diff options
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 3 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20785-8.txt | 12868 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20785-8.zip | bin | 0 -> 233014 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20785-h.zip | bin | 0 -> 525867 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20785-h/20785-h.htm | 12589 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20785-h/images/image053.jpg | bin | 0 -> 81118 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20785-h/images/image065.jpg | bin | 0 -> 64208 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20785-h/images/image275.jpg | bin | 0 -> 68103 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20785-h/images/image330.jpg | bin | 0 -> 69229 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20785-page-images.zip | bin | 0 -> 11461518 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20785.txt | 12868 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 20785.zip | bin | 0 -> 232992 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 |
14 files changed, 38341 insertions, 0 deletions
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/20785-8.txt b/20785-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..4a2412e --- /dev/null +++ b/20785-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,12868 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Slave Narratives, Oklahoma, by Various + +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, Oklahoma + A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From + Interviews with Former Slaves + +Author: Various + +Release Date: March 8, 2007 [EBook #20785] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SLAVE NARRATIVES, OKLAHOMA *** + + + + +Produced by Diane Monico and The Project Gutenberg Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net. (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by the Library of Congress, Manuscript Division.) This +file is gratefully uploaded to the PG collection in honor +of Distributed Proofreaders having posted over 10,000 +ebooks. + + + + + +[HW: ***] = Handwritten Note +[TR: ***] = Transcriber 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 + + +_Illustrated with Photographs_ + + +WASHINGTON 1941 + + + + +VOLUME XIII + +OKLAHOMA NARRATIVES + + +Prepared by +the Federal Writers' Project of +the Works Progress Administration +for the State of Oklahoma + + + + +INFORMANTS + + +Adams, Isaac 1 +Alexander, Alice 6 + +Banks, Phoebe 8 +Bean, Nancy Rogers 12 +Bee, Prince 14 +Bonner, Lewis 17 +Bridges, Francis 20 +Brown, John 24 + +Carder, Sallie 27 +Chessier, Betty Foreman 30 +Colbert, Polly 33 +Conrad, Jr., George 39 +Cunningham, Martha 45 +Curtis, William 48 + +Davis, Lucinda 53 +Dawson, Anthony 65 +Douglass, Alice 73 +Dowdy, Doc Daniel 76 +Draper, Joanna 81 + +Easter, Esther 88 +Evans, Eliza 92 + +Farmer, Lizzie 97 +Fountain, Della 102 + +Gardner, Nancy 108 +George, Octavia 111 +Grayson, Mary 115 + +Grinstead, Robert R. 124 + +Hardman, Mattie 128 +Hawkins, Annie 131 +Henry, Ida 134 +Hillyer, Morris 138 +Hutson, Hal 145 +Hutson, William 148 + +Jackson, Isabella 152 +Johnson, Nellie 155 +Jordan, Josie 160 + +King, George G. 165 +King, Martha 169 +Kye, George 172 + +Lawson, Ben 176 +Lindsay, Mary 178 +Logan, Mattie 187 +Love, Kiziah 192 +Lucas, Daniel William 200 +Luster, Bert 203 + +McCray, Stephen 207 +McFarland, Hannah 210 +Mack, Marshall 212 +Manning, Allen B. 215 +Maynard, Bob 223 +Montgomery, Jane 227 + +Oliver, Amanda 230 +Oliver, Salomon 233 + +Petite, Phyllis 236 +Poe, Matilda 242 +Pyles, Henry F. 245 + +Richardson, Chaney 257 +Richardson, Red 263 +Robertson, Betty 266 +Robinson, Harriett 270 +Rowe, Katie 275 + +Sheppard, Morris 285 +Simms, Andrew 295 +Smith, Liza 298 +Smith, Lou 300 +Southall, James 306 + +Tenneyson, Beauregard 310 + +Walters, William 312 +Webb, Mary Frances 314 +Wells, Easter 316 +White, John 322 +Williams, Charley 330 +Wilson, Sarah 344 +Woods, Tom 354 + +Young, Annie 359 + + + + +ILLUSTRATIONS + + + Facing Page + +Lucinda Davis 53 + +Anthony Dawson 65 + +Katie Rowe 275 + +Charley Williams and Granddaughter 330 + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +ISAAC ADAMS +Age 87 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + +I was born in Louisiana, way before the War. I think it was about ten +years before, because I can remember everything so well about the +start of the War, and I believe I was about ten years old. + +My Mammy belonged to Mr. Sack P. Gee. I don't know what his real given +name was, but it maybe was Saxon. Anyways we all called him Master +Sack. + +He was a kind of youngish man, and was mighty rich. I think he was +born in England. Anyway his pappy was from England, and I think he +went back before I was born. + +Master Sack had a big plantation ten miles north of Arcadia, +Louisiana, and his land run ten miles along both sides. He would leave +in a buggy and be gone all day and still not get all over it. + +There was all kinds of land on it, and he raised cane and oats and +wheat and lots of corn and cotton. His cotton fields was the biggest +anywheres in that part, and when chopping and picking times come he +would get negroes from other people to help out. I never was no good +at picking, but I was a terror with a hoe! + +I was the only child my Mammy had. She was just a young girl, and my +Master did not own her very long. He got her from Mr. Addison +Hilliard, where my pappy belonged. I think she was going to have me +when he got her; anyways I come along pretty soon, and my mammy never +was very well afterwards. Maybe Master Sack sent her back over to my +pappy. I don't know. + +Mammy was the house girl at Mr. Sack's because she wasn't very strong, +and when I was four or five years old she died. I was big enough to do +little things for Mr. Sack and his daughter, so they kept me at the +mansion, and I helped the house boys. Time I was nine or ten Mr. +Sack's daughter was getting to be a young woman--fifteen or sixteen +years old--and that was old enough to get married off in them days. +They had a lot of company just before the War, and they had whole +bunch of house negroes around all the time. + +Old Mistress died when I was a baby, so I don't remember anything +about her, but Young Mistress was a winder! She would ride horseback +nearly all the time, and I had to go along with her when I got big +enough. She never did go around the quarters, so I don't know nothing +much about the negroes Mr. Sack had for the fields. They all looked +pretty clean and healthy, though, when they would come up to the Big +House. He fed them all good and they all liked him. + +He had so much different kinds of land that they could raise anything +they wanted, and he had more mules and horses and cattle than anybody +around there. Some of the boys worked with his fillies all the time, +and he went off to New Orleans ever once in a while with his race +horses. He took his daughter but they never took me. + +Some of his land was in pasture but most of it was all open fields, +with just miles and miles of cotton rows. There was a pretty good +strip along one side he called the "old" fields. That's what they +called the land that was wore out and turned back. It was all growed +up in young trees, and that's where he kept his horses most of the +time. + +The first I knowed about the War coming on was when Mr. Sack had a +whole bunch of whitefolks at the Big House at a function. They didn't +talk about anything else all evening and then the next time they come +nearly all their menfolks wasn't there--just the womenfolks. It wasn't +very long till Mr. Sack went off to Houma with some other men, and +pretty soon we knew he was in the War. I don't remember ever seeing +him come home. I don't think he did until it was nearly all over. + +Next thing we knowed they was Confederate soldiers riding by pretty +nearly every day in big droves. Sometimes they would come and buy corn +and wheat and hogs, but they never did take any anyhow, like the +Yankees done later on. They would pay with billets, Young Missy called +them, and she didn't send them to git them cashed but saved them a +long time, and then she got them cashed, but you couldn't buy anything +with the money she got for them. + +That Confederate money she got wasn't no good. I was in Arcadia with +her at a store, and she had to pay seventy-five cents for a can of +sardines for me to eat with some bread I had, and before the War you +could get a can like that for two cents. Things was even higher then +than later on, but that's the only time I saw her buy anything. + +When the Yankees got down in that country the most of the big men paid +for all the corn and meat and things they got, but some of the little +bunches of them would ride up and take hogs and things like that and +just ride off. They wasn't anybody at our place but the womenfolks and +the negroes. Some of Mr. Sack's women kinfolks stayed there with Young +Mistress. + +Along at the last the negroes on our place didn't put in much +stuff--jest what they would need, and could hide from the Yankees, +because they would get it all took away from them if the Yankees found +out they had plenty of corn and oats. + +The Yankees was mighty nice about their manners, though. They camped +all around our place for a while. There was three camps of them close +by at one time, but they never did come and use any of our houses or +cabins. There was lots of poor whites and Cajuns that lived down below +us, between us and the Gulf, and the Yankees just moved into their +houses and cabins and used them to camp in. + +The negroes at our place and all of them around there didn't try to +get away or leave when the Yankees come in. They wasn't no place to +go, anyway, so they all stayed on. But they didn't do very much work. +Just enough to take care of themselves and their whitefolks. + +Master Sack come home before the War was quite over. I think he had +been sick, because he looked thin and old and worried. All the negroes +picked up and worked mighty hard after he come home, too. + +One day he went into Arcadia and come home and told us the War was +over and we was all free. The negroes didn't know what to make of it, +and didn't know where to go, so he told all that wanted to stay on +that they could just go on like they had been and pay him shares. + +About half of his negroes stayed on, and he marked off land for them +to farm and made arrangements with them to let them use their cabins, +and let them have mules and tools. They paid him out of their shares, +and some of them finally bought the mules and some of the land. But +about half went on off and tried to do better somewheres else. + +I didn't stay with him because I was jest a boy and he didn't need me +at the house anyway. + +Late in the War my Pappy belonged to a man named Sander or Zander. +Might been Alexander, but the negroes called him Mr. Sander. When +pappy got free he come and asked me to go with him, and I went along +and lived with him. He had a share-cropper deal with Mr. Sander and I +helped him work his patch. That place was just a little east of Houma, +a few miles. + +When my Pappy was born his parents belonged to a Mr. Adams, so he took +Adams for his last name, and I did too, because I was his son. I don't +know where Mr. Adams lived, but I don't think my Pappy was born in +Louisiana. Alabama, maybe. I think his parents come off the boat, +because he was very black--even blacker than I am. + +I lived there with my Pappy until I was about eighteen and then I +married and moved around all over Louisiana from time to time. My wife +give me twelve boys and five girls, but all my children are dead now +but five. My wife died in 1920 and I come up here to Tulsa to live. +One of my daughters takes care and looks out for me now. + +I seen the old Sack P. Gee place about twenty years ago, and it was +all cut up in little places and all run down. Never would have known +it was one time a big plantation ten miles long. + +I seen places going to rack and ruin all around--all the places I +lived at in Louisiana--but I'm glad I wasn't there to see Master +Sack's place go down. He was a good man and done right by all his +negroes. + +Yes, Lord, my old feets have been in mighty nigh every parish in +Louisiana, and I seen some mighty pretty places, but I'll never forget +how that old Gee plantation looked when I was a boy. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +ALICE ALEXANDER +Age 88 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was 88 years old the 15th of March. I was born in 1849, at Jackson +Parish, Louisiana. My mother's name was Mary Marlow, and father's +Henry Marlow. + +I can't remember very much 'bout slavery 'cause I was awful small, but +I can remember that my mother's master, Colonel Threff died, and my +mother, her husband, and us three chillun was handed down to Colonel +Threff's poor kin folks. Colonel Threff owned about two or three +hundred head of niggers, and all of 'em was tributed to his poor kin. +Ooh wee! he sho' had jest a lot of them too! Master Joe Threff, one of +his poor kin, took my mother, her husband, and three of us chillun +from Louisiana to the Mississippi Line. + +Down there we lived in a one-room log hut, and slept on homemade rail +bed steads with cotton, and sometimes straw, mostly straw summers and +cotton winners. I worked round the house and looked after de smaller +chillun--I mean my mother's chillun. Mostly we ate yeller meal corn +bread and sorghum malasses. I ate possums when we could get 'em, but +jest couldn't stand rabbit meat. Didn't know there was any Christmas +or holidays in dem days. + +I can't 'membuh nothing 'bout no churches in slavery. I was a sinner +and loved to dance. I remembuh I was on the floor one night dancing +and I had four daughters on the floor with me and my son was playing +de music--that got me! I jest stopped and said I wouldn't cut another +step and I haven't. I'm a member of the Baptist Church and been for 25 +or 30 years. I jined 'cause I wanted to be good 'cause I was an awful +sinner. + +We had a overseer back on Colonel Threff's plantation and my mother +said he was the meanest man on earth. He'd jest go out in de fields +and beat dem niggers, and my mother told me one day he come out in de +field beating her sister and she jumped on him and nearly beat him +half to death and old Master come up jest in time to see it all and +fired dat overseer. Said he didn't want no man working fer him dat a +woman could whip. + +After de war set us free my pappy moved us away and I stayed round +down there till I got to be a grown woman and married. You know I had +a pretty fine wedding 'cause my pappy had worked hard and commenced to +be prosperous. He had cattle, hogs, chickens and all those things like +that. + +A college of dem niggers got together and packed up to leave +Louisiana. Me and my husband went with them. We had covered wagons, +and let me tell you I walked nearly all the way from Louisiana to +Oklahoma. We left in March but didn't git here till May. We came in +search of education. I got a pretty fair education down there but +didn't take care of it. We come to Oklahoma looking for de same thing +then that darkies go North looking fer now. But we got dissapointed. +What little I learned I quit taking care of it and seeing after it and +lost it all. + +I love to fish. I've worked hard in my days. Washed and ironed for 30 +years, and paid for dis home that way. Yes sir, dis is my home. My +mother died right here in dis house. She was 111 yeahs old. She is +been dead 'bout 20 yeahs. + +I have three daughters here married, Sussie Pruitt, Bertie Shannon, +and Irene Freeman. Irene lost her husband, and he's dead now. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +10-19-1938 +1,428 words + +PHOEBE BANKS +Age 78 +Muskogee, Oklahoma. + + +In 1860, there was a little Creek Indian town of Sodom on the north +bank of the Arkansas River, in a section the Indians called Chocka +Bottoms, where Mose Perryman had a big farm or ranch for a long time +before the Civil War. That same year, on October 17, I was born on the +Perryman place, which was northwest of where I live now in Muskogee; +only in them days Fort Gibson and Okmulgee was the biggest towns +around and Muskogee hadn't shaped up yet. + +My mother belonged to Mose Perryman when I was born; he was one of the +best known Creeks in the whole nation, and one of his younger +brothers, Legus Perryman, was made the big chief of the Creeks (1887) +a long time after the slaves was freed. Mother's name was Eldee; my +father's name was William McIntosh, because he belonged to a Creek +Indian family by that name. Everybody say the McIntoshes was leaders +in the Creek doings away back there in Alabama long before they come +out here. + +With me, there was twelve children in our family; Daniel, Stroy, +Scott, Segal, Neil, Joe, Phillip, Mollie, Harriett, Sally and Queenie. + +The Perryman slave cabins was all alike--just two-room log cabins, +with a fireplace where mother do the cooking for us children at night +after she get through working in the Master's house. + +Mother was the house girl--cooking, waiting on the table, cleaning the +house, spinning the yarn, knitting some of the winter clothes, taking +care of the mistress girl, washing the clothes--yes, she was always +busy and worked mighty hard all the time, while them Indians wouldn't +hardly do nothing for themselves. + +On the McIntosh plantation, my daddy said there was a big number of +slaves and lots of slave children. The slave men work in the fields, +chopping cotton, raising corn, cutting rails for the fences, building +log cabins and fireplaces. One time when father was cutting down a +tree it fell on him and after that he was only strong enough to rub +down the horses and do light work around the yard. He got to be a good +horse trainer and long time after slavery he helped to train horses +for the Free Fairs around the country, and I suppose the first money +he ever earned was made that way. + +Lots of the slave owners didn't want their slaves to learn reading and +writing, but the Perrymans didn't care; they even helped the younger +slaves with that stuff. Mother said her master didn't care much what +the slaves do; he was so lazy he didn't care for nothing. + +They tell me about the war times, and that's all I remember of it. +Before the War is over some of the Perryman slaves and some from the +McIntosh place fix up to run away from their masters. + +My father and my uncle, Jacob Perryman, was some of the fixers. Some +of the Creek Indians had already lost a few slaves who slip off to the +North, and they take what was left down into Texas so's they couldn't +get away. Some of the other Creeks was friendly to the North and was +fixing to get away up there; that's the ones my daddy and uncle was +fixing to join, for they was afraid their masters would take up and +move to Texas before they could get away. + +They call the old Creek, who was leaving for the North, "Old Gouge" +(Opoethleyohola). All our family join up with him, and there was lots +of Creek Indians and slaves in the outfit when they made a break for +the North. The runaways was riding ponies stolen from their masters. + +When they get into the hilly country farther north in the country that +belong to the Cherokee Indians, they make camp on a big creek and +there the Rebel Indian soldiers catch up, but they was fought back. + +Then long before morning lighten the sky, the men hurry and sling the +camp kettles across the pack horses, tie the littlest children to the +horses backs and get on the move farther into the mountains. They kept +moving fast as they could, but the wagons made it mighty slow in the +brush and the lowland swamps, so just about the time they ready to +ford another creek the Indian soldiers catch up and the fighting begin +all over again. + +The Creek Indians and the slaves with them try to fight off them +soldiers like they did before, but they get scattered around and +separated so's they lose the battle. Lost their horses and wagons, and +the soldiers killed lots of the Creeks and Negroes, and some of the +slaves was captured and took back to their masters. + +Dead all over the hills when we get away; some of the Negroes shot and +wounded so bad the blood run down the saddle skirts, and some fall off +their horses miles from the battle ground, and lay still on the +ground. Daddy and Uncle Jacob keep our family together somehow and +head across the line into Kansas. We all get to Fort Scott where there +was a big army camp; daddy work in the blacksmith shop and Uncle Jacob +join with the Northern soldiers to fight against the South. He come +through the war and live to tell me about the fighting he been in. + +He went with the soldiers down around Fort Gibson where they fight the +Indians who stayed with the South. Uncle Jacob say he killed many a +man during the war, and showed me the musket and sword he used to +fight with; said he didn't shoot the women and children--just whack +their heads off with the sword, and almost could I see the blood +dripping from the point! It made me scared at his stories. + +The captain of this company want his men to be brave and not get +scared, so before the fighting start he put out a tub of white liquor +(corn whiskey) and steam them up so's they'd be mean enough to whip +their grannie! The soldiers do lots of riding and the saddle-sores get +so bad they grease their body every night with snake oil so's they +could keep going on. + +Uncle Jacob said the biggest battle was at Honey Springs (1863). That +was down near Elk Creek, close by Checotah, below Rentiersville. He +said it was the most terrible fighting he seen, but the Union soldiers +whipped and went back into Fort Gibson. The Rebels was chased all over +the country and couldn't find each other for a long time, the way he +tell it. + +After the war our family come back here and settle at Fort Gibson, but +it ain't like the place my mother told me about. There was big houses +and buildings of brick setting on the high land above the river when I +first see it, not like she know it when the Perrymans come here years +ago. + +She heard the Indians talk about the old fort (1824), the one that rot +down long before the Civil War. And she seen it herself when she go +with the Master for trading with the stores. She said it was made by +Matthew Arbuckle and his soldiers, and she talk about Companys B, C, +D, K, and the Seventh Infantry who was there and made the Osage +Indians stop fighting the Creeks and Cherokees. She talk of it, but +that old place all gone when I first see the Fort. + +Then I hear about how after the Arbuckle soldiers leave the old log +fort, the Cherokee Indians take over the land and start up the town of +Keetoowah. The folks who move in there make the place so wild and +rascally the Cherokees give up trying to make a good town and it +kinder blow away. + +My husband was Tom Banks, but the boy I got ain't my own son, but I +found him on my doorstep when he's about three weeks old and raise him +like he is my own blood. He went to school at the manual training +school at Tullahassee and the education he got get him a teacher job +at Taft (Okla), where he is now. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +10-19-38 +520 Words + +NANCY ROGERS BEAN +Age about 82 +Hulbert, Okla. + + +I'm getting old and it's easy to forget most of the happenings of +slave days; anyway I was too little to know much about them, for my +mammy told me I was born about six years before the War. My folks was +on their way to Fort Gibson, and on the trip I was born at Boggy +Depot, down in southern Oklahoma. + +There was a lot of us children; I got their names somewheres here. +Yes, there was George, Sarah, Emma, Stella, Sylvia, Lucinda, Rose, +Dan, Pamp, Jeff, Austin, Jessie, Isaac and Andrew; we all lived in a +one-room log cabin on Master Rogers' place not far from the old +military road near Choteau. Mammy was raised around the Cherokee town +of Tahlequah. + +I got my name from the Rogers', but I was loaned around to their +relatives most of the time. I helped around the house for Bill +McCracken, then I was with Cornelius and Carline Wright, and when I +was freed my Mistress was a Mrs. O'Neal, wife of a officer at Fort +Gibson. She treated me the best of all and gave me the first doll I +ever had. It was a rag doll with charcoal eyes and red thread worked +in for the mouth. She allowed me one hour every day to play with it. +When the War ended Mistress O'Neal wanted to take me with her to +Richmond, Virginia, but my people wouldn't let me go. I wanted to stay +with her, she was so good, and she promised to come back for me when I +get older, but she never did. + +All the time I was at the fort I hear the bugles and see the soldiers +marching around, but never did I see any battles. The fighting must +have been too far away. + +Master Rogers kept all our family together, but my folks have told me +about how the slaves was sold. One of my aunts was a mean, fighting +woman. She was to be sold and when the bidding started she grabbed a +hatchet, laid her hand on a log and chopped it off. Then she throwed +the bleeding hand right in her master's face. Not long ago I hear she +is still living in the country around Nowata, Oklahoma. + +Sometimes I would try to get mean, but always I got me a whipping for +it. When I was a little girl, moving around from one family to +another, I done housework, ironing, peeling potatoes and helping the +main cook. I went barefoot most of my life, but the master would get +his shoes from the Government at Fort Gibson. + +I wore cotton dresses, and the Mistress wore long dresses, with +different colors for Sunday clothes, but us slaves didn't know much +about Sunday in a religious way. The Master had a brother who used to +preach to the Negroes on the sly. One time he was caught and the +Master whipped him something awful. + +Years ago I married Joe Bean. Our children died as babies. Twenty year +ago Joe Bean and I separated for good and all. + +The good Lord knows I'm glad slavery is over. Now I can stay peaceful +in one place--that's all I aim to do. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + + +PRINCE BEE +Age 85 yrs. +Red Bird, Okla. + + +I don't know how old I was when I found myself standing on the toppen +part of a high stump with a lot of white folks walking around looking +at the little scared boy that was me. Pretty soon the old master, +(that's my first master) Saul Nudville, he say to me that I'm now +belonging to Major Bee and for me to get down off the auction block. + +I do that. Major Bee he comes over and right away I know I'm going to +like him. Then when I get to the Major's plantation and see his oldest +daughter Mary and all her brothers and sisters, and see how kind she +is to all them and to all the colored children, why, I just keeps +right on liking 'em more all the time. + +They was about nine white children on the place and Mary had to watch +out for them 'cause the mother was dead. + +That Mary gal seen to it that we children got the best food on the +place, the fattest possum and the hottest fish. When the possum was +all browned, and the sweet 'taters swimming in the good mellow gravy, +then she call us for to eat. Um-um-h! That was tasty eating! + +And from the garden come the vegetables like okra and corn and onions +that Mary would mix all up in the soup pot with lean meats. That would +rest kinder easy on the stomach too, 'specially if they was a bit of +red squirrel meats in with the stew! + +Major Bee say it wasn't good for me to learn reading and writing. +Reckoned it would ruin me. But they sent me to Sunday School. +Sometimes. Wasn't many of the slaves knew how to read the Bible +either, but they all got the religion anyhow. I believed in it then +and I still do. + +That religion I got in them way back days is still with me. And it +ain't this pie crust religion such as the folks are getting these +days. The old time religion had some filling between the crusts, +wasn't so many empty words like they is today. + +They was haunts in them way back days, too. How's I know? 'Cause I +stayed right with the haunts one whole night when I get caught in a +norther when the Major sends me to another plantation for to bring +back some cows he's bargained for. That was a cold night and a +frightful one. + +The blizzard overtook me and it was dark on the way. I come to an old +gin house that everybody said was the hauntinest place in all the +county. But I went in account of the cold and then when the noises +started I was just too scared to move, so there I stood in the corner, +all the time 'til morning come. + +There was nobody I could see, but I could hear peoples feet a-tromping +and stomping around the room and they go up and down the stairway like +they was running a race. + +Sometimes the noises would be right by my side and I would feel like a +hot wind passing around me, and lights would flash all over the room. +Nobody could I see. When daylight come I went through that door +without looking back and headed for the plantation, forgetting all +about the cows that Major Bee sent me for to get. + +When I tells them about the thing, Mary she won't let the old Major +scold, and she fixes me up with some warm foods and I is all right +again. But I stays me away from that gin place, even in the daylight, +account of the haunts. + +When the War come along the Major got kinder mean with some of the +slaves, but not with me. I never did try to run off, but some of 'em +did. One of my brothers tried and got caught. + +The old Master whipped him 'til the blood spurted all over his body, +the bull whip cutting in deeper all the time. He finish up the +whipping with a wet coarse towel and the end got my brother in the +eye. He was blinded in the one eye but the other eye is good enough he +can see they ain't no use trying to run away no more. + +After the War they was more whippings. This time it was the night +riders--them Klan folks didn't fool with mean Negroes. The mean +Negroes was whipped and some of them shot when they do something the +Klan folks didn't like, and when they come a-riding up in the night, +all covered with white spreads, they was something bound to happen. + +Them way back days is gone and I is mighty glad. The Negroes of today +needs another leader like Booker Washington. Get the young folks to +working, that's what they need, and get some filling in their pie +crust religion so's when they meet the Lord their soul won't be empty +like is their pocketbooks today! + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +LEWIS BONNER +Age 87 yrs. +507 N. Durland +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma + + +I was born 7 miles north of Palestine, Texas, on Matt Swanson's place +in 1850, but I kin not remember the date. My mistress was name Celia +Swanson. My mistress was so good to me till I jest loved her. + +My family and all slaves on our place was treated good. Mighty few +floggings went on 'round and about. Master was the overseer over his +darkies and didn't use no other'n. I waited table and churned in the +Big House. + +I ate at the table with my mistress and her family and nothing was +evah said. We ate bacon, greens, Irish potatoes and such as we git +now. Aunt Chaddy was the cook and nurse for all the chillun on the +place. + +We used to hear slaves on de other places hollering from whippings, +but master never whipped his niggers 'less they lied. Sometimes slaves +from other places would run off and come to our place. Master would +take them back and tell the slave-holders how to treat them so dey +wouldn't run off again. + +Mistress had a little stool for me in the big house, and if I got +sleepy, she put me on the foot of her bed and I stayed there til +morning, got up washed my face and hands and got ready to wait on the +table. + +There was four or five hundred slaves on our place. One morning during +slavery, my father killed 18 white men and ran away. They said he was +lazy and whipped him, and he just killed all of 'em he could, which +was 18 of 'em. He stayed away 3 years without being found. He come +back and killed 7 before they could kill him. When he was on the place +he jest made bluing. + +My mother worked in the field and weaved cloth. Shirts dat she made +lasted 12 months, even if wore and washed and ironed every day. Pants +could not be ripped with two men pulling on dem with all their might. +You talking 'bout clothes, them was some clothes then. Clothes made +now jest don't come up to them near abouts. + +Doing of slavery, we had the best church, lots better than today. I am +a Baptist from head to foot, yes sir, yes sir. Jest couldn't be +nothing else. In the first place, I wouldn't even try. + +I knows when the war started and ceaseted. I tell you it was some war. +When it was all over, the Yankees come thoo' singing, "You may die +poor but you won't die a slave." + +When the War was over, master told us that we could go out and take +care of the crops already planted and plant the ones that need +planting 'cause we knowed all 'bout the place and we would go halvers. +We stayed on 3 years after slavery. We got a little money, but we got +room and board and didn't have to work too hard. It was enough +difference to tell you was no slaves any more. + +After slavery and when I was old enough I got married. I married a gal +that was a daughter of her master. He wanted to own her, but she sho' +didn't return it. He kept up with her till he died and sent her money +jest all the time. Before he died, he put her name in his will and +told his oldest son to be sure and keep up with her. The son was sure +true to his promise, for till she died, she was forever hearing from +him or he would visit us, even after we moved to Oklahoma from Texas. + +Our chillun and grandchillun will git her part since she is gone. She +was sure a good wife and for no reason did I take the second look at +no woman. That was love, which don't live no more in our hearts. + +I make a few pennies selling fish worms and doing a little yard work +and raising vegetables. Not much money in circulation. When I gets my +old age pension, it will make things a little mite better. I guess the +time will be soon. + +Tain't nothing but bad treatment that makes people die young and I +ain't had none. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + +FRANCIS BRIDGES +Age 73 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Red River County, Texas in 1864, and that makes me 73 +years old. I had myself 75, and I went to my white folks and they +counted it up and told me I was 73, but I always felt like I was older +than that. + +My husband's name is Henry Bridges. We was raised up children together +and married. I had five sisters. My brother died here in Oklahoma +about two years ago. He was a Fisher. Mary Russell, my sister, she +lives in Parish, Texas; Willie Ann Poke, she lives in Greenville, +Texas; Winnie Jackson, lives in Adonia, Texas, and Mattie White, my +other sister, lives in Long Oak, Texas, White Hunt County. + +Our Master was named Master Travis Wright, and we all ate nearly the +same thing. Such things as barbecued rabbits, coon, possums baked with +sweet potatoes and all such as that. I used to hang round the kitchen. +The cook, Mama Winnie Long, used to feed all us little niggers on the +flo', jest like little pigs, in tin cups and wooden spoons. We ate +fish too, and I like to go fishing right this very day. + +We lived right in old Master Wright's yard. His house sat way up on a +high hill. It was jest a little old log hut we lived in a little old +shack around the yard. They was a lot of little shacks in the yard, I +can't tell jest how many, but it was quite a number of 'em. We slept +in old-fashion beds that we called "corded beds", 'cause they had +ropes crossed to hold the mattresses for slats. Some of 'em had beds +nailed to the wall. + +Master Travis Wright had one son named Sam Wright, and after old +Master Travis Wright died, young Master Sam Wright come to be my +mother's master. He jest died a few years ago. + +My mother say dey had a nigger driver and he'd whip 'em all but his +daughter. I never seen no slaves whipped, but my mother say dey had to +whip her Uncle Charley Mills once for telling a story. She say he +bored a hole in de wall of de store 'til he bored de hole in old +Master's whiskey barrel, and he caught two jugs of whiskey and buried +it in de banks of de river. When old Master found out de whiskey was +gone, he tried to make Uncle Charley 'fess up, and Uncle Charley +wouldn't so he brung him in and hung him and barely let his toes +touch. After Uncle Charley thought he was going to kill him, he told +where de whiskey was. + +We didn't go to church before freedom, land no! 'cause the closest +church was so far--it was 30 miles off. But I'm a member of the +Baptist Church and I've been a member for some 40-odd years. I was +past 40 when I heerd of a Methodist Church. My favorite song is +"Companion." I didn't get to go to school 'til after slavery. + +I 'member more after de War. I 'member my mother said dey had +patrollers, and if de slaves would get passes from de Master to go to +de dances and didn't git back before ten o'clock dey'd beat 'em half +to death. + +I used to hear 'em talking 'bout Ku Klux Klan coming to the well to +get water. They'd draw up a bucket of water and pour the water in they +false stomachs. They false stomachs was tied on 'em with a big leather +buckle. They'd jest pour de water in there to scare 'em and say, "This +is the first drink of water I've had since I left Hell." They'd say +all sech things to scare the cullud folks. + +I heerd my mother say they sold slaves on what they called an auction +block. Jest like if a slave had any portly fine looking children +they'd sell them chillun jest like selling cattle. I didn't see this, +jest heerd it. + +After freedom, when I was old enough then to work in the field, we +lived on Mr. Martin's plantation. We worked awful hard in the fields. +Lawd yes'm! I've heard 'bout shucking up de corn, but give me dem +cotton pickings. Fry'd pick out all de crop of cotton in one day. The +women would cook and de men'd pick the cotton, I mean on dem big +cotton pickings. Some would work for they meals. Then after dey'd +gather all de crops, dey'd give big dances, drink whiskey, and jest +cut up sumpin terrible. We didn't know anything 'bout holidays. + +I've heard my husband talk 'bout "Raw head an' bloody bones." Said +whenever dey mothers wanted to scare 'em to make 'em be good dey'd +tell 'em dat a man was outside de door and asked her if she'd hold his +head while he fixed his back bone. I don't believe in voodooing, and I +don't believe in hants. I used to believe in both of 'em when I was +young. + +I married Jake Bridges. We had a ordinary wedding. The preacher +married us and we had a license. We have two sons grown living here. +My husband told me that in slavery if your Master told you to live +with your brother, you had to live with him. My father's mother and +dad was first cousins. + +I can 'member my husband telling me he was hauling lumber from +Jefferson where the saw mill was and it was cold that night, and when +they got halfway back it snowed, and he stopped with an old cullud +family, and he said way in the night, a knock come at de door--woke +'em up, and it was an old cullud man, and he said dis old man commence +inquiring, trying to find out who dey people was and dey told him best +dey could remember, and bless de Lawd, 'fore dey finished talking de +found out dis old cullud man and de other cullud woman an' man dat was +married was all brothers and sisters, and he told his brother it was +a shame he had married his sister and dey had nine chillun. My husband +sho' told me dis. + +I've heerd 'em say dey old master raised chillun by those cullud +women. Why, there was one white man in Texas had a cullud woman, but +didn't have no chillun by her, and he had this cullud woman and her +old mistress there on the same place. So, when old Mistress died he +wouldn't let this cullud woman leave, and he gave her a swell home +right there on the place, and she is still there I guess. They say she +say sometime, she didn't want no Negro man smutting her sheets up. + +I think Abraham Lincoln was a good man, and I have read a whole lots +'bout him, but I don't know much 'bout Jeff Davis. I think Booker T. +Washington is a fine man, but I aint heerd so much about him. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +JOHN BROWN +Age (about) 87 yrs. +West Tulsa, Okla. + + +Most of the folks have themselves a regular birthday but this old +colored man just pick out any of the days during the year--one day +just about as good as another. + +I been around a long time but I don't know when I got here. That's the +truth. Nearest I figures it the year was 1850--the month don't make no +difference nohow. + +But I know the borning was down in Taloga County, Alabama, near the +county seat town. Miss Abby was with my Mammy that day. She was the +wife of Master John Brown. She was with all the slave women every time +a baby was born, or when a plague of misery hit the folks she knew +what to do and what kind of medicine to chase off the aches and pains. +God bless her! She sure loved us Negroes. + +Most of the time there was more'n three hundred slaves on the +plantation. The oldest ones come right from Africa. My Grandmother was +one of them. A savage in Africa--a slave in America. Mammy told it to +me. Over there all the natives dressed naked and lived on fruits and +nuts. Never see many white mens. + +One day a big ship stopped off the shore and the natives hid in the +brush along the beach. Grandmother was there. The ship men sent a +little boat to the shore and scattered bright things and trinkets on +the beach. The natives were curious. Grandmother said everybody made a +rush for them things soon as the boat left. The trinkets was fewer +than the peoples. Next day the white folks scatter some more. There +was another scramble. The natives was feeling less scared, and the +next day some of them walked up the gangplank to get things off the +plank and off the deck. + +The deck was covered with things like they'd found on the beach. +Two-three hundred natives on the ship when they feel it move. They +rush to the side but the plank was gone. Just dropped in the water +when the ship moved away. + +Folks on the beach started to crying and shouting. The ones on the +boat was wild with fear. Grandmother was one of them who got fooled, +and she say the last thing seen of that place was the natives running +up and down the beach waving their arms and shouting like they was +mad. The boat men come up from below where they had been hiding and +drive the slaves down in the bottom and keep them quiet with the whips +and clubs. + +The slaves was landed at Charleston. The town folks was mighty mad +'cause the blacks was driven through the streets without any clothes, +and drove off the boat men after the slaves was sold on the market. +Most of that load was sold to the Brown plantation in Alabama. +Grandmother was one of the bunch. + +The Browns taught them to work. Made clothes for them. For a long time +the natives didn't like the clothes and try to shake them off. There +was three Brown boys--John, Charley and Henry. Nephews of old Lady +Hyatt who was the real owner of the plantation, but the boys run the +place. The old lady she lived in the town. Come out in the spring and +fall to see how is the plantation doing. + +She was a fine woman. The Brown boys and their wives was just as good. +Wouldn't let nobody mistreat the slaves. Whippings was few and nobody +get the whip 'less he need it bad. They teach the young ones how to +read and write; say it was good for the Negroes to know about such +things. + +Sunday was a great day around the plantation. The fields was +forgotten, the light chores was hurried through and everybody got +ready for the church meeting. + +It was out of the doors, in the yard fronting the big log where the +Browns all lived. Master John's wife would start the meeting with a +prayer and then would come the singing. The old timey songs. + +The white folks on the next plantation would lick their slaves for +trying to do like we did. No praying there, and no singing. + +The Master gave out the week's supply on Saturday. Plenty of hams, +lean bacon, flour, corn meal, coffee and more'n enough for the week. +Nobody go hungry on that place! During the growing season all the +slaves have a garden spot all their own. Three thousand acres on that +place--plenty of room for gardens and field crops. + +Even during the war foods was plentiful. One time the Yankee soldiers +visit the place. The white folks gone and I talks with them. Asks me +lots of questions--got any meats--got any potatoes--got any this--some +of that--but I just shake my head and they don't look around. + +The old cook fixes them up though. She fry all the eggs on the place, +skillet the ham and pan the biscuits! Them soldiers fill up and leave +the house friendly as anybody I ever see! + +The Browns wasn't bothered with the Ku Klux Klan either. The Negroes +minded their own business just like before they was free. + +I stayed on the plantation 'til the last Brown die. Then I come to +Oklahoma and works on the railroad 'til I was too old to hustle the +grips and packages. Now I just sits thinking how much better off would +I be on the old plantation. + +Homesick! Just homesick for that Alabama farm like it was in them good +old times! + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +SALLIE CARDER +Age 83 yrs. +Burwin, Okla. + + +I was born in Jackson, Tennessee, and I'm going on 83 years. My mother +was Harriett Neel and father Jeff Bills, both of them named after +their masters. I has one brother, J. B. Bills, but all de rest of my +brothers and sisters is dead. + +No sir, we never had no money while I was a slave. We jest didn't have +nothing a-tall! We ate greens, corn bread, and ash cake. De only time +I ever got a biscuit would be when a misdemeanor was did, and my +Mistress would give a buttered biscuit to de one who could tell her +who done it. + +In hot weather and cold weather dere was no difference as to what we +wore. We wore dresses my mother wove for us and no shoes a-tall. I +never wore any shoes till I was grown and den dey was old brogans wid +only two holes to lace, one on each side. During my wedding I wore a +blue calico dress, a man's shirt tail as a head rag, and a pair of +brogan shoes. + +My Master lived in a three-story frame house painted white. My +Mistress was very mean. Sometimes she would make de overseer whip +negroes for looking too hard at her when she was talking to dem. Dey +had four children, three girls and one boy. + +I was a servant to my Master, and as he had de palsy I had to care for +him, feed him and push him around. I don't know how many slaves, but +he had a good deal of 'em. + +About four o' clock mornings de overseer or negro carriage driver who +stayed at the Big House would ring de bell to git up and git to work. +De slaves would pick a heap of cotton and work till late on +moonshining nights. + +Dere was a white post in front of my door with ropes to tie the slaves +to whip dem. Dey used a plain strap, another one with holes in it, and +one dey call de cat wid nine tails which was a number of straps plated +and de ends unplated. Dey would whip de slaves wid a wide strap wid +holes in it and de holes would make blisters. Den dey would take de +cat wid nine tails and burst de blisters and den rub de sores wid +turpentine and red pepper. + +I never saw any slaves auctioned off but I seen dem pass our house +chained together on de way to be sold, including both men and women +wid babies all chained to each other. Dere was no churches for slaves, +but at nights dey would slip off and git in ditches and sing and pray, +and when dey would sometimes be caught at it dey would be whipped. +Some of de slaves would turn down big pots and put dere heads in dem +and pray. My Mistress would tell me to be a good obedient slave and I +would go to heaven. When slaves would attempt to run off dey would +catch dem and chain dem and fetch 'em back and whip dem before dey was +turned loose again. + +De patrollers would go about in de quarters at nights to see if any of +de slaves was out or slipped off. As we sleep on de dirt floors on +pallets, de patrollers would walk all over and on us and if we even +grunt dey would whip us. De only trouble between de whites and blacks +on our plantation was when de overseer tied my mother to whip her and +my father untied her and de overseer shot and killed him. + +Negroes never was allowed to git sick, and when dey would look +somewhat sick, de overseer would give dem some blue-mass pills and oil +of some sort and make dem continue to work. + +During de War de Yankees would pass through and kill up de chickens, +and hogs, and cattle, and eat up all dey could find. De day of freedom +de overseer went into de field and told de slaves dat dey was free, +and de slaves replied, "free how?" and he told dem: "free to work and +live for demselves." And dey said dey didn't know what to do, and so +some of dem stayed on. I married Josh Forch. I am mother of four +children and 35 grand children. + +I like Abraham Lincoln. I think he was a good man and president. I +didn't know much who Jeff Davis was. What I heard 'bout Booker T. +Washington, he was a good man. + +Now dat slavery is over, I don't want to be in nary 'nother slavery, +and if ever nary 'nothern come up I wouldn't stay here. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +BETTY FOREMAN CHESSIER +Age 94 years +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born July 11, 1843 in Raleigh, N. C. My mother was named Melinda +Manley, the slave of Governor Manley of North Carolina, and my father +was named Arnold Foreman, slave of Bob and John Foreman, two young +masters. They come over from Arkansas to visit my master and my pappy +and mammy met and got married, 'though my pappy only seen my mammy in +the summer when his masters come to visit our master and dey took him +right back. I had three sisters and two brothers and none of dem was +my whole brothers and sisters. I stayed in the Big House all the time, +but my sisters and brothers was gived to the master's sons and +daughters whey dey got married and dey was told to send back for some +more when dem died. I didn't never stay with my mammy doing of +slavery. I stayed in the Big House. I slept under the dining room +table with three other darkies. The flo' was well carpeted. Don't +remembah my grandmammy and grandpappy, but my master was they master. + +I waited on the table, kept flies off'n my mistress and went for the +mail. Never made no money, but dey did give the slaves money at +Christmas time. I never had over two dresses. One was calico and one +gingham. I had such underclothes as dey wore then. + +Master Manley and Mistress had six sons an' six darters. Dey raised +dem all till dey was grown too. Dey lived in a great big house 'cross +from the mansion, right in town before Master was 'lected Governor, +den dey all moved in dat mansion. + +Plantation folks had barbecues and "lay crop feasts" and invited the +city darkies out. When I first come here I couldn't understand the +folks here, 'cause dey didn't quit work on Easter Monday. That is some +day in North Carolina even today. I doesn't remember any play songs, +'cause I was almost in prison. I couldn't play with any of the darkies +and I doesn't remember playing in my life when I was a little girl and +when I got grown I didn't want to. I wasn't hongry, I wasn't naked and +I got only five licks from the white folks in my life. Dey was for +being such a big forgitful girl. I saw 'em sell niggers once. The only +pusson I ever seen whipped at dat whipping post was a white man. + +I never got no learning; dey kept us from dat, but you know some of +dem darkies learnt anyhow. We had church in the heart of town or in +the basement of some old building. I went to the 'piscopal church most +all the time, till I got to be a Baptist. + +The slaves run away to the North 'cause dey wanted to be free. Some of +my family run away sometime and dey didn't catch 'em neither. The +patrollers sho' watched the streets. But when dey caught any of +master's niggers without passes, dey jest locked him up in the guard +house and master come down in the mawnin' and git 'em out, but dem +patrollers better not whip one. + +I know when the War commenced and ended. Master Manley sent me from +the Big House to the office about a mile away. Jest as I got to the +office door, three men rid up in blue uniforms and said, "Dinah, do +you have any milk in there?" I was sent down to the office for some +beans for to cook dinner, but dem men most nigh scared me to death. +They never did go in dat office, but jest rid off on horseback about a +quarter a mile and seem lak right now, Yankees fell out of the very +sky, 'cause hundeds and hundeds was everywhere you could look to save +your life. Old Mistress sent one of her grandchillun to tell me to +come on, and one of the Yankees told dat child, "You tell your +grandmother she ain't coming now and never will come back there as a +slave." Master was setting on the mansion porch. Dem Yankees come up +on de porch, go down in cellar and didn't tech one blessed thing. Old +Mistress took heart trouble, 'cause dem Yankees whipped white folks +going and coming. + +I laid in my bed a many night scared to death of Klu Klux Klan. Dey +would come to your house and ask for a drink and no more want a drink +than nothing. + +After the War, I went to mammy and my step-pappy. She done married +again, so I left and went to Warrington and Halifax, North Carolina, +jest for a little while nursing some white chillun. I stayed in +Raleigh, where I was born till 7 years ago, when I come to Oklahoma to +live with my only living child. I am the mother of 4 chillun and 11 +grandchillun. + +When I got married I jumped a broomstick. To git unmarried, all you +had to do was to jump backwards over the same broomstick. + +Lincoln and Booker T. Washington was two of the finest men ever lived. +Don't think nothing of Jeff Davis, 'cause he was a traitor. Freedom +for us was the best thing ever happened. Prayer is best thing in the +world. Everybody ought to pray, 'cause prayer got us out of slavery. + + + + +Oklahoma Writer's Project +Ex-Slaves + +POLLY COLBERT +Age 83 yrs. +Colbert, Oklahoma + + +I am now living on de forty-acre farm dat de Government give me and it +is just about three miles from my old home on Master Holmes Colbert's +plantation where I lived when I was a slave. + +Lawsy me, times sure has changed since slavery times! Maybe I notice +it more since I been living here all de time, but dere's farms 'round +here dat I've seen grown timber cleared off of twice during my +lifetime. Dis land was first cleared up and worked by niggers when dey +was slaves. After de War nobody worked it and it just naturally growed +up again wid all sorts of trees. Later, white folks cleared it up +again and took grown trees off'n it and now dey are still cultivating +it but it is most wore out now. Some of it won't even sprout peas. Dis +same land used to grow corn without hardly any work but it sure won't +do it now. + +I reckon it was on account of de rich land dat us niggers dat was +owned by Indians didn't have to work so hard as dey did in de old +states, but I think dat Indian masters was just naturally kinder any +way, leastways mine was. + +My mother, Liza, was owned by de Colbert family and my father, Tony, +was owned by de Love family. When Master Holmes and Miss Betty Love +was married dey fathers give my father and mother to dem for a wedding +gift. I was born at Tishomingo and we moved to de farm on Red River +soon after dat and I been here ever since. I had a sister and a +brother, but I ain't seen dem since den. + +My mother died when I was real small, and about a year after dat my +father died. Master Holmes told us children not to cry, dat he and +Miss Betsy would take good care of us. Dey did, too. Dey took us in de +house wid dem and look after us jest as good as dey could colored +children. We slept in a little room close to them and she allus seen +dat we was covered up good before she went to bed. I guess she got a +sight of satisfaction from taking care of us 'cause she didn't have no +babies to care for. + +Master Holmes and Miss Betsy was real young folks but dey was purty +well fixed. He owned about 100 acres of land dat was cleared and ready +for de plow and a lot dat was not in cultivation. He had de woods full +of hogs and cows and he owned seven or eight grown slaves and several +children. I remember Uncle Shed, Uncle Lige, Aunt Chaney, Aunt Lizzie, +and Aunt Susy just as well as if it was yesterday. Master Holmes and +Miss Betsy was both half-breed Choctaw Indians. Dey had both been away +to school somewhere in de states and was well educated. Dey had two +children but dey died when dey was little. Another little girl was +born to dem after de War and she lived to be a grown woman. + +Dey sure was fine young folks and provided well for us. He allus had a +smokehouse full of meat, lard, sausage, dried beans, peas, corn, +potatoes, turnips and collards banked up for winter. He had plenty of +milk and butter for all of us, too. + +Master Holmes allus say, "A hungry man caint work." And he allus saw +to it that we had lots to eat. + +We cooked all sorts of Indian dishes: Tom-fuller, pashofa, hickory-nut +grot, Tom-budha, ash-cakes, and pound cakes besides vegetables and +meat dishes. Corn or corn meal was used in all de Indian dishes. We +made hominy out'n de whole grains. Tom-fuller was made from beaten +corn and tasted sort of like hominy. + +We would take corn and beat it like in a wooden mortar wid a wooden +pestle. We would husk it by fanning it and we would den put it on to +cook in a big pot. While it was cooking we'd pick out a lot of +hickory-nuts, tie 'em up in a cloth and beat 'em a little and drop 'em +in and cook for a long time. We called dis dish hickory-nut grot. When +we made pashofa we beat de corn and cook for a little while and den we +add fresh pork and cook until de meat was done. Tom-budha was green +corn and fresh meat cooked together and seasoned wid tongue or +pepper-grass. + +We cooked on de fire place wid de pots hanging over de fire on racks +and den we baked bread and cakes in a oven-skillet. We didn't use soda +and baking powder. We'd put salt in de meal and scald it wid boiling +water and make it into pones and bake it. We'd roll de ash cakes in +wet cabbage leaves and put 'em in de hot ashes and bake 'em. We cooked +potatoes, and roasting ears dat way also. We sweetened our cakes wid +molasses, and dey was plenty sweet too. + +Dey was lots of possums and coons and squirrels and we nearly always +had some one of these to eat. We'd parboil de possum or coon and put +it in a pan and bake him wid potatoes 'round him. We used de broth to +baste him and for gravy. Hit sure was fine eating dem days. + +I never had much work to do. I helped 'round de house when I wanted to +and I run errands for Miss Betsy. I liked to do things for her. When I +got a little bigger my brother and I toted cool water to de field for +de hands. + +Didn't none of Master Holmes' niggers work when dey was sick. He allus +saw dat dey had medicine and a doctor iffen dey needed one. 'Bout de +only sickness we had was chills and fever. In de old days we made lots +of our own medicine and I still does it yet. We used polecat grease +for croup and rheumatism. Dog-fennel, butterfly-root, and +life-everlasting boiled and mixed and made into a syrup will cure +pneumonia and pleurisy. Pursley-weed, called squirrel physic, boiled +into a syrup will cure chills and fever. Snake-root steeped for a long +time and mixed with whiskey will cure chills and fever also. + +Our clothes was all made of homespun. De women done all de spinning +and de weaving but Miss Betsy cut out all de clothes and helped wid de +sewing. She learned to sew when she was away to school and she learnt +all her women to sew. She done all the sewing for de children. Master +Holmes bought our shoes and we all had 'em to wear in de winter. We +all went barefoot in de summer. + +He kept mighty good teams and he had two fine saddle horses. He and +Miss Betsy rode 'em all de time. She would ride wid him all over de +farm and dey would go hunting a lot, too. She could shoot a gun as +good as any man. + +Master Holmes sure did love his wife and children and he was so proud +of her. It nearly killed 'em both to give up de little boy and girl. I +never did hear of him taking a drink and he was kind to everybody, +both black and white, and everybody liked him. Dey had lots of company +and dey never turned anybody away. We lived about four miles from de +ferry on Red River on de Texas Road and lots of travelers stopped at +our house. + +We was 'lowed to visit de colored folks on de Eastman and Carter +plantations dat joined our farm. Eastman and Carter was both white men +dat married Indian wives. Dey was good to dey slaves, too, and let 'em +visit us. + +Old Uncle Kellup (Caleb) Colbert, Uncle Billy Hogan, Rev. John Carr, +Rev. Baker, Rev. Hogue, and old Father Murrow preached for de white +folks all de time and us colored folks went to church wid dem. Dey had +church under brush arbors and we set off to ourselves but we could +take part in de singing and sometimes a colored person would get happy +and pray and shout but nobody didn't think nothing 'bout dat. + +De Patrollers was de law, kind of like de policeman now. Dey sure +never did whip one of Master Holmes' niggers for he didn't allow it. +He didn't whip 'em hisself and he sure didn't allow anybody else to +either. I was afraid of de Ku Kluxers too, and I 'spects dat Master +Holmes was one of de leaders iffen de truth was known. Dey sure was +scary looking. + +I was scared of de Yankee soldiers. Dey come by and killed some of our +cattle for beef and took our meat and lard out'n de smokehouse and dey +took some corn, too. Us niggers was awful mad. We didn't know anything +'bout dem fighting to free us. We didn't specially want to be free dat +I knows of. + +Right after de War I went over to Bloomfield Academy to take care of a +little girl, but I went back to Master Holmes and Miss Betsy at de end +of two years to take care of de little girl dat was born to dem and I +stayed with her until I was about fifteen. Master Holmes went to +Washington as a delegate, for something for de Indians, and he took +sick and died and dey buried him dere. Poor Miss Betsy nearly grieved +herself to death. She stayed on at de farm till her little girl was +grown and married. Her nigger men stayed on with her and rented land +from her and dey sure raised a sight of truck. Didn't none of her old +slaves ever move very far from her and most of them worked for her +till dey was too old to work. + +I left Miss Betsy purty soon after Master Holmes died and went back +to de Academy and stayed three years. I married a man dat belonged to +Master Holmes' cousin. His name was Colbert, too. I had a big wedding. +Miss Betsy and a lot of white folks come and stayed for dinner. We +danced all evening and after supper we started again and danced all +night and de next day and de next night. We'd eat awhile and den we'd +dance awhile. + +My husband and I had nine children and now I've got seven +grandchildren. My husband has been dead a long time. + +My sister, Chaney, lives here close to me but her mind has got feeble +and she can't recollect as much as I can. I live with my son and he is +mighty good to me. I know I ain't long for dis world but I don't mind +for I has lived a long time and I'll have a lot of friends in de other +world and I won't be lonesome. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937] + +GEORGE CONRAD, JR., +Age 77 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born February 23, 1860 at Connersville, Harrison County, +Kentucky. I was born and lived just 13 miles from Parish. My mother's +name is Rachel Conrad, born at Bourbon County, Kentucky. My father, +George Conrad, was born at Bourbon County Kentucky. My grandmother's +name is Sallie Amos, and grandfather's name is Peter Amos. My +grandfather, his old Master freed him and he bought my grandmother, +Aunt Liza and Uncle Cy. He made the money by freighting groceries from +Ohio to Maysville, Kentucky. + +Our Master was named Master Joe Conrad. We sometimes called him "Mos" +Joe Conrad. Master Joe Conrad stayed in a big log house with weather +boarding on the outside. + +I was born in a log cabin. We slept in wooden beds with rope cords for +slats, and the beds had curtains around them. You see my mother was +the cook for the Master, and she cooked everything--chicken, roasting +ears. She cooked mostly everything we have now. They didn't have +stoves; they cooked in big ovens. The skillets had three legs. I can +remember the first stove that we had. I guess I was about six years +old. + +My old Master had 900 acres of land. My father was a stiller. He made +three barrels of whisky a day. Before the War whisky sold for 12-1/2¢ +and 13¢ a gallon. After the War it went up to $3 and $4 per gallon. +When War broke out he had 300 barrels hid under old Master's barn. + +There was 14 colored men working for old Master Joe and 7 women. I +think it was on the 13th of May, all 14 of these colored men, and my +father, went to the Army. When old Master Joe come to wake 'em up the +next morning--I remember he called real loud, Miles, Esau, George, +Frank, Arch, on down the line, and my mother told him they'd all gone +to the army. Old Master went to Cynthia, Kentucky, where they had +gone to enlist and begged the officer in charge to let him see all of +his boys, but the officer said "No." Some way or 'nother he got a +chance to see Arch, and Arch came back with him to help raise the +crops. + +My mother cooked and took care of the house. Aunt Sarah took care of +the children. I had two little baby brothers, Charlie and John. The +old Mistress would let my mother put them in her cradle and Aunt Sarah +got jealous, and killed both of the babies. When they cut one of the +babies open they took out two frogs. Some say she conjured the babies. +Them niggers could conjure each other but they couldn't do nothing to +the whitefolks, but I don't believe in it. There's an old woman living +back there now (pointing around the corner of the house where he was +sitting) they said her husband put a spell on her. They call 'em +two-headed Negroes. + +Old Master never whipped any of his slaves, except two of my +uncles--Pete Conrad and Richard Sherman, now living at Falsmouth, +Kentucky. + +We raised corn, wheat, oats, rye and barley, in the spring. In +January, February and March we'd go up to the Sugar Camp where he had +a grove of maple trees. We'd make maple syrup and put up sugar in +cakes. Sugar sold for $2.5O and $3 a cake. He had a regular sugar +house. My old Master was rich I tell you. + +Whenever a member of the white family die all the slaves would turn +out, and whenever a slave would die, whitefolks and all the slaves +would go. My Master had a big vault. My Mistress was buried in an iron +coffin that they called a potanic coffin. I went back to see her after +I was 21 years old and she look jest like she did when they buried +her. All of the family was buried in them vaults, and I expect if +you'd go there today they'd look the same. The slaves was buried in +good handmade coffins. + +I heard a lot of talk 'bout the patrollers. In them days if you went +away from home and didn't have a pass they'd whip you. Sometimes +they'd whip you with a long black cow whip, and then sometime they'd +roast elm switches in the fire. This was called "cat-o-nine-tails", +and they'd whip you with dat. We never had no jails; only punishment +was just to whip you. + +Now, the way the slaves travel. If a slave had been good sometimes old +Master would let him ride his hoss; then, sometime they'd steal a hoss +out and ride 'em and slip him back before old Master ever found it +out. There was a man in them days by the name of John Brown. We called +him an underground railroad man, 'cause he'd steal the slaves and +carry 'em across the river in a boat. When you got on the other side +you was free, 'cause you was in a free State, Ohio. + +We used to sing, and I guess young folks today does too: + + "John Brown's Body Lies A 'moulding In the Clay." + +and + + "They Hung John Brown On a Sour Apple Tree." + +Our slaves all got very good attention when they got sick. They'd send +and get a doctor for 'em. You see old Mistress Mary bought my mother, +father and two children throwed in for $1,100 and she told Master Joe +to always keep her slaves, not to sell 'em and always take good care +of 'em. + +When my father went to the army old Master told us he was gone to +fight for us niggers freedom. My daddy was the only one that come back +out of the 13 men that enlisted, and when my daddy come back old +Master give him a buggy and hoss. + +When the Yanks come, I never will forget one of 'em was named John +Morgan. We carried old Master down to the barn and hid him in the hay. +I felt so sorry for old Master they took all his hams, some of his +whiskey, and all dey could find, hogs, chickens, and jest treated him +something terrible. + +The whitefolks learned my father how to read and write, but I didn't +learn how to read and write 'til I enlisted in the U. S. Army in +1883. + +They sent us here (Oklahoma Territory) to keep the immigrants from +settling up Oklahoma. I went to Fort Riley the 1st day of October +1883, and stayed there three weeks. Left Fort Riley and went to Ft. +Worth, Texas, and landed in Henryetta, Texas, on the 14th day of +October 1883. Then, we had 65 miles to walk to Ft. Sill. We walked +there in three days. I was assigned to my Company, Troop G. 9th +Calvary, and we stayed and drilled in Ft. Sill six months, when we was +assigned to duty. We got orders to come to Ft. Reno, Okla., on the 6th +day of January 1885 where we was ordered to Stillwater, Okla., to move +five hundred immigrants under Capt. Couch. We landed there on the 23rd +day of January, Saturday evening, and Sunday was the 24th. We had +general inspection Monday, January 25, 1885. We fell in line of +battle, sixteen companies of soldiers, to move 500 immigrants to the +Arkansas City, Kansas line. + +We formed a line at 9:00 o'clock Monday morning and Captain Couch run +up his white flag, and Colonel Hatch he sent the orderly up to see +what he meant by putting up the flag, so Captain Couch sent word back, +"If you don't fire on me, I'll leave tomorrow." Colonel Hatch turned +around to the Major and told him to turn his troops back to the camp, +and detailed three camps of soldiers of the 8th Cavalry to carry +Captain Couch's troop of 500 immigrants to Arkansas City, Kansas. +Troop L., Troop D., and Troop B. taken them back with 43 wagons and +put them over the line of Kansas. Then we were ordered back to our +supply camp at Camp Alice, 9 miles north of Guthrie in the Cimarron +horseshoe bottom. We stayed there about three months, and Capt. Couch +and his colony came back into the territory at Caldwell, Kansas June +1885. + +I laid there 'til August 8, then we changed regiments with the 5th +Calvary to go to Nebraska. There was a breakout with the Indians at +Ft. Reno the 1st of July 1885. The Indian Agency tried to make the +Indians wear citizens' clothes. They had to call General Sheridan +from Washington, D. C., to quiet the Indians down. Now, we had to make +a line in three divisions, fifteen miles a part, one non-commissioned +officer to each squad, and these men was to go to Caldwell, Kansas and +bring him to Ft. Reno that night. He came that night, so the next +morning Colonel Brisbane and General Hatch reported to General +Sheridan what the trouble was. General Sheridan called all the Indian +Chiefs together and asked them why they rebelled against the agency, +and they told them they weren't going to wear citizen's clothes. +General Sheridan called his corporals and sergeants together and told +them to go behind the guard house and dig a grave for this Indian +agent in order to fool the Indian Chiefs. Then, he sent a detachment +of soldiers to order the Indian Chiefs away from the guard house and +to put this Indian agent in the ambulance that brought him to Ft. Reno +and take him back to Washington, D. C., to remain there 'til he +returned. The next morning he called all the Indian Chiefs to the +guard house and pointed down to the grave and said that, "I have +killed the agent and buried him there." The Indians tore the feathers +out of their hats rejoicing that they killed the agent. + +On the 12th of the same July, we had general inspection with General +Foresides from Washington, then we was ordered back to our supply camp +to stay there 'til we got orders of our change. On August 8, we got +orders to change to go to Nebraska, to Ft. Robinson, Ft. Nibrary, and +Ft. McKinney, and we left on the 8th of August. + +This is my Oklahoma history. I gave this story to the Daily Oklahoman +and Times at one time and they are supposed to publish it but they +haven't. + +Now you see that tree up there in front of my house? That tree is 50 +years old. It is called the potopic tree. That was the only tree +around here in 1882. This was a bald prairie. I enlisted over there +where the City Market sets now. That was our starting camp under Capt. +Payne, but he died. + +I joined the A. M. E. Methodist Church in 1874. I love this song +better than all the rest: + + "Am I a Soldier of the Cross?" + +Abraham Lincoln was a smart man, but he would have done more if he was +not killed. I don't think his work was finished. I'll tell you the +truth about Booker T. Washington. He argued our people to stay out of +town and stay in the country. He was a Democrat. He was a smart man, +but I think a man should live wherever he choose regardless. I never +stopped work whenever I'd hear he was coming to town to speak. You +know they wasn't fighting for freeing the slaves; they was fighting to +keep Kansas from being a slave State; so when they had the North +whipped, I mean the South had 'em whipped, they called for the Negroes +to go out and fight for his freedom. Don't know nothing 'bout Jeff +Davis. I've handled a lots of his money. It was counterfeited after +the War. + +I've been married four times. I had one wife and three women. I mean +the three wasn't no good. My first wife's name: Amanda Nelson. 2nd: +Pocahuntas Jackson. 3rd: Nannie Shumpard. We lived together 9 years. +She tried to beat me out of my home. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +MARTHA CUNNINGHAM +(white) Age 81 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma + + +My father's name was A. J. Brown, and my mother's name was Hattie +Brown. I was born in the East, in Saveer County, Tennessee. I had +twelve sisters and brothers, all are dead but two. W. S. Brown lives +at 327 W. California, and Maudie Reynolds, my sister lives at +Minrovie, California. + +We lived in different kinds of houses just like we do now. Some was of +log, some frame and some rock. I remember when we didn't have stoves +to cook on, no lamps, and not even any candles until I was about six +years old. We would take a rag and sop it in lard to make lights. + +All of our furniture was home made, but it was nice. We had just +plenty of every thing. It wasn't like it is in these days where you +have to pick and scrape for something to eat. + +My grandfather and grandmother gave my mother and father two slaves, +an old woman and man, when they married. My grandfather owned a large +plantation, and had a large number of slaves, and my father and mother +owned several farms at different places. Our mother and father treated +our slaves good. They ate what we ate, and they stayed with us a long +time after the War. I remember though all of the slave owners weren't +good to their slaves. I have seen 'em take those young fine looking +negroes, put them in a pen when they got ready to whip them, strip +them and lay them face down, and beat them until white whelps arose on +their bodies. Yes, some of them was treated awful mean. + +I saw mothers sold from their babies, and babies sold from their +mothers. They would strip them, put them on the auction block and sell +them--bid them off just like you would cattle. Some would sell for +lots of money. + +They wouldn't take the slaves to church. I don't remember when the +negroes had their first schools, but it was a long time after the War. + +Why, I remember when they'd have those big corn shuckings, flax +pullings, and quilting parties. They would sow acres after acres of +flax, then they would meet at some house or plantation and pull flax +until they had finished, then give a big party. There'd be the same +thing at the next plantation and so on until they'd all in that +neighborhood get their crops gathered. I remember they'd have all +kinds of good eats--pies, cakes, chicken, fish, fresh pork, +beef,--just plenty of good eats. + +I went over the battlefield at Knoxville, Tennessee, two or three +hours after the Yankees and the Rebels had a battle. It was about a +mile from our house, and I walked over hundreds of dead men lying on +the ground. Some were fatally wounded, and we carried about six or +seven to our house. I saw the doctor pick the bullets out of their +flesh. + +When the Yankees came they treated the slave owners awful mean. They +drew a gun on my mother, made her walk for several miles one real cold +night and take them up on the top of a mountain and show them where a +still was. They would make her cook for 'em. They took every thing we +had. I was about twelve years old at that time. + +I stayed there with my mother until after my father died, then we +moved to Alabama. I was about 22 years old. I married a man named +Kelley. He and my brothers were railroad graders. We traveled all over +Texas. + +I made the Run. Came here in '89 with my mother, husband and eight +children. My husband and brothers graded the streets for the townsite +of Oklahoma City and platted it off. + +When we made the Run, we just stood on the property until it was +surveyed, then we'd pay $1.00, and the lot was ours. I camped on the +corner of Robinson and Pottawatomie Streets and Robinson and +Chickasaw. I owned the Northwest corner. I later sold both lots. + +I am a Christian, Baptist mostly, I guess, and I believe in the Great +Beyond. I don't think you have to go to church all the time to be +saved, but you have to be right with the Man up yonder before you can +be saved. + +I am a Republican, and it makes my blood boil whenever I hear a negro +say he is a democrat. They should all be Republicans. + +I have been married twice. I married William Cunningham here in 1922. +He is dead; in fact, both my husbands are dead, so I don't see much +need of talking about them. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + + +WILLIAM CURTIS +Age 93 yrs. +McAlester, Oklahoma + + + "Run Nigger, run, + De Patteroll git ye! + Run Nigger, run, + He's almost here!" + + "Please Mr. Patteroll, + Don't ketch me! + Jest take dat nigger + What's behind dat tree." + +Lawsy, I done heard dat song all my life and it warn't no joke +neither. De Patrol would git ye too if he caught ye off the plantation +without a pass from your Master, and he'd whup ye too. None of us +dassn't leave without a pass. + +We chillun sung lots of songs and we played marbles, mumble peg, and +town ball. In de winter we would set around de fire and listen to our +Mammy and Pappy tell ghost tales and witch tales. I don't guess dey +was sho' nuff so, but we all thought dey was. + +My Mammy was bought in Virginia by our Master, Hugh McKeown. He owned +a big plantation in Georgia. Soon after she come to Georgia she +married my pa. Old Master was good to us. We lived for a while in the +quarters behind the Big House, and my mammy was de house woman. + +Somehow, in a trade, or maybe my pa was mortgaged, but anyway old +Master let a man in Virginia have him and we never see him no more +'till after the War. It nigh broke our hearts when he had to leave and +old Master sho' done everything he could to make it up to us. + +There was four of us chillun. I didn't do no work 'till I was about +fifteen years old. Old Master bought a tavern and mammy worked as +house woman and I went to work at the stables. I drove the carriage +and took keer of the team and carriage. I kept 'em shining too. I'd +curry the horses 'till they was slick and shiny. I'd polish the +harness and the carriage. Old Master and Mistress was quality and I +wanted everybody to know it. They had three girls and three boys and +we boys played together and went swimming together. We loved each +other, I tell ye. + +Old Master built us a little house jest back of de tavern and mammy +raised us jest like Old Mistress did her chillun. When I didn't have +to work de boys and me would go hunting. We'd kill possum, coon, +squirrels and wild hogs. Old Master killed a wild hog and he give +mammy her ten tiny pigs. She raised 'em and my, at the meat we had +when they was butchered. + +They had lots of company at de Big House, and it was de only tavern +too, so they was lots of cooking to do. They would go to church on +Sunday and they would spread their dinners on the ground. My, but they +was feasts. We'd allus git to go as I drive the carriage and mammy +looked after the food. We had our own church too, with our own +preacher. + +We had a spinning house where all the old women would card and spin +wool in de winter and cotton in de summer. Dey made all our clothes, +what few we wore. Us boys just wore long tailed shirts 'till we was 12 +or 13 years old, sometimes older. I was 15 when I started driving the +fambly carriage and I got to put on pants then. + +Our suits was made out of jeans. That cloth wore like buckskin. We'd +wear 'em for a year before they had to be patched. + +We made our own brogan shoes too. We'd kill a beef and skin it and +spread the skin out and let it dry a while. We'd put the hide in lime +water to get the hair off, then we'd oil it and work it 'till it was +soft. Next we'd take it to the bench and scrape or 'plesh' it with +knives. It was then put in a tight cabinet and smoked with oak wood +for about 24 hours. Smoking loosened the skin. We'd then take it out +and rub it to soften it. It was blacked and oiled and it was ready to +be made into shoes. It took nearly a year to get a green hide made +into shoes. Twan't no wonder we had to go barefooted. + +Sometimes I'd work in the wood shop, dressing wagon spokes. We made +spokes with a plane, by hand on a bench. + +I didn't have much work to do before I was 15 except to run errands. +One of my jobs was to take corn to the mill to be ground into meal. +Some one would put my sack of corn on the mule's back and help me up +and I'd ride to the mill and have it ground and they'd load me back on +and I'd go back home. + +I remember once my meal fell off and I waited and waited for somebody +to come by and help me. I got tired waiting so I toted the sack to a +big log and laid it acrost it. I led my mule up to the log and after +working hard for a long time I managed to get it on his back. I +climbed up and jest as we started off the mule jumped and I fell off +and pulled the sack off with me. I couldn't do nothing but wait and +finally old Master came after me. He knowed something was wrong. + +Old Master was good to all of his slaves but his overseers had orders +to make 'em work. He fed 'em good and took good keer of 'em and never +made 'em work iffen they was sick or even felt bad. They was two +things old Master jest wouldn't 'bide and dat was for a slave to be +sassy or lazy. Sometimes if dey wouldn't work or slipped off de farm +dey would whip 'em. He didn't whip often. Colored overseers was worse +to whip than white ones, but Master allus said, "Hadn't you all rather +have a nigger overseer than a white one? I don't want to white man +over my niggers." I've seen the overseer whip some but I never did +get no whipping. He would strip 'em to the waist and whip 'em with a +long leather strop, about as wide as two fingers and fastened to a +handle. + +When de war broke out everthing was changed. My young Masters had to +go. T. H. McKeown, the oldest was a Lieutenant and was one of the +first to go. It nigh broke all of our hearts. Pretty soon he sent for +me to come and keep him company. Old Master let me go and I stayed in +his quarters. He was stationed at Atlanta and Griffin, Georgia. I'd +stay with him a week or two and I'd go home for a few days and I'd +take back food and fruit. I stayed with him and waited on him 'till he +got used to being in the army and they moved him out to fighting. I +wanted to go on with him but he wouldn't let me, he told me to go back +and take care of Old Master and Old Mistress. They was getting old by +then. Purty soon Young Master got wounded purty bad and they sent me +home. I never went back. I got a "pass" to go home. Course, after the +war nothing was right no more. Yes, we was free but we didn't know +what to do. We didn't want to leave our old Master and our old home. +We stayed on and after a while my pappy come home to us. Dat was de +best thing about de war setting us free, he could come back to us. + +We all lived on at the old plantation. Old Master and old Mistress +died and young Master took charge of de farm. He couldn't a'done +nothing without us niggers. He didn't know how to work. He was good to +us and divided the crops with us. + +I never went to school much but my white folks learned me to read and +write. I could always have any of their books to read, and they had +lots of 'em. + +Times has changed a lot since that time. I don't know where the world +is much better now, that it has everthing or then when we didn't have +hardly nothing, but I believe there was more religion then. We always +went to church and I've seen 'em baptize from in the early morning +'till afternoon in the Chatahooche river. Folks don't hardly know +nowadays jest what to believe they's so many religions, but they's +only one God. + +I was eighteen when I married. I had eight chillun. My wife is 86, and +she lives in St. Louis, Missouri. + + + + +[Illustration: Lucinda Davis] + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[HW: (photo)] +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +LUCINDA DAVIS +Age (about) 89 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + + "What yo' gwine do when de meat give out? + What yo' gwine do when de meat give out? + Set in de corner wid my lips pooched out! + Lawsy! + + What yo' gwine do when de meat come in? + What yo' gwine do when de meat come in? + Set in de corner wid a greasy chin! + Lawsy!" + +Dat's about de only little nigger song I know, less'n it be de one +about: + + "Great big nigger, laying 'hind de log-- + Finger on de trigger and eye on the hawg! + Click go de trigger and bang go de gun! + Here come de owner and de buck nigger run!" + +And I think I learn both of dem long after I been grown, 'cause I +belong to a full-blood Creek Indian and I didn't know nothing but +Creek talk long after de Civil War. My mistress was part white and +knowed English talk, but she never did talk it because none of de +people talked it. I heard it sometime, but it sound like whole lot of +wild shoat in de cedar brake scared at something when I do hear it. +Dat was when I was little girl in time of de War. + +I don't know where I been born. Nobody never did tell me. But my mammy +and pappy git me after de War and I know den whose child I is. De men +at de Creek Agency help 'em git me, I reckon, maybe. + +First thing I remember is when I was a little girl, and I belong to +old Tuskaya-hiniha. He was big man in de Upper Creek, and we have a +purty good size farm, jest a little bit to de north of de wagon depot +houses on de old road at Honey Springs. Dat place was about +twenty-five mile south of Fort Gibson, but I don't know nothing about +whar de fort is when I was a little girl at dat time. I know de Elk +River 'bout two mile north of whar we live, 'cause I been there many +de time. + +I don't know if old Master have a white name. Lots de Upper Creek +didn't have no white name. Maybe he have another Indian name, too, +because Tuskaya-hiniha mean "head man warrior" in Creek, but dat what +everybody call him and dat what de family call him too. + +My Mistress' name was Nancy, and she was a Lott before she marry old +man Tuskaya-hiniha. Her pappy name was Lott and he was purty near +white. Maybe so all white. Dey have two chillun, I think, but only one +stayed on de place. She was name Luwina, and her husband was dead. His +name was Walker, and Luwina bring Mr. Walker's little sister, Nancy, +to live at de place too. + +Luwina had a little baby boy and dat de reason old Master buy me, to +look after de little baby boy. He didn't have no name cause he wasn't +big enough when I was with dem, but he git a name later on, I reckon. +We all call him "Istidji." Dat mean "little man." + +When I first remember, before de War, old Master had 'bout as many +slave as I got fingers, I reckon. I can think dem off on my fingers +like dis, but I can't recollect de names. + +Dey call all de slaves "Istilusti." Dat mean "Black man." + +Old man Tuskaya-hiniha was near 'bout blind before de War, and 'bout +time of de War he go plumb blind and have to set on de long seat under +de bresh shelter of de house all de time. Sometime I lead him around +de yard a little, but not very much. Dat about de time all de slave +begin to slip out and run off. + +My own pappy was name Stephany. I think he take dat name 'cause when +he little his mammy call him "Istifani." Dat mean a skeleton, and he +was a skinny man. He belong to de Grayson family and I think his +master name George, but I don't know. Dey big people in de Creek, and +with de white folks too. My mammy name was Serena and she belong to +some of de Gouge family. Dey was big people in de Upper Creek, and one +de biggest men of the Gouge was name Hopoethleyoholo for his Creek +name. He was a big man and went to de North in de War and died up in +Kansas, I think. Dey say when he was a little boy he was called +Hopoethli, which mean "good little boy", and when he git grown he make +big speeches and dey stick on de "yoholo." Dat mean "loud whooper." + +Dat de way de Creek made de name for young boys when I was a little +girl. When de boy git old enough de big men in de town give him a +name, and sometime later on when he git to going round wid de grown +men dey stick on some more name. If he a good talker dey sometime +stick on "yoholo", and iffen he make lots of jokes dey call him +"Hadjo." If he is a good leader dey call him "Imala" and if he kind of +mean dey sometime call him "fixigo." + +My mammy and pappy belong to two masters, but dey live together on a +place. Dat de way de Creek slaves do lots of times. Dey work patches +and give de masters most all dey make, but dey have some for +demselves. Dey didn't have to stay on de master's place and work like +I hear de slaves of de white people and de Cherokee and Choctaw people +say dey had to do. + +Maybe my pappy and mammy run off and git free, or maybeso dey buy +demselves out, but anyway dey move away some time and my mammy's +master sell me to old man Tuskaya-hiniha when I was jest a little gal. +All I have to do is stay at de house and mind de baby. + +Master had a good log house and a bresh shelter out in front like all +de houses had. Like a gallery, only it had de dirt for de flo' and +bresh for de roof. Dey cook everything out in de yard in big pots, and +dey eat out in de yard too. + +Dat was sho' good stuff to eat, and it make you fat too! Roast de +green corn on de ears in de ashes, and scrape off some and fry it! +Grind de dry corn or pound it up and make ash cake. Den bile de +greens--all kinds of greens from out in de woods--and chop up de pork +and de deer meat, or de wild turkey meat; maybe all of dem, in de big +pot at de same time! Fish too, and de big turtle dat lay out on de +bank! + +Dey always have a pot full of sofki settin right inside de house, and +anybody eat when dey feel hungry. Anybody come on a visit, always give +'em some of de sofki. Ef dey don't take none de old man git mad, too! + +When you make de sofki you pound up de corn real fine, den pour in de +water an dreen it off to git all de little skin from off'n de grain. +Den you let de grits soak and den bile it and let it stand. Sometime +you put in some pounded hickory nut meats. Dat make it real good. + +I don't know whar old Master git de cloth for de clothes, less'n he +buy it. Befo' I can remember I think he had some slaves dat weave de +cloth, but when I was dar he git it at de wagon depot at Honey +Springs, I think. He go dar all de time to sell his corn, and he raise +lots of corn, too. + +Dat place was on de big road, what we called de road to Texas, but it +go all de way up to de North, too. De traders stop at Honey Springs +and old Master trade corn for what he want. He git some purty checkedy +cloth one time, and everybody git a dress or a shirt made off'n it. I +have dat dress 'till I git too big for it. + +Everybody dress up fine when dey is a funeral. Dey take me along to +mind de baby at two-three funerals, but I don't know who it is dat +die. De Creek sho' take on when somebody die! + +Long in de night you wake up and hear a gun go off, way off yonder +somewhar. Den it go again, and den again, jest as fast as dey can ram +de load in. Dat mean somebody dead. When somebody die de men go out in +de yard and let de people know dat way. Den dey jest go back in de +house and let de fire go out, and don't even tech de dead person till +somebody git dar what has de right to tech de dead. + +When somebody bad sick dey build a fire in de house, even in de +summer, and don't let it die down till dat person git well or die. +When dey die dey let de fire go out. + +In de morning everybody dress up fine and go to de house whar de dead +is and stand around in de yard outside de house and don't go in. +Pretty soon along come somebody what got a right to tech and handle de +dead and dey go in. I don't know what give dem de right, but I think +dey has to go through some kind of medicine to git de right, and I +know dey has to drink de red root and purge good before dey tech de +body. When dey git de body ready dey come out and all go to de +graveyard, mostly de family graveyard, right on de place or at some of +the kinfolkses. + +When dey git to de grave somebody shoots a gun at de north, den de +west, den de south, and den de east. Iffen dey had four guns dey used +'em. + +Den dey put de body down in de grave and put some extra clothes in +with it and some food and a cup of coffee, maybe. Den dey takes strips +of elm bark and lays over de body till it all covered up, and den +throw in de dirt. + +When de last dirt throwed on, everybody must clap dey hands and smile, +but you sho hadn't better step on any of de new dirt around de grave, +because it bring sickness right along wid you back to your own house. +Dat what dey said, anyways. + +Jest soon as de grave filled up dey built a little shelter over it wid +poles like a pig pen and kiver it over wid elm bark to keep de rain +from soaking down in de new dirt. + +Den everybody go back to de house and de family go in and scatter +some kind of medicine 'round de place and build a new fire. Sometime +dey feed everybody befo' dey all leave for home. + +Every time dey have a funeral dey always a lot of de people say, +"Didn't you hear de stikini squalling in de night?" "I hear dat +stikini all de night!" De "stikini" is de screech owl, and he suppose +to tell when anybody going to die right soon. I hear lots of Creek +people say dey hear de screech owl close to de house, and sho' nuff +somebody in de family die soon. + +When de big battle come at our place at Honey Springs dey jest git +through having de green corn "busk." De green corn was just ripened +enough to eat. It must of been along in July. + +Dat busk was jest a little busk. Dey wasn't enough men around to have +a good one. But I seen lots of big ones. Ones whar dey had all de +different kinds of "banga." Dey call all de dances some kind of banga. +De chicken dance is de "Tolosabanga", and de "Istifanibanga" is de one +whar dey make lak dey is skeletons and raw heads coming to git you. + +De "Hadjobanga" is de crazy dance, and dat is a funny one. Dey all +dance crazy and make up funny songs to go wid de dance. Everybody +think up funny songs to sing and everybody whoop and laugh all de +time. + +But de worse one was de drunk dance. Dey jest dance ever whichaway, de +men and de women together, and dey wrassle and hug and carry on awful! +De good people don't dance dat one. Everybody sing about going to +somebody elses house and sleeping wid dem, and shout, "We is all drunk +and we don't know what we doing and we ain't doing wrong 'cause we is +all drunk" and things like dat. Sometime de bad ones leave and go to +de woods, too! + +Dat kind of doing make de good people mad, and sometime dey have +killings about it. When a man catch one his women--maybeso his wife or +one of his daughters--been to de woods he catch her and beat her and +cut off de rim of her ears! + +People think maybeso dat ain't so, but I know it is! + +I was combing somebody's hair one time--I ain't going tell who--and +when I lift it up off'n her ears I nearly drap dead! Dar de rims cut +right off'n 'em! But she was a married woman, and I think maybeso it +happen when she was a young gal and got into it at one of dem drunk +dances. + +Dem Upper Creek took de marrying kind of light anyways. Iffen de +younguns wanted to be man and wife and de old ones didn't care dey +jest went ahead and dat was about all, 'cepting some presents maybe. +But de Baptists changed dat a lot amongst de young ones. + +I never forgit de day dat battle of de Civil War happen at Honey +Springs! Old Master jest had de green corn all in, and us had been +having a time gitting it in, too. Jest de women was all dat was left, +'cause de men slaves had all slipped off and left out. My uncle Abe +done got up a bunch and gone to de North wid dem to fight, but I +didn't know den whar he went. He was in dat same battle, and after de +War dey called him Abe Colonel. Most all de slaves 'round dat place +done gone off a long time before dat wid dey masters when dey go wid +old man Gouge and a man named McDaniel. + +We had a big tree in de yard, and a grape vine swing in it for de +little baby "Istidji", and I was swinging him real early in de morning +befo' de sun up. De house set in a little patch of woods wid de field +in de back, but all out on de north side was a little open space, like +a kind of prairie. I was swinging de baby, and all at once I seen +somebody riding dis way 'cross dat prairie--jest coming a-kiting and +a-laying flat out on his hoss. When he see de house he begin to give +de war whoop, "Eya-a-a-a-he-ah!" When he git close to de house he +holler to git out de way 'cause dey gwine be a big fight, and old +Master start rapping wid his cane and yelling to git some grub and +blankets in de wagon right now! + +We jest leave everything setting right whar it is, 'cepting putting +out de fire and grabbing all de pots and kettles. Some de nigger women +run to git de mules and de wagon and some start gitting meat and corn +out of de place whar we done hid it to keep de scouters from finding +it befo' now. All de time we gitting ready to travel we hear dat boy +on dat horse going on down de big Texas road hollering. +"Eya-a-a-he-he-hah!" + +Den jest as we starting to leave here come something across dat little +prairie sho' nuff! We know dey is Indians de way dey is riding, and de +way dey is all strung out. Dey had a flag, and it was all red and had +a big criss-cross on it dat look lak a saw horse. De man carry it and +rear back on it when de wind whip it, but it flap all 'round de +horse's head and de horse pitch and rear lak he know something going +happen, sho! + +'Bout dat time it turn kind of dark and begin to rain a little, and we +git out to de big road and de rain come down hard. It rain so hard for +a little while dat we jest have to stop de wagon and set dar, and den +long come more soldiers dan I ever see befo'. Dey all white men, I +think, and dey have on dat brown clothes dyed wid walnut and +butternut, and old Master say dey de Confederate soldiers. Dey +dragging some big guns on wheels and most de men slopping 'long in de +rain on foot. + +Den we hear de fighting up to de north 'long about what de river is, +and de guns sound lak hosses loping 'cross a plank bridge way off +somewhar. De head men start hollering and some de hosses start rearing +and de soldiers start trotting faster up de road. We can't git out on +de road so we jest strike off through de prairie and make for a creek +dat got high banks and a place on it we call Rocky Cliff. + +We git in a big cave in dat cliff, and spend de whole day and dat +night in dar, and listen to de battle going on. + +Dat place was about half-a-mile from de wagon depot at Honey Springs, +and a little east of it. We can hear de guns going all day, and along +in de evening here come de South side making for a getaway. Dey come +riding and running by whar we is, and it don't make no difference how +much de head men hollers at 'em dey can't make dat bunch slow up and +stop. + +After while here come de Yankees, right after 'em, and dey goes on +into Honey Springs and pretty soon we see de blaze whar dey is burning +de wagon depot and de houses. + +De next morning we goes back to de house and find de soldiers ain't +hurt nothing much. De hogs is whar dey is in de pen and de chickens +come cackling 'round too. Dem soldiers going so fast dey didn't have +no time to stop and take nothing, I reckon. + +Den long come lots of de Yankee soldiers going back to de North, and +dey looks purty wore out, but dey is laughing and joshing and going +on. + +Old Master pack up de wagon wid everything he can carry den, and we +strike out down de big road to git out de way of any more war, is dey +going be any. + +Dat old Texas road jest crowded wid wagons! Everybody doing de same +thing we is, and de rains done made de road so muddy and de soldiers +done tromp up de mud so bad dat de wagons git stuck all de time. + +De people all moving along in bunches, and every little while one +bunch of wagons come up wid another bunch all stuck in de mud, and dey +put all de hosses and mules on together and pull em out, and den dey +go on together awhile. + +At night dey camp, and de women and what few niggers dey is have to +git de supper in de big pots, and de men so tired dey eat everything +up from de women and de niggers, purty nigh. + +After while we come to de Canadian town. Dat whar old man Gouge been +and took a whole lot de folks up north wid him, and de South soldiers +got in dar ahead of us and took up all de houses to sleep in. + +Dey was some of de white soldiers camped dar, and dey was singing at +de camp. I couldn't understand what dey sing, and I asked a Creek man +what dey say and he tell me dey sing, "I wish I was in Dixie, look +away--look away." + +I ask him whar dat is, and he laugh and talk to de soldiers and dey +all laugh, and make me mad. + +De next morning we leave dat town and git to de big river. De rain +make de river rise, and I never see so much water! Jest look out dar +and dar all dat water! + +Dey got some boats we put de stuff on, and float de wagons and swim de +mules and finally git across, but it look lak we gwine all drown. + +Most de folks say dey going to Boggy Depot and around Fort Washita, +but old Master strike off by hisself and go way down in de bottom +somewhar to live. + +I don't know whar it was, but dey been some kind of fighting all +around dar, 'cause we camp in houses and cabins all de time and nobody +live in any of 'em. + +Look like de people all git away quick, 'cause all de stuff was in de +houses, but you better scout up around de house before you go up to +it. Liable to be some scouters already in it! + +Dem Indian soldiers jest quit de army and lots went scouting in little +bunches and took everything dey find. Iffen somebody try to stop dem +dey git killed. + +Sometime we find graves in de yard whar somebody jest been buried +fresh, and one house had some dead people in it when old Mistress poke +her head in it. We git away from dar, and no mistake! + +By and by we find a little cabin and stop and stay all de time. I was +de only slave by dat time. All de others done slip out and run off. We +stay dar two year I reckon, 'cause we make two little crop of corn. +For meat a man name Mr. Walker wid us jest went out in de woods and +shoot de wild hogs. De woods was full of dem wild hogs, and lots of +fish in de holes whar he could sicken 'em wid buck root and catch 'em +wid his hands, all we wanted. + +I don't know when de War quit off, and when I git free, but I stayed +wid old man Tuskaya-hiniha long time after I was free, I reckon. I was +jest a little girl, and he didn't know whar to send me to, anyways. + +One day three men rid up and talk to de old man awhile in English +talk. Den he called me and tell me to go wid dem to find my own +family. He jest laugh and slap my behind and set me up on de hoss in +front of one de men and dey take me off and leave my good checkedy +dress at de house! + +Before long we git to dat Canadian river again, and de men tie me on +de hoss so I can't fall off. Dar was all dat water, and dey ain't no +boat, and dey ain't no bridge, and we jest swim de hosses. I knowed +sho' I was going to be gone dat time, but we git across. + +When we come to de Creek Agency dar is my pappy and my mammy to claim +me, and I live wid dem in de Verdigris bottom above Fort Gibson till I +was grown and dey is both dead. Den I marries Anderson Davis at Gibson +Station, and we git our allotments on de Verdigris east of Tulsa--kind +of south too, close to de Broken Arrow town. + +I knowed old man Jim McHenry at dat Broken Arrow town. He done some +preaching and was a good old man, I think. + +I knowed when dey started dat Wealaka school across de river from de +Broken Arrow town. Dey name it for de Wilaki town, but dat town was +way down in de Upper Creek country close to whar I lived when I was a +girl. + +I had lots of children, but only two is alive now. My boy Anderson got +in a mess and went to dat McAlester prison, but he got to be a trusty +and dey let him marry a good woman dat got lots of property dar, and +dey living all right now. + +When my old man die I come to live here wid Josephine, but I'se blind +and can't see nothing and all de noises pesters me a lot in de town. +And de children is all so ill mannered, too. Dey jest holler at you +all de time! Dey don't mind you neither! + +When I could see and had my own younguns I could jest set in de corner +and tell 'em what to do, and iffen dey didn't do it right I could +whack 'em on de head, 'cause dey was raised de old Creek way, and dey +know de old folks know de best! + + + + +[Illustration: Anthony Dawson] + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[HR: (photo)] +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +ANTHONY DAWSON +Age 105 yrs. +1008 E. Owen St., +Tulsa, Okla. + + + "Run nigger, run, + De Patteroll git you! + Run nigger, run, + De Patteroll come! + + "Watch nigger, watch-- + De Patteroll trick you! + Watch nigger, watch, + He got a big gun!" + +Dat one of the songs de slaves all knowed, and de children down on de +"twenty acres" used to sing it when dey playing in de moonlight 'round +de cabins in de quarters. Sometime I wonder iffen de white folks +didn't make dat song up so us niggers would keep in line. + +None of my old Master's boys tried to git away 'cepting two, and dey +met up wid evil, both of 'em. + +One of dem niggers was fotching a bull-tongue from a piece of new +ground way at de back of de plantation, and bringing it to my pappy to +git it sharped. My pappy was de blacksmith. + +Dis boy got out in de big road to walk in de soft sand, and long come +a wagon wid a white overseer and five, six, niggers going somewhar. +Dey stopped and told dat boy to git in and ride. Dat was de last +anybody seen him. + +Dat overseer and another one was cotched after awhile, and showed up +to be underground railroaders. Dey would take a bunch of niggers into +town for some excuse, and on de way jest pick up a extra nigger and +show him whar to go to git on de "railroad system." When de runaway +niggers got to de North dey had to go in de army, and dat boy from our +place got killed. He was a good boy, but dey jest talked him into it. +Dem railroaders was honest, and dey didn't take no presents, but de +patrollers was low white trash! + +We all knowed dat if a patroller jest rode right by and didn't say +nothing dat he was doing his honest job, but iffen he stopped his hoss +and talked to a nigger he was after some kind of trade. + +Dat other black boy was hoeing cotton way in de back of de field and +de patroller rid up and down de big road, saying nothing to nobody. + +De next day another white man was on de job, and long in de evening a +man come by and axed de niggers about de fishing and hunting! Dat +black boy seen he was de same man what was riding de day befo' and he +knowed it was a underground trick. But he didn't see all de trick, +bless God! + +We found out afterwards dat he told his mammy about it. She worked at +de big house and she stole something for him to give dat low white +trash I reckon, 'cause de next day he played sick along in de evening +and de black overlooker--he was my uncle--sent him back to de +quarters. + +He never did git there, but when dey started de hunt dey found him +about a mile away in de woods wid his head shot off, and old Master +sold his mammy to a trader right away. He never whipped his grown +niggers. + +Dat was de way it worked. Dey was all kinds of white folks jest like +dey is now. One man in Sesesh clothes would shoot you if you tried to +run away. Maybe another Sesesh would help slip you out to the +underground and say "God bless you poor black devil", and some of dem +dat was poor would help you if you could bring 'em sumpin you stole, +lak a silver dish or spoons or a couple big hams. I couldn't blame +them poor white folks, wid the men in the War and the women and +children hongry. The niggers didn't belong to them nohow, and they had +to live somehow. But now and then they was a devil on earth, walking +in the sight of God and spreading iniquity before him. He was de +low-down Sesesh dat would take what a poor runaway nigger had to give +for his chance to git away, and den give him 'structions dat would +lead him right into de hands of de patrollers and git him caught or +shot! + +Yes, dat's de way it was. Devils and good people walking in de road at +de same time, and nobody could tell one from t'other. + +I remember about de trickery so good 'cause I was "grown and out" at +that time. When I was a little boy I was a house boy, 'cause my mammy +was the house woman, but when the war broke I already been sent to the +fields and mammy was still at de house. + +I was born on July 25, 1832. I know, 'cause old Master keep de book on +his slaves jest like on his own family. He was a good man, and old +Mistress was de best woman in de world! + +De plantation had more than 500 acres and most was in cotton and +tobacco. But we raised corn and oats, and lots of cattle and horses, +and plenty of sheep for wool. + +I was born on the plantation, soon after my pappy and mammy was +brought to it. I don't remember whether they was bought or come from +my Mistress's father. He was mighty rich and had several hundred +niggers. When she was married he give her 40 niggers. One of them was +my pappy's brother. His name was John, and he was my master's +overlooker. + +We called a white man boss the "overseer", but a nigger was a +overlooker. John could read and write and figger, and old Master +didn't have no white overseer. + +Master's name was Levi Dawson, and his plantation was 18 miles east of +Greenville, North Carolina. It was a beautiful place, with all the +fences around the Big House and along the front made out of barked +poles, rider style, and all whitewashed. + +The Big House set back from the big road about a quarter of a mile. It +was only one story, but it had lots of rooms. + +There was four rooms in a bunch on one side and four in a bunch on the +other, with a wide hall in between. They was made of square adzed +logs, all weatherboarded on the outside and planked up and plastered +on the inside. Then they was a long gallery clean across the front +with big pillars made out of bricks and plastered over. They called it +the passage 'cause it din't have no floor excepting bricks, and a +buggy could drive right under it. Mostly it was used to set under and +talk and play cards and drink the best whiskey old Master could buy. + +Back in behind the big house was the kitchen, and the smokehouse in +another place made of plank, and all was whitewashed and painted white +all the time. + +Old Mistress was named Miss Susie and she was born an Isley. She +brought 40 niggers from her pappy as a present, and Master Levi jest +had 4 or 5, but he had got all his land from his pappy. She had the +niggers and he had the land. That's the way it was, and that's the way +it stayed! She never let him punish one of her niggers and he never +asked her about buying or selling land. Her pappy was richer than his +pappy, and she was sure quality! + +My pappy's name was Anthony, and mammy's name was Chanie. He was the +blacksmith and fixed the wagons, but he couldn't read and figger like +uncle John. Mammy was the head house woman but didn't know any letters +either. + +They was both black like me. Old man Isley, where they come from, had +lots of niggers, but I don't think they was off the boat. + +You can set the letters up and I can't tell them, but you can't fool +me with the figgers, 'less they are mighty big numbers. + +Master Levi had three sons and no daughters. The oldest son was +Simeon. He was in the Sesesh army. The other two boys was too young. I +can't remember their names. They was a lot younger and I was grown and +out befo' they got big. + +Old Master was a fine Christian but he like his juleps anyways. He let +us niggers have preachings and prayers, and would give us a parole to +go 10 or 15 miles to a camp meeting and stay two or three days with +nobody but Uncle John to stand for us. Mostly we had white preachers, +but when we had a black preacher that was Heaven. + +We didn't have no voodoo women nor conjure folks at our 20 acres. We +all knowed about the Word and the unseen Son of God and we didn't put +no stock in conjure. + +Course we had luck charms and good and bad signs, but everybody got +dem things even nowadays. My boy had a white officer in the Big War +and he tells me that man had a li'l old doll tied around his wrist on +a gold chain. + +We used herbs and roots for common ailments, like sassafras and +boneset and peach tree poultices and coon root tea, but when a nigger +got bad sick Old Master sent for a white doctor. I remember that old +doctor. He lived in Greenville and he had to come 18 miles in a buggy. + +When he give some nigger medicine he would be afraid the nigger was +like lots of them that believed in conjure, and he would say, "If you +don't take that medicine like I tell you and I have to come back here +to see you I going to break your dam black neck next time I come out +here!" + +When it was bad weather sometime the black boy sent after him had to +carry a lantern to show him the way back. If that nigger on his mule +got too fur ahead so old doctor couldn't see de light he sho' catch de +devil from that old doctor and from old Master, too, less'n he was one +of old Missy's house niggers, and then old Master jest grumble to +satisfy the doctor. + +Down in the quarters we had the spinning house, where the old woman +card the wool and run the loom. They made double weave for the winter +time, and all the white folks and slaves had good clothes and good +food. + +Master made us all eat all we could hold. He would come to the +smokehouse and look in and say, "You niggers ain't cutting down that +smoke side and that souse lak you ought to! You made dat meat and you +got to help eat it up!" + +Never no work on Sunday 'cepting the regular chores. The overlooker +made everybody clean up and wash de children up and after the praying +we had games. Antny over and marbles and "I Spy" and de likes of that. +Some times de boys would go down in de woods and git a possum. I love +possum and sweet taters, but de coon meat more delicate and de har +don't stink up de meat. + +I wasn't at the quarters much as a boy. I was at the big house with my +mammy, and I had to swing the fly bresh over my old Mistress when she +was sewing or eating or taking her nap. Sometime I would keep the +flies off'n old Master, and when I would get tired and let the bresh +slap his neck he would kick at me and cuss me, but he never did reach +me. He had a way of keeping us little niggers scared to death and +never hurting nobody. + +I was down in the field burning bresh when I first heard the guns in +the War. De fighting was de battle at Kingston, North Carolina, and it +lasted four days and nights. After while bunches of Sesesh come riding +by hauling wounded people in wagons, and then pretty soon big bunches +of Yankees come by, but dey didn't ack like dey was trying very hard +to ketch up. + +Dey had de country in charge quite some time, and they had forages +coming round all the time. By dat time old Master done buried his +money and all de silver and de big clock, but the Yankees didn't pear +to search out dat kind of stuff. All dey ask about was did anybody +find a bottle of brandy! + +When de War ended up most all de niggers stay with old Master and work +on de shares, until de land git divided up and sold off and the young +niggers git scattered to town. + +I never did have no truck wid de Ku Kluckers, but I had to step mighty +high to keep out'n it! De sho' nuff Kluxes never did bother around us +'cause we minded our own business and never give no trouble. + +We wouldn't let no niggers come 'round our place talking 'bout +delegates and voting, and we jest all stayed on the place. But dey was +some low white trash and some devilish niggers made out like dey was +Ku Klux ranging 'round de country stealing hosses and taking things. +Old Master said dey wasn't shore enough, so I reckon he knowed who the +regular ones was. + +These bunches that come around robbing got into our neighborhood and +old Master told me I better not have my old horse at the house, 'cause +if I had him they would know nobody had been there stealing and it +wouldn't do no good to hide anything 'cause they would tear up the +place hunting what I had and maybe whip or kill me. + +"Your old hoss aint no good, Tony, and you better kill him to make +them think you already been raided on," old Master told me, so I led +him out and knocked him in the head with an axe, and then we hid all +our grub and waited for the Kluckers to come most any night, but they +never did come. I borried a hoss to use in the day and took him back +home every night for about a year. + +The niggers kept talking about being free, but they wasn't free then +and they ain't now. + +Putting them free jest like putting goat hair on a sheep. When it rain +de goat come a running and git in de shelter, 'cause his hair won't +shed the rain and he git cold, but de sheep ain't got sense enough to +git in the shelter but jest stand out and let it rain on him all day. + +But the good Lord fix the sheep up wid a woolly jacket that turn the +water off, and he don't git cold, so he don't have to have no brains. + +De nigger during slavery was like de sheep. He couldn't take care of +hisself but his Master looked out for him and he didn't have to use +his brains. De master's protection was like de wooly coat. + +But de 'mancipation come and take off de woolly coat and leave de +nigger wid no protection and he cain't take care of hisself either. + +When de niggers was sot free lots of them got mighty uppity, and +everybody wanted to be a delegate to something or other. The Yankees +told us we could go down and vote in the 'lections and our color was +good enough to run for anything. Heaps of niggers believed them. You +cain't fault them for that, 'cause they didn't have no better sense, +but I knowed the black folks didn't have no business mixing in until +they knowed more. + +It was a long time after the War before I went down to vote and +everything quiet by that time, but I heard people talk about the +fights at the schoolhouse when they had the first election. + +I jest stayed on around the old place a long time, and then I got on +another piece of ground and farmed, not far from Greenville until +1900. Then I moved to Hearn, Texas, and stayed with my son Ed until +1903 when we moved to Sapulpa in the Creek Nation. We come to Tulsa +several years ago, and I been living with him ever since. + +I can't move off my bed now, but one time I was strong as a young +bull. I raised seven boys and seven girls. My boys was named Edward, +Joseph, Furney, Julius, James, and William, and my girls was Luvenia, +Olivia, Chanie Mamie, Rebecca and Susie. + +I always been a deep Christian and depend on God and know his unseen +Son, the King of Glory. I learned about Him when I was a little boy. +Old Master was a good man, but on some of the plantations the masters +wasn't good men and the niggers didn't get the Word. + +I never did get no reading and writing 'cause I never did go to the +schools. I thought I was too big, but they had schools and the young +ones went. + +But I could figger, and I was a good farmer, and now I bless the Lord +for all his good works. Everybody don't know it I reckon, but we all +needed each other. The blacks needed the whites, and still do. + +There's a difference in the color of the skin, but the souls is all +white, or all black, 'pending on the man's life and not on his skin. +The old fashioned meetings is busted up into a thousand different +kinds of churches and only one God to look after them. All is +confusion, but I ain't going to worry my old head about 'em. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp AUG 19 1937] + +ALICE DOUGLASS +Age 77 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born December 22, 1860 in Sumner County, Tennessee. My mother--I +mean mammy, 'cause what did we know 'bout mother and mamma. Master and +Mistress made dey chillun call all nigger women, "Black Mammy." Jest +as I was saying my mammy was named Millie Elkins and my pappy was +named Isaac Garrett. My sisters and brothers was Frank, Susie and +Mollie. They is all in Nashville, Tennessee right now. They lived in +log houses. I 'member my grandpappy and when he died. I allus slept in +the Big House in a cradle wid white babies. + +We all the time wore cotton dresses and we weaved our own cloth. The +boys jest wore shirts. Some wore shoes, and I sho' did. I kin see 'em +now as they measured my feets to git my shoes. We had doctors to wait +on us iffen we got sick and ailing. We wore asafedida to keep all +diseases offen us. + +When a nigger man got ready to marry, he go and tell his master that +they was a woman on sech and sech a farm that he'd lak to have. Iffen +master give his resent, then he go and ask her master and iffen he say +yes, well, they jest jump the broomstick. Mens could jest see their +wives on Sadday nite. + +They laid peoples 'cross barrels and whupped 'em wid bull whups till +the blood come. They'd half feed 'em and niggers'd steal food and cook +all night. The things we was forced to do then the whites is doing of +their own free will now. You gotta reap jest what you sow 'cause the +Good Book says it. + +They used to bid niggers off and then load 'em on wagons and take 'em +to cotton farms to work. I never seen no cotton till I come heah. +Peoples make big miration 'bout girls having babies at 11 years old. +And you better have them whitefolks some babies iffen you didn't wanta +be sold. Though a funny thing to me is, iffen a nigger woman had a +baby on the boat on the way to the cotton farms, they throwed it in +the river. Taking 'em to them cotton farms is jest the reason niggers +is so plentiful in the South today. + +I ain't got no education a'tall. In dem days you better not be caught +with a newspaper, else you got a beating and your back almost cut off. +When niggers got free, whitefolks killed 'em by the carload, 'cause +they said it was a nigger uprising. I used to lay on the flo' with the +whitefolks and hear 'em pass. Them patrollers roved trying to ketch +niggers without passes to whup 'em. They was sometimes called bush +whackers. + +We went to white folks' church. I was a great big girl before we went +to cullud church. We'd stay out and play while they worshipped. We +jest played marbles--girls, white chillun and all. + +The Yankees come thoo' and took all the meat and everything they could +find. They took horses, food and all. Mammy cooked their vittles. One +come in our cabin and took a sack of dried fruit with my mammy's shoes +on the top. I tried to make 'em leave mammy's shoes too but he didn't. + +I stayed in the house with the whitefolks till I was 19. They lak to +kept me in there too long. That's why I'm selfish as I am. Within +three weeks after I was out of the house, I married William Douglass. +Whitefolks now don't want you to tech 'em, and I slept with white +chillun till I was 19. You kin cook for 'em and put your hands in they +vittles and they don't say nothing, but jest you tech one! + +We stayed on, on the place, three or four years and it was right then +mammy give us our pappy's name. We moved from the place to one three +or four miles from our master's place, and mammy cooked there a long +time. + +Abraham Lincoln gits too much praise. I say, shucks, give God the +praise. Lincoln come thoo' Gallitan, Tennessee and stopped at Hotel +Tavern with his wife. They was dressed jest lak tramps and nobody +knowed it was him and his wife till he got to the White House and +writ back and told 'em to look 'twixt the leaves in the table where he +had set and they sho' nuff found out it was him. + +I never mentions Jeff Davis. He ain't wuff it. + +Booker T. Washington was all right in his place. He come here and told +these whitefolks jest what he thought. Course he wouldn't have done +that way down South. I declare to God he sho' told 'em enough. They +toted him 'round on their hands. No Jim Crow here then. + +I jined the church 'cause I had religion round 60 years ago. People +oughta be religious sho'; what for they wanta live in sin and die and +go to the Bad Man. To git to Heaven, you sho' ought to work some. I +want a resting place somewhar, 'cause I ain't got none here. I am a +member of Tabernacle Baptist Church, and I help build the first church +in Oklahoma City. + +I got three boys and three girls. I don't know none's age. I give 'em +the best education I could. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 13 1937] + +DOC DANIEL DOWDY +Age 81 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma + + +I was born June 6, 1856 in Madison County, Georgia. Father was named +Joe Dowdy and mother was named Mary Dowdy. There was 9 of us boys, +George, Smith, Lewis, Henry, William, myself, Newt, James and Jeff. +There was one girl and she was my twin, and her name was Sarah. My +mother and father come from Richmond, Va., to Georgia. Father lived on +one side of the river and my mother on the other side. My father would +come over ever week to visit us. Noah Meadows bought my father and +Elizabeth Davis, daughter of the old master took my mother. They +married in Noah Meadows' house. + +My mother was the cook in the Big House. They'd give us pot likker +with bread crumbs in it. Sometimes meat, jest sometimes, very seldom. +I liked black-eyed peas and still do till now. We lived in +weatherboard house. Our parents had corded-up beds with ropes and us +chillun slept on the floor for most part or in a hole bored in a log. +Our house had one window jest big enough to stick your head out of, +and one door, and this one door faced the Big House which was your +master's house. This was so that you couldn't git out 'less somebody +seen you. + +My job was picking up chips and keeping the calves and cows separate +so that the calves wouldn't suck the cows dry. Mostly, we had Saturday +afternoons off to wash. I was show boy doing [HW: during] the war, me +and my sister, 'cause we was twins. My mother couldn't be bought +'cause she done had 9 boys for one farm and neither my father, 'cause +he was the father of 'em. I was religious and didn't play much, but I +sho' did like to listen to preachings. I did used to play marbles +sometimes. + +We jest wore shirts and nothing else both winter and summer. They was +a little heavier in winter and that's all. No shoes ever. I had none +till after I was set free. I guess I was almost 12 years old then. + +The overseer on our place was a large tall, black man. We had plenty +poor white neighbors. They was one of our biggest troubles. They'd +allus look in our window and door all the time. + +I saw slaves sold. I can see that old block now. My cousin Eliza was a +pretty girl, really good looking. Her master was her father. When the +girls in the big house had beaux coming to see 'em, they'd ask, "Who +is that pretty gal?" So they decided to git rid of her right away. The +day they sold her will allus be remembered. They stripped her to be +bid off and looked at. I wasn't allowed to stand in the crowd. I was +laying down under a fig brush. The man that bought Eliza was from New +York. The Negroes had made up nuff money to buy her off theyself, but +they wouldn't let that happen. There was a man bidding for her who was +a Swedeland. He allus bid for the good looking cullud gals and bought +'em for his own use. He ask the man from New York, "Whut you gonna do +with her when you git 'er?" The man from New York said, "None of your +damn business, but you ain't got money nuff to buy 'er." When the man +from New York had done bought her, he said, "Eliza, you are free from +now on." She left and went to New York with him. Mama and Eliza both +cried when she was being showed off, and master told 'em to shet up +before he knocked they brains out. + +Iffen you didn't do nothing wrong, they whipped you now and then +anyhow. I called a boy Johnny once and he took me 'hind the garden and +poured it on me and made me call him master. It was from then on I +started to fear the white man. I come to think of him as a bear. +Sometimes fellows would be a little late making it in and they got +whipped with a cow-hide. The same man whut whipped me to make me call +him master, well, he whipped my mamma. He tied her to a tree and beat +her unmerciful and cut her tender parts. I don't know why he tied her +to that tree. + +The first time you was caught trying to read or write, you was whipped +with a cow-hide, the next time with a cat-o-nine tails and the third +time they cut the first jint offen your forefinger. They was very +severe. You most allus got 30 and 9 lashes. + +They carried news from one plantation by whut they call relay. Iffen +you was caught, they whipped you till you said, "Oh, pray Master!" One +day a man gitting whipped was saying "Oh pray master, Lord have +mercy!" They'd say "Keep whipping that nigger Goddamn him." He was +whipped till he said, "Oh pray Master, I gotta nuff." Then they said, +"Let him up now, 'cause he's praying to the right man." + +My father was the preacher and an educated man. You know the sermon +they give him to preach?--Servant, Obey Your Master. Our favorite +baptizing hymn was On Jordan's Stormy Bank I Stand. My favorite song +is Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen. + +Oh, them patrollers! They had a chief and he git'em together and iffen +they caught you without a pass and sometimes with a pass, they'd beat +you. But iffen you had a pass, they had to answer to the law. One old +master had two slaves, brothers, on his place. They was both +preachers. Mitchell was a hardshell Baptist and Andrew was a +Missionary Baptist. One day the patroller chief was rambling thoo' the +place and found some letters writ to Mitchell and Andrew. He went to +the master and said, "Did you know you had some niggers that could +read and write?" Master said, "No, but I might have, who do you +'spect?" The patroller answered, "Mitchell and Andrew." The old master +said, "I never knowed Andrew to tell me a lie 'bout nothing!" + +Mitchell was called first and asked could he read and write. He was +scared stiff. He said, "Naw-sir." Andrew was called and asked. He +said, "Yes-sir." He was asked iffen Mitchell could. He said, "Sho', +better'n me." The master told John Arnold, the patroller chief, not to +bother 'em. He gloried in they spunk. When the old master died, he +left all of his niggers a home apiece. We had Ku Klux Klans till the +government sent Federal officers out and put a stop to their ravaging +and sent 'em to Sing Sing. + +Doing the war my father was carpenter. His young master come to him +'cause he was a preacher and asked him must he go to the front and my +father told him not to go 'cause he wouldn't make it. He went on jest +the same and when he come back my father had to tote him in the house +'cause he had one leg tore off. The Yankees come thoo', ramshacked +houses, leave poor horses and take fat ones and turn the poor ones in +the corn they left. They took everthing they could. They cussed +niggers who dodged 'em for being fools and make 'em show 'em +everything they knowed whar was. + +Our old master was mighty old and him and the women folks cried when +we was freed. He told us we was free as he was. + +I come to Oklahoma in 1906. I come out of that riot in 1906. Some +fellow knocked up a colored woman or something and we waded right in +and believe me we made Atlanta a fit place to live in. It is one of +the best cities in America. + +I married Miss Emmaline Witt. I carried her to the preacher one of the +coldest nights I ever rid. I have three chillun and don't know how +many grandchillun. My chillun is one a nurse, one in Arizona for his +health and the other doing first one thing and another. + +I think Abraham Lincoln was the greatest human being ever been on +earth 'cepting the Apostle Paul. Who any better'n a man who liberated +4,000,000 Negroes? Some said he wasn't a Christian, but he told some +friends once, "I'm going to leave you and may never see you again (and +he didn't) so I'm going to take the Divine Spirit with me and leave it +with you." + +Jeff Davis was as bloody as he could be. I don't lak him a'tall. But +you know good things come from enemies. I don't even admire George +Washington. White men from the south that will help the Negro is far +and few between. Booker T. Washington was a great man. He made some +blunders and mistakes, but he was a great man. He is the father of +industrial education and you know that sho' is a great thing. + +The white folks was ignorant. You know the better you prepare yourself +the better you act. Iffen they had put some sense in our heads 'stead +of sticks on our heads, we'ud been better off and more benefit to 'em. + +I had something from within that made me fear God and taught me how to +pray. People say God don't hear sinners pray, but he do. Everybody +ought to be Christians so not to be lost. + +I work in real estate and can do a lot of work. I don't use no +crutches and no cane and walk all the time, never hardly ride. I come +in at 1 and 2 o'clock a. m. and get up between 8 and 9 a. m. 'cept +Sundays, I get up at 7 or 8 a. m. so I can be ready to go to Sunday +School. I cook for my own self all the time too. I am a Baptist and a +member of Tabernacle Baptist Church. I am a trustee in my church too. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + +JOANNA DRAPER +Age 83 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + +Most folks can't remember many things happened to 'em when they only +eight years old, but one of my biggest tribulations come about dat +time and I never will forget it! That was when I was took away from my +own mammy and pappy and sent off and bound out to another man, way off +two-three hundred miles away from whar I live. And dat's the last time +I ever see either one of them, or any my own kinfolks! + +Whar I was born was at Hazelhurst, Mississippi. Jest a little piece +east of Hazelhurst, close to the Pearl River, and that place was a +kind of new plantation what my Master, Dr. Alexander, bought when he +moved into Mississippi from up in Virginia awhile before the War. + +They said my mammy brings me down to Mississippi, and I was born jest +right after she got there. My mammy's name was Margaret, and she was +born under the Ramson's, back in Tennessee. She belonged to Dave +Ramson, and his pappy had come to Tennessee to settle on war land, and +he had knowed Dr. Alexander's people back in Virginia too. My pappy's +name was Addison, and he always belonged to Dr. Alexander. Old doctor +bought my mammy 'cause my pappy liked her. Old doctor live in +Tennessee a little while before he go on down in Mississippi. + +Old doctor's wife named Dinah, and she sho' was a good woman, but I +don't remember about old doctor much. He was away all the time, it +seem like. + +When I is about six year old they take me into the Big House to learn +to be a house woman, and they show me how to cook and clean up and +take care of babies. That Big House wasn't very fine, but it was +mighty big and cool, and made out of logs with a big hall, but it +didn't have no long gallery like most the houses around there had. + +They was lots of big trees in the yard, and most the ground was new +ground 'round that place, 'cause the old Doctor jest started to done +farming on it when I was took away, but he had some more places not so +far away, over towards the river that was old ground and made big +crops for him. I went to one of the places one time, but they wasn't +nobody on 'em but niggers and a white overseer. I don't know how many +niggers old Doctor had, but Master John Deeson say he had about a +hundred. + +At old Doctor's house I didn't have to work very hard. Jest had to +help the cooks and peel the potatoes and pick the guineas and chickens +and do things like that. Sometime I had to watch the baby. He was a +little boy, and they would bring him into the kitchen for me to watch. +I had to git up way before daylight and make the fire in the kitchen +fireplace and bring in some fresh water, and go get the milk what been +down in the spring all night, and do things like that until breakfast +ready. Old Master and old Mistress come in the big hall to eat in the +summer, and I stand behind them and shoo off the flies. + +Old doctor didn't have no spinning and weaving niggers 'cause he say +they don't do enough work and he buy all the cloth he use for +everybody's clothes. He can do that 'cause he had lots of money. He +was big rich, and he keep a whole lot of hard money in the house all +the time, but none of the slaves know it but me. Sometimes I would +have the baby in the Mistress' room and she would go git three or four +big wood boxes full of hard money for us to play with. I would make +fences out of the money all across the floor, to keep the baby +satisfied, and when he go to sleep I would put the money back in the +boxes. I never did know how much they is, but a whole lot. + +Even after the War start old Doctor have that money, and he would +exchange money for people. Sometimes he would go out and be gone a +long time, and come back with a lot more money he got from somewhar. + +Right at the first they made him a high officer in the War and he done +doctoring somewhar at a hospital most of the time. But he could go on +both sides of the War, and sometime he would come in at night and +bring old Mistress pretty little things, and I heard him tell her he +got them in the North. + +One day I was fanning him and I asked him is he been to the North and +he kick out at me and tell to shut up my black mouth, and it nearly +scared me to death the way he look at me! Nearly every time he been +gone and come in and tell Mistress he been in the North he have a lot +more hard money to put away in them boxes, too! + +One evening long come a man and eat supper at the house and stay all +night. He was a nice mannered man, and I like to wait on him. The next +morning I hear him ask old Doctor what is my name, and old Doctor +start in to try to sell me to that man. The man say he can't buy me +'cause old Doctor say he want a thousand dollars, and then old Doctor +say he will bind me out to him. + +I run away from the house and went out to the cabin whar my mammy and +pappy was, but they tell me to go on back to the Big House 'cause +maybe I am just scared. But about that time old Doctor and the man +come and old Doctor make me go with the man. We go in his buggy a long +ways off to the South, and after he stop two or three night at peoples +houses and put me out to stay with the niggers he come to his own +house. I ask him how far it is back home and he say about a hundred +miles or more, and laugh, and ask me if I know how far that is. + +I wants to know if I can go back to my mammy some time, and he say +"Sho', of course you can, some of these times. You don't belong to me, +Jo, I'se jest your boss and not your master." + +He live in a big old rottendy house, but he aint farming none of the +land. Jest as soon as he git home he go off again, and sometimes he +only come in at night for a little while. + +His wife's name was Kate and his name was Mr. John. I was there about +a week before I found out they name was Deeson. They had two children, +a girl about my size name Joanna like me, and a little baby boy name +Johnny. One day Mistress Kate tell me I the only nigger they got. I +been thinking maybe they had some somewhar on a plantation, but she +say they aint got no plantation and they aint been at that place very +long either. + +That little girl Joanna and me kind of take up together, and she was a +mighty nice mannered little girl, too. Her mammy raised her good. Her +mammy was mighty sickly all the time, and that's the reason they bind +me to do the work. + +Mr. John was in some kind of business in the War too, but I never see +him with no soldier clothes on but one time. One night he come in with +them on, but the next morning he come to breakfast in jest his plain +clothes again. Then he go off again. + +I sho' had a hard row at that house. It was old and rackady, and I had +to scrub off the staircase and the floors all the time, and git the +breakfast for Mistress Kate and the two children. Then I could have my +own breakfast in the kitchen. Mistress Kate always get the supper, +though. + +Some days she go off with the two children and leave me at the house +all day by myself, and I think maybe I run off, but I didn't know whar +to go. + +After I been at that place two years Mr. John come home and stay. He +done some kind of trading in Jackson, Mississippi, and he would be +gone three or four days at a time, but I never did know what kind of +trading it was. + +About the time he come home to stay I seen the first Ku Klux I ever +seen one night. I was going down the road in the moonlight and I heard +a hog grunting out in the bushes at the side of the road. I jest walk +right on and in a little ways I hear another hog in some more bushes. +This time I stop and listen, and they's another hog grunts across the +road, and about that time two mens dressed up in long white skirts +steps out into the road in front of me! I was so scared the goose +bumps jump up all over me 'cause I didn't know what they is! They +didn't say a word to me, but jest walked on past me and went on back +the way I had come. Then I see two more mens step out of the woods and +I run from that as fast as I can go! + +I ast Miss Kate what they is and she say they Ku Klux, and I better +not go walking off down the road any more. I seen them two, three +times after that, though, but they was riding hosses them times. + +I stayed at Mr. John's place two more years, and he got so grumpy and +his wife got so mean I make up my mind to run off. I bundle up my +clothes in a little bundle and hide them, and then I wait until Miss +Kate take the children and go off somewhere, and I light out on foot. +I had me a piece of that hard money what Master Dr. Alexander had give +me one time at Christmas. I had kept it all that time and nobody +knowed I had it, not even Joanna. Old Doctor told me it was fifty +dollars, and I thought I could live on it for a while. + +I never had been away from that place, not even to another plantation +in all the four years I was with the Deesons, and I didn't know +which-a-way to go, so I jest started west. + +I been walking about all evening it seem like, and I come to a little +town with jest a few houses. I see a nigger man and ask him whar I can +git something to eat, and I say I got fifty dollars. + +"What you doing wid fifty dollars, child? Where you belong at, +anyhow?" He ask me, and I tell him I belong to Master John Deeson, but +I is running away. I explain that I jest bound out to Mr. John, but +Dr. Alexander my real master, and then that man tell me the first time +I knowed it that I aint a slave no more! + +That man Deeson never did tell me, and his wife never did! + +Well, dat man asked me about the fifty dollars, and then I found out +that it was jest fifty cents! + +I can't begin to tell about all the hard times I had working for +something to eat and roaming around after that. I don't know why I +never did try to git back up around Hazelhurst and hunt up my pappy +and mammy, but I reckon I was jest ignorant and didn't know how to go +about it. Anyways I never did see them no more. + +In about three years or a little over I met Bryce Draper on a farm in +Mississippi and we was married. His mammy had had a harder time than I +had. She had five children by a man that belong to her master, Mr. +Bryce and already named one of the boys--that my husband--Bryce after +him, and then he take her in and sell her off away from all her +children! + +One was jest a little baby, and the master give it laudanum, but it +didn't die, and he sold her off and lied and said she was a young girl +and didn't have no husband, 'cause the man what bought her said he +didn't want to buy no woman and take her away from a family. That new +master name was Draper. + +The last year of the War Mr. Draper die, and his wife already dead, +and he give all his farm to his two slaves and set them free. One of +them slaves was my husband's mammy. + +Then right away the whites come and robbed the place of every thing +they could haul off, and run his mammy and the other niggers off! Then +she went and found her boy, that was my husband, and he live with her +until she died, jest before we is married. + +We lived in Mississippi a long time, and then we hear about how they +better to the Negroes up in the North, and we go up to Kansas, but +they ain't no better there, and we come down to Indian Territory in +the Creek Nation in 1898, jest as they getting in that Spanish War. + +We leased a little farm from the Creek Nation for $15 an acre, but +when they give out the allotments we had to give it up. Then we rent +100 acres from some Indians close to Wagoner, and we farm it all with +my family. We had enough to do it too! + +For children we had John and Joe, and Henry, and Jim and Robert and +Will that was big enough to work, and then the girls big enough was +Mary, Nellie, Izora, Dora, and the baby. Dora married Max Colbert. His +people belonged to the Colberts that had Colbert's Crossin' on the Red +River way before the War, and he was a freedman and got allotment. + +I lives with Dora now, and we is all happy, and I don't like to talk +about the days of the slavery times, 'cause they never did mean +nothing to me but misery, from the time I was eight years old. + +I never will forgive that white man for not telling me I was free, and +not helping me to git back to my mammy and pappy! Lots of white people +done that. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +MRS. ESTHER EASTER +Age 85 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + +I was born near Memphis, Tenn., on the old Ben Moore plantation, but I +don't know anything about the Old South because Master Ben moves us +all up into Missouri (about 14-miles east of Westport, now Kansas +City), long before they started fighting about slavery. + +Mary Collier was my mother's name before she was a Moore. About my +father, I dunno. Mammy was sickly most of the time when I was a baby, +and she was so thin and poorly when they move to Missouri the white +folks afraid she going die on the way. + +But she fool 'em, and she live two-three year after that. That's what +good Old Master Ben tells me when I gets older. + +I stay with Master Ben's married daughter, Mary, till the coming of +the War. Times was good before the War, and I wasn't suffering none +from slavery, except once in a while the Mistress would fan me with +the stick--bet I needed it, too. + +When the War come along Master he say to leave Mistress Mary and get +ready to go to Texas. Jim Moore, one of the meanest men I ever see, +was the son of Master Ben; he's going take us there. + +Demon Jim, that's what I call him when he ain't round the place, but +when he's home it was always Master Jim 'cause he was reckless with +the whip. He was a Rebel officer fighting round the country and didn't +take us slaves to Texas right away. So I stayed on at his place not +far from Master Ben's plantation. + +Master Jim's wife was a demon, just like her husband. Used the whip +all the time, and every time Master Jim come home he whip me 'cause +the Mistress say I been mean. + +One time I tell him, you better put me in your pocket (sell me), +Master Jim, else I'se going run away'. He don't pay no mind, and I +don't try to run away 'cause of the whips. + +I done see one whipping and that enough. They wasn't no fooling about +it. A runaway slave from the Jenkin's plantation was brought back, and +there was a public whipping, so's the slaves could see what happens +when they tries to get away. + +The runaway was chained to the whipping post, and I was full of misery +when I see the lash cutting deep into that boy's skin. He swell up +like a dead horse, but he gets over it, only he was never no count for +work no more. + +While Master Jim is out fighting the Yanks, the Mistress is fiddling +round with a neighbor man, Mister Headsmith. I is young then, but I +knows enough that Master Jim's going be mighty mad when he hears about +it. + +The Mistress didn't know I knows her secret, and I'm fixing to even up +for some of them whippings she put off on me. That's why I tell Master +Jim next time he come home. + +See that crack in the wall? Master Jim say yes, and I say, it's just +like the open door when the eyes are close to the wall. He peek and +see into the bedroom. + +That's how I find out about the Mistress and Mister Headsmith, I tells +him, and I see he's getting mad. + +What you mean? And Master Jim grabs me hard by the arm like I was +trying to get away. + +I see them in the bed. + +That's all I say. The Demon's got him and Master Jim tears out of the +room looking for the Mistress. + +Then I hears loud talking and pretty soon the Mistress is screaming +and calling for help, and if old Master Ben hadn't drop in just then +and stop the fight, why, I guess she be beat almost to death, that how +mad the Master was. + +Then Master Ben gets mad 'cause his boy Jim ain't got us down in Texas +yet. Then we stay up all the night packing for the trip. Master Jim +takes us, but the Mistress stay at home, and I wonder if Master Jim +beat her again when he gets back. + +We rides the wagons all the way, how many days, I dunno. The country +was wild most of the way, and I know now that we come through the same +country where I lives now, only it was to the east. (The trip was +evidently made over the "Texas Road.") And we keeps on riding and +comes to the big river that's all brown and red looking, (Red River) +and the next thing I was sold to Mrs. Vaughn at Bonham, Texas, and +there I stays till after the slaves is free. + +The new Mistress was a widow, no children round the place, and she +treat me mighty good. She was good white folks--like old Master Ben, +powerful good. + +When the word get to us that the slaves is free, the Mistress says I +is free to go anywheres I want. And I tell her this talk about being +free sounds like foolishment to me--anyway, where can I go? She just +pat me on the shoulder and say I better stay right there with her, and +that's what I do for a long time. Then I hears about how the white +folks down at Dallas pays big money for house girls and there I goes. + +That's all I ever do after that--work at the houses till I gets too +old to hobble on these tired old feets and legs, then I just sits +down. + +Just sits down and wishes for old Master Ben to come and get me, and +take care of this old woman like he use to do when she is just a +little black child on the plantation in Missouri! + +God Bless old Master Ben--he was good white folks! + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +ELIZA EVANS +Age 87 +McAlester, Okla. + + +I sho' remember de days when I was a slave and belonged to de best old +Master what ever was, Mr. John Mixon. We lived in Selma, Dallas +County, Alabama. + +My grandma was a refugee from Africa. You know dey was white men who +went slipping 'round and would capture or entice black folks onto +their boats and fetch them over here and sell 'em for slaves. Well, +grandma was a little girl 'bout eight or nine years old and her +parents had sent her out to get wood. Dey was going to have a feast. +Dey was going to roast a baby. Wasn't that awful? Well, they captured +her and put a stick in her mouth. The stick held her mouth wide open +so she wouldn't cry out. When she got to de boat she was so tired out +she didn't do nothing. + +They was a lot of more colored folks on de boat. It took about four +months to get across on de boat and Mr. John Mixon met the boat and +bought her. I think he gave five hundred dollars for her. She was +named Gigi, but Master John called her Gracie. She was so good and +they thought so much of her dat they gave her a grand wedding when she +was married. Master John told her he'd never sell none of her chillun. +He kept dat promise and he never did sell any of her grandchillun +either. He thought it was wrong to separate famblys. She was one +hundred and three years old when she died. I guess her mind got kind +of feeble 'cause she wandered off and fell into a mill race and was +drowned. + +Master John Mixon had two big plantations. I believe he owned about +four hundred slaves, chillun and all. He allowed us to have church one +time a month with de white folks and we had prayer meeting every +Sunday. Sometimes when de men would do something like being sassy or +lazy and dey knowed dey was gonna be whipped, dey'd slip off and hide +in de woods. When dey'd slip back to get some food dey would all pray +for 'em dat Master wouldn't have 'em whipped too hard, and for fear +the Patroller would hear 'em they'd put their faces down in a dinner +pot. I'd sit out and watch for the Patroller. He was a white man who +was appointed to catch runaway niggers. We all knew him. His name was +Howard Campbell. He had a big pack of dogs. The lead hound was named +Venus. There was five or six in the pack, and they was vicious too. + +My father was a carriage driver and he allus took the family to +church. My mother went along to take care of the little chilluns. +She'd take me too. They was Methodist and after they would take the +sacrament we would allus go up and take it. The niggers could use the +whitefolks church in the afternoon. + +De Big House was a grand place. It was a two-story house made out of +logs dat had been peeled and smoothed off. There was five big rooms +and a big open hall wid a wide front porch clean across de front. De +porch had big posts and pretty banisters. It was painted white and had +green shutters on de windows. De kitchen was back of de Big House. + +De slaves quarters was about a quarter of a mile from de Big House. +Their houses was made of logs and the cracks was daubed with mud. They +would have two rooms. Our bedsteads was made of poplar wood and we +kept them scrubbed white with sand. We used roped woven together for +slats. Our mattresses were made of cotton, grass, or even shucks. My +mother had a feather bed. The chairs was made from cedar with split +white oak bottoms. + +Each family kept their own home and cooked and served their own meals. +We used wooden trays and wooden spoons. Once a week all the cullud +chillun went to the Big House to eat dinner. The table was out in de +yard. My nickname was "Speck". I didn't like to eat bread and milk +when I went up there and I'd just sit there. Finally they'd let me go +in de house and my mother would feed me. She was the house woman and +my Auntie was cook. I don't know why they had us up there unless it +was so they could laugh at us. + +None of old Master's young niggers never did much work. He say he want +'em to grow up strong. He gave us lots to eat. He had a store of +bacon, milk, bread, beans and molasses. In summer we had vegetables. +My mother could make awful good corn pone. She would take meal and put +salt in it and pour boiling water over it and make into pones. She'd +wrap these pones in wet cabbage or collard leaves and roll dem into +hot ashes and bake dem. They sho' was good. We'd have possum and coon +and fish too. + +The boys never wore no britches in de summer time. Boys fifteen years +old would wear long shirts with no sleeves and they went barefooted. +De girls dressed in shimmys. They was a sort of dress with two seams +in it and no sleeves. + +Old Master had his slaves to get up about five o'clock. Dey did an +ordinary day's work. He never whipped them unless they was lazy or +sassy or had a fight. Sometimes his slaves would run away but they +allus come back. We didn't have no truck with railroaders 'cause we +like our home. + +A woman cussed my mother and it made her mad and they had a fight. Old +Master had them both whipped. My mother got ten licks and de other +woman got twenty-five. Old Mistress sho' was mad 'cause mother got +whipped. Said he wouldn't have done it if she had known it. Old +Mistress taught mother how to read and write and mother taught my +father. I went to school jest one day so I can't read and write now. + +Weddings was big days. We'd have big dinners and dances once in a +while [HW: and] when somebody died they'd hold a wake. They'd sit up +all night and sing and pray and talk. At midnight they'd serve +sandwiches and coffee. Sometimes we'd all get together and play ring +plays and dance. + +Once the Yankee soldiers come. I was big enough to tote pails and +piggins then. These soldiers made us chillun tote water to fill their +canteens and water their horses. We toted the water on our heads. +Another time we heard the Yankee's was coming and old Master had about +fifteen hundred pounds of meat. They was hauling it off to bury it and +hide it when the Yankees caught them. The soldiers ate and wasted +every bit of that good meat. We didn't like them a bit. + +One time some Yankee soldiers stopped and started talking to me--they +asked me what my name was. "I say Liza," and they say, "Liza who?" I +thought a minute and I shook my head, "Jest Liza, I ain't got no other +name." + +He say, "Who live up yonder in dat Big House?" I say, "Mr. John +Mixon." He say, "You are Liza Mixon." He say, "Do anybody ever call +you nigger?" And I say, "Yes Sir." He say, "Next time anybody call you +nigger you tell 'em dat you is a Negro and your name is Miss Liza +Mixon." The more I thought of that the more I liked it and I made up +my mind to do jest what he told me to. + +My job was minding the calves back while the cows was being milked. +One evening I was minding the calves and old Master come along. He +say, "What you doin' nigger?" I say real pert like, "I ain't no +nigger, I'se a Negro and I'm Miss Liza Mixon." Old Master sho' was +surprised and he picks up a switch and starts at me. + +Law, but I was skeered! I hadn't never had no whipping so I run fast +as I can to Grandma Gracie. I hid behind her and she say, "What's the +matter of you child?" And I say, "Master John gwine whip me." And she +say, "What you done?" And I say, "Nothing." She say she know better +and 'bout that time Master John got there. He say, "Gracie, dat little +nigger sassed me." She say, "Lawsie child, what does ail you?" I told +them what the Yankee soldier told me to say and Grandma Gracie took my +dress and lift it over my head and pins my hands inside, and Lawsie, +how she whipped me and I dassent holler loud either. I jest said dat +[HW: to] de wrong person. [TR: "didn't I?" at end was crossed out.] + +I'se getting old now and can't work no more. I jest sits here and +thinks about old times. They was good times. We didn't want to be +freed. We hated the Yankee soldiers. Abe Lincoln was a good man +though, wasn't he? I tries to be a good Christian 'cause I wants to go +to Heaven when I die. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +LIZZIE FARMER +Age 80 years +McAlester, Okla. + + +"Cousin Lizzie!" + +"What." + +"I'se seventy years old." + +And I say, "Whut's you telling me for. I ain't got nothing to do with +your age!" + +I knowed I was one year older than she was and it sorta riled me for +her to talk about it. I never would tell folks my age for I knowed +white folks didn't want no old woman working for 'em and I just +wouldn't tell 'em how old I really was. Dat was nine years ago and I +guess I'm seventy five now. I can't work much now. + +I was born four years before de War.--"The one what set the cullud +folks free." We lived on a big plantation in Texas. Old Master's name +was John Booker and he was good to us all. My mammy died just at de +close of de War and de young mistress took me and kept me and I growed +up with her chillun. I thought I was quality sure nuff and I never +would go to school 'cause I couldn't go 'long to de same school with +de white chillun. Young mistress taught me how to knit, spin, weave, +crochet, sew and embroider. I couldn't recollect my age and young +Mistress told me to say, "I'se born de second year of de War dat set +de cullud folks free," and the only time she ever git mad at me was +when I forgot to say it jest as she told me to. She take hold of me +and shook me. I recollects all it, all de time. + +Young mistress' name was Elizabeth Booker McNew. I'se named after her. +She finally gave me to my aunt when I was a big girl and I never lived +wid white folks any more. I never saw my pappy till I was grown. + +In the cullud quarters, we cooked on a fireplace in big iron pots. Our +bread was baked in iron skillets with lids and we would set the +skillet on de fire and put coals of fire on de lid. Bread was mighty +good cooked like dat. We made our own candles. We had a candle mold +and we would put a string in the center of the mold and pour melted +tallow in it and let it harden. We would make eight at one time. +Quality folks had brass lamps. + +When we went to cook our vegetables we would put a big piece of hog +jowl in de pot. We'd put in a lot of snap beans and when dey was about +half done we'd put in a mess of cabbage and when it was about half +done we'd put in some squash and when it was about half done we'd put +in some okra. Then when it was done we would take it out a layer at a +time. Go 'way! It makes me hungry to talk about it. + +When we cooked possum dat was a feast. We would skin him and dress him +and put him on top de house and let him freeze for two days or nights. +Then we'd boil him with red pepper, and take him out and put him in a +pan and slice sweet 'taters and put round him and roast him. My, dat +was good eating. + +It was a long time after de War 'fore all de niggers knowed dey was +really free. My grandpappy was Master Booker's overseer. He wouldn't +have a white man over his niggers. I saw grandpappy whip one man with +a long whip. Master Booker was good and wouldn't whip 'em less'n he +had to. De niggers dassent leave de farm without a pass for fear of de +Ku Kluxers and patrolers. + +We would have dances and play parties and have sho' nuff good times. +We had "ring plays." We'd all catch hands and march round, den we'd +drop all hands 'cept our pardners and we'd swing round and sing: + + "You steal my pardner, and I steal yours, + Miss Mary Jane. + My true lover's gone away, + Miss Mary Jane! + + "Steal all round and don't slight none, + Miss Mary Jane. + He's lost out but I'se got one, + Miss Mary Jane!" + +We always played at log rollin's an' cotton pickin's. + +Sometimes we would have a wedding and my what a good time we'd have. +Old Master's daughter, Miss Janie, got married and it took us more'n +three weeks to get ready for it. De house was cleaned from top to +bottom and us chillun had to run errands. Seemed like we was allers +under foot, at least dat was what mammy said. I never will fergit all +the good things they cooked up. Rows of pies and cakes, baked chicken +and ham, my, it makes my mouth water jest thinking of it. After de +wedding and de feast de white folks danced all night and us cullud +folks ate all night. + +When one of de cullud folks die we would allers hold a "wake." We +would set up with de corpse and sing and pray and at midnight we'd all +eat and den we'd sing and pray some more. + +In de evening after work was done we'd sit round and de older folks +would sing songs. One of de favorites was: + + "Miss Ca'line gal, + Yes Ma'am + Did you see dem buzzards? + Yes Ma'am, + Did you see dem floppin', + How did ye' like 'em? + Mighty well. + + "Miss Ca'line gal, + Yes Ma'am, + Did you see dem buzzards? + Yes Ma'am, + Did you see dem sailin', + Yes Ma'am. + How did you like 'em? + Mighty well." + +I've heered folks talk about conjures and hoodoo charms. I have a hoss +shoe over de door dat will bring good luck. I sho' do believe certain +things bring bad luck. I hate to hear a scrinch (screech) owl holler +at night. Whenever a scrinch owl git in dat tree at night and start to +holler I gits me a stick and I say, "Confound you, I'll make yet set +up dar and say 'Umph huh'," so I goes out and time I gits dar he is +gone. If you tie a knot in de corner of de bed sheet he will leave, or +turn your hat wrong side out too. Dey's all good and will make a +scrinch owl leave every time. + +I believes in dreams and visions too. I dreamed one night dat I had +tall palings all 'round my house and I went out in de yard and dere +was a big black hoss and I say, "How come you is in my yard? I'll jest +put you out jest lak you got in." I opened de gate but he wouldn't go +out and finally he run in de door and through the house and went +towards de East. Right after dat my son died. I saw dat hoss again de +other night. A black hoss allus means death. Seeing it de other night +might mean I'se gwineter die. + +I know one time a woman named May Runnels wanted to go to church about +a mile away and her old man wouldn't go with her. It made her mad and +she say, "I'll be dammed if I don't go." She had to go through a grave +yard and when she was about half way across it a icy hand jest slap +her and her mouth was twisted way 'round fer about three months. Dat +was a lesson to her fer cussing. + +One time there was a nigger what belonged on a adjoining farm to +Master John Bookers and dey told us dis story: + +"Dis nigger went down to de spring and found a terrapin and he say, +'What brung you here?' Jest imagine how he felt when it say to him, +'Teeth and tongue brung me here, and teeth and tongue will bring you +here.' He run to de house and told his Master dat he found a terrapin +dat could talk. Dey went back and he asked de terrapin what bring him +here and it wouldn't say a word. Old Master didn't like it 'cause he +went down there jest to see a common ordinary terrapin and he told de +nigger he was going to git into trouble fer telling him a lie. Next +day the nigger seen de terrapin and it say de same thing again. Soon +after dat dis nigger was lynched right close to de place he saw de +terrapin." + +Master John Booker had two niggers what had a habit of slipping across +de river and killing old Master's hogs and hiding de meat in de loft +of de house. Master had a big blue hog and one day he missed him and +he sent Ned to look fer him. Ned knowed all de time dat he had killed +it and had it hid in his loft. He hunted and called "Pig-ooie, Pig." +Somebody done stole old Master's big blue hog. Dey couldn't find it +but old Master thought Ned knowed something 'bout it. One night he +found out Ned was gonna kill another hog and had asked John to go with +him. He borrowed John's clothes and blacked his face and met Ned at de +river. Soon dey find a nice big one and Ned say, "John, I'll drive him +round and you kill him." So he drove him past old Master but he didn't +want to kill his own hog so he made lak he'd like to kill him but he +missed him. Finally Ned got tired and said. "I'll kill him, you drive +him by me." So Master John drove him by him and Ned knock de hog on de +head and cut his throat and dey load him on de canoe. When dey was +nearly 'cross de river Old Master dip up some water and wash his face +a little, then he look at Ned and he say, "Ned you look sick, I +believe you've got lepersy." Ned row on little more and he jump in de +river and Master had a hard time finding him again. He had the +overseer whip Ned for that. + +I think Lincoln was a wonderful man. Everybody was sorry when he died, +but I never heerd of Jeff Davis. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +10-19-38 +1,876-words + +DELLA FOUNTAIN +Age 69 years +McAlester, Oklahoma + + +I was born after de War of de Rebellion but I 'member lots o' things +dat my parents told me 'bout slavery. + +My grandmother was captured in Africa. Traders come dere in a big boat +and dey had all sorts of purty gew-gaws--red handkerchiefs, dress +goods, beads, bells, and trinkets in bright colors. Dey would pull up +at de shore and entice de colored folks onto de boat to see de purty +things. Befo' de darkies realized it dey would be out from shore. +Dat's de way she was captured. Fifteen to twenty-five would pay dem +for de trip as dey all brought good prices. + +I was born and raised in Louisiana, near Winfield. My mother's Master +was John Rogers and his wife was Miss Millie. Dey was awful good to +deir slaves and he never whupped his grown niggers. + +I 'member when I was a child dat we didn't have hardly anything to +keep house wid, but we got along purty well I guess. Our furniture was +home-made and we cooked on de fireplace. + +We saved all our oak-wood ashes, and would put a barrel on a slanting +scaffold and put sticks and shucks in de bottom of de barrel and den +fill it wid de ashes. We'd pour water in it and let it drip. Dese +drippings made pure lye. We used dis wid cracklings and meat scraps to +make our soap. + +Father took a good-sized pine long and split it open, planed it down +smooth and bored holes in de bottom and drove pegs in dem for legs; +dis was our battling bench. We'd spread our wet clothes on dis and +rub soap on 'em and take a paddle and beat de dirt out. We got 'em +clean but had to be careful not to wear 'em out wid de paddle. + +We had no tubs either, so father took a hollow log and split it open +and put partitions in it. He bored a hole in each section and drove a +peg in it. He next cut two forked poles and drove 'em in de ground and +rested de ends of de hollow log in dese forks. We'd fill de log trough +wid water and rinse our clothes. We could pull out de pegs and let de +water out. We had no brooms either, so we made brush brooms to sweep +our floors. + +Dere was lots of wild game near our home. I 'member father and two +more men going out and killing six deer in jest a little while. Dey +was plentiful, and so was squirrels, coon, possums and quail. Dere was +lots of bears, too. We'd be in de field working and hear de dogs, and +father and de boys would go to 'em and maybe dey'd have a bear. We +liked bear meat. It was dark, but awful good and sweet. + +De grown folks used to have big times at log-rollings, corn-shuckings +and quiltings. Dey'd have a big supper and a big dance at night. Us +children would play ring plays, play with home-made rag dolls, or we'd +take big leaves and pin 'em together wid thorns and make hats and +dresses. We'd ride saplings, too. All of us would pull a sapling down +and one would climb up in it near de top and git a good hold on it, +and dey would turn it loose. It took a purty good holding to stay wid +it, I can tell you. + +All de ladies rode horseback, and dey rode side-saddles. I had a purty +side-saddle when I growed up. De saddle seat was flowered plush. I had +a purty riding habit, too. De skirt was so long dat it almost touched +de ground. + +We spun and wove all our clothes. I had to spin three broaches ever +night before bedtime. Mother would take bark and make dye to give us +different colored dresses. + +Red oak and sweet gum made purple. Bois d'arc made yellow or orange. +Walnut made a purty brown. We knitted our socks and stockings, too. + +We celebrated Christmas by having a big dance and egg-nog for ever' +body. + +During slavery young colored boys and girls didn't do much work but +just growed up, care-free and happy. De first work boys done was to +learn to hitch up de team to Master's carriage and take de young folks +for a drive. + +My older brothers and sisters told me lots of things dey done during +slave days. My brother Joe felt mighty big after freedom and strutted +about. One day he took his younger brother, Ol wid him to where father +was building a house. Dey played 'bout de house and come up to where a +white man and father was talking. De white man was rolling a little +ball of mud in his hands and he just pitched it over on Ol's foot. It +didn't hurt him a mite, but Joe bridled up and he started to git +smart, and father told him he'd break his neck if he didn't go on home +and keep his mouth shet. Father finally had to whup Joe to make him +know he was black. He give father and mother lots of concern, for dey +was afraid the Ku Kluxers would git him. One day he was playing wid a +axe and chopped off brother Ol's finger. Mother told him she was going +to kill him when she caught him. He took to de woods. His three +sisters and two neighbor girls run him nearly all day but couldn't +catch him. Late in de evening, he come up to a white neighbor's house +and she told him to go in and git under de bed and dey couldn't find +him. Curtains come down to de floor and as he was tired he decided to +risk it. He hadn't much more dan got hid when he heard de girls +coming. He heard de woman say, "He's under de bed." He knowed he was +caught, and he put up a fight, but dey took him to mother. He got a +whupping, but he was shocked dat mother didn't kill him like she said +she was. He didn't mind de whupping. He growed up to be a good man, +and was de apple of my mother's eye. + +Father knowed a man that stole his Master's horse out and rode him to +a dance. For some reason de horse died. De poor man knowed he was up +against it, and he let in to begging de men to help him git de horse +on his back so he could put him back in his stable and his Master +would think he died dere. Poor fellow, he really did think he could +tote dat horse on his back. He couldn't git anybody to help him, so he +went to the woods. He was shot by a patroller 'cause he wouldn't +surrender. Dey captured him but he died. + +Paul Castleberry was a white preacher. De colored would go to church +de same as de whites. He give de colored instructions on obeying +Masters. He say, "while your Master is going f'om pillar to post, +looking after your intrusts, you is always doing some devilment." I +'spect dat was jest about de truth. + +My sister played wid Miss Millie's little girl, Mollie. De big house +was on a high hill and at de foot of de hill. Nearly a half-mile away +was a big creek wid a big wooden bridge across it. Soldiers come by +ever' few days, and you could hear deir horses when dey struck de +bridge. Sister and Mollie would run upstairs and look down de hill, +and if it was Confederate soldiers dey would run back and tell Miss +Millie and dey would start putting out de best food dey had. If dey +saw Yankee soldiers, dey would run down and tell 'em and dey'd start +hiding things. + +De Yankees come through dere and took ever' body's horses. Lots of +people took deir horses and cows and hid 'em in some low place in de +deep wood. + +Miss Millie had a young horse and she had 'em take him to de wheat +field and hide him. De wheat was as high as he was. De Yankees come +by, and a man had stopped dere just before dey come. He was riding an +old horse, and he was wearing a long linen-duster--a duster was a long +coat dat was worn over de suit to protect it from de dust. + +Dis smart-aleck hid behind de house and as de soldiers rode up he shot +at 'em. Dey started shooting at him and he started running, and his +coat was sticking straight out behind him. De soldiers surely wasn't +trying to hit him, but dey sure did scare him plenty. Miss Millie was +certain dey was going to find her horse but dey didn't. + +Master John Rogers was good to all his slaves, and they all loved him +and would a'died for him. One day he was sitting in his yard and +Mollie come running down stairs and told him de Yankees was coming. He +never say nothing, but kept sitting dere. Dat morning he had a big +sack of money and he give it to my mother to hide for him. She ripped +her mattress, and put it in de middle of it and sewed it up. She den +made up de bed and put de covers on it. De Yankees searched de house +and took de jewelry and silverware and old Master's gold mug, but dey +didn't find his money. + +My parents lived close to de old plantation dat they lived on when dey +was slaves. De big house was still dere, but it was sure dilapidated. +Ever'body was poor after de War, whites and blacks alike. I really +think de colored was de best off, for they knowed all 'bout hardships +and hard work and de white folks didn't. + +At first some of 'em was too proud to do drudgery work, but most of +'em went right to work and build up deir homes again. Food, clothes, +and in fact everything needed, was scarce. + +Mother always say, "If you visit on New Years, you'll visit all de +year." We always had black-eyed peas and hog jowl for New Year's +dinner, for it brought good luck. + +The Nineteenth of June was Emancipation Day, and we always had a big +picnic and speeches. + +I knowed one woman who was a conjur woman. Lots of people went to her +to git her to break a evil spell dat some one had over them. She'd +brew a tea from herbs and give to 'em to drink, and it always cured +'em. + +I've seen people use all kinds o' roots and herbs for medicine, and I +also seen 'em use all kind of things for cures. I've knowed 'em to put +wood lice in a bag and tie 'em 'round a baby's neck so it'd teeth +easy. + +Black-haw root, sour dock, bear grass, grape root, bull nettle, +sweet-gum bark and red-oak bark boiled separately and mixed, makes a +good blood medicine. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +NANCY GARDNER +Age 79 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma + + +Well, to tell you de truth I don't know my age, but I was born in +1858, in Franklin, Tennessee. Now, you can figger for yourself and +tell how old I is. I is de daughter of Prophet and Callie Isaiah, and +dey was natives of Tennessee. Dere was three of us children, two boys +and myself. I'm de only girl. My brothers names was Prophet and Billie +Isaiah. I don't 'member much about dem as we was separated when I was +seven years old. I'll never forget when me, my ma and my auntie had to +leave my pa and brothers. It is jest as clear in my mind now as it was +den, and dat's been about seventy years ago. + +Oh God! I tell you it was awful dat day when old Jeff Davis had a +bunch of us sent to Memphis to be sold. I can see old Major Clifton +now. He was a big nigger trader you know. Well, dey took us on up dere +to Memphis and we was sold jest like cattle. Dey sold me and ma +together and dey sold pa and de boys together. Dey was sent to +Mississippi and we was sent to Alabama. My pa, O how my ma was grieved +to death about him! She didn't live long after dat. She didn't live +long enough to be set free. Poor ma, she died a slave, but she is +saved though. I know she is, and I'll be wid her some day. + +It was thirty years before my pa knew if we was still living. Finally +in some way he heard dat I was still alive, and he began writing me. +Course I was grown and married den and me and my husband had moved to +Missouri. Well, my pa started out to see me and on his way he was +drowned in de Missouri River, and I never saw him alive after we was +sold in Memphis. + +I can't tell you much 'bout work during de slave days 'cause you see I +was jest a baby you might say when de War broke out. I do remember +our Master's name though, it was Dr. Perkins, and he was a good +Master. Ma and pa sure hated to have to leave him, he was so good to +dem. He was a rich man, and had a big fine house and thousands of +acres of land. He was good to his niggers too. We had a good house +too, better dan some of dese houses I see folks living in now. Course +Dr. Perkins niggers had to work, but dey didn't mind 'cause he would +let dem have little patches of dey own such as 'tatoes, corn, cotton +and garden. Jest a little, you know. He couldn't let dem have much, +there was so many on Dr. Perkins plantation. + +I don't remember seeing anybody sick in slavery time. You see I was +jest a kid and dere's a lot of things I can't remember. + +I am a Christian. I jined de church nigh on seventy years ago and when +I say dat, I don't mean I jest jined de church. I mean I gave myself +up to de Heavenly Father, and I've been gwine straight down de line +for Him ever since. You know in dem days, we didn't get religion like +young folks do now. Young folks today jest find de church and den call +theyselves Christians, but they aint. + +I remember jest as well when I was converted. One day I was thinking +'bout a sermon de preacher had preached and a voice spoke to me and +said, "De Holy Ghost is over your head. Accept it!" Right den I got +down on my knees and prayed to God dat I might understand dat voice, +and God Almighty in a vision told me dat I should find de church. I +could hardly wait for de next service so I could find it, and when I +was in de water getting my baptisement, dat same voice spoke and said, +"Now you have accepted don't turn back 'cause I will be wid you +always!" O you don't know nothing 'bout dat kind of religion! + +I 'member one night shortly after I jined de church I was laying in +bed and dere was a vine tied 'round my waist and dat vine extended +into de elements. O my God! I can see it now! I looked up dat vine +and away in de elements I could see my Divine Master and he spoke to +me and said, "When you get in trouble shake dis vine; I'm your Master +and I will hear your cry." + +I knowed old Jeff Davis good. Why I was jest as close to him as I am +to dat table. I've talked wid him too. I reckon I _do_ know dat +scoundrel! Why, he didn't want de niggers to be free! He was known as +a mean old rascal all over de South. + +Abraham Lincoln? Now you is talking 'bout de niggers friend! Why dat +was de best man God ever let tramp de earth! Everybody was mighty sad +when poor old Abraham was 'sassinated, 'cause he did a mighty good +deed for de colored race before he left dis world. + +I wasn't here long during slavery, but I saw enough of it to know it +was mighty hard going for most of de niggers den, and young folks +wouldn't stand for dat kind of treatment now. I know most of the young +folks would be killed, but they jest wouldn't stand for it. I would +hate to have to go through wid my little share of it again. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +OCTAVIA GEORGE +Age 85 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Mansieur, Louisiana, 1852, Avoir Parish. I am the +daughter of Alfred and Clementine Joseph. I don't know much about my +grandparents other than my mother told me my grandfather's name was +Fransuai, and was one time a king in Africa. + +Most of the slaves lived in log cabins, and the beds were home-made. +The mattresses were made out of moss gathered from trees, and we used +to have lots of fun gathering that moss to make those mattresses. + +My job was taking care of the white children up at the Big House (that +is what they called the house where our master lived), and I also had +to feed the little Negro children. I remember quite well how those +poor little children used to have to eat. They were fed in boxes and +troughs, under the house. They were fed corn meal mush and beans. When +this was poured into their box they would gather around it the same as +we see pigs, horses and cattle gather around troughs today. + +We were never given any money, but were able to get a little money +this way: our Master would let us have two or three acres of land each +year to plant for ourselves, and we could have what we raised on it. +We could not allow our work on these two or three acres to interfere +with Master's work, but we had to work our little crops on Sundays. +Now remind you, all the Negroes didn't get these two or three acres, +only good masters allowed their slaves to have a little crop of their +own. We would take the money from our little crops and buy a few +clothes and something for Christmas. The men would save enough money +out of the crops to buy their Christmas whiskey. It was all right for +the slaves to get drunk on Christmas and New Years Day; no one was +whipped for getting drunk on those days. We were allowed to have a +garden and from this we gathered vegetables to eat; on Sundays we +could have duck, fish, and pork. + +We didn't know anything about any clothes other than cotton; +everything we wore was made of cotton, except our shoes, they were +made from pieces of leather cut out of a raw cowhide. + +Our Master and Mistress was good, they let us go to church with them, +have our little two- or three-acre crops and any other thing that the +good masters would let their slaves do. They lived in a big fine house +and had a fine barn. Their barn was much better than the house we +lived in. Master Depriest (our master) was a Frenchman, and had eight +or nine children, and they were sure mean. They would fight us, but we +were not allowed to fight our little Master or Mistress as we had to +call them. + +The overseer on Master's plantation was a mean old fellow, he carried +his gun all the time and would ride a big fine horse and go from one +bunch of slaves to the other. Some poor white folks lived close to us. +They could not own slaves and they had to work for the rich plantation +owners. I believe that those poor white folk are to blame for the +Negroes stealing because they would get the Negroes to steal their +master's corn, hogs, chickens and many other things and sell it to +them for practically nothing. + +We had to work plenty hard, because our Master had a large plantation. +Don't know just how many acres it was, but we had to be up at 5 +o'clock in the morning and would work until dark than we would have to +go home and do our night work, that is cook, milk, and feed the stock. + +The slaves were punished for stealing, running off, not doing what +their master told them and for talking back to their master. If any of +these rules were disobeyed their feet and hands were chained together +and they were put across a log or a barrel and whipped until the blood +came from them. + +There were no jails; the white man was the slaves' jail. If whipping +didn't settle the crime the Negro committed--the next thing would be +to hang him or burn him at stake. + +I've seen them sell slaves. The whites would auction them off just as +we do cattle and horses today. The big fine healthy slaves were worth +more than those that were not quite so good. I have seen men sold from +their wives and I thought that was such a crime. I knew that God would +settle thing someday. + +Slaves would run away but most of the time they were caught. The +Master would put blood hounds on their trail, and sometimes the slave +would kill the blood hound and make his escape. If a slave once tried +to run away and was caught, he would be whipped almost to death, and +from then on if he was sent any place they would chain their meanest +blood hound to him. + +Funerals were very simple for slaves, they could not carry the body to +the church they would just take it to the grave yard and bury it. They +were not even allowed to sing a song at the cemetery. Old Mistress +used to tell us ghost stories after funerals and they would nearly +scare me to death. She would tell of seeing men with no head, and see +cattle that would suddenly turn to cats, and she made us believe if a +fire was close to a cemetery it was coming from a ghost. + +I used to hear quite a bit about voodoo, but that some thing I never +believed in, therefore, I didn't pay any attention to it. + +When a slave was sick, the master would get a good doctor for him if +he was a good slave, but if he wasn't considered a good slave he would +be given cheap medical care. Some of the doctors would not go to the +cabin where the slaves were, and the slave would have to be carried on +his bed to his master's back porch and the doctor would see him there. + +When the news came that we were free, all of us were hid on the +Mississippi River. We had been there for several days, and we had to +catch fish with our hands and roast them for food. I remember quite +well when old Master came down to there and hollered, Come on out +niggers; you are free now and you can do as you please! We all went to +the Big House and there we found old Miss crying and talking about how +she hated to lose her good niggers. + +Abraham Lincoln! Why we mourned three months for that man when he +died! I wouldn't miss a morning getting my black arm band and placing +it on in remembrance of Abraham, who was the best friend the Negroes +ever had. Now old Jeff Davis, I didn't care a thing about him. He was +a Democrat and none of them mean anything to the Negro. And if these +young Negroes don't quit messing with the democratic bunch they are +going to be right back where we started from. If they only knew as I +know they would struggle to keep such from happening, because although +I had a good master I wouldn't want to go through it again. