she shaves. She is a +hermaphrodite, reason for never marrying.) "I made and saved up at one +time twenty-three thousand dollars cooking and field work. I let it slip +out from me in dribs.</p> + +<p>"I used to run from the Yankees. I've seen them go in droves along the +road. They found old colored couple, went out, took their hog and made +them barbecue it. They drove up a stob, nailed a piece to a tree stacked +their guns. They rested around till everything was ready. They et at +one o'clock at night and after the feast drove on. They wasn't so good +to Negroes. They was good to their own feelings. They et up all that old +couple had to eat in their house and the pig they raised. I reckon their +owners give them more to eat. They lived off alone and the soldiers +stopped there and worked the old man and woman nearly to death.</p> + +<p>"Our master told us about freedom. His name was Master Martin. He come +here from Mississippi. I don't recollect his family.</p> + +<p>"I get help from the Welfare. I had paralysis. I never got over my +stroke. I ain't no 'count to work."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MathisBeth"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Bess Mathis, Hazen, Arkansas<br> +Age: 82</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in De Sota County, Mississippi. My parents' owners was Mars +Hancock. Mama was a cook and field hand. Papa milked and worked in the +field. Mama had jes' one child, that me. I had six childern. I got five +livin'. They knowed they free. It went round from mouth to mouth. Mama +said Mars Hancock was good er slave holder as ever lived she recken. I +heard her come over that er good many times. But they wanted to be free. +I jes' heard em talk bout the Ku Klux. They said the Ku Klux made lot of +em roamin' round go get a place to live and start workin'. They tell how +they would ride at night and how scarry lookin' they was. I heard em say +if Mars Hancock didn't want to give em meat they got tree a coon or +possum. Cut the tree down or climb it and then come home and cook it. +They had no guns. They had dogs or could get one. Game helps out lots.</p> + +<p>"The women chewed for their children after they weaned em. They don't +none of em do that way now. Women wouldn't cut the baby's finger nails. +They bite em off. They said if you cut its nails off he would steal. +They bite its toe nails off, too. And if they wanted the children to +have long pretty hair, they would trim the ends off on the new of the +moon. That would cause the hair to grow long. White folks and darkies +both done them things.</p> + +<p>"I been doin' whatever come to hand—farmin', cookin', washin', ironin'.</p> + +<p>"I never expects to vote neither. I sure ain't voted.</p> + +<p>"Conditions pretty bad sometimes. I don't know what cause it. You got +beyond me now. I don't know what going become of the young folks, and +they ain't studyin' it. They ain't kind. Got no raisin' I call it. I +tried to raise em to work and behave. They work some. My son is takin' +care of me now."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MatthewsCaroline"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Caroline Matthews<br> + 812 Spruce Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 79</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes'm, I was born in slavery times in Mississippi. Now, the only thing +I remember was some soldiers come along on some mules. I remember my +mother and father was sittin' on the gallery and they say, 'Look a +there, them's soldiers.'</p> + +<p>"And I remember when my parents run off. I was with 'em and I cried for +'em to tote me.</p> + +<p>"My mother's first owner was named Armstrong. She said she was about +eleven years old when he bought her. I heard her say they just changed +around a lot.</p> + +<p>"Freedom was comin' and her last owners had carried her to a state where +it hadn't come yet. That's right—it was Texas.</p> + +<p>"Her first owners was good. She said they wouldn't 'low the overseer to +'buke the women at all.</p> + +<p>"But her last owners was cruel. She said one day old missis was out in +the yard and backed up and fell into a pan of hot water and when her +husband come she told him and he tried to 'buke my mother. You know if +somebody tryin' to get the best of you and you can help yourself, you +gwine do it. So mama throwed up her arm and old master hit it with a +stick and cut it bad. So my parents run off. That was in Texas.</p> + +<p>"She said we was a year comin' back and I know they stopped at the +Dillard place and made a crop. And they lost one child on the way—that +was Kittie.</p> + +<p>"I heard mama say they got back here to Arkansas and got to the bureau +and they freed 'em. I know the War wasn't over yet 'cause I know I heard +mama say, 'Just listen to them guns at Vicksburg.'</p> + +<p>"When I was little, I was so sickly. I took down with the whoopin' cough +and I was sick so long. But mama say to the old woman what stayed with +me, 'This gal gwine be here to see many a winter 'cause she so stout in +the jaws I can't give her no medicine.'</p> + +<p>"When I commenced to remember anything, I heered 'em talkin' 'bout Grant +and Colfax. Used to wear buttons with Grant and Colfax.</p> + +<p>"But I was livin' in Abraham Lincoln's time. Chillun them days didn't +know nothin'. Why, woman, I was twelve years old 'fore I knowed babies +didn't come out a holler log. I used to go 'round lookin' in logs for a +baby.</p> + +<p>"I had seven sisters and three brothers and they all dead but me. Had +three younger than me. They was what they called freeborn chillun.</p> + +<p>"After freedom my parents worked for Major Ross. I know when mama fixed +us up to go to Sunday-school we'd go by Major Ross for him to see us. I +know we'd go so early, sometimes he'd still be in his drawers.</p> + +<p>"I know one thing—when I was about sixteen years old things was good +here. Ever'body had a good living."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MaxwellMalindy"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Malindy Maxwell, Madison, Arkansas<br> +Age: Up in 80's</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born close to Como and Sardis, Mississippi. My master and +mistress was Sam Shans and Miss Cornelia Shans. I was born a slave. They +owned mama and Master Rube Sanders owned pa. Neither owner wouldn't sell +but they agreed to let ma and pa marry. They had a white preacher and +they married out in the yard and had a big table full of weddin' supper, +and the white folks et in the house. They had a big supper too. Ma said +they had a big crowd. The preacher read the ceremony. Miss Cornelia give +her a white dress and white shoes and Miss Cloe Wilburn give her a veil. +Miss Cloe was some connection of Rube Sanders.</p> + +<p>"They had seven children. I'm the oldest—three of us living.</p> + +<p>"After 'mancipation pa went to see about marrying ma over agen and they +told him that marriage would stand long as ever he lived.</p> + +<p>"Mama was sold at twelve years old in Atlanta, Georgia. Ma and pa was +always field hands. Grandma got to be one of John Sanders' leading hands +to work mong the women folks. They said John Sanders was meanest man +ever lived or died. According to pa's saying, Mars Ruben was a good +sorter man. Pa said John Sanders was too mean a man to have a wife. He +was mean to Miss Sarah. They said he beat her, his wife, like he beat a +nigger woman.</p> + +<p>"Miss Sarah say, 'Come get your rations early Saturday morning, clean +up your house, wash and iron, and we'll go to preaching +tomorrow—Sunday. I want you to all come out clean Monday morning.' They +go ask Mars John Sanders if they could go to preaching. I recken from +what they said they walked. Mars John, when they git their best clothes +on, make them turn round and go to the field and work all day long. He +was just that mean. Work all day long Sunday.</p> + +<p>"Miss Sarah was a Primitive Baptist and that is what I am till this day. +Some folks call us Hardshell Baptist. The colored folks set in the back +of the church. The women all set on one side and the men on the other. +If they had a middle row, there was a railing dividing mens' seats from +the womens' seats on the very same benches.</p> + +<p>"Miss Cloe, Miss Cornelia, and Miss Sarah cook up a whole lot of good +things to eat and go to camp meeting. Sometimes they would stay a week +and longer. They would take time bout letting the colored folks go long. +We had big times. My grandpa took a gingercake cutter with him and sold +gingercakes when they come out of the church. He could keep that money +his own. I don't know how he sold them. My sister has the cutter now I +expect. My girl has seen it. It was a foot long, this wide (5 inches), +and fluted all around the edges, and had a handle like a biscuit cutter. +They was about an inch thick. He made good ones and he sold all he could +ever make. Grandpa took carpet sacks to carry his gingercakes in to sell +them. I remember that mighty well. (The shape of the cutter was like +this: <img src="images/063.jpg" width="40" height="20" +alt="cutter"> ) He purt nigh always got to go to all the camp +meetings. Folks got happy and shouted in them days. It would be when +somebody got religion. At some big meetings they didn't shout.</p> + +<p>"When I was born they had a white mid-wife, Miss Martin. My mistress +was in the cabin when I was born. I was born foot foremost and had a +veil on my face and down on my body a piece. They call it a 'caul.' +Sometimes I see forms and they vanish. I can see some out of one eye +now. But I've always seen things when my sight was good. It is like when +you are dreaming at night but I see them at times that plain in day.</p> + +<p>"I don't know how old I am but I was a good size girl when 'mancipation +come on. Miss Cornelia had my age in her Bible. They done took me from +the cabin and I was staying at the house. I slept on a trundle bed under +Miss Cornelia's bed. Her bed was a teaster—way high up, had a big stool +to step on to go up in there and she had it curtained off. I had a good +cotton bed and I slept good up under there. Her bed was corded with sea +grass rope. It didn't have no slats like beds do now.</p> + +<p>"Colored folks slept on cotton beds and white folks—some of em at +least—picked geese and made feather beds and down pillows. They carded +and washed sheep's wool and put in their quilts. Some of them, they'd be +light and warm. Colored folks' bed had one leg. Then it was holes hewed +in the wall on the other three sides and wooden slats across it. Now +that wasn't no bad bed. Some of them was big enough for three to sleep +on good. When the children was small four could sleep easy cross ways, +and they slept that way.</p> + +<p>"They had shelves and tables and chairs. They made chests and put things +in there and set on top of it too. White folks had fine chests to keep +their bed clothes in. Some of them was made of oak, and pine, and +cypress. They would cook walnut hulls and bark and paint them dark with +the tea.</p> + +<p>"I recollect a right smart of the Civil War. We was close nough to hear +the roar and ramble and the big cannons shake the things in the house. I +don't know where they was fighting—a long ways off I guess.</p> + +<p>"I saw the soldiers scouting. They come most any time. They go in and +take every drop of milk out of the churn. They took anything they could +find and went away with it. I seen the cavalry come through. I thought +they looked so pretty. Their canteens was shining in the sun. Miss +Cornelia told me to hide, the soldiers might take me on with them. I +didn't want to go. I was very well pleased there at Miss Cornelia's.</p> + +<p>"I seen the cavalry come through that raised the 'white sheet.' I know +now it must have been a white flag but they called it a white sheet to +quit fighting. It was raised a short time after they passed and they +said they was the ones raised it. I don't know where it was. I reckon it +was a big white flag they rared up. It was so they would stop fighting.</p> + +<p>"Mars Sam Shan didn't go to no war; he hid out. He said it was a useless +war, he wasn't going to get shot up for no use a tall, and he never went +a step. He hid out. I don't know where. I know Charles would take the +baskets off. Charles tended to the stock and the carriage. He drove the +wagon and carriage. He fetched water and wood. He was a black boy. Mars +Sam Shan said he wasn't goiner loose his life for nothing.</p> + +<p>"Miss Cornelia would cook corn light bread and muffins and anything else +they had to cook. Rations got down mighty scarce before it was done wid. +They put the big round basket nearly big as a split cotton basket out on +the back portico. Charles come and disappear with it.</p> + +<p>"Chess and Charles was colored overseers. He didn't have white +overseers. Miss Cornelia and Miss Cloe would walk the floor and cry and +I would walk between. I would cry feeling sorry for them, but I didn't +know why they cried so much. I know now it was squally times. War is +horrible.</p> + +<p>"Mars Sam Shan come home, went down to the cabins—they was scattered +over the fields—and told them the War was over, they was free but that +they could stay. Then come some runners, white men. They was Yankee men. +I know that now. They say you must get pay or go off. We stayed that +year. Another man went to pa and said he would give him half of what he +made. He got us all up and we went to Pleasant Hill. We done tolerable +well.</p> + +<p>"Then he tried to buy a house and five acres and got beat out of it. The +minor heirs come and took it. I never learnt in books till I went to +school. Seem like things was in a confusion after I got big nough for +that. I'd sweep and rake and cook and wash the dishes, card, spin, hoe, +scour the floors and tables. I would knit at night heap of times. We'd +sing some at night.</p> + +<p>"Colored folks couldn't read so they couldn't sing at church lessen they +learnt the songs by hearing them at home. Colored folks would meet and +sing and pray and preach at the cabins.</p> + +<p>"My first teacher was a white man, Mr. Babe Willroy. I went to him +several short sessions and on rainy days and cold days I couldn't work +in the field. I worked in the field all my life. Cook out in the winter, +back to the field in the spring till fall again.</p> + +<p>"Well, I jes' had this one girl. I carried her along with me. She would +play round and then she was a heap of help. She is mighty good to me +now.</p> + +<p>"I never seen a Ku Klux in my life. Now, I couldn't tell you about +them.</p> + +<p>"My parents' names was Lou Sanders and Anthony Sanders. Ma's mother was +a Rockmore and her husband was a Cherokee Indian. I recollect them well. +He was a free man and was fixing to buy her freedom. Her young mistress +married Mr. Joe Bues and she heired her. Mr. Joe Bues drunk her up and +they come and got her and took her off. They run her to Memphis before +his wife could write to her pa. He was Mars Rockmore.</p> + +<p>"Grandma was put on a block and sold fore grandpa could cumerlate nough +cash to buy her for his wife. Grandma never seen her ma no more. Grandpa +followed her and Mr. Sam Shans bought her and took her to Mississippi +with a lot more he bought.</p> + +<p>"My pa's ma b'long to John Sanders and grandpa b'long to Rube Sanders. +They was brothers. Rube Sanders bought grandpa from Enoch Bobo down in +Mississippi. The Bobo's had a heap of slaves and land. Now, he was the +one that sold gingercakes. He was a blacksmith too. Both my grandpas was +blacksmiths but my Indian grandpa could make wagons, trays, bowls, +shoes, and things out of wood too. Him being a free man made his living +that way. But he never could cumolate enough to buy grandma.</p> + +<p>"My other grandma was blacker than I am and grandpa too. When grandpa +died he was carried back to the Bobo graveyard and buried on Enoch +Bobo's place. It was his request all his slaves be brought back and +buried on his land. I went to the burying. I recollect that but ma and +pa had to ask could we go. We all got to go—all who wanted to go. It +was a big crowd. It was John Sanders let us go mean as he was.</p> + +<p>"Miss Cornelia had the cistern cleaned out and they packed up their +pretty china dishes and silver in a big flat sorter box. Charles took +them down a ladder to the bottom of the dark cistern and put dirt over +it all and then scattered some old rubbish round, took the ladder out. +The Yankees never much as peared to see that old open cistern. I don't +know if they buried money or not. They packed up a lot of nice things. +It wasn't touched till after the War was over.</p> + +<p>"I been farming and cooking all my life. I worked for Major Black, Mr. +Ben Tolbert, Mr. Williams at Pleasant Hill, Mississippi. I married and +long time after come to Arkansas. They said you could raise stock +here—no fence law.</p> + +<p>"I get $8 and commodities because I am blind. I live with my daughter +here."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MaxwellNellie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Nellie Maxwell, Biscoe, Arkansas<br> +Age: 63</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Mama was Harriett Baldwin. She was born in Virginia. Her owners was +Mistress Mollie Fisher and Master Coon Fisher. It was so cold one winter +that they burned up their furniture keeping a fire. Said seemed like +they would freeze in spite of what all they could do.</p> + +<p>"Grandpa was sold away from grandma and three children. He didn't want +to be sold nary bit. When they would be talking about selling him he go +hide under the house. They go on off. He'd come out. When he was sold he +went under there. He come out and went on off when they found him and +told him he was sold to this man. Grandma said he was obedient. They +never hit him. He was her best husband. They never sold grandma and she +couldn't 'count for him being let go. Grandma had another husband after +freedom and two more children. They left there in a crowd and all come +to Arkansas. Grandma was a cook for the field hands. She had charge of +ringing a big dinner-bell hung up in a tree. She was black as charcoal. +Mama and grandma said Master Coon and old Mistress Mollie was good to +them. That the reason grandpa would go under the house. He didn't want +to be sold. He never was seen no more by them.</p> + +<p>"Grandma said sometimes the meals was carried to the fields and they fed +the children out of troughs. They took all the children to the spring +set them in a row. They had a tubful of water and they washed them dried +them and put on their clean clothes. They used homemade lye soap and +greased them with tallow and mutton suet. That made them shine. They +kept them greased so their knees and knuckles would ruff up and bleed.</p> + +<p>"Grandma and mama stopped at Fourche Dam. They was so glad to be free +and go about. Then it scared them to hear talk of being sold. It divided +them and some owners was mean.</p> + +<p>"In my time if I done wrong most any grown person whoop me. Then mama +find it out, she give me another one. I got a double whooping.</p> + +<p>"Times is powerful bad to raise up a family. Drinking and gambling, and +it takes too much to feed a family now. Times is so much harder that way +then when I was growing."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MayAnn"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Sallie C. Miller<br> +Person interviewed: Ann May, Clarksville, Arkansas<br> +Age: 82</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born at Cabin Creek (Lamar now, but I still call it Cabin Creek. +I can't call it anything else). I was sold with my mother when I was a +little girl and lived with our white folks until after the war and was +freed. We lived on a farm. My father belong to another family, a +neighbor of ours. We all lived with the white folks. My mother took care +of all of them. They was always as good as they could be to us and after +the war we stayed on with the white folks who owned my father and worked +on the farm for him. His master gave us half of everything we made until +we could get started our selves, then our white folks told my father to +homestead a place near him, and he did. We lived there until after +father died. We paid taxes and lived just like the white folks. We did +what the white folks told us to do and never lost a thing by doing it. +After I married my husband worked at the mill for your father and made a +living for me and I worked for the white folks. Now I am too old to cook +but I have a few washin's for the white folks and am getting my old age +pension that helps me a lot.</p> + +<p>"I don't know what I think about the young generation. I aim at my +stopping place.</p> + +<p>"The songs we sang were</p> + +<pre> +'Come ye that love the Lord and let your Joys be known' +'When You and I Were Young, Maggie' +'Juanita' +'Just Before the Battle, Mother' +'Darling Nellie Gray' +'Carry Me Back to Old Virginia' +'Old Black Joe' +</pre> + +<p>Of course we sang 'Dixie.' We had to sing that, it was the leading +song."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MayesJoe"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Joe Mayes, Madison, Arkansas<br> +Age: ?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born a slave two years. I never will forget man come and told +mother she was free. She cooked. She never worked in the field till +after freedom. In a few days another man come and made them leave. They +couldn't hold them in Kentucky. The owners give her provisions, meat, +lasses, etc. They give her her clothes. She had four children and I was +her youngest. The two oldest was girls. Father was dead. I don't +remember him. Mother finally made arrangements to go to Will Bennett's +place.</p> + +<p>"Another thing I remember: Frank Hayes sold mother to Isaac Tremble +after she was free. She didn't know she was free. Neither did Isaac +Tremble. I don't know whether Frank Mayes was honest or not. The part I +remember was that us boys stood on the block and never was parted from +her. We had to leave our sisters. One was sold to Miss Margaret Moxley, +the other to Miss Almyra Winder. (He said "Miss" but they may have been +widows. He didn't seem to know—ed.) Father belong to a Master Mills. +All our family got together after we found out we had been freed.</p> + +<p>"The Ku Klux: I went to the well little after dark. It was a good piece +from our house. I looked up and saw a man with a robe and cap on. It +scared me nearly to death. I nearly fell out. I had heard about the +'booger man' and learned better then. But there he was. I had heard a +lot about Ku Klux.</p> + +<p>"There was a big gourd hanging up by the well. We kept it there. There +was a bucket full up. He said, 'Give me water.' I handed over the gourd +full. He done something with it. He kept me handing him water. He said, +'Hold my crown and draw me up another bucket full.' I was so scared I +lit out hard as I could run. It was dark enough to hide me when I got a +piece out of his way.</p> + +<p>"The owners was pretty good to mother to be slavery. She had clothes and +enough to eat all the time. I used to go back to see all our white folks +in Kentucky. They are about all dead now I expect. Mother was glad to be +free but for a long time her life was harder.</p> + +<p>"After we got up larger she got along better. I worked on a steamboat +twelve or thirteen years. I was a roustabout and freight picker. I was +on passenger boats mostly but they carried freight. I went to school +some. I always had colored teachers. I farmed at Hughes and Madison ever +since excepting one year in Mississippi.</p> + +<p>"I live alone. I get $8 and commodities from the Sociable Welfare.</p> + +<p>"The young folks would do better, work better, if they could get work +all time. It is hard at times to get work right now. The times is all +right. Better everything but work. I know colored folks is bad managers. +That has been bad on us always.</p> + +<p>"I worked on boats from Evansville, St. Louis, Memphis to New Orleans +mostly. It was hard work but a fine living. I was stout then."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MeeksJesse"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Jesse Meeks<br> + 707 Elm Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 76<br> +Occupation: Minister</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I am seventy-six. 'Course I was young in slavery times, but I can +remember some things. I remember how they used to feed us. Put milk and +bread or poke salad and corn-meal dumplin's in a trough and give you a +wooden spoon and all the children eat together.</p> + +<p>"We stayed with our old master fourteen years. They were good folks and +treated us right. My old master's name was Sam Meeks—in Longview, Drew +County, Arkansas, down here below Monticello.</p> + +<p>"I got a letter here about a month ago from the daughter of my young +mistress. I wrote to my young mistress and she was dead, so her daughter +got the letter. She answered it and sent me a dollar and asked me was I +on the Old Age Pension list.</p> + +<p>"As far as I know, I am the onliest one of the old darkies living that +belonged to Sam Meeks.</p> + +<p>"I remember when the Ku Klux run in on my old master. That was after the +War. He was at the breakfast table with his wife. You know in them days +they didn't have locks and keys. Had a hole bored through a board and +put a peg in it, and I know the Ku Klux come up and stuck a gun through +the auger hole and shot at old master but missed him. He run to the door +and shot at the Ku Klux. I know us children found one of 'em down at the +spring bathin' his leg where old master had shot him.</p> + +<p>"Oh! they were good folks and treated us right."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MeeksJesse2"></a> +<h3>FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Subject: Superstitions<br> +Story:—Information<br> +<br> +This information given by: Jesse Meeks<br> +Place of residence: 707 Elm Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Occupation: Minister<br> +Age: 76</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>"I remember there was on old man called Billy Mann lived down here at +Noble lake. He said he could 'give you a hand.' If you and your wife +wasn't gettin' along very well and you wanted to get somebody else, he +said he could 'give you a hand' and that would enable you to get anybody +you wanted. That's what he said.</p> + +<p>"And I've heard 'em say they could make a ring around you and you +couldn't get out.</p> + +<p>"I don't believe in that though 'cause I'm in the ministerial work and +it don't pay me to believe in things like that. That is the work of the +devil."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MetcalfJeff"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Jeff Metcalf<br> + R.F.D., Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 73</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My mother's name was Julia Metcalf and my father's name was Jim +Metcalf. They belong to an old bachelor named Bill Metcalf. I think I +was born in Lee County, Mississippi. They did not leave when the war was +over. They stayed on the Bill Metcalf place till they died. I reckon I +do remember him.</p> + +<p>"I can't tell you 'bout the war nor slavery. I don't know a thing 'bout +it. I heard but I couldn't tell you it been so long ago. They didn't +expect nothing but freedom. They got along in the Reconstruction days +about like they had been getting along. Seemed like they didn't know +much about the war. They heard they was free. I don't remember the Ku +Klux Klan. I heard old folks talk 'bout it.</p> + +<p>"I don't know if my father ever voted but I guess he did. I have voted +but I don't vote now. In part I 'proves of the women votin'. I think the +men outer vote and support his family fur as he can.</p> + +<p>"I come here in 1914 from Mississippi. I got busted farmin'. I knowed a +heap o' people said they was doing so well I come too. I come on the +train.</p> + +<p>"I ain't got no home, no land. I got a hog. No garden. Two times in the +year now is hard—winter and simmer. In some ways times is better. In +some ways they is worser. When a trade used to be made to let you have +provisions, you know you would not starve. Now if you can't get work you +'bout starve and can't get no credit. Crops been good last few years and +prices fair fur it. But money won't buy nothin' now. Everything is so +high. Meat is so high. Working man have to eat meat. If he don't he get +weak.</p> + +<p>"The young folks do work. They can't save much farmin'. If they could do +public work between times it be better. I had a hard time in July and +August. I got six children, they grown and gone. My wife is 72 years +old. She ain't no 'count for work no more. The Government give me an' +her $10 a month between us two. Her name is Hannah Metcalf.</p> + +<p>"I wish I did know somethin' to tell you, lady, 'bout the Civil War and +the slavery times. I done forgot 'bout all I heard 'em talkin'. When you +see Hannah she might know somethin'."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MillerHardy"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Hardy Miller<br> + 702-1/2 W. Second Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 85<br> +Occupation: Yardman</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Mistress, I'll tell you what my mother said. She said she birthed me on +Christmas morning in 1852 in Sumpter County, Georgia. It was on her old +master's place. Bright Herring was his name. Old mistress' name was Miss +Lizzie. My father belonged to a different owner.</p> + +<p>"Mac McClendon and John Mourning was two nigger traders and they brought +my mother and sister Nancy and sister Liza and my sister Anna and Hardy +Miller—that's me—out here on the train from Americus, Georgia to +Memphis and put us on a steamboat and brought us here to Pine Bluff and +sold me to Dr. Pope. He was a poor white man and he wanted a pair of +niggers. He bought me and Laura Beckwith. In them days a doctor examined +you and if your heart was sound and your lungs was sound and you didn't +have no broken bones—have to pay one hundred dollars for every year you +was old. That was in 1862 and I was ten years old so they sold me for +one thousand dollars and one thousand dollars for Laura cause she was +sound too. Carried us down to Monticello and when I got free my mammy +come after me.</p> + +<p>"Fore I left Georgia, my daddy belonged to a man named Bill Ramsey. You +see niggers used the name of their masters.</p> + +<p>"I can remember when I was a boy Bill Ramsey set my father free and give +him a free pass and anybody hire him have to pay just like they pay a +nigger now. My daddy hired my mammy from her master. My mammy was her +master's daughter by a colored woman.</p> + +<p>"My daddy had a hoss named Salem and had a cart and he would take me +and my mammy and my sister Liza and go to Americus and buy rations for +the next week.</p> + +<p>"I member when the war started in 1861 my mammy hired me out to Mrs. +Brewer and she used to git after me and say, 'You better do that good or +I'll whip you. My husband gone to war now on account of you niggers and +it's a pity you niggers ever been cause he may get killed and I'll never +see him again.'</p> + +<p>"I member seein' General Bragg's men and General Steele and General +Marmaduke. Had a fight down at Mark's Mill. We just lived six miles from +there. Seen the Yankees comin' by along the big public road. The Yankees +whipped and fought em so strong they didn't have time to bury the dead. +We could see the buzzards and carrion crows. I used to hear old mistress +say, 'There goes the buzzards, done et all the meat off.' I used to go +to mill and we could see the bones. Used to got out and look at their +teeth. No ma'm, I wasn't scared, the white boys was with me.</p> + +<p>"Dr. Pope was good to me, better to me than he was to Master Walter and +Master Billy and my young Miss, Aurelia, cause me and Laura was scared +of em and we tried to do everything they wanted.</p> + +<p>"When the war ended in 1865 we was out in the field gettin' pumpkins. +Old master come out and said, 'Hardy, you and Laura is free now. You can +stay or you can go and live with somebody else.' We stayed till 1868 and +then our mammies come after us. I was seventeen.</p> + +<p>"After freedom my mammy sent me to school. Teacher's name was W.H. +Young. Name was William Young but he went under the head of W.H. Young.</p> + +<p>"I went to school four years and then I got too old. I learned a whole +lot. Learned to read and spell and figger. I done pretty good. I learned +how to add and multiply and how to cancel and how to work square root.</p> + +<p>"What I've been doin' all my life is farmin' down at Fairfield on the +Murphy place.</p> + +<p>"Vote? Good lord! I done more votin'. Voted for all the Presidents. +Yankees wouldn't let us vote Democrat, had to vote Republican. They'd be +there agitatin'. Stand right there and tell me the ones to vote for. I +done quit votin'. I voted for Coolidge—we called him College—that's +the last votin' I did. One of my friends, Levi Hunter, he was a colored +magistrate down at Fairfield.</p> + +<p>"Ku Klux? What you talkin' about? Ku Klux come to our house. My sister +Ellen's husband went to war on the Yankee side durin' the war—on the +Republican side and fought the Democrats.</p> + +<p>"After the war the Ku Klux came and got the colored folks what fought +and killed em. I saw em kill a nigger right off his mule. Fell off on +his sack of corn and the old mule kep' on goin'.</p> + +<p>"Ku Klux used to wear big old long robe with bunches of cotton sewed all +over it. I member one time we was havin' church and a Ku Klux was hid up +in the scaffold. The preacher was readin' the Bible and tellin' the +folks there was a man sent from God and say an angel be here directly. +Just then the Ku Klux fell down and the niggers all thought 'twas the +angel and they got up and flew.</p> + +<p>"Ku Klux used to come to the church well and ask for a drink and say, 'I +ain't had a bit of water since I fought the battle of Shiloh.'</p> + +<p>"Might as well tell the truth—had just as good a time when I was a +slave as when I was free. Had all the hog meat and milk and everything +else to eat.</p> + +<p>"I member one time when old master wasn't at home the Yankees come and +say to old mistress, 'Madam, we is foragin'.' Old mistress say, 'My +husband ain't home; I can't let you.' Yankees say, 'Well, we're goin' to +anyway.' They say, 'Where you keep your milk and butter?' Old mistress +standin' up there, her face as red as blood and say, 'I haven't any milk +or butter to spare.' But the Yankees would hunt till they found it.</p> + +<p>"After a battle when the dead soldiers was layin' around and didn't have +on no uniform cause some of the other soldiers took em, I've heard the +old folk what knowed say you could tell the Yankees from the Rebels +cause the Yankees had blue veins on their bellies and the Rebels didn't.</p> + +<p>"Now you want me to tell you bout this young nigger generation? I never +thought I'd live to see this young generation come out and do as well as +they is doin'. I'm goin' tell you the truth. When I was young, boys and +girls used to wear long white shirt come down to their ankles, cause it +would shrink, with a hole cut out for their head. I think they is doin' +a whole lot better. Got better clothes. Almost look as well as the white +folks. I just say the niggers dressin' better than the white folks used +to.</p> + +<p>"Then I see some niggers got automobiles. Just been free bout +seventy-two years and some of em actin' just like white folks now.</p> + +<p>"Well, good-bye—if I don't see you again I'll meet you in Heaven."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MillerHK"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Beulah Sherwood Hagg<br> +Person interviewed: [HW: Henry Kirk] H.K. Miller<br> + 1513 State Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 86</h3> +<br> + +<p>"No ma'am, it will not bother me one bit if you want to have a long +visit with me.... Yes, I was a little busy, but it can wait. I was +getting my dishes ready for a party tomorrow night.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, I was born during slavery. I was born at a little place +called Fort Valley in Georgia, July 25, 1851. Fort Valley is about 30 +miles from Macon. I came to Little Rock in 1873. My old mistress was a +widow. As well as I can remember she did not have any slaves but my +father and mother and the six children. No ma'am, her name was not +Miller, it was Wade.... Where did I get my name, then? It came from my +grandfather on my father's side.... Well, now, Miss, I can't tell you +where he got that name. From some white master, I reckon.</p> + +<p>"We got free in Georgia June 15, 1865. I'll never forget that date. What +I mean is, that was the day the big freedom came. But we didn't know it +and just worked on. My father was a shoemaker for old mistress. Only one +in town, far as I recollect. He made a lot of money for mistress. Mother +was houseworker for her. As fast as us children got big enough to hire +out, she leased us to anybody who would pay for our hire. I was put out +with another widow woman who lived about 20 miles. She worked me on her +cotton plantation. Old mistress sold one of my sisters; took cotton for +pay. I remember hearing them tell about the big price she brought +because cotton was so high. Old mistress got 15 bales of cotton for +sister, and it was only a few days till freedom came and the man who had +traded all them bales of cotton lost my sister, but old mistress kept +the cotton. She was smart, wasn't she? She knew freedom was right there. +Sister came right back to my parents.</p> + +<p>"Just give me time, miss, and I'll tell you the whole story. This woman +what had me hired tried to run away and take all her slaves along. I +don't remember just how many, but a dozen or more. Lots of white folks +tried to run away and hide their slaves until after the Yankee soldiers +had been through the town searching for them what had not been set free. +She was trying to get to the woods country. But she got nervous and +scared and done the worst thing she could. She run right into a Yankee +camp. Course they asked where we all belonged and sent us where we +belonged. They had always taught us to be scared of the Yankees. I +remember just as well when I got back to where my mother was she asked +me: "Boy, why you come here? Don't you know old mistress got you rented +out? You're goin' be whipped for sure." I told her, no, now we got +freedom. That was the first they had heard. So then she had to tell my +father and mother. She tole them how they have no place to go, no +money,—nothing to start life on; they better stay on with her. So my +father and mother kept on with her; she let them have a part of what +they made; she took some for board, as was right. The white ladies what +had me between them fixed it up that I would serve out the time I was +rented out for. It was about six months more. My parents saved money and +we all went to a farm. I stayed with them till I was 19 years old. Of +course they got all the money I made. I married when I was 20, still +living in Georgia. We tried to farm on shares. A man from Arkansas came +there, getting up a colony of colored to go to Arkansas to farm. Told +big tales of fine land with nobody to work it. Not half as many Negroes +in Arkansas as in Georgia. Me and my wife joined up to go.</p> + +<p>"Well, ma'am, I didn't get enough education to be what you call a +educated man. My father paid for a six months night course for me after +peace. I learned to read and write and figure a little. I have used my +tablespoon full of brains ever since, always adding to that start. I +learned everything I could from the many white friends I have had. Any +way, miss, I have known enough to make a good living all these years.</p> + +<p>"Now I'll get on with the story. First work I got in Arkansas was +working on a farm; me and her both; we always tried to stay together. We +could not make anything on the Garner farm, and it was mighty unhealthy +down in Fourche bottoms. I carried her back to Little Rock and I got +work as house man in the Bunch home. From there I went to the home of +Dudley E. Jones and stayed there 28 years. That was the beginning of my +catering. I just naturally took to cooking and serving. White folks was +still used to having colored wait on them and they liked my style. Mr. +Jones was so kind. He told his friends about how I could plan big +dinners and banquets; then cook and serve them. Right soon I was +handling most of the big swell weddings for the society folks. Child, if +I could call off the names of the folks I have served, it would be +mighty near everybody of any consequence in Little Rock for more than +55 years. Yes ma'am, I'm now being called on to serve the grandchildren +of my first customers.</p> + +<p>"During the 28 years I lived in Mr. Jones' family I was serving +banquets, big public dinners, all kinds of big affairs. I have had the +spring and fall banquets for the Scottish Rite Masons for more than 41 +years. I have served nearly all the Governor's banquets, college +graduation and reunion parties; I took care of President Roosevelt—not +this one, but Teddy----. Served about 600 that day. Any big parties for +colored people?... Yes ma'am! Don't you remember when Booker T. +Washington was here?... No ma'am. White folks didn't have a thing to do +with it, excepting the city let us have the new fire station. It was +just finished but the fire engines ain't moved in yet. I served about +600 that time. Yes ma'am, there was a lot of white folks there. Then, I +have been called to other places to do the catering. Lonoke, Benton, +Malvern, Conway—a heap of places like that.</p> + +<p>"No miss, I didn't always have all the catering business; oh, no. There +was Mr. Rossner. He was a fine man. White gentleman. I used to help him +a lot. But when he sold out to Bott, I got a lot of what business Mr. +Rossner had had, Mr. Bott was a Jew. All that time my wife was my best +helper. I took a young colored fellow named Freeling Alexander and +taught him the business. He never been able to make it go on his own, +but does fine working on salary. He has a cafeteria now.</p> + +<p>"Well thank you miss, speaking about my home like that. Yes ma'am, I +sure do own it. Fifty-two years I been living right here. First I +bought the lot; it took me two years to pay for it. Next I build a +little house. The big pin oak trees out front was only saplings when I +set them out. Come out in the back yard and see my pecan tree.... It is +a giant, ain't it? Yes ma'am, it was a tiny thing when I set it out +fifty-two years ago. Our only child was born in this house,—a dear +daughter—and her three babies were born here too. After my wife and +daughter died, me and the children kept on trying to keep the home +together. I have taught them the catering business. Both granddaughters +are high school graduates. The boy is in Mexico. Before he went he +signed his name to a check and said: "Here, grandpa. You ain't going to +want for a thing while I'm gone. If something happens to your catering +business, or you get so you can't work, fill this in for whatever you +need." But thank the good Lord, I'm still going strong. Nobody has ever +had to take care of H.K. Miller. Now let me tell you something else +about this place. For more than ten years I have been paying $64.64 +every year for my part of that asphalt paving you see out in front. Yes +ma'am, the lot is 50 foot front, and I am paying for only half of it; +from my curb line to the middle of the street. Maybe if I live long +enough I'll get it paid for sometime.</p> + +<p>"I haven't tried to lay by much money. I don't suppose there is any +other colored man—uneducated like me—what has done more for his +community. I have given as high as $80 and $100 at one time to help out +on the church debt or when they wanted to build. I always help in times +of floods and things like that. I've helped many white persons in my +lifetime.</p> + +<p>"Well, now, I'll tell you what I think about the voting system. I think +this. Of course we are still in subjection to the white people; they are +in the majority and have most of the government on their side. But I +think that, er,—er,—well I'll tell you, while it is all right for them +to be at the head of things, they ought to do what is right. Being +educated, they ought to know right from wrong. I believe in the Bible, +miss. Look here. This little book—Gospel of St. John—has been carried +in my pocket every day for years and years. And I never miss a day +reading it. I don't see how some people can be so unjust. I guess they +never read their Bible. The reason I been able to make my three-score +years and ten is because I obeys what the Good Book says.</p> + +<p>"Now, let me see. I can remember that I been voting mighty near ever +since I been here. I never had any trouble voting. I have never been +objected from voting that I remember of.</p> + +<p>"Now you ask about what I think of the young people. Well, I tell you. I +think really that the young people of today had better begin to check +up, a little. They are going too fast. They don't seem to have enough +consideration. When I see so many killed in automobile accidents, and +know that drinking is the cause of so many car accidents,—well, yes +ma'am, drinking sure does have a lot to do with it. I think they should +more consider the way they going to make a living. Make a rule to look +before they act. Another thing—the education being given them—they are +not taking advantage of it. If they would profit by what they learn they +could benefit theirselves. A lot of them now spend heap of time trying +to get to be doctors and lawyers and like that. That is a mistake. There +is not enough work among colored people to support them. I know. +Negroes do not have confidence in their race for this kind of business. +No ma'am. Colored will go for a white doctor and white lawyer 'cause +they think they know more about that kind of business. I would recommend +as the best means of making a living for colored young people is to +select some kind of work that is absolutely necessary to be done and +then do it honestly. The trades, carpentering, paper hanging, painting, +garage work. Some work that white people need to have done, and they +just as soon colored do it as white. White folks ain't never going to +have Negro doctors and lawyers, I reckon. That's the reason I took up +catering—even that long ago. Fifty-five years ago I knew to look around +and find some work that white folks would need done. There's where your +living comes from.</p> + +<p>"Yes, miss, my business is slack—falling off, as you say. Catering is +not what it used to be. You see, 30 or 40 years ago, people's homes were +grand and big; big dining rooms, built for parties and banquets. But for +the big affairs with 500 or 600 guests, they went to the hotels. Even +the hotels had to rent my dishes, silver and linens.... Oh, lord, yes, +miss. I always had my own. It took me ten years to save enough money to +start out with my first 500 of everything.... You want to see them?... +Sure, I keep them here at home.... Look. Here's my silver chests, all +packed to go. I have them divided into different sizes. This one has +fifty of every kind of silver, so if fifty guests are to be provided +for. I keep my linens, plates of different sizes, glasses and everything +the same way. A 200-guest outfit is packed in those chests over there. +No, ma'am, I don't have much trouble of losing silver, because it all +has my initials on; look: H.K.M. on every piece. Heap of dishes are +broken every time I have a big catering. I found one plate +yesterday—the last of a full pattern I had fifteen years ago. About +every ten years is a complete turnover of china. Glassware goes faster, +and of course, the linen is the greatest overhead. Yes ma'am, as I was +telling you, catering is slack because of clubs. So many women take +their parties to clubs now. Another thing, the style of food has +changed. In those old days, the table was loaded with three four meats, +fish, half dozen vegetable dishes, entrees, different kinds of wine, and +an array of desserts. Now what do they have? Liquid punch, frozen punch +and cakes. In June I had a wedding party for 400, and that's all they +served. I had to have 30 punch bowls, but borrowed about half from my +white friends.</p> + +<p>"You have got that wrong about me living with my grandchildren. No +ma'am! They are living with me. They make their home with me. I don't +expect ever to marry again. I'm 86. In my will I am leaving everything I +have to my three grandchildren.</p> + +<p>"Well, miss, you're looking young and blooming. Guess your husband is +right proud of you? Say you're a widow? Well, now, my goodness. Some of +these days a fine man going to find you and then, er—er, lady, let me +cater for the wedding?"</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MillerHenryKirk"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Henry Kirk Miller [HW: Same as H.K. Miller]<br> + 1513 State Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age 87 [HW: 86]</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I am eighty-six years old-eighty-six years and six months. I was born +July 25, 1851. I was a slave. Didn't get free till June 1865. I was a +boy fifteen years old when I got free.</p> + +<p>"I have been living in this house fifty years. I have been living in +Arkansas ever since 1873. That makes about sixty-five years.</p> + +<p>"The engineer who got killed in that wreck the other day (a wreck which +occurred February 7, 1938, Monday morning at three and in which the +engineer and five other people were killed) came right from my town, +Fort Valley, Georgia. I came here from there in 1873. I don't know +anybody living in Fort Valley now unless it's my own folks. And I don't +'spect I'd know them now. When I got married and left there, I was only +twenty-one years old.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Parents and Relatives</b></p> + +<p>"My mother and father were born in South Carolina. After their master +and missis married they came to Georgia. Back there I don't know. When I +remember anything they were in Georgia. They said they came from South +Carolina to Georgia. I don't know how they came. Both of my parents were +Negroes. They came to Arkansas ahead of me. I have their pictures." (He +carried me into the parlor and showed me life-sized bust portraits of +his mother and father.)</p> + +<p>"There were eighteen of us: six boys and twelve girls. They are all +dead now but myself and one sister. She lives in Atlanta, Georgia. I am +older than she is.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Occupation</b></p> + +<p>"I am a caterer. I have been serving the Scottish Rite Masons in their +annual reunion every six months for forty-one years. We are going to the +Seventh Street Entrance this Friday. One of the orders will have a +dinner and I am going down to serve it. I served the dinner for Teddy +Roosevelt there, thirty years ago. This Roosevelt is a cousin of his.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Masters</b></p> + +<p>"My parents' master was named Wade. When he died, I was so little that +they had to lift me up to let me see into the coffin so I could look at +him. I went to his daughter. My name is after my father's father. My +grandfather was named Miller. I took his name. He was a white man.</p> + +<p>"Wade's daughter was named Riley, but I keep my grandfather's name. My +mother and father were then transferred to the Rileys too, and they took +the name of Riley. It was after freedom that I took the name Miller from +my original people. Haven Riley's father was my brother." (Haven Riley +lives in Little Rock and was formerly an instructor at Philander Smith +College. Now he is a public stenographer and a private teacher.)</p> + +<p>"Wade owned all of my brothers and sisters and parents and some of my +kin—father's sister and brother. There might have been some more I +can't remember. Wade was a farmer.</p> + +<p>"I remember once when my mother and father were going to the field to +work, I went with them as usual. That was before Wade died and his +daughter drew us.</p> + +<p>"My wife died six years ago. If she had lived till tomorrow, she would +have been married to me sixty years. She died on the tenth of February +and we were married on the sixth. We just lacked five years of being +married sixty years when she died.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Food</b></p> + +<p>"For food, I don't know anything more than bread and meat. Meal, meat, +molasses were the only rations I saw. In those times the white people +had what was known as the white people's house and then what was known +as nigger quarters. The children that weren't big enough to work were +fed at the white people's house. We got milk and mush for breakfast. +When they boiled cabbage we got bread and pot-liquor. For supper we got +milk and bread. They had cows and the children were fed mostly on milk +and mush or milk and bread. We used to bake a corn cake in the ashes, +ash cake, and put it in the milk.</p> + +<p>"The chickens used to lay out in the barn. If we children would find the +nests and bring the eggs in our missis would give us a biscuit, and we +always got biscuits for Christmas.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Houses in the Negro Quarters</b></p> + +<p>"In the nigger quarters there were nothing but log houses. I don't +remember any house other than a log house. They'd just go out in the +woods and get logs and put up a log house. Put dirt and mud or clay in +the cracks to seal it. Notch the logs in the end to hitch them at +corners. Nailed planks at the end of the logs to make a door frame.</p> + +<p>"My people all ate and cooked and lived in the same room. Some of the +slaves had dirt floors and some of them had plank floors.</p> + +<p>"Food was kept in the house in a sort of box or chest, built in the +wall sometimes. Mostly it was kept on the table.</p> + +<p>"In cooking they had a round oven made like a pot only the bottom would +be flat. It had an iron top. The oven was a bought oven. It was shaped +like a barrel. The top lifted up. Coal was placed under the oven and a +little on top.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Tables and Chairs</b></p> + +<p>"Tables were just boards nailed together. Nothing but planks nailed +together. I don't remember nothing but homemade benches for chairs. They +sometimes made platted or split-bottom chairs out of white oak. Strips +of oak were seven feet long. They put them in water so they would bend +easily and wove them while they were flexible and fresh. The whole chair +bottom was made out of one strip just like in caning. Those chairs were +stouter than the chairs they make now."</p> + +<p>(To be continued) [TR: No continuation found.]</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MillerMatilda"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Annie L. LaCotts<br> +Person interviewed: Matilda Miller<br> + Humphrey, Ark.<br> +Age: 79</h3> +<br> + +<p>The day of the interview Matilda, a nice clean-looking Negro woman, was +in bed, suffering from some kind of a pain in her head. She lives in a +little two-room unpainted boxed house beside the highway in Humphrey. +Her house is almost in the shadow of the big tank which was put up +recently when the town acquired its water system.</p> + +<p>When told that the visitor wanted to talk with her about her early life, +Matilda said, "Well, honey, I'll tell you all I can, but you see, I was +just a little girl when the war was, but I've heard my mother tell lots +of things about then.</p> + +<p>"I was born a slave; my mother and daddy both were owned by Judge +Richard Gamble at Crockett's Bluff. I was born at Boone Hill—about +twelve miles north of DeWitt—and how come it named Boone Hill, that +farm was my young mistress's. Her papa give it to her, just like he give +me to her when I was little, and after she married Mr. Oliver Boone and +lived there the farm always went by the name of 'Boone Hill.' The house +is right on top of a hill, you know, it shure was a pretty place when +Miss Georgia lived there, with great big Magnolia trees in the front +yard. I belonged to Miss Georgia, my young mistress, and when the +niggers were freed my mamma staid on with her. She was right there when +both of his chillun were born, Mr. John Boone and Miss Mary, too. I +nursed <u>both</u> of them chillun. You know who Miss Mary is now, don't +you? Yes'um, she's Mr. Lester Black's wife and he's good, too.</p> + +<p>"I was de oney child my mother had till twelve years after the +surrender. You see, my papa went off with Yankees and didn't come back +till twelve years after we was free, and then I had some brothers and +sisters. Exactly nine months from the day my daddy come home, I had a +baby brother born. My mother said she knew my daddy had been married or +took up with some other woman, but she hadn't got a divorce and still +counted him her husband. They lived for a long time with our white +folks, for they were good to us, but you know after the boys and girls +got grown and began to marry and live in different places, my parents +wanted to be with them and left the white folks.</p> + +<p>"No mam, I didn't see any fighting, but we could hear the big guns +booming away off in the distance. I was married when I was 21 to Henry +Miller and lived with him 51 years and ten months; he died from old age +and hard work. We had two chillun, both girls. One of them lives here +with me in that other room. Mamma said the Yankees told the Negroes when +they got em freed they'd give em a mule and a farm or maybe a part of +the plantation they'd been working on for their white folks. She thought +they just told em that to make them dissatisfied and to get more of them +'to join up with em' and they were dressed in pretty blue clothes and +had nice horses and that made lots of the Negro men go with them. None +of em ever got anything but what their white folks give em, and just +lots and lots of em never come back after the war cause the Yankees put +them in front where the shooting was and they was killed. My husband +Henry Miller died four years ago. He followed public work and made +plenty of money but he had lots of friends and his money went easy too. +I don't spect I'll live long for this hurtin' in my head is awful bad +sometime."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MillerNathan"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Nathan Miller, Madison, Arkansas<br> +Age: Born in 1868</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Lady, I'll tell you what I know but it won't nigh fill your book.</p> + +<p>"I was born in 1862 south of Lockesburg, Arkansas. My parents was +Marther and Burl Miller.</p> + +<p>"They told me their owners come here from North Carolina in 1820. They +owned lots of slaves and lots of land. Mother was medium light—about my +color. See, I'm mixed. My hair is white. I heard mother say she never +worked in the field. Father was a blacksmith on the place. He wasn't a +slave. His grandfather willed him free at ten years of age. It was tried +in the Supreme Court. They set him free. Said they couldn't break the +dead man's will.</p> + +<p>"My father was a real bright colored man. It caused some disturbance. +Father went back and forth to Kansas. They tried to make him leave if he +was a free man. They said I would have to be a slave several years or +leave the State. Freedom settled that for me.</p> + +<p>"My great grandmother on my mother's side belong to Thomas Jefferson. He +was good to her. She used to tell me stories on her lap. She come from +Virginia to Tennessee. They all cried to go back to Virginia and their +master got mad and sold them. He was a meaner man. Her name was Sarah +Jefferson. Mariah was her daughter and Marther was my mother. They was +real dark folks but mother was my color, or a shade darker.</p> + +<p>"Grandmother said she picked cotton from the seed all day till her +fingers nearly bled. That was fore gin day. They said the more hills of +tobacco you could cultivate was how much you was worth.</p> + +<p>"I don't remember the Ku Klux. They was in my little boy days but they +never bothered me.</p> + +<p>"All my life I been working hard—steamboat, railroad, farming. Wore +clean out now.</p> + +<p>"Times is awful hard. I am worn clean out. I am not sick. I'm ashamed to +say I can't do a good day's work but I couldn't. I am proud to own I get +commodities and $8 from the Relief."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MillerSam"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lacy<br> +Person interviewed: Sam Miller, Morrilton, Arkansas<br> +Age: 98</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I is ninety-eight years old, suh. My name's Sam Miller, and I was born +in Texas in 1840—don't know de month nor de day. My parents died when I +was jes' a little chap, and we come to Conway County, Arkansas fifty +years ago; been livin' here ever since. My wife's name was Annie +Williamson. We ain't got no chillun and never had none. I don't belong +to no chu'ch, but my wife is a Baptis'.</p> + +<p>"Can't see to git around much now. No, suh, I can't read or write, +neither. My memory ain't so good about things when I was little, away +back yonder, but I sure members dem Ku Klux Klans and de militia. They +used to ketch people and take em out and whup em.</p> + +<p>"Don't rickolleck any of de old songs but one or two—oh, yes, dey used +to sing 'Old time religion's good enough for me' and songs like dat.</p> + +<p>"De young people! Lawzy, I jest dunno how to take em. Can't understand +em at all. Dey too much for me!"</p> +<br> + +<p>NOTE: The old fellow chuckled and shook his head but said very little +more. He could have told much but for his faulty memory, no doubt. He +was almost non-committal as to facts of slavery days, the War between +the States, and Reconstruction period. Has the sense of humor that seems +to be a characteristic of most of the old-time Negroes, but aside from a +whimsical chuckle shows little of the interest that is usually +associated with the old generation of Negroes.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MillerWD"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: W.D. Miller, West Memphis, Arkansas<br> +Age: 65?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Grandpa was sold twice in Raleigh, North Carolina. He was sold twice to +the same people, from the Millers to the Robertsons (Robersons, +Robinsons, etc.?). He said the Robertsons were not so very good to him +but the Millers were. Grandma was washing when a Yank come and told them +they had been sot free. They quit washing and went from house to house +rejoicing. My parents' names was Jesse and Mary Miller, and Grandma +Agnes and Grandpa Peter Miller. The Robertsons was hill wheat farmers. +The Millers had a cloth factory. Dan Miller owned it and he raised +wheat. Mama was a puny woman and they worked her in the factory. She +made cloth and yarn.</p> + +<p>"I was born in Raleigh, North Carolina or close by there. My father's +uncle John House brought about one hundred families from North Carolina +to Quittenden County, Mississippi. I was seven years old. He said they +rode mules to pick cotton, it growed up like trees. We come in car +boxes. I came to Heath and Helena eleven years ago. Papa stayed with his +master Dan Miller till my uncle tolled him away. He died with smallpox +soon after we come to Mississippi.</p> + +<p>"It is a very good country but they don't pick cotton riding on mules, +at least I ain't seed none that way."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MinserMose"></a> +<h3>El Dorado District<br> +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of Interviewer: Pernella Anderson<br> +Subject: Slavery Customs<br> +Story:—Information<br> +<br> +Information given by: Mose Minser—Farmer—Age—78<br> +Place of Residence: 5 miles from El Dorado—Section 8</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>Ah use ter could tawk an tell a thing plum well but ah been broke up by +a cah. Cah run ovah mah haid an ah couldn' tawk fuh 30 days. So now ah +aint no good fuh nothin. Ah recollect one night ah dream a dream. De +dream at ah dreamt, next morning dat dream come true. Jes like ah dreamt +hit. Yes hit did. Ah wuz heah in slavery time. Ah membuh when dey freed +us niggers. Se here, ah wuz a purty good size kid when dey free us. Ah +kin membuh our house. Sot dis way. An ole Marster called all his niggers +up. Dey all come along roun in a squad on de porch. Ah did not heah whut +he said tuh em. But mah step-pa wuz dere an tole us we wuz free. Ah +atter dey freed mah step-pa ah recollect he went on home and fried some +aigs (eggs) in de ubben. Know we didn have no stove we cooked on de +fiuhplace. As ah said cook dem aigs, gimme some uv hit, an he lef' den. +Went east and ah aint nevah seed dat man since. Ah membuhs once ah got a +whoopin bout goin tuh de chinquepin tree. Some uv um tole me ole master +wuz gwianter let us quit at dinnuh an so in place uv me goin ter dinnuh +ah went on by de chinquepin tree tuh git some chanks. Ah had a brothuh +wid me. So ah come tuh fine out dat dey gin tuh callin us. Dey hollered +tuh come on dat we wuz gointer pick cotton. So in place uv us goin on +tuh de house we went on back tuh de fiel'. Our fiel wuz bout a mile fum +de house. Ole Moster waited down dere at de gate. He call me when ah got +dere an wanted tuh know why ah didn come and git mah dinnah sos ah could +pick cotton. So he taken mah britches down dat day. Mah chinks all run +out on de groun' an he tole mah brothah tuh pick um up. Ah knocked mah +brothuh ovah fuh pickin um up an aftuh ah done dat ole moster taken his +red pocket han'cher out and tied hit ovah mah eyes tuh keep me fum seein +mah brothuh pick um up.</p> + +<p>So when he got through wid me and put mah britches back on me ah went +on tuh de fiel and went tuh pickin cotton. Dat evenin when us stop +pickin cotton ah took mah brothah down and taken mah chinquapins.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MintonGip"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Gip Minton, Des Arc, Arkansas<br> +Age: 84</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born at Jackson, Alabama on the Tennessee River. It was sho a +putty river. I never did know my grandfolks. I think my father was a +soldier. My master was a soldier, I think. He was in de war. I do +remember the Civil War. I remember the last battle at Scottsboro. There +was several but one big battle and they got to Belfontain. That is where +it seemed they were trying to go. I don't recollect who won the battle. +I heard them fighting and saw the smoke and after they went on saw the +bodies dead and all that was left was like a cyclone had swept by. There +was a big regiment stationed at Scottsboro. It was just like any war +fought with guns and they lived in tents. They took everything they +could find. Looked like starvation was upon de land.</p> + +<p>"I had two sisters and one brother and my mother died when I was a baby. +I come out here to Arkansas with my mothers old master and mistress and +never did see nor hear of none of them. No I never did hear from none of +them. I come out here when I was ten or twelve years old. It was, it was +right after the war. I recken I was freed, but I was raised by white +folks and I stayed right on wid em. Dat freedom ain't never bothered me.</p> + +<p>"My master and mistress names was Master Alfred Minton. Dey call me Gip +for him. Gip Minton is what they always called me. My mistress was Miss +Annie Minton. I stayed right wid em. They raised me and I come on here +wid em. I don't know nothin about that freedom.</p> + +<p>"I recken they was good to me. I et in de kitchen when they got through +or on a table out in de back yard sometimes. I slept in an outhouse they +fixed up mostly, when I got up big.</p> + +<p>"We come on the train to Memphis and they come on thater way to Lonoke +whar we settled. Don Shirley was the man I come on horseback with from +Memphis to Lonoke. He was a man what dealt in horses. Sure he was a +white man. He's where we got some horses. I don't remember if he lived +at Lonoke or not.</p> + +<p>"I have voted, yes ma'am, a heap of times. I don't remember what kind er +ticket I votes. I'm a Democrat, I think so. I ain't voted fur sometime +now. I don't know if I'll vote any more times or not. I don't know what +is right bout votin and what ain't right.</p> + +<p>"When I was a boy I helped farm. We had what we made. I guess it was +plenty. I had more to eat and I didn't have as many changes of clothes +as folks has to have nowdays bout all de difference. They raised lots +more. They bought things to do a year and didn't be allus goin to town. +It was hard to come to town. Yes mam it did take a long time, sometimes +in a ox wagon. The oxen pulled more over muddy roads. Took three days to +come to town and git back. I farmed one-half-for-the-other and on shear +crop. Well one bout good as the other. Bout all anybody can make farmin +is plenty to eat and a little to wear long time ago and nows the same +way. The most I reckon I ever did make was on Surrounded Hill (Biscoe) +when I farmed one-half-fur-de-udder for Sheriff Reinhardt. The ground +was new and rich and the seasons hit just fine. No maam I never owned no +farm, no livestock, no home. The only thing I owned was a horse one +time. I worked 16 or 17 years for Mr. Brown and for Mr. Plunkett and +Son. I drayed all de time fur em. Hauled freight up from the old depot +(wharf) down on the river. Long time fore a railroad was thought of. I +helped load cotton and hides on the boats. We loaded all day and all +night too heap o'nights. We worked till we got through and let em take +the ship on.</p> + +<p>"The times is critical for old folks, wages low and everything is so +high. The young folks got heap better educations but seems like they +can't use it. They don't know how to any avantage. I know they don't +have as good chances at farmin as de older folks had. I don't know why +it is. My son works up at the lumber yard. Yes he owns this house. +That's all he owns. He make nough to get by on, I recken. He works hard, +yes maam. He helps me if he can. I get $4 a month janitor at the Farmers +and Merchants Bank (Des Arc). I works a little garden and cleans off +yards. No maam it hurts my rheumatism to run the yard mower. I works +when I sho can't hardly go. Nothin matter cept I'm bout wo out. I plied +for the old folks penshun but I ain't got nuthin yet. I signed up at the +bank fur it agin not long ago. I has been allus self sportin. Didn't +pend on no livin soul but myself."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MitchellAJ"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: A.J. Mitchell<br> + 419 E. 11th Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 78<br> +Occupation: Garbage hauler</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was 'bout seven when they surrendered. I can remember when my old +master sold Aunt Susan. She raised me. I seen old master when he was +tryin' to whip old Aunt Susan. She was the cook. She said, 'I ain't +goin' let you whip me' and I heard my sister say next day he done sold +Aunt Susan. I ain't seed her since. I called her ma. My mother died when +I was two years old. She was full Injun. My father was black but his +hair was straight. His face was so black it shined. Looked like it was +greased. My father said he was freeborn and I've seen stripes on his +back look like the veins on back of my hand where they whipped him +tryin' to make him disown his freedom.</p> + +<p>"Old Jack Clifton was my master. Yes ma'm, that was his name.</p> + +<p>"I 'member when they had those old looms—makin' cloth and old shuttle +to put the thread on. I can see 'em now.</p> + +<p>"I can 'member when this used to be a Injun place. I've seen old Injun +mounds. White folks come and run 'em out and give 'em Injun Territory.</p> + +<p>"I heered the guns in the war and seed the folks comin' home when the +war broke. They said they was fitin' 'bout freedom, tryin' to free the +people. I 'member when they was fitin' at Marks Mill. I know some of the +people said that was where they was sot free.</p> + +<p>"I don't know as I seed any Ku Klux when they was goin' round. Hearin' +'bout 'em scared me. I have a good recollection. I can remember the +first dream I ever had and the first time I whistled. I can remember +when I was two or three years old. Remember when they had a big old +conch shell. Old master would blow it at twelve o'clock for 'em to come +in.</p> + +<p>"Old master was good to us but I 'member he had a leather strap and if +we chillun had done anything he'd make us younguns put our head 'tween +his legs and put that strap on us. My goodness! He called me Pat and +called his own son Bug—his own son Junie. We played together. Old +master had nicknames for everybody.</p> + +<p>"My first mistress was named Miss Mary but she died. I 'member when old +master married and brought Miss Becky home.</p> + +<p>"Marse John (he was old master's oldest son) he used to tote me about in +his saddle bags. He was the overseer.</p> + +<p>"I 'member old master's ridin' hoss—a little old bay pony—called him +Hardy. I never remember nobody else bein' on it—that was his ridin' +hoss.</p> + +<p>"Old master had dogs. One was Gus and one named Brute (he was a red bone +hound). And one little dog they called Trigger. Old master's head as +white as cotton.</p> + +<p>"I do remember the day they said the people was free—after the war +broke. My father come and got me.</p> + +<p>"Now I'm givin' you a true statement. I've been stayin' by myself +twenty-three years. I been here in Pine Bluff—well I jest had got here +when the people was comin' back from that German war.</p> + +<p>"My God, we had the finest time when we killed hogs—make sausage. We'd +eat cracklin's—oh, we thought they wasn't nothin' like cracklin's. The +Lord have mercy, there was an old beech tree set there in my master's +yard. You could hear that old tree pop ever' day bout the same time, +bout twelve o'clock. We used to eat beech mass. Good? Yes ma'm! I think +about it often and wonder why it was right in old master's yard.</p> + +<p>"I've cast a many a vote. Not a bit of trouble in the world. Hope elect +most all the old officers here in town. I had a brother was a constable +under Squire Gaines. Well of course, Miss, I don't think it's right when +they disfranchised the colored people. I tell you, Miss, I read the +Bible and the Bible says every man has his rights—the poor and the free +and the bound. I got good sense from the time I leaped in this world. I +'member well I used to go and cast my vote just that quick but they got +so they wouldn't let you vote unless you could read.</p> + +<p>"I've had 'em to offer me money to vote the Democrat ticket. I told him, +no. I didn't think that was principle. The colored man ain't got no +representive now. Colored men used to be elected to the legislature and +they'd go and sell out. Some of 'em used to vote the Democrat ticket. +God wants every man to have his birthright.</p> + +<p>"I tell you one thing they did. This here no fence law was one of the +lowest things they ever did. I don't know what the governor was studyin' +'bout. If they would let the old people raise meat, they wouldn't have +to get so much help from the government. God don't like that, God wants +the people to raise things. I could make a livin' but they won't let me.</p> + +<p>"The first thing I remember bout studyin' was Junie, old master's son, +studyin' his book and I heard 'em spell the word 'baker'. That was when +they used the old Blue Back Speller.</p> + +<p>"I went to school. I'm goin' tell you as nearly as I can. That was, +madam, let me see, that was in sixty-nine as near as I can come at it. +Miss, I don't know how long I went. My father wouldn't let me. I didn't +know nothin' but work. I weighed cotton ever since I was a little boy. I +always wanted to be weighin'. Looked like it was my gift—weighin' +cotton.</p> + +<p>"I'm a Missionary Baptist preacher. Got a license to preach. You go down +and try to preach without a license and they put you up.</p> + +<p>"Madam, you asked me a question I think I can answer with knowledge and +understanding. The young people is goin' too fast. The people is growin' +weaker and wiser. You take my folks—goin' to school but not doin' +anything. I don't think there's much to the younger generation. Don't +think they're doin' much good. I was brought up with what they called +fireside teachin'."</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 65%;"><br><br> +<a name="MitchellGracie"></a> +<h3>STATE—Arkansas<br> +NAME OF WORKER—Bernice Bowden<br> +ADDRESS—1006 Oak Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +DATE—November 2, 1938<br> +SUBJECT—Exslaves</h3> +<p>[TR: Repetitive information deleted from subsequent pages.]</p> +<br> +<p><b>Circumstances of Interview</b></p> + +<p>1. Name and address of informant—<big><b>Gracie Mitchell</b></big></p> + +<p>2. Date and time of interview—November 1, 1938, 3:00 p.m.</p> + +<p>3. Place of interview—117 Worthen Street</p> + +<p>4. Name and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with +informant—Bernice Wilburn, 101 Miller Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas</p> + +<p>5. Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you—None</p> + +<p>6. Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.—A frame house +(rented), bare floors, no window shades; a bed and some boxes and three +straight chairs. In an adjoining room were another bed, heating stove, +two trunks, one straight chair, one rocking chair. A third room the +kitchen, contained cookstove and table and chairs.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Text of Interview</b></p> + +<p>"They said I was born in Alabama. My mother's name was Sallie and my +father was Andrew Wheeler. I couldn't tell when I was born—my folks +never did tell me that. Belonged to Dr. Moore and when his daughter +married he give my mother to her and she went to Mobile. They said I +wasn't weaned yet. My grandmother told me that. She is dead now. Don't +know nothin' bout nary one o' my white folks. I don't recollect nothin' +bout a one of 'em 'cept my old boss. He took us to Texas and stayed till +the niggers was all free and then he went back. Good to me? No ma'm—no +good there. And if you didn't work he'd see what was the matter. Lived +near Coffeyville in Upshaw county. That's whar my husband found me. I +was living with my aunt and uncle. They said the reason I had such a +good gift makin' quilts was cause my mother was a seamstress.</p> + +<p>"I cooked 'fore I married and I could make my own dresses, piece quilts +and quilt. That's mostly what I done. No laundry work. I never did farm +till I was married. After we went to Chicago in 1922, I took care of +other folks chillun, colored folks, while they was working in laundries +and factories. I sure has worked. I ain't nobody to what I was when I +was first married. I knowed how to turn, but I don't know whar to turn +now—I ain't able.</p> + +<p>"I use to could plow just as good as any man. I could put that dirt up +against that cotton and corn. I'd mold it up. Lay it by? Yes ma'm I'd +lay it by, too.</p> + +<p>"They didn't send me to school but they learned me how to work.</p> + +<p>"I had a quilt book with a lot o' different patterns but I loaned it to +a woman and she carried it to Oklahoma. Mighty few people you can put +confidence in nowdays.</p> + +<p>"I don't go out much 'cept to church—folks is so critical.</p> + +<pre> +"You have to mind how you walk on the cross; +If you don't, your foot will slip, +And your soul will be lost." +</pre> + +<p>"I was a motherless chile but the Lord made up for it by givin' me a +good husband and I don't want for anything."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>According to her husband, Gracie spends every spare moment piecing +quilts. He said they use to go fishing and that Gracie always took her +quilt pieces along and if the fish were not biting she would sew. She +showed me twenty-two finished quilt tops, each of a different design and +several of the same design, or about thirty quilts in all. Two were +entirely of silk, two of applique design which called "laid work". They +were folded up in a trunk and as she took them out and spread them on +the bed for me to see she told me the name of the design. The following +are the names of the designs:</p> + +<pre> + 1. Breakfast Dish + 2. Sawtooth (silk) + 3. Tulip design (Laid work) + 4. "Prickle" Pear + 5. Little Boy's Breeches + 6. Birds All Over the Elements + 7. Drunkard's Path + 8. Railroad Crossing + 9. Cocoanut Leaf ("That's Laid Work") +10. Cotton Leaf +11. Half an Orange +12. Tree of Paradise +13. Sunflower +14. Ocean Wave (silk) +15. Double Star +16. Swan's Nest +17. Log Cabin in the Lane +18. Reel +19. Lily in de Valley (Silk) +20. Feathered Star +21. Fish Tail +22. Whirligig +</pre> + +<p>Gracie showed me her winter coat bought in Chicago of fur fabric called +moleskin, and with fur collar and cuffs.</p> + +<p>She sells the quilt tops whenever she can. Many are made of new material +which they buy.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Personal History of Informant</b></p> + +<p>1. Ancestry—Father, Andrew Wheeler; Sallie Wheeler, mother.</p> + +<p>2. Place and date of birth—Alabama. No date known, about 80 years old.</p> + +<p>3. Family—Husband and one grown son.</p> + +<p>4. Places lived in, with dates—Alabama, Texas till 1897, Arkansas +1897-1922, Chicago, 1922 to 1930. Arkansas 1930 to date.</p> + +<p>5. Education, with dates—No education.</p> + +<p>6. Occupations and accomplishments, with dates—Cooked before marriage +at 16; farmed after marriage; home sewing.</p> + +<p>7. Special skills and interests—Quilt making and knitting.</p> + +<p>8. Community and religious activities—Assisted husband in ministry.</p> + +<p>9. Description of informant—Hair divided into many pigtails and wrapped +with rags. Skin, dark. Medium height, slender, clothing soiled.</p> + +<p>10. Other points gained in interview—Spends all her time piecing +quilts, aside from housework.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MitchellHettie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Hettie Mitchell (mulatto)<br> + Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 69</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I am sixty-nine years old. I was raised in Dyersburg, Tennessee. I can +tell you a few things mother told us. My own grandma on mother's side +was in South Carolina. She was stole when a child and brought to +Tennessee in a covered wagon. Her mother died from the grief of it. She +was hired out to nurse for these people. The people that stole her was +named Spence. She was a house woman for them till freedom. She was never +sold. Spences was not cruel people. Mother was never sold. She was the +mother of twelve and raised nine to a good age—more than grown. The +Spences seemed to always care for her children. When I go to Dyersburg +they always want us to come to see them and they treat us mighty well.</p> + +<p>"Mother was light. She said she had Indian strain (blood) but father was +very light and it was white blood but he never discussed it before his +children. So I can't tell you excepting he said he was owned by the +Brittians in South Carolina. He said his mother died soon after he was +sold. He was sold to a nigger trader and come in the gang to Memphis, +Tennessee and was put on the block and auctioned off to the highest +bidder. He was a farm hand.</p> + +<p>"Mother married father when she was nineteen years old. She was a house +girl. She lived close to her old mistress. She was very, very old before +she died she nearly stayed at my mother's house. Her mind wasn't right +and mother understood how to take care of her and was kind to her. The +Spences heard about grandma. They wrote and visited years after when +mother was a girl.</p> + +<p>"The way that father found out about his kin folks was this: One day a +creek was named and he told the white man, 'I was born close to that +creek and played there in the white sand and water when I was a little +boy.' The white man asked his name, said he knew the creek well too. +Father told him he never was named till he was sold and they named him +Sam—Sam Barnett. He was sold to Barnett in Memphis. But his dear own +mother called him 'Candy.' The white man found out about his people for +him and they found out his own dear mother died that same year he was +taken from South Carolina from grief. He heard from some of his people +from that time on till he died.</p> + +<p>"I worked on the farm in Tennessee till I married. I ironed, washed, and +have kept my own house and done the work that goes along with raising a +small family. We own our home. We have saved all we could along. I have +never had a real hard time like some I know. I guess my time is at hand +now. I don't know which way to turn since my husband got down sick.</p> + +<p>"I don't vote. Seem like it used to not be a nice place for women to go +where voting was taking place. Now they go mix up and vote. That is one +big change. Time is changing and changing the people. Maybe it is the +people is changing up the world as time goes by. We colored folks look +to the white folks to know the way to do. We have always done it."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MitchellMary"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Mary Mitchell, Hazen, Arkansas<br> +Age: 60</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Trenton, Tennessee. My parents had five children. They +were named William and Charlotte Wells. My father ran away and left my +mother with all the children to raise. By birth mother was a +Mississippian. She had been a nurse and my father was a timber man and +farmer. My mother said she had her hardest time raising her little +children. She was taken from her parents when a small girl and put on a +block and sold. She never said if her owners was bad to her, but she +said they was rough on Uncle Peter. He would fight. She said they would +tie Uncle Peter and whoop him with a strap. From what she said there was +a gang of slaves on Mr. Wade's place. He owned her. I never heard her +mention freedom but she said they had a big farm bell on a tall post in +the back yard and they had a horn to blow. It was a whistle made of a +cow's horn.</p> + +<p>"She said they was all afraid of the Ku Klux. They would ride across the +field and they could see that they was around, but they never come up +close to them."</p> + + + +<br><br><hr style="width: 65%;"><br><br> +<a name="MitchellMoses"></a> +<h3>STATE—Arkansas<br> +NAME OF WORKER—Bernice Bowden<br> +ADDRESS—1006 Oak Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +DATE—November 3, 1938<br> +SUBJECT—Exslaves +</h3> +<p>[TR: Repetitive information deleted from subsequent pages.]</p> +<br> +<p><b>Circumstances of Interview</b></p> + +<p>1. Name and address of informant—<big><b>Moses Mitchell</b></big>, +117 Worthen Street</p> + +<p>2. Date and time of interview—November 1, 1938, 1:00 p.m.</p> + +<p>3. Place of interview—117 Worthen Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas</p> + +<p>4. Place and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with +informant—Bernice Wilburn, 101 Miller Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas</p> + +<p>5. Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you—None</p> + +<p>6. Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.—A frame house +(rented), bare floors, no window shades; a bed and some boxes and three +straight chairs. In an adjoining room were another bed, heating stove, +two trunks, one straight chair, one rocking chair. A third room, the +kitchen, contained cookstove and table and chairs.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Text of Interview</b></p> + +<p>"I was born down here on White River near Arkansas Post, August, 1849. I +belonged to Thomas Mitchel and when they (Yankees) took Arkansas Post, +our owners gathered us up and my young master took us to Texas and he +sold me to an Irishman named John McInish in Marshall for $1500. $500 in +gold and the rest in Confederate money. They called it the new issue.</p> + +<p>"I was twelve years old then and I stayed in Texas till I was +forty-eight. I was at Tyler, Texas when they freed us. When they took us +to Texas they left my mother and baby sister here in Arkansas, down here +on Oak Log Bayou. I never saw her again and when I came back here to +Arkansas, they said she had been dead twenty-eight years. Never did hear +of my father again.</p> + +<p>"I'm supposed to be part Creek Indian. Don't know how much. We have one +son, a farmer, lives across the river. Married this wife in 1873.</p> + +<p>"My wife and I left Texas forty-one years ago and came back here to +Arkansas and stayed till 1922. Then we went to Chicago and stayed till +1930, and then came back here. I'd like to go back up there, but I guess +I'm gettin' too old. While I was there I preached and I worked all the +time. I worked on the streets and the driveways in Lincoln Park. I was +in the brick and block department. Then I went from there to the asphalt +department. There's where I coined the money. Made $6.60 in the brick +and block and $7.20 a day in the asphalt. Down here they don't know no +more about asphalt than a pig does about a holiday. <u>A man that's from +the South and never been nowhere, don't know nothin', a woman +either</u>.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'm, I'm a preacher. Just a local preacher, wasn't ordained. The +reason for that was, in Texas a man over forty-five couldn't join the +traveling connection. I was licensed, but of course I couldn't perform +marriage ceremonies. I was just within one step of that.</p> + +<p>"I went to school two days in my life. I was privileged to go to the +first free school in Texas. Had a teacher named Goldman. Don't know what +year that was but they found out me and another fellow was too old so +they wouldn't let us go no more. But I caught my alphabet in them two +days. So I just caught what education I've got, here and there. I can +read well—best on my Bible and Testament and I read the newspapers. I +can sorta scribble my name.</p> + +<p>"I've been a farmer most of my life and a preacher for fifty-five years. +I can repair shoes and use to do common carpenter work. I can help build +a house. I only preach occasionally now, here and there. I belong to the +Allen Temple in Hoboken (East Pine Bluff).</p> + +<p>"I think the young generation is gone to naught. They're a different cut +to what they was in my comin' up."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>This man and his wife live in the outskirts of West pine Bluff. They +receive a small sum of money and commodities from the County Welfare +Department. He has a very pleasant personality, a good memory and +intelligence above the ordinary. Reads the Daily Graphic and Arkansas +Gazette. Age 89. He said, "<u>Here's the idea, freedom is worth it +all</u>."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Personal History of Informant</b></p> + +<p>1. Ancestry—Father, Lewis Mitchell; Mother, Rhoda Mitchell</p> + +<p>2. Place and date of birth—Oak Log Bayou, White River, near Arkansas +Post, Ark.</p> + +<p>3. Family—Wife and one grown son.</p> + +<p>4. Places lived in, with dates—Taken to Texas by his young master and +sold in Marshall during the war. Lived in Tyler, Texas until forty-eight +years of age; came back to Arkansas in 1897 and stayed until 1922; went +to Chicago and lived until 1930; back to Jefferson County, Arkansas.</p> + +<p>5. Education, with dates—Two days after twenty-one years of age. No +date.</p> + +<p>6. Occupations and accomplishments, with dates—Farmer, preacher, common +carpenter, cobbler, public work on streets in Chicago, farmed and +preached until he went to Chicago in 1922. The he worked in the +maintenance department of city streets of Chicago and of Lincoln Park, +Chicago.</p> + +<p>7. Special skills and interests—Asphalt worker</p> + +<p>8. Community and religious activities—Licensed Methodist Preacher. No +assignment now.</p> + +<p>9. Description of informant—Five feet eight inches tall; weight, 165 +pounds, nearly bald. Very prominent cheek bones. Keen intelligence. +Neatly dressed.</p> + +<p>10. Other points gained in interview—Reads daily papers; knowledge of +world affairs.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MoonBen"></a> +<h3>Pine Bluff District<br> +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of Interviewer: Martin - Barker<br> +Subject: Negro Customs<br> +<br> +Information by: Ben Moon</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of second page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>I was born on the Walker place, in 1869. My father was a slave to Mr. +Bob. I used to drive Miss Lelia (Eulalie) to the Catholic church here in +Pine Bluff. She used to let me go barefooted, and bare headed.</p> + +<p>Miss Lelia was the daughter of Col. Creed Taylor. All during slavery +time I drove her gins. We had eight mules. Eight at a time hitched to +each lever, they would weave in an out but they was so hitched that they +never got in any body's way. They just walked around and round like they +did in those days. We had herds of sheep, we sheared them and wove yarn +for socks. We raised wheat, when it was ripe we laid a canvas cloth on +the ground and put wheat on it, then men and women on horse back rode +over it, and thrashed it that way. They called it treading it. Then we +took it to the mill and ground it and made it into flour. For breakfast, +(we ate awful soon in the morning), about 4 AM, then we packed lunch in +tin buckets and eat again at daylight. Fat meat, cornbread and molasses. +Some would have turnip greens for breakfast.</p> + +<p>Summertime, Miss Lelia would plant plenty of fruit, and we would have +fried apples, stewed peaches and things.</p> + +<p>Sunday mornings we would have biscuit, butter, molasses, chicken, etc.</p> + +<p>For our work they paid us seventy-five cents a day and when come cotton +picking time old rule, seventy five cents for pickin cotton. Christmas +time, plenty of fireworks, plenty to eat, drink and everything. We would +dance all Christmas.</p> + +<p>All kind of game was plentiful, plenty of coon, possum, used up +everything that grew in the woods. Plenty of corn, we took it to the +grist mill every Saturday.</p> + +<p>Ark. riv. boats passed the Walker place, and dey was a landing right at +dere place, and one at the Wright place, that is where the airport is +now.</p> + +<p>All de white folks had plenty of cattle den and in de winter time dey +was all turned in on the fields and with what us niggers had, that made +a good many, and you know yorself dat was good for de ground.</p> + +<p>Mother was a slave on the Merriweather place, her marster was Mick[TR: +name not clear] Merriweather. My granma was Gusta Merriweather, my +mother Lavina and lived on the Merriweather place in what was then +Dorsey county, near Edinburg, now Cleveland Co. My grandfather was Louis +Barnett, owned by Nick Barnett of Cleveland co., then Dorsey co. Fathers +people was owned by Marse Bob Walker. Miss Lelia (Eulalie) was mistis. +Miss Maggie Benton was young mistis.</p> + +<p>I dont believe in ghosts or spirits.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MooreEmma"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Emma Moore<br> + 3715 Short West Second, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 80<br> +Occupation: Laundry work</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I'se born in slavery times. When my daddy come back from the War, he +said I was gwine on seven or eight.</p> + +<p>"He stayed in the War three years and six months. I know that's what he +always told us. He went with his master, Joe Horton. Looks like I can +see old Marse Joe now. Had long sandy whiskers. The las' time I seed him +he come to my uncle's house. We was all livin' in a row of houses. +Called em the quarters. I never will fergit it.</p> + +<p>"I was born on Horton's Island here in Arkansas. That's what they told +me.</p> + +<p>"I know when my daddy went to war and when he come back, he put on his +crudiments (accoutrements) to let us see how he looked.</p> + +<p>"I seed the soldiers gwine to war and comin' back. Look like to me I was +glad to see em till I seed too many of em.</p> + +<p>"Yankees used to come down and take provisions. Yes, 'twas the Yankees!</p> + +<p>"My granddaddy was the whippin' boss. Had a white boss too named Massa +Fred.</p> + +<p>"Massa Joe used to come down and play with us chillun. His name was Joe +Horton. Ever'body can tell you that was his name. Old missis named Miss +Mary. She didn't play with us much.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, they sure did take us to Texas durin' of the War—in a ox +wagon. Stayed down there a long time.</p> + +<p>"We didn't have plenty to eat but we had to eat what we did. I member +they wouldn't give us chillun no meat, jus' grease my mouf and make my +mother think we had meat.</p> + +<p>"Now my mother told me, at night some of the folks used to steal one of +old massa's shoats and cook it at night. I know when that pot was on the +rack but you better not say nothin' bout it.</p> + +<p>"All us chillun stayed in a big long log house. Dar is where us chillun +stayed in the daytime, right close to Miss Mary.</p> + +<p>"I used to sit on the lever at the gin. You know that was glory to me to +ride. I whipped the old mule. Ever' now and then I'd give him a tap.</p> + +<p>"When they pressed the cotton, they wet the press and I member one time +they wet it too much. I don't say they sont it back but I think they +made em pay for it. And they used to put chunks in the bale to make it +weigh heavy. Right there on that lake where I was born.</p> + +<p>"Used to work in the field. These white folks can tell you I loved to +work. I used to get as much as the men. My mammy was a worker and as the +sayin' is, I was a chip off the old block.</p> + +<p>"The first teacher I went to school to was named Mr. Cushman. Didn't go +only on rainy days. That was the first school and you might say the las' +one cause I had to nuss them chillun.</p> + +<p>"You know old massa used to keep all our ages and my daddy said I was +nineteen when I married, but I don't know what year 'twas—honest I +don't.</p> + +<p>"I been married three times.</p> + +<p>"I member one time I was goin' to a buryin'. I was hurryin' to get +dressed. I wanted to be ready when they come by for me cause they say +it's bad luck to stop a corpse. If you don't know that I do—you know if +they had done started from the house.</p> + +<p>"My mama and daddy said they was born in Tennessee and was bought and +brought here.</p> + +<p>"I been goin' to one of these gov'ment schools and got my eyes so weak I +can't hardly see to thread a needle. I'se crazy bout it I'm tellin' you. +I sit up here till God knows how long. They give me a copy to practice +and they'd brag on me and that turned me foolish. I jus' thought I was +the teacher herself almos'. That's the truf now.</p> + +<p>"I can't read much. I don't fool with no newspaper. I wish I could, +woman—I sure do.</p> + +<p>"I keep tellin' these young folks they better learn somethin'. I tell em +they better take this chance. This young generation—I don't know much +bout the whites—I'm tellin' you these colored is a sight.</p> + +<p>"Well, I'm gwine away from here d'rectly—ain't gwine be here much +longer. If I don't see you again I'll meet you in heaven."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<h3><a name="MoorePatsy"></a> +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Patsy Moore, Madison, Arkansas<br> +Age: 74</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My mother was sold in Jamestown, Virginia to Daphney Hull. Her white +folks got in debt. My papa was born in Georgia. Folks named Williams +owned him. Ma never seen her ma no more but William Hull went to +Virginia and bought her two sisters.</p> + +<p>"I was named Patsy after grandma in Virginia. She had twenty-one +children to ma's knowing. Ma was a light color. Pa was a Molly Glaspy +man. That means he was Indian and African. Molly Glaspy folks was nearly +always free folks. Ma was named Mattie. If they would have no children +they got trafficked about.</p> + +<p>"Daphney Hull was good but William Hull and his wife was both mean. They +lived on the main road to Holly Springs. Daphney Hull was a Methodist +man, kind-hearted and good. He was a bachelor I think. He kept a woman +to cook and keep his house. Auntie said the Yankees was mean to Mr. +William Hull's wife. They took all their money and meat. They had their +money hid and some of the black folks let the Yankees find out where it +was. They got it.</p> + +<p>"Papa was a soldier. He sent for us. We come to Memphis, Tennessee in a +wagon. We lived there five or six years. Pa got a pension till he died. +Both my parents was field hands in slavery. Ma took in washing and +ironing in Memphis.</p> + +<p>"I was born in De Sota County, Mississippi. I remember Forrest's battle +in Memphis. I didn't have sense to be scared. I seen black and white +dead in the streets and alleys. We went to the magazine house for +protection, and we played and stayed there. They tried to open the +magazine house but couldn't.</p> + +<p>"When freedom come, folks left home, out in the streets, crying, +praying, singing, shouting, yelling, and knocking down everything. Some +shot off big guns. Den come the calm. It was sad then. So many folks +done dead, things tore up and nowheres to go and nothing to eat, nothing +to do. It got squally. Folks got sick, so hungry. Some folks starved +nearly to death. Times got hard. We went to the washtub onliest way we +all could live. Ma was a cripple woman. Pa couldn't find work for so +long when he mustered out.</p> + +<p>"I do recollect the Civil War well.</p> + +<p>"I live with my daughter. I have a cough since I had flu and now I have +chills and fever. My daughter helps me all I get. She lives with me.</p> + +<p>"Some of the young folks is mighty good. I reckon some is too loose +acting. Times is hard. Harder in the winter than in summer time. We has +our garden and chickens to help us out in summer."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MooreheadAda"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Ada Moorehead<br> + 2300 E. Barraque, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 82?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was here in slavery times, honey, but I don't know exactly how old I +am. I was born in Huntsville, Alabama but you know in them days old +folks didn't tell the young folks no thin' and I was so small when they +brought me here. I don't know what year I was born but I believe I'm +about eighty-two. You know when a person ain't able to work and dabble +out his own clothes, you know he's gone a long ways.</p> + +<p>"My white folks was Ad White what owned me. Called him Marse Ad. Don't +call folks marse much now-days.</p> + +<p>"My father was sold away from us in Alabama and we heard he was here in +Pine Bluff so Aunt Fanny brought us here. She just had a road full of us +and brought us here to Arkansas. We walked. We was a week on the road. I +know we started here on Monday morning and we got here to the courthouse +on the next Monday round about noon. That was that old courthouse. I +reckon that ground is in the river now.</p> + +<p>"When we got here I saw my father. He took me to his sister—that was my +Aunt Savannah—and dropped me down.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Reynolds raised me. She come to Aunt Savannah's house and hired me +the very same day I got here. I nursed Miss Katie. She was bout a month +old. You know—a little long dress baby. Don't wear then long dresses +now—gettin' wiser.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Reynolds she was good to me. And since she's gone looks like I'm +gone too—gone to the dogs. Cause when Mrs. Reynolds got a dress for +Miss Katie—got one for me too.</p> + +<p>"My father was a soldier in the war. Last time I heard from him I know +he was hauling salt to the breastworks. Yes, I was here in the war. That +was all right to me but I wished a many a time I wasn't here.</p> + +<p>"I went to school two or three days in a week for about a term. But I +didn't learn to read much. Had to hire out and help raise my brother and +sister. I'm goin' to this here government school now. I goes every +afternoon.</p> + +<p>"Since I got old I can think bout the old times. It comes to me. I +didn't pay attention to nothin' much when I was young.</p> + +<p>"Oh Lord, I don't know what's goin' to become of us old folks. Wasn't +for the Welfare, I don't know what I'd do.</p> + +<p>"I was sixteen when I married. I sure did marry young. I married young +so I could see my chillun grown. I never married but once and I stayed a +married woman forty-nine years to the very day my old man died. Lived +with one man forty-nine years. I had my hand and heart full. I had a +home of my own. How many chillun? Me? I had nine of my own and I raised +other folks' chillun. Oh, I been over this world right smart—first one +thing and then another. I know a lot of white folks. They all been +pretty good to me."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MooremanMaryJane"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mary D. Hudgins<br> +Person Interviewed: Mrs. Mary Jane (Mattie) Mooreman<br> +Home: with son<br> +Age: 90</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes, ma'am. I've been in Hot Springs, been in Hot Springs 57 years. +That's a long time. Lots of changes have come—I've seen lots of changes +here—changed from wooden sidewalks and little wood buildings.</p> + +<p>"Your name's Hudgins? I knew the Hudginses—knew Miss Nora well. What's +that? Did I know Adeline? Did I know Adeline! Do you mean to tell me +she's still alive? Adeline! Why Miss Maud," (addressing Mrs. Eisele, for +whom she works—and who sat nearby to help in the interview) "Miss +Maude, I tell you Adeline's WHITE, she's white clean through!" (see +interview with Adeline Blakeley, who incidentally is as black as "the +ace of spades"—in pigmentation.) "Miss Maude, you never knew anybody +like Adeline. She bossed those children and made them mind—just like +they was hers. She took good care of them." (Turning to the +interviewer) "You know how the Hudgins always was about their children. +Adeline thought every one of 'em was made out of gold---made out of pure +GOLD.</p> + +<p>"She made 'em mind. I remember once, she was down on Central Avenue with +Ross and he did southing or other that, wasn't nice. She walked over to +the umbrella stand, you remember how they used to have umbrellas for +sale out in front of the stores. She grabbed an umbrella and she whipped +Ross with it--she didn't hurt him. Then she put it back in the stand +and said to the man who ran the store, 'If that umbrella's hurt, just +charge it to Harve Hudgins.' That's the way Adeline was. So she's still +alive. Law how I'd like to see her. Bring me a picture of her. Oh Miss +Mary, I'd love to have it.</p> + +<p>"Me? I was born on Green river near Hartford, Kentucky. Guess I was +about a year and a half, from what they told me when my mistress +married. Don't know how she ever met my master. She was raised in a +convent and his folks lived a long way from hers. But anyhow she did. +She was just 13 when she married. The man she married was named Charles +Mooreman M-O-O-R-E-M-A-N. They had a son called Charles Wycliff +Mooreman. He was named for his mother's people. I got a son I called +Charles Wycliff too. He works at the Arlington. He's a waiter. They say +he looks just like me. Mr. Charles Wycliff Mooreman--back in Kentucky. +I still gets letters from him.</p> + +<p>"Miss Mary I guess I had a pretty easy time in slavery days. They was +good to us. Besides I was a house niggah." (Those who have been "house +niggahs" never quibble at the word slave or negro. A subtle social +distinction brewed in the black race to separate house servants from +field hands as far as wealthy planters from "poor white trash.".) "Once +I heard a man say of my mother, 'You could put on a white boiled shirt +and lie flat down on the floor in her kitchen and not get dirty.'"</p> + +<p>"Cook? No, ma'am!" (with dignity and indignation) "I never cooked until +after I was married, and I never washed, never washed so much as a rag. +All I washed was the babies and maybe my mistress's feet. I was a lady's +maid. I'd wait on my mistress and I'd knit sox for all the folks. When +they would sleep it was our duty—us maids—to fan 'em with feathers +made out of turkey feathers—feather fans. Part of it was to keep 'em +cool. Then they didn't have screens like we have today. So part of it +was to keep the flies off. I remember how we couldn't stomp our feet to +keep the flies from biting for fear of waking 'em up.</p> + +<p>"No, Miss Mary, we didn't get such, good food. Nobody had all the kinds +of things we have today. We had mostly buttermilk and cornbread and fat +meat. Cake? 'Deed we didn't. I remember once they baked a cake and Mr. +Charles Wycliff—he was just a little boy—he got in and took a whole +fistful out of the cake. When Miss found out about it, she give us all +doses of salts—enough to make us all throw up. She gave it to all the +niggahs and the children—the white children. And what did she find out? +It was her own child who had done it.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am we learned to read and write. Oh, Miss Maude now—I don't +want to recite. I don't want to." (But she did "Twinkle, Twinkle Little +Star" and "The Playful Kitten"—the latter all of 40 lines.) "I think, I +think they both come out of McGuffey's second Reader. Yes ma'am I +remember's McGuffey's and the Blueback speller too.</p> + +<p>"No, Miss Mary, there wasn't so much of the war that was fought around +us. I remember that old Master used to go out in the front yard and +stand by a locust tree and put his ear against it. He said that way he +could hear the cannon down to Bowling Green. No, I didn't never hear any +shooting from the war myself.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, the Confederates used to come through lots. I remember how +we used to go to the spring for water for 'em. Then we'd stand with the +buckets on our heads while they drank—drank out of a big gourd. When +the buckets was empty we'd go back to the spring for more water.</p> + +<p>"Once the Yankees come by the place. It was at night. They went out to +the quarters and they tried to get 'em to rise up. Told 'em to come on +in the big house and take what they wanted. Told 'em to take anything +they wanted to take, take Master's silver spoons and Miss' silk dress. +'If they don't like it, we'll shoot their brains out,' they said. Next +morning they told Master. He got scared and moved. At that time we was +living at Cloverport.</p> + +<p>"It was near the end of the war and we was already free, only we didn't +know it. He moved on up to Stephensport. That's on the Ohio too. He took +me and a brother of mine and another black boy. While we was there I +remember he took me to a circus. I remember how the lady—she was +dressed in pink come walking down a wire—straight on down to the +ground. She was carrying a long pole. I won't never forget that.</p> + +<p>"Not long afterwards I was married. We was all free then. My husband +asked my master if he could marry me. He told him 'You're a good man. +You can come and live on my farm and work for me, but you can't have +Mattie.' So we moved off to his Master's farm.</p> + +<p>"A little while after that his Master bought a big farm in Arkansas. He +wanted to hire as many people as he could. So we went with him. He +started out well, but the first summer he died. So everything had to be +sold. A man what come down to bid on some of the farm tools and +stock—come to the auction, he told us to come on up to Woodruff county +and work for him. We was there 7 years and he worked the farm and I took +care of myself and my babies. Then he went off and left me.</p> + +<p>"I went in to Cotton Plant and started working there. Finally he wrote +me and tried to get me to say we hadn't never been married. Said he +wanted to marry another woman. The white folks I worked for wouldn't let +me. I'd been married right and they wouldn't let me disgrace myself by +writing such a letter.</p> + +<p>"Finally I came on to Hot Springs. For a while I cooked and washed. Then +I started working for folks, regular. For 9 years, tho, I mostly washed +and ironed.</p> + +<p>"I came to Hot Springs on the 7th of February—I think it was 57 years +ago. You remember Miss Maud—it was just before that big hail storm. You +was here, don't you remember—that hail storm that took all the windows +out of all the houses, tore off roofs and swept dishes and table-cloths +right off the tables. Can't nobody forget that who's seen it.</p> + +<p>"Miss Mary, do you know Miss Julia Huggins? I worked for her a long +time. Worked for her before she went away and after she came back. +Between times I cooked for Mrs. Button (Burton—but called Button by +everyone) Housley. When Miss Julia come back she marches right down to +Mrs. Housley's and tells me she wants me to work for her again. 'Can't +get her now,' says Mrs. Housley, 'Mattie's done found out she's black.' +But anyhow I went to see her, and I went back to work for her, pretty +foxy Miss Julia was.</p> + +<p>"I been working for Mrs. Eisele pretty near twenty five years. Saw her +children grow up and the grand children. Lancing, he's my heart. Once +when Mr. and Mrs. Eisele went to see Mrs. Brown, Lancing's mother, they +took me with them. All the way to Watertown, Wisconsin. There wasn't any +more niggas in the town and all the children thought I was somthing to +look at. They'd come to see me and they'd bring their friends with 'em. +Once while we was there, a circus come to town. The children wanted me +to see it. Told me there was a negro boy in it. Guess they thought it +would be a treat to me to see another niggah. I told 'em, 'Law, don't +you think I see lots, lots more than I wants, everyday when I is at +home?'</p> + +<p>"It used to scare me. The folks would go off to a party or a show and +leave me alone with the baby. No, Miss Mary, I wasn't scared for myself. +I thought somebody might come in and kidnap that baby. No matter how +late they was I'd sit on the top step of the stairs leading +upstairs—just outside the door where Lansing was asleep. No matter what +time they come home they'd find me there. 'Why don't you go on in your +bedroom and lie down?' they'd ask me. 'No,' I'd tell 'em, 'somebody +might come in, and they would have to get that baby over my dead body.'</p> + +<p>"Jonnie, that's my daughter" (Mrs. D.G. Murphy, 338 Walnut Street, a +large stucco house with well cared for lawn) "she wants me to quit work. +I told her, 'You put that over on Mrs. Murphy—you made her quit work +and took care of her. What happened to her? She died! You're not going +to make me old.'</p> + +<p>"Twice she's got me to quit work. Once, she told me it was against the +law. Told me there was a law old folks couldn't work. I believed her and +I quit. Then I come on down and I asked Mr. Eisele" (an important +business executive and prominent in civic affairs, [HW: aged 83]) "He +rared back and he said, 'I'd like to see anybody stop me from working.' +So I come on back.</p> + +<p>"Another time, it was when the old age pensions come in. They tried to +stop me again. Told me I had to take it. I asked Mr. Eisele if I could +work just the same. 'No,' he says 'if you take it, you'll have to quit +work.' So I stamped my foot and I says, 'I won't take nobody's pension.'</p> + +<p>"The other day Jonnie called up here and she started to crying. Lots of +folks write her notes and say she's bad to let me work. Somebody told +her that they had seen me going by to work at 4 o'clock in the morning. +It wasn't no such. I asked a man when I was on the way and it was 25 +minutes until 5. Besides, my clock had stopped and I couldn't tell what +time it was. Yes, Miss Mary, I does get here sort of early, but then I +like it. I just sit in the kitchen until the folks get up.</p> + +<p>"You see that picture over there, it's Mr. Eisele when he was 17. I'd +know that smiling face anywhere. He's always good to me. When they go +away to Florida I can go to the store and get money whenever I need it. +But it's always good to see them come back. Miss Maud says I'm sure to +go to Heaven, I'm such a good worker. No, Miss Mary, I'm not going to +quit work. Not until I get old."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MorganEvelina"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Evelina Morgan<br> + 1317 W. Sixteenth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: App. 81</h3> +<p>[TR: Original first page moved to follow second page per<br> + HW: Insert this page before Par. 1, P. 3]</p> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Wedgeboro, North Carolina, on the plantation of—let me +see what that man's name was. He was an old lawyer. I done forgot that +old white man's name. Old Tom Ash! Senator Ash—that's his name. He was +good to his slaves. He had so many niggers he didn't know them all.