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +MARY GRAYSON +Age 83 yrs. +Tulsa, Oklahoma + + +I am what we colored people call a "native." That means that I didn't +come into the Indian country from somewhere in the Old South, after +the War, like so many negroes did, but I was born here in the old +Creek Nation, and my master was a Creek Indian. That was eighty three +years ago, so I am told. + +My mammy belonged to white people back in Alabama when she was +born--down in the southern part I think, for she told me that after +she was a sizeable girl her white people moved into the eastern part +of Alabama where there was a lot of Creeks. Some of them Creeks was +mixed up with the whites, and some of the big men in the Creeks who +come to talk to her master was almost white, it looked like. "My white +folks moved around a lot when I was a little girl", she told me. + +When mammy was about 10 or 13 years old some of the Creeks begun to +come out to the Territory in little bunches. They wasn't the ones who +was taken out here by the soldiers and contractor men--they come on +ahead by themselves and most of them had plenty of money, too. A Creek +come to my mammy's master and bought her to bring out here, but she +heard she was being sold and run off into the woods. There was an old +clay pit, dug way back into a high bank, where the slaves had been +getting clay to mix with hog hair scrapings to make chinking for the +big log houses that they built for the master and the cabins they made +for themselves. Well, my mammy run and hid way back in that old clay +pit, and it was way after dark before the master and the other man +found her. + +The Creek man that bought her was a kind sort of a man, mammy said, +and wouldn't let the master punish her. He took her away and was kind +to her, but he decided she was too young to breed and he sold her to +another Creek who had several slaves already, and he brought her out +to the Territory. + +The McIntosh men was the leaders in the bunch that come out at that +time, and one of the bunch, named Jim Perryman, bought my mammy and +married her to one of his "boys", but after he waited a while and she +didn't have a baby he decided she was no good breeder and he sold her +to Mose Perryman. + +Mose Perryman was my master, and he was a cousin to Legus Perryman, +who was a big man in the Tribe. He was a lot younger than Mose, and +laughed at Mose for buying my mammy, but he got fooled, because my +mammy got married to Mose's slave boy Jacob, the way the slaves was +married them days, and went ahead and had ten children for Mr. Mose. + +Mose Perryman owned my pappy and his older brother, Hector, and one of +the McIntosh men, Oona, I think his name was, owned my pappy's brother +William. I can remember when I first heard about there was going to be +a war. The older children would talk about it, but they didn't say it +was a war all over the country. They would talk about a war going to +be "back in Alabama", and I guess they had heard the Creeks talking +about it that way. + +When I was born we lived in the Choska bottoms, and Mr. Mose Perryman +had a lot of land broke in all up and down the Arkansas river along +there. After the War, when I had got to be a young woman, there was +quite a settlement grew up at Choska (pronounced Choe-skey) right +across the river east of where Haskell now is, but when I was a child +before the War all the whole bottoms was marshy kind of wilderness +except where farms had been cleared out. The land was very rich, and +the Creeks who got to settle there were lucky. They always had big +crops. All west of us was high ground, toward Gibson station and Fort +Gibson, and the land was sandy. Some of the McIntoshes lived over that +way, and my Uncle William belonged to one of them. + +We slaves didn't have a hard time at all before the War. I have had +people who were slaves of white folks back in the old states tell me +that they had to work awfully hard and their masters were cruel to +them sometimes, but all the Negroes I knew who belonged to Creeks +always had plenty of clothes and lots to eat and we all lived in good +log cabins we built. We worked the farm and tended to the horses and +cattle and hogs, and some of the older women worked around the owner's +house, but each Negro family looked after a part of the fields and +worked the crops like they belonged to us. + +When I first heard talk about the War the slaves were allowed to go +and see one another sometimes and often they were sent on errands +several miles with a wagon or on a horse, but pretty soon we were all +kept at home, and nobody was allowed to come around and talk to us. +But we heard what was going on. + +The McIntosh men got nearly everybody to side with them about the War, +but we Negroes got word somehow that the Cherokees over back of Ft. +Gibson was not going to be in the War, and that there were some Union +people over there who would help slaves to get away, but we children +didn't know anything about what we heard our parents whispering about, +and they would stop if they heard us listening. Most of the Creeks who +lived in our part of the country, between the Arkansas and the +Verdigris, and some even south of the Arkansas, belonged to the Lower +Creeks and sided with the South, but down below us along the Canadian +River they were Upper Creeks and there was a good deal of talk about +them going with the North. Some of the Negroes tried to get away and +go down to them, but I don't know of any from our neighborhood that +went to them. + +Some Upper Creeks came up into the Choska bottoms talking around among +the folks there about siding with the North. They were talking, they +said, for old man Gouge, who was a big man among the Upper Creeks. His +Indian name was Opoeth-le-ya-hola, and he got away into Kansas with a +big bunch of Creeks and Seminoles during the War. + +Before that time, I remember one night my uncle William brought +another Negro man to our cabin and talked a long time with my pappy, +but pretty soon some of the Perryman Negroes told them that Mr. Mose +was coming down and they went off into the woods to talk. But Mr. Mose +didn't come down. When pappy came back Mammy cried quite a while, and +we children could hear them arguing late at night. Then my uncle +Hector slipped over to our cabin several times and talked to pappy, +and mammy began to fix up grub, but she didn't give us children but a +little bit of it, and told us to stay around with her at the cabin and +not go playing with the other children. + +Then early one morning, about daylight, old Mr. Mose came down to the +cabin in his buggy, waving a shot gun and hollering at the top of his +voice. I never saw a man so mad in all my life, before nor since! + +He yelled in at mammy to "git them children together and git up to my +house before I beat you and all of them to death!" Mammy began to cry +and plead that she didn't know anything, but he acted like he was +going to shoot sure enough, so we all ran to mammy and started for Mr. +Mose's house as fast as we could trot. + +We had to pass all the other Negro cabins on the way, and we could see +that they were all empty, and it looked like everything in them had +been tore up. Straw and corn shucks all over the place, where somebody +had tore up the mattresses, and all the pans and kettles gone off the +outside walls where they used to hang them. + +At one place we saw two Negro boys loading some iron kettles on a +wagon, and a little further on was some boys catching chickens in a +yard, but we could see all the Negroes had left in a big hurry. + +I asked mammy where everybody had gone and she said, "Up to Mr. Mose's +house, where we are going. He's calling us all in." + +"Will pappy be up there too?" I asked her. + +"No. Your pappy and your Uncle Hector and your Uncle William and a lot +of other menfolks won't be here any more. They went away. That's why +Mr. Mose is so mad, so if any of you younguns say anything about any +strange men coming to our place I'll break your necks!" Mammy was sure +scared! + +We all thought sure she was going to get a big whipping, but Mr. Mose +just looked at her a minute and then told her to get back to the cabin +and bring all the clothes, and bed ticks and all kinds of cloth we had +and come back ready to travel. + +"We're going to take all you black devils to a place where there won't +no more of you run away!" he yelled after us. So we got ready to leave +as quick as we could. I kept crying about my pappy, but mammy would +say, "Don't you worry about your pappy, he's free now. Better be +worrying about us. No telling where we all will end up!" There was +four or five Creek families and their Negroes all got together to +leave, with all their stuff packed in buggies and wagons, and being +toted by the Negroes or carried tied on horses, jack asses, mules and +milk cattle. I reckon it was a funny looking sight, or it would be to +a person now; the way we was all loaded down with all manner of +baggage when we met at the old ford across the Arkansas that lead to +the Creek Agency. The Agency stood on a high hill a few miles across +the river from where we lived, but we couldn't see it from our place +down in the Choska bottoms. But as soon as we got up on the upland +east of the bottoms we could look across and see the hill. + +When we got to a grove at the foot of the hill near the agency Mr. +Mose and the other masters went up to the Agency for a while. I +suppose they found out up there what everybody was supposed to do and +where they was supposed to go, for when we started on it wasn't long +until several more families and their slaves had joined the party and +we made quite a big crowd. + +The little Negro boys had to carry a little bundle apiece, but Mr. +Mose didn't make the little girls carry anything and let us ride if we +could find anything to ride on. My mammy had to help lead the cows +part of the time, but a lot of the time she got to ride an old horse, +and she would put me up behind her. It nearly scared me to death, +because I had never been on a horse before, and she had to hold on to +me all the time to keep me from falling off. + +Of course I was too small to know what was going on then, but I could +tell that all the masters and the Negroes seemed to be mighty worried +and careful all the time. Of course I know now that the Creeks were +all split up over the War, and nobody was able to tell who would be +friendly to us or who would try to poison us or kill us, or at least +rob us. There was a lot of bushwhacking all through that country by +little groups of men who was just out to get all they could. They +would appear like they was the enemy of anybody they run across, just +to have an excuse to rob them or burn up their stuff. If you said you +was with the South they would be with the North and if you claimed to +be with the Yankees they would be with the South, so our party was +kind of upset all the time we was passing through the country along +the Canadian. That was where old Gouge had been talking against the +South. I've heard my folks say that he was a wonderful speaker, too. + +We all had to move along mighty slow, on account of the ones on foot, +and we wouldn't get very far in one day, then we Negroes had to fix up +a place to camp and get wood and cook supper for everybody. Sometimes +we would come to a place to camp that somebody knew about and we +would find it all tromped down by horses and the spring all filled in +and ruined. I reckon old Gouge's people would tear up things when they +left, or maybe some Southern bushwhackers would do it. I don't know +which. + +When we got down to where the North Fork runs into the Canadian we +went around the place where the Creek town was. There was lots of +Creeks down there who was on the other side, so we passed around that +place and forded across west of there. The ford was a bad one, and it +took us a long time to get across. Everybody got wet and a lot of the +stuff on the wagons got wet. Pretty soon we got down into the +Chickasaw country, and everybody was friendly to us, but the Chickasaw +people didn't treat their slaves like the Creeks did. They was more +strict, like the people in Texas and other places. The Chickasaws +seemed lighter color than the Creeks but they talked more in Indian +among themselves and to their slaves. Our masters talked English +nearly all the time except when they were talking to Creeks who didn't +talk good English, and we Negroes never did learn very good Creek. I +could always understand it, and can yet, a little, but I never did try +to talk it much. Mammy and pappy used English to us all the time. + +Mr. Mose found a place for us to stop close to Fort Washita, and got +us places to stay and work. I don't know which direction we were from +Fort Washita, but I know we were not very far. I don't know how many +years we were down in there, but I know it was over two for we worked +on crops at two different places, I remember. Then one day Mr. Mose +came and told us that the War was over and that we would have to root +for ourselves after that. Then he just rode away and I never saw him +after that until after we had got back up into the Choska country. +Mammy heard that the Negroes were going to get equal rights with the +Creeks, and that she should go to the Creek Agency to draw for us, so +we set out to try to get back. + +We started out on foot, and would go a little ways each day, and mammy +would try to get a little something to do to get us some food. Two or +three times she got paid in money, so she had some money when we got +back. After three or four days of walking we came across some more +Negroes who had a horse, and mammy paid them to let us children ride +and tie with their children for a day or two. They had their children +on the horse, so two or three little ones would get on with a larger +one to guide the horse and we would ride a while and get off and tie +the horse and start walking on down the road. Then when the others +caught up with the horse they would ride until they caught up with us. +Pretty soon the old people got afraid to have us do that, so we just +led the horse and some of the little ones rode it. + +We had our hardest times when we would get to a river or big creek. If +the water was swift the horse didn't do any good, for it would shy at +the water and the little ones couldn't stay on, so we would have to +just wait until someone came along in a wagon and maybe have to pay +them with some of our money or some of our goods we were bringing back +to haul us across. Sometimes we had to wait all day before anyone +would come along in a wagon. + +We were coming north all this time, up through the Seminole Nation, +but when we got to Weeleetka we met a Creek family of freedmen who +were going to the Agency too, and mammy paid them to take us along in +their wagon. When we got to the Agency mammy met a Negro who had seen +pappy and knew where he was, so we sent word to him and he came and +found us. He had been through most of the War in the Union army. + +When we got away into the Cherokee country some of them called the +"Pins" helped to smuggle him on up into Missouri and over into Kansas, +but he soon found that he couldn't get along and stay safe unless he +went with the Army. He went with them until the War was over, and was +around Gibson quite a lot. When he was there he tried to find out +where we had gone but said he never could find out. He was in the +battle of Honey Springs, he said, but never was hurt or sick. When we +got back together we cleared a selection of land a little east of the +Choska bottoms, near where Clarksville now is, and farmed until I was +a great big girl. + +I went to school at a little school called Blackjack school. I think +it was a kind of mission school and not one of the Creek nation +schools, because my first teacher was Miss Betty Weaver and she was +not a Creek but a Cherokee. Then we had two white teachers, Miss King +and John Kernan, and another Cherokee was in charge. His name was +Ross, and he was killed one day when his horse fell off a bridge +across the Verdigris, on the way from Tullahassee to Gibson Station. + +When I got to be a young woman I went to Okmulgee and worked for some +people near there for several years, then I married Tate Grayson. We +got our freedmen's allotments on Mingo Creek, east of Tulsa, and lived +there until our children were grown and Tate died, then I came to live +with my daughter in Tulsa. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +ROBERT R. GRINSTEAD +Age 80 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Lawrence County, Mississippi, February 17, 1857. My +father's name is Elias Grinstead, a German, and my mother's name is +Ann Greenstead after that of her master. I am a son by my mother and +her Master. I have four other half brothers William (Bill) oldest, +Albert, Silas, and John. + +I was only eight years of age at freedom and for that reason I was too +young to work and on account of being the son of my Master's I +received no hard treatment and did little or no work. Yet, I wore the +same clothing as did the rest of the slaves: a shirt of lowell for +summer and shirt and trousers for winter and no shoes. I could walk +through a briar patch in my bare feet without sticking one in the +bottom of my feet as they were so hard and resistant. + +I was the only child of my Master as he had no wife. When the War +broke out he went to the War and left the plantation in charge of his +overseer and his two sisters. As the overseers were hard for them to +get along with they were oftener without an overseer as with one, and +therefore they used one of the Negroes as overseer for the most of the +time. + +Across the river was another large plantation and slave owner by the +name of Master Wilson. We called him Master too, for he was a close +friend and neighbor to our Mistresses. There was one Negro man slave +who decided to not work after Master went to the War and the white +overseer was fired and the Negro overseer was acting as overseer, so +my Mistress gave him a note to take across the river to Master Wilson. +The note was an order to whip this Negro and as he couldn't read he +didn't know what the note contained until after Master Wilson read it +and gave orders to his men to tie him for his whipping. After this, +the whipping was so severe that they never had any more trouble in +making this Negro slave work and they never had to send him back again +to Master Wilson to be whipped. The fun part of this above incidence +was the Negro carried his own note and went alone to be whipped and +didn't know it 'til the lashes was being put on him. + +My Master's plantation was about 2 miles long and 1-1/2 mile wide and +he owned between 30 or 40 slaves. The Negro overseer would wake up the +slaves and have them in the field before they could see how to work +each morning and as they would go to work so soon their breakfast was +carried to the field to them. One morning the breakfast was taken to +the field and the slaves were hoeing cotton and among them was a lad +about 15 years of age who could not hoe as fast as the older slaves +and the breakfast was sat at the end of the rows and as they would hoe +out to the end they would eat, and if you would be late hoeing to the +end the first to go to the end would began eating and eat everything. +So, this 15 year old lad in order to get out to eat before everything +was gone did not hoe his row good and the overseer, who was white at +this time, whipped him so severely that he could not eat nor work, +that day. + +The Negroes went to church with the white people and joined their +church. The church was Baptist in denomination, and they built a pen +in the church in which the Negroes sat, and when they would take +sacrament the Negroes would be served after the whites were through +and one of the Negro group would pass it around to the others within +the pen. + +As there were no dances held on the plantation the Negroes would +oftimes slip off and go at nights to a nearby dance or peanut parching +or rice suppers at nights after work. Some of the slaves would be +allowed to make for themselves rice patches which they would gather +and save for the dances. To prepare this rice for cooking after +harvested they would burn a trough into a log, they called mortar and +with a large wooden mallet they called pessel, and which they would +pound upon the rice until hulled and ready for cooking. This rice +would be boiled with just salt and water and eaten as a great feast +with delight. + +During slavery some of the Negro slaves would kill snakes and skin +them and wear these snake skins to prevent being voodooed they said. +When some of the slaves would take sick and the home remedies would +fail to cure them our Mistress would allow one of the Negro men slaves +to go to the white doctor and get some medicine for the patient. The +doctor would ask questions as to the actions of the patient and from +said description would send medicine without ever going to see the +patient and his medicine would always cure the patient of his disease +if consulted in time. + +After the news came that brought our freedom a white union officer +with 20 trained Negro soldiers visited the plantations and saw that +the Negroes received their freedom. He would put on a demonstration +with his Negro soldiers by having them line up and then at a command +they would all rush forward and stand their guns up together on the +stock end without a one falling and get back into line and upon +another command they would rush forward and each get his gun again +without allowing one to fall and again reline up. + +When I was large enough to pay attention to my color and to that of +the other slaves I wondered to myself why I was not black like the +rest of the slaves and concluded to myself that I would when I got +grown like they were as I knew not then that I was the son of my +Master. + +During the War and as the men and our Master all went to the War the +Negroes or a Negro would have to go to the Mistress' homes each +morning and start fires and never, did I ever hear of a rape case +under such close conditions as Negroes going into the bed rooms each +morning of the white mistress to start fires. + +My first wife was name Tracy Smith. As I had been free for over 12 +years. We had ordinary marriage ceremony. I have 11 grown children, 15 +or 20 grandchildren and 3 great grandchildren. + +I think Abraham Lincoln was a fine old gentlemen and as to Jeff Davis +I don't think he was what he should have been, and as to Booker T. +Washington I think his idea of educating or training Negroes as +servants to serve the white race appealed more to the white race than +the Negroes. + +My viewpoint as to slavery is that it was as much detrimental to the +white race as it was to the Negroes, as one elevated ones minds too +highly, and the other degraded ones mind too lowly. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937] + +MATTIE HARDMAN +Age 78 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born January 2, 1859, at Gunalis, Texas. My father's name was +William Tensley and my mother's name Mildred Howard. They was brought +from Virginia. I did have 8 brothers and sisters but all of them are +dead. + +My Master was name William Henry Howard. Since I was too young to work +I nursed my sisters' children while they worked. The cooking was done +all up to the general kitchen at Masters house and when slaves come +from work they would send their children up to the kitchen to bring +their meals to their homes in the quarters. Our Mistress would have +one of the cooks to dish up vegetables and she herself would slice or +serve the meat to see that it wasn't wasted, as seemingly it was +thought so precious. + +As my mother worked 'round the Big House quite a deal I would go up to +the Big House with her and play with the white children who seemed to +like for me to come to play with them. One day in anger while playing +I called one of the white girls, "old black dog" and they pretended +they would tell their mother (my Mistress) about it. I was scared, as +they saw, and they promised me they would not tell if I'd promise to +not do it again, and which I was so glad to do and be let off so +lightly. + +For summer I wore a cotton slip and for winter my mother knitted at +nights after her days work was done so I wore red flannels for +underwear and thick linsey for an over-dress, and had knitted +stockings and bought shoes. As my Master was a doctor he made his +slaves wear suitable clothes in accordance to the weather. We also +wore gloves my mother knitted in winter. + +My Mistress was good to all of the slaves. On Sunday morning she would +make all the Negro children come to the Big House and she would stand +on the front steps and read the Catechism to us who sat or stood in +front on the ground. + +My Master was also good. On Wednesdays and Friday nights he would make +the slaves come up to the Big House and he would read the Bible to +them and he would pray. He was a doctor and very fractious and exact. +He didn't allow the slaves to claim they forgot to do thus and so nor +did he allow them to make the expression, "I thought so and so." He +would say to them if they did: "Who told you, you could think!" + +They had 10 children, 7 boys and 3 girls. Their house was a large +2-story log house painted white. My father was overseer on the +plantation. + +The plantation consisted of 400 acres and about 40 slaves including +children. The slaves were so seldom punished until they never'd worry +about being punished. They treated their slaves as though they loved +them. The poor white neighbors were also good and treated the slaves +good, for my Master would warn them to not bother his Negroes. My +Mistress always told the slaves she wanted all of them to visit her +and come to her funeral and burial when she died and named the men +slaves she wanted to be her pallbearers, all of which was carried out +as she planned even though it was after freedom. + +The slaves even who lived adjoining our plantation would have church +at our Big House. They would hold church on Sundays and Sunday nights. + +As my mother worked a deal for her Mistress she had an inkling or +overheard that they was going to be set free long before the day they +were. She called all the slaves on the plantation together and broke +to them this news after they had promised her they would not spread +the news so that it would get back to our Master. So, everybody kept +the news until Saturday night June 19th, when Master called all the +slaves to the big gate and told them they were all free, but could +stay right on in their homes if they had no places to go and which all +of them did. They went right out and gathered the crop just like +they'd always done, and some of them remained there several years. + +My first husband was name, S. W. Warnley. We had 4 children, 1 girl +and three boys and 3 grandchildren. I now have two grandchildren. + +Now that slavery is over I sometime wish 'twas still existing for some +of our lazy folks, so that so many of them wouldn't or couldn't loaf +around so much lowering our race, walking the streets day by day and +running from house to house living corruptible lives which is keeping +the race down as though there be no good ones among us. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +ANNIE HAWKINS +Age 90 +Colbert, Okla + + +I calls myself 90, but I don't know jest how old I really am but I was +a good sized gal when we moved from Georgia to Texas. We come on a big +boat and one night the stars fell. Talk about being scared! We all run +and hid and hollered and prayed. We thought the end of the world had +come. + +I never had no whitefolks that was good to me. We all worked jest like +dogs and had about half enough to eat and got whupped for everything. +Our days was a constant misery to us. I know lots of niggers that was +slaves had a good time but we never did. Seems hard that I can't say +anything good for any of 'em but I sho' can't. When I was small my job +was to tote cool water to the field to the hands. It kept me busy +going back and forth and I had to be sho' my old Mistress had a cool +drink when she wanted it, too. Mother and my sister and me worked in +the field all day and come in time to clear away the things and cook +supper. When we was through in the kitchen we would spin fer a long +time. Mother would spin and we would card. + +My old Master was Dave Giles, the meanest man that ever lived. He +didn't have many slaves, my mammy, and me, and my sister, Uncle Bill, +and Truman. He had owned my grandma but he give her a bad whupping and +she never did git over it and died. We all done as much work as a +dozen niggers--we knowed we had to. + +I seen old Master git mad at Truman and he buckled him down across a +barrel and whupped him till he cut the blood out of him and then he +rubbed salt and pepper in the raw places. It looked like Truman would +die it hurt so bad. I know that don't sound reasonable that a white +man in a Christian community would do such a thing but you can't +realize how heartless he was. People didn't know about it and we +dassent tell for we knowed he'd kill us if we did. You must remember +he owned us body and soul and they wasn't anything we could do about +it. Old Mistress and her three girls was mean to us too. + +One time me and my sister was spinning and old Mistress went to the +well-house and she found a chicken snake and killed it. She brought it +back and she throwed it around my sister's neck. She jest laughed and +laughed about it. She thought it was a big joke. + +Old Master stayed drunk all the time. I reckon that is the reason he +was so fetched mean. My, how we hated him! He finally killed hisself +drinking and I remember Old Mistress called us in to look at him in +his coffin. We all marched by him slow like and I jest happened to +look up and caught my sister's eye and we both jest natchelly +laughed--Why shouldn't we? We was glad he was dead. It's a good thing +we had our laugh fer old Mistress took us out and whupped us with a +broomstick. She didn't make us sorry though. + +Old Master and Mistress lived in a nice big house on top of a hill and +us darkies lived in log cabins with log floors. Our dresses was made +out of coarse cloth like cotton sacking and and [TR: sic] it sho' +lasted a long time. It ort to been called mule-hide for it was about +that tough. + +We went to church sometimes. They had to let us do that or folks would +have found out how mean they was to us. Old Master'd give us a pass to +show the patroller. We was glad to git the chance to git away and we +always went to church. + +During the War we seen lots of soldiers. Some of them was Yankees and +some were Sesesh soldiers. My job every day was to take a big tray of +food and set it on a stump about a quarter of a mile from our house. I +done this twice a day and ever time I went back the dishes would be +empty. I never did see nobody and didn't nobody tell me why I was to +take the food up there but of course it was either for soliders [TR: +sic] that was scouting 'round or it may been for some lowdown dirty +bushwhacker, and again it might a been for some of old Master's folks +scouting 'round to keep out of the army. + +We was the happiest folks in the world when we knowed we was free. We +couldn't realize it at first but how we did shout and cry for joy when +we did realize it. We was afraid to leave the place at first for fear +old Mistress would bring us back or the pateroller would git us. Old +Mistress died soon after the War and we didn't care either. She didn't +never do nothing to make us love her. We was jest as glad as when old +Master died. I don't know what become of the three gals. They was +about grown. + +We moved away jest as far away as we could and I married soon after. +My husband died and I married again. I been married four times and all +my husbands died. The last time I married it was to a man that +belonged to a Indian man, Sam Love. He was a good owner and was one of +the best men that ever lived. My husband never did move far away from +him and he loved him like a father. He always looked after him till he +died. My husband has been dead five years. + +I have had fifteen children. Four pairs of twins, and only four of +them are living. The good Lawd wouldn't let me keep them. I'se lived +through three wars so you see I'se no baby. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937] + +IDA HENRY +Age 83 +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Marshall, Texas, in 1854. Me mother was named Millie +Henderson and me father Silas Hall. Me mother was sold in South +Carolina to Mister Hall, who brought her to Texas. Me father was born +and raised by Master John Hall. Me mother's and father's family +consisted of five girls and one boy. My sisters' names were: +Margrette, Chalette, Lottie, Gracy and Loyo, and me brother's name was +Dock Howard. I lived with me mother and father in a log house on +Master Hall's plantation. We would be sorry when dark, as de +patrollers would walk through de quarters and homes of de slaves all +times of night wid pine torch lights to whip de niggers found away +from deir home. + +At nights when me mother would slip away for a visit to some of de +neighbors homes, she would raise up the old plank floor to de log +cabin and make pallets on de ground and put us to bed and put the +floor back down so dat we couldn't be seen or found by the patrollers +on their stroll around at nights. + +My grandmother Lottie would always tell us to not let Master catch you +in a lie, and to always tell him de truth. + +I was a house girl to me Mistress and nursed, cooked, and carried de +children to and from school. In summer we girls wore cotton slips and +yarn dresses for winter. When I got married I was dress in blue serge +and was de third person to marry in it. Wedding dresses was not worn +after de wedding in dem days by niggers as we was taught by our +Mistress dat it was bad luck to wear de wedding dress after marriage. +Therefore, 'twas handed down from one generation to the other one. + +Me Mistress was sometimes good and sometimes mean. One day de cook was +waiting de table and when passing around de potatoes, old Mistress +felt of one and as hit wasn't soft done, she exclaimed to de cook, +"What you bring these raw potatoes out here for?" and grab a fork and +stuck it in her eye and put hit out. She, de cook, lived about 10 +years and died. + +Me Mistress was de mother of five children, Crock, Jim, Boss and two +girls name, Lea and Annie. + +Dere home was a large two-story white house wid de large white posts. + +As me Master went to de War de old overseer tried himself in meanness +over de slaves as seemingly he tried to be important. One day de +slaves caught him and one held him whilst another knocked him in de +head and killed him. + +Master's plantation was about 300 acres and he had 'bout 160 slaves. +Before de slaves killed our overseer, he would work 'em night and day. +De slaves was punished when dey didn't do as much work as de overseer +wanted 'em to do. + +He would lock 'em in jail some nights without food and kept 'em dere +all night, and after whipping 'em de next morning would only give 'em +bread and water to work on till noon. + +When a slave was hard to catch for punishment dey would make 'em wear +ball and chains. De ball was 'bout de size of de head and made of +lead. + +On Sunday mornings before breakfast our Mistress would call us +together, read de Bible and show us pictures of de Devil in de Bible +and tell us dat if we was not good and if we would steal and tell lies +dat old Satan would git us. + +Close to our Master's plantation lived several families of old "poor +white trash" who would steal me Master's hogs and chickens and come +and tell me Mistress dat dey seen some of de slaves knock one of dere +hogs in de head. Dis continued up till Master returned from de War and +caught de old white trash stealing his hogs. De niggers did at times +steal Master's hogs and chickens, and I would put biscuits and pieces +of chicken in a sack under me dress dat hung from me waist, as I +waited de table for me Mistress, and later would slip off and eat it +as dey never gave de slaves none of dis sort of food. + +We had church Sundays and our preacher Rev. Pat Williams would preach +and our Master and family and other nearby white neighbors would +ofttime attend our services. De patrollers wouldn't allow de slaves to +hold night services, and one night dey caught me mother out praying. +Dey stripped her naked and tied her hands together and wid a rope tied +to de hand cuffs and threw one end of de rope over a limb and tied de +other end to de pommel of a saddle on a horse. As me mother weighed +'bout 200, dey pulled her up so dat her toes could barely touch de +ground and whipped her. Dat same night she ran away and stayed over a +day and returned. + +During de fall months dey would have corn shucking and cotton pickings +and would give a prize to de one who would pick de highest amount of +cotton or shuck de largest pile of corn. De prize would usually be a +suit of clothes or something to wear and which would be given at some +later date. + +We could only have dances during holidays, but dances was held on +other plantations. One night a traveler visiting me Master and wanted +his boots shined. So Master gave de boots to one of de slaves to shine +and de slave put de boots on and went to a dance and danced so much +dat his feet swelled so dat when he returned he could not pull 'em +off. + +De next morning as de slave did not show up with de boots dey went to +look for him and found him lying down trying to pull de boots off. He +told his Master dat he had put de boots on to shine 'em and could not +pull 'em off. So Master had to go to town and buy de traveler another +pair of boots. Before he could run away de slave was beaten wid 500 +lashes. + +De War dat brought our freedom lasted about two years. Me Master went +and carried one of de slaves for a servant. He was kind and good and +from dat day on he never whipped another slave nor did he allow any of +his slaves whipped. Dis time lasted from January to June de 19th when +we was set free in de State of Texas. + +Lincoln and Davis both died short of promise. I means dat dey both +died before dey carried out dere plans and promises for freeing de +slaves. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +MORRIS HILLYER +Age 84 yrs. +Alderson, Okla. + + +My father was Gabe Hillyer and my mother was Clarisay Hillyer, and our +home was in Rome, Georgia. Our owner was Judge Hillyer. He was de last +United States senator to Washington, D. C., before de War. + +My mother died when I was only a few days old and the only mother I +ever knew was Judge Hillyer's wife, Miss Jane. Her nine children were +all older than I was and when mother died Miss Jane said mother had +raised her children and she would raise hers. So she took us into her +house and we never lived at de quarters any more. I had two sisters, +Sally and Sylvia, and we had a room in de Big House and sister Sally +didn't do nothing else but look after me. I used to stand with my +thumb in my mouth and hold to Miss Jane's apron while she knitted. + +When Judge Hillyer was elected he sold out his farm and gave his +slaves to his children. He owned about twelve or fourteen slaves at +this time. He gave me and my sister Sylvia to his son, Dr. Hillyer, +and my father to another one of his sons who was studying law. Father +stayed with him and took care of him until he graduated. Father +learned to be a good carpenter while he lived with George Hillyer. +George never married until after de War. + +Dr. Hillyer lived on a big plantation but he practiced medicine all de +time. He didn't have much time to look after de farm but he had good +overseers and they sure didn't beat his slaves or mistreat 'em in any +way. Dr. Hillyer married a rich girl, Miss Mary Cooley, and her father +gave her fifteen slaves when she married and Judge Hillyer gave him +five so he had a purty good start from de first and he knowed how to +make money so he was a wealthy man when de Rebellion started. + +My sister and I didn't know how to act when we was sent out there +among strangers. We had to live in de quarters just like de other +niggers, and we didn't especially like it. I guess I was a sort of bad +boy. + +There was several more boys about my age and we didn't have any work +to do but just busy ourselves by getting into mischief. We'd ride de +calves, chase de pigs, kill de chickens, break up hens nests, and in +fact do most everything we hadn't ought to do. Finally they put us to +toting water to de field hands, minding de gaps, taking de cows to +pasture and as dat kept us purty busy we wasn't so bad after dat. + +My happiest days was when I was with de old Judge and Miss Jane. I can +sit here and think of them old times and it seems like it was just +yesterday dat it all happened. He was a great hand to go to town every +day and lounge around wid his cronies. I used to go with him, and my +how they would argue. Sometimes they would get mad and shake their +canes in each other's faces. I guess they was talking politics. + +Our old Master liked cats better than any man I ever saw, and he +always had five or six that followed him about de place like dogs. +When he went to eat they was always close to him and just as soon as +he finished he would always feed them. When he was gone us boys used +to throw at his cats or set de dogs on 'em. We was always careful dat +no one saw us for if he had known about it he would a-whipped us and +no mistake. I wouldn't a-blamed him either, for I like cats now. I +think they are lots of company. + +He was a typical Southern gentleman, medium sized, and wore a Van Dyke +beard. He never whipped his slaves, and he didn't have a one dat +wouldn't a-died for him. + +Judge Hillyer had one son, William, dat wouldn't go to college. He +made fun of his brothers for going to school so long, and said that he +would be ashamed to go and stay five or six years. After de War he +settled down and studied law in Judge Akin's office and opened a +office in Athens, Georgia, and he made de best lawyer of them all. + +Us boys used to go hunting with Master William. He hunted rabbits, +quails, squirrels, and sometimes he would kill a deer. He hunted +mostly with dogs. He never used a gun but very little. Lead was so +scarce and cost so much dat he couldn't afford to waste a bullet on +rabbits or snakes. He made his own bullets. The dogs would chase a +rabbit into a hollow tree and we'd take a stick and twist him out. +Sometimes we'd have nearly all de hide twisted off him when we'd git +him out. + +Old Judge Hillyer smoked a pipe with a long stem. He used to give me +ten cents a day to fill it for him. He told me I had to have $36 at +the end of the year, but I never made it. There was a store right +close to us and I'd go down there and spend my money for lemon stick +candy, ginger cakes, peanuts, and firecrackers. Old Master knowed I +wouldn't save it, and he didn't care if I did spent it for it was mine +to do with just as I pleased. + +Every time a circus come to town I'd run off and they wouldn't see me +again all day. Seemed like I just couldn't help it. I wouldn't take +time to git permission to go. One time to punish me for running off he +tied me up by my thumbs, and I had to stay home while de rest went. I +didn't dare try to git loose and run off for I knowed I'd git my +jacket tanned if I did. Old Master never laid his hand on me, but I +knowed he would if I didn't do as he told me. He never told us twice +to do anything either. + +Coins had curious names in them days. A dime was called a thrip. +Fourpen was about the same value as three cents or maybe a little +more. It took three of 'em to make a thrip. There was all sorts of +paper money. + +Every first Tuesday slaves were brought in from Virginia and sold on +de block. De auctioneer was Cap'n Dorsey. E. M. Cobb was de slave +bringer. They would stand de slaves up on de block and talk about what +a fine looking specimen of black manhood or womanhood dey was, tell +how healthy dey was, look in their mouth and examine their teeth just +like they was a horse, and talk about de kind of work they would be +fit for and could do. Young healthy boys and girls brought the best +prices. I guess they figured dat they would grow to be valuable. I +used to stand around and watch de sales take place but it never +entered my mind to be afraid for I knowed old Judge wasn't going to +sell me. I thought I was an important member of his family. + +Old Judge bought every roguish nigger in the country. He'd take him +home and give him the key to everything on de place and say to help +hisself. Soon as he got all he wanted to eat he'd quit being a rogue. +Old Judge said that was what made niggers steal--they was hungry. + +They used to scare us kids by telling us dat a runaway nigger would +git us. De timber was awful heavy in de river bottoms, and dey was one +nigger dat run off from his master and lived for years in these +bottoms. He was there all during de War and come out after de +surrender. Every man in dat country owned him at some time or other. +His owner sold him to a man who was sure he could catch him--he never +did, so he sold him to another slave owner and so on till nearly +everybody had him. He changed hands about six or seven times. They +would come in droves with blood hounds and hunt for him but dey +couldn't catch him for he knowed them woods too well. He'd feed de +dogs and make friends with 'em and they wouldn't bother him. He lived +on nuts, fruit, and wild game, and niggers would slip food to him. +He'd slip into town and get whiskey and trade it to de niggers for +food. + +Judge Hillyer never 'lowanced his niggers and dey could always have +anything on de place to eat. We had so much freedom dat other slave +owners in our neighborhood didn't like for us to come among their +slaves for they said we was free niggers and would make their slaves +discontented. + +After I went to live with Judge Hillyer's son, Dr. Hillyer, one of my +jobs was to tote the girls books to school every morning. All the +plantation owners had a colored boy dat did that. After we had toted +de books to de school house we'd go back down de road a piece and line +up and have the "gone-bying-est" fight you ever see. We'd have regular +battles. If I got licked in de morning I'd go home and rest up and I'd +give somebody a good licking dat evening. I reckon I caught up with my +fighting for in all my working life I have always worked with gangs of +men of from one to two-hundred and I never struck a man and no man +ever struck me. + +Jim Williams was a patroller, and how he did like to catch a nigger +off de farm without a permit so he could whip him. Jim thought he was +de best man in de country and could whip de best of 'em. One night +John Hardin, a big husky feller, was out late. He met Jim and knowed +he was in for it. Jim said, "John I'm gonna give you a white man's +chance. I'm gonna let you fight me and if you are de best man, well +and good." + +John say, "Master Jim, I can't fight wid you. Come on and give me my +licking, and let me go on home." + +But Jim wouldn't do it, and he slapped John and called him some names +and told him he is a coward to fight him. All dis made John awful mad +and he flew into him and give him the terriblest licking a man ever +toted. He went on home but knew he would git into trouble over it. + +Jim talked around over the country about what he was going to do to +John but everybody told him dat he brought it all on hisself. He +never did try to git another nigger to fight with him. + +Yes, I guess charms keep off bad luck. I have wore 'em but money +always was my best lucky piece. I've made lots of money but I never +made good use of it. + +I was always afraid of ghosts but I never saw one. There was a +graveyard beside de road from our house to town and I always was +afraid to go by it. I'd shut my eyes and run for dear life till I was +past de grave yard. I had heard dat there was a headless man dat +stayed there on cold rainy days or foggy nights he'd hide by de fence +and throw his head at you. Once a man got hit and he fell right down +dead. I believed dat tale and you can imagine how I felt whenever I +had to go past there by myself and on foot. + +I saw lots of Ku Kluxers but I wasn't afraid of them. I knowed I +hadn't done nothing and they wasn't after me. One time I met a bunch +of 'em and one of 'em said, "Who is dis feller?" Another one said, +"Oh, dat's Gabe's foolish boy, come on, don't bother him." I always +did think dat voice sounded natural but I never did say anything about +it. It sounded powerful like one of old Judge's boys. Dey rode on and +didn't bother me and I never was a bit afraid of 'em any more. + +I went to school one month after de War. I never learned much but I +learned to read some where along de road dat I come over. My father +come from Athens, Georgia, and took us away with him. I learned the +carpenter's trade from him. He was so mean to me dat I run away when I +was nineteen. I went back to Rome, Georgia, and got a job with a +bridge gang and spent two years with 'em. I went then to Henderson, +Kentucky, and worked for ten years. There was hundreds of colored +people coming to de mines at Krebs and Alderson and I decided to come +along, too. I never worked in de mines but I did all sorts of +carpentering for them. + +I married in Atoka, Oklahoma, thirty-three years ago. I never had no +children. + +I've made lots of money but somehow it always got away from me. But me +and my wife have our little home here and we are both still able to +work a little, so I guess we are making it all right. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +HAL HUTSON +Age 90 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born at Galveston, Tennessee, October 12, 1847. There were 11 +children: 7 brothers; Andrew, George, Clent, Gilbert, Frank, Mack and +Horace; and 3 girls: Rosie, Marie and Nancy. We were all Hutsons. +Together with my mother and father we worked for the same man whose +name was Mr. Barton Brown, but who we all call Master Brown, and +sometimes Mr. Brown. + +Master Brown had a good weather-board house, two story, with five or +six rooms. They lived pretty well. He had eight children. We lived in +one-room log huts. There were a long string of them huts. We slept on +the floor like hogs. Girls and boys slept together--jest everybody +slept every whar. We never knew what biscuits were! We ate "seconds +and shorts" (wheat ground once) for bread. Ate rabbits, possums baked +with taters, beans, and bean soup. No chicken, fish and the like. My +favorite dish now is beans. + +Master Brown owned about 36 or 40 slaves, I can't recall jest now, and +about 200 acres of ground. There was very little cotton raised in +Galveston--I mean jest some corn. Sometimes we would shuck corn all +night. He would not let us raise gardens of our own, but didn't mind +us raising corn and a few other truck vegetables to sell for a little +spending change. + +I learned to read, write and figger at an early age. Master Brown's +boy and I were the same age you see (14 years old) and he would send +me to school to protect his kids, and I would have to sit up there +until school was out. So while sitting there I listened to what the +white teacher was telling the kids, and caught on how to read, write +and figger--but I never let on, 'cause if I was caught trying to read +or figger dey would whip me something terrible. After I caught on how +to figger the white kids would ask me to teach them. Master Brown +would often say: "My God O'mighty, never do for that nigger to learn +to figger." + +We weren't allowed to count change. If we borrowed a fifty-cent piece, +we would have to pay back a fifty-cent piece--not five dimes or fifty +pennies or ten nickels. + +We went barefooted the year round and wore long shirts split on each +side. All of us niggers called all the whites "poor white trash." The +overseer was nothing but poor white trash and the meanest man that +ever walked on earth. He never did whip me much 'cause I was kind of a +pet. I worked up to the Big House, but he sho' did whip them others. +Why, one day he was beating my mother, and I was too small to say +anything, so my big brother heard her crying and came running, picked +up a chunk and that overseer stopped a'beating her. The white boy was +holding her on the ground and he was whipping her with a long leather +whip. They said they couldn't teach her no sense and she said "I don't +wanna learn no sense." The overseer's name was Charlie Clark. One day +he whipped a man until he was bloody as a pig 'cause he went to the +mill and stayed too long. + +The patroller rode all night and iffen we were caught out later than +10:00 o'clock they would beat us, but we would git each other word by +sending a man round way late at night. Always take news by night. Of +course the Ku Klux Klan didn't come 'til after the war. They was +something like the patrollers. Never heard of no trouble between the +black and whites 'cause them niggers were afraid to resist them. + +My biggest job was keeping flies off'n the table up at the Big House. +When time come to go in for the day we would cut up and dance. I can't +remember any of the songs jest now, but we had some that we sung. We +danced a whole lots and jest sung "made up" songs. + +Old Master would stay up to hear us come in. Of course Saturday +afternoon was a holiday. We didn't work no holidays. Master gave us +one week off for Christmas, and never worked us on Sunday, unless the +"ox was in the ditch." When the slaves got sick we had white doctors, +and we would wait on each other. Drink dock root tea, mullin tea, and +flaxweed tea, but we never wore charms. + +I think it's a good thing that slavery's over. It ought to been over a +good while ago. But its going to be slavery all over again if things +don't git better. But I thank God I've been a Christian for 70 years, +and now is a member of Tabernacle Baptist Church and deacon of the +church, and a Christian 'cause the Bible teaches me to be. + +That war was a awful thing. I used to pack them soldiers water on my +head, and then I worked at Fort Sill and Fort Dawson in Tennessee. +Those Yankees came by nights--got behind those rebels, and took their +hams, drove horses in the houses, killed their chickens and ate up the +rebels food, but the Yanks didn't bother us niggers. + +When freedom come old Master called us all in from the fields and told +us, "All of you niggers are free as frogs now to go wherever you +choose. You are your own man now." We all continued working for him at +$5.00 a month. After the crops were gathered the niggers scattered +out. Some went North--and we would say when they went North that they +had "crossed the water." + +I never married 'till after the War. Married at my mother's house +'cause my wife's mother didn't let us marry at her house, so I sent +Jack Perry after her on a hoss and we had a big dinner--and jest got +married. + +I am the father of nine children, but jest three is living. One is a +dentist in Muskogge, Dr. Andrew Hutson. All of the children are pretty +well read. We never had schools for niggers until after slavery. + +I think Abraham Lincoln was a great man, but I don't know much about +Jeff Davis. Booker T. Washington was a fine man. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +WILLIAM HUTSON +Age 98 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + +When a feller gets as old as me it's a heap easier to forget things +than it is to remember, but I ain't never forgot that old plantation +where good old Doctor Allison lived back there in Georgia long before +the War that brought us slaves the freedom. + +I hear the slaves talking about mean masters when I was a boy. They +wasn't talking about Master Allison though, 'cause he was a good man +and took part for the slaves when any trouble come up with the +overseer. + +The Mistress' name was Louisa (the same name as the gal I was married +to later after the War), and she was just about as mean as was the old +Master good. I was the house boy when I gets old enough to understand +what the Master wants done and I does it just like he says, so I +reckon that's why we always get along together. + +The Master helped to raise my mammy. When I was born he says to her +(my mammy tells me when I gets older): "Cheney", the old Master say, +"that boy is going be different from these other children. I aims to +see that he is. He's going be in the house all the time, he ain't +going work in the fields; he's going to stay right with me all the +time." + +They was about twenty slaves on the plantation but I was the one old +Master called for when he wanted something special for himself. I was +the one he took with him on the trips to town, I was the one who fetch +him the cooling drink after he look about the fields and sometimes I +carry the little black bag when he goes a-doctoring folks with the +misery away off some other farm. + +The Master hear about there going be an auction one day and he +figgered maybe he needed some more slaves if they was good ones, so he +took me and started out early in the morning. It wasn't very far and +we got there early before the auction started. Rockon that was the +first time I ever see any slaves sold. + +They was a long platform made of heavy planks and all the slaves was +lined up on the platform, and they was stripped to the waist, men, +women, and children. One or two of the women folks was bare naked. +They wasn't young women neither, just middle age ones, but they was +built good. Some of them was well greased and that grease covered up +many a scar they'd earned for some foolishment or other. + +The Master don't buy none and pretty soon we starts home. The Master +was riding horseback,--he didn't ever use no buggy 'cause he said that +was the way for folks to travel who was too feeble to sit in the +saddle--and I rode back of him on another horse, but that horse I +rides is just horse while the Master's was a real thoroughbred like +maybe you see on race tracks down in the South. + +That auction kept bothering me all the way back to the plantation. I +kept seeing them little children standing on the flatform (platform), +their mammy and pappy crying hard 'cause their young'uns is being +sold. They was a lot of heartaches even they was slaves and it gets me +worried. + +I asked the Master is he going to have an auction and he jest laugh. I +ain't never sold no slaves yet and I ain't going to, he says. And I +gets easier right then. I kind of hates to think about standing up on +one of them platforms, kinder sorry to leave my old mammy and the +Master, so I was easy in the heart when he talked like that. + +The plantation house was a big frame and the yard was shaded with +trees all around. The Master's children--four boys and two +girls--would play in the yard with me just like I was one of the +family. And we'd go hunting and fishing. There was a creek not far +away and they was good fishing in the stream and squirrels in the +trees. Mighty lot of fun to catch them fishes but more fun when they +is all fried brown and ready for to eat with a piece of hot pone. +Ain't no fish ever taste that good since! + +One thing I sort of ponders about. The old Master don't let us have no +religion meetings and reading and writing is something I learn after +the War. Some of the slaves talk about meeting 'round the country and +wants to have preaching on the plantation. Master says NO. No preacher +around here to tell about the Bible and religion will be just a +puzzlement, the Master say, and we let it go at that. I reckon that +was the only thing he was set against. + +That and the Yankees. The Master went to the War and stayed 'til it +was most over. He was a mighty sick man when he come back to the old +place, but I was there waiting for him just like always. All the time +he was away I take care around the house. That's what he say for me to +do when he rides away to fight the Yankees. Lot's of talk about the +War but the slaves goes right on working just the same, raising cotton +and tobacco. + +The slaves talk a heap about Lincoln and some trys to run away to the +North. Don't hear much about Jeff Davis, mostly Lincoln. He give us +slaves the freedom but we was better off as we was. + +The day of freedom come around just [HW: like] any other day, except +the Master say for me to bring up the horses, we is going to town. +That's when he hears about the slaves being free. We gets to the town +and the Master goes into the store. It's pretty early but the streets +was filled with folks talking and I wonder what makes the Master in +such a hurry when he comes out of the store. + +He gets on his horse and tells me to follow fast. When we gets back to +the plantation he sounds the horn calling the slaves. They come in +from the fields and meet 'round back of the kitchen building that +stood separate from the Master's house. They all keeps quiet while the +Master talks: "You-all is free now, and all the rest of the slaves is +free too. Nobody owns you now and nobody going to own you anymore!" +That was good news, I reckon, but nobody know what to do about it. + +The crops was mostly in and the Master wants the folks to stay 'til +the crop is finished. They talk about it the rest of that day. They +wasn't no celebration 'round the place, but they wasn't no work after +the Master tells us we is free. Nobody leave the place though. Not +'til in the fall when the work is through. Then some of us go into the +town and gets work 'cause everybody knows the Allison slaves was the +right kind of folks to have around. + +That was the first money I earn and then I have to learn how to spend +it. That was the hardest part 'cause the prices was high and the wages +was low. + +Then I moves on and meets the gal that maybe I been looking for, +Louisa Baker, and right away she takes to me and we is married. Ain't +been no other woman but her and she's waiting for me wherever the dead +waits for the living. + +I reckon she won't have so long to wait now, even if I is feeling +pretty spry and got good use of the feets and hands. Ninety-eight +years brings a heap of wear and some of these days the old body'll +need a long time rest and then I'll join her for all the time. + +I is ready for the New Day a-coming! + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +MRS. ISABELLA JACKSON +Age 79 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + +"Boom ... Boom! Boom ... Boom!" That's the way the old weaver go all +day long when my sister, Margaret, is making cloth for the slaves down +on old Doc Joe Jackson's plantation in Louisiana. + +That was near the little place of Bunker, and its my birthplace, and I +guess where all Mammy's children were born because she was never sold +but once and nobody but the old Doc ever did own her after she come to +his place. + +He always say couldn't nobody get work out of Mammy but him. I guess +that's just his foolery 'cause if she ain't no good the Old Doc most +likely sell her to some of them white folks in Texas. + +That's what they done to them mean, no account slaves--just send them +to Texas. Them folks sure knew how for to handle 'em! + +But I was talking about my sister, Margaret. I can still see her +weaving the cloth--Boom!... Boom!--and she hear that all the day and +get mighty tired. Sometimes she drop her head and go to sleep. The +Mistress get her then sure. Rap her on the head with almost anything +handy, but she hit pretty easy, just trying to scare her that's all. + +The old Master though, he ain't so easy as that. The whippings was +done by the master and the overseer just tell the old Doc about the +troubles, like the old Doc say: + +"You just watch the slaves and see they works and works hard, but +don't lay on with the whip, because I is the only one who knows how to +do it right!" + +Maybe the old Master was sickened of whippings from the stories the +slaves told about the plantation that joined ours on the north. + +If they ever was a living Devil that plantation was his home and the +owner was It! That's what the old slaves say, and when I tell you +about it see if I is right. + +That man got so mean even the white folks was scared of him, +'specially if he was filled with drink. That's the way he was most of +the time, just before the slaves was freed. + +All the time we hear about slaves on that place getting whipped or +being locked in the stock--that one of them things where your head and +hands is fastened through holes in a wide board, and you stands there +all the day and all the night--and sometimes we hears of them staying +in the stock for three-four weeks if they trys to run away to the +north. + +Sometimes we hears about some slave who is shot by that man while he +is wild with the drink. That's what I'm telling about now. + +Don't nobody know what made the master mad at the old slave--one of +the oldest on the place. Anyway, the master didn't whip him; instead +of that he kills him with the gun and scares the others so bad most of +'em runs off and hides in the woods. + +The drunk master just drags the old dead slave to the graveyard which +is down in the corner away from the growing crops, and hunts up two of +the young boys who was hiding in the barn. He takes them to dig the +grave. + +The master stands watching every move they make, the dead man lays +there with his face to the sky, and the boys is so scared they could +hardly dig. The master keeps telling them to hurry with the digging. + +After while he tells them to stop and put the body in the grave. They +wasn't no coffin, no box, for him. Just the old clothes that he wears +in the fields. + +But the grave was too short and they start to digging some more, but +the master stop them. He says to put back the body in the grave, and +then he jumps into the grave hisself. Right on the dead he jumps and +stomps 'til the body is mashed and twisted to fit the hole. Then the +old nigger is buried. + +That's the way my Mammy hears it and told it to us children. She was a +Christian and I know she told the truth. + +Like I said, Mammy was never sold only to Master Jackson. But she's +seen them slave auctions where the men, women and children was +stripped naked and lined up so's the buyers could see what kind of +animals they was getting for their money. + +My pappy's name was Jacob Keller and my mother was Maria. They's both +dead long ago, and I'm waiting for the old ship Zion that took my +Mammy away, like we use to sing of in the woods: + + "It has landed my old Mammy, + It has landed my old Mammy, + Get on board, Get on board, + 'Tis the Old Ship of Zion-- + Get on board!" + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +NELLIE JOHNSON + + +I don't know how old I is, but I is a great big half grown gal when +the time of the War come, and I can remember how everything look at +that time, and what all the people do, too. + +I'm pretty nigh to blind right now, and all I can do is set on this +little old front porch and maybe try to keep the things picked up +behing my grandchild and his wife, because she has to work and he is +out selling wood most of the time. + +But I didn't have to live in any such a house during the time I was +young like they is, because I belonged to old Chief Rolley McIntosh, +and my pappy and mammy have a big, nice, clean log house to live in, +and everything round it look better than most renters got these days. + +We never did call old Master anything but the Chief or the General for +that's what everybody called him in them days, and he never did act +towards us like we was slaves, much anyways. He was the mikko of the +Kawita town long before the War and long before I was borned, and he +was the chief of the Lower Creeks even before he got to be the chief +of all the Creeks. + +But just at the time of the War the Lower Creeks stayed with him and +the Upper Creeks, at least them that lived along to the south of where +we live, all go off after that old man Gouge, and he take most of the +Seminole too. I hear old Tuskenugge, the big man with the Seminoles, +but I never did see him, nor mighty few of the Seminoles. + +My mammy tells me old General ain't been living in that Kawita town +very many years when I was borned. He come up there from down in the +fork of the river where the Arkansas and the Verdigris run together a +little while after all the last of the Creeks come out to the +Territory. His brother old Chili McIntosh, live down in that forks of +the rivers too, but I don't think he ever move up into that Kawita +town. It was in the narrow stretch where the Verdigris come close to +the Arkansas. They got a pretty good sized white folks town there now +they call Coweta, but the old Creek town was different from that. The +folks lived all around in that stretch between the rivers, and my old +Master was the boss of all of them. + +For a long time after the Civil War they had a court at the new town +called Coweta court, and a school house too, but before I was born +they had a mission school down the Kawita Creek from where the town +now is. + +Earliest I can remember about my master was when he come to the slave +settlement where we live and get out of the buggy and show a preacher +all around the place. That preacher named Mr. Loughridge, and he was +the man had the mission down on Kawita Creek before I was born, but at +that time he had a school off at some other place. He git down out the +buggy and talk to all us children, and ask us how we getting along. + +I didn't even know at that time that old Chief was my master, until my +pappy tell me after he was gone. I think all the time he was another +preacher. + +My pappy's name was Jackson McInotsh, and my mammy name was Hagar. I +think old Chief bring them out to the Territory when he come out with +his brother Chili and the rest of the Creek people. My pappy tell me +that old Master's pappy was killed by the Creeks because he signed up +a treaty to bring his folks out here, and old Master always hated that +bunch of Creeks that done that. + +I think old man Gouge was one of the big men in that bunch, and he +fit in the War on the Government side, after he done holler and go on +so about the Government making him come out here. + +Old Master have lots of land took up all around that Kawita place, and +I don't know how much, but a lot more than anybody else. He have it +all fenced in with good rail fence, and all the Negroes have all the +horses and mules and tools they need to work it with. They all live in +good log houses they built themselves, and everything they need. + +Old Master's land wasn't all in one big field, but a lot of little +fields scattered all over the place. He just take up land what already +was a kind of prairie, and the niggers don't have to clear up much +woods. + +We all live around on them little farms, and we didn't have to be +under any overseer like the Cherokee Negroes had lots of times. We +didn't have to work if they wasn't no work to do that day. + +Everybody could have a little patch of his own, too, and work it +between times, on Saturdays and Sundays if he wanted to. What he made +on that patch belong to him, and the old Chief never bothered the +slaves about anything. + +Every slave can fix up his own cabin any way he want to, and pick out +a good place with a spring if he can find one. Mostly the slave houses +had just one big room with a stick-and-mud chimney, just like the poor +people among the Creeks had. Then they had a brush shelter built out +of four poles with a roof made out of brush, set out to one side of +the house where they do the cooking and eating, and sometimes the +sleeping too. They set there when they is done working, and lay around +on corn shuck beds, because they never did use the log house much only +in cold and rainy weather. + +Old Chief just treat all the Negroes like they was just hired hands, +and I was a big girl before I knowed very much about belonging to him. + +I was one of the youngest children in my family; only Sammy and +Millie was younger than I was. My big brothers was Adam, August and +Nero, and my big sisters was Flora, Nancy and Rhoda. We could work a +mighty big patch for our own selves when we was all at home together, +and put in all the work we had to for the old Master too, but after +the War the big children all get married off and took up land of they +own. + +Old Chief lived in a big log house made double with a hall in between, +and a lot of white folks was always coming there to see him about +something. He was gone off somewhere a lot of the time, too, and he +just trusted the Negroes to look after his farms and stuff. We would +just go on out in the fields and work the crops just like they was our +own, and he never come around excepting when we had harvest time, or +to tell us what he wanted planted. + +Sometimes he would send a Negro to tell us to gather up some chickens +or turkeys or shoats he wanted to sell off, and sometimes he would +send after loads of corn and wheat to sell. I heard my pappy say old +Chief and Mr. Chili McIntosh was the first ones to have any wheat in +the Territory, but I don't know about that. + +Along during the War the Negro men got pretty lazy and shiftless, but +my pappy and my big brothers just go right on and work like they +always did. My pappy always said we better off to stay on the place +and work good and behave ourselves because old Master take care of us +that way. But on lots of other places the men slipped off. + +I never did see many soldiers during the War, and there wasn't any +fighting close to where we live. It was kind of down in the bottoms, +not far from the Verdigris and that Gar Creek, and the soldiers would +have bad crossings if the come by our place. + +We did see some whackers riding around sometimes, in little bunches +of about a dozen, but they never did bother us and never did stop. +Some of the Negro girls that I knowed of mixed up with the poor Creeks +and Seminoles, and some got married to them after the War, but none of +my family ever did mix up with them that I knows of. + +Along towards the last of the War I never did see old Chief come +around any more, and somebody say he went down into Texas. He never +did come back that I knows of, and I think he died down there. + +One day my pappy come home and tell us all that the Creek done sign up +to quit the War, and that old Master send word that we all free now +and can take up some land for our own selves or just stay where we is +if we want to. Pappy stayed on that place where he was at until he +died. + +I got to be a big girl and went down to work for a Creek family close +to where they got that Checotah town now. At that time it was just all +a scattered settlement of Creeks and they call it Eufaula town. After +while I marry a man name Joe Johnson, at a little settlement they call +Rentesville. He have his freedmen's allotment close to that place, but +mine is up on the Verdigris, and we move up there to live. + +We just had one child, named Louisa, and she married Tom Armstrong. +They had three-four children, but one was named Ton, and it is him I +live with now. My husband's been dead a long, long time now. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +MS. JOSIE JORDAN +Age 75 yrs. +840 East King St., +Tulsa, Oklahoma. + + +I was born right in the middle of the War on the Mark Lowery +plantation at Sparta, in White County, Tennessee, so I don't know +anything much about them slave days except what my mammy told me long +years ago. 'Course I mean the Civil War, for to us colored folks they +just wasn't no other war as meanful as that one. + +My mother she come from Virginia when a little girl, but never nobody +tells me where at my pappy is from. His name was David Lowery when I +was born, but I guess he had plenty other names, for like my mammy he +was sold lots of times. + +Salina was my mammy's name, and she belonged to a Mister Clark, who +sold her and pappy to Mark Lowery 'cause she was a fighting, +mule-headed woman. + +It wasn't her fault 'cause she was a fighter. The master who owned her +before Mister Clark was one of them white mens who was always whipping +and beating his slaves and mammy couldn't stand it no more. + +That's the way she tells me about it. She just figgured she would be +better off dead and out of her misery as to be whipped all the time, +so one day the master claimed they was something wrong with her work +and started to raise his whip, but mammy fought back and when the +ruckus was over the Master was laying still on the ground and folks +thought he was dead, he got such a heavy beating. + +Mammy says he don't die and right after that she was sold to Mister +Clark I been telling you about. And mammy was full of misery for a +long time after she was carried to Mark Lowery's plantation where at +I was born during of the War. + +She had two children while belonging to Mister Clark and he wouldn't +let them go with mammy and pappy. That's what caused her misery. Pappy +tried to ease her mind but she jest kept a'crying for her babies, Ann +and Reuban, till Mister Lowery got Clark to leave them visit with her +once a month. + +Mammy always says that Mark Lowery was a good master. But he'd heard +things about mammy before he got her and I reckon was curious to know +if they was all true. Mammy says he found out mighty quick they was. + +It was mammy's second day on the plantation and Mark Lowery acted like +he was going to whip her for something she'd done or hadn't, but mammy +knocked him plumb through the open cellar door. He wasn't hurt, not +even mad for mammy says he climbed out the cellar a'laughing, saying +he was only fooling to see if she would fight. + +But mammy's troubles wasn't over then, for Mark Lowery he got himself +a new young wife (his first wife was dead), and mammy was round of the +house most of the time after that. + +Right away they had trouble. The Mistress was trying to make mammy +hurry up with the work and she hit mammy with the broom stick. Mammy's +mule temper boiled up all over the kitchen and the Master had to stop +the fighting. + +He wouldn't whip mammy for her part in the trouble, so the Mistress +she sent word to her father and brothers and they come to Mister +Lowery's place. + +They was going to whip mammy, they was good and mad. Master was good +and mad, too, and he warned 'em home. + +"Whip your own slaves." He told them. "Mine have to work and if +they're beat up they can't do a days work. Get on home--I'll take care +of this." And they left. + +My folks didn't have no food troubles at Mark Lowery's like they did +somewheres else. I remember mammy told me about one master who almost +starved his slaves. Mighty stingy I reckon he was. + +Some of them slaves was so poorly thin they ribs would kinder rustle +against each other like corn stalks a-drying in the hot winds. But +they gets even one hog-killing time, and it was funny too, mammy said. + +They was seven hogs, fat and ready for fall hog-killing time. Just the +day before old master told off they was to be killed something +happened to all them porkers. One of the field boys found them and +come a-telling the master: "The hogs is all died, now they won't be +any meats for the winter." + +When the master gets to where at the hogs is laying, they's a lot of +Negroes standing round looking sorrow-eyed at the wasted meat. The +master asks: "What's the illness with 'em?" + +"Malitis." They tell him, and they acts like they don't want to touch +the hogs. Master says to dress them anyway for they ain't no more meat +on the place. + +He says to keep all the meat for the slave families, but that's +because he's afraid to eat it hisself account of the hogs' got +malitis. + +"Don't you-all know what is malitis?" Mammy would ask the children +when she was telling of the seven fat hogs and seventy lean slaves. +And she would laugh, remembering how they fooled the old master so's +to get all them good meats. + +"One of the strongest Negroes got up early in the morning," Mammy +would explain, "long 'fore the rising horn called the slaves from +their cabins. He skitted to the hog pen with a heavy mallet in his +hand. When he tapped Mister Hog 'tween the eyes with that mallet +'malitis' set in mighty quick, but it was a uncommon 'disease', even +with hungry Negroes around all the time." + +Mammy had me three sisters and a brother while on the Lowery +plantation. They was Lisa, Addie, Alice and Lincoln. It was a long +time after the War and we was all freed before we left old Master +Lowery. + +Stayed right there where we was at home, working in the fields, living +in the same old cabins, just like before the War. Never did have no +big troubles after the War, except one time the Ku Klux Klan broke up +a church meeting and whipped some of the Negroes. + +The preacher was telling about the Bible days when the Klan rode up. +They was all masked up and everybody crawled under the benches when +they shouted: "We'll make you damn niggers wish you wasn't free!" + +And they just about did. The preacher got the worst whipping, blood +was running from his nose and mouth and ears, and they left him laying +on the floor. + +They whipped the women just like the men, but Mammy and the girls +wasn't touched none and we run all the way back to the cabin. Layed +down with all our clothes on and tried to sleep, but we's too scairt +to close our eyes. + +Mammy reckoned old Master Lowery was a-riding with the Klan that +night, else we'd got a flogging too. + +We first moved about a mile from Master Lowery's place and ever week +we'd ask mammy if we children could go see old Master and she'd say: +"Yes, if you-all are good niggers." + +The old Master was always glad to see us children and he would give us +candy and apples and treat us mighty fine. + +The old plantations gone, the old Masters gone, the old slaves is +gone, and I'll be a going some of these days, too, for I been here a +mighty long time and they ain't nobody needs me now 'cause I is too +old for any good. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +"UNCLE" GEORGE G. KING +Age 83 yrs +Tulsa, Oklahoma + + +"Prayers for sale.... Prayers for sale...." Uncle George chants in +sing-song fashion as he roams around Tulsa's Greenwood Negro +district--pockets filled with prayer papers that are soiled and dirty +with constant handling. + +But they are potent, Uncle George tells those who fear the coming of +some trouble, disaster or just ordinary misery, and there's a special +prayer for each and every trouble--including one to keep away the bill +collector when the young folks forget to make payments on the radio, +the furniture, the car, or the Spring outfit purchased months ago from +the credit clothier. + +Its all in the Bible and the Bible is his workshop--'cause folks don't +know how to pray. + +He's mighty old, is Uncle George King, and he'll tell you that he was +born on two-hundred acres of Hell, but the whitefolks called it Samuel +Roll's plantation (six miles N.E. of Lexington, South Carolina). + +Kinder small for a plantation, Uncle George explains, but plenty room +for that devil overseer to lay on the lash, and plenty room for the +old she-devil Mistress to whip his mammy til' she was just a piece of +living raw meat! + +The old Master talked hard words, but the Mistress whipped. Lot's of +difference, and Uncle George ought to know, 'cause he's felt the lash +layed on pretty heavy when he was no older than kindergarten children +of today. + +The Mistress owned the slaves and they couldn't be sold without her +say-so. That's the reason George was never sold, but the Master once +tried to sell him 'cause the beatings was breaking him down. Old +Mistress said "No", and used it for an excuse to whip his Mammy. Uncle +George remembers that, too. + +They crossed her wrists and tied them with a stout cord. They made her +bend over so that her arms was sticking back between her legs and +fastened the arms with a stick so's she couldn't straighten up. + +He saw the Mistress pull his Mammy's clothes over her head so's the +lash would reach the skin. He saw the overseer lay on the whip with +hide busting blows that left her laying, all a shiver, on the ground, +like a wounded animal dying from the chase. + +He saw the Mistress walk away, laughing, while his Mammy screamed and +groaned--the old Master standing there looking sad and wretched, like +he could feel the blows on Mammy's bared back and legs as much as she. + +The Mistress was a great believer in the power of punishment, and +Uncle George remembers the old log cabin jail built before the War, +right on the plantation, where runaway slaves were stowed away 'till +they would promise to behave themselves. + +The old jail was full up during most of the War. Three runaway slaves +were still chained to its floor when the Master gave word the Negroes +were free. + +They were Prince, Sanovey (his wife), and Henry, who were caught and +whipped by the patrollers, and then brought back to the plantation for +another beating before being locked in jail. + +The Mistress ordered them chained, and the overseer would come every +morning with the same question: "Will you niggers promise not to +runaway no more?" + +But they wouldn't promise. One at a time the overseer would loosen the +chains, and lead them from the jail to cut them with powerful blows +from the lash, then drag them back to be chained until the next day +when more lickings were given 'cause they wouldn't promise. + +The jail was emptied on the day Master Roll called together all the +men, women and children to tell them they wasn't slaves no more. Uncle +George tells it this way: + +"The Master he says we are all free, but it don't mean we is white. +And it don't mean we is equal. Just equal for to work and earn our own +living and not depend on him for no more meats and clother." [TR: clothes?] + +Food was scarce before the War; it was worse after the shooting and +killing was over, and Uncle George says: "There wasn't no corn bread, +no bacon--just trash eating trash, like when General Sherman marched +down through the country taking everything the soldiers could lug +away, and burning all along the way. + +"Wasn't nothing to eat after he march by. Darkies search 'round the +barns, maybe find some grains of corn in the manure, and they'd parch +the grains--nothing else to eat, except sometimes at night Mammy would +skit out and steal scraps from the Master's house for the children. + +"She had lots of hungry mouths, too. They was seven of us then, six +boys and a girl, Eliza. The boys was Wesley, Simeon, Moses, Peter, +William and me, George. This pappy's name was Griffin. + +"But they was other pappys (Mammy told him) when Eva was born long +before any of us, and Laura come next, but from a white daddy. Mammy +lost them when she was sold around on the markets. + +"The Klan they done lots of riding round the country. One night the +come down to the old slave quarters where the cabins is all squared +round each other, and called everybody outdoors. They's looking for +two women. + +"They picks 'em out of the crowd right quick and say they been with +white men. Says their children is by white men, and they're going to +get whipped so's they'll remember to stay with their own kind. The +women kick and scream, but the mens grab them and roll them over a +barrel and let fly with the whip." + +It was a long time after the Civil War that Uncle George got his first +schooling or attended regular church meetings. Like he says: + +"Getting up at four o'clock in the morning, hoeing in the fields all +day, doing chores when they come in from the fields, and then piddling +with the weaver 'til nine or ten every night--it just didn't leave no +time for reading and such, even if we was allowed to." + +And religion, that came later too, for during the old plantation days +Uncle George's white folks didn't think a Negro needed religion--there +wasn't a Heaven for Negroes anyhow. + +Finally, though, the Master gave them right to hold meetings on the +plantation, and old Peter Coon was the preacher. The overseer was +there with guards to keep the Negroes from getting too much riled up +when old Peter started talking about Paul or some of the things in the +Old Testament. That's all he would talk about; nothing 'bout Jesus, +just Paul and the Old Testament. + +His Mammy went to every meeting. Like he says: "She knew them good +things was good for her children and she told us about the Bible." + +Like his old Mammy, Uncle George is a firm believer in the power of +the word. "Prayers are saving!" Uncle George says, "But they's lots of +folks' don't know how to pray." + +That's why he has prayers for sale--and he knows they are never +failing, "If you tack 'em up on the wall and say 'em over and over +every day they's sure to be answered." + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + +MARTHA KING +Age 85 yrs. +McAlester, Oklahoma + + + "They hung Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree! + They hung Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree! + They hung Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree! + While we go marching on!" + +Dat was de song de Yankees sang when they marched by our house. They +didn't harm us in any way. I guess de War was over then 'cause a few +days after dat old Master say, "Matt", and I say, "Suh?" He say, "Come +here. You go tell Henry I say come out here and to bring the rest of +the niggers with him." I went to the north door and I say, "Henry, +Master Willis say ever one of you come out here." We all went outside +and line up in front of old Master. He say, "Henry". Henry say, "Yes +sah". Old Master say, "Every one of you is free--as free as I am. You +all can leave or stay 'round here if you want to." + +We all stayed on for a long time 'cause we didn't have no other home +and didn't know how to take keer of ourselves. We was kind of scared I +reckon. Finally I heard my mother was in Walker County, Alabama, and I +left and went to live with her. + +My mother was Harriet Davis and she was born in Virginia. I don't know +who my father was. My grandmother was captured in Africa when she was +a little girl. A big boat was down at the edge of a bay an' the people +was all excited about it an' some of the bravest went up purty close +to look at it. The men on the boat told them to come on board and they +could have the pretty red handkerchiefs, red and blue beads and big +rings. A lot of them went on board and the ship sailed away with them. +My grandmother never saw any of her folks again. + +When I was about five years old they brought my grandmother, my mother +and my two aunts and two uncles to Tuskaloosa from Fayettesville, +Alabama. We crossed a big river on a ferry boat. They put us on the +"block" and sold us. I can remember it well. A white man "cried" me +off just like I was a animal or varmint or something. He said, "Here's +a little nigger, who will give me a bid on her. She will make a good +house gal someday." Old man Davis give him $300.00 for me. I don't +know whether I was afraid or not; I don't think I cared just so I had +something to eat. I was allus hungry. Miss Davis' grandmother and one +of my aunts and uncles. Old man Davis bought the rest of us. Uncle +Henry looked after me when he could. I could see my mother once in +awhile but not often. + +I had a purty easy time. I didn't have to work very hard 'till I was +about ten years old. I started working in the field and I had to work +in the weaving room too. We made all our own clothes. I spun and wove +cotton and wool. Old Master bought our shoes. We made fancy cloth. We +could stripe the cloth or check it or leave it plain. We also wove +coverlids and jeans to make mens suits out of. I could still do that +if I had to. + +We all went to church with the white folks. We didn't have no colored +preachers. The niggers would get happy and shout all over the place. +Sometimes they'd fall out doors. + +The Big House was a double log, two story house, not very fine but +awful comfortable. They was four big fireplace rooms downstairs and +two upstairs. Then they was two sort of shed rooms. There was a big +piazza across the front. The kitchen was a way off from the house, +seems like it was 200 feet at least. Our quarters were close by at the +back. He didn't have many slaves and they was nearly all my kinfolks. +There was Aunt Emmy and Phillis, Uncles Henry, Mitchell, Louis and +Andy, and the others were Uncle Logan and Uncle Nathan. They was old +Mistress' slaves when she done married. + +Old Master and old Mistress had three boys, Eli, Billy and Dock. They +had to go to war and old Mistress sho' did cry. She say they might get +killed and she might not see 'em any more. I wonder why all dem white +folks didn't think of that when they sold mothers away from they +chillun. I had to be sold away from my mother. Two of her boys was +badly wounded but they all come back. + +Abe Lincoln done everything he could for the niggers. We lost our best +friend when he got killed. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +GEORGE KYE +Age 110 yrs. +Fort Gibson, Okla. + + +I was born in Arkansas under Mr. Abraham Stover, on a big farm about +twenty miles north of Van Buren. I was plumb grown when the Civil War +come along, but I can remember back when the Cherokee Indians was in +all that part of the country. + +Joe Kye was my pappy's name what he was born under back in Garrison +County, Virginia, and I took that name when I was freed, but I don't +know whether he took it or not because he was sold off by old Master +Stover when I was a child. I never have seen him since. I think he +wouldn't mind good, leastways that what my mammy say. + +My mammy was named Jennie and I don't think I had any brothers or +sisters, but they was a whole lot of children at the quarters that I +played and lived with. I didn't live with mammy because she worked all +the time, and us children all stayed in one house. + +It was a little one room log cabin, chinked and daubed, and you +couldn't stir us with a stick. When we went to eat we had a big pan +and all ate out of it. One what ate the fastest got the most. + +Us children wore homespun shirts and britches and little slips, and +nobody but the big boys wore any britches. I wore just a shirt until I +was about 12 years old, but it had a long tall down to my calves. Four +or five of us boys slept in one bed, and it was made of hewed logs +with rope laced acrost it and a shuck mattress. We had stew made out +of pork and potatoes, and sometimes greens and pot liquor, and we had +ash cake mostly, but biscuits about once a month. + +In the winter time I had brass toed shoes made on the place, and a +cloth cap with ear flaps. + +The work I done was hoeing and plowing, and I rid a horse a lot for +old Master because I was a good rider. He would send me to run chores +for him, like going to the mill. He never beat his negroes but he +talked mighty cross and glared at us until he would nearly scare us to +death sometimes. + +He told us the rules and we lived by them and didn't make trouble, but +they was a neighbor man that had some mean negroes and he nearly beat +them to death. We could hear them hollering in the field sometimes. +They would sleep in the cotton rows, and run off, and then they would +catch the cat-o-nine tails sure nuff. He would chain them up, too, and +keep them tied out to trees, and when they went to the field they +would be chained together in bunches sometimes after they had been +cutting up. + +We didn't have no place to go to church, but old Master didn't care if +we had singing and praying, and we would tie our shoes on our backs +and go down the road close to the white church and all set down and +put our shoes on and go up close and listen to the service. + +Old Master was baptized almost every Sunday and cussed us all out on +Monday. I didn't join the church until after freedom, and I always was +a scoundrel for dancing. My favorite preacher was old Pete Conway. He +was the only ordained colored preacher we had after freedom, and he +married me. + +Old Master wouldn't let us take herb medicine, and he got all our +medicine in Van Buren when we was sick. But I wore a buckeye on my +neck just the same. + +When the War come along I was a grown man, and I went off to serve +because old Master was too old to go, but he had to send somebody +anyways. I served as George Stover, but every time the sergeant would +call out "Abe Stover", I would answer "Here". + +They had me driving a mule team wagon that Old Master furnished, and I +went with the Sesesh soldiers from Van Buren to Texarkana and back a +dozen times or more. I was in the War two years, right up to the day +of freedom. We had a battle close to Texarkana and another big one +near Van Buren, but I never left Arkansas and never got a scratch. + +One time in the Texarkana battle I was behind some pine trees and the +bullets cut the limbs down all over me. I dug a big hole with my bare +hands before I hardly knowed how I done it. + +One time two white soldiers named Levy and Briggs come to the wagon +train and said they was hunting slaves for some purpose. Some of us +black boys got scared because we heard they was going to Squire Mack +and get a reward for catching runaways, so me and two more lit out of +there. + +They took out after us and we got to a big mound in the woods and hid. +Somebody shot at me and I rolled into some bushes. He rid up and got +down to look for me but I was on t'other side of his horse and he +never did see me. When they was gone we went back to the wagons just +as the regiment was pulling out and the officer didn't say nothing. + +They was eleven negro boys served in my regiment for their masters. +The first year was mighty hard because we couldn't get enough to eat. +Some ate poke greens without no grease and took down and died. + +How I knowed I was free, we was bad licked, I reckon. Anyways, we quit +fighting and a Federal soldier come up to my wagon and say: "Whose +mules?" "Abe Stover's mules," I says, and he tells me then, "Let me +tell you, black boy, you are as free now as old Abe Stover his own +self!" When he said that I jumped on top of one of them mules' back +before I knowed anything! + +I married Sarah Richardson, February 10, 1870, and had only eleven +children. One son is a deacon and one grandson is a preacher. I am a +good Baptist. Before I was married I said to the gal's old man, "I'll +go to the mourners bench if you'll let me have Sal," and sure nuff I +joined up just a month after I got her. I am head of the Sunday School +and deacon in the St. Paul Baptist church in Muskogee now. + +I lived about five miles from Van Buren until about twelve years ago +when they found oil and then they run all the negroes out and leased +up the land. They never did treat the negroes good around there +anyways. + +I never had a hard time as a slave, but I'm glad we was set free. +Sometimes we can't figger out the best thing to do, but anyways we can +lead our own life now, and I'm glad the young ones can learn and get +somewhere these days. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937] + +BEN LAWSON +Age 84 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Danville, Illinois. De best I can get at my age I is 84 +years old. My father dey tell me was name Dennis Lawson and died +before I was born. My mother's name was Ann Lawson, who I saw once. I +was given by her to my Mistress, Mrs. Jane Brazier, when a kid and she +was too. My mother raised me, she and her son to manhood. I got no +brothers or sisters to my knowledge. I was de only slave dey had and +dey raised me to be humble and fear dem as a slave and servant. As I +was de only slave I slept in de same room wid my Mistress and her son +who was grown, her husband and father being dead. + +I worked on the farm doing general farm work, hoeing, plowing, +harvesting the crop of wheat, corn, barley, oats, rice, peas, etc. To +make and harvest the crops dey would hire poor white help and as dey +was grown and I was a lad, dey kept me in a strain in order to keep up +wid dem for if I didn't it was just too bad for my back. So's dere +would be work for me to do during the bad days of winter dey built a +pen under a shed and dey would lay a cloth on de ground covering the +ground in the pen and wid small mesh wire on top of de pen on which de +wheat was laid and wid a wooden maul I would pounder out wheat all day +long, even though dey could have thrashed it as dey did de biggest +part of it. + +At meal time dey would give me what was left of de scraps off dey +table in a plate, which I would eat most de time on de back porch in +warm weather and in de kitchen in winter. + +For summer I wore a lowell shirt and for winter I wore de same old +lowell shirt only wid outing slips and a pair of brogan shoes or a +pair of old shoes dat was thrown away by my Mistress' son. + +Their house was a 3-room log house unpainted, wid only one bed room +and a dining room and kitchen. + +The plantation had 'bout 160 acres and was worked by my Mistress' son +and myself plus poor white hired help, my being de only slave. + +I was treated most harshly 'mongst a group of just white people and +who seemed to think me de old work ox for all de hardest work. De +nearest other Negro slaves were 'bout 15 or 20 miles from me. + +When I was grown I ran away one night and walked and rode de rods +under stage coaches to Paducah, Kentucky. I got me a job and worked as +a roustabout on a boat where I learned to gamble wid dice. I fought +and gambled all up and down de Mississippi River, and in de course of +time I had 'bout $3,000, but I lost it. + +I don't know de month or de year I was born in but I can 'member de +sinking of de biggest circus show in de Mississippi River at Mobile, +Alabama when I was 10 to 14 years old, I ain't sure which. + +There wasn't no children for me to play with and it seem like I never +was a child but was just always a man. I wasn't never told dat I was +free, and I didn't know nothing 'bout de War much dat brought my +freedom. Dey kept all of dat away from me and I couldn't read or write +so I didn't know. + +I've been married only once. My wife is 54 years old, and her name is +Hattie Lawson. We have no children. Since we married after freedom +there wasn't nothing unusual at our wedding. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +MARY LINDSAY +Age 91 yrs. +Tulsa, Oklahoma. + + +My slavery days wasn't like most people tell you about, 'cause I was +give to my young Mistress and sent away to Texas when I was jest a +little girl, and I didn't live on a big plantation a very long tine. + +I got an old family Bible what say I was born on September 20, in +1846, but I don't know who put de writing in it unless it was my +mammy's mistress. My mammy had de book when she die. + +My mammy come out to the Indian country from Mississippi two years +before I was born. She was the slave of a Chickasaw part-breed name +Sobe Love. He was the kinsfolks of Mr. Benjamin Love, and Mr. Henry +Love what bring two big bunches of the Chickasaws out from Mississippi +to the Choctaw country when the Chickasaws sign up de treaty to leave +Mississippi, and the whole Love family settle 'round on the Red River +below Fort Washita. There whar I was born. + +My mammy say dey have a terrible hard time again the sickness when +they first come out into that country, because it was low and swampy +and all full of cane brakes, and everybody have the smallpox and the +malaria and fever all the time. Lots of the Chickasaw families nearly +died off. + +Old Sobe Love marry her off to a slave named William, what belong to a +full-blood Chickasaw man name Chick-a-lathe, and I was one of de +children. + +De children belong to the owner of the mother, and me and my brother +Franklin, what we called "Bruner", was born under the name of Love and +then old Master Sobe bought my pappy William, and we was all Love +slaves then. My mammy had two more girls, name Hatty and Rena. + +My mammy name was Mary, and I was named after her. Old Mistress name +was Lottie, and they had a daughter name Mary. Old Master Sobe was +powerful rich, and he had about a hundred slaves and four or five big +pieces of that bottom land broke out for farms. He had niggers on all +the places, but didn't have no overseers, jest hisself and he went +around and seen that everybody behave and do they work right. + +Old Master Sobe was a mighty big man in the tribe, and so was all his +kinfolks, and they went to Fort Washita and to Boggy Depot all the +time on business, and leave the Negroes to look after old Mistress and +the young daughter. She was almost grown along about that time, when I +can first remember about things. + +'Cause my name was Mary, and so was my mammy's and my young Mistress' +too. Old Master Sobe called me Mary-Ka-Chubbe to show which Mary he +was talking about. + +Miss Mary have a black woman name Vici what wait on her all the time, +and do the carding and spinning and cooking 'round the house, and Vici +belong to Miss Mary. I never did go 'round the Big House, but jest +stayed in the quarters with my mammy and pappy and helped in the field +a little. + +Then one day Miss Mary run off with a man and married him, and old +Master Sobe nearly went crazy! The man was name Bill Merrick, and he +was a poor blacksmith and didn't have two pair of britches to his +name, and old Master Sobe said he jest stole Miss Mary 'cause she was +rich, and no other reason. 'Cause he was a white man and she was +mostly Chickasaw Indian. + +Anyways old Master Sobe wouldn't even speak to Mr. Bill, and wouldn't +let him set foot on the place. He jest reared and pitched around, and +threatened to shoot him if he set eyes on him, and Mr. Bill took Miss +Mary and left out for Texas. He set up a blacksmith shop on the big +road between Bonham and Honey Grove, and lived there until he died. + +Miss Mary done took Vici along with her, and pretty soon she come back +home and stay a while, and old Master Sobe kind of soften up a little +bit and give her some money to git started on, and he give her me too. + +Dat jest nearly broke my old mammy's and pappy's heart, to have me +took away off from them, but they couldn't say nothing and I had to go +along with Miss Mary back to Texas. When we git away from the Big +House I jest cried and cried until I couldn't hardly see, my eyes was +so swole up, but Miss Mary said she gwine to be good to me. + +I ask her how come Master Sobe didn't give her some of the grown boys +and she say she reckon it because he didn't want to help her husband +out none, but jest wanted to help her. If he give her a man her +husband have him working in the blacksmith shop, she reckon. + +Master Bill Merrick was a hard worker, and he was more sober than most +the men in them days, and he never tell me to do nothing. He jest let +Miss Mary tell me what to do. They have a log house close to the shop, +and a little patch of a field at first, but after awhile he git more +land, and then Miss Mary tell me and Vici we got to help in the field +too. + +That sho' was hard living then! I have to git up at three o'clock +sometimes so I have time to water the hosses and slop the hogs and +feed the chickens and milk the cows, and then git back to the house +and git the breakfast. That was during the times when Miss Mary was +having and nursing her two children, and old Vici had to stay with her +all the time. Master Bill never did do none of that kind of work, but +he had to be in the shop sometimes until way late in the night, and +sometimes before daylight, to shoe peoples hosses and oxen and fix +wagons. + +He never did tell me to do that work, but he never done it his own +self and I had to do it if anybody do it. + +He was the slowest one white man I ever did see. He jest move 'round +like de dead lice falling off'n him all the time, and everytime he go +to say anything he talk so slow that when he say one word you could +walk from here to way over there before he say de next word. He don't +look sick, and he was powerful strong in his arms, but he act like he +don't feel good jest the same. + +I remember when the War come. Mostly by the people passing 'long the +big road, we heard about it. First they was a lot of wagons hauling +farm stuff into town to sell, and then purty soon they was soldiers on +the wagons, and they was coming out into the country to git the stuff +and buying it right at the place they find it. + +Then purty soon they commence to be little bunches of mens in soldier +clothes riding up and down the road going somewhar. They seem like +they was mostly young boys like, and they jest laughing and jollying +and going on like they was on a picnic. + +Then the soldiers come 'round and got a lot of the white men and took +them off to the War even iffen they didn't want to go. Master Bill +never did want to go, 'cause he had his wife and two little children, +and anyways he was gitting all the work he could do fixing wagons and +shoeing hosses, with all the traffic on de road at that time. Master +Bill had jest two hosses, for him and his wife to ride and to work to +the buggy, and he had one old yoke of oxen and some more cattle. He +got some kind of a paper in town and he kept it with him all the time, +and when the soldiers would come to git his hosses or his cattle he +would jest draw that paper on 'em and they let 'em alone. + +By and by the people got so thick on the big road that they was +somebody in sight all the time. They jest keep a dust kicked up all +day and all night 'cepting when it rain, and they git all bogged down +and be strung all up and down the road camping. They kept Master Bill +in the shop all the time, fixing the things they bust trying to git +the wagons out'n the mud. They was whole families of them, with they +children and they slaves along, and they was coming in from every +place because the Yankees was gitting in their part of the country, +they say. + +We all git mighty scared about the Yankees coming but I don't reckon +they ever git thar, 'cause I never seen none, and we was right on the +big road and we would of seen them. They was a whole lot more soldiers +in them brown looking jeans, round-about jackets and cotton britches +a-faunching up and down the road on their hosses, though. Them hoss +soldiers would come b'iling by, going east, all day and night, and the +two-three days later on they would all come tearing by going west! Dey +acted like dey didn't know whar dey gwine, but I reckon dey did. + +Den Master Bill git sick. I reckon he more wore out and worried than +anything else, but he go down with de fever one day and it raining so +hard Mistress and me and Vici can't neither one go nowhar to git no +help. + +We puts peach tree poultices on his head and wash him off all the +time, until it quit raining so Mistress can go out on de road, and +then a doctor man come from one of the bunches of soldiers and see +Master Bill. He say he going be all right and jest keep him quiet, and +go on. + +Mistress have to tend de children and Vici have to take care of Master +Bill and look after the house, and dat leave me all by myself wid all +the rest of everything around the place. + +I got to feed all the stock and milk the cows and work in the field +too. Dat the first time I ever try to plow, and I nearly git killed, +too! I got me a young yoke of oxens I broke to pull the wagon, 'cause +Vici have to use the old oxens to work the field. I had to take the +wagon and go 'bout ten miles west to a patch of woods Master Bill +owned to git fire wood, 'cause we lived right on a flat patch of +prairie, and I had to chop and haul the wood by myself. I had to git +postoak to burn in the kitchen fireplace and willow for Master Bill to +make charcoal out of to burn in his blacksmith fire. + +Well, I hitch up them young oxen to the plow and they won't follow the +row, and so I go git the old oxens. One of them old oxens didn't know +me and took in after me, and I couldn't hitch 'em up. And then it +begins to rain again. + +After the rain was quit I git the bucket and go milk the cows, and it +is time to water the hosses too, so I starts to the house with the +milk and leading one of the hosses. When I gits to the gate I drops +the halter across my arm and hooks the bucket of milk on my arm too, +and starts to open the gate. The wind blow the gate wide open, and it +slap the hoss on the flank. That was when I nearly git killed! + +Out the hoss go through the gate to the yard, and down the big road, +and my arm all tangled up in the halter rope and me dragging on the +ground! + +The first jump knock the wind out of me and I can't git loose, and +that hoss drag me down the road on the run until he meet up with a +passel of soldiers and they stop him. + +The next thing I knowed I was laying on the back kitchen gallery, and +some soldiers was pouring water on me with a bucket. My arm was broke, +and I was stove up so bad that I have to lay down for a whole week, +and Mistress and Vici have to do all the work. + +Jest as I gitting able to walk 'round here come some soldiers and say +they come to git Master Bill for the War. He still in the bed sick, +and so they leave a parole paper for him to stay until he git well, +and then he got to go into Bonham and go with the soldiers to +blacksmith for them that got the cannons, the man said. + +Mistress take on and cry and hold onto the man's coat and beg, but it +don't do no good. She say they don't belong in Texas but they belong +in the Chickasaw Nation, but he say that don't do no good, 'cause they +living in Texas now. + +Master Bill jest stew and fret so, one night he fever git way up and +he go off into a kind of a sleep and about morning he died. + +My broke arm begin to swell up and hurt me, and I git sick with it +again, and Mistress git another doctor to come look at it. + +He say I got bad blood from it how come I git so sick, and he git out +his knife out'n his satchel and bleed me in the other arm. The next +day he come back and bleed me again two times, and the next day one +more time, and then I git so sick I puke and he quit bleeding me. + +While I still sick Mistress pick up and go off to the Territory to her +pappy and leave the children thar for Vici and me to look after. After +while she come home for a day or two and go off again somewhere else. +Then the next time she come home she say they been having big battles +in the Territory and her pappy moved all his stuff down on the river, +and she home to stay now. + +We git along the best we can for a whole winter, but we nearly starve +to death, and then the next spring when we getting a little patch +planted Mistress go into Bonham and come back and say we all free and +the War over. + +She say, "You and Vici jest as free as I am, and a lot freer, I +reckon, and they say I got to pay you if you work for me, but I ain't +got no money to pay you. If you stay on with me and help me I will +feed and home you and I can weave you some good dresses if you card +and spin the cotton and wool." + +Well, I stayed on, 'cause I didn't have no place to go, and I carded +and spinned the cotton and wool and she make me just one dress. Vici +didn't do nothing but jest wait on the children and Mistress. + +Mistress go off again about a week, and when she come back I see she +got some money, but she didn't give us any of it. + +After while I asked her ain't she got some money for me, and she say +no, ain't she giving me a good home? Den I starts to feeling like I +aint treated right. + +Every evening I git done with the work and go out in the back yard and +jest stand and look off to the west towards Bonham, and wish I was at +that place or some other place. + +Den along come a nigger boy and say he working for a family in Bonham +and he git a dollar every week. He say Mistress got some kinfolks in +Bonham and some of Master Sobe Love's niggers living close to there. + +So one night I jest put that new dress in a bundle and set foot right +down the big road a-walking west, and don't say nothing to nobody! + +Its ten miles into Bonham, and I gits in town about daylight. I keeps +on being afraid, 'cause I con't git it out'n my mind I still belong to +Mistress. + +Purty soon some niggers tells me a nigger name Bruner Love living down +west of Greenville, and I know that my brother Franklin, 'cause we all +called him Bruner. I don't remember how all I gits down to Greenville, +but I know I walks most the way, and I finds Bruner. Him and his wife +working on a farm, and they say my sister Hetty and my sister Rena +what was little is living with my mammy way back up on the Red River. +My pappy done died in time of the War and I didn't know it. + +Bruner taken me in a wagon and we went to my mammy, and I lived with +her until she died and Hetty was married. Then I married a boy name +Henry Lindsay. His people was from Georgia and he live with them way +west at Cedar Mills, Texas. That was right close to Gordonville, on +the Red River. + +We live at Cedar Mills until three my children was born and then we +come to the Creek Nation in 1887. My last one was born here. + +My oldest is named Georgia on account of her pappy. He was born in +Georgia and that was in 1838, so his whitefolks got a book that say. +My next child was Henry. We called him William Henry, after my pappy +and his pappy. Then come Donie, and after we come here we had Madison, +my youngest boy. + +I lives with Henry here on this little place we got in Tulsa. + +When we first come here we got some land for $15 an acre from the +Creek Nation, but our papers said we can only stay as long as it is +the Creek Nation. Then in 1901 comes the allotments, and we found out +our land belong to a Creek Indian, and we have to pay him to let us +stay on it. After while he makes us move off and we lose out all +around. + +But my daughter Donie git a little lot, and we trade it for this place +about thirty year ago, when this town was a little place. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +MRS. MATTIE LOGAN +Age 79 yrs. +Route 5, West Tulsa, Oklahoma. + + +This is a mighty fitting time to be telling about the slave days, for +I'm just finished up celebrating my seventy-nine years of being around +and the first part of my life was spent on the old John B. Lewis +plantation down in old Mississippi. + +Yes, sir! my birthday is just over. September 1 it was and the year +was 1858. Borned on the John B. Lewis plantation just ten mile south +of Jackson in the Mississippi country. Rankin County it was. + +My mother's name was Lucinda, and father's name was Levi Miles. My +mother was part Indian, for her mother was a half-blood Cherokee +Indian from Virginia. + +There was children a-plenty besides me. There was Sally, Julia, +Hubbard, Ada, Ira, Anthony, Henry, Amanda, Mary, John, Lucinda, Daniel +and me, Mattie. That was my family. + +The master's family was a large one, too. Six children was born to the +Master and Mistress. Her name, his first wife, was Jennie, the second +and last was named, Louise. The children was, Rebecca, Mollie, Jennie, +Susie, Silas, and Begerlan. They kind of leaned to females. + +My mother belonged to Mistress Jennie who thought a heap of her, and +why shouldn't she? Mother nursed all Miss Jennie's children because +all of her young ones and my mammy's was born so close together it +wasn't no trouble at all for mammy to raise the whole kaboodle of +them. I was born about the same time as the baby Jennie. They say I +nursed on one breast while that white child, Jennie, pulled away at +the other! + +That was a pretty good idea for the Mistress, for it didn't keep her +tied to the place and she could visit around with her friends most any +time she wanted 'thout having to worry if the babies would be fed or +not. + +Mammy was the house girl and account of that and because her family +was so large, the Mistress fixed up a two room cabin right back of the +Big House and that's where we lived. The cabin had a fireplace in one +of the rooms, just like the rest of the slave cabins which was set in +a row away from the Big House. In one room was bunk beds, just plain +old two-by-fours with holes bored through the plank so's ropes could +be fastened in and across for to hold the corn-shuck mattress. + +My brothers and sisters was allowed to play with the Master's +children, but not with the children who belonged to the field Negroes. +We just played yard games like marbles and tossing a ball. I don't +rightly remember much about games, for there wasn't too much fun in +them days even if we did get raised with the Master's family. We +wasn't allowed to learn any reading or writing. They say if they +catched a slave learning them things they'd pull his finger nails off! +I never saw that done, though. + +Each slave cabin had a stone fireplace in the end, just like ours, and +over the flames at daybreak was prepared the morning meal. That was +the only meal the field negroes had to cook. + +All the other meals was fixed up by an old man and woman who was too +old for field trucking. The peas, the beans, the turnips, the +potatoes, all seasoned up with fat meats and sometimes a ham bone, was +cooked in a big iron kettle and when meal time come they all gathered +around the pot for a-plenty of helpings! Corn bread and buttermilk +made up the rest of the meal. + +Ten or fifteen hogs was butchered every fall and the slaves would get +the skins and maybe a ham bone. That was all, except what was mixed in +with the stews. Flour was given out every Sunday morning and if a +family run out of that before the next week, well, they was just out +that's all! + +The slaves got small amounts of vegetables from the plantation garden, +but they didn't have any gardens of their own. Everybody took what old +Master rationed out. + +Once in a while we had rabbits and fish, but the best dish of all was +the 'possum and sweet potatoes--baked together over red-hot coals in +the fireplace. Now, that was something to eat! + +The Lewis plantation was about three hundred acres, with usually fifty +slaves working on the place. Master Lewis was a trader. He couldn't +sell of our family, for we belonged to Mistress Jennie. Negro girls, +the fat ones who was kinder pretty, was the most sold. Folks wanted +them pretty bad but the Mistress said there wasn't going to be any +selling of the girls who was mammy's children. + +There was no overseer on our place, just the old Master who did all +the bossing. He wasn't too mean, but I've seen him whip Old John. I'd +run in the house to get away from the sight, but I could still hear +Old John yelling, 'Pray, Master! Oh! Pray, Master!', but I guess that +there was more howling than there was hurting at that. + +My uncle Ed Miles run away to the North and joined with Yankees during +the War. He was lucky to get away, for lots of them who tried it was +ketched up by the patrollers. I seen some of them once. They had +chains fastened around their legs, fastened short, too, just long +enough to take a short step. No more running away with them chains +anchoring the feets! + +There wasn't any negro churches close by our plantation. All the +slaves who wanted religion was allowed to join the Methodist church +because that was the Mistress' church. + +A doctor was called in when the slaves would get sick. He'd give pills +for most all the ailments, but once in a while, like when the +children would get the whooping cough, some old negro would try to +cure them with home made remedies. + +The whooping cough cure was by using a land turtle. Cut off his head +and drain the blood into a cup. Then take a lump of sugar and dip in +the blood, eat the sugar and the coughing was supposed to stop. If it +did or not I don't know. + +And that makes me think about another cure they use to tell about. A +cure for mean overseers. And I don't mean kill, just scare him, that's +all. They say the cure was tried on an overseer who worked for Silas +Stien, who was a slave owner living close by the Lewis plantation. + +It seems like this overseer was of the meanest kind, always whipping +the slaves for no reason at all, and the slaves tried to figure out a +way to even up with him by chasing him off the place. + +One of the slaves told how to cure him. Get a King snake and put the +snake in the overseer's cabin. Slip the snake in about, no, not about, +but just exactly nine o'clock at night. Seems like the time was +important, why so, I don't remember now. + +That's what the slaves did. Put in the snake and out went the +overseer. Never no more did he whip the slaves on that plantation +because he wasn't working there no more! When he went, when he went, +or how he went nobody knows, but they all say he went. That's what +counted--he was gone! + +The Yankees didn't come around our plantation during the war. All we +heard was, 'They'll kill all the slaves,' and such hearing was +a-plenty! + +After the war some man come to the plantation and told the field +negroes they was free. But he didn't know about the cabin we lived in +and didn't tell my folks nothing about it. They learned about the +freedom from the old Master. + +That was some days after the man left the place. The Master called my +mother and father into the Big House and told them they was free. Free +like him. But he didn't want my folks to leave and they stayed, stayed +there three year after they was free to go anywhere they wanted. + +The master paid them $200 a month to work for him and that wasn't so +much if you stop to figure there was two grown folks and thirteen +children who could do plenty of work around the place. + +But that money paid for an 80-acre farm my folks bought not far from +the old plantation and they moved onto it three year after the freedom +come. + +I think Lincoln was a mighty good man, and I think Roosevelt is trying +to carry some of the good ideas Lincoln had. Lincoln would have done a +heap more if he had lived. + +The young negroes who are living now are selfish and shiftless. +They're not worth two cents and don't have the respect for other folks +to get along right. That's what I think. + +I been married three times, but no children did I have. The first man +was Frank Morris, the next was Jim White, and the last was John Logan. +All gone. Dead. + +From Mississippi I come to Idabel, Oklahoma, in 1909, two year after +statehood. I moved to Muskogee in 1910, staying there while the times +was good and coming to Tulsa some years ago. + +I'm pretty old and can't work hard anymore, but I manage to get along. +I'm glad to be free and I don't believe I could stand them slavery +days now at all. + +I'm my own boss, get up when I want, go to bed the same way. Nobody to +say this or that about what I do. + +Yes, I'm glad to be free! + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +KIZIAH LOVE +Age 93 +Colbert, Okla. + + +Lawd help us, I sho' remembers all about slavery times for I was a +grown woman, married and had one baby when de War done broke out. That +was a sorry time for some poor black folks but I guess Master Frank +Colbert's niggers was about as well off as the best of 'em. I can +recollect things that happened way back better than I can things that +happen now. Funny ain't it? + +Frank Colbert, a full blood Choctaw Indian, was my owner. He owned my +mother but I don't remember much about my father. He died when I was a +little youngun. My Mistress' name was Julie Colbert. She and Master +Frank was de best folks that ever lived. All the niggers loved Master +Frank and knowed jest what he wanted done and they tried their best to +do it, too. + +I married Isom Love, a slave of Sam Love, another full-blood Indian +that lived on a jining farm. We lived on Master Frank's farm and Isom +went back and forth to work fer his master and I worked ever day fer +mine. I don't 'spect we could of done that way iffen we hadn't of had +Indian masters. They let us do a lot like we pleased jest so we got +our work done and didn't run off. + +Old Master Frank never worked us hard and we had plenty of good food +to eat. He never did like to put us under white overseers and never +tried it but once. A white man come through here and stopped +overnight. He looked 'round the farm and told Master Frank that he +wasn't gitting half what he ought to out of his rich land. He said he +could take his bunch of hands and double his amount of corn and +cotton. + +Master Frank told him that he never used white overseers, that he had +one nigger that bossed around some when he didn't do it hisself. He +also told the white man that he had one nigger named Bill that was +kind of bad, that he was a good worker but he didn't like to be +bothered as he liked to do his own work in his own way. The white boss +told him he wouldn't have any trouble and that he could handle him all +right. + +Old Master hired him and things went very well for a few days. He +hadn't said anything to Bill and they had got along fine. I guess the +new boss got to thinking it was time for him to take Bill in hand so +one morning he told him to hitch up another team before he caught his +own team to go to work. + +Uncle Bill told him that he didn't have time, that he had a lot of +plowing to git done that morning and besides it was customary for +every man to catch his own team. Of course this made the overseer mad +and he grabbed a stick and started cussing and run at Uncle Bill. Old +Bill grabbed a single-tree and went meeting him. Dat white man all on +a sudden turned 'round and run fer dear life and I tell you, he fairly +bust old Red River wide open gitting away from there and nobody never +did see hide nor hair of him 'round to this day. + +Master Colbert run a stage stand and a ferry on Red River and he +didn't have much time to look after his farm and his niggers. He had +lots of land and lots of slaves. His house was a big log house, three +rooms on one side and three on the other, and there was a big open +hall between them. There was a big gallery clean across the front of +the house. Behind the house was the kitchen and the smokehouse. The +smokehouse was always filled with plenty of good meat and lard. They +would kill the polecat and dress it and take a sharp stick and run it +up their back jest under the flesh. They would also run one up each +leg and then turn him on his back and put him on top of the house and +let him freeze all night. The next morning they'd pull the sticks out +and all the scent would be on them sticks and the cat wouldn't smell +at all. They'd cook it like they did possum, bake it with taters or +make dumplings. + +We had plenty of salt. We got that from Grand Saline. Our coffee was +made from parched meal or wheat bran. We made it from dried sweet +potatoes that had been parched, too. + +One of our choicest dishes was "Tom Pashofa", an Indian dish. We'd +take corn and beat it in a mortar with a pestle. They took out the +husks with a riddle and a fanner. The riddle was a kind of a sifter. +When it was beat fine enough to go through the riddle we'd put it in a +pot and cook it with fresh pork or beef. We cooked our bread in a +Dutch oven or in the ashes. + +When we got sick we would take butterfly root and life-everlasting and +boil it and made a syrup and take it for colds. Balmony and queen's +delight boiled and mixed would make good blood medicine. + +The slaves lived in log cabins scattered back of the house. He wasn't +afraid they'd run off. They didn't know as much as the slaves in the +states, I reckon. But Master Frank had a half brother that was as mean +as he was good. I believe he was the meanest man the sun ever shined +on. His name was Buck Colbert and he claimed he was a patroller. He +was sho' bad to whup niggers. He'd stop a nigger and ask him if he had +a pass and even if they did he'd read it and tell them they had stayed +over time and he'd beat 'em most to death. He'd say they didn't have +any business off the farm and to git back there and stay there. + +One time he got mad at his baby's nurse because she couldn't git the +baby to stop crying and he hit her on the head with some fire-tongs +and she died. His wife got sick and she sent for me to come and take +care of her baby. I sho' didn't want to go and I begged so hard for +them not to make me that they sent an older woman who had a baby of +her own so she could nurse the baby if necessary. + +In the night the baby woke up and got to crying and Master Buck called +the woman and told her to git him quiet. She was sleepy and was sort +of slow and this made Buck mad and he made her strip her clothes off +to her waist and he began to whip her. His wife tried to git him to +quit and he told her he'd beat her iffen she didn't shut up. Sick as +as she was she slipped off and went to Master Frank's and woke him up +and got him to go and make Buck quit whipping her. He had beat her so +that she was cut up so bad she couldn't nurse her own baby any more. + +Master Buck kept on being bad till one day he got mad at one of his +own brothers and killed him. This made another one of his brothers mad +and he went to his house and killed him. Everybody was glad that Buck +was dead. + +We had lots of visitors. They'd stop at the stage inn that we kept. +One morning I was cleaning the rooms and I found a piece of money in +the bed where two men had slept. I thought it was a dime and I showed +it to my mammy and she told me it was a five dollar piece. I sho' was +happy fer I had been wanting some hoops fer my skirts like Misstress +had so Mammy said she would keep my money 'til I could send fer the +hoops. My brother got my money from my mammy and I didn't git my hoops +fer a long time. Miss Julie give me some later. + +When me and my husband got married we built us a log cabin about +half-way from Master Frank's house and Master Sam Love's house. I +would go to work at Master Frank's and Isom would go to work at Mister +Sam's. One day I was at home with jest my baby and a runner come by +and said the Yankee soldiers was coming. I looked 'round and I knowed +they would git my chickens. I had 'em in a pen right close to the +house to keep the varmints from gitting 'em so I decided to take up +the boards in the floor and put 'em in there as the wall logs come to +the ground and they couldn't git out. By the time I got my chickens +under the floor and the house locked tight the soldiers had got so +close I could hear their bugles blowing so I jest fairly flew over to +old Master's house. Them Yankees clumb down the chimbley and got every +one of my chickens and they killed about fifteen of Master Frank's +hogs. He went down to their camp and told the captain about it and he +paid him for his hogs and sent me some money for my chickens. + +We went to church all the time. We had both white and colored +preachers. Master Frank wasn't a Christian but he would help build +brush-arbors fer us to have church under and we sho' would have big +meetings I'll tell you. + +One day Master Frank was going through the woods close to where +niggers was having church. All on a sudden he started running and +beating hisself and hollering and the niggers all went to shouting and +saying "Thank the Lawd, Master Frank has done come through!" Master +Frank after a minute say, "Yes, through the worst of 'em." He had run +into a yellow jacket's nest. + + +One night my old man's master sent him to Sherman, Texas. He aimed to +come back that night so I stayed at home with jest my baby. It went to +sleep so I set down on the steps to wait and ever minute I thought I +could hear Isom coming through the woods. All a sudden I heard a +scream that fairly made my hair stand up. My dog that was laying out +in the yard give a low growl and come and set down right by me. He +kept growling real low. + +Directly, right close to the house I heard that scream again. It +sounded like a woman in mortal misery. I run into the house and made +the dog stay outside. I locked the door and then thought what must I +do. Supposing Isom did come home now and should meet that awful thing? +I heard it again. It wasn't more'n a hundred yards from the house. The +dog scratched on the door but I dassent open it to let him in. I +knowed by this time that it was a panther screaming. I turned my table +over and put it against the opening of the fireplace. I didn't aim fer +that thing to come down the chimbley and git us. + +Purty soon I heard it again a little mite further away--it was going +on by. I heard a gun fire. Thank God, I said, somebody else heard it +and was shooting at it. I set there on the side of my bed fer the rest +of the night with my baby in my arms and praying that Isom wouldn't +come home. He didn't come till about nine o'clock the next morning and +I was that glad to see him that I jest cried and cried. + +I ain't never seen many sperits but I've seen a few. One day I was +laying on my bed here by myself. My son Ed was cutting wood. I'd been +awful sick and I was powerful weak. I heard somebody walking real +light like they was barefooted. I said, "Who's dat?" + +He catch hold of my hand and he has the littlest hand I ever seen, and +he say, "You been mighty sick and I want you to come and go with me to +Sherman to see a doctor." + +I say, "I ain't got nobody at Sherman what knows me." + +He say, "You'd better come and go with me anyway." + +I jest lay there fer a minute and didn't say nothing and purty soon he +say, "Have you got any water?" + +I told him the water was on the porch and he got up and went outside +and I set in to calling Ed. He come hurrying and I asked him why he +didn't lock the door when he went out and I told him to go see if he +could see the little man and find out what he wanted. He went out and +looked everywhere but he couldn't find him nor he couldn't even find +his tracks. + +I always keep a butcher-knife near me but it was between the mattress +and the feather bed and I couldn't get to it. I don't guess it would +have done any good though fer I guess it was jest a sperit. + +The funniest thing that ever happened to me was when I was a real +young gal. Master and Miss Julie was going to see one of his sisters +that was sick. I went along to take care of the baby fer Miss Julie. +The baby was about a year old. I had a bag of clothes and the baby to +carry. I was riding a pacing mule and it was plumb gentle. I was +riding along behind Master Frank and Miss Julie and I went to sleep. I +lost the bag of clothes and never missed it. Purty soon I let the baby +slip out of my lap and I don't know how far I went before I nearly +fell off myself and jest think how I felt when I missed that baby! I +turned around and went back and found the baby setting in the trail +sort of crying. He wasn't hurt a mite as he fell in the grass. I got +off the mule and picked him up and had to look fer a log so I could +get back on again. + +Jest as I got back on Master Frank rode up. He had missed me and come +back to see what was wrong. I told him that I had lost the bag of +clothes but I didn't say anything about losing the baby. We never did +find the clothes and I sho' kept awake the rest of the way. I wasn't +going to risk losing that precious baby again! I guess the reason he +didn't cry much was because he was a Indian baby. He was sho' a sweet +baby though. + +Jest before the War people would come through the Territory stealing +niggers and selling 'em in the states. Us women dassent git fur from +the house. We wouldn't even go to the spring if we happened to see a +strange wagon or horsebacker. One of Master Sam Love's women was stole +and sold down in Texas. After freedom she made her way back to her +fambly. Master Frank sent one of my brothers to Sherman on an errand. +After several days the mule come back but we never did see my brother +again. We didn't know whether he run off or was stole and sold. + +I was glad to be free. What did I do and say? Well, I jest clapped my +hands together and said, "Thank God Almighty, I'se free at last!" + +I live on the forty acres that the government give me. I have been +blind for nine years and don't git off my bed much. I live here with +my son, Ed. Isom has been dead for over forty years. I had fifteen +children, but only ten of them are living. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +DANIEL WILLIAM LUCAS +Age 94 yrs. +Red Bird, Okla. + + +I remember them slave days well as it was yesterday, and when I get to +remembering the very first thing comes back to me is the little log +cabin where at I lived when I was a slave boy back 'fore the War. + +Just like yesterday--I see that little old cabin standing on a bit of +hill about a quarter-mile from the Master's brick mansion, and I see +into the cabin and there's the old home-made bed with rope cords +a-holding up the corn shuck bedding where on I use to sleep after +putting in the day at hoeing cotton or following a slow time mule team +down the corn rows 'till it got so dark the old overseer just +naturally had to call it a day. + +And then I see the old baker swinging in the fireplace. That cooked up +the corn pone to go with the fat side meats the Master Doctor (didn't +I tell you the Master was a doctor?) give us for the meals of the week +day. But on a Sunday morning we always had flour bread, excepting +after the War is over and then we is lucky do we get anything. + +Just like yesterday--I hear the old overseer making round of the +cabins every day at four, and I means in the morning, too, when the +night sleep is the best, and the folkses tumbling out of the door +getting ready for the fields. + +All the mens dressed about the same. Just like me. Wearing the grey +jeans with the blue shirt stuck in loose around the belt, brogan shoes +that feels like brakes on the feet about the hot time of day when the +old sun's a-grinning down like he was saying: "work, niggers, work!" +And the overseer is saying the same thing, only we pays more attention +to him 'cause of the whip he shakes around when the going gets kinder +slow down the row. + +Now I sees them getting ready for the slave auction. Many of 'em there +was. The Master Doctor done owned about two hundred slaves and +sometimes he sell some for to beat the bad crops. + +There they'd stand on the wooden blocks, their faces greased and +shiny, their arms and bodies pretty well greased too; seemed like they +looked better and stronger that way, maybe some other reason, I dunno. +And when the auction was over lots of the slaves would try to figger +out when would the next one be and worry some afraid they'd be +standing up there waiting for the buyers to punch and slap to see is +they sound of limb and able to do the days work without loafing down +the rows. + +There's the old white preacher who tried to tell the slaves about the +Lord. He had a mighty hard job sometimes, 'cause of the teaching was +hard to understand. And then--then he'd just seem to be riled with +anger and lay down the law of the Lord between cuss-words that all the +slaves could understand. So finally I guess everybody was religionized +even it was cussed into 'em right from the pulpit! + +That old preacher always makes me think of haunts, 'cause every +evening when I drive up the cows for milking, there's a old, old log +cabin right on the way that I pass every night--and it's so haunted +won't nobody pass it after the darkness covers in the daylight. + +I didn't always get by 'fore then, and the sounds I hear! Like they +was people inside jumping and knocking on the floor, maybe they was +dancing, I dunno. But they was a light in the big room. Wasn't the +moon a-shining through the windows either, 'cause sometimes I would +stop at the gate and say HELLO, then out go the light and the noises +would stop quick, like them haunts was a-scairt as me--and then, then +I run like the old preacher's Devil is after me with all his forks. + +Then along come the War. The slaves would go around from cabin to +cabin telling each other about how mean and cruel was the master or +the overseer, and maybe some of them would make for the North. They +was the unlucky ones, 'cause lots of times they was caught. + +And when the patrollers get 'em caught, they was due for a heavy +licking that would last for a long time. + +The slaves didn't know how to travel. The way would be marked when +they'd start North, but somehow they'd get lost, 'cause they didn't +know one direction from another, they was so scairt. + +Just like yesterday--I remember the close of the War. Nothing exciting +about it down on the plantation. Just the old overseer come around and +say: + +"The Yankees has whipped the Rebels and the War is over. But the Old +Master don't want you to leave. He just wants you to stay right on +here where at is your home. That's what the Master say is best for you +to do." + +That's what I do, but some of them other slaves is kinder filled up +with the idea of freedom and wants to find out is it good or bad, so +they leave and scatter round. + +But I stays, and the Master Doctor he pays me ten dollars every month, +gives me board and my sleeping place just like always, and when I gets +sick there he is with the herb medicine for my ailment and I is well +again. + +It's long after the War before I leaves the old place. And that's when +I gets married in 1885. That was my first licensed wife and we is +married in Holly Springs. Her name was Josephine and we has maybe +eight-ten children, I dunno. + +And I is thankful they ain't none of my children born slaves and have +to remember all them terrible days when we was ruled by the whip--like +I remember it, just like it was yesterday. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + +BERT LUSTER +Age 85 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma + + +I'll be jest frank, I'm not for sho' when I was born, but it was in +1853. Don't know the month, but I was sho' born in 1853 in Watson +County, Tennessee. You see my father was owned by Master Luster and my +mother was owned by Masters Joe and Bill Asterns (father and son). I +can remember when Master Astern moved from Watson County, Tennessee he +brought me and my mother with him to Barnum County Seat, Texas. Master +Astern owned about twelve slaves, and dey was all Astern 'cept Miriah +Elmore's son Jim. He owned 'bout five or six hundred acres of ground, +and de slaves raised and shucked all de corn and picked all de cotton. +De whites folks lived in a big double log house and we slaves lived in +log cabins. Our white folks fed us darkies! We ate nearly ever'thing +dey ate. Dey ate turkey, chickens, ducks, geese, fish and we killed +beef, pork, rabbits and deer. Yes, and possums too. And whenever we +killed beef we tanned the hide and dere was a white man who made shoes +for de white folks and us darkies. I tell you I'm not gonna lie, dem +white folks was good to us darkies. We didn't have no mean overseer. +Master Astern and his son jest told us niggers what to do and we did +it, but 50 miles away dem niggers had a mean overseer, and dey called +him "poor white trash", "old whooser", and sometime "old red neck", +and he would sho' beat 'em turrible iffen dey didn't do jest like he +wanted 'em to. + +Seem like I can hear dem "nigger hounds" barking now. You see whenever +a darky would get a permit to go off and wouldn't come back dey would +put de "nigger hounds" on his trail and run dat nigger down. + +De white women wove and spin our clothes. You know dey had looms, +spins, and weavers. Us darkies would stay up all night sometime +sep'rating cotton from the seed. When dem old darkies got sleepy dey +would prop their eyes open wid straws. + +Sho', we wore very fine clothes for dem days. You know dey dyed the +cloth with poke berries. + +We cradled de wheat on pins, caught the grain, carried it to de mill +and had it ground. Sho', I ate biscuits and cornbread too. Keep +telling you dat we ate. + +We got de very best of care when we got sick. Don't you let nobody +tell you dem white folks tried to kill out dem darkies 'cause when a +darkey took sick dey would send and git de very best doctors round dat +country. Dey would give us ice water when we got sick. You see we put +up ice in saw dust in winter and when a slave got sick dey give him +ice water, sometimes sage tea and chicken gruel. Dey wanted to keep +dem darkies fat so dey could git top price for 'em. I never saw a +slave sold, but my half brother's white folks let him work and buy +hisself. + +I was about 14, and I milked the cows, packed water, seeded cotton, +churned milk up at de Big House and jest first one chore and den +another. My mother cooked up at de Big House. + +Dey was a lot of talk 'bout conjure but I didn't believe in it. Course +dem darkies could do everything to one another, and have one another +scared, but dey couldn't conjure dat overseer and stop him from +beating 'em near to death. Course he didn't flog 'em till dey done +sumping. + +I married my woman, Nannie Wilkerson, 58 years ago. Dat was after +slavery, and I love her, honest to God I does. Course in dem days we +didn't buy no license, we jest got permits from old Master and jumped +over a broom stick and jest got married. + +I sho' did hate when de Yanks come 'cause our white folks was good to +us, and jest take us right along to church with 'em. We didn't work on +Sad'days or Christmas. + +We raised gardens, truck patches and such for spending change. + +I sho' caught hell after dem Yanks come. Befo' de war, you see de +patroller rode all nite but wouldn't bother a darkey iffen he wouldn't +run off. Why dem darkeys would run off I jest couldn't see. + +Dose Yanks treated old master and mistress so mean. Dey took all his +hams, chickens, and drove his cattle out of the pasture, but didn't +bother us niggers honest. Dey drove old master Aster off'n his own +plantation and we all hid in de corn field. + +My mother took me to Greenville, Texas, 'cause my step-pappy was one +of dem half smart niggers round dere trying to preach and de Ku Klux +Klan beat him half to death. + +Dere was some white folks who would take us to church wid 'em--dis dis +[TR: sic] was aftah the war now--and one night we was all sitting up +thar and one old woman with one leg was dah and when dem Klans shot in +amongst us niggers and white folks aunt Mandy beat all of us home. Yes +suh. + +My first two teachers was two white men, and dem Klans shot in de +hotel what dey lived in, but dey had school for us niggers jest de +same. After dat, dose Klans got so bad Uncle Sam sent soljers down +dere to keep peace. + +After de soljers come and run de Klans out we worked hard dat fall and +made good crops. 'Bout three years later I came to Indian Territory in +search of educating my kids. + +I landed here 46 years ago on a farm not far from now Oklahoma City. I +got to be a prosperous farmer. My bale of cotton amongst 5,000 bales +won the blue ribbon at Guthrie, Oklahoma, and dat bale of cotton and +being a good democrat won for me a good job as a clerk on the +Agriculture Board at the State Capitol. All de white folks liked me +and still like me and called me "cotton king." + +I have jest three chillun living. Walter is parcel post clerk here at +de post office downtown. Delia Jenkins, my daughter is a housewife and +Cleo Luckett, my other daughter, a common laborer. + +Have been a christian 20 years. Jest got sorry for my wicked ways. I +am a member of the Church of God. My wife is a member of the Church of +Christ. I'm a good democrat and she is a good republican. + +My fav'rite songs is: "Dark Was the Nite, and Cold the Ground" and +"Couldn't Hear Nobody Pray." + +I'm glad slavery is over, but I don't think dem white folks was +fighting to free us niggers. God freed us. Of course, Abraham Lincoln +was a pretty fine man. Don't know much about Jeff Davis. Never seen +him. Yes, and Booker T. Washington. He was one of the Negro leaders. +The first Negro to represent the Negroes in Washington. He was a great +leader. + +During slavery time never heerd of a cullud man committing 'sault on a +white woman. The white and cullud all went to church together too. +Niggers and white shouted alike. + +I remember some of the little games we played now: "Fox in the wall", +"Mollie, Mollie Bride", and "Hide and go seek." + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + +STEPHEN McCRAY +Age 88 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Huntsville County, Alabama, right where the Scottsboro +boys was in jail, in 1850. + +My parents was Wash and Winnie McCray. They was the mother and father +of 22 chillun. Jest five lived to be grown and the rest died at baby +age. My father's mother and father was named Mandy and Peter McCray, +and my mother's mother and father was Ruthie and Charlie McCray. They +all had the same Master, Mister McCray, all the way thoo'. + +We live in log huts and when I left home grown, I left my folks living +in the same log huts. Beds was put together with ropes and called rope +beds. No springs was ever heard of by white or cullud as I knows of. + +All the work I ever done was pick up chips for my grandma to cook +with. I was kept busy doing this all day. + +The big boys went out and got rabbits, possums and fish. I would sho' +lak to be in old Alabama fishing, 'cause I am a fisherman. There is +sho' some pretty water in Alabama and as swift as cars run here. Water +so clear and blue you can see the fish way down, and dey wouldn't bite +to save your life. + +Slaves had their own gardens. All got Friday and Sadday to work in +garden during garden time. I liked cornbread best and I'd give a +dollar to git some of the bread we had on those good old days and I +ain't joking. I went in shirt tail all the time. Never had on no pants +'til I was 15 years old. No shoes, 'cept two or three winters. Never +had a hat 'til I was a great big boy. + +Marriage was performed by getting permission from Master and go where +the woman of your choice had prepared the bed, undress and flat-footed +jump a broom-stick together into the bed. + +Master had a brick house for hisself and the overseer. They was the +only ones on the place. The overseer woke up the slaves all the way +from 2 o'clock till 4 o'clock of mornings. He wasn't nothing but white +trash. Nothing else in the world but that. They worked till they +couldn't see how to work. I jest couldn't jedge the size of that big +place, and there was a mess of slaves, not less'n three hundred. + +I doesn't have no eggycation, edgecation, or ejecation, and about all +I can do is spell. I jest spell till I get the pronouncements. + +We had church, but iffen the white folks caught you at it, you was +beat most nigh to death. We used a big pot turned down to keep our +voices down. When we went to hear white preachers, he would say, "Obey +your master and mistress." I am a hard shell-flint Baptist. I was +baptised in Pine Bluff, Arkansas. Our baptizing song was mostly "On +Jordan's Stormy Banks I Stand" and our funeral song was "Hark From The +Tomb." + +We had some slaves who would try to run off to the North but the white +folks would catch 'em with blood hounds and beat 'em to death. Them +patrollers done their work mostly at night. One night I was sleeping +on cotton and the patrollers come to our house and ask for water. +Happen we had plenty. They drunk a whole lot and got warm and told my +father to be a good nigger and they wouldn't bother him at all. They +raided till General Grant come thoo'. He sent troops out looking for +Klu Klux Klanners and killed 'em jest lak killing black birds. General +Grant was one of the men that caused us to set heah free today and +able to talk together without being killed. + +I didn't and don't believe in no conjure. No sensible person do +either. We had a doctor on the place. Ever master had a doctor who +waited on his slaves, but we wore asafetida or onion 'round our necks +to keep off diseases. A dime was put 'round a teething baby's neck to +make it tooth easy, and it sho' helped too. But today all folks done +got 'bove that. + +The old folks talked very little of freedom and the chillun knew +nothing at all of it, and that they heard they was daresome to mention +it. + +Bushwhacker, nothing but poor white trash, come thoo' and killed all +the little nigger chillun they could lay hands on. I was hid under the +house with a big rag on my mouf many a time. Them Klu Klux after +slavery sho' got enough from them soldiers to last 'em. + +I was married to Kan Pry in 1884. Two chillun was born. The girl is +living and the boy might be, but I don't know. My daughter works out +in service. + +I wish Lincoln was here now. He done more for the black face than any +one in that seat. Old Jeff Davis kept slavery up till General Grant +met him at the battle. Lincoln sho' snowed him under. General Grant +put fire under him jest lak I'm fixing to do my pipe. Booker T. +Washington was jest all right. + +Every time I think of slavery and if it done the race any good, I +think of the story of the coon and dog who met. The coon said to the +dog "Why is it you're so fat and I am so poor, and we is both +animals?" The dog said: "I lay round Master's house and let him kick +me and he gives me a piece of bread right on." Said the coon to the +dog: "Better then that I stay poor." Them's my sentiment. I'm lak the +coon, I don't believe in 'buse. + +I used to be the most wicked man in the world but a voice converted me +by saying, "Friend, friend, why is you better to everybody else than +you is to your self? You are sending your soul to hell." And from that +day I lived like a Christian. People here don't live right and I don't +lak to 'tend church. I base my Christian life on: "Believe in me, +trust my work and you shall be saved, for I am God and beside me there +is no other." + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +HANNAH McFARLAND +Age 85 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Georgetown, South Carolina, February 29, 1853. My father +was name James Gainey and my mother was name Katie Gainey. There was +three chillun born to my folks doing slavery. My father was a free +man, but my mother was de slave of the Sampsons, some Jews. My father +was de richest Negro in South Carolina doing this time. He bought all +three of we chillun for $1,000 apiece, but dem Jews jest wouldn't sell +mamma. Dey was mighty sweet to her. She come home ever night and +stayed with us. Doing the day a Virginian nigger woman stayed with us +and she sho' was mean to we chillun. She used to beat us sumpin' +terrible. You know Virginia people is mean to cullud people. My father +bought her from some white folks too. + +We lived in town and in a good house. + +It was a good deal of confusion doing de War. I waited on the Yankees. +Dey captured mamma's white people's house. Dey tried to git mamma to +tell dem jest whut de white folks done done to her and all she could +say was dey was good to her. Shucks, dey wouldn't sell her. She jest +told them she had a free husband. + +My father was a blockader. He run rafts from one place to another and +sho' made a lot of money. He was drowned while doing this while I was +a good size child. + +Dem patrollers tied you to a whipping post iffen dey caught you out +after 10 o'clock. They 'tempted to do my mother that way, but my papa +sho' stopped dat. I can't say I lak white people even now, 'cause dey +done done so much agin us. + +I was free, but I couldn't go to school, 'cause we didn't had none. I +been in Oklahoma over 40 years. Have done some traveling and could go +some whar else, but I jest stays here 'cause I ain't got no desire to +travel. + +All we ever wore to keep off diseases was asafetida, nothing else. + +I done heard more 'bout conjure in Oklahoma than I ever heerd in South +Carolina. All dat stuff is in Louisiana. I didn't heah nothing 'bout +the Klu Klux Klan till I come to Oklahoma neither. More devilment in +Oklahoma than any place I know. South got more religion too. I jest as +soon be back with the Rebels. + +Bushwhackers whipped you iffen you stayed out late, and sho' nuff if +dey didn't lak you. + +I felt sorry for Jeff Davis when the Yankees drilled him through the +streets. I saw it all. I said, "Mama, Mama, look, dey got old Jeff +Davis." She said, "Be quiet, dey'll lynch you." She didn't know no +better! She was a old slave nigger. I showed the Yankees where the +white folks hid their silver and money and jewelry, and Mamma sho' +whipped me about it too. She was no fool 'bout slavery. Slavery sho' +didn't he'p us none to my belief. + +I didn't care much 'bout Lincoln. It was nice of him to free us, but +'course he didn't want to. + +The overseer was sho' nothing but poor white trash, the kind who +didn't lak niggers and dey still don't, old devils. Don't let 'em fool +you, dey don't lak a nigger a'tall. + +I'm a Methodist. People ought to praise God 'cause he done done so +much for dese sinners. Dey was heap more religious in my early days. I +jined church in 1863. I jined the Holiness so I could git baptized and +the Methodist wouldn't baptize you. After my baptism, I went back to +the Methodist Church. You know my pastor, Reverend Miller, is the +first Methodist preacher I ever knowed that was baptized, and that +baptizes everybody. + +I was married in Akin, South Carolina to Andrew Pew. We had 12 +chillun. Jest one boy is my only living child today. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +MARSHALL MACK +Age 83 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born September 10, 1854. I am the second child of five. My +mother was named Sylvestus Mack and my father Booker Huddleston. I do +not remember my mother's master, 'cause he died before I was born. My +Mistress was named Nancy Mack. She was the mother of six children, +four boys and two girls. Three of dem boys went to the War and one +packed and went off somewhar and nobody heard from him doing of the +whole War. But soon as the War was over he come home and he never told +whar he had been. + +I never saw but one grown person flogged during slavery and dat was my +mother. The younger son of my mistress whipped her one morning in de +kitchen. His name was Jack. De slaves on Mistress' place was treated +so good, all de people round and 'bout called us "Mack's Free +Niggers." Dis was 14 miles northwest of Liberty, county seat of +Bedford County, Virginia. + +One day while de War was going on, my Mistress got a letter from her +son Jim wid jest one line. Dat was "Mother: Jack's brains spattered on +my gun this morning." That was all he written. + +Jack Huddleston owned my father, who was his half-brother, and he was +the meanest man I ever seen. He flogged my father with tobacco sticks +and my mother after these floggings (which I never seen) had to pick +splinters out of his back. My father had to slip off a night to come +and visit us. He lived a mile and a half from our house on the south +side of the Blue Ridge Mountains, and it sho' is a rocky country. He'd +oversleep hisself and git up running. We would stand in our door and +hear him running over them rocks til he got home. He was trying to git +dere before his master called him. + +It was a law among the slave-holders that if you left your master's +place, you had to have a pass, for if the patroller caught you without +one, he would give you 9 and 30 lashes and carry you to your master, +and if he was mean, you got the same again! + +On the 3-foot fireplace my mother and father cooked ash cakes and my +father having to run to work, had to wash his cakes off in a spring +betwixt our house and his. My mother was the cook in the Big House. + +All the time we would see "nigger traders" coming through the country. +I have seen men and women cuffed to 60-foot chains being took to +Lynchburg, Va., to the block to be sold. Now I am talking 'bout what I +know, for it would not mean one thing for me to lie. I ain't jest +heard dis. My uncle John was a carpenter and always took Mistress' +chillun to school in a two-horse surrey. On sech trips, the chillun +learned my uncle to read and write. Dey slipped and done this, for it +was a law among slave-holders that a slave not be caught wid a book. + +One morning when I was on my way to de mill with a sack of corn, I had +to go down de main pike. I saw sech a fog 'til I rid close enough to +see what was gwine on. I heard someone say "close up." I was told +since dat it was Hood's Raid. They took every slave that could carry a +gun. It was at dis time, Negroes went into de service. Lee was +whipping Grant two battles to one 'til them raids, and den Grant +whipped Lee two battles to one, 'cause he had Negroes in the Union +Army. Dey took Negroes and all de white people's food. Dey killed +chickens and picked dem on horseback. I never will forgit that time +long as I live. + +Ever day I had to get the mail for three families. I carried it around +in a bag and each family took his'n out. I guess I was one of the +first Negro mailmen. + +We had church on the place and had right good meetings. Everybody went +and took part in the service. We had to have passes to go off the +place to the meetings. + +The children wore just one garment from this time of year (spring) +till the frost fell. Mistress' daughters made dese. We sure kept +healthy and fat. + +I will be 83 years of age September 10, 1937 and am enjoying my second +eyesight. I could not see a thing hardly for some few years, but now I +can read sometimes without glasses. I keep my lawn in first class +shape and work all the time. I think this is 'cause I never was +treated bad during slavery. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + +ALLEN V. MANNING +Age 87 +Tulsa, Okla. + + +I always been somewhar in the South, mostly in Texas when I was a +young man, and of course us Negroes never got much of a show in court +matters, but I reckon if I had of had the chance to set on a jury I +would of made a mighty poor out at it. + +No sir, I jest can't set in judgement on nobody, 'cause I learned when +I was jest a little boy that good people and bad people--makes no +difference which--jest keep on living and doing like they been taught, +and I jest can't seem to blame them none for what they do iffen they +been taught that way. + +I was born in slavery, and I belonged to a Baptist preacher. Until I +was fifteen years old I was taught that I was his own chattel-property, +and he could do with me like he wanted to, but he had been taught that +way too, and we both believed it. I never did hold nothing against him +for being hard on Negroes sometimes, and I don't think I ever would of +had any trouble even if I had of growed up and died in slavery. + +The young Negroes don't know nothing 'bout that today, and lots of +them are rising up and amounting to something, and all us Negroes is +proud of them. You see, it's because they been taught that they got as +good a show to be something as anybody, if they tries hard. + +Well, this old Negro knows one thing: they getting somewheres 'cause +the young whitefolks is letting them and helping them to do it, 'cause +the whitefolks has been taught the same way, and I praise God its +getting to be that way, too. But it all go to show, people do like +they been taught to do. + +Like I say, my master was a preacher and a kind man, but he treated +the Negroes jest like they treated him. He been taught that they was +jest like his work hosses, and if they act like they his work hosses +they git along all right. But if they don't--Oh, oh! + +Like the Dixie song say, I was born "on a frosty mornin'" at the +plantation in Clarke County, Mississippi, in the fall of 1850 they +tell me. The old place looked the same all the time I was a child, +clean up to when we pull out and leave the second year of the War. + +I can shet my eyes and think about it and it seem to come right up in +front of me jest like it looked. From my Pappy's cabin the Big House +was off to the west, close to the big road, and most of the fields +stretched off to the north. They was a big patch of woods off to the +east, and no much open land between us and the Chickasawhay River. Off +to the southwest a few miles was the Bucatunna Creek, and the +plantation was kind of in the forks between them, a little ways east +of Quitman, Mississippi. + +Old Master's people been living at that place a mighty long time, and +most the houses and barns was old and been repaired time and time +again, but it was a mighty pretty place. The Big House was built long, +with a lot of rooms all in a row and a long porch, but it wasn't fine +like a lot of the houses we seen as we passed by when we left that +place to go to Louisiana. + +Old Master didn't have any overseer hired, but him and his boys looked +after the place and had a Negro we called the driver. We-all shore +hated that old black man, but I forget his name now. That driver never +was allowed to think up nothing for the slaves to do, but jest was +told to make them work hard at what the master and his boys told them +to do. Whitefolks had to set them at a job and then old driver would +whoopity and whoopity around, and egg them and egg them until they +finish up, so they can go at something else. He worked hard hisself, +though, and set a mighty hard pattern for the rest to keep up with. +Like I say, he been taught he didn't know how to think, so he didn't +try. + +Old Mistress name was Mary, and they had two daughters, Levia and +Betty. Then they had three sons. The oldest was named Bill Junior, and +he was plumb grown when I was a boy, but the other two, Jedson and +Jim, was jest a little older then me. + +Old Master didn't have but two or three single Negroes, but he had +several families, and most of them was big ones. My own family was +pretty good size, but three of the children was born free. Pappy's +name was William and Mammy's was Lucy. My brother Joe was the oldest +child and then come Adeline, Harriet, and Texana and Betty before the +surrender, and then Henry, Mattie and Louisa after it. + +When the War come along old Master jest didn't know what to do. He +always been taught not to raise his hand up and kill nobody--no matter +how come--and he jest kept holding out against all them that was +talking about fighting, and he wouldn't go and fight. He been taught +that it was all right to have slaves and treat them like he want to, +but he been taught it was sinful to go fight and kill to keep them, +and he lived up to what he been taught. + +They was some Choctaw people lived 'round there, and they flew up and +went right off to the War, and Mr. Trot Hand and Mr. Joe Brown that +had plantations on the big road towards Quitman both went off with +their grown boys right at the start, but old Master was a preacher and +he jest stayed out of it. I remember one day I was sent up to the Big +House and I heard old Master and some men out at the gate 'xpounding +about the War. Some of the men had on soldier clothes, and they acted +like they was mad. Somebody tell me later on that they was getting up +a home guard because the yankees done got down in Alabama not far +away, but old Master wouldn't go in with them. + +Two, three days after that, it seems like, old Master come down to the +quarters and say git everything bundled up and in the wagons for a +long trip. The Negroes all come in and everybody pitch in to help pack +up the wagons. Then old Master look around and he can't find Andy. +Andy was one Negro that never did act like he been taught, and old +Master's patience about wore out with him anyways. + +We all know that Andy done run off again, but we didn't know where to. +Leastwise all the Negroes tell old Master that. But old Master soon +show us we done the work and he done the thinking! He jest goes ahead +and keeps all the Negroes busy fixing up the wagons and bundling up +the stuff to travel, and keeps us all in his sight all the time, and +says nothing about Andy being gone. + +Then that night he sends for a white man name Clements that got some +blood hounds, and him and Mr. Clements takes time about staying awake +and watching all the cabins to see nobody slips out of them. Everybody +was afraid to stick their head out. + +Early next morning we has all the wagons ready to drive right off, and +old Master call Andy's brother up to him. He say, "You go down to that +spring and wait, and when Andy come down to the spring to fill that +cedar bucket you stole out'n the smokehouse for him to git water in +you tell him to come on in here. Tell him I know he is hiding out way +down the branch whar he can come up wading the water clean up to the +cornfield and the melon patch, so the hounds won't git his scent, but +I'm going to send the hounds down there if he don't come on in right +now." Then we all knowed we was for the work and old Master was for +the thinking, 'cause pretty soon Andy come on in. He'd been right whar +old Master think he is. + +About that time Mr. Sears come riding down the big road. He was a +deacon in old Master's church, and he see us all packed up to leave +and so he light at the big gate and walk up to whar we is. He ask old +Master where we all lighting out for, and old Master say for +Louisiana. We Negroes don't know where that is. Then old deacon say +what old Master going to do with Andy, 'cause there stood Mr. Clements +holding his bloodhounds and old Master had his cat-o-nine-tails in his +hand. + +Old Master say just watch him, and he tell Andy if he can make it to +that big black gum tree down at the gate before the hounds git him he +can stay right up in that tree and watch us all drive off. Then he +tell Andy to git! + +Poor Andy jest git hold of the bottom limbs when the blood hounds grab +him and pull him down onto the ground. Time old Master and Mr. +Clements git down there the hounds done tore off all Andy's clothes +and bit him all over bad. He was rolling on the ground and holding his +shirt up 'round his throat when Mr. Clements git there and pull the +hounds off of him. + +Then old Master light in on him with that cat-o-nine-tails, and I +don't know how many lashes he give him, but he jest bloody all over +and done fainted pretty soon. Old Deacon Sears stand it as long as he +can and then he step up and grab old Master's arm and say, "Time to +stop, Brother! I'm speaking in the name of Jesus!" Old Master quit +then, but he still powerful mad. I don't think he believe Andy going +to make that tree when he tell him that. + +Then he turn on Andy's brother and give him a good beating too, and we +all drive off and leave Andy setting on the ground under a tree and +old Deacon standing by him. I don't know what ever become of Andy, but +I reckon maybe he went and live with old Deacon Sears until he was +free. + +When I think back and remember it, it all seems kind of strange, but +it seem like old Master and old Deacon both think the same way. They +kind of understand that old Master had a right to beat his Negro all +he wanted to for running off, and he had a right to set the hounds on +him if he did, but he shouldn't of beat him so hard after he told him +he was going let him off if he made the tree, and he ought to keep his +word even if Andy was his own slave. That's the way both them white +men had been taught, and that was the way they both lived. + +Old Master had about five wagons on that trip down into Louisiana, but +they was all full of stuff and only the old slaves and children could +ride in them. I was big enough to walk most of the time, but one time +I walked in the sun so long that I got sick and they put me in the +wagon for most the rest of the way. + +We would come to places where the people said the Yankees had been and +gone, but we didn't run into any Yankees. They was most to the north +of us I reckon, because we went on down to the south part of +Mississippi and ferried across the big river at Baton Rouge. Then we +went on to Lafayette, Louisiana, before we settled down anywhere. + +All us Negroes thought that was a mighty strange place. We would hear +white folks talking and we couldn't understand what they said, and +lots of the Negroes talked the same way, too. It was all full of +French people around Lafayette, but they had all their menfolks in the +Confederate Army just the same. I seen lots of men in butternut +clothes coming and going hither and yon, but they wasn't in bunches. +They was mostly coming home to see their folks. + +Everybody was scared all the time, and two--three times when old +Master hired his Negroes out to work the man that hired them quit his +place and went on west before they got the crop in. But old Master +got a place and we put in a cotton crop, and I think he got some money +by selling his place in Mississippi. Anyway, pretty soon after the +cotton was all in he moves again and goes to a place on Simonette Lake +for the winter. It aint a bit cold in that place, and we didn't have +no fire 'cepting to cook, and sometimes a little charcoal fire in some +crock pots that the people left on the place when they went on out to +Texas. + +The next spring old Master loaded up again and we struck out for +Texas, when the Yankees got too close again. But Master Bill didn't go +to Texas, because the Confederates done come that winter and made him +go to the army. I think they took him to New Orleans, and old Master +was hopping mad, but he couldn't do anything or they would make him go +too, even if he was a preacher. + +I think he left out of there partly because he didn't like the people +at that place. They wasn't no Baptists around anywheres, they was all +Catholics, and old Master didn't like them. + +About that time it look like everybody in the world was going to +Texas. When we would be going down the road we would have to walk +along the side all the time to let the wagons go past, all loaded with +folks going to Texas. + +Pretty soon old Master say git the wagons loaded again, and this time +we start out with some other people, going north. We go north a while +and then turn west, and cross the Sabine River and go to Nachedoches, +Texas. Me and my brother Joe and my sister Adeline walked nearly all +the way, but my little sister Harriet and my mammy rid in a wagon. +Mammy was mighty poorly, and jest when we got to the Sabine bottoms +she had another baby. Old Master didn't like it 'cause it was a girl, +but he named her Texana on account of where she was born and told us +children to wait on Mammy good and maybe we would get a little brother +next time. + +But we didn't. Old Master went with a whole bunch of wagons on out to +the prairie country in Coryell County and set up a farm where we just +had to break the sod and didn't have to clear off much. And the next +baby Mammy had the next year was a girl. We named her Betty because +Mistress jest have a baby a little while before and its name was +Betty. + +Old Master's place was right at the corner where Coryell and McLennan +and Bosque Counties come together, and we raised mostly cotton and +jest a little corn for feed. He seem like he changed a lot since we +left Mississippi, and seem like he paid more attention to us and +looked after us better. But most the people that already live there +when we git there was mighty hard on their Negroes. They was mostly +hard drinkers and hard talkers, and they work and fight jest as hard +as they talk, too! + +One day Old Master come out from town and tell us that we all been set +free, and we can go or stay jest as we wish. All of my family stay on +the place and he pay us half as shares on all we make. Pretty soon the +whitefolks begin to cut down on the shares, and the renters git only a +third and some less, and the Negroes begin to drift out to other +places, but old Master stick to the halves a year or so after that. +Then he come down to a third too. + +It seem like the white people can't git over us being free, and they +do everything to hold us down all the time. We don't git no schools +for a long time, and I never see the inside of a school. I jest grow +up on hard work. And we can't go 'round where they have the voting, +unless we want to ketch a whipping some night, and we have to jest +keep on bowing and scraping when we are 'round white folks like we did +when we was slaves. They had us down and they kept us down. But that +was the way they been taught, and I don't blame them for it none, I +reckon. + +When I git about thirty years old I marry Betty Sadler close to Waco, +and we come up to the Creek Nation forty years ago. We come to +Muskogee first, and then to Tulsa about thirty seven years ago. + +We had ten children but only seven are alive. Three girls and a boy +live here in Tulsa and we got one boy in Muskogee and one at +Frederick, Oklahoma. + +I sells milk and makes my living, and I keeps so busy I don't think +back on the old days much, but if anybody ask me why the Texas Negroes +been kept down so much I can tell them. If they set like I did on the +bank at that ferry across the Sabine, and see all that long line of +covered wagons, miles and miles of them, crossing that river and going +west with all they got left out of the War, it aint hard to +understand. + +Them whitefolks done had everything they had tore up, or had to run +away from the places they lived, and they brung their Negroes out to +Texas and then right away they lost them too. They always had them +Negroes, and lots of them had mighty fine places back in the old +states, and then they had to go out and live in sod houses and little +old boxed shotguns and turn their Negroes loose. They didn't see no +justice in it then, and most of them never did until they died. The +folks that stayed at home and didn't straggle all over the country had +their old places to live on and their old friends around them, but +them Texans was different. + +So I says, when they done us the way they did they was jest doing the +way they was taught. I don't blame them, because anybody will do that. + +Whitefolks mighty decent to me now, and I always tried to teach my +children to be respectful and act like they think the whitefolks they +dealing with expects them to act. That the way to git along, because +some folks been taught one way and some been taught another, and folks +always thinks the way they been taught. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +BOB MAYNARD, AGE 79 +23 East Choctaw +Weleetka, Oklahoma. + + +I was born near what is now Marlin, Texas, Falls County. My father was +Robert Maynard and my mother was Chanie Maynard, both born slaves. Our +Master, Gerard Branum, was a very old man and wore long white +whiskers. He sho' was a fine built man, and walked straight and tall +like a young man. + +I was too little to do much work so my job was to carry the key basket +for old Mistress. I sho' was proud of that job. The basket held the +keys to the pantry, the kitchen, the linen closet, and extra keys to +the rooms and smokehouse. When old Mistress started out on her rounds +every morning she'd call to me to get de basket and away we'd go. I'd +run errands for all the house help too, so I was kept purty busy. + +The "big house" was a fine one. It was a big two-story white house +made of pine lumber. There was a big porch or veranda across the front +and wings on the east and west. The house faced south. There was big +round white posts that went clean up to the roof and there was a big +porch upstairs too. I believe the house was what you'd call colonial +style. There was twelve or fifteen rooms and a big wide stairway. It +was a purty place, with a yard and big trees and the house that set in +a walnut and pecan grove. They was graveled walks and driveways and +all along by the driveway was cedars. There was a hedge close to the +house and a flower garden with purty roses, holly hocks and a lot of +others I don't know the name of. + +Back to the right of the house was the smokehouse, kept full of meat, +and further back was the big barns. Old Master kept a spanking pair of +carriage horses and several fine riding horses. He kept several pairs +of mules, too, to pull the plow. He had some ox teams too. + +To the left and back of the "big house" was the quarters. He owned +about two thousand acres of land and three hundred slaves. He kept a +white overseer and the colored overlooker was my uncle. He sho' saw +that the gang worked. He saw to it that the cotton was took to the +gin. They used oxen to pull the wagons full of cotton. There was two +gins on the plantation. Had to have two for it was slow work to gin a +bale of cotton as it was run by horse power. + +Old Master raised hundreds of hogs; he raised practically all the food +we et. He gave the food out to each family and they done their own +cooking except during harvest. The farm hands was fed at the "big +house." They was called in from the farm by a big bell. + +Sunday was our only day for recreation. We went to church at our own +church, and we could sing and shout jest as loud as we pleased and it +didn't disturb nobody. + +During the week after supper we would all set round the doors outside +and sing or play music. The only musical instruments we had was a jug +or big bottle, a skillet lid or frying pan that they'd hit with a +stick or a bone. We had a flute too, made out of reed cane and it'd +make good music. Sometimes we'd sing and dance so long and loud old +Master'd have to make us stop and go to bed. + +The Patrollers, Ku Kluxers or night riders come by sometimes at night +to scare the niggers and make 'em behave. Sometimes the slaves would +run off and the Patroller would catch 'em and have 'em whipped. I've +seen that done lots of times. They was some wooden stocks (a sort of +trough) and they'd put the darky in this and strap him down, take off +his clothers and give him 25 to 50 licks, 'cording to what he had +done. + +I reckon old Master had everything his heart could wish for at this +time. Old Mistress was a fine lady and she always went dressed up. She +wore long trains on her skirts and I'd walk behind her and hold her +train up when she made de rounds. She was awful good to me. I slept on +the floor in her little boy's room, and she give me apples and candy +just like she did him. Old Master gave ever chick and child good warm +clothes for winter. We had store boughten shoes but the women made our +clothes. For underwear we all wore 'lowers' but no shirts. + +After the war started old Master took a lot of his slaves and went to +Natchez, Mississippi. He thought he'd have a better chance of keeping +us there I guess, and he was afraid we'd be greed [TR: freed?] and he +started running with us. I remember when General Grant blowed up +Vicksburg. I had a free born Uncle and Aunt who sometimes visited in +the North and they'd till us how easy it was up there and it sho' made +us all want to be free. + +I think Abe Lincoln was next to de Lawd. He done all he could for de +slaves; he set 'em free. People in the South knowed they'd lose their +slaves when he was elected president. 'Fore the election he traveled +all over the South and he come to our house and slept in old Mistress' +bed. Didn't nobody know who he was. It was a custom to take strangers +in and put them up for one night or longer, so he come to our house +and he watched close. He seen how the niggers come in on Saturday and +drawed four pounds of meat and a peck of meal for a week's rations. He +also saw 'em whipped and sold. When he got back up north he writ old +Master a letter and told him he was going to have to free his slaves, +that everybody was going to have to, that the North was going to see +to it. He also told him that he had visited at his house and if he +doubted it to go in the room he slept in and look on the bedstead at +the head and he'd see where he'd writ his name. Sho' nuff, there was +his name: A. Lincoln. + +Didn't none of us like Jeff Davis. We all liked Robert E. Lee, but we +was glad that Grant whipped him. + +When the War was over, old Master called all the darkies in and lined +'em up in a row. He told 'em they was free to go and do as they +pleased. It was six months before any of us left him. + +Darkies could vote in Mississippi. Fred Douglas, a colored man, came +to Natchez and made political speeches for General Grant. + +After the war they was a big steam boat line on the Mississippi River +known as the Robert E. Lee Line. They sho' was fine boats too. + +We used to have lots of Confederate money. Five cent pieces, two bit +pieces, half dollar bills and half dimes. During the war old Master +dug a long trench and buried all de silver ware, fine clothes, jewelry +and a lot of money. I guess he dug it up, but I don't remember. + +Master died three years after the War. He took it purty good, losing +his niggers and all. Lots of men killed theirselves. Old Master was a +good old man. + +I'm getting old, I reckon. I've been married twice and am the father +of 19 chillun. The oldest if 57 and my youngest is two boys, ten and +twelve. I has great grandchillun older than them two boys. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + +JANE MONTGOMERY +Age 80 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma + + +I was born March 15, 1857, in Homer, Louisiana. I claim to be 75 years +old, but that's jest my way of counting. My mother was Sarah Strong +and my father was Edmond Beavers. We lived in a log cabin that had +jest one door. I had two sisters named Peggy and Katie. Mammy was +bought from the Strong family and my pappy was bought from Beavers by +Mister Eason. + +We slept on wooden slabs which was jest make-shift beds. I didn't do +no work in slave times 'cause I was too little. You jest had to be +good and husky to work on that place. I listened and told mammy +everything I heerd. I ate right side dat old white woman on the flo'. +I was a little busy-body. I don't recollect eating in our quarters on +Sunday and no other time. + +I don't remember no possums and rabbits being on our place, 'cause +when white folks killed a chicken for their selves, dey killed one for +the niggers. My pappy never ate no cornbread in all his put-together. +Meat was my favorite food. I never ate no dry bread without no meat. + +We wore homespun clothes. My first pair of shoes was squirrel skin. +Mammy had 'em made. We wore clothes called linsey that was wool and +cotton mixed. + +My father was the onliest overseer. It was sho' a great big old place. +My master jest seen the place on Sundays. They was jest seven Niggers +on our plantation. No working late at night but we had to git up at +daylight. When our day's work was done, we went to bed, but sometimes +they sung. Sadday was a holiday from working on the plantation. You +had Sadday to wash for yourself. We didn't do nothing on Christmas and +all holidays. + +Mistress never whip us and iffen master would start, mistress would +git a gun and make him stop. She said, "Let ever bitch whip her own +chillun." I never seen no patrollers, I jest heerd of 'em. They never +come on our place. I guess they was scared to. The Klu Klux whipped +niggers when so never they could catch 'em. They rid at night mostly. + +I am a Baptist. I belong to Calvary Baptist Church. I was baptized in +a creek. Our favorite hymn was "Dark Was the Night an' Cold the +Ground." Our favorite revival hymn was "Lord I'd Come to Thee, a +Sinner Undefiled." Our favorite funeral song was "Hark From the Tomb." + +My family didn't believe in conjure an' all that stuff, 'though they's +a heap of it was going on and still is for that matter. They had +"hands" that was made up of all kinds of junk. You used 'em to make +folks love you more'n they did. We used asafetida to keep off smallpox +and measles. Put mole foots round a baby's neck to make him teethe +easy. We used to use nine red ants tied in a sack round they neck to +make 'em teethe easy and never had no trouble with 'em neither. + +I think I seen a haunt once, 'cause when I looked the second time, +what I seen the first time was gone. + +When the War was over, mistress' son come home and he cleaned his guns +on my dress tail. It sho' stunk up my dress and made me sick too. He +told old mistress that niggers was free now. I went and told mammy +that old Betsy's son told her the niggers was free and what did he +mean. She said, "Shhhhhh!" They never did jest come out and tell us we +was free. We was free in July and mammy left in September. We lived in +Jordan Saline, out from Smith County. Then my mother give me to my +father 'cause she was married to another man. Her and my step-father +moved to Gilmore, Texas. They sent for me round 'bout Christmas and we +lived on Sampers' farm. + +We lived so far out, we couldn't go to school, 'though they was for +us. We didn't own no land. Didn't nobody learn me to read and write. + +Abe Lincoln was a good man. It was through Mr. Lincoln that God fit to +free us. I don't know much 'bout Jeff Davis and don't care nothing +'bout him. Booker T. Washington built that school through God. He used +to live in a cabin jest lak I done. He was sho' a great man. + +I married Trole Kemp in 1883. I 'mind you they didn't marry in +slavery, they jest took up. Master jest give a permit. I am the mother +of 10 chillun and 5 grandchillun. Four of my chillun died young. Them +what's living is doing different things sech as: writing policy, +working on made work, housework, government clerk and hotel maid. One +is in the pen. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 13 1937] + +AMANDA OLIVER +Age 80 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I 'membuh what my mother say--I was born November 9, 1857, in +Missouri. I was 'bout eight years old, when she was sold to a master +named Harrison Davis. They said he had two farms in Missouri, but when +he moved to northern Texas he brought me, my mother, Uncle George, +Uncle Dick and a cullud girl they said was 15 with 'im. He owned 'bout +6 acres on de edge of town near Sherman, Texas, and my mother and 'em +was all de slaves he had. They said he sold off some of de folks. + +We didn't have no overseers in northern Texas, but in southern Texas +dey did. Dey didn't raise cotton either; but dey raised a whole lots +of corn. Sometime de men would shuck corn all night long. Whenever dey +was going to shuck all night de women would piece quilts while de men +shuck de corn and you could hear 'em singing and shucking corn. After +de cornshucking, de cullud folks would have big dances. + +Master Davis lived in a big white frame house. My mother lived in the +yard in a big one-room log hut with a brick chimney. De logs was +"pinted" (what dey call plastered now with lime). I don't know whether +young folks know much 'bout dat sort of thing now. + +I slept on de floor up at de "Big House" in de white woman's room on a +quilt. I'd git up in de mornings, make fires, put on de coffee, and +tend to my little brother. Jest do little odd jobs sech as that. + +We ate vegetables from de garden, sech as that. My favorite dish is +vegetables now. + +I don't remember seeing any slaves sold. My mother said dey sold 'em +on de block in Kentucky where she was raised. + +I don't remembuh when de War broke out, but I remembuh seeing the +soldiers with de blue uniforms on. I was afraid of 'em. + +Old mistress didn't tell us when he was free, but another white woman +told my mother and I remembuh. One day old mistress told my mother to +git to that wheel and git to work, and my mother said, "I ain't +gwineter, I'm jest as free as you air." So dat very day my mother +packed up all our belongings and moved us to town, Sherman, Texas. She +worked awful hard, doing day work for 50¢ a day, and sometimes she'd +work for food, clothes or whatever she could git. + +I don't believe in conjuring though I heard lotta talk 'bout it. +Sometimes I have pains and aches in my hands, feel like sometime dat +somebody puts dey hands on me, but I think jest de way my nerves is. + +I can't say much 'bout Abe Lincoln. He was a republican in favor of de +cullud folk being free. Jeff Davis? Yeah, the boys usta sing a song +'bout 'im: + + Lincoln rides a fine hoss, + Jeff Davis rides a mule, + Lincoln is de President, + Jeff Davis is de fool. + +Booker T. Washington--I guess he is a right good man. He's for the +cullud people I guess. + +I been a Christian thirty some odd years. I've been here some thirty +odd years. Had to come when my husband did. He died in 1902. We +married in 18--I've forgot, but we went to de preacher and got +married. We did more than jump over de broom stick. + +In those days we went to church with de white folks. Dey had church at +eleven and the cullud folks at three, but all of us had white +preachers. Our church is standing right there now, at least it was de +last time I was there. + +I don't have a favorite song, theys so many good ones, but I like, +"Bound for the Promised Land." I'm a Baptist, my mother was a Baptist, +and her white folks was Baptist. + +I have two daughters, Julia Goodwin and Bertha Frazier, and four +grandchildren, both of 'ems been separated. Dey do housework. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +SALOMON OLIVER +Age 78 yrs. +Tulsa, Oklahoma. + + +John A. Miller owned the finest plantation in Washington County, +Mississippi, about 12-mile east of Greenville. I was born on this +20,000-acre plantation November 17, 1859, being one of about four +hundred slave children on the place. + +About three hundred negro families living in box-type cabins made it +seem like a small town. Built in rows, the cabins were kept +whitewashed, neat and orderly, for the Master was strict about such +things. Several large barns and storage buildings were scattered +around the plantation. Also, two cotton gins and two old fashioned +presses, operated by horses and mules, made Miller's plantation one of +the best equipped in Mississippi. + +Master John was quite a character. The big plantation didn't occupy +all his time. He owned a bank in Vicksburg and another in New Orleans, +and only came to the plantation two or three times a year for a week +or two visit. + +Things happened around there mighty quick when the Master showed up. +If the slaves were not being treated right--out go the white overseer. +Fired! The Master was a good man and tried to hire good boss men. +Master John was bad after the slave women. A yellow child show up +every once in a while. Those kind always got special privileges +because the Master said he didn't want his children whipped like the +rest of them slaves. + +My own Mammy, Mary, was the Master's own daughter! She married Salomon +Oliver (who took the name of Oliver after the War), and the Master +told all the slave drivers to leave her alone and not whip her. This +made the overseers jealous of her and caused trouble. John Santhers +was one of the white overseers who treated her bad, and after I was +born and got strong enough (I was a weakling for three-four years +after birth), to do light chores he would whip me just for the fun of +it. It was fun for him but not for me. I hoped to whip him when I grew +up. That is the one thing I won't ever forget. He died about the end +of the War so that's one thing I won't ever get to do. + +My mother was high-tempered and she knew about the Master's orders not +to whip her. I guess sometimes she took advantage and tried to do +things that maybe wasn't right. But it did her no good and one of the +white men flogged her to death. She died with scars on her back! + +Father use to preach to the slaves when a crowd of them could slip off +into the woods. I don't remember much about the religious things, only +just what Daddy told me when I was older. He was caught several times +slipping off to the woods and because he was the preacher I guess they +layed on the lash a little harder trying to make him give up +preaching. + +Ration day was Saturday. Each person was given a peck of corn meal, +four pounds of wheat flour, four pounds of pork meat, quart of +molasses, one pound of sugar, the same of coffee and a plug of +tobacco. Potatoes and vegetables came from the family garden and each +slave family was required to cultivate a separate garden. + +During the Civil War a battle was fought near the Miller plantation. +The Yankees under General Grant came through the country. They burned +2,000 bales of Miller cotton. When the Yankee wagons crossed Bayou +Creek the bridge gave way and quite a number of soldiers and horses +were seriously injured. + +For many years after the War folks would find bullets in the ground. +Some of the bullets were 'twins' fastened together with a chain. + +Master Miller settled my father upon a piece of land after the War and +we stayed on it several years, doing well. + +I moved to Muskogee in 1902, coming on to Tulsa in 1907, the same year +Oklahoma was made a state. My six wives are all dead,--Liza, Lizzie, +Ellen, Lula, Elizabeth and Henrietta. Six children, too. George, +Anna, Salomon, Nelson, Garfield, Cosmos--all good children. They +remember the Tulsa riot and don't aim ever to come back to Oklahoma. + +When the riot started in 1922 (I think it was), I had a place on the +corner of Pine and Owasso Streets. Two hundred of my people gathered +at my place, because I was so well known everybody figured we wouldn't +be molested. I was wrong. Two of my horses was shot and killed. Two of +my boys, Salomon and Nelson, was wounded, one in the hip, the other in +the shoulder. They wasn't bad and got well alright. Some of my people +wasn't so lucky. The dead wagon hauled them away! + +White men came into the negro district and gathered up the homeless. +The houses were most all burned. No place to go except to the camps +where armed whites kept everybody quiet. They took my clothes and all +my money--$298.00--and the police couldn't do nothing about my loss +when I reported it to them. + +That was a terrible time, but we people are better off today that any +time during the days of slavery. We have some privileges and they are +worth more than all the money in the world! + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +PHYLLIS PETITE +Age 83 yrs. +Fort Gibson, Okla. + + +I was born in Rusk County, Texas, on a plantation about eight miles +east of Belleview. There wasn't no town where I was born, but they had +a church. + +My mammy and pappy belonged to a part Cherokee named W. P. Thompson +when I was born. He had kinfolks in the Cherokee Nation, and we all +moved up here to a place on Fourteen-Mile Creek close to where Hulbert +now is, 'way before I was big enough to remember anything. Then, so I +been told, old master Thompson sell my pappy and mammy and one of my +baby brothers and me back to one of his neighbors in Texas name of +John Harnage. + +Mammy's name was Letitia Thompson and pappy's was Riley Thompson. My +little brother was named Johnson Thompson, but I had another brother +sold to a Vann and he always call hisself Harry Vann. His Cherokee +master lived on the Arkansas river close to Webber's Falls and I never +did know him until we was both grown. My only sister was Patsy and she +was borned after slavery and died at Wagoner, Oklahoma. + +I can just remember when Master John Harnage took us to Texas. We went +in a covered wagon with oxen and camped out all along the way. Mammy +done the cooking in big wash kettles and pappy done the driving of the +oxen. I would set in a wagon and listen to him pop his whip and +holler. + +Master John took us to his plantation and it was a big one, too. You +could look from the field up to the Big House and any grown body in +the yard look like a little body, it was so far away. + +We negroes lived in quarters not far from the Big House and ours was a +single log house with a stick and dirt chimney. We cooked over the hot +coals in the fireplace. + +I just played around until I was about six years old I reckon, and +then they put me up at the Big House with my mammy to work. She done +all the cording and spinning and weaving, and I done a whole lot of +sweeping and minding the baby. The baby was only about six months old +I reckon. I used to stand by the cradle and rock it all day, and when +I quit I would go to sleep right by the cradle sometimes before mammy +would come and get me. + +The Big House had great big rooms in front, and they was fixed up +nice, too. I remember when old Mistress Harnage tried me out sweeping +up the front rooms. They had two or three great big pictures of some +old people hanging on the wall. They was full blood Indians it look +like, and I was sure scared of them pictures! I would go here and +there and every which-a-way, and anywheres I go them big pictures +always looking straight at me and watching me sweep! I kept my eyes +right on them so I could run if they moved, and old Mistress take me +back to the kitchen and say I can't sweep because I miss all the dirt. + +We always have good eating, like turnip greens cooked in a kettle with +hog skins and crackling grease, and skinned corn, and rabbit or possum +stew. I liked big fish tolerable well too, but I was afraid of the +bones in the little ones. + +That skinned corn aint like the boiled hominy we have today. To make +it you boil some wood ashes, or have some drip lye from the hopper to +put in the hot water. Let the corn boil in the lye water until the +skin drops off and the eyes drop out and then wash that corn in fresh +water about a dozen times, or just keep carrying water from the spring +until you are wore out, like I did. Then you put the corn in a crock +and set it in the spring, and you got good skinned corn as long as it +last, all ready to warm up a little batch at a time. + +Master had a big, long log kitchen setting away from the house, and we +set a big table for the family first, and when they was gone we +negroes at the house eat at that table too, but we don't use the china +dishes. + +The negro cook was Tilda Chisholm. She and my mammy didn't do no +out-work. Aunt Tilda sure could make them corn-dodgers. Us children +would catch her eating her dinner first out of the kettles and when we +say something she say: "Go on child, I jest tasting that dinner." + +In the summer we had cotton homespun clothes, and in winter it had +wool mixed in. They was dyed with copperas and wild indigo. + +My brother, Johnson Thompson, would get up behind old Master Harnage +on his horse and go with him to hunt squirrels so they would go 'round +on Master's side so's he could shoot them. Master's old mare was named +"Old Willow", and she knowed when to stop and stand real still so he +could shoot. + +His children was just all over the place! He had two houses full of +them! I only remember Bell, Ida, Maley, Mary and Will, but they was +plenty more I don't remember. + +That old horn blowed 'way before daylight, and all the field negroes +had to be out in the row by the time of sun up. House negroes got up +too, because old Master always up to see everybody get out to work. + +Old Master Harnage bought and sold slaves most all the time, and some +of the new negroes always acted up and needed a licking. The worst +ones got beat up good, too! They didn't have no jail to put slaves in +because when the Masters got done licking them they didn't need no +jail. + +My husband was George Petite. He tell me his mammy was sold away from +him when he was a little boy. He looked down a long lane after her +just as long as he could see her, and cried after her. He went down to +the big road and set down by his mammy's barefooted tracks in the sand +and set there until it got dark, and then he come on back to the +quarters. + +I just saw one slave try to get away right in hand. They caught him +with bloodhounds and brung him back in. The hounds had nearly tore him +up, and he was sick a long time. I don't remember his name, but he +wasn't one of the old regular negroes. + +In Texas we had a church where we could go. I think it was a white +church and they just let the negroes have it when they got a preacher +sometimes. My mammy took me sometimes, and she loved to sing them +salvation songs. + +We used to carry news from one plantation to the other I reckon, +'cause mammy would tell about things going on some other plantation +and I know she never been there. + +Christmas morning we always got some brown sugar candy or some +molasses to pull, and we children was up bright and early to get that +'lasses pull, I tell you! And in the winter we played skeeting on the +ice when the water froze over. No, I don't mean skating. That's when +you got iron skates, and we didn't have them things. We just get a +running start and jump on the ice and skeet as far as we could go, and +then run some more. + +I nearly busted my head open, and brother Johnson said: "Try it +again," but after that I was scared to skeet any more. + +Mammy say we was down in Texas to get away from the War, but I didn't +see any war and any soldiers. But one day old Master stay after he eat +breakfast and when us negroes come in to eat he say: "After today I +ain't your master any more. You all as free as I am." We just stand +and look and don't know what to say about it. + +After while pappy got a wagon and some oxen to drive for a white man +who was coming to the Cherokee Nation because he had folks here. His +name was Dave Mounts and he had a boy named John. + +We come with them and stopped at Fort Gibson where my own grand mammy +was cooking for the soldiers at the garrison. Her name was Phyllis +Brewer and I was named after her. She had a good Cherokee master. My +mammy was born on his place. + +We stayed with her about a week and then we moved out on Four Mile +Creek to live. She died on Fourteen-Mile Creek about a year later. + +When we first went to Four Mile Creek I seen negro women chopping wood +and asked them who they work for and I found out they didn't know they +was free yet. + +After a while my pappy and mammy both died, and I was took care of by +my aunt Elsie Vann. She took my brother Johnson too, but I don't know +who took Harry Vann. + +I was married to George Petite, and I had on a white underdress and +black high-top shoes, and a large cream colored hat, and on top of all +I had a blue wool dress with tassels all around the bottom of it. That +dress was for me to eat the terrible supper in. That what we called +the wedding supper because we eat too much of it. Just danced all +night, too! I was at Mandy Foster's house in Fort Gibson, and the +preacher was Reverend Barrows, I had that dress a long time, but its +gone now. I still got the little sun bonnet I wore to church in Texas. + +We had six children, but all are dead but George, Tish, and Annie +now. + +Yes, they tell me Abraham Lincoln set me free, and I love to look at +his picture on the wall in the school house at Four Mile branch where +they have church. My grand mammy kind of help start that church, and I +think everybody ought to belong to some church. + +I want to say again my Master Harnage was Indian, but he was a good +man and mighty good to us slaves, and you can see I am more than six +feet high, and they say I weighs over a hundred and sixty, even if my +hair is snow white. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +MATILDA POE +Age 80 yrs. +McAlester, Okla. + + +I was born in Indian Territory on de plantation of Isaac Love. He was +old Master, and Henry Love was young Master. Isaac Love was a full +blood Chickasaw Indian but his wife was a white woman. + +Old Master was sure good to his slaves. The young niggers never done +no heavy work till dey was fully grown. Dey would carry water to de +men in de field and do other light jobs 'round de place. + +De Big House set way back from de road 'bout a quarter of a mile. It +was a two-story log house, and the rooms was awful big and they was +purty furniture in it. The furniture in de parlor was red plush and I +loved to slip in and rub my hand over it, it was so soft like. The +house was made of square logs and de cracks was filled out even with +the edges of de logs. It was white washed and my but it was purty. +They was a long gallery clean across de front of de house and big +posts to support de roof. Back a ways from de house was de kitchen and +nearby was de smokehouse. Old Master kept it well filled with meat, +lard and molasses all de time. He seen to it that we always had plenty +to eat. The old women done all de cooking in big iron pots that hung +over the fire. De slaves was all served together. + +The slave quarters was about two hundred yards back of de Big House. +Our furniture was made of oak 'cepting de chairs, and dey was made out +of hackberry. I still have a chair dat belonged to my mammy. + +The boys didn't wear no britches in de summer time. Dey just wore long +shirts. De girls wore homespun dresses, either blue or gray. + +Old Master never hired no overseer for his slaves, but he looked after +'em hisself. He punished dem hisself too. He had to go away one time +and he hired a white man to oversee while he was gone. The only orders +he left was to keep dem busy. Granny Lucy was awful old but he made +her go to the field. She couldn't hold out to work so he ups and whips +her. He beat her scandalous. He cut her back so bad she couldn't wear +her dress. Old Master come home and my, he was mad when he see Granny +Lucy. He told de man to leave and iffen he ever set foot on his ground +again he's shoot him, sure! + +Old Master had a big plantation and a hundred or more slaves. Dey +always got up at daylight and de men went out and fed de horses. When +de bell rang dey was ready to eat. After breakfast dey took de teams +and went out to plow. Dey come in 'bout half past 'leven and at twelve +de bell rung agin. Dey eat their dinner and back to plowing dey went. +'Bout five o'clock dey come in again, and den they'd talk, sing and +jig dance till bedtime. + +Old Master never punished his niggers 'cepting dey was sassy or lazy. +He never sold his slaves neither. A owner once sold several babies to +traders. Dey stopped at our plantation to stay awhile. My mammy and de +other women had to take care of dem babies for two days, and teach dem +to nuss a bottle or drink from a glass. Dat was awful, dem little +children crying for they mothers. Sometimes dey sold de mothers away +from they husbands and children. + +Master wasn't a believer in church but he let us have church. My we'd +have happy times singing an shouting. They'd have church when dey had +a preacher and prayer meeting when dey didn't. + +Slaves didn't leave de plantation much on 'count of de Patrollers. De +patroller was low white trash what jest wanted a excuse to shoot +niggers. I don't think I ever saw one but I heard lots of 'em. + +I don't believe in luck charms and things of the such. Iffen you is in +trouble, there ain't nothing gonna save you but de Good Lawd. I heard +of folks keeping all kind of things for good luck charms. When I was a +child different people gave me buttons to string and we called them +our charm string and wore 'em round our necks. If we was mean dey +would tell us "Old Raw Head and Bloody Bones" would git us. Grand +mammy told us ghost stories after supper, but I don't remember any of +dem. + +I never did know I was a slave, 'cause I couldn't tell I wasn't free. +I always had a good time, didn't have to work much, and allus had +something to eat and wear and that was better than it is with me now. + +When de War was over old Master told us we was free. Mammy she say, +"Well, I'm heading for Texas." I went out and old Master ask me to +bring him a coal of fire to light his pipe. I went after it and mammy +left pretty soon. My pappy wouldn't leave old Master right then but +old Master told us we was free to go where we pleased, so me an' pappy +left and went to Texas where my mammy was. We never saw old Master any +more. We stayed a while in Texas and then come back to de Indian +Territory. + +Abe Lincoln was a good man, everybody liked him. See, I've got his +picture. Jeff Davis was a good man too, he just made a mistake. I like +Mr. Roosevelt, too. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +HENRY F. PYLES +Age 81 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + + Little pinch o' pepper---- + Little bunch o' wool---- + + Mumbledy--Mumbledy---- + + Two, three Pammy Christy beans---- + Little piece o' rusty iron---- + + Mumbledy--Mumbledy---- + + Wrop it in a rag and tie it wid hair, + Two fum a hoss an' one fum a mare---- + + Mumbledy, Mumbledy, Mumbledy---- + + Wet it in whiskey + Boughten wid silver; + Dat make you wash so hard your sweat pop out, + And he come to pass, sho'! + +That's how the niggers say old Bab Russ used to make the hoodoo +"hands" he made for the young bucks and wenches, but I don't know, +'cause I was too trusting to look inside de one he make for me, and +anyways I lose it, and it no good nohow! + +Old Bab Russ live about two mile from me, and I went to him one night +at midnight and ask him to make me de hand. I was a young strapper +about sixteen years old, and thinking about wenches pretty hard and +wanting something to help me out wid the one I liked best. + +Old Bab Russ charge me four bits for dat hand, and I had to give four +bits more for a pint of whiskey to wet it wid, and it wasn't no good +nohow! + +Course dat was five-six years after de War. I wasn't yet quite eleven +when de War close. Most all the niggers was farming on de shares and +whole lots of them was still working for their old Master yet. Old +Bab come in there from deep South Carolina two-three years befo', and +live all by hisself. De gal I was worrying about had come wid her old +pappy and mammy to pick cotton on de place, and dey was staying in one +of de cabins in the "settlement", but dey didn't live there all de +time. + +I don't know whether I believed in conjure much or not in dem days, +but anyways I tried it that once and it stirred up sech a rumpus +everybody called me "Hand" after that until after I was married and +had a pack of children. + +Old Bab Russ was coal black, and he could talk African or some other +unknown tongue, and all the young bucks and wenches was mortal 'fraid +of him! + +Well sir, I took dat hand he made for me and set out to try it on dat +gal. She never had give me a friendly look even, and when I would +speak to her polite she just hang her head and say nothing! + +We was all picking cotton, and I come along up behind her and decided +to use my "Hand." I had bought me a pint of whiskey to wet the hand +wid, but I was scared to take out of my pocket and let the other +niggers see it, so I jest set down in de cotton row and taken a big +mouthful. I figgered to hold it in my mouth until I catched up wid +that gal and then blow it on the hand jest before I tech her on the +arm and speak to her. + +Well, I take me a big mouthful, but it was so hot and scaldy it jest +slip right on down my throat! Then I had to take another, and when I +was gitting up I kind of stumbled and it slip down, too! + +Then I see all the others get way on ahead, and I took another big +mouthful--the last in the bottle--and drap the bottle under a big +stalk and start picking fast and holding the whiskey in my mouth this +time. I missed about half the cotton I guess, but at last I catch up +with de rest and git close up behind dat purty gal. Then I started to +speak to her, but forgot I had de whiskey in mouth and I lost most of +it down my neck and all over my chin, and then I strangled a little on +the rest, so as when I went to squirt it on de "hand" I didn't have +nothing left to squirt but a little spit. + +That make me a little nervous right then, but anyways I step up behind +dat gal and lay my hand on her arm and speak polite and start to say +something, but I finish up what I start to say laying on my neck with +my nose shoved up under a cotton stalk about four rows away! + +De way that gal lam me across the head was a caution! We was in new +ground, and she jest pick up a piece of old root and whopped me right +in de neck with it! + +That raise sech a laugh on me that I never say nothing to her for +three-four days, but after while I gets myself wound up to go see her +at her home. I didn't know how she going to act, but I jest took my +foot in my hand and went on over. + +Her old pappy and mammy was asleep in the back of the room on a +pallet, and we set in front of the fireplace on our hunches and jest +looked at the fire and punched it up a little. It wasn't cold, but de +malary fog was thick all through de bottoms. + +After while I could smell the whiskey soaked up in dat "hand" I had in +my pocket, and I was scared she could smell it too. So I jest reached +in my pocket and teched it for luck, then I reached over and teched +her arm. She jerked it back so quick she knocked over the churn and +spilled buttermilk all over de floor! Dat make de old folks mad, and +dey grumble and holler and told de gal, "Send dat black rapscallion on +out of here!" But I didn't go. + +I kept on moving over closer and she kept on backing away, but after +while I reach over and put my hand on her knee. All I was going to do +was say something but I shore forgot what it was the next minnit, +'cause she jest whinnied lak a scared hoss and give me a big push. I +was settin straddledy-legged on the floor, and that push sent me on my +head in the hot ashes in the fur corner of the chimney. + +Then the old man jump up and make for me and I make for the door! It +was dark, all 'cepting the light from the chimney, and I fumble all up +and down the door jamb before I find de latch pin. The old man shorely +git me if he hadn't stumble over the eating table and whop his hand +right down in de dish of fresh made butter. That make him so mad he +jest stand and holler and cuss. + +I git de pin loose and jerk de door open so quick and hard I knock de +powder gourd down what was hanging over it, and my feet git caught in +the string. The stopper gits knocked out, and when I untangle it from +my feet and throw it back in de house it fall in the fireplace. + +I was running all de time, but I hear dat gourd go "Blammity Blam!" +and then all de yelling, but I didn't go back to see how dey git the +hot coals all put out what was scattered all over de cabin! + +I done drap dat "hand" and I never did see it again. Never did see the +gal but two-three times after that, and we never mention about dat +night. Her old pappy was too old to work, so I never did see him +neither, but she must of told about it because all the young bucks +called me "Hand" after that for a long time. + +Old Bab kept on trying to work his conjure with the old niggers, but +the young ones didn't pay him much mind cause they was hearing about +the Gospel and de Lord Jesus Christ. We was all free then, and we +could go and come without a pass, and they was always some kind of +church meeting going on close enough to go to. Our niggers never did +hear about de Lord Jesus until after we was free, but lots of niggers +on de other plantations had masters that told them all about him, and +some of dem niggers was pretty good at preaching. Then de good church +people in de North was sending white preachers amongst us all the time +too. Most of de young niggers was Christians by that time. + +One day old Bab was hoeing in a field and got in a squabble about +something with a young gal name Polly, same name as his wife. After +while he git so mad he reach up with his fingers and wet them on his +tongue and point straight up and say, "Now you got a trick on you! +Dere's a heavy trick on you now! Iffen you don't change your mind you +going pass on before de sun go down!" + +All de young niggers looked like they want to giggle but afraid to, +and the old ones start begging old Bab to take the trick off, but that +Polly git her dander up and take in after him with a hoe! + +She knocked him down, and he jest laid there kicking his feet in the +air and trying to keep her from hitting him in the head! + +Well, that kind of broke up Bab's charm, so he set out to be a +preacher. The Northern whites was paying some of the Negro preachers, +so he tried to be one too. He didn't know nothing about de Bible but +to shout loud, so the preacher board at Red Mound never would give him +a paper to preach. Then he had to go back to tricking and trancing +again. + +One day he come in at dinner and told his wife to git him something to +eat. She told him they aint nothing but some buttermilk, and he says +give me some of that. He hollered around till she fix him a big ash +cake and he ate that and she made him another and he ate that. Then he +drunk the rest of de gallon of buttermilk and went out and laid down +on a tobacco scaffold in de yard and nearly died. + +After while he jest stiffened out and looked like he was dead, and +nobody couldn't wake him up. 'Bout forty niggers gathered round and +tried but it done no good. Old mammy Polly got scared and sent after +the white judge, old Squire Wilson, and he tried, and then the white +preacher Reverend Dennison tried and old man Gorman tried. He was a +infidel, but that didn't do no good. + +By that time it was getting dark, and every nigger in a square mile +was there, looking on and acting scared. Me and my partner who was a +little bit cripple but mighty smart come up to see what all the rumpus +was about, and we was jest the age to do anything. + +He whispered to me to let him start it off and then me finish it while +he got a head running start. I ast him what he talking about. + +Then he fooled round the house and got a little ball of cotton and +soaked it in kerosene from a lamp. It was a brass lamp with a hole and +a stopper in the side of the bowl. Wonder he didn't burn his fool head +off! Then he sidle up close and stuck dat cotton 'tween old Bab's +toes. Old Bab had the biggest feet I ever see, too. + +'Bout that time I lit a corn shuck in de lamp and run out in de yard +and stuck it to de cotton and jest kept right on running! + +My partner had a big start but I catch up wid him and we lay down in +de bresh and listened to everybody hollering and old Bab hollering +louder than anybody. Old Bab moved away after that. + +All that foolishness happen after the War, but before de War while I +was a little boy they wasn't much foolishness went on I warrant you. + +I was born on de 15th of August in 1856, and belonged to Mister +Addison Pyles. He lived in town, in Jackson, Tennessee, and was a old +man when de War broke. He had a nephew named Irvin T. Pyles he raised +from a baby, and Mister Irvin kept a store at de corner of de roads at +our plantation. The plantation covered about 300 or 400 acres I +reckon, and they had about 25 slaves counting de children. + +The plantation was about 9 miles north of Red Mound, close to +Lexington, Tennessee, and about a mile and a half from Parker's +Crossroads where they had a big battle in de War. + +They wasn't no white overseer on the place, except Mister Irvin, and +he stayed in de store or in town and didn't bother about the farm +work. We had a Negro overlooker who was my stepdaddy. His name was +Jordan, and he run away wid de Yankees about de middle of de War and +was in a Negro Yankee regiment. After he left we jest worked on as +usual because we was afraid not to. Several of de men got away like +that but he was de only one that got in de army. + +They was a big house in de middle of de place and a settlement of +Negro cabins behind and around it. We called it de settlement, but on +other plantations where white folks lived there too they called it de +quarters. We always kept this big house clean and ready, and sometimes +de white folks come out from town and stay a few days and hunt and +fish and look over de crops. + +We all worked at farm work. Cotton and corn and tobacco mostly. We all +laid off Sunday after noontime, but we didn't have no church nor +preaching and we didn't hear anything 'bout Jesus much until after de +emancipation. + +I reckon old Master wasn't very religious, 'cause he never tell us +'bout the Holy Word. He jest said to behave ourselves and tell him +when we wanted to marry, and not have but one wife. + +We had little garden patches and cotton patches we could work on +Sunday and what de stuff brung we could sell and keep the money. Old +Master let us have what we made that way on Sunday. We could buy +ribbons and hand soap and coal oil and such at de store. Master Irvin +was always honest 'bout continuing de money, too. + +We didn't have no carders and spinners nor no weavers on de +plantation. They cost too much money to buy just for 25 niggers, and +they cost a lot more than field niggers. So we got our clothes sent +out to us from in town, and sometimes we was give cloth from de store +to make our clothes out of. + +We got de shorts and seconds from de mill when we had wheat ground, +and so we had good wheat bread as well as corn pone, and de big +smokehouse was on de place and we had all de meat we wanted to eat. +Old Master sent out after de meat he wanted every day or so and we +kept him in garden sass that way too. + +We was right between de forks of Big Beaver and Little Beaver and we +could go fishing without getting far off de place. We couldn't go far +away without a pass, though, and they wasn't nobody on the place to +write us a pass, so we couldn't go to meeting and dances and sech. + +But de niggers on de other plantations could get passes to come to our +place, and so we had parties sometimes there at our place. We always +had them on Sundays, 'cause in the evening we would be too tired to +work if we set up, and the other masters wouldn't give passes to their +niggers to come over in de evening. + +We had a white doctor lived at de next plantation, and old Master had +a contract with old Dr. Brown to look after us. He had a beard as long +as your arm. He come for all kinds of misery except bornings. Then we +had a mid-wife who was a white woman lived down below us. They was +poor people renting or living on war land. Nearly all de white folks +in that country been there a long time and their old people got de +land from de government for fighting in the Revolutionary War. Most +all was from North Carolina--way back. I think old Master's pappy was +from dere in de first place. + +Old Master had two sons named Newton and Willis. Newton was in de War +and was killed, and Willis went to war later and was sick a long time +and come home early. Old Master was too old to go. + +There was two daughters, Mary, de oldest, married a Holmes, and Miss +Laura never did marry I don't think. + +My mammy's name was Jane, and she was born on de 10th day of May in +1836. I know de dates 'cause old Master kept his book on all his +niggers de same as on his own family. Mammy was the nurse of all de +children but I think old Master sent her to de plantation about the +time I was born. I don't think I had any pappy. I think I was jest one +of them things that happened sometimes in slavery days, but I know old +Master didn't have nothing to do with it--I'm too black. + +Mammy married a man named Jordan when I was a little baby. He was the +overlooker and went off to de Yankees, when dey come for foraging +through dat country de first time. + +He served in de Negro regiment in de battle at Fort Piller and a lot +of Sesesh was killed in dat battle, so when de War was over and Jordan +come back home he was a changed nigger and all de whites and a lot of +de niggers hated him. All 'cepting old Master, and he never said a +word out of de way to him. Jest told him to come on and work on de +place as long as he wanted to. + +But Jordan had a hard time, and he brung it on his self I reckon. + +'Bout de first thing, he went down to Wildersville Schoolhouse, about +a mile from Wildersville, to a nigger and carpet bagger convention and +took me and mammy along. That was de first picnic and de first brass +band I ever see. De band men was all white men and they still had on +their blue soldier clothes. + +Lots of de niggers there had been in de Union army too, and they had +on parts of their army clothes. They took them out from under their +coats and their wagon seats an put them on for de picnic. + +There was a saloon over in Wildersville, and a lot of them went over +there but they was scared to go in, most of them. But a colored +delegate named Taylor and my pappy went in and ordered a drink. The +bartender didn't pay them no mind. + +Then a white man named Billy Britt walked up and throwed a glass of +whiskey in Jordan's face and cussed him for being in de Yankee army. +Then a white man from the North named Pearson took up the fight and +him and Jordan jumped on Billy Britt, but de crowd stopped them and +told pappy to git on back to whar he come from. + +He got elected a delegate at de convention and went on down to +Nashville and helped nominate Brownlow for governor. Then he couldn't +come back home for a while, but finally he did. + +Old Master was uneasy about de way things was going on, and he come +out to de farm and stayed in de big house a while. + +One day in broad daylight he was on de gallery and down de road come +'bout 20 bushwhackers in Sesesh clothes on horses and rid up to de +gate. Old Master knowed all of them, and Captain Clay Taylor, who had +been de master of de nigger delegate, was at the head of them. + +They had Jordan Pyles tied with a rope and walked along on de ground +betwixt two horses. + +"Whar you taking my nigger?", Old Master say. He run down off de +gallery and out in de road. + +"He ain't your nigger no more--you know that", old Captain Taylor +holler back. + +"He jest as much my nigger as that Taylor nigger was your nigger, and +you ain't laid hands on him! Now you jest have pity on my nigger!" + +"Your nigger Jordan been in de Yankee army, and he was in de battle at +Fort Piller and help kill our white folks, and you know it!" Old +Captain Taylor say, and argue on like that, but old Master jest take +hold his bridle and shake his head. + +"No, Clay", he say, "that boy maybe didn't kill Confederates, but you +and him both know my two boys killed plenty Yankees, and you forgot I +lost one of my boys in de War. Ain't that enough to pay for letting my +nigger alone?" + +And old Captain Taylor give the word to turn Jordan loose, and they +rid on down de road. + +That's one reason my stepdaddy never did leave old Master's place, and +I stayed on dere till I was grown and had children. + +The Yankees come through past our place three-four times, and one time +they had a big battle jest a mile and a half away at Parker's +Crossroads. + +I was in de field hoeing, and I remember I hadn't watered the cows we +had hid way down in de woods, so I started down to water them when I +first heard de shooting. + +We had de stock hid down in de woods and all de corn and stuff hid +too, 'cause the Yankees and the Sesesh had been riding through quite a +lot, and either one take anything they needed iffen they found it. + +First I hear something way off say "Br-r-rump!" Then again, and again. +Then something sound like popcorn beginning to pop real slow. Then it +git faster and I start for de settlement and de big house. + +All Master's folks was staying at de big house then, and couldn't git +back to town 'count of de soldiers, so they all put on they good +clothes, with de hoop skirts and little sunshades and the lace +pantaloons and got in the buggy to go see de battle! + +They rid off and it wasn't long till all the niggers was following +behind. We all got to a hill 'bout a half a mile from the crossroads +and stopped when we couldn't see nothing but thick smoke all over de +whole place. + +We could see men on horses come in and out of de smoke, going this way +and that way, and then some Yankees on horses broke through de woods +right close to us and scattered off down through de field. One of de +white officers rid up close and yelled at us and took off his hat, but +I couldn't hear nothing he said. + +Then he rid on and catch up with his men. They had stopped and was +turning off to one side. He looked back and waved his hat again for us +to git away from that, and jest then he clapped his hand to his belly +and fell off his hoss. + +Our white folks turned their buggy round and made it for home and no +mistake! The niggers wasn't fur behind neither! + +They fit on back toward our plantation, and some of the fighting was +inside it at one corner. For three-four days after that they was +burying soldiers 'round there, and some of de graves was on our old +place. + +Long time afterwards people come and moved all them to other +graveyards at Shiloh and Corinth and other places. They was about a +hundred killed all around there. + +After de War I married Molly Timberlake and we lived on there 'til +1902, when we come to Indian Territory at Haskell. They wasn't no +Haskell there then, and I helped to build dat town, doing carpenter +work and the like. + +We had two boys, Bill and Jim Dick, and eight daughters, Effie, Ida, +Etta, Eva, Jessie, Tommie, Bennie and Timmie. Her real name is +Timberlake after her mammy. They all went to school and graduated in +the high schools. + +My wife has been dead about ten years. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +10-13-37 +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937] + +CHANEY RICHARDSON +Age 90 years +Fort Gibson, Okla. + + +I was born in the old Caney settlement southeast of Tahlequah on the +banks of Caney Creek. Off to the north we could see the big old ridge +of Sugar Mountain when the sun shine on him first thing in the morning +when we all getting up. + +I didn't know nothing else but some kind of war until I was a grown +woman, because when I first can remember my old Master, Charley +Rogers, was always on the lookout for somebody or other he was lined +up against in the big feud. + +My master and all the rest of the folks was Cherokees, and they'd been +killing each other off in the feud ever since long before I was +borned, and jest because old Master have a big farm and three-four +families of Negroes them other Cherokees keep on pestering his stuff +all the time. Us children was always afeared to go any place less'n +some of the grown folks was along. + +We didn't know what we was a-feared of, but we heard the Master and +Mistress keep talking 'bout "another Party killing" and we stuck close +to the place. + +Old Mistress' name was Nancy Rogers, but I was a orphan after I was a +big girl and I called her "Aunt" and "Mamma" like I did when I was +little. You see my own mammy was the house woman and I was raised in +the house, and I heard the little children call old mistress "mamma" +and so I did too. She never did make me stop. + +My pappy and mammy and us children lived in a one-room log cabin close +to the creek bank and jest a little piece from old Master's house. + +My pappy's name was Joe Tucker and my mammy's name was Ruth Tucker. +They belonged to a man named Tucker before I was born and he sold them +to Master Charley Rogers and he just let them go on by the same name +if they wanted to, because last name didn't mean nothing to a slave +anyways. The folks jest called my pappy "Charley Rogers' boy Joe." + +I already had two sisters, Mary and Mandy, when I was born, and purty +soon I had a baby brother, Louis. Mammy worked at the Big House and +took me along every day. When I was a little bigger I would help hold +the hank when she done the spinning and old Mistress done a lot of the +weaving and some knitting. She jest set by the window and knit most +all of the time. + +When we weave the cloth we had a big loom out on the gallery, and Miss +Nancy tell us how to do it. + +Mammy eat at our own cabin, and we had lots of game meat and fish the +boys get in the Caney Creek. Mammy bring down deer meat and wild +turkey sometimes, that the Indian boys git on Sugar Mountain. + +Then we had corn bread, dried bean bread and green stuff out'n +Master's patch. Mammy make the bean bread when we git short of corn +meal and nobody going to the mill right away. She take and bile the +beans and mash them up in some meal and that make it go a long ways. + +The slaves didn't have no garden 'cause they work the old Master's +garden and make enough for everybody to have some anyway. + +When I was about 10 years old that feud got so bad the Indians was +always talking about getting their horses and cattle killed and their +slaves harmed. I was too little to know how bad it was until one +morning my own mammy went off somewhere down the road to git some +stuff to dye cloth and she didn't come back. + +Lots of the young Indian bucks on both sides of the feud would ride +around the woods at night, and old Master got powerful oneasy about my +mammy and had all the neighbors and slaves out looking for her, but +nobody find her. + +It was about a week later that two Indian men rid up and ast old +master wasn't his gal Ruth gone. He says yes, and they take one of the +slaves along with a wagon to show where they seen her. + +They find her in some bushes where she'd been getting bark to set the +dyes, and she been dead all the time. Somebody done hit her in the +head with a club and shot her through and through with a bullet too. +She was so swole up they couldn't lift her up and jest had to make a +deep hole right along side of her and roll her in it she was so bad +mortified. + +Old Master nearly go crazy he was so mad, and the young Cherokee men +ride the woods every night for about a month, but they never catch on +to who done it. + +I think old Master sell the children or give them out to somebody +then, because I never see my sisters and brother for a long time after +the Civil War, and for me, I have to go live with a new mistress that +was a Cherokee neighbor. Her name was Hannah Ross, and she raised me +until I was grown. + +I was her home girl, and she and me done a lot of spinning and +weaving too. I helped the cook and carried water and milked. I carried +the water in a home-made pegging set on my head. Them peggings was +kind of buckets made out of staves set around a bottom and didn't have +no handle. + +I can remember weaving with Miss Hannah Ross. She would weave a strip +of white and one of yellow and one of brown to make it pretty. She had +a reel that would pop every time it got to a half skein so she would +know to stop and fill it up again. We used copperas and some kind of +bark she bought at the store to dye with. It was cotton clothes winter +and summer for the slaves, too, I'll tell you. + +When the Civil War come along we seen lots of white soldiers in them +brown butternut suits all over the place, and about all the Indian men +was in it too. Old master Charley Rogers' boy Charley went along too. +Then pretty soon--it seem like about a year--a lot of the Cherokee men +come back home and say they not going back to the War with that +General Cooper and some of them go off the Federal side because the +captain go to the Federal side too. + +Somebody come along and tell me my own pappy have to go in the war and +I think they say he on the Copper side, and then after while Miss +Hannah tell me he git kilt over in Arkansas. + +I was so grieved all the time I don't remember much what went on, but +I know pretty soon my Cherokee folks had all the stuff they had et up +by the soldiers and they was jest a few wagons and mules left. + +All the slaves was piled in together and some of the grown ones +walking, and they took us way down across the big river and kept us in +the bottoms a long time until the War was over. + +We lived in a kind of a camp, but I was too little to know where they +got the grub to feed us with. Most all the Negro men was off somewhere +in the War. + +Then one day they had to bust up the camp and some Federal soldiers go +with us and we all start back home. We git to a place where all the +houses is burned down and I ask what is that place. Miss Hannah say: +"Skullyville, child. That's where they had part of the War." + +All the slaves was set out when we git to Fort Gibson, and the +soldiers say we all free now. They give us grub and clothes to the +Negroes at that place. It wasn't no town but a fort place and a patch +of big trees. + +Miss Hannah take me to her place and I work there until I was grown. I +didn't git any money that I seen, but I got a good place to stay. + +Pretty soon I married Ran Lovely and we lived in a double log house +here at Fort Gibson. Then my second husband was Henry Richardson, but +he's been dead for years, too. We had six children, but they all dead +but one. + +I didn't want slavery to be over with, mostly because we had the War I +reckon. All that trouble made me the loss of my mammy and pappy, and I +was always treated good when I was a slave. When it was over I had +rather be at home like I was. None of the Cherokees ever whipped us, +and my mistress give me some mighty fine rules to live by to git along +in this world, too. + +The Cherokee didn't have no jail for Negroes and no jail for +themselves either. If a man done a crime he come back to take his +punishment without being locked up. + +None of the Negroes ran away when I was a child that I know of. We all +had plenty to eat. The Negroes didn't have no school and so I can't +read and write, but they did have a school after the War, I hear. But +we had a church made out of a brush arbor and we would sing good songs +in Cherokee sometimes. + +I always got Sunday off to play, and at night I could go git a piece +of sugar or something to eat before I went to bed and Mistress didn't +care. + +We played bread-and-butter and the boys played hide the switch. The +one found the switch got to whip the one he wanted to. + +When I got sick they give me some kind of tea from weeds, and if I et +too many roasting ears and swole up they biled gourds and give me the +liquor off'n them to make me throw up. + +I've been a good church-goer all my life until I git too feeble, and I +still understand and talk Cherokee language and love to hear songs and +parts of the Bible in it because it make me think about the time I was +a little girl before my mammy and pappy leave me. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +RED RICHARDSON +Age 75 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma + + +I was born July 21, 1862, at Grimes County, Texas. Smith Richardson +was my father's name, and Eliza Richardson my mother's. My father came +from Virginia. My mother she was born in Texas. + +We lived in so many places round there I can't tell jest what, but we +lived in a log house most of the time. We slept on the flo' on pallets +on one quilt. We ate cornbread, beans, vegetables, and got to drink +plenty milk. We ate rabbits, fish, possums and such as that but we +didn't get no chicken. I don't have no fav'rite food, I don't guess. + +We wore shirts, long shirts slit up the side. I didn't know what pants +was until I was 14. In Grimes County it ain't even cold these days, +and I never wore no shoes. I married in a suit made of broad cloth. It +had a tail on the coat. + +Master Ben Hadley, and Mistress Minnie Hadley, they had three sons: +Josh, Henry and Charley. Didn't have no overseer. We had to call all +white folks, poor or rich, Mr. Master and Mistress. Master Hadley +owned 'bout 2,000 acres. He had a big number of slaves. They used to +wake 'em up early in the mornings by ringing a large bell. They said +they used to whip 'em, drive 'em, and sell 'em away from their +chillun,--I'd hear my old folks talk about it. Say they wasn't no such +a thing as going to jail. The master stood good for anything his +nigger done. If the master's nigger killed 'im another nigger, the old +master stood good. + +They never had no schools for the Negro chillun. I can't remember the +date of the first school--its in a book someplace--but anyway I went +to one of the first schools that was established for the education of +Negro chillun. + +You know Mr. Negro always was a church man, but he don't mean nothing. +I don't have no fav'rite spiritual. All of them's good ones. Whenever +they'd baptise they'd sing: + +"Harp From the Tune the Domeful Sound." + +Which starts like this: + + "Come live in man and view this ground + where we must sho'ly lie." + +I'm a member of Tabernacle Baptist Church myself, and I think all +people should be religious 'cause Jesus died for us all. + +The patrollers used to run after me but I'd jump 'em. They used to +have a permit to go from one plantation to another. You had to go to +old master and say, "I want to go to such and such a place." And if +you had a permit they didn't bother you. The pateroller would stop you +and say, "Where you going? You got a permit to go to such and such a +place?" You'd say, yes suh, and show that pass. Den he wouldn't bother +you and iffen he did old master would git on 'em. + +When 10 o'clock come which was bed time the slaves would go to their +cabins and some of 'em would go stealing chickens, hogs, steal sweet +potatoes, and cook and eat 'em. Jest git in to all kind of devilment. + +Old master would give 'em Sadday afternoon off, and they'd have them +Sadday night breakdowns. We played a few games such as marbles, mumble +peg, and cards--jest anything to pass off the time. Heahs one of the +games we'd play an' I sho did like it too: + + She is my sweetheart as I stand, + Come and stand beside of me, + Kiss her sweet and; + Hug her near. + +On Christmas they'd make egg nog, drink whiskey and kiss their girls. + +Some wore charms to ward off the devil, but I don't believe in such. +I do believe in voodoo like this: People can put propositions up to +you and fool you. Don't believe in ghost. Tried to see 'em but I never +could. + +Old master didn't turn my father loose and tell 'em we was free. They +didn't turn us loose 'til they got the second threat from President +Lincoln. Good old Lincoln; they wasn't nothing like 'im. Booker T. +Washington was one of the finest Negro Educators in the world, but old +Jefferson Davis was against the cullud man. + +I think since slavery is all over, it has been a benefit to the cullud +man. He's got more freedom now. + + + + +Oklahoma Writer's Project +Ex-Slaves + +BETTY ROBERTSON +Age 93 yrs. +Fort Gibson, Oklahoma + + +I was born close to Webber's Falls, in the Canadian District of the +Cherokee Nation, in the same year that my pappy was blowed up and +killed in the big boat accident that killed my old Master. + +I never did see my daddy excepting when I was a baby and I only know +what my mammy told me about him. He come from across the water when he +was a little boy, and was grown when old Master Joseph Vann bought +him, so he never did learn to talk much Cherokee. My mammy was a +Cherokee slave, and talked it good. My husband was a Cherokee born +negro, too, and when he got mad he forgit all the English he knowed. + +Old Master Joe had a mighty big farm and several families of negroes, +and he was a powerful rich man. Pappy's name was Kalet Vann, and +mammy's name was Sally. My brothers was name Sone and Frank. I had one +brother and one sister sold when I was little and I don't remember the +names. My other sisters was Polly, Ruth and Liddie. I had to work in +the kitchen when I was a gal, and they was ten or twelve children +smaller than me for me to look after, too. Sometime Young Master Joe +and the other boys give me a piece of money and say I worked for it, +and I reckon I did for I have to cook five or six times a day. Some of +the Master's family was always going down to the river and back, and +every time they come in I have to fix something to eat. Old Mistress +had a good cookin' stove, but most Cherokees had only a big fireplace +and pot hooks. We had meat, bread, rice, potatoes and plenty of fish +and chicken. The spring time give us plenty of green corn and beans +too. I couldn't buy anything in slavery time, so I jest give the piece +of money to the Vann children. I got all the clothes I need from old +Mistress, and in winter I had high top shoes with brass caps on the +toe. In the summer I wear them on Sunday, too. I wore loom cloth +clothes, dyed in copperas what the old negro women and the old +Cherokee women made. + +The slaves had a pretty easy time I think. Young Master Vann never +very hard on us and he never whupped us, and old Mistress was a widow +woman and a good Christian and always kind. I sure did love her. Maybe +old Master Joe Vann was harder, I don't know, but that was before my +time. Young Master never whip his slaves, but if they don't mind good +he sell them off sometimes. He sold one of my brothers and one sister +because they kept running off. They wasn't very big either, but one +day two Cherokees rode up and talked a long time, then young Master +came to the cabin and said they were sold because mammy couldn't make +them mind him. They got on the horses behind the men and went off. + +Old Master Joe had a big steam boat he called the Lucy Walker, and he +run it up and down the Arkansas and the Mississippi and the Ohio +river, old Mistress say. He went clean to Louisville, Kentucky, and +back. My pappy was a kind of a boss of the negroes that run the boat, +and they all belong to old Master Joe. Some had been in a big run-away +and had been brung back, and wasn't so good, so he keep them on the +boat all the time mostly. Mistress say old Master and my pappy on the +boat somewhere close to Louisville and the boiler bust and tear the +boat up. Some niggers say my pappy kept hollering, "Run it to the +bank! Run it to the bank!" but it sunk and him and old Master died. + +Old Master Joe was a big man in the Cherokees, I hear, and was good to +his negroes before I was born. My pappy run away one time, four or +five years before I was born, mammy tell me, and at that time a whole +lot of Cherokee slaves run off at once. They got over in the Creek +country and stood off the Cherokee officers that went to git them, +but pretty soon they give up and come home. Mammy say they was lots of +excitement on old Master's place and all the negroes mighty scared, +but he didn't sell my pappy off. He jest kept him and he was a good +negro after that. He had to work on the boat, though, and never got to +come home but once in a long while. + +Young Master Joe let us have singing and be baptized if we want to, +but I wasn't baptized till after the War. But we couldn't learn to +read or have a book, and the Cherokee folks was afraid to tell us +about the letters and figgers because they have a law you go to jail +and a big fine if you show a slave about the letters. + +When the War come they have a big battle away west of us, but I never +see any battles. Lots of soldiers around all the time though. + +One day young Master come to the cabins and say we all free and can't +stay there less'n we want to go on working for him just like we'd +been, for our feed and clothes. Mammy got a wagon and we traveled +around a few days and go to Fort Gibson. When we git to Fort Gibson +they was a lot of negroes there, and they had a camp meeting and I was +baptized. It was in the Grand River close to the ford, and winter +time. Snow on the ground and the water was muddy and all full of +pieces of ice. The place was all woods, and the Cherokees and the +soldiers all come down to see the baptizing. + +We settled down a little ways above Fort Gibson. Mammy had the wagon +and two oxen, and we worked a good size patch there until she died, +and then I git married to Cal Robertson to have somebody to take care +of me. Cal Robertson was eighty-nine years old when I married him +forty years ago, right on this porch. I had on my old clothes for the +wedding, and I aint had any good clothes since I was a little slave +girl. Then I had clean warm clothes and I had to keep them clean, too! + +I got my allotment as a Cherokee Freedman, and so did Cal, but we +lived here at this place because we was too old to work the land +ourselves. In slavery time the Cherokee negroes do like anybody else +when they is a death--jest listen to a chapter in the Bible and all +cry. We had a good song I remember. It was "Don't Call the Roll, +Jesus, Because I'm Coming Home." The only song I remember from the +soldiers was: "Hang Jeff Davis to a Sour Apple Tree", and I remember +that because they said he used to be at Fort Gibson one time. I don't +know what he done after that. + +I don't know about Robert Lee, but I know about Lee's Creek. + +I been a good Christian ever since I was baptized, but I keep a little +charm here on my neck anyways, to keep me from having the nose bleed. +Its got a buckeye and a lead bullet in it. I had a silver dime on it, +too, for a long time, but I took it off and got me a box of snuff. I'm +glad the War's over and I am free to meet God like anybody else, and +my grandchildren can learn to read and write. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 18 1937] + +HARRIET ROBINSON +Age 95 yrs. +500 Block N. Fonshill +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. + + +I was born September 1, 1842, in Bastrop, Texas, on Colorado River. My +pappy was named Harvey Wheeler and my mammy was named Carolina Sims. +My brothers and sisters was named Alex, Taylor, Mary, Cicero, +Tennessee, Sarah, Jeff, Ella and Nora. We lived in cedar log houses +with dirt floors and double chimneys, and doors hung on wooden hinges. +One side of our beds was bored in the walls and had one leg on the +other. Them white folks give each nigger family a blanket in winter. + +I nussed 3 white chillun, Lulu, Helen Augusta, and Lola Sims. I done +this before that War that set us free. We kids use to make extra money +by toting gravel in our aprons. They'd give us dimes and silver +nickles. + +Our clothes was wool and cotton mixed. We had red rustic shoes, soles +one-half inch thick. They'd go a-whick a-whack. The mens had pants wid +one seam and a right-hand pocket. Boys wore shirts. + +We ate hominy, mush, grits and pone bread for the most part. Many of +them ate out of one tray with wooden spoons. All vittles for field +hands was fixed together. + +Women broke in mules throwed 'em down and roped 'em. They'd do it +better'n men. While mammy made some hominy one day both my foots was +scalded and when they clipped them blisters, they jest put some cotton +round them and catched all dat yellow water and made me a yellow dress +out of it. This was 'way back yonder in slavery, before the War. + +Whenever white folks had a baby born den all de old niggers had to +come thoo the room and the master would be over 'hind the bed and he'd +say, "Here's a new little mistress or master you got to work for." +You had to say, "Yessuh Master" and bow real low or the overseer would +crack you. Them was slavery days, dog days. + +I remember in slavery time we had stages. Them devilish things had +jest as many wrecks as cars do today. Only thing, we jest didn't have +as many. + +My mammy belonged to Master Colonel Sam Sims and his old mean wife +Julia. My pappy belonged to Master Meke Smith and his good wife +Harriett. She was sho' a good woman. I was named after her. Master Sam +and Master Meke was partners. Ever year them rich men would send so +many wagons to New Mexico for different things. It took 6 months to go +and come. + +Slaves was punished by whip and starving. Decker was sho' a mean +slave-holder. He lived close to us. Master Sam didn't never whip me, +but Miss Julia whipped me every day in the mawning. During the war she +beat us so terrible. She say, "Your master's out fighting and losing +blood trying to save you from them Yankees, so you kin git your'n +here." Miss Julia would take me by my ears and butt my head against +the wall. She wanted to whip my mother, but old Master told her, naw +sir. When his father done give my mammy to Master Sam, he told him not +to beat her, and iffen he got to whar he jest had to, jest bring her +back and place her in his yard from whar he got her. + +White folks didn't 'low you to read or write. Them what did know come +from Virginny. Mistress Julia used to drill her chillun in spelling +any words. At every word them chillun missed, she gived me a lick +'cross the head for it. Meanest woman I ever seen in my whole life. + +This skin I got now, it ain't my first skin. That was burnt off when I +was a little child. Mistress used to have a fire made on the +fireplace and she made me scour the brass round it and my skin jest +blistered. I jest had to keep pulling it off'n me. + +We didn't had no church, though my pappy was a preacher. He preached +in the quarters. Our baptizing song was "On Jordan's Stormy Bank I +stand" and "Hark From The Tomb." Now all dat was before the War. We +had all our funerals at the graveyard. Everybody, chillun and all +picked up a clod of dirt and throwed in on top the coffin to help fill +up the grave. + +Taling 'bout niggers running away, didn't my step-pappy run away? +Didn't my uncle Gabe run away? The frost would jest bite they toes +most nigh off too, whiles they was gone. They put Uncle Isom (my +step-pappy) in jail and while's he was in there he killed a white +guardman. Then they put in the paper, "A nigger to kill", and our +Master seen it and bought him. He was a double-strengthed man, he was +so strong. He'd run off so help you God. They had the blood hounds +after him once and he caught the hound what was leading and beat the +rest of the dogs. The white folks run up on him before he knowed it +and made them dogs eat his ear plumb out. But don't you know he got +away anyhow. One morning I was sweeping out the hall in the big house +and somebody come a-knocking on the front door and I goes to the door. +There was Uncle Isom wid rags all on his head. He said, "Tell ole +master heah I am." I goes to Master's door and says, "Master Colonel +Sam, Uncle Isom said heah he am." He say, "Go 'round to the kitchen +and tell black mammy to give you breakfast." When he was thoo' eating +they give him 300 lashes and, bless my soul, he run off again. + +When we went to a party the nigger fiddlers would play a chune dat +went lak this: + + I fooled Ole Mastah 7 years + Fooled the overseer three; + Hand me down my banjo + And I'll tickle your bel-lee. + +We had the same doctors the white folks had and we wore asafetida and +garlic and onions to keep from taking all them ailments. + +I 'member the battle being fit. The white folks buried all the jewelry +and silver and all the gold in the Blue Ridge Mountains, in Orange, +Texas. Master made all us niggers come together and git ready to leave +'cause the Yankees was coming. We took a steamer. Now this was in +slavery time, sho' 'nuff slavery. Then we got on a steamship and +pulled out to Galveston. Then he told the captain to feed we niggers. +We was on the bay, not the ocean. We left Galveston and went on trains +for Houston. + +One, my sister Liza, was mulatto and Master Colonel Sims' son had 3 +chillun by her. We never seen her no more after her last child was +born. I found out though that she was in Canada. + +After the War, Master Colonel Sims went to git the mail and so he call +Daniel Ivory, the overseer, and say to him, "Go round to all the +quarters and tell all the niggers to come up, I got a paper to read to +'em. They're free now, so you kin git you another job, 'cause I ain't +got no more niggers which is my own." Niggers come up from the cabins +nappy-headed, jest lak they gwine to the field. Master Colonel Sims +say, "Caroline (that's my mammy), you is free as me. Pa said bring you +back and I'se gwina do jest that. So you go on and work and I'll pay +you and your three oldest chillun $10.00 a month a head and $4.00 fer +Harriet," that's me, and then he turned to the rest and say "Now all +you'uns will receive $10.00 a head till the crops is laid by." Don't +you know before he got half way thoo', over half them niggers was +gone. + +Them Klu Klux Klans come and ask for water with the false stomachs and +make lak they was drinking three bucketsful. They done some terrible +things, but God seen it all and marked it down. + +We didn't had no law, we had "bureau." Why, in them days iffen +somebody stole anything from you, they had to pay you and not the +Law. Now they done turned that round and you don't git nothing. + +One day whiles master was gone hunting, Mistress Julia told her +brother to give Miss Harriett (me) a free whipping. She was a nigger +killer. Master Colonel Sam come home and he said, "You infernal sons +o' bitches don't you know there is 300 Yankees camped out here and +iffen they knowed you'd whipped this nigger the way you done done, +they'd kill all us. Iffen they find it out, I'll kill all you all." +Old rich devils, I'm here, but they is gone. + +God choosed Abraham Lincoln to free us. It took one of them to free us +so's they couldn't say nothing. + +Doing one 'lection they sung: + + Clark et the watermelon + J. D. Giddings et the vine! + Clark gone to Congress + An' J. D. Giddings left behind. + +They hung Jeff Davis up a sour apple tree. They say he was a +president, but he wasn't, he was a big senator man. + +Booker T. Washington was all right in his way, I guess, but Bruce and +Fred Douglass, or big mens jest sold us back to the white folks. + +I married Haywood Telford and had 13 head of chillun by him. My oldest +daughter is the mammy of 14. All my chillun but four done gone to +heaven before me. + +I jined the church in Chapel Hill, Texas. I am born of the Spirit of +God sho' nuff. I played with him seven years and would go right on +dancing at Christmas time. Now I got religion. Everybody oughta live +right, though you won't have no friends iffen you do. + +Our overseer was a poor man. Had us up before day and lak-a-that. He +was paid to be the head of punishment. I jest didn't like to think of +them old slavery days, dogs' days. + + + + +[Illustration: Katie Rowe] + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[HW: (photo)] +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +KATIE ROWE +Age 88 yrs. +Tulsa, Oklahoma + + +I can set on de gallery, whar de sunlight shine bright, and sew a +powerful fine seam when my grandchillun wants a special purty dress +for de school doings, but I ain't worth much for nothing else I +reckon. + +These same old eyes seen powerful lot of tribulations in my time, and +when I shets 'em now I can see lots of l'il chillun jest lak my +grandchillun, toting hoes bigger dan dey is, and dey pore little black +hands and legs bleeding whar dey scratched by de brambledy weeds, and +whar dey got whuppings 'cause dey didn't git out all de work de +overseer set out for 'em. + +I was one of dem little slave gals my own self, and I never seen +nothing but work and tribulations till I was a grown up woman, jest +about. + +De niggers had hard traveling on de plantation whar I was born and +raised, 'cause old Master live in town and jest had de overseer on de +place, but iffen he had lived out dar hisself I speck it been as bad, +'cause he was a hard driver his own self. + +He git biling mad when de Yankees have dat big battle at Pea Ridge and +scatter de 'Federates all down through our country all bleeding and +tied up and hungry, and he jest mount on his hoss and ride out to de +plantation whar we all hoeing corn. + +He ride up and tell old man Saunders--dat de overseer--to bunch us all +up round de lead row man--dat my own uncle Sandy--and den he tell us +de law! + +"You niggers been seeing de 'Federate soldiers coming by here looking +purty raggedy and hurt and wore out," he say, "but dat no sign dey +licked! + +"Dem Yankees ain't gwine git dis fur, but iffen dey do you all ain't +gwine git free by 'em, 'cause I gwine free you befo' dat. When dey git +here dey going find you already free, 'cause I gwine line you up on de +bank of Bois d' Arc Creek and free you wid my shotgun! Anybody miss +jest one lick wid de hoe, or one step in de line, or one clap of dat +bell, or one toot of de horn, and he gwine be free and talking to de +debil long befo' he ever see a pair of blue britches!" + +Dat de way he talk to us, and dat de way he act wid us all de time. + +We live in de log quarters on de plantation, not far from Washington, +Arkansas, close to Bois d' Arc Creek, in de edge of de Little River +bottom. + +Old Master's name was Dr. Isaac Jones, and he live in de town, whar he +keep four, five house niggers, but he have about 200 on de plantation, +big and little, and old man Saunders oversee 'em at de time of de War. +Old Mistress name was Betty, and she had a daughter name Betty about +grown, and then they was three boys, Tom, Bryan, and Bob, but they was +too young to go to de War. I never did see 'em but once or twice 'til +after de War. + +Old Master didn't go to de War, 'cause he was a doctor and de onliest +one left in Washington, and purty soon he was dead anyhow. + +Next fall after he ride out and tell us dat he gwine shoot us befo' he +let us free he come out to see how his steam gin doing. De gin box was +a little old thing 'bout as big as a bedstead, wid a long belt running +through de side of de gin house out to de engine and boiler in de +yard. De boiler burn cord wood, and it have a little crack in it whar +de nigger ginner been trying to fix it. + +Old Master come out, hopping mad 'cause de gin shet down, and ast de +ginner, old Brown, what de matter. Old Brown say de boiler weak and +it liable to bust, but old Master jump down off'n his hoss and go +'round to de boiler and say, "Cuss fire to your black heart! Dat +boiler all right! Throw on some cordwood, cuss fire to your heart!" + +Old Brown start to de wood pile grumbling to hisself and old Master +stoop down to look at de boiler again, and it blow right up and him +standing right dar! + +Old Master was blowed all to pieces, and dey jest find little bitsy +chunks of his clothes and parts of him to bury. + +De wood pile blow down, and old Brown land way off in de woods, but he +wasn't killed. + +Two wagons of cotton blowed over, and de mules run away, and all de +niggers was scared nearly to death 'cause we knowed de overseer gwine +be a lot worse, now dat old Master gone. + +Before de War when Master was a young man de slaves didn't have it so +hard, my mammy tell me. Her name was Fanny and her old mammy name was +Nanny. Grandma Nanny was alive during de War yet. + +How she come in de Jones family was dis way: old Mistress was jest a +little girl, and her older brother bought Nanny and give her to her. I +think his name was Little John, anyways we called him Master Little +John. He drawed up a paper what say dat Nanny allus belong to Miss +Betty and all de chillun Nanny ever have belong to her, too, and +nobody can't take 'em for a debt and things like dat. When Miss Betty +marry, old Master he can't sell Nanny or any of her chillun neither. + +Dat paper hold good too, and grandmammy tell me about one time it hold +good and keep my own mammy on de place. + +Grandmammy say mammy was jest a little gal and was playing out in de +road wid three, four other little chillun when a white man and old +Master rid up. The white man had a paper about some kind of a debt, +and old Master say take his pick of de nigger chillun and give him +back de paper. + +Jest as Grandmammy go to de cabin door and hear him say dat de man git +off his hoss and pick up my mammy and put her up in front of him and +start to ride off down de road. + +Pretty soon Mr. Little John come riding up and say something to old +Master, and see grandmammy standing in de yard screaming and crying. +He jest job de spur in his hoss and go kiting off down de road after +dat white man. + +Mammy say he ketch up wid him jest as he git to Bois d' Arc Creek and +start to wade de hoss across. Mr. Little John holler to him to come +back wid dat little nigger 'cause de paper don't kiver dat child, +'cause she old Mistress' own child, and when de man jest ride on, Mr. +Little John throw his big old long hoss-pistol down on him and make +him come back. + +De man hopping mad, but he have to give over my mammy and take one de +other chillun on de debt paper. + +Old Master allus kind of techy 'bout old Mistress having niggers he +can't trade or sell, and one day he have his whole family and some +more white folks out at de plantation. He showing 'em all de quarters +when we all come in from de field in de evening, and he call all de +niggers up to let de folks see 'em. + +He make grandmammy and mammy and me stand to one side and den he say +to the other niggers, "Dese niggers belong to my wife but you belong +to me, and I'm de only one you is to call Master. + +"Dis is Tom, and Bryan, and Bob, and Miss Betty, and you is to call +'em dat, and don't you ever call one of 'em Young Master or Young +Mistress, cuss fire to your black hearts!" All de other white folks +look kind of funny, and old Mistress look 'shamed of old Master. + +My own pappy was in dat bunch, too. His name was Frank, and after de +War he took de name of Frank Henderson, 'cause he was born under dat +name, but I allus went by Jones, de name I was born under. + +Long about de middle of de War, after old Master was killed, de +soldiers begin coming 'round de place and camping. Dey was Southern +soldiers and dey say dey have to take de mules and most de corn to git +along on. Jest go in de barns and cribs and take anything dey want, +and us niggers didn't have no sweet 'taters nor Irish 'taters to eat +on when dey gone neither. + +One bunch come and stay in de woods across de road from de overseer's +house, and dey was all on hosses. Dey lead de hosses down to Bois d' +Arc Creek every morning at daylight and late every evening to git +water. When we going to de field and when we coming in we allus see +dem leading big bunches of hosses. + +Dey bugle go jest 'bout de time our old horn blow in de morning and +when we come in dey eating supper, and we smell it and sho' git +hungry! + +Before old Master died he sold off a whole lot of hosses and cattle, +and some niggers too. He had de sales on de plantation, and white men +from around dar come to bid, and some traders come. He had a big stump +whar he made de niggers stand while dey was being sold, and de men and +boys had to strip off to de waist to show dey muscle and iffen dey had +any scars or hurt places, but de women and gals didn't have to strip +to de waist. + +De white men come up and look in de slave's mouth jest lak he was a +mule or a hoss. + +After old Master go, de overseer hold one sale, but mostly he jest +trade wid de traders what come by. He make de niggers git on de stump, +through. De traders all had big bunches of slaves and dey have 'em all +strung out in a line going down de road. Some had wagons and de +chillun could ride, but not many. Dey didn't chain or tie 'em 'cause +dey didn't have no place dey could run to anyway. + +I seen chillun sold off and de mammy not sold, and, sometimes de mammy +sold and a little baby kept on de place and give to another woman to +raise. Dem white folks didn't care nothing 'bout how de slaves +grieved when dey tore up a family. + +Old man Saunders was de hardest overseer of anybody. He would git mad +and give a whipping some time and de slave wouldn't even know what it +was about. + +My uncle Sandy was de lead row nigger, and he was a good nigger and +never would tech a drap of likker. One night some de niggers git hold +of some likker somehow, and dey leave de jug half full on de step of +Sandy's cabin. Next morning old man Saunders come out in de field so +mad he was pale. + +He jest go to de lead row and tell Sandy to go wid him, and start +toward de woods along Bois d' Arc Creek wid Sandy follering behind. De +overseer always carry a big heavy stick, but we didn't know he was so +mad, and dey jest went off in de woods. + +Purty soon we hear Sandy hollering and we know old overseer pouring in +on, den de overseer come back by his self and go on up to de house. + +Come late evening he come and see what we done in de day's work, and +go back to de quarters wid us all. Then he git to mammy's cabin, whar +grandmammy live too, he say to grandmammy, "I sent Sandy down in de +woods to hunt a hoss, he gwine come in hungry purty soon. You better +make him a extra hoe cake," and he kind of laugh and go on to his +house. + +Jest soon as he gone we all tell grandmammy we think he got a +whipping, and sho' nuff he didn't come in. + +De next day some white boys find uncle Sandy whar dat overseer done +killed him and throwed him in a little pond, and dey never done +nothing to old man Saunders at all! + +When he go to whip a nigger he make him strip to de waist, and he take +a cat-o-nine tails and bring de blisters, and den bust de blisters +wid a wide strap of leather fastened to a stick handle. I seen de +blood running out'n many a back, all de way from de neck to de waist! + +Many de time a nigger git blistered and cut up so dat we have to git a +sheet and grease it wid lard and wrap 'em up in it, and dey have to +wear a greasy cloth wrapped around dey body under de shirt for +three-four days after dey git a big whipping! + +Later on in de War de Yankees come in all around us and camp, and de +overseer git sweet as honey in de comb! Nobody git a whipping all de +time de Yankees dar! + +Dey come and took all de meat and corn and 'taters dey want too, and +dey tell us, "Why don't you poor darkeys take all de meat and molasses +you want? You made it and it's your's much as anybody's!" But we know +dey soon be gone, and den we git a whipping iffen we do. Some niggers +run off and went wid de Yankees, but dey had to work jest as hard for +dem, and dey didn't eat so good and often wid de soldiers. + +I never forget de day we was set free! + +Dat morning we all go to de cotton field early, and den a house nigger +come out from old Mistress on a hoss and say she want de overseer to +come into town, and he leave and go in. After while de old horn blow +up at de overseer's house, and we all stop and listen, 'cause it de +wrong time of day for de horn. + +We start chopping again, and dar go de horn again. + +De lead row nigger holler "Hold up!" And we all stop again. "We better +go on in. Dat our horn," he holler at de head nigger, and de head +nigger think so too, but he say he afraid we catch de devil from de +overseer iffen we quit widout him dar, and de lead row man say maybe +he back from town and blowing de horn hisself, so we line up and go +in. + +When we git to de quarters we see all de old ones and de chillun up in +de overseer's yard, so we go on up dar. De overseer setting on de end +of de gallery wid a paper in his hand, and when we all come up he say +come and stand close to de gallery. Den he call off everybody's name +and see we all dar. + +Setting on de gallery in a hide-bottom chair was a man we never see +before. He had on a big broad black hat lak de Yankees wore but it +din't have no yaller string on it lak most de Yankees had, and he was +in store clothes dat wasn't homespun or jeans, and dey was black. His +hair was plumb gray and so was his beard, and it come way down here on +his chest, but he didn't look lak he was very old, 'cause his face was +kind of fleshy and healthy looking. I think we all been sold off in a +bunch, and I notice some kind of smiling, and I think they sho' glad +of it. + +De man say, "You darkies know what day dis is?" He talk kind, and +smile. + +We all don't know of course, and we jest stand dar and grin. Pretty +soon he ask again and de head man say, No, we don't know. + +"Well dis de fourth day of June, and dis is 1865, and I want you all +to 'member de date, 'cause you allus going 'member de day. Today you +is free, Jest lak I is, and Mr. Saunders and your Mistress and all us +white people," de man say. + +"I come to tell you", he say, "and I wants to be sho' you all +understand, 'cause you don't have to git up and go by de horn no more. +You is your own bosses now, and you don't have to have no passes to go +and come." + +We never did have no passes, nohow, but we knowed lots of other +niggers on other plantations got 'em. + +"I wants to bless you and hope you always is happy, and tell you got +all de right and lief [TR: sic] dat any white people got", de man say, +and den he git on his hoss and ride off. + +We all jest watch him go on down de road, and den we go up to Mr. +Saunders and ask him what he want us to do. He jest grunt and say do +lak we dam please, he reckon, but git off dat place to do it, less'n +any of us wants to stay and make de crop for half of what we make. + +None of us know whar to go, so we all stay, and he split up de fields +and show us which part we got to work in, and we go on lak we was, and +make de crop and git it in, but dey ain't no more horn after dat day. +Some de niggers lazy and don't git in de field early, and dey git it +took away from 'em, but dey plead around and git it back and work +better de rest of dat year. + +But we all gits fooled on dat first go-out! When de crop all in we +don't git half! Old Mistress sick in town, and de overseer was still +on de place and he charge us half de crop for de quarters and de mules +and tools and grub! + +Den he leave, and we gits another white man, and he sets up a book, +and give us half de next year, and take out for what we use up, but we +all got something left over after dat first go-out. + +Old Mistress never git well after she lose all her niggers, and one +day de white boss tell us she jest drap over dead setting in her +chair, and we know her heart jest broke. + +Next year de chillun sell off most de place and we scatter off, and I +and mammy go into Little Rock and do work in de town. Grandmammy done +dead. + +I git married to John White in Little Rock, but he died and we didn't +have no chillun. Den in four, five years I marry Billy Rowe. He was a +Cherokee citizen and he had belonged to a Cherokee name Dave Rowe, and +lived east of Tahlequah before de War. We married in Little Rock, but +he had land in de Cherokee Nation, and we come to east of Tahlequah +and lived 'til he died, and den I come to Tulsa to live wid my +youngest daughter. + +Billy Rowe and me had three chillun, Ellie, John, and Lula. Lula +married a Thomas, and it's her I lives with. + +Lots of old people lak me say dat dey was happy in slavery, and dat +dey had de worst tribulations after freedom, but I knows dey didn't +have no white master and overseer lak we all had on our place. Dey +both dead now I reckon, and dey no use talking 'bout de dead, but I +know I been gone long ago iffen dat white man Saunder didn't lose his +hold on me. + +It was de fourth day of June in 1865 I begins to live, and I gwine +take de picture of dat old man in de big black hat and long whiskers, +setting on de gallery and talking kind to us, clean into my grave wid +me. + +No, bless God, I ain't never seen no more black boys bleeding all up +and down de back under a cat o' nine tails, and I never go by no cabin +and hear no poor nigger groaning, all wrapped up in a lardy sheet no +more! + +I hear my chillun read about General Lee, and I know he was a good +man, I didn't know nothing about him den, but I know now he wasn't +fighting for dat kind of white folks. + +Maybe dey dat kind still yet, but dey don't show it up no more, and I +got lots of white friends too. All my chillun and grandchillun been to +school, and dey git along good, and I know we living in a better +world, what dey ain't nobody "cussing fire to my black heart!" + +I sho' thank de good Lawd I got to see it. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + + +MORRIS SHEPPARD +Age 85 yrs. +Fort Gibson, Okla. + + +Old Master tell me I was borned in November 1852, at de old home place +about five miles east of Webber's Falls, mebbe kind of northeast, not +far from de east bank of de Illinois River. + +Master's name was Joe Sheppard, and he was a Cherokee Indian. Tall and +slim and handsome. He had black eyes and mustache but his hair was +iron gray, and everybody liked him because he was so good-natured and +kind. + +I don't remember old Mistress' name. My mammy was a Crossland negro +before she come to belong to Master Joe and marry my pappy, and I +think she come wid old Mistress and belong to her. Old Mistress was +small and mighty pretty too, and she was only half Cherokee. She +inherit about half a dozen slaves, and say dey was her own and old +Master can't sell one unless she give him leave to do it. + +Dey only had two families of slaves wid about twenty in all, and dey +only worked about fifty acres, so we sure did work every foot of it +good. We git three or four crops of different things out of dat farm +every year, and something growing on dat place winter and summer. + +Pappy's name was Caesar Sheppard and Mammy's name was Easter. Dey was +both raised 'round Webber's Falls somewhere. I had two brothers, Silas +and George, dat belong to Mr. George Holt in Webber's Falls town. I +got a pass and went to see dem sometimes, and dey was both treated +mighty fine. + +The Big House was a double log wid a big hall and a stone chimney but +no porches, wid two rooms at each end, one top side of de other. I +thought it was mighty big and fine. + +Us slaves lived in log cabins dat only had one room and no windows so +we kept de doors open most of de time. We had home-made wooden beds +wid rope springs, and de little ones slept on trundle beds dat was +home made too. + +At night dem trundles was jest all over de floor, and in de morning we +shove dem back under de big beds to git dem out'n de way. No nails in +none of dem nor in de chairs and tables. Nails cost big money and old +Master's blacksmith wouldn't make none 'cepting a few for old Master +now and den, so we used wooden dowels to put things together. + +They was so many of us for dat little field we never did have to work +hard. Up at five o'clock and back in sometimes about de middle of de +evening, long before sundown, unless they was a crop to git in before +it rain or something like dat. + +When crop was laid by de slaves jest work 'round at dis and dat and +keep tol'able busy. I never did have much of a job, jest tending de +calves mostly. We had about twenty calves and I would take dem out and +graze 'em while some grown-up negro was grazing de cows so as to keep +de cows milk. I had me a good blaze-faced horse for dat. + +One time old Master and another man come and took some calves off and +Pappy say old Master taking dem off to sell. I didn't know what "sell" +meant and I ast Pappy, "Is he going to bring 'em back when he git +through selling them?" I never did see no money neither, until time of +de War or a little before. + +Master Joe was sure a good provider, and we always had plenty of corn +pone, sow belly and greens, sweet potatoes, cow peas and cane +molasses. We even had brown sugar and cane molasses most of de time +before de War. Sometimes coffee, too. + +De clothes wasn't no worry neither. Everything we had was made by my +folks. My aunt done de carding and spinning and my mammy done de +weaving and cutting and sewing, and my pappy could make cowhide shoes +wid wooden pegs. Dey was for bad winter only. + +Old Master bought de cotton in Ft. Smith because he didn't raise no +cotton, but he had a few sheep and we had wool-mix for winter. + +Everything was stripedy 'cause Mammy like to make it fancy. She dye +wid copperas and walnut and wild indigo and things like dat and make +pretty cloth. I wore a stripedy shirt till I was about eleven years +old, and den one day while we was down in de Choctaw Country old +Mistress see me and nearly fall off'n her horse! She holler, "Easter, +you go right now and make dat big buck of a boy some britches!" + +We never put on de shoes until about late November when de frost begin +to hit regular and split our feet up, and den when it git good and +cold and de crop all gathered in anyways, they is nothing to do +'cepting hog killing and a lot of wood chopping, and you don't git +cold doing dem two things. + +De hog killing mean we gits lots of spare-ribs and chitlings, and +somebody always git sick eating too much of dat fresh pork. I always +pick a whole passel of muskatines for old Master and he make up sour +wine, and dat helps out when we git the bowel complaint from eating +dat fresh pork. + +If somebody bad sick he git de doctor right quick, and he don't let no +negroes mess around wid no poultices and teas and sech things like +cupping-horns neither! + +Us Cherokee slaves seen lots of green corn shootings and de like of +dat, but we never had no games of our own. We was too tired when we +come in to play any games. We had to have a pass to go any place to +have singing or praying, and den they was always a bunch of patrollers +around to watch everything we done. Dey would come up in a bunch of +about nine men on horses, and look at all our passes, and if a negro +didn't have no pass dey wore him out good and made him go home. Dey +didn't let us have much enjoyment. + +Right after de War de Cherokees that had been wid the South kind of +pestered the freedmen some, but I was so small dey never bothered me; +jest de grown ones. Old Master and Mistress kept on asking me did de +night riders persecute me any but dey never did. Dey told me some of +dem was bad on negroes but I never did see none of dem night riding +like some said dey did. + +Old Master had some kind of business in Fort Smith, I think, 'cause he +used to ride in to dat town 'bout every day on his horse. He would +start at de crack of daylight and not git home till way after dark. +When he get home he call my uncle in and ask about what we done all +day and tell him what we better do de next day. My uncle Joe was de +slave boss and he tell us what de Master say do. + +When dat Civil War come along I was a pretty big boy and I 'remember +it good as anybody. Uncle Joe tell us all to lay low and work hard and +nobody bother us, and he would look after us. He sure stood good with +de Cherokee neighbors we had, and dey all liked him. There was Mr. Jim +Collins, and Mr. Bell, and Mr. Dave Franklin, and Mr. Jim Sutton and +Mr. Blackburn that lived around close to us and dey all had slaves. +Dey was all wid the South, but dey was a lot of dem Pin Indians all up +on de Illinois River and dey was wid de North and dey taken it out on +de slave owners a lot before de War and during it too. + +Dey would come in de night and hamstring de horses and maybe set fire +to de barn, and two of 'em named Joab Scarrel and Tom Starr killed my +pappy one night just before de War broke out. + +I don't know what dey done it for, only to be mean, and I guess they +was drunk. + +Them Pins was after Master all de time for a while at de first of de +War, and he was afraid to ride into Fort Smith much. Dey come to de +house one time when he was gone to Fort Smith and us children told dem +he was at Honey Springs, but they knowed better and when he got home +he said somebody shot at him and bushwhacked him all the way from +Wilson's Rock to dem Wildhorse Mountains, but he run his horse like de +devil was setting on his tail and dey never did hit him. He never seen +them neither. We told him 'bout de Pins coming for him and he just +laughed. + +When de War come old Master seen he was going into trouble and he sold +off most of de slaves. In de second year of de War he sold my mammy +and my aunt dat was Uncle Joe's wife and my two brothers and my little +sister. Mammy went to a mean old man named Peper Goodman and he took +her off down de river, and pretty soon Mistress tell me she died +'cause she can't stand de rough treatment. + +When Mammy went old Mistress took me to de Big House to help her, and +she was kind to me like I was part of her own family. I never forget +when they sold off some more negroes at de same time, too, and put dem +all in a pen for de trader to come and look at. + +He never come until the next day, so dey had to sleep in dat pen in a +pile like hogs. + +It wasn't my Master done dat. He done already sold 'em to a man and it +was dat man was waiting for de trader. It made my Master mad, but dey +didn't belong to him no more and he couldn't say nothing. + +The man put dem on a block and sold 'em to a man dat had come in on a +steamboat, and he took dem off on it when de freshet come down and de +boat could go back to Fort Smith. It was tied up at de dock at +Webber's Falls about a week and we went down and talked to my aunt and +brothers and sister. De brothers was Sam and Eli. Old Mistress cried +jest like any of de rest of us when de boat pull out with dem on it. + +Pretty soon all de young Cherokee menfolks all gone off to de War, and +de Pins was riding 'round all de time, and it aint safe to be in dat +part around Webber's Falls, so old Master take us all to Fort Smith +where they was a lot of Confederate soldiers. + +We camp at dat place a while and old Mistress stay in de town wid some +kinfolks. Den old Master get three wagons and ox teams and take us all +way down on Red River in de Choctaw Nation. + +We went by Webber's Falls and filled de wagons. We left de furniture +and only took grub and tools and bedding and clothes, 'cause they +wasn't very big wagons and was only single-yoke. + +We went on a place in de Red River bottoms close to Shawneetown and +not far from de place where all de wagons crossed over to go into +Texas. We was at dat place two years and made two little crops. + +One night a runaway negro come across from Texas and he had de blood +hounds after him. His britches was all muddy and tore where de hounds +had cut him up in de legs when he clumb a tree in de bottoms. He come +to our house and Mistress said for us negroes to give him something to +eat and we did. + +Then up come de man from Texas with de hounds and wid him was young +Mr. Joe Vann and my uncle that belong to young Joe. Dey called young +Mr. Joe "Little Joe Vann" even after he was grown on account of when +he was a little boy before his pappy was killed. His pappy was old +Captain "Rich Joe" Vann, and he been dead ever since long before de +War. My uncle belong to old Captain Joe nearly all his life. + +Mistress try to get de man to tell her who de negro belong to so she +can buy him, but de man say he can't sell him and he take him on back +to Texas wid a chain around his two ankles. Dat was one poor negro dat +never got away to de North, and I was sorry for him 'cause I know he +must have had a mean master, but none of us Sheppard negroes, I mean +the grown ones, tried to git away. + +I never seen any fighting in de War, but I seen soldiers in de South +army doing a lot of blacksmithing 'long side de road one day. Dey was +fixing wagons and shoeing horses. + +After de War was over, old Master tell me I am free but he will look +out after me 'cause I am just a little negro and I aint got no sense. +I know he is right, too. + +Well, I go ahead and make me a crop of corn all by myself and then I +don't know what to do wid it. I was afraid I would get cheated out of +it 'cause I can't figure and read, so I tell old Master about it and +he bought it off'n me. + +We never had no school in slavery and it was agin the law for anybody +to even show a negro de letters and figures, so no Cherokee slave +could read. + +We all come back to de old place and find de negro cabins and barns +burned down and de fences all gone and de field in crab grass and +cockleburrs. But de Big House aint hurt 'cepting it need a new roof. +De furniture is all gone, and some said de soldiers burned it up for +firewood. Some officers stayed in de house for a while and tore +everything up or took it off. + +Master give me over to de National Freedmen's Bureau and I was bound +out to a Cherokee woman name Lizzie McGee. Then one day one of my +uncles named Wash Sheppard come and tried to git me to go live wid +him. He say he wanted to git de family all together agin. + +He had run off after he was sold and joined de North army and +discharged at Fort Scott in Kansas, and he said lots of freedmen was +living close to each other up by Coffeyville in de Coo-ee-scoo-ee +District. + +I wouldn't go, so he sent Isaac and Joe Vann dat had been two of old +Captain Joe's negroes to talk to me. Isaac had been Young Joe's +driver, and he told me all about how rich Master Joe was and how he +would look after us negroes. Dey kept after me 'bout a year, but I +didn't go anyways. + +But later on I got a freedman's allotment up in dat part close to +Coffeyville, and I lived in Coffeyville a while but I didn't like it +in Kansas. + +I lost my land trying to live honest and pay my debts. I raised eleven +children just on de sweat of my hands and none of dem ever tasted +anything dat was stole. + +When I left Mrs. McGee's I worked about three years for Mr. Sterling +Scott and Mr. Roddy Reese. Mr. Reese had a big flock of peafowls dat +had belonged to Mr. Scott and I had to take care of dem. + +Whitefolks, I would have to tromp seven miles to Mr. Scott's house two +or three times a week to bring back some old peafowl dat had got out +and gone back to de old place! + +Poor old Master and Mistress only lived a few years after de War. +Master went plumb blind after he move back to Webber's Falls and so he +move up on de Illinois River 'bout three miles from de Arkansas, and +there old Mistress take de white swelling and die and den he die +pretty soon. I went to see dem lots of times and they was always glad +to see me. + +I would stay around about a week and help 'em, and dey would try to +git me to take something but I never would. Dey didn't have much and +couldn't make anymore and dem so old. Old Mistress had inherited some +property from her pappy and dey had de slave money and when dey turned +everything into good money after de War dat stuff only come to about +six thousand dollars in good money, she told me. Dat just about lasted +'em through until dey died, I reckon. + +By and by I married Nancy Hildebrand what lived on Greenleaf Creek, +'bout four miles northwest of Gore. She had belonged to Joe Hildebrand +and he was kin to old Steve Hildebrand dat owned de mill on Flint +Creek up in de Going Snake District. She was raised up at dat mill, +but she was borned in Tennessee before dey come out to de Nation. Her +master was white but he had married into de Nation and so she got a +freedmen's allotment too. She had some land close to Catoosa and some +down on Greenleaf Creek. + +We was married at my home in Coffeyville, and she bore me eleven +children and then went on to her reward. A long time ago I came to +live wid my daughter Emma here at dis place, but my wife just died +last year. She was eighty three. + +I reckon I wasn't cut out on de church pattern, but I raised my +children right. We never had no church in slavery, and no schooling, +and you had better not be caught wid a book in your hand even, so I +never did go to church hardly any. + +Wife belong to de church and all de children too, and I think all +should look after saving their souls so as to drive de nail in, and +den go about de earth spreading kindness and hoeing de row clean so as +to clinch dat nail and make dem safe for Glory. + +Of course I hear about Abraham Lincoln and he was a great man, but I +was told mostly by my children when dey come home from school about +him. I always think of my old Master as de one dat freed me, and +anyways Abraham Lincoln and none of his North people didn't look after +me and buy my crop right after I was free like old Master did. Dat was +de time dat was de hardest and everything was dark and confusion. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +ANDREW SIMMS +Age 80 +Sapulpa, Okla. + + +My parents come over on a slave ship from Africa about twenty year +before I was born on the William Driver plantation down in Florida. My +folks didn't know each other in Africa but my old Mammy told me she +was captured by Negro slave hunters over there and brought to some +coast town where the white buyers took her and carried her to America. + +She was kinder a young gal then and was sold to some white folks when +the boat landed here. Dunno who they was. The same thing happen to my +pappy. Must have been about the same time from the way they tells it. +Maybe they was on the [HW: same] boat, I dunno. + +They was traded around and then mammy was sold to William Driver. The +plantation was down in Florida. Another white folks had a plantation +close by. Mister Simms was the owner. Bill Simms--that's the name +pappy kept after the War. + +Somehow or other mammy and pappy meets 'round the place and the first +thing happens they is in love. That's what mammy say. And the next +thing happen is me. They didn't get married. The Master's say it is +alright for them to have a baby. They never gets married, even after +the War. Just jumped the broomstick and goes to living with somebody +else I reckon. + +Then when I was four year old along come the War and Master Driver +takes up his slaves and leaves the Florida country and goes way out to +Texas. Mammy goes along, I goes along, all the children goes along. I +don't remember nothing about the trip but I hears mammy talk about it +when I gets older. + +Texas, that was the place, down near Fairfield. That's where I learn +to do the chores. But the work was easy for the Master was kind as old +Mammy herself and he never give me no hard jobs that would wear me +down. All the slaves on our place was treated good. All the time. +They didn't whip. The Master feeds all the slaves on good clean foods +and lean meats so's they be strong and healthy. + +Master Driver had four children, Mary, Julia, Frank and George. Every +one of them children kind and good just the old Master. They was never +mean and could I find some of 'em now hard times would leave me on the +run! They'd help this old man get catched up on his eating! + +Makes me think of the old song we use to sing: + + Don't mind working from Sun to Sun, + Iffen you give me my dinner-- + When the dinner time comes! + +Nowadays I gets me something to eat when I can catch it. The trouble +is sometimes I don't catch! But that ain't telling about the slave +days. + +In them times it was mostly the overseers and the drivers who was the +mean ones. They caused all the misery. There was other whitefolks +caused troubles too. Sneak around where there was lots of the black +children on the plantation and steal them. Take them poor children +away off and sell them. + +There wasn't any Sunday Schooling. There was no place to learn to read +and write--no big brick schools like they is now. The old Master say +we can teach ourselves but we can't do it. Old Elam Bowman owned the +place next door to Mister Driver. If he catch his slaves toying with +the pencil, why, he cut off one of their fingers. Then I reckon they +lost interest in education and get their mind back on the hoe and plow +like he say for them to do. + +I didn't see no fighting during of the War. If they was any Yankees +soldiering around the country I don't remember nothing of it. + +Long time after the War is over, about 1885, I meets a gal named +Angeline. We courts pretty fast and gets married. The wedding was a +sure enough affair with the preacher saying the words just like the +whitefolks marriage. We is sure married. + +The best thing we do after that is raise us a family. One of them old +fashioned families. Big 'uns! Seventeen children does we have and +twelve of them still living. Wants to know they names? I ain't never +forgets a one! There was Lucy, Bill, Ebbie, Cora, Minnie, George, +Frank, Kizzie, Necie, Andrew, Joe, Sammie, David, Fannie, Jacob, Bob +and Myrtle. + +All good children. Just like their old pappy who's tried to care for +'em just like the old Master takes care of their old daddy when he was +a boy on that plantation down Texas way. + +When the age comes on a man I reckon religion gets kind of meanful. +Thinks about it more'n when he's young and busy in the fields. I +believes in the Bible and what it says to do. Some of the Colored +folks takes to the voodoo. I don't believe in it. Neither does I +believe in the fortune telling or charms. I aims to live by the Bible +and leave the rabbit foots alone! + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +10-19-38 +718 words + +LIZA SMITH +Age 91 +Muskogee, Oklahoma + + +Both my mammy and pappy was brought from Africa on a slave boat and +sold on de Richmond (Va.) slave market. What year dey come over I +don't know. My mammy was Jane Mason, belonging to Frank Mason; pappy +was Frank Smith, belonging to a master wid de same name. I mean, my +pappy took his Master's name, and den after my folks married mammy +took de name of Smith, but she stayed on wid de Masons and never did +belong to my pappy's master. Den, after Frank Mason took all his +slaves out of de Virginia county, mammy met up wid another man, Ben +Humphries, and married him. + +In Richmond, dat's where I was born, 'bout 1847, de Master said; and +dat make me more dan 90-year old dis good year. I had two brothers +named Webb and Norman, a half-brother Charley, and two half-sisters, +Mealey and Ann. Me, I was born a slave and so was my son. His father, +Toney, was one of de Mason slave boys; de Master said I was 'bout +13-year old when de boy was born. + +Frank Mason was a young man when de War started, living wid his +mother. Dey had lots of slaves, maybe a hundred, and dey always try to +take good care of 'em; even after de War was over he worried 'bout +trying to get us settled so's we wouldn't starve. De Master had +overseer, but dere was no whuppings. + +All de way from Richmond to a place dey call Waco, Texas, we traveled +by ox-wagon and boats, and den de Master figures we all be better off +over in Arkansas and goes to Pine Bluff. + +What wid all de running 'round de slaves was kept clean and always wid +plenty to eat and good clothes to wear. De Master was a plenty rich +man and done what his mother, Mrs. Betsy Mason, told him when we all +left de Big Mansion, way back dere in Richmond. De Mistress said, +"Frank, you watch over dem Negroes cause dey's good men and women; +keep dem clean!" Dat's what he done, up until we was freed, and den +times was so hard nobody wanted us many Negroes around, and de work +was scarce, too. Hard times! Folks don't know what hard times is. + +When a Negro get sick de master would send out for herbs and roots. +Den one of de slaves who knew how to cook and mix 'em up for medicine +use would give de doses. All de men and women wore charms, something +like beads, and if dey was any good or not I don't know, but we didn't +have no bad diseases like after dey set us free. + +I was at Pine Bluff when de Yankees was shooting all over de place. De +fighting got so hot we all had to leave; dat's the way it was all de +time for us during de War--running away to some place or de next +place, and we was all glad when it stopped and we could settle down in +a place. + +We was back at Waco when de peace come, but Master Frank was away from +home when dat happen. It was on a Sunday when he got back and called +all de slaves up in de yard and counted all of dem, young and old. + +The first thing he said was, "You men and women is all free! I'm going +back to my own mammy in old Virginia, but I ain't going back until all +de old people is settled in cabins and de young folks fix up wid +tents!" + +Den he kinder stopped talking. Seem now like he was too excited to +talk, or maybe he was feeling bad and worried 'bout what he going to +do wid all of us. Pretty soon he said, "You men and women, can't none +of you tell anybody I ain't always been a good master. Old folks, have +I ever treated you mean?" He asked. Everybody shout, "No, sir!" And +Master Frank smiled; den he told us he was going 'round and find +places for us to live. + +He went to see Jim Tinsley, who owned some slaves, about keeping us. +Tinsley said he had cabins and could fix up tents for extra ones, if +his own Negroes was willing to share up with us. Dat was the way it +worked out. We stayed on dere for a while, but times was so hard we +finally get dirty and ragged like all de Tinsley Negroes. But Master +Frank figure he done the best he could for us. + +After he go back to Virginia we never hear no more of him, but every +day I still pray if he has any folks in Richmond dey will find me +someway before I die. Is dere someway I could find dem, you s'pose? + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date Stamp: Aug 12 1937] + +LOU SMITH +Age 83 yrs. +Platter, Okla. + + +Sho', I remembers de slavery days! I was a little gal but I can tell +you lots of things about dem days. My job was nussing de younguns. I +took keer of them from daylight to dark. I'd have to sing them to +sleep too. I'd sing: + + "By-lo Baby Bunting + Daddy's gone a-hunting + To get a rabbit skin + To wrap Baby Bunting in." + +Sometimes I'd sing: + + "Rock-a-bye baby, in a tree top + When de wind blows your cradle'll rock. + When de bough breaks de crad'll fall + Down comes baby cradle'n all." + +My father was Jackson Longacre and he was born in Mississippi. My +mother, Caroline, was born in South Carolina. Both of them was born +slaves. My father belonged to Huriah Longacre. He had a big plantation +and lots of niggers. He put up a lot of his slaves as security on a +debt and he took sick and died so they put them all on de block and +sold them. My father and his mother (my grandma) was sold together. My +old Mistress bought my grandmother and old Mistress' sister bought my +grandma's sister. These white women agreed that they would never go +off so far that the two slave women couldn't see each other. They +allus kept this promise. A Mr. Covington offered old Master $700 for +me when I was about ten years old, but he wouldn't sell me. He didn't +need to for he was rich as cream and my, how good he was to us. + +Young Master married Miss Jo Arnold and old Master sent me and my +mother over to live with them. I was small when I was took out of old +man McWilliams' yard. It was his wife that bought my grandmother and +my father. My mother's folks had always belonged to his family. They +all moved to Texas and we all lived there until after the surrender. + +Miss Jo wasn't a good Mistress and mother and me wasn't happy. When +young Master was there he made her treat us good but when he was gone +she made our lives a misery to us. She was what we called a +"low-brow." She never had been used to slaves and she treated us like +dogs. She said us kids didn't need to wear any clothes and one day she +told us we could jest take'em off as it cost too much to clothe us. I +was jest a little child but I knowed I oughten to go without my +clothes. We wore little enough as it was. In summer we just wore one +garment, a sort of slip without any sleeves. Well, anyway she made me +take off my clothes and I just crept off and cried. Purty soon young +Master come home. + +He wanted to know what on earth I was doing without my dress on. I +told him, and my goodness, but he raised the roof. He told her if she +didn't treat us better he was going to take us back to old Master. I +never did have any more good times 'cepting when I'd get to go to +visit at old Master's. None of our family could be sold and that was +why old Master just loaned us to young Master. When old Master died, +dey put all our names in a hat and all the chilluns draw out a name. +This was done to 'vide us niggers satisfactory. Young Master drawed my +mother's name and they all agreed that I should go with her, so back +we went to Miss Jo. She wouldn't feed us niggers. She'd make me set in +a corner like a little dog. I got so hungry and howled so loud they +had to feed me. When the surrender come, I was eleven years old, and +they told us we was free. I ran off and hid in the plum orchard and I +said over'n over, "I'se free, I'se free; I ain't never going back to +Miss Jo." My mother come out and got me and in a few days my father +came and lived with us. He worked for young Master and the crops was +divided with him. Miss Jo died and we lived on there. My mother took +over the charge of the house and the chillun for young Master and we +was all purty happy after that. + +They was a white man come into our settlement and bought a plantation +and some slaves. My, but he treated them bad. He owned a boy about +fifteen years old. One day he sent him on a errand. On the way home he +got off his mule and set down in the shade of a tree to rest. He fell +asleep and the mule went home. When he woke up he was scared to go +home and he stayed out in de woods for several days. Finally they +caught him and took him home and his master beat him nearly to death. +He then dug a hole and put him in it and piled corn shucks all around +him. This nearly killed him 'cause his body was cut up so with the +whip. One of the niggers slipped off and went to the jining plantation +and told about the way the boy was being treated and a bunch of white +men came over and made him take the child out and doctor his wounds. +This man lived there about ten years and he was so mean to his slaves +'til all the white men round who owned niggers finally went to him and +told him they would just give him so long to sell out and leave. They +made him sell his slaves to people there in the community, and he went +back north. + +My mother told me that he owned a woman who was the mother of several +chillun and when her babies would get about a year or two of age he'd +sell them and it would break her heart. She never got to keep them. +When her fourth baby was born and was about two months old she just +studied all the time about how she would have to give it up and one +day she said, "I just decided I'm not going to let old Master sell +this baby; he just ain't going to do it." She got up and give it +something out of a bottle and purty soon it was dead. 'Course didn't +nobody tell on her or he'd of beat her nearly to death. There wasn't +many folks that was mean to their slaves. + +Old Master's boys played with the nigger boys all the time. They'd go +swimming, fishing and hunting together. One of his boys name was +Robert but everybody called him Bud. They all would catch rabbits and +mark them and turn them loose. One day a boy come along with a rabbit +he had caught in a trap. Old Master's boy noticed that it had Bud's +mark on it and they made him turn it loose. + +Old Master was his own overseer, but my daddy was the overlooker. He +was purty hard on them too, as they had to work just like they never +got tired. The women had to do housework, spinning, sewing and work in +the fields too. My mother was housewoman and she could keep herself +looking nice. My, she went around with her hair and clothes all +Jenny-Lynned-up all the time until we went to live with Miss Jo. She +took all the spirit out of poor mother and me too. + +I remember she allus kept our cabin as clean and neat as a pin. When +other niggers come to visit her they would say, "My you are Buckry +Niggers (meaning we tried to live like white folks)." + +I love to think of when we lived with old Master. We had a good time. +Our cabin was nice and had a chimbley in it. Mother would cook and +serve our breakfast at home every morning and dinner and supper on +Sundays. We'd have biscuit every Sunday morning for our breakfast. +That was something to look forward to. + +We all went to church every Sunday. We would go to the white folks +church in the morning and to our church in the evening. Bill +McWilliams, old Master's oldest boy, didn't take much stock in church. +He owned a nigger named Bird, who preached for us. Bill said, "Bird, +you can't preach, you can't read, how on earth can you get a text out +of the Bible when you can't even read? How'n hell can a man preach +that don't know nothing?" Bird told him the Lord had called him to +preach and he'd put the things in his mouth that he ought to say. One +night Bill went to church and Bird preached the hair-raisingest +sermon you ever heard. Bill told him all right to go and preach, and +he gave Bird a horse and set him free to go anywhere he wanted to and +preach. + +Old Master and old Mistress lived in grand style. Bob was the driver +of their carriage. My, but he was always slick and shiny. He'd set up +in front with his white shirt and black clothes. He looked like a +black martin (bird) with a white breast. The nurse set in the back +with the chillun. Old Master and Mistress set together in the front +seat. + +Old Master and Mistress would come down to the quarters to eat +Christmas dinners sometimes and also birthday dinners. It was sho' a +big day when they done that. They'd eat first, and the niggers would +sing and dance to entertain them. Old Master would walk 'round through +the quarters talking to the ones that was sick or too old to work. He +was awful kind. I never knowed him to whip much. Once he whipped a +woman for stealing. She and mother had to spin and weave. She couldn't +or didn't work as fast as Ma and wouldn't have as much to show for her +days work. She'd steal hanks of Ma's thread so she couldn't do more +work than she did. She'd also steal old Master's tobacco. He caught up +with her and whipped her. + +I never saw any niggers on the block but I remember once they had a +sale in town and I seen them pass our house in gangs, the little ones +in wagons and others walking. I've seen slaves who run away from their +masters and they'd have to work in the field with a big ball and chain +on their leg. They'd hoe out to the end of the chain and then drag it +up a piece and hoe on to the end of the row. + +Times was awful hard during the War. We actually suffered for some +salt. We'd go to the smoke house where meat had been salted down for +years, dig a hole in the ground and fill it with water. After it would +stand for a while we'd dip the water up carefully and strain it and +cook our food in it. We parched corn and meal for coffee. We used +syrup for sugar. Some folks parched okra for coffee. When the War was +over you'd see men, women and chillun walk out of their cabins with a +bundle under their arms. All going by in droves, just going nowhere in +particular. My mother and father didn't join them; we stayed on at the +plantation. I run off and got married when I was twenty. Ma never did +want me to get married. My husband died five years ago. I never had no +chillun. + +I reckon I'm a mite superstitious. If a man comes to your house first +on New Years you will have good luck; if a woman is your first visitor +you'll have bad luck. When I was a young woman I knowed I'd be left +alone in my old age. I seen it in my sleep. I dreamed I spit every +tooth in my head right out in my hand and something tell me I would be +a widow. That's a bad thing to dream about, losing your teeth. + +Once my sister was at my house. She had a little baby and we was +setting on the porch. They was a big pine tree in front of the house, +and we seen something that looked like a big bird light in the tree. +She begun to cry and say that's a sign my baby is going to die. Sho' +nuff it just lived two weeks. Another time a big owl lit in a tree +near a house and we heard it holler. The baby died that night. It was +already sick, we's setting up with it. + +I don't know where they's hants or not but I'se sho heard things I +couldn't see. + +We allus has made our own medicines. We used herbs and roots. If +you'll take poke root and cut it in small pieces and string it and put +it 'round a baby's neck it will cut teeth easy. A tea made out of dog +fennel or corn shucks will cure chills and malaria. It'll make 'em +throw up. We used to take button snake root, black snake root, chips +of anvil iron and whiskey and make a tonic to cure consumption. It +would cure it too. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +10-13-37 +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937] + +JAMES SOUTHALL +Age 82 years, +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Clarksville, Tenn. My father was Wesley and my mother +was Hagar Southall. Our owner was Dr. John Southall, an old man. +Father always belonged to him but he bought my mother when she was a +young girl and raised her. She never knew anything 'bout her people +but my father's mother lived with us in de quarter's at Master +Southall's. Master John never sold any of his slaves. + +We was known as "Free Niggers." Master said he didn't believe it was +right to own human beings just because dey was black, and he freed all +his slaves long before de War. He give 'em all freedom papers and told +dem dat dey was as free as he was and could go anywhere dey wanted. +Dey didn't have no where to go so we all stayed on wid him. It was +nice though to know we could go where we pleased 'thout having to get +a pass and could come back when we pleased even if we didn't take +advantage of it. + +He told his slaves dat dey could stay on at his farm but dey would +have to work and make a living for deyselves and families. Old Master +managed de farm and bought all de food and clothes for us all. +Everybody had to work, but dey had a good time. + +We had good clothes, plenty of food and good cabins. We had what was +known as Georgia bedsteads. Dey was wooden bedsteads wid holes bored +in de side pieces and in de foot and head-boards. Ropes was laced back +and forth across and this took de place of both slats and springs. De +ropes would git loose and we had what was called a "following-pin" to +tighten 'em wid. We'd take a block of wood wid a notch in it and catch +de rope and hold it till de following-pin could be driven in and den +we'd twist de ropes tight again. We had grass or cotton beds and we +slept good, too. + +We had tin plates but no knives or forks so we et with our fingers. +Old Master was a doctor and we had good attention when we was sick. We +had no wish to take advantage of our freedom for we was a lot better +off even than we is now and we knowed it. We never had to worry about +anything. + +De quarters was about a half mile from de "Big House" as we called +Master John's house. It really wasn't such a big house as it had only +four or five rooms in it. It was a common boxed house, painted white +and wid a long gallery across de front. Maybe it was de gallery dat +made it look so big to us. We liked to set on de steps at night and +listen to Master John talk and to hear old Mistress and de girls sing. +Sometimes we'd join in wid dem and fairly make de woods ring. +Everybody thought dey was crazy to let us have so much freedom but dey +wasn't nothing any of us black folks wouldn't a-done for that family. + +He never employed any overseers as he done his own overseeing. He'd +tell de older hands what he wanted done and dey would see it was done. +We was never punished. Just iffen dey didn't work dey didn't have +nothing to eat and wear and de hands what did work wouldn't divide wid +'em iffen dey didn't work. Old Master sho' was wise fer he knowed +iffen we was ever set free dat we would have to work and he sure +didn't bide no laziness in his hands. Dey got up 'bout four o'clock in +de morning and was at work as soon as dey could see. Dey would work +and sing as happy as you please. + +We used to hear stories 'bout how slaves was punished but we never saw +any of it. Dey would punish 'em by whupping 'em or by making 'em stand +on one foot for a long time, tie 'em up by de thumbs as high as dey +could reach and by making 'em do hard tasks and by going without food +for two-three days. + +Niggers was very religious and dey had church often. Dey would annoy +de white folks wid shouting and singing and praying and dey would take +cooking pots and put over dey mouths so de white folks couldn't hear +'em. Dey would dig holes in de ground too, and lie down when dey +prayed. + +Old Master let us have church in de homes. We had prayer-meeting every +Wednesday night. All our cullud preachers could read de Bible. He let +dem teach us how to read iffen we wanted to learn. + +In de evening when we was through wid our work dey would gather at one +of de cabins and visit and sing or dance. We'd pop corn, eat walnuts, +peanuts, hickory nuts, and tell ghost stories. We didn't have any +music instruments so de music we danced by wasn't so very good. +Everybody sang and one or two would beat on tin pans or beat bones +together. + +Us boys played marbles. I got to be a professional. I could hit de +middler ever time. We made a square and put a marble in each corner +and one in de middle and got off several feet from de ring and shot at +de marbles. Iffen you hit de middler you got de game. I could beat 'em +all. + +Old Master kept us through de War. We saw Yankee soldiers come through +in droves lak Coxsey's Army. We wasn't afraid for ourselves but we was +afraid dey would catch old Master or one of de boys when dey would +come home on a furlough. We'd hep 'em git away and just swear dat dey +hadn't been home a-tall. + +After de war we stayed until old Master died. It broke us all up for +we knowed we had lost de best friend dat we ever had or ever would +have. He was a sort of father to all of us. Old Mistress went to live +with her daughter and we started wandering 'round. Some folks from de +North come down and made de cullud folks move on. I guess dey was +afraid dat we'd hep our masters rebuild dey homes again. We lived in a +sort of bondage for a long time. + +De white folks in de South as well as de cullud folks lost de best +friend dey had when Abe Lincoln was killed. He was God's man and it +was a great loss when he died. + +God created us all free and equal. Somewhere along de road we lost +out. + +Cullud folks would have been better off iffen dey had been left alone +in Africa. We'd a-had better opportunities. We should have some +compensation fer what we have suffered. Yes, we could be sent back and +we'd like it if dey would help us to get started out again. Dat's +where our forefathers come from. + +I learned a long time ago dat dey was nothing to charms. How could a +rabbit's foot bring me good luck? De Bible teaches me better'n dat. I +believes in dreams though. I've seen de end of time in my dreams. Saw +de great trouble we going through right now, years ago in a dream. +It's clear in my mind how de world is coming to a end. + +I believe all Christians should all join up together as dat makes 'em +stronger. I believe in praying fer what we want and need. I'm a +licensed preacher in de Baptist church. I've been a member for forty +years but have just been a licensed preacher about ten years. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +BEAUREGARD TENNEYSON +Age 87 yrs. +West Tulsa, Okla. + + +My mother and father just about stocked Jess Tenneyson's plantation +with slaves. That's a fact. The old folks had one big +family--twenty-three Children was the number. With the old folks that +make twenty-five (there were only five more slaves), so I reckon they +done mighty well by Master Jess. + +The Master done well by them, too. Master Jess and Mistress Lula was +Christian peoples. They raised their two sons, Henry and George, the +same way. + +There was so many of us children I don't remember all the names. Three +of the boys was named after good southern gentlemen who soldiered in +the War. Price, Lee and Beaugard. Beaugard is me. Proud of that name +just like I'm proud of the Master's name. + +My folks named Patrick and Harriett. Mother worked round the house And +father was the field boss. They was close by the Master all the time. + +The plantation was down in Craig County, Texas. Nine hundred acre it +was. They raise everything, but mostly corn and cotton. Big times when +come the harvest. Master fix up a cotton gin right on the place. It +was an old-fashioned press. Six horses run it with two boys tromping +down the cotton with their feets. + +In the fall time was the best of all. Come cotton picking time, all +the master from miles around send in their best pickers--and how +they'd work, sometimes pick the whole crop in one day! The one who +picked the most win a prize. Then come noon and the big feast, and at +night come the dancing. + +Something like that when the corn was ready. All the folks have the +biggest time. Log rollings. Clearing the new ground for planting. +Cutting the trees, burning the bresh, making ready for the plow. The +best worker wins hisself a prize at these log rollings, too. + +Them kind of good times makes me think of Christmas. Didn't have no +Christmas tree, but they set up a long pine table in the house and +that plank table was covered with presents and none of the Negroes was +ever forgot on that day. + +Master Jess didn't work his slaves like other white folks done. Wasn't +no four o'clock wake-up horns and the field work started at seven +o'clock. Quitting time was five o'clock--just about union hours +nowadays. The Master believed in plenty of rest for the slaves and +they work better that way, too. + +One of my brother took care of the Master's horse while on the +plantation. When the Master join in with rebels that horse went along. +So did brother. Master need them both and my brother mighty pleased +when he get to go. + +When Master come back from the War and tell us that brother is dead, +he said brother was the best boy in all the army. + +The Tenneyson slaves wasn't bothered with patrollers, neither the +Klan. The Master said we was all good Negroes--nobody going to bother +a good Negro. + +We was taught to work and have good manners. And to be honest. Just +doing them three things will keep anybody out of trouble. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +WILLIAM WALTERS +Age 85 yrs. +Tulsa, Oklahoma. + + +Mammy Ann (that was my mother) was owned by Mistress Betsy, and lived +on the Bradford plantation in Relsford County, Tennessee, when I was +born in 1852. + +My daddy, Jim Walters, then lived in Nashville, where my mammy carried +me when she ran away from the Mistress after the Rebs and Yanks +started to fight. My daddy died in Nashville in 1875. + +We were runaway slaves. The slipper-offers were often captured, but +Mammy Ann and her little boy William (that's me) escaped the sharp +eyes of the patrollers and found refuge with a family of northern +symphatizers living in Nashville. + +Nashville was a fort town, filled with trenches and barricades. Right +across the road from where we stayed was a vacant block used by the +Rebs as an emergency place for treating the wounded. + +I remember the boom of cannons one whole day, and I heard the rumble +of army wagons as they crossed through the town. But there was nothing +to see as the fog of powder smoke became thicker with every blast of +Sesesh cannon. + +When the smoke fog cleared away I watched the wounded being carried to +the clearing across the road--fighting men with arms shot off, legs +gone, faces blood smeared--some of them just laying there cussing God +and Man with their dying breath! + +Those were awful times. Yet I have heard many of the older Negroes say +the old days were better. + +Such talk always seemed to me but an expression of sentiment for some +good old master, or else the older Negroes were just too handicapped +with ignorance to recognize the benefits of liberty or the +opportunities of freedom. + +But I've always been proud of my freedom, and proud of my old mother +who faced death for her freedom and mine when she escaped from the +Bradford plantation a long time before freedom came to the Negro race +as a whole. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +570 words +10-19-1938 + +MARY FRANCES WEBB +Grand daughter of Sarah Vest, aged 92, (deceased) +McAlester, Okla. + + +I've heard my grandmother tell a lot of her experiences during +slavery. She remembered things well as she was a grown woman at the +time of the War of the Rebellion. + +Her home was at Sedalia, Mo., and her owner was Baxter West, a +prominent farmer and politician. He was very kind and good to his +slaves. He provided them with plenty of food and good clothes. He +would go to town and buy six or eight bolts of cloth at a time and the +women could pick out two dresses apiece off it. These would be their +dresses for dressing up. They wove the cloth for their everyday +clothes. + +The men wore jeans suits in winter. He bought shoes for all his +slaves, young and old. He had about twenty slaves counting the +children. + +My grandmother was a field hand. She plowed and hoed the crops in the +summer and spring, and in the winter she sawed and cut cord wood just +like a man. She said it didn't hurt her as she was as strong as an ox. + +She could spin and weave and sew. She helped make all the cloth for +their clothes and in the spring one of the jobs for the women was to +weave hats for the men. They used oat-straw, grass, and cane which had +been split and dried and soaked in hot water until it was pliant, and +they wove it into hats. The women wore a cloth tied around their head. + +They didn't have many matches so they always kept a log heap burning +to keep a fire. It was a common thing for a neighbor to come in to +borrow a coal of fire as their fire had died out. + +On wash days all the neighbors would send several of their women to +the creek to do the family wash. They all had a regular picnic of it +as they would wash and spread the clothes on the bushes and low +branches of the trees to dry. They would get to spend the day +together. + +They had no tubs or wash boards. They had a large flat block of wood +and a wooden paddle. They'd spread the wet garment on the block, +spread soap on it and paddle the garment till it was clean. They would +rinse the clothes in the creek. Their soap was made from lye, dripped +from ashes, and meat scraps. + +The slaves had no lamps in their cabins. In winter they would pile +wood on the fire in their fireplace and have the light from the fire. + +The colored men went with their master to the army. They made regular +soldiers and endured the same hardships that the white soldiers did. +They told of one battle when so many men were killed that a little +stream seemed to be running pure blood as the water was so bloody. + +After the war the slaves returned home with their masters and some of +the older ones stayed on with them and helped them to rebuild their +farms. None of them seemed to think it strange that they had been +fighting on the wrong side in the army as they were following their +white folks. + +Those who stayed with their old master were taught to read and write +and were taught to handle their own business and to help themselves in +every way possible to take their place in life. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +10-14-37 +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937] + +EASTER WELLS +Age 83 +Colbert, Okla. + + +I was born in Arkansas, in 1854, but we moved to Texas in 1855. I've +heard 'em tell about de trip to Texas. De grown folks rode in wagons +and carts but de chaps all walked dat was big enuff. De men walked and +toted their guns and hunted all de way. Dey had plenty of fresh game +to eat. + +My mother's name was Nellie Bell. I had one sister, Liza. I never saw +my father; in fact, I never heard my mammy say anything about him and +I don't guess I ever asked her anything about him for I never thought +anything about not having a father. I guess he belonged to another +family and when we moved away he was left behind and he didn't try to +find us after de War. + +My mammy and my sister and me belonged to young Master Jason Bell. We +was his onliest slaves and as he wasn't married and lived at home wid +his parents we was worked and bossed by his father, Cap'n William Bell +and his wife, Miss Mary. + +After we moved to Texas, old Master built a big double log house, +weather-boarded on de inside and out. It was painted white. Dey was a +long gallery clean across de front of de house and a big open hall +between de two front rooms. Dey was three rooms on each side of de +hall and a wide gallery across de back. De kitchen set back from de +house and dey was a board walk leading to it. Vines was planted 'round +de gallery and on each side of de walk in de summer time. De house was +on a hill and set back from de big road about a quarter of a mile and +dey was big oak and pine trees all 'round de yard. We had purty +flowers, too. + +We had good quarters. Dey was log cabins, but de logs was peeled and +square-adzed and put together with white plaster and had shuttered +windows and pine floors. Our furniture was home made but it was good +and made our cabins comfortable. + +Old Master give us our allowance of staple food and it had to run us, +too. We could raise our own gardens and in dat way we had purty plenty +to eat. Dey took good care of us sick or well and old Mistress was +awful good to us. + +My mammy was de cook. I remember old Master had some purty strict +rules and one of 'em was iffen you burnt de bread you had to eat it. +One day mammy burnt de bread. She was awful busy and forgot it and it +burnt purty bad. She knowed dat old Master would be mad and she'd be +punished so she got some grub and her bonnet and she lit out. She hid +in de woods and cane brakes for two weeks and dey couldn't find her +either. One of de women slipped food out to her. Finally she come home +and old Master give her a whipping but he didn't hurt her none. He was +glad to git her back. She told us dat she could'a slipped off to de +North but she didn't want to leave us children. She was afraid young +Master would be mad and sell us and we'd a-had a hard time so she come +back. I don't know whether she ever burnt de bread any more or not. + +Once one of de men got his 'lowance and he decided he'd have de meat +all cooked at once so he come to our cabin and got mammy to cook it +for him. She cooked it and he took it home. One day he was at work and +a dog got in and et de meat all up. He didn't have much food for de +rest of de week. He had to make out wid parched corn. + +We all kept parched corn all de time and went 'round eating it. It was +good to fill you up iffen you was hungry and was nourishing, too. + +When de niggers cooked in dere own cabins dey put de food in a sort of +tray or trough and everybody et together. Dey didn't have no dishes. +We allus ate at de Big House as mammy had to do de cooking for de +family. + +I never had to work hard as old Master wanted us to grow up strong. +He'd have mammy boil Jerusalem Oak and make a tea for us to drink to +cure us of worms and we'd run races and get exercise so we would be +healthy. + +Old Mistress and old Master had three children. Dey was two children +dead between Master Jason and Miss Jane. Dey was a little girl 'bout +my age, named Arline. We played together all de time. We used to set +on de steps at night and old Mistress would tell us about de stars. +She'd tell us and show us de Big Dipper, Little Dipper, Milky Way, +Ellen's Yard, Job's Coffin, and de Seven Sisters. I can show 'em to +you and tell you all about 'em yet. + +I scared Arline and made her fall and break her leg twice. One time we +was on de porch after dark one night and I told her dat I heard +something and I made like I could see it and she couldn't so she got +scared and run and hung her toe in a crack and fell off de high porch +and broke her leg. Another time while de War was going on we was +dressed up in long dresses playing grown-ups. We had playhouses under +some big castor-bean bushes. We climbed up on de fence and jest for +fun I told her dat I seen some Yankees coming. She started to run and +got tangled up in her long dress and fell and broke her leg again. It +nigh broke my heart for I loved her and she loved me and she didn't +tell on me either time. I used to visit her after she was married and +we'd sure have a good visit talking 'bout de things we used to do. We +was separated when we was about fifteen and didn't see [HW: each] +other any more till we was both married and had children. I went to +visit her at Bryant, Brazos County, Texas and I ain't seen her since. +I don't know whether she is still living or not. + +I 'members hearing a man say dat once he was a nigger trader. He'd buy +and trade or sell 'em like they was stock. He become a Christian and +never sold any more. + +Our young Master went to de War and got wounded and come home and +died. Old Master den took full charge of us and when de War ended he +kept us because he said we didn't have no folks and he said as our +owner was dead we wasn't free. Mother died about a year after de War, +and some white folks took my sister but I was afraid to go. Old Master +told me iffen I left him he would cut my ears off end I'd starve and I +don't know what all he did tell me he'd do. I must a-been a fool but I +was afraid to try it. + +I had so much work to do and I never did git to go anywhere. I reckon +he was afraid to let me go off de place for fear some one would tell +me what a fool I was, so I never did git to go anywhere but had to +work all de time. I was de only one to work and old Mistress and de +girls never had done no work and didn't know much about it. I had a +harder time den when we was slaves. + +I got to wanting to see my sister so I made up my mind to run off. One +of old Master's motherless nephews lived with him and I got him to go +with me one night to the potato bank and I got me a lap full of +potatoes to eat so I wouldn't starve like old Master said I would. Dis +white boy went nearly to a house where some white folks lived. I went +to de house and told 'em I wanted to go to where my sister was and dey +let me stay fer a few days and sent me on to my sister. + +I saw old Master lots of times after I run away but he wasn't mad at +me. I heard him tell de white folks dat I lived wid dat he raised me +and I sure wouldn't steal nor tell a lie. I used to steal brown sugar +lumps when mammy would be cooking but he didn't know 'bout dat. + +On holidays we used to allus have big dinners, 'specially on +Christmas, and we allus had egg-nog. + +We allus had hog-jowl and peas on New Years Day 'cause iffen you'd +have dat on New Years Day you'd have good luck all de year. + +Iffen you have money on New Years' Day you will have money all de +year. + +My husband, Lewis Wells, lived to be one-hundred and seven years old. +He died five years ago. He could see witches, spirits and ghosts but I +never could. Dere are a few things dat I've noticed and dey never +fail. + +Dogs howling and scritch owls hollering is allus a warning. My mother +was sick and we didn't think she was much sick. A dog howled and +howled right outside de house. Old Master say, "Nellie gonna die." +Sure nuff she died dat night. + +Another time a gentle old mule we had got after de children and run +'em to do house and den he lay down and wallow and wallow. One of our +children was dead 'fore a week. + +One of our neighbors say his dog been gone 'bout a week. He was +walking and met de dog and it lay down and stretch out on de ground +and measure a grave wid his body. He made him git up and he went home +jest as fast as he could. When he got dere one of his children was +dead. + +Iffen my left eye quiver I know I'm gwineter cry and iffen both my +eyes quiver I know I gwinter laugh till I cry. I don't like for my +eyes to quiver. + +We has allus made our own medicine. Iffen we hadn't we never could +astood de chills and fevers. We made a tea out'n bitter weeds and +bathed in it to cure malaria. We also made bread pills and soaked 'em +in dis tea and swallowed 'em. After bathing in dis tea we'd go to bed +and kiver up and sweat de malaria out. + +Horse mint and palm of crystal (Castor-bean) and bullnettle root +boiled together will make a cure fer swelling. Jest bathe de swollen +part in dis hot tea. + +Anvil dust and apple vinegar will cure dropsy. One tea cup of anvil +dust to a quart of vinegar. Shake up well and bathe in it. It sure +will cure de worse kind of a case. + +God worked through Abraham Lincoln and he answered de prayers of dem +dat was wearing de burden of slavery. We cullud folks all love and +honor Abraham Lincoln's memory and don't you think we ought to? + +I love to hear good singing. My favorite songs are: "Am I A Soldier Of +The Cross", an "How Can I Live In Sin and Doubt My Savior's Love." I +belongs to de Baptist church. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +Revision of story sent in 8-13-37. + +JOHN WHITE +Age 121 years +Sand Springs, Okla. + + +Of all my Mammy's children I am the first born and the longest living. +The others all gone to join Mammy. She was named Mary White, the same +name as her Mistress, the wife of my first master, James White. + +About my pappy. I never hear his name and I never see him, not even +when I was the least child around the old Master's place 'way back +there in Georgia more'n one-hundred twenty years ago! + +Mammy try to make it clear to me about my daddy. She married like the +most of the slaves in them days. + +He was a slave on another plantation. One day he come for to borrow +something from Master White. He sees a likely looking gal, and the way +it work out that gal was to be my Mammy. After that he got a paper +saying it was all right for him to be off his own plantation. He come +a'courting over to Master White's. After a while he talks with the +Master. Says he wants to marry the gal, Mary. The Master says it's all +right if it's all right with Mary and the other white folks. He finds +out it is and they makes ready for the wedding. + +Mary says a preacher wedding is the best but Master say he can marry +them just as good. There wasn't no Bible, just an old Almanac. Master +White read something out of that. That's all and they was married. The +wedding was over! + +Every night he gets a leave paper from his Master and come over to be +with his wife, Mary. The next morning he leaves her to work in the +fields. Then one night Mammy says he don't come home. The next night +is the same, and the next. From then on Mammy don't see him no +more--never find out what happen to my pappy. + +When I was born Mammy named me John, John White. She tells me I was +the blackest 'white' boy she ever see. I stays with her till I was +eleven year old. The Master wrote down in the book when I was born, +April 10, 1816, and I know it's right. Mammy told me so, and Master +told me when I was eleven and he sold me to Sarah Davenport. + +Mistress Sarah lived in Texas. Master White always selling and trading +to folks all over the country. I hates to leave on account of Mammy +and the good way Master White fared the slaves--they was good people. +Mammy cry but I has to go just the same. The tears are on my face a +long time after the leaving. I was hoping all the time to see Mammy +again, but that's the last time. + +We travels and travels on the stage coach. Once we cross the Big River +(Mississippi) on the boat and pick up with the horses on the other +side. A new outfit and we rides some more. Seems like we going to wear +out all the horses before we gets to the place. + +The Davenport plantation was way north of Linden, Texas, up in the Red +River country. That's where I stayed for thirty-eight year. There I +was drug through the hackles by the meanest master that ever lived. +The Mistress was the best white woman I ever knew but Master Presley +used his whip all the time, reason or no reason, and I got scars to +remember by! + +I remembers the house. A heavy log house with a gallery clear across +the front. The kitchen was back of the house. I work in there and I +live in there. It wasn't built so good as the Master's house. The cold +winds in the winter go through the cracks between the logs like the +walls was somewheres else, and I shivers with the misery all the time. + +The cooking got to be my job. The washing too. Washday come around +and I fills the tub with clothes. Puts the tub on my head and walks +half a mile to the spring where I washes the clothes. Sometimes I run +out of soap. Then I make ash soap right by the spring. I learns to be +careful about streaks in the clothes. I learns by the bull whip. One +day the Master finds a soapy streak in his shirt. Then he finds me. + +The Military Road goes by the place and the Master drives me down the +road and ties me to a tree. First he tears off the old shirt and then +he throws the bull whip to me. When he is tired of beating me more +torture is a-coming. The salt water cure. It don't cure nothing but +that's what the white folks called it. "Here's at you," the Master +say, and slap the salt water into the bleeding cuts. "Here's at you!" +The blisters burst every time he slap me with the brine. + +Then I was loosened to stagger back into the kitchen. The Mistress +couldn't do nothing about it 'cept to lay on the grease thick, with a +kind word to help stop the misery. + +Ration time was Saturday night. Every slave get enough fat pork, corn +meal and such to last out the week. I reckon the Master figure it to +the last bite because they was no leavings over. Most likely the +shortage catch them! + +Sometimes they'd borrow, sometimes I'd slip somethings from out the +kitchen. The single women folks was bad that way. I favors them with +something extra from the kitchen. Then they favors me--at night when +the overseer thinks everybody asleep in they own places! + +I was always back to my kitchen bed long before the overseer give the +get-up-knock. I hear the knock, he hear me answer. Then he blow the +horn and shout the loud call, ARE YOU UP, and everybody know it was +four o'clock and pour out of the cabins ready for the chores. + +Sometimes the white folks go around the slave quarters for the night. +Not on the Davenport plantation, but some others close around. The +slaves talked about it amongst themselves. + +After a while they'd be a new baby. Yellow. When the child got old +enough for chore work the master would sell him (or her). No +difference was it his own flesh and blood--if the price was right! + +I traffic with lots of the women, but never marries. Not even when I +was free after the War. I sees too many married troubles to mess up +with such doings! + +Sometimes the master sent me alone to the grinding mill. Load in the +yellow corn, hitch in the oxen, I was ready to go. I gets me fixed up +with a pass and takes to the road. + +That was the trip I like best. On the way was a still. Off in the +bresh. If the still was lonely I stop, not on the way to but on the +way back. Mighty good whiskey, too! Maybe I drinks too much, then I +was sorry. + +Not that I swipe the whiskey, just sorry because I gets sick! Then I +figures a woods camp meeting will steady me up and I goes. + +The preacher meet me and want to know how is my feelings. I says I is +low with the misery and he say to join up with the Lord. + +I never join because he don't talk about the Lord. Just about the +Master and Mistress. How the slaves must obey around the +plantation--how the white folks know what is good for the slaves. +Nothing about obeying the Lord and working for him. + +I reckon the old preacher was worrying more about the bull whip than +he was the Bible, else he say something about the Lord! But I always +obeys the Lord--that's why I is still living! + +The slaves would pray for to get out of bondage. Some of them say the +Lord told them to run away. Get to the North. Cross the Red River. +Over there would be folks to guide them to the Free State (Kansas). + +The Lord never tell me to run away. I never tried it, maybe, because +mostly they was caught by patrollers and fetched back for a +flogging--and I had whippings enough already! + +Before the Civil War was the fighting with Mexico. Some of the troops +on they way south passed on the Military Road. Wasn't any fighting +around Linden or Jefferson during the time. + +They was lots of traveling on the Military Road. Most of the time you +could see covered wagons pulled by mules and horses, and sometimes a +crawling string of wagons with oxen on the pulling end. + +From up in Arkansas come the stage coach along the road. To San +Antonio. The drivers bring news the Mexicans just about all killed off +and the white folks say Texas was going to join the Union. The +country's going to be run different they say, but I never see no +difference. Maybe, because I ain't white folks. + +Wasn't many Mexicans around the old plantation. Come and go. Lots of +Indians. Cherokees and Choctaws. Living in mud huts and cabin shacks. +I never see them bother the whites, it was the other way around. + +During the Civil War, when the Red River was bank high with muddy +water, the Yankee's made a target of Jefferson. That was a small town +down south of Linden. + +Down the river come a flat barge with cannon fastened to the deck. The +Yankee soldiers stopped across the river from Jefferson and the +shooting started. + +When the cannon went to popping the folks went arunning--hard to tell +who run the fastest, the whites or the blacks! Almost the town was +wiped out. Buildings was smashed and big trees cut through with the +cannon balls. + +And all the time the Yankee drums was a-beating and the soldiers +singing: + + We'll hang Jeff Davis on a sour apple tree, + As we go marching on! + +Before the Civil War everybody had money. The white folks, not the +negroes. Sometimes the master take me to the town stores. They was +full of money. Cigar boxes on the counter, boxes on the shelf, all +filled with money. Not the crinkley paper kind, but hard, jingley gold +and silver! Not like these scarce times! + +After the War I stay on the plantation 'til a soldier man tells me of +the freedom. The master never tell us--negroes working just like +before the War. + +That's when I leave the first time. Slip off, saying nothing, to +Jefferson. There I found some good white folks going to New Orleans. +First place we go is Shreveport, by wagon. They took me because I fix +up with them to do the cooking. + +On to the Big River (Mississippi) and boards a river steamboat for New +Orleans. Lots of negroes going down there--to work on the canal. + +The whole town was built on logs covered with dirt. Trying to raise +itself right out of the swamp. Sometimes the water get high and folks +run for the hills. When I got there almost was I ready to leave. + +I like Texas the best. Back to Jefferson is where I go. Fifteen-twenty +mile below Linden. Almost the first person I see was Master Davenport. + +He says, "Black rascal, you is coming with me." And I do. He tried to +keep his slaves and just laugh when I tell him about the freedom. I +worked for food and quarters 'til his meanness come cropping out +again. + +That wasn't long and he threatened me with the whip and the buck and +gag. The buck and gag was maybe worse. I got to feeling that iron +stick in my mouth, fastened around my head with chains, pressing hard +on my tongue. No drinking, no eating, no talking! + +So I slip off again. That night I goes through Linden. Crawling on my +hands and knees! Keeping in the dark spots, hiding from the whites, +'til I pass the last house, then my feets hurries me to Jefferson, +where I gets a ride to Arkansas. + +In Russelville is where I stop. There I worked around in the yards, +cutting the grass, fancying the flower beds, and earned a little money +for clothes and eats, with some of it spent for good whiskey. + +That was the reason I left Arkansas. Whiskey. The law got after me to +tell where was a man's whiskey still. I just leave so's I won't have +to tell. + +But while I was making a little money in Russelville, I lose out on +some big money, account some white folks beat me to it. + +I was out in the hills west of town, walking along the banks of a +little creek, when I heard a voice. Queer like. I called out who is +that talking and I hears it again. + +"Go to the white oak tree and you will find Ninety Thousand Dollars!" +That's what I hear. I look around, nobody in sight, but I see the +tree. A big white oak tree standing taller than all the rest 'round +about. + +Under the tree was a grave. An old grave. I scratch around but finds +no money and thinks of getting some help. + +I done some work for a white man in town and told him about the voice. +He promised to go with me, but the next day he took two white mens and +dug around the tree. Then he says they was nothing to find. + +To this day I know better. I know wherever they's a ghost, money is +around someplace! That's what the ghost comes back for. + +Somebody dies and leaves buried money. The ghost watches over it 'til +it sees somebody it likes. Then ghost shows himself--lets know he's +around. Sometimes the ghost tells where is the money buried, like that +time at Russelville. + +That ain't the only ghost I've seen or heard. I see one around the +yard where I is living now. A woman. Some of these times she'll tell +me where the buried money is. + +Maybe the ghost woman thinks I is too old to dig. But I been a-digging +all these long years. For a bite to eat and a sleep-under cover. + +I reckon pretty soon she's going to tell where to dig. When she does, +then old Uncle John won't have to dig for the eats no more! + + + + +[Illustration: Charley Williams and Granddaughter] + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[HW: (photo)] +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +CHARLEY WILLIAMS +Age 94 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + +Iffen I could see better out'n my old eyes, and I had me something to +work with and de feebleness in my back and head would let me 'lone, I +would have me plenty to eat in de kitchen all de time, and plenty +tobaccy in my pipe, too, bless God! + +And dey wouldn't be no rain trickling through de holes in de roof, and +no planks all fell out'n de flo' on de gallery neither, 'cause dis one +old nigger knows everything about making all he need to git along! Old +Master done showed him how to git along in dis world, jest as long as +he live on a plantation, but living in de town is a different way of +living, and all you got to have is a silver dime to lay down for +everything you want, and I don't git de dime very often. + +But I aint give up! Nothing like dat! On de days when I don't feel so +feeble and trembly I jest keep patching 'round de place. I got to keep +patching so as to keep it whar it will hold de winter out, in case I +git to see another winter. + +Iffen I don't, it don't grieve me none, 'cause I wants to see old +Master again anyways. I reckon maybe I'll jest go up an ask him what +he want me to do, and he'll tell me, and iffen I don't know how he'll +show me how, and I'll try to do it to please him. And when I git it +done I wants to hear him grumble like he used to and say, "Charley, +you ain't got no sense but you is a good boy. Dis here ain't very good +but it'll do, I reckon. Git yourself a little piece o' dat brown +sugar, but don't let no niggers see you eating it--if you do I'll whup +your black behind!" + +Dat ain't de way it going be in Heaven, I reckon, but I can't set here +on dis old rottendy gallery and think of no way I better like to have +it! + +I was a great big hulking buck of a boy when de War come along and +bust up everything, and I can 'member back when everybody was living +peaceful and happy, and nobody never had no notion about no war. + +I was borned on the 'leventh of January, in 1843, and was old enough +to vote when I got my freedom, but I didn't take no stock in all dat +politics and goings on at dat time, and I didn't vote till a long time +after old Master passed away, but I was big enough before de War to +remember everything pretty plain. + +Old Master name was John Williams, and old Mistress name was Miss +Betty, and she was a Campbell before she married. Young Missy was +named Betty after her mommy, and Young Master was named Frank, but I +don't know who after. Our overseer was Mr. Simmons, and he was mighty +smart and had a lot of patience, but he wouldn't take no talk nor +foolishness. He didn't whup nobody very often, but he only had to whup +'em jest one time! He never did whup a nigger at de time the nigger +done something, but he would wait till evening and have old Master +come and watch him do it. He never whupped very hard 'cept when he had +told a nigger about something and promised a whupping next time and +the nigger done it again. Then that nigger got what he had been +hearing 'bout! + +De plantation was about as big as any. I think it had about three +hundred acres, and it was about two miles northwest of Monroe, +Louisiana. Then he had another one not so big, two--three miles south +of the big one, kind of down in the woodsy part along the White river +bottoms. He had another overseer on that place and a big passel of +niggers, but I never did go down to that one. That was where he raised +most of his corn and shoats, and lots of sorghum cane. + +Our plantation was up on higher ground, and it was more open country, +but still they was lots of woods all around and lots of the +plantations had been whacked right out of de new ground and was full +of stumps. Master's place was more open, though, and all in the fields +was good plowing. + +The big road runned right along past our plantation, and it come from +Shreveport and run into Monroe. There wasn't any town at Monroe in +them days, jest a little cross roads place with a general store and a +big hide house. I think there was about two big hide houses, and you +could smell that place a mile before you got into it. Old Master had a +part in de store, I think. + +De hide houses was jest long sheds, all open along de sides and +kivered over wid cypress clapboards. + +Down below de hide houses and de store was jest a little settlement of +one or two houses, but they was a school for white boys. Somebody said +there was a place where they had been an old fort, but I never did see +it. + +Everything boughten we got come from Shreveport, and was brung in by +the stage and the freighters, and that was only a little coffee or +gunpowder, or some needles for the sewing, or some strap iron for the +blacksmith, or something like dat. We made and raised everything else +we needed right on the place. + +I never did even see any quinine till after I was free. My mammy +knowed jest what root to go out and pull up to knock de chills right +out'n me. And de bellyache and de running off de same way, too. + +Our plantation was a lot different from some I seen other places, like +way east of there, around Vicksburg. Some of them was fixed up fancier +but dey didn't have no more comforts than we had. + +Old Master come out into that country when he was a young man, and +they didn't have even so much then as they had when I was a boy. I +think he come from Alabama or Tennessee, and way back his people had +come from Virginia, or maybe North Carolina, 'cause he knowed all +about tobacco on the place. Cotton and tobacco was de long crops on +his big place, and of course lots of horses and cattle and mules. + +De big house was made out'n square hewed logs, and chinked wid little +rocks and daubed wid white clay, and kivered wid cypress clapboards. I +remember one time we put on a new roof, and de niggers hauled up de +cypress logs and sawed dem and frowed out de clapboards by hand. + +De house had two setting rooms on one side and a big kitchen room on +de other, wid a wide passage in between, and den about was de sleeping +rooms. They wasn't no stairways 'cepting on de outside. Steps run up +to de sleeping rooms on one side from de passageway and on de other +side from clean outside de house. Jest one big chimbley was all he +had, and it was on de kitchen end, and we done all de cooking in a +fireplace dat was purty nigh as wide as de whole room. + +In de sleeping rooms day wasn't no fires 'cepting in brazers made out +of clay, and we toted up charcoal to burn in 'em when it was cold +mornings in de winter. Dey kept warm wide de bed clothes and de +knitten clothes dey had. + +Master never did make a big gallery on de house, but our white folks +would set out in de yard under de big trees in de shade. They was long +benches made out'n hewed logs and all padded wid gray moss and corn +shuck padding, and dey set pretty soft. All de furniture in de house +was home-made, too. De beds had square posts as big around as my shank +and de frame was mortised into 'em, and holes bored in de frame and +home-made rope laced in to make it springy. Den a great big mattress +full of goose feathers and two--three comforts as thick as my foot wid +carded wool inside! Dey didn't need no fireplaces! + +De quarters was a little piece from de big house, and dey run along +both sides of de road dat go to de fields. All one-room log cabins, +but dey was good and warm, and every one had a little open shed at de +side whar we sleep in de summer to keep cool. + +They was two or three wells at de quarters for water, and some good +springs in de branch at de back of de fields. You could ketch a fish +now and den in dat branch, but Young Master used to do his fishing in +White River, and take a nigger or two along to do de work at his camp. + +It wasn't very fancy at de Big House, but it was mighty pretty jest de +same, wid de gray moss hanging from de big trees, and de cool green +grass all over de yard, and I can shet my old eyes and see it jest +like it was before de War come along and bust it up. + +I can see old Master setting out under a big tree smoking one of his +long cheroots his tobacco nigger made by hand, and fanning hisself wid +his big wide hat another nigger platted out'n young inside corn shucks +for him, and I can hear him holler at a big bunch of white geeses +what's gitting in his flower beds and see 'em string off behind de old +gander towards de big road. + +When de day begin to crack de whole plantation break out wid all kinds +of noises, and you could tell what going on by de kind of noise you +hear. + +Come de daybreak you hear de guinea fowls start potracking down at de +edge of de woods lot, and den de roosters all start up 'round de barn +and de ducks finally wake up and jine in. You can smell de sow belly +frying down at the cabins in de "row", to go wid de hoecake and de +buttermilk. + +Den purty soon de wind rise a little, and you can hear a old bell +donging way on some plantation a mile or two off, and den more bells +at other places and maybe a horn, and purty soon younder go old +Master's old ram horn wid a long toot and den some short toots, and +here come de overseer down de row of cabins, hollering right and left, +and picking de ham out'n his teeth wid a long shiny goose quill pick. + +Bells and horns! Bells for dis and horns for dat! All we knowed was go +and come by de bells and horns! + +Old ram horn blow to send us all to de field. We all line up, about +seventy-five field niggers, and go by de tool shed and git our hoes, +or maybe go hitch up de mules to de plows and lay de plows out on de +side so de overseer can see iffen de points is shart. Any plow gits +broke or de point gits bungled up on de rocks it goes to de blacksmith +nigger, den we all git on down in de field. + +Den de anvil start dangling in de blacksmith shop: "Tank! Deling-ding! +Tank! Deling-ding!", and dat ole bull tongue gitting straightened out! + +Course you can't hear de shoemaker awling and pegging, and de card +spinners, and de old mammy sewing by hand, but maybe you can hear de +old loom going "frump, frump", and you know it all right iffen your +clothes do be wearing out, 'cause you gwine git new britches purty +soon! + +We had about a hundred niggers on dat place, young and old, and about +twenty on de little place down below. We could make about every kind +of thing but coffee and gunpowder dat our whitefolks and us needed. + +When we needs a hat we gits inside cornshucks and weave one out, and +makes horse collars de same way. Jest tie two little soft shucks +together and begin plaiting. + +All de cloth 'cepting de Mistress' Sunday dresses come from de sheep +to de carders and de spinners and de weaver, den we dye it wid +"butternut" and hickory bark and indigo and other things and set it +wid copperas. Leather tanned on de place made de shoes, and I never +see a store boughten wagon wheel 'cepting among de stages and de +freighters along de big road. + +We made purty, long back-combs out'n cow horn, and knitting needles +out'n second hickory. Split a young hickory and put in a big wedge to +prize it open, then cut it down and let it season, and you got good +bent grain for wagon hames and chair rockers and such. + +It was jest like dat until I was grown, and den one day come a +neighbor man and say we in de War. + +Little while young Master Frank ride over to Vicksburg and jine de +Sesesh army, but old Master jest go on lak nothing happen, and we all +don't hear nothing more until long come some Sesesh soldiers and take +most old Master's hosses and all his wagons. + +I bin working on de tobacco, and when I come back to de barns +everything was gone. I would go into de woods and git good hickory and +burn it till it was all coals and put it out wid water to make hickory +charcoal for curing de tobacco. I had me some charcoal in de fire +trenches under de curing houses, all full of new tobacco, and overseer +come and say bundle all de tobacco up and he going take it to +Shreveport and sell it befo' de soldiers take it too. + +After de hosses all gone and most de cattle and de cotton and de +tobacco gone too, here come de Yankees and spread out all over de +whole country. Dey had a big camp down below our plantation. + +One evening a big bunch of Yankee officers come up to de Big House and +old Master set out de brandy in de yard and dey act purty nice. Next +day de whole bunch leave on out of dat part. + +When de hosses and stuff all go old Master sold all de slaves but +about four, but he kept my pappy and mammy and my brother Jimmie and +my sister Betty. She was named after old Mistress. Pappy's name was +Charley and mammy's was Sally. De niggers he kept didn't have much +work without any hosses and wagons, but de blacksmith started in +fixing up more wagons and he kept them hid in de woods till they was +all fixed. + +Den along come some more Yankees, and dey tore everything we had up, +and old Master was afeared to shoot at them on account his womenfolks, +so he tried to sneak the fambly out but they kotched him and brung him +back to de plantation. + +We niggers didn't know dat he was gone until we seen de Yankees +bringing dem back. De Yankees had done took charge of everything and +was camping in de big yard, and us was all down at de quarters scared +to death, but dey was jest letting us alone. + +It was night when de white folks tried to go away, and still night +when de Yankees brung dem back, and a house nigger come down to de +quarters wid three--four mens in blue clothes and told us to come up +to de Big House. + +De Yankees didn't seem to be mad wid old Master, but jest laughed and +talked wid him, but he didn't take de jokes any too good. + +Den dey asked him could he dance and he said no, and dey told him to +dance or make us dance. Dar he stood inside a big ring of dem mens in +blue clothes, wid dey brass buttons shining in de light from de fire +dey had in front of de tents, and he jest stood and said nothing, and +it look lak he wasn't wanting to tell us to dance. + +So some of us young bucks jest step up and say we was good dancers, +and we start shuffling while de rest of de niggers pat. + +Some nigger women go back to de quarters and git de gourd fiddles and +de clapping bones made out'n beef ribs, and bring dem back so we could +have some music. We git all warmed up and dance lak we never did dance +befo'! I speck we invent some new steps dat night! + +We act lak we dancing for de Yankees, but we trying to please Master +and old Mistress more than anything, and purty soon he begin to smile +a little and we all feel a lot better. + +Next day de Yankees move on away from our place, and old Master start +gitting ready to move out. We git de wagons we hid, and de whole +passel of us leaves out for Shreveport. Jest left de old place +standing like it was. + +In Shreveport old Master git his cotton and tobacco money what he been +afraid to have sent back to de plantation when he sell his stuff, and +we strike out north through Arkansas. + +Dat was de awfullest trip any man ever make! We had to hide from +everybody until we find out if dey Yankees or Sesesh, and we go along +little old back roads and up one mountain and down another, through de +woods all de way. + +After a long time we git to the Missouri line, and kind of cut off +through de corner of dat state into Kansas. I don't know how we ever +git across some of dem rivers but we did. Dey nearly always would be +some soldiers around de fords, and dey would help us find de best +crossing. Sometimes we had to unload de wagons and dry out de stuff +what all got wet, and camp a day or two to fix up again. + +Purty soon we git to Fort Scott, and that was whar de roads forked +ever whichaways. One went on north and one east and one went down into +de Indian country. It was full of soldiers coming and going back and +forth to Arkansas and Fort Gibson. + +We took de road on west through Kansas, and made for Colorado Springs. + +Fort Scott was all run down, and the old places whar dey used to have +de soldiers was all fell in in most places. Jest old rackety walls and +leaky roofs, and a big pole fence made out'n poles sot in de ground +all tied together, but it was falling down too. + +They was lots of wagons all around what belong to de army, hauling +stuff for de soldiers, and some folks told old Master he couldn't make +us niggers go wid him, but we said we wanted to anyways, so we jest +went on west across Kansas. + +When we got away on west we come to a fork, and de best road went +kinda south into Mexico, and we come to a little place called Clayton, +Mexico whar we camped a while and then went north. + +Dat place is in New Mexico now, but old Master jest called it Mexico. +Somebody showed me whar it is on de map, and it look lak it a long +ways off'n our road to Colorado Springs, but I guess de road jest wind +off down dat ways at de time we went over it. It was jest two or three +houses made out'n mud at dat time, and a store whar de soldiers and de +Indians come and done trading. + +About dat time old Master sell off some of de stuff he been taking +along, 'cause de wagons loaded too heavy for de mountains and he +figger he better have de money than some of de stuff, I reckon. + +On de way north it was a funny country. We jest climb all day long +gitting up one side of one bunch of mountains, and all de nigger men +have to push on de wheels while de mules pull and den scotch de wheels +while de mules rest. Everybody but de whitefolks has to walk most de +time. + +Down in de valleys it was warm like in Louisiana, but it seem lak de +sun aint so hot on de head, but it look lak every time night come it +ketch us up on top of one of dem mountains, and it almost as cold as +in de winter time! + +All de niggers had shoes and plenty warm clothes and we wrop up at +night in everything we can git. + +We git to Fort Scott again, and den de Yankee officers come and ask +all us niggers iffen we want to leave old Master and stay dar and +work, 'cause we all free now. Old Master say we can do what we please +about it. + +A few of de niggers stay dar in Fort Scott, but most of us say we +gwine stay wid old Master, and we don't care iffen we is free or not. + +When we git back to Monroe to de old place us niggers git a big +surprise. We didn't hear about it, but some old Master's kinfolks back +in Virginia done come out dar an fix de place up and kept it for him +while we in Colorado, and it look 'bout as good as when we left it. + +He cut it up in chunks and put us niggers out on it on de halves, but +he had to sell part of it to git de money to git us mules and tools +and found to run on. Den after while he had to sell some more, and he +seem lak he git old mighty fast. + +Young Master bin in de big battles in Virginia, and he git hit, and +den he git sick, and when he come home he jest lak a old man he was so +feeble. + +About dat time they was a lot of people coming into dat country from +de North, and dey kept telling de niggers dat de thing for dem to do +was to be free, and come and go whar dey please. + +Dey try to git de darkeys to go and vote but none us folks took much +stock by what dey say. Old Master tell us plenty time to mix in de +politics when de younguns git educated and know what to do. + +Jest de same he never mind iffen we go to de dances and de singing and +sech. He allus lent us a wagon iffen we want to borry one to go in, +too. + +Some de niggers what work for de white folks from de North act purty +uppity and big, and come pestering 'round de dance places and try to +talk up ructions amongst us, but it don't last long. + +De Ku Kluckers start riding 'round at night, and dey pass de word dat +de darkeys got to have a pass to go and come and to stay at de dances. +Dey have to git de pass from de white folks dey work for, and passes +writ from de Northern people wouldn't do no good. Dat de way de +Kluckers keep the darkies in line. + +De Kluckers jest ride up to de dance ground and look at everybody's +passes, and iffen some darkey dar widout a pass or got a pass from de +wrong man dey run him home, and iffen he talk big and won't go home +dey whop him and make him go. + +Any nigger out on de road after dark liable to run across de Kluckers, +and he better have a good pass! All de dances got to bust up at about +'leven o'clock, too. + +One time I seen three-four Kluckers on hosses, all wrapped up in +white, and dey was making a black boy git home. Dey was riding hosses +and he was trotting down de road ahead of 'em. Ever time he stop and +start talking dey pop de whip at his heels and he start trotting on. +He was so made he was crying, but he was gitting on down de road jest +de same. + +I seen 'em coming and I gits out my pass young Master writ so I could +show it, but when dey ride by one in front jest turns in his saddle +and look back at tother men and nod his head, and they jest ride on by +widout stopping to see my pass. Dat man knowed me, I reckon. I looks +to see iffen I knowed de hoss, but de Kluckers sometime swapped dey +hosses 'round amongst 'em, so de hoss maybe wasn't hisn. + +Dey wasn't very bad 'cause de niggers 'round dar wasn't bad, but I +hear plenty of darkeys git whopped in other places 'cause dey act up +and say dey don't have to take off dey hats in de white stores and +such. + +Any nigger dat behave hisself and don't go running 'round late at +night and drinking never had no trouble wid de Kluckers. + +Young Mistress go off and git married, but I don't remember de name +'cause she live off somewhar else, and de next year, I think it was, +my pappy and mammy go on a place about five miles away owned by a man +named Mr. Bumpus, and I go 'long wid my sister Betty and brother +Jimmie to help 'em. + +I live around dat place and never marry till old mammy and pappy both +gone, and Jimmie and Betty both married and I was gitting about forty +year old myself, and den I go up in Kansas and work around till I git +married at last. + +I was in Fort Scott, and I married Mathilda Black in 1900, and she is +73 years old now and was born in Tennessee. We went to Pittsburg, +Kansas, and lived from 1907 to 1913 when we come to Tulsa. + +Young Master's children writ to me once in a while and telled me how +dey gitting 'long up to about twenty year ago, and den I never heard +no more about 'em. I never had no children, and it look lak my wife +going outlive me, so my mainest hope when I goes on is seeing Mammy +and Pappy and old Master. Old overseer, I speck, was too devilish mean +to be thar! + +'Course I loves my Lord Jesus same as anybody, but you see I never +hear much about Him until I was grown, and it seem lak you got to hear +about religion when you little to soak it up and put much by it. +Nobody could read de Bible when I was a boy, and dey wasn't no white +preachers talked to de niggers. We had meeting sometimes, but de +nigger preacher jest talk about bein a good nigger and "doing to +please de Master," and I allus thought he meant to please old Master, +and I allus wanted to do dat anyways. + +So dat de reason I allus remember de time old Master pass on. + +It was about two years after de War, and old Master been mighty porely +all de time. One day we was working in de Bumpus field and a nigger +come on a mule and say old Mistress like to have us go over to de old +place 'cause old Master mighty low and calling mine and Pappy's and +Mammy's name. Old man Bumpus say go right ahead. + +When we git to de Big House old Master setting propped up in de bed +and you can see he mighty low and out'n his head. + +He been talking about gitting de oats stacked, 'cause it seem to him +lak it gitting gloomy-dark, and it gwine to rain, and hail gwine to +ketch de oats in de shocks. Some nigger come running up to de back +door wid an old horn old Mistress sent him out to hunt up, and he +blowed it so old Master could hear it. + +Den purty soon de doctor come to de door and say old Master wants de +bell rung 'cause de slaves should ought to be in from de fields, +'cause it gitting too dark to work. Somebody git a wagon tire and beat +on it like a bell ringing, right outside old Master's window, and den +we all go up on de porch and peep in. Every body was snuffling kind of +quiet, 'cause we can't help it. + +We hear old Master say, "Dat's all right, Simmons. I don't want my +niggers working in de rain. Go down to de quarters and see dey all +dried off good. Dey ain't got no sense but dey all good niggers." +Everybody around de bed was crying, and we all was crying too. + +Den old Mistress come to de door and say we can go in and look at him +if we want to. He was still setting propped up, but he was gone. + +I stayed in Louisiana a long time after dat, but I didn't care nothing +about it, and it look lak I'm staying a long time past my time in dis +world, 'cause I don't care much about staying no longer only I hates +to leave Mathilda. + +But any time de Lord want me I'm ready, and I likes to think when He +ready He going tell old Master to ring de bell for me to come on in. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +SARAH WILSON +Age 87 yrs. +Fort Gibson, Okla. + + +I was a Cherokee slave and now I am a Cherokee freedwoman, and besides +that I am a quarter Cherokee my own self. And this is the way it is. + +I was born in 1850 along the Arkansas river about half way between +Fort Smith and old Fort Coffee and the Skullyville boat landing on the +river. The farm place was on the north side of the river on the old +wagon road what run from Fort Smith out to Fort Gibson, and that old +road was like you couldn't hardly call a road when I first remember +seeing it. The ox teams bog down to they bellies in some places, and +the wagon wheel mighty nigh bust on the big rocks in some places. + +I remember seeing soldiers coming along that old road lots of times, +and freighting wagons, and wagons what we all know carry mostly +wiskey, and that was breaking the law, too! Them soldiers catch the +man with that whiskey they sure put him up for a long time, less'n he +put some silver in they hands. That's what my Uncle Nick say. That +Uncle Nick a mean Negro, and he ought to know about that. + +Like I tell you, I am quarter Cherokee. My mammy was named Adeline and +she belong to old Master Ben Johnson. Old Master Ben bring my +grandmammy out to that Sequoyah district way back when they call it +Arkansas, mammy tell me, and God only know who my mammy's pa is, but +mine was old Master Ben's boy, Ned Johnson. + +Old Master Ben come from Tennessee when he was still a young man, and +he bring a whole passel of slaves and my mammy say they all was kin to +one another, all the slaves I mean. He was a white man that married a +Cherokee woman, and he was a devil on this earth. I don't want to +talk about him none. + +White folks was mean to us like the devil, and so I jest let them +pass. When I say my brothers and sisters I mean my half brothers and +sisters, you know, but maybe some of them was my whole kin anyways, I +don't know. They was Lottie that was sold off to a Starr because she +wouldn't have a baby, and Ed, Dave, Ben, Jim and Ned. + +My name is Sarah now but it was Annie until I was eight years old. My +old Mistress' name was Annie and she name me that, and Mammy was +afraid to change it until old Mistress died, then she change it. She +hate old Mistress and that name too. + +Lottie's name was Annie, too, but Mammy changed it in her own mind but +she was afraid to say it out loud, a-feared she would get a whipping. +When sister was sold off Mammy tell her to call herself Annie when she +was leaving but call herself Lottie when she git over to the Starrs. +And she done it too. I seen her after that and she was called Lottie +all right. + +The Negroes lived all huddled up in a bunch in little one-room log +cabins with stick and mud chimneys. We lived in one, and it had beds +for us children like shelves in the wall. Mammy need to help us up +into them. + +Grandmammy was mighty old and Mistress was old too. Grandmammy set on +the Master's porch and minded the baby mostly. I think it was Young +Master's. He was married to a Cherokee girl. They was several of the +boys but only one girl, Nicie. The old Master's boys were Aaron, John, +Ned, Cy and Nathan. They lived in a double log house made out of +square hewed logs, and with a double fireplace out of rock where they +warmed theirselves on one side and cooked on the other. They had a +long front porch where they set most of the time in the summer, and +slept on it too. + +There was over a hundred acres in the Master's farm, and it was all +bottom land too, and maybe you think he let them slaves off easy! Work +from daylight to dark! They all hated him and the overseer too, and +before slavery ended my grandmammy was dead and old Mistress was dead +and old Master was mighty feeble and Uncle Nick had run away to the +North soldiers and they never got him back. He run away once before, +about ten years before I was born, Mammy say, but the Cherokees went +over in the Creek Nation and got him back that time. + +The way he made the Negroes work so hard, old Master must have been +trying to get rich. When they wouldn't stand for a whipping he would +sell them. + +I saw him sell a old woman and her son. Must have been my aunt. She +was always pestering around trying to get something for herself, and +one day she was cleaning the yard he seen her pick up something and +put it inside her apron. He flew at her and cussed her, and started +like he was going to hit her but she just stood right up to him and +never budged, and when he come close she just screamed out loud and +ran at him with her fingers stuck out straight and jabbed him in the +belly. He had a big soft belly, too, and it hurt him. He seen she +wasn't going to be afraid, and he set out to sell her. He went off on +his horse to get some men to come and bid on her and her boy, and all +us children was mighty scared about it. + +They would have hangings at Fort Smith courthouse, and old Master +would take a slave there sometimes to see the hanging, and that slave +would come back and tell us all scary stories about the hanging. + +One time he whipped a whole bunch of the men on account of a fight in +the quarters, and then he took them all to Fort Smith to see a +hanging. He tied them all in the wagon, and when they had seen the +hanging he asked them if they was scared of them dead men hanging up +there. They all said yes, of course, but my old uncle Nick was a bad +Negro and he said, "No, I aint a-feared of them nor nothing else in +this world", and old Master jumped on him while he was tied and beat +him with a rope, and then when they got home he tied old Nick to a +tree and took his shirt off and poured the cat-o-nine-tails to him +until he fainted away and fell over like he was dead. + +I never forget seeing all that blood all over my uncle, and if I could +hate that old Indian any more I guess I would, but I hated him all I +could already I reckon. + +Old Master wasn't the only hellion neither. Old Mistress just as bad, +and she took most of her wrath out hitting us children all the time. +She was afraid of the grown Negroes. Afraid of what they might do +while old Master was away, but she beat us children all the time. + +She would call me, "Come here Annie!" and I wouldn't know what to do. +If I went when she called "Annie" my mammy would beat me for answering +to that name, and if I didn't go old Mistress would beat me for that. +That made me hate both of them, and I got the devil in me and I +wouldn't come to either one. My grandmammy minded the Master's yard, +and she set on the front porch all the time, and when I was called I +would run to her and she wouldn't let anybody touch me. + +When I was eight years old old Mistress died, and Grandmammy told me +why old Mistress picked on me so. She told me about me being half +Mister Ned's blood. Then I knowed why Mister Ned would say, "Let her +along, she got big big blood in her", and then laugh. + +Young Mister Ned was a devil, too. When his mammy died he went out and +"blanket married." I mean he brung in a half white and half Indian +woman and just lived with her. + +The slaves would get rations every Monday morning to do them all week. +The Overseer would weigh and measure according to how many in the +family, and if you run out you just starve till you get some more. We +all know the overseer steal some of it for his own self but we can't +do anything, so we get it from the old Master some other way. + +One day I was carrying water from the spring and I run up on +Grandmammy and Uncle Nick skinning a cow. "What you-all doing?", I +say, and they say keep my mouth shut or they kill me. They was +stealing from the Master to piece out down at the quarters with. Old +Master had so many cows he never did count the difference. + +I guess I wasn't any worse than any the rest of the Negroes, but I was +bad to tell little lies. I carry scars on my legs to this day where +Old Master whip me for lying, with a rawhide quirt he carry all the +time for his horse. When I lie to him he just jump down off'n his +horse and whip me good right there. + +In slavery days we all ate sweet potatoes all the time. When they +didn't measure out enough of the tame kind we would go out in the +woods and get the wild kind. They growed along the river sand betaween +where we lived and Wilson's Rock, out west of our place. + +Then we had boiled sheep and goat, mostly goat, and milk and wild +greens and corn pone. I think the goat meat was the best, but I aint +had no teeth for forty years now, and a chunk of meat hurts my +stomach. So I just eats grits mostly. Besides hoeing in the field, +chopping sprouts, shearing sheep, carrying water, cutting firewood, +picking cotton and sewing I was the one they picked to work Mistress' +little garden where she raised things from seed they got in Fort +Smith. Green peas and beans and radishes and things like that. If we +raised a good garden she give me a little of it, and if we had a poor +one I got a little anyhow even when she didn't give it. + +For clothes we had homespun cotton all the year round, but in winter +we had a sheep skin jacket with the wool left on the inside. Sometimes +sheep skin shoes with the wool on the inside and sometimes real cow +leather shoes with wood peggings for winter, but always barefooted in +summer, all the men and women too. + +Lord, I never earned a dime of money in slave days for myself but +plenty for the old Master. He would send us out to work the neighbors +field and he got paid for it, but we never did see any money. + +I remember the first money I ever did see. It was a little while after +we was free, and I found a greenback in the road at Fort Gibson and I +didn't know what it was. Mammy said it was money and grabbed for it, +but I was still a hell cat and I run with it. I went to the little +sutler store and laid it down and pointed to a pitcher I been wanting. +The man took the money and give me the pitcher, but I don't know to +this day how much money it was and how much was the pitcher, but I +still got that pitcher put away. It's all blue and white stripedy. + +Most of the work I done off the plantation was sewing. I learned from +my Granny and I loved to sew. That was about the only thing I was +industrious in. When I was just a little bitsy girl I found a steel +needle in the yard that belong to old Mistress. My mammy took it and I +cried. She put it in her dress and started for the field. I cried so +old Mistress found out why and made Mammy give me the needle for my +own. + +We had some neighbor Indians named Starr, and Mrs. Starr used me +sometimes to sew. She had nine boys and one girl, and she would sew up +all they clothes at once to do for a year. She would cut out the cloth +for about a week, and then send the word around to all the neighbors, +and old Mistress would send me because she couldn't see good to sew. +They would have stacks of drawers, shirts, pants and some dresses all +cut out to sew up. + +I was the only Negro that would set there and sew in that bunch of +women, and they always talked to me nice and when they eat I get part +of it too, out in the kitchen. + +One Negro girl, Eula Davis, had a mistress sent her too, one time, but +she wouldn't sew. She didn't like me because she said I was too white +and she played off to spite the white people. She got sent home, too. + +When old Mistress die I done all the sewing for the family almost. I +could sew good enough to go out before I was eight years old, and when +I got to be about ten I was better than any other girl on the place +for sewing. + +I can still quilt without my glasses, and I have sewed all night long +many a time while I was watching Young Master's baby after old +Mistress died. + +They was over a hundred acres in the plantation, and I don't know how +many slaves, but before the War ended lots of the men had run away. +Uncle Nick went to the North and never come home, and Grandmammy died +about that time. + +We was way down across the Red river in Texas at that time, close to +Shawneetown of the Choctaw Nation but just across the river on the +other side in Texas bottoms. Old Master took us there in covered +wagons when the Yankee soldiers got too close by in the first part of +the War. He hired the slaves out to Texas people because he didn't +make any crops down there, and we all lived in kind of camps. That's +how some of the men and my uncle Nick got to slip off to the north +that way. + +Old Master just rant and rave all the time we was in Texas. That's the +first time I ever saw a doctor. Before that when a slave sick the old +women give them herbs, but down there one day old Master whip a Negro +girl and she fall in the fire, and he had a doctor come out to fix her +up where she was burnt. I remember Granny giving me clabber milk when +I was sick, and when I was grown I found out it had had medicine in +it. + +Before freedom we didn't have no church, but slipped around to the +other cabins and had a little singing sometimes. Couldn't have anybody +show us the letters either, and you better not let them catch you pick +up a book even to look at the pictures, for it was against a Cherokee +law to have a Negro read and write or to teach a Negro. + +Some Negroes believed in buckeyes and charms but I never did. Old +Master had some good boys, named Aaron, John, Ned, Cy and Nat and they +told me the charms was no good. Their sister Nicie told me too, and +said when I was sick just come and tell her. + +They didn't tell us anything about Christmas and New Year though, and +all we done was work. + +When the War was ended we was still in Texas, and when old Master got +a letter from Fort Smith telling him the slaves was free he couldn't +read, and Young Miss read it to him. He went wild and jumped on her +and beat the devil out of her. Said she was lying to him. It near +about killed him to let us loose, but he cooled down after awhile and +said he would help us all get back home if we wanted to come. + +Mammy told him she could bear her own expenses. I remember I didn't +know what "expenses" was, and I thought it was something I was going +to have to help carry all the way back. + +It was a long time after he knew we was free before he told us. He +tried to keep us, I reckon, but had to let us go. He died pretty soon +after he told us, and some said his heart just broke and some said +some Negroes poisoned him. I didn't know which. + +Anyways we had to straggle back the best way we could, and me and +mammy just got along one way and another till we got to a ferry over +the Red River and into Arkansas. Then we got some rides and walked +some until we got to Fort Smith. They was a lot of Negro camps there +and we stayed awhile and then started out to Fort Gibson because we +heard they was giving rations out there. Mammy knew we was Cherokee +anyway, I guess. + +That trip was hell on earth. Nobody let us ride and it took us nearly +two weeks to walk all that ways, and we nearly starved all the time. +We was skin and bones and feet all bloody when we got to the Fort. + +We come here to Four Mile Branch to where the Negroes was all setting +down, and pretty soon Mammy died. + +I married Oliver Wilson on January second, 1878. He used to belong to +Mr. DeWitt Wilson of Tahlequah, and I think the old people used to +live down at Wilson Rock because my husband used to know all about +that place and the place where I was borned. Old Mister DeWitt Wilson +give me a pear tree the next year after I was married, and it is still +out in my yard and bears every year. + +I was married in a white and black checkedy calico apron that I +washed for Mr. Tim Walker's mother Lizzie all day for, over close to +Ft. Gibson, and I was sure a happy woman when I married that day. Him +and me both got our land on our Cherokee freedman blood and I have +lived to bury my husband and see two great grandchildren so far. + +I bless God about Abraham Lincoln. I remember when my mammy sold +pictures of him in Fort Smith for a Jew. If he give me my freedom I +know he is in Heaven now. + +I heard a lot about Jefferson Davis in my life. During the War we hear +the Negroes singing the soldier song about hand Jeff Davis to a apple +tree, and old Master tell about the time we know Jeff Davis. Old +Master say Jeff Davis was just a dragoon soldier out of Fort Gibson +when he bring his family out here from Tennessee, and while they was +on the road from Fort Smith to where they settled young Jeff Davis and +some more dragoon soldiers rid up and talked to him a long time. He +say my grandmammy had a bundle on her head, and Jeff Davis say, "Where +you going Aunty?" and she was tired and mad and she said, "I don't +know, to Hell I reckon", and all the white soldiers laughed at her and +made her that much madder. + +I joined the Four Mile Branch church in 1879 and Sam Solomon was a +Creek negro and the first preacher I ever heard preach. Everybody +ought to be in the church and ready for that better home on the other +side. + +All the old slaves I know are dead excepting two, and I will be going +pretty soon I reckon, but I'm glad I lived to see the day the Negroes +get the right treatment if they work good and behave themselves right. +They don't have to have no pass to walk abroad no more, and they can +all read and write now, but it's a tarnation shame some of them go and +read the wrong kind of things anyways. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +10-19-38 +1,534 words + +TOM W. WOODS +Age 83. +Alderson, Okla. + + +Lady, if de nigger hadn't been set free dis country wouldn't ever been +what it is now! Poor white folks wouldn't never had a chance. De slave +holders had most of de money and de land and dey wouldn't let de poor +white folks have a chance to own any land or anything else to speak +of. Dese white folks wasn't much better off den we was. Dey had to +work hard and dey had to worry 'bout food, clothes and shelter and we +didn't. Lots of slave owners wouldn't allow dem on deir farms among +deir slaves without orders from de overseer. I don't know why, unless +he was afraid dey would stir up discontent among de niggers. Dere was +lots of "underground railroading" and I rekon dat was what Old Master +and others was afraid of. + +Us darkies was taught dat poor white folks didn't amount to much. +Course we knowed dey was white and we was black and dey was to be +respected for dat, but dat was about all. + +White folks as well as niggers profited by emancipation. Lincoln was a +friend to all poor white folks as well as black ones and if he could +a' lived things would a'been different for ever'body. + +Dis has been a good old world to live in. I always been able to make a +purty good living and de only trouble I ever had has been sickness and +death. I've had a sight of dat kind of trouble. I've outlived two +wives and eight children. I had 13 brothers and sisters and I was de +oldest, and I'm de only one left. + +I sits here at night by myself and gits to wondering what de good +Lord is sparing me for. I reckon it's for some good reason, and I'd +like to live to be a hundred if He wants me to. I'm not tired of +living yet! + +I was born in Florence, Alabama. My father's name was Thomas Woods and +my mammy was Frances Foster. Mammy belonged to Wash Foster and father +was owned by Moses Woods, who lived on an adjoining plantation. He +worked for his Master ever' day but spent each night wid us. He walked +'bout a mile to his work ever' day. + +Master Wash was a poor man when he married Miss Sarah Watkins of +Richmond, Virginia. Her father was as rich as cream, he owned 7 +plantations and 200 slaves to each plantation. When Master Wash and +Miss Sarah got married her father give her 50 slaves. Ever'body said +Miss Mary jest married Master Wash because he was a purty boy, and he +sure was a fine looking man. + +He was good and kind to all his slaves when he was sober, but he was +awful crabbed and cross when he was drunk, and he was drunk most of de +time. He was hard to please and sometimes he would whip de slaves. I +remember seeing Master Wash whup two men once. He give 'em 200 lashes. + +Miss Sarah was de best woman in de world. It takes a good woman to +live wid a drunkard. + +Two of the men ran away one time and was gone till dey got tired of +staying away. Master Wash wouldn't let anyone hunt 'em. When dey +finally come home he had dem strapped in stocks and den deir bodies +bared to de waist and he sure did ply de lash. I guess he whupped 'em +harder dan he would if he hadn't been so full of whisky. + +He never did sell any of his slaves. He kept the 50 dat Miss Sarah's +father give 'em and deir increase. He bought some ever' time dey had a +sale. He owned two plantations and dey was about a hundred slaves on +each one. Him and his family lived in town. + +Me and a boy named John was sized and put to work when we was about +nine or ten years old. We was so bad dey had to put us to work as dey +couldn't do any thing else with us. We'd chase de pigs and ride de +calves and to punish us dey made us tote water to de hands. Dey was so +many hands to water dat it kept us busy running back and forth with de +water. De next year dey put me to plowing and him to hoeing. We made +regular hands from den on. + +If we had behaved ourselves we wouldn't a'had to go to work till we +was fourteen or fifteen anyway. Slave owners was awful good to deir +nigger chaps for dey wanted 'em to grow up to be strong men and women. + +Dey was about thirty children on our plantation. Two women looked +after us and took care of us till our parents come in from de field. +Dey cooked for us and always gave us our supper and sent us home to +our parents for de night. + +Our food was placed on a long table in a trough. Each child had a +spoon and four of us eat out of one trough. Our food at night was +mostly milk and bread. At noon we had vegetables, bread, meat and +milk. He gave us more and better food than he did his field hands. He +said he didn't want none of us to be stunted in our growing. + +He bought our shoes for us but cloth for our clothes was spun and wove +right there on de farm. In summer us boys wore long tailed shirts and +no pants. I've plowed dat way a many a day. We was glad to see it git +warm in de spring so we could go barefooted and go wid out our pants. + +Our overseers lived near de quarters and every morning about four o' +clock dey'd blow a horn [HW: to] wake us up. We knowed it meant to git +up and start de day. We was in de field by de time we could see. We +always fed our teams at night. We'd give 'em enough to keep 'em eating +all night so we wouldn't have to feed 'em in de morning. + +Master Wash Foster and his family lived in de finest house in +Florence, Ala. It was a fine, large two-story house, painted white as +nearly all de houses was in dem days. Dere was big gallery in front +and back and a fine lawn wid big cedar and chestnut trees all 'round +de house. + +He had a fine carriage and a pair of spanking bays dat cost him $500 +apiece. Old Monroe was his coachman and dey made a grand sight. Monroe +kept de nickel plated harness and carriage trimmings shining and de +team was brushed slick and clean and dey sure stepped out. + +We lived on de plantation about eight miles from town and we liked for +de family to come out to de farm. Dey was four children, Wash, Jack, +Sarah and Sally and dey always played with us. When dey come we always +had a regular feast as dey children would eat wid us children. Dey had +dishes though to eat out of. After dinner we would run and play Peep +Squirrel. I think dey call it hide-and-seek now. + +My mother was a regular field hand till Miss Sarah decided to take her +into town to take care of her children. Dey all called her Frank +instead of Frances. I used to get to go to town to visit my mother and +we'd have glorious times I tell you. + +We'd go out and gather hickory nuts, hazel nuts, pig nuts, and +walnuts. We'd all set around de fire and eat nuts and tell ghost tales +ever' night. Master Wash raised lots of apples too, and we had all +that we wanted of dem to eat. + +I saw lots of Yankee soldiers. Sherman and Grant's armies marched by +our house and camped at DeCatur, Ala. It took dem three days to pass. +We wasn't afraid of dem. + +In the second year of de war some Yankee soldiers come through and +gathered up all de slaves and took us to Athens, Ala., and put us on a +Government farm. We stayed dere till de end of de War. My father died +jest before dey took us away. + +My mother and us children were on de farm together and dey treated us +all mighty good. We had plenty of good food and clothes. + +Master Wash came to see us while we was on de Government farm. He was +left in a bad shape and we was all sorry for him. A lot of his hands +went back to him after de Surrender but we never did. Mother married +another man named Goodloe and we all went to Arkansas, near Little +Rock. Dis was his former home. I was about nineteen or twenty years +old at this time. + +I never sent to school. My wife taught me how to read de Bible but I +never learned to write. I have good eyesight. I guess dat is cause I +never put dem out reading and going to moving picture shows. + +When any of my family was sick I always sent for de doctor. We had a +few of our own home remedies dat we used also. We boiled poke root and +bathed in it for a cure for rheumatism. + +A tea made from May apples was used for a physic. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +ANNIE YOUNG +Age 86 +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in 1851, makes me 86 years old. I was born in Middle +Tennessee, Summers County. My mother was put on a block and sold from +me when I was a child. I don't remember my father real good. Sister +Martha, Sister Sallie, nor Sister Jane wasn't sold. But my brother +John was. My mother's name is Rachel Donnahue. We lived in a log hut. +The white folks lived in a frame white building sitting in a big grove +yard. Old master owned a big farm. + +We ate molasses, bread and butter and milk in wooden bowls and +crumbled our bread up in it. Old master had big smokehouses of meat. +Dey ate chickens, possums and coons, and my old auntie would barbecue +rabbits for de white folks. We ate ash cakes too. + +I washed dishes, swept de yard, and kept de yard clean wid weed brush +brooms. I never earned no money. All de slaves had gardens, and +chickens too. My auntie, dey let her have chickens of her own and she +raised chickens, and had a chicken house and garden down in de woods. + +I remember in time of de War dey'd send me down in de woods to pick up +chips and git wood. All de men had gone to de army. One morning and +t'was cold dey sent me down in de woods and my hands got frostbitten. +All de skin come off and dey had to tie my hands up in roasted +turnips. Sallie she had gloves, and didn't get frostbitten. After my +old master died, Master Donnahue was his name, his old son-in-law come +to take over de plantation. He was mean, but my sister whipped him. + +We had no nigger driver or overseer. We raised wheat, corn and +vegetables, not much cotton, jest enough to spun de clothes out of. + +At night when we'd go to our cabins we'd pick cotton from de seeds to +make our clothes. Boys and girls alike wore dem long shirts slit up de +side nearly to your necks. They'd have cornshuckings sometimes all +night long. You see I didn't have no mother, no father, nobody to lead +me, teach me or tell me, and so jest lived with anybody was good +enough to let me stay and done what they did. They'd have log +rollings, with all de whiskey dey could drink. + +I remember going to church, de Methodist Church dey call it. We used +to sing dis song and I sho did like it too: + + "I went down in de valley to pray, + Studying dat good old way." + +I been a Christian long before most of dese young niggers was born. My +other favorites are: + + "Must Jesus bear This Cross Alone." + +and + + "The Consecrated Cross I'll Bear 'til + Death Shall Set Me Free, + Yea, There's a Crown for Everyone, + And There's a Crown for Me." + +Yes Lawd, there sho is. + +One day a nigger killed one of his master's shoats and he catch him +and when he'd ask him, "What's that you got there?" The nigger said, +"a possum." De master said, "Let me see." He looked and seen it was a +shoat. De nigger said, "Master it may be a shoat now, but it sho was a +possum while ago when I put 'im in dis sack." + +Dey didn't whip our folks much, but one day I saw a overseer on +another place. He staked a man down with two forked sticks 'cross his +wrist nailed in de ground and beat him half to death with a hand saw +'til it drawed blisters. Den he mopped his back wid vinegar, salt and +pepper. Sometimes dey'd drop dat hot rosin from pine knots on dose +blisters. + +When de Yanks come, business took place. I remember white folks was +running and hiding, gitting everything dey could from de Yanks. Dey +hid dey jewelry and fine dishes and such. Dose Yanks had on big boots. +Dey'd drive up, feed dey hosses from old Master's corn, catch dey +chickens, and tell old Master's cook to cook 'em, and they'd shoot +down old Master's hogs and skin 'em. + +De Yanks used to make my nephew drunk, and have him sing (dis is kind +of bad): + + "I'll be God O'Mighty + God Dammed if I don't + Kill a nigger, + Oh Whooey boys! Oh Whooey! + Oh Whooey boys! Oh Whooey!" + +I don't remember never seeing no funerals. Jest took 'em off and +buried 'em. I remember dat old Master's son-in-law dat my sister +whipped, he called hisself a doctor and he killed Aunt Clo. Give her +some medicine but he didn't know what he was doing and killed her. + +I married William Young and we had a pretty good wedding. Married in +Crittington County Arkansas. When I left Tennessee and went to +Arkansas I followed some hands. You know after de War dey immigrated +niggers from one place to another. I owned a good farm in Arkansas. I +came out here some 42 years ago. + +I have three daughters. Mattie Brockins runs a rooming house in Kansas +City. Jessie Cotton, lives right up de street here. Osie Olla Anderson +is working out in North town. + +Well I think Abraham Lincoln is more than a type a man than Moses. I +believe he is a square man, believe in union that every man has a +right to be a free man regardless to color. He was a republican man. +Don't know much 'bout Jeff Davis but I think Booker T. Washington was +a pretty good man. He's a right good man I guess, but he is dead ain't +he? + +I can remember once my auntie's old Master tried to have her and she +run off out in de woods, and when he put those blood hounds or nigger +hounds on her trail he catched her and hit her in de head wid +something like de stick de police carry, and he knocked a hole in her +head and she bled like a hog, and he made her have him. She told her +mistress, and mistress told her to go ahead and be wid him 'cause he's +gonna kill you. And he had dem two women and she had some chillun +nearly white, and master and dey all worked in de fields side by side. + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Slave Narratives, Oklahoma, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SLAVE NARRATIVES, OKLAHOMA *** + +***** This file should be named 20785-8.txt or 20785-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/0/7/8/20785/ + +Produced by Diane Monico and The Project Gutenberg Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net. (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by the Library of Congress, Manuscript Division.) This +file is gratefully uploaded to the PG collection in honor +of Distributed Proofreaders having posted over 10,000 +ebooks. + + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +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 + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/20785-8.zip b/20785-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..1d6dbe8 --- /dev/null +++ b/20785-8.zip diff --git a/20785-h.zip b/20785-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a2defa2 --- /dev/null +++ b/20785-h.zip diff --git a/20785-h/20785-h.htm b/20785-h/20785-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3391465 --- /dev/null +++ b/20785-h/20785-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,12589 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of Slave Narratives, Oklahoma (A Folk History of Slavery in the United States from Interviews with Former Slaves), by Work Projects Administration. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + h1,h2,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: left; + clear: both; + } + h3 {text-align: left; margin-top: 2em; clear: both} + + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + + table {margin-left: 0; margin-right: auto;} + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + .pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: .8em; + text-align: right; + } /* page numbers */ + + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + .u {text-decoration: underline;} + + .caption {font-weight: bold;} + + .figcenter {margin: auto; text-align: center;} + + .figleft {float: left; clear: left; margin-left: 0; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: + 1em; margin-right: 1em; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .figright {float: right; clear: right; margin-left: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-top: 1em; margin-right: 0; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span.i0 {display: block; margin-left: 0em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i4 {display: block; margin-left: 4em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Slave Narratives, Oklahoma, by Various + +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, Oklahoma + A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From + Interviews with Former Slaves + +Author: Various + +Release Date: March 8, 2007 [EBook #20785] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SLAVE NARRATIVES, OKLAHOMA *** + + + + +Produced by Diane Monico and The Project Gutenberg Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net. (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by the Library of Congress, Manuscript Division.) This +file is gratefully uploaded to the PG collection in honor +of Distributed Proofreaders having posted over 10,000 +ebooks. + + + + + + +</pre> + + + + + +<p>[HW: ***] = Handwritten Note<br /> +[TR: ***] = Transcriber Note<br /><br /><br /> +</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /> +<h1>SLAVE NARRATIVES</h1> + + +<h2> +<i>A Folk History of Slavery in the United States<br /> +From Interviews with Former Slaves</i><br /><br /> +</h2> + + +<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<br /><br /> +</h4> + + +<h3><i>Illustrated with Photographs</i><br /><br /><br /></h3> + + +<h4>WASHINGTON 1941</h4> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /> +<h2>VOLUME XIII</h2> + +<h2>OKLAHOMA NARRATIVES</h2> + + +<h3> +Prepared by<br /> +the Federal Writers' Project of<br /> +the Works Progress Administration<br /> +for the State of Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /> +<h2><a name="INFORMANTS" id="INFORMANTS"></a>INFORMANTS</h2> + + +<div class='table'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary="toc"> +<tr><td align='left'>Adams, Isaac</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_1">1</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Alexander, Alice</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_6">6</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Banks, Phoebe</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_8">8</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Bean, Nancy Rogers</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_12">12</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Bee, Prince</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_14">14</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Bonner, Lewis</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_17">17</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Bridges, Francis</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_20">20</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Brown, John</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_24">24</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Carder, Sallie</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_27">27</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Chessier, Betty Foreman</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_30">30</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Colbert, Polly</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_33">33</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Conrad, Jr., George</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_39">39</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Cunningham, Martha</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_45">45</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Curtis, William</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_48">48</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Davis, Lucinda</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_53">53</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Dawson, Anthony</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_65">65</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Douglass, Alice</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_73">73</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Dowdy, Doc Daniel</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_76">76</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Draper, Joanna</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_81">81</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Easter, Esther</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_88">88</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Evans, Eliza</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_92">92</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Farmer, Lizzie</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_97">97</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Fountain, Della</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_102">102</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Gardner, Nancy</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_108">108</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>George, Octavia</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_111">111</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Grayson, Mary</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_115">115</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Grinstead, Robert R.</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_124">124</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Hardman, Mattie</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_128">128</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Hawkins, Annie</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_131">131</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Henry, Ida</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_134">134</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Hillyer, Morris</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_138">138</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Hutson, Hal</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_145">145</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Hutson, William</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_148">148</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Jackson, Isabella</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_152">152</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Johnson, Nellie</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_155">155</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Jordan, Josie</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_160">160</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>King, George G.</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_165">165</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>King, Martha</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_169">169</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Kye, George</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_172">172</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Lawson, Ben</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_176">176</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Lindsay, Mary</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_178">178</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Logan, Mattie</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_187">187</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Love, Kiziah</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_192">192</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Lucas, Daniel William</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_200">200</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Luster, Bert</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_203">203</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>McCray, Stephen</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_207">207</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>McFarland, Hannah</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_210">210</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Mack, Marshall</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_212">212</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Manning, Allen B.</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_215">215</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Maynard, Bob</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_223">223</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Montgomery, Jane</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_227">227</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Oliver, Amanda</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_230">230</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Oliver, Salomon</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_233">233</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Petite, Phyllis</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_236">236</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Poe, Matilda</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_242">242</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Pyles, Henry F.</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_245">245</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Richardson, Chaney</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_257">257</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Richardson, Red</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_263">263</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Robertson, Betty</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_266">266</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Robinson, Harriett</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_270">270</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Rowe, Katie</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_275">275</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Sheppard, Morris</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_285">285</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Simms, Andrew</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_295">295</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Smith, Liza</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_298">298</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Smith, Lou</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_300">300</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Southall, James</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_306">306</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Tenneyson, Beauregard</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_310">310</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Walters, William</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_312">312</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Webb, Mary Frances</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_314">314</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Wells, Easter</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_316">316</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>White, John</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_322">322</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Williams, Charley</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_330">330</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Wilson, Sarah</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_344">344</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Woods, Tom</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_354">354</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Young, Annie</td><td align='right'><a href="#Page_359">359</a></td></tr> +</table></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /> +<h2>ILLUSTRATIONS</h2> + + + +<div class='table'> +<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary="illus"> +<tr><td align='left'></td><td align='right'>Facing Page</td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Lucinda Davis</td><td align='right'><a href="#Lucinda_Davis">53</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Anthony Dawson</td><td align='right'><a href="#Anthony_Dawson">65</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Katie Rowe</td><td align='right'><a href="#Katie_Rowe">275</a></td></tr> +<tr><td align='left'>Charley Williams and Granddaughter</td><td align='right'><a href="#Charley_Williams_and_Granddaughter">330</a></td></tr> +</table></div> +<hr style="width: 95%;" /> + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>ISAAC ADAMS<br /> +Age 87 yrs.<br /> +Tulsa, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in Louisiana, way before the War. I think it was about ten +years before, because I can remember everything so well about the start of +the War, and I believe I was about ten years old.</p> + +<p>My Mammy belonged to Mr. Sack P. Gee. I don't know what his real given +name was, but it maybe was Saxon. Anyways we all called him Master Sack.</p> + +<p>He was a kind of youngish man, and was mighty rich. I think he was born +in England. Anyway his pappy was from England, and I think he went back +before I was born.</p> + +<p>Master Sack had a big plantation ten miles north of Arcadia, Louisiana, +and his land run ten miles along both sides. He would leave in a buggy and +be gone all day and still not get all over it.</p> + +<p>There was all kinds of land on it, and he raised cane and oats and wheat +and lots of corn and cotton. His cotton fields was the biggest anywheres in +that part, and when chopping and picking times come he would get negroes from +other people to help out. I never was no good at picking, but I was a terror +with a hoe!</p> + +<p>I was the only child my Mammy had. She was just a young girl, and my +Master did not own her very long. He got her from Mr. Addison Hilliard, where +my pappy belonged. I think she was going to have me when he got her; anyways +I come along pretty soon, and my mammy never was very well afterwards. Maybe +Master Sack sent her back over to my pappy. I don't know.</p> + +<p>Mammy was the house girl at Mr. Sack's because she wasn't very strong, +and when I was four or five years old she died. I was big enough to do little +things for Mr. Sack and his daughter, so they kept me at the mansion, and I +helped the house boys. Time I was nine or ten Mr. Sack's daughter was getting<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span> +to be a young woman—fifteen or sixteen years old—and that was old +enough to get married off in them days. They had a lot of company just +before the War, and they had whole bunch of house negroes around all +the time.</p> + +<p>Old Mistress died when I was a baby, so I don't remember anything about +her, but Young Mistress was a winder! She would ride horseback nearly all +the time, and I had to go along with her when I got big enough. She never +did go around the quarters, so I don't know nothing much about the negroes +Mr. Sack had for the fields. They all looked pretty clean and healthy, +though, when they would come up to the Big House. He fed them all good and +they all liked him.</p> + +<p>He had so much different kinds of land that they could raise anything +they wanted, and he had more mules and horses and cattle than anybody around +there. Some of the boys worked with his fillies all the time, and he went +off to New Orleans ever once in a while with his race horses. He took his +daughter but they never took me.</p> + +<p>Some of his land was in pasture but most of it was all open fields, +with just miles and miles of cotton rows. There was a pretty good strip +along one side he called the "old" fields. That's what they called the +land that was wore out and turned back. It was all growed up in young +trees, and that's where he kept his horses most of the time.</p> + +<p>The first I knowed about the War coming on was when Mr. Sack had a +whole bunch of whitefolks at the Big House at a function. They didn't +talk about anything else all evening and then the next time they come +nearly all their menfolks wasn't there—just the womenfolks. It wasn't +very long till Mr. Sack went off to Houma with some other men, and pretty +soon we knew he was in the War. I don't remember ever seeing him come<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span> +home. I don't think he did until it was nearly all over.</p> + +<p>Next thing we knowed they was Confederate soldiers riding by pretty +nearly every day in big droves. Sometimes they would come and buy corn and +wheat and hogs, but they never did take any anyhow, like the Yankees done +later on. They would pay with billets, Young Missy called them, and she +didn't send them to git them cashed but saved them a long time, and then +she got them cashed, but you couldn't buy anything with the money she got +for them.</p> + +<p>That Confederate money she got wasn't no good. I was in Arcadia with +her at a store, and she had to pay seventy-five cents for a can of sardines +for me to eat with some bread I had, and before the War you could get a +can like that for two cents. Things was even higher then than later on, +but that's the only time I saw her buy anything.</p> + +<p>When the Yankees got down in that country the most of the big men paid +for all the corn and meat and things they got, but some of the little bunches +of them would ride up and take hogs and things like that and just ride off. +They wasn't anybody at our place but the womenfolks and the negroes. Some +of Mr. Sack's women kinfolks stayed there with Young Mistress.</p> + +<p>Along at the last the negroes on our place didn't put in much stuff—jest +what they would need, and could hide from the Yankees, because they +would get it all took away from them if the Yankees found out they had +plenty of corn and oats.</p> + +<p>The Yankees was mighty nice about their manners, though. They camped +all around our place for a while. There was three camps of them close by +at one time, but they never did come and use any of our houses or cabins. +There was lots of poor whites and Cajuns that lived down below us, between +us and the Gulf, and the Yankees just moved into their houses and cabins +and used them to camp in.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span></p> + +<p>The negroes at our place and all of them around there didn't try to get +away or leave when the Yankees come in. They wasn't no place to go, anyway, +so they all stayed on. But they didn't do very much work. Just enough +to take care of themselves and their whitefolks.</p> + +<p>Master Sack come home before the War was quite over. I think he had +been sick, because he looked thin and old and worried. All the negroes +picked up and worked mighty hard after he come home, too.</p> + +<p>One day he went into Arcadia and come home and told us the War was +over and we was all free. The negroes didn't know what to make of it, and +didn't know where to go, so he told all that wanted to stay on that they +could just go on like they had been and pay him shares.</p> + +<p>About half of his negroes stayed on, and he marked off land for them +to farm and made arrangements with them to let them use their cabins, and +let them have mules and tools. They paid him out of their shares, and some +of them finally bought the mules and some of the land. But about half went +on off and tried to do better somewheres else.</p> + +<p>I didn't stay with him because I was jest a boy and he didn't need +me at the house anyway.</p> + +<p>Late in the War my Pappy belonged to a man named Sander or Zander. Might +been Alexander, but the negroes called him Mr. Sander. When pappy got free +he come and asked me to go with him, and I went along and lived with him. He +had a share-cropper deal with Mr. Sander and I helped him work his patch. +That place was just a little east of Houma, a few miles.</p> + +<p>When my Pappy was born his parents belonged to a Mr. Adams, so he took +Adams for his last name, and I did too, because I was his son. I don't know +where Mr. Adams lived, but I don't think my Pappy was born in Louisiana. +Alabama, maybe. I think his parents come off the boat, because he was very +black—even blacker than I am.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span></p> + +<p>I lived there with my Pappy until I was about eighteen and then I +married and moved around all over Louisiana from time to time. My wife +give me twelve boys and five girls, but all my children are dead now but +five. My wife died in 1920 and I come up here to Tulsa to live. One of +my daughters takes care and looks out for me now.</p> + +<p>I seen the old Sack P. Gee place about twenty years ago, and it was +all cut up in little places and all run down. Never would have known it +was one time a big plantation ten miles long.</p> + +<p>I seen places going to rack and ruin all around—all the places I +lived at in Louisiana—but I'm glad I wasn't there to see Master Sack's +place go down. He was a good man and done right by all his negroes.</p> + +<p>Yes, Lord, my old feets have been in mighty nigh every parish in +Louisiana, and I seen some mighty pretty places, but I'll never forget how +that old Gee plantation looked when I was a boy.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>ALICE ALEXANDER<br /> +Age 88 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was 88 years old the 15th of March. I was born in 1849, at Jackson +Parish, Louisiana. My mother's name was Mary Marlow, and father's Henry +Marlow.</p> + +<p>I can't remember very much 'bout slavery 'cause I was awful small, +but I can remember that my mother's master, Colonel Threff died, and my mother, +her husband, and us three chillun was handed down to Colonel Threff's poor +kin folks. Colonel Threff owned about two or three hundred head of niggers, +and all of 'em was tributed to his poor kin. Ooh wee! he sho' had jest a lot +of them too! Master Joe Threff, one of his poor kin, took my mother, her +husband, and three of us chillun from Louisiana to the Mississippi Line.</p> + +<p>Down there we lived in a one-room log hut, and slept on homemade +rail bed steads with cotton, and sometimes straw, mostly straw summers and +cotton winners. I worked round the house and looked after de smaller +chillun—I mean my mother's chillun. Mostly we ate yeller meal corn bread +and sorghum malasses. I ate possums when we could get 'em, but jest couldn't +stand rabbit meat. Didn't know there was any Christmas or holidays in dem +days.</p> + +<p>I can't 'membuh nothing 'bout no churches in slavery. I was a sinner +and loved to dance. I remembuh I was on the floor one night dancing and I +had four daughters on the floor with me and my son was playing de music—that +got me! I jest stopped and said I wouldn't cut another step and I +haven't. I'm a member of the Baptist Church and been for 25 or 30 years. +I jined 'cause I wanted to be good 'cause I was an awful sinner.</p> + +<p>We had a overseer back on Colonel Threff's plantation and my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> +mother said he was the meanest man on earth. He'd jest go out in de fields +and beat dem niggers, and my mother told me one day he come out in de field +beating her sister and she jumped on him and nearly beat him half to death and +old Master come up jest in time to see it all and fired dat overseer. Said he +didn't want no man working fer him dat a woman could whip.</p> + +<p>After de war set us free my pappy moved us away and I stayed round +down there till I got to be a grown woman and married. You know I had a +pretty fine wedding 'cause my pappy had worked hard and commenced to be +prosperous. He had cattle, hogs, chickens and all those things like that.</p> + +<p>A college of dem niggers got together and packed up to leave Louisiana. +Me and my husband went with them. We had covered wagons, and let me tell you +I walked nearly all the way from Louisiana to Oklahoma. We left in March but +didn't git here till May. We came in search of education. I got a pretty +fair education down there but didn't take care of it. We come to Oklahoma +looking for de same thing then that darkies go North looking fer now. But +we got dissapointed. What little I learned I quit taking care of it and +seeing after it and lost it all.</p> + +<p>I love to fish. I've worked hard in my days. Washed and ironed +for 30 years, and paid for dis home that way. Yes sir, dis is my home. My +mother died right here in dis house. She was 111 yeahs old. She is been +dead 'bout 20 yeahs.</p> + +<p>I have three daughters here married, Sussie Pruitt, Bertie Shannon, +and Irene Freeman. Irene lost her husband, and he's dead now.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +10-19-1938<br /> +1,428 words</p> + +<h3>PHOEBE BANKS<br /> +Age 78<br /> +Muskogee, Oklahoma.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>In 1860, there was a little Creek Indian town of Sodom on the north bank of +the Arkansas River, in a section the Indians called Chocka Bottoms, where Mose +Perryman had a big farm or ranch for a long time before the Civil War. That same +year, on October 17, I was born on the Perryman place, which was northwest of where +I live now in Muskogee; only in them days Fort Gibson and Okmulgee was the biggest +towns around and Muskogee hadn't shaped up yet.</p> + +<p>My mother belonged to Mose Perryman when I was born; he was one of the best +known Creeks in the whole nation, and one of his younger brothers, Legus Perryman, +was made the big chief of the Creeks (1887) a long time after the slaves was freed. +Mother's name was Eldee; my father's name was William McIntosh, because he belonged +to a Creek Indian family by that name. Everybody say the McIntoshes was leaders +in the Creek doings away back there in Alabama long before they come out here.</p> + +<p>With me, there was twelve children in our family; Daniel, Stroy, Scott, Segal, +Neil, Joe, Phillip, Mollie, Harriett, Sally and Queenie.</p> + +<p>The Perryman slave cabins was all alike—just two-room log cabins, with +a fireplace where mother do the cooking for us children at night after she get +through working in the Master's house.</p> + +<p>Mother was the house girl—cooking, waiting on the table, cleaning the +house, spinning the yarn, knitting some of the winter clothes, taking care of the +mistress girl, washing the clothes—yes, she was always busy and worked mighty +hard all the time, while them Indians wouldn't hardly do nothing for themselves.</p> + +<p>On the McIntosh plantation, my daddy said there was a big number of slaves<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> +and lots of slave children. The slave men work in the fields, chopping cotton, +raising corn, cutting rails for the fences, building log cabins and fireplaces. +One time when father was cutting down a tree it fell on him and after that he +was only strong enough to rub down the horses and do light work around the yard. +He got to be a good horse trainer and long time after slavery he helped to train +horses for the Free Fairs around the country, and I suppose the first money he +ever earned was made that way.</p> + +<p>Lots of the slave owners didn't want their slaves to learn reading and writing, +but the Perrymans didn't care; they even helped the younger slaves with that +stuff. Mother said her master didn't care much what the slaves do; he was so +lazy he didn't care for nothing.</p> + +<p>They tell me about the war times, and that's all I remember of it. Before +the War is over some of the Perryman slaves and some from the McIntosh place fix +up to run away from their masters.</p> + +<p>My father and my uncle, Jacob Perryman, was some of the fixers. Some of the +Creek Indians had already lost a few slaves who slip off to the North, and they +take what was left down into Texas so's they couldn't get away. Some of the other +Creeks was friendly to the North and was fixing to get away up there; that's the +ones my daddy and uncle was fixing to join, for they was afraid their masters +would take up and move to Texas before they could get away.</p> + +<p>They call the old Creek, who was leaving for the North, "Old Gouge" +(Opoethleyohola). All our family join up with him, and there was lots of Creek +Indians and slaves in the outfit when they made a break for the North. The runaways +was riding ponies stolen from their masters.</p> + +<p>When they get into the hilly country farther north in the country that belong +to the Cherokee Indians, they make camp on a big creek and there the Rebel<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> +Indian soldiers catch up, but they was fought back.</p> + +<p>Then long before morning lighten the sky, the men hurry and sling the camp +kettles across the pack horses, tie the littlest children to the horses backs +and get on the move farther into the mountains. They kept moving fast as they +could, but the wagons made it mighty slow in the brush and the lowland swamps, so +just about the time they ready to ford another creek the Indian soldiers catch up +and the fighting begin all over again.</p> + +<p>The Creek Indians and the slaves with them try to fight off them soldiers +like they did before, but they get scattered around and separated so's they lose +the battle. Lost their horses and wagons, and the soldiers killed lots of the +Creeks and Negroes, and some of the slaves was captured and took back to their +masters.</p> + +<p>Dead all over the hills when we get away; some of the Negroes shot and wounded +so bad the blood run down the saddle skirts, and some fall off their horses +miles from the battle ground, and lay still on the ground. Daddy and Uncle Jacob +keep our family together somehow and head across the line into Kansas. We all +get to Fort Scott where there was a big army camp; daddy work in the blacksmith +shop and Uncle Jacob join with the Northern soldiers to fight against the South. +He come through the war and live to tell me about the fighting he been in.</p> + +<p>He went with the soldiers down around Fort Gibson where they fight the +Indians who stayed with the South. Uncle Jacob say he killed many a man during +the war, and showed me the musket and sword he used to fight with; said he didn't +shoot the women and children—just whack their heads off with the sword, +and almost could I see the blood dripping from the point! It made me scared at +his stories.</p> + +<p>The captain of this company want his men to be brave and not get scared,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> +so before the fighting start he put out a tub of white liquor (corn whiskey) and +steam them up so's they'd be mean enough to whip their grannie! The soldiers do +lots of riding and the saddle-sores get so bad they grease their body every night +with snake oil so's they could keep going on.</p> + +<p>Uncle Jacob said the biggest battle was at Honey Springs (1863). That was +down near Elk Creek, close by Checotah, below Rentiersville. He said it was the +most terrible fighting he seen, but the Union soldiers whipped and went back into +Fort Gibson. The Rebels was chased all over the country and couldn't find each +other for a long time, the way he tell it.</p> + +<p>After the war our family come back here and settle at Fort Gibson, but it +ain't like the place my mother told me about. There was big houses and buildings +of brick setting on the high land above the river when I first see it, not like +she know it when the Perrymans come here years ago.</p> + +<p>She heard the Indians talk about the old fort (1824), the one that rot down +long before the Civil War. And she seen it herself when she go with the Master +for trading with the stores. She said it was made by Matthew Arbuckle and his +soldiers, and she talk about Companys B, C, D, K, and the Seventh Infantry who +was there and made the Osage Indians stop fighting the Creeks and Cherokees. She +talk of it, but that old place all gone when I first see the Fort.</p> + +<p>Then I hear about how after the Arbuckle soldiers leave the old log fort, +the Cherokee Indians take over the land and start up the town of Keetoowah. The +folks who move in there make the place so wild and rascally the Cherokees give up +trying to make a good town and it kinder blow away.</p> + +<p>My husband was Tom Banks, but the boy I got ain't my own son, but I found +him on my doorstep when he's about three weeks old and raise him like he is my +own blood. He went to school at the manual training school at Tullahassee and +the education he got get him a teacher job at Taft (Okla), where he is now.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +10-19-38<br /> +520 Words</p> + +<h3>NANCY ROGERS BEAN<br /> +Age about 82<br /> +Hulbert, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I'm getting old and it's easy to forget most of the happenings of +slave days; anyway I was too little to know much about them, for my mammy +told me I was born about six years before the War. My folks was on their +way to Fort Gibson, and on the trip I was born at Boggy Depot, down in +southern Oklahoma.</p> + +<p>There was a lot of us children; I got their names somewheres here. +Yes, there was George, Sarah, Emma, Stella, Sylvia, Lucinda, Rose, Dan, +Pamp, Jeff, Austin, Jessie, Isaac and Andrew; we all lived in a one-room +log cabin on Master Rogers' place not far from the old military road near +Choteau. Mammy was raised around the Cherokee town of Tahlequah.</p> + +<p>I got my name from the Rogers', but I was loaned around to their relatives +most of the time. I helped around the house for Bill McCracken, +then I was with Cornelius and Carline Wright, and when I was freed my Mistress +was a Mrs. O'Neal, wife of a officer at Fort Gibson. She treated +me the best of all and gave me the first doll I ever had. It was a rag +doll with charcoal eyes and red thread worked in for the mouth. She +allowed me one hour every day to play with it. When the War ended Mistress +O'Neal wanted to take me with her to Richmond, Virginia, but my people +wouldn't let me go. I wanted to stay with her, she was so good, and she +promised to come back for me when I get older, but she never did.</p> + +<p>All the time I was at the fort I hear the bugles and see the soldiers +marching around, but never did I see any battles. The fighting must have been +too far away.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span></p> + +<p>Master Rogers kept all our family together, but my folks have told me +about how the slaves was sold. One of my aunts was a mean, fighting woman. +She was to be sold and when the bidding started she grabbed a hatchet, laid +her hand on a log and chopped it off. Then she throwed the bleeding hand +right in her master's face. Not long ago I hear she is still living in the +country around Nowata, Oklahoma.</p> + +<p>Sometimes I would try to get mean, but always I got me a whipping for +it. When I was a little girl, moving around from one family to another, I +done housework, ironing, peeling potatoes and helping the main cook. I went +barefoot most of my life, but the master would get his shoes from the Government +at Fort Gibson.</p> + +<p>I wore cotton dresses, and the Mistress wore long dresses, with different +colors for Sunday clothes, but us slaves didn't know much about Sunday in a +religious way. The Master had a brother who used to preach to the Negroes on +the sly. One time he was caught and the Master whipped him something awful.</p> + +<p>Years ago I married Joe Bean. Our children died as babies. Twenty +year ago Joe Bean and I separated for good and all.</p> + +<p>The good Lord knows I'm glad slavery is over. Now I can stay peaceful +in one place—that's all I aim to do.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]</p> + +<h3>PRINCE BEE<br /> +Age 85 yrs.<br /> +Red Bird, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I don't know how old I was when I found myself standing on the +toppen part of a high stump with a lot of white folks walking around looking +at the little scared boy that was me. Pretty soon the old master, (that's my +first master) Saul Nudville, he say to me that I'm now belonging to Major Bee +and for me to get down off the auction block.</p> + +<p>I do that. Major Bee he comes over and right away I know I'm going +to like him. Then when I get to the Major's plantation and see his oldest +daughter Mary and all her brothers and sisters, and see how kind she is to +all them and to all the colored children, why, I just keeps right on liking +'em more all the time.</p> + +<p>They was about nine white children on the place and Mary had to +watch out for them 'cause the mother was dead.</p> + +<p>That Mary gal seen to it that we children got the best food on the +place, the fattest possum and the hottest fish. When the possum was all +browned, and the sweet 'taters swimming in the good mellow gravy, then she +call us for to eat. Um-um-h! That was tasty eating!</p> + +<p>And from the garden come the vegetables like okra and corn and +onions that Mary would mix all up in the soup pot with lean meats. That would +rest kinder easy on the stomach too, 'specially if they was a bit of red +squirrel meats in with the stew!</p> + +<p>Major Bee say it wasn't good for me to learn reading and writing. +Reckoned it would ruin me. But they sent me to Sunday School. Sometimes. +Wasn't many of the slaves knew how to read the Bible either, but they all got +the religion anyhow. I believed in it then and I still do.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span></p> + +<p>That religion I got in them way back days is still with me. And it +ain't this pie crust religion such as the folks are getting these days. The +old time religion had some filling between the crusts, wasn't so many empty +words like they is today.</p> + +<p>They was haunts in them way back days, too. How's I know? 'Cause +I stayed right with the haunts one whole night when I get caught in a norther +when the Major sends me to another plantation for to bring back some cows +he's bargained for. That was a cold night and a frightful one.</p> + +<p>The blizzard overtook me and it was dark on the way. I come to an +old gin house that everybody said was the hauntinest place in all the county. +But I went in account of the cold and then when the noises started I was just +too scared to move, so there I stood in the corner, all the time 'til morning +come.</p> + +<p>There was nobody I could see, but I could hear peoples feet a-tromping +and stomping around the room and they go up and down the stairway +like they was running a race.</p> + +<p>Sometimes the noises would be right by my side and I would feel like +a hot wind passing around me, and lights would flash all over the room. Nobody +could I see. When daylight come I went through that door without looking +back and headed for the plantation, forgetting all about the cows that Major +Bee sent me for to get.</p> + +<p>When I tells them about the thing, Mary she won't let the old Major +scold, and she fixes me up with some warm foods and I is all right again. But +I stays me away from that gin place, even in the daylight, account of the +haunts.</p> + +<p>When the War come along the Major got kinder mean with some of the +slaves, but not with me. I never did try to run off, but some of 'em did. +One of my brothers tried and got caught.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span></p> + +<p>The old Master whipped him 'til the blood spurted all over his body, +the bull whip cutting in deeper all the time. He finish up the whipping with +a wet coarse towel and the end got my brother in the eye. He was blinded in +the one eye but the other eye is good enough he can see they ain't no use +trying to run away no more.</p> + +<p>After the War they was more whippings. This time it was the night +riders—them Klan folks didn't fool with mean Negroes. The mean Negroes was +whipped and some of them shot when they do something the Klan folks didn't +like, and when they come a-riding up in the night, all covered with white +spreads, they was something bound to happen.</p> + +<p>Them way back days is gone and I is mighty glad. The Negroes of +today needs another leader like Booker Washington. Get the young folks to +working, that's what they need, and get some filling in their pie crust religion +so's when they meet the Lord their soul won't be empty like is their +pocketbooks today!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>LEWIS BONNER<br /> +Age 87 yrs.<br /> +507 N. Durland<br /> +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born 7 miles north of Palestine, Texas, on Matt Swanson's +place in 1850, but I kin not remember the date. My mistress was name Celia +Swanson. My mistress was so good to me till I jest loved her.</p> + +<p>My family and all slaves on our place was treated good. Mighty +few floggings went on 'round and about. Master was the overseer over his +darkies and didn't use no other'n. I waited table and churned in the Big +House.</p> + +<p>I ate at the table with my mistress and her family and nothing +was evah said. We ate bacon, greens, Irish potatoes and such as we git now. +Aunt Chaddy was the cook and nurse for all the chillun on the place.</p> + +<p>We used to hear slaves on de other places hollering from whippings, +but master never whipped his niggers 'less they lied. Sometimes slaves from +other places would run off and come to our place. Master would take them +back and tell the slave-holders how to treat them so dey wouldn't run off +again.</p> + +<p>Mistress had a little stool for me in the big house, and if I got +sleepy, she put me on the foot of her bed and I stayed there til morning, +got up washed my face and hands and got ready to wait on the table.</p> + +<p>There was four or five hundred slaves on our place. One morning +during slavery, my father killed 18 white men and ran away. They said he was +lazy and whipped him, and he just killed all of 'em he could, which was 18 of +'em. He stayed away 3 years without being found. He come back and killed +7 before they could kill him. When he was on the place he jest made bluing.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span></p> + +<p>My mother worked in the field and weaved cloth. Shirts dat she +made lasted 12 months, even if wore and washed and ironed every day. Pants +could not be ripped with two men pulling on dem with all their might. You +talking 'bout clothes, them was some clothes then. Clothes made now jest +don't come up to them near abouts.</p> + +<p>Doing of slavery, we had the best church, lots better than today. +I am a Baptist from head to foot, yes sir, yes sir. Jest couldn't be nothing +else. In the first place, I wouldn't even try.</p> + +<p>I knows when the war started and ceaseted. I tell you it was some +war. When it was all over, the Yankees come thoo' singing, "You may die poor +but you won't die a slave."</p> + +<p>When the War was over, master told us that we could go out and +take care of the crops already planted and plant the ones that need planting +'cause we knowed all 'bout the place and we would go halvers. We stayed on +3 years after slavery. We got a little money, but we got room and board +and didn't have to work too hard. It was enough difference to tell you was +no slaves any more.</p> + +<p>After slavery and when I was old enough I got married. I married +a gal that was a daughter of her master. He wanted to own her, but she +sho' didn't return it. He kept up with her till he died and sent her money +jest all the time. Before he died, he put her name in his will and told his +oldest son to be sure and keep up with her. The son was sure true to his +promise, for till she died, she was forever hearing from him or he would +visit us, even after we moved to Oklahoma from Texas.</p> + +<p>Our chillun and grandchillun will git her part since she is gone. +She was sure a good wife and for no reason did I take the second look at +no woman. That was love, which don't live no more in our hearts.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span></p> + +<p>I make a few pennies selling fish worms and doing a little yard +work and raising vegetables. Not much money in circulation. When I gets +my old age pension, it will make things a little mite better. I guess the +time will be soon.</p> + +<p>Tain't nothing but bad treatment that makes people die young and +I ain't had none.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937]</p> + +<h3>FRANCIS BRIDGES<br /> +Age 73 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in Red River County, Texas in 1864, and that makes me +73 years old. I had myself 75, and I went to my white folks and they counted +it up and told me I was 73, but I always felt like I was older than that.</p> + +<p>My husband's name is Henry Bridges. We was raised up children together +and married. I had five sisters. My brother died here in Oklahoma +about two years ago. He was a Fisher. Mary Russell, my sister, she lives in +Parish, Texas; Willie Ann Poke, she lives in Greenville, Texas; Winnie Jackson, +lives in Adonia, Texas, and Mattie White, my other sister, lives in Long Oak, +Texas, White Hunt County.</p> + +<p>Our Master was named Master Travis Wright, and we all ate nearly the +same thing. Such things as barbecued rabbits, coon, possums baked with sweet +potatoes and all such as that. I used to hang round the kitchen. The cook, +Mama Winnie Long, used to feed all us little niggers on the flo', jest like +little pigs, in tin cups and wooden spoons. We ate fish too, and I like to +go fishing right this very day.</p> + +<p>We lived right in old Master Wright's yard. His house sat way up +on a high hill. It was jest a little old log hut we lived in a little old +shack around the yard. They was a lot of little shacks in the yard, I can't +tell jest how many, but it was quite a number of 'em. We slept in old-fashion +beds that we called "corded beds", 'cause they had ropes crossed to hold the +mattresses for slats. Some of 'em had beds nailed to the wall.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span></p> + +<p>Master Travis Wright had one son named Sam Wright, and after old +Master Travis Wright died, young Master Sam Wright come to be my mother's master. +He jest died a few years ago.</p> + +<p>My mother say dey had a nigger driver and he'd whip 'em all but his +daughter. I never seen no slaves whipped, but my mother say dey had to whip +her Uncle Charley Mills once for telling a story. She say he bored a hole in de +wall of de store 'til he bored de hole in old Master's whiskey barrel, and +he caught two jugs of whiskey and buried it in de banks of de river. When old +Master found out de whiskey was gone, he tried to make Uncle Charley 'fess up, +and Uncle Charley wouldn't so he brung him in and hung him and barely let his +toes touch. After Uncle Charley thought he was going to kill him, he told +where de whiskey was.</p> + +<p>We didn't go to church before freedom, land no! 'cause the closest +church was so far—it was 30 miles off. But I'm a member of the Baptist +Church and I've been a member for some 40-odd years. I was past 40 when I +heerd of a Methodist Church. My favorite song is "Companion." I didn't get +to go to school 'til after slavery.</p> + +<p>I 'member more after de War. I 'member my mother said dey had +patrollers, and if de slaves would get passes from de Master to go to de dances +and didn't git back before ten o'clock dey'd beat 'em half to death.</p> + +<p>I used to hear 'em talking 'bout Ku Klux Klan coming to the well to +get water. They'd draw up a bucket of water and pour the water in they false +stomachs. They false stomachs was tied on 'em with a big leather buckle. +They'd jest pour de water in there to scare 'em and say, "This is the first +drink of water I've had since I left Hell." They'd say all sech things to +scare the cullud folks.</p> + +<p>I heerd my mother say they sold slaves on what they called an auction<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> +block. Jest like if a slave had any portly fine looking children they'd sell +them chillun jest like selling cattle. I didn't see this, jest heerd it.</p> + +<p>After freedom, when I was old enough then to work in the field, we +lived on Mr. Martin's plantation. We worked awful hard in the fields. Lawd +yes'm! I've heard 'bout shucking up de corn, but give me dem cotton pickings. +Fry'd pick out all de crop of cotton in one day. The women would cook and de +men'd pick the cotton, I mean on dem big cotton pickings. Some would work for +they meals. Then after dey'd gather all de crops, dey'd give big dances, drink +whiskey, and jest cut up sumpin terrible. We didn't know anything 'bout holidays.</p> + +<p>I've heard my husband talk 'bout "Raw head an' bloody bones." Said +whenever dey mothers wanted to scare 'em to make 'em be good dey'd tell 'em +dat a man was outside de door and asked her if she'd hold his head while he +fixed his back bone. I don't believe in voodooing, and I don't believe in +hants. I used to believe in both of 'em when I was young.</p> + +<p>I married Jake Bridges. We had a ordinary wedding. The preacher +married us and we had a license. We have two sons grown living here. My +husband told me that in slavery if your Master told you to live with your +brother, you had to live with him. My father's mother and dad was first cousins.</p> + +<p>I can 'member my husband telling me he was hauling lumber from Jefferson +where the saw mill was and it was cold that night, and when they got halfway +back it snowed, and he stopped with an old cullud family, and he said way +in the night, a knock come at de door—woke 'em up, and it was an old cullud +man, and he said dis old man commence inquiring, trying to find out who dey +people was and dey told him best dey could remember, and bless de Lawd, 'fore +dey finished talking de found out dis old cullud man and de other cullud woman +an' man dat was married was all brothers and sisters, and he told his brother<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> +it was a shame he had married his sister and dey had nine chillun. My husband +sho' told me dis.</p> + +<p>I've heerd 'em say dey old master raised chillun by those cullud women. +Why, there was one white man in Texas had a cullud woman, but didn't have no +chillun by her, and he had this cullud woman and her old mistress there on the +same place. So, when old Mistress died he wouldn't let this cullud woman leave, +and he gave her a swell home right there on the place, and she is still there +I guess. They say she say sometime, she didn't want no Negro man smutting her +sheets up.</p> + +<p>I think Abraham Lincoln was a good man, and I have read a whole lots +'bout him, but I don't know much 'bout Jeff Davis. I think Booker T. Washington +is a fine man, but I aint heerd so much about him.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]</p> + +<h3>JOHN BROWN<br /> +Age (about) 87 yrs.<br /> +West Tulsa, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>Most of the folks have themselves a regular birthday but this old +colored man just pick out any of the days during the year—one day just about +as good as another.</p> + +<p>I been around a long time but I don't know when I got here. That's +the truth. Nearest I figures it the year was 1850—the month don't make no +difference nohow.</p> + +<p>But I know the borning was down in Taloga County, Alabama, near the +county seat town. Miss Abby was with my Mammy that day. She was the wife of +Master John Brown. She was with all the slave women every time a baby was +born, or when a plague of misery hit the folks she knew what to do and what +kind of medicine to chase off the aches and pains. God bless her! She sure +loved us Negroes.</p> + +<p>Most of the time there was more'n three hundred slaves on the +plantation. The oldest ones come right from Africa. My Grandmother was one +of them. A savage in Africa—a slave in America. Mammy told it to me. Over +there all the natives dressed naked and lived on fruits and nuts. Never see +many white mens.</p> + +<p>One day a big ship stopped off the shore and the natives hid in the +brush along the beach. Grandmother was there. The ship men sent a little +boat to the shore and scattered bright things and trinkets on the beach. The +natives were curious. Grandmother said everybody made a rush for them things +soon as the boat left. The trinkets was fewer than the peoples. Next day the +white folks scatter some more. There was another scramble. The natives was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> +feeling less scared, and the next day some of them walked up the gangplank to +get things off the plank and off the deck.</p> + +<p>The deck was covered with things like they'd found on the beach. +Two-three hundred natives on the ship when they feel it move. They rush to +the side but the plank was gone. Just dropped in the water when the ship moved +away.</p> + +<p>Folks on the beach started to crying and shouting. The ones on the +boat was wild with fear. Grandmother was one of them who got fooled, and she +say the last thing seen of that place was the natives running up and down the +beach waving their arms and shouting like they was mad. The boat men come up +from below where they had been hiding and drive the slaves down in the bottom +and keep them quiet with the whips and clubs.</p> + +<p>The slaves was landed at Charleston. The town folks was mighty mad +'cause the blacks was driven through the streets without any clothes, and +drove off the boat men after the slaves was sold on the market. Most of that +load was sold to the Brown plantation in Alabama. Grandmother was one of the +bunch.</p> + +<p>The Browns taught them to work. Made clothes for them. For a long +time the natives didn't like the clothes and try to shake them off. There +was three Brown boys—John, Charley and Henry. Nephews of old Lady Hyatt who +was the real owner of the plantation, but the boys run the place. The old +lady she lived in the town. Come out in the spring and fall to see how is the +plantation doing.</p> + +<p>She was a fine woman. The Brown boys and their wives was just as +good. Wouldn't let nobody mistreat the slaves. Whippings was few and nobody +get the whip 'less he need it bad. They teach the young ones how to read and +write; say it was good for the Negroes to know about such things.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span></p> + +<p>Sunday was a great day around the plantation. The fields was forgotten, +the light chores was hurried through and everybody got ready for the +church meeting.</p> + +<p>It was out of the doors, in the yard fronting the big log where the +Browns all lived. Master John's wife would start the meeting with a prayer +and then would come the singing. The old timey songs.</p> + +<p>The white folks on the next plantation would lick their slaves for +trying to do like we did. No praying there, and no singing.</p> + +<p>The Master gave out the week's supply on Saturday. Plenty of hams, +lean bacon, flour, corn meal, coffee and more'n enough for the week. Nobody +go hungry on that place! During the growing season all the slaves have a +garden spot all their own. Three thousand acres on that place—plenty of +room for gardens and field crops.</p> + +<p>Even during the war foods was plentiful. One time the Yankee soldiers +visit the place. The white folks gone and I talks with them. Asks me +lots of questions—got any meats—got any potatoes—got any this—some of +that—but I just shake my head and they don't look around.</p> + +<p>The old cook fixes them up though. She fry all the eggs on the place, +skillet the ham and pan the biscuits! Them soldiers fill up and leave the +house friendly as anybody I ever see!</p> + +<p>The Browns wasn't bothered with the Ku Klux Klan either. The Negroes +minded their own business just like before they was free.</p> + +<p>I stayed on the plantation 'til the last Brown die. Then I come to +Oklahoma and works on the railroad 'til I was too old to hustle the grips and +packages. Now I just sits thinking how much better off would I be on the old +plantation.</p> + +<p>Homesick! Just homesick for that Alabama farm like it was in them +good old times!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>SALLIE CARDER<br /> +Age 83 yrs.<br /> +Burwin, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in Jackson, Tennessee, and I'm going on 83 years. My +mother was Harriett Neel and father Jeff Bills, both of them named +after their masters. I has one brother, J. B. Bills, but all de +rest of my brothers and sisters is dead.</p> + +<p>No sir, we never had no money while I was a slave. We jest didn't +have nothing a-tall! We ate greens, corn bread, and ash cake. De only +time I ever got a biscuit would be when a misdemeanor was did, and my +Mistress would give a buttered biscuit to de one who could tell her who +done it.</p> + +<p>In hot weather and cold weather dere was no difference as to what +we wore. We wore dresses my mother wove for us and no shoes a-tall. I +never wore any shoes till I was grown and den dey was old brogans wid +only two holes to lace, one on each side. During my wedding I wore a +blue calico dress, a man's shirt tail as a head rag, and a pair of +brogan shoes.</p> + +<p>My Master lived in a three-story frame house painted white. My +Mistress was very mean. Sometimes she would make de overseer whip +negroes for looking too hard at her when she was talking to dem. Dey +had four children, three girls and one boy.</p> + +<p>I was a servant to my Master, and as he had de palsy I had to care +for him, feed him and push him around. I don't know how many slaves, +but he had a good deal of 'em.</p> + +<p>About four o' clock mornings de overseer or negro carriage driver +who stayed at the Big House would ring de bell to git up and git to work.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> +De slaves would pick a heap of cotton and work till late on moonshining +nights.</p> + +<p>Dere was a white post in front of my door with ropes to tie the slaves +to whip dem. Dey used a plain strap, another one with holes in it, and +one dey call de cat wid nine tails which was a number of straps plated and +de ends unplated. Dey would whip de slaves wid a wide strap wid holes in +it and de holes would make blisters. Den dey would take de cat wid nine +tails and burst de blisters and den rub de sores wid turpentine and red +pepper.</p> + +<p>I never saw any slaves auctioned off but I seen dem pass our house +chained together on de way to be sold, including both men and women wid +babies all chained to each other. Dere was no churches for slaves, but +at nights dey would slip off and git in ditches and sing and pray, and +when dey would sometimes be caught at it dey would be whipped. Some of +de slaves would turn down big pots and put dere heads in dem and pray. +My Mistress would tell me to be a good obedient slave and I would go to +heaven. When slaves would attempt to run off dey would catch dem and +chain dem and fetch 'em back and whip dem before dey was turned loose +again.</p> + +<p>De patrollers would go about in de quarters at nights to see if any +of de slaves was out or slipped off. As we sleep on de dirt floors on +pallets, de patrollers would walk all over and on us and if we even grunt +dey would whip us. De only trouble between de whites and blacks on our +plantation was when de overseer tied my mother to whip her and my father +untied her and de overseer shot and killed him.</p> + +<p>Negroes never was allowed to git sick, and when dey would look somewhat +sick, de overseer would give dem some blue-mass pills and oil of some sort<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> +and make dem continue to work.</p> + +<p>During de War de Yankees would pass through and kill up de chickens, +and hogs, and cattle, and eat up all dey could find. De day of freedom +de overseer went into de field and told de slaves dat dey was free, and +de slaves replied, "free how?" and he told dem: "free to work and live +for demselves." And dey said dey didn't know what to do, and so some of +dem stayed on. I married Josh Forch. I am mother of four children and 35 +grand children.</p> + +<p>I like Abraham Lincoln. I think he was a good man and president. I +didn't know much who Jeff Davis was. What I heard 'bout Booker T. +Washington, he was a good man.</p> + +<p>Now dat slavery is over, I don't want to be in nary 'nother slavery, +and if ever nary 'nothern come up I wouldn't stay here.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>BETTY FOREMAN CHESSIER<br /> +Age 94 years<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born July 11, 1843 in Raleigh, N. C. My mother was named +Melinda Manley, the slave of Governor Manley of North Carolina, and my +father was named Arnold Foreman, slave of Bob and John Foreman, two young +masters. They come over from Arkansas to visit my master and my pappy and +mammy met and got married, 'though my pappy only seen my mammy in the summer +when his masters come to visit our master and dey took him right back. I +had three sisters and two brothers and none of dem was my whole brothers and +sisters. I stayed in the Big House all the time, but my sisters and brothers +was gived to the master's sons and daughters whey dey got married and dey was +told to send back for some more when dem died. I didn't never stay with my +mammy doing of slavery. I stayed in the Big House. I slept under the dining +room table with three other darkies. The flo' was well carpeted. Don't +remembah my grandmammy and grandpappy, but my master was they master.</p> + +<p>I waited on the table, kept flies off'n my mistress and went for +the mail. Never made no money, but dey did give the slaves money at Christmas +time. I never had over two dresses. One was calico and one gingham. I had +such underclothes as dey wore then.</p> + +<p>Master Manley and Mistress had six sons an' six darters. Dey raised +dem all till dey was grown too. Dey lived in a great big house 'cross from +the mansion, right in town before Master was 'lected Governor, den dey all +moved in dat mansion.</p> + +<p>Plantation folks had barbecues and "lay crop feasts" and invited +the city darkies out. When I first come here I couldn't understand the +folks here, 'cause dey didn't quit work on Easter Monday. That is some day<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> +in North Carolina even today. I doesn't remember any play songs, 'cause I was +almost in prison. I couldn't play with any of the darkies and I doesn't remember +playing in my life when I was a little girl and when I got grown I +didn't want to. I wasn't hongry, I wasn't naked and I got only five licks +from the white folks in my life. Dey was for being such a big forgitful girl. +I saw 'em sell niggers once. The only pusson I ever seen whipped at dat +whipping post was a white man.</p> + +<p>I never got no learning; dey kept us from dat, but you know some of +dem darkies learnt anyhow. We had church in the heart of town or in the +basement of some old building. I went to the 'piscopal church most all the +time, till I got to be a Baptist.</p> + +<p>The slaves run away to the North 'cause dey wanted to be free. Some +of my family run away sometime and dey didn't catch 'em neither. The patrollers +sho' watched the streets. But when dey caught any of master's niggers +without passes, dey jest locked him up in the guard house and master come down +in the mawnin' and git 'em out, but dem patrollers better not whip one.</p> + +<p>I know when the War commenced and ended. Master Manley sent me +from the Big House to the office about a mile away. Jest as I got to the +office door, three men rid up in blue uniforms and said, "Dinah, do you have +any milk in there?" I was sent down to the office for some beans for to cook +dinner, but dem men most nigh scared me to death. They never did go in dat +office, but jest rid off on horseback about a quarter a mile and seem lak +right now, Yankees fell out of the very sky, 'cause hundeds and hundeds was +everywhere you could look to save your life. Old Mistress sent one of her +grandchillun to tell me to come on, and one of the Yankees told dat child, +"You tell your grandmother she ain't coming now and never will come back there +as a slave." Master was setting on the mansion porch. Dem Yankees come up on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> +de porch, go down in cellar and didn't tech one blessed thing. Old Mistress +took heart trouble, 'cause dem Yankees whipped white folks going and coming.</p> + +<p>I laid in my bed a many night scared to death of Klu Klux Klan. Dey +would come to your house and ask for a drink and no more want a drink than +nothing.</p> + +<p>After the War, I went to mammy and my step-pappy. She done married +again, so I left and went to Warrington and Halifax, North Carolina, jest +for a little while nursing some white chillun. I stayed in Raleigh, where I +was born till 7 years ago, when I come to Oklahoma to live with my only living +child. I am the mother of 4 chillun and 11 grandchillun.</p> + +<p>When I got married I jumped a broomstick. To git unmarried, all +you had to do was to jump backwards over the same broomstick.</p> + +<p>Lincoln and Booker T. Washington was two of the finest men ever +lived. Don't think nothing of Jeff Davis, 'cause he was a traitor. Freedom +for us was the best thing ever happened. Prayer is best thing in the world. +Everybody ought to pray, 'cause prayer got us out of slavery.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writer's Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>POLLY COLBERT<br /> +Age 83 yrs.<br /> +Colbert, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I am now living on de forty-acre farm dat de Government give me and it +is just about three miles from my old home on Master Holmes Colbert's +plantation where I lived when I was a slave.</p> + +<p>Lawsy me, times sure has changed since slavery times! Maybe I notice +it more since I been living here all de time, but dere's farms 'round here +dat I've seen grown timber cleared off of twice during my lifetime. Dis +land was first cleared up and worked by niggers when dey was slaves. After +de War nobody worked it and it just naturally growed up again wid all sorts +of trees. Later, white folks cleared it up again and took grown trees +off'n it and now dey are still cultivating it but it is most wore out now. +Some of it won't even sprout peas. Dis same land used to grow corn without +hardly any work but it sure won't do it now.</p> + +<p>I reckon it was on account of de rich land dat us niggers dat was +owned by Indians didn't have to work so hard as dey did in de old states, +but I think dat Indian masters was just naturally kinder any way, leastways +mine was.</p> + +<p>My mother, Liza, was owned by de Colbert family and my father, Tony, +was owned by de Love family. When Master Holmes and Miss Betty Love was +married dey fathers give my father and mother to dem for a wedding gift. I +was born at Tishomingo and we moved to de farm on Red River soon after dat +and I been here ever since. I had a sister and a brother, but I ain't seen +dem since den.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span></p> + +<p>My mother died when I was real small, and about a year after dat my +father died. Master Holmes told us children not to cry, dat he and Miss +Betsy would take good care of us. Dey did, too. Dey took us in de house +wid dem and look after us jest as good as dey could colored children. We +slept in a little room close to them and she allus seen dat we was covered +up good before she went to bed. I guess she got a sight of satisfaction +from taking care of us 'cause she didn't have no babies to care for.</p> + +<p>Master Holmes and Miss Betsy was real young folks but dey was purty +well fixed. He owned about 100 acres of land dat was cleared and ready for +de plow and a lot dat was not in cultivation. He had de woods full of hogs +and cows and he owned seven or eight grown slaves and several children. I +remember Uncle Shed, Uncle Lige, Aunt Chaney, Aunt Lizzie, and Aunt Susy +just as well as if it was yesterday. Master Holmes and Miss Betsy was both +half-breed Choctaw Indians. Dey had both been away to school somewhere in +de states and was well educated. Dey had two children but dey died when dey +was little. Another little girl was born to dem after de War and she lived +to be a grown woman.</p> + +<p>Dey sure was fine young folks and provided well for us. He allus had a +smokehouse full of meat, lard, sausage, dried beans, peas, corn, potatoes, +turnips and collards banked up for winter. He had plenty of milk and butter +for all of us, too.</p> + +<p>Master Holmes allus say, "A hungry man caint work." And he allus saw +to it that we had lots to eat.</p> + +<p>We cooked all sorts of Indian dishes: Tom-fuller, pashofa, hickory-nut +grot, Tom-budha, ash-cakes, and pound cakes besides vegetables and meat +dishes. Corn or corn meal was used in all de Indian dishes. We made hominy +out'n de whole grains. Tom-fuller was made from beaten corn and tasted sort<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> +of like hominy.</p> + +<p>We would take corn and beat it like in a wooden mortar wid a wooden +pestle. We would husk it by fanning it and we would den put it on to cook +in a big pot. While it was cooking we'd pick out a lot of hickory-nuts, tie +'em up in a cloth and beat 'em a little and drop 'em in and cook for a long +time. We called dis dish hickory-nut grot. When we made pashofa we beat de +corn and cook for a little while and den we add fresh pork and cook until de +meat was done. Tom-budha was green corn and fresh meat cooked together and +seasoned wid tongue or pepper-grass.</p> + +<p>We cooked on de fire place wid de pots hanging over de fire on racks +and den we baked bread and cakes in a oven-skillet. We didn't use soda and +baking powder. We'd put salt in de meal and scald it wid boiling water and +make it into pones and bake it. We'd roll de ash cakes in wet cabbage +leaves and put 'em in de hot ashes and bake 'em. We cooked potatoes, and +roasting ears dat way also. We sweetened our cakes wid molasses, and dey was +plenty sweet too.</p> + +<p>Dey was lots of possums and coons and squirrels and we nearly always had +some one of these to eat. We'd parboil de possum or coon and put it in a pan +and bake him wid potatoes 'round him. We used de broth to baste him and for +gravy. Hit sure was fine eating dem days.</p> + +<p>I never had much work to do. I helped 'round de house when I wanted to +and I run errands for Miss Betsy. I liked to do things for her. When I got +a little bigger my brother and I toted cool water to de field for de hands.</p> + +<p>Didn't none of Master Holmes' niggers work when dey was sick. He allus +saw dat dey had medicine and a doctor iffen dey needed one. 'Bout de only +sickness we had was chills and fever. In de old days we made lots of our +own medicine and I still does it yet. We used polecat grease for croup and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> +rheumatism. Dog-fennel, butterfly-root, and life-everlasting boiled and +mixed and made into a syrup will cure pneumonia and pleurisy. Pursley-weed, +called squirrel physic, boiled into a syrup will cure chills and fever. +Snake-root steeped for a long time and mixed with whiskey will cure chills +and fever also.</p> + +<p>Our clothes was all made of homespun. De women done all de spinning +and de weaving but Miss Betsy cut out all de clothes and helped wid de +sewing. She learned to sew when she was away to school and she learnt all +her women to sew. She done all the sewing for de children. Master Holmes +bought our shoes and we all had 'em to wear in de winter. We all went barefoot +in de summer.</p> + +<p>He kept mighty good teams and he had two fine saddle horses. He and +Miss Betsy rode 'em all de time. She would ride wid him all over de farm +and dey would go hunting a lot, too. She could shoot a gun as good as any +man.</p> + +<p>Master Holmes sure did love his wife and children and he was so proud +of her. It nearly killed 'em both to give up de little boy and girl. I +never did hear of him taking a drink and he was kind to everybody, both black +and white, and everybody liked him. Dey had lots of company and dey never +turned anybody away. We lived about four miles from de ferry on Red River +on de Texas Road and lots of travelers stopped at our house.</p> + +<p>We was 'lowed to visit de colored folks on de Eastman and Carter plantations +dat joined our farm. Eastman and Carter was both white men dat +married Indian wives. Dey was good to dey slaves, too, and let 'em visit +us.</p> + +<p>Old Uncle Kellup (Caleb) Colbert, Uncle Billy Hogan, Rev. John Carr,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> +Rev. Baker, Rev. Hogue, and old Father Murrow preached for de white folks +all de time and us colored folks went to church wid dem. Dey had church +under brush arbors and we set off to ourselves but we could take part in de +singing and sometimes a colored person would get happy and pray and shout +but nobody didn't think nothing 'bout dat.</p> + +<p>De Patrollers was de law, kind of like de policeman now. Dey sure +never did whip one of Master Holmes' niggers for he didn't allow it. He +didn't whip 'em hisself and he sure didn't allow anybody else to either. +I was afraid of de Ku Kluxers too, and I 'spects dat Master Holmes was one +of de leaders iffen de truth was known. Dey sure was scary looking.</p> + +<p>I was scared of de Yankee soldiers. Dey come by and killed some of +our cattle for beef and took our meat and lard out'n de smokehouse and dey +took some corn, too. Us niggers was awful mad. We didn't know anything +'bout dem fighting to free us. We didn't specially want to be free dat I +knows of.