</p> + +<p>"My father's name was Alphonso Dorgens and my mother's name was Lizzie +Dorgens. Both of them dead. I don't know what her name was before she +married. My pa belonged to the Dorgens' and he married my ma. That is +how she come to be a Dorgen. Old Man Ash never did buy him. He just +visited my mother. They all was in the same neighborhood. Big +plantations. Both of them had masters that owned lots of land. I don't +know how often he visited my mother after he married her. He was over +there all the time. They were right adjoining plantations.</p> + +<p>"I was born in a frame house. I don't know nothin' about it no more than +that. It was j'ined to the kitchen. My mother had two rooms j'ined to +the kitchen. She was the old mistress' cook. She could come right out of +the kitchen and go on in her room.</p> + +<p>"My father worked on the farm. They fed the slaves meat and bread. That +is all I remember—meat and bread and potatoes. They made lots of +potatoes. They gave 'em what they raised. You could raise stuff for +yourself if you wanted to.</p> + +<p>"My mother took care of her children. We children was on the place there +with her. She didn't have nobody's children to take care of but us.</p> + +<p>"I was six years old during of the War. My ma told me my age, but I +forgot it; I never did have it put down. The only way I gits a pension, +I just tells 'em I was six years old during of the War, and they figures +out the age. Sorta like that. But I know I was six years old when the +Rebels and the Yankees was fighting.</p> + +<p>"I seed the Yankees come through. I seed that. They come in the time old +master was gone. He run off—he run away. He didn't let 'em git him. I +was a little child. They stayed there all day breaking into +things—breaking into the molasses and all like that. Old mistress +stayed upstairs hiding. The soldiers went down in the basement and +throwed things around. Old master was a senator; they wanted to git him. +They sure did cuss him: 'The ----, ----, ----, old senator,' they would say. He took his +finest horses and all the gold and silver with him somewheres. They couldn't git 'im. +They was after senators and high-ups like that.</p> + +<p>"The soldiers tickled me. They sung. The white people's yard was jus' +full of them playing 'Yankee Doodle' and 'Hang Jeff Davis on a Sour +Apple Tree.'</p> + +<p>"All the white people gone! Funny how they run away like that. They had +to save their selves. I 'member they took one old boss man and hung him +up in a tree across a drain of water, jus' let his foot touch—and +somebody cut him down after 'while. Those white folks had to run away.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Patrollers</b></p> + +<p>"I used to hear them all talk about the patrollers. I used to hear my +mother talking about them. My ma said my master wouldn't let the +patrollers come on his place. They could go on anybody else's place but +he never did let them come on his place. Some of the slaves were treated +very bad. But my ma said he didn't allow a patroller on the place and he +didn't allow no other white man to touch his niggers. He was a big white +man—a senator. He didn't know all his Negroes but he didn't allow +nobody to impose on them. He didn't let no patroller and nobody else +beat up his niggers.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>How Freedom Came</b></p> + +<p>"I don't know how freedom came. I know the Yankees came through and +they'd pat we little niggers on the head and say, 'Nigger, you are just +as free as I am.' And I would say, 'Yes'm.'</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Right After Freedom</b></p> + +<p>"Right after the War my mother and father moved off the place and went +on another plantation somewheres—I don't know where. They share +cropped. I don't know how long. Old mistress didn't want them to move at +all. I never will forget that.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Present Occupation and Opinions</b></p> + +<p>"I used to cook out all the time when I got grown. I couldn't tell you +when I married. You got enough junk down there now. So I ain't giving +you no more. My husband's been dead about seven years. I goes to the +Methodist church on Ninth and Broadway. I ain't able to do no work now. +I gets a little pension, and the Lord takes care of me. I have a hard +time sometime.</p> + +<p>"I ain't bothered about these young folks. They is <u>somethin' +awful</u>. It would be wonderful to write a book from that. They ought +to git a history of these young people. You could git a wonderful book +out of that.</p> + +<p>"The colored folks have come a long way since freedom. And if the white +folks didn't pin 'em down they'd go further. Old Jeff Davis said when +the niggers was turned loose, 'Dive up your knives and forks with them.' +But they didn't do it.</p> + +<p>"Some niggers was sharp and got something. And they lost it just like +they got it. Look at Bush. I know two or three big niggers got a lot and +ain't got nothin' left now. Well, I ain't got no time for no more junk. +You got enough down there. You take that and go on."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>During the interview, a little "pickaninny" came in with his mother. His +grandmother and a forlorn little dog were also along. "Tell grandma what +you want," his mother prompted. "Is that your grandson?" I interrupted. +"No," she said, "He ain't no kin to me, but he calls me 'ma' and acts as +if I was his grandma." The little fellow hung back. He was just about +twenty-two months old, but large and mature for that age.</p> + +<p>"Tell 'ma' what you want," his grandmother put in. Finally, he made up +his mind and stood in front of her and said, "Buh—er." His mother +explained, "I've done made him some corn bread, but he ain't got no +butter to put on it and he wants you to give him some."</p> + +<p>Sister Morgan sat silent awhile. Then she rose deliberately and went +slowly to the ancient ice-box, opened it and took out a tin of butter +which she had evidently churned herself in some manner and carefully cut +out a small piece and wrapped it neatly and handed it to the little one. +After a few amenities, they passed out.</p> + +<p>Even with her pitiful and meagre lot, the old lady evidently means to +share her bare necessities with others.</p> + +<p>The manner of her calculation of her age is interesting. She was six +years old when the War was going on. She definitely remembers seeing +Sherman's army and Wheeler's cavalry after she was six. Since they were +in her neighborhood in 1864, she is undoubtedly more than eighty. +Eighty-one is a fair estimate.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MorganJames"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: James Morgan<br> + 819 Rice Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 65</h3> +<br> + +<p>"During the slave time, the pateroles used to go from one plantation to +the other hunting Negroes. They would catch them at the door and throw +hot ashes in their faces. You could go to another plantation and steal +or do anything you wanted if you could manage to get back to your old +master's place. But if you got caught away from your plantation, they +would get you. Sometimes a nigger didn't want to get caught and beat, so +he would throw a shovel of hot ashes in the pateroles' faces and beat it +away.</p> + +<p>"My daddy used to tell lots of stories about slavery times. He's been +dead forty-three years and my mother has been dead forty-one +years—forty-one years this May. I was quite young and lots of the +things they told me, I remember, and some of them, I don't.</p> + +<p>"I was born in 1873. That was eight years after the War ended. My +father's name was Aaron and my mother's name was Rosa. Both of them was +in slavery. [TR: sentence lined out.] I got a brother that was a baby in +her lap when the Yankee soldiers got after a chicken. The chicken flew +up in her lap and they never got that one. The white folks lost it, but +the Yankees didn't get it. I have heard my mother tell all sorts of +things. But they just come to me at times. The soldiers would take +chickens or anything they could get their hands on—those soldiers +would.</p> + +<p>"My mother married the first time in slavery. Her first husband was sold +in slavery. That is the onliest brother I'm got living now out of +ten—that one that was settin' in her lap when the soldiers come +through. He's in Boydell, Arkansas now. It used to be called Morrell. +It is about one hundred twenty-one miles from here, because Dermott is +one hundred nine and Boydell is about twelve miles further on. It's in +Nashville[HW:?] County. My brother was a great big old baby in slavery +times. He was my mother's child by her first husband. All the rest of +them is dead and he is the onliest one that is living.</p> + +<p>"I was a section foreman for the Missouri Pacific for twenty-two years. +I worked there altogether for thirty-five years, but I was section +foreman for twenty-two years. There's my card. Lots of men stayed on the +job till it wore them out. Lewis Holmes did that. It would take him two +hours to walk from here to his home—if he ever managed it at all.</p> + +<p>"It's warm today and it will bring a lot of flies. Flies don't die in +the winter. Lots of folks think they do. They go up in cracks and little +places like that under the weatherboard there—any place where it is +warm—and there they huddle up and stay till it gets warm. Then they +come out and get something to eat and go back again when it cools off. +They live right on through the winter in their hiding places.</p> + +<p>"Both of my parents said they always did their work whatever the task +might be. And my daddy said he never got no whipping at all. You know +they would put a task on you and if you didn't do it, you would get a +whipping. My daddy wouldn't stand to be whipped by a paterole, and he +didn't have to be whipped by nobody else, because he always did his +work.</p> + +<p>"He was one of the ones that the pateroles couldn't catch. When the +pateroles would be trying to break in some place where he was, and the +other niggers would be standing 'round frightened to death and wonderin' +what to do, he would be gettin' up a shovelful of ashes. When the door +would be opened and they would be rushin' in, he would scatter the ashes +in their faces and rush out. If he couldn't find no ashes, he would +always have a handful of pepper with him, and he would throw that in +their faces and beat it.</p> + +<p>"He would fool dogs that my too. My daddy never did run away. He said he +didn't have no need to run away. They treated him all right. He did his +work. He would get through with everything and sometimes he would be +home before six o'clock. My mother said that lots of times she would +pick cotton and give it to the others that couldn't keep up so that they +wouldn't be punished. She had a brother they used to whip all the time +because he didn't keep up.</p> + +<p>"My father told me that his old master told him he was free. He stayed +with his master till he retired and sold the place. He worked on shares +with him. His old master sold the place and went to Monticello and died. +He stayed with him about fifteen or sixteen years after he was freed, +stayed on that place till the Government donated him one hundred sixty +acres and charged him only a dollar and sixty cents for it. He built a +house on it and cleared it up. That's what my daddy did. Some folks +don't believe me when I tell 'em the Government gave him a hundred and +sixty acres of land and charged him only a dollar and sixty cents for +it—a penny a acre.</p> + +<p>"I am retired now. Been retired since 1938. The Government took over the +railroad pension and it pays me now. That is under the Security Act. +Each and every man on the railroad pays in to the Government.</p> + +<p>"I have been married right around thirty-nine years.</p> + +<p>"I was born in Chicot County, Arkansas.[TR: sentence lined out.] My +father was born in Georgia and brought here by his master. He come here +in a old covered ox wagon. I don't know how they happened to decide to +come here. My mother was born in South Carolina. She met my father here +in Arkansas. They sold her husband and she was brought here. After peace +was declared she met my daddy. Her first husband was sold in South +Carolina and she never did know that became of him. They put him up on +the block and sold him and she never did know which way he went. He left +her with two boys right then. She had a sister that stayed in South +Carolina. Somebody bought her there and kept her and somebody bought my +mother and brought her here. My father's master was named McDermott. My +mother's last master was named Belcher or something like that.</p> + +<p>"I don't belong to any church. I have always lived decent and kept out +of trouble."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>When Morgan said "there is my record", he showed me a pass for the year +1938-39 for himself and his wife between all stations on the Missouri +Pacific lines signed by L.W. Baldwin, Chief Executive Officer.</p> + +<p>He is a good man even if he is not a Christian as to church membership.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MorganOlivia"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person Interviewed: Olivia Morgan<br> + Hazen, Ark.<br> +Age: 62</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I am 62 years old. I was born in Lafayette County close to New +Lewisville. I heard mama say many a time she was named after her +state—North Carolina. Her name was Carolina Alexandria. They brought +her a slave girl to this new country. She and papa must of met up +toreckly after freedom. She had some children and I'm one of my papa's +oldest children.</p> + +<p>"Papa come here long fore the war started. The old master in Atlanta, +Georgia—Abe Smith—give his son three boys and one girl. He emigrated +to Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"Mama said her first husband and the young master went off and he never +come back as she knowed of. Young master played with mama's second girl +a whole heap. One day they was playing hiding round. Just as she come +running to the base from round the house, young master hit her on the +forehead with a rock. It killed her. Old master tried to school him but +he worried so they sent him off—thought it would do his health good to +travel. I don't think they ever come back.</p> + +<p>"After freedom mama married and went over to papa's master's. Papa +stayed round there a long time. They got news some way they was to get +forty acres land and a mule to start out with but they said they never +got nothing.</p> + +<p>"My papa said he knowed it to be a fact, the Ku Klux cut a colored +woman's breast off. I don't recollect why he said they got after her. +The Jayhawkers was bad too. They all went wild; some of em left men +hanging up in trees. They needed a good master to protect em worse after +the war than they needed em before. They said they had a Yankee +government then was reason of the Ku Klux. They run the Jayhawkers out +and made the Yankees go on home. Everybody had a hard time. Bread was +mighty scarce when I was a child. Times was hard. Men that had land had +to let it lay out. They had nothin' to feed the hands on, no money to +pay, no seed, no stock to work. The fences all went to rack and all the +houses nearly down. When I was a child they was havin' hard times.</p> + +<p>"I'm a country woman. I farmed all my life. I been married two times; I +married Holmes, then Morgan. They dead. I washed, ironed, cooked, all at +Mr. Jim Buchannan's sawmill close to Lewisville two years and eight +months; then I went back to farmin' up at Pine Bluff. My oldest sister +washed and ironed for Mrs. Buchannan till she moved from the sawmill to +Texarkana. He lived right at the sawmill ground.</p> + +<p>"My papa voted a Republican ticket. I don't vote. My husbands have voted +along. If the women would let the men have the business I think times +would be better. I don't believe in women voting. The men ought to make +the livings for the families, but the women doing too much. They +crowding the men out of work.</p> + +<p>"Some folks is sorry in all colors. Seems like the young folks ain't got +no use for quiet country life. They buying too much. They say they have +to buy everything. I ain't had no depression yet. I been at work and we +had crop failures but I made it through. Some folks good and some ain't. +Times is bout to run away with some of the folks. They all say times is +better than they been since 1928. I hope times is on the mend."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MorganTom"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Tom Morgan, Madison, Arkansas<br> +Age: 71</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My mother was the mother of fourteen of us children. Their names was +Sarah and Richard Morgan.</p> + +<p>"My great-grandfather b'long to Bill Woods. They had b'long to the +Morgans and when freedom come they changed their names back. Some of +them still owned by Morgans.</p> + +<p>"Mother's owners was Auris and Lucella Harris. They had a boy named +Harley Harris and a girl. He had a small farm.</p> + +<p>"Mother said her master wasn't bad, but my father said his owner was +tough on him—tough on all of them. They was all field hands. They had +to git up and be doing. He said they fed by torch morning and night and +rested in the heat of the day two or three hours. Feed the oxen and +mules. In them days stock and folks all et three times a day. I does +real well now to get two meals a day, sometimes but one. They done some +kind of work all the year 'round. He said they had tasks. They better +git the task done or they would get a beating.</p> + +<p>"I haven't voted in so long a time. I voted Republican. I thought I did.</p> + +<p>"I worked at the railroad till they put me off. They put me off on +disability. Trying to git my papers fixed up to work or get something +one. Back on the railroad job. I farmed when I was young."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MorrisCharity"></a> +<h3>El Dorado District<br> +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of Interviewer: Pernella Anderson<br> +Subject: Slavery Days—Cruel Master Murdered by Slaves<br> +Story:—Information<br> +<br> +This Information given by: Charity Morris<br> +Place of Residence: Camden, Arkansas<br> +Age: 90</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>Ah wuz born in Carolina uh slave an ah was de eldest daughtuh of +Christiana Webb whose owner wuz Master Louis Amos. Mah mammy had lots uv +chillun an she also mammied de white chillun, whut wuz lef' mammyless. +When ah wuz very small dey rented me out tuh some very po' white fokes. +Dey wuzn use tuh slaves so mah marster made him promise [HW: not] tuh +beat me or knock me bout. Dey promise dey wouldn. Dey cahried me home an +ah clare dey wuz so mean tuh me till ah run off an tried tuh fin' de way +back tuh mah marster. Night caught me in de woods. Ah sho' wuz skeered. +Ah wuz skeered uv bears an panthers so ah crawled up in a ole bandoned +crib an crouched down gainst de loft. Ah went off tuh sleep but wuz woke +by somethin scratchin on de wall below. Ah stayed close as ah could tuh +de wall an 'gin er prayin. Dat things scratched all night an ah prayed +all night. De nex' mawnin dese white fokes sent word tuh Marster dat ah +had lef' so Marster foun' me an took me home and let me stay dar too. Ah +didn' work in de fiel' ah worked in de house. We lived in uh log cabin. +Evah Sunda mawnin Marster Louis would have all us slaves tuh de house +while he would sing an pray an read de Bible tuh us all.</p> + +<p>De people dat owned de plantation near us had lots of slaves. Dey owned +lots uv mah kin fokes. Dey marster would beat dem at night when dey come +fum de fiel' an lock em up. He'd whoop um an sen' um tuh de fiel'. Dey +couldn' visit no slaves an no slaves was 'lowed tuh visit em. So mah +cousin Sallie watched him hide de key so she moved dem a li'l further +back so dat he had tuh lean ovah tuh reach dem. Dat mawnin soon when he +come tuh let em out she cracked him in de haid wid de poker an made +little Joe help put his haid in de fiuh place. Dat day in de fiel' +Little Joe made er song; "If yo don' bleave Aunt Sallie kilt Marse Jim +de blood is on huh under dress". He jes hollered hit. "Aunt Sallie kilt +Marse Jim." Dey zamined Aunt Sallie's under dress so dey put huh in jail +till de baby come den dey tried huh an sentenced huh tuh be hung an she +wuz.</p> + +<p>Our Marster use tuh tell us if we left de house de patarollers would +catch us. One night de patarollers run mah two brothers home, Joe an +Henry.</p> + +<p>When de ole haid died out dey chillun got de property. Yo see we slaves +wuz de property. Den we got separated. Some sent one way an some nother. +Hit jes happent dat Marse Jim drawed me.</p> + +<p>When de Wah broke out we could heah li'l things bein said. We couldn' +make out. So we begin tuh move erbout. Later we learnt we wuz runnin fum +de wah. In runnin we run intuh a bunch uv soldiers dat had got kilt. Oh +dat wuz terrible. Aftuh mah brudders foun out dat dey wuz fightin tuh +free us dey stole hosses an run erway tuh keep fum bein set free. Aftuh +we got tuh Morris Creek hit wuz bloody an dar wuz one uv de hosses +turnin roun an roun in de watuh wid his eyes shot out. We nevah saw +nuthin else uv Joe nor Henry nor de othuh horse from dat day tuh dis +one. But we went on an on till we come tuh a red house and dat red house +represented free. De white fokes wouldn go dat way cause dey hated tuh +give us up. Dey turnt an went de othuh way but hit wuz too late. De news +come dat Mr. Lincoln had signed de papuhs dat made us all free an dere +wuz some 'joicing ah tells yo. Ah wuz a grown woman at dat time. Ole +Moster Amos brought us on as fur as Fo'dyce an turnt us a loose. Dat's +wha' dey settled. Some uv de slaves stayed wid em an some went tuh othuh +places. Me an mah sistuh come tuh Camden an settled. Ah mahried George +Morris. We havn' seen our pa an ma since we wuz 'vided and since we wuz +chillun. When we got tuh Camden and settled down we went tuh work an +sont back tuh de ole country aftuh ma an pa. Enroute tuh dis country we +come through Tennessee an ah membuh comin through Memphis an Pine Bluff +to Fordyce.</p> + +<p>As we wuz comin we stopped at de Mississippi Rivuh. Ah wuz standin on de +bank lookin at de great roll uv watuh high in de air. Somebody snatched +me back and de watuh took in de bank wha ah wuz standin. Yo cound'n +stand too close tuh de rivuh 'count uv de waves.</p> + +<p>Der wuz a col' wintuh and at night we would gather roun a large camp +fire an play sich games as "Jack-in-de-bush cut him down" an "Ole gray +mule-out ride him." Yaul know dem games ah know. An in de summer times +at night we played <u>Julands</u>. On our way tuh Arkansas we drove +ox-teams, jinnie teams, donkey teams, mule teams an horse teams. We sho +had a good time.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MorrisEmma"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Emma Morris, Forrest City, Arkansas<br> +Age: 71</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My parents was Jane and Sam McCaslin. They come from close to Atlanta, +Georgia to Hernando, Mississippi after slavery. Ma was heired and they +bought pa before they left North Carolina. They bought pa out of a +nigger drove after he was grown. He raised tobacco and corn. Pa helped +farm and they raised hogs. He drove hogs to sell. He didn't say where +they took the hogs, only they would have to stay up all night driving +the hogs, and they rode horses and walked too and had shepherd dogs to +keep them in a drove.</p> + +<p>"Pa was a Böwick (B(our)ick) but I never heard him say nothing bout +Master Bowick, so I don't know his other name. He said they got in a +tight [TR: missing word?] and had to sell some of the slaves and he +being young would bring more than one of the older men. He was real +black. Ma was lighter but not very light.</p> + +<p>"McCaslin was a low heavy set man and he rented out hacks and horses in +Atlanta and pa drove, greased the harness and curried and sheared the +horses. Master McCaslin brought them in town and rented them out. He +didn't have a livery stable. He just furnished conveyances. I heard him +tell about a good hitching post where he could more than apt rent out +his rig and how he always stopped and fed the horses when eating time +come. He took a feed box all the time. Master McCaslin would tell him to +not drive too hard when he had to make long drives. He never would let +him take a whoop.</p> + +<p>"He had some girls I heard him say. May and Alice was their names. He +didn't say much about the family. He took a basket of provision with him +to eat Miss May and Miss Alice fixed up. The basket was close wove and +had a lid. The old man farmed. He drove too. He drove a hack. Ma worked +in the field. I heard her tell about the cockleburs. Well, she said they +would stick on your dress and stick your legs and you would have to pick +them off and sometimes the beggar's-lice would be thick on their clothes +and they would pick them off.</p> + +<p>"When they would clean out the fence corners (rail fence) they would +leave every little wild plum tree and leave a whole lot of briers so +they would have wild plums and berries. They raised cotton. Sometime +during the War old Master McCaslin took all his slaves and stock way +back in the bottoms. The cane was big as ma's wrist she said. They put +up some cabins to live in and shelter the stock. Pa said some of em went +in the army. He didn't want to go. They worked a corn crop over in +there.</p> + +<p>"They left soon as they was freed. I don't know how they found it out. +They walked to way over in Alabama and pa made terms with a man, to come +to Mississippi. Then they come in a wagon and walked too. She had three +little children. I was [HW: born] close to Montgomery, Alabama in +September but I don't know how long it was after the War. I was the +first girl. There was two more boys and three more girls after me. Ma +had children born in three states.</p> + +<p>"Ma died with the typhoid fever. Then two sisters and a brother died. Pa +had it all summer and he got well. Miss (Mrs.) Betty Chamlin took us +children to a house and fed us away from ma and the sick girls and boy. +We was on her place. She had two families then. We got water from a +spring. It was a pretty spring under a big hill. We would wade where +the spring run off. She moved us out of that house.</p> + +<p>"Miss Betty was a widow. She had several boys. They worked in the field +all the time. We stayed till the boys left and she sold her place. She +went back to her folks. I never did see her no more. We scattered out. +Pa lived about wid us till he died. I got three girls living. I got five +children dead. I got one girl out here from town and one girl at +Meridian and my oldest girl in Memphis. I takes it time around wid em.</p> + +<p>"I seen the Ku Klux but they never bothered us. I seen them in Alabama, +I recken it was. I was so small I jes' do remember seeing them. I was +the onliest child born in Alabama. Pa made one crop. I don't know how +they got along the rest of the time there. We started share cropping in +Mississippi. Pa was always a good hand with stock. If they got sick they +sent for him to tell them what to do. He never owned no land, no home +neither.</p> + +<p>"I farmed all my life. I used to make a little money along during the +year washing and ironing. I don't get no help. I live with the girls. My +girl in Memphis sends me a little change to buy my snuff and little +things I have to have. She cooks for a lawyer now. She did take care of +an lady. She died since I been here and she moved. I rather work in the +field than do what she done when that old lady lived. She was like a +baby to tend to. She had to stay in that house all the time.</p> + +<p>"The young folks don't learn manners now like they used to. Times is +better than I ever seen em. Poor folks have a hard time any time. Some +folks got a lot and some ain't got nothing everywhere."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MossClaiborne"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Claiborne Moss<br> + 1812 Marshall Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 81</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Washington County, Georgia, on Archie Duggins' +plantation, fifteen miles from Sandersville, the county-seat, June 18, +1857.</p> + +<p>"My mother's name was Ellen Moss. She was born in Georgia too, in +Hancock County, near Sparta, the county-seat. My father was Fluellen +Moss. He, too, was born in Hancock County. Bill Moss was his owner. +Jesse Battle was my mother's owner before she married. My mother and +father had ten children, none of them living now but me, so far as I +know. I was the fifth in line. There were four older than I. The oldest +was ten years older than I.</p> + +<p>"Bill Moss' and Jesse Battle's plantations ware not far apart. I never +heard my father say how he first met my mother. I was only eight years +old when he died. They were all right there in the same neighborhood, +and they would go visiting. Battle and Moss and Evans all had +plantations in the same neighborhood and they would go from one place to +the other.</p> + +<p>"When Bill Moss went to Texas, he gave my mother and father to Mrs. +Beck. Mrs. Beck was Battle's daughter and Mrs. Beck bought my father +from Moss and that kept them together. He was that good. Moss sold out +and went to Texas and all his slaves went walking while he went on the +train. He had about a hundred of them. When he got there, he couldn't +hear from them. He didn't know where they was—they was walking and he +had got on the train—so he killed hisself. When they got there, just +walking along, they found him dead.</p> + +<p>"Moss' nephew, Whaley, got two parts of all he had. Another fellow—I +can't call his name—got one part. His sister, they sent her back +five—three of my uncles and two of my aunties.</p> + +<p>"Where I was raised, Duggins wasn't a mean man. His slaves didn't get +out to work till after sunup. His brother, who lived three miles out +from us, made his folks get up before sunup. But Duggins didn't do that. +He seemed to think something of his folks. Every Saturday, he'd give +lard, flour, hog meat, syrup. That was all he had to give. That was +extra. War was going on and he couldn't get nothing else. On Wednesday +night he'd give it to them again. Of course, they would get corn-meal +and other things from the kitchen. They didn't eat in the kitchen or any +place together. Everybody got what there was on the place and cooked it +in his cabin.</p> + +<p>"Before I was born, Beck sold my mother and father to Duggins. I don't +know why he sold them. They had an auction block in the town, but out in +the country they didn't have no block. If I had seen a nigger and wanted +to buy him, I would just go up to the owner and do business with him. +That was the way it was with Beck and Duggins. Selling my mother and +father was just a private transaction between them.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Rations</b></p> + +<p>"Twice a week, flour, syrup, meat, and lard were given to the slaves. +you got other food from the kitchen. Meat, vegetables, milk,—all the +milk you wanted—bread.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>A Mean Owner</b></p> + +<p>"Beck, Moss, Battle, and Duggins, they was all good people. But Kenyon +Morps, now talk about a mean man, there was one. He lived on a hill a +little off from the Duggins plantation. His women never give birth to +children in the house. He'd never let 'em quit work before the time. He +wanted them to work—work right up to the last minute. Children were all +born in the field and in fence corners. Then he had to let 'em stay in +about a week. Last I seen him, he didn't have nothin', and was ragged as +a jay bird.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Houses</b></p> + +<p>"Our house was a log house. It had a large room, and then it had another +room as large as that one or larger built on to it. Both of these rooms +were for our use. My mother and father slept in the log cabin and the +kids slept back in the other room. My sister stayed with Joe Duggins. +Her missis was a school-teacher, and she loved sister. My master gave my +sister to Joe Duggins. Mrs. Duggins taught my sister, Fannie, to read +and spell but not to write. If there was a slave man that knowed how to +write, they used to cut off his thumb so that he couldn't write.</p> + +<p>"There was some white people wouldn't have the darkies eating butter; +our white people let us have butter, biscuits, and ham every day. They +would put it up for me.</p> + +<p>"I had more sense than any kid on the plantation. I would do anything +they wanted done no matter how hard it was. I walked five miles through +the woods once on an errand. The old lady who I went to said:</p> + +<p>"'You walk way down here by yourself?'</p> + +<p>"I told her, 'yes'.</p> + +<p>"She said, 'Well, you ain't going back by yo'self because you're too +little,' and she sent her oldest son back with me. He was white.</p> + +<p>"My boss was sick once, and he wanted to get his mail. The post office +was five miles away. He said to me:</p> + +<p>"'Can't you get my mail if I let you ride on my horse?'</p> + +<p>"I said, 'Yes sir.' I rode up to the platform on the horse. They run out +and took me off the horse and filled up the saddle bags. Then they put +me back on and told me not to get off until I reached my master. When I +got back, everybody was standing out watching for me. When my boss heard +me coming, he jumped out the bed and ran out and took me off the horse +and carried me and the sacks and all back into the house.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Soldiers</b></p> + +<p>"I saw all of Wheeler's cavalry. Sherman come through first. He came and +stayed all night. Thousands and thousands of soldiers passed through +during the night. Cooper Cuck was with them. He was a fellow that used +to peddle around in all that country before the War. He went all through +the South and learned everything. Then he joined up with the Yankees. He +come there. Nobody seen him that night. He knowed everybody knowed him. +He went and hid under something somewhere. He was under the hill at +daybreak, but nobody seen him. When the last of the soldiers was going +out in the morning, one fellow lagged behind and rounded a corner. Then +he galloped a little ways and motioned with his arms. Cooper Cuck come +out from under the hill, and he and Cooper Cuck both came back and stole +everything that they could lay their hands on—all the gold and silver +that was in the house, and everything they could carry.</p> + +<p>"Wheeler's cavalry was about three days behind Sherman. They caught up +with Sherman, but it would have been better if they hadn't, 'cause he +whipped 'em and drove 'em back and went right on. They didn't have much +fighting in my country. They had a little scrimmage once—thirty-six men +was all they was in it. One of the Yankees got lost from his company. He +come back and inquired the way to Louisville. The old boss pointed the +way with his left hand and while the fellow was looking that way, he +drug him off his horse and cut his throat and took his gun off'n him and +killed him.</p> + +<p>"Sherman's men stayed one night and left. I mean, his officers stayed. +We had to feed them. They didn't pay nothing for what they was fed. The +other men cooked and ate their own grub. They took every horse and mule +we had. I was sitting beside my old missis. She said:</p> + +<p>"'Please don't let 'em take all our horses.'</p> + +<p>"The fellows she was talking to never looked around. He just said: +'Every damn horse goes.'</p> + +<p>"The Yankees took my Uncle Ben with them when they left. He didn't stay +but a couple of days. They got in a fight. They give Uncle Ben five +horses, five sacks of silverware, and five saddles. The goods was taken +in the fight. Uncle Ben brought it back with him. The boss took all that +silver away from him. Uncle Ben didn't know what to do with it. The +Yankees had taken all my master's and he took Ben's. Ben give it to him. +He come back 'cause he wanted to.</p> + +<p>"When Wheeler's cavalry came through they didn't take nothing—nothing +but what they et. I heard a fellow say, 'Have you got anything to eat?'</p> + +<p>"My mother said, 'I ain't got nothin' but some chitlins.'</p> + +<p>"He said, 'Gimme some of those; I love chitlins.' "Mother gave 'em to +me to carry to him. I didn't get half way to him before the rest of the +men grabbed me and took 'em away from me and et 'em up. The man that +asked for them didn't get a one.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Slave Money</b></p> + +<p>"The slaves would sometimes have five or six dollars. Mostly, they would +make charcoal and sell it to get money.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Patrollers</b></p> + +<p>"I seen patrollers. They come to our house. They didn't whip nobody. Our +folks didn't care nothin' about 'em. They come looking for keys and +whiskey. They couldn't whip nobody on my master's plantation. When they +would come there, he would be sitting up with 'em. He would sit there in +his back door and look at 'em. Wouldn't let 'em hit nobody.</p> + +<p>"Them colored women had more fun that enough—laughing at them +patrollers. Fool 'em and then laugh at 'em. Make out like they was +trying to hide something and the patrollers would come running up, grab +'em and try to see what it was. And the women would laugh and show they +had nothing. Couldn't do nothin' about it. Never whipped anybody 'round +there. Couldn't whip nobody on our place; couldn't whip nobody on Jessie +Mills' place; couldn't whip nobody on Stephen Mills' place; couldn't +whip nobody on Betsy Geesley's place; couldn't whip nobody on Nancy +Mills' place; couldn't whip nobody on Potter Duggins' place. Potter +Duggins was a cousin to my master. Nobody run them peoples' plantations +but theirselves.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Social Life</b></p> + +<p>"When slaves wanted to, they would have dances. They would have dances +from one plantation to the other. The master didn't object. They had +fiddles, banjo and quills. They made the quills and blowed 'em to beat +the band. Good music. They would make the quills out of reeds. Those +reeds would sound just like a piano. They didn't have no piano. They +didn't serve nothing. Nothing to eat and nothing to drink except them +that brought whiskey. The white folks made the whiskey, but the colored +folks would get it.</p> + +<p>"We had church twice a month. The Union Church was three miles away from +us. My father and I would go when they had a meeting. Bethlehem Church +was five miles away. Everybody on the plantation belonged to that +church. Both the colored and the white belonged and went there. They had +the same pastor for Bethlehem, Union, and Dairy Ann. His name was Tom +Adams. He was a white man. Colored folks would go to Dairy Ann +sometimes. They would go to Union too.</p> + +<p>"Sometimes they would have meetings from house to house, the colored +folks. The colored folks had those house to house meetings any time they +felt like it. The masters didn't care. They didn't care how much they +prayed.</p> + +<p>"Sometimes they had corn shuckings. That was where they did the serving, +and that was where they had the big eatings. They'd lay out a big pile +of corn. Everybody would get down and throw the corn out as they shucked +it. They would have a fellow there they would call the general. He would +walk from one person to another and from one end of the pile to the +other and holler and the boys would answer. His idea was to keep them +working. If they didn't do something to keep them working, they wouldn't +get that corn shucked that night. Them people would be shucking corn! +There would be a prize to the one who got the most done or who would be +the first to get done. They would sing while they were shucking. They +had one song they would sing when they were getting close to the finish. +Part of it went like this:</p> + +<pre> +'Red shirt, red shirt +Nigger got a red shirt.' +</pre> + +<p>After the shucking was over, they would have pies, beef, biscuits, corn +bread, whiskey if you wanted it. I believe that was the most they had. +They didn't have any ice-cream. They didn't use ice-cream much in those +days. Didn't have no ice down there in the country. Not a bit of ice +there. If they had anything they wanted to save, they would let it down +in the well with a rope and keep it cool down there. They used to do +that here until they stopped them from having the wells.</p> + +<p>"Ring plays too. Sometimes when they wanted to amuse themselves, they +would play ring plays. They all take hands and form a ring and there +would be one in the center of the ring. Now he is got to get out. He +would come up and say, 'I am in this lady's garden, and I'll bet you +five dollars I can get out of here.' And d'reckly he would break +somebody's hands apart and get out.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>How Freedom Came</b></p> + +<p>"The old boss called 'em up to the house and told 'em, 'You are free as +I am.' That was one day in June. I went on in the house and got +something to eat. My mother and father, he hired them to stay and look +after the crop. Next year, my mother and father went to Ben Hook's place +and farmed on shares. But my father died there about May. Then it wasn't +nobody working but me and my sister and mother.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>What the Slaves Got</b></p> + +<p>"The slaves never got nothing. Alexander Stephens, the Vice-President of +the Confederacy, divided his plantation up and gave it to his darkies +when he died. I knew him and his brother too. Alexander[HW: *] never +did walk. He was deformed. Big headed rascal, but he had sense! His +brother was named Leonard[HW: *]. He was a lawyer. He really killed +himself. He was one of these die-hard Southerners. He did something and +they arrested him. It made him so mad. He'd bought him a horse. He got +on that horse and fell off and broke his neck. That was right after the +War. They kept garrisons in all the counties right after the War.</p> + +<p>"I was in Hancock County when I knew Vice-President Stephens. I don't +know where he was born but he had a plantation in Toliver [HW: +Taliaferro] County. Most of the Stephenses was lawyers. He was a lawyer +too, and he would come to Sparta. That is where I was living then. There +was more politics and political doings in Sparta than there was in +Crawfordville where he lived. He lived between Montgomery and Richmond +during the War, for the capital of the Confederacy was at Montgomery one +time and Richmond another.</p> + +<p>"After the War, the Republicans nominated Alexander Stephens for +governor. The Democrats knew they couldn't beat him, so they turned +'round and nominated him too. He had a lot of sense. He said, 'What we +lost on the battle-field, we will get it back at the ballot box.' Seeb +Reese, United States Senator from Hancock County, said, 'If you let the +nigger have four or five dollars in his pocket he never will steal.'</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Life Since Freedom</b></p> + +<p>"After my father died, my mother stayed where she was till Christmas. +Then she moved back to the place she came from. We went to farming. My +brother and my uncle went and farmed up in Hancock County; so the next +year we moved up there. We stayed there and farmed for a long while. My +mother married three years afterwards. We still farmed. After awhile, I +got to be sixteen years old and I wouldn't work with my stepfather, I +told my mother to hire me out; if she didn't I would be gone. She hired +me out all right. But the old man used all my money. The next year I +made it plain to her that I wanted her to hire me out again but that +nobody was to use a dollar of my money. My mother could get as much of +it as she wanted but he couldn't. The first year I bought a buggy for +them. The old man didn't want me to use it at all. I said, 'Well then, +he can't use my money no more.' But I didn't stop helping him and giving +him things. I would buy beef and give it to my mother. I knew they would +all eat it. He asked me for some wheat. I wouldn't steal it like he +wanted me to but I asked the man I was working for for it. He said, +'Take just as much as you want.' So I let him come up and get it. He +would carry it to the mill.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Ku Klux Klan</b></p> + +<p>"The Ku Klux got after Uncle Will once. He was a brave man. He had a +little mare that was a race horse. Will rode right through the bunch +before they ever realized that it was him. He got on the other side of +them. She was gone! They kept on after him. They went down to his house +one night. He wouldn't run for nothing. He shot two of them and they +went away. Then he was out of ammunition. People urged him to leave, for +they knew he didn't have no more bullets; but he wouldn't and they came +back and killed him.</p> + +<p>"They came down to Hancock County one night and the boys hid on both +sides of the bridge. When they got in the middle of the bridge, the boys +commenced to fire on them from both sides, and they jumped into the +river. The darkies went on home when they got through shooting at them; +but there wasn't no more Ku Klux in Hancock County. The better thinking +white folks got together and stopped it.</p> + +<p>"The Ku Klux kept the niggers scared. They cowed them down so that they +wouldn't go to the polls. I stood there one night when they were +counting ballots. I belonged to the County Central Committee. I went in +and stood and looked. Our ballot was long; theirs was short. I stood and +seen Clait Turner calling their names from our ballots. I went out and +got Rube Turner and then we both went back. They couldn't call the votes +that they had put down they had. Rube saw it.</p> + +<p>"Then they said, 'Are you going to test this?'</p> + +<p>"Rube said, 'Yes.' But he didn't because it would have cost too much +money. Rube was chairman of the committee.</p> + +<p>"The Ku Klux did a whole lot to keep the niggers away from the polls in +Washington and Baldwin counties. They killed a many a nigger down there.</p> + +<p>"They hanged a Ku Klux for killing his wife and he said he didn't mind +being hung but he didn't want a damn nigger to see him die.</p> + +<p>"But they couldn't keep the niggers in Hancock County away from the +polls. There was too many of them.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Work in Little Rock</b></p> + +<p>"I came to Little Rock, November 1, 1903. I came here with surveyors. +They wanted to send me to Miami but I wouldn't go. Then I went to the +mortar box and made mortar. Then I went to the school board. After that +I ain't had no job. I was too old. I get a little help from the +government.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Opinions of the Present</b></p> + +<p>"I think that the young folks ought to make great men and women. But I +don't see that they are making that stride. Most of them is dropping +below the mark. I think we ought to have some powerful men and women but +what I see they don't stand up like they should.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Own Family</b></p> + +<p>"I have three daughters, no sons. These three daughters have twelve +grandchildren."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MossFrozie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Frozie Moss (dark mulatto), Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 69</h3> +<br> + +<p>"When my grandma whut raised me got free she and grandpa come to Memphis +and didn't stay there long till they went to Crittenden County on a +man's farm. My grandma was born in Alabama and my grandpa in Virginia. I +know he wasn't in the Nat Turner rebellion, for my mother had nine +children and all but me at Holly Grove, Mississippi. I was born up in +Crittenden County. She died. I remember very little about my father. I +jes' remember father a little. He died too. My grand parents lived at +Holly Grove all during the war. They used to talk about how they did. +She said hardest time she ever lived through was at Memphis. Nothing to +do, nothing to eat and no places to stay. I don't know why they left and +come on to Memphis. She said her master's name was Pig'ge. He wasn't +married. He and his sisters lived together. My grandmother was a slave +thirty years. She was a field hand. She said she would be right back in +the field when her baby was two weeks old. They didn't wont the slaves +to die, they cost too much money, but they give them mighty hard work to +do sometimes. Grandma and grandpa was heap stronger I am at my age. They +didn't know how old they was. Her master told her how long he had her +when they left him and his father owned her before he died. I think they +had a heap easier time after they come to Arkansas from what she said. I +can't answer yo questions because I'm just tellin' you what I remembers +and I was little when they used to talk so much.</p> + +<p>"If the young generation would save anything for the time when they +can't work I think they would be all right. I don't hear about them +saving. They buys too much. That their only trouble. They don't know how +to see ahead.</p> + +<p>"I owns this house is all. I been sick a whole heap, spent a lot on my +medicines and doctor bill. I worked on the farm till after I come to +Brinkley. We bought this place here and I cooks. I cooked for Miss Molly +Brinkkell, Mr. Adams and Mrs. Fowler. I washes and irons some when I can +get it. Washing and ironing 'bout gone out of fashion now. I don't get +no moneys. I get commodities from the Sociable Welfare. My son works and +they don't give me no money."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MossMose"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lucy<br> +Person interviewed: Mose Moss, Russellville, Arkansas<br> +Age: 65</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Mose Moss is my name, suh, and I was born in 1875 in Yell County. My +father was born in old Virginny in 1831 and died in Yell County, +Arkansas, eight miles from Dardanelle, in 1916. Yes suh, I've lived in +Pope County a good many years. I recollects some things pretty well and +some not so good.</p> + +<p>"Yes suh, my father used to talk a heap about the Ku Klux Klan, and a +lot of the Negroes were afraid of em and would run when they heard they +was comin' around.</p> + +<p>"My father's name was Henry Moss. He run away from the plantation in +Virginia before the War had been goin' on very long, and he j'ined the +army in Tennessee—yes suh, the Confedrit army. Ho suh, his name was +never found on the records, so didn't never draw no pension.</p> + +<p>"After he was freed he always voted the Republican ticket till he died.</p> + +<p>"After the War he served as Justice of the Peace in his township in Yell +County. Yes suh, that was the time they called the Re-con-struc-tion.</p> + +<p>"I vote the Republican ticket, but sometimes I don't vote at the reg'lar +elections. No, I've never had any trouble with my votin'.</p> + +<p>"I works at first one thing and another but ain't doin' much now. Work +is hard to get. Used to work mostly at the mines. Not able to do much of +late years.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, I remember some of the old songs they used to sing when my +parents was living: 'Old-Time Religion' was one of em, and 'Swing Low, +Sweet Chariot' was another one we liked to sing."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MullinsSO"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: S.O. Mullins, Clarendon, Arkansas<br> + Janitor for Masonic Hall<br> + He wears a Masonic ring<br> +Age: 80</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My master was B.F. Wallace—Benjamin Franklin Wallace and Katie +Wallace. They had no children to my recollection.</p> + +<p>"I was born at Brittville, Alabama. My parents' names was George W. +Mullins and Millie. They had, to my recollection, one girl and three +boys. Mr. Wallace moved to Arkansas before the Civil War. They moved to +Phillips County. My mother and father both farm hands and when my +grandmother was no longer able to do the cookin' my mother took her +place. I was rally too little to recollect but they always praised +Wallace. They said he never whipped one of his slaves in his life. His +slaves was about free before freedom was declared. They said he was a +good man. Well when freedom was declared all the white folks knowed it +first. He come down to the cabins and told us. He said you can stay and +finish the crops. I will feed and clothe you and give you men $10 and +you women $5 apiece Christmas. That was more money then than it is now. +We all stayed on and worked on shares the next year. We stayed around +Poplar Grove till he died. When I was nineteen I got a job, porter on +the railroad. I brought my mother to Clarendon to live with me. I was in +the railroad service at least fifteen years. I was on the passenger +train. Then I went to a sawmill here and then I farmed, I been doing +every little thing I find to do since I been old. All I owns is a little +house and six lots in the new addition. I live with my wife. She is my +second wife. Cause I am old they wouldn't let me work on the levy. If I +been young I could have got work. My age knocks me out of 'bout all the +jobs. Some of it I could do. I sure don't get no old age pension. I gets +$4 every two months janitor of the Masonic Hall.</p> + +<p>"I have a garden. No place for hog nor cow.</p> + +<p>"My boys in Chicago. They need 'bout all they can get. They don't help.</p> + +<p>"The present conditions seem good. They can get cotton to pick and two +sawmills run in the winter (100 men each) where folks can get work if +they hire them. The stay (stave) mill is shut down and so is the button +factory. That cuts out a lot of work here. The present generation is +beyond me. Seems like they are gone hog wild."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Note</b></p> + +<p>The next afternoon he met me and told me the following story:——</p> + +<p>"One night the servants quarters was overflowin' wid Yankee soldiers. I +was scared nearly to death. My mother left me and my little brother +cause she didn't wanter sleep in the house where the soldiers was. We +slept on the floor and they used our beds. They left next mornin'. They +camped in our yard under the trees. Next morning they was ridin' out +when old mistress saw 'em. She said they'd get it pretty soon. When they +crossed the creek—Big Creek—half mile from our cabins I heard the guns +turn in on 'em. The neighbors all fell out wid my master. They say he +orter go fight too. He was sick all time. Course he wasn't sick. They +come and took off 25 mules and all the chickens and he never got up. +They took two fine carriage horses weighed 2,000 pounds apiece I speck. +One named Lee and one Stone Wall. He never went out there. He claimed +he was sick all time. One of the carriage horses was a fine big white +horse and had a bay match. Folks didn't like him—said he was a coward. +When I went over cross the creek after the fightin' was over, men just +lay like dis[A] piled on top each other."</p> +<p>[A: <img src="images/177.jpg" width="60" height="33" alt="sketch of stacked +fingers"> He used his fingers to show me how the soldiers were crossed.]</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MurdockAlex"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Alex Murdock, Edmondson, Arkansas<br> +Age: 65</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My owner or least my folks was owned by Dr. [HW: 'Murder'] (Murdock). +He had a big farm. He was a widower. He had no children as ever I knowed +of. Dr. 'Murder' raised my father's mother. He bought her at Tupelo, +Mississippi. He raised mother too. She was bright color. I'm sure they +stayed on after freedom 'cause I stayed there till we come to Arkansas. +Father was a teamster. He followed that till he died. He owned a dray +and died at Brinkley. He was well-known and honorable.</p> + +<p>"I worked in the oil mill at Brinkley-American Oil Company.</p> + +<p>"Mother was learned durin' slavery but I couldn't say who done it. She +taught school 'round Buena Vista and Okolona, Mississippi. She learned +me. I was born 1874—November 25, 1874. I heard her say she worked in +the field one year. They give her some land and ploughed it so she could +have a patch. It was all she could work. I don't know how much. It was +her patch. Our depot was Prairie Station, Mississippi. My parents was +Monroe [HW: 'Murder'] Murdock [TR: lined out] and Lucy Ann Murdock [TR: +lined out] [HW: Murder]. It is spelled M-u-r-d-o-c-k.</p> + +<p>"I farmed all my whole life. Oil milling was the surest, quickest living +but I likes farmin' all right.</p> + +<p>"I never contacted the Ku Kluxes. They was 'bout gone when I come on.</p> + +<p>"I voted off an' on. This is the white folks' country and they going to +run their gov'mint. The thing balls us up is, some tells us one way and +some more tells us a different way to do. And we don't know the best +way. That balls us up. Times is better than ever I seen them, for the +man that wants to work.</p> + +<p>"I get $8 a month. I work all I can."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MyersBessie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Bessie Myers, Brassfield, Arkansas<br> +Age: 50? didn't know</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My mother was named Jennie Bell. She was born in North Ca'lina +(Carolina). She worked about the house. She said there was others at the +house working all the time with her.</p> + +<p>"She said they daresn't to cross the fence on other folks' land or go +off up the road 'lessen you had a writing to show. One woman could +write. She got a pass and this woman made some more. She said couldn't +find nothing to make passes on. It happened they never got caught up. +That woman didn't live very close by. She talked like she was free but +was one time a slave her own self.</p> + +<p>"Mother said she would run hide every time the Yankee men come. She said +she felt safer in the dark. They took so many young women to wait on +them and mother was afraid every time they would take her.</p> + +<p>"She said she had been at the end of a corn row at daylight ready to +start chopping it over, or pull fodder, or pull ears either. She said +they thought to lie in bed late made you weak. Said the early fresh air +what made children strong.</p> + +<p>"On wash days they all met at a lake and washed. They had good times +then. They put the clothes about on the bushes and briers and rail +fences. Some one or two had to stay about to keep the clothes from a +stray hog or goat till they dried. And they would forage about in the +woods. It was cool and pleasant. They had to gather up the clothes in +hamper baskets and bring them up to iron. Mother said they didn't mind +work much. They got used to it.</p> + +<p>"Mother told about men carried money in sacks. When they bought a slave, +they open up a sack and pull out gold and silver.</p> + +<p>"The way she talked she didn't mind slavery much. Papa lived till a few +years ago but he never would talk about slavery at all. His name was +Willis Bell."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MyhandMary"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Sallie C. Miller<br> +Person interviewed: Mary Myhand, Clarksville, Arkansas<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My mammie died when I was a little girl She had three children and our +white folks took us in their house and raised us. Two of us had fever +and would have died if they hadn't got us a good doctor. The doctor they +had first was a quack and we were getting worse until they called the +other doctor, then we commence to get well. I don't know how old I am. +Our birthdays was down in the mistress' Bible and when the old war come +up, the house was burned and lost everything but I know I am at least 83 +or 84 years old. Our white folks was so good to us. They never whipped +us, and we eat what they eat and when they eat. I was born in White +County, Tennessee and moved to Missouri but the folks did not like it +there so we come to Benton County, Arkansas. One side of the road was +Benton County and the other side was Washington County but we always had +to go to Bentonville, the county seat, to tend to business. I was a +little tod of a girl when the war come up. One day word come that the +'Feds' were coming through and kill all of the old men and take all the +boys with them, so master took my brother and a grandson of his and +started South. I was so scared. I followed them about a half mile before +they found me and I begged so hard they took me with them. We went to +Texas and was there about one year when the Feds gave the women on our +place orders to leave their home. Said they owned it now. They had just +got to Texas where we was when the South surrendered and we all come +back home.</p> + +<p>"We stayed with our white folks for about twenty years after the war. +They shore was good to me. I worked for them in the house but never +worked in the field. I came across the mountain to Clarksville with a +Methodist preacher and his family and married here. My husband worked in +a livery stable until he died, then I worked for the white folks until I +fell and hurt my knee and got too old. I draws my old age pension.</p> + +<p>"I do not know about the young generation. I am old and crippled and +don't go out none."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="MyraxGriffin"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Griffin Myrax<br> + 913 Missouri Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age 77?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I don't know my age exactly. You know in them days people didn't take +care of their ages like they do now. I couldn't give you any trace of +the war, but I do remember when the Ku Klux was runnin' around.</p> + +<p>"Oh Lord, so much of the time I heard my mother talk about the slavery. +I was born in Oklahoma and my grandfather was a full-blooded Crete +Indian. He was very much of a man and lived to be one hundred thirty +years old. All Crete Indians named after some herb—that's what the name +Myrax means.</p> + +<p>"I heard my mother say that in slavery times the man worked all day with +weights on their feet so when night come they take them off and their +feet feel so light they could outran the Ku Klux. Now I heard her tell +that.</p> + +<p>"My parents moved from Oklahoma to Texas and I went to school in +Marshall, Texas. All my schoolin' was in Texas—my people was tied up +there. My last schoolin' was in Buchanan, Texas. The professor told my +mother she would have to take me out of school for awhile, I studied too +hard. I treasured my books. When other children was out playin' I was +studyin'.</p> + +<p>"There was some folks in that country that didn't get along so well. I +remember there was a blind woman that the folks sent something to eat by +another colored woman. But she eat it up and cooked a toadfrog for the +old blind woman. That didn't occur on our place but in the neighborhood. +When the people found it out they whipped her sufficient.</p> + +<p>"When my grandfather died he didn't have a decayed tooth in his head. +They was worn off like a horse's teeth but he had all of them.</p> + +<p>"I always followed sawmill work and after I left that I followed +railroading. I liked railroading. I more or less kept that in my view.</p> + +<p>"About this slavery—I couldn't hardly pass my sentiments on it. The +world is so far gone, it would be the hardest thing to put the bridle on +some of the people that's runnin' wild now."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NealTomWylie"></a> +<h3>Name of Interviewer: Irene Robertson<br> +Subject: Ex-slaves—Dreams—Herbs: Cures and Remedies<br> +Story:—<br> +<br> +This information given by: Tom Wylie Neal<br> +Place of Residence: Hazen, Arkansas—Near Green Grove<br> +Occupation: Farmer—Feeds cattle in the winter for a man in Hazen.<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>His father and mother belonged to Tom Neal at Calhoun, Georgia. He +remembers the big battle at Atlanta Ga. He was eight years old. He saw +the lights, [saw the bullets in the air at night] and heard the boom, +boom of guns and cannons. They passed along with loaded wagons and in +uniforms. The horses were beautiful, and he saw lots of fine saddles and +bridles. His mistress' name was Mrs. Tom Neal. She had the property and +married Tom Neal. She had been married before and her first husband died +but her first husband's name can't be recalled. She had two +children—girls—by her first husband. Her second husband just married +her to protect them all he could. He didn't do anything unless the old +mistress told him to do it and how to do it. Wylie Neal was raised up +with the old mistress' children. He was born a slave and lived to +thirteen years. "The family had some better to eat and lots more to +wear, but they gave me plenty and never did mistreat me. They had a +peafowl. That was good luck, to keep some of them about on the place." +They had guineas, chickens and turkeys. They never had a farm bell. He +never saw one till he came to Arkansas. They blew a big "Conch shell" +instead. Mistress had cows and she would pour milk or pot-liquor out in +a big pewter bowl on a stump and the children would come up there from +the cabins and eat [till the field hands had time to cook a meal.][HW:?] +Wylie's mother was a field hand. They drank out of tin cans and gourds. +The master mated his hands. Some times he would ask his young man or +woman if they knew anybody they would like to marry that he was going to +buy more help and if they knew anybody he would buy them if he could. +The way they met folks they would get asked to corn shuckings and log +rollings and Mrs. Neal always took some of her colored people to church +to attend to the stock, tie the horses and hitch up, maybe feed and to +nurse her little girls at church. The colored folks sat on the back +seats over in a corner together. If they didn't behave or talked out +they got a whipping or didn't go no more. "They kept the colored people +scared to be bad."</p> + +<p>The colored folks believed in hoodoo and witches. Heard them talking +lots about witches. They said if they found anybody was a witch they +would kill them. Witches took on other forms and went out to do meaness. +They said sometimes some of them got through latch holes. They used +buttons and door knobs whittled out of wood, and door latches with +strings.</p> + +<p>People married early in "Them days"—when Mistress' oldest girl married +she gave her Sumanthy, Wylie's oldest sister when they come home [they +would let her come.] They sent their children to school some but the +colored folks didn't go because it was "pay school." Every year they had +"pertracted meeting." Looked like a thousand people come and stayed two +or three weeks along in August, in tents. "We had a big time then and +some times we'd see a colored girl we'd ask the master to buy. They'd +preach to the colored folks some days. Tell them the law. How to behave +and serve the Lord." When Wylie was twelve years old the "Yanks" came +and tore up the farm. "It was just like these cyclones that is [TR: +illegible word] around here in Arkansas, exactly like that."</p> + +<p>His mistress left and he never saw her again. General [HW: John Bell] +Hood was the [TR: illegible word] he thinks, but he was given to Captain +Condennens to wait on him. They went to Marietta, Ga., and Kingston, Ga. +"Rumors came about that we were free and everybody was drifting around. +The U.S. Government gave us food then like they do now and we hunted +work. Everybody nearly froze and starved. We wore old uniforms and slept +anywhere we could find, an old house or piece of a house. In +1865-1869—the Ku Klux was miserable on the colored folks. Lots of folks +died out of consumption in the spring and pneumonia all winter.</p> + +<p>"There wasn't any doctors seeing after colored folks for they had no +money and they used herbs—only medicine they could get."</p> + +<p>Only herbs he remembers he used is: chew black snake roots to settle +sick stomach. Flux weed tea for disordered stomach. People eat so much +"messed up food" lot of them got sick.</p> + +<p>Wylie Neal wandered about and finally came to Chattanooga. They got old +uniforms and victuals from the "Yanks" about a year.</p> + +<p>Colonel Stocker come and got up a lot of hands and paid their way to +Memphis on the train. From there they were put on the <u>Molly +Hamilton</u> boat and went to Linden, Arkansas, on the St. Francis +River. "He fared fine" there. In 1906[TR: ?] he came to Hazen and since +then he has owned small farms at Biscoe and forty acres near Hazen. It +was joining the old Joe Perry place. Dr. ---- got a mortgage on it and +took it. Wylie Neal lives with his niece and she is old too so they get +relief and a pension.</p> + +<p>"He don't believe in dreams but some dreams like when you dream of the +dead there's sho' goner be falling weather." He "don't dream much" he +says.</p> + +<p>He has a birthmark on his leg. It looks like a bunch of berries. He +never heard what caused it. It has always been there.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NealySally"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Sally Nealy<br> + 105 Mulberry Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 91</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes mam, I was a slave! I was sixteen years old when the war begun. I +was born in Texas.</p> + +<p>"My old master was John Hall and my young master was Marse Dick. Marse +John went to war the 5th day of May in 1861 and he was killed in June. +They wasn't nothin' left to bring home but his right leg and his left +arm. They knowed it was him cause his name was tattooed on his leg.</p> + +<p>"He was a mean rascal. He brought us up from the plantation and pat us +on the head and give us a little whisky and say 'Your name is Sally or +Mary or Mose' just like we was dogs.</p> + +<p>"My old mistress, Miss Caroline, was a mean one too. She was the mother +of eight children—five girls and three boys. When she combed her hair +down low on her neck she was all right but when she come down with it +done up on the top of her head—look out.</p> + +<p>"It was my job to scrub the big cedar churns with brick dust and Irish +potato and polish the knives and forks the same way. Then every other +day I had to mold twelve dozen candles and sweep the yard with a dogwood +bresh broom.</p> + +<p>"She didn't give us no biscuits or sugar 'cept on Christmas. Jest +shorts and molasses for our coffee. When the Yankee soldiers come +through old mistress run and hide in the cellar but the Yankees went +down in the collar too and took all the hams and honey and brandied +peaches she had.</p> + +<p>"They didn't have no doctors for the niggers then. Old mistress just +give us some blue mass and castor oil and they didn't give you nothin' +to take the taste out your mouth either.</p> + +<p>"Oh lord, I know 'bout them Ku Klux. They wore false faces and went +around whippin' people.</p> + +<p>"After the surrender I went to stay with Miss Fulton. She was good to me +and I stayed with her eleven years. She wanted to know how old I was so +my father went to Miss Caroline and she say I 'bout twenty now.</p> + +<p>"Some white folks was good to their slaves. I know one man, Alec Yates, +when he killed hogs he give the niggers five of 'em. Course he took the +best but that was all right.</p> + +<p>"After freedom the Yankees come and took the colored folks away to the +marshal's yard and kept them till they got jobs for 'em. They went to +the white folks houses and took things to feed the niggers.</p> + +<p>"I ain't been married but once. I thought I was in love but I wasn't. +Love is a itchin' 'round the heart you can't get at to scratch.</p> + +<p>"I 'member one song they sung durin' the war</p> + +<pre> +'The Yankees are comin' through +By fall sez I +We'll all drink stone blind +Johnny fill up the bowl.'" +</pre> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NeelySally"></a> +<h3>FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Subject: Songs of Civil War Days<br> +Story:—Information<br> +<br> +This information given by: Sally Neeley<br> +Place of residence: 105 N. Mulberry, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Occupation: None<br> +Age: 90</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]<br> +[TR: Same as previous informant (Sally Nealy).]</p> +<br> + + +<pre> +(1) +"In eighteen hundred and sixty-one +Football (?) sez I; +In eighteen hundred and sixty-one +That's the year the war begun +We'll all drink stone blind, +Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(2) +"In eighteen hundred and sixty-two +Football (?) sez I; +In eighteen hundred and sixty-two +That's the year we put 'em through +We'll all drink stone blind, +Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(3) +"In eighteen hundred and sixty-three +Football (?) sez I; +In eighteen hundred and sixty-three +That's the year we didn't agree +We'll all drink stone blind. +Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(4) +"In eighteen hundred and sixty-four +Football (?) sez I; +In eighteen hundred and sixty-four +We'll all go home and fight no more +We'll all drink stone blind. +Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(5) +"In eighteen hundred and sixty-five +Football (?) sez I; +In eighteen hundred and sixty-five +We'll have the Rebels dead or alive +We'll all drink stone blind, +Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(6) +"In eighteen hundred and sixty-six +Football (?) sez I; +In eighteen hundred and sixty-six +We'll have the Rebels in a helava fix +We'll all drink stone blind, +Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(7) +"In eighteen hundred and sixty-seven +Football (?) sez I; +In eighteen hundred and sixty-seven +We'll have the Rebels dead and at the devil +We'll all drink stone blind. +Johnny, came fill up the bowl." +</pre> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>The word "football" doesn't sound right in this song, but I was unable +to find it in print, and Sally seemed to think it was the right word.</p> + +<p>Sally is a very wicked old woman and swears like a sailor, but she has a +remarkable memory.</p> + +<p>She was "bred and born" in Rusk County, Texas and says she came to Pine +Bluff when it was "just a little pig."</p> + +<p>Says she was sixteen when the Civil War began.</p> + +<p>I have previously reported an interview with her.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NealyWylie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Wylie Nealy [HW: Biscoe Arkansas?]<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<br> + +<p>I was born in 1852. I am 85 years old. I was born in Gordon County. The +closest town was Calhoun, South Carolina. My sister died in '59. That's +the first dead, person I ever saw. One of my sisters was give away and +another one was sold before the Civil War started. Sister Mariah was +give to the young mistress, Miss Ella Conley. I didn't see her sold. I +never seed nobody sold but I heard 'em talking about it. I had five +sisters and one brother. My father was a free man always. He was a +Choctaw Indian. Mother was part Cherokee Indian. My mother's mistress +was Mrs. Martha Christian. He died and she married Tom Nealy, the one +they call me fur, Wylie Nealy.</p> + +<p>Liberty and Freedom was all I ever heard any colored folks say dey +expected to get out of de war, and mighty proud of dot. Nobody knowed +they was goin to have a war till it was done broke out and they was +fightin about it. Didn't nobody want land, they jess wanted freedom. I +remembers when Lincoln was made the President both times and when he was +killed. I recollects all that like yesterday.</p> + +<p>The army had been through and swept out everything. There wasn't a +chicken or hog nowhere to be had, took the stock and cattle and all the +provisions. So de slaves jess had to scatter out and leave right now. +And after de army come through. I was goin back down to the old place +and some soldiers passed riding along and one said "Boy where you goin? +Said nothing up there." I says, "I knows it." Then he say "Come on here, +walk along back there" and I followed him. I was twelve years old. He +was Captain McClendenny. Then when I got to the camp wid him he say "You +help around here." I got sick and they let me go back home then to +Resacca, Georgia and my mother died. When I went back they sent me to +Chattanooga with Captain Story. I was in a colored regiment nine months, +I saw my father several times while I was at Chattanooga. We was in +Shermans army till it went past Atlanta. They burned up the city. Two of +my masters come out of the war alive and two dead. I was mustered out in +August 1865. I stayed in camp till my sisters found a cabin to move in. +Everybody got rations issued out. It was a hard time. I got hungry lots +times. No plantations was divided and the masters didn't have no more +than the slaves had when the war was done. After the Yankees come in and +ripped them up old missus left and Mr. Tom Nealy was a Home Guard. He +had a class of old men. Never went back or seen any more of them. +Everybody left and a heap of the colored folks went where rations could +be issued to them and some followed on in the armies. After I was +mustered out I stayed around the camps and went to my sister's cabin +till we left there. Made anything we could pick up. Men come in there +getting people to go work for them. Some folks went to Chicago. A heap +of the slaves went to the northern cities. Colonel Stocker, a officer in +the Yankee army, got us to come to a farm in Arkansas. We wanted to stay +together is why we all went on the farm. May 1866, when we come to +Arkansas is the first farmin I had seen done since I left Tom Nealy's +place. Colonel Stocker is mighty well known in St. Francis County. He +brought lots of families, brought me and my brother, my two brothers and +a nephew. We come on the train. It took four or five days. When we got +to Memphis we come to Linden on a boat "Molly Hamilton" they called it. +I heard it was sunk at Madison long time after that. Colonel Stocker +promised to pay $6 a month and feed us. When Christmas come he said all +I was due was $12.45. We made a good crop. That wasn't it. Been there +since May. Had to stay till got all the train and boat fare paid. There +wasn't no difference in that and slavery 'cept they couldn't sell us.</p> + +<p>I heard a heap about the Ku Klux but I nebber seed them. Everybody was +scared of them.</p> + +<p>The first votin I ever heard of was in Grant's election. Both black and +white voted. I voted Republican for Grant. Lot of the southern soldiers +was franchised and couldn't vote. Just the private soldiers could vote +at tall. I don't know why it was. I was a slave for thirteen years from +birth. Every slave could vote after freedom. Some colored folks held +office. I knew several magistrates and sheriffs. There was one at Helena +(Arkansas) and one at Marianna. He was a High Sheriff. I voted some +after that but I never voted in the last Presidento election. I heard +'em say it wasn't no use, this man would be elected anyhow. I sorter +quit off long time ago.</p> + +<p>In 1874 and 1875 I worked for halves and made nough to buy a farm in St. +Francis County. It cost $925. I bought it in 1887. Eighty acres to be +cleared down in the bottoms. My family helped and when my help got +shallow, the children leaving me, I sold it for $2,000, in 1904. I was +married jess once and had eight children; five livin and three dead. Me +and the old woman went to Oklahoma. We went in January and come back to +Biscoe (Arkansas) in September. It wasn't no place for farming. I bought +40 acres from Mr. Aydelott and paid him $500. I sold it and come to Mr. +Joe Perry's place, paid $500 for 40 acres of timber land. We cleared it +and I got way in debt and lost it. Clear lost it! Ize been working +anywhere I could make a little since then. My wife died and I been doing +little jobs and stays about with my children. The Welfare gives me a +little check and some supplies now and then.</p> + +<p>No maam, I can't read much. I was not learnt. I could figure a little +before my eyes got bad. The white folks did send their children to pay +schools but we colored children had to stay around the house and about +in the field to work. I never got no schoolin. I went with old missus to +camp meeting down in Georgia one time and got to go to white church +sometimes. At the camp meeting there was a big tent and all around it +there was brush harbors and tents where people stayed to attend the +meetins. They had four meetins a day. Lots of folk got converted and +shouted. They had a lot of singings They had a lots to eat and a big +time.</p> + +<p>I don't think much about these young folks now. It seems lack everybody +is having a hard time to live among us colored folks. Some white folks +has got a heap and fine cars to get about in. I don't know what go in to +become of 'em.</p> + +<p>People did sing more than I hear them now but I never could sing. They +sing a lot of foolish songs and mostly religious songs.</p> + +<p>I don't recollect of any slave uprising. I never heard of any. We didn't +know they was going to have a war till they was fighting. Yes maam, they +heard Lincoln was going to set 'em free, but they didn't know how he was +going to do it. Everybody wanted freedom. Mr. Hammond (white) ask me not +long ago if I didn't think it best to bring us from Africa and be slaves +than like wild animals in Africa. He said we was taught about God and +the Gospel over here if we was slaves. I told him I thought dot freedom +was de best anywhere.</p> + +<p>We had a pretty hard time before freedom. My mother was a field woman. +When they didn't need her to work they hired her out and they got the +pay. The master mated the colored people. I got fed from the white folks +table whenever I curried the horses. I was sorter raised up with Mr. +Nealy's children. They didn't mistreat me. On Saturday the mistress +would blow a cone shell and they knowed to go and get the rations. We +got plenty to eat. They had chickens and ducks and geese and plenty +milk. They did have hogs. They had seven or eight guineas and a lot of +peafowls. I never heard a farm bell till I come to Arkansas. The +children et from pewter bowls or earthen ware. Sometimes they et greens +or milk from the same bowl, all jess dip in. The Yankees took me to +General Hood's army and I was Captain McCondennen's helper at the +camps.[HW: ?] We went down through Marietta and Atlanta and through +Kingston. Shells come over where we lived. I saw 'em fight all the +time. Saw the light and heard the roaring of de guns miles away. It +looked like a storm where the army went along. They tramped the wheat +and oats and cotton down and turned the horses in on the corn. The +slaves show did hate to see the Yankees waste everything. They promised +a lot and wasn't as good as the old masters. All dey wanted was to be +waited on too. The colored folks was freed when the Yankees took all the +stock and cattle and rations. Everybody had to leave and let the +government issue them rations. Everybody was proud to be free. They +shouted and sung. They all did pretty well till the war was about to end +then they was told to scatter and no whars to go. Cabins all tore down +or burned. No work to do. There was no money to pay. I wore old uniforms +pretty well till I come to Arkansas. I been here in Hazen since 1906. I +come on a boat from Memphis to Linden. Colonel Stocker brought a lot of +us on the train. The name of the boat was Molly Hamilton. It was a big +boat and we about filled it. I show was glad to get back on a farm.</p> + +<p>I don't know what is goin to become of the young folks. Everything is so +different now and when I was growin up I don't know what will become of +the younger generation.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelandEmaline"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Emaline Neland, Marianna, Arkansas<br> +Age: Born 1859</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born two years before the War. I was born in Murray County, +Tennessee. It was middle Tennessee. When I come to remembrance I was in +Grant County, Arkansas. When I remember they raised wheat and corn and +tobacco. Mother's master was Dr. Harrison. His son was married and me +and my brother Anderson was give to him. He come to Arkansas 'fore ever +I could remember. He was a farmer but I never seen him hit a lick of +work in my life. He was good to me and my brother. She was good too. I +was the nurse. They had two children. Brother was a house boy. Me and +her girl was about the same size but I was the oldest. Being with the +other children I called her mother too. I didn't know no other mother +till freedom.</p> + +<p>"Freedom! Well, here is the very way it all was: Old master told her +(mother) she was free. He say, 'Go get your children, you free as I is +now.' Ain't I heard her say it many a time? Well, mother come in a ox +wagon what belong to him and got us. They run me down, caught me and got +me in the wagon. They drove twenty-five miles. Old Dr. Harrison had +moved to Arkansas. Being with the other children I soon learnt to call +her ma. She had in all ten or eleven children. She was real dark.</p> + +<p>"Pa was a slave too. He was a low man. He was a real bright man. He was +brighter than I is. He belong to a widow woman named Tedford. He renamed +his self after freedom. He took the name Brown 'stead of Tedford. I +never heard him say why he wasn't satisfied with his own name. He was a +soldier. He worked for the Yankees.</p> + +<p>"After the War pa and ma got back together and lived together till she +died. There was five days' difference in their deaths. They died of +pneumonia. He was 64 years old and she was 54 years old. I was at home +when pa come from the War. All my sisters was light, one sister had +sandy hair like pa. She was real light. Ma was a good all 'round woman. +She cooked more than anything else. She nursed. Dr. Harrison told her to +stay till her husband come back or all the time if he didn't ever come +back. Ma never worked in the field. When pa come he moved us on a place +to share crop. Ma never worked in the field. He was buying a home in +Grant County. He started to Mississippi and stopped close to Helena and +ten or twelve miles from Marianna. He had a soldier friend wouldn't let +him go. He told him this was a better country. He decided to stay down +in here.</p> + +<p>"I heard a whole heap about the Ku Klux. One time when a crowd was going +to church, we heard horse's feet coming; sound like they would run over +us. We all got clear out of reach so they wouldn't run over us. They had +on funny caps was all I could see, they went so fast. We give them the +clear road and they went on. That is all I ever seen of the Ku Klux.</p> + +<p>"I seen Dr. Harrison's wife. She was a little old lady but we left after +I went there.</p> + +<p>"I used to sew for the public. Yes, white and colored folks. I learnt my +own self to sew. I never had but one boy in my life. He died at seven +weeks old. I raised a stepson. I married twice. I married at home both +times. Just a quiet marriage and a colored preacher married me both +times.</p> + +<p>"The present conditions is hard. I want things and can't get 'em. If I +had the strength to hold out to work I could get along.</p> + +<p>"The present generation—young white and black—blinds me. They turns +corners too fast. They going so fast they don't have time to take +advice. They promise to do better but they don't. They do like they want +to do and don't tell nobody till they done it. I say they just running +way with their selves.</p> + +<p>"I get $8 and a little help along. I'm thankful for it. It is a blessing +I tell you."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelsonHenry"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Henry Nelson<br> + 904 E. Fifth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: About 70</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My name is Henry Nelson. I was born in Arkansas—Crittenden County near +Memphis, Tennessee. I was born not far from Memphis but on this side.</p> + +<p>"My mother's name was Adeline Taylor. That was her old slavery folks' +name. She was a Taylor before she married my father—Nelson. My father's +first name was Green. I don't remember none of my grandparents. My +father's mother died before I come to remember and I know my mother's +mother died before I could remember.</p> + +<p>"My father was born in Mississippi—Sardis, Mississippi—and my mother +was a Tennesseean—<u>Cartersville</u>[HW:?] Tennessee, twenty-five +miles above Memphis. [HW: Carter, in Carter County, about 35 m. north of +Memphis, but no Cartersville.] [TR: moved from bottom of following +page.]</p> + +<p>"After peace was declared, they met in Tennessee. That was where my +mother was born, you know. They fell in love with one another in Shelby +County, and married there. My mother had been married once before during +slavery time. She had been made to marry by her master. Her first +husband was named Eli. He was my oldest sister's father. Him and my +mother had the same master and missis. She was made to marry him. She +was only thirteen years old when she married him. She was fine and stout +and her husband was fine and stout, and they wanted more from that +stock. I don't know how old he was but he was a lot older than she was. +He was a kind of an elderly man. She had just one child by him—my +oldest sister, Georgia. She was only married a short time before freedom +came.</p> + +<p>"My father farmed. He was always a farmer—raised cotton and corn. My +mother was a farmer too. Both of them—that is both of her +husbands—were farmers.</p> + +<p>"My mother and father used to go off to places to dance and the +pateroles would get after them. You had to have a pass to go off your +place and if you didn't have a pass, they would make you warm. Some of +them would get caught sometimes and the pateroles would whip them. They +would sure got whipped if they didn't have a pass.</p> + +<p>"The old master come out and told them they were free when peace was +declared. He said, 'You are free this morning—free as I am.'</p> + +<p>"Right after the War, my mother come further down in Tennessee, and that +is how she met my father where she was when she was married. They went +farming. They farmed on shares—sharecropped. They were on a big place +called Ensley place. The man that owned the place was called Nuck +Ensley.</p> + +<p>"My mother and father didn't have no schooling. I never heard that they +were bothered by the Ku Klux.</p> + +<p>"She didn't live with her first husband after slavery. She left him when +she was freed. She never did intend to marry him. She was forced to +that."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>Nelson evidently rents rooms. A yellow sallow-faced, cadaverous, and +dissatisfied looking "gentleman" went into the house eyeing me +suspiciously as he passed. In a moment he was out again interrupting the +old man with pointless remarks. In—out again—standing over +me—peering on my paper in the offensive way that ill-bred people have. +He straightened up with a disgusted look on his face. He couldn't read +shorthand.</p> + +<p>"What's that you're writin'?"</p> + +<p>"Shorthand."</p> + +<p>"What's that about?"</p> + +<p>"History."</p> + +<p>"History uv whut?"</p> + +<p>"Slavery."</p> + +<p>"He don't know nothin' about slavery."</p> + +<p>"Thank you. However, if he says he does, I'll just continue to listen to +him if you don't mind."</p> + +<p>"Humph," and the "yellow gentleman" passed in.</p> + +<p>Out again—eyeing both the old man and me with disgust that was +unconcealed. To him, "You don't know whutchu're doin'."</p> + +<p>Deep silence by all. Exit the yellow brother.</p> + +<p>To the old man, I said, "Is that your son?"</p> + +<p>"Lawd, no, that's jus' a roomer."</p> + +<p>Out came the yellow brother again. "See here, Uncle, if you want me to +fix that fence you'd bettuh come awn out heah now. It's gettin' dark."</p> + +<p>I closed my notebook and arose. "Don't let me interfere with your +program, Brother Nelson."</p> + +<p>The old man settled back in his chair. His eyes inspected the sky, his +jaw "sorta" set. The yellow brother looked at him a minute and passed +on.</p> + +<p>Five minutes later. Enter, the Madam. She also was of the yellow variety +with the suspicious and spiteful look of an undersized black Belgian +police dog. A moment of silence—a word to him.</p> + +<p>"You don't know whutchu're doin'." Silence all around. To me, "You're +upsettin' my work."</p> + +<p>I arose. "Madam, I'm sorry."</p> + +<p>The old man spoke, "You ain't keepin' me from nothin'."</p> + +<p>"Well, I said, you've given me a nice start; I'll come again and get the +rest."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelsonHenry2"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Henry Nelson, Edmondson, Arkansas<br> +Age: 70</h3> +<p>[TR: Appears to be same as last informant despite different address.]</p> +<br> + +<p>"My mother belong to the Taylors close to Carterville, Tennessee. My +father never was sold. He belong to the Nelsons. My parents married +toreckly after the surrender and come on to this state. I was born ten +miles from Edmondson. Their names was Adeline and Green Nelson. They +didn't get nothing after freedom like land or a horse. I'm seventy years +old and I would have known.</p> + +<p>"I was at Alton, Illinois in the lead works thirteen years ago and I had +a stroke. I been cripple ever since.</p> + +<p>"My folks never spoke of being nothing but field hands. Folks used to be +proud of their crops, go look over them on Sunday when company come. Now +if they got a garden they hide it and don't mention it. Times is changed +that way.</p> + +<p>"Clothes ain't as lasty as they used to be. People has a heap more money +to spend and don't raise and have much at home as they did when I was a +child. Times is all turned around and folks too. I always had plenty +till I couldn't do hard work. I farmed my early life. We didn't have +much money but we had rations and warm clothes. I cleared new ground, +hauled wood, big logs. I steamboated on the Sun, Kate Adams, and One Arm +John. I helped with the freight. I railroaded with pick and shovel and +in the lead mines. I worked from Memphis to Helena on boats a good +while. I come back here to farm. Time is changed and I'm changed.</p> + +<p>"It has been so long since I heard my parents tell about slavery I +couldn't tell you straight. She told till she died, talked about how the +Yankees done when they come through. They took axes and busted up good +furniture. They et up and wasted the rations, then humor up the black +folks like they was in their favor when they was settin' out wasting +their living. They done made it to live on. Some followed them and some +stayed on. They wanted freedom but it wasn't like they thought it would +be. They didn't know how it would be. They didn't know it meant <u>set +out</u>. Seem like they left. In some ways times was better and some +ways it was worse. They had to work or starve is what they told me. +That's the way I found freedom. 'Course their owners made them work and +he looked out for the ration and in slavery.</p> + +<p>"I keeps up my own self all I can. I don't get help."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelsonIran"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Iran Nelson<br> + 603 E. Fourteenth Ave., Pine Bluff, Ark.<br> +Age: 77</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes ma'm, they fotch me from Mississippi to Arkansas on the +steamboat—you know they didn't have railroads then. They fotch my +mother and they went back after grandfather and grandmother too.</p> + +<p>"Dr. Noell was our master and he had us under mortgage to his +brother-in-law. They fotched us here till he could get straight from +that debt, but fore that could be, we got free.</p> + +<p>"I knowed slavery times. I member seem' em lash some of the rest but you +know I wasn't big enough to put in the fields. Old mistress say when I +got big enough, she goin' take me for a house girl. When they fotched +mama and grandmother here they had eighty some odd head of niggers. They +was gwine carry em back home after they got that mortgage paid but the +war come.</p> + +<p>"I member when the Yankees come, my white folks would run and hide and +hide us colored folks too. Boss man had the colored folks get all the +meat out of the smokehouse and hide it in the peach orchard in the +grass.</p> + +<p>"I used to play with old mistress daughter Addie. We would play in the +parlor and after we moved to town some of the little girls would pick up +and go home. You know these town folks didn't believe in playin' with +the colored folks.</p> + +<p>"After mama was free she stayed right there on the place and made a +crop. Raised eight hundred bales and the average was nine. Mama plowed +and hoed too. I had to work right with her too.</p> + +<p>"I never went to school but once. I learned my ABC's but couldn't read. +My next ABC's was a hoe in my hand. Mama had a switch right under her +belt. I worked but I couldn't keep up. Just seein' that switch was +enough. I had a pretty good time when I was young, but I had to go all +the time."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelsonJamesHenry"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: James Henry Nelson<br> + 1103 Orange, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 82<br> +Occupation: Gardener</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I member all about the war—why of cose. I saddled many a cavalry hoss. +I tell you how I know how old I am. Old master, Henry Stanley of Athens, +Alabama, moved to Palaski, Tennessee and left me with young mistress to +take care of things. One day we was drivin' up some stock and I said, +'Miss Nannie, how old is you?' And she said, 'I'm seventeen.' I was old +enough to have the knowledge she would know how old I was and I said, +'How old am I?' And she said, 'You is seven years old.' That was durin' +the war.</p> + +<p>"I remember the soldiers comin' and stoppin' at our building—Yankees +and Southern soldiers, too. They fit all around our plantation.</p> + +<p>"The Yankees taken me when I was a little fellow. About two years after +the war started, young Marse Henry went to war and took a colored man +with him but he ran away—he wouldn't stay with the Rebel army. So young +Marse Henry took me. I reckon I was bout ten. I know I was big enough to +saddle a cavalry hoss. We carried three horses—his hoss, my hoss and a +pack hoss. You know chillun them days, they made em do a man's work. I +studied bout my mother durin' the war, so they let me go home.</p> + +<p>"One day I went to mill. They didn't low the chillun to lay around, and +while I was at the mill a Yankee soldier ridin' a white hoss captured me +and took me to Pulaski, Tennessee and then I was in the Yankee army. I +wasn't no size and I don't think he would a took me if it hadn't been +for the hoss.</p> + +<p>"We come back to Athens and the Rebels captured the whole army. Colonel +Camp was in charge and General Forrest captured us and I was carried +south. We was marchin' along the line and a Rebel soldier said, 'Don't +you want to go home and stay with my wife?' And so I went there, to +Millville, Alabama. Then he bound me to a friend of his and I stayed +there till the war bout ended. I was getting along very well but a older +boy 'suaded me to run away to Decatur, Alabama.</p> + +<p>"Oh I seen lots of the war. Bof sides was good to me. I've seen many a +scout. The captain would say 'By G----, close the ranks.' Captains is +right crabbed. I stayed back with the hosses.</p> + +<p>"After the war I worked about for this one and that one. Some paid me +and some didn't.</p> + +<p>"I can remember back to Breckenridge; and I can remember hearin' em say +'Hurrah for Buchanan!' I'm just tellin' you to show how fur back I can +remember. I used to have a book with a picture of Abraham Lincoln with +an axe on his shoulder and a picture of that log cabin, but somebody +stole my book.</p> + +<p>"I worked for whoever would take me—I had no mother then. If I had had +parents to make me go to school, but I got along very well. The white +folks taught me not to have no bad talk. They's all dead now and if they +wasn't I'd be with them.</p> + +<p>"I'm a natural born farmer—that's all I know. The big overflow drownded +me out and my wife died with pellagra in '87. She was a good woman and +nice to white folks. I'm just a bachin' here now. I did stay with my +daughter but she is mean to me, so I just picked up my rags and moved +into this room where I can live in peace. I'm a christian man, and I +can't live right with her. When colored folks is mean, they's meaner +than white folks.</p> + +<p>"I'm gettin' along very well now. I been with white folks all my +day—and it's hard for me to get along with my folks.</p> + +<p>"In one way the world is crueler than they used to be. They don't +appreciate things like they used to. They have no feelin's and don't +care nothin' bout the olden people.</p> + +<p>"Well, good-bye, I'm proud of you."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelsonJohn"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: John Nelson, Holly Grove, Arkansas<br> +Age: 76</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My parents was Jazz Nelson and Mahaney Nelson. He come from Louisiana +durin' slavery. She come from Richmond, Virginia. I think from what they +said he come to Louisiana from there too. They was plain field hands.</p> + +<p>"My folks belong to Miss Mary Ann Richardson and Massa Harve Richardson. +They had five children and every one dead now. They lived at Duncan +Station.</p> + +<p>"The white folks told em they was free. They had no place to go and they +been workin' the crop. White folks glad for em to stay and work on. And +the truth is they was glad to git to stay on cause they had no place to +go. They kept stayin' on a long time.</p> + +<p>"I was so small I don't know if the Ku Klux ever did come bout our place +at tall."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelsonLettie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Lettie Nelson<br> + St. Marys Street, Helena, Arkansas<br> +Age: 55 or 56?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Grandma was Patsy Smith. She said in slavery they had a certain amount +of cotton to pick. If they didn't have that amount they would put their +heads between the rails of the fences and whoop them. They whooped them +in the ebenin' when they weighed up the cotton. Grandma was raised in +Virginia. She was light. Mama was light. They was carried from Virginia +to Louisiana in wagons. They found clothes along the road people had +lost. She said several bundles of good clothes. They thought they had +dropped off of wagons ahead of them. They washed and wore the clothes. +Some of 'em fit so they wore them. Mama left her husband and brother in +Virginia. Ed Smith was her second husband. He was a light man. My +grandpa was a field man. I never heard if grandpa was sold. Jimmie +Stansberry was the man that bought or brought mama and grandma to +Louisiana. Mama cooked and worked in the field both. Grandma did too. +She cooked in Louisiana more than mama. They belong to Lou and Jimmie +Stansberry and they had two boys. They lived close to Minden, Louisiana. +I don't know so much about my parents and grandma talked but we didn't +pay enough attention to remember it all. She was old and got things +confused.</p> + +<p>"They was glad when freedom come but they lived on with Jimmie +Stansberry. I remember them. Grandma raised me after my parents died. +Then she lived with me till she died. She was awful old when she died. +They would talk about how different Virginia and Louisiana was. It took +them a long time to make that trip."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NelsonMattie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Mattie Nelson<br> + 710 E. Fourth Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 72</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Chicot County, Arkansas in '65. They said I was born on +the roadside while we was on our way here from Texas. They had to camp +they said. Some people called it emigrate. Now that's the straightest +way I can tell it.</p> + +<p>"Our mistress and master was named Chapman. I member when I was a child +mistress used to be so good to us. After surrender my parents stayed +right on there with the Chapmans, stayed right on the place till they +died.</p> + +<p>"My mudder and pappy neither one of em could read or write, but I went +to school. I always was apt. I am now. I always was one to work—yes +ma'm—rolled logs, hope clean up new ground—yes ma'm. When we was +totin' logs, I'd say, "Put the big end on me" but they'd say, "No, +you're a woman." Yes ma'm I been here a long time. I do believe in +stirrin' work for your livin', yes ma'm, that's what I believe in.</p> + +<p>"I been workin' ever since I was six years old. My daughter was just +like me—she had a gift, but she died. I seen all my folks die and that +lets me know I got to die too.</p> + +<p>"White folks used to come along in buggies, and hoss back too, and stop +and watch me plow. Seem like the hotter the sun was the better I liked +it.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'm, I done all kinds a work and I feels it now, too."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NewbornDan"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Dan Newborn<br> + 1000 Louisiana, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 78</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in 1860. Born in Knoxville, Tennessee. I suppose it was in +the country.</p> + +<p>"Solomon Walton was my mother's owner and my father belonged to the +Newborns. My grandmother belonged to the Buggs in Richmond, Virginia and +she was sold to the Waltons. When my mother died in '65 my grandmother +raised me. After she was freed she went to the Powell Clayton place. Her +daughter lived there and she sent up the river and got her. I went too. +Me and two more boys.</p> + +<p>"I never went to school but about thirty days. Hardly learned my +alphabet.</p> + +<p>"In '66, my grandmother bound two of us to Powell Clayton for our +'vittils' and clothes and schoolin', but I didn't get no schoolin'. I +waited in the house. Stayed there three years, then we come back to the +Walton place.</p> + +<p>"My grandmother said the Waltons treated her mean. Beat her on the head +and that was part of her death. Every spring her head would run. She +said they didn't get much of somethin' to eat.</p> + +<p>"I was married 'fore my grandmother died—to this wife that died two +months ago. We stayed together fifty-seven years.</p> + +<p>"To my idea, this younger generation is too wild—not near as settled as +when I was comin' up. They used to obey. Why, I slept in the bed with +my grandmother till I was married. She whipped me the day before I was +married. It was 'cause I had disobeyed her. Children will resist their +mothers now.</p> + +<p>"I think the colored people is better off now 'cause they got more +privilege, but the way some of 'em use their privilege, I think they +ought to be slaves.</p> + +<p>"My grandmother taught me not to steal. My white folks here have trusted +me with two and three hundred dollars. I don't want nothin' in the world +but mine.</p> + +<p>"I been workin' here for Fox Brothers thirty-eight years and they'll +tell you there's not a black mark against me.</p> + +<p>"I used to be a mortar maker and used to sample cotton. Then I worked at +the Cotton Belt Shops eight years.</p> + +<p>"I've bought me a home that cost $780.</p> + +<p>"I don't mind tellin' about myself 'cause I've been honest and you can +go up the river and get my record.</p> + +<p>"Out of all due respect to everybody, the Yankees is the ones I like.</p> + +<p>"Vote? Oh yes, Republican ticket. I like Roosevelt's administration. If +I could vote now, I'd vote for him. He has done a whole lot of good."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NewsomSallie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person Interviewed: Sallie Newsom<br> + Brinkley, Ark.<br> +Age 75?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Miss, I don't know my age, but I know I is old. I'm sick now.</p> + +<p>"My grandma's mistress and mama's mistress and my mistress was Miss +Jennie Brawner at Thomasville, Georgia. Me and my oldest sister was born +in Atlanta. Then freedom come on. My own papa wanted mama to follow him +to Mississippi. He had a wife there. She wouldn't go. She stayed on a +while with Mr. Acy and Miss Jennie. They come from Virginia. Her name +was Catherine.</p> + +<p>"Grandma toted her big hoop dresses about and carried her trains up off +the floor. Combed her long glossy hair. Mama was a house girl too, but +then grandma took to the kitchen. She was the cook then.</p> + +<p>"Old Miss Jennie wanted mama to give her my oldest sister Lulu, so mama +gave her to her. Then when we started to come to Holly Grove, +Mississippi, Miss Jennie still wanted her. Mama didn't want to part from +her. She was married again and brought me but my aunts told mama to +leave her there, she would have a good home and be educated, so she +'greed to leave her two years. She sent back for her at the end of two +years; she wrote and didn't want to come. She was still at Miss +Jennie's. I haben seen her from the day we left Atlanta till this very +day. A woman, colored woman, was here in Brinkley once seen her. Said +she was so fine and nice. Had nice soft skin and was well to do. I have +wrote but my letters come back. I know Miss Jennie is dead, and my +sister may be by now.</p> + +<p>"My papa was Abe Brooks. His master was Mars Jonas Brooks. Old master +give him to the young master. He was rich, rich, and traveled all time. +His pa give him a servant. He cooked for him, drove his carriage—they +called it a brake in them days—followed him to the hotels and +bar-rooms. He drink and give him a dram. When he was freed he come to +Mississippi with the Brooks to farm for them. I went to see my papa at +Waterford, Miss.</p> + +<p>"When we was at Holly Springs, Mississippi my cousin was a railroad man +so he helped me run away. He paid my way. I come to Clarendon. I cooked, +washed and ironed. In two or three years I went back to see mama. They +was glad to see me. They had eight children.</p> + +<p>"I couldn't guarantee you about the eight younger children, but there +ain't a speck of no kind of blood about me and Lulu Violet but African. +We are slick black Negroes. (She is very black, large and bony.)</p> + +<p>"Miss Jennie Brawner had one son—Gus Brawner—and he may be living now +in Atlanta.</p> + +<p>"My uncle said he seen the Yankees come through Thomasville, Georgia. I +never seen an army of them. I seen soldiers, plenty of em. None of the +Brooks or Brawners went to war that I heard of. I was kept close and too +young to know much of what happened. I heard about the Ku Klux but I +never seen them.</p> + +<p>"I know Miss Jennie Brawner come from Virginia but I don't brought +grandma with her or bought her. She never did say.</p> + +<p>"I don't vote. My husband voted, I don't know how he voted.</p> + +<p>"Since I been sick, I get a check and commodities."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NewtonPete"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Sallie C. Miller<br> +Person interviewed: Pete Newton, Clarksville, Arkansas<br> +Age: 83 [TR: 85?]<br> +Occupation: Farmer and day laborer</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My white folks was as good to me as they could be. I ain't got no kick +to make about my white people. The boys was all brave. I was raised on +the farm. I staid with my boss till I was nearly grown. When the war got +so hot my boss was afraid the 'Feds' would get us. He sent my mammy to +Texas and sent me in the army with Col. Bashom, to take care of his +horses. I was about eleven or twelve years old. Col. Bashom was always +good to me. He always found a place for me to sleep and eat. Sometimes +after the colonel left the folks would run as off and not let me stay +but I never told the colonel. I went to Boston, Texas with the colonel +and his men and when he went on the big raid into Missouri he left me in +Sevier County, Arkansas with his horses 'Little Baldy' and 'Orphan Boy'. +They was race horses. The colonel always had race horses. He was killed +at Pilot Knob, Missouri. After the colonel was killed his son George (I +shore did think a lot of George) come after me and the horses and +brough' us home.</p> + +<p>"While I was in Arkadelphia with Col. Bashom's horses, I went down to +the spring to water the horses. The artillery was there cleaning a big +cannon they called 'Old Tom'. Of course I went up to watch them. One of +the men saw me and hollered, 'Stick his head in the cannon.' It liked to +scared me to death. I jumped on that race horse and run. I reconed I +would have been killed but my uncle was there and saw me and stopped the +horse.</p> + +<p>"Another time we went to a place and me and another colored boy was +taking care of the horses while our masters eat dinner. I saw some +watermelons in the garden with a paling fence around it. I said if the +other boy would pull a paling off I would crawl through and get us a +watermelon. He did but the man who owned the place saw me just as I got +the melon and whipped us and told us if we hollered he would kill us. We +didn't holler and we never told Col. Bashom either.</p> + +<p>"After the war my mammie come back from Texas and took me over to Dover +to live but my old boss told her if she would let him have me he would +raise and educate me like his own children. When I got back the old boss +already had a boy so I went to live with one of his sons. He told me it +was time for me to learn how to work. My boss was rough but he was good +to me and taught me how to work. The old boss had five sons in the army +and all was wounded except one. One of them was shot through and through +in the battle of Oak Hill. He got a furlough and come back and died. I +left my white folks in 1869 and went to farming for myself up in Hartman +bottom. I married when I was about seventeen years old.</p> + +<p>"They though' a house near us was hainted. Nobody wanted to live in it +so they went to see what the noise was. They found a pet coon with a +piece of chain around his neck. The coon would run across the floor and +drag the chain.</p> + +<p>"The children now are bad. No telling that will be in the next twenty or +thirty years everything is so changed now.</p> + +<p>"I learnt to sing the hymns but never sang in the choir. We sang +'Dixie', 'John Brown's Body Lies, etc.', 'Juanita', 'Just Before the +Battle, Mother', 'Old Black Joe'."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="NorrisCharlie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Charlie Norris<br> + 122 Miller Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 81</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Born in slavery times? That's me, I reckon. I was born October 1, 1857 +in Arkansas in Union County. Tom Murphy was old master's name.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, I remember the first regiment left Arkansas—went to +Virginia. I member our white folks had us packin' grub out in the woods +cause they was spectin' the Yankees.</p> + +<p>"I member when the first regiment started out. The music boat come to +the landin' and played 'Yankee Doodle.' They carried all us chillun out +there.</p> + +<p>"After they fit they just come by from daylight till dark to eat. They +was death on bread. My mother and Susan Murphy, that was the old lady +herself, cooked bread for em.</p> + +<p>"I stayed with the Murphys—round on the plantation amongst em for five +or six years after freedom. Andrew Norris, my father's old master, was +the first sheriff of Ouachita County.</p> + +<p>"My mother belonged to the Murphys and my father belonged to the +Norrises and after freedom they never did go back together.</p> + +<p>"My mother told me that Susan Murphy would suckle me when my mother was +out workin' and then my mother would suckle her daughter.</p> + +<p>"I was raised up in the house you might say till I was a big nigger. Had +plenty to eat. That's one thing they did do. I lived right amongst a +settlement of what they called free niggers cause they was treated so +well.</p> + +<p>"Sometimes Susan Murphy got after me and whipped me and old Marse Tom +would tell me to run and not let her whip me. You see, I was worth +$1,500 to him and he thought a lot of us black kids.</p> + +<p>"Old man Tom Murphy raised me up to a big nigger and never did whip me +but twice and that was cause I got drunk on tobacco and turned out his +horse.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, I voted till bout two or three years ago. Oh Lawd, the +colored used to hold office down in the country. I've voted for white +and black.</p> + +<p>"Some of the colored folks better off free and some not. That's what I +think but they don't."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="OatsEmma"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person Interviewed: Emma Oats (Mulatto)<br> + Holly Grove, Ark.<br> +Age: 90 or older</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in St. Louis. My mother died when I was little. I never +knowed no father. (He was probably a white man.) Jack Oats raised me. +Jim Oats at Helena was his son. He is still living. He come through here +(Holly Grove) not long ago. I was raised on the Esque place.</p> + +<p>"I was fraid of my grandma. I wouldn't live with her. I know'd her. She +was a big woman, big white eyes, big thick lips, and had 'Molly Glaspy +hair,' long straight soft hair. She was a African woman. She made my +clothes. I was fraid of her. I never lived with her. My folks was all +free folks. When my mother died my uncle took us—me and brother. He +hired us out and we got stole. Gene Oglesby stole us and brought us to +Memphis to Joe Nivers. I recken he sold us then. Then they stood me up +in the parlor and sold me to Jack Oats. They said I was 'good pluck.' +Joe Nivers sold me to Jack Oats for $1,150.00 when I was four years old. +My brother was name Milton Smith. I ain't seen him from that day till +this. Joe Nivers kept him, I recken. I come here on a 'legal +tender'—name of the boat I recken. I know that. I recken it was name of +a boat. I got off and Thornton Walls, old colored man, toted me cross +every mud hole we come to. He belong to Bud Walls' (white man at Holly +Grove) daddy. When we got home Jack Oats and all of em was there.</p> + +<p>"I slept on a pallet and lounge and took care of their children. I +played round. Done bout as I pleased. They had a cook they called Aunt +Joe—Joe Oats. We had plenty to eat and wear. They dressed me like one +their children. We had good flannel clothes. When she washed her +children she washed me too. When she combed their hair she combed mine +too. She kept working with it till I had pretty hair. Some of her +children died. It hurt me bad as it did them. All I done was play with +em and see after em. Their names was Sam, John, Dixie, Sallie, Jim. I +went in the hack to church; if she took the children, she took me. I was +a good size girl when she died. The last word she spoke was to me; she +said, 'Emma, take care of my children.' Dr. John Chester was her doctor.</p> + +<p>"Oats come here from North Alabama. Will Oats, Wyatt Oats, and Jack +Oats—all brothers.</p> + +<p>"When mistress living we took a bath every Friday in a sawed-intwo +barrel (wooden tub). The cook done our washing. We had clean fresh +clothes. We had to dress up every few days. If we get dirty she say she +would give us lashes. She never give me none, I never was sassy (saucy). +That what most of em got 10 lashes, 25, 50 lashes for.</p> + +<p>"When I was bout grown I went to school a little bit to James A. Kerr +here at Holly Grove. I was good and grown too.</p> + +<p>"I was settin' on the gate post—they had a picket fence. I seen some +folks coming to our house. I run in the house and says, 'Miss Mai Liza, +the Yankees coming here!' She told her husband to get in the bed. He +says, 'Oh God, what she know bout Yankees?' Miss Mai Liza say, 'I don't +know; she's one of em, I speck she knows em.' One of the officers come +in and asked him what was the matter. He said he was sick. He had boils +bout on him. He had a Masonic pin on his shirt. He showed it to the +officer. He asked Lou and Becky and all the servants if he hadn't been +bushwhacking. They all said, 'No.' He said he wanted something to eat. +They went to the well house and got him some milk.</p> + +<p>"They camped below the house. They went to their store house and brought +more rations up there in a wagon. Lou cooked and she had help. She set a +big table and they had the biggest dinner. They had more hams. They had +'Lincoln Coffee' there that day. It was a jolly day. They never et up +there no more or bothered round our house no more. The officer had +something on his bare arm he showed. He said, when he went to leave, +'Aunt Lou, you shall not be hurt.'</p> + +<p>"Mr. Oats had taken long before that day all his slaves to Texas. He +took all but Wash Martin. They went in wagons and none of them ever come +back.</p> + +<p>"Miss Callie Edwards was older than Miss Henrietta Jackson. They kept +Wash Martin going through the bottoms nearly all time from their houses +at Golden Hill to Indian Bay. They kept him from one place to the other +to keep him out of the war. They hired him out to school Miss Henrietta. +Miss Callie Edwards died then they give him to Miss Henrietta.</p> + +<p>"During the war Mrs. Keeps come up to our house. They heard a gun. She +was jes visiting Mrs. Oats. Mrs. Keeps went home and the bushwhackers +had killed him. He was dead.</p> + +<p>"I never seen no Ku Klux in my whole life.</p> + +<p>"I remember the stage coach that run every two or three days from Helena +to Clarendon.</p> + +<p>"I don't remember bout freedom. Dr. Green, Hall Green's daddy, told his +colored folks they was free. They told our folks. I heard em talking +bout it. I was kept quiet. It was done freedom, fore I knowed it. I +stayed on and done like I been doin'. I stayed on and on.</p> + +<p>"When I was grown I come here to school and soon married. I washed and +ironed and cooked all over Holly Grove. I was waiting on the table at +the boarding house here at Holly Grove. Mr. Oats was talking bout naming +the town. They had put the railroad through. I ask em why didn't they +name the town Holly Grove. It was thick with holly trees. They named it +that, and put it up on the side of the depot. That way I named the town.</p> + +<p>"My folks give me five acres of land and Julia Woolfolk give a blind +woman on the place five acres. I didn't know what to do wid it. I didn't +have no husband. I was young and foolish. I let it be.</p> + +<p>"My husband farmed. I raised my family, chopped and picked cotton and +done other things along with that. I have worked all my life till way +after my husband died.</p> + +<p>"My husband could jump up, knock heels together three times before he +come down. He died May 12, 1909. He was 83 years old February 16, 1909.</p> + +<p>"I never voted. I never heard my husband say much bout voting. I know +some colored folks sold their voting rights. That was wrong.</p> + +<p>"I lived at Baptist Bottoms two years. It lack to killed me."</p> + +<p>Wyatt Oats and Miss Callie Edwards owned the husband of Emma Oats. She +was married once and had two girls and two boys—one boy dead now. Emma +lives at one of her daughters' homes.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="OdomHelen"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Helen Odom and mother, Sarah Odom<br> + Biscoe, Arkansas<br> +Age: 30?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Great-grandmother was part African, Indian, and Caucasian. She had two +girls before slavery ended by her own master—Master Temple. He was also +Caucasian (white). She was cook and housemaid at his home. He was a +bachelor. Grandmother's name was Rachael and her sister's name was +Gilly. Before freedom Master Temple had another wife. By her he had one +boy and two girls. He never had a Caucasian wife. In fact he was always +a bachelor. Grandmother was a field hand and so was her sister, Gilly.</p> + +<p>"But after freedom grandmother married a Union soldier. His took-on name +was George Washington Tomb. He was generally called Parson Tomb +(preacher). He met Grandmother Rachael in Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"When Master Temple died his nearest relative was Jim McNeilly. He made +a will leaving everything he possessed to Master McNeilly. The estate +had to be settled, so he brought the two sisters to Little Rock we think +to be sold. They rode horseback and walked and brought wagons with +bedding and provisions to camp along the road. The blankets were frozen +and stood alone. It was so cold. Grandmother was put up on the block to +be auctioned off and freedom was declared! Aunt Gilly never got to the +block. Grandmother married and was separated from her sister.</p> + +<p>"Whether the other three children were brought to Arkansas then I don't +know but this I know that they went by the name McNeilly. They changed +their names or it was done for them. They are all dead now and my own +mother is the only one now living. Their names were John, Tom, and +Netline. Mother says they were sold to Johnson, and went by that name +too as much as McNeilly. They remained with Johnson till freedom, in +Tennessee.</p> + +<p>"My mother's name is Sarah.</p> + +<p>"They seem to think they were treated good till Master Temple died. They +nearly froze coming to Arkansas to be sold.</p> + +<p>"I heard this told over and over so many, many times before grandmother +died. Seemed it was the greatest event of her life. She told other +smaller things I can't remember to tell with sense at all. Nothing so +important as her master and own father's death and being sold.</p> + +<p>"Times are good, very good with me. Our African race is advancing with +the times."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> +<br> + +<p>Teacher in Biscoe school. Father was a graduate doctor of medicine and +in about 1907, '08, '09 school director at Biscoe.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="OliverJane"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Jane Oliver<br> + Route 4, near airport, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 81</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I'm certainly one of em, cause I was in the big house. When Miss Liza +married they give sister to her and I stayed with Miss Netta. Her name +was Drunetta Rawls. That was in Mississippi. We come to Arkansas when I +was small.</p> + +<p>"I remember when they run us to Texas, and we stayed there till freedom +come. I remember hearin' em read the free papers. Mama died in Texas and +they buried her the day they read the free papers. I know. I was out +playin' and Miss Lucy, that was my young mistress, come out and say, +'Jane, you go in and see your mother, she wants you.' I was busy playin' +and didn't want to go in and I member Miss Lucy say, 'Poor little fool +nigger don't know her mother's dyin'.' I went in then and said, 'Mama, +is you dyin'?' She say, 'No, I ain't; I died when you was a baby.' You +know, she meant she had died in sin. She was a christian.</p> + +<p>"Me and Lucy played together all the time—round about the house and in +the kitchen. Little Marse Henry, that was big old Marse Henry's son, he +was a captain in the army. We all called him Little Marse Henry. Old +mistress was good to us. Us chillun called her Miss Netta. Best woman I +ever seed. Me and Lucy growed up together. Looks like I can see just the +way the house looked and how we used to go down to the big gate and +play. I sits here and studies and wonders if I'd know that place today. +That's what I study bout.</p> + +<p>"I used to hear em say we only stayed in Texas nine months and the +white folks brought us back.</p> + +<p>"My uncle Simon Rawls, he took me after the war. Then I worked for Mrs. +Adkins.</p> + +<p>"I went to school a little and learned to read prints. The teacher tried +to get me to write but I wouldn't do it. And since then I have wished so +much I had learned to write. Oh mercy! Old folks would tell me, 'Well, +when you get up the road, you'll wish you had.' I didn't know what they +meant but I know now they meant when I got old.</p> + +<p>"I was married when I was young—I don't think I was fifteen.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, I've worked hard. I've always lived in the country.</p> + +<p>"I can remember when the white folks refugeed us to Texas. Oh we did +hate the Yankees. If I ever seed a Yankee I didn't know it but I heard +the white folks talkin' bout em.</p> + +<p>"I used to hear em talk bout old Jeff Davis and Abe Lincoln.</p> + +<p>"Bradley County was where we lived fore we went to Texas and afterward. +Colonel Ed Hampton's plantation jined the Rawls plantation on the +Arkansas River where it overflowed the land. I loved that better than +any place I ever seed in my life.</p> + +<p>"I couldn't say what I think of the young folks now. They is different +from what we was. Yes, Lord, they is different. Sometimes I think they +is better and sometimes wuss. I just thanks the Lord that I'm here—have +come this far.</p> + +<p>"When I bought this place from Mr. R.M. Knox he said, 'When I'm in my +grave you'll thank me that you took my advice and put your savings in a +Home.' I do thank him. I been here thirty years and I get along. God +bless you."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="OsborneIvory"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Ivory Osborne<br> + Route 5, Box 158, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Know about slavery? Sho I do—I was born in '52. Born in Arkansas? No +ma'm, born in Texas.</p> + +<p>"Oh yes, indeed, I had a good master. Good to me, indeed. I was that +high when the war started. I member everything. Take me from now till +dark to tell you everything I know bout slavery.</p> + +<p>"I put in three years and five months, choppin' cotton and corn. I +member the very day, on the 10th of May, old mistress blowed the conk +and told us we was free.</p> + +<p>"Oh Lord, I had a good time.</p> + +<p>"I never was whipped.</p> + +<p>"Ku Klux used to run me. Run me clear from the plum orchard bout a mile +from the house. Run to my mistress at the big house.</p> + +<p>"Miss Ann had eight darkies and told her stepmother, 'Don't you put your +hand on em.' She didn't either.</p> + +<p>"I went to school since 'mancipation in Nacitosh. Learned to read and +write. Was in the eighth grade when I left. Stood at the head of every +class. They couldn't get me down. I done got old and forgot now.</p> + +<p>"I didn't know the difference between slavery and free, I never was +whipped.</p> + +<p>"Did I ever vote? You know I voted, old as I am. Ain't voted in over +forty years. I ain't nobody. My wife's eighty. I've had her forty years. +<u>Cose</u> I voted the Republican ticket. You never seed a colored +person a Democrat in your life.</p> + +<p>"In slavery days we killed seventy-five or eighty hogs every year. And I +don't mean shoats, I mean hogs. I ain't lost my membrance."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="OsbrookJane"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Jane Osbrook<br> + 602 E. 21st Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 90</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes ma'm, I was livin' in slavery days. I was borned in Arkansas I +reckon. I was borned within three, miles of Camden but I wasn't raised +there. We moved to Saline County directly after peace was declared.</p> + +<p>"I don't know what year I was born because you see I'm not educated but +I was ninety the 27th of this last past May. Yes ma'm, I'm a old bondage +woman. I can say what a heap of em can't say—I can tell the truth bout +it. I believe in the truth. I was brought up to tell the truth. I'm no +young girl.</p> + +<p>"My old master was Adkison Billingsly. My old mistress treated us just +like her own children. She said we had feelin's and tastes. I visited +her long after the war. Went there and stayed all night.</p> + +<p>"I member when they had the fight at Jenkins Ferry. Old Steele had +30,000 and he come down to take Little Rock, Pine Bluff and others. +Captain Webb with 1,500 Rebels was followin' him and when they got to +Saline River they had a battle.</p> + +<p>"The next Sunday my father carried all us children and some of the white +folks to see the battle field. I member the dead was lyin' in graves, +just one row after another and hadn't even been covered up.</p> + +<p>"Oh yes, I can tell all bout that. Nother time there was four hundred +fifty colored and five white Yankee soldiers come and ask my father if +old mistress treated us right. We told em we had good owners. I never +was so scared in my life. Them colored soldiers was so tall and so black +and had red eyes. Oh yes ma'm, they had on the blue uniforms. Oh, we +sure was fraid of em—you know them eyes.</p> + +<p>"They said, 'Now uncle, we want you to tell the truth, does she feed you +well?' My ma did all the cookin' and we had good livin'. I tole my +daughter we fared ten thousand times better than now.</p> + +<p>"I come up in the way of obedience. Any time I wanted to go, had to go +to old mistress and she say, 'Don't let the sun go down on you.' And +when we come home the sun was in the trees. If you seed the sun was +goin' down on you, you run.</p> + +<p>"I ain't goin' tell nothin' but the truth. Truth better to live with and +better to die with.</p> + +<p>"Some of the folks said they never seed a biscuit from Christmas to +Christmas but we had em every day. Never seed no sodie till peace was +declared—used saleratus.</p> + +<p>"In my comin' up it was Whigs and Democrats. Never heard of no +Republicans till after the war. I've seed a man get upon that platform +and wipe the sweat from his brow. I've seed em get to fight in' too. +That was done at our white folks house—arguin' politics.</p> + +<p>"I never did go to school. I married right after the war you know. What +you talkin' bout—bein' married and goin' to school? I was housekeepin': +Standin' right in my own light and didn't know it."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PageAnnie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Annie Page<br> + 412-1/2 Pullen Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 86</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born 1852, they tell me, on the fifteenth of March. I was workin' +a good while 'fore surrender.</p> + +<p>"Bill Jimmerson was my old master. He was a captain in Marmaduke's army. +Come home on thirty days furlough once and he and Daniel Carmack got +into some kind of a argument 'bout some whisky and Daniel Carmack +stabbed him with a penknife. Stabbed him three times. He was black as +tar when they brought him home. The blood had done settled. Oh Lawd, +that was a time.</p> + +<p>"My eyes been goin' blind 'bout six years till I got so I can't excern +(discern) anything.</p> + +<p>"Old miss used to box me over the head mightily and the colored folks +used to hit me over the head till seem like I could hear a bell for two +or three days. Niggers ain't got no sense. Put 'em in authority and they +gits so uppity.</p> + +<p>"My brother brought me here and left me here with a colored woman named +Rachael Ross. And oh Lawd, she was hard on me. Never had to do in +slavery times what I had to do then.</p> + +<p>"But the devil got her and all her chillun now I reckon. They tell me +when death struck her, they asked if the Lawd called her, and they say +she just turned over and over in the bed like a worm in hot ashes."</p> + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PageAnnie2"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Annie Page<br> + 400 Block West Pullen, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes'm I 'member the war. I never knowed why they called it the Civil +War though.</p> + +<p>"I was born in Union County, Arkansas, 'bout a mile from Bear Creek, in +1852. That's what my old mistress tole me the morning we was sot free.</p> + +<p>"My mistress was a Democrat. Old master was a captain in Marmaduke's +army.</p> + +<p>"I used to hope (help) spin the thread to make the soldiers' clothes. +Old mistress cared for me. Lacy Jimmerson—the onliest mistress I ever +had. She wanted to send us away to Texas but old master say it want no +use. Cause if the Yankees won, they have to bring us back, so we didn't +go.</p> + +<p>"Did they <u>whip</u> us? Why I bet I can show you scars now. Old Miss +whip me when she feel like fightin'. Her granddaughter, Mary Jane, tried +to learn me my ABC's out of the old Blue Back Speller. We'd be out on +the seesaw, but old Miss didn't know what we doin'. Law, she pull our +hair. Directly she see us and say 'What you doin'? Bring that book +here!'</p> + +<p>"One day old master come home on a thirty-day furlough. He was awful +hot-headed and he got into a argument with Daniel Carmack and old +Daniel stobbed him right in the heart. Fore he die he say to bury him by +the side of the road so he can see the niggers goin' to work.</p> + +<p>"I never seen no Ku Klux but I heard of 'em 'rectly after the war.</p> + +<p>"I'se blind. I jest can see enough to get around. The Welfare gives me +eight dollars a month.</p> + +<p>"My mother died soon after the war ended and after that I was jest +knocked over the head. I went to Camblin and worked for Mrs. Peters. +Then I runned away and married my first husband Mike Samson. I been +married twice and had two children but they all dead now.</p> + +<p>"Law, I jest scared of these young ones as I can be. I don't have no +dealins with 'em."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PageAnnie3"></a> +<h3>FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Subject: Apparitions<br> +Subject: Superstitions<br> +Subject: Birthmarks<br> +Story:—Information<br> +<br> +This information given by: Annie Page<br> +Place of residence: 412-1/2 Pullen Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Occupation: None Age: 86</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]<br> +[TR: Repetitive information deleted from subsequent pages.]</p> +<br> + +<p>"I told 'bout old master's death. Mama had done sent me out to feed the +chickens soon of a morning.</p> + +<p>"Here was the smokehouse and there was a turkey in a coop. And when I +throwed it the feed I heard somethin' sounded just like you was draggin' +a brush over leaves. It come around the corner of the smokehouse and +look like a tall woman. It kept on goin' toward the house till it got to +the hickory nut tree and still sound like draggin' a brush. When it got +to the hickory nut tree it changed and look like a man. I looked and I +said, 'It's old master.' And the next day he got killed. I run to the +house and told mama, 'Look at that man.' She said, 'Shut your mouth, you +don't see no man.' Old miss heard and said, 'Who do you s'pose it could +be?' But mama wouldn't let me talk.</p> + +<p>"But I know it was a sign that old master was goin' to die."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Superstitions</b></p> + +<p>"I was born with a caul over my face. Old miss said it hung from the top +of my head half way to my waist.</p> + +<p>"She kept it and when I got big enough she said, 'Now that's your veil, +you play with it.'</p> + +<p>"But I lost it out in the orchard one day.</p> + +<p>"They said it would keep you from seein' ha'nts."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Birthmarks</b></p> + +<p>"William Jimmerson's wife had a daughter was born blind, and she said it +was her husband's fault. She was delicate, you know, and one afternoon +she was layin' down and I was sittin' there fannin' her with a peafowl +fan. Her husband was layin' there too and I guess I must a nodded and +let the fan drop down in his face. He jumped up and pressed his thumbs +on my eyes till they was all bloodshot and when he let loose I fell down +on the floor. Miss Phenie said, 'Oh, William, don't do that.' I can +remember it just as well.</p> + +<p>"My eyes like to went out and do you know, when her baby was born it was +blind. It's eyes just looked like two balls of blood. It died though, +just lived 'bout two weeks."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="ParkerFannie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Fannie Parker<br> + 1908 W. Sixth Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 90?</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes, honey, this is old Fannie. I'se just a poor old nigger waitin' for +Jesus to come and take me to Heaven.</p> + +<p>"I was just a young strip of a girl when the war come. Dr. M.C. Comer +was my owner. His wife was Elizabeth Comer. I said Marse and Mistis in +them days and when old mistress called me I went runnin' like a turkey. +They called her Miss Betsy. Yes Lord, I was in slavery days. Master and +mistress was bossin' me then. We all come under the rules. We lived in +Monticello—right in the city of Monticello.</p> + +<p>"All I can tell you is just what I remember. I seed the Yankees. I +remember a whole host of 'em come to our house and wanted something to +eat. They got it too! They cooked it them selves and then they burned +everything they could get their hands on. They said plenty to me. They +said so much I don't know what they said. I know one thing they said I +belonged to the Yankees. Yes Lord, they wanted me to tell 'em if I was +free. I told 'em I was free indeed and that I belonged to Miss Betsy. I +didn't know what else to say. We had plenty to eat, plenty of hog meat +and buttermilk and cornbread. Yes ma'm—don't talk about that now.</p> + +<p>"Don't tell me 'bout old Jeff Davis—he oughta been killed. Abraham +Lincoln thought what was right was right and what was wrong was wrong. +Abraham was a great man cause he was the President. When the rebels +ceded from the Union he made 'em fight the North. Abraham Lincoln +studied that and he had it all in his mind. He wasn't no fighter but he +carried his own and the North give 'em the devil. Grant was a good man +too. They tried to kill him but he was just wrapped up in silver and +gold.</p> + +<p>"I remember when the stars fell. Yes, honey, I know I was ironin' and it +got so dark I had to light the lamp. Yes, I did!</p> + +<p>"It's been a long time and my mind's not so good now but I remember old +Comer put us through. Good-bye and God bless you!"</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="ParkerJM"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Subject: Ex-slavery<br> +Story: Birth, Parents, Master.<br> +<br> +Person Interviewed: J.M. Parker, (dark brown)<br> +Address: 1002 Ringo Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Occupation: Formerly a carpenter<br> +Age: 76</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in South Carolina, Waterloo, in Lawrence County, [HW: +Laurens Co.] in 1861, April 5th. Waterloo is a little town in South +Carolina. I believe that fellow shot the first gun of the war when I was +born. I knew then I was going to be free. Of course that is just a lie. +I made that up. Anyway I was born in 1861.</p> + +<p>"Colonel Rice was our master. He was in the war too. The name Parker +came in by intermarriage, you see. My mother belonged to Rice. She could +have been a Simms before she married. My father's name was Edmund +Parker. He belonged to the Rices also. That was his master; Colonel Rice +and him were boys together. He went down there to Charleston, South +Carolina to build breastworks. While down there, he slipped off and +brought a hundred men away from Charleston back to Lawrence County where +the men was that owned them. He was a business man, father was. Brought +'em all through the swamps. They were slaves and he brought 'em all back +home. They all followed his advice.</p> + +<p>"My mother's name was Rowena Parker after she married.</p> + +<p>"Colonel Rice was a pretty fair man—a pretty good fellow. He was a +colonel in the war and stood pretty high. Bound to be that way by him +being a colonel. Seemed like him and my father had about the same number +of kids. He thought there was nobody like my mother. He never <u>whipped +the slaves himself</u> but his <u>overseer would sometimes jump on +them</u>. The Rice family was very good to our people. The men being +gone they were left in the hands of the mistress. She never touched +anybody. She never had no reason to.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Pateroles</b></p> + +<p>"Patterollers didn't bother us, but we were in that country. During the +war, most of the men that amounted to anything were in the war and the +patrolers didn't bother you much. The overseer didn't have so much power +over me than. That pretty well left the colored people to come up +without being abused during the war. The white folks was forced to go to +the war. They drafted them just like they do now. They'd shoot a +<u>po'</u> white man if he didn't come.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Breeding</b></p> + +<p>"My master didn't force men and women to marry. <u>He didn't</u> put 'em +together just to get more slave. Some times other people would have +women and men just for that purpose. But there wasn't much of it in my +country.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>House, Stock, Parents' Occupations</b></p> + +<p>"Our house was a frame building, boxed in with one-by-twelve like we +have here in the country. That was a good house with regular flooring, +tongue and groove. We was raised up in a good house. Old Colonel Rice +had to protect his standing. He had good stock. My father was a carriage +man. He had to keep those horses clean and they always looked good. That +carriage had to shine too. Colonel Rice was a high stepper. He'd take +his handkerchief and rub it over the horses hair to see if they were +really clean. He would always find 'em clean though when the old man got +through with them. He would drive fine stock. Had some fine horses. +Couldn't trust 'em with just anybody.</p> + +<p>"My mother was cook. She helped Mrs. Rice take care of the kids, and +cooked around the house. She took care of her kids, too.</p> + +<p>"The house we was born and bred in was built for a carriage house, but +somehow or 'nother they give it to us to live in. My mother being a +cook, she got what she wanted. That was a good house too. It was sealed. +It had good floors. It had two rooms. It had about three windows and +good doors to each room.</p> + +<p>"We had just common furniture. Niggers didn't have much then. My father +was a good mechanic though and he would make anything he wanted. We +didn't have much, just common things. But all my people were mechanics, +harness makers, shoemakers,—they could make anything. Young Sam Parker +could make any kind of shoe. He made shoes for the white folks; Young +Jacob was a blacksmith; he made horseshoes and anything else out of +iron. He may still be living. In fact, he made anything he could get his +hands on. My young uncles on my mother's side, I don't know much about +them, because they were all mechanics. My grandfather on my mother's +side could make baskets—any kind—could make baskets that would hold +water.</p> + +<p>"My father had thirteen children. Three of them are living now. My +brother lives here in the city. He was born during the war and his +mother was supposed to be free when he was born.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Right After the War</b></p> + +<p>"That's what my mother told me. I can remember a long ways back myself. +After the war, it wasn't long before they began to open up schools. They +used to run school three or four months a year. Both white and colored +in the country had about three or four months. That is all they had. +There weren't so very many white folks that took an interest in +education during slave time. Colored people got just about as much as +they did right after the war. What time we went to school we went the +whole day. We would come home and work in the evening like. We had +pretty fair teachers. All white then at first. They didn't have no +colored till afterwards. If they did, they had so few, I never heard of +them.</p> + +<p>"The first teacher I had was Katie Whitefold (white). That was in +Waterloo. Miss Richardson was our next teacher. She was white too. We +went to school two terms under white women. After that we began to get +teachers from Columbia, South Carolina, where the normal school was.</p> + +<p>"The white teachers who taught us were people who had been raised right +around Waterloo. We never had no Northern teachers as I knows of. Our +first colored teacher was Murry Evans. He a preacher. He was one of our +leading preachers too. After him our colored women began to come in and +stand examination wasn't so hard at that time, but they made a good +showing. There were good scholars.</p> + +<p>"I went to school too much. I went to school at Philander Smith College +some, too. I went a good piece in school. Come pretty near finishing the +English course (high school). I finished Good[HW: sp.?] Brown's 'Grammer +of Grammers'. Professor Backensto (the spelling is the interviewer's) +sent away and got it and sold it to us. We was his students. He was a +white man from the North and a good scholar. We got in those grammars +and got the same lessons they give him when he was in school—nine pages +a lesson and we had to repeat that lesson three times. When my mother +died, I was off in the normal school.</p> + +<p>"Right after the war, my parents farmed. He followed his trade. That +always gave us something to eat you know. When we farmed, we +sharecropped—a third and a fourth—that is, we got a third of the +cotton and a fourth of the corn. Potatoes and things like that went +free. All women got an acre free. My mother always got an acre and she +worked it good too. She always had her bale of cotton. And if she didn't +have a bale, she laid it next to the white folks' and made it out. They +knew it and they didn't care. She stood well with the white people. +Helped all of 'em raise their children, and they all liked that.</p> + +<p>"I went along with my father whenever he had a big job and needed help. +I got to be as good a carpenter as he was.</p> + +<p>"I married out here. About eighty-five. People were emigrating to this +country. There was a boom to emigrating then. Emigrating was a little +dangerous when a man was trying to get hands. White folks would lay +traps and kill men that were taking away their hands—they would kill +white just as quick as they would black. I started out under a white +man—I can't remember his name. He turned me over to Madden, a colored +man who was raised in Waterloo. We came from there to Greenwood, South +Carolina where everything was straight. After that we had nothing to do +but get on the train and keep coming. We was with our agent then and we +had no more trouble after that.</p> + +<p>"I got off at Brinkley over at Minor Gregory's farm. He needed hands +then and was glad to get us. He is dead now. I stayed in Brinkley the +space of about a year. Then he gave us transportation to Little Rock. +The train came from Memphis, and we struck out for Little Rock. I +married after I come to Little Rock. I forget what year. But anyway my +wife is dead and gone and all the children. So I'm single now.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Opinions of the Present</b></p> + +<p>"I think times are about dead now. Things ought to get better. I believe +things are going to get better for all of us. People have got to think +more. People have got to get together more. War doesn't always make +thing better. It didn't after the Civil War. And it didn't after the +World War. The young people are all right in their way. It would just +take another war to learn 'em a lesson.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Support</b></p> + +<p>"I can't do any work now. I get a little help from the welfare. It +doesn't come regular. I need a check right now. I think it's due now. +But they haven't sent it out yet. That is, I haven't got it.</p> + +<p>"I'm a Christian. All my family were Methodists. I belong to Wesley.</p> + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="ParkerJudy"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mary D. Hudgins<br> +Person Interviewed: Judy Parker<br> +Home: 618 Wade Street, Hot Springs, Ark.<br> +Aged: 77</h3> +<br> + +<p>For location of Wade Street, see interview with Emma Sanderson.</p> + +<p>As the interviewer walked down Silver Street a saddle colored girl came +out on a porch for a load of wood.</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon," she began, pausing, "can you tell me where I will +find Emma Sanderson?"</p> + +<p>"I sure can." The girl left the porch and came out to the street. "I'll +walk down with you and show you. That way it'll be easier. Kind of cold, +ain't it?"</p> + +<p>"It surely is," this from the interviewer. "Isn't it too cold for you, +can't you just tell me? I think I can find it." The girl had expected to +be only on the porch and didn't have a coat.</p> + +<p>"No, ma'am. It's all right. Now we're far enough for you to see. You see +those two houses jam up against one and 'tother? Well Miz Parker lives +in the one this way. I goes down to look after her most every day. +That's where you'll find her.—No ma'am—'twaren't no bother."</p> + +<p>The gate sagged slightly at the house "this way" of the "two jam up +against one and 'tother." A large slab from an oak log in the front yard +near a woodpile bore mute evidence of many an ax blow. (Stove wood is +generally split in the rural South—one end of the "stick" resting +against the ground, the other atop a small log.)</p> + +<p>Up a couple of rickety steps the interviewer climbed. She knocked three +times. When she was bade to enter she opened the door to find an old +woman sitting near a wood stove combing her long, white hair.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Parker was expecting the visit. A few days before the interviewer +had had a visit from a couple of colored women who had "heard tell how +you is investigating the old people.—been trying to get on old age +pension for a long time—glad you come to get us on.——No? Oh, I see +you is the Townsend woman." (An explanation of her true capacity was +almost impossible for the interviewer.)</p> + +<p>Mrs. Parker, however, seemed to comprehend the idea perfectly. She +expected nothing save the chance to tell her story. Her joy at the gift +of a quarter (the amount the interviewer set aside from her salary for +each interviewee) was pitiful. Evidently it had been a long time since +she had possessed a similar sum to spend exactly as she pleased.</p> + +<p>"I don't rightly know how old I is. My mother used to tell me that I +was a little baby, six months old when our master, Joe Potts was his +name, got ready to clear out of Florida. You see he had heard tell of +the war scare. So he started drifting out of the way. Bet it didn't take +him long after he made up his mind. He was a right decided man. Mister +Joe was.</p> + +<p>"How did we like him? Well, he was always good to us. He was well +thought of. Seemed to be a pretty clever man, Mr. Joe did." ("Clever" in +plantation language like "smart" refers more to muscular than mental +activity. They might almost be used as synonyms for "hard working" on +the labor level.)</p> + +<p>"So Mr. Joe got ready to go to Texas. Law, Miss, I don't rightly know +whether he had a family or not. Never heard my Mother say. Anyhow he +come through Arkansas intending to drift on out into Texas. But when he +got near the border 'twix't and between Arkansas and Texas he stopped. +The talk about war had about settled down. So he stopped. He stopped +near where the big bridge is. You know where Little River County is +don't you? He stopped and he started to work. Started to make a crop. +'Course I can't remember none about that. Just what my Mother told me. +But I remembers him from later.</p> + +<p>"He went at it the good way. Settled down and tried to open up a home. +They put in a crop and got along pretty good. Time passed and the war +talk started floating again. That time he didn't pay much attention and +it got him. It was on a Sunday morning when he went away. I never knew +whether they made him go or not. But I kind of think they must of. Cause +he wouldn't have moved off from Florida if he had wanted to go to war.</p> + +<p>"He took my daddy with him! Ma'am—did he take him to fight or to wait +on him—Don't know ma'am, but I sort of think he took him to wait on +him. But he didn't bring him back. My daddy got killed in the war. No +ma'am. I don't rightly know how he got killed. Never heard nobody say. I +was just a little girl—nobody bothered to tell me much.</p> + +<p>"Yes, that we did. We stayed on on the farm and we made a crop—the old +folks did. Mr. Joe, when he went off, said "Now you stay on here, you +make a crop and you use all you need. Then you put up the rest and save +for me." He was a right good man, Mr. Joe was.</p> + +<p>"No, we didn't never see no fighting. There wasn't nothing to be scared +of. Didn't see no Yankees until the war was through. Then they started +passing. Lawsey, I couldn't tell how many of them there was. More than +you could count.</p> + +<p>"We had all stayed on. I was the oldest of my mother's children. But she +had two more after me. There was our family and my two uncles and my +grandmother. Then there was some other colored folks. But we wasn't +scared of the Yankees. Mr. Joe was there by that time. They camped all +around in the woods near us. They got us to do their washing. Lawsey +they was as filthy as hogs. I never see such folks. They asked Mr. Joe +if we could do their washing. Everything on the place that come near +those clothes got lousey. Those men was covered with them. I never see +nothing like it. We got covered with them. No, ma'am, we got rid of 'em +pretty easy. They ain't so hard to get rid of, if you keep clean.</p> + +<p>"After it was all over Master Joe got ready to go back to Florida. He +took Warley and Jenny with him. They was children he had had by a black +woman—you know folks did such things in them days. He asked the rest of +us if they wanted to go back too. But my folks made up their minds they +didn't. You see, they didn't know how they'd get along and how long it +would take them to pay for the trip back, so they stayed right where +they was.</p> + +<p>"Lots of 'em went to Rondo and some of us worked for Herb Jeans—he +lived farther up Red River. After my mother died I was with my +grandmother. She washed and cooked for Herb Jeans's family. I stayed on +with her, helped out until I got married. I was about fifteen when that +time come.</p> + +<p>"My man owned his place. Sure he did. Owned it when I married him. He +owned it himself and farmed it good. Yes ma'am we stayed with the land. +He made good crops—corn and cotton, mostly. Course we raised potatoes +and the truck we needed—all stuff like that. Yes, ma'am we had thirteen +children. Just three of them's living. All of them is boys.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am we got along good. My husband made good crops and we got +along just good. But 'bout eight years ago my husband he got sick. So he +sold out the farm—sold out everything. Then he come here.</p> + +<p>"Before he died he spent every last cent—every last cent—left me to +get along the very best way I kin. I stays with my son. He takes care of +me. He don't make much, but he does the best he kin.</p> + +<p>"No ma'am, I likes living down in the country. Down there near Red River +it's soft and sandy. Up here in Hot Springs the rocks tear up your feet. +If you's country raised—you like the country. Yes ma'am, you like the +country."</p> + +<p>As she left the interviewer handed her a quarter. At first the old +woman's face was expressionless. But she moved the coin nearer to her +eyes and a smile broke and widened until her whole face was a wrinkle of +joy. When she turned in the doorway, the interviewer noticed that the +hand jammed into an apron pocket was clutched into a possessive fist, +cradling the precious twenty five cents.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="ParkerRF"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: R.F. Parker<br> + 619 N. Hickory, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 76</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in '62. I reckon I was born in slavery times. Born in Ripley +County, Missouri. Old man Billy Parker was my master, and my young +master was Jim Parker.</p> + +<p>"They bought my mother in Tennessee when she was a child. I wasn't big +enough to remember much about slavery but I was big enough to know when +they turned my mother loose, and we come to Lawrence County, Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"I remember my mother sayin' she had to plow while her young master, Jim +Parker, was off to war, but I don't know what side he was on.</p> + +<p>"I remember seein' some soldiers ridin' down the road, about +seventy-five of 'em. I know I run under a corn pen and hid. I thought +they was after me. They stopped right there and turned their horses +loose 'round that pen. I can remember that all right. They went in the +white folks' house and took a shotgun. I know I remember hearin' mama +talk about it. I think they had on blue clothes.</p> + +<p>"I was goin' on seven when we come to Arkansas. I know I'd walk a while +and she'd tote me a while. But we was lucky enough to get in with some +white people that was movin' to Arkansas. We was comin' to a place +called 'The Promised Land.' We stayed there till '92.</p> + +<p>"I have farmed and done public work. I worked nine years at that heading +factory in the east end (of Pine Bluff).</p> + +<p>"I used to vote. When I was in north Arkansas, I voted in all kinds of +elections. But after I come down here to Jefferson County, I couldn't +vote in nothin' but the presidential elections.</p> + +<p>"I don't think the young people are goin' to amount to much. They are a +heap wilder than when I was young. They got a chance to graduate +now—something I didn't get to do.</p> + +<p>"I never went to school a day in my life, but the white people where I +worked learned me to read and write."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>This man could easily pass for a white person.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="ParksAnnie"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Annie Parks<br> + 720 Pulaski Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: About 80<br> +Occupation: Formerly house and field work</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born and raised in Mer Rouge, Louisiana. That is between here and +Monroe. I have been here in Little Rock more than twenty-five years.</p> + +<p>"My mother's name was Sarah Mitchell. That was her married name. I don't +know what her father's name was. My father's name was Willis Clapp. He +was killed in the first war—the Civil War. My father went to the war +from Mer Rouge, Louisiana. I don't remember him at all. But that is what +my mother told me about him. My mother said he had very good people. +After he married my mother, old man Offord bought him. Offord's name was +Warren Offord. They buried him while I was still there in Mer Rouge. He +was a old-time Mason. That was my mother's master—in olden days.</p> + +<p>"His grandmother took my mother across the seas with her. She (his +grandmother) died on shipboard, and they throwed her body into the +water. There's people denies it, but my mother told me it was so. Young +Davenport is still living. He is a relative of Offords. My mother never +did get no pension for my father.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Slave House and Occupation</b></p> + +<p>"I was born in a log house. There were two doors—a front and a +back—and there were two windows. My mother had no furniture 'cept an +old-time wooden bed—big bed. She was a nurse all the time in the house. +I heard her say she milked and waited on them in the house. My father's +occupation was farming during slavery times.</p> + +<p>"My mother always said she didn't have no master to beat on her. I like +to tell the truth. My mother's master never let no overseer beat his +slaves around. She didn't say just what we had to eat. But they always +give us a plenty, and there wasn't none of us mistreated.</p> + +<p>"My father could have an extra patch and make a bale of cotton or +whatever he wanted to on it. That was so that he could make a little +money to buy things for hisself and his family. And if he raised a bale +of cotton on his patch and wanted to sell it to the agent, that was all +right.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Family</b></p> + +<p>"I have a brother named Manuel Clayton. If he's living still, he is +younger than I am. He is the baby boy. I doesn't remember his father at +all. I had five sisters with myself and two brothers. All of them were +older than me except Manuel. My mother had one brother and two sisters. +Her brother's name was Lin Urbin. We always called him Big Buddy. He +hasn't been so long died. My older brother is named Willis Clayton—if +he's still living. Willis has a half dozen sons. He is my oldest +brother. He lives way out in the country 'round Mer Rouge.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Freedom</b></p> + +<p>"My mother said they promised to them money when they were freed. Some +of them gave them something, and some of them didn't. My mother's folks +didn't give her nothin'. The Government didn't give her nothin' either. +I don't know just who told her she was free nor how. I don't remember +myself.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Patrollers and Ku Klux</b></p> + +<p>"I never heard much about pateroles. My mother said they used to whip +you if they would catch you out without a pass. I heard her talk about +the Ku Klux after freedom.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Slave Worship</b></p> + +<p>"My mother could always go to church on Sunday. Her slave-time preacher +was Tom Johnson. Henry Soates and Watt Taylor were slavery-time +preachers too. Old man Jacob Anderson too was a great preacher in slave +time. There was a big arbor where they held church. That was outdoors. +There was just a wood frame and green leaves laid over it. Hundreds of +people sat under there and heard the Gospel preached. The Offords didn't +care how much you worshipped. If I was with them, I wouldn't have no +trouble.</p> + +<p>"In the winter time they had a small place to meet in. They built a +church after the war. When I went home, eight or nine years ago, I +walked all 'round and looked at all the old places.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Health</b></p> + +<p>"You know my remembrance comes and goes. I ain't had no good remembrance +since I been sick. I been mighty sick with high blood pressure. I can't +work and I can't even go out. I'm 'fraid I'll fall down and get myself +hurt or run over.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Support</b></p> + +<p>"I don't get no help 'cept what my daughter gives me. I can't get no Old +Age Pension. I never did get nothin' for my father. My mother didn't +either. He was killed in the war, but they didn't give nobody nothin' +for his death. They told me they'd give me something and then they told +me they wouldn't. I'm dependent on what my daughter does for me. If I +was back in Mer Rouge, I wouldn't have no trouble gettin' a pension, nor +nothin' else.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Slave Marriages on the Offord Plantation</b></p> + +<p>"My mother said they just read 'em together, slavery times. I think she +said that the preacher married them on the Offord plantation. They +didn't get no license.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Amusements</b></p> + +<p>"They had quiltings and corn shuckings. I don't know what other +amusements they had, but I know everything was pleasant on the Offord +plantation.</p> + +<p>"If slaves went out without a pass, my mother said her master wouldn't +allow them to beat on them when they come in. They had plenty to eat, +and they had substantial clothes, and they had a good fire.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Age</b></p> + +<p>"I don't know how old I am. I was born before the war. My father went to +the war when it begun. I had another brother that was born before the +war. He don't remember nothin' about my father. I don't neither. I was +too young."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>Allowing for a year's difference between the two youngest children, and +allowing that the boy was born immediately before the War, the girl +could not be younger than seventy-eight. She could be older. She states +all facts as through her mother, but she seems to have experienced some +of the things she relates. Her memory is fading. Failure to get pension +or old age assistance oppresses her mind. She comes back to it again and +again. She carries her card and her commodity order with her in her +pocketbook.</p> + +<p>She had asked me to write some letters for her when her daughter +interfered and said that she didn't want it done. She said that she had +told the case worker that her husband worked at the Missouri Pacific +Shop and that the case worker had asked her if she wouldn't provide for +her mother. They live in a neat rented house. The mother weighs about a +hundred and ten pounds and is tall. The daughter is about the same +height but weighs about two hundred and fifty. Time and again, the old +lady tried to convey to me a message that she didn't want her daughter +to hear, but I could not make it out. The daughter was belligerent, as +is sometimes the case, and it was only by walking in the very middle of +the straight and narrow path that I managed to get my story.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="ParnellAustinPen"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Austin Pen Parnell<br> + 4314 W. Seventeenth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 73<br> +Occupation: Carpenter</h3> +<br> + +<p><b>Birth and General Fact About Life</b></p> + +<p>"I was born April fifteenth, 1865, the day Lincoln was assassinated, in +Carroll County, Mississippi, about ten miles from Grenada. It's about +half the distance between Grenada and Carrollton. Carrollton is our +county seat but we went to Grenada more than we went to Carrollton.</p> + +<p>"When I got older, I moved to Grenada and I come from there here. I was +about thirty-five years old when I moved to Grenada. About 160 acres of +land in Grenada was mine. I bought it, but heirs claimed the place and I +had to leave. I had no land then, only a lot here and I came over here +to look it over. A lady had come to Mississippi selling property and she +had a plat which she said was in Little Rock not far from the capitol. +Her name was Mrs. Putman. The place was on the other side of the +Fourche. But I didn't know that until I came here. She misguided me. I +came to Arkansas and looked at the lot and didn't want it. I made a trip +over here twice before I settled on living in Little Rock. I told the +others who had bought property from her the truth about its location. +They asked me and I hate to lie. I didn't knock; I just answered +questions and didn't volunteer nothing. They all quit making their +payments, Just like I did. My land had a rock on it as big as a bale of +cotton.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Herring thought hard of me because I told the others the truth. I +went into the office one day and Mr. Herring said, 'Parnell, I +understand you have been knocking on me.' I said, 'Well, I'll tell you, +Mr. Herring, if telling the truth about things is knocking on them, I +certainly did.' He never said anything more about it, and I didn't +either.</p> + +<p>"I rented a place on Twelfth and Maple and then rented around there two +or three times, and finally bought a place at 3704 West Twelfth Street. +I moved to Little Rock March 18, 1911. That was twenty-seven years ago.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Parents</b></p> + +<p>"My father was named Henry Parnell. He died in the year 1917 in the time +of the great war. He was ninety-five years old when he died. His master +had the same name. My mother's name was Priscilla Parnell. She belonged +to the same family as he did. They married before freedom. My father was +a farmer and my mother was a housewife and she'd work in the field too.</p> + +<p>"My grandmother on my mother's side was named Hester Parnell. I don't +know what her husband's name was. My mother, father, and grandmother +were all from North Carolina. My grandmother did house and field work.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>House</b></p> + +<p>"My mother and father lived in a two-room house hewed out of big +logs—great big logs. The logs were about four inches thick and twelve +inches wide. It didn't take many of them to build a wall—about ten or +twelve of them on a side. They were notched down so as to almost come +together. They chinked up the cracks with mud and covered it with a +board.</p> + +<p>"I laid in bed many a night and looked up through the cracks in the +roof. Snow would come through there when it snowed and cover the bed +covers. We thought you couldn't build a roof so that it would keep out +rain and snow, but we were mistaken. Before you would make a fire in +them days, you had to sweep out the snow so that it wouldn't melt up in +the house and make a mess. But we kept healthy just the same. Didn't +have no pneumonia in those days.</p> + +<p>"The house had two rooms about eight feet apart. The rooms were +connected by a hall which we called a gallery in those days. The hall +was covered by the same roof as the house and it had the same floor. The +house sot east and west and had a chimney in each end. The chimneys were +made out of sticks and mud. I can build a chimney now like that.</p> + +<p>"It was large at the bottom and tapered at the top. It was about six or +seven feet square at the bottom. It grew smaller as it went toward the +top. You could get a piece of wood three and a half or four feet long in +the boddom of it. Sometimes the wood would be too large to carry and you +would just have to roll it in.</p> + +<p>"The floors was boards about one by twelve. There were two doors in each +room—one leading outside and the other to the hall. If there were any +windows, I can't remember them. We didn't need no windows for +ventilation.</p> + +<p>"This was the house that I remember first after freedom. I remember +living in it. That was about seven or eight years after freedom. My +father rented it from the big man named Alf George for whom he worked. +Mr. George used to come out and eat breakfast with us. We'd get that +hoecake out of the ashes and wash it off until it looked like it was as +clean as bread cooked in a skillet. I have seen my grandmother cook a +many a one in the fire. We didn't use no skillet for corn bread. The +bread would have a good firm crust on it. But it didn't get too hard to +eat and enjoy.</p> + +<p>"She'd take a poker before she put the bread in and rake the ashes off +the hearth down to the solid stone or earth bottom, and the ashes would +be banked in two hills to one side and the other. Then she would put the +batter down on it; the batter would be about an inch thick and about +nine inches across. She'd put down three cakes at a time and let 'em +stay there till the cakes were firm—about five minutes on the bare hot +hearth. They would almost bake before she covered them up. Sometimes she +would lay down as many as four at a time. The cakes had to be dry before +they were covered up, because if the ashes ever stuck to them while they +were wet, there would be ashes in them when you would take them out to +eat. She'd take her poker then and rake the ashes back on the top of the +cakes and let 'em stay there till the cakes were done. I don't know just +how long—maybe about ten or twelve minutes. She knew how long to cook +them. Then she'd rake down the hearth gently, backward and forward, with +the poker till she got down to them and then she'd put the poker under +them and lift them out. That poker was a kind of flat iron. It wasn't a +round one. Then we'd wash 'em off like I told you and they be ready to +eat.</p> + +<p>"Mr. George would eat the ash cake and drink sweet milk. 'Auntie, I want +some of that ash cake and some of that good sweet milk.' We had plenty +of cows.</p> + +<p>"Two-thirds of the water used in the ash cake was hot water, and that +made the batter stick together like it was biscuit dough. She could put +it together and take it in her hand and pat it out flat and lay it on +the hearth. It would be just as round! That was the art of it!</p> + +<p>"When I go back to Mississippi, I'm going back to that house again. I +don't remember seeing the house I was born in. But I was told it was an +ordinary log house just like those all the other slaves had,—just a +one-room log house.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Freedom</b></p> + +<p>"My father went to the War. He was on the Confederate side. They carried +him there as a worker. They cut down all the timber 'round the place +where they were to keep the Yankee gunboats from shelling them and +knocking the logs down on them. But them Yankees were sharp. They stayed +away till everything got dry as a chip. Then they come down and set all +that wood afire with their shells, and the wind seemed to be in their +favor. The Rebels had to get away from there.</p> + +<p>"He got sick before the War closed and he had to come home. His young +master and the other folks stayed there four or five months longer. His +young master was named Tom. When Tom came home, he waited about five or +six months before he would tell them they was free. Then he said, 'You +all free as I am. You can stay here if you want or you can go. You are +free.' They all got together and told him that if he would treat them +right he wouldn't have to do no work. They would stay and do his work +and theirs too. They would work the land and he would give them their +part. I don't know just what the agreement was. I think it was about a +third. Anyway, they worked on shares. When the landlord furnished a team +usually it was halves. But when the worker furnished his own team, it +was usually two-thirds or three-fourths that the worker got. But none of +them owned teams at that time. They were just turned loose. We stayed +there with them people a good while. I don't know just how long, but it +was several years.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Catching a Hog</b></p> + +<p>"One time a slave went to steal a hog. I don't know the name of the man; +I just hear my father tell what happened, and I'm repeating it. It was a +great big hog and kind of wild. His plan to catch the hog was to climb +a tree and carry a yeer of corn up the tree and at the same time he'd +carry a long rope. He had put a running noose in the end of the rope and +laid it on the ground and shelled the corn into the ring. He had the +other end of the rope tied around himself; he was up the tree. About the +time he got the noose pulled up around the hog so that he could tighten +up on it, he dropped his hat and scared the hog. The hog didn't know he +was around until the hat fell, and the falling of the hat scared it so +that it made a big jump and ran a little ways off. That jerked the man +out of the tree. Him falling scared the hog a second time and got him to +running right. He was a big stout hog, and the man's weight didn't hold +him back much. The man didn't know what to do to stop the hog. The hog +was running draggin' him along, snatching him over logs. There was +nothin' else he could do, so he tried prayer. But the hog didn't stop. +Seemed like even the Lord couldn't stop him. Then he questioned the +Lord; he said, 'Lawd, what sawt [HW: sort] of a Lawd is you? You can +stop the wind; you can stop the rain; you can stop the ocean; but you +can't stop this hog.'</p> + +<p>"The hog ran till he came to a big ditch. He jumped the ditch, but the +man fell in it, and that compelled the hog to stop. The man's hollering +made somebody hear him and come and git him loose from the hog. He was +so glad to git loose, he didn't mind losing the hog and gettin' +punished. He didn't get the hog. He just got a lot of bruises. I don't +remember just how they punished him.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Ku Klux Klan</b></p> + +<p>"Once after the War there was a lot of colored people at a prayer +meeting. It was in the winter and they had a fire. The Ku Klux come up. +They just stood outside the door, but the people thought they were +coming in and they got scared. They didn't know hardly how to get out. +One man got a big shovelful of hot coals and ashes out of the fireplace +and threw it out over them, and while they was dusting off the ashes and +coals, the niggers all got away.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Patrollers</b></p> + +<p>"I remember my father telling tales about the patrollers, but I can't +remember them just now. There was an old song about them. Part of it +went like this:</p> + +<pre> +'Run, nigger, run +The pateroles'll get you. + +That nigger run +That nigger flew +That nigger bust +His Sunday shoe. + +Run, nigger, run +The pateroles'll get you.' +</pre> + +<p>That's all I know of that. There is more to it. I used to hear the boys +sing it, and I used to hear 'em pick it out on the banjo and the guitar.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Old Massa Goes 'Way</b></p> + +<p>"Old massa went off one time and left the niggers. He told 'em that he +was goin' to New York. He jus' wanted to see what they would do if they +thought he was away. The niggers couldn't call the name New York, and +they said, 'Old massa's gone to PhilameYawk.'</p> + +<p>"They went in the pantry and got everything they wanted to eat. And they +had a big feast. While they were feasting, the old man came in disguised +as a tramp—face smutty and clothes all dirty and raggedy. They couldn't +tell who he was. He walked up just as though he wanted to eat and +begged the boys for something to eat. The boys said to him, 'Stan' back, +you shabby rascal, you; <u>if'n</u> they's anything left, you get some; +<u>if'n</u> they ain't none left, you get none. This is our time. Old +massa done gone to PhilameYawk and we're having a big time.'</p> + +<p>"After they were through, they did give him a little something but they +still didn't know him. I never did learn the details about what happened +after they found out who the tramp was. My father told me about it.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Whipping a Slave</b></p> + +<p>"I heard my father say his old master give him two licks with a whip +once. Him and another man had been off and they came in. Master drove up +in a double surrey. He had been to town and had bought the boys a pair +of boots apiece. He told them as he got out of the surrey to take his +horses out and feed them. My father's friend was there with him and he +said: 'Le's get our boots before we feed the horses.' After that the +master walked out on the porch and he had on crying boots. The horses +heard them squeaking and they nickered.</p> + +<p>"Master said, 'Henry, I thought I told you to feed them horses. Henry +was so taken aback that he couldn't say a thing. Henry was my father, +you know. Master went and got his cowhide. He said, 'Are you going to +obey my orders?' About the time he said that, he hit my father twice +with the cowhide, and my father said, 'Oh pray, master, oh pray,' and he +let him go. He beat the other fellow pretty bad because he told him to +'Le's get the boots first.'</p> + +<p>"Old master would get drunk sometimes and get on the niggers and beat +them up. He would have them stark naked and would be beating them. Then +old missis would come right out there and stop him. She would say, 'I +didn't come all the way here from North Carolina to have my niggers beat +up for nothin'.' She'd take hold of the cowhide, and he would have to +quit. My father had both her picture and the old man's.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Prayer</b></p> + +<p>"I can remember how my mother used to pray out in the field. We'd be +picking cotton. She would go off out there in the ditch a little ways. +It wouldn't be far, and I would listen to her. She would say to me: +'Pray, son,' and I would say, 'Mother, I don't know how to pray,' and +she would say, 'Well, just say Lord have mercy.' That gave me religious +inclinations. I cultivated religion from that time on. I would try to +pray and finally I learned. One day I was out in the field and it was +pouring down rain, and I was standing up with tears in my eyes trying to +pray as she taught me to. We weren't picking cotton then. I was just +walking out. My mother was dead. I would be walking out and whenever I +would get the notion I would stop right there and go to praying.</p> + +<p>"In slave times, they would have a prayer meeting out in some of the +places and they would turn a pot down out in front of the door. It would +be on a stick or something and raised up a short distance from the +ground so that it wouldn't set flat on the ground. It seems that that +would catch the sound and keep it right around there. They would sing +that old song:</p> + +<pre> +'We will camp awhile in the wilderness +And then I'm going home.' +</pre> + +<p>I don't know any more of the words of that song.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Early Schooling</b></p> + +<p>"I started to school when I was about six or seven years old. I didn't +get to school regular because my father had plenty of work and he had a +habit of taking me out to help him when he needed me in his work.</p> + +<p>"My first teacher was a white man named Jones. I don't remember his +first name. He was a northerner and a Republican. He taught in the +public school with us. His boy, John, and his girl, Louisa, went to the +same school, and were in classes with us. The kids would beat them up +sometimes but he didn't cut up about it. He was pretty good man.</p> + +<p>"After him, I had a colored man named M.E. Davis as a teacher. He would +say to my father, 'Henry, that is a bright boy; he will be a credit to +you if you will keep him at school and give him a chance. Don't make him +lose so much time.' My father would say, 'Yes, that is right.' But as +soon as another job came up, he would keep me out again.</p> + +<p>"I soon got so my learning was a help to him in his work. Whenever any +figuring was to be done, I had to do it if it was done right. He never +had a chance to get any schooling and he couldn't figure well. So they +used to beat him out of plenty when he would work for them. One day we +had picked cotton for a white man and when the time came to pay off, the +man paid father, but I noticed that he didn't give him all he should +have. I didn't say anything while we was standing there but after we got +away I said, 'Papa, he didn't give you the right money.'</p> + +<p>"Papa said, 'How much should he have given me?'</p> + +<p>"I told him, and he said to me, 'Will you say that to him?'</p> + +<p>"I said, 'Yes, papa.'</p> + +<p>"He turned 'round and we went on back to the place and pa said, 'My boy +says you didn't pay me all that was comin' to me.'</p> + +<p>"The white man turned to me at once and said, 'How much was coming to +him?'</p> + +<p>"I told him.</p> + +<p>"He said, 'What makes you think that?'</p> + +<p>"I said, 'We picked so many pounds of cotton at so much per hundred +pounds, and that would amount to so many dollars and so many cents.'</p> + +<p>"When I said that, he fell over on the ground and like to killed his +self laughing. He counted out the right money to my father and said, +'Henry, you better watch that little skinny-eyed nigger; he knows +something.'</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Present Support</b></p> + +<p>"I don't got anything from the government. I live by what little I make +at odd jobs."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Note:</b> In this interview this man used correct English most of the time +and the interview is given in his own words. Lapses into dialect will be +noticed.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="ParrBen"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Ben Parr, Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 85 next March (1938)</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Tennessee close to Ripley. My master was Charles Warpoo +and Catherine Warpoo. They had three boys and two girls. They owned my +mama and me and Gentry was the oldest child. He died last year. My mama +raised twelve children. My papa belong to people over on the Mississippi +River. Their name was Parr but I couldn't tell a thing about them. When +I come to know about them was after freedom. There was Jim Parr, Dick +Parr, Columbus Parr. We lived on their place. Both my parents was farm +hands, and all twelve children wid them.</p> + +<p>"Well, the first I recollect is that we lived on the five acre lot, the +big house, and some of the slaves lived in houses around the big yard +all fenced with pailings and nice pickett fence in front of Charlie +Warpoo's house. We played around under the trees all day. The soldiers +come nearly every day and nearly et us out of house and home. The blue +coats seemed the hungriest or greediest pear lack. They both come. +Master didn't go to war; his boys was too young to go, so we was all at +home. My papa shunned the war. He said he didn't give a pickayune +whether he be free or not, it wouldn't do no good if he be dead nohow. +He didn't live with us doe (though). They kept papa pretty well hid out +with stock in the Mississippi River bottoms. He wasn't scared ceptin' +when he come over to see my mama and us. When we come to know anything +we was free.</p> + +<p>"I never seen nobody sold. None of my folks was sold. The folks raised +my mama and they didn't want her to leave. The folks raised papa what +had him at freedom. He said him and mama was married long before the war +sprung up. I don't know how they married nor where. She was young when +they married.</p> + +<p>"I remember hearing mama say when you went to preaching you sit in the +back of the church and sit still till the preaching was all over. They +had no leaving.</p> + +<p>"I know when I was a child people raised children, now they let them +grow up. Children was sent off or out to play, not sit and listen to +what grown folks had to say. Now the children is educated and too smart +to listen to good advice. They are going to ruination. Mama used to have +our girls knit at night and she spin, weave, sew. They would tell us how +to be polite and honest and how to work. Young folks too smart to take +advice now.</p> + +<p>"Mama was cooking at the Warpoo's house; she cooked breakfast. One +morning I woke up and here was a yard full of 'Feds.' I was hungry. I +went through the whole regiment—a yard full—to mama hard as I could +split. They didn't bother me. I was afraid they would carry me off +sometimes. They was great hands to tease and worry the little Negro +children.</p> + +<p>"Over at Dyersburg, Tennessee the Ku Klux was bad. Jefferie Segress was +pretty prosperous, owned his own home. John Carson whooped him, cut his +ear off, treated him bad. High Sheriff they said was a 'Fed.' He put +twenty-four buck shots in John Carson. That was the last of the Ku Klux +at Dyersburg. The Negroes all left Dyersburg. They kept leaving. The +'Feds' was meaner to them than the owners. In 1886, three weeks before +Christmas, one hundred head of Negroes got off the train here at +Brinkley. The Ku Klux was the tail end of the war, whooping around. It +was a fight between the 'Feds' and the old owners—both sides telling +the Negroes what to do. The best way was stay at home and work to keep +out of trouble.</p> + +<p>"The bushwhackers killed Raymond Jones (black man) before the war +closed. Well, I don't know what they ambushed for.</p> + +<p>"I paid my own way to Arkansas. I brought my wife. Mama was dead.</p> + +<p>"If the Negro is a taxpayer he ought to vote like white folks. But they +can't run the government. That was tried out after that war we been +talking about. Our color has faith in white folks and this is their +country. I vote some. We got a good right to vote. We helped clear out +the country. It is our home now.</p> + +<p>"The present times is too fast. I can't place this young generation.</p> + +<p>"This is my second wife I'm living wid now. She's got children. I never +had a child. We gets $10 off of the Welfare and I work around at pick-up +jobs. I farmed all my whole life."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PattersonFrankA"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Frank A. Patterson<br> + 906 Chester Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 88</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Raleigh, North Carolina in 1850. My father was born in +Baltimore, Maryland. My mother and father was sold into Bibb County, +Georgia. I don't know how much they sold for. I don't know how much they +paid for them. I don't know how much the speculator asked for them. Used +to have them in droves and you would go in and pick 'em out and pay +different amounts for them.</p> + +<p>"I was never sold. My old boss didn't believe in selling slaves. He +would buy 'em but he wouldn't sell 'em. I'll say that much for him.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Master</b></p> + +<p>"I belonged to a man named Thomas Johnson Cater.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Houses</b></p> + +<p>"They lived in log houses. Some of them had weatherboard houses but the +majority of them was log houses. Two doors and one window. Some of them +had plank floors. Some of them had floors what was hewed, you know, +sills. They had stick and dirt chimneys. Some of them had brick +chimneys. It depended on the master—on the situation of the master.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Furniture</b></p> + +<p>"They just had bunks built up side the wall. The best experienced +colored people had these teester beds. Didn't have no slats. Had ropes. +They called 'em cord beds sometimes. They had tables just like we have +now what they made themselves. Chairs were long benches made out of +planks. Little kids had big blocks to sit on where they sawed off +timber.</p> + +<p>"They had what they called a cupboard to keep the food in. Some of them +had chests made out of planks, you know. That is the way they kept it. +They put a hasp and steeple on it so as to keep the children out when +they was gone to the field.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Food</b></p> + +<p>"They give 'em three pounds of meat a week, peck of meal, pint of +molasses; some of them give 'em three to five pounds of flour on a +Sunday morning according to the size of the family. The majority of them +had shorts from the wheat. Some of the slaves would clean up a flat in +the bottoms and plant rice in it. That was where they would allow the +slaves to have truck patches.</p> + +<p>"Some few of them had chickens that was allowed to have them. Same of +them had owners that wouldn't allow their slaves to own chickens. They +never allowed them to have hogs or cows. Wherever there was a family +that had a whole lot of children they would allow them to have a cow to +milk for to get milk for their children. They claimed the cow, but the +master was the owner of it. It belonged to him. He would just let them +milk it. He would just let them raise their children off of the milk it +gave.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Clothes</b></p> + +<p>"There was no child ever had a pair of shoes until he got old enough to +go in the field. That was when he was twelve years old. That is about +all I know about it.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Schooling</b></p> + +<p>"I never went to school in my life. I got hold of one of them old blue +back spelling books. My young boss gave it to me after I was free. He +told me that I was free now and I had to think and act for myself.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Signs of War</b></p> + +<p>"Before the War I saw the elements all red as blood and I saw after that +a great comet; and they said there was going to be a war.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Memories of the Pre-War Campaign</b></p> + +<p>"When Fillmore, Buchanan, and Lincoln ran for President one of my old +bosses said, 'Hurrah for Buchanan,' and I said, 'Hurrah for Lincoln.' +One of my mistresses said, 'Why do you say, 'Hurrah for Lincoln?' And I +said, 'Because he's goin' to set me free.'</p> + +<p>"During that campaign, Lincoln came to North Carolina and ate breakfast +with my master. In those days, the kitchen was off from the house. They +had for breakfast ham with cream gravy made out of sweet milk and they +had biscuits, poached eggs on toast, coffee and tea, and grits. They had +waffles and honey and maple syrup. That was what they had for breakfast.</p> + +<p>"He told my old boss that our sons are 'ceivin' children by slaves and +buyin' and sellin' our own blood and it will have to be stopped. And +that is what I know about that.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Refugeeing</b></p> + +<p>"At the close of the War, we had refugeed down in Houston County in +Georgia.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>War Memories</b></p> + +<p>"Sherman's army came through there looking for Jeff Davis, and they told +me that they wasn't fightin' any more,—that I was free.</p> + +<p>"They said, 'You ain't got no master and no mistress.' They et dinner +there. All the old folks went upstairs and turned the house over to me +and the cook. And they et dinner. One of them said, 'My little man, +bring your hat 'round now and we are going to pay you,' and they passed +the hat 'round and give me a hat full of money. I thought it wasn't no +good and I carried it and give it to my old mistress, but it was good.</p> + +<p>"They asked me if I had ever seen Jeff Davis. I said 'No.' Then they +said, 'That's him sittin' there.' He had on a black dress and a pair of +boots and a mantilla over his shoulders and a Quaker bonnet and a black +veil.</p> + +<p>"They got up from the dining table and Sherman ordered them to 'Recover +arms.' He had on a big black hat full of eagles and he had stars and +stripes all over him. That was Sherman's artillery. They had mules with +pots and skillets, and frying pans, and axes, and picks, grubbing hoes, +and spades, and so on, all strapped on those mules. And the mules didn't +have no bridles but they went on just as though they had bridles. One of +the Yanks started a song when he picked up his gun.</p> + +<pre> +'Here's my little gun +His name is number one +Four and five rebels +We'll slay 'em as they come +Join the ban' +The rebels understan' +Give up all the lan' +To my brother Abraham +Old Gen'l Lee +Who is he? +He's not such a man +As our Gen'l Grant +Snap Poo, Snap Peter +Real rebel eater +I left my ply stock +Standin' in the mould +I left my family +And silver and gold +Snap Poo, Snap Peter +Real rebel eater +Snap Poo, Snap Peter.' +</pre> + +<p>"And General Sherman gave the comman', 'Silence', and 'Silence' roared +one man, and it rolled all down the line, 'Silence, silence, silence, +silence.' And they all got silent.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>How Freedom Came</b></p> + +<p>"They had a notification for a big speaking and that was in Perry, +Georgia. Everybody that was able throughout the State went to that +convention where that speaking was. And that is where peace was +declared. Every man was his own free agent. 'No more master, no more +mistress. You are your own free moral agent. Think and act for +yourself.' That is how it was declared. I didn't go to the meeting. I +was right there in the town. There was too many people there. You +couldn't stir them with hot fire. But my mother and father went.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>What the Slaves Expected</b></p> + +<p>"They didn't expect anything but freedom. Some of them didn't have sense +enough to secure a home for themselves. They didn't have no sense. Some +of them wasn't eligible to speak for themselves. They wanted somebody to +speak for them.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>What They Got</b></p> + +<p>"I don't know that they got anything.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Immediately After the War</b></p> + +<p>"Right after the War, I stayed with the people that owned me and worked. +They give me two dollars a month and my food and clothes. I stayed with +them five years and then I quit. I had sense enough to quit and I went +to work for wages. I got five dollars a month. And I thought that was a +big salary. I didn't know no better. I learnt better by experience.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Negroes in Politics</b></p> + +<p>"Just after the War, the Republicans used to have representatives at the +state convention. After the Democrats got in power, they knocked all +that in the head. Colored people used to be on juries. But they won't +let them serve now. (Negroes served on local grand jury last year.)</p> + +<p>"I knew one nigger politician in Georgia named I.B. Simons. He was a +school-teacher. He never held any office. I knowed a nigger politician +here by the name of John Bush. He had the United States Land Office. +When the Democrats got in power they put him out. I knowed another +fellow used to be here named Crockett Brown. He lived in Lee County, +Arkansas. He was a Congressman. I don't know whether he ever got to the +White House or not. I ain't never seen no account of it. I can't tell +you all any more now.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Memories of Fred Douglass</b></p> + +<p>"I knowed Fred Douglass. I shook hands with him and talked with him here +in Little Rock. They give him the opera house. We had the first floor. +The white folks had the gallery. That was when the Republicans were in +power.</p> + +<p>"He said: 'They all seem to be amazed and dumbfounded over me having a +white woman for a wife.' He said, 'You all don't know that my father was +my mother's master and she was as black as a crow. Don't it seem natural +that history should repeat itself? have often wondered why he liked +such a black woman as my mother. I was jus' a chip off the old block.'</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Voting</b></p> + +<p>"I voted for U.S. Grant. He was the first President we had after the +Civil War. I shook hands with him twice in Little Rock. He put up at the +Capitol Hotel and I was a-cooking there.</p> + +<p>"I voted for McKinley. I saw him too. I had a walking cane with his head +on it. That is about all I remember right now. He was the one that got +up this gold standard. He liked to put this state under bayonet laws +when he was working under that gold standard. The South was bitterly +against him.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Occupation</b></p> + +<p>"I followed cooking all my life. I have had the white peoples' lives in +my hand all my life. I worked on the Government boat, <u>Wichita</u>. It +went out of season and they built a boat called the <u>Arkansas</u>. I +cooked on it. Captain Griffin was the master of it. When it went out of +service, Captain Newcome from the War Department transferred me over to +the Mississippi River on the <u>Arthur Hider</u> (?). My headquarters +were in Greenville, Mississippi. It was far from home, so after nine +months I quit and came home (Little Rock). Captain Van Frank give me a +position on a dredge boat and the people were so bad on there I wouldn't +stay. I came away. I wouldn't stay 'mongst 'em.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Religion</b></p> + +<p>"I want you to know that I am a Christian and I want you to know I ain't +got no compromise with nobody on God's word. I ain't got but one way and +that is the way Jesus said:</p> + +Come unto me all ye that are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.<br> +He that believeth on me shall be saved.<br> + +<p>You all fix anything anyway you want. I ain't bothered 'bout you.</p> + +<p>"My people were good Christian people."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PattersonJohn"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: John Patterson, Helena, Arkansas<br> +Age: 74</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born near Paducah, Kentucky. Mother was never sold. She belong to +Master Arthur Patterson. Mother was what folks called black folks. I +never seen a father to know. I never heard mother say a thing about my +father if I had one. He never was no use to me nor her neither. Mother +brought me here in time of the Civil War. I was four years old. We come +here to be kept from the Yankee soldiers. We was sent with some of the +Pattersons. At the end of the war mother cooked for Nick Rightor (?) and +his wife here in North Helena. He was a farmer but his son is a ear, +eye, nose specialist.</p> + +<p>"I farmed, cleaned house and yards for these Helena people. I was +janitor at the Episcopal church in Helena sixteen years and four months. +They paid me forty-five dollars a month.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, I have heard about the Ku Klux. Heard talk but never seen +one.</p> + +<p>"I never been in jail. I never been drunk. Folks in Helena will tell you +John Patterson can be trusted.</p> + +<p>"I saved up one thousand dollars, just let it slip. The present times +are hard. Times are hard. I get ten dollars and comissary helps. I got +one in family.</p> + +<p>"I think mother said she was treated very good in slavery. She didn't +tell me much about it.</p> + +<p>"I own a home. It come through a will from my aunt. My uncle was a +drayman here in Helena and a close liver. I want to hold to it if I can.</p> + +<p>"If you'd ask me what all ain't took place since I been here I could +come nigh telling you. We had colored officers here. Austin Barrer was +sheriff. Half of the officers was colored at one time. John Jones was +police. No, they wasn't friends of mine. I seen these levies built. One +was here in 1897. It was rebuilt then.</p> + +<p>"It seems to me the country is going down. When they put in the Stock +Law people had to sell so much stock. Milch cows sold for six dollars a +head. People that want and need stock have no place to raise it. People +are not as industrious as they was and they accumolate more it seems to +me. We used to make our living at home. I think that is the best way.</p> + +<p>"I voted a Republican ticket years ago. I don't believe in women voting. +The Lord don't believe in that. I belong to the Baptist church.</p> + +<p>"Young folks don't act on education principles. Folks used to fight with +fist. Now one shoots the other down. Times are not improving morally. +Folks don't even think it is wrong to take things; that is stealing. +They drink up all the money they can get. I don't see no colored folks +ever save a dollar. They did long time ago. Thaes worse in some ways.</p> + +<p>"I forgot our plough songs:</p> + +<pre> +'I wonder where my darling is.' + +'Nigger makes de cotton and de +White man gets the money.' +</pre> + +<p>"Everybody used to sing. We worked from sun to sun; we courted and was +happy. People not happy now. They are craving now. About four o'clock we +all start up singing. Sing till dark."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PattersonSarahJane"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Sarah Jane Patterson<br> + 2611 Orange Street, North Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 90</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Bartow County, Georgia, January 17, 1848. You can go +there and look in that Bible over there and you will find it all written +down. My mama kept a record of all our ages. Her old mistress kept the +record and gave it to my mother after freedom.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Parents</b></p> + +<p>"My parents were Joe Patterson and Mary Adeline Patterson. My mother's +name before she married was Mary Adeline Huff. My grandfather on my +mother's side was named Huff. My mother's sisters were Mahala, and +Sallie. And them's the onliest two I remember. She had two brothers but +I don't remember their names.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>How Freedom Came</b></p> + +<p>"I was living in Bartow County in north Georgia when freedom came. I +don't remember how the slaves found it out. I remember them saying, +'Well, they's all free.' And that is all I remember. And I remember some +one saying—asking a question, 'You got to say master?' And somebody +answered and said, 'Naw.' But they said it all the same. They said it +for a long time. But they learned better though.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Family</b></p> + +<p>"I have brother Willis, Lizzie, Mary, Maud, and myself. There was four +sisters and one brother. I had just one child—a boy. He lived to be a +grown man and raised a family. His wife had three children and all of +them is gone. The father, the mother, and the children. I was a woman. I +wasn't no man. I just had one child, but the Lord blessed me. I have +three sisters and a brother dead.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Master</b></p> + +<p>"My old master's name was John Patterson and my old mistress was named +Lucy Patterson. She had a son named Bill and a son named Tommy and a son +named Charles, and a boy named Bob, and a girl named Marion. We are so +for apart they can't help me none. I know Bob's boys are dead because +they got killed in a fight in Texas.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Crippled in Slave Time</b></p> + +<p>"I been crippled all my life. We was on the lawn playing and the white +boy had been to the pond to water the horses. He came back and said he +was going to run over us. We all ran and climbed up on the top of a ten +rail fence. The fence gave 'way and broke and fell down with us. I +caught the load. They all fell on me. It knocked the knee out of place. +They carried me to Stilesboro to Dr. Jeffrey, a white doctor in slavery +time. I don't know what he did, but he left me with my knee out of joint +after he treated it. I can't work my toes and I have to walk with that +stick.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Soldiers</b></p> + +<p>"I was a tot when I seen the soldiers coming dressed in blue, and I run. +They was very nice to the colored people, never beat 'em or nothin'. I +was in Bartow County when they come through. They took a lot of things, +but I can't remember exactly what it was. I 'tended to the children +then—both the white and colored children, but mostly the white.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Good Masters</b></p> + +<p>"My old master, John Patterson, never beat up the women and men he +bossed.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Patrollers</b></p> + +<p>"I have heard people talk about the pateroles raising sand with the +niggers. Some of the niggers would say they got whipped. I was small. I +would hear 'em say, 'The pateroles is out tonight.'</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Ku Klux Klan</b></p> + +<p>"I have seed the old Ku Klux. That was after freedom. They came 'round +to my old master where my mama stayed. They were just after whipping +folks. Some of them they couldn't whip.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Support</b></p> + +<p>"I used to get a little money from Mr. Dent long as he was living. I +would go over there and he would give me a dollar or two. Since he's +been dead, his wife don't have much to give me. She gives me something +to eat sometimes but she doesn't have any money now that her husband is +dead.</p> + +<p>"I can't get up to the Welfare. Crippled as I am, I can't walk up and +down those stairs, and I can't git there nohow. I been tryin' to git +some one to take me up there.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Pratt helps me from time to time, but he ain't sent me nothin' now +in a good while. He's right smart busy, but if I go to him, I spect +he'll stir up somethin' for me.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Travels</b></p> + +<p>"I wouldn't never a left Bartow County, but the white people made out +that this was a rich country and you could make so much out here, and +we moved out here. We was young then. We came out on the train. It was a +long time back but it was too far to came on a wagon. I don't remember +just how long ago it was.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Occupation</b></p> + +<p>"I used to quilt until my fingers got too stiff. I got some patterns in +there now if you want to see them."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>The old lady took me in the house and showed me about a dozen quilts, +beautifully patterned and made. She had also some unfinished tops. She +says that she does not have much of a sale for them now because the +"quality of folks" who liked such things well enough to buy them "is +just about gone."</p> + +<p>She is crippled and unable to walk with facility. She has a great deal +of difficulty in getting off and on her porch. Still she does not +impress one as feeble so much as just disabled in one or two +particulars. She has a crippled knee, and both of her hands are +peculiarly stiff in the finger joints, one more so than the other. If it +were not for the disabilities, as old as she is, I believe that she +could give a good account of herself.</p> + +<p>I didn't have the heart to tell the old lady that her Bible record is +not what she thinks it is. It is not the old original record which her +mistress possessed. Neither is it the copy of the record of her mistress +which her mother kept. From questioning, I gather that the old mistress +dictated the original record to some one connected with her mother, +might have written it out herself on a sheet of paper. From time to +time, as new deaths and births occurred, scraps of paper containing them +were added to the first paper, and as the papers got worn, blurred, and +dog-eared, they were copied—probably not without errors. Time came when +the grandchildren up in the grades and with <u>semi-modern</u>[HW:?] +ideas copied the scraps into the family Bible. By that time aging and +blurring of the original lead pencil notes, together with recopying, had +invalidated the record till it is no longer altogether reliable.</p> + +<p>The births recorded in the Bible are as follows and in the exact order +given below:</p> + +<pre> +Mary Patterson 10-11-1866 +Harris Donesson 3-13- 72 +Lilley Donesson 7-21- 85 +Pearly Donesson 3-29- 92 +Silvay Williams 8-29- 84 +Beney Williams 11-24- 85 +Millia A. Williams 12-30- 88 +Joe Patterson 10- 3- 77 +H. Patterson 7-29- 79 +Maria E. Patterson 11-19- 81 +Jennie Patterson 12-24- 84 +Alex Patterson 7- 5- 86 +James Patterson 6-20- 90 +Janie Patterson 1-27- 60 +Amanda Patterson 1-28- 63 +James Rafield Walker 8-11- 99 +Cornelius Walker 7-21-1902 +Willie Walker 11-20- 03 +Elias Walker 7-21- 11 +Emmet Brown 1-23- 22 +Leon Harris 12-13- 21 +</pre> + +<p>The following marriages were given:</p> + +<pre> +May Lee Brown 2-26-1926 +James Walker Brown 2-21- 35 +Jennie Walker 6-20- 15 +Lillie Jean Walker 12-6- 36 +</pre> + +<p>The name of Sarah Jane Patterson is not in the list. The list itself is +not chronological. It is written in ink but in the stiff cramped hand +to be expected of a school child not yet thoroughly familiar with the +pen. The eye fixes on the name of Janie Patterson, 1-27-1860. It does +not seem probable that this is correct if it is meant to be Sarah Jane. +Sarah Jane could give no help except to answer questions about the +manner in which the record was made.</p> + +<p>These considerations led me to set the record aside in my own mind so +far as Sarah Jane Patterson's age is concerned and to take her word. She +has a very clear conception of the change from slavery to freedom. Her +memories are blurred and indistinct, but she recollects that this matter +was during slavery times and that during freedom. It seems that she had +the care of the smaller children during slavery time—at the time she +saw the soldiers marching through. This was not during the time of +freedom, because she distinguished clearly the Ku Klux time. She would +have to be at least eighty to have cared for children. Her tenacious +memory of ninety may have some foundation, therefore.</p> + +<p>Moreover where writing is done in lead pencil and hurriedly, six is +often made to look like four and a part of eight may become blurred till +it looks like a zero. That would account for 1848 being transcribed as +1860. There would be nothing unusual, however, in a Sarah Jane and a +Jane. I neglected to cover that point in a question.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PattilloSolomonP"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Solomon P. Pattillo<br> + 1502 Martin Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 76<br> +Occupation: Formerly farmer, teacher, and small dealer—now blind</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born November 1862. I was three years old at the time of the +surrender. I was born right here in Arkansas—right down here in Tulip, +Dallas County, Arkansas. I have never been out of the state but twice.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Refugeeing</b></p> + +<p>"My daddy carried me out once when they took him to Texas during the war +to keep the Yanks from setting him free.</p> + +<p>"Then I went out once long after slavery to get a load of sand. On the +way back, my boat nearly sank. Those are the only two times I ever left +the state.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Parents</b></p> + +<p>"My father's name was Thomas Smith, but the Pattillos bought him and he +took the name of Pattillo. I don't know how much he sold for. That was +the only time he was ever sold. I believe that my father was born in +North Carolina. It seems like to me I recollect that is where he said he +was born.</p> + +<p>"My mother was born in Virginia. I don't know how she got here unless +she was sold like my father was. I don't know her name before she got +married. Yes, I do; her name was Fannie Smith, I believe.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Houses</b></p> + +<p>"We lived in old log cabins. We had bedsteads nailed to the wall. Then +we had them old fashioned cordboard springs. They had ropes made into +springs. That was a high class bed. People who had those cord springs +felt themselves. They made good sleeping. My father had one. Ropes were +woven back and forth across the bed frame.</p> + +<p>"We had those old spinning wheels. Three cuts was a day's work. A cut +was so many threads. It was quite a day to make them. They had hanks +too. The threads were all linked together.</p> + +<p>"My mother was a spinner. My father was a farmer. Both of them worked +for their master,—old Massa, they called him, or Massa, Mass Tom, Mass +John or Massta.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>War Recollections</b></p> + +<p>"I remember during the war when I was in Texas with a family of Moody's +how old Mistiss had me packing rocks out of the yard in a basket and +cleaning the yard. I didn't know it then, but my daddy told me later +that that was when I was in Texas,—during the war. I remember that I +used to work in my shirt tail.</p> + +<p>"The soldiers used to come in the house somewhere and take anything they +could get or wanted to take.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Pateroles</b></p> + +<p>"When I was a boy they had a song, 'Run, Nigger, run; The Pateroles will +get you.' They would run you in and I have been told they would whip +you. If you overstayed your time when your master had let you go out, he +would notify the pateroles and they would hunt you up and turn you over +to him.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Church Meetings</b></p> + +<p>"Way long then, my father and mother used to say that man doesn't serve +the Lord—the true and living God and let it be known. A bunch of them +got together and resolved to serve Him any way. First they sang in a +whisper, 'Come ye that love the Lord.' Finally they got bold and began +to sing in tones that could be heard everywhere, 'Oh for a thousand +tongues to sing my Great Redeemer's praise.'</p> +<br> + +<p><b>After the War</b></p> + +<p>"After the war my father fanned—made share crops. I remember once how +some one took his horse and left an old tired horse in the stable. She +looked like a nag. When she got rested up she was better than the one +that was took.</p> + +<p>"His first farm was down here in Dallas County. He made a share crop +with his former master, Pattillo. He never had no trouble with him.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Ku Klux</b></p> + +<p>"I heard a good deal of talk about the Ku Klux Klan, but I don't know +anything much about it. They never bothered my father and mother. My +father was given the name of being an obedient servant—among the best +help they had.</p> + +<p>"My father farmed all his life. He died at the age of seventy-two in +Tulip, near the year 1885, just before Cleveland's inauguration. He died +of typhoid pneumonia. My mother was ninety-six years old when she died +in 1909.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Little Rock</b></p> + +<p>"I came to Little Rock in 1894. I came up here to teach in Fourche Dam. +Then I moved here. I taught my first school in this county at Cato. I +quit teaching because my salary was so poor and then I went into the +butcher's business, and in the wood business. I farmed all the while.</p> + +<p>"I taught school for twenty-one years. I always was a successful +teacher. I did my best. If you contract to do a job for ten dollars, do +as much as though you were getting a hundred. That will always help you +to get a better job.</p> + +<p>"I have farmed all my life in connection with my teaching. I went into +other businesses like I said a moment ago. I was a caretaker at the +Haven of Rest Cemetery for sometime.</p> + +<p>"I was postmaster from 1904 to 1911 at Sweet Home. At one time I was +employed on the United States Census.</p> + +<p>"I get a little blind pension now. I have no other means of support.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Loss of Eyes</b></p> + +<p>"The doctor says I lost my eyesight on account of cataracts. I had an +operation and when I came home, I got to stirring around and it caused +me to have a hemorrhage of the eye. You see I couldn't stay at the +hospital because it was costing me $3 a day and I didn't have it. They +had to take one eye clean out. Nothing can be done for them, but somehow +I feel that the lord's going to let me see again. That's the way I feel +about it.</p> + +<p>"I have lived here in this world this long and never had a fight in my +life. I have never been mistreated by a white man in my life. I always +knew my place. Some fellows get mistreated because they get out of their +place.</p> + +<p>"I was told I couldn't stay in Benton because that was a white man's +town. I went there and they treated me white. I tried to stay with a +colored family way out. They were scared to take me. I had gone there to +attend to some business. Then I went to the sheriff and he told me that +if they were scared to have me stay at their home, I could stay at the +hotel and put my horse in the livery stable. I stayed out in the wagon +yard. But I was invited into the hotel. They took care of my horse and +fed it and they brought me my meals. The next morning, they cleaned and +curried and hitched my horse for me.</p> + +<p>"I have voted all my life. I never had any trouble about it.</p> + +<p>"The Ku Klux never bothered me. Nobody else ever did. If we live so that +everybody will respect us, the better class will always try to help us."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PattonCarryAllen"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Carry Allen Patton<br> + Forrest City, Arkansas<br> +Age: 71</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Shelby County, Tennessee. My parents was Tillie Watts and +Pierce Allen. He come from Louisiana reckly (directly) after the +surrender. My mother come from Virginia. She was sold in Virginia and +brought to middle Tennessee close to Murfreesboro and then brought to +Memphis and sold. She was dark and my father was too. They was living +close to Wilmar, Arkansas when the yellow fever was so bad. I don't +remember it. Heard them talk about it.</p> + +<p>"I heard my mother say how Mr. Jake Watts saved his money from the +Yankees. They had a great big rock flat on both sides. They put on the +joints of big meat to weight it down when they salted it down in a +barrel. They didn't unjoint the meat and in the joint is where it +started to spoil. Well, he put his silver and gold in a pot. It was a +big round pot and was smaller around the top. He dug a hole after +midnight. He and his two boys James and Dock put the money in this hole +in the back yard. They covered the pot with the big flat rock and put +dirt on that and next morning they planted a good big cedar tree over +the rock, money and all.</p> + +<p>"Old Master Jake died during the War and their house was burned but +James lived in one of the cabins in the yard. Dock went to the War. My +mother said when they left, that tree was standing.</p> + +<p>"My mother run off. She thought she would go cook for the men in the +camps but before she got to the camps a wagon overtook her and they +stole her. They brought her to Memphis and sold her on a block. They +guarded her. She never did know who they was nor what become of them. +They kept her in the wagon on the outskirts of the city nearly a month. +One man always stayed to watch her. She was scared to death of both of +them. One of the men kept a jug of whiskey in the wagon and drunk it but +he never would get dead drunk so she could slip off.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Johnson bought her and when the surrender come on, Master Johnson +took his family and went to Texas. She begged him to take her to nurse +but he said if it wasn't freedom he would send her back to Master James +Watts and he would let her go back then. He give her some money but she +never went back. She was afraid to start walking and before her money +give clear out she met up with my father and he talked her out of going +back.</p> + +<p>"She had a baby pretty soon. It was by them men that stole her. He was +light. He died when he got nearly grown. I recollect him good. I was +born close to Memphis, the boy died of dysentery.</p> + +<p>"When my mother was sold in Virginia she was carried in a wagon to the +block and thought she was going to market. She never seen her folks no +more. They let them go along to market sometimes and set in the wagon. +She had a little pair of gloves she wore when she was sold her grandma +had knit for her. They was white, had half thumb and no fingers. When +she died I put them in her coffin. She had twins born dead besides me. +They was born close to Wilmar, Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"We farmed all my life in Arkansas and Mississippi. I married in +Mississippi and we come back here before Joe died. I live out here and +in Memphis. My son is a janitor at the Sellers Brothers Store in +Memphis. My daughter cooks about here in town and I keep her children. I +rather farm if I was able.</p> + +<p>"I think young folks, both colors, shuns work. Times is running away +with itself. Folks is living too fast. They ride too fast and drinks and +do all kinds of meanness.</p> + +<p>"My father was a mighty poor hand at talking. He said he was sold in a +gang shipped to Memphis from New Orleans. Master Allen bought him. He +was a boy. I don't know how big. He cleaned fish—scaled them. He +butchered and in a few months Mr. Allen set him free. It was surrender +when he was sold but Mr. Allen didn't know it or else he meant to keep +him on a few years. When he got loose he started farming and farmed till +he died. He farmed in Tennessee, Mississippi, and Arkansas. He owned a +place but a drouth come along. He got in debt and white folks took it.</p> + +<p>"I married in Mississippi. My husband immigrated from South Carolina. He +was Joe Patton. I washed and ironed and farmed. I rather farm now if I +was able.</p> + +<p>"I never got no gov'ment help. I ain't posing it. It is a fine thing. I +was in Tennessee when it come on. They said I'd have to stay here six +months. I never do stay."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PayneHarriettMcFarlin"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Annie L. LaCotts<br> +Person interviewed: Harriett McFarlin Payne<br> + Dewitt, Arkansas<br> +Age: 83</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Aunt Harriett, were you born in slavery time?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, mam! I was big enough to remember well, us coming back from Texas +after we refugeed there when the fighting of the war was so bad at St. +Charles. We stayed in Texas till the surrender, then we all come back in +lots of wagons. I was sick but they put me on a little bed and me and +all the little chillun rode in a 'Jersey' that one of the old Negro +mammies drove, along behind the wagons, and our young master, Colonel +Bob Chaney rode a great big black horse. Oh! he nice-looking on dat +horse! Every once and awhile he'd ride back to the last wagon to see if +everything was all right. I remember how scared us chillun was when we +crossed the Red River. Aunt Mandy said, 'We crossin' you old Red River +today, but we not going to cross you any more, cause we are going home +now, back to Arkansas.' That day when we stopped to cook our dinner I +picked up a lot little blackjack acorns and when my mammy saw them she +said, 'Throw them things down, chile. They'll make you wormy.' (I cried +because I thought they were chinquapins.) I begged my daddy to let's go +back to Texas, but he said, 'No! No! We going with our white folks.' My +mama and daddy belonged to Col. Jesse Chaney, much of a gentleman, and +his wife Miss Sallie was the best mistress anybody ever had. She was a +Christian. I can hear her praying yet! She wouldn't let one of her +slaves hit a tap on Sunday. They must rest and go to church. They had +preaching at the cabin of some one of the slaves, and in the Summertime +sometimes they had it out in the shade under the trees. Yes, and the +slaves on each plantation had their own church. They didn't go +galavanting over the neighborhood or country like niggers do now. Col. +Chaney had lots and lots of slaves and all their houses were in a row, +all one-room cabins. Everything happened in that one room,—birth, +sickness, death and everything, but in them days niggers kept their +houses clean and their door yards too. These houses where they lived was +called 'the quarters'. I used to love to walk down by that row of +houses. It looked like a town and late of an evening as you'd go by the +doors you could smell meat a frying, coffee making and good things +cooking. We were fed good and had plenty clothes to keep us dry and +warm.</p> + +<p>"Along about time for de surrender, Col. Jesse, our master, took sick +and died with some kind of head trouble. Then Col. Bob, our young +master, took care of his mama and the slaves. All the grown folks went +to the field to work and the little chillun would be left at a big room +called the nursing home. All us little ones would be nursed and fed by +an old mammy, Aunt Mandy. She was too old to go to the field, you know. +We wouldn't see our mammy and daddy from early in the morning till night +when their work was done, then they'd go by Aunt Mandy's and get their +chillun and go home till work time in the morning.</p> + +<p>"Some of the slaves were house negroes. They didn't go to work in the +fields, they each one had their own job around the house, barn, orchard, +milk house, and things like that.</p> + +<p>"When washday come, Lord, the pretty white clothes! It would take three +or four women a washing all day.</p> + +<p>"When two of de slaves wanted to get married, they'd dress up nice as +they could and go up to the big house and the master would marry them. +They'd stand up before him and he'd read out of a book called the +'discipline' and say, 'Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy +heart, all thy strength, with all thy might and thy neighbor as +thyself.' Then he'd say they were man and wife and tell them to live +right and be honest and kind to each other. All the slaves would be +there too, seeing the 'wedden'.</p> + +<p>"Our Miss Sallie was the sweetest best thing in the world! She was so +good and kind to everybody and she loved her slaves, too. I can remember +when Uncle Tony died how she cried! Uncle Tony Wadd was Miss Sallie's +favorite servant. He stayed in a little house in the yard and made fires +for her, brought in wood and water and just waited on the house. He was +a little black man and white-headed as cotton, when he died. Miss Sallie +told the niggers when they come to take him to the grave yard, to let +her know when they got him in his coffin, and when they sent and told +her she come out with all the little white chillun, her little +grandchillun, to see Uncle Tony. She just cried and stood for a long +time looking at him, then she said, 'Tony, you have been a good and +faithful servant.' Then the Negro men walked and carried him to the +graveyard out in a big grove in de field. Every plantation had its own +graveyard and buried its own folks, and slaves right on the place.</p> + +<p>"If all slaves had belonged to white folks like ours, there wouldn't +been any freedom wanted."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PayneJohn"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: John Payne<br> + Brinkley, Ark.<br> +Age: 74</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Georgia, close to Bowles Spring, in Franklin County. My +mama's master was Reverend David Payne. He was a Baptist preacher. My +mama said my father was Monroe Glassby. He was a youngster on a +neighboring plantation. He was white. His father was a landowner. I +think she said it was 70 miles east of Atlanta where they went to trade. +They went to town two or three times a year. It took about a week to go +and come.</p> + +<p>"From what Mama said they didn't know it was freedom for a long time. +They worked on I know till that crop was made and gathered. Somebody +sent word to the master, Rev. David, he better turn them slaves loose. +Some of the hands heard the message. That was the first they knowed it +was freedom. My mama said she seen soldiers and heard fighting. She had +heard that if the Yankees won the war all the slaves be free. She set to +studyin' what she would do. She didn't know what to do. So when she +heard it she asked If she had to be free. She told Rev. David she wanted +to stay like she had been staying. After I was up a good size boy we +went to Banks County. She done house work and field work too and I done +farm work. All kinds and from sun-up till dark every day. Sometimes I +get in so late I have to make a torch light to see how to put the feed +in the troughs. We had plenty litard—pine knots—they was rich to +burn.</p> + +<p>"I used to vote but I quit since I come to Arkansas. I come in 1902. I +paid my own way and wrote back for my family. I paid their way too. I +got one little grandaughter, 20 years old. She is off trying to make her +way through college. My wife had a stroke and she can't do much no more. +I got a piece of a house. It need repairs. I can't hardly pay my taxes. +I can't work much. I got two cows and six little pigs. I got eighty +acres land. I worked fourteen years for John Gazolla and that is when I +made enough to buy my place. I am in debt but I am still working. Seems +like one old man can't make much."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PayneLarkin"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person Interviewed: Larkin Payne<br> + Brinkley, Ark.<br> +Age: 85</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in North Carolina. I don't recall my moster's name. My +parents was Sarah Hadyn and John Payne. They had seven children. None of +them was sold. My pa was sold. He had three sons in the Civil War. None +of em was killed. One was in the war four years, the others a good +portion of two years. They was helpers.</p> + +<p>"Grandma bought grandpa's, freedom. My great grandma was an Indian +woman. My mother was dark brown. My father was tolerable light. When I +was small child they come in and tell bout people being sold. I heard a +whole lot about it that way. It was great grandma Hadyn that was the +Indian. My folks worked in the field or anywhere as well as I recollect.</p> + +<p>"When freedom come on my folks moved to East Tennessee. I don't know +whether they got good treatment or not. They was freedom loving folks. +The Ku Klux never bothered us at home. I heard a lot of em. They was +pretty hot further south. I had two brothers scared pretty bad. They +went wid some white men to South Carolina and drove hogs. The white men +come back in buggies or on the train—left them to walk back. The Ku +Klux got after them. They had a hard time getting home. I heard the Ku +Klux was bad down in Alabama. They had settled down fore I went to +Alabama. I owned a home in Alabama. I took stock for it. Sold the stock +and come to Arkansas. I had seven children. We raised three.</p> + +<p>"When my folks was set free they never got nothing. The mountain folks +raised corn and made whiskey. They made red corn cob molasses; it was +good. They put lye in the whiskey; it would kill you. They raised hogs +plenty. My folks raised hogs and corn. They didn't make no whiskey. I +seen em make it and sell it too.</p> + +<p>"I heard folks say they rather be under the home men overseers than +Northern overseers. They was kinder to em it seem like. I was jes +beginnin' to go to the field when freedom come on. I helped pile brush +to be burned before freedom. I farmed when I was a boy; pulled fodder +and bundled it. I shucked corn, slopped pigs, milked, plowed a mule over +them rocks, thinned out corn. I worked twenty days in East Tennessee on +the section. I cut and haul wood all winter.</p> + +<p>"My parents both died in Arkansas. We come here to get to a fine farmin' +country. We did like it fine. I'm still here.</p> + +<p>"I have voted. I vote if I'm needed. The white folks country and they +been runnin' it. I don't want no enemies. They been good to me. I got no +egercation much. I sorter follows bout votin'. We look to the white +folks to look after our welfare.</p> + +<p>"I get $8.00 and commodities. I work all I can git to do."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PerkinsCella"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Cella Perkins<br> + Marvell and Palestine, Arkansas<br> +Age: 67</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born close to Macon, Georgia. Mama's old mistress, Miss Mari +(Maree) Beth Woods, brung her there from fifteen miles outer Atlanta.</p> + +<p>"After emancipation Miss Mari Beth's husband got killed. A horse kicked +him to death. It shyed at something and it run in front of the horse. He +held the horse so it couldn't run. It kicked the foot board clean off, +kicked him in the stomach. His boy crawled out of the buggy. That's the +way we knowed how it happened. She didn't hurt the boy. His name was +Benjamin Woods.</p> + +<p>"Pa went to war with his master and he never come back to mama. She +never heard from him after freedom. He got captured and got to be a +soldier and went 'way off. She didn't never know if he got killed or +lost his way back home.</p> + +<p>"Mama cooked and kept up the house. Miss Mari Beth kept a boarding house +in Macon till way after I was a big girl. I stood on a box and washed +dishes and dried them for mama.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Ben was grown when we come to Arkansas. He got his ma to go to +Kentucky with him and I heard about Arkansas. Me and mama come to +Palestine. We come in a crowd. A man give us tickets and we come by our +lone selves till we got to Tennessee. A big crowd come from Dyersburg, +Tennessee. Ma got to talking and found out we was headed fo' the same +place in Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"Ma talked a whole heap at tines more 'an others (times) about slavery +times. Her master didn't take on over her much when he found out she was +a barren woman. The old man Crumpton give her to his youngest daughter, +Miss Mari Beth. She always had to do all kinds of work and house turns.</p> + +<p>"After mama's slavery husband didn't come back and she was living in +Macon, she fell in love with another man and I was a picked-up baby. +Mama said Miss Mari Beth lost faith in her when I was born but she +needed her and kept her on. Said seem like she thought she was too old +to start up when she never had children when her papa owned her. They +didn't like me. She said she could trust mama but she didn't know my +stock. He was a black man. Mama was black as I is.</p> + +<p>"Miss Mari Beth had a round double table. The top table turned with the +victuals on it. I knocked flies three times a day over that table.</p> + +<p>"I never had a store-bought dress in my life till mama bought me one at +Madison, Arkansas. I wanted a pure white dress. She said if we made a +good crop she was going to give me a dress. All the dresses I ever had +was made out of Miss Mari Beth's dresses but I never had a pure white +one. I never had one bought for me till I was nearly grown. I was so +proud of it. When I would go and come back, I would pull it off and put +it away. I wore it one summer white and the next summer I blued it and +had a new dress. I had a white dress nearly every year till I got too +old to dress up gay now. I got a white bonnet and apron I wears right +now.</p> + +<p>"Mama said Master Crumpton bought up babies to raise. She was taken away +from her folks so soon she never heard of them. Aunt Mat raised her up +in Atlanta and out on his place. He had a place in town but kept them on +a place in the country. He had a drove of them. He hired them out. He +hired mama once to a doctor, Dr. Willbanks. Mama said old master thought +she would learn how to have children from him the reason he sent her +there so much. When they had big to-dos old master sent mama over there. +She never seen no money till about freedom. She loved to get hired out +to be off from him. They all had young babies about but her. He was +cross and her husband was cross. She had pleasure hired out. She said he +didn't whoop much. He stamped his foot. They left right now.</p> + +<p>"I hab three girls living; one here (Palestine), one at Marvell, and one +in St. Louis. My youngest girl teaches music at a big colored school. +She sends me my money and I lives with these girls. I been up there and +I sure don't aim to live in no city old as I is. It's too dangerous slow +as I got to be and so much racket I never slept a night I was there. I +was there a month. She brung me home and I didn't go back.</p> + +<p>"I cooked and washed and ironed and worked in the field. I do some work +yet. I helps out where I am.</p> + +<p>"The times is better I think from accounts I hear. This generation all +living too fast er lives. They don't never be still a minute."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PerkinsMaggie"></a> +<h3>Pine Bluff District<br> +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS<br> +Name of Interviewer: Martin & Barker<br> +Subject: Ex-Slaves—Slavery Times<br> +<br> +This Information given by: Maggie Perkins<br> +Place of Residence: W. 6th. St.</h3> +<p>[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]</p> +<br> + +<p>My folks lived in S. Carolina and belonged to Col. Bob Baty and his +family.</p> + +<p>If I should lay down tonight I could tell when my folks were going to +die, because the Lawd would tell me in a vision.</p> + +<p>Just before my grandmother died, I got up one morning and told my aunt +that granma was dead. Aunt said she did not want me telling lies.</p> + +<p>Then I saw another aunt laying on the bed, and she had her hand under +her jaw. She was smiling. The house was full of people. After awhile +they heard that her aunt was dead too, and after that they paid +attention to me when I told them somebody was going to die.</p> + +<p>I'se a member of the Holiness Church. I believes step up right and keep +the faith.</p> + +<p>I seen my aunt walking up and down on a glass. The Lawd tells me in a +vision to step right up and see the faith.</p> + +<p>I am living in Jesus. He is coming to Pine Bluff soon. He is going to +separate the lions from the sheep.</p> + +<p>I was born in slavery times. I member folks riding around on horses.</p> + +<p>Them days I used to wash my mistis feet and legs, and sometimes I would +fall asleep against my mistis knees. I tells the young fry to give honor +to the white folks, and my preacher tell 'em to obey the white folks, +dat dey are our best friends, dey is our dependence and it would be hard +getting on if we didn't have em to help us.</p> + +<p>Spirits—Me and my husband moved into a house that a man, "uncle Bill" +Hearn died in, and we wanted dat house so bad we moved right in as soon +as he was taken out, we ate supper and went to bed.</p> + +<p>By the time we got to sleep we heard sounds like someone was emptying +shelled corn, and I hunched up under my husband scared to death and then +moved out the next day. The dead haven't gone to Heaven. When death +comes, he comes to your heart. He has your number and knows where to +find you. He won't let you off, he has the key.</p> + +<p>Death comes and unlocks the heart and twists the breath out of that +heart and carries it back to God.</p> + +<p>Nobody has gone to Heaven, no one can get pass Jesus until the day of +his redemption, which is judgement day.</p> + +<p>We can't pass the door without being judged. On the day of ressurection +the trumpet will sound and us will wake up out of he graveyard, and come +forth to be judged. The sea shall give up its dead. Every nation will +have to appear before God and be judged in a twinklin of an eye. If you +aren't prepared before Jesus comes, it will be too late. God is +everywhere, he is the almight. God is a nice God, he is a clean God, he +is a good God. I would be afraid to tell you a lie for God would strike +me down.</p> + +<p>Eight years ago I couldn't see, I wore specs 3 years. I forgot my specs +one morning, I prayed for my eyesight and it was restored that morning.</p> + +<p>Our marster was a good man. De overseers sometimes wuz bad, but dey did +not let marsters know how dey treated their girl slaves. My grandmother +was whipped by de overseers one time, it made welts on her back. My +sister Mary had a child by a white man.</p> + +<p>To get joy in de morning, get up and pray and ask Him to bless you. God +will feed all alike, he is no respector of persons. He shows no extra +favors twixt de rich and de poor.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PerkinsMarguerite"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Marguerite Perkins<br> + West Sixth and Catalpa Streets, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 81</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in slavery times, Miss. I was born in South Carolina, Union +County. I was born in May.</p> + +<p>"I know I 'member old Missy. I just been washin' her feet and legs when +they said the Yankees was comin. Old Miss' name was Miss Sally. Her +husband was a colonel. What is a colonel?</p> + +<p>"I got some white cousins. They tell me they was the boss man's chillun.</p> + +<p>"Yes'm, I reckon Miss Sally was good to me. I'm a old nigger. All us +niggers belonged to Colonel Beatty. I went to school a little while but +I didn't learn nothin'.</p> + +<p>"I use to be a nurse girl and sleep right upstairs.</p> + +<p>"Missus, you know people just walkin along the street droppin dead with +heart trouble and white women killin men. I tell you lady it's awful.</p> + +<p>"I been married just once. The Lord took him out o' my house one Sunday +morning 'fore day.</p> + +<p>"The thing about it is I got that high blood pressure. Well, Missus, I +had it five years ago and I went to Memphis and the Lord healed me. All +we got to do is believe in the Lord and He will put you on your feet.</p> + +<p>"I had four sisters and three brothers and all of 'em dead but me, +darlin.</p> + +<p>"Now let me tell you somethin'. Old as I is, I ain't never been to but +one picture show in my life. Old as I is, I never was on a base ball +ground in my life. The onliest place I go now is to church."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PerkinsRachel"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Rachel Perkins, Goodwin, Arkansas<br> +Age: ? Baby during the Civil War</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Greensboro, Alabama. Sallie Houston and Peter Houston was +my parents. They had two girls and a boy. They died when they was small, +but me. They always told me mother died when I was three days old in the +cradle. I don't fur a fact know much about my own people. Miss Agnes +took me to raise me fur a house girl. She nursed me wid her Mary. My +mother's and father's owners was Alonso Brown and Miss Agnes Brown. +Their two girls was Mary and Lucy and their three boys was Bobby, Jesse, +and Frank. Miss Agnes rocked the babies to sleep in a big chair out on +the gallery. We slept there all night. Company come and say, 'Where the +babies?' Miss Agnes take them back and show us off. They say, 'Where the +little black chile?' They'd try to get me to come go live wid them. They +say they be good to me. I'd tell 'em, 'No, I stay here.' It was good a +home as I wanted. We slept on the front gallery till Lucy come on, then +we had sheep skin pallets. She got the big chair. She put us out there +because it was cool.</p> + +<p>"I left Miss Agnes when I got to be my own woman. Didn't nobody toll me +off. I knowed I ought to go to my own race of people. They come after me +once. Then they sent the baby boy after me what I had nursed. I wanted +to go but I never went. Miss Lucy and Miss Mary both in college. It was +lonesome for me. I wanted to go to my color. I jus' picked up and walked +on off.</p> + +<p>"My girl is half Indian. I'm fifteen years older than my girl. Then I +married Wesley Perkins, my husband. He is black fur a fact. He died last +fall. I married at my husband's brother's by a colored preacher. Tom +Screws was his name. He was a Baptist preacher.</p> + +<p>"I never went to school a day in my life. I can't read. I can count +money. Seem lack it jus' come natural. I never learned it at no one +time. It jus' come to me.</p> + +<p>"In warm weather I slept on the gallery and in cold weather I slept by +the fire. I made down my own bed. I cleaned the house. I took the cows +off to the pasture. I nursed the babies, washed and dried the dishes. I +made up the beds and cleaned the yards.</p> + +<p>"Master Brown owned two farms. He had plenty hands on his farms. I did +never go down to the farms much but I knowed the hands. On Saturday +little later than other days they brought the stock to the house and +fed. Then they went to the smokehouse for their rations. He had a great +big garden, strawberries, and grape arbors.</p> + +<p>"One thing I had to do was worm the plants. I put the worms in a bottle +and leave it in the row where the sun would dry the worms up. When a +light frost come I would water the plants that would wilt before the sun +riz and ag'in at night. Then the plants never felt the frost. Certainly +it didn't kill 'em. It didn't hurt 'em.</p> + +<p>"Julane was the regular milk woman. She milked and strained the milk. I +churned and 'tended to the chickens. Miss Agnes sot the hens her own +self. She marked the eggs with a piece of charcoal to see if other hens +laid by the setting hen. If they did she'd take the new egg out of the +nest.</p> + +<p>"We had flower gardens. We had mint, rosemary, tansy, sage, mullen, +catnip, horseradish, artichokes, hoarhound—all good home remedies.</p> + +<p>"I never knowed when we moved to that farm. I was so small. I heard Miss +Agnes Brown say I was a baby when they moved to Boldan depot, not fur +from Clinton, Mississippi.</p> + +<p>"When I left Miss Agnes I went to some folks my own color on another +farm 'joining to their farm. Of course I took my baby. I took Anna and I +been living with Anna ever since. What I'd do now without her. (Anna is +an Indian and very proud of being half Indian.) My husband done dead.</p> + +<p>"I get eight dollars welfare help. And I do get some commodities. Anna +does all right but she got hit on the shoulder and about lost use of her +arm. One of the railroad hands up here got mad and hit her. I had +doctors. They done it a little good. It's been hurt three years or more +now.</p> + +<p>"I wisht I knowd where to find a bed of mullen. Boil it down to a syrup +and add some molasses, boil that down. It makes a good syrup for coughs +and colds.</p> + +<p>"I never went to white folks' church none hardly. Miss Agnes sent me +along with her cook to my own color's church.</p> + +<p>"My husband sure was good to me. We never had but one fight. Neither one +whooped.</p> + +<p>"This young generation is going backward. They tired of training. They +don't want no advice. They don't want to work out no more. They don't +know what they want. I think folks is trifling than they was when I come +on. The times is all right and some of the people. I'm talking about +mine and yo' color both."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PerryDinah"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Dinah Perry<br> + 1800 Ohio Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 78</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes ma'am, I lived in slavery times. They brought me from Alabama, a +baby, right here to this place where I am at, Mr. Sterling Cockril.</p> + +<p>"I don't know zackly when I was born but I member bout the slave times. +Yes ma'am, I do. After I growed up some, I member the overseer—I do. I +can remember Mr. Burns. I member when he took the hands to Texas. Left +the chillun and the old folks here.</p> + +<p>"Oh Lord, this was a big plantation. Had bout four or five hundred head +of niggers.</p> + +<p>"My mother done the milkin' and the weavin'. After free times, I wove me +a dross. My mother fixed it for me and I wove it. They'd knit stockin's +too. But now they wear silk. Don't keep my legs warm.</p> + +<p>"I member when they fit here in Pine Bluff. I member when 'Marmajuke' +sent word he was gain' to take breakfast with Clayton that mornin' and +they just fit. I can remember that was 'Marmajuke.' It certainly was +'Marmajuke.' The Rebels tried to carry me away but the wagon was so full +I didn't get in and I was glad they didn't. My mother was runnin' from +the Rebels and she hid under the cotehouse. After the battle was over +she come back hero to the plantation.</p> + +<p>"I had three brothers and three sisters went to Texas and I know I +didn't know em when they come back.</p> + +<p>"I member when they fit here a bum shell fell right in the yard. It was +big around as this stovepipe and was all full of chains and things.</p> + +<p>"After free time my folks stayed right here and worked on the shares. I +was the baby chile and never done no work till I married when I was +fifteen.</p> + +<p>"After the War I went to school to white teachers from the North. I +never went to nothin' but them. I went till I was in the fifth grade.</p> + +<p>"My daddy learned me to spell 'lady' and 'baker' and 'shady' fore I went +to school. I learned all my ABC's too. I got out of the first reader the +second day. I could just read it right on through. I could spell and +just stand at the head of the class till the teacher sent me to the foot +all the time.</p> + +<p>"My daddy was his old mistress' pet. He used to carry her to school all +the time and I guess that's where he got his learnin'.</p> + +<p>"After I was married I worked in the field. Rolled logs, cut brush, +chopped and picked cotton.</p> + +<p>"I member when they had that 'Bachelor' (Brooks-Baxter) War up here at +Little Rock.</p> + +<p>"After my chillun died, I never went to the field no more. I just stayed +round mongst the white folks nussin'. All the chillun I nussed is +married and grown now.</p> + +<p>"All this younger generation—white and colored—I don't know what's +gwine come of em. The poet says:</p> + +<pre> +'Each gwine a different way +And all the downward road.'" +</pre> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PerryDinah2"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Dinah Perry<br> + 1002 Indiana, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 78</h3> +<p>[TR: Appears to be same as last informant despite different address.]</p> +<br> + +<p>"I'se bawn in Alabama and brought here to Arkansas a baby. I couldn't +tell what year I was bawn 'cause I was a baby. A chile can't tell what +year he was bawn 'less they tells him and they sure didn't tell me.</p> + +<p>"When I'd wake up in the mawnin' my mother would be gone to the field.</p> + +<p>"Some things I can remember good but you know old folks didn't 'low +chillun to stand around when they was talkin' in dem days. They had to +go play. They had to be mighty particular or they'd get a whippin'.</p> + +<p>"Chillun was better in them days 'cause the old folks was strict on 'em. +Chillun is raisin' theirselves today.</p> + +<p>"I 'member one song they used to sing</p> + +<pre> +'We'll land over shore +We'll land over shore; +And we'll live forever more.' +</pre> + +<p>"They called it a hymn. They'd sing it in church, then they'd all get to +shoutin'.</p> + +<p>"Superstitions? Well, I seen a engineer goin' to work the other day and +a black cat run in front of him, and he went back 'cause he said he +would have a wreck with his train if he didn't. So you see, the white +folks believes in things like that too.</p> + +<p>"I never was any hand to play any games 'cept 'Chick. Chick.' You'd +ketch 'hold a hands and ring up. Had one outside was the hawk and some +inside was the hen and chickens. The old mother hen would say</p> + +<pre> +'Chick-a-ma, chick-a-ma, craney crow, +Went to the well to wash my toe; +When I come back my chicken was gone, +What time is it, old witch?' +</pre> + +<p>One chicken was s'posed to get out and then the hawk would try to ketch +him.</p> + +<p>"We was more 'ligious than the chillun nowadays. We used to play +preachin' and baptisin'. We'd put 'em down in the water and souse 'em +and we'd shout just like the old folk. Yes ma'am."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PetersAlfred"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Alfred Peters, 1518 Bell Street,<br> + Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 78</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born seven miles from Camden.</p> + +<p>"I was 'leven months old when they carried us to Texas. First thing I +remember I was in Texas.</p> + +<p>"Lucius Grimm was old master. He's been dead a long time. His wife died +'bout two years after the Civil War and he died twenty-five years after.</p> + +<p>"I 'member durin' of the war he buried his stuff---silverware and +stuff—and he never took it up. And after he died his brother's son +lived in California, and he come back and dug it up.</p> + +<p>"The Yankees burned up four hundred bales of cotton and taken the meat +and two cribs of corn.</p> + +<p>"I heard 'em talk 'bout the Ku Klux but I never did see 'em.</p> + +<p>"My mother said old Mars Lucius was good to his folks. She said he first +bought her and then she worried so 'bout my father, he paid twenty-five +hundred dollars for him.</p> + +<p>"Biggest part of my life I farmed, and then I done carpenter work.</p> + +<p>"I been blind four years. The doctor says it's cataracts.</p> + +<p>"I think the younger generation goin' to cause another war. They ain't +studyin' nothin' but pleasure."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PetersMaryEstes"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: S.S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Mary Estes Peters,<br> + 3115 W. 17th Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: 78</h3> +<br> + +<p><b>Biographical</b></p> + +<p>Mary Estes Peters was born a slave January 30, 1860 in Missouri +somewhere. Her mother was colored and her father white, the white +parentage being very evident in her color and features and hair. She is +very reticent about the facts of her birth. The subject had to be +approached from many angles and in many ways and by two different +persons before that part of the story could be gotten.</p> + +<p>Although she was born in Missouri, she was "refugeed" first to +Mississippi and then here, Arkansas. She is convinced that her mother +was sold at least twice after freedom,—once into Mississippi, one into +Helena, and probably once more after reaching Arkansas, Mary herself +being still a very small child.</p> + +<p>I think she is mistaken on this point. I did not debate with her but I +cross-examined her carefully and it appears to me that there was +probably in her mother's mind a confused knowledge of the issuance of +the Emancipation Proclamation in 1862. Lincoln's Compensation +Emancipation plan advocated in March 1863, the Abolition in the District +of Columbia in 1862 in April, the announcement of Lincoln's Emancipation +intention in July 1862, the prohibition of slavery in present and future +territories, June 19, 1862, together with the actual issuance of the +Emancipation in September 1862, and the effectiveness of the +proclamation in January 1, 1863, would well give rise to an impression +among many slaves that emancipation had been completed.</p> + +<p>As a matter of fact, Missouri did not secede; the Civil War which +nevertheless ensued would find some slaveholders exposed to the full +force of the 1862 proclamation in 1863 at the time of its first +effectiveness. Naturally it did not become effective in many other +places till 1865. It would very naturally happen then that a sale in +Missouri in the latter part of 1862 or any time thereafter might be well +construed by ex-slaves as a sale after emancipation, especially since +they do not as a rule pay as much attention to the dates of occurrences +as to their sequence. This interpretation accords with the story. Only +such an explanation could make probable a narrative which places the +subject as a newborn babe in 1860 and sold after slavery had ceased +while still too young to remember. Her earliest recollections are +recollections of Arkansas.</p> + +<p>She has lived in Arkansas ever since the Civil War and in Little Rock +ever since 1879. She made a living as a seamstress for awhile but is now +unable to sew because of fading eyesight. She married in 1879 and led a +long and contented married life until the recent death of her husband. +She lives with her husband's nephew and ekes out a living by fragmentary +jobs. She has a good memory and a clear mind for her age.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Slave After Freedom</b></p> + +<p>"My mother was sold after freedom. It was the young folks did all that +devilment. They found they could get some money out of her and they did +it. She was put on the block in St. Louis and sold down into Vicksburg, +Mississippi. Then they sold her into Helena, Arkansas. After that they +carried her down into Trenton (?), Arkansas. I don't know whether they +sold her that time or not, but I reckon they did. Leastways, they +carried her down there. All this was done after freedom. My mother was +only fifteen years old when she was sold the first time, and I was a +baby in her arms. I don't know nothing about it myself, but I have heard +her tell about it many and many a time. It was after freedom. Of course, +she didn't know she was free.</p> + +<p>"It was a good while before my mother realized she was free. She noticed +the other colored people going to and fro and she wondered about it. +They didn't allow you to go round in slave times. She asked them about +it and they told her, 'Don't you know you are free?' Some of the white +people too told her that she was free. After that, from the way she +talked, I guess she stayed around there until she could go some place +and get wages for her work. She was a good cook.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Mean Mistress</b></p> + +<p>"I have seen many a scar on my mother. She had mean white folks. She had +one big scar on the side of her head. The hair never did grow back on +that place. She used to comb her hair over it so that it wouldn't show. +The way she got it was this:</p> + +<p>"One day her mistress went to high mass and left a lot of work for my +mother to do. She was only a girl and it was too much. There was more +work than she could get done. She had too big a task for a child to get +done. When her old mistress came back and her work was not all done, she +beat my mother down to the ground, and then she took one of the skillets +and bust her over the head with it—trying to kill her, I reckon. I have +seen the scar with my own eyes. It was an awful thing.</p> + +<p>"My mother was a house servant in Missouri and Mississippi. Never done +no hard work till she came here (Arkansas). When they brought her here +they tried to make a field hand out of her. She hadn't been used to +chopping cotton. When she didn't chop it fast as the others did, they +would beat her. She didn't know nothing about no farmwork. She had all +kinds of trouble. They just didn't treat her good. She used to have good +times in Missouri and Mississippi but not in Arkansas. They just didn't +treat her good. In them days, they'd whip anybody. They'd tie you to the +bed or have somebody hold you down on the floor and whip you till the +blood ran.</p> + +<p>"But, Lawd, my mother never had no use for Catholics because it was a +Catholic that hit her over the head with that skillet—right after she +come from mass.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Food</b></p> + +<p>"My mother said that they used to pour the food into troughs and give it +to the slaves. They'd give them an old, wooden spoon or something and +they all eat out of the same dish or trough. They wouldn't let the +slaves eat out of the things they et out of. Fed them just like they +would hogs.</p> + +<p>"When I was little, she used to come to feed me about twelve o'clock +every day. She hurry in, give me a little bowl of something, and then +hurry right on out because she had to go right back to her work. She +didn't have time to stay and see how I et. If I had enough, it was all +right. If I didn't have enough, it was all right. It might be pot liquor +or it might be just anything.</p> + +<p>"One day she left me alone and I was lying on the floor in front of the +fireplace asleep. I didn't have no bed nor nothing then. The fire must +have popped out and set me on fire. You see they done a whole lot of +weaving in them days. And they put some sort of lint on the children.</p> + +<p>"I don't reckon children them days knowed what a biscuit was. They just +raked up whatever was left off the table and brung it to you. Children +have a good time nowadays.</p> + +<p>"People goin' to work heard me hollering and came in and put out the +fire. I got scars all round my waist today I could show you.</p> + +<p>"Another time my mother had to go off and leave me. I was older then. I +guess I must have gotten hungry and wanted to get somethin' to eat. So I +got up and wandered off into the woods. There weren't many people living +round there then. (This was in Trenton (?), Arkansas, a small place not +far from Helena.) And the place was [HW: not] built up much then and they +had lots of wolves. Wolves make a lot of noise when they get to trailin' +anything. I got about a half mile from the road and the wolves got after +me. I guess they would have eat me up but a man heard them howling, and +he knew there wasn't no house around there but ours, and he came to see +what was up, and he beat off the wolves and carried me back home. There +wasn't nare another house round there but ours and he knew I must have +come from there.</p> + +<p>"Mother was working then. It was night though. They brung the news to +her and they wouldn't let her come to me. Mother said she felt like +getting a gun and killin' them. Her child out like that and they +wouldn't let her go home.</p> + +<p>"That must have happened after freedom, because it was the last mistress +she had. Almost all her beatings and trouble came from her last +mistress. That woman sure gave her a lot of trouble.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Age, Good Masters</b></p> + +<p>"All I know about my age is what my mother told me.</p> + +<p>"The first people that raised my mother had her age in the Bible. She +said she was about fifteen years old when I was born. From what she told +me, I must be about seventy-eight years old. She taught me that I was +born on Sunday, on the thirtieth of January, in the year before the War.</p> + +<p>"My mother's name was Myles. I don't know what her first master's name +was. She told me I was born in Phelps County, Missouri; I guess you'd +call it St. Louis now. I am giving you the straight truth just as she +gave it to me.</p> + +<p>"From the way she talked, the people what raised her from a child were +good to her. They raised her with their children. Them people fed her +just like they fed their own children.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Color and Birth</b></p> + +<p>"There was a light brownskin boy around there and they give him anything +that he wanted. But they didn't like my mother and me—on account of my +color. They would talk about it. They tell their children that when I +got big enough, I would think I was good as they was. I couldn't help my +color. My mother couldn't either.</p> + +<p>"My mother's mistress had three boys, one twenty-one, one nineteen, and +one seventeen. Old mistress had gone away to spend the day one day. +Mother always worked in the house. She didn't work on the farm in +Missouri. While she was alone, the boys came in and threw her down on +the floor and tied her down so she couldn't struggle, and one after the +other used her as long as they wanted for the whole afternoon. Mother +was sick when her mistress came home. When old mistress wanted to know +what was the matter with her, she told her what the boys had done. She +whipped them and that's the way I came to be here.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Sales and Separations</b></p> + +<p>"My mother was separated from her mother when she was three years old. +They sold my mother away from my grandmother. She don't know nothing +about her people. She never did see her mother's folks. She heard from +them. It must have been after freedom. But she never did get no full +understanding about them. Some of them was in Kansas City, Kansas. My +grandmother, I don't know what became of her.</p> + +<p>"When my mother was sold into St. Louis, they would have sold me away +from her but she cried and went on so that they bought me too. I don't +know nothing about it myself, but my mother told me. I was just nine +months old then. They would call it refugeeing. These people that had +raised her wanted to get something out of her because they found out +that the colored people was going to be free. Those white people in +Missouri didn't have many slaves. They just had four slaves—my mother, +myself, another woman and an old colored man called Uncle Joe. They +didn't get to sell him because he bought hisself. He made a little money +working on people with rheumatism. They would ran the niggers from state +to state about that time to keep them from getting free and to get +something out of them. My mother was sold into Mississippi after +freedom. Then she was refugeed from one place to another through Helena +to Trenton (?), Arkansas.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Marriages</b></p> + +<p>"My mother used to laugh at that. The master would do all the marryin'. +I have heard her say that many a time. They would call themselves +jumpin' the broom. I don't know what they did. Whatever the master said +put them together. I don't know just how it was fixed up, but they helt +the broom and master would say, 'I pronounce you man and wife' or +something like that.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Ku Klux</b></p> + +<p>"My mother talked about the Ku Klux but I don't know much about them. +She talked about how they would ride and how they would go in and +destroy different people's things. Go in the smoke house and eat the +people's stuff. She said that they didn't give the colored people much +trouble. Sometimes they would give them something to eat.</p> + +<p>"When they went to a place where they didn't give the colored people +much to eat, what they didn't destroy they would say, 'Go get it.' I +don't know how it was but the Ku Klux didn't have much use for certain +white people and they would destroy everything they had.</p> + +<p>"I have lived in Arkansas about all my life. I have been in Little Rock +ever since January 30, 1879. I don't know how I happened to move on my +birthday. My husband brought me here for my rheumatism.</p> + +<p>"I married in 1879 and moved here from Marianna. I had lived in Helena +before Marianna.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Voting</b></p> + +<p>"The niggers voted in Marianna and in Helena. They voted in Little Rock +too. I didn't know any of them. It seems like some of the people didn't +make so much talk about it. They did, I guess, though. Many of the +farmers would tell their hands who they wanted them to vote for, and +they would do it.</p> + +<p>"Them was critical times. A man would kill you if he got beat. They +would say, 'So and so lost the lection,' and then somebody would go to +Judgment. I remember once they had a big barbecue in Helena just after +the 'lection. They had it for the white and for the colored alike. We +didn't know there was any trouble. The shooting started on a hill where +everybody could see. First thing you know, one man fell dead. Another +dropped down on all fours bleeding, but he retch in under him and +dragged out a pistol and shot down the man that shot him. That was a sad +time. Niggers and white folks were all mixed up together and shooting. +It was the first time I had ever been out. My mother never would let me +go out before that.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Seamstress</b></p> + +<p>"I ain't able to do much of anything now. I used to make a good living +as a dressmaker. I can't sew now because of my eyes. I used to make many +a dollar before my eyes got to failing me. Make pants, dresses, +anything. When you get old, you fail in what you been doing. I don't get +anything from the government. They don't give me any kind of help."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PetersonJohn"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: John Peterson, 1810 Eureka Street,<br> + Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 80</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was small but I can remember some 'bout slavery days. I was born down +here in Louisiana.</p> + +<p>"I seed dem Yankees come through. Dey stopped dere and broke up all de +bee gums. Just tore 'em up. And took what dey could eat and went on. Dey +was doin' all dey <u>could</u> do. No tellin' what dey <u>didn't</u> do. +People what owned de place just run off and left. Yankees come dere in +de night. I 'member dat. Had ever'thing excited, so my white folks just +skipped out. Oh, yes, dey come back after the Yankees had gwine on.</p> + +<p>"You could hear dem guns shootin' around. I heered my mother and father +say de Yankees was fightin' to free slavery.</p> + +<p>"Run off? Oh Lawd, yes ma'am, I heered 'em say dey was plenty of 'em run +off.</p> + +<p>"George Swapsy was our owner. I know one thing, dey beat me enough. Had +me watchin' de garden to keep de chickens out. And sometimes I'd git to +playin' and fergit and de chickens would git in de garden, and I'd pay +for it too. I can 'member dat. Yes'm, dat was before freedom. Dey was +whippin' all de colored people—and me too.</p> + +<p>"Yes'm, dey give us plenty to eat, but dey didn't give us no clothes. I +was naked half my time. Dat was when I was a little fellow.</p> + +<p>"We all belonged to de same man. Dey never did 'part us. But my mother +was sold away from her people—and my father, too. He come from +Virginia.</p> + +<p>"No ma'am, dey didn't have a big plantation—just a little place +cleared up in the woods.</p> + +<p>"He didn't have no wife—just two grown sons and dey bof went to the +war.</p> + +<p>"Mars George died 'fore peace declared. He was a old fellow—and mean as +he could be.</p> + +<p>"I never went to school till I was sixteen or seventeen years old. Dere +was a colored fellow had a little learnin' and we hired him two nights +in de week for three dollars a month. Did it for three years. I can read +a little and write my own name and sort of 'tend to my own business.</p> + +<p>"Yes'm, I used to vote after I got grown. Yes'm, I did vote Republican. +But de white people stopped us from votin'. Dat was when Seymour and +Blair was runnin', and I ain't voted none since—I just quit. I've known +white people to go to the polls wif der guns and keep de colored folks +from votin'.</p> + +<p>"Oh, dey was plenty of Ku Klux. I've known 'em to ketch people and whip +'em and kill 'em. Dey didn't bother me—I didn't give 'em a chance. Ku +Klux—I sure 'member dem.</p> + +<p>"Younger generation? Well, Miss, you're a little too hard for me. Hard +to tell what'll become of 'em. I know one thing—dey is wiser. Oh, my +Lawd! A chile a year old know more'n I did when I was ten. We didn't +have no chance. Didn't have nobody to learn us nothin'. People is just +gittin' wuss ever' day. Killin' 'em up ever' day. Wuss now than dey was +ten years ago."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PettisLouise"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Louise Pettis, Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 59</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My mama was born at Aiken, South Carolina. She was Frances Rotan. I was +born at Elba, South Carolina, forty miles below Augusta, Georgia. My +papa was born at Macon, Georgia. Both my parents was slaves. He farmed +and was a Baptist preacher. Mama was a cook.</p> + +<p>"Mama was owned by some of the Willis. There was three; Mike, Bill, and +Logie Willis, all brothers, and she lived with them all but who owned +her I don't know. She never was sold. Papa wasn't either. Mama lived at +Aiken till papa married her. She belong to some of the Willis. They +married after freedom. She had three husbands and fifteen children.</p> + +<p>"Mama had a soldier husband. He took her to James Island. She runned off +from him. Got back across the sea to Charleston to Aunt Anette's. She +was mama's sister. Mama sent back to Aiken and they got her back to her +folks. Aunt Anette had been sold to folks at Charleston.</p> + +<p>"Grandma was Rachel Willis. She suckled some of the Willis children. +Mama suckled me and Mike Willis together. His mama got sick and my mama +took him and raised him. She got well but their names have left me. When +we got sick the Willis women would send a hamper basket full of +provisions, some cooked and some to be cooked. I used to sweep their +yards. They was white sand and not a sprig of grass nor a weed in there.</p> + +<p>"Mama and papa was both slavery niggers and they spoke mighty well of +their owners.</p> + +<p>"Papa said in slavery times about two nights in a week they would have +a dance. He would slip off and go. Sometimes he would get a pass. He was +a figger caller till he 'fessed religion. One time the pattyrollers come +in. They said, 'All got passes tonight.' When they had about danced down +my daddy got a shovelful of live coals and run about scattering it on +the floor. All the niggers run out and he was gone too. It was a dark +night. A crowd went up the road and here come the pattyrollers. One run +into grapevines across the road and tumbled off his horse. The niggers +took to the woods then. Pa tole us about how he studied up a way to get +himself and several others outer showing their passes that night. Master +never found that out on him.</p> + +<p>"During the War they sent a lot of the meat to feed the soldiers on and +kept the skins and sides. They tole them if the Yankees ask them if they +had enough to eat say, 'See how greasy and slick I is.' They greased +their legs and arms to make them shine and look fat. The dust made the +chaps look rusty.</p> + +<p>"Papa saved his young mistress' life. His master was gone to war. He had +promised with others to take care of her. The Yankees come and didn't +find meat. It was buried. They couldn't find much. They got mad and +burned the house. Pa was a boy. He run up there and begged folks not to +burn the house; they promised to take care of everything. Papa begged to +let him get his mistress and three-day-old baby. They cursed him but he +run in and got her and the baby. The house fell in before they got out +of the yard. He took her to the quarters. Papa was overstrained carrying +a log and limped as long as he lived.</p> + +<p>"Pa was hired out and they was goner whoop him and he run off and got +back to the master. Ma nor pa was never sold.</p> + +<p>"We had a reason to come out here to Arkansas. A woman had a white +husband and a black one too. The black husband told the white husband +not come about there no more. He come on. The black man killed the white +man at his door. They lynched six or seven niggers. They sure did kill +him. That dissatisfied all the niggers. That took place in Barnwell +County, South Carolina. Three train loads of us left. There was fifteen +in our family. We was doing well. My pa had cattle and money. They +stopped the train befo' and behind us—the train we was on. Put the +Arkansas white man in Augusta jail. They stopped us all there. We got to +come on. We was headed for Pine Bluff. We got down there 'bout Altheimer +and they was living in tents. Pa said he wasn't goiner tent, he didn't +run away from South Carolina and he'd go straight back. Mr. Aydelott got +eight families on track at Rob Roy to come to Biscoe. We got a house +here. Pa was old and they would listen at what he said. He made a speech +at Rob Roy and told them let's come to Biscoe. Eleven families come. He +had two hundred or three hundred dollars then in his pocket to rattle. +He could get more. He grieved for South Carolina, so he went back and +took us but ma wanted to coma back. They stayed back there a year or +two. We made a crop. Pa was the oldest boss in his crowd. We all come +back. There was more room out here and so many of us.</p> + +<p>"The schools was better out there. I went to Miss Scofield's College. +All the teachers but three was colored. There was eight or ten colored +teachers. It was at Aiken, South Carolina. Miss Criley was our sewing +mistress. Miss Criley was white and Miss Scofield was too. I didn't have +to pay. Rich folks in the North run the school. No white children went +there. I think the teachers was sent there.</p> + +<p>"I taught school out here at Blackton and Moro and in Prairie County +about. I got tired of it. I married and settled down.</p> + +<p>"We owns my home here. My husband was a railroad man. We lives by the +hardest.</p> + +<p>"I don't know what becoming of the young generation. They shuns the +field work. Times is faster than I ever seen them. I liked the way times +was before that last war (World War). Reckon when will they get back +like that?"</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PettusHenryC"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Henry C. Pettus, Marianna, Arkansas<br> +Age: 80</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Wilkes County, near Washington, Georgia. My mother's +owners was Dr. Palmer and Sarah Palmer. They had three boys; Steve, +George, and Johnie. They lived in Washington and the farm I lived on was +five miles southeast of town. It was fifty miles from Augusta, Georgia. +He had another farm on the Augusta Road. He had a white man overseer. +His name was Tom Newsom and his nephew, Jimmie Newsom, helped. He was +pretty smooth most of the time. He got rough sometimes. Tom's wife was +named Susie Newsom.</p> + +<p>"Dick Gilbert had a place over back of ours. They sent things to the +still at Dick Gilbert's. Sent peaches and apples and surplus corn. The +still was across the hill from Dr. Palmer's farm. He didn't seem to +drink much but the boys did. All three did. Dr. Palmer died in 1861. +People kept brandy and whiskey in a closet and some had fancy bottles +they kept, one brandy, one whiskey, on their mantel. Some owners passed +drinks around like on Sunday morning. Dr. Palmer didn't do that but it +was done on some places before the Civil War. It wasn't against the law +to make spirits for their own use. That is the way it was made. Meal and +flour was made the same way then.</p> + +<p>"Mother lived in Dr. Palmer's office in Warren County. It was a very +nice log house and had a fence to make the front on the road and the +back enclosed like. Inside the fence was a tanyard and house at some +distance and a very nice log house where Mr. Hudson lived. Dr. Palmer +and Mr. Hudson had that place together. The shoemaker lived in +Washington in Dr. Palmer's back yard. He had his office and home all in +the same. Mr. Anthony made all the shoes for Dr. Palmer's slaves and for +white folks in town. He made fine nice shoes. He was considered a high +class shoemaker.</p> + +<p>"Mother was a field hand. She wasn't real black. My father never did do +much. He was a sort of a foreman. He rode around. He was lighter than I +am. He was old man Pettus' son. Old man Pettus had a great big +farm—land! land! land! Wiley and Milton Roberts had farms between Dr. +Palmer and old man Pettus' farm. Mother originally belong to old man +Pettus. He give Miss Sarah Palmer her place on the Augusta Road and his +son the place on which his own home was. They was his white children. He +had two. Mother was hired by her young mistress, Dr. Palmer's wife, Miss +Sarah. Father rode around, upheld by the old man Pettus. He never worked +hard. I don't know if old man Pettus raised grandma or not; he never +grandpa. He was a Terral. He died when I was small. Grandpa was a field +hand. He was the only colored man on the place allowed to have a dog. He +was Dr. Palmer's stock man. They raised their own stock; sheep, goats, +cows, hogs, mules, and horses.</p> + +<p>"None of us was ever sold that I know of. Mother had three boys and +three girls. One sister died in infancy. One sister was married and +remained in Georgia. Two of my brothers and one sister come to Arkansas. +Mother brought us boys to a new country. Father got shot and died from +the womb. He was a captain in the war. He was shot accidentally. Some of +them was drinking and pranking with the guns. We lived on at Dr. +Palmer's place till 1866. That was our first year in Arkansas. That was +nearly two years. We never was abused. My early life was very favorable.</p> + +<p>"The quarters was houses built on each side of the road. Some set off +in the field. They must have had stock law. We had pastures. The houses +was joining the pasture. Mr. Pope had a sawmill on his place. The saw +run perpendicularly up and down. He had a grist mill there too. I like +to go to mill. It was dangerous for young boys. Mr. Pope's farm joined +us on one side. Oxen was used as team for heavy loads. Such a contrast +in less than a century as trucks are in use now. I learned about oxen. +They didn't go fast 'ceptin' when they ran away. They would run at the +sight of water in hot weather. They was dangerous if they saw the river +and had to go down a steep bank, load or no load the way they went. If +it was shallow they would wade but if it was deep they would swim unless +the load was heavy enough to pull them down. Oxen was interesting to me +always.</p> + +<p>"Children didn't stay in town like they do now. They was left to think +more for themselves. They hardly ever got to go to town.</p> + +<p>"We raised a pet pig. Nearly every year we raised a pet pig. When mother +would be out that pig would get my supper in spite of all I could do. +The pig was nearly as large as I was. I couldn't do anything. We had a +watermelon patch and sometimes sold Dr. Palmer melons. He let us have a +melon patch and a cotton patch our own to work. Mother worked in +moonlight and at odd times. They give that to her extra. We helped her +work it. They give old people potato patches and let the children have +goober rows. Land was plentiful. Dr. Palmer wasn't stingy with his +slaves—very liberal. He was a man willing to live and let live so far +as I can know of him.</p> + +<p>"During the Civil War things was quiet like where I was. The soldiers +didn't come through till after the war was over. Then the Union soldiers +took Washington. They come there after the surrender.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Freedom</b></p> + +<p>"The Union soldiers came in a gang out from Washington all over the +surrounding country, scouting about, and notified all the black folks of +freedom. My folks made arrangements to stay on. Two colored men went +through the country getting folks to move to southwest Georgia but +before mother decided to move anywhere along come two men and they had a +helper, Mr. Allen. It was Mr. William H. Wood and Mr. Peters over here +on Cat Island. They worked from Washington, Georgia. We consented to +leave and come to Arkansas. We started and went to Barnetts station to +Augusta, to Atlanta. There was so many tracks out of order, bridges been +burnt. We crossed the river at Chattanooga, then to Nashville, then to +Johnsonville. We took a boat to Cairo, then to Memphis, then on to some +landing out here. Well, I never heard. We went to the Woods' place and +made a crop here in Arkansas in 1866. I worked with John I. Foreman till +1870 and went back to the Woods' farm till 1880. Then I went to the Bush +place (now McCullough farm). I farmed all along through life till the +last twelve years. I started preaching in 1875. I preach yet +occasionally. I preached here thirty-six years in the Marianna Baptist +church. I quit last year. My health broke down.</p> + +<p>"Chills was my worst worry in these swamps. We made fine crops. In 1875 +yellow fever come on. Black folks didn't have yellow fever at first but +they later come to have it. Some died of it. White folks had died in +piles. It was hard times for some reason then. It was hard to get +something to eat. We couldn't get nothing from Memphis. Arrangements was +made to get supplies from St. Louis to Little Rock and we could go get +them and send boats out here.</p> + +<p>"In 1875 was the tightest, hardest time in all my life, A chew of +tobacco cost ten cents. In 1894-'95 hard times struck me again. Cotton +was four and five cents a pound, flour three dollars a barrel, and meat +four and five cents a pound. We raised so much of our meat that didn't +make much difference. Money was so scarce.</p> + +<p>"Ku Klux—I never was in the midst of them. They was pretty bad in +Georgia and in northeast part of this county. They was bad so I heard. +They sent for troops at Helena to settle things up at about Marion, +Arkansas now. I heard more of the Ku Klux in Georgia than I heard after +we come here. And as time went on and law was organized the Ku Klux +disbanded everywhere.</p> + +<p>"Traveling conditions was bad when we came to Arkansas. We rode in box +cars, shabby passenger coaches. The boats was the best riding. As I told +you we went way around on account of burnt out and torn up bridges. The +South looked shabby.</p> + +<p>"I haven't voted since 1927 except I voted in favor of the Cotton +Control Saturday before last.</p> + +<p>"Times has come up to a most deplorable condition. Craving exists. +Ungratefulness. People want more than they can make. Some don't work +hard and some won't work at all. I don't know how to improve conditions +except by work except economical living. Some would work if they could. +Some can work but won't. Some do work hard. I believe in bread by the +sweat of the brow, and all work.</p> + +<p>"The slaves didn't expect anything. They didn't expect war. It was going +on a while before my parents heard of it. I was a little boy. They +didn't know what it was for except their freedom. They didn't know what +freedom was. They couldn't read. They never seen a newspaper like I take +the Commercial Appeal now. I went to school a little in Arkansas. My +father being old man Pettus' son as he was may have been given something +by Miss Sarah or Dr. Palmer or by his white son, but the old man was +dead and I doubt that. Father was killed and mother left. Mother knew +she had a home on Dr. Palmer's land as long as she needed one but she +left to do better. In some ways we have done better but it was hard to +live in these bottoms. It is a fine country now.</p> + +<p>"I own eighty acres of land and this house. (Good house and furnished +well.) We made six bales of cotton last year. My son lives here and his +wife—a Chicago reared mulatto, a cook. He runs my farm. I live very +well."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PhillipsDolly"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Dolly Phillips, Clarendon, Arkansas<br> +Age: 67</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I ain't no ex-slave. I am 67 years old. I was born out here on the +Mullins place. My mother's master was Mr. Ricks and Miss Emma Ricks.</p> + +<p>"My mother named Diana and my father Henry Mullins. I never saw my grand +fathers and I seen one grandma I remembers. My mother had ten children. +My father said he never owned nuthin' in his life but six horses. When +they was freed they got off to their selves and started farming. See +they belong to different folks. My father's master was a captain of a +mixed regiment. They was in the war four years. I heard 'em say they +went to Galveston, Texas. The Yankees was after 'em. But I don't know +how it was.</p> + +<p>"I heard 'em say they put their heads under big black pot to pray. They +say sing easy, pray easy. I forgot whut all she say.</p> + +<p>"I lives wid my daughter. I gets commodities from the Welfare some. The +young folks drinks a heap now. It look lack a waste of money to me."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PiggyTony"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person Interviewed: Tony Piggy<br> + Brinkley, Ark.<br> +Age: 75</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born near Selma, Alabama, but I was raised in Mississippi. My +grandpa was sold from South Carolina to Moster Alexander Piggy. He +didn't talk plain but my papa didn't nother. Moster Piggy bought a gang +of black folks in South Carolina and brought em into the state of +Alabama. My papa was mighty near full-blood African, I'll tell you. Now +ma was mixed.</p> + +<p>"I'm most too young to recollect the war. Right after the war we had +small pox. My uncle died and there was seven children had em at one +time. The bushwhackers come in and kicked us around—kicked my uncle +around. We lived at Union Town, Alabama then.</p> + +<p>"Aunt Connie used to whip us. Mama had no time; she was a chambermaid +(housewoman). The only thing I recollect bout slavery time to tell is +Old Mistress pour out a bushell of penders (peanuts) on the grass to see +us pick em up and set out eating em. When they went to town they would +bring back things like cheese good to eat. We got some of what they had +most generally. She wasn't so good; she whoop me with a cow whip. She'd +make pull candy for us too. I got a right smart of raisin' in a way but +I growed up to be a wild young man. I been converted since then.</p> + +<p>"Well, one day pa come to our house and told mama, 'We free, don't have +to go to the house no more, git ready, we all goin' to Mississippi. +Moster Piggy goiner go. He goner rent us twenty acres and we goner take +two cows and a mule.' We was all happy to be free and goin' off +somewhere. Moster Piggy bought land in Mississippi and put families +renters on it. Moster Piggy was rough on the grown folks but good to the +children. The work didn't let up. We railly had more clearin' and fences +to make. His place in Alabama was pore and that was new ground.</p> + +<p>"There was all toll nine children in my family. Ma was named Matty +Piggy. Papa was named Ezra Piggy. Moster Alexander Piggy's wife named +Harriett. I knowed Ed, Charley, Bowls, Ells, and Liza. That's all I ever +knowd.</p> + +<p>"I have done so many things. I run on a steamboat from Cairo to New +Orleans—Kate Adams and May F. Carter. They called me a Rouster—that +means a working man. I run on a boat from Newport to Memphis. Then I +farmed, done track work on the railroad, and farmed some more.</p> + +<p>"The young generation ain't got respect for old people and they tryin' +to live without work. I ain't got no fault to find with the times if I +was bout forty years younger than I is now I could work right ahead."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PittmanElla"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Ella Pittman<br> + 2409 West Eleventh Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 84</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes ma'm, I was born in slavery days. I tell you I never had no name. +My old master named me—Just called me 'Puss? and said I could name +myself when I got big enough.</p> + +<p>"My old master was named Mac Williams. But where I got free at was at +Stricklands. Mac Williams' daughter married a Strickland and she drawed +me. She was tollable good to me but her husband wa'nt.</p> + +<p>"In slavery times I cleaned up the house and worked in the house. I +worked in the field a little but she kept me busy in the house. I was +busy night and day.</p> + +<p>"No ma'm, I never did go to school—never did go to school.</p> + +<p>"After I got grown I worked in the farm. When I wasn't farmin' I was +doin' other kinds of work. I used to cut and sew and knit and crochet. I +stayed around the white folks so much they learned me to do all kinds of +work. I never did buy my children any stockins—I knit 'em myself.</p> + +<p>"After old Master died old Miss hired us out to Ben Deans, but he was so +cruel mama run away and went back to old Miss. I know we stayed at Ben +Deans till they was layin the crop by and I think he whipped mama that +morning so she run away.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'm, I sho do member bout the Klu Klux—sho do. They looked +dreadful—nearly scare you to death. The Klu Klux was bad, and the +paddyrollers too.</p> + +<p>"I can't think of nothin' much to tell you now but I know all about +slavery. They used to build 'little hell', made something like a +barbecue pit and when the niggers didn't do like they wanted they'd lay +him over that 'little hell'.</p> + +<p>"I've done ever kind of work—maulin rails, clearin up new ground. They +was just one kind of work I didn't do and that was workin' with a +grubbin' hoe. I tell you I just worked myself to death till now I ain't +able to do nothin'."</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Interviewer's Comment</b></p> + +<p>Ella Pittman's son, Almira Pittman was present when I interviewed his +mother. He was born in 1884. He added this information to what Ella told +me:</p> + +<p>"She is the mother of nine children—three living. I use to hear mama +tell about how they did in slavery times. If she could hear good now she +could map it out to you."</p> + +<p>I asked him why he didn't teach his mother to read and write and he +said, "Well, I tell you, mama is high strung. She didn't have no real +name till she went to Louisiana."</p> + +<p>These people live in a well-furnished home. The living room had a rug, +overstuffed furniture and an organ. Ella was clean.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PittmanElla2"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Ella Pittman<br> + 2417 W. Eleventh Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 84</h3> +<p>[TR: Appears to be same as last informant despite different address.]</p> +<br> + +<p>"Here's one that lived then. I can remember fore the Civil War started. +That was in the State of North Carolina where I was bred and born in +March 1853. Mac Williams, he was my first owner and John Strickland was +my last owner. That was durin' of the war. My white folks told me I was +thirteen when peace was declared. They told me in April if I make no +mistake. That was in North Carolina. I grewed up there and found my +childun there. That is—seven of them. And then I found two since I been +down in here. I been in Arkansas about forty years.</p> + +<p>"When the war come I heard em say they was after freein' the people.</p> + +<p>"My mother worked in the field and old mistress kep' me in the house. +She married a widow-man and he had four childun and then she had one so +there was plenty for me to do. Yes ma'm!</p> + +<p>"I ain't never been to school a day in my life. They didn't try to send +me after freedom. I had a very, very bad, cruel stepfather and he sent +all his childun to school but wouldn't send me. I stayed there till I +was grown. I sho did. Then I married. Been married just once. Never had +but that one man in my life. He was a very good man, too. Cose he was a +poor man but he was good to me.</p> + +<p>"Yes ma'm, I sho did see the Ku Klux and the paddyrollers, too. They +done em bad I tell you.</p> + +<p>"I know they was a white man they called Old Man Ford. He dug a pit +just like a barbecue pit, and he would burn coals just like you was +goin' to barbecue. Then he put sticks across the top and when any of his +niggers didn't do right, he laid em across that pit. I member they +called it Old Ford's Hell.</p> + +<p>"I had a bad time fore freedom and a bad time after freedom till after I +married. I'm doin' tollably well now. I lives with my son and his wife +and she treats me very well. I can't live alone cause I'se subject to +inagestin' and I takes sick right sudden.</p> + +<p>"I'm just as thankful as I can be that I'm gettin' along as well as I +is.</p> + +<p>"I stayed in the North in Detroit one year. I liked it very well. I +liked the white people very well. They was so sociable. My son lives +there and works for Henry Ford. My oldest son stays in Indiana.</p> + +<p>"It was so cold I come back down here. I'se gettin' old and I needs to +be warm. Good-bye."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PittmanSarah"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor<br> +Person interviewed: Sarah Pittman<br> + 1320 W. Twentieth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas<br> +Age: About 82</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I never saw nothing between white folks and colored folks. My white +folks were good to us. My daddy's white folks were named Jordan—Jim +Jordan—and my mama's folks were Jim Underwood. And they were good. My +mama's and father's folks both were good to the colored folks. As the +song goes, 'I can tell it everywhere I go.' And thank the Lord, I'm here +to tell it too. I raised children, grandchildren, and +great-grandchildren you see there. That is my great-grandson playing +there. He is having the time of his life. I raised him right too. You +see how good he minds me. He better not do nothin' different. He's about +two years old.</p> + +<p>"I was born in Union Parish, Louisiana way up yonder in them hills, me +and my folks, and they come down here.</p> + +<p>"Jim Jordan married one of the Taylor girls—Jim Taylor's daughter. The +old folks gave mama to them to do their housework. My father and mama +didn't belong to the same masters. He died the first year of the +surrender. He was a wonderful man. He was a Jackson. On Saturday night +he would stay with us till Sunday. On Sunday night he would go home. He +would play with us. Now he and mama both are dead. They are gone home +and I am waiting to go. They're waiting for me in the kingdom there. As +the song says, 'I am waiting on the promises of God.'</p> + +<p>"My mama did housework in slave time. I don't know what my father did. +In them days you done some working from plantation to plantation. Them +folks is all gone in now near about. Guess mine will be the next time.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Early Childhood</b></p> + +<p>"First thing I remember is staying at the house. We et at the white +folks' house. We would go there in the evening before sundown and git +our supper. One time Jim Underwood made me mad. Mama said something he +didn't like. And he tied her thumbs together and tied them to a limb. +Her feet could touch the ground—they weren't off the ground. He said +she could stay there till she thought better of it.</p> + +<p>"Before the surrender I didn't do nothing in the line of work 'cept +'tend to my mother's children. I didn't do no work at all 'cept that. My +white folks were good to me. All my folks 'cept me are gone. My grandmas +and uncles and things all settin' up yonder. All my children what is +dead, they're up yonder. I ain't got but three living, and they're on +their way. Minnie and Mamie and Annie, that is all I got. Mamie's the +youngest and she's got grandchildren.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>How Freedom Came</b></p> + +<p>"The way we learned that freedom had come, my uncle come to the fence +and told my mama we were free and I went with her. Sure he'd been to the +War. He come back with his budget. Don't you know what a budget is? You +ain't never been to war, have you? Well, you oughter know what a budget +is. That's a knapsack. It had a pocket on each side and a water can on +each shoulder. He come home with his budget on his back, and he come to +the fence and told mama we was free and I heered him.</p> +<br> + +<p><b>Right After Freedom</b></p> + +<p>"Right after freedom my mama and them stayed with the same people they +had been with. The rest of the people scattered wherever they wanted to +But my uncle come there and got mama. They moved back to the Taylors +then where my grandma was. Wouldn't care if I had some of that good old +spring water now where my grandma lived!</p> + +<p>"None of my people were ever bothered by the pateroles or the Ku Klux.</p> + +<p>"We come to Arkansas because we had kinfolks down here. Just picked up +and come on. I been here a long time. I don't know how long, I don't +keep up with nothing like that. When my husband was living I just +followed him. He said that this was a good place and we could make a +good living. So I just come on. When he died, those gravediggers dug his +grave deep enough to put another man on top of him. But that don't hurt +him none. He's settin' in the kingdom. He was a deacon in the church and +his word went. The whole plantation would listen to him and do what he +said. Everybody respected him because he was right. I was just married +once and no man can take his place. He was the first one and the best +one and the last one. He was heaven bound and he went on there. I don't +know just how long I was married. It is in the Bible. It is in there in +big letters. I can't get that right now. It's so big and heavy. But it's +in there. I think we left it in Detroit when I was there, and it ain't +come back here yet. But I know we lived together a long time.</p> + +<p>"I remember the old slave-time songs but I can't think of them just now. +'Come to Jesus' is one of them. 'Where shall I be when the first trumpet +sounds?', that's another one. Another one is: 'If I could, I surely +would; Set on the rock where Moses stood—first verse or stanza. All of +my sins been taken away, taken away—chorus. Mary wept and Martha +moaned, Mary's gone to a world unknown—second verse or stanza. All of +my sins are taken away, taken away—chorus."</p> + +<p>"I don't think nothing 'bout these young folks. When they was turned +loose a lot of them went wild and the young folks followed their +leaders. But mine followed me and my daddy.</p> + +<p>"My grandmother had a big old bay horse and she was midwife for the +white and the colored folks. She would put her side saddle on the old +horse and get up and go, bless her heart; and me and my cousin had to +stay there and take care of things. She's gone now. The Lord left me +here for some reason. And I'm enjoyin' it too. I have got my first +cussin' to do. I don't like to hear nobody cuss. I belong to the church. +I belong to the Baptist church and I go to the Arch Street Church."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PoeMary"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: Mary Poe, Forrest City, Arkansas<br> +Age: 60</h3> +<br> + +<p>"My papa used to tell about two men he knowd stealing a hog. He was +Wyatt Alexander. He was feeding one evening and the master was out there +too that evening. They overheard two colored men inside the crib lot +house. They was looking at the hogs. They planned to come back after +dark and get a hog. The way it turned out master dressed up ragged and +got inside that night. The first man come. They got a shoat and killed +it, knocked it in the head. The master took it on his back to the log +cabin. When he knocked, his wife opened the door. She seen who it was. +She nearly fell out and when he seen who it was he run off. The master +throwed the hog down. They all got the hot water and went to work. He +left a third there and took part to the other man. He done gone to bed +and he took a third on home. He said he wanted to see if they needed +meat or wanted to keep in stealing practice. He didn't want them to +waste his big hog meat neither. Said that man never come home for two +weeks, 'fraid he'd get a whooping. No, they said he never got a whooping +but the meat was near by gone.</p> + +<p>"Seem lack hog stealing was common in North Carolina in them days from +the way he talked.</p> + +<p>"Papa said he went down in the pasture one night to get a shoat. He said +they had a fine big drove. He got one knocked over an' was carrying it +out across the fence to the field. He seen another man. He couldn't see. +It was dark. He throwed the hog over on him. The man took the shoat on +to his house and papa was afraid to say much about it. He said way 'long +towards day this man come bringing about half of that hog cleaned and +ready to salt away. They got up and packed it away out of sight.</p> + +<p>"My mother was named Lucy Alexander, too."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PollacksWL"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: W.L. Pollacks<br> + Brinkley, Arkansas<br> +Age: 68</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I was born in Shelby County Tennessee. My folks all come from Richmond, +Virginia. They come to Kentucky and then on to Tennessee. I am 68 years +old. My father's master was Joe Rollacks and Mrs. Chicky they called his +wife. My mother's master was Joe Ricks and they all called his wife Miss +Fee. I guess it was Pheobe or Josephine but they never called her by +them names. Seemed like they was all kin folks. I heard my mother say +she dress up in some of the white folks dresses and hitch up the buggy, +take dinner and carry two girls nearly grown out to church and to big +picnics. She liked that. The servants would set the table and help the +white folks plates at the table. Said they had a heap good eating. She +had a plenty work to do but she got to take the girls places where the +parents didn't want to go. She said they didn't know what to do wid +freedom. She said it was like weening a child what never learned to eat +yet. I forgot what they did do. She said work was hard to find and money +scarce. They find some white folks feed em to do a little work. She said +a nickle looked big as a dollar now. They couldn't buy a little bit. +They like never get nough money to buy a barrel of flour. It was so +high. Seem like she say I was walking when they got a barrel of flour. +So many colored folks died right after freedom. They caught +consumption. My mother said they was exposed mo than they been used to +and mixing up in living quarters too much what caused it. My father +voted a Republican ticket. I ain't voted much since I come to Arkansas. +I been here 32 years. My farm failed over in Tennessee. I was out +lookin' round for farmin' land, lookin' round for good work. I farmed +then I worked seven or eight years on the section, then I helped do +brick work till now I can't do but a mighty little. I had three children +but they all dead. I got sugar dibeates.</p> + +<p>"The present times are tough on sick people. It is hard for me to get a +living. I find the young folks all for their own selves. If I was well I +could get by easy. If a man is strong he can get a little work along.</p> + +<p>"The times and young generation both bout to run away wid themselves, +and the rest of the folks can't stop em 'pears to me like."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PopeJohn"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson<br> +Person interviewed: "Doc" John Pope, Biscoe, Arkansas<br> +Age: 87</h3> +<br> + +<p>I am 87 years old for a fact. I was born in De Soto County, Mississippi, +eight miles south of Memphis, Tennessee. No I didn't serve in de War but +my father Gus Pope did. He served in de War three years and never came +home. He served in 63rd Regiment Infantry of de Yankee army. He died +right at the surrender. I stayed on de farm till the surrender. We +scattered around den. My father was promised $300.00 bounty and 160 +acres of land. Dey was promised dat by the Constitution of the United +States. Every soldier was promised dat. No he never got nary penny nor +nary acre of land. We ain't got nuthin. De masters down in Mississippi +did help 'em where they stayed on. I never stayed on. I left soon as de +fightin was gone. I was roamin round in Memphis and man asked me if I +wanted to go to college. He sent a train load to Fitz (Fisk) University. +I stayed there till I graduated. I studied medicine generally. Sandy +Odom, the preacher at Brinkley, was there same time as I was. He show is +old. He's up in ninety now. He had a brother here till he died. He was a +fine doctor. He got more practice around here than any white doctor in +this portion of de county. Fitz University was a fine college. It was +run by rich folks up north. I don't know how long I stayed there. It was +a good while. I went to Isaac Pope, my uncle. He was farming. Briscoe +owned the Pope niggers at my first recollection. He brought my uncle and +a lot more over here where he owned a heap of dis land. It was all +woods. Dats how I come here.</p> + +<p>After de Civil War? Dey had to "Root hog or die". From 1860-1870 the +times was mighty hard. People rode through the county and killed both +white and black. De carpet bagger was bout as bad as de Ku Kluck.</p> + +<p>I came here I said wid John Briscoe. They all called him Jack Briscoe, +in 1881. I been here ever since cept W.T. Edmonds and P.H. Conn sent me +back home to get hands. I wrote 'em how many I had. They wired tickets +to Memphis. I fetched 52 families back. I been farmin and practicin all +my life put near.</p> + +<p>I show do vote. I voted the last time for President Hoover. The first +time I voted was at the General Grant election. I am a Republican, +because it is handed down to me. That's the party of my race. I ain't +going to change. That's my party till I dies. We has our leader what +instructs us how to vote.</p> + +<p>Dey say dey goiner pay 60 cents a hundred but I ain't able to pick no +cotton. No I don't get no help from de relief. I think the pore class of +folks in a mighty bad fix. Is what I think. The nigger is hard hit and +the pore trash dey call 'em is too. I don't know what de cause is. It's +been jess this way ever since I can recollect. No times show ain't one +bit better. I owns dis house and dats all. I got one daughter.</p> + +<p>I went to Fitz (Fisk) University in 1872. The folks I told you about was +there then too. Their names was Dr. E.B. Odom of Biscoe and his brother +Sandy Odom. He preaches at Brinkley now. Doc Odom is dead. He served on +the Biscoe School Board a long time wid two white men.</p> + +<p>I don't know much about the young generation. They done got too smart +for me to advise. The young ones is gettin fine educations but it ain't +doin 'em no good. Some go north and cook. It don't do the balance of 'em +no good. If they got education they don't lack de farm. De sun too hot. +No times ain't no better an de nigger ain't no better off en he used to +be. A little salary dun run 'em wild.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PorterWilliam"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: William Porter<br> + 1818 Louisiana Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 81<br> +Occupation: Janitor of church</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Yes'm I lived in slavery times. I was born in 1856. I was borned in +Tennessee but the most of my life has been in Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"I remember when Hood's raid was. That was the last fight of the war. I +recollect seein' the soldiers marchin' night and day for two days. I saw +the cavalry men and the infant men walking. I heard em say the North was +fightin' the South. They called the North Yankees and the South Rebels.</p> + +<p>"Some of the Tennessee niggers was called free niggers. There was a +colored man in Pulaski, Tennessee who owned slaves.</p> + +<p>"My father was workin' to buy his freedom and had just one more year to +work when peace come. His master gave him a chance to buy his freedom. +He worked for old master in the daytime and at night he worked for +himself. He split rails and raised watermelons.</p> + +<p>"My father's master was named Tom Gray at that time. Considering the +times he was a very fair man.</p> + +<p>"When the war broke up I was workin' around a barber shop in Nashville, +Tennessee.</p> + +<p>"The Queen of England offered to buy the slaves and raise them till they +were grown, then give them a horse, a plow and so many acres of ground +but the South wouldn't accept this offer.</p> + +<p>"It was the rule of the South to keep the people as ignorant as +possible, but my mother had a little advantage over some. The white +children learned her to read and write, and when freedom came she could +write her name and even scribble out a letter. She gave me my first +lesson, and I started to school in '67. The North sent teachers down +here after the war. They were government schools.</p> + +<p>"I was pretty apt in figgers—studied Bay's Arithmetic through the third +book. I was getting along in school, but I slipped away from my people +and was goin' to get a pocket full of money and then go back. First man +I worked for was a colored man and I kept his books for him and was to +get one-fourth of the crop. The first year he settled with me I had $165 +clear after I paid all my debts. I done very well. I farmed one more +year, then I come to Pine Bluff and did government work along the +Arkansas River.</p> + +<p>"I've done carpenter work and concrete work. I learned it by doing it. I +followed concrete work for a long time. I've hoped to build several +houses here in Pine Bluff and a lot of these streets.</p> + +<p>"I have a brother and sister who graduated from Fisk University.</p> + +<p>"I think one thing about the younger generation is they need to be more +educated in the way of manners and to have race pride and to be subject +to the laws."</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PotterBob"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lacy<br> +Person interviewed: Bob Potter, Russellville, Arkansas<br> +Age: 65</h3> +<br> + +<p>"Sure, you oughter remember me—Bob Potter. Used to know you when you +was a boy passin' de house every day go in' down to de old Democrat +printin' office. Knowed yo' brother and all yo' folks. Knowed yo' pappy +mighty well. Is yo' ma and pa livin' now? No suh, I reckin not.</p> + +<p>"I was born de seventeenth of September, 1873 right here in +Russellville. Daddy's name was Dick, and mudder's was Ann Potter. Daddy +died before I was born, and I never seed him. Mudder's been dead about +eighteen years. Dey master was named Hale, and he lived up around Dover +somewheres on his farm, but I dunno how dey come by de name Potter. +Well, now, lemme see—oh, yes, dey was freed at Dover after dey come +dere from North Ca'liny. I think my ma was born in West Virginia, and +den dey went to North Ca'liny and den to South Ca'liny, and den come to +Arkansas.</p> + +<p>"I raised seven boys and lost five chillen. Dere was three girls and +nine boys. All dat's livin' is here except one in Fresno, California. My +old woman here, she tells fortunes for de white folks and belongs to de +Holiness church but I don't belong to none; I let her look after de +religion for de fambly." (Interjection from Mrs. Potter: "Yes suh, you +bet I belongs to de Holiness chu'ch. You got to walk in de light to be +saved, and if you do walk in de light you can't sin. I been saved for a +good many yeahs and am goin' on in de faith. Praise de Lawd!")</p> + +<p>"My mudder was sold once for a hundud dollahs and once ag'in for +thirty-eight hundud dollahs. Perhaps dis was jist before dey left West +Virginia and was shipped to North Ca'liny. De master put her upon a box, +she said, made her jump up and pop her heels together three times and +den turn around and pop her heels again to show how strong she was. She +sure was strong and a hard worker. She could cut wood, tote logs, plow, +hoe cotton, and do ever'thing on de place, and lived to be about +ninety-five yeahs old. Yas suh, she was as old or older dan Aunt Joan is +when she died.</p> + +<p>"No suh, I used to vote but I quit votin', for votin' never did git me +nothin'; I quit two yeahs ago. You see, my politics didn't suit em. +Maybe I shouldn't be tellin' you but I was a Socialist, and I was +runnin' a mine and wo'kin' fifteen men, and dey was all Socialists, and +de Republicans and Democrats sure put me out of business—dey put me to +de bad.</p> + +<p>"Dat was about twelve yeahs ago when I run de mine. I been tryin' to git +me a pension but maybe dat's one reason I can't git it. Oh yes, I owns +my home—dat is, I did own it, but——</p> + +<p>"Oh Lawd, yes, I knows a lot of dem old songs like 'Let Our Light +Shine,' and 'De Good Old Gospel Way,' and 'Hark From de Tomb.' Listen, +you oughter hear Elder Beam sing dat one. He's de pastor of de Baptis' +Chu'ch at Fort Smith. He can sure make it ring!</p> + +<p>"De young folks of today compa'ed to dem when we was boys? Huh! You jist +can't compaih em—can't be done. Why, a fo'-yeah-old young'un knows mo' +today dan our grandmammies knowed. And in dem days de boys and gals +could go out and play and swing togedder and behave deyselves. We went +in our shu'ttails and hit was all right; we had two shu'ts to weah—one +for every day and one for Sunday—and went in our shu'ttails both every +day and Sunday and was respected. And if you didn't behave you sure got +whupped. Dey didn't put dey arms around you and hug you and den put you +off to sleep. Dey whupped you, and it was real whuppin'.</p> + +<p>"Used to hear my mudder talk about de Ku Klux Klan puttin' cotton +between her toes and whuppin' her, and dat's de way dey done us +young'uns when we didn't behave. And we used to have manners den, both +whites and blacks. I wish times was like dem days, but dey's gone.</p> + +<p>"Yes, we used to have our tasks to do befo' goin' to bed. We'd have a +little basket of cotton and had to pick de seeds all out of dat cotton +befo' we went to bed. And we could all ca'd and spin—yes suh—make dat +old spinnin' wheel go Z-z-z-z as you walked back and fo'f a-drawin' out +de spool of ya'n. And you could weave cloth and make all yo' own +britches, too. (Here his wife interpolated a homely illustration of the +movement of "de shettle" in the loom weaving—ed.)</p> + +<p>"Yes, I mind my mudder tellin' many a time about dem Klan-men, and how +dey whupped white women to make em give up de money dey had hid, and how +dey used to burn dey feet. Yes suh, ain't no times like dem old days, +and I wish we had times like em now. Yes suh, I'll sure come to see you +in town one of dese days. Good mornin'."</p> +<br> +<p><b>NOTE:</b> Bob Potter is a most interesting Negro character—one of the +most genial personalities of the Old South that the interviewer has met +anywhere. His humor is infectious, his voice boisterous, but delightful, +and his uproarious laugh just such as one delights to listen to. And his +narrations seem to ring with veracity.</p> + + + + +<br><br><hr width="65%"><br><br> +<a name="PrayerLouise"></a> +<h3>Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden<br> +Person interviewed: Louise Prayer<br> + 3401 Short West Third, Pine Bluff, Arkansas<br> +Age: 80</h3> +<br> + +<p>"I can member seein' the Yankees. My mother died when I was a baby and +my grandmother raised me. I'se goin' on eighty.</p> + +<p>"When the Yankees come we piled boxes and trunks in front of the doors +and windows. She'd say, 'You chillun get in the house; the Yankees are +comin'.' I didn't know what 'twas about—I sure didn't.</p> + +<p>"I'm honest in mind. You know the Yankees used to come in and whip the +folks. I know they come in and whipped my grandma and when they come in +we chillun went under the bed. Didn't know no better. Why did they whip +her? Oh my God, I don't know bout dat. You know when we chillun saw em +ridin' in a hurry we went in the house and under the bed. I specks +they'd a killed me if they come up to me cause they'd a scared me to +death.</p> + +<p>"We lived on the Williams' place. All belonged to the same people. They +give us plenty to eat such as 'twas. But in them days they fed the +chillun mostly on bread and syrup. Sometimes we had greens and +dumplin's. Jus' scald some meal and roll up in a ball and drop in with +the greens. Just a very few chickens we had. I don't love chicken +though. If I can jus' get the liver I'm through with the chicken.</p> + +<p>"When I got big enough my grandmother had me in the field. I went to +school a little bit but I didn't learn nothin'. Didn't go long enough. +That I didn't cause the old man had us in the field.</p> + +<p>"If we chillun in them days had had the sense these got now, I could +remember more bout things.</p> + +<p>"I was a young missy when I married.</p> + +<p>"I told you the best I could—that's all I know. I been treated pretty +good."</p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Slave Narratives: A Folk History of +Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves, by Work Projects Administration + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SLAVE NARRATIVES *** + +***** This file should be named 11544-h.htm or 11544-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/1/5/4/11544/ + +Produced by Andrea Ball and PG Distributed Proofreaders. Produced from +images provided by the Library of Congress, Manuscript Division. + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States + From Interviews with Former Slaves + Arkansas Narratives, Part 5 + +Author: Work Projects Administration + +Release Date: March 11, 2004 [EBook #11544] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SLAVE NARRATIVES *** + + + + +Produced by Andrea Ball and PG Distributed Proofreaders. Produced from +images provided by the Library of Congress, Manuscript Division. + + + + + + +[TR: ***] = Transcriber Note +[HW: ***] = Handwritten Note + + + + +SLAVE NARRATIVES + + +A Folk History of Slavery in the United States +From Interviews with Former Slaves + + +TYPEWRITTEN RECORDS PREPARED BY +THE FEDERAL WRITERS' PROJECT +1936-1938 +ASSEMBLED BY +THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS PROJECT +WORK PROJECTS ADMINISTRATION +FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA +SPONSORED BY THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS + + +WASHINGTON 1941 + + + + +VOLUME II + +ARKANSAS NARRATIVES + +PART 5 + + + + +Prepared by +the Federal Writers' Project of +the Works Progress Administration +for the State of Arkansas + + + +INFORMANTS + +McClendon, Charlie +McCloud, Lizzie +McConico, Avalena +McCoy, Ike +McDaniel, Richard H. +McIntosh, Waters +Mack, Cresa +McKinney, Warren +McMullen, Victoria +Madden, Nannie P. +Madden, Perry +Mann, Lewis +Martin, Angeline +Martin, Josie +Mathis, Bess +Matthews, Caroline +Maxwell, Malindy +Maxwell, Nellie +May, Ann +Mayes, Joe +Meeks, Rev. Jesse +Metcalf, Jeff +Miller, Hardy +Miller, Henry Kirk +Miller, Matilda +Miller, Nathan +Miller, Sam +Miller, W.D. +Minser, Mose +Minton, Gip +Mitchell, A.J. +Mitchell, Gracie +Mitchell, Hettie +Mitchell, Mary +Mitchell, Moses +Moon, Ben +Moore, Emma +Moore, Patsy +Moorehead, Ada +Mooreman, Mary Jane (Mattie) +Morgan, Evelina +Morgan, James +Morgan, Olivia +Morgan, Tom +Morris, Charity +Morris, Emma +Moss, Claiborne +Moss, Frozie +Moss, Mose +Mullins, S.O. +Murdock, Alex +Myers, Bessie +Myhand, Mary +Myrax, Griffin + +Neal, Tom Wylie +Nealy (Neely), Sally +Nealy, Wylie +Neland, Emaline +Nelson, Henry +Nelson, Iran +Nelson, James Henry +Nelson, John +Nelson, Lettie +Nelson, Mattie +Newborn, Dan +Newsom, Sallie +Newton, Pete +Norris, Charlie + +Oats, Emma +Odom, Helen +Oliver, Jane +Osborne, Ivory +Osbrook, Jane + +Page, Annie +Parker, Fannie +Parker, J.M. +Parker, Judy +Parker, R.F. +Parks, Annie +Parnell, Austin Pen +Parr, Ben +Patterson, Frank A. +Patterson, John +Patterson, Sarah Jane +Pattillo, Solomon P. +Patton, Carry Allen +Payne, Harriett McFarlin +Payne, John +Payne, Larkin +Perkins, Cella +Perkins, Marguerite (Maggie) +Perkins, Rachel +Perry, Dinah +Peters, Alfred +Peters, Mary Estes +Peterson, John +Pettis, Louise +Pettus, Henry C. +Phillips, Dolly +Piggy, Tony +Pittman, Ella +Pittman, Sarah +Poe, Mary +Pollacks, W.L. +Pope, John (Doc) +Porter, William +Potter, Bob +Prayer, Louise + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Charlie McClendon + 708 E. Fourth Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 77 + + +"I don't know exactly how old I am. I was six or seven when the war +ended. I member dis--my mother said I was born on Christmas day. Old +master was goin' to war and he told her to take good care of that +boy--he was goin' to make a fine little man. + +"Did I live up to it? I reckon I was bout as smart a man as you could +jump up. The work didn't get too hard for _me_. I farmed and I sawmilled +a lot. Most of my time was farmin'. + +"I been in Jefferson County all my life. I went to school three or four +sessions. + +"About the war, I member dis--I member they carried us to Camden and I +saw the guards. I'd say, 'Give me a pistol.' They'd say, 'Come back +tomorrow and we'll give you one.' They had me runnin' back there every +day and I never did get one. They was Yankee soldiers. + +"Our folks' master was William E. Johnson. Oh Lord, they was just as +good to us as could be to be under slavery. + +"After they got free my people stayed there a year or two and then our +master broke up and went back to South Carolina and the folks went in +different directions. Oh Lord, my parents sho was well treated. Yes +ma'm. If he had a overseer, he wouldn't low him to whip the folks. He'd +say, 'Just leave em till I come home.' Then he'd give em a light +breshin'. + +"My father run off and stay in the woods one or two months. Old master +say, 'Now, Jordan, why you run off? Now I'm goin' to give you a light +breshin' and don't you run off again.' But he'd run off again after +awhile. + +"He had one man named Miles Johnson just stayed in the woods so he put +him on the block and sold him. + +"I seed the Ku Klux. We colored folks had to make it here to Pine Bluff +to the county band. If the Rebels kotch you, you was dead. + +"Oh Lord yes, I voted. I voted the Publican ticket, they called it. You +know they had this Australia ballot. You was sposed to go in the caboose +and vote. They like to scared me to death one time. I had a description +of the man I wanted to vote for in my pocket and I was lookin' at it so +I'd be sure to vote for the right man and they caught me. They said, +'What you doin' there? We're goin' to turn you over to the sheriff after +election!' They had me scared to death. I hid out for a long time till I +seed they wasn't goin' to do nothin'. + +"My wife's brother was one of the judges of the election. Some of the +other colored folks was constables and magistrates--some of em are +now--down in the country. + +"I knew a lot about things but I knew I was in the United States and had +to bow to the law. There was the compromise they give the colored +folks--half of the offices and then they got em out afterwards. John M. +Clayton was runnin' for the senate and say he goin' to see the colored +people had equal rights, but they killed him as he was gwine through the +country speakin'. + +"The white people have treated me very well but they don't pay us enough +for our work--just enough to live on and hardly that. I can say with a +clear conscience that if it hadn't been for this relief, I don't know +what I'd do--I'm not able to work. I'm proud that God Almighty put the +spirit in the man (Roosevelt) to help us." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Lizzie McCloud + 1203 Short 13th Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 120? + + +"I was one of 'em bless your heart. Yes ma'm, Yes ma'm, I wouldn't tell +you a lie 'bout that. If I can't tell you the truth I'm not goin' tell +you nothin'! + +"Oh yes, I was a young lady in slavery times--bred and born in +Tennessee. Miss Lizzie and Marse John Williams--I belonged to them--sho +did! I was scared to death of the white folks. Miss Lizzie--she mean as +the devil. She wouldn't step her foot on the ground, she so rich. No +ma'm wouldn't put her foot on the ground. Have her carriage drive up to +the door and have that silk carpet put down for her to walk on. Yes +Lord. Wouldn't half feed us and they went and named me after her. + +"I know all about the stars fallin'. I was out in the field and just +come in to get our dinner. Got so dark and the stars begin to play +aroun'. Mistress say, 'Lizzie, it's the judgment.' She was just a +hollerin'. Yes ma'm I was a young woman. I been here a long time, yes +ma'm, I been here a long time. Worked and whipped, too. I run off many a +time. Run off to see my mammy three or four miles from where I was. + +"I never was sold but they took we young women and brought us down in +the country to another plantation where they raised corn, wheat, and +hay. Overseer whipped us too. Marse John had a brother named Marse +Andrew and he was a good man. He'd say to the overseer, 'Now don't whip +these girls so much, they can't work.' Oh, he was a good man. Oh, white +folks was the devil in slavery tines. I was scared to death of 'em. +They'd have these long cow hide whips. Honey, I was treated bad. I seen +a time in this world. + +"Oh Lord, yes, that was long 'fore the war. I was right down on my +master's place when it started. They said it was to free the niggers. Oh +Lord, we was right under it in Davidson County where I come from. Oh +Lord, yes, I knowed all about when the war started. I'se a young woman, +a young woman. We was treated just like dogs and hogs. We seed a hard +time--I know what I'm talkin' about. + +"Oh God, I seed the Yankees. I saw it all. We was so scared we run under +the house and the Yankees called 'Come out Dinah' (didn't call none of +us anything but Dinah). They said 'Dinah, we're fightin' to free you and +get you out from under bondage.' I sure understood that but I didn't +have no better sense than to go back to mistress. + +"Oh Lord, yes, I seed the Ku Klux. They didn't bother me cause I didn't +stay where they could; I was way under the house. + +"Yankees burned up everything Marse John had. I looked up the pike and +seed the Yankees a coming'. They say 'We's a fightin' for you, Dinah!' +Yankees walked in, chile, just walked right in on us. I tell you I've +seed a time. You talkin' 'bout war--you better wish no more war come. I +know when the war started. The Secessors on this side and the Yankees on +that side. Yes, Miss, I seen enough. My brother went and jined the +Secessors and they killed him time he got in the war. + +"No, Missy, I never went to no school. White folks never learned me +nothin'. I believes in tellin' white folks the truth. + +"White folks didn't 'low us to marry so I never married till I come to +Arkansas and that was one year after surrender. + +"First place I landed on was John Clayton's place. Mr. John Clayton was +a Yankee and he was good to us. We worked in the field and stayed there +two years. I been all up and down the river and oh Lord, I had a good +time after I was free. I been treated right since I was free. My color +is good to me and the white folks, too. I ain't goin' to tell only the +truth. Uncle Sam goin' send me 'cross the water if I don't tell the +truth. Better _not fool_ with dat man!" + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Lizzie McCloud + 1203 E. Short 13th Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 103 +[TR: Appears to be same as previous informant despite age discrepancy.] + + +"Well, where you been? I been wonderin' 'bout you. Yes Lawd. You sure is +lookin' fine. + +"Yes, honey, I was bred and bawn in Davidson County, Tennessee. Come +here one year after surrender. + +"My daughter there was a baby jus' sittin' alone, now, sittin' alone +when I come here to this Arkansas. I know what I'm talkin' about. + +"Lizzie Williams, my old missis, was rich as cream. Yes Lawd! I know all +about it 'cause I worked for 'em. + +"I was a young missis when the War started. I was workin' for my owners +then. I knowed when they was free--when they said they was free. + +"The Yankees wouldn't call any of the colored women anything but Dinah. +I didn't know who they was till they told us. Said, 'Dinah, we's comin' +to free you.' + +"The white folks didn't try to scare us 'bout the Yankees 'cause they +was too scared theirselves. Them Yankees wasn't playin'; they was +fitin'. Yes, Jesus! + +"Had to work hard--and whipped too. Wasn't played with. Mars Andrew come +in the field a heap a times and say, 'Don't whip them women so hard, +they can't work.' I thought a heap of Mars Andrew. + +"I used to see the Yankees ridin' hosses and them breastplates a +shining'. Yes Lawd. I'd run and they'd say, 'Dinah, we ain't gwine hurt +you.' Lawd, them Yankees didn't care for nothin'. Oh, they was fine. + +"My husband was a soldier--a Yankee. Yes ma'am. They sends me thirty +dollars every month, before the fourth. Postman brings it right to me +here at the house. They treats me nice. + +"When I come here, I landed on John Clayton's place. He was a Yankee and +he was a good white man too. + +"I'm the onliest one left now in my family." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Irene Robertson +Person Interviewed: Avalena McConico + on the [TR: ---- ----] west of Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 40[TR: ?] +[TR: Much of this interview smeared and difficult to decipher; + illegible words indicated by "----", questionable words + followed by "?".] + + +"Grandma was a slave woman. Her name was Emma Harper. She was born in +Chesterville, Mississippi. Her young master was Jim and Miss Corrie +Burton. The old man was John Burton. I aimed[?] to see them once. I +seen both Miss Corrie and Mr. Jim. My grandparents was never sold. They +left out after freedom. They stayed there a long time but they left. + +"The first of the War was like dis: Our related folks was having a +dance. The Yankees come in and was dancing. Some "fry boys" [---- ----] +them. The next day they were all in the field and heard something. +They went to the house and told the white folks there was [----] a +fire. They heard it. [----] he [----] about. Master told them it +was war. Miss Burton was crying. They heard about [----] in [----] at +Harrisburg where they could hear the shooting. + +"They put the slaves to digging. They dug two weeks. They buried their +meat and money and a whole heap of things. They never found it. A little +white,[?] Mollita[?], was out where they were digging. She went in the +house. She said, Mama, is the devil coming? They said he was." Master +had them come to him. He questioned them. They told him they got so +tired [----] of them said he [----] he [---- ----] the [----] Yankees +come he'd tell them where all this was, but he was just talking. But +when the Yankees did come they was so scared they never got close to a +Yankee. They was scared to death. They never found the meat and money. +They [----] and cut the turkeys' heads off and the turkey fell off the +rail fence, the head drop on one side and the body on the other. They +milked a cow and cut both hind quarters off and leave the rest of the +cow there and the cow not dead yet. + +"Mr. South[?] Strange at Chesterville, Mississippi had a pony named +Zane. The Yankees hemmed him and four more men in at Malone Creek and +killed the four men. Zane rared up on hind legs and went up a steep +cliff and ran three miles. Mr. Strange's coat was cut off from him. It +was a gray coat. Mr. Strange was a white man. + +"Uncle Frank Jones was forty years old when they gathered him up out of +the woods and put him in the battle lines. All the runaway black folks +in the woods was hunted out and put in the Yankee lines. Uncle Frank +lived in a cave up till about then. His master made him mean. He got +better as he got old. His master would sell him and tell him to run away +and come back to his cave. He'd feed him. He never worked and he went up +for his provisions. He was sold over and over and over. His master +learnt him in books and to how to cuss. He learnt him how to trick the +dogs and tap trees like a coon. At the end of the trail the dogs would +turn on the huntsman. Uncle Frank was active when he was old. He was +hired out to race other boys sometimes. He never wore glasses. He could +see well when he was old. He told me he was raised out from England, +Arkansas. + +"When freedom was told 'em Uncle Frank said all them in the camps +hollered and danced, and marched and sung. They was so glad the War was +done and so glad they been freed. + +"Grandma was sold in South Carolina to Mississippi and sold again to Dr. +Shelton. Now that was my father's father and mother. She said they rode +and walked all the way. They came on ox wagons. She said on the way they +passed some children. They was playing. A little white boy was up in a +persimmon tree settin' on a limb eating persimmons. He was so pretty and +clean. Grandma says, 'You think you is some pumpkin, don't you, honey +child.' He says, 'Some pumpkin and some 'simmon too.' Grandma was a +house girl. She got to keep her baby and brought him. He was my father. +Uncle was born later. Then they was freed. Grandma lived to be +ninety-five years old. Mrs. Dolphy Wooly and Mrs. Shelton was her young +mistresses. They kept her till she died. They kept her well. + +"Grandma told us about freedom. She was hired out to the Browns to make +sausage and dry out lard. Five girls was in the field burning brush. +They was white girls--Mrs. Brown's girls. They come to the house and +said some Blue Coats come by and said, 'You free.' They told them back, +'That's no news, we was born free.' Grandma said that night she melted +pewter and made dots on her best dress. It was shiny. She wore it home +next day 'cause she was free, and she never left from about her own +white folks till she died and left them. + +"Times seem very good on black folks till hard cold winter and spring +come, then times is mighty, mighty bad. It is so hard to keep warm fires +and enough to eat. Times have been good. Black folks in the young +generation need more heart training and less book learning. Times is so +fast the young set is too greedy. They is wasteful too. Some is hard +workers and tries to live right. + +"I wash and irons and keep a woman's little chile so she can work. I +owns my home." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Irene Robertson +Person Interviewed: Ike McCoy, Biscoe, Arkansas +Age: 65 +[TR: Illegible words indicated by "----", + questionable words followed by "?".] + + +"My parents named Harriett and Isaac McCoy. Far as I knew they was +natives of North Kaline (Carolina). He was a farmer. He raised corn and +cabbage, a little corn and wheat. He had tasks at night in winter I +heard him say. She muster just done anything. She knit for us here in +the last few years. She died several years ago. Now my oldest sister was +born in slavery. I was next but I came way after slavery. + +"In war time McCoys hid their horses in the woods. The Yankees found +them and took all the best ones and left their [----] (nags). Old boss +man McCoy hid in the closet and locked himself up. The Yankees found +him, broke in on him and took him out and they nearly killed him +beating him so bad. He told all of 'em on the place he was going off. +They wore him out. He didn't live long after that. + +"Things got lax. I heard her say one man sold all his slaves. The War +broke out. They run away and went back to him. She'd see 'em pass going +back home. They been sold and wouldn't stay. Folks got to running off to +war. They thought it look like a frolic. I heard some of them say they +wish they hadn't gone off to war 'fore it was done. Niggers didn't know +that[TR: ?] war no freedom was 'ceptin' the Yankees come tell them +something and then they couldn't understand how it all be. Black folks +was mighty ignant then. They is now for that matter. They look to white +folks for right kind of doings[?]. + +"Ma said every now and then see somebody going back to that man tried to +get rid of them. They traveled by night and beg along from black folks. +In daytime they would stay in the woods so the pettyrollers wouldn't run +up on them. The pettyrollers would whoop 'em if they catch 'em. + +"Ma told about one day the Yankees come and made the white women came +help the nigger women cook up a big dinner. Ma was scared so bad she +couldn't see nothing she wanted. She said there was no talking. They was +too scared to say a word. They sot the table and never a one of them +told 'em it was ready. + +"She said biscuits so scarce after the War they took 'em 'round in their +pockets to nibble on they taste so good. + +"I was eighteen years old when pa and ma took the notion to come out +here. All of us come but one sister had married, and pa and one brother +had a little difference. Pa had children ma didn't have. They went +together way after slavery. We got transportation to Memphis by train +and took a steamboat to Pillowmount. That close to Forrest City. Later +on I come to Biscoe. They finally come too. + +"I been pretty independent all my life till I getting so feeble. I work +a sight now. I'm making boards to kiver my house out at the lot now. I +goiner get somebody to kiver it soon as I get my boards made. + +"We don't get no PWA aid 'ceptin' for two orphant babies we got. They +are my wife's sister's little boys. + +"Well sir-ree, folks could do if the young ones would. Young folks don't +have no consideration for the old wore-out parents. They dance and drink +it bodaciously out on Saturday ebening and about till Sunday night. I +may be wrong but I sees it thater way. Whan we get old we get helpless. +I'm getting feebler every year. I see that. Times goiner be hard ag'in +this winter and next spring. Money is scarce now for summer time and +craps laid by. I feels that my own self now. Every winter times get +tough." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Richard H. McDaniel, Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 73 + + +"I was born in Newton County, Mississippi the first year of the +surrender. I don't think my mother was sold and I know my father was +never sold. Jim McDaniel raised my father and one sister after his +mother died. One sister was married when she died. I heard him say when +he got mad he would quit work. He said old master wouldn't let the +mistress whoop him and she wouldn't let him whoop my father. My father +was a black man but my mother was light. Her father was a white man and +her mother part Indian and white mixed, so what am I? My mother was +owned by people named Wash. Dick Wash was her young master. My parents' +names was Willis and Elsie McDaniel. When it was freedom I heard them +say Moster McDaniel told them they was free. He was broke. If they could +do better go on, he didn't blame them, he couldn't promise them much +now. They moved off on another man's place to share crop. They had to +work as hard and didn't have no more than they had in slavery. That is +what they told me. They could move around and visit around without +asking. They said it didn't lighten the work none but it lightened the +rations right smart. Moster McDaniel nor my father neither one went to +war. + +"From the way I always heard it, the Ku Klux was the law like night +watchman. When I was a boy there was a lot of stealing and bushwhacking. +Folks meet you out and kill you, rob you, whoop you. A few of the black +men wouldn't work and wanted to steal. That Ku Klux was the law watching +around. Folks was scared of em. I did see them. I would run hide. + +"I farmed up till 1929. Then I been doing jobs. I worked on relief till +they turned me off, said I was too old to work but they won't give me +the pension. I been trying to figure out what I am to do. Lady, could +you tell me? Work at jobs when I can get them. + +"I allus been voting till late years. If they let some folks vote in the +first lection, they would be putting in somebody got no business in the +gover'ment. All the fault I see in white folks running the gover'ment is +we colored folks ain't got work we can do all the time to live on. I +thought all the white folks had jobs what wanted jobs. The conditions is +hard for old men like me. I pay $3 for a house every month. It is a cold +house. + +"This present generation is living a fast life. What all don't they do?" + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Waters McIntosh + 1900 Howard Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 76 + + +"I was born July 4, 1862 at 2:08 in the morning at Lynchburg, Sumter +County, South Carolina. + + +Parents + +"My mother was named Lucy Sanders. My father was named Sumter Durant. +Our owner was Dr. J.M. Sanders, the son of Mr. Bartlett Sanders. Sumter +Durant was a white man. My mother was fourteen years old when I was born +I was her second child. Durant was in the Confederate army and was +killed during the War in the same year I was born, and before my birth. + + +Sold + +"When I was a year old, my mother was sold for $1500 in gold, and I was +sold for $500 in gold to William Carter who lived about five miles south +of Cartersville. The payment was made in fine gold. I was sold because +my folk realized that freedom was coming and they wanted to obtain the +cash value of their slaves. + + +Name + +"My name is spelled 'Waters' but it is pronounced 'Waiters.' When I was +born, I was thought to be a very likely child and it was proposed that I +should be a waiter. Therefore I was called Waters (but it was pronounced +Waiters). They did not spell it w-a-i-t-e-r-s, but they pronounced it +that way. + + +How Freedom Came + +"My mother said that they had been waiting a long time to hear what had +become of the War, perhaps one or two weeks. One day when they were in +the field moulding corn, going round the corn hoeing it and putting a +little hill around it, the conk sounded at about eleven o'clock, and +they knew that the long expected time had come. They dropped their hoes +and went to the big house. They went around to the back where the master +always met the servants and he said to them, 'You are all free, free as +I am. You can go or come as you please. I want you to stay. If you will +stay, I will give you half the crop.' That was the beginning of the +share cropping system. + +"My mother came at once to the quarters, and when she found me she +pulled the end out of a corn sack, stuck holes on the sides, put a cord +through the top, pulled out the end, put it on me, put on the only dress +she had, and made it back to the old home (her first master's folk). + + +What the Slaves Expected + +"When the slaves were freed, they got what they expected. They were glad +to get it and get away with it, and that was what mother and them did. + + +Slave Time Preaching + +"One time when an old white man come along who wanted to preach, the +white people gave him a chance to preach to the niggers. The substance +of his sermon was this: + +"'Now when you servants are working for your masters, you must be +honest. When you go to the mill, don't carry along an extra sack and put +some of the meal or the flour in for yourself. And when you women are +cooking in the big house, don't make a big pocket under your dress and +put a sack of coffee and a sack of sugar and other things you want in +it." + +"They took him out and hanged him for corrupting the morals of the +slaves. + + +Conditions After the War + +"Immediately after the War, there was a great scarcity of food. Neither +Negroes nor white folk had anything to eat. The few white people who did +have something wouldn't let it be known. My grandmother who was +sixty-five years old and one of the old and respected inhabitants of +that time went out to find something for us to eat. A white woman named +Mrs. Burton gave her a sack of meal and told her not to tell anybody +where she got it. + +"My grandmother brought the meal home and cooked it in a large skillet +in a big cake. When it got done, she cut it into slices in the way you +would cut up a pie and divided it among us. That all we had to eat. + + +House + +"The white people in those days built their houses back from the front. +In South Carolina, there were lots of farms that had four to twelve +thousand acres. From what mother told me, Master Bill's place set back +from the road. Then there was a great square place they called the yard. +A fence divided the house and the yard adjoining it from that part of +the grounds which held the barn. The yard in front and back of the house +held a grove. + +[Illustration] + +The square around the house and the Negro quarters were all enclosed so +that the little slaves could not get out while parents were at work. The +Negroes assembled on the porch when the gong called them in the morning. +The boss gave orders from the porch. There was an open space between the +quarters and the court (where the little slaves played). There was a +gate between the court and the big house. + +"On the rear of the house, there was a porch from which the boss gave +orders usually about four o'clock in the morning and at which they would +disband in the evening between nine and ten--no certain time but more or +less not earlier than nine and not often later than ten. Back of the +house and beyond it was a fence extending clear across the yard. In one +corner of this fence was a gate leading into the court. Leading out of +the court was an opening surrounded by a semi-circular fence which +enclosed the Negro quarters. + +"The cabins were usually built on the ground--no floors. The roofs were +covered with clapboards. + +"When I was a boy we used to sing, 'Rather be a nigger than a poor white +man.' Even in slavery they used to sing that. It was the poor white man +who was freed by the War, not the Negroes. + + +Furniture + +"There wasn't any furniture. Beds were built with one post out and the +other three _sides_ fastened to the sides of the house. + + +Marrying Time + +"I remember one night the people were gone to marry. That was when all +the people in the community married immediately after slavery. + + +Ghosts + +"We had an open fireplace. That was at Bartlett Sanders' place. He had +close on to three thousand acres. Every grown person had gone to the +marrying, and I was at home in the bed I just described. + +"My grandfather's mother[HW: ?] had a chair and that was hers only. She +was named Senia and was about eighty years old. We burned nothing but +pine knots in the hearth. You would put one or two of those on the fire +and they would burn for hours. We were all in bed and had been for an +hour or two. There were some others sleeping in the same room. There +came a peculiar knocking on grandmother's[HW: great grandmother?] chair. +It's hard to describe it. It was something like the distant beating of a +drum. Grandmother was dead, of course. The boys got up and ran out and +brought in some of the hands. When they came in, a little thing about +three and a half feet high with legs about six or eight inches long ran +out of the room. + + +Ku Klux Klan + +"Whenever there was a man of influence, they terrorized him. They were +at their height about the time of Grant's election. Many a time my +mother and I have watched them pass our door. They wore gowns and some +kind of helmet. They would be going to catch same leading Negro and whip +him. There was scarcely a night they couldn't take a leading Negro out +and whip him if they would catch him alone. On that account, the Negro +men did not stay at home in Sumter County, South Carolina at night. They +left home and stayed together. The Ku Klux very seldom interfered with a +woman or a child. + +"They often scared colored people by drinking large quantities of water. +They had something that held a lot of water, and when they would raise +the bucket to their mouths to drink, they would slip the water into it. + + +White Caps + +"The white caps operated further to the northwest of where I lived. I +never came in contact with them. They were not the same thing as the Ku +Klux. + + +Voting + +"In South Carolina under the Reconstruction, we voted right along. In +1868 there were soldiers at all of the election places to see that you +did vote. + + +Career Since the War + +"In 1881 I married. The year after that, in '83,[HW: ?] I merchandised a +little. Then I got converted. I got it in my head that it was wrong to +take big profits from business, so I sold out. Then I was asked to +assist the keeper of the jail. + +"In 1888 I went to school for the first time. I was then twenty-six +years old. By the end of the first term, I knew all that the teacher +could teach, so he sent me to Claflin University. I left there in the +third year normal. + +"When I returned home, I taught school, at first in a private school and +later in a public school for $15 a month. + +"A man named Boyle told me that he had some ground to sell. I saved up +$45, the price he asked for it. When I offered it to him, he said that +he had decided not to sell it. I went to town and spent my $45. A few +days later, he met me and offered me the place again. I told him I had +spent my money. He then offered it to me on time. There was plenty of +timber on the place, so I got some contracts with a man named Roland and +delivered wood to him. When I went to collect the money, he said he +would not pay me in money. + +"A man named Pennington offered me 20ข a day for labor. I asked if he +would pay in money. + +"He replied, 'If you're looking for money, don't come.' + +"I went home and said to my wife, 'I am going to leave here.' + +"I came to Forrest City, Arkansas January 28, 1888. I farmed in Forrest +City, making one crop, and then I entered the ministry, and then I +preached at Spring Park for two years. + +"Then I entered Philander Smith College where I stayed from 1891-1897. I +preached from the time I left Philander until 1913. + +"Then I studied law and completed the American Correspondence course in +Law when I was fifty years old. I am still practicing. + + +Wife and Family + +"In 1897, when I graduated from Philander, my wife and six children were +sitting on the front seat. + +"I have eleven sons and daughters, of whom six are living. I had seven +brothers and sisters. + +"My wife and I have been married fifty-six years. I had to steal her +away from her parents, and she has never regretted coming to me nor I +taking her." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +"Brother Mack" as he is familiarly and affectionately known to his +friends is a man keen and vigorous, mentally and physically. He attends +Sunday school, church both in the morning and evening, and all +departments of the Epworth League. He takes the Epworth Herald, the +Southwestern Christian Advocate, the Literary Digest, some poultry and +farm magazines, the Arkansas Gazette, and the St. Louis Democrat, and +several other journals. He is on omnivorous reader and a clear thinker. +He raises chickens and goats and plants a garden as avocations. He has +on invincible reputation for honesty as well as for thrift and thought. + +Nothing is pleasanter than to view the relationship between him and his +wife. They have been married fifty-six years and seem to have achieved a +perfect understanding. She is an excellent cook and is devoted to her +home. She attends church regularly. Seems to be four or five years +younger than her husband. Like him, however, she seems to enjoy +excellent health. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Cresa Mack + 1417 Short Indiana St., Pine Bluff, Ark. +Age: 85 + + +"I can tell you something about slavery days. I was born at South Bend, +Arkansas on the old Joe Clay place. I 'member they used to work 'em +scandalous. They used me at the house and I used to wait on old +mistress' brother. He was a old man named Cal Fletcher. + +"I 'member when they said the Yankees was comin' the boss man put us in +wagons and runned us to Texas. They put the women and chillun in the +wagons but the men had to walk. I know I was something over twelve years +old. + +"Old mistress, Miss Sarah Clay, took her chillun and went to Memphis. + +"My white folks treated us very well. I never seed 'em whip my mother +but once, but I seen some whipped till they's speechless. Yes ma'm I +have. + +"I can 'member a lot 'bout the war. The Lord have mercy, I'se old. I +'member they used to sing + + 'Run nigger run, + The paddyrollers'll ketch you, + Run nigger run.' + +"Corse if they ketch you out without a pass they'd beat you nearly to +death and tell you to go home to your master. + +"One time I was totin' water for the woman what did the washin'. I was +goin' along the road and seed somethin' up in a tree that look like a +dog. I said 'Look at that dog.' The overseer was comin' from the house +and said 'That ain't no dog, that's a panther. You better not stop' and +he shot it out. Then I've seen bears out in the cane brakes. I thought +they was big black bulls. I was young then--yes mam, I was young. + +"When the Yankees come through they sot the house afire and the gin and +burned up 'bout a hundred bales a cotton. They never bothered the +niggers' quarters. That was the time the overseer carried us to Texas to +get rid of the Yankees. + +"After the surrender the Yankees told the overseer to bring us all up in +the front yard so he could read us the ceremony and he said we was as +free as any white man that walked the ground. I didn't know what 'twas +about much cause I was too busy playin'. + +"I didn't know what school was 'fore freedom, but I went about a month +after peace was declared. Then papa died and mama took me out and put me +in the field. + +"I was grown, 'bout twenty-four or five, when I married. Now my chillun +and grand chillun takes care of me." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Warren McKinney, Hazen, Arkansas +Age: 85 + + +I was born in Edgefield County, South Carolina. I am eighty-five years +old. I was born a slave of George Strauter. I remembers hearing them say +"Thank God Ize free as a jay bird." My ma was a slave in the field. I +was eleven years old when freedom was declared. When I was little, Mr. +Strauter whipped my ma. It hurt me bad as it did her. I hated him. She +was crying. I chunked him with rocks. He run after me, but he didn't +catch me. There was twenty-five or thirty hands that worked in the +field. They raised wheat, corn, oats, barley, and cotton. All the +children that couldn't work stayed at one house. Aunt Mat kept the +babies and small children that couldn't go to the field. He had a gin +and a shop. The shop was at the fork of the roads. When de war come on +my papa went to build forts. He quit ma and took another woman. When de +war closed ma took her four children, bundled em up and went to Augusta. +The government give out rations there. My ma washed and ironed. People +died in piles. I don't know till yet what was de matter. They said it +was the change of living. I seen five or six wooden, painted coffins +piled up on wagons pass by our house. Loads passed every day lack you +see cotton pass here. Some said it was cholorea and some took +consumption. Lots of de colored people nearly starved. Not much to get +to do and not much house room. Several families had to live in one +house. Lots of the colored folks went up north and froze to death. They +couldn't stand the cold. They wrote back about them dieing. No they +never sent them back. I heard some sent for money to come back. I heerd +plenty bout the Ku Klux. They scared the folks to death. People left +Augusta in droves. About a thousand would all meet and walk going to +hunt work and new homes. Some of them died. I had a sister and brother +lost that way. I had another sister come to Louisiana that way. She +wrote back. + +I don't think the colored folks looked for a share of land. They never +got nothing cause the white folks didn't have nothing but barren hills +left. About all the mules was wore out hauling provisions in the army. +Some folks say they ought to done more for de colored folks when dey +left, but dey say dey was broke. Freeing all de slaves left em broke. + +That reconstruction was a mighty hard pull. Me and ma couldn't live. A +man paid our ways to Carlisle, Arkansas and we come. We started working +for Mr. Emenson. He had a big store, teams, and land. We liked it fine, +and I been here fifty-six years now. There was so much wild game living +was not so hard. If a fellow could get a little bread and a place to +stay he was all right. After I come to dis state I voted some. I have +farmed and worked at odd jobs. I farmed mostly. Ma went back to her old +master. He persuaded her to come back home. Me and her went back and run +a farm four or five years before she died. Then I come back here. I +first had 300 acres at Carlisle. I sold it and bought 80 acres at Green +Grove. I married in South Carolina. We had a fine weddin, home weddin. +Each of our families furnished the weddin supper. We had 24 waiters. +That is all the wife I ever had. We lived together 57 years. It is hard +for me to keep up with my mind since she died. She been dead five years +nearly now. I used to sing but I forgot all the songs. We had song +books. I joined the church when I was twelve years old. + +I think the times are worse than they use to be. The people is living +mighty fast I tell you. I don't get no help from the government. They +won't give me the pension. I can't work and I can't pay taxes on my +place. They just don't give me nothing but a little out of the store. I +can't get no pension. + + + + +Little Rock District +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of Interviewer: Irene Robertson +Subject: Ex-Slave--History +Story:--Information + +This Information given by: Warren McKinney +Place of Residence: Hazen, Green Grove Settlement, Arkansas +Occupation: Farming +Age: 84 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] + + +Warren McKinney was born in Edgefield County, South Carolina. He was +born a slave. His master was George Strauter. He had a big plantation +and worked twenty-five or thirty work hands. There were twenty-five or +thirty children too small to work in the field. They raised cotton, +corn, oats, and wheat. His mother washed and ironed and cooked. He was +small but well remembers once when his mother had been sick and had just +gotten out. George Strauter whipped her with a switch on her legs. +Warren did not approve of it. Rocks were plentiful and he began throwing +at him. He said Mr. George took out after him but didn't catch or whip +him. + +George Strauter tried to teach them all how to be good farmers and be +saving. Warren knew war was going on but he didn't see any of it. His +father came home several times. He was off building forts. He said he +remembered a big "hurly-burly" and he heard 'em saying, "Thank God I'ze +free as a jay bird." He didn't know why they were fighting so he didn't +know then why they were saying that. + +George Strauter had a shop at the fork of the roads. He had his own gin. +They sold cotton and bought provisions at Augusta, Georgia. They made +some of their meal and flour and raised all their meat and made enough +lard to do the year around. + +He heard them talking about the "Yankees" burning up Augusta, but he saw +where they had burned Hamburg, South Carolina or North Augusta they call +it. + +After they were free he remembers his mother bundling up her things and +her family and them all going in an ox cart to Augusta to live. Warren's +mother washed, cooked and ironed for a living. Her husband went off and +lived with another woman after freedom. Warren was about eleven years +old then. The Government furnished food for them too. One thing that +distressed Warren was _the way people died for more than a year_. He saw +five or six coffins piled up on a wagon being taken out to be buried. He +thought it was changing houses and changing ways of living. They didn't +have shoes and warm clothes and weren't fed from white folks smoke +house. _Lots of the slaves had Consumption and died right now_. Stout +men and women didn't live two years after they were freed. Lots of them +said they didn't like that freedom and wanted to go back but the masters +were broke and couldn't keep many of them if they went back. + +When Warren was about fifteen years old, there was a white man or two, +but colored leaders mostly got about a thousand colored people to start +for the West walking. Warren had sisters and brothers who started on +this trip. Warren had some fussy brothers, his mother was afraid would +get in jail. They kept her uneasy. They shipped their "stuff" by boat +and train. He never saw them any more but he heard from them in +Louisiana. Louisiana had a bad name in those days. + +When Warren was about fourteen and fifteen, his mother had them on a +farm, farming near Hamburg. + +When he was sixteen or seventeen, his mother and the other children came +on the train to about where Carlisle now is but it wasn't called by that +name. There were very few houses of any kind. Mr. Emerson had a big +store and lots of land. He worked black and white. Mr. Emerson let them +have seven or eight mules and wagons and they farmed near there. He +remembers pretty soon there was a depot where the depot now stands, a +bank, a post office, and two or three more stores, all small buildings. +He liked coming to Arkansas because he got to ride on the train a long +ways. It was easy to live here. There were lots of game and fish. + +Warren never shot anything in his life. He was no hunter. _Nats_ were +awful. Warren made smoke to run the nats from the cows. Four or five +deer would come to the smoke. Cows were afraid of them and would leave +the smoke. When he would go the deer would leap four or five feet in the +air at the sight of him. + +When Warren lived in Augusta, Georgia, they had schools a month at a +time but Warren never did get to go to any, so he can't read or write. +But he learned to save his money. He joined a church when he was twelve +years old in South Carolina and belongs to the Baptist church at Green +Grove now. + +The old master in South Carolina persuaded his mother to come back. They +all went back four or five years before his mother died. While Warren +was there he married a woman on a joining farm. + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Victoria McMullen + 1416 E. Valmar, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 54 +Occupation: Seamstress + + +"My mother was born March 16, 1865, and knew nothing of slavery. + +"Both my grandmothers and both grandfathers were slaves. My father was +born in the same year as my mother and like my mother knew nothing of +slavery although both of them might have been born slaves. + +"I knew my mother's mother and father and my father's mother, but I +didn't know my father's father. + +"He was from Texas and he always stayed there. He never did come out to +Louisiana where I was born. My mother was born in Louisiana, but my +father was born in Texas. I don't know what county or city my father was +born in. I just heard my grandmother on his side say he was born in +Texas. + +"During the War (he was born in '65 when the War ceased), Grandmother +Katy--that was her name, Katy, Katy Elmore--she was in Louisiana at +first--she was run out in Texas, I suppose, to be hidden from the +Yankees. My father was born there and my grandfather stayed there. He +died in Texas and then Grandma Katy come back to Louisiana with my +father and settled in Ouachita Parish. + +"Grandma Katy was sold from South Carolina into Louisiana to Bob +McClendon, and she kept the name of Elmore who was her first owner in +South Carolina. It was Bob McClendon who run her out in Texas to hide +her from the Yankees. My grandfather in Texas kept the name of Jamison. +That was the name of his master in Texas. But grandma kept the name of +Elmore from South Carolina because he was good to her. He was better +than Bob McClendon. The eastern states sold their slaves to the southern +states and got all the money, then they freed the slaves and that left +the South without anything. + +"Grandma Katy had Creek Indian blood in her. She was of medium size and +height, copper colored, high cheek bones, small squinchy eyes, black +curly hair. Her hair was really pretty but she didn't curl it. It was +just naturally curly. She was a practical nurse as they call it, but she +did more of what some people call a midwife. They call it something else +now. They got a proper word for it. + +"They got it in these government agencies. That is what she was even in +slavery times. She worked for colored people and white people both. That +was after she was freed until she went blind. She went blind three years +before she died. She died at the age of exactly one hundred years. She +treated women and babies. They said she was a real good doctor in her +day. That is been fifty-four years ago. [I will be fifty-four years old +tomorrow--September 18, 1938.] In slavery times my grandma was almost as +free as she was in freedom because of her work. + +"She said that Bob McClendon was cruel to her. Sometimes he'd get angry +and take the shovel and throw hot ashes on the slaves. And then he'd see +them with blisters on them and he would take a handsaw or a flat plank +and bust the blisters. Louisiana was a warm country and they wouldn't +have much clothes on. When the slaves were freed, he went completely +broke. He had scarcely a place to live. + +"I seen him once. Be look like on old possum. He had a long beard down +to his waist and he had long side burns too. Just a little of his face +showed. He was tall and stooping and he wore his hair long and uncut +down on his neck. You know about what he looked like. He had on blue +jeans pants and brogan shoes and a common shirt--a work shirt. He wore +very common clothes. When they freed the Negroes, it broke him up +completely. He had been called a 'big-to-do' in his life but he wasn't +nothing then. He owned Grandma Katy. + +"Grandma Katy had a sister named Maria and a brother named Peter. He +owned all three of them. I have seen all of them. Grandma Katy was the +oldest. She and Uncle Peter stayed close together. He didn't have no +wife and she didn't have no husband. But Aunt Maria had a husband. She +lived off from them after freedom. It was about twelve miles away. My +great-aunt and great-uncle--they were Maria and Peter--that was what +they were. Uncle Peter died first before I left Louisiana, but Aunt +Maria and Grandma Katy died after I came to Arkansas. Grandma Katy lived +four years after I came here. + +"After they was free and my father had gotten large enough to work and +didn't have no horse, my grandma was going 'round waiting on women--that +is all she did--all the rest of the people had gotten large and left +home. Papa made a crop with a hoe. He made three bales of cotton and +about twelve loads of corn with that hoe. He used to tell me, 'You don't +know nothin' 'bout work. You oughter see how I had to work.' After that +he bought him a horse. Money was scarce then and it took something to +buy the place and the horse both. They were turned loose from slavery +without anything. Hardly had a surname--just Katy, Maria, and Peter. + +"I knew more about the slave-time history of my mother's folks than I +did about my father's but I'll tell you that some other time. My +grandmother on my mother's side was born in Richmond, Virginia. She was +owned by a doctor but I can't call his name. She gets her name from her +husband's owners. They came from Virginia. They didn't take the name of +their owners in Louisiana. They took the name of the owners in Virginia. +She was a twin--her twin was a boy named June and her name was Hetty. +Her master kept her brother to be a driver for him. She was sent from +Virginia to Louisiana to people that were related to her Virginia +people. She called her Louisiana mistress 'White Ma;' she never did call +her 'missis.' The white folks and the colored folks too called her +Indian because she was mixed with Choctaw. That's the Indian that has +brown spots on the jaw. They're brownskin. It was an Indian from the +Oklahoma reservation that said my mother belonged to the Choctaws. + +"She rode from Virginia to Louisiana on a boat at the age of twelve +years. She was separated from her mother and brothers and sisters and +never did see them again. She was kept in the house for a nurse. She was +not a midwife. She nursed the white babies. That was what she was sent +to Louisiana for--to nurse the babies. The Louisiana man that owned her +was named George Dorkins. But I think this white woman came from +Virginia. She married this Louisiana man, then sent back to her father's +house and got grandma; she got her for a nurse. She worked only a year +and a half in the field before peace was declared. After she got grown +and married, my grandfather--she had to stay with him and cook and keep +house for him. That was during slavery time but after George Dorkins +died. Dorkins went and got hisself a barrel of whiskey--one of these +great big old barrels--and set it up in his house, and put a faucet in +it and didn't do nothin' but drink whiskey. He said he was goin' to +drink hisself to death. And he did. + +"He was young enough to go to war and he said he would drink hisself to +death before he would go, and he did. My grandma used to steal +newspapers out of his house and take them down to the quarters and leave +them there where there were one or two slaves that could read and tell +how the War was goin' on. I never did learn how the slaves learned to +read. But she was in the house and she could steal the papers and send +them down. Later she could slip off and they would tell her the news, +and then she could slip the papers back. + +"Her master drank so much he couldn't walk without falling and she would +have to help him out. Her mistress was really good. She never allowed +the overseer to whip her. She was only whipped once in slave time while +my father's mother was whipped more times than you could count. + +"Her master often said, 'I'll drink myself to death before I'll go to +war and be shot down like a damn target.' She said in living with them +in the house, she learned to cuss from him. She said she was a cussin' +soul until she became a Christian. She wasn't 'fraid of them because she +was kin to them in some way. There was another woman there who was some +kin to them and she looked enough like my grandma for them to be kin to +each other. We talked it over several times and said we believed we were +related; but none of us know for sure. + +"When the slaves wanted something said they would have my grandma say it +because they knew she wouldn't be whipped for it. 'White Ma' wouldn't +let nobody whip her if she knew it. She cussed the overseer out that +time for whipping her. + +"When grandma was fourteen or fifteen years old they locked her up in +the seed house once or twice for not going to church. You see they let +the white folks go to the church in the morning and the colored folks in +the evening, and my grandma didn't always want to go. She would be +locked up in the seed bin and she would cuss the preacher out so he +could hear her. She would say, 'Master, let us out.' And he would say, +'You want to go to church?' And she would say, 'No, I don't want to hear +that same old sermon: "Stay out of your missis' and master's hen house. +Don't steal your missis' and master's chickens. Stay out of your missis' +and master's smokehouse. Don't steal your missis' and master's hams." I +don't steal nothing. Don't need to tell me not to.' + +"She was tellin' the truth too. She didn't steal because she didn't have +to. She had plenty without stealin'! She got plenty to eat in the house. +But the other slaves didn't git nothin' but fat meat and corn bread and +molasses. And they got tired of that same old thing. They wanted +something else sometimes. They'd go to the hen house and get chickens. +They would go to the smokehouse and get hams and lard. And they would +get flour and anything else they wanted and they would eat something +they wanted. There wasn't no way to keep them from it. + +"The reason she got whipped that time, the overseer wanted her to help +get a tree off the fence that had been blown down by a storm. She told +him that wasn't her work and she wasn't goin' to do it. Old miss was +away at that time. He hit her a few licks and she told old miss when she +came back. Old 'White Ma' told the overseer, 'Don't never put your hands +on her no more no matter what she does. That's more than I do. I don't +hit her and you got no business to do it.' + +"Her husband, my grandfather, was a blacksmith, and he never did work in +the field. He made wagons, plows, plowstocks, buzzard wings--they call +them turning plows now. They used to make and put them on the stocks. He +made anything-handles, baskets. He could fill wagon wheels. He could +sharpen tools. Anything that come under the line of blacksmith, that is +what he did. He used to fix wagons all the time I knowed him. In harvest +time in the fall he would drive from Bienville where they were slaves to +Monroe in Ouachita Parish. He kept all the plows and was sharpening and +fixing anything that got broke. He said he never did get no whipping. + +"His name was Tom Eldridge. They called him 'Uncle Tom'. They was the +mother and father of twelve children. Six lived and six died. One boy +and five girls lived. And one girl and five boys died--half and half. He +died at the age of seventy-five, June 6, 1908. She died January 1920. + +"I came out here in January 1907. I lived in Pine Bluff. From Louisiana +I came to Pine Bluff in 1906. In 1907 I went to Kerr in Lonoke County +and lived there eight years and then I came to Little Rock. I farmed at +Kerr and just worked 'round town those few months in Pine Bluff. +Excusing the time I was in Pine Bluff and Little Rock I farmed. I farmed +in Ouachita Parish, Louisiana." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Nannie P. Madden + West Memphis, Arkansas +Age: 69 + + +"I am Martha Johnson's sister. I was born at Lake Village, Arkansas. I +am 69 years old. I was born on Mr. Ike Wethingtons place. Pa was +renting. Mother died in 1876 on this farm. We called it Red Leaf +plantation. Father died at Martha Johnson's here in West Memphis when he +was 88 years old. + +"Mother was not counted a slave. Her master's Southern wife (white wife) +disliked her very much but kept her till her death. Mother had three +white children by her master. After freedom she married a black man and +had four children by him. We are in the last set. + +"We was born after slavery and all we know is from hearing our people +talk. Father talked all time about slavery. He was a soldier. I couldn't +tell you straight. I can give you some books on slavery: + + Booker T. Washington's Own Story of His Life and Work, + 64 page supplement, by Albon L. Holsey + + Authentic Edition--in office of Library of Congress, + Washington, D.C., 1915, copywrighted by J.L. Nichols + Co. + + The Master Mind of a Child of Slavery--Booker T. Washington, + by Frederick E. Drinker, Washington, D.C. + +I have read them both. Yes, they are my own books. + +"I farmed and cooked all my life." + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Perry Madden, Thirteenth Street, south side, + one block east of Boyle Park Road, Route 6, + Care L.G. Cotton, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: About 79 + + +Birth and Age + +"I have been here quite a few years. This life is short. A man ought to +prepare for eternity. I had an uncle who used to say that a person who +went to torment stayed as long as there was a grain of sand on the sea. + +"I was a little boy when slavery broke. I used to go out with my +brother. He watched gaps. I did not have to do anything; I just went out +with him to keep him company. I was scared of the old master. I used to +call him the 'Big Bear.' He was a great big old man. + +"I was about six years old when the War ended, I guess. I don't know how +old I am. The insurance men put me down as seventy-three. I know I was +here in slavery time, and I was just about six years old when the War +ended. + + +Schooling + +"I got my first learning in Alabama. I didn't learn anything at all in +slavery times. I went to school. I would go to the house in slavery +tine, and there wouldn't be nobody home, and I would go to the bed and +get under it because I was scared. When I would wake up it would be way +in the night and dark, and I would be in bed. + +"I got my schooling way after the surrender. We would make crops. The +third time we moved, dad started me to school. I had colored teachers. I +was in Talladega County. I made the fifth grade before I stopped. My +father died and then I had to stop and take care of my mother. + + +An "Aunt Caroline" Story + +"I know that some people can tell things that are goin' to happen. Old +man Julks lived at Pumpkin Bend. He had a colt that disappeared. He went +to 'Aunt Caroline'--that's Caroline Dye. She told him just where the +colt was and who had it and how he had to get it back. She described the +colt and told him that was what he come to find out about before he had +a chance to ask her anything. She told him that white people had it and +told him where they lived and told him he would have to have a white man +go and git it for him. He was working for a good man and he told him +about it. He advertised for the colt and the next day, the man that +stole it came and told him that a colt had been found over on his place +and for him to come over and arrange to git it. But he said, 'No, I've +placed that matter in the hands of my boss.' He told his boss about it, +but the fellow brought the horse and give it to the boss without any +argument. + + +Family and Masters + +"My old master's slaves were called free niggers. He and his wife never +mistreated their slaves. When any of Madden's slaves were out and the +pateroles got after them, if they could make it home, that ended it. +Nobody beat Madden's niggers. + +"My father's name was Allen Madden and my mother's name was Amy Madden. +I knew my grandfather and grandmother on my mother's side. My +grandfather and grandmother never were 'round me though that I can +remember. + +"When the old man died, the Negroes were divided out. This boy got so +many and that one got so many. The old man, Mabe Madden, had two sons, +John and Little Mabe. My mother and father went to John. They were in +Talladega because John stayed there. + +"My father's mother and father fell to Little Mabe Madden. They never +did come to Alabama but I have heard my father talk about them so much. +My father's father was named Harry. His last name must have been Madden. + +"My grandfather on my mother's side was named Charlie Hall. He married +into the Madden family. He belonged to the Halls before he married. Old +man Charlie, his master, had a plantation that wasn't far from the +Madden's plantation. In those days, if you met a girl and fell in love +with her, you could git a pass and go to see her if you wanted to. You +didn't have to be on the same plantation at all. And you could marry her +and go to see her, and have children by her even though you belonged to +different masters. The Maddens never did buy Hall. Grandma never would +change her name to Hall. He stayed at my house after we married, stayed +with me sometimes, and stayed with his other son sometimes. + +"My mother was born a Madden. She was born right at Madden's place. When +grandma married Hall, like it is now, she would have been called Hall. +But she was born a Madden and stayed Madden and never did change to her +husband's name. So my mother was born a Madden although her father's +name was Hall. + +"I don't know what sort of man Mabe was, and I only know what my parents +said about John. They said he was a good man and I have to say what they +said. He didn't let nobody impose on his niggers. Pateroles did git +after them and bring them in with the hounds, but when they got in, that +settled it. Madden never would allow white people to beat on his +niggers. + +"They tried to git my daddy out so that they could whip him, but they +couldn't catch him. They shot him--the pateroles did--but he whipped +them. My daddy was a coon. I mean he was a good man. + + +Early Life + +"My brother was big enough to mind gaps. That was in slavery times. They +had good fences around the field. They didn't have gates like they do +now. They had gaps. The fence would zigzag, and the rails could be +lifted down at one section, and that would leave a gap. If you left a +gap, the stock would go into the field. When there was a gap, my brother +would stay in it and keep the stock from passing. When the folks would +come to dinner, he would go in and eat dinner with them just as big as +anybody. When they would leave, the gap would stay down till night. It +stayed down from morning till noon and from one o'clock till the men +come in at night. The gap was a place in the rails like I told you where +they could take down the rails to pass. It took time to lay the rails +down and more time to place then back up again. They wouldn't do it. +They would leave them down till they come back during the work hours and +a boy that was too small to do anything else was put to mind them. My +brother used to do that and I would keep him company. When I heard old +master coming there, I'd be gone, yes siree. I would see him when he +left the house and when he got to the gap, I would be home or at my +grandfather's. + + +Occupational Experiences + +"I have followed farming all my life. That is the sweetest life a man +can lead. I have been farming all my life principally. My occupation is +farming. That is it was until I lost my health. I ain't done nothin' for +about four years now. I would follow public work in the fall of the year +and make a crop every year. Never failed till I got disabled. I used to +make all I used and all I needed to feed my stock. I even raised my own +wheat before I left home in Alabama. That is a wheat country. They don't +raise it out here.[HW: ?] + +"I came here--lemme see, about how many years ago did I come here. I +guess I have been in Arkansas about twenty-eight years since the first +time I come here. I have gone in and out as I got a chance to work +somewheres. I have been living in this house about three years. + +"I preached for about twenty or more years. I don't know that I call +myself a preacher. I am a pretty good talker sometimes. I have never +pastored a church; somehow or 'nother the word come to me to go and I go +and talk. I ain't no pulpit chinch. I could have taken two or three +men's churches out from under them, but I didn't. + + +Freedom and Soldiers + +"I can't remember just how my father got freed. Old folks then didn't +let you stan' and listen when they talked. If you did it once, you +didn't do it again. They would talk while they were together, but the +children would have business outdoors. Yes siree, I never heard them say +much about how they got freedom. + +"I was there when the Yankees come through. That was in slave time. They +marched right through old man Madden's grove. They were playing the +fifes and beating the drums. And they were playing the fiddle. Yes sir, +they were playing the fiddle too. It must have been a fiddle; it sounded +just like one. The soldiers were all just a singin'. They didn't bother +nobody at our house. If they bothered anything, nothing was told me +about it. I heard my uncle say they took a horse from my old manager. I +didn't see it. They took the best horse in the lot my uncle said. Pardon +me, they didn't take him. A peckerwood took him and let the Yankees get +him. I have heard that they bothered plenty of other places. Took the +best mules, and left old broken down ones and things like that. Broke +things up. I have heard that about other places, but I didn't see any of +it. + + +Right after the War + +"Right after the War, my father went to farming--renting land. I mean he +sharecropped and done around. Thing is come way up from then when the +Negroes first started. They didn't have no stock nor nothin' then. They +made a crop just for the third of it. When they quit the third, they +started givin' them two-fifths. That's more than a third, ain't it? Then +they moved up from that, and give them half, and they are there yet. If +you furnish, they give you two-thirds and take one-third. Or they give +you so much per acre or give him produce in rent. + + +Marriage + +"I was married in 1883. My wife's name was Mary Elston. Her mother died +when she was an infant. Her grandmother was an Elston at first. Then she +changed her name to Cunningham. But she always went in the name of +Elston, and was an Elston when she married me. My wife I mean. I married +on a Thursday in the Christmas week. This December I will be married +fifty-five years. This is the only wife I have ever had. We had three +children and all of them are dead. All our birthed children are dead. +One of them was just three months old when he died. My baby girl had +three children and she lived to see all of them married. + + +Opinions + +"Our own folks is about the worst enemies we have. They will come and +sweet talk you and then work against you. I had a fellow in here not +long ago who came here for a dollar, and I never did hear from him again +after he got it. He couldn't get another favor from me. No man can fool +me more than one time. I have been beat out of lots of money and I have +got hurt trying to help people. + +"The young folks now is just gone astray. I tell you the truth, I +wouldn't give you forty cents a dozen for these young folks. They are +sassy and disrespectful. Don't respect themselves and nobody else. When +they get off from home, they'll respect somebody else better 'n they +will their own mothers. + +"If they would do away with this stock law, they would do better +everywhere. If you would say fence up your place and raise what you +want, I could get along. But you have to keep somebody to watch your +stock. If you don't, you'll have to pay something out. It's a bad old +thing this stock law. It's detrimental to the welfare of man." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Lewis Mann + 1501 Bell Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 81 + + +"As nigh as I can come at it, I was bout five or six time of the war. I +remember when the war ceasted. I was a good-sized chap. + +"Durin' the war my mother's master sent us to Texas; western Texas is +whar they stopped me. We stayed there two years and then they brought us +back after surrender. + +"I remember when the war ceasted and remember the soldiers refugeein' +through the country. I'm somewhar round eighty-one. I'm tellin' you the +truf. I ain't just now come here. + +"I was born right here in Arkansas. My mother's master was old B.D. +Williams of Tennessee and we worked for his son Mac H. Williams here in +Arkansas. They was good to my mother. Always had nurses for the colored +childrun while the old folks was in the field. + +"After the war I used to work in the house for my white folks--for Dr. +Bob Williams way up there in the country on the river. I stayed with his +brother Mac Williams might near twenty-five or thirty years. Worked +around the house servin' and doin' arrands different places. + +"I went to school a little bit a good piece after the war and learned to +read and write. + +"I've heard too much of the Ku Klux. I remember when they was Ku Kluxin' +all round through here. + +"Lord! I don't know how many times I ever voted. I used to vote every +time they had an election. I voted before I could read. The white man +showed me how to vote and asked me who I wanted to vote for. Oh Lord, I +was might near grown when I learned to read. + +"I been married just one time in my life and my wife's been dead +thirteen years. + +"I tell you, Miss, I don't know hardly what to think of things now. +Everything so changeable I can't bring nothin' to remembrance to hold +it. + +"I didn't do nothin' when I was young but just knock around with the +white folks. Oh Lord, when I was young I delighted in parties. Don't +nothin' like that worry me now. Don't go to no parades or nothin'. Don't +have that on my brain like I did when I was young. I goes to church all +the place I does go. + +"I ain't never had no accident. Don't get in the way to have no accident +cause I know the age I is if I injure these bones there ain't anything +more to me. + +"My mother had eight childrun and just my sister and me left. I can't do +a whole day's work to save my life. I own this place and my +sister-in-law gives me a little somethin' to eat. I used to be on the +bureau but they took me off that." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Angeline Martin, Kansas City, Missouri + Visiting at 1105 Louisiana St., Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age 80 + + +"Well, I was livin' then. I was born in Georgia. Honey, I don't know +what year. I was born before the war. I was about ten when freedom come. +I don't remember when it started but I remember when it ended. I think +I'm in the 80's--that's the way I count it. + +"My master was dead and my mistress was a widow--Miss Sarah Childs. She +had a guardeen. + +"When the war come, old mistress and her daughter refugeed to +Mississippi. The guardeen wouldn't let me go, said I was too young. + +"My parents stayed on the plantation. My white folks' house was vacant +and the Yankees come and used it for headquarters. They never had put +shoes on me and when the Yankees shot the chickens I'd run and get em. +They didn't burn up nothin', just kill the hogs and chickens and give us +plenty. + +"I didn't know what the war was about. You know chillun in them days +didn't have as much sense as they got now. + +"After freedom, my folks stayed on the place and worked on the shares. I +want to school right after the war. I went every year till we left +there. We come to this country in seventy something. We come here and +stopped at the Cummins place. I worked in the field till I come to town +bout fifty years ago. Since then I cooked some and done laundry work. + +"I married when I was seventeen. Had six children. I been livin' in +Kansas City twenty-three years. Followed my boy up there. I like it up +there a lot better than I do here. Oh lord, yes, there are a lot of +colored people in Kansas City." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Josie Martin + R.F.D., Madison, Arkansas +Age: 86 + + +"I was born up near Cotton Plant but took down near Helena to live. My +parents named Sallie and Bob Martin. They had seven children. I heard +mother say she was sold on a block in Mississippi when she was twelve +years old. My father was a Creek Indian; he was dark. Mother was a +Choctaw Indian; she was bright. Mother died when I was but a girl and +left a family on my hands. I sent my baby brother and sister to school +and I cooked on a boarding train. The railroad hands working on the +tracks roomed and et on the train. They are all dead now and I'm 'lone +in the world. + +"My greatest pleasure was independence--make my money, go and spend it +as I see fit. I wasn't popular with men. I never danced. I did sell +herbs for diarrhea and piles and 'what ails you.' I don't sell no more. +Folks too close to drug stores now. I had long straight hair nearly to +my knees. It come out after a spell of typhoid fever. It never come in +to do no good." (Baldheaded like a man and she shaves. She is a +hermaphrodite, reason for never marrying.) "I made and saved up at one +time twenty-three thousand dollars cooking and field work. I let it slip +out from me in dribs. + +"I used to run from the Yankees. I've seen them go in droves along the +road. They found old colored couple, went out, took their hog and made +them barbecue it. They drove up a stob, nailed a piece to a tree stacked +their guns. They rested around till everything was ready. They et at one +o'clock at night and after the feast drove on. They wasn't so good to +Negroes. They was good to their own feelings. They et up all that old +couple had to eat in their house and the pig they raised. I reckon their +owners give them more to eat. They lived off alone and the soldiers +stopped there and worked the old man and woman nearly to death. + +"Our master told us about freedom. His name was Master Martin. He come +here from Mississippi. I don't recollect his family. + +"I get help from the Welfare. I had paralysis. I never got over my +stroke. I ain't no 'count to work." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Bess Mathis, Hazen, Arkansas +Age: 82 + + +"I was born in De Sota County, Mississippi. My parents' owners was Mars +Hancock. Mama was a cook and field hand. Papa milked and worked in the +field. Mama had jes' one child, that me. I had six childern. I got five +livin'. They knowed they free. It went round from mouth to mouth. Mama +said Mars Hancock was good er slave holder as ever lived she recken. I +heard her come over that er good many times. But they wanted to be free. +I jes' heard em talk bout the Ku Klux. They said the Ku Klux made lot of +em roamin' round go get a place to live and start workin'. They tell how +they would ride at night and how scarry lookin' they was. I heard em say +if Mars Hancock didn't want to give em meat they got tree a coon or +possum. Cut the tree down or climb it and then come home and cook it. +They had no guns. They had dogs or could get one. Game helps out lots. + +"The women chewed for their children after they weaned em. They don't +none of em do that way now. Women wouldn't cut the baby's finger nails. +They bite em off. They said if you cut its nails off he would steal. +They bite its toe nails off, too. And if they wanted the children to +have long pretty hair, they would trim the ends off on the new of the +moon. That would cause the hair to grow long. White folks and darkies +both done them things. + +"I been doin' whatever come to hand--farmin', cookin', washin', ironin'. + +"I never expects to vote neither. I sure ain't voted. + +"Conditions pretty bad sometimes. I don't know what cause it. You got +beyond me now. I don't know what going become of the young folks, and +they ain't studyin' it. They ain't kind. Got no raisin' I call it. I +tried to raise em to work and behave. They work some. My son is takin' +care of me now." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Caroline Matthews + 812 Spruce Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 79 + + +"Yes'm, I was born in slavery times in Mississippi. Now, the only thing +I remember was some soldiers come along on some mules. I remember my +mother and father was sittin' on the gallery and they say, 'Look a +there, them's soldiers.' + +"And I remember when my parents run off. I was with 'em and I cried for +'em to tote me. + +"My mother's first owner was named Armstrong. She said she was about +eleven years old when he bought her. I heard her say they just changed +around a lot. + +"Freedom was comin' and her last owners had carried her to a state where +it hadn't come yet. That's right--it was Texas. + +"Her first owners was good. She said they wouldn't 'low the overseer to +'buke the women at all. + +"But her last owners was cruel. She said one day old missis was out in +the yard and backed up and fell into a pan of hot water and when her +husband come she told him and he tried to 'buke my mother. You know if +somebody tryin' to get the best of you and you can help yourself, you +gwine do it. So mama throwed up her arm and old master hit it with a +stick and cut it bad. So my parents run off. That was in Texas. + +"She said we was a year comin' back and I know they stopped at the +Dillard place and made a crop. And they lost one child on the way--that +was Kittie. + +"I heard mama say they got back here to Arkansas and got to the bureau +and they freed 'em. I know the War wasn't over yet 'cause I know I heard +mama say, 'Just listen to them guns at Vicksburg.' + +"When I was little, I was so sickly. I took down with the whoopin' cough +and I was sick so long. But mama say to the old woman what stayed with +me, 'This gal gwine be here to see many a winter 'cause she so stout in +the jaws I can't give her no medicine.' + +"When I commenced to remember anything, I heered 'em talkin' 'bout Grant +and Colfax. Used to wear buttons with Grant and Colfax. + +"But I was livin' in Abraham Lincoln's time. Chillun them days didn't +know nothin'. Why, woman, I was twelve years old 'fore I knowed babies +didn't come out a holler log. I used to go 'round lookin' in logs for a +baby. + +"I had seven sisters and three brothers and they all dead but me. Had +three younger than me. They was what they called freeborn chillun. + +"After freedom my parents worked for Major Ross. I know when mama fixed +us up to go to Sunday-school we'd go by Major Ross for him to see us. I +know we'd go so early, sometimes he'd still be in his drawers. + +"I know one thing--when I was about sixteen years old things was good +here. Ever'body had a good living." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Malindy Maxwell, Madison, Arkansas +Age: Up in 80's + + +"I was born close to Como and Sardis, Mississippi. My master and +mistress was Sam Shans and Miss Cornelia Shans. I was born a slave. They +owned mama and Master Rube Sanders owned pa. Neither owner wouldn't sell +but they agreed to let ma and pa marry. They had a white preacher and +they married out in the yard and had a big table full of weddin' supper, +and the white folks et in the house. They had a big supper too. Ma said +they had a big crowd. The preacher read the ceremony. Miss Cornelia give +her a white dress and white shoes and Miss Cloe Wilburn give her a veil. +Miss Cloe was some connection of Rube Sanders. + +"They had seven children. I'm the oldest--three of us living. + +"After 'mancipation pa went to see about marrying ma over agen and they +told him that marriage would stand long as ever he lived. + +"Mama was sold at twelve years old in Atlanta, Georgia. Ma and pa was +always field hands. Grandma got to be one of John Sanders' leading hands +to work mong the women folks. They said John Sanders was meanest man +ever lived or died. According to pa's saying, Mars Ruben was a good +sorter man. Pa said John Sanders was too mean a man to have a wife. He +was mean to Miss Sarah. They said he beat her, his wife, like he beat a +nigger woman. + +"Miss Sarah say, 'Come get your rations early Saturday morning, clean up +your house, wash and iron, and we'll go to preaching tomorrow--Sunday. I +want you to all come out clean Monday morning.' They go ask Mars John +Sanders if they could go to preaching. I recken from what they said they +walked. Mars John, when they git their best clothes on, make them turn +round and go to the field and work all day long. He was just that mean. +Work all day long Sunday. + +"Miss Sarah was a Primitive Baptist and that is what I am till this day. +Some folks call us Hardshell Baptist. The colored folks set in the back +of the church. The women all set on one side and the men on the other. +If they had a middle row, there was a railing dividing mens' seats from +the womens' seats on the very same benches. + +"Miss Cloe, Miss Cornelia, and Miss Sarah cook up a whole lot of good +things to eat and go to camp meeting. Sometimes they would stay a week +and longer. They would take time bout letting the colored folks go long. +We had big times. My grandpa took a gingercake cutter with him and sold +gingercakes when they come out of the church. He could keep that money +his own. I don't know how he sold them. My sister has the cutter now I +expect. My girl has seen it. It was a foot long, this wide (5 inches), +and fluted all around the edges, and had a handle like a biscuit cutter. +They was about an inch thick. He made good ones and he sold all he could +ever make. Grandpa took carpet sacks to carry his gingercakes in to sell +them. I remember that mighty well. (The shape of the cutter was like +this: [Illustration].) He purt nigh always got to go to all the camp +meetings. Folks got happy and shouted in them days. It would be when +somebody got religion. At some big meetings they didn't shout. + +"When I was born they had a white mid-wife, Miss Martin. My mistress was +in the cabin when I was born. I was born foot foremost and had a veil on +my face and down on my body a piece. They call it a 'caul.' Sometimes I +see forms and they vanish. I can see some out of one eye now. But I've +always seen things when my sight was good. It is like when you are +dreaming at night but I see them at times that plain in day. + +"I don't know how old I am but I was a good size girl when 'mancipation +come on. Miss Cornelia had my age in her Bible. They done took me from +the cabin and I was staying at the house. I slept on a trundle bed under +Miss Cornelia's bed. Her bed was a teaster--way high up, had a big stool +to step on to go up in there and she had it curtained off. I had a good +cotton bed and I slept good up under there. Her bed was corded with sea +grass rope. It didn't have no slats like beds do now. + +"Colored folks slept on cotton beds and white folks--some of em at +least--picked geese and made feather beds and down pillows. They carded +and washed sheep's wool and put in their quilts. Some of them, they'd be +light and warm. Colored folks' bed had one leg. Then it was holes hewed +in the wall on the other three sides and wooden slats across it. Now +that wasn't no bad bed. Some of them was big enough for three to sleep +on good. When the children was small four could sleep easy cross ways, +and they slept that way. + +"They had shelves and tables and chairs. They made chests and put things +in there and set on top of it too. White folks had fine chests to keep +their bed clothes in. Some of them was made of oak, and pine, and +cypress. They would cook walnut hulls and bark and paint them dark with +the tea. + +"I recollect a right smart of the Civil War. We was close nough to hear +the roar and ramble and the big cannons shake the things in the house. I +don't know where they was fighting--a long ways off I guess. + +"I saw the soldiers scouting. They come most any time. They go in and +take every drop of milk out of the churn. They took anything they could +find and went away with it. I seen the cavalry come through. I thought +they looked so pretty. Their canteens was shining in the sun. Miss +Cornelia told me to hide, the soldiers might take me on with them. I +didn't want to go. I was very well pleased there at Miss Cornelia's. + +"I seen the cavalry come through that raised the 'white sheet.' I know +now it must have been a white flag but they called it a white sheet to +quit fighting. It was raised a short time after they passed and they +said they was the ones raised it. I don't know where it was. I reckon it +was a big white flag they rared up. It was so they would stop fighting. + +"Mars Sam Shan didn't go to no war; he hid out. He said it was a useless +war, he wasn't going to get shot up for no use a tall, and he never went +a step. He hid out. I don't know where. I know Charles would take the +baskets off. Charles tended to the stock and the carriage. He drove the +wagon and carriage. He fetched water and wood. He was a black boy. Mars +Sam Shan said he wasn't goiner loose his life for nothing. + +"Miss Cornelia would cook corn light bread and muffins and anything else +they had to cook. Rations got down mighty scarce before it was done wid. +They put the big round basket nearly big as a split cotton basket out on +the back portico. Charles come and disappear with it. + +"Chess and Charles was colored overseers. He didn't have white +overseers. Miss Cornelia and Miss Cloe would walk the floor and cry and +I would walk between. I would cry feeling sorry for them, but I didn't +know why they cried so much. I know now it was squally times. War is +horrible. + +"Mars Sam Shan come home, went down to the cabins--they was scattered +over the fields--and told them the War was over, they was free but that +they could stay. Then come some runners, white men. They was Yankee men. +I know that now. They say you must get pay or go off. We stayed that +year. Another man went to pa and said he would give him half of what he +made. He got us all up and we went to Pleasant Hill. We done tolerable +well. + +"Then he tried to buy a house and five acres and got beat out of it. The +minor heirs come and took it. I never learnt in books till I went to +school. Seem like things was in a confusion after I got big nough for +that. I'd sweep and rake and cook and wash the dishes, card, spin, hoe, +scour the floors and tables. I would knit at night heap of times. We'd +sing some at night. + +"Colored folks couldn't read so they couldn't sing at church lessen they +learnt the songs by hearing them at home. Colored folks would meet and +sing and pray and preach at the cabins. + +"My first teacher was a white man, Mr. Babe Willroy. I went to him +several short sessions and on rainy days and cold days I couldn't work +in the field. I worked in the field all my life. Cook out in the winter, +back to the field in the spring till fall again. + +"Well, I jes' had this one girl. I carried her along with me. She would +play round and then she was a heap of help. She is mighty good to me +now. + +"I never seen a Ku Klux in my life. Now, I couldn't tell you about them. + +"My parents' names was Lou Sanders and Anthony Sanders. Ma's mother was +a Rockmore and her husband was a Cherokee Indian. I recollect them well. +He was a free man and was fixing to buy her freedom. Her young mistress +married Mr. Joe Bues and she heired her. Mr. Joe Bues drunk her up and +they come and got her and took her off. They run her to Memphis before +his wife could write to her pa. He was Mars Rockmore. + +"Grandma was put on a block and sold fore grandpa could cumerlate nough +cash to buy her for his wife. Grandma never seen her ma no more. Grandpa +followed her and Mr. Sam Shans bought her and took her to Mississippi +with a lot more he bought. + +"My pa's ma b'long to John Sanders and grandpa b'long to Rube Sanders. +They was brothers. Rube Sanders bought grandpa from Enoch Bobo down in +Mississippi. The Bobo's had a heap of slaves and land. Now, he was the +one that sold gingercakes. He was a blacksmith too. Both my grandpas was +blacksmiths but my Indian grandpa could make wagons, trays, bowls, +shoes, and things out of wood too. Him being a free man made his living +that way. But he never could cumolate enough to buy grandma. + +"My other grandma was blacker than I am and grandpa too. When grandpa +died he was carried back to the Bobo graveyard and buried on Enoch +Bobo's place. It was his request all his slaves be brought back and +buried on his land. I went to the burying. I recollect that but ma and +pa had to ask could we go. We all got to go--all who wanted to go. It +was a big crowd. It was John Sanders let us go mean as he was. + +"Miss Cornelia had the cistern cleaned out and they packed up their +pretty china dishes and silver in a big flat sorter box. Charles took +them down a ladder to the bottom of the dark cistern and put dirt over +it all and then scattered some old rubbish round, took the ladder out. +The Yankees never much as peared to see that old open cistern. I don't +know if they buried money or not. They packed up a lot of nice things. +It wasn't touched till after the War was over. + +"I been farming and cooking all my life. I worked for Major Black, Mr. +Ben Tolbert, Mr. Williams at Pleasant Hill, Mississippi. I married and +long time after come to Arkansas. They said you could raise stock +here--no fence law. + +"I get $8 and commodities because I am blind. I live with my daughter +here." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Nellie Maxwell, Biscoe, Arkansas +Age: 63 + + +"Mama was Harriett Baldwin. She was born in Virginia. Her owners was +Mistress Mollie Fisher and Master Coon Fisher. It was so cold one winter +that they burned up their furniture keeping a fire. Said seemed like +they would freeze in spite of what all they could do. + +"Grandpa was sold away from grandma and three children. He didn't want +to be sold nary bit. When they would be talking about selling him he go +hide under the house. They go on off. He'd come out. When he was sold he +went under there. He come out and went on off when they found him and +told him he was sold to this man. Grandma said he was obedient. They +never hit him. He was her best husband. They never sold grandma and she +couldn't 'count for him being let go. Grandma had another husband after +freedom and two more children. They left there in a crowd and all come +to Arkansas. Grandma was a cook for the field hands. She had charge of +ringing a big dinner-bell hung up in a tree. She was black as charcoal. +Mama and grandma said Master Coon and old Mistress Mollie was good to +them. That the reason grandpa would go under the house. He didn't want +to be sold. He never was seen no more by them. + +"Grandma said sometimes the meals was carried to the fields and they fed +the children out of troughs. They took all the children to the spring +set them in a row. They had a tubful of water and they washed them dried +them and put on their clean clothes. They used homemade lye soap and +greased them with tallow and mutton suet. That made them shine. They +kept them greased so their knees and knuckles would ruff up and bleed. + +"Grandma and mama stopped at Fourche Dam. They was so glad to be free +and go about. Then it scared them to hear talk of being sold. It divided +them and some owners was mean. + +"In my time if I done wrong most any grown person whoop me. Then mama +find it out, she give me another one. I got a double whooping. + +"Times is powerful bad to raise up a family. Drinking and gambling, and +it takes too much to feed a family now. Times is so much harder that way +then when I was growing." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Sallie C. Miller +Person interviewed: Ann May, Clarksville, Arkansas +Age: 82 + + +"I was born at Cabin Creek (Lamar now, but I still call it Cabin Creek. +I can't call it anything else). I was sold with my mother when I was a +little girl and lived with our white folks until after the war and was +freed. We lived on a farm. My father belong to another family, a +neighbor of ours. We all lived with the white folks. My mother took care +of all of them. They was always as good as they could be to us and after +the war we stayed on with the white folks who owned my father and worked +on the farm for him. His master gave us half of everything we made until +we could get started our selves, then our white folks told my father to +homestead a place near him, and he did. We lived there until after +father died. We paid taxes and lived just like the white folks. We did +what the white folks told us to do and never lost a thing by doing it. +After I married my husband worked at the mill for your father and made a +living for me and I worked for the white folks. Now I am too old to cook +but I have a few washin's for the white folks and am getting my old age +pension that helps me a lot. + +"I don't know what I think about the young generation. I aim at my +stopping place. + +"The songs we sang were + + 'Come ye that love the Lord and let your Joys be known' + 'When You and I Were Young, Maggie' + 'Juanita' + 'Just Before the Battle, Mother' + 'Darling Nellie Gray' + 'Carry Me Back to Old Virginia' + 'Old Black Joe' + +Of course we sang 'Dixie.' We had to sing that, it was the leading +song." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Joe Mayes, Madison, Arkansas +Age: ? + + +"I was born a slave two years. I never will forget man come and told +mother she was free. She cooked. She never worked in the field till +after freedom. In a few days another man come and made them leave. They +couldn't hold them in Kentucky. The owners give her provisions, meat, +lasses, etc. They give her her clothes. She had four children and I was +her youngest. The two oldest was girls. Father was dead. I don't +remember him. Mother finally made arrangements to go to Will Bennett's +place. + +"Another thing I remember: Frank Hayes sold mother to Isaac Tremble +after she was free. She didn't know she was free. Neither did Isaac +Tremble. I don't know whether Frank Mayes was honest or not. The part I +remember was that us boys stood on the block and never was parted from +her. We had to leave our sisters. One was sold to Miss Margaret Moxley, +the other to Miss Almyra Winder. (He said "Miss" but they may have been +widows. He didn't seem to know--ed.) Father belong to a Master Mills. +All our family got together after we found out we had been freed. + +"The Ku Klux: I went to the well little after dark. It was a good piece +from our house. I looked up and saw a man with a robe and cap on. It +scared me nearly to death. I nearly fell out. I had heard about the +'booger man' and learned better then. But there he was. I had heard a +lot about Ku Klux. + +"There was a big gourd hanging up by the well. We kept it there. There +was a bucket full up. He said, 'Give me water.' I handed over the gourd +full. He done something with it. He kept me handing him water. He said, +'Hold my crown and draw me up another bucket full.' I was so scared I +lit out hard as I could run. It was dark enough to hide me when I got a +piece out of his way. + +"The owners was pretty good to mother to be slavery. She had clothes and +enough to eat all the time. I used to go back to see all our white folks +in Kentucky. They are about all dead now I expect. Mother was glad to be +free but for a long time her life was harder. + +"After we got up larger she got along better. I worked on a steamboat +twelve or thirteen years. I was a roustabout and freight picker. I was +on passenger boats mostly but they carried freight. I went to school +some. I always had colored teachers. I farmed at Hughes and Madison ever +since excepting one year in Mississippi. + +"I live alone. I get $8 and commodities from the Sociable Welfare. + +"The young folks would do better, work better, if they could get work +all time. It is hard at times to get work right now. The times is all +right. Better everything but work. I know colored folks is bad managers. +That has been bad on us always. + +"I worked on boats from Evansville, St. Louis, Memphis to New Orleans +mostly. It was hard work but a fine living. I was stout then." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Jesse Meeks + 707 Elm Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 76 +Occupation: Minister + + +"I am seventy-six. 'Course I was young in slavery times, but I can +remember some things. I remember how they used to feed us. Put milk and +bread or poke salad and corn-meal dumplin's in a trough and give you a +wooden spoon and all the children eat together. + +"We stayed with our old master fourteen years. They were good folks and +treated us right. My old master's name was Sam Meeks--in Longview, Drew +County, Arkansas, down here below Monticello. + +"I got a letter here about a month ago from the daughter of my young +mistress. I wrote to my young mistress and she was dead, so her daughter +got the letter. She answered it and sent me a dollar and asked me was I +on the Old Age Pension list. + +"As far as I know, I am the onliest one of the old darkies living that +belonged to Sam Meeks. + +"I remember when the Ku Klux run in on my old master. That was after the +War. He was at the breakfast table with his wife. You know in them days +they didn't have locks and keys. Had a hole bored through a board and +put a peg in it, and I know the Ku Klux come up and stuck a gun through +the auger hole and shot at old master but missed him. He run to the door +and shot at the Ku Klux. I know us children found one of 'em down at the +spring bathin' his leg where old master had shot him. + +"Oh! they were good folks and treated us right." + + + + +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Subject: Superstitions +Story:--Information + +This information given by: Jesse Meeks +Place of residence: 707 Elm Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Occupation: Minister +Age: 76 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] + + +"I remember there was on old man called Billy Mann lived down here at +Noble lake. He said he could 'give you a hand.' If you and your wife +wasn't gettin' along very well and you wanted to get somebody else, he +said he could 'give you a hand' and that would enable you to get anybody +you wanted. That's what he said. + +"And I've heard 'em say they could make a ring around you and you +couldn't get out. + +"I don't believe in that though 'cause I'm in the ministerial work and +it don't pay me to believe in things like that. That is the work of the +devil." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Jeff Metcalf + R.F.D., Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 73 + + +"My mother's name was Julia Metcalf and my father's name was Jim +Metcalf. They belong to an old bachelor named Bill Metcalf. I think I +was born in Lee County, Mississippi. They did not leave when the war was +over. They stayed on the Bill Metcalf place till they died. I reckon I +do remember him. + +"I can't tell you 'bout the war nor slavery. I don't know a thing 'bout +it. I heard but I couldn't tell you it been so long ago. They didn't +expect nothing but freedom. They got along in the Reconstruction days +about like they had been getting along. Seemed like they didn't know +much about the war. They heard they was free. I don't remember the Ku +Klux Klan. I heard old folks talk 'bout it. + +"I don't know if my father ever voted but I guess he did. I have voted +but I don't vote now. In part I 'proves of the women votin'. I think the +men outer vote and support his family fur as he can. + +"I come here in 1914 from Mississippi. I got busted farmin'. I knowed a +heap o' people said they was doing so well I come too. I come on the +train. + +"I ain't got no home, no land. I got a hog. No garden. Two times in the +year now is hard--winter and simmer. In some ways times is better. In +some ways they is worser. When a trade used to be made to let you have +provisions, you know you would not starve. Now if you can't get work you +'bout starve and can't get no credit. Crops been good last few years and +prices fair fur it. But money won't buy nothin' now. Everything is so +high. Meat is so high. Working man have to eat meat. If he don't he get +weak. + +"The young folks do work. They can't save much farmin'. If they could do +public work between times it be better. I had a hard time in July and +August. I got six children, they grown and gone. My wife is 72 years +old. She ain't no 'count for work no more. The Government give me an' +her $10 a month between us two. Her name is Hannah Metcalf. + +"I wish I did know somethin' to tell you, lady, 'bout the Civil War and +the slavery times. I done forgot 'bout all I heard 'em talkin'. When you +see Hannah she might know somethin'." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Hardy Miller + 702-1/2 W. Second Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 85 +Occupation: Yardman + + +"Mistress, I'll tell you what my mother said. She said she birthed me on +Christmas morning in 1852 in Sumpter County, Georgia. It was on her old +master's place. Bright Herring was his name. Old mistress' name was Miss +Lizzie. My father belonged to a different owner. + +"Mac McClendon and John Mourning was two nigger traders and they brought +my mother and sister Nancy and sister Liza and my sister Anna and Hardy +Miller--that's me--out here on the train from Americus, Georgia to +Memphis and put us on a steamboat and brought us here to Pine Bluff and +sold me to Dr. Pope. He was a poor white man and he wanted a pair of +niggers. He bought me and Laura Beckwith. In them days a doctor examined +you and if your heart was sound and your lungs was sound and you didn't +have no broken bones--have to pay one hundred dollars for every year you +was old. That was in 1862 and I was ten years old so they sold me for +one thousand dollars and one thousand dollars for Laura cause she was +sound too. Carried us down to Monticello and when I got free my mammy +come after me. + +"Fore I left Georgia, my daddy belonged to a man named Bill Ramsey. You +see niggers used the name of their masters. + +"I can remember when I was a boy Bill Ramsey set my father free and give +him a free pass and anybody hire him have to pay just like they pay a +nigger now. My daddy hired my mammy from her master. My mammy was her +master's daughter by a colored woman. + +"My daddy had a hoss named Salem and had a cart and he would take me and +my mammy and my sister Liza and go to Americus and buy rations for the +next week. + +"I member when the war started in 1861 my mammy hired me out to Mrs. +Brewer and she used to git after me and say, 'You better do that good or +I'll whip you. My husband gone to war now on account of you niggers and +it's a pity you niggers ever been cause he may get killed and I'll never +see him again.' + +"I member seein' General Bragg's men and General Steele and General +Marmaduke. Had a fight down at Mark's Mill. We just lived six miles from +there. Seen the Yankees comin' by along the big public road. The Yankees +whipped and fought em so strong they didn't have time to bury the dead. +We could see the buzzards and carrion crows. I used to hear old mistress +say, 'There goes the buzzards, done et all the meat off.' I used to go +to mill and we could see the bones. Used to got out and look at their +teeth. No ma'm, I wasn't scared, the white boys was with me. + +"Dr. Pope was good to me, better to me than he was to Master Walter and +Master Billy and my young Miss, Aurelia, cause me and Laura was scared +of em and we tried to do everything they wanted. + +"When the war ended in 1865 we was out in the field gettin' pumpkins. +Old master come out and said, 'Hardy, you and Laura is free now. You can +stay or you can go and live with somebody else.' We stayed till 1868 and +then our mammies come after us. I was seventeen. + +"After freedom my mammy sent me to school. Teacher's name was W.H. +Young. Name was William Young but he went under the head of W.H. Young. + +"I went to school four years and then I got too old. I learned a whole +lot. Learned to read and spell and figger. I done pretty good. I learned +how to add and multiply and how to cancel and how to work square root. + +"What I've been doin' all my life is farmin' down at Fairfield on the +Murphy place. + +"Vote? Good lord! I done more votin'. Voted for all the Presidents. +Yankees wouldn't let us vote Democrat, had to vote Republican. They'd be +there agitatin'. Stand right there and tell me the ones to vote for. I +done quit votin'. I voted for Coolidge--we called him College--that's +the last votin' I did. One of my friends, Levi Hunter, he was a colored +magistrate down at Fairfield. + +"Ku Klux? What you talkin' about? Ku Klux come to our house. My sister +Ellen's husband went to war on the Yankee side durin' the war--on the +Republican side and fought the Democrats. + +"After the war the Ku Klux came and got the colored folks what fought +and killed em. I saw em kill a nigger right off his mule. Fell off on +his sack of corn and the old mule kep' on goin'. + +"Ku Klux used to wear big old long robe with bunches of cotton sewed all +over it. I member one time we was havin' church and a Ku Klux was hid up +in the scaffold. The preacher was readin' the Bible and tellin' the +folks there was a man sent from God and say an angel be here directly. +Just then the Ku Klux fell down and the niggers all thought 'twas the +angel and they got up and flew. + +"Ku Klux used to come to the church well and ask for a drink and say, 'I +ain't had a bit of water since I fought the battle of Shiloh.' + +"Might as well tell the truth--had just as good a time when I was a +slave as when I was free. Had all the hog meat and milk and everything +else to eat. + +"I member one time when old master wasn't at home the Yankees come and +say to old mistress, 'Madam, we is foragin'.' Old mistress say, 'My +husband ain't home; I can't let you.' Yankees say, 'Well, we're goin' to +anyway.' They say, 'Where you keep your milk and butter?' Old mistress +standin' up there, her face as red as blood and say, 'I haven't any milk +or butter to spare.' But the Yankees would hunt till they found it. + +"After a battle when the dead soldiers was layin' around and didn't have +on no uniform cause some of the other soldiers took em, I've heard the +old folk what knowed say you could tell the Yankees from the Rebels +cause the Yankees had blue veins on their bellies and the Rebels didn't. + +"Now you want me to tell you bout this young nigger generation? I never +thought I'd live to see this young generation come out and do as well as +they is doin'. I'm goin' tell you the truth. When I was young, boys and +girls used to wear long white shirt come down to their ankles, cause it +would shrink, with a hole cut out for their head. I think they is doin' +a whole lot better. Got better clothes. Almost look as well as the white +folks. I just say the niggers dressin' better than the white folks used +to. + +"Then I see some niggers got automobiles. Just been free bout +seventy-two years and some of em actin' just like white folks now. + +"Well, good-bye--if I don't see you again I'll meet you in Heaven." + + + + +Interviewer: Beulah Sherwood Hagg +Person interviewed: [HW: Henry Kirk] H.K. Miller + 1513 State Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 86 + + +"No ma'am, it will not bother me one bit if you want to have a long +visit with me.... Yes, I was a little busy, but it can wait. I was +getting my dishes ready for a party tomorrow night. + +"Yes ma'am, I was born during slavery. I was born at a little place +called Fort Valley in Georgia, July 25, 1851. Fort Valley is about 30 +miles from Macon. I came to Little Rock in 1873. My old mistress was a +widow. As well as I can remember she did not have any slaves but my +father and mother and the six children. No ma'am, her name was not +Miller, it was Wade.... Where did I get my name, then? It came from my +grandfather on my father's side.... Well, now, Miss, I can't tell you +where he got that name. From some white master, I reckon. + +"We got free in Georgia June 15, 1865. I'll never forget that date. What +I mean is, that was the day the big freedom came. But we didn't know it +and just worked on. My father was a shoemaker for old mistress. Only one +in town, far as I recollect. He made a lot of money for mistress. Mother +was houseworker for her. As fast as us children got big enough to hire +out, she leased us to anybody who would pay for our hire. I was put out +with another widow woman who lived about 20 miles. She worked me on her +cotton plantation. Old mistress sold one of my sisters; took cotton for +pay. I remember hearing them tell about the big price she brought +because cotton was so high. Old mistress got 15 bales of cotton for +sister, and it was only a few days till freedom came and the man who had +traded all them bales of cotton lost my sister, but old mistress kept +the cotton. She was smart, wasn't she? She knew freedom was right there. +Sister came right back to my parents. + +"Just give me time, miss, and I'll tell you the whole story. This woman +what had me hired tried to run away and take all her slaves along. I +don't remember just how many, but a dozen or more. Lots of white folks +tried to run away and hide their slaves until after the Yankee soldiers +had been through the town searching for them what had not been set free. +She was trying to get to the woods country. But she got nervous and +scared and done the worst thing she could. She run right into a Yankee +camp. Course they asked where we all belonged and sent us where we +belonged. They had always taught us to be scared of the Yankees. I +remember just as well when I got back to where my mother was she asked +me: "Boy, why you come here? Don't you know old mistress got you rented +out? You're goin' be whipped for sure." I told her, no, now we got +freedom. That was the first they had heard. So then she had to tell my +father and mother. She tole them how they have no place to go, no +money,--nothing to start life on; they better stay on with her. So my +father and mother kept on with her; she let them have a part of what +they made; she took some for board, as was right. The white ladies what +had me between them fixed it up that I would serve out the time I was +rented out for. It was about six months more. My parents saved money and +we all went to a farm. I stayed with them till I was 19 years old. Of +course they got all the money I made. I married when I was 20, still +living in Georgia. We tried to farm on shares. A man from Arkansas came +there, getting up a colony of colored to go to Arkansas to farm. Told +big tales of fine land with nobody to work it. Not half as many Negroes +in Arkansas as in Georgia. Me and my wife joined up to go. + +"Well, ma'am, I didn't get enough education to be what you call a +educated man. My father paid for a six months night course for me after +peace. I learned to read and write and figure a little. I have used my +tablespoon full of brains ever since, always adding to that start. I +learned everything I could from the many white friends I have had. Any +way, miss, I have known enough to make a good living all these years. + +"Now I'll get on with the story. First work I got in Arkansas was +working on a farm; me and her both; we always tried to stay together. We +could not make anything on the Garner farm, and it was mighty unhealthy +down in Fourche bottoms. I carried her back to Little Rock and I got +work as house man in the Bunch home. From there I went to the home of +Dudley E. Jones and stayed there 28 years. That was the beginning of my +catering. I just naturally took to cooking and serving. White folks was +still used to having colored wait on them and they liked my style. Mr. +Jones was so kind. He told his friends about how I could plan big +dinners and banquets; then cook and serve them. Right soon I was +handling most of the big swell weddings for the society folks. Child, if +I could call off the names of the folks I have served, it would be +mighty near everybody of any consequence in Little Rock for more than 55 +years. Yes ma'am, I'm now being called on to serve the grandchildren of +my first customers. + +"During the 28 years I lived in Mr. Jones' family I was serving +banquets, big public dinners, all kinds of big affairs. I have had the +spring and fall banquets for the Scottish Rite Masons for more than 41 +years. I have served nearly all the Governor's banquets, college +graduation and reunion parties; I took care of President Roosevelt--not +this one, but Teddy----. Served about 600 that day. Any big parties for +colored people?... Yes ma'am! Don't you remember when Booker T. +Washington was here?... No ma'am. White folks didn't have a thing to do +with it, excepting the city let us have the new fire station. It was +just finished but the fire engines ain't moved in yet. I served about +600 that time. Yes ma'am, there was a lot of white folks there. Then, I +have been called to other places to do the catering. Lonoke, Benton, +Malvern, Conway--a heap of places like that. + +"No miss, I didn't always have all the catering business; oh, no. There +was Mr. Rossner. He was a fine man. White gentleman. I used to help him +a lot. But when he sold out to Bott, I got a lot of what business Mr. +Rossner had had, Mr. Bott was a Jew. All that time my wife was my best +helper. I took a young colored fellow named Freeling Alexander and +taught him the business. He never been able to make it go on his own, +but does fine working on salary. He has a cafeteria now. + +"Well thank you miss, speaking about my home like that. Yes ma'am, I +sure do own it. Fifty-two years I been living right here. First I bought +the lot; it took me two years to pay for it. Next I build a little +house. The big pin oak trees out front was only saplings when I set them +out. Come out in the back yard and see my pecan tree.... It is a giant, +ain't it? Yes ma'am, it was a tiny thing when I set it out fifty-two +years ago. Our only child was born in this house,--a dear daughter--and +her three babies were born here too. After my wife and daughter died, me +and the children kept on trying to keep the home together. I have taught +them the catering business. Both granddaughters are high school +graduates. The boy is in Mexico. Before he went he signed his name to a +check and said: "Here, grandpa. You ain't going to want for a thing +while I'm gone. If something happens to your catering business, or you +get so you can't work, fill this in for whatever you need." But thank +the good Lord, I'm still going strong. Nobody has ever had to take care +of H.K. Miller. Now let me tell you something else about this place. For +more than ten years I have been paying $64.64 every year for my part of +that asphalt paving you see out in front. Yes ma'am, the lot is 50 foot +front, and I am paying for only half of it; from my curb line to the +middle of the street. Maybe if I live long enough I'll get it paid for +sometime. + +"I haven't tried to lay by much money. I don't suppose there is any +other colored man--uneducated like me--what has done more for his +community. I have given as high as $80 and $100 at one time to help out +on the church debt or when they wanted to build. I always help in times +of floods and things like that. I've helped many white persons in my +lifetime. + +"Well, now, I'll tell you what I think about the voting system. I think +this. Of course we are still in subjection to the white people; they are +in the majority and have most of the government on their side. But I +think that, er,--er,--well I'll tell you, while it is all right for them +to be at the head of things, they ought to do what is right. Being +educated, they ought to know right from wrong. I believe in the Bible, +miss. Look here. This little book--Gospel of St. John--has been carried +in my pocket every day for years and years. And I never miss a day +reading it. I don't see how some people can be so unjust. I guess they +never read their Bible. The reason I been able to make my three-score +years and ten is because I obeys what the Good Book says. + +"Now, let me see. I can remember that I been voting mighty near ever +since I been here. I never had any trouble voting. I have never been +objected from voting that I remember of. + +"Now you ask about what I think of the young people. Well, I tell you. I +think really that the young people of today had better begin to check +up, a little. They are going too fast. They don't seem to have enough +consideration. When I see so many killed in automobile accidents, and +know that drinking is the cause of so many car accidents,--well, yes +ma'am, drinking sure does have a lot to do with it. I think they should +more consider the way they going to make a living. Make a rule to look +before they act. Another thing--the education being given them--they are +not taking advantage of it. If they would profit by what they learn they +could benefit theirselves. A lot of them now spend heap of time trying +to get to be doctors and lawyers and like that. That is a mistake. There +is not enough work among colored people to support them. I know. Negroes +do not have confidence in their race for this kind of business. No +ma'am. Colored will go for a white doctor and white lawyer 'cause they +think they know more about that kind of business. I would recommend as +the best means of making a living for colored young people is to select +some kind of work that is absolutely necessary to be done and then do it +honestly. The trades, carpentering, paper hanging, painting, garage +work. Some work that white people need to have done, and they just as +soon colored do it as white. White folks ain't never going to have Negro +doctors and lawyers, I reckon. That's the reason I took up +catering--even that long ago. Fifty-five years ago I knew to look around +and find some work that white folks would need done. There's where your +living comes from. + +"Yes, miss, my business is slack--falling off, as you say. Catering is +not what it used to be. You see, 30 or 40 years ago, people's homes were +grand and big; big dining rooms, built for parties and banquets. But for +the big affairs with 500 or 600 guests, they went to the hotels. Even +the hotels had to rent my dishes, silver and linens.... Oh, lord, yes, +miss. I always had my own. It took me ten years to save enough money to +start out with my first 500 of everything.... You want to see them?... +Sure, I keep them here at home.... Look. Here's my silver chests, all +packed to go. I have them divided into different sizes. This one has +fifty of every kind of silver, so if fifty guests are to be provided +for. I keep my linens, plates of different sizes, glasses and everything +the same way. A 200-guest outfit is packed in those chests over there. +No, ma'am, I don't have much trouble of losing silver, because it all +has my initials on; look: H.K.M. on every piece. Heap of dishes are +broken every time I have a big catering. I found one plate +yesterday--the last of a full pattern I had fifteen years ago. About +every ten years is a complete turnover of china. Glassware goes faster, +and of course, the linen is the greatest overhead. Yes ma'am, as I was +telling you, catering is slack because of clubs. So many women take +their parties to clubs now. Another thing, the style of food has +changed. In those old days, the table was loaded with three four meats, +fish, half dozen vegetable dishes, entrees, different kinds of wine, and +an array of desserts. Now what do they have? Liquid punch, frozen punch +and cakes. In June I had a wedding party for 400, and that's all they +served. I had to have 30 punch bowls, but borrowed about half from my +white friends. + +"You have got that wrong about me living with my grandchildren. No +ma'am! They are living with me. They make their home with me. I don't +expect ever to marry again. I'm 86. In my will I am leaving everything I +have to my three grandchildren. + +"Well, miss, you're looking young and blooming. Guess your husband is +right proud of you? Say you're a widow? Well, now, my goodness. Some of +these days a fine man going to find you and then, er--er, lady, let me +cater for the wedding?" + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Henry Kirk Miller [HW: Same as H.K. Miller] + 1513 State Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age 87 [HW: 86] + + +"I am eighty-six years old-eighty-six years and six months. I was born +July 25, 1851. I was a slave. Didn't get free till June 1865. I was a +boy fifteen years old when I got free. + +"I have been living in this house fifty years. I have been living in +Arkansas ever since 1873. That makes about sixty-five years. + +"The engineer who got killed in that wreck the other day (a wreck which +occurred February 7, 1938, Monday morning at three and in which the +engineer and five other people were killed) came right from my town, +Fort Valley, Georgia. I came here from there in 1873. I don't know +anybody living in Fort Valley now unless it's my own folks. And I don't +'spect I'd know them now. When I got married and left there, I was only +twenty-one years old. + + +Parents and Relatives + +"My mother and father were born in South Carolina. After their master +and missis married they came to Georgia. Back there I don't know. When I +remember anything they were in Georgia. They said they came from South +Carolina to Georgia. I don't know how they came. Both of my parents were +Negroes. They came to Arkansas ahead of me. I have their pictures." (He +carried me into the parlor and showed me life-sized bust portraits of +his mother and father.) + +"There were eighteen of us: six boys and twelve girls. They are all dead +now but myself and one sister. She lives in Atlanta, Georgia. I am older +than she is. + + +Occupation + +"I am a caterer. I have been serving the Scottish Rite Masons in their +annual reunion every six months for forty-one years. We are going to the +Seventh Street Entrance this Friday. One of the orders will have a +dinner and I am going down to serve it. I served the dinner for Teddy +Roosevelt there, thirty years ago. This Roosevelt is a cousin of his. + + +Masters + +"My parents' master was named Wade. When he died, I was so little that +they had to lift me up to let me see into the coffin so I could look at +him. I went to his daughter. My name is after my father's father. My +grandfather was named Miller. I took his name. He was a white man. + +"Wade's daughter was named Riley, but I keep my grandfather's name. My +mother and father were then transferred to the Rileys too, and they took +the name of Riley. It was after freedom that I took the name Miller from +my original people. Haven Riley's father was my brother." (Haven Riley +lives in Little Rock and was formerly an instructor at Philander Smith +College. Now he is a public stenographer and a private teacher.) + +"Wade owned all of my brothers and sisters and parents and some of my +kin--father's sister and brother. There might have been some more I +can't remember. Wade was a farmer. + +"I remember once when my mother and father were going to the field to +work, I went with them as usual. That was before Wade died and his +daughter drew us. + +"My wife died six years ago. If she had lived till tomorrow, she would +have been married to me sixty years. She died on the tenth of February +and we were married on the sixth. We just lacked five years of being +married sixty years when she died. + + +Food + +"For food, I don't know anything more than bread and meat. Meal, meat, +molasses were the only rations I saw. In those times the white people +had what was known as the white people's house and then what was known +as nigger quarters. The children that weren't big enough to work were +fed at the white people's house. We got milk and mush for breakfast. +When they boiled cabbage we got bread and pot-liquor. For supper we got +milk and bread. They had cows and the children were fed mostly on milk +and mush or milk and bread. We used to bake a corn cake in the ashes, +ash cake, and put it in the milk. + +"The chickens used to lay out in the barn. If we children would find the +nests and bring the eggs in our missis would give us a biscuit, and we +always got biscuits for Christmas. + + +Houses in the Negro Quarters + +"In the nigger quarters there were nothing but log houses. I don't +remember any house other than a log house. They'd just go out in the +woods and get logs and put up a log house. Put dirt and mud or clay in +the cracks to seal it. Notch the logs in the end to hitch them at +corners. Nailed planks at the end of the logs to make a door frame. + +"My people all ate and cooked and lived in the same room. Some of the +slaves had dirt floors and some of them had plank floors. + +"Food was kept in the house in a sort of box or chest, built in the wall +sometimes. Mostly it was kept on the table. + +"In cooking they had a round oven made like a pot only the bottom would +be flat. It had an iron top. The oven was a bought oven. It was shaped +like a barrel. The top lifted up. Coal was placed under the oven and a +little on top. + + +Tables and Chairs + +"Tables were just boards nailed together. Nothing but planks nailed +together. I don't remember nothing but homemade benches for chairs. They +sometimes made platted or split-bottom chairs out of white oak. Strips +of oak were seven feet long. They put them in water so they would bend +easily and wove them while they were flexible and fresh. The whole chair +bottom was made out of one strip just like in caning. Those chairs were +stouter than the chairs they make now." + +(To be continued) [TR: No continuation found.] + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Annie L. LaCotts +Person interviewed: Matilda Miller + Humphrey, Ark. +Age: 79 + + +The day of the interview Matilda, a nice clean-looking Negro woman, was +in bed, suffering from some kind of a pain in her head. She lives in a +little two-room unpainted boxed house beside the highway in Humphrey. +Her house is almost in the shadow of the big tank which was put up +recently when the town acquired its water system. + +When told that the visitor wanted to talk with her about her early life, +Matilda said, "Well, honey, I'll tell you all I can, but you see, I was +just a little girl when the war was, but I've heard my mother tell lots +of things about then. + +"I was born a slave; my mother and daddy both were owned by Judge +Richard Gamble at Crockett's Bluff. I was born at Boone Hill--about +twelve miles north of DeWitt--and how come it named Boone Hill, that +farm was my young mistress's. Her papa give it to her, just like he give +me to her when I was little, and after she married Mr. Oliver Boone and +lived there the farm always went by the name of 'Boone Hill.' The house +is right on top of a hill, you know, it shure was a pretty place when +Miss Georgia lived there, with great big Magnolia trees in the front +yard. I belonged to Miss Georgia, my young mistress, and when the +niggers were freed my mamma staid on with her. She was right there when +both of his chillun were born, Mr. John Boone and Miss Mary, too. I +nursed _both_ of them chillun. You know who Miss Mary is now, don't you? +Yes'um, she's Mr. Lester Black's wife and he's good, too. + +"I was de oney child my mother had till twelve years after the +surrender. You see, my papa went off with Yankees and didn't come back +till twelve years after we was free, and then I had some brothers and +sisters. Exactly nine months from the day my daddy come home, I had a +baby brother born. My mother said she knew my daddy had been married or +took up with some other woman, but she hadn't got a divorce and still +counted him her husband. They lived for a long time with our white +folks, for they were good to us, but you know after the boys and girls +got grown and began to marry and live in different places, my parents +wanted to be with them and left the white folks. + +"No mam, I didn't see any fighting, but we could hear the big guns +booming away off in the distance. I was married when I was 21 to Henry +Miller and lived with him 51 years and ten months; he died from old age +and hard work. We had two chillun, both girls. One of them lives here +with me in that other room. Mamma said the Yankees told the Negroes when +they got em freed they'd give em a mule and a farm or maybe a part of +the plantation they'd been working on for their white folks. She thought +they just told em that to make them dissatisfied and to get more of them +'to join up with em' and they were dressed in pretty blue clothes and +had nice horses and that made lots of the Negro men go with them. None +of em ever got anything but what their white folks give em, and just +lots and lots of em never come back after the war cause the Yankees put +them in front where the shooting was and they was killed. My husband +Henry Miller died four years ago. He followed public work and made +plenty of money but he had lots of friends and his money went easy too. +I don't spect I'll live long for this hurtin' in my head is awful bad +sometime." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Nathan Miller, Madison, Arkansas +Age: Born in 1868 + + +"Lady, I'll tell you what I know but it won't nigh fill your book. + +"I was born in 1862 south of Lockesburg, Arkansas. My parents was +Marther and Burl Miller. + +"They told me their owners come here from North Carolina in 1820. They +owned lots of slaves and lots of land. Mother was medium light--about my +color. See, I'm mixed. My hair is white. I heard mother say she never +worked in the field. Father was a blacksmith on the place. He wasn't a +slave. His grandfather willed him free at ten years of age. It was tried +in the Supreme Court. They set him free. Said they couldn't break the +dead man's will. + +"My father was a real bright colored man. It caused some disturbance. +Father went back and forth to Kansas. They tried to make him leave if he +was a free man. They said I would have to be a slave several years or +leave the State. Freedom settled that for me. + +"My great grandmother on my mother's side belong to Thomas Jefferson. He +was good to her. She used to tell me stories on her lap. She come from +Virginia to Tennessee. They all cried to go back to Virginia and their +master got mad and sold them. He was a meaner man. Her name was Sarah +Jefferson. Mariah was her daughter and Marther was my mother. They was +real dark folks but mother was my color, or a shade darker. + +"Grandmother said she picked cotton from the seed all day till her +fingers nearly bled. That was fore gin day. They said the more hills of +tobacco you could cultivate was how much you was worth. + +"I don't remember the Ku Klux. They was in my little boy days but they +never bothered me. + +"All my life I been working hard--steamboat, railroad, farming. Wore +clean out now. + +"Times is awful hard. I am worn clean out. I am not sick. I'm ashamed to +say I can't do a good day's work but I couldn't. I am proud to own I get +commodities and $8 from the Relief." + + + + +Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lacy +Person interviewed: Sam Miller, Morrilton, Arkansas +Age: 98 + + +"I is ninety-eight years old, suh. My name's Sam Miller, and I was born +in Texas in 1840--don't know de month nor de day. My parents died when I +was jes' a little chap, and we come to Conway County, Arkansas fifty +years ago; been livin' here ever since. My wife's name was Annie +Williamson. We ain't got no chillun and never had none. I don't belong +to no chu'ch, but my wife is a Baptis'. + +"Can't see to git around much now. No, suh, I can't read or write, +neither. My memory ain't so good about things when I was little, away +back yonder, but I sure members dem Ku Klux Klans and de militia. They +used to ketch people and take em out and whup em. + +"Don't rickolleck any of de old songs but one or two--oh, yes, dey used +to sing 'Old time religion's good enough for me' and songs like dat. + +"De young people! Lawzy, I jest dunno how to take em. Can't understand +em at all. Dey too much for me!" + + +NOTE: The old fellow chuckled and shook his head but said very little +more. He could have told much but for his faulty memory, no doubt. He +was almost non-committal as to facts of slavery days, the War between +the States, and Reconstruction period. Has the sense of humor that seems +to be a characteristic of most of the old-time Negroes, but aside from a +whimsical chuckle shows little of the interest that is usually +associated with the old generation of Negroes. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: W.D. Miller, West Memphis, Arkansas +Age: 65? + + +"Grandpa was sold twice in Raleigh, North Carolina. He was sold twice to +the same people, from the Millers to the Robertsons (Robersons, +Robinsons, etc.?). He said the Robertsons were not so very good to him +but the Millers were. Grandma was washing when a Yank come and told them +they had been sot free. They quit washing and went from house to house +rejoicing. My parents' names was Jesse and Mary Miller, and Grandma +Agnes and Grandpa Peter Miller. The Robertsons was hill wheat farmers. +The Millers had a cloth factory. Dan Miller owned it and he raised +wheat. Mama was a puny woman and they worked her in the factory. She +made cloth and yarn. + +"I was born in Raleigh, North Carolina or close by there. My father's +uncle John House brought about one hundred families from North Carolina +to Quittenden County, Mississippi. I was seven years old. He said they +rode mules to pick cotton, it growed up like trees. We come in car +boxes. I came to Heath and Helena eleven years ago. Papa stayed with his +master Dan Miller till my uncle tolled him away. He died with smallpox +soon after we come to Mississippi. + +"It is a very good country but they don't pick cotton riding on mules, +at least I ain't seed none that way." + + + + +El Dorado District +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of Interviewer: Pernella Anderson +Subject: Slavery Customs +Story:--Information + +Information given by: Mose Minser--Farmer--Age--78 +Place of Residence: 5 miles from El Dorado--Section 8 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] + + +Ah use ter could tawk an tell a thing plum well but ah been broke up by +a cah. Cah run ovah mah haid an ah couldn' tawk fuh 30 days. So now ah +aint no good fuh nothin. Ah recollect one night ah dream a dream. De +dream at ah dreamt, next morning dat dream come true. Jes like ah dreamt +hit. Yes hit did. Ah wuz heah in slavery time. Ah membuh when dey freed +us niggers. Se here, ah wuz a purty good size kid when dey free us. Ah +kin membuh our house. Sot dis way. An ole Marster called all his niggers +up. Dey all come along roun in a squad on de porch. Ah did not heah whut +he said tuh em. But mah step-pa wuz dere an tole us we wuz free. Ah +atter dey freed mah step-pa ah recollect he went on home and fried some +aigs (eggs) in de ubben. Know we didn have no stove we cooked on de +fiuhplace. As ah said cook dem aigs, gimme some uv hit, an he lef' den. +Went east and ah aint nevah seed dat man since. Ah membuhs once ah got a +whoopin bout goin tuh de chinquepin tree. Some uv um tole me ole master +wuz gwianter let us quit at dinnuh an so in place uv me goin ter dinnuh +ah went on by de chinquepin tree tuh git some chanks. Ah had a brothuh +wid me. So ah come tuh fine out dat dey gin tuh callin us. Dey hollered +tuh come on dat we wuz gointer pick cotton. So in place uv us goin on +tuh de house we went on back tuh de fiel'. Our fiel wuz bout a mile fum +de house. Ole Moster waited down dere at de gate. He call me when ah got +dere an wanted tuh know why ah didn come and git mah dinnah sos ah could +pick cotton. So he taken mah britches down dat day. Mah chinks all run +out on de groun' an he tole mah brothah tuh pick um up. Ah knocked mah +brothuh ovah fuh pickin um up an aftuh ah done dat ole moster taken his +red pocket han'cher out and tied hit ovah mah eyes tuh keep me fum seein +mah brothuh pick um up. + +So when he got through wid me and put mah britches back on me ah went on +tuh de fiel and went tuh pickin cotton. Dat evenin when us stop pickin +cotton ah took mah brothah down and taken mah chinquapins. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Gip Minton, Des Arc, Arkansas +Age: 84 + + +"I was born at Jackson, Alabama on the Tennessee River. It was sho a +putty river. I never did know my grandfolks. I think my father was a +soldier. My master was a soldier, I think. He was in de war. I do +remember the Civil War. I remember the last battle at Scottsboro. There +was several but one big battle and they got to Belfontain. That is where +it seemed they were trying to go. I don't recollect who won the battle. +I heard them fighting and saw the smoke and after they went on saw the +bodies dead and all that was left was like a cyclone had swept by. There +was a big regiment stationed at Scottsboro. It was just like any war +fought with guns and they lived in tents. They took everything they +could find. Looked like starvation was upon de land. + +"I had two sisters and one brother and my mother died when I was a baby. +I come out here to Arkansas with my mothers old master and mistress and +never did see nor hear of none of them. No I never did hear from none of +them. I come out here when I was ten or twelve years old. It was, it was +right after the war. I recken I was freed, but I was raised by white +folks and I stayed right on wid em. Dat freedom ain't never bothered me. + +"My master and mistress names was Master Alfred Minton. Dey call me Gip +for him. Gip Minton is what they always called me. My mistress was Miss +Annie Minton. I stayed right wid em. They raised me and I come on here +wid em. I don't know nothin about that freedom. + +"I recken they was good to me. I et in de kitchen when they got through +or on a table out in de back yard sometimes. I slept in an outhouse they +fixed up mostly, when I got up big. + +"We come on the train to Memphis and they come on thater way to Lonoke +whar we settled. Don Shirley was the man I come on horseback with from +Memphis to Lonoke. He was a man what dealt in horses. Sure he was a +white man. He's where we got some horses. I don't remember if he lived +at Lonoke or not. + +"I have voted, yes ma'am, a heap of times. I don't remember what kind er +ticket I votes. I'm a Democrat, I think so. I ain't voted fur sometime +now. I don't know if I'll vote any more times or not. I don't know what +is right bout votin and what ain't right. + +"When I was a boy I helped farm. We had what we made. I guess it was +plenty. I had more to eat and I didn't have as many changes of clothes +as folks has to have nowdays bout all de difference. They raised lots +more. They bought things to do a year and didn't be allus goin to town. +It was hard to come to town. Yes mam it did take a long time, sometimes +in a ox wagon. The oxen pulled more over muddy roads. Took three days to +come to town and git back. I farmed one-half-for-the-other and on shear +crop. Well one bout good as the other. Bout all anybody can make farmin +is plenty to eat and a little to wear long time ago and nows the same +way. The most I reckon I ever did make was on Surrounded Hill (Biscoe) +when I farmed one-half-fur-de-udder for Sheriff Reinhardt. The ground +was new and rich and the seasons hit just fine. No maam I never owned no +farm, no livestock, no home. The only thing I owned was a horse one +time. I worked 16 or 17 years for Mr. Brown and for Mr. Plunkett and +Son. I drayed all de time fur em. Hauled freight up from the old depot +(wharf) down on the river. Long time fore a railroad was thought of. I +helped load cotton and hides on the boats. We loaded all day and all +night too heap o'nights. We worked till we got through and let em take +the ship on. + +"The times is critical for old folks, wages low and everything is so +high. The young folks got heap better educations but seems like they +can't use it. They don't know how to any avantage. I know they don't +have as good chances at farmin as de older folks had. I don't know why +it is. My son works up at the lumber yard. Yes he owns this house. +That's all he owns. He make nough to get by on, I recken. He works hard, +yes maam. He helps me if he can. I get $4 a month janitor at the Farmers +and Merchants Bank (Des Arc). I works a little garden and cleans off +yards. No maam it hurts my rheumatism to run the yard mower. I works +when I sho can't hardly go. Nothin matter cept I'm bout wo out. I plied +for the old folks penshun but I ain't got nuthin yet. I signed up at the +bank fur it agin not long ago. I has been allus self sportin. Didn't +pend on no livin soul but myself." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: A.J. Mitchell + 419 E. 11th Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 78 +Occupation: Garbage hauler + + +"I was 'bout seven when they surrendered. I can remember when my old +master sold Aunt Susan. She raised me. I seen old master when he was +tryin' to whip old Aunt Susan. She was the cook. She said, 'I ain't +goin' let you whip me' and I heard my sister say next day he done sold +Aunt Susan. I ain't seed her since. I called her ma. My mother died when +I was two years old. She was full Injun. My father was black but his +hair was straight. His face was so black it shined. Looked like it was +greased. My father said he was freeborn and I've seen stripes on his +back look like the veins on back of my hand where they whipped him +tryin' to make him disown his freedom. + +"Old Jack Clifton was my master. Yes ma'm, that was his name. + +"I 'member when they had those old looms--makin' cloth and old shuttle +to put the thread on. I can see 'em now. + +"I can 'member when this used to be a Injun place. I've seen old Injun +mounds. White folks come and run 'em out and give 'em Injun Territory. + +"I heered the guns in the war and seed the folks comin' home when the +war broke. They said they was fitin' 'bout freedom, tryin' to free the +people. I 'member when they was fitin' at Marks Mill. I know some of the +people said that was where they was sot free. + +"I don't know as I seed any Ku Klux when they was goin' round. Hearin' +'bout 'em scared me. I have a good recollection. I can remember the +first dream I ever had and the first time I whistled. I can remember +when I was two or three years old. Remember when they had a big old +conch shell. Old master would blow it at twelve o'clock for 'em to come +in. + +"Old master was good to us but I 'member he had a leather strap and if +we chillun had done anything he'd make us younguns put our head 'tween +his legs and put that strap on us. My goodness! He called me Pat and +called his own son Bug--his own son Junie. We played together. Old +master had nicknames for everybody. + +"My first mistress was named Miss Mary but she died. I 'member when old +master married and brought Miss Becky home. + +"Marse John (he was old master's oldest son) he used to tote me about in +his saddle bags. He was the overseer. + +"I 'member old master's ridin' hoss--a little old bay pony--called him +Hardy. I never remember nobody else bein' on it--that was his ridin' +hoss. + +"Old master had dogs. One was Gus and one named Brute (he was a red bone +hound). And one little dog they called Trigger. Old master's head as +white as cotton. + +"I do remember the day they said the people was free--after the war +broke. My father come and got me. + +"Now I'm givin' you a true statement. I've been stayin' by myself +twenty-three years. I been here in Pine Bluff--well I jest had got here +when the people was comin' back from that German war. + +"My God, we had the finest time when we killed hogs--make sausage. We'd +eat cracklin's--oh, we thought they wasn't nothin' like cracklin's. The +Lord have mercy, there was an old beech tree set there in my master's +yard. You could hear that old tree pop ever' day bout the same time, +bout twelve o'clock. We used to eat beech mass. Good? Yes ma'm! I think +about it often and wonder why it was right in old master's yard. + +"I've cast a many a vote. Not a bit of trouble in the world. Hope elect +most all the old officers here in town. I had a brother was a constable +under Squire Gaines. Well of course, Miss, I don't think it's right when +they disfranchised the colored people. I tell you, Miss, I read the +Bible and the Bible says every man has his rights--the poor and the free +and the bound. I got good sense from the time I leaped in this world. I +'member well I used to go and cast my vote just that quick but they got +so they wouldn't let you vote unless you could read. + +"I've had 'em to offer me money to vote the Democrat ticket. I told him, +no. I didn't think that was principle. The colored man ain't got no +representive now. Colored men used to be elected to the legislature and +they'd go and sell out. Some of 'em used to vote the Democrat ticket. +God wants every man to have his birthright. + +"I tell you one thing they did. This here no fence law was one of the +lowest things they ever did. I don't know what the governor was studyin' +'bout. If they would let the old people raise meat, they wouldn't have +to get so much help from the government. God don't like that, God wants +the people to raise things. I could make a livin' but they won't let me. + +"The first thing I remember bout studyin' was Junie, old master's son, +studyin' his book and I heard 'em spell the word 'baker'. That was when +they used the old Blue Back Speller. + +"I went to school. I'm goin' tell you as nearly as I can. That was, +madam, let me see, that was in sixty-nine as near as I can come at it. +Miss, I don't know how long I went. My father wouldn't let me. I didn't +know nothin' but work. I weighed cotton ever since I was a little boy. I +always wanted to be weighin'. Looked like it was my gift--weighin' +cotton. + +"I'm a Missionary Baptist preacher. Got a license to preach. You go down +and try to preach without a license and they put you up. + +"Madam, you asked me a question I think I can answer with knowledge and +understanding. The young people is goin' too fast. The people is growin' +weaker and wiser. You take my folks--goin' to school but not doin' +anything. I don't think there's much to the younger generation. Don't +think they're doin' much good. I was brought up with what they called +fireside teachin'." + + + + +Circumstances of Interview +STATE--Arkansas +NAME OF WORKER--Bernice Bowden +ADDRESS--1006 Oak Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +DATE--November 2, 1938 +SUBJECT--Exslaves +[TR: Repetitive information deleted from subsequent pages.] + + +1. Name and address of informant--Gracie Mitchell + +2. Date and time of interview--November 1, 1938, 3:00 p.m. + +3. Place of interview--117 Worthen Street + +4. Name and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with +informant--Bernice Wilburn, 101 Miller Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas + +5. Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you--None + +6. Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.--A frame house +(rented), bare floors, no window shades; a bed and some boxes and three +straight chairs. In an adjoining room were another bed, heating stove, +two trunks, one straight chair, one rocking chair. A third room the +kitchen, contained cookstove and table and chairs. + + +Text of Interview + +"They said I was born in Alabama. My mother's name was Sallie and my +father was Andrew Wheeler. I couldn't tell when I was born--my folks +never did tell me that. Belonged to Dr. Moore and when his daughter +married he give my mother to her and she went to Mobile. They said I +wasn't weaned yet. My grandmother told me that. She is dead now. Don't +know nothin' bout nary one o' my white folks. I don't recollect nothin' +bout a one of 'em 'cept my old boss. He took us to Texas and stayed till +the niggers was all free and then he went back. Good to me? No ma'm--no +good there. And if you didn't work he'd see what was the matter. Lived +near Coffeyville in Upshaw county. That's whar my husband found me. I +was living with my aunt and uncle. They said the reason I had such a +good gift makin' quilts was cause my mother was a seamstress. + +"I cooked 'fore I married and I could make my own dresses, piece quilts +and quilt. That's mostly what I done. No laundry work. I never did farm +till I was married. After we went to Chicago in 1922, I took care of +other folks chillun, colored folks, while they was working in laundries +and factories. I sure has worked. I ain't nobody to what I was when I +was first married. I knowed how to turn, but I don't know whar to turn +now--I ain't able. + +"I use to could plow just as good as any man. I could put that dirt up +against that cotton and corn. I'd mold it up. Lay it by? Yes ma'm I'd +lay it by, too. + +"They didn't send me to school but they learned me how to work. + +"I had a quilt book with a lot o' different patterns but I loaned it to +a woman and she carried it to Oklahoma. Mighty few people you can put +confidence in nowdays. + +"I don't go out much 'cept to church--folks is so critical. + + "You have to mind how you walk on the cross; + If you don't, your foot will slip, + And your soul will be lost." + +"I was a motherless chile but the Lord made up for it by givin' me a +good husband and I don't want for anything." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +According to her husband, Gracie spends every spare moment piecing +quilts. He said they use to go fishing and that Gracie always took her +quilt pieces along and if the fish were not biting she would sew. She +showed me twenty-two finished quilt tops, each of a different design and +several of the same design, or about thirty quilts in all. Two were +entirely of silk, two of applique design which called "laid work". They +were folded up in a trunk and as she took them out and spread them on +the bed for me to see she told me the name of the design. The following +are the names of the designs: + + 1. Breakfast Dish + 2. Sawtooth (silk) + 3. Tulip design (Laid work) + 4. "Prickle" Pear + 5. Little Boy's Breeches + 6. Birds All Over the Elements + 7. Drunkard's Path + 8. Railroad Crossing + 9. Cocoanut Leaf ("That's Laid Work") + 10. Cotton Leaf + 11. Half an Orange + 12. Tree of Paradise + 13. Sunflower + 14. Ocean Wave (silk) + 15. Double Star + 16. Swan's Nest + 17. Log Cabin in the Lane + 18. Reel + 19. Lily in de Valley (Silk) + 20. Feathered Star + 21. Fish Tail + 22. Whirligig + +Gracie showed me her winter coat bought in Chicago of fur fabric called +moleskin, and with fur collar and cuffs. + +She sells the quilt tops whenever she can. Many are made of new material +which they buy. + + +Personal History of Informant + +1. Ancestry--Father, Andrew Wheeler; Sallie Wheeler, mother. + +2. Place and date of birth--Alabama. No date known, about 80 years old. + +3. Family--Husband and one grown son. + +4. Places lived in, with dates--Alabama, Texas till 1897, Arkansas +1897-1922, Chicago, 1922 to 1930. Arkansas 1930 to date. + +5. Education, with dates--No education. + +6. Occupations and accomplishments, with dates--Cooked before marriage +at 16; farmed after marriage; home sewing. + +7. Special skills and interests--Quilt making and knitting. + +8. Community and religious activities--Assisted husband in ministry. + +9. Description of informant--Hair divided into many pigtails and wrapped +with rags. Skin, dark. Medium height, slender, clothing soiled. + +10. Other points gained in interview--Spends all her time piecing +quilts, aside from housework. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Hettie Mitchell (mulatto) + Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 69 + + +"I am sixty-nine years old. I was raised in Dyersburg, Tennessee. I can +tell you a few things mother told us. My own grandma on mother's side +was in South Carolina. She was stole when a child and brought to +Tennessee in a covered wagon. Her mother died from the grief of it. She +was hired out to nurse for these people. The people that stole her was +named Spence. She was a house woman for them till freedom. She was never +sold. Spences was not cruel people. Mother was never sold. She was the +mother of twelve and raised nine to a good age--more than grown. The +Spences seemed to always care for her children. When I go to Dyersburg +they always want us to come to see them and they treat us mighty well. + +"Mother was light. She said she had Indian strain (blood) but father was +very light and it was white blood but he never discussed it before his +children. So I can't tell you excepting he said he was owned by the +Brittians in South Carolina. He said his mother died soon after he was +sold. He was sold to a nigger trader and come in the gang to Memphis, +Tennessee and was put on the block and auctioned off to the highest +bidder. He was a farm hand. + +"Mother married father when she was nineteen years old. She was a house +girl. She lived close to her old mistress. She was very, very old before +she died she nearly stayed at my mother's house. Her mind wasn't right +and mother understood how to take care of her and was kind to her. The +Spences heard about grandma. They wrote and visited years after when +mother was a girl. + +"The way that father found out about his kin folks was this: One day a +creek was named and he told the white man, 'I was born close to that +creek and played there in the white sand and water when I was a little +boy.' The white man asked his name, said he knew the creek well too. +Father told him he never was named till he was sold and they named him +Sam--Sam Barnett. He was sold to Barnett in Memphis. But his dear own +mother called him 'Candy.' The white man found out about his people for +him and they found out his own dear mother died that same year he was +taken from South Carolina from grief. He heard from some of his people +from that time on till he died. + +"I worked on the farm in Tennessee till I married. I ironed, washed, and +have kept my own house and done the work that goes along with raising a +small family. We own our home. We have saved all we could along. I have +never had a real hard time like some I know. I guess my time is at hand +now. I don't know which way to turn since my husband got down sick. + +"I don't vote. Seem like it used to not be a nice place for women to go +where voting was taking place. Now they go mix up and vote. That is one +big change. Time is changing and changing the people. Maybe it is the +people is changing up the world as time goes by. We colored folks look +to the white folks to know the way to do. We have always done it." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Mary Mitchell, Hazen, Arkansas +Age: 60 + + +"I was born in Trenton, Tennessee. My parents had five children. They +were named William and Charlotte Wells. My father ran away and left my +mother with all the children to raise. By birth mother was a +Mississippian. She had been a nurse and my father was a timber man and +farmer. My mother said she had her hardest time raising her little +children. She was taken from her parents when a small girl and put on a +block and sold. She never said if her owners was bad to her, but she +said they was rough on Uncle Peter. He would fight. She said they would +tie Uncle Peter and whoop him with a strap. From what she said there was +a gang of slaves on Mr. Wade's place. He owned her. I never heard her +mention freedom but she said they had a big farm bell on a tall post in +the back yard and they had a horn to blow. It was a whistle made of a +cow's horn. + +"She said they was all afraid of the Ku Klux. They would ride across the +field and they could see that they was around, but they never come up +close to them." + + + + +Circumstances of Interview +STATE--Arkansas +NAME OF WORKER--Bernice Bowden +ADDRESS--1006 Oak Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +DATE--November 3, 1938 +SUBJECT--Exslaves +[TR: Repetitive information deleted from subsequent pages.] + + +1. Name and address of informant--Moses Mitchell, 117 Worthen Street + +2. Date and time of interview--November 1, 1938, 1:00 p.m. + +3. Place of interview--117 Worthen Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas + +4. Place and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with +informant--Bernice Wilburn, 101 Miller Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas + +5. Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you--None + +6. Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.--A frame house +(rented), bare floors, no window shades; a bed and some boxes and three +straight chairs. In an adjoining room were another bed, heating stove, +two trunks, one straight chair, one rocking chair. A third room, the +kitchen, contained cookstove and table and chairs. + + +Text of Interview + +"I was born down here on White River near Arkansas Post, August, 1849. I +belonged to Thomas Mitchel and when they (Yankees) took Arkansas Post, +our owners gathered us up and my young master took us to Texas and he +sold me to an Irishman named John McInish in Marshall for $1500. $500 in +gold and the rest in Confederate money. They called it the new issue. + +"I was twelve years old then and I stayed in Texas till I was +forty-eight. I was at Tyler, Texas when they freed us. When they took us +to Texas they left my mother and baby sister here in Arkansas, down here +on Oak Log Bayou. I never saw her again and when I came back here to +Arkansas, they said she had been dead twenty-eight years. Never did hear +of my father again. + +"I'm supposed to be part Creek Indian. Don't know how much. We have one +son, a farmer, lives across the river. Married this wife in 1873. + +"My wife and I left Texas forty-one years ago and came back here to +Arkansas and stayed till 1922. Then we went to Chicago and stayed till +1930, and then came back here. I'd like to go back up there, but I guess +I'm gettin' too old. While I was there I preached and I worked all the +time. I worked on the streets and the driveways in Lincoln Park. I was +in the brick and block department. Then I went from there to the asphalt +department. There's where I coined the money. Made $6.60 in the brick +and block and $7.20 a day in the asphalt. Down here they don't know no +more about asphalt than a pig does about a holiday. _A man that's from +the South and never been nowhere, don't know nothin', a woman either_. + +"Yes ma'm, I'm a preacher. Just a local preacher, wasn't ordained. The +reason for that was, in Texas a man over forty-five couldn't join the +traveling connection. I was licensed, but of course I couldn't perform +marriage ceremonies. I was just within one step of that. + +"I went to school two days in my life. I was privileged to go to the +first free school in Texas. Had a teacher named Goldman. Don't know what +year that was but they found out me and another fellow was too old so +they wouldn't let us go no more. But I caught my alphabet in them two +days. So I just caught what education I've got, here and there. I can +read well--best on my Bible and Testament and I read the newspapers. I +can sorta scribble my name. + +"I've been a farmer most of my life and a preacher for fifty-five years. +I can repair shoes and use to do common carpenter work. I can help build +a house. I only preach occasionally now, here and there. I belong to the +Allen Temple in Hoboken (East Pine Bluff). + +"I think the young generation is gone to naught. They're a different cut +to what they was in my comin' up." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +This man and his wife live in the outskirts of West pine Bluff. They +receive a small sum of money and commodities from the County Welfare +Department. He has a very pleasant personality, a good memory and +intelligence above the ordinary. Reads the Daily Graphic and Arkansas +Gazette. Age 89. He said, "_Here's the idea, freedom is worth it all_." + + +Personal History of Informant + +1. Ancestry--Father, Lewis Mitchell; Mother, Rhoda Mitchell + +2. Place and date of birth--Oak Log Bayou, White River, near Arkansas +Post, Ark. + +3. Family--Wife and one grown son. + +4. Places lived in, with dates--Taken to Texas by his young master and +sold in Marshall during the war. Lived in Tyler, Texas until forty-eight +years of age; came back to Arkansas in 1897 and stayed until 1922; went +to Chicago and lived until 1930; back to Jefferson County, Arkansas. + +5. Education, with dates--Two days after twenty-one years of age. No +date. + +6. Occupations and accomplishments, with dates--Farmer, preacher, common +carpenter, cobbler, public work on streets in Chicago, farmed and +preached until he went to Chicago in 1922. The he worked in the +maintenance department of city streets of Chicago and of Lincoln Park, +Chicago. + +7. Special skills and interests--Asphalt worker + +8. Community and religious activities--Licensed Methodist Preacher. No +assignment now. + +9. Description of informant--Five feet eight inches tall; weight, 165 +pounds, nearly bald. Very prominent cheek bones. Keen intelligence. +Neatly dressed. + +10. Other points gained in interview--Reads daily papers; knowledge of +world affairs. + + + + +Pine Bluff District +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of Interviewer: Martin - Barker +Subject: Negro Customs + +Information by: Ben Moon +[TR: Information moved from bottom of second page.] + + +I was born on the Walker place, in 1869. My father was a slave to Mr. +Bob. I used to drive Miss Lelia (Eulalie) to the Catholic church here in +Pine Bluff. She used to let me go barefooted, and bare headed. + +Miss Lelia was the daughter of Col. Creed Taylor. All during slavery +time I drove her gins. We had eight mules. Eight at a time hitched to +each lever, they would weave in an out but they was so hitched that they +never got in any body's way. They just walked around and round like they +did in those days. We had herds of sheep, we sheared them and wove yarn +for socks. We raised wheat, when it was ripe we laid a canvas cloth on +the ground and put wheat on it, then men and women on horse back rode +over it, and thrashed it that way. They called it treading it. Then we +took it to the mill and ground it and made it into flour. For breakfast, +(we ate awful soon in the morning), about 4 AM, then we packed lunch in +tin buckets and eat again at daylight. Fat meat, cornbread and molasses. +Some would have turnip greens for breakfast. + +Summertime, Miss Lelia would plant plenty of fruit, and we would have +fried apples, stewed peaches and things. + +Sunday mornings we would have biscuit, butter, molasses, chicken, etc. + +For our work they paid us seventy-five cents a day and when come cotton +picking time old rule, seventy five cents for pickin cotton. Christmas +time, plenty of fireworks, plenty to eat, drink and everything. We would +dance all Christmas. + +All kind of game was plentiful, plenty of coon, possum, used up +everything that grew in the woods. Plenty of corn, we took it to the +grist mill every Saturday. + +Ark. riv. boats passed the Walker place, and dey was a landing right at +dere place, and one at the Wright place, that is where the airport is +now. + +All de white folks had plenty of cattle den and in de winter time dey +was all turned in on the fields and with what us niggers had, that made +a good many, and you know yorself dat was good for de ground. + +Mother was a slave on the Merriweather place, her marster was Mick[TR: +name not clear] Merriweather. My granma was Gusta Merriweather, my +mother Lavina and lived on the Merriweather place in what was then +Dorsey county, near Edinburg, now Cleveland Co. My grandfather was Louis +Barnett, owned by Nick Barnett of Cleveland co., then Dorsey co. Fathers +people was owned by Marse Bob Walker. Miss Lelia (Eulalie) was mistis. +Miss Maggie Benton was young mistis. + +I dont believe in ghosts or spirits. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Emma Moore + 3715 Short West Second, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 80 +Occupation: Laundry work + + +"I'se born in slavery times. When my daddy come back from the War, he +said I was gwine on seven or eight. + +"He stayed in the War three years and six months. I know that's what he +always told us. He went with his master, Joe Horton. Looks like I can +see old Marse Joe now. Had long sandy whiskers. The las' time I seed him +he come to my uncle's house. We was all livin' in a row of houses. +Called em the quarters. I never will fergit it. + +"I was born on Horton's Island here in Arkansas. That's what they told +me. + +"I know when my daddy went to war and when he come back, he put on his +crudiments (accoutrements) to let us see how he looked. + +"I seed the soldiers gwine to war and comin' back. Look like to me I was +glad to see em till I seed too many of em. + +"Yankees used to come down and take provisions. Yes, 'twas the Yankees! + +"My granddaddy was the whippin' boss. Had a white boss too named Massa +Fred. + +"Massa Joe used to come down and play with us chillun. His name was Joe +Horton. Ever'body can tell you that was his name. Old missis named Miss +Mary. She didn't play with us much. + +"Yes ma'am, they sure did take us to Texas durin' of the War--in a ox +wagon. Stayed down there a long time. + +"We didn't have plenty to eat but we had to eat what we did. I member +they wouldn't give us chillun no meat, jus' grease my mouf and make my +mother think we had meat. + +"Now my mother told me, at night some of the folks used to steal one of +old massa's shoats and cook it at night. I know when that pot was on the +rack but you better not say nothin' bout it. + +"All us chillun stayed in a big long log house. Dar is where us chillun +stayed in the daytime, right close to Miss Mary. + +"I used to sit on the lever at the gin. You know that was glory to me to +ride. I whipped the old mule. Ever' now and then I'd give him a tap. + +"When they pressed the cotton, they wet the press and I member one time +they wet it too much. I don't say they sont it back but I think they +made em pay for it. And they used to put chunks in the bale to make it +weigh heavy. Right there on that lake where I was born. + +"Used to work in the field. These white folks can tell you I loved to +work. I used to get as much as the men. My mammy was a worker and as the +sayin' is, I was a chip off the old block. + +"The first teacher I went to school to was named Mr. Cushman. Didn't go +only on rainy days. That was the first school and you might say the las' +one cause I had to nuss them chillun. + +"You know old massa used to keep all our ages and my daddy said I was +nineteen when I married, but I don't know what year 'twas--honest I +don't. + +"I been married three times. + +"I member one time I was goin' to a buryin'. I was hurryin' to get +dressed. I wanted to be ready when they come by for me cause they say +it's bad luck to stop a corpse. If you don't know that I do--you know if +they had done started from the house. + +"My mama and daddy said they was born in Tennessee and was bought and +brought here. + +"I been goin' to one of these gov'ment schools and got my eyes so weak I +can't hardly see to thread a needle. I'se crazy bout it I'm tellin' you. +I sit up here till God knows how long. They give me a copy to practice +and they'd brag on me and that turned me foolish. I jus' thought I was +the teacher herself almos'. That's the truf now. + +"I can't read much. I don't fool with no newspaper. I wish I could, +woman--I sure do. + +"I keep tellin' these young folks they better learn somethin'. I tell em +they better take this chance. This young generation--I don't know much +bout the whites--I'm tellin' you these colored is a sight. + +"Well, I'm gwine away from here d'rectly--ain't gwine be here much +longer. If I don't see you again I'll meet you in heaven." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Patsy Moore, Madison, Arkansas +Age: 74 + + +"My mother was sold in Jamestown, Virginia to Daphney Hull. Her white +folks got in debt. My papa was born in Georgia. Folks named Williams +owned him. Ma never seen her ma no more but William Hull went to +Virginia and bought her two sisters. + +"I was named Patsy after grandma in Virginia. She had twenty-one +children to ma's knowing. Ma was a light color. Pa was a Molly Glaspy +man. That means he was Indian and African. Molly Glaspy folks was nearly +always free folks. Ma was named Mattie. If they would have no children +they got trafficked about. + +"Daphney Hull was good but William Hull and his wife was both mean. They +lived on the main road to Holly Springs. Daphney Hull was a Methodist +man, kind-hearted and good. He was a bachelor I think. He kept a woman +to cook and keep his house. Auntie said the Yankees was mean to Mr. +William Hull's wife. They took all their money and meat. They had their +money hid and some of the black folks let the Yankees find out where it +was. They got it. + +"Papa was a soldier. He sent for us. We come to Memphis, Tennessee in a +wagon. We lived there five or six years. Pa got a pension till he died. +Both my parents was field hands in slavery. Ma took in washing and +ironing in Memphis. + +"I was born in De Sota County, Mississippi. I remember Forrest's battle +in Memphis. I didn't have sense to be scared. I seen black and white +dead in the streets and alleys. We went to the magazine house for +protection, and we played and stayed there. They tried to open the +magazine house but couldn't. + +"When freedom come, folks left home, out in the streets, crying, +praying, singing, shouting, yelling, and knocking down everything. Some +shot off big guns. Den come the calm. It was sad then. So many folks +done dead, things tore up and nowheres to go and nothing to eat, nothing +to do. It got squally. Folks got sick, so hungry. Some folks starved +nearly to death. Times got hard. We went to the washtub onliest way we +all could live. Ma was a cripple woman. Pa couldn't find work for so +long when he mustered out. + +"I do recollect the Civil War well. + +"I live with my daughter. I have a cough since I had flu and now I have +chills and fever. My daughter helps me all I get. She lives with me. + +"Some of the young folks is mighty good. I reckon some is too loose +acting. Times is hard. Harder in the winter than in summer time. We has +our garden and chickens to help us out in summer." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Ada Moorehead + 2300 E. Barraque, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 82? + + +"I was here in slavery times, honey, but I don't know exactly how old I +am. I was born in Huntsville, Alabama but you know in them days old +folks didn't tell the young folks no thin' and I was so small when they +brought me here. I don't know what year I was born but I believe I'm +about eighty-two. You know when a person ain't able to work and dabble +out his own clothes, you know he's gone a long ways. + +"My white folks was Ad White what owned me. Called him Marse Ad. Don't +call folks marse much now-days. + +"My father was sold away from us in Alabama and we heard he was here in +Pine Bluff so Aunt Fanny brought us here. She just had a road full of us +and brought us here to Arkansas. We walked. We was a week on the road. I +know we started here on Monday morning and we got here to the courthouse +on the next Monday round about noon. That was that old courthouse. I +reckon that ground is in the river now. + +"When we got here I saw my father. He took me to his sister--that was my +Aunt Savannah--and dropped me down. + +"Mrs. Reynolds raised me. She come to Aunt Savannah's house and hired me +the very same day I got here. I nursed Miss Katie. She was bout a month +old. You know--a little long dress baby. Don't wear then long dresses +now--gettin' wiser. + +"Mrs. Reynolds she was good to me. And since she's gone looks like I'm +gone too--gone to the dogs. Cause when Mrs. Reynolds got a dress for +Miss Katie--got one for me too. + +"My father was a soldier in the war. Last time I heard from him I know +he was hauling salt to the breastworks. Yes, I was here in the war. That +was all right to me but I wished a many a time I wasn't here. + +"I went to school two or three days in a week for about a term. But I +didn't learn to read much. Had to hire out and help raise my brother and +sister. I'm goin' to this here government school now. I goes every +afternoon. + +"Since I got old I can think bout the old times. It comes to me. I +didn't pay attention to nothin' much when I was young. + +"Oh Lord, I don't know what's goin' to become of us old folks. Wasn't +for the Welfare, I don't know what I'd do. + +"I was sixteen when I married. I sure did marry young. I married young +so I could see my chillun grown. I never married but once and I stayed a +married woman forty-nine years to the very day my old man died. Lived +with one man forty-nine years. I had my hand and heart full. I had a +home of my own. How many chillun? Me? I had nine of my own and I raised +other folks' chillun. Oh, I been over this world right smart--first one +thing and then another. I know a lot of white folks. They all been +pretty good to me." + + + + +Interviewer: Mary D. Hudgins +Person Interviewed: Mrs. Mary Jane (Mattie) Mooreman +Home: with son +Age: 90 + + +"Yes, ma'am. I've been in Hot Springs, been in Hot Springs 57 years. +That's a long time. Lots of changes have come--I've seen lots of changes +here--changed from wooden sidewalks and little wood buildings. + +"Your name's Hudgins? I knew the Hudginses--knew Miss Nora well. What's +that? Did I know Adeline? Did I know Adeline! Do you mean to tell me +she's still alive? Adeline! Why Miss Maud," (addressing Mrs. Eisele, for +whom she works--and who sat nearby to help in the interview) "Miss +Maude, I tell you Adeline's WHITE, she's white clean through!" (see +interview with Adeline Blakeley, who incidentally is as black as "the +ace of spades"--in pigmentation.) "Miss Maude, you never knew anybody +like Adeline. She bossed those children and made them mind--just like +they was hers. She took good care of them." (Turning to the interviewer) +"You know how the Hudgins always was about their children. Adeline +thought every one of 'em was made out of gold---made out of pure GOLD. + +"She made 'em mind. I remember once, she was down on Central Avenue with +Ross and he did southing or other that, wasn't nice. She walked over to +the umbrella stand, you remember how they used to have umbrellas for +sale out in front of the stores. She grabbed an umbrella and she whipped +Ross with it--she didn't hurt him. Then she put it back in the stand +and said to the man who ran the store, 'If that umbrella's hurt, just +charge it to Harve Hudgins.' That's the way Adeline was. So she's still +alive. Law how I'd like to see her. Bring me a picture of her. Oh Miss +Mary, I'd love to have it. + +"Me? I was born on Green river near Hartford, Kentucky. Guess I was +about a year and a half, from what they told me when my mistress +married. Don't know how she ever met my master. She was raised in a +convent and his folks lived a long way from hers. But anyhow she did. +She was just 13 when she married. The man she married was named Charles +Mooreman M-O-O-R-E-M-A-N. They had a son called Charles Wycliff +Mooreman. He was named for his mother's people. I got a son I called +Charles Wycliff too. He works at the Arlington. He's a waiter. They say +he looks just like me. Mr. Charles Wycliff Mooreman--back in Kentucky. +I still gets letters from him. + +"Miss Mary I guess I had a pretty easy time in slavery days. They was +good to us. Besides I was a house niggah." (Those who have been "house +niggahs" never quibble at the word slave or negro. A subtle social +distinction brewed in the black race to separate house servants from +field hands as far as wealthy planters from "poor white trash.".) "Once +I heard a man say of my mother, 'You could put on a white boiled shirt +and lie flat down on the floor in her kitchen and not get dirty.'" + +"Cook? No, ma'am!" (with dignity and indignation) "I never cooked until +after I was married, and I never washed, never washed so much as a rag. +All I washed was the babies and maybe my mistress's feet. I was a lady's +maid. I'd wait on my mistress and I'd knit sox for all the folks. When +they would sleep it was our duty--us maids--to fan 'em with feathers +made out of turkey feathers--feather fans. Part of it was to keep 'em +cool. Then they didn't have screens like we have today. So part of it +was to keep the flies off. I remember how we couldn't stomp our feet to +keep the flies from biting for fear of waking 'em up. + +"No, Miss Mary, we didn't get such, good food. Nobody had all the kinds +of things we have today. We had mostly buttermilk and cornbread and fat +meat. Cake? 'Deed we didn't. I remember once they baked a cake and Mr. +Charles Wycliff--he was just a little boy--he got in and took a whole +fistful out of the cake. When Miss found out about it, she give us all +doses of salts--enough to make us all throw up. She gave it to all the +niggahs and the children--the white children. And what did she find out? +It was her own child who had done it. + +"Yes ma'am we learned to read and write. Oh, Miss Maude now--I don't +want to recite. I don't want to." (But she did "Twinkle, Twinkle Little +Star" and "The Playful Kitten"--the latter all of 40 lines.) "I think, I +think they both come out of McGuffey's second Reader. Yes ma'am I +remember's McGuffey's and the Blueback speller too. + +"No, Miss Mary, there wasn't so much of the war that was fought around +us. I remember that old Master used to go out in the front yard and +stand by a locust tree and put his ear against it. He said that way he +could hear the cannon down to Bowling Green. No, I didn't never hear any +shooting from the war myself. + +"Yes ma'am, the Confederates used to come through lots. I remember how +we used to go to the spring for water for 'em. Then we'd stand with the +buckets on our heads while they drank--drank out of a big gourd. When +the buckets was empty we'd go back to the spring for more water. + +"Once the Yankees come by the place. It was at night. They went out to +the quarters and they tried to get 'em to rise up. Told 'em to come on +in the big house and take what they wanted. Told 'em to take anything +they wanted to take, take Master's silver spoons and Miss' silk dress. +'If they don't like it, we'll shoot their brains out,' they said. Next +morning they told Master. He got scared and moved. At that time we was +living at Cloverport. + +"It was near the end of the war and we was already free, only we didn't +know it. He moved on up to Stephensport. That's on the Ohio too. He took +me and a brother of mine and another black boy. While we was there I +remember he took me to a circus. I remember how the lady--she was +dressed in pink come walking down a wire--straight on down to the +ground. She was carrying a long pole. I won't never forget that. + +"Not long afterwards I was married. We was all free then. My husband +asked my master if he could marry me. He told him 'You're a good man. +You can come and live on my farm and work for me, but you can't have +Mattie.' So we moved off to his Master's farm. + +"A little while after that his Master bought a big farm in Arkansas. He +wanted to hire as many people as he could. So we went with him. He +started out well, but the first summer he died. So everything had to be +sold. A man what come down to bid on some of the farm tools and +stock--come to the auction, he told us to come on up to Woodruff county +and work for him. We was there 7 years and he worked the farm and I took +care of myself and my babies. Then he went off and left me. + +"I went in to Cotton Plant and started working there. Finally he wrote +me and tried to get me to say we hadn't never been married. Said he +wanted to marry another woman. The white folks I worked for wouldn't let +me. I'd been married right and they wouldn't let me disgrace myself by +writing such a letter. + +"Finally I came on to Hot Springs. For a while I cooked and washed. Then +I started working for folks, regular. For 9 years, tho, I mostly washed +and ironed. + +"I came to Hot Springs on the 7th of February--I think it was 57 years +ago. You remember Miss Maud--it was just before that big hail storm. You +was here, don't you remember--that hail storm that took all the windows +out of all the houses, tore off roofs and swept dishes and table-cloths +right off the tables. Can't nobody forget that who's seen it. + +"Miss Mary, do you know Miss Julia Huggins? I worked for her a long +time. Worked for her before she went away and after she came back. +Between times I cooked for Mrs. Button (Burton--but called Button by +everyone) Housley. When Miss Julia come back she marches right down to +Mrs. Housley's and tells me she wants me to work for her again. 'Can't +get her now,' says Mrs. Housley, 'Mattie's done found out she's black.' +But anyhow I went to see her, and I went back to work for her, pretty +foxy Miss Julia was. + +"I been working for Mrs. Eisele pretty near twenty five years. Saw her +children grow up and the grand children. Lancing, he's my heart. Once +when Mr. and Mrs. Eisele went to see Mrs. Brown, Lancing's mother, they +took me with them. All the way to Watertown, Wisconsin. There wasn't any +more niggas in the town and all the children thought I was somthing to +look at. They'd come to see me and they'd bring their friends with 'em. +Once while we was there, a circus come to town. The children wanted me +to see it. Told me there was a negro boy in it. Guess they thought it +would be a treat to me to see another niggah. I told 'em, 'Law, don't +you think I see lots, lots more than I wants, everyday when I is at +home?' + +"It used to scare me. The folks would go off to a party or a show and +leave me alone with the baby. No, Miss Mary, I wasn't scared for myself. +I thought somebody might come in and kidnap that baby. No matter how +late they was I'd sit on the top step of the stairs leading +upstairs--just outside the door where Lansing was asleep. No matter what +time they come home they'd find me there. 'Why don't you go on in your +bedroom and lie down?' they'd ask me. 'No,' I'd tell 'em, 'somebody +might come in, and they would have to get that baby over my dead body.' + +"Jonnie, that's my daughter" (Mrs. D.G. Murphy, 338 Walnut Street, a +large stucco house with well cared for lawn) "she wants me to quit work. +I told her, 'You put that over on Mrs. Murphy--you made her quit work +and took care of her. What happened to her? She died! You're not going +to make me old.' + +"Twice she's got me to quit work. Once, she told me it was against the +law. Told me there was a law old folks couldn't work. I believed her and +I quit. Then I come on down and I asked Mr. Eisele" (an important +business executive and prominent in civic affairs, [HW: aged 83]) "He +rared back and he said, 'I'd like to see anybody stop me from working.' +So I come on back. + +"Another time, it was when the old age pensions come in. They tried to +stop me again. Told me I had to take it. I asked Mr. Eisele if I could +work just the same. 'No,' he says 'if you take it, you'll have to quit +work.' So I stamped my foot and I says, 'I won't take nobody's pension.' + +"The other day Jonnie called up here and she started to crying. Lots of +folks write her notes and say she's bad to let me work. Somebody told +her that they had seen me going by to work at 4 o'clock in the morning. +It wasn't no such. I asked a man when I was on the way and it was 25 +minutes until 5. Besides, my clock had stopped and I couldn't tell what +time it was. Yes, Miss Mary, I does get here sort of early, but then I +like it. I just sit in the kitchen until the folks get up. + +"You see that picture over there, it's Mr. Eisele when he was 17. I'd +know that smiling face anywhere. He's always good to me. When they go +away to Florida I can go to the store and get money whenever I need it. +But it's always good to see them come back. Miss Maud says I'm sure to +go to Heaven, I'm such a good worker. No, Miss Mary, I'm not going to +quit work. Not until I get old." + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Evelina Morgan + 1317 W. Sixteenth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: App. 81 +[TR: Original first page moved to follow second page per + HW: Insert this page before Par. 1, P. 3] + + +"I was born in Wedgeboro, North Carolina, on the plantation of--let me +see what that man's name was. He was an old lawyer. I done forgot that +old white man's name. Old Tom Ash! Senator Ash--that's his name. He was +good to his slaves. He had so many niggers he didn't know them all. + +"My father's name was Alphonso Dorgens and my mother's name was Lizzie +Dorgens. Both of them dead. I don't know what her name was before she +married. My pa belonged to the Dorgens' and he married my ma. That is +how she come to be a Dorgen. Old Man Ash never did buy him. He just +visited my mother. They all was in the same neighborhood. Big +plantations. Both of them had masters that owned lots of land. I don't +know how often he visited my mother after he married her. He was over +there all the time. They were right adjoining plantations. + +"I was born in a frame house. I don't know nothin' about it no more than +that. It was j'ined to the kitchen. My mother had two rooms j'ined to +the kitchen. She was the old mistress' cook. She could come right out of +the kitchen and go on in her room. + +"My father worked on the farm. They fed the slaves meat and bread. That +is all I remember--meat and bread and potatoes. They made lots of +potatoes. They gave 'em what they raised. You could raise stuff for +yourself if you wanted to. + +"My mother took care of her children. We children was on the place there +with her. She didn't have nobody's children to take care of but us. + +"I was six years old during of the War. My ma told me my age, but I +forgot it; I never did have it put down. The only way I gits a pension, +I just tells 'em I was six years old during of the War, and they figures +out the age. Sorta like that. But I know I was six years old when the +Rebels and the Yankees was fighting. + +"I seed the Yankees come through. I seed that. They come in the time old +master was gone. He run off--he run away. He didn't let 'em git him. I +was a little child. They stayed there all day breaking into +things--breaking into the molasses and all like that. Old mistress +stayed upstairs hiding. The soldiers went down in the basement and +throwed things around. Old master was a senator; they wanted to git him. +They sure did cuss him: 'The ----, ----, ----, old senator,' they would +say. He took his finest horses and all the gold and silver with him +somewheres. They couldn't git 'im. They was after senators and high-ups +like that. + +"The soldiers tickled me. They sung. The white people's yard was jus' +full of them playing 'Yankee Doodle' and 'Hang Jeff Davis on a Sour +Apple Tree.' + +"All the white people gone! Funny how they run away like that. They had +to save their selves. I 'member they took one old boss man and hung him +up in a tree across a drain of water, jus' let his foot touch--and +somebody cut him down after 'while. Those white folks had to run away. + + +Patrollers + +"I used to hear them all talk about the patrollers. I used to hear my +mother talking about them. My ma said my master wouldn't let the +patrollers come on his place. They could go on anybody else's place but +he never did let them come on his place. Some of the slaves were treated +very bad. But my ma said he didn't allow a patroller on the place and he +didn't allow no other white man to touch his niggers. He was a big white +man--a senator. He didn't know all his Negroes but he didn't allow +nobody to impose on them. He didn't let no patroller and nobody else +beat up his niggers. + + +How Freedom Came + +"I don't know how freedom came. I know the Yankees came through and +they'd pat we little niggers on the head and say, 'Nigger, you are just +as free as I am.' And I would say, 'Yes'm.' + + +Right After Freedom + +"Right after the War my mother and father moved off the place and went +on another plantation somewheres--I don't know where. They share +cropped. I don't know how long. Old mistress didn't want them to move at +all. I never will forget that. + + +Present Occupation and Opinions + +"I used to cook out all the time when I got grown. I couldn't tell you +when I married. You got enough junk down there now. So I ain't giving +you no more. My husband's been dead about seven years. I goes to the +Methodist church on Ninth and Broadway. I ain't able to do no work now. +I gets a little pension, and the Lord takes care of me. I have a hard +time sometime. + +"I ain't bothered about these young folks. They is _somethin' awful_. It +would be wonderful to write a book from that. They ought to git a +history of these young people. You could git a wonderful book out of +that. + +"The colored folks have come a long way since freedom. And if the white +folks didn't pin 'em down they'd go further. Old Jeff Davis said when +the niggers was turned loose, 'Dive up your knives and forks with them.' +But they didn't do it. + +"Some niggers was sharp and got something. And they lost it just like +they got it. Look at Bush. I know two or three big niggers got a lot and +ain't got nothin' left now. Well, I ain't got no time for no more junk. +You got enough down there. You take that and go on." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +During the interview, a little "pickaninny" came in with his mother. His +grandmother and a forlorn little dog were also along. "Tell grandma what +you want," his mother prompted. "Is that your grandson?" I interrupted. +"No," she said, "He ain't no kin to me, but he calls me 'ma' and acts as +if I was his grandma." The little fellow hung back. He was just about +twenty-two months old, but large and mature for that age. + +"Tell 'ma' what you want," his grandmother put in. Finally, he made up +his mind and stood in front of her and said, "Buh--er." His mother +explained, "I've done made him some corn bread, but he ain't got no +butter to put on it and he wants you to give him some." + +Sister Morgan sat silent awhile. Then she rose deliberately and went +slowly to the ancient ice-box, opened it and took out a tin of butter +which she had evidently churned herself in some manner and carefully cut +out a small piece and wrapped it neatly and handed it to the little one. +After a few amenities, they passed out. + +Even with her pitiful and meagre lot, the old lady evidently means to +share her bare necessities with others. + +The manner of her calculation of her age is interesting. She was six +years old when the War was going on. She definitely remembers seeing +Sherman's army and Wheeler's cavalry after she was six. Since they were +in her neighborhood in 1864, she is undoubtedly more than eighty. +Eighty-one is a fair estimate. + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: James Morgan + 819 Rice Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 65 + + +"During the slave time, the pateroles used to go from one plantation to +the other hunting Negroes. They would catch them at the door and throw +hot ashes in their faces. You could go to another plantation and steal +or do anything you wanted if you could manage to get back to your old +master's place. But if you got caught away from your plantation, they +would get you. Sometimes a nigger didn't want to get caught and beat, so +he would throw a shovel of hot ashes in the pateroles' faces and beat it +away. + +"My daddy used to tell lots of stories about slavery times. He's been +dead forty-three years and my mother has been dead forty-one +years--forty-one years this May. I was quite young and lots of the +things they told me, I remember, and some of them, I don't. + +"I was born in 1873. That was eight years after the War ended. My +father's name was Aaron and my mother's name was Rosa. Both of them was +in slavery.[TR: sentence lined out.] I got a brother that was a baby in +her lap when the Yankee soldiers got after a chicken. The chicken flew +up in her lap and they never got that one. The white folks lost it, but +the Yankees didn't get it. I have heard my mother tell all sorts of +things. But they just come to me at times. The soldiers would take +chickens or anything they could get their hands on--those soldiers +would. + +"My mother married the first time in slavery. Her first husband was sold +in slavery. That is the onliest brother I'm got living now out of +ten--that one that was settin' in her lap when the soldiers come +through. He's in Boydell, Arkansas now. It used to be called Morrell. It +is about one hundred twenty-one miles from here, because Dermott is one +hundred nine and Boydell is about twelve miles further on. It's in +Nashville[HW:?] County. My brother was a great big old baby in slavery +times. He was my mother's child by her first husband. All the rest of +them is dead and he is the onliest one that is living. + +"I was a section foreman for the Missouri Pacific for twenty-two years. +I worked there altogether for thirty-five years, but I was section +foreman for twenty-two years. There's my card. Lots of men stayed on the +job till it wore them out. Lewis Holmes did that. It would take him two +hours to walk from here to his home--if he ever managed it at all. + +"It's warm today and it will bring a lot of flies. Flies don't die in +the winter. Lots of folks think they do. They go up in cracks and little +places like that under the weatherboard there--any place where it is +warm--and there they huddle up and stay till it gets warm. Then they +come out and get something to eat and go back again when it cools off. +They live right on through the winter in their hiding places. + +"Both of my parents said they always did their work whatever the task +might be. And my daddy said he never got no whipping at all. You know +they would put a task on you and if you didn't do it, you would get a +whipping. My daddy wouldn't stand to be whipped by a paterole, and he +didn't have to be whipped by nobody else, because he always did his +work. + +"He was one of the ones that the pateroles couldn't catch. When the +pateroles would be trying to break in some place where he was, and the +other niggers would be standing 'round frightened to death and wonderin' +what to do, he would be gettin' up a shovelful of ashes. When the door +would be opened and they would be rushin' in, he would scatter the ashes +in their faces and rush out. If he couldn't find no ashes, he would +always have a handful of pepper with him, and he would throw that in +their faces and beat it. + +"He would fool dogs that my too. My daddy never did run away. He said he +didn't have no need to run away. They treated him all right. He did his +work. He would get through with everything and sometimes he would be +home before six o'clock. My mother said that lots of times she would +pick cotton and give it to the others that couldn't keep up so that they +wouldn't be punished. She had a brother they used to whip all the time +because he didn't keep up. + +"My father told me that his old master told him he was free. He stayed +with his master till he retired and sold the place. He worked on shares +with him. His old master sold the place and went to Monticello and died. +He stayed with him about fifteen or sixteen years after he was freed, +stayed on that place till the Government donated him one hundred sixty +acres and charged him only a dollar and sixty cents for it. He built a +house on it and cleared it up. That's what my daddy did. Some folks +don't believe me when I tell 'em the Government gave him a hundred and +sixty acres of land and charged him only a dollar and sixty cents for +it--a penny a acre. + +"I am retired now. Been retired since 1938. The Government took over the +railroad pension and it pays me now. That is under the Security Act. +Each and every man on the railroad pays in to the Government. + +"I have been married right around thirty-nine years. + +"I was born in Chicot County, Arkansas.[TR: sentence lined out.] My +father was born in Georgia and brought here by his master. He come here +in a old covered ox wagon. I don't know how they happened to decide to +come here. My mother was born in South Carolina. She met my father here +in Arkansas. They sold her husband and she was brought here. After peace +was declared she met my daddy. Her first husband was sold in South +Carolina and she never did know that became of him. They put him up on +the block and sold him and she never did know which way he went. He left +her with two boys right then. She had a sister that stayed in South +Carolina. Somebody bought her there and kept her and somebody bought my +mother and brought her here. My father's master was named McDermott. My +mother's last master was named Belcher or something like that. + +"I don't belong to any church. I have always lived decent and kept out +of trouble." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +When Morgan said "there is my record", he showed me a pass for the year +1938-39 for himself and his wife between all stations on the Missouri +Pacific lines signed by L.W. Baldwin, Chief Executive Officer. + +He is a good man even if he is not a Christian as to church membership. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person Interviewed: Olivia Morgan + Hazen, Ark. +Age: 62 + + +"I am 62 years old. I was born in Lafayette County close to New +Lewisville. I heard mama say many a time she was named after her +state--North Carolina. Her name was Carolina Alexandria. They brought +her a slave girl to this new country. She and papa must of met up +toreckly after freedom. She had some children and I'm one of my papa's +oldest children. + +"Papa come here long fore the war started. The old master in Atlanta, +Georgia--Abe Smith--give his son three boys and one girl. He emigrated +to Arkansas. + +"Mama said her first husband and the young master went off and he never +come back as she knowed of. Young master played with mama's second girl +a whole heap. One day they was playing hiding round. Just as she come +running to the base from round the house, young master hit her on the +forehead with a rock. It killed her. Old master tried to school him but +he worried so they sent him off--thought it would do his health good to +travel. I don't think they ever come back. + +"After freedom mama married and went over to papa's master's. Papa +stayed round there a long time. They got news some way they was to get +forty acres land and a mule to start out with but they said they never +got nothing. + +"My papa said he knowed it to be a fact, the Ku Klux cut a colored +woman's breast off. I don't recollect why he said they got after her. +The Jayhawkers was bad too. They all went wild; some of em left men +hanging up in trees. They needed a good master to protect em worse after +the war than they needed em before. They said they had a Yankee +government then was reason of the Ku Klux. They run the Jayhawkers out +and made the Yankees go on home. Everybody had a hard time. Bread was +mighty scarce when I was a child. Times was hard. Men that had land had +to let it lay out. They had nothin' to feed the hands on, no money to +pay, no seed, no stock to work. The fences all went to rack and all the +houses nearly down. When I was a child they was havin' hard times. + +"I'm a country woman. I farmed all my life. I been married two times; I +married Holmes, then Morgan. They dead. I washed, ironed, cooked, all at +Mr. Jim Buchannan's sawmill close to Lewisville two years and eight +months; then I went back to farmin' up at Pine Bluff. My oldest sister +washed and ironed for Mrs. Buchannan till she moved from the sawmill to +Texarkana. He lived right at the sawmill ground. + +"My papa voted a Republican ticket. I don't vote. My husbands have voted +along. If the women would let the men have the business I think times +would be better. I don't believe in women voting. The men ought to make +the livings for the families, but the women doing too much. They +crowding the men out of work. + +"Some folks is sorry in all colors. Seems like the young folks ain't got +no use for quiet country life. They buying too much. They say they have +to buy everything. I ain't had no depression yet. I been at work and we +had crop failures but I made it through. Some folks good and some ain't. +Times is bout to run away with some of the folks. They all say times is +better than they been since 1928. I hope times is on the mend." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Tom Morgan, Madison, Arkansas +Age: 71 + + +"My mother was the mother of fourteen of us children. Their names was +Sarah and Richard Morgan. + +"My great-grandfather b'long to Bill Woods. They had b'long to the +Morgans and when freedom come they changed their names back. Some of +them still owned by Morgans. + +"Mother's owners was Auris and Lucella Harris. They had a boy named +Harley Harris and a girl. He had a small farm. + +"Mother said her master wasn't bad, but my father said his owner was +tough on him--tough on all of them. They was all field hands. They had +to git up and be doing. He said they fed by torch morning and night and +rested in the heat of the day two or three hours. Feed the oxen and +mules. In them days stock and folks all et three times a day. I does +real well now to get two meals a day, sometimes but one. They done some +kind of work all the year 'round. He said they had tasks. They better +git the task done or they would get a beating. + +"I haven't voted in so long a time. I voted Republican. I thought I did. + +"I worked at the railroad till they put me off. They put me off on +disability. Trying to git my papers fixed up to work or get something +one. Back on the railroad job. I farmed when I was young." + + + + +El Dorado District +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of Interviewer: Pernella Anderson +Subject: Slavery Days--Cruel Master Murdered by Slaves +Story:--Information + +This Information given by: Charity Morris +Place of Residence: Camden, Arkansas +Age: 90 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] + + +Ah wuz born in Carolina uh slave an ah was de eldest daughtuh of +Christiana Webb whose owner wuz Master Louis Amos. Mah mammy had lots uv +chillun an she also mammied de white chillun, whut wuz lef' mammyless. +When ah wuz very small dey rented me out tuh some very po' white fokes. +Dey wuzn use tuh slaves so mah marster made him promise [HW: not] tuh +beat me or knock me bout. Dey promise dey wouldn. Dey cahried me home an +ah clare dey wuz so mean tuh me till ah run off an tried tuh fin' de way +back tuh mah marster. Night caught me in de woods. Ah sho' wuz skeered. +Ah wuz skeered uv bears an panthers so ah crawled up in a ole bandoned +crib an crouched down gainst de loft. Ah went off tuh sleep but wuz woke +by somethin scratchin on de wall below. Ah stayed close as ah could tuh +de wall an 'gin er prayin. Dat things scratched all night an ah prayed +all night. De nex' mawnin dese white fokes sent word tuh Marster dat ah +had lef' so Marster foun' me an took me home and let me stay dar too. Ah +didn' work in de fiel' ah worked in de house. We lived in uh log cabin. +Evah Sunda mawnin Marster Louis would have all us slaves tuh de house +while he would sing an pray an read de Bible tuh us all. + +De people dat owned de plantation near us had lots of slaves. Dey owned +lots uv mah kin fokes. Dey marster would beat dem at night when dey come +fum de fiel' an lock em up. He'd whoop um an sen' um tuh de fiel'. Dey +couldn' visit no slaves an no slaves was 'lowed tuh visit em. So mah +cousin Sallie watched him hide de key so she moved dem a li'l further +back so dat he had tuh lean ovah tuh reach dem. Dat mawnin soon when he +come tuh let em out she cracked him in de haid wid de poker an made +little Joe help put his haid in de fiuh place. Dat day in de fiel' +Little Joe made er song; "If yo don' bleave Aunt Sallie kilt Marse Jim +de blood is on huh under dress". He jes hollered hit. "Aunt Sallie kilt +Marse Jim." Dey zamined Aunt Sallie's under dress so dey put huh in jail +till de baby come den dey tried huh an sentenced huh tuh be hung an she +wuz. + +Our Marster use tuh tell us if we left de house de patarollers would +catch us. One night de patarollers run mah two brothers home, Joe an +Henry. + +When de ole haid died out dey chillun got de property. Yo see we slaves +wuz de property. Den we got separated. Some sent one way an some nother. +Hit jes happent dat Marse Jim drawed me. + +When de Wah broke out we could heah li'l things bein said. We couldn' +make out. So we begin tuh move erbout. Later we learnt we wuz runnin fum +de wah. In runnin we run intuh a bunch uv soldiers dat had got kilt. Oh +dat wuz terrible. Aftuh mah brudders foun out dat dey wuz fightin tuh +free us dey stole hosses an run erway tuh keep fum bein set free. Aftuh +we got tuh Morris Creek hit wuz bloody an dar wuz one uv de hosses +turnin roun an roun in de watuh wid his eyes shot out. We nevah saw +nuthin else uv Joe nor Henry nor de othuh horse from dat day tuh dis +one. But we went on an on till we come tuh a red house and dat red house +represented free. De white fokes wouldn go dat way cause dey hated tuh +give us up. Dey turnt an went de othuh way but hit wuz too late. De news +come dat Mr. Lincoln had signed de papuhs dat made us all free an dere +wuz some 'joicing ah tells yo. Ah wuz a grown woman at dat time. Ole +Moster Amos brought us on as fur as Fo'dyce an turnt us a loose. Dat's +wha' dey settled. Some uv de slaves stayed wid em an some went tuh othuh +places. Me an mah sistuh come tuh Camden an settled. Ah mahried George +Morris. We havn' seen our pa an ma since we wuz 'vided and since we wuz +chillun. When we got tuh Camden and settled down we went tuh work an +sont back tuh de ole country aftuh ma an pa. Enroute tuh dis country we +come through Tennessee an ah membuh comin through Memphis an Pine Bluff +to Fordyce. + +As we wuz comin we stopped at de Mississippi Rivuh. Ah wuz standin on de +bank lookin at de great roll uv watuh high in de air. Somebody snatched +me back and de watuh took in de bank wha ah wuz standin. Yo cound'n +stand too close tuh de rivuh 'count uv de waves. + +Der wuz a col' wintuh and at night we would gather roun a large camp +fire an play sich games as "Jack-in-de-bush cut him down" an "Ole gray +mule-out ride him." Yaul know dem games ah know. An in de summer times +at night we played _Julands_. On our way tuh Arkansas we drove ox-teams, +jinnie teams, donkey teams, mule teams an horse teams. We sho had a good +time. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Emma Morris, Forrest City, Arkansas +Age: 71 + + +"My parents was Jane and Sam McCaslin. They come from close to Atlanta, +Georgia to Hernando, Mississippi after slavery. Ma was heired and they +bought pa before they left North Carolina. They bought pa out of a +nigger drove after he was grown. He raised tobacco and corn. Pa helped +farm and they raised hogs. He drove hogs to sell. He didn't say where +they took the hogs, only they would have to stay up all night driving +the hogs, and they rode horses and walked too and had shepherd dogs to +keep them in a drove. + +"Pa was a B๖wick (B(our)ick) but I never heard him say nothing bout +Master Bowick, so I don't know his other name. He said they got in a +tight [TR: missing word?] and had to sell some of the slaves and he +being young would bring more than one of the older men. He was real +black. Ma was lighter but not very light. + +"McCaslin was a low heavy set man and he rented out hacks and horses in +Atlanta and pa drove, greased the harness and curried and sheared the +horses. Master McCaslin brought them in town and rented them out. He +didn't have a livery stable. He just furnished conveyances. I heard him +tell about a good hitching post where he could more than apt rent out +his rig and how he always stopped and fed the horses when eating time +come. He took a feed box all the time. Master McCaslin would tell him to +not drive too hard when he had to make long drives. He never would let +him take a whoop. + +"He had some girls I heard him say. May and Alice was their names. He +didn't say much about the family. He took a basket of provision with him +to eat Miss May and Miss Alice fixed up. The basket was close wove and +had a lid. The old man farmed. He drove too. He drove a hack. Ma worked +in the field. I heard her tell about the cockleburs. Well, she said they +would stick on your dress and stick your legs and you would have to pick +them off and sometimes the beggar's-lice would be thick on their clothes +and they would pick them off. + +"When they would clean out the fence corners (rail fence) they would +leave every little wild plum tree and leave a whole lot of briers so +they would have wild plums and berries. They raised cotton. Sometime +during the War old Master McCaslin took all his slaves and stock way +back in the bottoms. The cane was big as ma's wrist she said. They put +up some cabins to live in and shelter the stock. Pa said some of em went +in the army. He didn't want to go. They worked a corn crop over in +there. + +"They left soon as they was freed. I don't know how they found it out. +They walked to way over in Alabama and pa made terms with a man, to come +to Mississippi. Then they come in a wagon and walked too. She had three +little children. I was [HW: born] close to Montgomery, Alabama in +September but I don't know how long it was after the War. I was the +first girl. There was two more boys and three more girls after me. Ma +had children born in three states. + +"Ma died with the typhoid fever. Then two sisters and a brother died. Pa +had it all summer and he got well. Miss (Mrs.) Betty Chamlin took us +children to a house and fed us away from ma and the sick girls and boy. +We was on her place. She had two families then. We got water from a +spring. It was a pretty spring under a big hill. We would wade where the +spring run off. She moved us out of that house. + +"Miss Betty was a widow. She had several boys. They worked in the field +all the time. We stayed till the boys left and she sold her place. She +went back to her folks. I never did see her no more. We scattered out. +Pa lived about wid us till he died. I got three girls living. I got five +children dead. I got one girl out here from town and one girl at +Meridian and my oldest girl in Memphis. I takes it time around wid em. + +"I seen the Ku Klux but they never bothered us. I seen them in Alabama, +I recken it was. I was so small I jes' do remember seeing them. I was +the onliest child born in Alabama. Pa made one crop. I don't know how +they got along the rest of the time there. We started share cropping in +Mississippi. Pa was always a good hand with stock. If they got sick they +sent for him to tell them what to do. He never owned no land, no home +neither. + +"I farmed all my life. I used to make a little money along during the +year washing and ironing. I don't get no help. I live with the girls. My +girl in Memphis sends me a little change to buy my snuff and little +things I have to have. She cooks for a lawyer now. She did take care of +an lady. She died since I been here and she moved. I rather work in the +field than do what she done when that old lady lived. She was like a +baby to tend to. She had to stay in that house all the time. + +"The young folks don't learn manners now like they used to. Times is +better than I ever seen em. Poor folks have a hard time any time. Some +folks got a lot and some ain't got nothing everywhere." + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Claiborne Moss + 1812 Marshall Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 81 + + +"I was born in Washington County, Georgia, on Archie Duggins' +plantation, fifteen miles from Sandersville, the county-seat, June 18, +1857. + +"My mother's name was Ellen Moss. She was born in Georgia too, in +Hancock County, near Sparta, the county-seat. My father was Fluellen +Moss. He, too, was born in Hancock County. Bill Moss was his owner. +Jesse Battle was my mother's owner before she married. My mother and +father had ten children, none of them living now but me, so far as I +know. I was the fifth in line. There were four older than I. The oldest +was ten years older than I. + +"Bill Moss' and Jesse Battle's plantations ware not far apart. I never +heard my father say how he first met my mother. I was only eight years +old when he died. They were all right there in the same neighborhood, +and they would go visiting. Battle and Moss and Evans all had +plantations in the same neighborhood and they would go from one place to +the other. + +"When Bill Moss went to Texas, he gave my mother and father to Mrs. +Beck. Mrs. Beck was Battle's daughter and Mrs. Beck bought my father +from Moss and that kept them together. He was that good. Moss sold out +and went to Texas and all his slaves went walking while he went on the +train. He had about a hundred of them. When he got there, he couldn't +hear from them. He didn't know where they was--they was walking and he +had got on the train--so he killed hisself. When they got there, just +walking along, they found him dead. + +"Moss' nephew, Whaley, got two parts of all he had. Another fellow--I +can't call his name--got one part. His sister, they sent her back +five--three of my uncles and two of my aunties. + +"Where I was raised, Duggins wasn't a mean man. His slaves didn't get +out to work till after sunup. His brother, who lived three miles out +from us, made his folks get up before sunup. But Duggins didn't do that. +He seemed to think something of his folks. Every Saturday, he'd give +lard, flour, hog meat, syrup. That was all he had to give. That was +extra. War was going on and he couldn't get nothing else. On Wednesday +night he'd give it to them again. Of course, they would get corn-meal +and other things from the kitchen. They didn't eat in the kitchen or any +place together. Everybody got what there was on the place and cooked it +in his cabin. + +"Before I was born, Beck sold my mother and father to Duggins. I don't +know why he sold them. They had an auction block in the town, but out in +the country they didn't have no block. If I had seen a nigger and wanted +to buy him, I would just go up to the owner and do business with him. +That was the way it was with Beck and Duggins. Selling my mother and +father was just a private transaction between them. + + +Rations + +"Twice a week, flour, syrup, meat, and lard were given to the slaves. +you got other food from the kitchen. Meat, vegetables, milk,--all the +milk you wanted--bread. + + +A Mean Owner + +"Beck, Moss, Battle, and Duggins, they was all good people. But Kenyon +Morps, now talk about a mean man, there was one. He lived on a hill a +little off from the Duggins plantation. His women never give birth to +children in the house. He'd never let 'em quit work before the time. He +wanted them to work--work right up to the last minute. Children were all +born in the field and in fence corners. Then he had to let 'em stay in +about a week. Last I seen him, he didn't have nothin', and was ragged as +a jay bird. + + +Houses + +"Our house was a log house. It had a large room, and then it had another +room as large as that one or larger built on to it. Both of these rooms +were for our use. My mother and father slept in the log cabin and the +kids slept back in the other room. My sister stayed with Joe Duggins. +Her missis was a school-teacher, and she loved sister. My master gave my +sister to Joe Duggins. Mrs. Duggins taught my sister, Fannie, to read +and spell but not to write. If there was a slave man that knowed how to +write, they used to cut off his thumb so that he couldn't write. + +"There was some white people wouldn't have the darkies eating butter; +our white people let us have butter, biscuits, and ham every day. They +would put it up for me. + +"I had more sense than any kid on the plantation. I would do anything +they wanted done no matter how hard it was. I walked five miles through +the woods once on an errand. The old lady who I went to said: + +"'You walk way down here by yourself?' + +"I told her, 'yes'. + +"She said, 'Well, you ain't going back by yo'self because you're too +little,' and she sent her oldest son back with me. He was white. + +"My boss was sick once, and he wanted to get his mail. The post office +was five miles away. He said to me: + +"'Can't you get my mail if I let you ride on my horse?' + +"I said, 'Yes sir.' I rode up to the platform on the horse. They run out +and took me off the horse and filled up the saddle bags. Then they put +me back on and told me not to get off until I reached my master. When I +got back, everybody was standing out watching for me. When my boss heard +me coming, he jumped out the bed and ran out and took me off the horse +and carried me and the sacks and all back into the house. + + +Soldiers + +"I saw all of Wheeler's cavalry. Sherman come through first. He came and +stayed all night. Thousands and thousands of soldiers passed through +during the night. Cooper Cuck was with them. He was a fellow that used +to peddle around in all that country before the War. He went all through +the South and learned everything. Then he joined up with the Yankees. He +come there. Nobody seen him that night. He knowed everybody knowed him. +He went and hid under something somewhere. He was under the hill at +daybreak, but nobody seen him. When the last of the soldiers was going +out in the morning, one fellow lagged behind and rounded a corner. Then +he galloped a little ways and motioned with his arms. Cooper Cuck come +out from under the hill, and he and Cooper Cuck both came back and stole +everything that they could lay their hands on--all the gold and silver +that was in the house, and everything they could carry. + +"Wheeler's cavalry was about three days behind Sherman. They caught up +with Sherman, but it would have been better if they hadn't, 'cause he +whipped 'em and drove 'em back and went right on. They didn't have much +fighting in my country. They had a little scrimmage once--thirty-six men +was all they was in it. One of the Yankees got lost from his company. He +come back and inquired the way to Louisville. The old boss pointed the +way with his left hand and while the fellow was looking that way, he +drug him off his horse and cut his throat and took his gun off'n him and +killed him. + +"Sherman's men stayed one night and left. I mean, his officers stayed. +We had to feed them. They didn't pay nothing for what they was fed. The +other men cooked and ate their own grub. They took every horse and mule +we had. I was sitting beside my old missis. She said: + +"'Please don't let 'em take all our horses.' + +"The fellows she was talking to never looked around. He just said: +'Every damn horse goes.' + +"The Yankees took my Uncle Ben with them when they left. He didn't stay +but a couple of days. They got in a fight. They give Uncle Ben five +horses, five sacks of silverware, and five saddles. The goods was taken +in the fight. Uncle Ben brought it back with him. The boss took all that +silver away from him. Uncle Ben didn't know what to do with it. The +Yankees had taken all my master's and he took Ben's. Ben give it to him. +He come back 'cause he wanted to. + +"When Wheeler's cavalry came through they didn't take nothing--nothing +but what they et. I heard a fellow say, 'Have you got anything to eat?' + +"My mother said, 'I ain't got nothin' but some chitlins.' + +"He said, 'Gimme some of those; I love chitlins.' "Mother gave 'em to me +to carry to him. I didn't get half way to him before the rest of the men +grabbed me and took 'em away from me and et 'em up. The man that asked +for them didn't get a one. + + +Slave Money + +"The slaves would sometimes have five or six dollars. Mostly, they would +make charcoal and sell it to get money. + + +Patrollers + +"I seen patrollers. They come to our house. They didn't whip nobody. Our +folks didn't care nothin' about 'em. They come looking for keys and +whiskey. They couldn't whip nobody on my master's plantation. When they +would come there, he would be sitting up with 'em. He would sit there in +his back door and look at 'em. Wouldn't let 'em hit nobody. + +"Them colored women had more fun that enough--laughing at them +patrollers. Fool 'em and then laugh at 'em. Make out like they was +trying to hide something and the patrollers would come running up, grab +'em and try to see what it was. And the women would laugh and show they +had nothing. Couldn't do nothin' about it. Never whipped anybody 'round +there. Couldn't whip nobody on our place; couldn't whip nobody on Jessie +Mills' place; couldn't whip nobody on Stephen Mills' place; couldn't +whip nobody on Betsy Geesley's place; couldn't whip nobody on Nancy +Mills' place; couldn't whip nobody on Potter Duggins' place. Potter +Duggins was a cousin to my master. Nobody run them peoples' plantations +but theirselves. + + +Social Life + +"When slaves wanted to, they would have dances. They would have dances +from one plantation to the other. The master didn't object. They had +fiddles, banjo and quills. They made the quills and blowed 'em to beat +the band. Good music. They would make the quills out of reeds. Those +reeds would sound just like a piano. They didn't have no piano. They +didn't serve nothing. Nothing to eat and nothing to drink except them +that brought whiskey. The white folks made the whiskey, but the colored +folks would get it. + +"We had church twice a month. The Union Church was three miles away from +us. My father and I would go when they had a meeting. Bethlehem Church +was five miles away. Everybody on the plantation belonged to that +church. Both the colored and the white belonged and went there. They had +the same pastor for Bethlehem, Union, and Dairy Ann. His name was Tom +Adams. He was a white man. Colored folks would go to Dairy Ann +sometimes. They would go to Union too. + +"Sometimes they would have meetings from house to house, the colored +folks. The colored folks had those house to house meetings any time they +felt like it. The masters didn't care. They didn't care how much they +prayed. + +"Sometimes they had corn shuckings. That was where they did the serving, +and that was where they had the big eatings. They'd lay out a big pile +of corn. Everybody would get down and throw the corn out as they shucked +it. They would have a fellow there they would call the general. He would +walk from one person to another and from one end of the pile to the +other and holler and the boys would answer. His idea was to keep them +working. If they didn't do something to keep them working, they wouldn't +get that corn shucked that night. Them people would be shucking corn! +There would be a prize to the one who got the most done or who would be +the first to get done. They would sing while they were shucking. They +had one song they would sing when they were getting close to the finish. +Part of it went like this: + + 'Red shirt, red shirt + Nigger got a red shirt.' + +After the shucking was over, they would have pies, beef, biscuits, corn +bread, whiskey if you wanted it. I believe that was the most they had. +They didn't have any ice-cream. They didn't use ice-cream much in those +days. Didn't have no ice down there in the country. Not a bit of ice +there. If they had anything they wanted to save, they would let it down +in the well with a rope and keep it cool down there. They used to do +that here until they stopped them from having the wells. + +"Ring plays too. Sometimes when they wanted to amuse themselves, they +would play ring plays. They all take hands and form a ring and there +would be one in the center of the ring. Now he is got to get out. He +would come up and say, 'I am in this lady's garden, and I'll bet you +five dollars I can get out of here.' And d'reckly he would break +somebody's hands apart and get out. + + +How Freedom Came + +"The old boss called 'em up to the house and told 'em, 'You are free as +I am.' That was one day in June. I went on in the house and got +something to eat. My mother and father, he hired them to stay and look +after the crop. Next year, my mother and father went to Ben Hook's place +and farmed on shares. But my father died there about May. Then it wasn't +nobody working but me and my sister and mother. + + +What the Slaves Got + +"The slaves never got nothing. Alexander Stephens, the Vice-President of +the Confederacy, divided his plantation up and gave it to his darkies +when he died. I knew him and his brother too. Alexander[HW: *] never did +walk. He was deformed. Big headed rascal, but he had sense! His brother +was named Leonard[HW: *]. He was a lawyer. He really killed himself. He +was one of these die-hard Southerners. He did something and they +arrested him. It made him so mad. He'd bought him a horse. He got on +that horse and fell off and broke his neck. That was right after the +War. They kept garrisons in all the counties right after the War. + +"I was in Hancock County when I knew Vice-President Stephens. I don't +know where he was born but he had a plantation in Toliver [HW: +Taliaferro] County. Most of the Stephenses was lawyers. He was a lawyer +too, and he would come to Sparta. That is where I was living then. There +was more politics and political doings in Sparta than there was in +Crawfordville where he lived. He lived between Montgomery and Richmond +during the War, for the capital of the Confederacy was at Montgomery one +time and Richmond another. + +"After the War, the Republicans nominated Alexander Stephens for +governor. The Democrats knew they couldn't beat him, so they turned +'round and nominated him too. He had a lot of sense. He said, 'What we +lost on the battle-field, we will get it back at the ballot box.' Seeb +Reese, United States Senator from Hancock County, said, 'If you let the +nigger have four or five dollars in his pocket he never will steal.' + + +Life Since Freedom + +"After my father died, my mother stayed where she was till Christmas. +Then she moved back to the place she came from. We went to farming. My +brother and my uncle went and farmed up in Hancock County; so the next +year we moved up there. We stayed there and farmed for a long while. My +mother married three years afterwards. We still farmed. After awhile, I +got to be sixteen years old and I wouldn't work with my stepfather, I +told my mother to hire me out; if she didn't I would be gone. She hired +me out all right. But the old man used all my money. The next year I +made it plain to her that I wanted her to hire me out again but that +nobody was to use a dollar of my money. My mother could get as much of +it as she wanted but he couldn't. The first year I bought a buggy for +them. The old man didn't want me to use it at all. I said, 'Well then, +he can't use my money no more.' But I didn't stop helping him and giving +him things. I would buy beef and give it to my mother. I knew they would +all eat it. He asked me for some wheat. I wouldn't steal it like he +wanted me to but I asked the man I was working for for it. He said, +'Take just as much as you want.' So I let him come up and get it. He +would carry it to the mill. + + +Ku Klux Klan + +"The Ku Klux got after Uncle Will once. He was a brave man. He had a +little mare that was a race horse. Will rode right through the bunch +before they ever realized that it was him. He got on the other side of +them. She was gone! They kept on after him. They went down to his house +one night. He wouldn't run for nothing. He shot two of them and they +went away. Then he was out of ammunition. People urged him to leave, for +they knew he didn't have no more bullets; but he wouldn't and they came +back and killed him. + +"They came down to Hancock County one night and the boys hid on both +sides of the bridge. When they got in the middle of the bridge, the boys +commenced to fire on them from both sides, and they jumped into the +river. The darkies went on home when they got through shooting at them; +but there wasn't no more Ku Klux in Hancock County. The better thinking +white folks got together and stopped it. + +"The Ku Klux kept the niggers scared. They cowed them down so that they +wouldn't go to the polls. I stood there one night when they were +counting ballots. I belonged to the County Central Committee. I went in +and stood and looked. Our ballot was long; theirs was short. I stood and +seen Clait Turner calling their names from our ballots. I went out and +got Rube Turner and then we both went back. They couldn't call the votes +that they had put down they had. Rube saw it. + +"Then they said, 'Are you going to test this?' + +"Rube said, 'Yes.' But he didn't because it would have cost too much +money. Rube was chairman of the committee. + +"The Ku Klux did a whole lot to keep the niggers away from the polls in +Washington and Baldwin counties. They killed a many a nigger down there. + +"They hanged a Ku Klux for killing his wife and he said he didn't mind +being hung but he didn't want a damn nigger to see him die. + +"But they couldn't keep the niggers in Hancock County away from the +polls. There was too many of them. + + +Work in Little Rock + +"I came to Little Rock, November 1, 1903. I came here with surveyors. +They wanted to send me to Miami but I wouldn't go. Then I went to the +mortar box and made mortar. Then I went to the school board. After that +I ain't had no job. I was too old. I get a little help from the +government. + + +Opinions of the Present + +"I think that the young folks ought to make great men and women. But I +don't see that they are making that stride. Most of them is dropping +below the mark. I think we ought to have some powerful men and women but +what I see they don't stand up like they should. + + +Own Family + +"I have three daughters, no sons. These three daughters have twelve +grandchildren." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Frozie Moss (dark mulatto), Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 69 + + +"When my grandma whut raised me got free she and grandpa come to Memphis +and didn't stay there long till they went to Crittenden County on a +man's farm. My grandma was born in Alabama and my grandpa in Virginia. I +know he wasn't in the Nat Turner rebellion, for my mother had nine +children and all but me at Holly Grove, Mississippi. I was born up in +Crittenden County. She died. I remember very little about my father. I +jes' remember father a little. He died too. My grand parents lived at +Holly Grove all during the war. They used to talk about how they did. +She said hardest time she ever lived through was at Memphis. Nothing to +do, nothing to eat and no places to stay. I don't know why they left and +come on to Memphis. She said her master's name was Pig'ge. He wasn't +married. He and his sisters lived together. My grandmother was a slave +thirty years. She was a field hand. She said she would be right back in +the field when her baby was two weeks old. They didn't wont the slaves +to die, they cost too much money, but they give them mighty hard work to +do sometimes. Grandma and grandpa was heap stronger I am at my age. They +didn't know how old they was. Her master told her how long he had her +when they left him and his father owned her before he died. I think they +had a heap easier time after they come to Arkansas from what she said. I +can't answer yo questions because I'm just tellin' you what I remembers +and I was little when they used to talk so much. + +"If the young generation would save anything for the time when they +can't work I think they would be all right. I don't hear about them +saving. They buys too much. That their only trouble. They don't know how +to see ahead. + +"I owns this house is all. I been sick a whole heap, spent a lot on my +medicines and doctor bill. I worked on the farm till after I come to +Brinkley. We bought this place here and I cooks. I cooked for Miss Molly +Brinkkell, Mr. Adams and Mrs. Fowler. I washes and irons some when I can +get it. Washing and ironing 'bout gone out of fashion now. I don't get +no moneys. I get commodities from the Sociable Welfare. My son works and +they don't give me no money." + + + + +Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lucy +Person interviewed: Mose Moss, Russellville, Arkansas +Age: 65 + + +"Mose Moss is my name, suh, and I was born in 1875 in Yell County. My +father was born in old Virginny in 1831 and died in Yell County, +Arkansas, eight miles from Dardanelle, in 1916. Yes suh, I've lived in +Pope County a good many years. I recollects some things pretty well and +some not so good. + +"Yes suh, my father used to talk a heap about the Ku Klux Klan, and a +lot of the Negroes were afraid of em and would run when they heard they +was comin' around. + +"My father's name was Henry Moss. He run away from the plantation in +Virginia before the War had been goin' on very long, and he j'ined the +army in Tennessee--yes suh, the Confedrit army. Ho suh, his name was +never found on the records, so didn't never draw no pension. + +"After he was freed he always voted the Republican ticket till he died. + +"After the War he served as Justice of the Peace in his township in Yell +County. Yes suh, that was the time they called the Re-con-struc-tion. + +"I vote the Republican ticket, but sometimes I don't vote at the reg'lar +elections. No, I've never had any trouble with my votin'. + +"I works at first one thing and another but ain't doin' much now. Work +is hard to get. Used to work mostly at the mines. Not able to do much of +late years. + +"Oh, yes, I remember some of the old songs they used to sing when my +parents was living: 'Old-Time Religion' was one of em, and 'Swing Low, +Sweet Chariot' was another one we liked to sing." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: S.O. Mullins, Clarendon, Arkansas + Janitor for Masonic Hall + He wears a Masonic ring +Age: 80 + + +"My master was B.F. Wallace--Benjamin Franklin Wallace and Katie +Wallace. They had no children to my recollection. + +"I was born at Brittville, Alabama. My parents' names was George W. +Mullins and Millie. They had, to my recollection, one girl and three +boys. Mr. Wallace moved to Arkansas before the Civil War. They moved to +Phillips County. My mother and father both farm hands and when my +grandmother was no longer able to do the cookin' my mother took her +place. I was rally too little to recollect but they always praised +Wallace. They said he never whipped one of his slaves in his life. His +slaves was about free before freedom was declared. They said he was a +good man. Well when freedom was declared all the white folks knowed it +first. He come down to the cabins and told us. He said you can stay and +finish the crops. I will feed and clothe you and give you men $10 and +you women $5 apiece Christmas. That was more money then than it is now. +We all stayed on and worked on shares the next year. We stayed around +Poplar Grove till he died. When I was nineteen I got a job, porter on +the railroad. I brought my mother to Clarendon to live with me. I was in +the railroad service at least fifteen years. I was on the passenger +train. Then I went to a sawmill here and then I farmed, I been doing +every little thing I find to do since I been old. All I owns is a little +house and six lots in the new addition. I live with my wife. She is my +second wife. Cause I am old they wouldn't let me work on the levy. If I +been young I could have got work. My age knocks me out of 'bout all the +jobs. Some of it I could do. I sure don't get no old age pension. I gets +$4 every two months janitor of the Masonic Hall. + +"I have a garden. No place for hog nor cow. + +"My boys in Chicago. They need 'bout all they can get. They don't help. + +"The present conditions seem good. They can get cotton to pick and two +sawmills run in the winter (100 men each) where folks can get work if +they hire them. The stay (stave) mill is shut down and so is the button +factory. That cuts out a lot of work here. The present generation is +beyond me. Seems like they are gone hog wild." + + +Interviewer's Note + +The next afternoon he met me and told me the following story:---- + +"One night the servants quarters was overflowin' wid Yankee soldiers. I +was scared nearly to death. My mother left me and my little brother +cause she didn't wanter sleep in the house where the soldiers was. We +slept on the floor and they used our beds. They left next mornin'. They +camped in our yard under the trees. Next morning they was ridin' out +when old mistress saw 'em. She said they'd get it pretty soon. When they +crossed the creek--Big Creek--half mile from our cabins I heard the guns +turn in on 'em. The neighbors all fell out wid my master. They say he +orter go fight too. He was sick all time. Course he wasn't sick. They +come and took off 25 mules and all the chickens and he never got up. +They took two fine carriage horses weighed 2,000 pounds apiece I speck. +One named Lee and one Stone Wall. He never went out there. He claimed he +was sick all time. One of the carriage horses was a fine big white horse +and had a bay match. Folks didn't like him--said he was a coward. When I +went over cross the creek after the fightin' was over, men just lay like +dis[A] piled on top each other." [A: [Illustration] He used his fingers +to show me how the soldiers were crossed.] + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Alex Murdock, Edmondson, Arkansas +Age: 65 + + +"My owner or least my folks was owned by Dr. [HW: 'Murder'] (Murdock). +He had a big farm. He was a widower. He had no children as ever I knowed +of. Dr. 'Murder' raised my father's mother. He bought her at Tupelo, +Mississippi. He raised mother too. She was bright color. I'm sure they +stayed on after freedom 'cause I stayed there till we come to Arkansas. +Father was a teamster. He followed that till he died. He owned a dray +and died at Brinkley. He was well-known and honorable. + +"I worked in the oil mill at Brinkley-American Oil Company. + +"Mother was learned durin' slavery but I couldn't say who done it. She +taught school 'round Buena Vista and Okolona, Mississippi. She learned +me. I was born 1874--November 25, 1874. I heard her say she worked in +the field one year. They give her some land and ploughed it so she could +have a patch. It was all she could work. I don't know how much. It was +her patch. Our depot was Prairie Station, Mississippi. My parents was +Monroe [HW: 'Murder'] Murdock[TR: lined out] and Lucy Ann Murdock[TR: +lined out] [HW: Murder]. It is spelled M-u-r-d-o-c-k. + +"I farmed all my whole life. Oil milling was the surest, quickest living +but I likes farmin' all right. + +"I never contacted the Ku Kluxes. They was 'bout gone when I come on. + +"I voted off an' on. This is the white folks' country and they going to +run their gov'mint. The thing balls us up is, some tells us one way and +some more tells us a different way to do. And we don't know the best +way. That balls us up. Times is better than ever I seen them, for the +man that wants to work. + +"I get $8 a month. I work all I can." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Bessie Myers, Brassfield, Arkansas +Age: 50? didn't know + + +"My mother was named Jennie Bell. She was born in North Ca'lina +(Carolina). She worked about the house. She said there was others at the +house working all the time with her. + +"She said they daresn't to cross the fence on other folks' land or go +off up the road 'lessen you had a writing to show. One woman could +write. She got a pass and this woman made some more. She said couldn't +find nothing to make passes on. It happened they never got caught up. +That woman didn't live very close by. She talked like she was free but +was one time a slave her own self. + +"Mother said she would run hide every time the Yankee men come. She said +she felt safer in the dark. They took so many young women to wait on +them and mother was afraid every time they would take her. + +"She said she had been at the end of a corn row at daylight ready to +start chopping it over, or pull fodder, or pull ears either. She said +they thought to lie in bed late made you weak. Said the early fresh air +what made children strong. + +"On wash days they all met at a lake and washed. They had good times +then. They put the clothes about on the bushes and briers and rail +fences. Some one or two had to stay about to keep the clothes from a +stray hog or goat till they dried. And they would forage about in the +woods. It was cool and pleasant. They had to gather up the clothes in +hamper baskets and bring them up to iron. Mother said they didn't mind +work much. They got used to it. + +"Mother told about men carried money in sacks. When they bought a slave, +they open up a sack and pull out gold and silver. + +"The way she talked she didn't mind slavery much. Papa lived till a few +years ago but he never would talk about slavery at all. His name was +Willis Bell." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Sallie C. Miller +Person interviewed: Mary Myhand, Clarksville, Arkansas +Age: 85 + + +"My mammie died when I was a little girl She had three children and our +white folks took us in their house and raised us. Two of us had fever +and would have died if they hadn't got us a good doctor. The doctor they +had first was a quack and we were getting worse until they called the +other doctor, then we commence to get well. I don't know how old I am. +Our birthdays was down in the mistress' Bible and when the old war come +up, the house was burned and lost everything but I know I am at least 83 +or 84 years old. Our white folks was so good to us. They never whipped +us, and we eat what they eat and when they eat. I was born in White +County, Tennessee and moved to Missouri but the folks did not like it +there so we come to Benton County, Arkansas. One side of the road was +Benton County and the other side was Washington County but we always had +to go to Bentonville, the county seat, to tend to business. I was a +little tod of a girl when the war come up. One day word come that the +'Feds' were coming through and kill all of the old men and take all the +boys with them, so master took my brother and a grandson of his and +started South. I was so scared. I followed them about a half mile before +they found me and I begged so hard they took me with them. We went to +Texas and was there about one year when the Feds gave the women on our +place orders to leave their home. Said they owned it now. They had just +got to Texas where we was when the South surrendered and we all come +back home. + +"We stayed with our white folks for about twenty years after the war. +They shore was good to me. I worked for them in the house but never +worked in the field. I came across the mountain to Clarksville with a +Methodist preacher and his family and married here. My husband worked in +a livery stable until he died, then I worked for the white folks until I +fell and hurt my knee and got too old. I draws my old age pension. + +"I do not know about the young generation. I am old and crippled and +don't go out none." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Griffin Myrax + 913 Missouri Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age 77? + + +"I don't know my age exactly. You know in them days people didn't take +care of their ages like they do now. I couldn't give you any trace of +the war, but I do remember when the Ku Klux was runnin' around. + +"Oh Lord, so much of the time I heard my mother talk about the slavery. +I was born in Oklahoma and my grandfather was a full-blooded Crete +Indian. He was very much of a man and lived to be one hundred thirty +years old. All Crete Indians named after some herb--that's what the name +Myrax means. + +"I heard my mother say that in slavery times the man worked all day with +weights on their feet so when night come they take them off and their +feet feel so light they could outran the Ku Klux. Now I heard her tell +that. + +"My parents moved from Oklahoma to Texas and I went to school in +Marshall, Texas. All my schoolin' was in Texas--my people was tied up +there. My last schoolin' was in Buchanan, Texas. The professor told my +mother she would have to take me out of school for awhile, I studied too +hard. I treasured my books. When other children was out playin' I was +studyin'. + +"There was some folks in that country that didn't get along so well. I +remember there was a blind woman that the folks sent something to eat by +another colored woman. But she eat it up and cooked a toadfrog for the +old blind woman. That didn't occur on our place but in the neighborhood. +When the people found it out they whipped her sufficient. + +"When my grandfather died he didn't have a decayed tooth in his head. +They was worn off like a horse's teeth but he had all of them. + +"I always followed sawmill work and after I left that I followed +railroading. I liked railroading. I more or less kept that in my view. + +"About this slavery--I couldn't hardly pass my sentiments on it. The +world is so far gone, it would be the hardest thing to put the bridle on +some of the people that's runnin' wild now." + + + + +Name of Interviewer: Irene Robertson +Subject: Ex-slaves--Dreams--Herbs: Cures and Remedies +Story:-- + +This information given by: Tom Wylie Neal +Place of Residence: Hazen, Arkansas--Near Green Grove +Occupation: Farmer--Feeds cattle in the winter for a man in Hazen. +Age: 85 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] + + +His father and mother belonged to Tom Neal at Calhoun, Georgia. He +remembers the big battle at Atlanta Ga. He was eight years old. He saw +the lights, [saw the bullets in the air at night] and heard the boom, +boom of guns and cannons. They passed along with loaded wagons and in +uniforms. The horses were beautiful, and he saw lots of fine saddles and +bridles. His mistress' name was Mrs. Tom Neal. She had the property and +married Tom Neal. She had been married before and her first husband died +but her first husband's name can't be recalled. She had two +children--girls--by her first husband. Her second husband just married +her to protect them all he could. He didn't do anything unless the old +mistress told him to do it and how to do it. Wylie Neal was raised up +with the old mistress' children. He was born a slave and lived to +thirteen years. "The family had some better to eat and lots more to +wear, but they gave me plenty and never did mistreat me. They had a +peafowl. That was good luck, to keep some of them about on the place." +They had guineas, chickens and turkeys. They never had a farm bell. He +never saw one till he came to Arkansas. They blew a big "Conch shell" +instead. Mistress had cows and she would pour milk or pot-liquor out in +a big pewter bowl on a stump and the children would come up there from +the cabins and eat [till the field hands had time to cook a meal.][HW:?] +Wylie's mother was a field hand. They drank out of tin cans and gourds. +The master mated his hands. Some times he would ask his young man or +woman if they knew anybody they would like to marry that he was going to +buy more help and if they knew anybody he would buy them if he could. +The way they met folks they would get asked to corn shuckings and log +rollings and Mrs. Neal always took some of her colored people to church +to attend to the stock, tie the horses and hitch up, maybe feed and to +nurse her little girls at church. The colored folks sat on the back +seats over in a corner together. If they didn't behave or talked out +they got a whipping or didn't go no more. "They kept the colored people +scared to be bad." + +The colored folks believed in hoodoo and witches. Heard them talking +lots about witches. They said if they found anybody was a witch they +would kill them. Witches took on other forms and went out to do meaness. +They said sometimes some of them got through latch holes. They used +buttons and door knobs whittled out of wood, and door latches with +strings. + +People married early in "Them days"--when Mistress' oldest girl married +she gave her Sumanthy, Wylie's oldest sister when they come home [they +would let her come.] They sent their children to school some but the +colored folks didn't go because it was "pay school." Every year they had +"pertracted meeting." Looked like a thousand people come and stayed two +or three weeks along in August, in tents. "We had a big time then and +some times we'd see a colored girl we'd ask the master to buy. They'd +preach to the colored folks some days. Tell them the law. How to behave +and serve the Lord." When Wylie was twelve years old the "Yanks" came +and tore up the farm. "It was just like these cyclones that is [TR: +illegible word] around here in Arkansas, exactly like that." + +His mistress left and he never saw her again. General [HW: John Bell] +Hood was the [TR: illegible word] he thinks, but he was given to Captain +Condennens to wait on him. They went to Marietta, Ga., and Kingston, Ga. +"Rumors came about that we were free and everybody was drifting around. +The U.S. Government gave us food then like they do now and we hunted +work. Everybody nearly froze and starved. We wore old uniforms and slept +anywhere we could find, an old house or piece of a house. In +1865-1869--the Ku Klux was miserable on the colored folks. Lots of folks +died out of consumption in the spring and pneumonia all winter. + +"There wasn't any doctors seeing after colored folks for they had no +money and they used herbs--only medicine they could get." + +Only herbs he remembers he used is: chew black snake roots to settle +sick stomach. Flux weed tea for disordered stomach. People eat so much +"messed up food" lot of them got sick. + +Wylie Neal wandered about and finally came to Chattanooga. They got old +uniforms and victuals from the "Yanks" about a year. + +Colonel Stocker come and got up a lot of hands and paid their way to +Memphis on the train. From there they were put on the _Molly Hamilton_ +boat and went to Linden, Arkansas, on the St. Francis River. "He fared +fine" there. In 1906[TR: ?] he came to Hazen and since then he has owned +small farms at Biscoe and forty acres near Hazen. It was joining the old +Joe Perry place. Dr. ---- got a mortgage on it and took it. Wylie Neal +lives with his niece and she is old too so they get relief and a +pension. + +"He don't believe in dreams but some dreams like when you dream of the +dead there's sho' goner be falling weather." He "don't dream much" he +says. + +He has a birthmark on his leg. It looks like a bunch of berries. He +never heard what caused it. It has always been there. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Sally Nealy + 105 Mulberry Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 91 + + +"Yes mam, I was a slave! I was sixteen years old when the war begun. I +was born in Texas. + +"My old master was John Hall and my young master was Marse Dick. Marse +John went to war the 5th day of May in 1861 and he was killed in June. +They wasn't nothin' left to bring home but his right leg and his left +arm. They knowed it was him cause his name was tattooed on his leg. + +"He was a mean rascal. He brought us up from the plantation and pat us +on the head and give us a little whisky and say 'Your name is Sally or +Mary or Mose' just like we was dogs. + +"My old mistress, Miss Caroline, was a mean one too. She was the mother +of eight children--five girls and three boys. When she combed her hair +down low on her neck she was all right but when she come down with it +done up on the top of her head--look out. + +"It was my job to scrub the big cedar churns with brick dust and Irish +potato and polish the knives and forks the same way. Then every other +day I had to mold twelve dozen candles and sweep the yard with a dogwood +bresh broom. + +"She didn't give us no biscuits or sugar 'cept on Christmas. Jest shorts +and molasses for our coffee. When the Yankee soldiers come through old +mistress run and hide in the cellar but the Yankees went down in the +collar too and took all the hams and honey and brandied peaches she had. + +"They didn't have no doctors for the niggers then. Old mistress just +give us some blue mass and castor oil and they didn't give you nothin' +to take the taste out your mouth either. + +"Oh lord, I know 'bout them Ku Klux. They wore false faces and went +around whippin' people. + +"After the surrender I went to stay with Miss Fulton. She was good to me +and I stayed with her eleven years. She wanted to know how old I was so +my father went to Miss Caroline and she say I 'bout twenty now. + +"Some white folks was good to their slaves. I know one man, Alec Yates, +when he killed hogs he give the niggers five of 'em. Course he took the +best but that was all right. + +"After freedom the Yankees come and took the colored folks away to the +marshal's yard and kept them till they got jobs for 'em. They went to +the white folks houses and took things to feed the niggers. + +"I ain't been married but once. I thought I was in love but I wasn't. +Love is a itchin' 'round the heart you can't get at to scratch. + +"I 'member one song they sung durin' the war + + 'The Yankees are comin' through + By fall sez I + We'll all drink stone blind + Johnny fill up the bowl.'" + + + + +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Subject: Songs of Civil War Days +Story:--Information + +This information given by: Sally Neeley +Place of residence: 105 N. Mulberry, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Occupation: None +Age: 90 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] +[TR: Same as previous informant (Sally Nealy).] + + +(1) + "In eighteen hundred and sixty-one + Football (?) sez I; + In eighteen hundred and sixty-one + That's the year the war begun + We'll all drink stone blind, + Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(2) + "In eighteen hundred and sixty-two + Football (?) sez I; + In eighteen hundred and sixty-two + That's the year we put 'em through + We'll all drink stone blind, + Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(3) + "In eighteen hundred and sixty-three + Football (?) sez I; + In eighteen hundred and sixty-three + That's the year we didn't agree + We'll all drink stone blind. + Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(4) + "In eighteen hundred and sixty-four + Football (?) sez I; + In eighteen hundred and sixty-four + We'll all go home and fight no more + We'll all drink stone blind. + Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(5) + "In eighteen hundred and sixty-five + Football (?) sez I; + In eighteen hundred and sixty-five + We'll have the Rebels dead or alive + We'll all drink stone blind, + Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(6) + "In eighteen hundred and sixty-six + Football (?) sez I; + In eighteen hundred and sixty-six + We'll have the Rebels in a helava fix + We'll all drink stone blind, + Johnny, come fill up the bowl. + +(7) + "In eighteen hundred and sixty-seven + Football (?) sez I; + In eighteen hundred and sixty-seven + We'll have the Rebels dead and at the devil + We'll all drink stone blind. + Johnny, came fill up the bowl." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +The word "football" doesn't sound right in this song, but I was unable +to find it in print, and Sally seemed to think it was the right word. + +Sally is a very wicked old woman and swears like a sailor, but she has a +remarkable memory. + +She was "bred and born" in Rusk County, Texas and says she came to Pine +Bluff when it was "just a little pig." + +Says she was sixteen when the Civil War began. + +I have previously reported an interview with her. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Wylie Nealy [HW: Biscoe Arkansas?] +Age: 85 + + +I was born in 1852. I am 85 years old. I was born in Gordon County. The +closest town was Calhoun, South Carolina. My sister died in '59. That's +the first dead, person I ever saw. One of my sisters was give away and +another one was sold before the Civil War started. Sister Mariah was +give to the young mistress, Miss Ella Conley. I didn't see her sold. I +never seed nobody sold but I heard 'em talking about it. I had five +sisters and one brother. My father was a free man always. He was a +Choctaw Indian. Mother was part Cherokee Indian. My mother's mistress +was Mrs. Martha Christian. He died and she married Tom Nealy, the one +they call me fur, Wylie Nealy. + +Liberty and Freedom was all I ever heard any colored folks say dey +expected to get out of de war, and mighty proud of dot. Nobody knowed +they was goin to have a war till it was done broke out and they was +fightin about it. Didn't nobody want land, they jess wanted freedom. I +remembers when Lincoln was made the President both times and when he was +killed. I recollects all that like yesterday. + +The army had been through and swept out everything. There wasn't a +chicken or hog nowhere to be had, took the stock and cattle and all the +provisions. So de slaves jess had to scatter out and leave right now. +And after de army come through. I was goin back down to the old place +and some soldiers passed riding along and one said "Boy where you goin? +Said nothing up there." I says, "I knows it." Then he say "Come on here, +walk along back there" and I followed him. I was twelve years old. He +was Captain McClendenny. Then when I got to the camp wid him he say "You +help around here." I got sick and they let me go back home then to +Resacca, Georgia and my mother died. When I went back they sent me to +Chattanooga with Captain Story. I was in a colored regiment nine months, +I saw my father several times while I was at Chattanooga. We was in +Shermans army till it went past Atlanta. They burned up the city. Two of +my masters come out of the war alive and two dead. I was mustered out in +August 1865. I stayed in camp till my sisters found a cabin to move in. +Everybody got rations issued out. It was a hard time. I got hungry lots +times. No plantations was divided and the masters didn't have no more +than the slaves had when the war was done. After the Yankees come in and +ripped them up old missus left and Mr. Tom Nealy was a Home Guard. He +had a class of old men. Never went back or seen any more of them. +Everybody left and a heap of the colored folks went where rations could +be issued to them and some followed on in the armies. After I was +mustered out I stayed around the camps and went to my sister's cabin +till we left there. Made anything we could pick up. Men come in there +getting people to go work for them. Some folks went to Chicago. A heap +of the slaves went to the northern cities. Colonel Stocker, a officer in +the Yankee army, got us to come to a farm in Arkansas. We wanted to stay +together is why we all went on the farm. May 1866, when we come to +Arkansas is the first farmin I had seen done since I left Tom Nealy's +place. Colonel Stocker is mighty well known in St. Francis County. He +brought lots of families, brought me and my brother, my two brothers and +a nephew. We come on the train. It took four or five days. When we got +to Memphis we come to Linden on a boat "Molly Hamilton" they called it. +I heard it was sunk at Madison long time after that. Colonel Stocker +promised to pay $6 a month and feed us. When Christmas come he said all +I was due was $12.45. We made a good crop. That wasn't it. Been there +since May. Had to stay till got all the train and boat fare paid. There +wasn't no difference in that and slavery 'cept they couldn't sell us. + +I heard a heap about the Ku Klux but I nebber seed them. Everybody was +scared of them. + +The first votin I ever heard of was in Grant's election. Both black and +white voted. I voted Republican for Grant. Lot of the southern soldiers +was franchised and couldn't vote. Just the private soldiers could vote +at tall. I don't know why it was. I was a slave for thirteen years from +birth. Every slave could vote after freedom. Some colored folks held +office. I knew several magistrates and sheriffs. There was one at Helena +(Arkansas) and one at Marianna. He was a High Sheriff. I voted some +after that but I never voted in the last Presidento election. I heard +'em say it wasn't no use, this man would be elected anyhow. I sorter +quit off long time ago. + +In 1874 and 1875 I worked for halves and made nough to buy a farm in St. +Francis County. It cost $925. I bought it in 1887. Eighty acres to be +cleared down in the bottoms. My family helped and when my help got +shallow, the children leaving me, I sold it for $2,000, in 1904. I was +married jess once and had eight children; five livin and three dead. Me +and the old woman went to Oklahoma. We went in January and come back to +Biscoe (Arkansas) in September. It wasn't no place for farming. I bought +40 acres from Mr. Aydelott and paid him $500. I sold it and come to Mr. +Joe Perry's place, paid $500 for 40 acres of timber land. We cleared it +and I got way in debt and lost it. Clear lost it! Ize been working +anywhere I could make a little since then. My wife died and I been doing +little jobs and stays about with my children. The Welfare gives me a +little check and some supplies now and then. + +No maam, I can't read much. I was not learnt. I could figure a little +before my eyes got bad. The white folks did send their children to pay +schools but we colored children had to stay around the house and about +in the field to work. I never got no schoolin. I went with old missus to +camp meeting down in Georgia one time and got to go to white church +sometimes. At the camp meeting there was a big tent and all around it +there was brush harbors and tents where people stayed to attend the +meetins. They had four meetins a day. Lots of folk got converted and +shouted. They had a lot of singings They had a lots to eat and a big +time. + +I don't think much about these young folks now. It seems lack everybody +is having a hard time to live among us colored folks. Some white folks +has got a heap and fine cars to get about in. I don't know what go in to +become of 'em. + +People did sing more than I hear them now but I never could sing. They +sing a lot of foolish songs and mostly religious songs. + +I don't recollect of any slave uprising. I never heard of any. We didn't +know they was going to have a war till they was fighting. Yes maam, they +heard Lincoln was going to set 'em free, but they didn't know how he was +going to do it. Everybody wanted freedom. Mr. Hammond (white) ask me not +long ago if I didn't think it best to bring us from Africa and be slaves +than like wild animals in Africa. He said we was taught about God and +the Gospel over here if we was slaves. I told him I thought dot freedom +was de best anywhere. + +We had a pretty hard time before freedom. My mother was a field woman. +When they didn't need her to work they hired her out and they got the +pay. The master mated the colored people. I got fed from the white folks +table whenever I curried the horses. I was sorter raised up with Mr. +Nealy's children. They didn't mistreat me. On Saturday the mistress +would blow a cone shell and they knowed to go and get the rations. We +got plenty to eat. They had chickens and ducks and geese and plenty +milk. They did have hogs. They had seven or eight guineas and a lot of +peafowls. I never heard a farm bell till I come to Arkansas. The +children et from pewter bowls or earthen ware. Sometimes they et greens +or milk from the same bowl, all jess dip in. The Yankees took me to +General Hood's army and I was Captain McCondennen's helper at the +camps.[HW: ?] We went down through Marietta and Atlanta and through +Kingston. Shells come over where we lived. I saw 'em fight all the time. +Saw the light and heard the roaring of de guns miles away. It looked +like a storm where the army went along. They tramped the wheat and oats +and cotton down and turned the horses in on the corn. The slaves show +did hate to see the Yankees waste everything. They promised a lot and +wasn't as good as the old masters. All dey wanted was to be waited on +too. The colored folks was freed when the Yankees took all the stock and +cattle and rations. Everybody had to leave and let the government issue +them rations. Everybody was proud to be free. They shouted and sung. +They all did pretty well till the war was about to end then they was +told to scatter and no whars to go. Cabins all tore down or burned. No +work to do. There was no money to pay. I wore old uniforms pretty well +till I come to Arkansas. I been here in Hazen since 1906. I come on a +boat from Memphis to Linden. Colonel Stocker brought a lot of us on the +train. The name of the boat was Molly Hamilton. It was a big boat and we +about filled it. I show was glad to get back on a farm. + +I don't know what is goin to become of the young folks. Everything is so +different now and when I was growin up I don't know what will become of +the younger generation. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Emaline Neland, Marianna, Arkansas +Age: Born 1859 + + +"I was born two years before the War. I was born in Murray County, +Tennessee. It was middle Tennessee. When I come to remembrance I was in +Grant County, Arkansas. When I remember they raised wheat and corn and +tobacco. Mother's master was Dr. Harrison. His son was married and me +and my brother Anderson was give to him. He come to Arkansas 'fore ever +I could remember. He was a farmer but I never seen him hit a lick of +work in my life. He was good to me and my brother. She was good too. I +was the nurse. They had two children. Brother was a house boy. Me and +her girl was about the same size but I was the oldest. Being with the +other children I called her mother too. I didn't know no other mother +till freedom. + +"Freedom! Well, here is the very way it all was: Old master told her +(mother) she was free. He say, 'Go get your children, you free as I is +now.' Ain't I heard her say it many a time? Well, mother come in a ox +wagon what belong to him and got us. They run me down, caught me and got +me in the wagon. They drove twenty-five miles. Old Dr. Harrison had +moved to Arkansas. Being with the other children I soon learnt to call +her ma. She had in all ten or eleven children. She was real dark. + +"Pa was a slave too. He was a low man. He was a real bright man. He was +brighter than I is. He belong to a widow woman named Tedford. He renamed +his self after freedom. He took the name Brown 'stead of Tedford. I +never heard him say why he wasn't satisfied with his own name. He was a +soldier. He worked for the Yankees. + +"After the War pa and ma got back together and lived together till she +died. There was five days' difference in their deaths. They died of +pneumonia. He was 64 years old and she was 54 years old. I was at home +when pa come from the War. All my sisters was light, one sister had +sandy hair like pa. She was real light. Ma was a good all 'round woman. +She cooked more than anything else. She nursed. Dr. Harrison told her to +stay till her husband come back or all the time if he didn't ever come +back. Ma never worked in the field. When pa come he moved us on a place +to share crop. Ma never worked in the field. He was buying a home in +Grant County. He started to Mississippi and stopped close to Helena and +ten or twelve miles from Marianna. He had a soldier friend wouldn't let +him go. He told him this was a better country. He decided to stay down +in here. + +"I heard a whole heap about the Ku Klux. One time when a crowd was going +to church, we heard horse's feet coming; sound like they would run over +us. We all got clear out of reach so they wouldn't run over us. They had +on funny caps was all I could see, they went so fast. We give them the +clear road and they went on. That is all I ever seen of the Ku Klux. + +"I seen Dr. Harrison's wife. She was a little old lady but we left after +I went there. + +"I used to sew for the public. Yes, white and colored folks. I learnt my +own self to sew. I never had but one boy in my life. He died at seven +weeks old. I raised a stepson. I married twice. I married at home both +times. Just a quiet marriage and a colored preacher married me both +times. + +"The present conditions is hard. I want things and can't get 'em. If I +had the strength to hold out to work I could get along. + +"The present generation--young white and black--blinds me. They turns +corners too fast. They going so fast they don't have time to take +advice. They promise to do better but they don't. They do like they want +to do and don't tell nobody till they done it. I say they just running +way with their selves. + +"I get $8 and a little help along. I'm thankful for it. It is a blessing +I tell you." + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Henry Nelson + 904 E. Fifth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: About 70 + + +"My name is Henry Nelson. I was born in Arkansas--Crittenden County near +Memphis, Tennessee. I was born not far from Memphis but on this side. + +"My mother's name was Adeline Taylor. That was her old slavery folks' +name. She was a Taylor before she married my father--Nelson. My father's +first name was Green. I don't remember none of my grandparents. My +father's mother died before I come to remember and I know my mother's +mother died before I could remember. + +"My father was born in Mississippi--Sardis, Mississippi--and my mother +was a Tennesseean--_Cartersville_[HW:?] Tennessee, twenty-five miles +above Memphis. [HW: Carter, in Carter County, about 35 m. north of +Memphis, but no Cartersville.] [TR: moved from bottom of following +page.] + +"After peace was declared, they met in Tennessee. That was where my +mother was born, you know. They fell in love with one another in Shelby +County, and married there. My mother had been married once before during +slavery time. She had been made to marry by her master. Her first +husband was named Eli. He was my oldest sister's father. Him and my +mother had the same master and missis. She was made to marry him. She +was only thirteen years old when she married him. She was fine and stout +and her husband was fine and stout, and they wanted more from that +stock. I don't know how old he was but he was a lot older than she was. +He was a kind of an elderly man. She had just one child by him--my +oldest sister, Georgia. She was only married a short time before freedom +came. + +"My father farmed. He was always a farmer--raised cotton and corn. My +mother was a farmer too. Both of them--that is both of her +husbands--were farmers. + +"My mother and father used to go off to places to dance and the +pateroles would get after them. You had to have a pass to go off your +place and if you didn't have a pass, they would make you warm. Some of +them would get caught sometimes and the pateroles would whip them. They +would sure got whipped if they didn't have a pass. + +"The old master come out and told them they were free when peace was +declared. He said, 'You are free this morning--free as I am.' + +"Right after the War, my mother come further down in Tennessee, and that +is how she met my father where she was when she was married. They went +farming. They farmed on shares--sharecropped. They were on a big place +called Ensley place. The man that owned the place was called Nuck +Ensley. + +"My mother and father didn't have no schooling. I never heard that they +were bothered by the Ku Klux. + +"She didn't live with her first husband after slavery. She left him when +she was freed. She never did intend to marry him. She was forced to +that." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +Nelson evidently rents rooms. A yellow sallow-faced, cadaverous, and +dissatisfied looking "gentleman" went into the house eyeing me +suspiciously as he passed. In a moment he was out again interrupting the +old man with pointless remarks. In--out again--standing over me--peering +on my paper in the offensive way that ill-bred people have. He +straightened up with a disgusted look on his face. He couldn't read +shorthand. + +"What's that you're writin'?" + +"Shorthand." + +"What's that about?" + +"History." + +"History uv whut?" + +"Slavery." + +"He don't know nothin' about slavery." + +"Thank you. However, if he says he does, I'll just continue to listen to +him if you don't mind." + +"Humph," and the "yellow gentleman" passed in. + +Out again--eyeing both the old man and me with disgust that was +unconcealed. To him, "You don't know whutchu're doin'." + +Deep silence by all. Exit the yellow brother. + +To the old man, I said, "Is that your son?" + +"Lawd, no, that's jus' a roomer." + +Out came the yellow brother again. "See here, Uncle, if you want me to +fix that fence you'd bettuh come awn out heah now. It's gettin' dark." + +I closed my notebook and arose. "Don't let me interfere with your +program, Brother Nelson." + +The old man settled back in his chair. His eyes inspected the sky, his +jaw "sorta" set. The yellow brother looked at him a minute and passed +on. + +Five minutes later. Enter, the Madam. She also was of the yellow variety +with the suspicious and spiteful look of an undersized black Belgian +police dog. A moment of silence--a word to him. + +"You don't know whutchu're doin'." Silence all around. To me, "You're +upsettin' my work." + +I arose. "Madam, I'm sorry." + +The old man spoke, "You ain't keepin' me from nothin'." + +"Well, I said, you've given me a nice start; I'll come again and get the +rest." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Henry Nelson, Edmondson, Arkansas +Age: 70 +[TR: Appears to be same as last informant despite different address.] + + +"My mother belong to the Taylors close to Carterville, Tennessee. My +father never was sold. He belong to the Nelsons. My parents married +toreckly after the surrender and come on to this state. I was born ten +miles from Edmondson. Their names was Adeline and Green Nelson. They +didn't get nothing after freedom like land or a horse. I'm seventy years +old and I would have known. + +"I was at Alton, Illinois in the lead works thirteen years ago and I had +a stroke. I been cripple ever since. + +"My folks never spoke of being nothing but field hands. Folks used to be +proud of their crops, go look over them on Sunday when company come. Now +if they got a garden they hide it and don't mention it. Times is changed +that way. + +"Clothes ain't as lasty as they used to be. People has a heap more money +to spend and don't raise and have much at home as they did when I was a +child. Times is all turned around and folks too. I always had plenty +till I couldn't do hard work. I farmed my early life. We didn't have +much money but we had rations and warm clothes. I cleared new ground, +hauled wood, big logs. I steamboated on the Sun, Kate Adams, and One Arm +John. I helped with the freight. I railroaded with pick and shovel and +in the lead mines. I worked from Memphis to Helena on boats a good +while. I come back here to farm. Time is changed and I'm changed. + +"It has been so long since I heard my parents tell about slavery I +couldn't tell you straight. She told till she died, talked about how the +Yankees done when they come through. They took axes and busted up good +furniture. They et up and wasted the rations, then humor up the black +folks like they was in their favor when they was settin' out wasting +their living. They done made it to live on. Some followed them and some +stayed on. They wanted freedom but it wasn't like they thought it would +be. They didn't know how it would be. They didn't know it meant _set +out_. Seem like they left. In some ways times was better and some ways +it was worse. They had to work or starve is what they told me. That's +the way I found freedom. 'Course their owners made them work and he +looked out for the ration and in slavery. + +"I keeps up my own self all I can. I don't get help." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Iran Nelson + 603 E. Fourteenth Ave., Pine Bluff, Ark. +Age: 77 + + +"Yes ma'm, they fotch me from Mississippi to Arkansas on the +steamboat--you know they didn't have railroads then. They fotch my +mother and they went back after grandfather and grandmother too. + +"Dr. Noell was our master and he had us under mortgage to his +brother-in-law. They fotched us here till he could get straight from +that debt, but fore that could be, we got free. + +"I knowed slavery times. I member seem' em lash some of the rest but you +know I wasn't big enough to put in the fields. Old mistress say when I +got big enough, she goin' take me for a house girl. When they fotched +mama and grandmother here they had eighty some odd head of niggers. They +was gwine carry em back home after they got that mortgage paid but the +war come. + +"I member when the Yankees come, my white folks would run and hide and +hide us colored folks too. Boss man had the colored folks get all the +meat out of the smokehouse and hide it in the peach orchard in the +grass. + +"I used to play with old mistress daughter Addie. We would play in the +parlor and after we moved to town some of the little girls would pick up +and go home. You know these town folks didn't believe in playin' with +the colored folks. + +"After mama was free she stayed right there on the place and made a +crop. Raised eight hundred bales and the average was nine. Mama plowed +and hoed too. I had to work right with her too. + +"I never went to school but once. I learned my ABC's but couldn't read. +My next ABC's was a hoe in my hand. Mama had a switch right under her +belt. I worked but I couldn't keep up. Just seein' that switch was +enough. I had a pretty good time when I was young, but I had to go all +the time." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: James Henry Nelson + 1103 Orange, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 82 +Occupation: Gardener + + +"I member all about the war--why of cose. I saddled many a cavalry hoss. +I tell you how I know how old I am. Old master, Henry Stanley of Athens, +Alabama, moved to Palaski, Tennessee and left me with young mistress to +take care of things. One day we was drivin' up some stock and I said, +'Miss Nannie, how old is you?' And she said, 'I'm seventeen.' I was old +enough to have the knowledge she would know how old I was and I said, +'How old am I?' And she said, 'You is seven years old.' That was durin' +the war. + +"I remember the soldiers comin' and stoppin' at our building--Yankees +and Southern soldiers, too. They fit all around our plantation. + +"The Yankees taken me when I was a little fellow. About two years after +the war started, young Marse Henry went to war and took a colored man +with him but he ran away--he wouldn't stay with the Rebel army. So young +Marse Henry took me. I reckon I was bout ten. I know I was big enough to +saddle a cavalry hoss. We carried three horses--his hoss, my hoss and a +pack hoss. You know chillun them days, they made em do a man's work. I +studied bout my mother durin' the war, so they let me go home. + +"One day I went to mill. They didn't low the chillun to lay around, and +while I was at the mill a Yankee soldier ridin' a white hoss captured me +and took me to Pulaski, Tennessee and then I was in the Yankee army. I +wasn't no size and I don't think he would a took me if it hadn't been +for the hoss. + +"We come back to Athens and the Rebels captured the whole army. Colonel +Camp was in charge and General Forrest captured us and I was carried +south. We was marchin' along the line and a Rebel soldier said, 'Don't +you want to go home and stay with my wife?' And so I went there, to +Millville, Alabama. Then he bound me to a friend of his and I stayed +there till the war bout ended. I was getting along very well but a older +boy 'suaded me to run away to Decatur, Alabama. + +"Oh I seen lots of the war. Bof sides was good to me. I've seen many a +scout. The captain would say 'By G----, close the ranks.' Captains is +right crabbed. I stayed back with the hosses. + +"After the war I worked about for this one and that one. Some paid me +and some didn't. + +"I can remember back to Breckenridge; and I can remember hearin' em say +'Hurrah for Buchanan!' I'm just tellin' you to show how fur back I can +remember. I used to have a book with a picture of Abraham Lincoln with +an axe on his shoulder and a picture of that log cabin, but somebody +stole my book. + +"I worked for whoever would take me--I had no mother then. If I had had +parents to make me go to school, but I got along very well. The white +folks taught me not to have no bad talk. They's all dead now and if they +wasn't I'd be with them. + +"I'm a natural born farmer--that's all I know. The big overflow drownded +me out and my wife died with pellagra in '87. She was a good woman and +nice to white folks. I'm just a bachin' here now. I did stay with my +daughter but she is mean to me, so I just picked up my rags and moved +into this room where I can live in peace. I'm a christian man, and I +can't live right with her. When colored folks is mean, they's meaner +than white folks. + +"I'm gettin' along very well now. I been with white folks all my +day--and it's hard for me to get along with my folks. + +"In one way the world is crueler than they used to be. They don't +appreciate things like they used to. They have no feelin's and don't +care nothin' bout the olden people. + +"Well, good-bye, I'm proud of you." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: John Nelson, Holly Grove, Arkansas +Age: 76 + + +"My parents was Jazz Nelson and Mahaney Nelson. He come from Louisiana +durin' slavery. She come from Richmond, Virginia. I think from what they +said he come to Louisiana from there too. They was plain field hands. + +"My folks belong to Miss Mary Ann Richardson and Massa Harve Richardson. +They had five children and every one dead now. They lived at Duncan +Station. + +"The white folks told em they was free. They had no place to go and they +been workin' the crop. White folks glad for em to stay and work on. And +the truth is they was glad to git to stay on cause they had no place to +go. They kept stayin' on a long time. + +"I was so small I don't know if the Ku Klux ever did come bout our place +at tall." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Lettie Nelson + St. Marys Street, Helena, Arkansas +Age: 55 or 56? + + +"Grandma was Patsy Smith. She said in slavery they had a certain amount +of cotton to pick. If they didn't have that amount they would put their +heads between the rails of the fences and whoop them. They whooped them +in the ebenin' when they weighed up the cotton. Grandma was raised in +Virginia. She was light. Mama was light. They was carried from Virginia +to Louisiana in wagons. They found clothes along the road people had +lost. She said several bundles of good clothes. They thought they had +dropped off of wagons ahead of them. They washed and wore the clothes. +Some of 'em fit so they wore them. Mama left her husband and brother in +Virginia. Ed Smith was her second husband. He was a light man. My +grandpa was a field man. I never heard if grandpa was sold. Jimmie +Stansberry was the man that bought or brought mama and grandma to +Louisiana. Mama cooked and worked in the field both. Grandma did too. +She cooked in Louisiana more than mama. They belong to Lou and Jimmie +Stansberry and they had two boys. They lived close to Minden, Louisiana. +I don't know so much about my parents and grandma talked but we didn't +pay enough attention to remember it all. She was old and got things +confused. + +"They was glad when freedom come but they lived on with Jimmie +Stansberry. I remember them. Grandma raised me after my parents died. +Then she lived with me till she died. She was awful old when she died. +They would talk about how different Virginia and Louisiana was. It took +them a long time to make that trip." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Mattie Nelson + 710 E. Fourth Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 72 + + +"I was born in Chicot County, Arkansas in '65. They said I was born on +the roadside while we was on our way here from Texas. They had to camp +they said. Some people called it emigrate. Now that's the straightest +way I can tell it. + +"Our mistress and master was named Chapman. I member when I was a child +mistress used to be so good to us. After surrender my parents stayed +right on there with the Chapmans, stayed right on the place till they +died. + +"My mudder and pappy neither one of em could read or write, but I went +to school. I always was apt. I am now. I always was one to work--yes +ma'm--rolled logs, hope clean up new ground--yes ma'm. When we was +totin' logs, I'd say, "Put the big end on me" but they'd say, "No, +you're a woman." Yes ma'm I been here a long time. I do believe in +stirrin' work for your livin', yes ma'm, that's what I believe in. + +"I been workin' ever since I was six years old. My daughter was just +like me--she had a gift, but she died. I seen all my folks die and that +lets me know I got to die too. + +"White folks used to come along in buggies, and hoss back too, and stop +and watch me plow. Seem like the hotter the sun was the better I liked +it. + +"Yes ma'm, I done all kinds a work and I feels it now, too." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Dan Newborn + 1000 Louisiana, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 78 + + +"I was born in 1860. Born in Knoxville, Tennessee. I suppose it was in +the country. + +"Solomon Walton was my mother's owner and my father belonged to the +Newborns. My grandmother belonged to the Buggs in Richmond, Virginia and +she was sold to the Waltons. When my mother died in '65 my grandmother +raised me. After she was freed she went to the Powell Clayton place. Her +daughter lived there and she sent up the river and got her. I went too. +Me and two more boys. + +"I never went to school but about thirty days. Hardly learned my +alphabet. + +"In '66, my grandmother bound two of us to Powell Clayton for our +'vittils' and clothes and schoolin', but I didn't get no schoolin'. I +waited in the house. Stayed there three years, then we come back to the +Walton place. + +"My grandmother said the Waltons treated her mean. Beat her on the head +and that was part of her death. Every spring her head would run. She +said they didn't get much of somethin' to eat. + +"I was married 'fore my grandmother died--to this wife that died two +months ago. We stayed together fifty-seven years. + +"To my idea, this younger generation is too wild--not near as settled as +when I was comin' up. They used to obey. Why, I slept in the bed with my +grandmother till I was married. She whipped me the day before I was +married. It was 'cause I had disobeyed her. Children will resist their +mothers now. + +"I think the colored people is better off now 'cause they got more +privilege, but the way some of 'em use their privilege, I think they +ought to be slaves. + +"My grandmother taught me not to steal. My white folks here have trusted +me with two and three hundred dollars. I don't want nothin' in the world +but mine. + +"I been workin' here for Fox Brothers thirty-eight years and they'll +tell you there's not a black mark against me. + +"I used to be a mortar maker and used to sample cotton. Then I worked at +the Cotton Belt Shops eight years. + +"I've bought me a home that cost $780. + +"I don't mind tellin' about myself 'cause I've been honest and you can +go up the river and get my record. + +"Out of all due respect to everybody, the Yankees is the ones I like. + +"Vote? Oh yes, Republican ticket. I like Roosevelt's administration. If +I could vote now, I'd vote for him. He has done a whole lot of good." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person Interviewed: Sallie Newsom + Brinkley, Ark. +Age 75? + + +"Miss, I don't know my age, but I know I is old. I'm sick now. + +"My grandma's mistress and mama's mistress and my mistress was Miss +Jennie Brawner at Thomasville, Georgia. Me and my oldest sister was born +in Atlanta. Then freedom come on. My own papa wanted mama to follow him +to Mississippi. He had a wife there. She wouldn't go. She stayed on a +while with Mr. Acy and Miss Jennie. They come from Virginia. Her name +was Catherine. + +"Grandma toted her big hoop dresses about and carried her trains up off +the floor. Combed her long glossy hair. Mama was a house girl too, but +then grandma took to the kitchen. She was the cook then. + +"Old Miss Jennie wanted mama to give her my oldest sister Lulu, so mama +gave her to her. Then when we started to come to Holly Grove, +Mississippi, Miss Jennie still wanted her. Mama didn't want to part from +her. She was married again and brought me but my aunts told mama to +leave her there, she would have a good home and be educated, so she +'greed to leave her two years. She sent back for her at the end of two +years; she wrote and didn't want to come. She was still at Miss +Jennie's. I haben seen her from the day we left Atlanta till this very +day. A woman, colored woman, was here in Brinkley once seen her. Said +she was so fine and nice. Had nice soft skin and was well to do. I have +wrote but my letters come back. I know Miss Jennie is dead, and my +sister may be by now. + +"My papa was Abe Brooks. His master was Mars Jonas Brooks. Old master +give him to the young master. He was rich, rich, and traveled all time. +His pa give him a servant. He cooked for him, drove his carriage--they +called it a brake in them days--followed him to the hotels and +bar-rooms. He drink and give him a dram. When he was freed he come to +Mississippi with the Brooks to farm for them. I went to see my papa at +Waterford, Miss. + +"When we was at Holly Springs, Mississippi my cousin was a railroad man +so he helped me run away. He paid my way. I come to Clarendon. I cooked, +washed and ironed. In two or three years I went back to see mama. They +was glad to see me. They had eight children. + +"I couldn't guarantee you about the eight younger children, but there +ain't a speck of no kind of blood about me and Lulu Violet but African. +We are slick black Negroes. (She is very black, large and bony.) + +"Miss Jennie Brawner had one son--Gus Brawner--and he may be living now +in Atlanta. + +"My uncle said he seen the Yankees come through Thomasville, Georgia. I +never seen an army of them. I seen soldiers, plenty of em. None of the +Brooks or Brawners went to war that I heard of. I was kept close and too +young to know much of what happened. I heard about the Ku Klux but I +never seen them. + +"I know Miss Jennie Brawner come from Virginia but I don't brought +grandma with her or bought her. She never did say. + +"I don't vote. My husband voted, I don't know how he voted. + +"Since I been sick, I get a check and commodities." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Sallie C. Miller +Person interviewed: Pete Newton, Clarksville, Arkansas +Age: 83 [TR: 85?] +Occupation: Farmer and day laborer + + +"My white folks was as good to me as they could be. I ain't got no kick +to make about my white people. The boys was all brave. I was raised on +the farm. I staid with my boss till I was nearly grown. When the war got +so hot my boss was afraid the 'Feds' would get us. He sent my mammy to +Texas and sent me in the army with Col. Bashom, to take care of his +horses. I was about eleven or twelve years old. Col. Bashom was always +good to me. He always found a place for me to sleep and eat. Sometimes +after the colonel left the folks would run as off and not let me stay +but I never told the colonel. I went to Boston, Texas with the colonel +and his men and when he went on the big raid into Missouri he left me in +Sevier County, Arkansas with his horses 'Little Baldy' and 'Orphan Boy'. +They was race horses. The colonel always had race horses. He was killed +at Pilot Knob, Missouri. After the colonel was killed his son George (I +shore did think a lot of George) come after me and the horses and +brough' us home. + +"While I was in Arkadelphia with Col. Bashom's horses, I went down to +the spring to water the horses. The artillery was there cleaning a big +cannon they called 'Old Tom'. Of course I went up to watch them. One of +the men saw me and hollered, 'Stick his head in the cannon.' It liked to +scared me to death. I jumped on that race horse and run. I reconed I +would have been killed but my uncle was there and saw me and stopped the +horse. + +"Another time we went to a place and me and another colored boy was +taking care of the horses while our masters eat dinner. I saw some +watermelons in the garden with a paling fence around it. I said if the +other boy would pull a paling off I would crawl through and get us a +watermelon. He did but the man who owned the place saw me just as I got +the melon and whipped us and told us if we hollered he would kill us. We +didn't holler and we never told Col. Bashom either. + +"After the war my mammie come back from Texas and took me over to Dover +to live but my old boss told her if she would let him have me he would +raise and educate me like his own children. When I got back the old boss +already had a boy so I went to live with one of his sons. He told me it +was time for me to learn how to work. My boss was rough but he was good +to me and taught me how to work. The old boss had five sons in the army +and all was wounded except one. One of them was shot through and through +in the battle of Oak Hill. He got a furlough and come back and died. I +left my white folks in 1869 and went to farming for myself up in Hartman +bottom. I married when I was about seventeen years old. + +"They though' a house near us was hainted. Nobody wanted to live in it +so they went to see what the noise was. They found a pet coon with a +piece of chain around his neck. The coon would run across the floor and +drag the chain. + +"The children now are bad. No telling that will be in the next twenty or +thirty years everything is so changed now. + +"I learnt to sing the hymns but never sang in the choir. We sang +'Dixie', 'John Brown's Body Lies, etc.', 'Juanita', 'Just Before the +Battle, Mother', 'Old Black Joe'." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Charlie Norris + 122 Miller Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 81 + + +"Born in slavery times? That's me, I reckon. I was born October 1, 1857 +in Arkansas in Union County. Tom Murphy was old master's name. + +"Yes ma'am, I remember the first regiment left Arkansas--went to +Virginia. I member our white folks had us packin' grub out in the woods +cause they was spectin' the Yankees. + +"I member when the first regiment started out. The music boat come to +the landin' and played 'Yankee Doodle.' They carried all us chillun out +there. + +"After they fit they just come by from daylight till dark to eat. They +was death on bread. My mother and Susan Murphy, that was the old lady +herself, cooked bread for em. + +"I stayed with the Murphys--round on the plantation amongst em for five +or six years after freedom. Andrew Norris, my father's old master, was +the first sheriff of Ouachita County. + +"My mother belonged to the Murphys and my father belonged to the +Norrises and after freedom they never did go back together. + +"My mother told me that Susan Murphy would suckle me when my mother was +out workin' and then my mother would suckle her daughter. + +"I was raised up in the house you might say till I was a big nigger. Had +plenty to eat. That's one thing they did do. I lived right amongst a +settlement of what they called free niggers cause they was treated so +well. + +"Sometimes Susan Murphy got after me and whipped me and old Marse Tom +would tell me to run and not let her whip me. You see, I was worth +$1,500 to him and he thought a lot of us black kids. + +"Old man Tom Murphy raised me up to a big nigger and never did whip me +but twice and that was cause I got drunk on tobacco and turned out his +horse. + +"Yes ma'am, I voted till bout two or three years ago. Oh Lawd, the +colored used to hold office down in the country. I've voted for white +and black. + +"Some of the colored folks better off free and some not. That's what I +think but they don't." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person Interviewed: Emma Oats (Mulatto) + Holly Grove, Ark. +Age: 90 or older + + +"I was born in St. Louis. My mother died when I was little. I never +knowed no father. (He was probably a white man.) Jack Oats raised me. +Jim Oats at Helena was his son. He is still living. He come through here +(Holly Grove) not long ago. I was raised on the Esque place. + +"I was fraid of my grandma. I wouldn't live with her. I know'd her. She +was a big woman, big white eyes, big thick lips, and had 'Molly Glaspy +hair,' long straight soft hair. She was a African woman. She made my +clothes. I was fraid of her. I never lived with her. My folks was all +free folks. When my mother died my uncle took us--me and brother. He +hired us out and we got stole. Gene Oglesby stole us and brought us to +Memphis to Joe Nivers. I recken he sold us then. Then they stood me up +in the parlor and sold me to Jack Oats. They said I was 'good pluck.' +Joe Nivers sold me to Jack Oats for $1,150.00 when I was four years old. +My brother was name Milton Smith. I ain't seen him from that day till +this. Joe Nivers kept him, I recken. I come here on a 'legal +tender'--name of the boat I recken. I know that. I recken it was name of +a boat. I got off and Thornton Walls, old colored man, toted me cross +every mud hole we come to. He belong to Bud Walls' (white man at Holly +Grove) daddy. When we got home Jack Oats and all of em was there. + +"I slept on a pallet and lounge and took care of their children. I +played round. Done bout as I pleased. They had a cook they called Aunt +Joe--Joe Oats. We had plenty to eat and wear. They dressed me like one +their children. We had good flannel clothes. When she washed her +children she washed me too. When she combed their hair she combed mine +too. She kept working with it till I had pretty hair. Some of her +children died. It hurt me bad as it did them. All I done was play with +em and see after em. Their names was Sam, John, Dixie, Sallie, Jim. I +went in the hack to church; if she took the children, she took me. I was +a good size girl when she died. The last word she spoke was to me; she +said, 'Emma, take care of my children.' Dr. John Chester was her doctor. + +"Oats come here from North Alabama. Will Oats, Wyatt Oats, and Jack +Oats--all brothers. + +"When mistress living we took a bath every Friday in a sawed-intwo +barrel (wooden tub). The cook done our washing. We had clean fresh +clothes. We had to dress up every few days. If we get dirty she say she +would give us lashes. She never give me none, I never was sassy (saucy). +That what most of em got 10 lashes, 25, 50 lashes for. + +"When I was bout grown I went to school a little bit to James A. Kerr +here at Holly Grove. I was good and grown too. + +"I was settin' on the gate post--they had a picket fence. I seen some +folks coming to our house. I run in the house and says, 'Miss Mai Liza, +the Yankees coming here!' She told her husband to get in the bed. He +says, 'Oh God, what she know bout Yankees?' Miss Mai Liza say, 'I don't +know; she's one of em, I speck she knows em.' One of the officers come +in and asked him what was the matter. He said he was sick. He had boils +bout on him. He had a Masonic pin on his shirt. He showed it to the +officer. He asked Lou and Becky and all the servants if he hadn't been +bushwhacking. They all said, 'No.' He said he wanted something to eat. +They went to the well house and got him some milk. + +"They camped below the house. They went to their store house and brought +more rations up there in a wagon. Lou cooked and she had help. She set a +big table and they had the biggest dinner. They had more hams. They had +'Lincoln Coffee' there that day. It was a jolly day. They never et up +there no more or bothered round our house no more. The officer had +something on his bare arm he showed. He said, when he went to leave, +'Aunt Lou, you shall not be hurt.' + +"Mr. Oats had taken long before that day all his slaves to Texas. He +took all but Wash Martin. They went in wagons and none of them ever come +back. + +"Miss Callie Edwards was older than Miss Henrietta Jackson. They kept +Wash Martin going through the bottoms nearly all time from their houses +at Golden Hill to Indian Bay. They kept him from one place to the other +to keep him out of the war. They hired him out to school Miss Henrietta. +Miss Callie Edwards died then they give him to Miss Henrietta. + +"During the war Mrs. Keeps come up to our house. They heard a gun. She +was jes visiting Mrs. Oats. Mrs. Keeps went home and the bushwhackers +had killed him. He was dead. + +"I never seen no Ku Klux in my whole life. + +"I remember the stage coach that run every two or three days from Helena +to Clarendon. + +"I don't remember bout freedom. Dr. Green, Hall Green's daddy, told his +colored folks they was free. They told our folks. I heard em talking +bout it. I was kept quiet. It was done freedom, fore I knowed it. I +stayed on and done like I been doin'. I stayed on and on. + +"When I was grown I come here to school and soon married. I washed and +ironed and cooked all over Holly Grove. I was waiting on the table at +the boarding house here at Holly Grove. Mr. Oats was talking bout naming +the town. They had put the railroad through. I ask em why didn't they +name the town Holly Grove. It was thick with holly trees. They named it +that, and put it up on the side of the depot. That way I named the town. + +"My folks give me five acres of land and Julia Woolfolk give a blind +woman on the place five acres. I didn't know what to do wid it. I didn't +have no husband. I was young and foolish. I let it be. + +"My husband farmed. I raised my family, chopped and picked cotton and +done other things along with that. I have worked all my life till way +after my husband died. + +"My husband could jump up, knock heels together three times before he +come down. He died May 12, 1909. He was 83 years old February 16, 1909. + +"I never voted. I never heard my husband say much bout voting. I know +some colored folks sold their voting rights. That was wrong. + +"I lived at Baptist Bottoms two years. It lack to killed me." + +Wyatt Oats and Miss Callie Edwards owned the husband of Emma Oats. She +was married once and had two girls and two boys--one boy dead now. Emma +lives at one of her daughters' homes. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Helen Odom and mother, Sarah Odom + Biscoe, Arkansas +Age: 30? + + +"Great-grandmother was part African, Indian, and Caucasian. She had two +girls before slavery ended by her own master--Master Temple. He was also +Caucasian (white). She was cook and housemaid at his home. He was a +bachelor. Grandmother's name was Rachael and her sister's name was +Gilly. Before freedom Master Temple had another wife. By her he had one +boy and two girls. He never had a Caucasian wife. In fact he was always +a bachelor. Grandmother was a field hand and so was her sister, Gilly. + +"But after freedom grandmother married a Union soldier. His took-on name +was George Washington Tomb. He was generally called Parson Tomb +(preacher). He met Grandmother Rachael in Arkansas. + +"When Master Temple died his nearest relative was Jim McNeilly. He made +a will leaving everything he possessed to Master McNeilly. The estate +had to be settled, so he brought the two sisters to Little Rock we think +to be sold. They rode horseback and walked and brought wagons with +bedding and provisions to camp along the road. The blankets were frozen +and stood alone. It was so cold. Grandmother was put up on the block to +be auctioned off and freedom was declared! Aunt Gilly never got to the +block. Grandmother married and was separated from her sister. + +"Whether the other three children were brought to Arkansas then I don't +know but this I know that they went by the name McNeilly. They changed +their names or it was done for them. They are all dead now and my own +mother is the only one now living. Their names were John, Tom, and +Netline. Mother says they were sold to Johnson, and went by that name +too as much as McNeilly. They remained with Johnson till freedom, in +Tennessee. + +"My mother's name is Sarah. + +"They seem to think they were treated good till Master Temple died. They +nearly froze coming to Arkansas to be sold. + +"I heard this told over and over so many, many times before grandmother +died. Seemed it was the greatest event of her life. She told other +smaller things I can't remember to tell with sense at all. Nothing so +important as her master and own father's death and being sold. + +"Times are good, very good with me. Our African race is advancing with +the times." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +Teacher in Biscoe school. Father was a graduate doctor of medicine and +in about 1907, '08, '09 school director at Biscoe. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Jane Oliver + Route 4, near airport, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 81 + + +"I'm certainly one of em, cause I was in the big house. When Miss Liza +married they give sister to her and I stayed with Miss Netta. Her name +was Drunetta Rawls. That was in Mississippi. We come to Arkansas when I +was small. + +"I remember when they run us to Texas, and we stayed there till freedom +come. I remember hearin' em read the free papers. Mama died in Texas and +they buried her the day they read the free papers. I know. I was out +playin' and Miss Lucy, that was my young mistress, come out and say, +'Jane, you go in and see your mother, she wants you.' I was busy playin' +and didn't want to go in and I member Miss Lucy say, 'Poor little fool +nigger don't know her mother's dyin'.' I went in then and said, 'Mama, +is you dyin'?' She say, 'No, I ain't; I died when you was a baby.' You +know, she meant she had died in sin. She was a christian. + +"Me and Lucy played together all the time--round about the house and in +the kitchen. Little Marse Henry, that was big old Marse Henry's son, he +was a captain in the army. We all called him Little Marse Henry. Old +mistress was good to us. Us chillun called her Miss Netta. Best woman I +ever seed. Me and Lucy growed up together. Looks like I can see just the +way the house looked and how we used to go down to the big gate and +play. I sits here and studies and wonders if I'd know that place today. +That's what I study bout. + +"I used to hear em say we only stayed in Texas nine months and the white +folks brought us back. + +"My uncle Simon Rawls, he took me after the war. Then I worked for Mrs. +Adkins. + +"I went to school a little and learned to read prints. The teacher tried +to get me to write but I wouldn't do it. And since then I have wished so +much I had learned to write. Oh mercy! Old folks would tell me, 'Well, +when you get up the road, you'll wish you had.' I didn't know what they +meant but I know now they meant when I got old. + +"I was married when I was young--I don't think I was fifteen. + +"Yes ma'am, I've worked hard. I've always lived in the country. + +"I can remember when the white folks refugeed us to Texas. Oh we did +hate the Yankees. If I ever seed a Yankee I didn't know it but I heard +the white folks talkin' bout em. + +"I used to hear em talk bout old Jeff Davis and Abe Lincoln. + +"Bradley County was where we lived fore we went to Texas and afterward. +Colonel Ed Hampton's plantation jined the Rawls plantation on the +Arkansas River where it overflowed the land. I loved that better than +any place I ever seed in my life. + +"I couldn't say what I think of the young folks now. They is different +from what we was. Yes, Lord, they is different. Sometimes I think they +is better and sometimes wuss. I just thanks the Lord that I'm here--have +come this far. + +"When I bought this place from Mr. R.M. Knox he said, 'When I'm in my +grave you'll thank me that you took my advice and put your savings in a +Home.' I do thank him. I been here thirty years and I get along. God +bless you." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Ivory Osborne + Route 5, Box 158, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 85 + + +"Know about slavery? Sho I do--I was born in '52. Born in Arkansas? No +ma'm, born in Texas. + +"Oh yes, indeed, I had a good master. Good to me, indeed. I was that +high when the war started. I member everything. Take me from now till +dark to tell you everything I know bout slavery. + +"I put in three years and five months, choppin' cotton and corn. I +member the very day, on the 10th of May, old mistress blowed the conk +and told us we was free. + +"Oh Lord, I had a good time. + +"I never was whipped. + +"Ku Klux used to run me. Run me clear from the plum orchard bout a mile +from the house. Run to my mistress at the big house. + +"Miss Ann had eight darkies and told her stepmother, 'Don't you put your +hand on em.' She didn't either. + +"I went to school since 'mancipation in Nacitosh. Learned to read and +write. Was in the eighth grade when I left. Stood at the head of every +class. They couldn't get me down. I done got old and forgot now. + +"I didn't know the difference between slavery and free, I never was +whipped. + +"Did I ever vote? You know I voted, old as I am. Ain't voted in over +forty years. I ain't nobody. My wife's eighty. I've had her forty years. +_Cose_ I voted the Republican ticket. You never seed a colored person a +Democrat in your life. + +"In slavery days we killed seventy-five or eighty hogs every year. And I +don't mean shoats, I mean hogs. I ain't lost my membrance." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Jane Osbrook + 602 E. 21st Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 90 + + +"Yes ma'm, I was livin' in slavery days. I was borned in Arkansas I +reckon. I was borned within three, miles of Camden but I wasn't raised +there. We moved to Saline County directly after peace was declared. + +"I don't know what year I was born because you see I'm not educated but +I was ninety the 27th of this last past May. Yes ma'm, I'm a old bondage +woman. I can say what a heap of em can't say--I can tell the truth bout +it. I believe in the truth. I was brought up to tell the truth. I'm no +young girl. + +"My old master was Adkison Billingsly. My old mistress treated us just +like her own children. She said we had feelin's and tastes. I visited +her long after the war. Went there and stayed all night. + +"I member when they had the fight at Jenkins Ferry. Old Steele had +30,000 and he come down to take Little Rock, Pine Bluff and others. +Captain Webb with 1,500 Rebels was followin' him and when they got to +Saline River they had a battle. + +"The next Sunday my father carried all us children and some of the white +folks to see the battle field. I member the dead was lyin' in graves, +just one row after another and hadn't even been covered up. + +"Oh yes, I can tell all bout that. Nother time there was four hundred +fifty colored and five white Yankee soldiers come and ask my father if +old mistress treated us right. We told em we had good owners. I never +was so scared in my life. Them colored soldiers was so tall and so black +and had red eyes. Oh yes ma'm, they had on the blue uniforms. Oh, we +sure was fraid of em--you know them eyes. + +"They said, 'Now uncle, we want you to tell the truth, does she feed you +well?' My ma did all the cookin' and we had good livin'. I tole my +daughter we fared ten thousand times better than now. + +"I come up in the way of obedience. Any time I wanted to go, had to go +to old mistress and she say, 'Don't let the sun go down on you.' And +when we come home the sun was in the trees. If you seed the sun was +goin' down on you, you run. + +"I ain't goin' tell nothin' but the truth. Truth better to live with and +better to die with. + +"Some of the folks said they never seed a biscuit from Christmas to +Christmas but we had em every day. Never seed no sodie till peace was +declared--used saleratus. + +"In my comin' up it was Whigs and Democrats. Never heard of no +Republicans till after the war. I've seed a man get upon that platform +and wipe the sweat from his brow. I've seed em get to fight in' too. +That was done at our white folks house--arguin' politics. + +"I never did go to school. I married right after the war you know. What +you talkin' bout--bein' married and goin' to school? I was housekeepin': +Standin' right in my own light and didn't know it." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Annie Page + 412-1/2 Pullen Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 86 + + +"I was born 1852, they tell me, on the fifteenth of March. I was workin' +a good while 'fore surrender. + +"Bill Jimmerson was my old master. He was a captain in Marmaduke's army. +Come home on thirty days furlough once and he and Daniel Carmack got +into some kind of a argument 'bout some whisky and Daniel Carmack +stabbed him with a penknife. Stabbed him three times. He was black as +tar when they brought him home. The blood had done settled. Oh Lawd, +that was a time. + +"My eyes been goin' blind 'bout six years till I got so I can't excern +(discern) anything. + +"Old miss used to box me over the head mightily and the colored folks +used to hit me over the head till seem like I could hear a bell for two +or three days. Niggers ain't got no sense. Put 'em in authority and they +gits so uppity. + +"My brother brought me here and left me here with a colored woman named +Rachael Ross. And oh Lawd, she was hard on me. Never had to do in +slavery times what I had to do then. + +"But the devil got her and all her chillun now I reckon. They tell me +when death struck her, they asked if the Lawd called her, and they say +she just turned over and over in the bed like a worm in hot ashes." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Annie Page + 400 Block West Pullen, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 85 + + +"Yes'm I 'member the war. I never knowed why they called it the Civil +War though. + +"I was born in Union County, Arkansas, 'bout a mile from Bear Creek, in +1852. That's what my old mistress tole me the morning we was sot free. + +"My mistress was a Democrat. Old master was a captain in Marmaduke's +army. + +"I used to hope (help) spin the thread to make the soldiers' clothes. +Old mistress cared for me. Lacy Jimmerson--the onliest mistress I ever +had. She wanted to send us away to Texas but old master say it want no +use. Cause if the Yankees won, they have to bring us back, so we didn't +go. + +"Did they _whip_ us? Why I bet I can show you scars now. Old Miss whip +me when she feel like fightin'. Her granddaughter, Mary Jane, tried to +learn me my ABC's out of the old Blue Back Speller. We'd be out on the +seesaw, but old Miss didn't know what we doin'. Law, she pull our hair. +Directly she see us and say 'What you doin'? Bring that book here!' + +"One day old master come home on a thirty-day furlough. He was awful +hot-headed and he got into a argument with Daniel Carmack and old Daniel +stobbed him right in the heart. Fore he die he say to bury him by the +side of the road so he can see the niggers goin' to work. + +"I never seen no Ku Klux but I heard of 'em 'rectly after the war. + +"I'se blind. I jest can see enough to get around. The Welfare gives me +eight dollars a month. + +"My mother died soon after the war ended and after that I was jest +knocked over the head. I went to Camblin and worked for Mrs. Peters. +Then I runned away and married my first husband Mike Samson. I been +married twice and had two children but they all dead now. + +"Law, I jest scared of these young ones as I can be. I don't have no +dealins with 'em." + + + + +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Subject: Apparitions +Subject: Superstitions +Subject: Birthmarks +Story:--Information + +This information given by: Annie Page +Place of residence: 412-1/2 Pullen Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Occupation: None Age: 86 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] +[TR: Repetitive information deleted from subsequent pages.] + + +"I told 'bout old master's death. Mama had done sent me out to feed the +chickens soon of a morning. + +"Here was the smokehouse and there was a turkey in a coop. And when I +throwed it the feed I heard somethin' sounded just like you was draggin' +a brush over leaves. It come around the corner of the smokehouse and +look like a tall woman. It kept on goin' toward the house till it got to +the hickory nut tree and still sound like draggin' a brush. When it got +to the hickory nut tree it changed and look like a man. I looked and I +said, 'It's old master.' And the next day he got killed. I run to the +house and told mama, 'Look at that man.' She said, 'Shut your mouth, you +don't see no man.' Old miss heard and said, 'Who do you s'pose it could +be?' But mama wouldn't let me talk. + +"But I know it was a sign that old master was goin' to die." + + +Superstitions + +"I was born with a caul over my face. Old miss said it hung from the top +of my head half way to my waist. + +"She kept it and when I got big enough she said, 'Now that's your veil, +you play with it.' + +"But I lost it out in the orchard one day. + +"They said it would keep you from seein' ha'nts." + + +Birthmarks + +"William Jimmerson's wife had a daughter was born blind, and she said it +was her husband's fault. She was delicate, you know, and one afternoon +she was layin' down and I was sittin' there fannin' her with a peafowl +fan. Her husband was layin' there too and I guess I must a nodded and +let the fan drop down in his face. He jumped up and pressed his thumbs +on my eyes till they was all bloodshot and when he let loose I fell down +on the floor. Miss Phenie said, 'Oh, William, don't do that.' I can +remember it just as well. + +"My eyes like to went out and do you know, when her baby was born it was +blind. It's eyes just looked like two balls of blood. It died though, +just lived 'bout two weeks." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Fannie Parker + 1908 W. Sixth Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 90? + + +"Yes, honey, this is old Fannie. I'se just a poor old nigger waitin' for +Jesus to come and take me to Heaven. + +"I was just a young strip of a girl when the war come. Dr. M.C. Comer +was my owner. His wife was Elizabeth Comer. I said Marse and Mistis in +them days and when old mistress called me I went runnin' like a turkey. +They called her Miss Betsy. Yes Lord, I was in slavery days. Master and +mistress was bossin' me then. We all come under the rules. We lived in +Monticello--right in the city of Monticello. + +"All I can tell you is just what I remember. I seed the Yankees. I +remember a whole host of 'em come to our house and wanted something to +eat. They got it too! They cooked it them selves and then they burned +everything they could get their hands on. They said plenty to me. They +said so much I don't know what they said. I know one thing they said I +belonged to the Yankees. Yes Lord, they wanted me to tell 'em if I was +free. I told 'em I was free indeed and that I belonged to Miss Betsy. I +didn't know what else to say. We had plenty to eat, plenty of hog meat +and buttermilk and cornbread. Yes ma'm--don't talk about that now. + +"Don't tell me 'bout old Jeff Davis--he oughta been killed. Abraham +Lincoln thought what was right was right and what was wrong was wrong. +Abraham was a great man cause he was the President. When the rebels +ceded from the Union he made 'em fight the North. Abraham Lincoln +studied that and he had it all in his mind. He wasn't no fighter but he +carried his own and the North give 'em the devil. Grant was a good man +too. They tried to kill him but he was just wrapped up in silver and +gold. + +"I remember when the stars fell. Yes, honey, I know I was ironin' and it +got so dark I had to light the lamp. Yes, I did! + +"It's been a long time and my mind's not so good now but I remember old +Comer put us through. Good-bye and God bless you!" + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Subject: Ex-slavery +Story: Birth, Parents, Master. + +Person Interviewed: J.M. Parker, (dark brown) +Address: 1002 Ringo Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Occupation: Formerly a carpenter +Age: 76 +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] + + +"I was born in South Carolina, Waterloo, in Lawrence County, [HW: +Laurens Co.] in 1861, April 5th. Waterloo is a little town in South +Carolina. I believe that fellow shot the first gun of the war when I was +born. I knew then I was going to be free. Of course that is just a lie. +I made that up. Anyway I was born in 1861. + +"Colonel Rice was our master. He was in the war too. The name Parker +came in by intermarriage, you see. My mother belonged to Rice. She could +have been a Simms before she married. My father's name was Edmund +Parker. He belonged to the Rices also. That was his master; Colonel Rice +and him were boys together. He went down there to Charleston, South +Carolina to build breastworks. While down there, he slipped off and +brought a hundred men away from Charleston back to Lawrence County where +the men was that owned them. He was a business man, father was. Brought +'em all through the swamps. They were slaves and he brought 'em all back +home. They all followed his advice. + +"My mother's name was Rowena Parker after she married. + +"Colonel Rice was a pretty fair man--a pretty good fellow. He was a +colonel in the war and stood pretty high. Bound to be that way by him +being a colonel. Seemed like him and my father had about the same number +of kids. He thought there was nobody like my mother. He never _whipped +the slaves himself_ but his _overseer would sometimes jump on them_. The +Rice family was very good to our people. The men being gone they were +left in the hands of the mistress. She never touched anybody. She never +had no reason to. + + +Pateroles + +"Patterollers didn't bother us, but we were in that country. During the +war, most of the men that amounted to anything were in the war and the +patrolers didn't bother you much. The overseer didn't have so much power +over me than. That pretty well left the colored people to come up +without being abused during the war. The white folks was forced to go to +the war. They drafted them just like they do now. They'd shoot a _po'_ +white man if he didn't come. + + +Breeding + +"My master didn't force men and women to marry. _He didn't_ put 'em +together just to get more slave. Some times other people would have +women and men just for that purpose. But there wasn't much of it in my +country. + + +House, Stock, Parents' Occupations + +"Our house was a frame building, boxed in with one-by-twelve like we +have here in the country. That was a good house with regular flooring, +tongue and groove. We was raised up in a good house. Old Colonel Rice +had to protect his standing. He had good stock. My father was a carriage +man. He had to keep those horses clean and they always looked good. That +carriage had to shine too. Colonel Rice was a high stepper. He'd take +his handkerchief and rub it over the horses hair to see if they were +really clean. He would always find 'em clean though when the old man got +through with them. He would drive fine stock. Had some fine horses. +Couldn't trust 'em with just anybody. + +"My mother was cook. She helped Mrs. Rice take care of the kids, and +cooked around the house. She took care of her kids, too. + +"The house we was born and bred in was built for a carriage house, but +somehow or 'nother they give it to us to live in. My mother being a +cook, she got what she wanted. That was a good house too. It was sealed. +It had good floors. It had two rooms. It had about three windows and +good doors to each room. + +"We had just common furniture. Niggers didn't have much then. My father +was a good mechanic though and he would make anything he wanted. We +didn't have much, just common things. But all my people were mechanics, +harness makers, shoemakers,--they could make anything. Young Sam Parker +could make any kind of shoe. He made shoes for the white folks; Young +Jacob was a blacksmith; he made horseshoes and anything else out of +iron. He may still be living. In fact, he made anything he could get his +hands on. My young uncles on my mother's side, I don't know much about +them, because they were all mechanics. My grandfather on my mother's +side could make baskets--any kind--could make baskets that would hold +water. + +"My father had thirteen children. Three of them are living now. My +brother lives here in the city. He was born during the war and his +mother was supposed to be free when he was born. + + +Right After the War + +"That's what my mother told me. I can remember a long ways back myself. +After the war, it wasn't long before they began to open up schools. They +used to run school three or four months a year. Both white and colored +in the country had about three or four months. That is all they had. +There weren't so very many white folks that took an interest in +education during slave time. Colored people got just about as much as +they did right after the war. What time we went to school we went the +whole day. We would come home and work in the evening like. We had +pretty fair teachers. All white then at first. They didn't have no +colored till afterwards. If they did, they had so few, I never heard of +them. + +"The first teacher I had was Katie Whitefold (white). That was in +Waterloo. Miss Richardson was our next teacher. She was white too. We +went to school two terms under white women. After that we began to get +teachers from Columbia, South Carolina, where the normal school was. + +"The white teachers who taught us were people who had been raised right +around Waterloo. We never had no Northern teachers as I knows of. Our +first colored teacher was Murry Evans. He a preacher. He was one of our +leading preachers too. After him our colored women began to come in and +stand examination wasn't so hard at that time, but they made a good +showing. There were good scholars. + +"I went to school too much. I went to school at Philander Smith College +some, too. I went a good piece in school. Come pretty near finishing the +English course (high school). I finished Good[HW: sp.?] Brown's 'Grammer +of Grammers'. Professor Backensto (the spelling is the interviewer's) +sent away and got it and sold it to us. We was his students. He was a +white man from the North and a good scholar. We got in those grammars +and got the same lessons they give him when he was in school--nine pages +a lesson and we had to repeat that lesson three times. When my mother +died, I was off in the normal school. + +"Right after the war, my parents farmed. He followed his trade. That +always gave us something to eat you know. When we farmed, we +sharecropped--a third and a fourth--that is, we got a third of the +cotton and a fourth of the corn. Potatoes and things like that went +free. All women got an acre free. My mother always got an acre and she +worked it good too. She always had her bale of cotton. And if she didn't +have a bale, she laid it next to the white folks' and made it out. They +knew it and they didn't care. She stood well with the white people. +Helped all of 'em raise their children, and they all liked that. + +"I went along with my father whenever he had a big job and needed help. +I got to be as good a carpenter as he was. + +"I married out here. About eighty-five. People were emigrating to this +country. There was a boom to emigrating then. Emigrating was a little +dangerous when a man was trying to get hands. White folks would lay +traps and kill men that were taking away their hands--they would kill +white just as quick as they would black. I started out under a white +man--I can't remember his name. He turned me over to Madden, a colored +man who was raised in Waterloo. We came from there to Greenwood, South +Carolina where everything was straight. After that we had nothing to do +but get on the train and keep coming. We was with our agent then and we +had no more trouble after that. + +"I got off at Brinkley over at Minor Gregory's farm. He needed hands +then and was glad to get us. He is dead now. I stayed in Brinkley the +space of about a year. Then he gave us transportation to Little Rock. +The train came from Memphis, and we struck out for Little Rock. I +married after I come to Little Rock. I forget what year. But anyway my +wife is dead and gone and all the children. So I'm single now. + + +Opinions of the Present + +"I think times are about dead now. Things ought to get better. I believe +things are going to get better for all of us. People have got to think +more. People have got to get together more. War doesn't always make +thing better. It didn't after the Civil War. And it didn't after the +World War. The young people are all right in their way. It would just +take another war to learn 'em a lesson. + + +Support + +"I can't do any work now. I get a little help from the welfare. It +doesn't come regular. I need a check right now. I think it's due now. +But they haven't sent it out yet. That is, I haven't got it. + +"I'm a Christian. All my family were Methodists. I belong to Wesley. + + + + +Interviewer: Mary D. Hudgins +Person Interviewed: Judy Parker +Home: 618 Wade Street, Hot Springs, Ark. +Aged: 77 + + +For location of Wade Street, see interview with Emma Sanderson. + +As the interviewer walked down Silver Street a saddle colored girl came +out on a porch for a load of wood. + +"I beg your pardon," she began, pausing, "can you tell me where I will +find Emma Sanderson?" + +"I sure can." The girl left the porch and came out to the street. "I'll +walk down with you and show you. That way it'll be easier. Kind of cold, +ain't it?" + +"It surely is," this from the interviewer. "Isn't it too cold for you, +can't you just tell me? I think I can find it." The girl had expected to +be only on the porch and didn't have a coat. + +"No, ma'am. It's all right. Now we're far enough for you to see. You see +those two houses jam up against one and 'tother? Well Miz Parker lives +in the one this way. I goes down to look after her most every day. +That's where you'll find her.--No ma'am--'twaren't no bother." + +The gate sagged slightly at the house "this way" of the "two jam up +against one and 'tother." A large slab from an oak log in the front yard +near a woodpile bore mute evidence of many an ax blow. (Stove wood is +generally split in the rural South--one end of the "stick" resting +against the ground, the other atop a small log.) + +Up a couple of rickety steps the interviewer climbed. She knocked three +times. When she was bade to enter she opened the door to find an old +woman sitting near a wood stove combing her long, white hair. + +Mrs. Parker was expecting the visit. A few days before the interviewer +had had a visit from a couple of colored women who had "heard tell how +you is investigating the old people.--been trying to get on old age +pension for a long time--glad you come to get us on.----No? Oh, I see +you is the Townsend woman." (An explanation of her true capacity was +almost impossible for the interviewer.) + +Mrs. Parker, however, seemed to comprehend the idea perfectly. She +expected nothing save the chance to tell her story. Her joy at the gift +of a quarter (the amount the interviewer set aside from her salary for +each interviewee) was pitiful. Evidently it had been a long time since +she had possessed a similar sum to spend exactly as she pleased. + +"I don't rightly know how old I is. My mother used to tell me that I was +a little baby, six months old when our master, Joe Potts was his name, +got ready to clear out of Florida. You see he had heard tell of the war +scare. So he started drifting out of the way. Bet it didn't take him +long after he made up his mind. He was a right decided man. Mister Joe +was. + +"How did we like him? Well, he was always good to us. He was well +thought of. Seemed to be a pretty clever man, Mr. Joe did." ("Clever" in +plantation language like "smart" refers more to muscular than mental +activity. They might almost be used as synonyms for "hard working" on +the labor level.) + +"So Mr. Joe got ready to go to Texas. Law, Miss, I don't rightly know +whether he had a family or not. Never heard my Mother say. Anyhow he +come through Arkansas intending to drift on out into Texas. But when he +got near the border 'twix't and between Arkansas and Texas he stopped. +The talk about war had about settled down. So he stopped. He stopped +near where the big bridge is. You know where Little River County is +don't you? He stopped and he started to work. Started to make a crop. +'Course I can't remember none about that. Just what my Mother told me. +But I remembers him from later. + +"He went at it the good way. Settled down and tried to open up a home. +They put in a crop and got along pretty good. Time passed and the war +talk started floating again. That time he didn't pay much attention and +it got him. It was on a Sunday morning when he went away. I never knew +whether they made him go or not. But I kind of think they must of. Cause +he wouldn't have moved off from Florida if he had wanted to go to war. + +"He took my daddy with him! Ma'am--did he take him to fight or to wait +on him--Don't know ma'am, but I sort of think he took him to wait on +him. But he didn't bring him back. My daddy got killed in the war. No +ma'am. I don't rightly know how he got killed. Never heard nobody say. I +was just a little girl--nobody bothered to tell me much. + +"Yes, that we did. We stayed on on the farm and we made a crop--the old +folks did. Mr. Joe, when he went off, said "Now you stay on here, you +make a crop and you use all you need. Then you put up the rest and save +for me." He was a right good man, Mr. Joe was. + +"No, we didn't never see no fighting. There wasn't nothing to be scared +of. Didn't see no Yankees until the war was through. Then they started +passing. Lawsey, I couldn't tell how many of them there was. More than +you could count. + +"We had all stayed on. I was the oldest of my mother's children. But she +had two more after me. There was our family and my two uncles and my +grandmother. Then there was some other colored folks. But we wasn't +scared of the Yankees. Mr. Joe was there by that time. They camped all +around in the woods near us. They got us to do their washing. Lawsey +they was as filthy as hogs. I never see such folks. They asked Mr. Joe +if we could do their washing. Everything on the place that come near +those clothes got lousey. Those men was covered with them. I never see +nothing like it. We got covered with them. No, ma'am, we got rid of 'em +pretty easy. They ain't so hard to get rid of, if you keep clean. + +"After it was all over Master Joe got ready to go back to Florida. He +took Warley and Jenny with him. They was children he had had by a black +woman--you know folks did such things in them days. He asked the rest of +us if they wanted to go back too. But my folks made up their minds they +didn't. You see, they didn't know how they'd get along and how long it +would take them to pay for the trip back, so they stayed right where +they was. + +"Lots of 'em went to Rondo and some of us worked for Herb Jeans--he +lived farther up Red River. After my mother died I was with my +grandmother. She washed and cooked for Herb Jeans's family. I stayed on +with her, helped out until I got married. I was about fifteen when that +time come. + +"My man owned his place. Sure he did. Owned it when I married him. He +owned it himself and farmed it good. Yes ma'am we stayed with the land. +He made good crops--corn and cotton, mostly. Course we raised potatoes +and the truck we needed--all stuff like that. Yes, ma'am we had thirteen +children. Just three of them's living. All of them is boys. + +"Yes ma'am we got along good. My husband made good crops and we got +along just good. But 'bout eight years ago my husband he got sick. So he +sold out the farm--sold out everything. Then he come here. + +"Before he died he spent every last cent--every last cent--left me to +get along the very best way I kin. I stays with my son. He takes care of +me. He don't make much, but he does the best he kin. + +"No ma'am, I likes living down in the country. Down there near Red River +it's soft and sandy. Up here in Hot Springs the rocks tear up your feet. +If you's country raised--you like the country. Yes ma'am, you like the +country." + +As she left the interviewer handed her a quarter. At first the old +woman's face was expressionless. But she moved the coin nearer to her +eyes and a smile broke and widened until her whole face was a wrinkle of +joy. When she turned in the doorway, the interviewer noticed that the +hand jammed into an apron pocket was clutched into a possessive fist, +cradling the precious twenty five cents. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: R.F. Parker + 619 N. Hickory, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 76 + + +"I was born in '62. I reckon I was born in slavery times. Born in Ripley +County, Missouri. Old man Billy Parker was my master, and my young +master was Jim Parker. + +"They bought my mother in Tennessee when she was a child. I wasn't big +enough to remember much about slavery but I was big enough to know when +they turned my mother loose, and we come to Lawrence County, Arkansas. + +"I remember my mother sayin' she had to plow while her young master, Jim +Parker, was off to war, but I don't know what side he was on. + +"I remember seein' some soldiers ridin' down the road, about +seventy-five of 'em. I know I run under a corn pen and hid. I thought +they was after me. They stopped right there and turned their horses +loose 'round that pen. I can remember that all right. They went in the +white folks' house and took a shotgun. I know I remember hearin' mama +talk about it. I think they had on blue clothes. + +"I was goin' on seven when we come to Arkansas. I know I'd walk a while +and she'd tote me a while. But we was lucky enough to get in with some +white people that was movin' to Arkansas. We was comin' to a place +called 'The Promised Land.' We stayed there till '92. + +"I have farmed and done public work. I worked nine years at that heading +factory in the east end (of Pine Bluff). + +"I used to vote. When I was in north Arkansas, I voted in all kinds of +elections. But after I come down here to Jefferson County, I couldn't +vote in nothin' but the presidential elections. + +"I don't think the young people are goin' to amount to much. They are a +heap wilder than when I was young. They got a chance to graduate +now--something I didn't get to do. + +"I never went to school a day in my life, but the white people where I +worked learned me to read and write." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +This man could easily pass for a white person. + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Annie Parks + 720 Pulaski Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: About 80 +Occupation: Formerly house and field work + + +"I was born and raised in Mer Rouge, Louisiana. That is between here and +Monroe. I have been here in Little Rock more than twenty-five years. + +"My mother's name was Sarah Mitchell. That was her married name. I don't +know what her father's name was. My father's name was Willis Clapp. He +was killed in the first war--the Civil War. My father went to the war +from Mer Rouge, Louisiana. I don't remember him at all. But that is what +my mother told me about him. My mother said he had very good people. +After he married my mother, old man Offord bought him. Offord's name was +Warren Offord. They buried him while I was still there in Mer Rouge. He +was a old-time Mason. That was my mother's master--in olden days. + +"His grandmother took my mother across the seas with her. She (his +grandmother) died on shipboard, and they throwed her body into the +water. There's people denies it, but my mother told me it was so. Young +Davenport is still living. He is a relative of Offords. My mother never +did get no pension for my father. + + +Slave House and Occupation + +"I was born in a log house. There were two doors--a front and a +back--and there were two windows. My mother had no furniture 'cept an +old-time wooden bed--big bed. She was a nurse all the time in the house. +I heard her say she milked and waited on them in the house. My father's +occupation was farming during slavery times. + +"My mother always said she didn't have no master to beat on her. I like +to tell the truth. My mother's master never let no overseer beat his +slaves around. She didn't say just what we had to eat. But they always +give us a plenty, and there wasn't none of us mistreated. + +"My father could have an extra patch and make a bale of cotton or +whatever he wanted to on it. That was so that he could make a little +money to buy things for hisself and his family. And if he raised a bale +of cotton on his patch and wanted to sell it to the agent, that was all +right. + + +Family + +"I have a brother named Manuel Clayton. If he's living still, he is +younger than I am. He is the baby boy. I doesn't remember his father at +all. I had five sisters with myself and two brothers. All of them were +older than me except Manuel. My mother had one brother and two sisters. +Her brother's name was Lin Urbin. We always called him Big Buddy. He +hasn't been so long died. My older brother is named Willis Clayton--if +he's still living. Willis has a half dozen sons. He is my oldest +brother. He lives way out in the country 'round Mer Rouge. + + +Freedom + +"My mother said they promised to them money when they were freed. Some +of them gave them something, and some of them didn't. My mother's folks +didn't give her nothin'. The Government didn't give her nothin' either. +I don't know just who told her she was free nor how. I don't remember +myself. + + +Patrollers and Ku Klux + +"I never heard much about pateroles. My mother said they used to whip +you if they would catch you out without a pass. I heard her talk about +the Ku Klux after freedom. + + +Slave Worship + +"My mother could always go to church on Sunday. Her slave-time preacher +was Tom Johnson. Henry Soates and Watt Taylor were slavery-time +preachers too. Old man Jacob Anderson too was a great preacher in slave +time. There was a big arbor where they held church. That was outdoors. +There was just a wood frame and green leaves laid over it. Hundreds of +people sat under there and heard the Gospel preached. The Offords didn't +care how much you worshipped. If I was with them, I wouldn't have no +trouble. + +"In the winter time they had a small place to meet in. They built a +church after the war. When I went home, eight or nine years ago, I +walked all 'round and looked at all the old places. + + +Health + +"You know my remembrance comes and goes. I ain't had no good remembrance +since I been sick. I been mighty sick with high blood pressure. I can't +work and I can't even go out. I'm 'fraid I'll fall down and get myself +hurt or run over. + + +Support + +"I don't get no help 'cept what my daughter gives me. I can't get no Old +Age Pension. I never did get nothin' for my father. My mother didn't +either. He was killed in the war, but they didn't give nobody nothin' +for his death. They told me they'd give me something and then they told +me they wouldn't. I'm dependent on what my daughter does for me. If I +was back in Mer Rouge, I wouldn't have no trouble gettin' a pension, nor +nothin' else. + + +Slave Marriages on the Offord Plantation + +"My mother said they just read 'em together, slavery times. I think she +said that the preacher married them on the Offord plantation. They +didn't get no license. + + +Amusements + +"They had quiltings and corn shuckings. I don't know what other +amusements they had, but I know everything was pleasant on the Offord +plantation. + +"If slaves went out without a pass, my mother said her master wouldn't +allow them to beat on them when they come in. They had plenty to eat, +and they had substantial clothes, and they had a good fire. + + +Age + +"I don't know how old I am. I was born before the war. My father went to +the war when it begun. I had another brother that was born before the +war. He don't remember nothin' about my father. I don't neither. I was +too young." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +Allowing for a year's difference between the two youngest children, and +allowing that the boy was born immediately before the War, the girl +could not be younger than seventy-eight. She could be older. She states +all facts as through her mother, but she seems to have experienced some +of the things she relates. Her memory is fading. Failure to get pension +or old age assistance oppresses her mind. She comes back to it again and +again. She carries her card and her commodity order with her in her +pocketbook. + +She had asked me to write some letters for her when her daughter +interfered and said that she didn't want it done. She said that she had +told the case worker that her husband worked at the Missouri Pacific +Shop and that the case worker had asked her if she wouldn't provide for +her mother. They live in a neat rented house. The mother weighs about a +hundred and ten pounds and is tall. The daughter is about the same +height but weighs about two hundred and fifty. Time and again, the old +lady tried to convey to me a message that she didn't want her daughter +to hear, but I could not make it out. The daughter was belligerent, as +is sometimes the case, and it was only by walking in the very middle of +the straight and narrow path that I managed to get my story. + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Austin Pen Parnell + 4314 W. Seventeenth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 73 +Occupation: Carpenter + + +Birth and General Fact About Life + +"I was born April fifteenth, 1865, the day Lincoln was assassinated, in +Carroll County, Mississippi, about ten miles from Grenada. It's about +half the distance between Grenada and Carrollton. Carrollton is our +county seat but we went to Grenada more than we went to Carrollton. + +"When I got older, I moved to Grenada and I come from there here. I was +about thirty-five years old when I moved to Grenada. About 160 acres of +land in Grenada was mine. I bought it, but heirs claimed the place and I +had to leave. I had no land then, only a lot here and I came over here +to look it over. A lady had come to Mississippi selling property and she +had a plat which she said was in Little Rock not far from the capitol. +Her name was Mrs. Putman. The place was on the other side of the +Fourche. But I didn't know that until I came here. She misguided me. I +came to Arkansas and looked at the lot and didn't want it. I made a trip +over here twice before I settled on living in Little Rock. I told the +others who had bought property from her the truth about its location. +They asked me and I hate to lie. I didn't knock; I just answered +questions and didn't volunteer nothing. They all quit making their +payments, Just like I did. My land had a rock on it as big as a bale of +cotton. + +"Mr. Herring thought hard of me because I told the others the truth. I +went into the office one day and Mr. Herring said, 'Parnell, I +understand you have been knocking on me.' I said, 'Well, I'll tell you, +Mr. Herring, if telling the truth about things is knocking on them, I +certainly did.' He never said anything more about it, and I didn't +either. + +"I rented a place on Twelfth and Maple and then rented around there two +or three times, and finally bought a place at 3704 West Twelfth Street. +I moved to Little Rock March 18, 1911. That was twenty-seven years ago. + + +Parents + +"My father was named Henry Parnell. He died in the year 1917 in the time +of the great war. He was ninety-five years old when he died. His master +had the same name. My mother's name was Priscilla Parnell. She belonged +to the same family as he did. They married before freedom. My father was +a farmer and my mother was a housewife and she'd work in the field too. + +"My grandmother on my mother's side was named Hester Parnell. I don't +know what her husband's name was. My mother, father, and grandmother +were all from North Carolina. My grandmother did house and field work. + + +House + +"My mother and father lived in a two-room house hewed out of big +logs--great big logs. The logs were about four inches thick and twelve +inches wide. It didn't take many of them to build a wall--about ten or +twelve of them on a side. They were notched down so as to almost come +together. They chinked up the cracks with mud and covered it with a +board. + +"I laid in bed many a night and looked up through the cracks in the +roof. Snow would come through there when it snowed and cover the bed +covers. We thought you couldn't build a roof so that it would keep out +rain and snow, but we were mistaken. Before you would make a fire in +them days, you had to sweep out the snow so that it wouldn't melt up in +the house and make a mess. But we kept healthy just the same. Didn't +have no pneumonia in those days. + +"The house had two rooms about eight feet apart. The rooms were +connected by a hall which we called a gallery in those days. The hall +was covered by the same roof as the house and it had the same floor. The +house sot east and west and had a chimney in each end. The chimneys were +made out of sticks and mud. I can build a chimney now like that. + +"It was large at the bottom and tapered at the top. It was about six or +seven feet square at the bottom. It grew smaller as it went toward the +top. You could get a piece of wood three and a half or four feet long in +the boddom of it. Sometimes the wood would be too large to carry and you +would just have to roll it in. + +"The floors was boards about one by twelve. There were two doors in each +room--one leading outside and the other to the hall. If there were any +windows, I can't remember them. We didn't need no windows for +ventilation. + +"This was the house that I remember first after freedom. I remember +living in it. That was about seven or eight years after freedom. My +father rented it from the big man named Alf George for whom he worked. +Mr. George used to come out and eat breakfast with us. We'd get that +hoecake out of the ashes and wash it off until it looked like it was as +clean as bread cooked in a skillet. I have seen my grandmother cook a +many a one in the fire. We didn't use no skillet for corn bread. The +bread would have a good firm crust on it. But it didn't get too hard to +eat and enjoy. + +"She'd take a poker before she put the bread in and rake the ashes off +the hearth down to the solid stone or earth bottom, and the ashes would +be banked in two hills to one side and the other. Then she would put the +batter down on it; the batter would be about an inch thick and about +nine inches across. She'd put down three cakes at a time and let 'em +stay there till the cakes were firm--about five minutes on the bare hot +hearth. They would almost bake before she covered them up. Sometimes she +would lay down as many as four at a time. The cakes had to be dry before +they were covered up, because if the ashes ever stuck to them while they +were wet, there would be ashes in them when you would take them out to +eat. She'd take her poker then and rake the ashes back on the top of the +cakes and let 'em stay there till the cakes were done. I don't know just +how long--maybe about ten or twelve minutes. She knew how long to cook +them. Then she'd rake down the hearth gently, backward and forward, with +the poker till she got down to them and then she'd put the poker under +them and lift them out. That poker was a kind of flat iron. It wasn't a +round one. Then we'd wash 'em off like I told you and they be ready to +eat. + +"Mr. George would eat the ash cake and drink sweet milk. 'Auntie, I want +some of that ash cake and some of that good sweet milk.' We had plenty +of cows. + +"Two-thirds of the water used in the ash cake was hot water, and that +made the batter stick together like it was biscuit dough. She could put +it together and take it in her hand and pat it out flat and lay it on +the hearth. It would be just as round! That was the art of it! + +"When I go back to Mississippi, I'm going back to that house again. I +don't remember seeing the house I was born in. But I was told it was an +ordinary log house just like those all the other slaves had,--just a +one-room log house. + + +Freedom + +"My father went to the War. He was on the Confederate side. They carried +him there as a worker. They cut down all the timber 'round the place +where they were to keep the Yankee gunboats from shelling them and +knocking the logs down on them. But them Yankees were sharp. They stayed +away till everything got dry as a chip. Then they come down and set all +that wood afire with their shells, and the wind seemed to be in their +favor. The Rebels had to get away from there. + +"He got sick before the War closed and he had to come home. His young +master and the other folks stayed there four or five months longer. His +young master was named Tom. When Tom came home, he waited about five or +six months before he would tell them they was free. Then he said, 'You +all free as I am. You can stay here if you want or you can go. You are +free.' They all got together and told him that if he would treat them +right he wouldn't have to do no work. They would stay and do his work +and theirs too. They would work the land and he would give them their +part. I don't know just what the agreement was. I think it was about a +third. Anyway, they worked on shares. When the landlord furnished a team +usually it was halves. But when the worker furnished his own team, it +was usually two-thirds or three-fourths that the worker got. But none of +them owned teams at that time. They were just turned loose. We stayed +there with them people a good while. I don't know just how long, but it +was several years. + + +Catching a Hog + +"One time a slave went to steal a hog. I don't know the name of the man; +I just hear my father tell what happened, and I'm repeating it. It was a +great big hog and kind of wild. His plan to catch the hog was to climb a +tree and carry a yeer of corn up the tree and at the same time he'd +carry a long rope. He had put a running noose in the end of the rope and +laid it on the ground and shelled the corn into the ring. He had the +other end of the rope tied around himself; he was up the tree. About the +time he got the noose pulled up around the hog so that he could tighten +up on it, he dropped his hat and scared the hog. The hog didn't know he +was around until the hat fell, and the falling of the hat scared it so +that it made a big jump and ran a little ways off. That jerked the man +out of the tree. Him falling scared the hog a second time and got him to +running right. He was a big stout hog, and the man's weight didn't hold +him back much. The man didn't know what to do to stop the hog. The hog +was running draggin' him along, snatching him over logs. There was +nothin' else he could do, so he tried prayer. But the hog didn't stop. +Seemed like even the Lord couldn't stop him. Then he questioned the +Lord; he said, 'Lawd, what sawt [HW: sort] of a Lawd is you? You can +stop the wind; you can stop the rain; you can stop the ocean; but you +can't stop this hog.' + +"The hog ran till he came to a big ditch. He jumped the ditch, but the +man fell in it, and that compelled the hog to stop. The man's hollering +made somebody hear him and come and git him loose from the hog. He was +so glad to git loose, he didn't mind losing the hog and gettin' +punished. He didn't get the hog. He just got a lot of bruises. I don't +remember just how they punished him. + + +Ku Klux Klan + +"Once after the War there was a lot of colored people at a prayer +meeting. It was in the winter and they had a fire. The Ku Klux come up. +They just stood outside the door, but the people thought they were +coming in and they got scared. They didn't know hardly how to get out. +One man got a big shovelful of hot coals and ashes out of the fireplace +and threw it out over them, and while they was dusting off the ashes and +coals, the niggers all got away. + + +Patrollers + +"I remember my father telling tales about the patrollers, but I can't +remember them just now. There was an old song about them. Part of it +went like this: + + 'Run, nigger, run + The pateroles'll get you. + + That nigger run + That nigger flew + That nigger bust + His Sunday shoe. + + Run, nigger, run + The pateroles'll get you.' + +That's all I know of that. There is more to it. I used to hear the boys +sing it, and I used to hear 'em pick it out on the banjo and the guitar. + + +Old Massa Goes 'Way + +"Old massa went off one time and left the niggers. He told 'em that he +was goin' to New York. He jus' wanted to see what they would do if they +thought he was away. The niggers couldn't call the name New York, and +they said, 'Old massa's gone to PhilameYawk.' + +"They went in the pantry and got everything they wanted to eat. And they +had a big feast. While they were feasting, the old man came in disguised +as a tramp--face smutty and clothes all dirty and raggedy. They couldn't +tell who he was. He walked up just as though he wanted to eat and begged +the boys for something to eat. The boys said to him, 'Stan' back, you +shabby rascal, you; _if'n_ they's anything left, you get some; _if'n_ +they ain't none left, you get none. This is our time. Old massa done +gone to PhilameYawk and we're having a big time.' + +"After they were through, they did give him a little something but they +still didn't know him. I never did learn the details about what happened +after they found out who the tramp was. My father told me about it. + + +Whipping a Slave + +"I heard my father say his old master give him two licks with a whip +once. Him and another man had been off and they came in. Master drove up +in a double surrey. He had been to town and had bought the boys a pair +of boots apiece. He told them as he got out of the surrey to take his +horses out and feed them. My father's friend was there with him and he +said: 'Le's get our boots before we feed the horses.' After that the +master walked out on the porch and he had on crying boots. The horses +heard them squeaking and they nickered. + +"Master said, 'Henry, I thought I told you to feed them horses. Henry +was so taken aback that he couldn't say a thing. Henry was my father, +you know. Master went and got his cowhide. He said, 'Are you going to +obey my orders?' About the time he said that, he hit my father twice +with the cowhide, and my father said, 'Oh pray, master, oh pray,' and he +let him go. He beat the other fellow pretty bad because he told him to +'Le's get the boots first.' + +"Old master would get drunk sometimes and get on the niggers and beat +them up. He would have them stark naked and would be beating them. Then +old missis would come right out there and stop him. She would say, 'I +didn't come all the way here from North Carolina to have my niggers beat +up for nothin'.' She'd take hold of the cowhide, and he would have to +quit. My father had both her picture and the old man's. + + +Prayer + +"I can remember how my mother used to pray out in the field. We'd be +picking cotton. She would go off out there in the ditch a little ways. +It wouldn't be far, and I would listen to her. She would say to me: +'Pray, son,' and I would say, 'Mother, I don't know how to pray,' and +she would say, 'Well, just say Lord have mercy.' That gave me religious +inclinations. I cultivated religion from that time on. I would try to +pray and finally I learned. One day I was out in the field and it was +pouring down rain, and I was standing up with tears in my eyes trying to +pray as she taught me to. We weren't picking cotton then. I was just +walking out. My mother was dead. I would be walking out and whenever I +would get the notion I would stop right there and go to praying. + +"In slave times, they would have a prayer meeting out in some of the +places and they would turn a pot down out in front of the door. It would +be on a stick or something and raised up a short distance from the +ground so that it wouldn't set flat on the ground. It seems that that +would catch the sound and keep it right around there. They would sing +that old song: + + 'We will camp awhile in the wilderness + And then I'm going home.' + +I don't know any more of the words of that song. + + +Early Schooling + +"I started to school when I was about six or seven years old. I didn't +get to school regular because my father had plenty of work and he had a +habit of taking me out to help him when he needed me in his work. + +"My first teacher was a white man named Jones. I don't remember his +first name. He was a northerner and a Republican. He taught in the +public school with us. His boy, John, and his girl, Louisa, went to the +same school, and were in classes with us. The kids would beat them up +sometimes but he didn't cut up about it. He was pretty good man. + +"After him, I had a colored man named M.E. Davis as a teacher. He would +say to my father, 'Henry, that is a bright boy; he will be a credit to +you if you will keep him at school and give him a chance. Don't make him +lose so much time.' My father would say, 'Yes, that is right.' But as +soon as another job came up, he would keep me out again. + +"I soon got so my learning was a help to him in his work. Whenever any +figuring was to be done, I had to do it if it was done right. He never +had a chance to get any schooling and he couldn't figure well. So they +used to beat him out of plenty when he would work for them. One day we +had picked cotton for a white man and when the time came to pay off, the +man paid father, but I noticed that he didn't give him all he should +have. I didn't say anything while we was standing there but after we got +away I said, 'Papa, he didn't give you the right money.' + +"Papa said, 'How much should he have given me?' + +"I told him, and he said to me, 'Will you say that to him?' + +"I said, 'Yes, papa.' + +"He turned 'round and we went on back to the place and pa said, 'My boy +says you didn't pay me all that was comin' to me.' + +"The white man turned to me at once and said, 'How much was coming to +him?' + +"I told him. + +"He said, 'What makes you think that?' + +"I said, 'We picked so many pounds of cotton at so much per hundred +pounds, and that would amount to so many dollars and so many cents.' + +"When I said that, he fell over on the ground and like to killed his +self laughing. He counted out the right money to my father and said, +'Henry, you better watch that little skinny-eyed nigger; he knows +something.' + + +Present Support + +"I don't got anything from the government. I live by what little I make +at odd jobs." + + +Note: In this interview this man used correct English most of the time +and the interview is given in his own words. Lapses into dialect will be +noticed. + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Ben Parr, Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 85 next March (1938) + + +"I was born in Tennessee close to Ripley. My master was Charles Warpoo +and Catherine Warpoo. They had three boys and two girls. They owned my +mama and me and Gentry was the oldest child. He died last year. My mama +raised twelve children. My papa belong to people over on the Mississippi +River. Their name was Parr but I couldn't tell a thing about them. When +I come to know about them was after freedom. There was Jim Parr, Dick +Parr, Columbus Parr. We lived on their place. Both my parents was farm +hands, and all twelve children wid them. + +"Well, the first I recollect is that we lived on the five acre lot, the +big house, and some of the slaves lived in houses around the big yard +all fenced with pailings and nice pickett fence in front of Charlie +Warpoo's house. We played around under the trees all day. The soldiers +come nearly every day and nearly et us out of house and home. The blue +coats seemed the hungriest or greediest pear lack. They both come. +Master didn't go to war; his boys was too young to go, so we was all at +home. My papa shunned the war. He said he didn't give a pickayune +whether he be free or not, it wouldn't do no good if he be dead nohow. +He didn't live with us doe (though). They kept papa pretty well hid out +with stock in the Mississippi River bottoms. He wasn't scared ceptin' +when he come over to see my mama and us. When we come to know anything +we was free. + +"I never seen nobody sold. None of my folks was sold. The folks raised +my mama and they didn't want her to leave. The folks raised papa what +had him at freedom. He said him and mama was married long before the war +sprung up. I don't know how they married nor where. She was young when +they married. + +"I remember hearing mama say when you went to preaching you sit in the +back of the church and sit still till the preaching was all over. They +had no leaving. + +"I know when I was a child people raised children, now they let them +grow up. Children was sent off or out to play, not sit and listen to +what grown folks had to say. Now the children is educated and too smart +to listen to good advice. They are going to ruination. Mama used to have +our girls knit at night and she spin, weave, sew. They would tell us how +to be polite and honest and how to work. Young folks too smart to take +advice now. + +"Mama was cooking at the Warpoo's house; she cooked breakfast. One +morning I woke up and here was a yard full of 'Feds.' I was hungry. I +went through the whole regiment--a yard full--to mama hard as I could +split. They didn't bother me. I was afraid they would carry me off +sometimes. They was great hands to tease and worry the little Negro +children. + +"Over at Dyersburg, Tennessee the Ku Klux was bad. Jefferie Segress was +pretty prosperous, owned his own home. John Carson whooped him, cut his +ear off, treated him bad. High Sheriff they said was a 'Fed.' He put +twenty-four buck shots in John Carson. That was the last of the Ku Klux +at Dyersburg. The Negroes all left Dyersburg. They kept leaving. The +'Feds' was meaner to them than the owners. In 1886, three weeks before +Christmas, one hundred head of Negroes got off the train here at +Brinkley. The Ku Klux was the tail end of the war, whooping around. It +was a fight between the 'Feds' and the old owners--both sides telling +the Negroes what to do. The best way was stay at home and work to keep +out of trouble. + +"The bushwhackers killed Raymond Jones (black man) before the war +closed. Well, I don't know what they ambushed for. + +"I paid my own way to Arkansas. I brought my wife. Mama was dead. + +"If the Negro is a taxpayer he ought to vote like white folks. But they +can't run the government. That was tried out after that war we been +talking about. Our color has faith in white folks and this is their +country. I vote some. We got a good right to vote. We helped clear out +the country. It is our home now. + +"The present times is too fast. I can't place this young generation. + +"This is my second wife I'm living wid now. She's got children. I never +had a child. We gets $10 off of the Welfare and I work around at pick-up +jobs. I farmed all my whole life." + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Frank A. Patterson + 906 Chester Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 88 + + +"I was born in Raleigh, North Carolina in 1850. My father was born in +Baltimore, Maryland. My mother and father was sold into Bibb County, +Georgia. I don't know how much they sold for. I don't know how much they +paid for them. I don't know how much the speculator asked for them. Used +to have them in droves and you would go in and pick 'em out and pay +different amounts for them. + +"I was never sold. My old boss didn't believe in selling slaves. He +would buy 'em but he wouldn't sell 'em. I'll say that much for him. + + +Master + +"I belonged to a man named Thomas Johnson Cater. + + +Houses + +"They lived in log houses. Some of them had weatherboard houses but the +majority of them was log houses. Two doors and one window. Some of them +had plank floors. Some of them had floors what was hewed, you know, +sills. They had stick and dirt chimneys. Some of them had brick +chimneys. It depended on the master--on the situation of the master. + + +Furniture + +"They just had bunks built up side the wall. The best experienced +colored people had these teester beds. Didn't have no slats. Had ropes. +They called 'em cord beds sometimes. They had tables just like we have +now what they made themselves. Chairs were long benches made out of +planks. Little kids had big blocks to sit on where they sawed off +timber. + +"They had what they called a cupboard to keep the food in. Some of them +had chests made out of planks, you know. That is the way they kept it. +They put a hasp and steeple on it so as to keep the children out when +they was gone to the field. + + +Food + +"They give 'em three pounds of meat a week, peck of meal, pint of +molasses; some of them give 'em three to five pounds of flour on a +Sunday morning according to the size of the family. The majority of them +had shorts from the wheat. Some of the slaves would clean up a flat in +the bottoms and plant rice in it. That was where they would allow the +slaves to have truck patches. + +"Some few of them had chickens that was allowed to have them. Same of +them had owners that wouldn't allow their slaves to own chickens. They +never allowed them to have hogs or cows. Wherever there was a family +that had a whole lot of children they would allow them to have a cow to +milk for to get milk for their children. They claimed the cow, but the +master was the owner of it. It belonged to him. He would just let them +milk it. He would just let them raise their children off of the milk it +gave. + + +Clothes + +"There was no child ever had a pair of shoes until he got old enough to +go in the field. That was when he was twelve years old. That is about +all I know about it. + + +Schooling + +"I never went to school in my life. I got hold of one of them old blue +back spelling books. My young boss gave it to me after I was free. He +told me that I was free now and I had to think and act for myself. + + +Signs of War + +"Before the War I saw the elements all red as blood and I saw after that +a great comet; and they said there was going to be a war. + + +Memories of the Pre-War Campaign + +"When Fillmore, Buchanan, and Lincoln ran for President one of my old +bosses said, 'Hurrah for Buchanan,' and I said, 'Hurrah for Lincoln.' +One of my mistresses said, 'Why do you say, 'Hurrah for Lincoln?' And I +said, 'Because he's goin' to set me free.' + +"During that campaign, Lincoln came to North Carolina and ate breakfast +with my master. In those days, the kitchen was off from the house. They +had for breakfast ham with cream gravy made out of sweet milk and they +had biscuits, poached eggs on toast, coffee and tea, and grits. They had +waffles and honey and maple syrup. That was what they had for breakfast. + +"He told my old boss that our sons are 'ceivin' children by slaves and +buyin' and sellin' our own blood and it will have to be stopped. And +that is what I know about that. + + +Refugeeing + +"At the close of the War, we had refugeed down in Houston County in +Georgia. + + +War Memories + +"Sherman's army came through there looking for Jeff Davis, and they told +me that they wasn't fightin' any more,--that I was free. + +"They said, 'You ain't got no master and no mistress.' They et dinner +there. All the old folks went upstairs and turned the house over to me +and the cook. And they et dinner. One of them said, 'My little man, +bring your hat 'round now and we are going to pay you,' and they passed +the hat 'round and give me a hat full of money. I thought it wasn't no +good and I carried it and give it to my old mistress, but it was good. + +"They asked me if I had ever seen Jeff Davis. I said 'No.' Then they +said, 'That's him sittin' there.' He had on a black dress and a pair of +boots and a mantilla over his shoulders and a Quaker bonnet and a black +veil. + +"They got up from the dining table and Sherman ordered them to 'Recover +arms.' He had on a big black hat full of eagles and he had stars and +stripes all over him. That was Sherman's artillery. They had mules with +pots and skillets, and frying pans, and axes, and picks, grubbing hoes, +and spades, and so on, all strapped on those mules. And the mules didn't +have no bridles but they went on just as though they had bridles. One of +the Yanks started a song when he picked up his gun. + + 'Here's my little gun + His name is number one + Four and five rebels + We'll slay 'em as they come + Join the ban' + The rebels understan' + Give up all the lan' + To my brother Abraham + Old Gen'l Lee + Who is he? + He's not such a man + As our Gen'l Grant + Snap Poo, Snap Peter + Real rebel eater + I left my ply stock + Standin' in the mould + I left my family + And silver and gold + Snap Poo, Snap Peter + Real rebel eater + Snap Poo, Snap Peter.' + +"And General Sherman gave the comman', 'Silence', and 'Silence' roared +one man, and it rolled all down the line, 'Silence, silence, silence, +silence.' And they all got silent. + + +How Freedom Came + +"They had a notification for a big speaking and that was in Perry, +Georgia. Everybody that was able throughout the State went to that +convention where that speaking was. And that is where peace was +declared. Every man was his own free agent. 'No more master, no more +mistress. You are your own free moral agent. Think and act for +yourself.' That is how it was declared. I didn't go to the meeting. I +was right there in the town. There was too many people there. You +couldn't stir them with hot fire. But my mother and father went. + + +What the Slaves Expected + +"They didn't expect anything but freedom. Some of them didn't have sense +enough to secure a home for themselves. They didn't have no sense. Some +of them wasn't eligible to speak for themselves. They wanted somebody to +speak for them. + + +What They Got + +"I don't know that they got anything. + + +Immediately After the War + +"Right after the War, I stayed with the people that owned me and worked. +They give me two dollars a month and my food and clothes. I stayed with +them five years and then I quit. I had sense enough to quit and I went +to work for wages. I got five dollars a month. And I thought that was a +big salary. I didn't know no better. I learnt better by experience. + + +Negroes in Politics + +"Just after the War, the Republicans used to have representatives at the +state convention. After the Democrats got in power, they knocked all +that in the head. Colored people used to be on juries. But they won't +let them serve now. (Negroes served on local grand jury last year.) + +"I knew one nigger politician in Georgia named I.B. Simons. He was a +school-teacher. He never held any office. I knowed a nigger politician +here by the name of John Bush. He had the United States Land Office. +When the Democrats got in power they put him out. I knowed another +fellow used to be here named Crockett Brown. He lived in Lee County, +Arkansas. He was a Congressman. I don't know whether he ever got to the +White House or not. I ain't never seen no account of it. I can't tell +you all any more now. + + +Memories of Fred Douglass + +"I knowed Fred Douglass. I shook hands with him and talked with him here +in Little Rock. They give him the opera house. We had the first floor. +The white folks had the gallery. That was when the Republicans were in +power. + +"He said: 'They all seem to be amazed and dumbfounded over me having a +white woman for a wife.' He said, 'You all don't know that my father was +my mother's master and she was as black as a crow. Don't it seem natural +that history should repeat itself? have often wondered why he liked such +a black woman as my mother. I was jus' a chip off the old block.' + + +Voting + +"I voted for U.S. Grant. He was the first President we had after the +Civil War. I shook hands with him twice in Little Rock. He put up at the +Capitol Hotel and I was a-cooking there. + +"I voted for McKinley. I saw him too. I had a walking cane with his head +on it. That is about all I remember right now. He was the one that got +up this gold standard. He liked to put this state under bayonet laws +when he was working under that gold standard. The South was bitterly +against him. + + +Occupation + +"I followed cooking all my life. I have had the white peoples' lives in +my hand all my life. I worked on the Government boat, _Wichita_. It went +out of season and they built a boat called the _Arkansas_. I cooked on +it. Captain Griffin was the master of it. When it went out of service, +Captain Newcome from the War Department transferred me over to the +Mississippi River on the _Arthur Hider_ (?). My headquarters were in +Greenville, Mississippi. It was far from home, so after nine months I +quit and came home (Little Rock). Captain Van Frank give me a position +on a dredge boat and the people were so bad on there I wouldn't stay. I +came away. I wouldn't stay 'mongst 'em. + + +Religion + +"I want you to know that I am a Christian and I want you to know I ain't +got no compromise with nobody on God's word. I ain't got but one way and +that is the way Jesus said: + +Come unto me all ye that are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. +He that believeth on me shall be saved. + +You all fix anything anyway you want. I ain't bothered 'bout you. + +"My people were good Christian people." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: John Patterson, Helena, Arkansas +Age: 74 + + +"I was born near Paducah, Kentucky. Mother was never sold. She belong to +Master Arthur Patterson. Mother was what folks called black folks. I +never seen a father to know. I never heard mother say a thing about my +father if I had one. He never was no use to me nor her neither. Mother +brought me here in time of the Civil War. I was four years old. We come +here to be kept from the Yankee soldiers. We was sent with some of the +Pattersons. At the end of the war mother cooked for Nick Rightor (?) and +his wife here in North Helena. He was a farmer but his son is a ear, +eye, nose specialist. + +"I farmed, cleaned house and yards for these Helena people. I was +janitor at the Episcopal church in Helena sixteen years and four months. +They paid me forty-five dollars a month. + +"Yes ma'am, I have heard about the Ku Klux. Heard talk but never seen +one. + +"I never been in jail. I never been drunk. Folks in Helena will tell you +John Patterson can be trusted. + +"I saved up one thousand dollars, just let it slip. The present times +are hard. Times are hard. I get ten dollars and comissary helps. I got +one in family. + +"I think mother said she was treated very good in slavery. She didn't +tell me much about it. + +"I own a home. It come through a will from my aunt. My uncle was a +drayman here in Helena and a close liver. I want to hold to it if I can. + +"If you'd ask me what all ain't took place since I been here I could +come nigh telling you. We had colored officers here. Austin Barrer was +sheriff. Half of the officers was colored at one time. John Jones was +police. No, they wasn't friends of mine. I seen these levies built. One +was here in 1897. It was rebuilt then. + +"It seems to me the country is going down. When they put in the Stock +Law people had to sell so much stock. Milch cows sold for six dollars a +head. People that want and need stock have no place to raise it. People +are not as industrious as they was and they accumolate more it seems to +me. We used to make our living at home. I think that is the best way. + +"I voted a Republican ticket years ago. I don't believe in women voting. +The Lord don't believe in that. I belong to the Baptist church. + +"Young folks don't act on education principles. Folks used to fight with +fist. Now one shoots the other down. Times are not improving morally. +Folks don't even think it is wrong to take things; that is stealing. +They drink up all the money they can get. I don't see no colored folks +ever save a dollar. They did long time ago. Thaes worse in some ways. + +"I forgot our plough songs: + + 'I wonder where my darling is.' + + 'Nigger makes de cotton and de + White man gets the money.' + +"Everybody used to sing. We worked from sun to sun; we courted and was +happy. People not happy now. They are craving now. About four o'clock we +all start up singing. Sing till dark." + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Sarah Jane Patterson + 2611 Orange Street, North Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 90 + + +"I was born in Bartow County, Georgia, January 17, 1848. You can go +there and look in that Bible over there and you will find it all written +down. My mama kept a record of all our ages. Her old mistress kept the +record and gave it to my mother after freedom. + + +Parents + +"My parents were Joe Patterson and Mary Adeline Patterson. My mother's +name before she married was Mary Adeline Huff. My grandfather on my +mother's side was named Huff. My mother's sisters were Mahala, and +Sallie. And them's the onliest two I remember. She had two brothers but +I don't remember their names. + + +How Freedom Came + +"I was living in Bartow County in north Georgia when freedom came. I +don't remember how the slaves found it out. I remember them saying, +'Well, they's all free.' And that is all I remember. And I remember some +one saying--asking a question, 'You got to say master?' And somebody +answered and said, 'Naw.' But they said it all the same. They said it +for a long time. But they learned better though. + + +Family + +"I have brother Willis, Lizzie, Mary, Maud, and myself. There was four +sisters and one brother. I had just one child--a boy. He lived to be a +grown man and raised a family. His wife had three children and all of +them is gone. The father, the mother, and the children. I was a woman. I +wasn't no man. I just had one child, but the Lord blessed me. I have +three sisters and a brother dead. + + +Master + +"My old master's name was John Patterson and my old mistress was named +Lucy Patterson. She had a son named Bill and a son named Tommy and a son +named Charles, and a boy named Bob, and a girl named Marion. We are so +for apart they can't help me none. I know Bob's boys are dead because +they got killed in a fight in Texas. + + +Crippled in Slave Time + +"I been crippled all my life. We was on the lawn playing and the white +boy had been to the pond to water the horses. He came back and said he +was going to run over us. We all ran and climbed up on the top of a ten +rail fence. The fence gave 'way and broke and fell down with us. I +caught the load. They all fell on me. It knocked the knee out of place. +They carried me to Stilesboro to Dr. Jeffrey, a white doctor in slavery +time. I don't know what he did, but he left me with my knee out of joint +after he treated it. I can't work my toes and I have to walk with that +stick. + + +Soldiers + +"I was a tot when I seen the soldiers coming dressed in blue, and I run. +They was very nice to the colored people, never beat 'em or nothin'. I +was in Bartow County when they come through. They took a lot of things, +but I can't remember exactly what it was. I 'tended to the children +then--both the white and colored children, but mostly the white. + + +Good Masters + +"My old master, John Patterson, never beat up the women and men he +bossed. + + +Patrollers + +"I have heard people talk about the pateroles raising sand with the +niggers. Some of the niggers would say they got whipped. I was small. I +would hear 'em say, 'The pateroles is out tonight.' + + +Ku Klux Klan + +"I have seed the old Ku Klux. That was after freedom. They came 'round +to my old master where my mama stayed. They were just after whipping +folks. Some of them they couldn't whip. + + +Support + +"I used to get a little money from Mr. Dent long as he was living. I +would go over there and he would give me a dollar or two. Since he's +been dead, his wife don't have much to give me. She gives me something +to eat sometimes but she doesn't have any money now that her husband is +dead. + +"I can't get up to the Welfare. Crippled as I am, I can't walk up and +down those stairs, and I can't git there nohow. I been tryin' to git +some one to take me up there. + +"Mr. Pratt helps me from time to time, but he ain't sent me nothin' now +in a good while. He's right smart busy, but if I go to him, I spect +he'll stir up somethin' for me. + + +Travels + +"I wouldn't never a left Bartow County, but the white people made out +that this was a rich country and you could make so much out here, and we +moved out here. We was young then. We came out on the train. It was a +long time back but it was too far to came on a wagon. I don't remember +just how long ago it was. + + +Occupation + +"I used to quilt until my fingers got too stiff. I got some patterns in +there now if you want to see them." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +The old lady took me in the house and showed me about a dozen quilts, +beautifully patterned and made. She had also some unfinished tops. She +says that she does not have much of a sale for them now because the +"quality of folks" who liked such things well enough to buy them "is +just about gone." + +She is crippled and unable to walk with facility. She has a great deal +of difficulty in getting off and on her porch. Still she does not +impress one as feeble so much as just disabled in one or two +particulars. She has a crippled knee, and both of her hands are +peculiarly stiff in the finger joints, one more so than the other. If it +were not for the disabilities, as old as she is, I believe that she +could give a good account of herself. + +I didn't have the heart to tell the old lady that her Bible record is +not what she thinks it is. It is not the old original record which her +mistress possessed. Neither is it the copy of the record of her mistress +which her mother kept. From questioning, I gather that the old mistress +dictated the original record to some one connected with her mother, +might have written it out herself on a sheet of paper. From time to +time, as new deaths and births occurred, scraps of paper containing them +were added to the first paper, and as the papers got worn, blurred, and +dog-eared, they were copied--probably not without errors. Time came when +the grandchildren up in the grades and with _semi-modern_[HW:?] ideas +copied the scraps into the family Bible. By that time aging and blurring +of the original lead pencil notes, together with recopying, had +invalidated the record till it is no longer altogether reliable. + +The births recorded in the Bible are as follows and in the exact order +given below: + + Mary Patterson 10-11-1866 + Harris Donesson 3-13- 72 + Lilley Donesson 7-21- 85 + Pearly Donesson 3-29- 92 + Silvay Williams 8-29- 84 + Beney Williams 11-24- 85 + Millia A. Williams 12-30- 88 + Joe Patterson 10- 3- 77 + H. Patterson 7-29- 79 + Maria E. Patterson 11-19- 81 + Jennie Patterson 12-24- 84 + Alex Patterson 7- 5- 86 + James Patterson 6-20- 90 + Janie Patterson 1-27- 60 + Amanda Patterson 1-28- 63 + James Rafield Walker 8-11- 99 + Cornelius Walker 7-21-1902 + Willie Walker 11-20- 03 + Elias Walker 7-21- 11 + Emmet Brown 1-23- 22 + Leon Harris 12-13- 21 + +The following marriages were given: + + May Lee Brown 2-26-1926 + James Walker Brown 2-21- 35 + Jennie Walker 6-20- 15 + Lillie Jean Walker 12-6- 36 + +The name of Sarah Jane Patterson is not in the list. The list itself is +not chronological. It is written in ink but in the stiff cramped hand to +be expected of a school child not yet thoroughly familiar with the pen. +The eye fixes on the name of Janie Patterson, 1-27-1860. It does not +seem probable that this is correct if it is meant to be Sarah Jane. +Sarah Jane could give no help except to answer questions about the +manner in which the record was made. + +These considerations led me to set the record aside in my own mind so +far as Sarah Jane Patterson's age is concerned and to take her word. She +has a very clear conception of the change from slavery to freedom. Her +memories are blurred and indistinct, but she recollects that this matter +was during slavery times and that during freedom. It seems that she had +the care of the smaller children during slavery time--at the time she +saw the soldiers marching through. This was not during the time of +freedom, because she distinguished clearly the Ku Klux time. She would +have to be at least eighty to have cared for children. Her tenacious +memory of ninety may have some foundation, therefore. + +Moreover where writing is done in lead pencil and hurriedly, six is +often made to look like four and a part of eight may become blurred till +it looks like a zero. That would account for 1848 being transcribed as +1860. There would be nothing unusual, however, in a Sarah Jane and a +Jane. I neglected to cover that point in a question. + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Solomon P. Pattillo + 1502 Martin Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 76 +Occupation: Formerly farmer, teacher, and small dealer--now blind + + +"I was born November 1862. I was three years old at the time of the +surrender. I was born right here in Arkansas--right down here in Tulip, +Dallas County, Arkansas. I have never been out of the state but twice. + + +Refugeeing + +"My daddy carried me out once when they took him to Texas during the war +to keep the Yanks from setting him free. + +"Then I went out once long after slavery to get a load of sand. On the +way back, my boat nearly sank. Those are the only two times I ever left +the state. + + +Parents + +"My father's name was Thomas Smith, but the Pattillos bought him and he +took the name of Pattillo. I don't know how much he sold for. That was +the only time he was ever sold. I believe that my father was born in +North Carolina. It seems like to me I recollect that is where he said he +was born. + +"My mother was born in Virginia. I don't know how she got here unless +she was sold like my father was. I don't know her name before she got +married. Yes, I do; her name was Fannie Smith, I believe. + + +Houses + +"We lived in old log cabins. We had bedsteads nailed to the wall. Then +we had them old fashioned cordboard springs. They had ropes made into +springs. That was a high class bed. People who had those cord springs +felt themselves. They made good sleeping. My father had one. Ropes were +woven back and forth across the bed frame. + +"We had those old spinning wheels. Three cuts was a day's work. A cut +was so many threads. It was quite a day to make them. They had hanks +too. The threads were all linked together. + +"My mother was a spinner. My father was a farmer. Both of them worked +for their master,--old Massa, they called him, or Massa, Mass Tom, Mass +John or Massta. + + +War Recollections + +"I remember during the war when I was in Texas with a family of Moody's +how old Mistiss had me packing rocks out of the yard in a basket and +cleaning the yard. I didn't know it then, but my daddy told me later +that that was when I was in Texas,--during the war. I remember that I +used to work in my shirt tail. + +"The soldiers used to come in the house somewhere and take anything they +could get or wanted to take. + + +Pateroles + +"When I was a boy they had a song, 'Run, Nigger, run; The Pateroles will +get you.' They would run you in and I have been told they would whip +you. If you overstayed your time when your master had let you go out, he +would notify the pateroles and they would hunt you up and turn you over +to him. + + +Church Meetings + +"Way long then, my father and mother used to say that man doesn't serve +the Lord--the true and living God and let it be known. A bunch of them +got together and resolved to serve Him any way. First they sang in a +whisper, 'Come ye that love the Lord.' Finally they got bold and began +to sing in tones that could be heard everywhere, 'Oh for a thousand +tongues to sing my Great Redeemer's praise.' + + +After the War + +"After the war my father fanned--made share crops. I remember once how +some one took his horse and left an old tired horse in the stable. She +looked like a nag. When she got rested up she was better than the one +that was took. + +"His first farm was down here in Dallas County. He made a share crop +with his former master, Pattillo. He never had no trouble with him. + + +Ku Klux + +"I heard a good deal of talk about the Ku Klux Klan, but I don't know +anything much about it. They never bothered my father and mother. My +father was given the name of being an obedient servant--among the best +help they had. + +"My father farmed all his life. He died at the age of seventy-two in +Tulip, near the year 1885, just before Cleveland's inauguration. He died +of typhoid pneumonia. My mother was ninety-six years old when she died +in 1909. + + +Little Rock + +"I came to Little Rock in 1894. I came up here to teach in Fourche Dam. +Then I moved here. I taught my first school in this county at Cato. I +quit teaching because my salary was so poor and then I went into the +butcher's business, and in the wood business. I farmed all the while. + +"I taught school for twenty-one years. I always was a successful +teacher. I did my best. If you contract to do a job for ten dollars, do +as much as though you were getting a hundred. That will always help you +to get a better job. + +"I have farmed all my life in connection with my teaching. I went into +other businesses like I said a moment ago. I was a caretaker at the +Haven of Rest Cemetery for sometime. + +"I was postmaster from 1904 to 1911 at Sweet Home. At one time I was +employed on the United States Census. + +"I get a little blind pension now. I have no other means of support. + + +Loss of Eyes + +"The doctor says I lost my eyesight on account of cataracts. I had an +operation and when I came home, I got to stirring around and it caused +me to have a hemorrhage of the eye. You see I couldn't stay at the +hospital because it was costing me $3 a day and I didn't have it. They +had to take one eye clean out. Nothing can be done for them, but somehow +I feel that the lord's going to let me see again. That's the way I feel +about it. + +"I have lived here in this world this long and never had a fight in my +life. I have never been mistreated by a white man in my life. I always +knew my place. Some fellows get mistreated because they get out of their +place. + +"I was told I couldn't stay in Benton because that was a white man's +town. I went there and they treated me white. I tried to stay with a +colored family way out. They were scared to take me. I had gone there to +attend to some business. Then I went to the sheriff and he told me that +if they were scared to have me stay at their home, I could stay at the +hotel and put my horse in the livery stable. I stayed out in the wagon +yard. But I was invited into the hotel. They took care of my horse and +fed it and they brought me my meals. The next morning, they cleaned and +curried and hitched my horse for me. + +"I have voted all my life. I never had any trouble about it. + +"The Ku Klux never bothered me. Nobody else ever did. If we live so that +everybody will respect us, the better class will always try to help us." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Carry Allen Patton + Forrest City, Arkansas +Age: 71 + + +"I was born in Shelby County, Tennessee. My parents was Tillie Watts and +Pierce Allen. He come from Louisiana reckly (directly) after the +surrender. My mother come from Virginia. She was sold in Virginia and +brought to middle Tennessee close to Murfreesboro and then brought to +Memphis and sold. She was dark and my father was too. They was living +close to Wilmar, Arkansas when the yellow fever was so bad. I don't +remember it. Heard them talk about it. + +"I heard my mother say how Mr. Jake Watts saved his money from the +Yankees. They had a great big rock flat on both sides. They put on the +joints of big meat to weight it down when they salted it down in a +barrel. They didn't unjoint the meat and in the joint is where it +started to spoil. Well, he put his silver and gold in a pot. It was a +big round pot and was smaller around the top. He dug a hole after +midnight. He and his two boys James and Dock put the money in this hole +in the back yard. They covered the pot with the big flat rock and put +dirt on that and next morning they planted a good big cedar tree over +the rock, money and all. + +"Old Master Jake died during the War and their house was burned but +James lived in one of the cabins in the yard. Dock went to the War. My +mother said when they left, that tree was standing. + +"My mother run off. She thought she would go cook for the men in the +camps but before she got to the camps a wagon overtook her and they +stole her. They brought her to Memphis and sold her on a block. They +guarded her. She never did know who they was nor what become of them. +They kept her in the wagon on the outskirts of the city nearly a month. +One man always stayed to watch her. She was scared to death of both of +them. One of the men kept a jug of whiskey in the wagon and drunk it but +he never would get dead drunk so she could slip off. + +"Mr. Johnson bought her and when the surrender come on, Master Johnson +took his family and went to Texas. She begged him to take her to nurse +but he said if it wasn't freedom he would send her back to Master James +Watts and he would let her go back then. He give her some money but she +never went back. She was afraid to start walking and before her money +give clear out she met up with my father and he talked her out of going +back. + +"She had a baby pretty soon. It was by them men that stole her. He was +light. He died when he got nearly grown. I recollect him good. I was +born close to Memphis, the boy died of dysentery. + +"When my mother was sold in Virginia she was carried in a wagon to the +block and thought she was going to market. She never seen her folks no +more. They let them go along to market sometimes and set in the wagon. +She had a little pair of gloves she wore when she was sold her grandma +had knit for her. They was white, had half thumb and no fingers. When +she died I put them in her coffin. She had twins born dead besides me. +They was born close to Wilmar, Arkansas. + +"We farmed all my life in Arkansas and Mississippi. I married in +Mississippi and we come back here before Joe died. I live out here and +in Memphis. My son is a janitor at the Sellers Brothers Store in +Memphis. My daughter cooks about here in town and I keep her children. I +rather farm if I was able. + +"I think young folks, both colors, shuns work. Times is running away +with itself. Folks is living too fast. They ride too fast and drinks and +do all kinds of meanness. + +"My father was a mighty poor hand at talking. He said he was sold in a +gang shipped to Memphis from New Orleans. Master Allen bought him. He +was a boy. I don't know how big. He cleaned fish--scaled them. He +butchered and in a few months Mr. Allen set him free. It was surrender +when he was sold but Mr. Allen didn't know it or else he meant to keep +him on a few years. When he got loose he started farming and farmed till +he died. He farmed in Tennessee, Mississippi, and Arkansas. He owned a +place but a drouth come along. He got in debt and white folks took it. + +"I married in Mississippi. My husband immigrated from South Carolina. He +was Joe Patton. I washed and ironed and farmed. I rather farm now if I +was able. + +"I never got no gov'ment help. I ain't posing it. It is a fine thing. I +was in Tennessee when it come on. They said I'd have to stay here six +months. I never do stay." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Annie L. LaCotts +Person interviewed: Harriett McFarlin Payne + Dewitt, Arkansas +Age: 83 + + +"Aunt Harriett, were you born in slavery time?" + +"Yes, mam! I was big enough to remember well, us coming back from Texas +after we refugeed there when the fighting of the war was so bad at St. +Charles. We stayed in Texas till the surrender, then we all come back in +lots of wagons. I was sick but they put me on a little bed and me and +all the little chillun rode in a 'Jersey' that one of the old Negro +mammies drove, along behind the wagons, and our young master, Colonel +Bob Chaney rode a great big black horse. Oh! he nice-looking on dat +horse! Every once and awhile he'd ride back to the last wagon to see if +everything was all right. I remember how scared us chillun was when we +crossed the Red River. Aunt Mandy said, 'We crossin' you old Red River +today, but we not going to cross you any more, cause we are going home +now, back to Arkansas.' That day when we stopped to cook our dinner I +picked up a lot little blackjack acorns and when my mammy saw them she +said, 'Throw them things down, chile. They'll make you wormy.' (I cried +because I thought they were chinquapins.) I begged my daddy to let's go +back to Texas, but he said, 'No! No! We going with our white folks.' My +mama and daddy belonged to Col. Jesse Chaney, much of a gentleman, and +his wife Miss Sallie was the best mistress anybody ever had. She was a +Christian. I can hear her praying yet! She wouldn't let one of her +slaves hit a tap on Sunday. They must rest and go to church. They had +preaching at the cabin of some one of the slaves, and in the Summertime +sometimes they had it out in the shade under the trees. Yes, and the +slaves on each plantation had their own church. They didn't go +galavanting over the neighborhood or country like niggers do now. Col. +Chaney had lots and lots of slaves and all their houses were in a row, +all one-room cabins. Everything happened in that one room,--birth, +sickness, death and everything, but in them days niggers kept their +houses clean and their door yards too. These houses where they lived was +called 'the quarters'. I used to love to walk down by that row of +houses. It looked like a town and late of an evening as you'd go by the +doors you could smell meat a frying, coffee making and good things +cooking. We were fed good and had plenty clothes to keep us dry and +warm. + +"Along about time for de surrender, Col. Jesse, our master, took sick +and died with some kind of head trouble. Then Col. Bob, our young +master, took care of his mama and the slaves. All the grown folks went +to the field to work and the little chillun would be left at a big room +called the nursing home. All us little ones would be nursed and fed by +an old mammy, Aunt Mandy. She was too old to go to the field, you know. +We wouldn't see our mammy and daddy from early in the morning till night +when their work was done, then they'd go by Aunt Mandy's and get their +chillun and go home till work time in the morning. + +"Some of the slaves were house negroes. They didn't go to work in the +fields, they each one had their own job around the house, barn, orchard, +milk house, and things like that. + +"When washday come, Lord, the pretty white clothes! It would take three +or four women a washing all day. + +"When two of de slaves wanted to get married, they'd dress up nice as +they could and go up to the big house and the master would marry them. +They'd stand up before him and he'd read out of a book called the +'discipline' and say, 'Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy +heart, all thy strength, with all thy might and thy neighbor as +thyself.' Then he'd say they were man and wife and tell them to live +right and be honest and kind to each other. All the slaves would be +there too, seeing the 'wedden'. + +"Our Miss Sallie was the sweetest best thing in the world! She was so +good and kind to everybody and she loved her slaves, too. I can remember +when Uncle Tony died how she cried! Uncle Tony Wadd was Miss Sallie's +favorite servant. He stayed in a little house in the yard and made fires +for her, brought in wood and water and just waited on the house. He was +a little black man and white-headed as cotton, when he died. Miss Sallie +told the niggers when they come to take him to the grave yard, to let +her know when they got him in his coffin, and when they sent and told +her she come out with all the little white chillun, her little +grandchillun, to see Uncle Tony. She just cried and stood for a long +time looking at him, then she said, 'Tony, you have been a good and +faithful servant.' Then the Negro men walked and carried him to the +graveyard out in a big grove in de field. Every plantation had its own +graveyard and buried its own folks, and slaves right on the place. + +"If all slaves had belonged to white folks like ours, there wouldn't +been any freedom wanted." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: John Payne + Brinkley, Ark. +Age: 74 + + +"I was born in Georgia, close to Bowles Spring, in Franklin County. My +mama's master was Reverend David Payne. He was a Baptist preacher. My +mama said my father was Monroe Glassby. He was a youngster on a +neighboring plantation. He was white. His father was a landowner. I +think she said it was 70 miles east of Atlanta where they went to trade. +They went to town two or three times a year. It took about a week to go +and come. + +"From what Mama said they didn't know it was freedom for a long time. +They worked on I know till that crop was made and gathered. Somebody +sent word to the master, Rev. David, he better turn them slaves loose. +Some of the hands heard the message. That was the first they knowed it +was freedom. My mama said she seen soldiers and heard fighting. She had +heard that if the Yankees won the war all the slaves be free. She set to +studyin' what she would do. She didn't know what to do. So when she +heard it she asked If she had to be free. She told Rev. David she wanted +to stay like she had been staying. After I was up a good size boy we +went to Banks County. She done house work and field work too and I done +farm work. All kinds and from sun-up till dark every day. Sometimes I +get in so late I have to make a torch light to see how to put the feed +in the troughs. We had plenty litard--pine knots--they was rich to burn. + +"I used to vote but I quit since I come to Arkansas. I come in 1902. I +paid my own way and wrote back for my family. I paid their way too. I +got one little grandaughter, 20 years old. She is off trying to make her +way through college. My wife had a stroke and she can't do much no more. +I got a piece of a house. It need repairs. I can't hardly pay my taxes. +I can't work much. I got two cows and six little pigs. I got eighty +acres land. I worked fourteen years for John Gazolla and that is when I +made enough to buy my place. I am in debt but I am still working. Seems +like one old man can't make much." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person Interviewed: Larkin Payne + Brinkley, Ark. +Age: 85 + + +"I was born in North Carolina. I don't recall my moster's name. My +parents was Sarah Hadyn and John Payne. They had seven children. None of +them was sold. My pa was sold. He had three sons in the Civil War. None +of em was killed. One was in the war four years, the others a good +portion of two years. They was helpers. + +"Grandma bought grandpa's, freedom. My great grandma was an Indian +woman. My mother was dark brown. My father was tolerable light. When I +was small child they come in and tell bout people being sold. I heard a +whole lot about it that way. It was great grandma Hadyn that was the +Indian. My folks worked in the field or anywhere as well as I recollect. + +"When freedom come on my folks moved to East Tennessee. I don't know +whether they got good treatment or not. They was freedom loving folks. +The Ku Klux never bothered us at home. I heard a lot of em. They was +pretty hot further south. I had two brothers scared pretty bad. They +went wid some white men to South Carolina and drove hogs. The white men +come back in buggies or on the train--left them to walk back. The Ku +Klux got after them. They had a hard time getting home. I heard the Ku +Klux was bad down in Alabama. They had settled down fore I went to +Alabama. I owned a home in Alabama. I took stock for it. Sold the stock +and come to Arkansas. I had seven children. We raised three. + +"When my folks was set free they never got nothing. The mountain folks +raised corn and made whiskey. They made red corn cob molasses; it was +good. They put lye in the whiskey; it would kill you. They raised hogs +plenty. My folks raised hogs and corn. They didn't make no whiskey. I +seen em make it and sell it too. + +"I heard folks say they rather be under the home men overseers than +Northern overseers. They was kinder to em it seem like. I was jes +beginnin' to go to the field when freedom come on. I helped pile brush +to be burned before freedom. I farmed when I was a boy; pulled fodder +and bundled it. I shucked corn, slopped pigs, milked, plowed a mule over +them rocks, thinned out corn. I worked twenty days in East Tennessee on +the section. I cut and haul wood all winter. + +"My parents both died in Arkansas. We come here to get to a fine farmin' +country. We did like it fine. I'm still here. + +"I have voted. I vote if I'm needed. The white folks country and they +been runnin' it. I don't want no enemies. They been good to me. I got no +egercation much. I sorter follows bout votin'. We look to the white +folks to look after our welfare. + +"I get $8.00 and commodities. I work all I can git to do." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Cella Perkins + Marvell and Palestine, Arkansas +Age: 67 + + +"I was born close to Macon, Georgia. Mama's old mistress, Miss Mari +(Maree) Beth Woods, brung her there from fifteen miles outer Atlanta. + +"After emancipation Miss Mari Beth's husband got killed. A horse kicked +him to death. It shyed at something and it run in front of the horse. He +held the horse so it couldn't run. It kicked the foot board clean off, +kicked him in the stomach. His boy crawled out of the buggy. That's the +way we knowed how it happened. She didn't hurt the boy. His name was +Benjamin Woods. + +"Pa went to war with his master and he never come back to mama. She +never heard from him after freedom. He got captured and got to be a +soldier and went 'way off. She didn't never know if he got killed or +lost his way back home. + +"Mama cooked and kept up the house. Miss Mari Beth kept a boarding house +in Macon till way after I was a big girl. I stood on a box and washed +dishes and dried them for mama. + +"Mr. Ben was grown when we come to Arkansas. He got his ma to go to +Kentucky with him and I heard about Arkansas. Me and mama come to +Palestine. We come in a crowd. A man give us tickets and we come by our +lone selves till we got to Tennessee. A big crowd come from Dyersburg, +Tennessee. Ma got to talking and found out we was headed fo' the same +place in Arkansas. + +"Ma talked a whole heap at tines more 'an others (times) about slavery +times. Her master didn't take on over her much when he found out she was +a barren woman. The old man Crumpton give her to his youngest daughter, +Miss Mari Beth. She always had to do all kinds of work and house turns. + +"After mama's slavery husband didn't come back and she was living in +Macon, she fell in love with another man and I was a picked-up baby. +Mama said Miss Mari Beth lost faith in her when I was born but she +needed her and kept her on. Said seem like she thought she was too old +to start up when she never had children when her papa owned her. They +didn't like me. She said she could trust mama but she didn't know my +stock. He was a black man. Mama was black as I is. + +"Miss Mari Beth had a round double table. The top table turned with the +victuals on it. I knocked flies three times a day over that table. + +"I never had a store-bought dress in my life till mama bought me one at +Madison, Arkansas. I wanted a pure white dress. She said if we made a +good crop she was going to give me a dress. All the dresses I ever had +was made out of Miss Mari Beth's dresses but I never had a pure white +one. I never had one bought for me till I was nearly grown. I was so +proud of it. When I would go and come back, I would pull it off and put +it away. I wore it one summer white and the next summer I blued it and +had a new dress. I had a white dress nearly every year till I got too +old to dress up gay now. I got a white bonnet and apron I wears right +now. + +"Mama said Master Crumpton bought up babies to raise. She was taken away +from her folks so soon she never heard of them. Aunt Mat raised her up +in Atlanta and out on his place. He had a place in town but kept them on +a place in the country. He had a drove of them. He hired them out. He +hired mama once to a doctor, Dr. Willbanks. Mama said old master thought +she would learn how to have children from him the reason he sent her +there so much. When they had big to-dos old master sent mama over there. +She never seen no money till about freedom. She loved to get hired out +to be off from him. They all had young babies about but her. He was +cross and her husband was cross. She had pleasure hired out. She said he +didn't whoop much. He stamped his foot. They left right now. + +"I hab three girls living; one here (Palestine), one at Marvell, and one +in St. Louis. My youngest girl teaches music at a big colored school. +She sends me my money and I lives with these girls. I been up there and +I sure don't aim to live in no city old as I is. It's too dangerous slow +as I got to be and so much racket I never slept a night I was there. I +was there a month. She brung me home and I didn't go back. + +"I cooked and washed and ironed and worked in the field. I do some work +yet. I helps out where I am. + +"The times is better I think from accounts I hear. This generation all +living too fast er lives. They don't never be still a minute." + + + + +Pine Bluff District +FOLKLORE SUBJECTS +Name of Interviewer: Martin & Barker +Subject: Ex-Slaves--Slavery Times + +This Information given by: Maggie Perkins +Place of Residence: W. 6th. St. +[TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] + + +My folks lived in S. Carolina and belonged to Col. Bob Baty and his +family. + +If I should lay down tonight I could tell when my folks were going to +die, because the Lawd would tell me in a vision. + +Just before my grandmother died, I got up one morning and told my aunt +that granma was dead. Aunt said she did not want me telling lies. + +Then I saw another aunt laying on the bed, and she had her hand under +her jaw. She was smiling. The house was full of people. After awhile +they heard that her aunt was dead too, and after that they paid +attention to me when I told them somebody was going to die. + +I'se a member of the Holiness Church. I believes step up right and keep +the faith. + +I seen my aunt walking up and down on a glass. The Lawd tells me in a +vision to step right up and see the faith. + +I am living in Jesus. He is coming to Pine Bluff soon. He is going to +separate the lions from the sheep. + +I was born in slavery times. I member folks riding around on horses. + +Them days I used to wash my mistis feet and legs, and sometimes I would +fall asleep against my mistis knees. I tells the young fry to give honor +to the white folks, and my preacher tell 'em to obey the white folks, +dat dey are our best friends, dey is our dependence and it would be hard +getting on if we didn't have em to help us. + +Spirits--Me and my husband moved into a house that a man, "uncle Bill" +Hearn died in, and we wanted dat house so bad we moved right in as soon +as he was taken out, we ate supper and went to bed. + +By the time we got to sleep we heard sounds like someone was emptying +shelled corn, and I hunched up under my husband scared to death and then +moved out the next day. The dead haven't gone to Heaven. When death +comes, he comes to your heart. He has your number and knows where to +find you. He won't let you off, he has the key. + +Death comes and unlocks the heart and twists the breath out of that +heart and carries it back to God. + +Nobody has gone to Heaven, no one can get pass Jesus until the day of +his redemption, which is judgement day. + +We can't pass the door without being judged. On the day of ressurection +the trumpet will sound and us will wake up out of he graveyard, and come +forth to be judged. The sea shall give up its dead. Every nation will +have to appear before God and be judged in a twinklin of an eye. If you +aren't prepared before Jesus comes, it will be too late. God is +everywhere, he is the almight. God is a nice God, he is a clean God, he +is a good God. I would be afraid to tell you a lie for God would strike +me down. + +Eight years ago I couldn't see, I wore specs 3 years. I forgot my specs +one morning, I prayed for my eyesight and it was restored that morning. + +Our marster was a good man. De overseers sometimes wuz bad, but dey did +not let marsters know how dey treated their girl slaves. My grandmother +was whipped by de overseers one time, it made welts on her back. My +sister Mary had a child by a white man. + +To get joy in de morning, get up and pray and ask Him to bless you. God +will feed all alike, he is no respector of persons. He shows no extra +favors twixt de rich and de poor. + + + + +Interviewer: Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Marguerite Perkins + West Sixth and Catalpa Streets, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 81 + + +"I was born in slavery times, Miss. I was born in South Carolina, Union +County. I was born in May. + +"I know I 'member old Missy. I just been washin' her feet and legs when +they said the Yankees was comin. Old Miss' name was Miss Sally. Her +husband was a colonel. What is a colonel? + +"I got some white cousins. They tell me they was the boss man's chillun. + +"Yes'm, I reckon Miss Sally was good to me. I'm a old nigger. All us +niggers belonged to Colonel Beatty. I went to school a little while but +I didn't learn nothin'. + +"I use to be a nurse girl and sleep right upstairs. + +"Missus, you know people just walkin along the street droppin dead with +heart trouble and white women killin men. I tell you lady it's awful. + +"I been married just once. The Lord took him out o' my house one Sunday +morning 'fore day. + +"The thing about it is I got that high blood pressure. Well, Missus, I +had it five years ago and I went to Memphis and the Lord healed me. All +we got to do is believe in the Lord and He will put you on your feet. + +"I had four sisters and three brothers and all of 'em dead but me, +darlin. + +"Now let me tell you somethin'. Old as I is, I ain't never been to but +one picture show in my life. Old as I is, I never was on a base ball +ground in my life. The onliest place I go now is to church." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Rachel Perkins, Goodwin, Arkansas +Age: ? Baby during the Civil War + + +"I was born in Greensboro, Alabama. Sallie Houston and Peter Houston was +my parents. They had two girls and a boy. They died when they was small, +but me. They always told me mother died when I was three days old in the +cradle. I don't fur a fact know much about my own people. Miss Agnes +took me to raise me fur a house girl. She nursed me wid her Mary. My +mother's and father's owners was Alonso Brown and Miss Agnes Brown. +Their two girls was Mary and Lucy and their three boys was Bobby, Jesse, +and Frank. Miss Agnes rocked the babies to sleep in a big chair out on +the gallery. We slept there all night. Company come and say, 'Where the +babies?' Miss Agnes take them back and show us off. They say, 'Where the +little black chile?' They'd try to get me to come go live wid them. They +say they be good to me. I'd tell 'em, 'No, I stay here.' It was good a +home as I wanted. We slept on the front gallery till Lucy come on, then +we had sheep skin pallets. She got the big chair. She put us out there +because it was cool. + +"I left Miss Agnes when I got to be my own woman. Didn't nobody toll me +off. I knowed I ought to go to my own race of people. They come after me +once. Then they sent the baby boy after me what I had nursed. I wanted +to go but I never went. Miss Lucy and Miss Mary both in college. It was +lonesome for me. I wanted to go to my color. I jus' picked up and walked +on off. + +"My girl is half Indian. I'm fifteen years older than my girl. Then I +married Wesley Perkins, my husband. He is black fur a fact. He died last +fall. I married at my husband's brother's by a colored preacher. Tom +Screws was his name. He was a Baptist preacher. + +"I never went to school a day in my life. I can't read. I can count +money. Seem lack it jus' come natural. I never learned it at no one +time. It jus' come to me. + +"In warm weather I slept on the gallery and in cold weather I slept by +the fire. I made down my own bed. I cleaned the house. I took the cows +off to the pasture. I nursed the babies, washed and dried the dishes. I +made up the beds and cleaned the yards. + +"Master Brown owned two farms. He had plenty hands on his farms. I did +never go down to the farms much but I knowed the hands. On Saturday +little later than other days they brought the stock to the house and +fed. Then they went to the smokehouse for their rations. He had a great +big garden, strawberries, and grape arbors. + +"One thing I had to do was worm the plants. I put the worms in a bottle +and leave it in the row where the sun would dry the worms up. When a +light frost come I would water the plants that would wilt before the sun +riz and ag'in at night. Then the plants never felt the frost. Certainly +it didn't kill 'em. It didn't hurt 'em. + +"Julane was the regular milk woman. She milked and strained the milk. I +churned and 'tended to the chickens. Miss Agnes sot the hens her own +self. She marked the eggs with a piece of charcoal to see if other hens +laid by the setting hen. If they did she'd take the new egg out of the +nest. + +"We had flower gardens. We had mint, rosemary, tansy, sage, mullen, +catnip, horseradish, artichokes, hoarhound--all good home remedies. + +"I never knowed when we moved to that farm. I was so small. I heard Miss +Agnes Brown say I was a baby when they moved to Boldan depot, not fur +from Clinton, Mississippi. + +"When I left Miss Agnes I went to some folks my own color on another +farm 'joining to their farm. Of course I took my baby. I took Anna and I +been living with Anna ever since. What I'd do now without her. (Anna is +an Indian and very proud of being half Indian.) My husband done dead. + +"I get eight dollars welfare help. And I do get some commodities. Anna +does all right but she got hit on the shoulder and about lost use of her +arm. One of the railroad hands up here got mad and hit her. I had +doctors. They done it a little good. It's been hurt three years or more +now. + +"I wisht I knowd where to find a bed of mullen. Boil it down to a syrup +and add some molasses, boil that down. It makes a good syrup for coughs +and colds. + +"I never went to white folks' church none hardly. Miss Agnes sent me +along with her cook to my own color's church. + +"My husband sure was good to me. We never had but one fight. Neither one +whooped. + +"This young generation is going backward. They tired of training. They +don't want no advice. They don't want to work out no more. They don't +know what they want. I think folks is trifling than they was when I come +on. The times is all right and some of the people. I'm talking about +mine and yo' color both." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Dinah Perry + 1800 Ohio Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 78 + + +"Yes ma'am, I lived in slavery times. They brought me from Alabama, a +baby, right here to this place where I am at, Mr. Sterling Cockril. + +"I don't know zackly when I was born but I member bout the slave times. +Yes ma'am, I do. After I growed up some, I member the overseer--I do. I +can remember Mr. Burns. I member when he took the hands to Texas. Left +the chillun and the old folks here. + +"Oh Lord, this was a big plantation. Had bout four or five hundred head +of niggers. + +"My mother done the milkin' and the weavin'. After free times, I wove me +a dross. My mother fixed it for me and I wove it. They'd knit stockin's +too. But now they wear silk. Don't keep my legs warm. + +"I member when they fit here in Pine Bluff. I member when 'Marmajuke' +sent word he was gain' to take breakfast with Clayton that mornin' and +they just fit. I can remember that was 'Marmajuke.' It certainly was +'Marmajuke.' The Rebels tried to carry me away but the wagon was so full +I didn't get in and I was glad they didn't. My mother was runnin' from +the Rebels and she hid under the cotehouse. After the battle was over +she come back hero to the plantation. + +"I had three brothers and three sisters went to Texas and I know I +didn't know em when they come back. + +"I member when they fit here a bum shell fell right in the yard. It was +big around as this stovepipe and was all full of chains and things. + +"After free time my folks stayed right here and worked on the shares. I +was the baby chile and never done no work till I married when I was +fifteen. + +"After the War I went to school to white teachers from the North. I +never went to nothin' but them. I went till I was in the fifth grade. + +"My daddy learned me to spell 'lady' and 'baker' and 'shady' fore I went +to school. I learned all my ABC's too. I got out of the first reader the +second day. I could just read it right on through. I could spell and +just stand at the head of the class till the teacher sent me to the foot +all the time. + +"My daddy was his old mistress' pet. He used to carry her to school all +the time and I guess that's where he got his learnin'. + +"After I was married I worked in the field. Rolled logs, cut brush, +chopped and picked cotton. + +"I member when they had that 'Bachelor' (Brooks-Baxter) War up here at +Little Rock. + +"After my chillun died, I never went to the field no more. I just stayed +round mongst the white folks nussin'. All the chillun I nussed is +married and grown now. + +"All this younger generation--white and colored--I don't know what's +gwine come of em. The poet says: + + 'Each gwine a different way + And all the downward road.'" + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Dinah Perry + 1002 Indiana, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 78 +[TR: Appears to be same as last informant despite different address.] + + +"I'se bawn in Alabama and brought here to Arkansas a baby. I couldn't +tell what year I was bawn 'cause I was a baby. A chile can't tell what +year he was bawn 'less they tells him and they sure didn't tell me. + +"When I'd wake up in the mawnin' my mother would be gone to the field. + +"Some things I can remember good but you know old folks didn't 'low +chillun to stand around when they was talkin' in dem days. They had to +go play. They had to be mighty particular or they'd get a whippin'. + +"Chillun was better in them days 'cause the old folks was strict on 'em. +Chillun is raisin' theirselves today. + +"I 'member one song they used to sing + + 'We'll land over shore + We'll land over shore; + And we'll live forever more.' + +"They called it a hymn. They'd sing it in church, then they'd all get to +shoutin'. + +"Superstitions? Well, I seen a engineer goin' to work the other day and +a black cat run in front of him, and he went back 'cause he said he +would have a wreck with his train if he didn't. So you see, the white +folks believes in things like that too. + +"I never was any hand to play any games 'cept 'Chick. Chick.' You'd +ketch 'hold a hands and ring up. Had one outside was the hawk and some +inside was the hen and chickens. The old mother hen would say + + 'Chick-a-ma, chick-a-ma, craney crow, + Went to the well to wash my toe; + When I come back my chicken was gone, + What time is it, old witch?' + +One chicken was s'posed to get out and then the hawk would try to ketch +him. + +"We was more 'ligious than the chillun nowadays. We used to play +preachin' and baptisin'. We'd put 'em down in the water and souse 'em +and we'd shout just like the old folk. Yes ma'am." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Alfred Peters, 1518 Bell Street, + Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 78 + + +"I was born seven miles from Camden. + +"I was 'leven months old when they carried us to Texas. First thing I +remember I was in Texas. + +"Lucius Grimm was old master. He's been dead a long time. His wife died +'bout two years after the Civil War and he died twenty-five years after. + +"I 'member durin' of the war he buried his stuff---silverware and +stuff--and he never took it up. And after he died his brother's son +lived in California, and he come back and dug it up. + +"The Yankees burned up four hundred bales of cotton and taken the meat +and two cribs of corn. + +"I heard 'em talk 'bout the Ku Klux but I never did see 'em. + +"My mother said old Mars Lucius was good to his folks. She said he first +bought her and then she worried so 'bout my father, he paid twenty-five +hundred dollars for him. + +"Biggest part of my life I farmed, and then I done carpenter work. + +"I been blind four years. The doctor says it's cataracts. + +"I think the younger generation goin' to cause another war. They ain't +studyin' nothin' but pleasure." + + + + +Interviewer: S.S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Mary Estes Peters, + 3115 W. 17th Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: 78 + + +Biographical + +Mary Estes Peters was born a slave January 30, 1860 in Missouri +somewhere. Her mother was colored and her father white, the white +parentage being very evident in her color and features and hair. She is +very reticent about the facts of her birth. The subject had to be +approached from many angles and in many ways and by two different +persons before that part of the story could be gotten. + +Although she was born in Missouri, she was "refugeed" first to +Mississippi and then here, Arkansas. She is convinced that her mother +was sold at least twice after freedom,--once into Mississippi, one into +Helena, and probably once more after reaching Arkansas, Mary herself +being still a very small child. + +I think she is mistaken on this point. I did not debate with her but I +cross-examined her carefully and it appears to me that there was +probably in her mother's mind a confused knowledge of the issuance of +the Emancipation Proclamation in 1862. Lincoln's Compensation +Emancipation plan advocated in March 1863, the Abolition in the District +of Columbia in 1862 in April, the announcement of Lincoln's Emancipation +intention in July 1862, the prohibition of slavery in present and future +territories, June 19, 1862, together with the actual issuance of the +Emancipation in September 1862, and the effectiveness of the +proclamation in January 1, 1863, would well give rise to an impression +among many slaves that emancipation had been completed. + +As a matter of fact, Missouri did not secede; the Civil War which +nevertheless ensued would find some slaveholders exposed to the full +force of the 1862 proclamation in 1863 at the time of its first +effectiveness. Naturally it did not become effective in many other +places till 1865. It would very naturally happen then that a sale in +Missouri in the latter part of 1862 or any time thereafter might be well +construed by ex-slaves as a sale after emancipation, especially since +they do not as a rule pay as much attention to the dates of occurrences +as to their sequence. This interpretation accords with the story. Only +such an explanation could make probable a narrative which places the +subject as a newborn babe in 1860 and sold after slavery had ceased +while still too young to remember. Her earliest recollections are +recollections of Arkansas. + +She has lived in Arkansas ever since the Civil War and in Little Rock +ever since 1879. She made a living as a seamstress for awhile but is now +unable to sew because of fading eyesight. She married in 1879 and led a +long and contented married life until the recent death of her husband. +She lives with her husband's nephew and ekes out a living by fragmentary +jobs. She has a good memory and a clear mind for her age. + + +Slave After Freedom + +"My mother was sold after freedom. It was the young folks did all that +devilment. They found they could get some money out of her and they did +it. She was put on the block in St. Louis and sold down into Vicksburg, +Mississippi. Then they sold her into Helena, Arkansas. After that they +carried her down into Trenton (?), Arkansas. I don't know whether they +sold her that time or not, but I reckon they did. Leastways, they +carried her down there. All this was done after freedom. My mother was +only fifteen years old when she was sold the first time, and I was a +baby in her arms. I don't know nothing about it myself, but I have heard +her tell about it many and many a time. It was after freedom. Of course, +she didn't know she was free. + +"It was a good while before my mother realized she was free. She noticed +the other colored people going to and fro and she wondered about it. +They didn't allow you to go round in slave times. She asked them about +it and they told her, 'Don't you know you are free?' Some of the white +people too told her that she was free. After that, from the way she +talked, I guess she stayed around there until she could go some place +and get wages for her work. She was a good cook. + + +Mean Mistress + +"I have seen many a scar on my mother. She had mean white folks. She had +one big scar on the side of her head. The hair never did grow back on +that place. She used to comb her hair over it so that it wouldn't show. +The way she got it was this: + +"One day her mistress went to high mass and left a lot of work for my +mother to do. She was only a girl and it was too much. There was more +work than she could get done. She had too big a task for a child to get +done. When her old mistress came back and her work was not all done, she +beat my mother down to the ground, and then she took one of the skillets +and bust her over the head with it--trying to kill her, I reckon. I have +seen the scar with my own eyes. It was an awful thing. + +"My mother was a house servant in Missouri and Mississippi. Never done +no hard work till she came here (Arkansas). When they brought her here +they tried to make a field hand out of her. She hadn't been used to +chopping cotton. When she didn't chop it fast as the others did, they +would beat her. She didn't know nothing about no farmwork. She had all +kinds of trouble. They just didn't treat her good. She used to have good +times in Missouri and Mississippi but not in Arkansas. They just didn't +treat her good. In them days, they'd whip anybody. They'd tie you to the +bed or have somebody hold you down on the floor and whip you till the +blood ran. + +"But, Lawd, my mother never had no use for Catholics because it was a +Catholic that hit her over the head with that skillet--right after she +come from mass. + + +Food + +"My mother said that they used to pour the food into troughs and give it +to the slaves. They'd give them an old, wooden spoon or something and +they all eat out of the same dish or trough. They wouldn't let the +slaves eat out of the things they et out of. Fed them just like they +would hogs. + +"When I was little, she used to come to feed me about twelve o'clock +every day. She hurry in, give me a little bowl of something, and then +hurry right on out because she had to go right back to her work. She +didn't have time to stay and see how I et. If I had enough, it was all +right. If I didn't have enough, it was all right. It might be pot liquor +or it might be just anything. + +"One day she left me alone and I was lying on the floor in front of the +fireplace asleep. I didn't have no bed nor nothing then. The fire must +have popped out and set me on fire. You see they done a whole lot of +weaving in them days. And they put some sort of lint on the children. + +"I don't reckon children them days knowed what a biscuit was. They just +raked up whatever was left off the table and brung it to you. Children +have a good time nowadays. + +"People goin' to work heard me hollering and came in and put out the +fire. I got scars all round my waist today I could show you. + +"Another time my mother had to go off and leave me. I was older then. I +guess I must have gotten hungry and wanted to get somethin' to eat. So I +got up and wandered off into the woods. There weren't many people living +round there then. (This was in Trenton (?), Arkansas, a small place not +far from Helena.) And the place was [HW: not] built up much then and they +had lots of wolves. Wolves make a lot of noise when they get to trailin' +anything. I got about a half mile from the road and the wolves got after +me. I guess they would have eat me up but a man heard them howling, and +he knew there wasn't no house around there but ours, and he came to see +what was up, and he beat off the wolves and carried me back home. There +wasn't nare another house round there but ours and he knew I must have +come from there. + +"Mother was working then. It was night though. They brung the news to +her and they wouldn't let her come to me. Mother said she felt like +getting a gun and killin' them. Her child out like that and they +wouldn't let her go home. + +"That must have happened after freedom, because it was the last mistress +she had. Almost all her beatings and trouble came from her last +mistress. That woman sure gave her a lot of trouble. + + +Age, Good Masters + +"All I know about my age is what my mother told me. + +"The first people that raised my mother had her age in the Bible. She +said she was about fifteen years old when I was born. From what she told +me, I must be about seventy-eight years old. She taught me that I was +born on Sunday, on the thirtieth of January, in the year before the War. + +"My mother's name was Myles. I don't know what her first master's name +was. She told me I was born in Phelps County, Missouri; I guess you'd +call it St. Louis now. I am giving you the straight truth just as she +gave it to me. + +"From the way she talked, the people what raised her from a child were +good to her. They raised her with their children. Them people fed her +just like they fed their own children. + + +Color and Birth + +"There was a light brownskin boy around there and they give him anything +that he wanted. But they didn't like my mother and me--on account of my +color. They would talk about it. They tell their children that when I +got big enough, I would think I was good as they was. I couldn't help my +color. My mother couldn't either. + +"My mother's mistress had three boys, one twenty-one, one nineteen, and +one seventeen. Old mistress had gone away to spend the day one day. +Mother always worked in the house. She didn't work on the farm in +Missouri. While she was alone, the boys came in and threw her down on +the floor and tied her down so she couldn't struggle, and one after the +other used her as long as they wanted for the whole afternoon. Mother +was sick when her mistress came home. When old mistress wanted to know +what was the matter with her, she told her what the boys had done. She +whipped them and that's the way I came to be here. + + +Sales and Separations + +"My mother was separated from her mother when she was three years old. +They sold my mother away from my grandmother. She don't know nothing +about her people. She never did see her mother's folks. She heard from +them. It must have been after freedom. But she never did get no full +understanding about them. Some of them was in Kansas City, Kansas. My +grandmother, I don't know what became of her. + +"When my mother was sold into St. Louis, they would have sold me away +from her but she cried and went on so that they bought me too. I don't +know nothing about it myself, but my mother told me. I was just nine +months old then. They would call it refugeeing. These people that had +raised her wanted to get something out of her because they found out +that the colored people was going to be free. Those white people in +Missouri didn't have many slaves. They just had four slaves--my mother, +myself, another woman and an old colored man called Uncle Joe. They +didn't get to sell him because he bought hisself. He made a little money +working on people with rheumatism. They would ran the niggers from state +to state about that time to keep them from getting free and to get +something out of them. My mother was sold into Mississippi after +freedom. Then she was refugeed from one place to another through Helena +to Trenton (?), Arkansas. + + +Marriages + +"My mother used to laugh at that. The master would do all the marryin'. +I have heard her say that many a time. They would call themselves +jumpin' the broom. I don't know what they did. Whatever the master said +put them together. I don't know just how it was fixed up, but they helt +the broom and master would say, 'I pronounce you man and wife' or +something like that. + + +Ku Klux + +"My mother talked about the Ku Klux but I don't know much about them. +She talked about how they would ride and how they would go in and +destroy different people's things. Go in the smoke house and eat the +people's stuff. She said that they didn't give the colored people much +trouble. Sometimes they would give them something to eat. + +"When they went to a place where they didn't give the colored people +much to eat, what they didn't destroy they would say, 'Go get it.' I +don't know how it was but the Ku Klux didn't have much use for certain +white people and they would destroy everything they had. + +"I have lived in Arkansas about all my life. I have been in Little Rock +ever since January 30, 1879. I don't know how I happened to move on my +birthday. My husband brought me here for my rheumatism. + +"I married in 1879 and moved here from Marianna. I had lived in Helena +before Marianna. + + +Voting + +"The niggers voted in Marianna and in Helena. They voted in Little Rock +too. I didn't know any of them. It seems like some of the people didn't +make so much talk about it. They did, I guess, though. Many of the +farmers would tell their hands who they wanted them to vote for, and +they would do it. + +"Them was critical times. A man would kill you if he got beat. They +would say, 'So and so lost the lection,' and then somebody would go to +Judgment. I remember once they had a big barbecue in Helena just after +the 'lection. They had it for the white and for the colored alike. We +didn't know there was any trouble. The shooting started on a hill where +everybody could see. First thing you know, one man fell dead. Another +dropped down on all fours bleeding, but he retch in under him and +dragged out a pistol and shot down the man that shot him. That was a sad +time. Niggers and white folks were all mixed up together and shooting. +It was the first time I had ever been out. My mother never would let me +go out before that. + + +Seamstress + +"I ain't able to do much of anything now. I used to make a good living +as a dressmaker. I can't sew now because of my eyes. I used to make many +a dollar before my eyes got to failing me. Make pants, dresses, +anything. When you get old, you fail in what you been doing. I don't get +anything from the government. They don't give me any kind of help." + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: John Peterson, 1810 Eureka Street, + Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 80 + + +"I was small but I can remember some 'bout slavery days. I was born down +here in Louisiana. + +"I seed dem Yankees come through. Dey stopped dere and broke up all de +bee gums. Just tore 'em up. And took what dey could eat and went on. Dey +was doin' all dey _could_ do. No tellin' what dey _didn't_ do. People +what owned de place just run off and left. Yankees come dere in de +night. I 'member dat. Had ever'thing excited, so my white folks just +skipped out. Oh, yes, dey come back after the Yankees had gwine on. + +"You could hear dem guns shootin' around. I heered my mother and father +say de Yankees was fightin' to free slavery. + +"Run off? Oh Lawd, yes ma'am, I heered 'em say dey was plenty of 'em run +off. + +"George Swapsy was our owner. I know one thing, dey beat me enough. Had +me watchin' de garden to keep de chickens out. And sometimes I'd git to +playin' and fergit and de chickens would git in de garden, and I'd pay +for it too. I can 'member dat. Yes'm, dat was before freedom. Dey was +whippin' all de colored people--and me too. + +"Yes'm, dey give us plenty to eat, but dey didn't give us no clothes. I +was naked half my time. Dat was when I was a little fellow. + +"We all belonged to de same man. Dey never did 'part us. But my mother +was sold away from her people--and my father, too. He come from +Virginia. + +"No ma'am, dey didn't have a big plantation--just a little place cleared +up in the woods. + +"He didn't have no wife--just two grown sons and dey bof went to the +war. + +"Mars George died 'fore peace declared. He was a old fellow--and mean as +he could be. + +"I never went to school till I was sixteen or seventeen years old. Dere +was a colored fellow had a little learnin' and we hired him two nights +in de week for three dollars a month. Did it for three years. I can read +a little and write my own name and sort of 'tend to my own business. + +"Yes'm, I used to vote after I got grown. Yes'm, I did vote Republican. +But de white people stopped us from votin'. Dat was when Seymour and +Blair was runnin', and I ain't voted none since--I just quit. I've known +white people to go to the polls wif der guns and keep de colored folks +from votin'. + +"Oh, dey was plenty of Ku Klux. I've known 'em to ketch people and whip +'em and kill 'em. Dey didn't bother me--I didn't give 'em a chance. Ku +Klux--I sure 'member dem. + +"Younger generation? Well, Miss, you're a little too hard for me. Hard +to tell what'll become of 'em. I know one thing--dey is wiser. Oh, my +Lawd! A chile a year old know more'n I did when I was ten. We didn't +have no chance. Didn't have nobody to learn us nothin'. People is just +gittin' wuss ever' day. Killin' 'em up ever' day. Wuss now than dey was +ten years ago." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Louise Pettis, Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 59 + + +"My mama was born at Aiken, South Carolina. She was Frances Rotan. I was +born at Elba, South Carolina, forty miles below Augusta, Georgia. My +papa was born at Macon, Georgia. Both my parents was slaves. He farmed +and was a Baptist preacher. Mama was a cook. + +"Mama was owned by some of the Willis. There was three; Mike, Bill, and +Logie Willis, all brothers, and she lived with them all but who owned +her I don't know. She never was sold. Papa wasn't either. Mama lived at +Aiken till papa married her. She belong to some of the Willis. They +married after freedom. She had three husbands and fifteen children. + +"Mama had a soldier husband. He took her to James Island. She runned off +from him. Got back across the sea to Charleston to Aunt Anette's. She +was mama's sister. Mama sent back to Aiken and they got her back to her +folks. Aunt Anette had been sold to folks at Charleston. + +"Grandma was Rachel Willis. She suckled some of the Willis children. +Mama suckled me and Mike Willis together. His mama got sick and my mama +took him and raised him. She got well but their names have left me. When +we got sick the Willis women would send a hamper basket full of +provisions, some cooked and some to be cooked. I used to sweep their +yards. They was white sand and not a sprig of grass nor a weed in there. + +"Mama and papa was both slavery niggers and they spoke mighty well of +their owners. + +"Papa said in slavery times about two nights in a week they would have a +dance. He would slip off and go. Sometimes he would get a pass. He was a +figger caller till he 'fessed religion. One time the pattyrollers come +in. They said, 'All got passes tonight.' When they had about danced down +my daddy got a shovelful of live coals and run about scattering it on +the floor. All the niggers run out and he was gone too. It was a dark +night. A crowd went up the road and here come the pattyrollers. One run +into grapevines across the road and tumbled off his horse. The niggers +took to the woods then. Pa tole us about how he studied up a way to get +himself and several others outer showing their passes that night. Master +never found that out on him. + +"During the War they sent a lot of the meat to feed the soldiers on and +kept the skins and sides. They tole them if the Yankees ask them if they +had enough to eat say, 'See how greasy and slick I is.' They greased +their legs and arms to make them shine and look fat. The dust made the +chaps look rusty. + +"Papa saved his young mistress' life. His master was gone to war. He had +promised with others to take care of her. The Yankees come and didn't +find meat. It was buried. They couldn't find much. They got mad and +burned the house. Pa was a boy. He run up there and begged folks not to +burn the house; they promised to take care of everything. Papa begged to +let him get his mistress and three-day-old baby. They cursed him but he +run in and got her and the baby. The house fell in before they got out +of the yard. He took her to the quarters. Papa was overstrained carrying +a log and limped as long as he lived. + +"Pa was hired out and they was goner whoop him and he run off and got +back to the master. Ma nor pa was never sold. + +"We had a reason to come out here to Arkansas. A woman had a white +husband and a black one too. The black husband told the white husband +not come about there no more. He come on. The black man killed the white +man at his door. They lynched six or seven niggers. They sure did kill +him. That dissatisfied all the niggers. That took place in Barnwell +County, South Carolina. Three train loads of us left. There was fifteen +in our family. We was doing well. My pa had cattle and money. They +stopped the train befo' and behind us--the train we was on. Put the +Arkansas white man in Augusta jail. They stopped us all there. We got to +come on. We was headed for Pine Bluff. We got down there 'bout Altheimer +and they was living in tents. Pa said he wasn't goiner tent, he didn't +run away from South Carolina and he'd go straight back. Mr. Aydelott got +eight families on track at Rob Roy to come to Biscoe. We got a house +here. Pa was old and they would listen at what he said. He made a speech +at Rob Roy and told them let's come to Biscoe. Eleven families come. He +had two hundred or three hundred dollars then in his pocket to rattle. +He could get more. He grieved for South Carolina, so he went back and +took us but ma wanted to coma back. They stayed back there a year or +two. We made a crop. Pa was the oldest boss in his crowd. We all come +back. There was more room out here and so many of us. + +"The schools was better out there. I went to Miss Scofield's College. +All the teachers but three was colored. There was eight or ten colored +teachers. It was at Aiken, South Carolina. Miss Criley was our sewing +mistress. Miss Criley was white and Miss Scofield was too. I didn't have +to pay. Rich folks in the North run the school. No white children went +there. I think the teachers was sent there. + +"I taught school out here at Blackton and Moro and in Prairie County +about. I got tired of it. I married and settled down. + +"We owns my home here. My husband was a railroad man. We lives by the +hardest. + +"I don't know what becoming of the young generation. They shuns the +field work. Times is faster than I ever seen them. I liked the way times +was before that last war (World War). Reckon when will they get back +like that?" + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Henry C. Pettus, Marianna, Arkansas +Age: 80 + + +"I was born in Wilkes County, near Washington, Georgia. My mother's +owners was Dr. Palmer and Sarah Palmer. They had three boys; Steve, +George, and Johnie. They lived in Washington and the farm I lived on was +five miles southeast of town. It was fifty miles from Augusta, Georgia. +He had another farm on the Augusta Road. He had a white man overseer. +His name was Tom Newsom and his nephew, Jimmie Newsom, helped. He was +pretty smooth most of the time. He got rough sometimes. Tom's wife was +named Susie Newsom. + +"Dick Gilbert had a place over back of ours. They sent things to the +still at Dick Gilbert's. Sent peaches and apples and surplus corn. The +still was across the hill from Dr. Palmer's farm. He didn't seem to +drink much but the boys did. All three did. Dr. Palmer died in 1861. +People kept brandy and whiskey in a closet and some had fancy bottles +they kept, one brandy, one whiskey, on their mantel. Some owners passed +drinks around like on Sunday morning. Dr. Palmer didn't do that but it +was done on some places before the Civil War. It wasn't against the law +to make spirits for their own use. That is the way it was made. Meal and +flour was made the same way then. + +"Mother lived in Dr. Palmer's office in Warren County. It was a very +nice log house and had a fence to make the front on the road and the +back enclosed like. Inside the fence was a tanyard and house at some +distance and a very nice log house where Mr. Hudson lived. Dr. Palmer +and Mr. Hudson had that place together. The shoemaker lived in +Washington in Dr. Palmer's back yard. He had his office and home all in +the same. Mr. Anthony made all the shoes for Dr. Palmer's slaves and for +white folks in town. He made fine nice shoes. He was considered a high +class shoemaker. + +"Mother was a field hand. She wasn't real black. My father never did do +much. He was a sort of a foreman. He rode around. He was lighter than I +am. He was old man Pettus' son. Old man Pettus had a great big +farm--land! land! land! Wiley and Milton Roberts had farms between Dr. +Palmer and old man Pettus' farm. Mother originally belong to old man +Pettus. He give Miss Sarah Palmer her place on the Augusta Road and his +son the place on which his own home was. They was his white children. He +had two. Mother was hired by her young mistress, Dr. Palmer's wife, Miss +Sarah. Father rode around, upheld by the old man Pettus. He never worked +hard. I don't know if old man Pettus raised grandma or not; he never +grandpa. He was a Terral. He died when I was small. Grandpa was a field +hand. He was the only colored man on the place allowed to have a dog. He +was Dr. Palmer's stock man. They raised their own stock; sheep, goats, +cows, hogs, mules, and horses. + +"None of us was ever sold that I know of. Mother had three boys and +three girls. One sister died in infancy. One sister was married and +remained in Georgia. Two of my brothers and one sister come to Arkansas. +Mother brought us boys to a new country. Father got shot and died from +the womb. He was a captain in the war. He was shot accidentally. Some of +them was drinking and pranking with the guns. We lived on at Dr. +Palmer's place till 1866. That was our first year in Arkansas. That was +nearly two years. We never was abused. My early life was very favorable. + +"The quarters was houses built on each side of the road. Some set off in +the field. They must have had stock law. We had pastures. The houses was +joining the pasture. Mr. Pope had a sawmill on his place. The saw run +perpendicularly up and down. He had a grist mill there too. I like to go +to mill. It was dangerous for young boys. Mr. Pope's farm joined us on +one side. Oxen was used as team for heavy loads. Such a contrast in less +than a century as trucks are in use now. I learned about oxen. They +didn't go fast 'ceptin' when they ran away. They would run at the sight +of water in hot weather. They was dangerous if they saw the river and +had to go down a steep bank, load or no load the way they went. If it +was shallow they would wade but if it was deep they would swim unless +the load was heavy enough to pull them down. Oxen was interesting to me +always. + +"Children didn't stay in town like they do now. They was left to think +more for themselves. They hardly ever got to go to town. + +"We raised a pet pig. Nearly every year we raised a pet pig. When mother +would be out that pig would get my supper in spite of all I could do. +The pig was nearly as large as I was. I couldn't do anything. We had a +watermelon patch and sometimes sold Dr. Palmer melons. He let us have a +melon patch and a cotton patch our own to work. Mother worked in +moonlight and at odd times. They give that to her extra. We helped her +work it. They give old people potato patches and let the children have +goober rows. Land was plentiful. Dr. Palmer wasn't stingy with his +slaves--very liberal. He was a man willing to live and let live so far +as I can know of him. + +"During the Civil War things was quiet like where I was. The soldiers +didn't come through till after the war was over. Then the Union soldiers +took Washington. They come there after the surrender. + + +Freedom + +"The Union soldiers came in a gang out from Washington all over the +surrounding country, scouting about, and notified all the black folks of +freedom. My folks made arrangements to stay on. Two colored men went +through the country getting folks to move to southwest Georgia but +before mother decided to move anywhere along come two men and they had a +helper, Mr. Allen. It was Mr. William H. Wood and Mr. Peters over here +on Cat Island. They worked from Washington, Georgia. We consented to +leave and come to Arkansas. We started and went to Barnetts station to +Augusta, to Atlanta. There was so many tracks out of order, bridges been +burnt. We crossed the river at Chattanooga, then to Nashville, then to +Johnsonville. We took a boat to Cairo, then to Memphis, then on to some +landing out here. Well, I never heard. We went to the Woods' place and +made a crop here in Arkansas in 1866. I worked with John I. Foreman till +1870 and went back to the Woods' farm till 1880. Then I went to the Bush +place (now McCullough farm). I farmed all along through life till the +last twelve years. I started preaching in 1875. I preach yet +occasionally. I preached here thirty-six years in the Marianna Baptist +church. I quit last year. My health broke down. + +"Chills was my worst worry in these swamps. We made fine crops. In 1875 +yellow fever come on. Black folks didn't have yellow fever at first but +they later come to have it. Some died of it. White folks had died in +piles. It was hard times for some reason then. It was hard to get +something to eat. We couldn't get nothing from Memphis. Arrangements was +made to get supplies from St. Louis to Little Rock and we could go get +them and send boats out here. + +"In 1875 was the tightest, hardest time in all my life, A chew of +tobacco cost ten cents. In 1894-'95 hard times struck me again. Cotton +was four and five cents a pound, flour three dollars a barrel, and meat +four and five cents a pound. We raised so much of our meat that didn't +make much difference. Money was so scarce. + +"Ku Klux--I never was in the midst of them. They was pretty bad in +Georgia and in northeast part of this county. They was bad so I heard. +They sent for troops at Helena to settle things up at about Marion, +Arkansas now. I heard more of the Ku Klux in Georgia than I heard after +we come here. And as time went on and law was organized the Ku Klux +disbanded everywhere. + +"Traveling conditions was bad when we came to Arkansas. We rode in box +cars, shabby passenger coaches. The boats was the best riding. As I told +you we went way around on account of burnt out and torn up bridges. The +South looked shabby. + +"I haven't voted since 1927 except I voted in favor of the Cotton +Control Saturday before last. + +"Times has come up to a most deplorable condition. Craving exists. +Ungratefulness. People want more than they can make. Some don't work +hard and some won't work at all. I don't know how to improve conditions +except by work except economical living. Some would work if they could. +Some can work but won't. Some do work hard. I believe in bread by the +sweat of the brow, and all work. + +"The slaves didn't expect anything. They didn't expect war. It was going +on a while before my parents heard of it. I was a little boy. They +didn't know what it was for except their freedom. They didn't know what +freedom was. They couldn't read. They never seen a newspaper like I take +the Commercial Appeal now. I went to school a little in Arkansas. My +father being old man Pettus' son as he was may have been given something +by Miss Sarah or Dr. Palmer or by his white son, but the old man was +dead and I doubt that. Father was killed and mother left. Mother knew +she had a home on Dr. Palmer's land as long as she needed one but she +left to do better. In some ways we have done better but it was hard to +live in these bottoms. It is a fine country now. + +"I own eighty acres of land and this house. (Good house and furnished +well.) We made six bales of cotton last year. My son lives here and his +wife--a Chicago reared mulatto, a cook. He runs my farm. I live very +well." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Dolly Phillips, Clarendon, Arkansas +Age: 67 + + +"I ain't no ex-slave. I am 67 years old. I was born out here on the +Mullins place. My mother's master was Mr. Ricks and Miss Emma Ricks. + +"My mother named Diana and my father Henry Mullins. I never saw my grand +fathers and I seen one grandma I remembers. My mother had ten children. +My father said he never owned nuthin' in his life but six horses. When +they was freed they got off to their selves and started farming. See +they belong to different folks. My father's master was a captain of a +mixed regiment. They was in the war four years. I heard 'em say they +went to Galveston, Texas. The Yankees was after 'em. But I don't know +how it was. + +"I heard 'em say they put their heads under big black pot to pray. They +say sing easy, pray easy. I forgot whut all she say. + +"I lives wid my daughter. I gets commodities from the Welfare some. The +young folks drinks a heap now. It look lack a waste of money to me." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person Interviewed: Tony Piggy + Brinkley, Ark. +Age: 75 + + +"I was born near Selma, Alabama, but I was raised in Mississippi. My +grandpa was sold from South Carolina to Moster Alexander Piggy. He +didn't talk plain but my papa didn't nother. Moster Piggy bought a gang +of black folks in South Carolina and brought em into the state of +Alabama. My papa was mighty near full-blood African, I'll tell you. Now +ma was mixed. + +"I'm most too young to recollect the war. Right after the war we had +small pox. My uncle died and there was seven children had em at one +time. The bushwhackers come in and kicked us around--kicked my uncle +around. We lived at Union Town, Alabama then. + +"Aunt Connie used to whip us. Mama had no time; she was a chambermaid +(housewoman). The only thing I recollect bout slavery time to tell is +Old Mistress pour out a bushell of penders (peanuts) on the grass to see +us pick em up and set out eating em. When they went to town they would +bring back things like cheese good to eat. We got some of what they had +most generally. She wasn't so good; she whoop me with a cow whip. She'd +make pull candy for us too. I got a right smart of raisin' in a way but +I growed up to be a wild young man. I been converted since then. + +"Well, one day pa come to our house and told mama, 'We free, don't have +to go to the house no more, git ready, we all goin' to Mississippi. +Moster Piggy goiner go. He goner rent us twenty acres and we goner take +two cows and a mule.' We was all happy to be free and goin' off +somewhere. Moster Piggy bought land in Mississippi and put families +renters on it. Moster Piggy was rough on the grown folks but good to the +children. The work didn't let up. We railly had more clearin' and fences +to make. His place in Alabama was pore and that was new ground. + +"There was all toll nine children in my family. Ma was named Matty +Piggy. Papa was named Ezra Piggy. Moster Alexander Piggy's wife named +Harriett. I knowed Ed, Charley, Bowls, Ells, and Liza. That's all I ever +knowd. + +"I have done so many things. I run on a steamboat from Cairo to New +Orleans--Kate Adams and May F. Carter. They called me a Rouster--that +means a working man. I run on a boat from Newport to Memphis. Then I +farmed, done track work on the railroad, and farmed some more. + +"The young generation ain't got respect for old people and they tryin' +to live without work. I ain't got no fault to find with the times if I +was bout forty years younger than I is now I could work right ahead." + + + + +Interviewer: Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Ella Pittman + 2409 West Eleventh Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 84 + + +"Yes ma'm, I was born in slavery days. I tell you I never had no name. +My old master named me--Just called me 'Puss? and said I could name +myself when I got big enough. + +"My old master was named Mac Williams. But where I got free at was at +Stricklands. Mac Williams' daughter married a Strickland and she drawed +me. She was tollable good to me but her husband wa'nt. + +"In slavery times I cleaned up the house and worked in the house. I +worked in the field a little but she kept me busy in the house. I was +busy night and day. + +"No ma'm, I never did go to school--never did go to school. + +"After I got grown I worked in the farm. When I wasn't farmin' I was +doin' other kinds of work. I used to cut and sew and knit and crochet. I +stayed around the white folks so much they learned me to do all kinds of +work. I never did buy my children any stockins--I knit 'em myself. + +"After old Master died old Miss hired us out to Ben Deans, but he was so +cruel mama run away and went back to old Miss. I know we stayed at Ben +Deans till they was layin the crop by and I think he whipped mama that +morning so she run away. + +"Yes ma'm, I sho do member bout the Klu Klux--sho do. They looked +dreadful--nearly scare you to death. The Klu Klux was bad, and the +paddyrollers too. + +"I can't think of nothin' much to tell you now but I know all about +slavery. They used to build 'little hell', made something like a +barbecue pit and when the niggers didn't do like they wanted they'd lay +him over that 'little hell'. + +"I've done ever kind of work--maulin rails, clearin up new ground. They +was just one kind of work I didn't do and that was workin' with a +grubbin' hoe. I tell you I just worked myself to death till now I ain't +able to do nothin'." + + +Interviewer's Comment + +Ella Pittman's son, Almira Pittman was present when I interviewed his +mother. He was born in 1884. He added this information to what Ella told +me: + +"She is the mother of nine children--three living. I use to hear mama +tell about how they did in slavery times. If she could hear good now she +could map it out to you." + +I asked him why he didn't teach his mother to read and write and he +said, "Well, I tell you, mama is high strung. She didn't have no real +name till she went to Louisiana." + +These people live in a well-furnished home. The living room had a rug, +overstuffed furniture and an organ. Ella was clean. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Ella Pittman + 2417 W. Eleventh Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 84 +[TR: Appears to be same as last informant despite different address.] + + +"Here's one that lived then. I can remember fore the Civil War started. +That was in the State of North Carolina where I was bred and born in +March 1853. Mac Williams, he was my first owner and John Strickland was +my last owner. That was durin' of the war. My white folks told me I was +thirteen when peace was declared. They told me in April if I make no +mistake. That was in North Carolina. I grewed up there and found my +childun there. That is--seven of them. And then I found two since I been +down in here. I been in Arkansas about forty years. + +"When the war come I heard em say they was after freein' the people. + +"My mother worked in the field and old mistress kep' me in the house. +She married a widow-man and he had four childun and then she had one so +there was plenty for me to do. Yes ma'm! + +"I ain't never been to school a day in my life. They didn't try to send +me after freedom. I had a very, very bad, cruel stepfather and he sent +all his childun to school but wouldn't send me. I stayed there till I +was grown. I sho did. Then I married. Been married just once. Never had +but that one man in my life. He was a very good man, too. Cose he was a +poor man but he was good to me. + +"Yes ma'm, I sho did see the Ku Klux and the paddyrollers, too. They +done em bad I tell you. + +"I know they was a white man they called Old Man Ford. He dug a pit just +like a barbecue pit, and he would burn coals just like you was goin' to +barbecue. Then he put sticks across the top and when any of his niggers +didn't do right, he laid em across that pit. I member they called it Old +Ford's Hell. + +"I had a bad time fore freedom and a bad time after freedom till after I +married. I'm doin' tollably well now. I lives with my son and his wife +and she treats me very well. I can't live alone cause I'se subject to +inagestin' and I takes sick right sudden. + +"I'm just as thankful as I can be that I'm gettin' along as well as I +is. + +"I stayed in the North in Detroit one year. I liked it very well. I +liked the white people very well. They was so sociable. My son lives +there and works for Henry Ford. My oldest son stays in Indiana. + +"It was so cold I come back down here. I'se gettin' old and I needs to +be warm. Good-bye." + + + + +Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor +Person interviewed: Sarah Pittman + 1320 W. Twentieth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas +Age: About 82 + + +"I never saw nothing between white folks and colored folks. My white +folks were good to us. My daddy's white folks were named Jordan--Jim +Jordan--and my mama's folks were Jim Underwood. And they were good. My +mama's and father's folks both were good to the colored folks. As the +song goes, 'I can tell it everywhere I go.' And thank the Lord, +I'm here to tell it too. I raised children, grandchildren, and +great-grandchildren you see there. That is my great-grandson playing +there. He is having the time of his life. I raised him right too. You +see how good he minds me. He better not do nothin' different. He's about +two years old. + +"I was born in Union Parish, Louisiana way up yonder in them hills, me +and my folks, and they come down here. + +"Jim Jordan married one of the Taylor girls--Jim Taylor's daughter. The +old folks gave mama to them to do their housework. My father and mama +didn't belong to the same masters. He died the first year of the +surrender. He was a wonderful man. He was a Jackson. On Saturday night +he would stay with us till Sunday. On Sunday night he would go home. He +would play with us. Now he and mama both are dead. They are gone home +and I am waiting to go. They're waiting for me in the kingdom there. As +the song says, 'I am waiting on the promises of God.' + +"My mama did housework in slave time. I don't know what my father did. +In them days you done some working from plantation to plantation. Them +folks is all gone in now near about. Guess mine will be the next time. + + +Early Childhood + +"First thing I remember is staying at the house. We et at the white +folks' house. We would go there in the evening before sundown and git +our supper. One time Jim Underwood made me mad. Mama said something he +didn't like. And he tied her thumbs together and tied them to a limb. +Her feet could touch the ground--they weren't off the ground. He said +she could stay there till she thought better of it. + +"Before the surrender I didn't do nothing in the line of work 'cept +'tend to my mother's children. I didn't do no work at all 'cept that. My +white folks were good to me. All my folks 'cept me are gone. My grandmas +and uncles and things all settin' up yonder. All my children what is +dead, they're up yonder. I ain't got but three living, and they're on +their way. Minnie and Mamie and Annie, that is all I got. Mamie's the +youngest and she's got grandchildren. + + +How Freedom Came + +"The way we learned that freedom had come, my uncle come to the fence +and told my mama we were free and I went with her. Sure he'd been to the +War. He come back with his budget. Don't you know what a budget is? You +ain't never been to war, have you? Well, you oughter know what a budget +is. That's a knapsack. It had a pocket on each side and a water can on +each shoulder. He come home with his budget on his back, and he come to +the fence and told mama we was free and I heered him. + + +Right After Freedom + +"Right after freedom my mama and them stayed with the same people they +had been with. The rest of the people scattered wherever they wanted to +But my uncle come there and got mama. They moved back to the Taylors +then where my grandma was. Wouldn't care if I had some of that good old +spring water now where my grandma lived! + +"None of my people were ever bothered by the pateroles or the Ku Klux. + +"We come to Arkansas because we had kinfolks down here. Just picked up +and come on. I been here a long time. I don't know how long, I don't +keep up with nothing like that. When my husband was living I just +followed him. He said that this was a good place and we could make a +good living. So I just come on. When he died, those gravediggers dug his +grave deep enough to put another man on top of him. But that don't hurt +him none. He's settin' in the kingdom. He was a deacon in the church and +his word went. The whole plantation would listen to him and do what he +said. Everybody respected him because he was right. I was just married +once and no man can take his place. He was the first one and the best +one and the last one. He was heaven bound and he went on there. I don't +know just how long I was married. It is in the Bible. It is in there in +big letters. I can't get that right now. It's so big and heavy. But it's +in there. I think we left it in Detroit when I was there, and it ain't +come back here yet. But I know we lived together a long time. + +"I remember the old slave-time songs but I can't think of them just now. +'Come to Jesus' is one of them. 'Where shall I be when the first trumpet +sounds?', that's another one. Another one is: 'If I could, I surely +would; Set on the rock where Moses stood--first verse or stanza. All of +my sins been taken away, taken away--chorus. Mary wept and Martha +moaned, Mary's gone to a world unknown--second verse or stanza. All of +my sins are taken away, taken away--chorus." + +"I don't think nothing 'bout these young folks. When they was turned +loose a lot of them went wild and the young folks followed their +leaders. But mine followed me and my daddy. + +"My grandmother had a big old bay horse and she was midwife for the +white and the colored folks. She would put her side saddle on the old +horse and get up and go, bless her heart; and me and my cousin had to +stay there and take care of things. She's gone now. The Lord left me +here for some reason. And I'm enjoyin' it too. I have got my first +cussin' to do. I don't like to hear nobody cuss. I belong to the church. +I belong to the Baptist church and I go to the Arch Street Church." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: Mary Poe, Forrest City, Arkansas +Age: 60 + + +"My papa used to tell about two men he knowd stealing a hog. He was +Wyatt Alexander. He was feeding one evening and the master was out there +too that evening. They overheard two colored men inside the crib lot +house. They was looking at the hogs. They planned to come back after +dark and get a hog. The way it turned out master dressed up ragged and +got inside that night. The first man come. They got a shoat and killed +it, knocked it in the head. The master took it on his back to the log +cabin. When he knocked, his wife opened the door. She seen who it was. +She nearly fell out and when he seen who it was he run off. The master +throwed the hog down. They all got the hot water and went to work. He +left a third there and took part to the other man. He done gone to bed +and he took a third on home. He said he wanted to see if they needed +meat or wanted to keep in stealing practice. He didn't want them to +waste his big hog meat neither. Said that man never come home for two +weeks, 'fraid he'd get a whooping. No, they said he never got a whooping +but the meat was near by gone. + +"Seem lack hog stealing was common in North Carolina in them days from +the way he talked. + +"Papa said he went down in the pasture one night to get a shoat. He said +they had a fine big drove. He got one knocked over an' was carrying it +out across the fence to the field. He seen another man. He couldn't see. +It was dark. He throwed the hog over on him. The man took the shoat on +to his house and papa was afraid to say much about it. He said way 'long +towards day this man come bringing about half of that hog cleaned and +ready to salt away. They got up and packed it away out of sight. + +"My mother was named Lucy Alexander, too." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: W.L. Pollacks + Brinkley, Arkansas +Age: 68 + + +"I was born in Shelby County Tennessee. My folks all come from Richmond, +Virginia. They come to Kentucky and then on to Tennessee. I am 68 years +old. My father's master was Joe Rollacks and Mrs. Chicky they called his +wife. My mother's master was Joe Ricks and they all called his wife Miss +Fee. I guess it was Pheobe or Josephine but they never called her by +them names. Seemed like they was all kin folks. I heard my mother say +she dress up in some of the white folks dresses and hitch up the buggy, +take dinner and carry two girls nearly grown out to church and to big +picnics. She liked that. The servants would set the table and help the +white folks plates at the table. Said they had a heap good eating. She +had a plenty work to do but she got to take the girls places where the +parents didn't want to go. She said they didn't know what to do wid +freedom. She said it was like weening a child what never learned to eat +yet. I forgot what they did do. She said work was hard to find and money +scarce. They find some white folks feed em to do a little work. She said +a nickle looked big as a dollar now. They couldn't buy a little bit. +They like never get nough money to buy a barrel of flour. It was so +high. Seem like she say I was walking when they got a barrel of flour. +So many colored folks died right after freedom. They caught consumption. +My mother said they was exposed mo than they been used to and mixing up +in living quarters too much what caused it. My father voted a Republican +ticket. I ain't voted much since I come to Arkansas. I been here 32 +years. My farm failed over in Tennessee. I was out lookin' round for +farmin' land, lookin' round for good work. I farmed then I worked seven +or eight years on the section, then I helped do brick work till now I +can't do but a mighty little. I had three children but they all dead. I +got sugar dibeates. + +"The present times are tough on sick people. It is hard for me to get a +living. I find the young folks all for their own selves. If I was well I +could get by easy. If a man is strong he can get a little work along. + +"The times and young generation both bout to run away wid themselves, +and the rest of the folks can't stop em 'pears to me like." + + + + +Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson +Person interviewed: "Doc" John Pope, Biscoe, Arkansas +Age: 87 + + +I am 87 years old for a fact. I was born in De Soto County, Mississippi, +eight miles south of Memphis, Tennessee. No I didn't serve in de War but +my father Gus Pope did. He served in de War three years and never came +home. He served in 63rd Regiment Infantry of de Yankee army. He died +right at the surrender. I stayed on de farm till the surrender. We +scattered around den. My father was promised $300.00 bounty and 160 +acres of land. Dey was promised dat by the Constitution of the United +States. Every soldier was promised dat. No he never got nary penny nor +nary acre of land. We ain't got nuthin. De masters down in Mississippi +did help 'em where they stayed on. I never stayed on. I left soon as de +fightin was gone. I was roamin round in Memphis and man asked me if I +wanted to go to college. He sent a train load to Fitz (Fisk) University. +I stayed there till I graduated. I studied medicine generally. Sandy +Odom, the preacher at Brinkley, was there same time as I was. He show is +old. He's up in ninety now. He had a brother here till he died. He was a +fine doctor. He got more practice around here than any white doctor in +this portion of de county. Fitz University was a fine college. It was +run by rich folks up north. I don't know how long I stayed there. It was +a good while. I went to Isaac Pope, my uncle. He was farming. Briscoe +owned the Pope niggers at my first recollection. He brought my uncle and +a lot more over here where he owned a heap of dis land. It was all +woods. Dats how I come here. + +After de Civil War? Dey had to "Root hog or die". From 1860-1870 the +times was mighty hard. People rode through the county and killed both +white and black. De carpet bagger was bout as bad as de Ku Kluck. + +I came here I said wid John Briscoe. They all called him Jack Briscoe, +in 1881. I been here ever since cept W.T. Edmonds and P.H. Conn sent me +back home to get hands. I wrote 'em how many I had. They wired tickets +to Memphis. I fetched 52 families back. I been farmin and practicin all +my life put near. + +I show do vote. I voted the last time for President Hoover. The first +time I voted was at the General Grant election. I am a Republican, +because it is handed down to me. That's the party of my race. I ain't +going to change. That's my party till I dies. We has our leader what +instructs us how to vote. + +Dey say dey goiner pay 60 cents a hundred but I ain't able to pick no +cotton. No I don't get no help from de relief. I think the pore class of +folks in a mighty bad fix. Is what I think. The nigger is hard hit and +the pore trash dey call 'em is too. I don't know what de cause is. It's +been jess this way ever since I can recollect. No times show ain't one +bit better. I owns dis house and dats all. I got one daughter. + +I went to Fitz (Fisk) University in 1872. The folks I told you about was +there then too. Their names was Dr. E.B. Odom of Biscoe and his brother +Sandy Odom. He preaches at Brinkley now. Doc Odom is dead. He served on +the Biscoe School Board a long time wid two white men. + +I don't know much about the young generation. They done got too smart +for me to advise. The young ones is gettin fine educations but it ain't +doin 'em no good. Some go north and cook. It don't do the balance of 'em +no good. If they got education they don't lack de farm. De sun too hot. +No times ain't no better an de nigger ain't no better off en he used to +be. A little salary dun run 'em wild. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: William Porter + 1818 Louisiana Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 81 +Occupation: Janitor of church + + +"Yes'm I lived in slavery times. I was born in 1856. I was borned in +Tennessee but the most of my life has been in Arkansas. + +"I remember when Hood's raid was. That was the last fight of the war. I +recollect seein' the soldiers marchin' night and day for two days. I saw +the cavalry men and the infant men walking. I heard em say the North was +fightin' the South. They called the North Yankees and the South Rebels. + +"Some of the Tennessee niggers was called free niggers. There was a +colored man in Pulaski, Tennessee who owned slaves. + +"My father was workin' to buy his freedom and had just one more year to +work when peace come. His master gave him a chance to buy his freedom. +He worked for old master in the daytime and at night he worked for +himself. He split rails and raised watermelons. + +"My father's master was named Tom Gray at that time. Considering the +times he was a very fair man. + +"When the war broke up I was workin' around a barber shop in Nashville, +Tennessee. + +"The Queen of England offered to buy the slaves and raise them till they +were grown, then give them a horse, a plow and so many acres of ground +but the South wouldn't accept this offer. + +"It was the rule of the South to keep the people as ignorant as +possible, but my mother had a little advantage over some. The white +children learned her to read and write, and when freedom came she could +write her name and even scribble out a letter. She gave me my first +lesson, and I started to school in '67. The North sent teachers down +here after the war. They were government schools. + +"I was pretty apt in figgers--studied Bay's Arithmetic through the third +book. I was getting along in school, but I slipped away from my people +and was goin' to get a pocket full of money and then go back. First man +I worked for was a colored man and I kept his books for him and was to +get one-fourth of the crop. The first year he settled with me I had $165 +clear after I paid all my debts. I done very well. I farmed one more +year, then I come to Pine Bluff and did government work along the +Arkansas River. + +"I've done carpenter work and concrete work. I learned it by doing it. I +followed concrete work for a long time. I've hoped to build several +houses here in Pine Bluff and a lot of these streets. + +"I have a brother and sister who graduated from Fisk University. + +"I think one thing about the younger generation is they need to be more +educated in the way of manners and to have race pride and to be subject +to the laws." + + + + +Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lacy +Person interviewed: Bob Potter, Russellville, Arkansas +Age: 65 + + +"Sure, you oughter remember me--Bob Potter. Used to know you when you +was a boy passin' de house every day go in' down to de old Democrat +printin' office. Knowed yo' brother and all yo' folks. Knowed yo' pappy +mighty well. Is yo' ma and pa livin' now? No suh, I reckin not. + +"I was born de seventeenth of September, 1873 right here in +Russellville. Daddy's name was Dick, and mudder's was Ann Potter. Daddy +died before I was born, and I never seed him. Mudder's been dead about +eighteen years. Dey master was named Hale, and he lived up around Dover +somewheres on his farm, but I dunno how dey come by de name Potter. +Well, now, lemme see--oh, yes, dey was freed at Dover after dey come +dere from North Ca'liny. I think my ma was born in West Virginia, and +den dey went to North Ca'liny and den to South Ca'liny, and den come to +Arkansas. + +"I raised seven boys and lost five chillen. Dere was three girls and +nine boys. All dat's livin' is here except one in Fresno, California. My +old woman here, she tells fortunes for de white folks and belongs to de +Holiness church but I don't belong to none; I let her look after de +religion for de fambly." (Interjection from Mrs. Potter: "Yes suh, you +bet I belongs to de Holiness chu'ch. You got to walk in de light to be +saved, and if you do walk in de light you can't sin. I been saved for a +good many yeahs and am goin' on in de faith. Praise de Lawd!") + +"My mudder was sold once for a hundud dollahs and once ag'in for +thirty-eight hundud dollahs. Perhaps dis was jist before dey left West +Virginia and was shipped to North Ca'liny. De master put her upon a box, +she said, made her jump up and pop her heels together three times and +den turn around and pop her heels again to show how strong she was. She +sure was strong and a hard worker. She could cut wood, tote logs, plow, +hoe cotton, and do ever'thing on de place, and lived to be about +ninety-five yeahs old. Yas suh, she was as old or older dan Aunt Joan is +when she died. + +"No suh, I used to vote but I quit votin', for votin' never did git me +nothin'; I quit two yeahs ago. You see, my politics didn't suit em. +Maybe I shouldn't be tellin' you but I was a Socialist, and I was +runnin' a mine and wo'kin' fifteen men, and dey was all Socialists, and +de Republicans and Democrats sure put me out of business--dey put me to +de bad. + +"Dat was about twelve yeahs ago when I run de mine. I been tryin' to git +me a pension but maybe dat's one reason I can't git it. Oh yes, I owns +my home--dat is, I did own it, but---- + +"Oh Lawd, yes, I knows a lot of dem old songs like 'Let Our Light +Shine,' and 'De Good Old Gospel Way,' and 'Hark From de Tomb.' Listen, +you oughter hear Elder Beam sing dat one. He's de pastor of de Baptis' +Chu'ch at Fort Smith. He can sure make it ring! + +"De young folks of today compa'ed to dem when we was boys? Huh! You jist +can't compaih em--can't be done. Why, a fo'-yeah-old young'un knows mo' +today dan our grandmammies knowed. And in dem days de boys and gals +could go out and play and swing togedder and behave deyselves. We went +in our shu'ttails and hit was all right; we had two shu'ts to weah--one +for every day and one for Sunday--and went in our shu'ttails both every +day and Sunday and was respected. And if you didn't behave you sure got +whupped. Dey didn't put dey arms around you and hug you and den put you +off to sleep. Dey whupped you, and it was real whuppin'. + +"Used to hear my mudder talk about de Ku Klux Klan puttin' cotton +between her toes and whuppin' her, and dat's de way dey done us +young'uns when we didn't behave. And we used to have manners den, both +whites and blacks. I wish times was like dem days, but dey's gone. + +"Yes, we used to have our tasks to do befo' goin' to bed. We'd have a +little basket of cotton and had to pick de seeds all out of dat cotton +befo' we went to bed. And we could all ca'd and spin--yes suh--make dat +old spinnin' wheel go Z-z-z-z as you walked back and fo'f a-drawin' out +de spool of ya'n. And you could weave cloth and make all yo' own +britches, too. (Here his wife interpolated a homely illustration of the +movement of "de shettle" in the loom weaving--ed.) + +"Yes, I mind my mudder tellin' many a time about dem Klan-men, and how +dey whupped white women to make em give up de money dey had hid, and how +dey used to burn dey feet. Yes suh, ain't no times like dem old days, +and I wish we had times like em now. Yes suh, I'll sure come to see you +in town one of dese days. Good mornin'." + + +NOTE: Bob Potter is a most interesting Negro character--one of the most +genial personalities of the Old South that the interviewer has met +anywhere. His humor is infectious, his voice boisterous, but delightful, +and his uproarious laugh just such as one delights to listen to. And his +narrations seem to ring with veracity. + + + + +Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden +Person interviewed: Louise Prayer + 3401 Short West Third, Pine Bluff, Arkansas +Age: 80 + + +"I can member seein' the Yankees. My mother died when I was a baby and +my grandmother raised me. I'se goin' on eighty. + +"When the Yankees come we piled boxes and trunks in front of the doors +and windows. She'd say, 'You chillun get in the house; the Yankees are +comin'.' I didn't know what 'twas about--I sure didn't. + +"I'm honest in mind. You know the Yankees used to come in and whip the +folks. I know they come in and whipped my grandma and when they come in +we chillun went under the bed. Didn't know no better. Why did they whip +her? Oh my God, I don't know bout dat. You know when we chillun saw em +ridin' in a hurry we went in the house and under the bed. I specks +they'd a killed me if they come up to me cause they'd a scared me to +death. + +"We lived on the Williams' place. All belonged to the same people. They +give us plenty to eat such as 'twas. But in them days they fed the +chillun mostly on bread and syrup. Sometimes we had greens and +dumplin's. Jus' scald some meal and roll up in a ball and drop in with +the greens. Just a very few chickens we had. I don't love chicken +though. If I can jus' get the liver I'm through with the chicken. + +"When I got big enough my grandmother had me in the field. I went to +school a little bit but I didn't learn nothin'. Didn't go long enough. +That I didn't cause the old man had us in the field. + +"If we chillun in them days had had the sense these got now, I could +remember more bout things. + +"I was a young missy when I married. + +"I told you the best I could--that's all I know. I been treated pretty +good." + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Slave Narratives: A Folk History of +Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves, by Work Projects Administration + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SLAVE NARRATIVES *** + +***** This file should be named 11544.txt or 11544.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/1/5/4/11544/ + +Produced by Andrea Ball and PG Distributed Proofreaders. Produced from +images provided by the Library of Congress, Manuscript Division. + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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