</p> + +<p>Right after de War I went over to Bloomfield Academy to take care of a +little girl, but I went back to Master Holmes and Miss Betsy at de end of +two years to take care of de little girl dat was born to dem and I stayed +with her until I was about fifteen. Master Holmes went to Washington as a +delegate, for something for de Indians, and he took sick and died and dey +buried him dere. Poor Miss Betsy nearly grieved herself to death. She +stayed on at de farm till her little girl was grown and married. Her nigger +men stayed on with her and rented land from her and dey sure raised a sight +of truck. Didn't none of her old slaves ever move very far from her and +most of them worked for her till dey was too old to work.</p> + +<p>I left Miss Betsy purty soon after Master Holmes died and went back to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> +de Academy and stayed three years. I married a man dat belonged to Master +Holmes' cousin. His name was Colbert, too. I had a big wedding. Miss +Betsy and a lot of white folks come and stayed for dinner. We danced all +evening and after supper we started again and danced all night and de next +day and de next night. We'd eat awhile and den we'd dance awhile.</p> + +<p>My husband and I had nine children and now I've got seven grandchildren. +My husband has been dead a long time.</p> + +<p>My sister, Chaney, lives here close to me but her mind has got feeble +and she can't recollect as much as I can. I live with my son and he is +mighty good to me. I know I ain't long for dis world but I don't mind for I +has lived a long time and I'll have a lot of friends in de other world and +I won't be lonesome.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937]</p> + +<h3>GEORGE CONRAD, JR.,<br /> +Age 77 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born February 23, 1860 at Connersville, Harrison County, Kentucky. +I was born and lived just 13 miles from Parish. My mother's name is +Rachel Conrad, born at Bourbon County, Kentucky. My father, George Conrad, was +born at Bourbon County Kentucky. My grandmother's name is Sallie Amos, and +grandfather's name is Peter Amos. My grandfather, his old Master freed him +and he bought my grandmother, Aunt Liza and Uncle Cy. He made the money by +freighting groceries from Ohio to Maysville, Kentucky.</p> + +<p>Our Master was named Master Joe Conrad. We sometimes called him +"Mos" Joe Conrad. Master Joe Conrad stayed in a big log house with weather +boarding on the outside.</p> + +<p>I was born in a log cabin. We slept in wooden beds with rope cords +for slats, and the beds had curtains around them. You see my mother was +the cook for the Master, and she cooked everything—chicken, roasting ears. +She cooked mostly everything we have now. They didn't have stoves; they cooked +in big ovens. The skillets had three legs. I can remember the first stove +that we had. I guess I was about six years old.</p> + +<p>My old Master had 900 acres of land. My father was a stiller. He +made three barrels of whisky a day. Before the War whisky sold for 12-1/2¢ and +13¢ a gallon. After the War it went up to $3 and $4 per gallon. When War +broke out he had 300 barrels hid under old Master's barn.</p> + +<p>There was 14 colored men working for old Master Joe and 7 women. I +think it was on the 13th of May, all 14 of these colored men, and my father, +went to the Army. When old Master Joe come to wake 'em up the next morning—I +remember he called real loud, Miles, Esau, George, Frank, Arch, on down +the line, and my mother told him they'd all gone to the army. Old Master went<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> +to Cynthia, Kentucky, where they had gone to enlist and begged the officer in +charge to let him see all of his boys, but the officer said "No." Some way +or 'nother he got a chance to see Arch, and Arch came back with him to help +raise the crops.</p> + +<p>My mother cooked and took care of the house. Aunt Sarah took care +of the children. I had two little baby brothers, Charlie and John. The old +Mistress would let my mother put them in her cradle and Aunt Sarah got jealous, +and killed both of the babies. When they cut one of the babies open they took +out two frogs. Some say she conjured the babies. Them niggers could conjure +each other but they couldn't do nothing to the whitefolks, but I don't +believe in it. There's an old woman living back there now (pointing around +the corner of the house where he was sitting) they said her husband put a +spell on her. They call 'em two-headed Negroes.</p> + +<p>Old Master never whipped any of his slaves, except two of my uncles—Pete +Conrad and Richard Sherman, now living at Falsmouth, Kentucky.</p> + +<p>We raised corn, wheat, oats, rye and barley, in the spring. In +January, February and March we'd go up to the Sugar Camp where he had a grove +of maple trees. We'd make maple syrup and put up sugar in cakes. Sugar sold +for $2.5O and $3 a cake. He had a regular sugar house. My old Master was +rich I tell you.</p> + +<p>Whenever a member of the white family die all the slaves would turn +out, and whenever a slave would die, whitefolks and all the slaves would go. +My Master had a big vault. My Mistress was buried in an iron coffin that they +called a potanic coffin. I went back to see her after I was 21 years old and +she look jest like she did when they buried her. All of the family was buried +in them vaults, and I expect if you'd go there today they'd look the same. +The slaves was buried in good handmade coffins.</p> + +<p>I heard a lot of talk 'bout the patrollers. In them days if you went +away from home and didn't have a pass they'd whip you. Sometimes they'd whip<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> +you with a long black cow whip, and then sometime they'd roast elm switches +in the fire. This was called "cat-o-nine-tails", and they'd whip you with +dat. We never had no jails; only punishment was just to whip you.</p> + +<p>Now, the way the slaves travel. If a slave had been good sometimes +old Master would let him ride his hoss; then, sometime they'd steal a +hoss out and ride 'em and slip him back before old Master ever found it out. +There was a man in them days by the name of John Brown. We called him an +underground railroad man, 'cause he'd steal the slaves and carry 'em across +the river in a boat. When you got on the other side you was free, 'cause +you was in a free State, Ohio.</p> + +<p>We used to sing, and I guess young folks today does too:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"John Brown's Body Lies A 'moulding In the Clay."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>and</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"They Hung John Brown On a Sour Apple Tree."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Our slaves all got very good attention when they got sick. They'd +send and get a doctor for 'em. You see old Mistress Mary bought my mother, +father and two children throwed in for $1,100 and she told Master Joe to always +keep her slaves, not to sell 'em and always take good care of 'em.</p> + +<p>When my father went to the army old Master told us he was gone to +fight for us niggers freedom. My daddy was the only one that come back out of +the 13 men that enlisted, and when my daddy come back old Master give him a +buggy and hoss.</p> + +<p>When the Yanks come, I never will forget one of 'em was named +John Morgan. We carried old Master down to the barn and hid him in the hay. +I felt so sorry for old Master they took all his hams, some of his whiskey, +and all dey could find, hogs, chickens, and jest treated him something terrible.</p> + +<p>The whitefolks learned my father how to read and write, but I didn't +learn how to read and write 'til I enlisted in the U. S. Army in 1883.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span></p> + +<p>They sent us here (Oklahoma Territory) to keep the immigrants from +settling up Oklahoma. I went to Fort Riley the 1st day of October 1883, and +stayed there three weeks. Left Fort Riley and went to Ft. Worth, Texas, and +landed in Henryetta, Texas, on the 14th day of October 1883. Then, we had +65 miles to walk to Ft. Sill. We walked there in three days. I was assigned +to my Company, Troop G. 9th Calvary, and we stayed and drilled in Ft. Sill six +months, when we was assigned to duty. We got orders to come to Ft. Reno, Okla., +on the 6th day of January 1885 where we was ordered to Stillwater, Okla., to +move five hundred immigrants under Capt. Couch. We landed there on the 23rd +day of January, Saturday evening, and Sunday was the 24th. We had general +inspection Monday, January 25, 1885. We fell in line of battle, sixteen companies +of soldiers, to move 500 immigrants to the Arkansas City, Kansas line.</p> + +<p>We formed a line at 9:00 o'clock Monday morning and Captain Couch +run up his white flag, and Colonel Hatch he sent the orderly up to see what +he meant by putting up the flag, so Captain Couch sent word back, "If you +don't fire on me, I'll leave tomorrow." Colonel Hatch turned around to the +Major and told him to turn his troops back to the camp, and detailed three +camps of soldiers of the 8th Cavalry to carry Captain Couch's troop of 500 +immigrants to Arkansas City, Kansas. Troop L., Troop D., and Troop B. taken +them back with 43 wagons and put them over the line of Kansas. Then we were +ordered back to our supply camp at Camp Alice, 9 miles north of Guthrie in the +Cimarron horseshoe bottom. We stayed there about three months, and Capt. Couch +and his colony came back into the territory at Caldwell, Kansas June 1885.</p> + +<p>I laid there 'til August 8, then we changed regiments with the 5th +Calvary to go to Nebraska. There was a breakout with the Indians at Ft. Reno +the 1st of July 1885. The Indian Agency tried to make the Indians wear citizens'<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> +clothes. They had to call General Sheridan from Washington, D. C., to quiet +the Indians down. Now, we had to make a line in three divisions, fifteen +miles a part, one non-commissioned officer to each squad, and these men was +to go to Caldwell, Kansas and bring him to Ft. Reno that night. He came that +night, so the next morning Colonel Brisbane and General Hatch reported to +General Sheridan what the trouble was. General Sheridan called all the Indian +Chiefs together and asked them why they rebelled against the agency, and they +told them they weren't going to wear citizen's clothes. General Sheridan +called his corporals and sergeants together and told them to go behind the +guard house and dig a grave for this Indian agent in order to fool the Indian +Chiefs. Then, he sent a detachment of soldiers to order the Indian Chiefs +away from the guard house and to put this Indian agent in the ambulance that +brought him to Ft. Reno and take him back to Washington, D. C., to remain +there 'til he returned. The next morning he called all the Indian Chiefs +to the guard house and pointed down to the grave and said that, "I have killed +the agent and buried him there." The Indians tore the feathers out of their +hats rejoicing that they killed the agent.</p> + +<p>On the 12th of the same July, we had general inspection with +General Foresides from Washington, then we was ordered back to our supply camp +to stay there 'til we got orders of our change. On August 8, we got orders +to change to go to Nebraska, to Ft. Robinson, Ft. Nibrary, and Ft. McKinney, +and we left on the 8th of August.</p> + +<p>This is my Oklahoma history. I gave this story to the Daily Oklahoman +and Times at one time and they are supposed to publish it but they haven't.</p> + +<p>Now you see that tree up there in front of my house? That tree is +50 years old. It is called the potopic tree. That was the only tree around +here in 1882. This was a bald prairie. I enlisted over there where the City +Market sets now. That was our starting camp under Capt. Payne, but he died.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span></p> + +<p>I joined the A. M. E. Methodist Church in 1874. I love this song +better than all the rest:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Am I a Soldier of the Cross?"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Abraham Lincoln was a smart man, but he would have done more if he +was not killed. I don't think his work was finished. I'll tell you the +truth about Booker T. Washington. He argued our people to stay out of town +and stay in the country. He was a Democrat. He was a smart man, but I +think a man should live wherever he choose regardless. I never stopped work +whenever I'd hear he was coming to town to speak. You know they wasn't +fighting for freeing the slaves; they was fighting to keep Kansas from being +a slave State; so when they had the North whipped, I mean the South had 'em +whipped, they called for the Negroes to go out and fight for his freedom. +Don't know nothing 'bout Jeff Davis. I've handled a lots of his money. It +was counterfeited after the War.</p> + +<p>I've been married four times. I had one wife and three women. I +mean the three wasn't no good. My first wife's name: Amanda Nelson. 2nd: +Pocahuntas Jackson. 3rd: Nannie Shumpard. We lived together 9 years. She +tried to beat me out of my home.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>MARTHA CUNNINGHAM<br /> +(white) Age 81 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>My father's name was A. J. Brown, and my mother's name was Hattie +Brown. I was born in the East, in Saveer County, Tennessee. I had +twelve sisters and brothers, all are dead but two. W. S. Brown lives +at 327 W. California, and Maudie Reynolds, my sister lives at Minrovie, +California.</p> + +<p>We lived in different kinds of houses just like we do now. Some was +of log, some frame and some rock. I remember when we didn't have stoves +to cook on, no lamps, and not even any candles until I was about six years +old. We would take a rag and sop it in lard to make lights.</p> + +<p>All of our furniture was home made, but it was nice. We had just +plenty of every thing. It wasn't like it is in these days where you +have to pick and scrape for something to eat.</p> + +<p>My grandfather and grandmother gave my mother and father two slaves, +an old woman and man, when they married. My grandfather owned a large plantation, +and had a large number of slaves, and my father and mother owned several +farms at different places. Our mother and father treated our slaves good. +They ate what we ate, and they stayed with us a long time after the War. I +remember though all of the slave owners weren't good to their slaves. I +have seen 'em take those young fine looking negroes, put them in a pen when +they got ready to whip them, strip them and lay them face down, and beat +them until white whelps arose on their bodies. Yes, some of them was +treated awful mean.</p> + +<p>I saw mothers sold from their babies, and babies sold from their +mothers. They would strip them, put them on the auction block and sell +them—bid them off just like you would cattle. Some would sell for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> +lots of money.</p> + +<p>They wouldn't take the slaves to church. I don't remember when the +negroes had their first schools, but it was a long time after the War.</p> + +<p>Why, I remember when they'd have those big corn shuckings, flax pullings, +and quilting parties. They would sow acres after acres of flax, then they +would meet at some house or plantation and pull flax until they had finished, +then give a big party. There'd be the same thing at the next plantation and +so on until they'd all in that neighborhood get their crops gathered. I +remember they'd have all kinds of good eats—pies, cakes, chicken, fish, +fresh pork, beef,—just plenty of good eats.</p> + +<p>I went over the battlefield at Knoxville, Tennessee, two or three hours +after the Yankees and the Rebels had a battle. It was about a mile from +our house, and I walked over hundreds of dead men lying on the ground. Some +were fatally wounded, and we carried about six or seven to our house. I saw +the doctor pick the bullets out of their flesh.</p> + +<p>When the Yankees came they treated the slave owners awful mean. They +drew a gun on my mother, made her walk for several miles one real cold night +and take them up on the top of a mountain and show them where a still was. +They would make her cook for 'em. They took every thing we had. I was +about twelve years old at that time.</p> + +<p>I stayed there with my mother until after my father died, then we moved +to Alabama. I was about 22 years old. I married a man named Kelley. He +and my brothers were railroad graders. We traveled all over Texas.</p> + +<p>I made the Run. Came here in '89 with my mother, husband and eight +children. My husband and brothers graded the streets for the townsite of +Oklahoma City and platted it off.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span></p> + +<p>When we made the Run, we just stood on the property until it was surveyed, +then we'd pay $1.00, and the lot was ours. I camped on the corner +of Robinson and Pottawatomie Streets and Robinson and Chickasaw. I owned +the Northwest corner. I later sold both lots.</p> + +<p>I am a Christian, Baptist mostly, I guess, and I believe in the Great +Beyond. I don't think you have to go to church all the time to be saved, +but you have to be right with the Man up yonder before you can be saved.</p> + +<p>I am a Republican, and it makes my blood boil whenever I hear a negro +say he is a democrat. They should all be Republicans.</p> + +<p>I have been married twice. I married William Cunningham here in 1922. +He is dead; in fact, both my husbands are dead, so I don't see much need of +talking about them.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937]</p> + +<h3>WILLIAM CURTIS<br /> +Age 93 yrs.<br /> +McAlester, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Run Nigger, run,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">De Patteroll git ye!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Run Nigger, run,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He's almost here!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Please Mr. Patteroll,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Don't ketch me!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Jest take dat nigger<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What's behind dat tree."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Lawsy, I done heard dat song all my life and it warn't no joke +neither. De Patrol would git ye too if he caught ye off the plantation +without a pass from your Master, and he'd whup ye too. None of us dassn't +leave without a pass.</p> + +<p>We chillun sung lots of songs and we played marbles, mumble peg, +and town ball. In de winter we would set around de fire and listen to our +Mammy and Pappy tell ghost tales and witch tales. I don't guess dey was sho' +nuff so, but we all thought dey was.</p> + +<p>My Mammy was bought in Virginia by our Master, Hugh McKeown. He +owned a big plantation in Georgia. Soon after she come to Georgia she +married my pa. Old Master was good to us. We lived for a while in the +quarters behind the Big House, and my mammy was de house woman.</p> + +<p>Somehow, in a trade, or maybe my pa was mortgaged, but anyway +old Master let a man in Virginia have him and we never see him no more 'till +after the War. It nigh broke our hearts when he had to leave and old Master +sho' done everything he could to make it up to us.</p> + +<p>There was four of us chillun. I didn't do no work 'till I was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> +about fifteen years old. Old Master bought a tavern and mammy worked as house +woman and I went to work at the stables. I drove the carriage and took keer +of the team and carriage. I kept 'em shining too. I'd curry the horses 'till +they was slick and shiny. I'd polish the harness and the carriage. Old Master +and Mistress was quality and I wanted everybody to know it. They had three +girls and three boys and we boys played together and went swimming together. +We loved each other, I tell ye.</p> + +<p>Old Master built us a little house jest back of de tavern and mammy +raised us jest like Old Mistress did her chillun. When I didn't have to work +de boys and me would go hunting. We'd kill possum, coon, squirrels and wild +hogs. Old Master killed a wild hog and he give mammy her ten tiny pigs. She +raised 'em and my, at the meat we had when they was butchered.</p> + +<p>They had lots of company at de Big House, and it was de only tavern +too, so they was lots of cooking to do. They would go to church on Sunday and +they would spread their dinners on the ground. My, but they was feasts. We'd +allus git to go as I drive the carriage and mammy looked after the food. We had +our own church too, with our own preacher.</p> + +<p>We had a spinning house where all the old women would card and spin +wool in de winter and cotton in de summer. Dey made all our clothes, what few +we wore. Us boys just wore long tailed shirts 'till we was 12 or 13 years +old, sometimes older. I was 15 when I started driving the fambly carriage and +I got to put on pants then.</p> + +<p>Our suits was made out of jeans. That cloth wore like buckskin. +We'd wear 'em for a year before they had to be patched.</p> + +<p>We made our own brogan shoes too. We'd kill a beef and skin it +and spread the skin out and let it dry a while. We'd put the hide in lime +water to get the hair off, then we'd oil it and work it 'till it was soft.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> +Next we'd take it to the bench and scrape or 'plesh' it with knives. It +was then put in a tight cabinet and smoked with oak wood for about 24 +hours. Smoking loosened the skin. We'd then take it out and rub it to +soften it. It was blacked and oiled and it was ready to be made into shoes. +It took nearly a year to get a green hide made into shoes. Twan't no wonder +we had to go barefooted.</p> + +<p>Sometimes I'd work in the wood shop, dressing wagon spokes. We +made spokes with a plane, by hand on a bench.</p> + +<p>I didn't have much work to do before I was 15 except to run errands. +One of my jobs was to take corn to the mill to be ground into meal. Some one +would put my sack of corn on the mule's back and help me up and I'd ride to +the mill and have it ground and they'd load me back on and I'd go back home.</p> + +<p>I remember once my meal fell off and I waited and waited for somebody +to come by and help me. I got tired waiting so I toted the sack to a big +log and laid it acrost it. I led my mule up to the log and after working +hard for a long time I managed to get it on his back. I climbed up and jest +as we started off the mule jumped and I fell off and pulled the sack off with +me. I couldn't do nothing but wait and finally old Master came after me. He +knowed something was wrong.</p> + +<p>Old Master was good to all of his slaves but his overseers had +orders to make 'em work. He fed 'em good and took good keer of 'em and never +made 'em work iffen they was sick or even felt bad. They was two things old +Master jest wouldn't 'bide and dat was for a slave to be sassy or lazy. +Sometimes if dey wouldn't work or slipped off de farm dey would whip 'em. He +didn't whip often. Colored overseers was worse to whip than white ones, but +Master allus said, "Hadn't you all rather have a nigger overseer than a white +one? I don't want to white man over my niggers." I've seen the overseer whip<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> +some but I never did get no whipping. He would strip 'em to the waist and +whip 'em with a long leather strop, about as wide as two fingers and fastened +to a handle.</p> + +<p>When de war broke out everthing was changed. My young Masters had +to go. T. H. McKeown, the oldest was a Lieutenant and was one of the first to +go. It nigh broke all of our hearts. Pretty soon he sent for me to come and +keep him company. Old Master let me go and I stayed in his quarters. He was +stationed at Atlanta and Griffin, Georgia. I'd stay with him a week or two +and I'd go home for a few days and I'd take back food and fruit. I stayed +with him and waited on him 'till he got used to being in the army and they +moved him out to fighting. I wanted to go on with him but he wouldn't let +me, he told me to go back and take care of Old Master and Old Mistress. They +was getting old by then. Purty soon Young Master got wounded purty bad and +they sent me home. I never went back. I got a "pass" to go home. Course, +after the war nothing was right no more. Yes, we was free but we didn't know +what to do. We didn't want to leave our old Master and our old home. We +stayed on and after a while my pappy come home to us. Dat was de best thing +about de war setting us free, he could come back to us.</p> + +<p>We all lived on at the old plantation. Old Master and old Mistress +died and young Master took charge of de farm. He couldn't a'done nothing +without us niggers. He didn't know how to work. He was good to us and +divided the crops with us.</p> + +<p>I never went to school much but my white folks learned me to read +and write. I could always have any of their books to read, and they had +lots of 'em.</p> + +<p>Times has changed a lot since that time. I don't know where the +world is much better now, that it has everthing or then when we didn't have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> +hardly nothing, but I believe there was more religion then. We always went +to church and I've seen 'em baptize from in the early morning 'till afternoon +in the Chatahooche river. Folks don't hardly know nowadays jest what to believe +they's so many religions, but they's only one God.</p> + +<p>I was eighteen when I married. I had eight chillun. My wife is +86, and she lives in St. Louis, Missouri.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /> +<p class="figcenter" style="width: 683px;"> +<a name="Lucinda_Davis" id="Lucinda_Davis"></a> +<img src="images/image053.jpg" width="683" height="600" alt="Lucinda Davis" title="Lucinda Davis" /> +</p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[HW: (photo)]<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]</p> + +<h3>LUCINDA DAVIS<br /> +Age (about) 89 yrs.<br /> +Tulsa, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"What yo' gwine do when de meat give out?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What yo' gwine do when de meat give out?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Set in de corner wid my lips pooched out!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lawsy!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What yo' gwine do when de meat come in?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What yo' gwine do when de meat come in?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Set in de corner wid a greasy chin!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lawsy!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Dat's about de only little nigger song I know, less'n it be de one +about:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Great big nigger, laying 'hind de log—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Finger on de trigger and eye on the hawg!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Click go de trigger and bang go de gun!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here come de owner and de buck nigger run!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>And I think I learn both of dem long after I been grown, 'cause I +belong to a full-blood Creek Indian and I didn't know nothing but Creek talk +long after de Civil War. My mistress was part white and knowed English talk, +but she never did talk it because none of de people talked it. I heard it +sometime, but it sound like whole lot of wild shoat in de cedar brake scared +at something when I do hear it. Dat was when I was little girl in time of +de War.</p> + +<p>I don't know where I been born. Nobody never did tell me. But my +mammy and pappy git me after de War and I know den whose child I is. De men +at de Creek Agency help 'em git me, I reckon, maybe.</p> + +<p>First thing I remember is when I was a little girl, and I belong to +old Tuskaya-hiniha. He was big man in de Upper Creek, and we have a purty good +size farm, jest a little bit to de north of de wagon depot houses on de old +road at Honey Springs. Dat place was about twenty-five mile south of Fort +Gibson, but I don't know nothing about whar de fort is when I was a little girl<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> +at dat time. I know de Elk River 'bout two mile north of whar we live, 'cause +I been there many de time.</p> + +<p>I don't know if old Master have a white name. Lots de Upper Creek +didn't have no white name. Maybe he have another Indian name, too, because +Tuskaya-hiniha mean "head man warrior" in Creek, but dat what everybody call +him and dat what de family call him too.</p> + +<p>My Mistress' name was Nancy, and she was a Lott before she marry old +man Tuskaya-hiniha. Her pappy name was Lott and he was purty near white. Maybe +so all white. Dey have two chillun, I think, but only one stayed on de place. +She was name Luwina, and her husband was dead. His name was Walker, and +Luwina bring Mr. Walker's little sister, Nancy, to live at de place too.</p> + +<p>Luwina had a little baby boy and dat de reason old Master buy me, to +look after de little baby boy. He didn't have no name cause he wasn't big +enough when I was with dem, but he git a name later on, I reckon. We all call +him "Istidji." Dat mean "little man."</p> + +<p>When I first remember, before de War, old Master had 'bout as many +slave as I got fingers, I reckon. I can think dem off on my fingers like +dis, but I can't recollect de names.</p> + +<p>Dey call all de slaves "Istilusti." Dat mean "Black man."</p> + +<p>Old man Tuskaya-hiniha was near 'bout blind before de War, and +'bout time of de War he go plumb blind and have to set on de long seat under +de bresh shelter of de house all de time. Sometime I lead him around de +yard a little, but not very much. Dat about de time all de slave begin to +slip out and run off.</p> + +<p>My own pappy was name Stephany. I think he take dat name 'cause +when he little his mammy call him "Istifani." Dat mean a skeleton, and he +was a skinny man. He belong to de Grayson family and I think his master name<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> +George, but I don't know. Dey big people in de Creek, and with de white folks +too. My mammy name was Serena and she belong to some of de Gouge family. Dey +was big people in de Upper Creek, and one de biggest men of the Gouge was +name Hopoethleyoholo for his Creek name. He was a big man and went to de North +in de War and died up in Kansas, I think. Dey say when he was a little boy +he was called Hopoethli, which mean "good little boy", and when he git grown +he make big speeches and dey stick on de "yoholo." Dat mean "loud whooper."</p> + +<p>Dat de way de Creek made de name for young boys when I was a little +girl. When de boy git old enough de big men in de town give him a name, and +sometime later on when he git to going round wid de grown men dey stick on +some more name. If he a good talker dey sometime stick on "yoholo", and iffen +he make lots of jokes dey call him "Hadjo." If he is a good leader dey call +him "Imala" and if he kind of mean dey sometime call him "fixigo."</p> + +<p>My mammy and pappy belong to two masters, but dey live together on +a place. Dat de way de Creek slaves do lots of times. Dey work patches and +give de masters most all dey make, but dey have some for demselves. Dey didn't +have to stay on de master's place and work like I hear de slaves of de white +people and de Cherokee and Choctaw people say dey had to do.</p> + +<p>Maybe my pappy and mammy run off and git free, or maybeso dey buy +demselves out, but anyway dey move away some time and my mammy's master sell +me to old man Tuskaya-hiniha when I was jest a little gal. All I have to do +is stay at de house and mind de baby.</p> + +<p>Master had a good log house and a bresh shelter out in front like +all de houses had. Like a gallery, only it had de dirt for de flo' and bresh +for de roof. Dey cook everything out in de yard in big pots, and dey eat out +in de yard too.</p> + +<p>Dat was sho' good stuff to eat, and it make you fat too! Roast de<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> +green corn on de ears in de ashes, and scrape off some and fry it! Grind de +dry corn or pound it up and make ash cake. Den bile de greens—all kinds +of greens from out in de woods—and chop up de pork and de deer meat, or +de wild turkey meat; maybe all of dem, in de big pot at de same time! Fish +too, and de big turtle dat lay out on de bank!</p> + +<p>Dey always have a pot full of sofki settin right inside de house, +and anybody eat when dey feel hungry. Anybody come on a visit, always give +'em some of de sofki. Ef dey don't take none de old man git mad, too!</p> + +<p>When you make de sofki you pound up de corn real fine, den pour +in de water an dreen it off to git all de little skin from off'n de grain. +Den you let de grits soak and den bile it and let it stand. Sometime you +put in some pounded hickory nut meats. Dat make it real good.</p> + +<p>I don't know whar old Master git de cloth for de clothes, less'n +he buy it. Befo' I can remember I think he had some slaves dat weave de +cloth, but when I was dar he git it at de wagon depot at Honey Springs, I +think. He go dar all de time to sell his corn, and he raise lots of corn, too.</p> + +<p>Dat place was on de big road, what we called de road to Texas, but +it go all de way up to de North, too. De traders stop at Honey Springs and +old Master trade corn for what he want. He git some purty checkedy cloth one +time, and everybody git a dress or a shirt made off'n it. I have dat dress +'till I git too big for it.</p> + +<p>Everybody dress up fine when dey is a funeral. Dey take me along +to mind de baby at two-three funerals, but I don't know who it is dat die. +De Creek sho' take on when somebody die!</p> + +<p>Long in de night you wake up and hear a gun go off, way off yonder +somewhar. Den it go again, and den again, jest as fast as dey can ram de load +in. Dat mean somebody dead. When somebody die de men go out in de yard and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> +let de people know dat way. Den dey jest go back in de house and let de fire +go out, and don't even tech de dead person till somebody git dar what has de +right to tech de dead.</p> + +<p>When somebody bad sick dey build a fire in de house, even in de +summer, and don't let it die down till dat person git well or die. When dey +die dey let de fire go out.</p> + +<p>In de morning everybody dress up fine and go to de house whar de +dead is and stand around in de yard outside de house and don't go in. +Pretty soon along come somebody what got a right to tech and handle de dead +and dey go in. I don't know what give dem de right, but I think dey has to +go through some kind of medicine to git de right, and I know dey has to drink +de red root and purge good before dey tech de body. When dey git de body +ready dey come out and all go to de graveyard, mostly de family graveyard, +right on de place or at some of the kinfolkses.</p> + +<p>When dey git to de grave somebody shoots a gun at de north, den +de west, den de south, and den de east. Iffen dey had four guns dey used 'em.</p> + +<p>Den dey put de body down in de grave and put some extra clothes in +with it and some food and a cup of coffee, maybe. Den dey takes strips of +elm bark and lays over de body till it all covered up, and den throw in de +dirt.</p> + +<p>When de last dirt throwed on, everybody must clap dey hands and +smile, but you sho hadn't better step on any of de new dirt around de grave, +because it bring sickness right along wid you back to your own house. Dat +what dey said, anyways.</p> + +<p>Jest soon as de grave filled up dey built a little shelter over +it wid poles like a pig pen and kiver it over wid elm bark to keep de rain +from soaking down in de new dirt.</p> + +<p>Den everybody go back to de house and de family go in and scatter<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> +some kind of medicine 'round de place and build a new fire. Sometime dey +feed everybody befo' dey all leave for home.</p> + +<p>Every time dey have a funeral dey always a lot of de people say, +"Didn't you hear de stikini squalling in de night?" "I hear dat stikini all +de night!" De "stikini" is de screech owl, and he suppose to tell when anybody +going to die right soon. I hear lots of Creek people say dey hear de +screech owl close to de house, and sho' nuff somebody in de family die soon.</p> + +<p>When de big battle come at our place at Honey Springs dey jest git +through having de green corn "busk." De green corn was just ripened enough +to eat. It must of been along in July.</p> + +<p>Dat busk was jest a little busk. Dey wasn't enough men around to +have a good one. But I seen lots of big ones. Ones whar dey had all de +different kinds of "banga." Dey call all de dances some kind of banga. De +chicken dance is de "Tolosabanga", and de "Istifanibanga" is de one whar dey +make lak dey is skeletons and raw heads coming to git you.</p> + +<p>De "Hadjobanga" is de crazy dance, and dat is a funny one. Dey all +dance crazy and make up funny songs to go wid de dance. Everybody think up +funny songs to sing and everybody whoop and laugh all de time.</p> + +<p>But de worse one was de drunk dance. Dey jest dance ever whichaway, +de men and de women together, and dey wrassle and hug and carry on awful! De +good people don't dance dat one. Everybody sing about going to somebody elses +house and sleeping wid dem, and shout, "We is all drunk and we don't know what +we doing and we ain't doing wrong 'cause we is all drunk" and things like dat. +Sometime de bad ones leave and go to de woods, too!</p> + +<p>Dat kind of doing make de good people mad, and sometime dey have +killings about it. When a man catch one his women—maybeso his wife or one +of his daughters—been to de woods he catch her and beat her and cut off +de rim of her ears!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span></p> + +<p>People think maybeso dat ain't so, but I know it is!</p> + +<p>I was combing somebody's hair one time—I ain't going tell who—and +when I lift it up off'n her ears I nearly drap dead! Dar de rims cut +right off'n 'em! But she was a married woman, and I think maybeso it happen +when she was a young gal and got into it at one of dem drunk dances.</p> + +<p>Dem Upper Creek took de marrying kind of light anyways. Iffen de +younguns wanted to be man and wife and de old ones didn't care dey jest went +ahead and dat was about all, 'cepting some presents maybe. But de Baptists +changed dat a lot amongst de young ones.</p> + +<p>I never forgit de day dat battle of de Civil War happen at Honey +Springs! Old Master jest had de green corn all in, and us had been having +a time gitting it in, too. Jest de women was all dat was left, 'cause de men +slaves had all slipped off and left out. My uncle Abe done got up a bunch +and gone to de North wid dem to fight, but I didn't know den whar he went. +He was in dat same battle, and after de War dey called him Abe Colonel. Most +all de slaves 'round dat place done gone off a long time before dat wid dey +masters when dey go wid old man Gouge and a man named McDaniel.</p> + +<p>We had a big tree in de yard, and a grape vine swing in it for de +little baby "Istidji", and I was swinging him real early in de morning befo' +de sun up. De house set in a little patch of woods wid de field in de back, +but all out on de north side was a little open space, like a kind of prairie. +I was swinging de baby, and all at once I seen somebody riding dis way 'cross +dat prairie—jest coming a-kiting and a-laying flat out on his hoss. When +he see de house he begin to give de war whoop, "Eya-a-a-a-he-ah!" When he +git close to de house he holler to git out de way 'cause dey gwine be a big +fight, and old Master start rapping wid his cane and yelling to git some grub +and blankets in de wagon right now!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span></p> + +<p>We jest leave everything setting right whar it is, 'cepting putting +out de fire and grabbing all de pots and kettles. Some de nigger women run +to git de mules and de wagon and some start gitting meat and corn out of de +place whar we done hid it to keep de scouters from finding it befo' now. All +de time we gitting ready to travel we hear dat boy on dat horse going on down +de big Texas road hollering. "Eya-a-a-he-he-hah!"</p> + +<p>Den jest as we starting to leave here come something across dat +little prairie sho' nuff! We know dey is Indians de way dey is riding, and +de way dey is all strung out. Dey had a flag, and it was all red and had a +big criss-cross on it dat look lak a saw horse. De man carry it and rear +back on it when de wind whip it, but it flap all 'round de horse's head and +de horse pitch and rear lak he know something going happen, sho!</p> + +<p>'Bout dat time it turn kind of dark and begin to rain a little, +and we git out to de big road and de rain come down hard. It rain so hard +for a little while dat we jest have to stop de wagon and set dar, and den +long come more soldiers dan I ever see befo'. Dey all white men, I think, +and dey have on dat brown clothes dyed wid walnut and butternut, and old +Master say dey de Confederate soldiers. Dey dragging some big guns on wheels +and most de men slopping 'long in de rain on foot.</p> + +<p>Den we hear de fighting up to de north 'long about what de river is, +and de guns sound lak hosses loping 'cross a plank bridge way off somewhar. +De head men start hollering and some de hosses start rearing and de soldiers +start trotting faster up de road. We can't git out on de road so we jest +strike off through de prairie and make for a creek dat got high banks and a +place on it we call Rocky Cliff.</p> + +<p>We git in a big cave in dat cliff, and spend de whole day and dat +night in dar, and listen to de battle going on.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span></p> + +<p>Dat place was about half-a-mile from de wagon depot at Honey Springs, +and a little east of it. We can hear de guns going all day, and along in de +evening here come de South side making for a getaway. Dey come riding and +running by whar we is, and it don't make no difference how much de head men +hollers at 'em dey can't make dat bunch slow up and stop.</p> + +<p>After while here come de Yankees, right after 'em, and dey goes on +into Honey Springs and pretty soon we see de blaze whar dey is burning de wagon +depot and de houses.</p> + +<p>De next morning we goes back to de house and find de soldiers ain't +hurt nothing much. De hogs is whar dey is in de pen and de chickens come +cackling 'round too. Dem soldiers going so fast dey didn't have no time to +stop and take nothing, I reckon.</p> + +<p>Den long come lots of de Yankee soldiers going back to de North, and +dey looks purty wore out, but dey is laughing and joshing and going on.</p> + +<p>Old Master pack up de wagon wid everything he can carry den, and we +strike out down de big road to git out de way of any more war, is dey going +be any.</p> + +<p>Dat old Texas road jest crowded wid wagons! Everybody doing de same +thing we is, and de rains done made de road so muddy and de soldiers done +tromp up de mud so bad dat de wagons git stuck all de time.</p> + +<p>De people all moving along in bunches, and every little while one +bunch of wagons come up wid another bunch all stuck in de mud, and dey put all +de hosses and mules on together and pull em out, and den dey go on together +awhile.</p> + +<p>At night dey camp, and de women and what few niggers dey is have to +git de supper in de big pots, and de men so tired dey eat everything up from +de women and de niggers, purty nigh.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span></p> + +<p>After while we come to de Canadian town. Dat whar old man Gouge +been and took a whole lot de folks up north wid him, and de South soldiers +got in dar ahead of us and took up all de houses to sleep in.</p> + +<p>Dey was some of de white soldiers camped dar, and dey was singing +at de camp. I couldn't understand what dey sing, and I asked a Creek man +what dey say and he tell me dey sing, "I wish I was in Dixie, look away—look +away."</p> + +<p>I ask him whar dat is, and he laugh and talk to de soldiers and +dey all laugh, and make me mad.</p> + +<p>De next morning we leave dat town and git to de big river. De rain +make de river rise, and I never see so much water! Jest look out dar and +dar all dat water!</p> + +<p>Dey got some boats we put de stuff on, and float de wagons and swim +de mules and finally git across, but it look lak we gwine all drown.</p> + +<p>Most de folks say dey going to Boggy Depot and around Fort Washita, +but old Master strike off by hisself and go way down in de bottom somewhar +to live.</p> + +<p>I don't know whar it was, but dey been some kind of fighting all +around dar, 'cause we camp in houses and cabins all de time and nobody live +in any of 'em.</p> + +<p>Look like de people all git away quick, 'cause all de stuff was in +de houses, but you better scout up around de house before you go up to it. +Liable to be some scouters already in it!</p> + +<p>Dem Indian soldiers jest quit de army and lots went scouting in little +bunches and took everything dey find. Iffen somebody try to stop dem dey git +killed.</p> + +<p>Sometime we find graves in de yard whar somebody jest been buried<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> +fresh, and one house had some dead people in it when old Mistress poke her +head in it. We git away from dar, and no mistake!</p> + +<p>By and by we find a little cabin and stop and stay all de time. +I was de only slave by dat time. All de others done slip out and run off. +We stay dar two year I reckon, 'cause we make two little crop of corn. For +meat a man name Mr. Walker wid us jest went out in de woods and shoot de wild +hogs. De woods was full of dem wild hogs, and lots of fish in de holes whar +he could sicken 'em wid buck root and catch 'em wid his hands, all we wanted.</p> + +<p>I don't know when de War quit off, and when I git free, but I +stayed wid old man Tuskaya-hiniha long time after I was free, I reckon. I +was jest a little girl, and he didn't know whar to send me to, anyways.</p> + +<p>One day three men rid up and talk to de old man awhile in English +talk. Den he called me and tell me to go wid dem to find my own family. He +jest laugh and slap my behind and set me up on de hoss in front of one de men +and dey take me off and leave my good checkedy dress at de house!</p> + +<p>Before long we git to dat Canadian river again, and de men tie me +on de hoss so I can't fall off. Dar was all dat water, and dey ain't no +boat, and dey ain't no bridge, and we jest swim de hosses. I knowed sho' +I was going to be gone dat time, but we git across.</p> + +<p>When we come to de Creek Agency dar is my pappy and my mammy to +claim me, and I live wid dem in de Verdigris bottom above Fort Gibson till I +was grown and dey is both dead. Den I marries Anderson Davis at Gibson Station, +and we git our allotments on de Verdigris east of Tulsa—kind of south too, +close to de Broken Arrow town.</p> + +<p>I knowed old man Jim McHenry at dat Broken Arrow town. He done some +preaching and was a good old man, I think.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span></p> + +<p>I knowed when dey started dat Wealaka school across de river from +de Broken Arrow town. Dey name it for de Wilaki town, but dat town was way +down in de Upper Creek country close to whar I lived when I was a girl.</p> + +<p>I had lots of children, but only two is alive now. My boy Anderson +got in a mess and went to dat McAlester prison, but he got to be a trusty and +dey let him marry a good woman dat got lots of property dar, and dey living +all right now.</p> + +<p>When my old man die I come to live here wid Josephine, but I'se +blind and can't see nothing and all de noises pesters me a lot in de town. +And de children is all so ill mannered, too. Dey jest holler at you all de +time! Dey don't mind you neither!</p> + +<p>When I could see and had my own younguns I could jest set in de +corner and tell 'em what to do, and iffen dey didn't do it right I could +whack 'em on de head, 'cause dey was raised de old Creek way, and dey know +de old folks know de best!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /> +<p class="figcenter" style="width: 790px;"> +<a name="Anthony_Dawson" id="Anthony_Dawson"></a> +<img src="images/image065.jpg" width="790" height="600" alt="Anthony Dawson" title="Anthony Dawson" /> +</p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[HR: (photo)]<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]</p> + +<h3>ANTHONY DAWSON<br /> +Age 105 yrs.<br /> +1008 E. Owen St.,<br /> +Tulsa, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Run nigger, run,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">De Patteroll git you!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Run nigger, run,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">De Patteroll come!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Watch nigger, watch—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">De Patteroll trick you!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Watch nigger, watch,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He got a big gun!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Dat one of the songs de slaves all knowed, and de children down +on de "twenty acres" used to sing it when dey playing in de moonlight 'round +de cabins in de quarters. Sometime I wonder iffen de white folks didn't make +dat song up so us niggers would keep in line.</p> + +<p>None of my old Master's boys tried to git away 'cepting two, and +dey met up wid evil, both of 'em.</p> + +<p>One of dem niggers was fotching a bull-tongue from a piece of new +ground way at de back of de plantation, and bringing it to my pappy to git it +sharped. My pappy was de blacksmith.</p> + +<p>Dis boy got out in de big road to walk in de soft sand, and long come +a wagon wid a white overseer and five, six, niggers going somewhar. Dey stopped +and told dat boy to git in and ride. Dat was de last anybody seen him.</p> + +<p>Dat overseer and another one was cotched after awhile, and showed +up to be underground railroaders. Dey would take a bunch of niggers into town +for some excuse, and on de way jest pick up a extra nigger and show him whar +to go to git on de "railroad system." When de runaway niggers got to de North +dey had to go in de army, and dat boy from our place got killed. He was a good +boy, but dey jest talked him into it. Dem railroaders was honest, and dey<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> +didn't take no presents, but de patrollers was low white trash!</p> + +<p>We all knowed dat if a patroller jest rode right by and didn't +say nothing dat he was doing his honest job, but iffen he stopped his hoss +and talked to a nigger he was after some kind of trade.</p> + +<p>Dat other black boy was hoeing cotton way in de back of de field +and de patroller rid up and down de big road, saying nothing to nobody.</p> + +<p>De next day another white man was on de job, and long in de evening +a man come by and axed de niggers about de fishing and hunting! Dat +black boy seen he was de same man what was riding de day befo' and he knowed +it was a underground trick. But he didn't see all de trick, bless God!</p> + +<p>We found out afterwards dat he told his mammy about it. She worked +at de big house and she stole something for him to give dat low white trash +I reckon, 'cause de next day he played sick along in de evening and de black +overlooker—he was my uncle—sent him back to de quarters.</p> + +<p>He never did git there, but when dey started de hunt dey found +him about a mile away in de woods wid his head shot off, and old Master sold +his mammy to a trader right away. He never whipped his grown niggers.</p> + +<p>Dat was de way it worked. Dey was all kinds of white folks jest +like dey is now. One man in Sesesh clothes would shoot you if you tried to +run away. Maybe another Sesesh would help slip you out to the underground +and say "God bless you poor black devil", and some of dem dat was poor would +help you if you could bring 'em sumpin you stole, lak a silver dish or spoons +or a couple big hams. I couldn't blame them poor white folks, wid the men +in the War and the women and children hongry. The niggers didn't belong to +them nohow, and they had to live somehow. But now and then they was a devil +on earth, walking in the sight of God and spreading iniquity before him. He +was de low-down Sesesh dat would take what a poor runaway nigger had to give<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span> +for his chance to git away, and den give him 'structions dat would lead him +right into de hands of de patrollers and git him caught or shot!</p> + +<p>Yes, dat's de way it was. Devils and good people walking in de +road at de same time, and nobody could tell one from t'other.</p> + +<p>I remember about de trickery so good 'cause I was "grown and out" +at that time. When I was a little boy I was a house boy, 'cause my mammy was +the house woman, but when the war broke I already been sent to the fields +and mammy was still at de house.</p> + +<p>I was born on July 25, 1832. I know, 'cause old Master keep de +book on his slaves jest like on his own family. He was a good man, and old +Mistress was de best woman in de world!</p> + +<p>De plantation had more than 500 acres and most was in cotton and +tobacco. But we raised corn and oats, and lots of cattle and horses, and +plenty of sheep for wool.</p> + +<p>I was born on the plantation, soon after my pappy and mammy was +brought to it. I don't remember whether they was bought or come from my +Mistress's father. He was mighty rich and had several hundred niggers. When +she was married he give her 40 niggers. One of them was my pappy's brother. +His name was John, and he was my master's overlooker.</p> + +<p>We called a white man boss the "overseer", but a nigger was a overlooker. +John could read and write and figger, and old Master didn't have no +white overseer.</p> + +<p>Master's name was Levi Dawson, and his plantation was 18 miles east +of Greenville, North Carolina. It was a beautiful place, with all the fences +around the Big House and along the front made out of barked poles, rider style, +and all whitewashed.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span></p> + +<p>The Big House set back from the big road about a quarter of a +mile. It was only one story, but it had lots of rooms.</p> + +<p>There was four rooms in a bunch on one side and four in a bunch +on the other, with a wide hall in between. They was made of square adzed logs, +all weatherboarded on the outside and planked up and plastered on the inside. +Then they was a long gallery clean across the front with big pillars made out +of bricks and plastered over. They called it the passage 'cause it din't have +no floor excepting bricks, and a buggy could drive right under it. Mostly it +was used to set under and talk and play cards and drink the best whiskey old +Master could buy.</p> + +<p>Back in behind the big house was the kitchen, and the smokehouse in +another place made of plank, and all was whitewashed and painted white all +the time.</p> + +<p>Old Mistress was named Miss Susie and she was born an Isley. She +brought 40 niggers from her pappy as a present, and Master Levi jest had 4 +or 5, but he had got all his land from his pappy. She had the niggers and +he had the land. That's the way it was, and that's the way it stayed! She +never let him punish one of her niggers and he never asked her about buying +or selling land. Her pappy was richer than his pappy, and she was sure +quality!</p> + +<p>My pappy's name was Anthony, and mammy's name was Chanie. He was +the blacksmith and fixed the wagons, but he couldn't read and figger like +uncle John. Mammy was the head house woman but didn't know any letters either.</p> + +<p>They was both black like me. Old man Isley, where they come from, +had lots of niggers, but I don't think they was off the boat.</p> + +<p>You can set the letters up and I can't tell them, but you can't +fool me with the figgers, 'less they are mighty big numbers.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span></p> + +<p>Master Levi had three sons and no daughters. The oldest son was +Simeon. He was in the Sesesh army. The other two boys was too young. I +can't remember their names. They was a lot younger and I was grown and out +befo' they got big.</p> + +<p>Old Master was a fine Christian but he like his juleps anyways. +He let us niggers have preachings and prayers, and would give us a parole to +go 10 or 15 miles to a camp meeting and stay two or three days with nobody +but Uncle John to stand for us. Mostly we had white preachers, but when we +had a black preacher that was Heaven.</p> + +<p>We didn't have no voodoo women nor conjure folks at our 20 acres. +We all knowed about the Word and the unseen Son of God and we didn't put no +stock in conjure.</p> + +<p>Course we had luck charms and good and bad signs, but everybody +got dem things even nowadays. My boy had a white officer in the Big War and +he tells me that man had a li'l old doll tied around his wrist on a gold chain.</p> + +<p>We used herbs and roots for common ailments, like sassafras and +boneset and peach tree poultices and coon root tea, but when a nigger got bad +sick Old Master sent for a white doctor. I remember that old doctor. He lived +in Greenville and he had to come 18 miles in a buggy.</p> + +<p>When he give some nigger medicine he would be afraid the nigger +was like lots of them that believed in conjure, and he would say, "If you don't +take that medicine like I tell you and I have to come back here to see you I +going to break your dam black neck next time I come out here!"</p> + +<p>When it was bad weather sometime the black boy sent after him had +to carry a lantern to show him the way back. If that nigger on his mule got +too fur ahead so old doctor couldn't see de light he sho' catch de devil from +that old doctor and from old Master, too, less'n he was one of old Missy's<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> +house niggers, and then old Master jest grumble to satisfy the doctor.</p> + +<p>Down in the quarters we had the spinning house, where the old woman +card the wool and run the loom. They made double weave for the winter time, +and all the white folks and slaves had good clothes and good food.</p> + +<p>Master made us all eat all we could hold. He would come to the +smokehouse and look in and say, "You niggers ain't cutting down that smoke +side and that souse lak you ought to! You made dat meat and you got to help +eat it up!"</p> + +<p>Never no work on Sunday 'cepting the regular chores. The overlooker +made everybody clean up and wash de children up and after the praying +we had games. Antny over and marbles and "I Spy" and de likes of that. Some +times de boys would go down in de woods and git a possum. I love possum and +sweet taters, but de coon meat more delicate and de har don't stink up de +meat.</p> + +<p>I wasn't at the quarters much as a boy. I was at the big house +with my mammy, and I had to swing the fly bresh over my old Mistress when she +was sewing or eating or taking her nap. Sometime I would keep the flies off'n +old Master, and when I would get tired and let the bresh slap his neck he +would kick at me and cuss me, but he never did reach me. He had a way of +keeping us little niggers scared to death and never hurting nobody.</p> + +<p>I was down in the field burning bresh when I first heard the guns +in the War. De fighting was de battle at Kingston, North Carolina, and it +lasted four days and nights. After while bunches of Sesesh come riding by +hauling wounded people in wagons, and then pretty soon big bunches of Yankees +come by, but dey didn't ack like dey was trying very hard to ketch up.</p> + +<p>Dey had de country in charge quite some time, and they had forages +coming round all the time. By dat time old Master done buried his money and +all de silver and de big clock, but the Yankees didn't pear to search out dat<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> +kind of stuff. All dey ask about was did anybody find a bottle of brandy!</p> + +<p>When de War ended up most all de niggers stay with old Master and +work on de shares, until de land git divided up and sold off and the young +niggers git scattered to town.</p> + +<p>I never did have no truck wid de Ku Kluckers, but I had to step +mighty high to keep out'n it! De sho' nuff Kluxes never did bother around us +'cause we minded our own business and never give no trouble.</p> + +<p>We wouldn't let no niggers come 'round our place talking 'bout +delegates and voting, and we jest all stayed on the place. But dey was some +low white trash and some devilish niggers made out like dey was Ku Klux ranging +'round de country stealing hosses and taking things. Old Master said dey +wasn't shore enough, so I reckon he knowed who the regular ones was.</p> + +<p>These bunches that come around robbing got into our neighborhood +and old Master told me I better not have my old horse at the house, 'cause +if I had him they would know nobody had been there stealing and it wouldn't +do no good to hide anything 'cause they would tear up the place hunting what I +had and maybe whip or kill me.</p> + +<p>"Your old hoss aint no good, Tony, and you better kill him to make +them think you already been raided on," old Master told me, so I led him out +and knocked him in the head with an axe, and then we hid all our grub and +waited for the Kluckers to come most any night, but they never did come. I +borried a hoss to use in the day and took him back home every night for about +a year.</p> + +<p>The niggers kept talking about being free, but they wasn't free then +and they ain't now.</p> + +<p>Putting them free jest like putting goat hair on a sheep. When it +rain de goat come a running and git in de shelter, 'cause his hair won't shed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> +the rain and he git cold, but de sheep ain't got sense enough to git in the +shelter but jest stand out and let it rain on him all day.</p> + +<p>But the good Lord fix the sheep up wid a woolly jacket that turn +the water off, and he don't git cold, so he don't have to have no brains.</p> + +<p>De nigger during slavery was like de sheep. He couldn't take care +of hisself but his Master looked out for him and he didn't have to use his +brains. De master's protection was like de wooly coat.</p> + +<p>But de 'mancipation come and take off de woolly coat and leave de +nigger wid no protection and he cain't take care of hisself either.</p> + +<p>When de niggers was sot free lots of them got mighty uppity, and +everybody wanted to be a delegate to something or other. The Yankees told us +we could go down and vote in the 'lections and our color was good enough to +run for anything. Heaps of niggers believed them. You cain't fault them for +that, 'cause they didn't have no better sense, but I knowed the black folks +didn't have no business mixing in until they knowed more.</p> + +<p>It was a long time after the War before I went down to vote and +everything quiet by that time, but I heard people talk about the fights at +the schoolhouse when they had the first election.</p> + +<p>I jest stayed on around the old place a long time, and then I got +on another piece of ground and farmed, not far from Greenville until 1900. +Then I moved to Hearn, Texas, and stayed with my son Ed until 1903 when we +moved to Sapulpa in the Creek Nation. We come to Tulsa several years ago, and +I been living with him ever since.</p> + +<p>I can't move off my bed now, but one time I was strong as a young +bull. I raised seven boys and seven girls. My boys was named Edward, Joseph, +Furney, Julius, James, and William, and my girls was Luvenia, Olivia, Chanie +Mamie, Rebecca and Susie.</p> + +<p>I always been a deep Christian and depend on God and know his +unseen Son, the King of Glory. I learned about Him when I was a little boy. +Old Master was a good man, but on some of the plantations the masters wasn't +good men and the niggers didn't get the Word.</p> + +<p>I never did get no reading and writing 'cause I never did go to +the schools. I thought I was too big, but they had schools and the young ones +went.</p> + +<p>But I could figger, and I was a good farmer, and now I bless the +Lord for all his good works. Everybody don't know it I reckon, but we all +needed each other. The blacks needed the whites, and still do.</p> + +<p>There's a difference in the color of the skin, but the souls is all +white, or all black, 'pending on the man's life and not on his skin. The old +fashioned meetings is busted up into a thousand different kinds of churches +and only one God to look after them. All is confusion, but I ain't going to +worry my old head about 'em.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp AUG 19 1937]</p> + +<h3>ALICE DOUGLASS<br /> +Age 77 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born December 22, 1860 in Sumner County, Tennessee. My +mother—I mean mammy, 'cause what did we know 'bout mother and mamma. +Master and Mistress made dey chillun call all nigger women, "Black Mammy." +Jest as I was saying my mammy was named Millie Elkins and my pappy was +named Isaac Garrett. My sisters and brothers was Frank, Susie and Mollie. +They is all in Nashville, Tennessee right now. They lived in log houses. +I 'member my grandpappy and when he died. I allus slept in the Big House in +a cradle wid white babies.</p> + +<p>We all the time wore cotton dresses and we weaved our own cloth. +The boys jest wore shirts. Some wore shoes, and I sho' did. I kin see 'em +now as they measured my feets to git my shoes. We had doctors to wait on us +iffen we got sick and ailing. We wore asafedida to keep all diseases offen us.</p> + +<p>When a nigger man got ready to marry, he go and tell his master that +they was a woman on sech and sech a farm that he'd lak to have. Iffen master +give his resent, then he go and ask her master and iffen he say yes, well, they +jest jump the broomstick. Mens could jest see their wives on Sadday nite.</p> + +<p>They laid peoples 'cross barrels and whupped 'em wid bull whups till +the blood come. They'd half feed 'em and niggers'd steal food and cook all +night. The things we was forced to do then the whites is doing of their own +free will now. You gotta reap jest what you sow 'cause the Good Book says it.</p> + +<p>They used to bid niggers off and then load 'em on wagons and take +'em to cotton farms to work. I never seen no cotton till I come heah. Peoples +make big miration 'bout girls having babies at 11 years old. And you better +have them whitefolks some babies iffen you didn't wanta be sold. Though a +funny thing to me is, iffen a nigger woman had a baby on the boat on the way<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> +to the cotton farms, they throwed it in the river. Taking 'em to them cotton +farms is jest the reason niggers is so plentiful in the South today.</p> + +<p>I ain't got no education a'tall. In dem days you better not be +caught with a newspaper, else you got a beating and your back almost cut off. +When niggers got free, whitefolks killed 'em by the carload, 'cause they said +it was a nigger uprising. I used to lay on the flo' with the whitefolks and +hear 'em pass. Them patrollers roved trying to ketch niggers without passes +to whup 'em. They was sometimes called bush whackers.</p> + +<p>We went to white folks' church. I was a great big girl before we +went to cullud church. We'd stay out and play while they worshipped. We +jest played marbles—girls, white chillun and all.</p> + +<p>The Yankees come thoo' and took all the meat and everything they +could find. They took horses, food and all. Mammy cooked their vittles. One +come in our cabin and took a sack of dried fruit with my mammy's shoes on the +top. I tried to make 'em leave mammy's shoes too but he didn't.</p> + +<p>I stayed in the house with the whitefolks till I was 19. They lak +to kept me in there too long. That's why I'm selfish as I am. Within three +weeks after I was out of the house, I married William Douglass. Whitefolks +now don't want you to tech 'em, and I slept with white chillun till I was +19. You kin cook for 'em and put your hands in they vittles and they don't +say nothing, but jest you tech one!</p> + +<p>We stayed on, on the place, three or four years and it was right +then mammy give us our pappy's name. We moved from the place to one three or +four miles from our master's place, and mammy cooked there a long time.</p> + +<p>Abraham Lincoln gits too much praise. I say, shucks, give God the +praise. Lincoln come thoo' Gallitan, Tennessee and stopped at Hotel Tavern +with his wife. They was dressed jest lak tramps and nobody knowed it was him<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> +and his wife till he got to the White House and writ back and told 'em to +look 'twixt the leaves in the table where he had set and they sho' nuff found +out it was him.</p> + +<p>I never mentions Jeff Davis. He ain't wuff it.</p> + +<p>Booker T. Washington was all right in his place. He come here and +told these whitefolks jest what he thought. Course he wouldn't have done +that way down South. I declare to God he sho' told 'em enough. They toted +him 'round on their hands. No Jim Crow here then.</p> + +<p>I jined the church 'cause I had religion round 60 years ago. People +oughta be religious sho'; what for they wanta live in sin and die and go to +the Bad Man. To git to Heaven, you sho' ought to work some. I want a resting +place somewhar, 'cause I ain't got none here. I am a member of Tabernacle +Baptist Church, and I help build the first church in Oklahoma City.</p> + +<p>I got three boys and three girls. I don't know none's age. I +give 'em the best education I could.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 13 1937]</p> + +<h3>DOC DANIEL DOWDY<br /> +Age 81 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born June 6, 1856 in Madison County, Georgia. Father was named +Joe Dowdy and mother was named Mary Dowdy. There was 9 of us boys, George, +Smith, Lewis, Henry, William, myself, Newt, James and Jeff. There was one girl +and she was my twin, and her name was Sarah. My mother and father come from +Richmond, Va., to Georgia. Father lived on one side of the river and my mother +on the other side. My father would come over ever week to visit us. Noah +Meadows bought my father and Elizabeth Davis, daughter of the old master took +my mother. They married in Noah Meadows' house.</p> + +<p>My mother was the cook in the Big House. They'd give us pot likker +with bread crumbs in it. Sometimes meat, jest sometimes, very seldom. I +liked black-eyed peas and still do till now. We lived in weatherboard house. +Our parents had corded-up beds with ropes and us chillun slept on the floor +for most part or in a hole bored in a log. Our house had one window jest big +enough to stick your head out of, and one door, and this one door faced the +Big House which was your master's house. This was so that you couldn't git +out 'less somebody seen you.</p> + +<p>My job was picking up chips and keeping the calves and cows separate +so that the calves wouldn't suck the cows dry. Mostly, we had Saturday afternoons +off to wash. I was show boy doing [HW: during] the war, me and my sister, 'cause we +was twins. My mother couldn't be bought 'cause she done had 9 boys for one +farm and neither my father, 'cause he was the father of 'em. I was religious +and didn't play much, but I sho' did like to listen to preachings. I did used +to play marbles sometimes.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span></p> + +<p>We jest wore shirts and nothing else both winter and summer. They +was a little heavier in winter and that's all. No shoes ever. I had none till +after I was set free. I guess I was almost 12 years old then.</p> + +<p>The overseer on our place was a large tall, black man. We had plenty +poor white neighbors. They was one of our biggest troubles. They'd allus look +in our window and door all the time.</p> + +<p>I saw slaves sold. I can see that old block now. My cousin Eliza +was a pretty girl, really good looking. Her master was her father. When the +girls in the big house had beaux coming to see 'em, they'd ask, "Who is that +pretty gal?" So they decided to git rid of her right away. The day they sold +her will allus be remembered. They stripped her to be bid off and looked at. +I wasn't allowed to stand in the crowd. I was laying down under a fig brush. +The man that bought Eliza was from New York. The Negroes had made up nuff +money to buy her off theyself, but they wouldn't let that happen. There was +a man bidding for her who was a Swedeland. He allus bid for the good looking +cullud gals and bought 'em for his own use. He ask the man from New York, +"Whut you gonna do with her when you git 'er?" The man from New York said, +"None of your damn business, but you ain't got money nuff to buy 'er." When +the man from New York had done bought her, he said, "Eliza, you are free from +now on." She left and went to New York with him. Mama and Eliza both cried +when she was being showed off, and master told 'em to shet up before he +knocked they brains out.</p> + +<p>Iffen you didn't do nothing wrong, they whipped you now and then +anyhow. I called a boy Johnny once and he took me 'hind the garden and poured +it on me and made me call him master. It was from then on I started to fear +the white man. I come to think of him as a bear. Sometimes fellows would be +a little late making it in and they got whipped with a cow-hide. The same man<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> +whut whipped me to make me call him master, well, he whipped my mamma. He +tied her to a tree and beat her unmerciful and cut her tender parts. I don't +know why he tied her to that tree.</p> + +<p>The first time you was caught trying to read or write, you was +whipped with a cow-hide, the next time with a cat-o-nine tails and the third +time they cut the first jint offen your forefinger. They was very severe. +You most allus got 30 and 9 lashes.</p> + +<p>They carried news from one plantation by whut they call relay. +Iffen you was caught, they whipped you till you said, "Oh, pray Master!" One +day a man gitting whipped was saying "Oh pray master, Lord have mercy!" They'd +say "Keep whipping that nigger Goddamn him." He was whipped till he said, "Oh +pray Master, I gotta nuff." Then they said, "Let him up now, 'cause he's +praying to the right man."</p> + +<p>My father was the preacher and an educated man. You know the sermon +they give him to preach?—Servant, Obey Your Master. Our favorite baptizing +hymn was On Jordan's Stormy Bank I Stand. My favorite song is Nobody Knows +the Trouble I've Seen.</p> + +<p>Oh, them patrollers! They had a chief and he git'em together and +iffen they caught you without a pass and sometimes with a pass, they'd beat +you. But iffen you had a pass, they had to answer to the law. One old master +had two slaves, brothers, on his place. They was both preachers. Mitchell +was a hardshell Baptist and Andrew was a Missionary Baptist. One day the +patroller chief was rambling thoo' the place and found some letters writ to +Mitchell and Andrew. He went to the master and said, "Did you know you had +some niggers that could read and write?" Master said, "No, but I might have, +who do you 'spect?" The patroller answered, "Mitchell and Andrew." The old +master said, "I never knowed Andrew to tell me a lie 'bout nothing!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span></p> + +<p>Mitchell was called first and asked could he read and write. He was +scared stiff. He said, "Naw-sir." Andrew was called and asked. He said, +"Yes-sir." He was asked iffen Mitchell could. He said, "Sho', better'n me." +The master told John Arnold, the patroller chief, not to bother 'em. He +gloried in they spunk. When the old master died, he left all of his niggers +a home apiece. We had Ku Klux Klans till the government sent Federal officers +out and put a stop to their ravaging and sent 'em to Sing Sing.</p> + +<p>Doing the war my father was carpenter. His young master come to him +'cause he was a preacher and asked him must he go to the front and my father +told him not to go 'cause he wouldn't make it. He went on jest the same and +when he come back my father had to tote him in the house 'cause he had one leg +tore off. The Yankees come thoo', ramshacked houses, leave poor horses and +take fat ones and turn the poor ones in the corn they left. They took everthing +they could. They cussed niggers who dodged 'em for being fools and make +'em show 'em everything they knowed whar was.</p> + +<p>Our old master was mighty old and him and the women folks cried when +we was freed. He told us we was free as he was.</p> + +<p>I come to Oklahoma in 1906. I come out of that riot in 1906. Some +fellow knocked up a colored woman or something and we waded right in and believe +me we made Atlanta a fit place to live in. It is one of the best cities +in America.</p> + +<p>I married Miss Emmaline Witt. I carried her to the preacher one of +the coldest nights I ever rid. I have three chillun and don't know how many +grandchillun. My chillun is one a nurse, one in Arizona for his health and +the other doing first one thing and another.</p> + +<p>I think Abraham Lincoln was the greatest human being ever been on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> +earth 'cepting the Apostle Paul. Who any better'n a man who liberated 4,000,000 +Negroes? Some said he wasn't a Christian, but he told some friends once, "I'm +going to leave you and may never see you again (and he didn't) so I'm going to +take the Divine Spirit with me and leave it with you."</p> + +<p>Jeff Davis was as bloody as he could be. I don't lak him a'tall. +But you know good things come from enemies. I don't even admire George +Washington. White men from the south that will help the Negro is far and few +between. Booker T. Washington was a great man. He made some blunders and +mistakes, but he was a great man. He is the father of industrial education +and you know that sho' is a great thing.</p> + +<p>The white folks was ignorant. You know the better you prepare yourself +the better you act. Iffen they had put some sense in our heads 'stead +of sticks on our heads, we'ud been better off and more benefit to 'em.</p> + +<p>I had something from within that made me fear God and taught me how to +pray. People say God don't hear sinners pray, but he do. Everybody ought to +be Christians so not to be lost.</p> + +<p>I work in real estate and can do a lot of work. I don't use no +crutches and no cane and walk all the time, never hardly ride. I come in at +1 and 2 o'clock a. m. and get up between 8 and 9 a. m. 'cept Sundays, I get +up at 7 or 8 a. m. so I can be ready to go to Sunday School. I cook for my +own self all the time too. I am a Baptist and a member of Tabernacle Baptist +Church. I am a trustee in my church too.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937]</p> + +<h3>JOANNA DRAPER<br /> +Age 83 yrs.<br /> +Tulsa, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>Most folks can't remember many things happened to 'em when +they only eight years old, but one of my biggest tribulations come about +dat time and I never will forget it! That was when I was took away from +my own mammy and pappy and sent off and bound out to another man, way off +two-three hundred miles away from whar I live. And dat's the last time I +ever see either one of them, or any my own kinfolks!</p> + +<p>Whar I was born was at Hazelhurst, Mississippi. Jest a little +piece east of Hazelhurst, close to the Pearl River, and that place was a kind +of new plantation what my Master, Dr. Alexander, bought when he moved into +Mississippi from up in Virginia awhile before the War.</p> + +<p>They said my mammy brings me down to Mississippi, and I was +born jest right after she got there. My mammy's name was Margaret, and she +was born under the Ramson's, back in Tennessee. She belonged to Dave Ramson, +and his pappy had come to Tennessee to settle on war land, and he had knowed +Dr. Alexander's people back in Virginia too. My pappy's name was Addison, +and he always belonged to Dr. Alexander. Old doctor bought my mammy 'cause +my pappy liked her. Old doctor live in Tennessee a little while before he +go on down in Mississippi.</p> + +<p>Old doctor's wife named Dinah, and she sho' was a good woman, +but I don't remember about old doctor much. He was away all the time, it +seem like.</p> + +<p>When I is about six year old they take me into the Big House to +learn to be a house woman, and they show me how to cook and clean up and take<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> +care of babies. That Big House wasn't very fine, but it was mighty big +and cool, and made out of logs with a big hall, but it didn't have no long +gallery like most the houses around there had.</p> + +<p>They was lots of big trees in the yard, and most the ground was +new ground 'round that place, 'cause the old Doctor jest started to done farming +on it when I was took away, but he had some more places not so far away, +over towards the river that was old ground and made big crops for him. I +went to one of the places one time, but they wasn't nobody on 'em but niggers +and a white overseer. I don't know how many niggers old Doctor had, but +Master John Deeson say he had about a hundred.</p> + +<p>At old Doctor's house I didn't have to work very hard. Jest had +to help the cooks and peel the potatoes and pick the guineas and chickens and +do things like that. Sometime I had to watch the baby. He was a little boy, +and they would bring him into the kitchen for me to watch. I had to git up +way before daylight and make the fire in the kitchen fireplace and bring in +some fresh water, and go get the milk what been down in the spring all night, +and do things like that until breakfast ready. Old Master and old Mistress +come in the big hall to eat in the summer, and I stand behind them and shoo +off the flies.</p> + +<p>Old doctor didn't have no spinning and weaving niggers 'cause he +say they don't do enough work and he buy all the cloth he use for everybody's +clothes. He can do that 'cause he had lots of money. He was big rich, and +he keep a whole lot of hard money in the house all the time, but none of the +slaves know it but me. Sometimes I would have the baby in the Mistress' room +and she would go git three or four big wood boxes full of hard money for us +to play with. I would make fences out of the money all across the floor, to +keep the baby satisfied, and when he go to sleep I would put the money back in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> +the boxes. I never did know how much they is, but a whole lot.</p> + +<p>Even after the War start old Doctor have that money, and he would +exchange money for people. Sometimes he would go out and be gone a long time, +and come back with a lot more money he got from somewhar.</p> + +<p>Right at the first they made him a high officer in the War and he +done doctoring somewhar at a hospital most of the time. But he could go on +both sides of the War, and sometime he would come in at night and bring old +Mistress pretty little things, and I heard him tell her he got them in the +North.</p> + +<p>One day I was fanning him and I asked him is he been to the North +and he kick out at me and tell to shut up my black mouth, and it nearly scared +me to death the way he look at me! Nearly every time he been gone and come +in and tell Mistress he been in the North he have a lot more hard money to +put away in them boxes, too!</p> + +<p>One evening long come a man and eat supper at the house and stay +all night. He was a nice mannered man, and I like to wait on him. The next +morning I hear him ask old Doctor what is my name, and old Doctor start in to +try to sell me to that man. The man say he can't buy me 'cause old Doctor say +he want a thousand dollars, and then old Doctor say he will bind me out to +him.</p> + +<p>I run away from the house and went out to the cabin whar my mammy +and pappy was, but they tell me to go on back to the Big House 'cause maybe I +am just scared. But about that time old Doctor and the man come and old +Doctor make me go with the man. We go in his buggy a long ways off to the +South, and after he stop two or three night at peoples houses and put me out +to stay with the niggers he come to his own house. I ask him how far it is +back home and he say about a hundred miles or more, and laugh, and ask me +if I know how far that is.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span></p> + +<p>I wants to know if I can go back to my mammy some time, and he +say "Sho', of course you can, some of these times. You don't belong to me, +Jo, I'se jest your boss and not your master."</p> + +<p>He live in a big old rottendy house, but he aint farming none of +the land. Jest as soon as he git home he go off again, and sometimes he only +come in at night for a little while.</p> + +<p>His wife's name was Kate and his name was Mr. John. I was there +about a week before I found out they name was Deeson. They had two children, +a girl about my size name Joanna like me, and a little baby boy name Johnny. +One day Mistress Kate tell me I the only nigger they got. I been thinking +maybe they had some somewhar on a plantation, but she say they aint got no +plantation and they aint been at that place very long either.</p> + +<p>That little girl Joanna and me kind of take up together, and she +was a mighty nice mannered little girl, too. Her mammy raised her good. Her +mammy was mighty sickly all the time, and that's the reason they bind me to +do the work.</p> + +<p>Mr. John was in some kind of business in the War too, but I never +see him with no soldier clothes on but one time. One night he come in with +them on, but the next morning he come to breakfast in jest his plain clothes +again. Then he go off again.</p> + +<p>I sho' had a hard row at that house. It was old and rackady, and +I had to scrub off the staircase and the floors all the time, and git the +breakfast for Mistress Kate and the two children. Then I could have my own +breakfast in the kitchen. Mistress Kate always get the supper, though.</p> + +<p>Some days she go off with the two children and leave me at the +house all day by myself, and I think maybe I run off, but I didn't know whar +to go.</p> + +<p>After I been at that place two years Mr. John come home and stay.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> +He done some kind of trading in Jackson, Mississippi, and he would be gone +three or four days at a time, but I never did know what kind of trading it +was.</p> + +<p>About the time he come home to stay I seen the first Ku Klux I ever +seen one night. I was going down the road in the moonlight and I heard a +hog grunting out in the bushes at the side of the road. I jest walk right on +and in a little ways I hear another hog in some more bushes. This time I +stop and listen, and they's another hog grunts across the road, and about +that time two mens dressed up in long white skirts steps out into the road +in front of me! I was so scared the goose bumps jump up all over me 'cause +I didn't know what they is! They didn't say a word to me, but jest walked +on past me and went on back the way I had come. Then I see two more mens +step out of the woods and I run from that as fast as I can go!</p> + +<p>I ast Miss Kate what they is and she say they Ku Klux, and I +better not go walking off down the road any more. I seen them two, three times +after that, though, but they was riding hosses them times.</p> + +<p>I stayed at Mr. John's place two more years, and he got so grumpy +and his wife got so mean I make up my mind to run off. I bundle up my clothes +in a little bundle and hide them, and then I wait until Miss Kate take the +children and go off somewhere, and I light out on foot. I had me a piece of +that hard money what Master Dr. Alexander had give me one time at Christmas. +I had kept it all that time and nobody knowed I had it, not even Joanna. Old +Doctor told me it was fifty dollars, and I thought I could live on it for a +while.</p> + +<p>I never had been away from that place, not even to another plantation +in all the four years I was with the Deesons, and I didn't know which-a-way +to go, so I jest started west.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span></p> + +<p>I been walking about all evening it seem like, and I come to a +little town with jest a few houses. I see a nigger man and ask him whar I +can git something to eat, and I say I got fifty dollars.</p> + +<p>"What you doing wid fifty dollars, child? Where you belong at, +anyhow?" He ask me, and I tell him I belong to Master John Deeson, but I is +running away. I explain that I jest bound out to Mr. John, but Dr. Alexander +my real master, and then that man tell me the first time I knowed it that I +aint a slave no more!</p> + +<p>That man Deeson never did tell me, and his wife never did!</p> + +<p>Well, dat man asked me about the fifty dollars, and then I found +out that it was jest fifty cents!</p> + +<p>I can't begin to tell about all the hard times I had working for +something to eat and roaming around after that. I don't know why I never did +try to git back up around Hazelhurst and hunt up my pappy and mammy, but I +reckon I was jest ignorant and didn't know how to go about it. Anyways I +never did see them no more.</p> + +<p>In about three years or a little over I met Bryce Draper on a farm +in Mississippi and we was married. His mammy had had a harder time than I had. +She had five children by a man that belong to her master, Mr. Bryce and already +named one of the boys—that my husband—Bryce after him, and then +he take her in and sell her off away from all her children!</p> + +<p>One was jest a little baby, and the master give it laudanum, but +it didn't die, and he sold her off and lied and said she was a young girl and +didn't have no husband, 'cause the man what bought her said he didn't want to +buy no woman and take her away from a family. That new master name was Draper.</p> + +<p>The last year of the War Mr. Draper die, and his wife already dead, +and he give all his farm to his two slaves and set them free. One of them<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> +slaves was my husband's mammy.</p> + +<p>Then right away the whites come and robbed the place of every +thing they could haul off, and run his mammy and the other niggers off! +Then she went and found her boy, that was my husband, and he live with her +until she died, jest before we is married.</p> + +<p>We lived in Mississippi a long time, and then we hear about how +they better to the Negroes up in the North, and we go up to Kansas, but +they ain't no better there, and we come down to Indian Territory in the Creek +Nation in 1898, jest as they getting in that Spanish War.</p> + +<p>We leased a little farm from the Creek Nation for $15 an acre, +but when they give out the allotments we had to give it up. Then we rent +100 acres from some Indians close to Wagoner, and we farm it all with my +family. We had enough to do it too!</p> + +<p>For children we had John and Joe, and Henry, and Jim and Robert +and Will that was big enough to work, and then the girls big enough was Mary, +Nellie, Izora, Dora, and the baby. Dora married Max Colbert. His people +belonged to the Colberts that had Colbert's Crossin' on the Red River way before +the War, and he was a freedman and got allotment.</p> + +<p>I lives with Dora now, and we is all happy, and I don't like to +talk about the days of the slavery times, 'cause they never did mean nothing +to me but misery, from the time I was eight years old.</p> + +<p>I never will forgive that white man for not telling me I was free, +and not helping me to git back to my mammy and pappy! Lots of white people +done that.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>MRS. ESTHER EASTER<br /> +Age 85 yrs.<br /> +Tulsa, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born near Memphis, Tenn., on the old Ben Moore plantation, +but I don't know anything about the Old South because Master Ben moves us all +up into Missouri (about 14-miles east of Westport, now Kansas City), long before +they started fighting about slavery.</p> + +<p>Mary Collier was my mother's name before she was a Moore. About my +father, I dunno. Mammy was sickly most of the time when I was a baby, and +she was so thin and poorly when they move to Missouri the white folks afraid +she going die on the way.</p> + +<p>But she fool 'em, and she live two-three year after that. That's +what good Old Master Ben tells me when I gets older.</p> + +<p>I stay with Master Ben's married daughter, Mary, till the coming of +the War. Times was good before the War, and I wasn't suffering none from +slavery, except once in a while the Mistress would fan me with the stick—bet +I needed it, too.</p> + +<p>When the War come along Master he say to leave Mistress Mary and +get ready to go to Texas. Jim Moore, one of the meanest men I ever see, was +the son of Master Ben; he's going take us there.</p> + +<p>Demon Jim, that's what I call him when he ain't round the place, +but when he's home it was always Master Jim 'cause he was reckless with the +whip. He was a Rebel officer fighting round the country and didn't take us +slaves to Texas right away. So I stayed on at his place not far from Master +Ben's plantation.</p> + +<p>Master Jim's wife was a demon, just like her husband. Used the whip +all the time, and every time Master Jim come home he whip me 'cause the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> +Mistress say I been mean.</p> + +<p>One time I tell him, you better put me in your pocket (sell me), +Master Jim, else I'se going run away'. He don't pay no mind, and I don't try +to run away 'cause of the whips.</p> + +<p>I done see one whipping and that enough. They wasn't no fooling +about it. A runaway slave from the Jenkin's plantation was brought back, and +there was a public whipping, so's the slaves could see what happens when they +tries to get away.</p> + +<p>The runaway was chained to the whipping post, and I was full of +misery when I see the lash cutting deep into that boy's skin. He swell up +like a dead horse, but he gets over it, only he was never no count for work +no more.</p> + +<p>While Master Jim is out fighting the Yanks, the Mistress is fiddling +round with a neighbor man, Mister Headsmith. I is young then, but I knows +enough that Master Jim's going be mighty mad when he hears about it.</p> + +<p>The Mistress didn't know I knows her secret, and I'm fixing to even +up for some of them whippings she put off on me. That's why I tell Master Jim +next time he come home.</p> + +<p>See that crack in the wall? Master Jim say yes, and I say, it's +just like the open door when the eyes are close to the wall. He peek and see +into the bedroom.</p> + +<p>That's how I find out about the Mistress and Mister Headsmith, I +tells him, and I see he's getting mad.</p> + +<p>What you mean? And Master Jim grabs me hard by the arm like I was +trying to get away.</p> + +<p>I see them in the bed.</p> + +<p>That's all I say. The Demon's got him and Master Jim tears out of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> +the room looking for the Mistress.</p> + +<p>Then I hears loud talking and pretty soon the Mistress is screaming +and calling for help, and if old Master Ben hadn't drop in just then and stop +the fight, why, I guess she be beat almost to death, that how mad the Master +was.</p> + +<p>Then Master Ben gets mad 'cause his boy Jim ain't got us down in +Texas yet. Then we stay up all the night packing for the trip. Master Jim +takes us, but the Mistress stay at home, and I wonder if Master Jim beat her +again when he gets back.</p> + +<p>We rides the wagons all the way, how many days, I dunno. The +country was wild most of the way, and I know now that we come through the +same country where I lives now, only it was to the east. (The trip was evidently +made over the "Texas Road.") And we keeps on riding and comes to the +big river that's all brown and red looking, (Red River) and the next thing +I was sold to Mrs. Vaughn at Bonham, Texas, and there I stays till after the +slaves is free.</p> + +<p>The new Mistress was a widow, no children round the place, and +she treat me mighty good. She was good white folks—like old Master Ben, +powerful good.</p> + +<p>When the word get to us that the slaves is free, the Mistress says +I is free to go anywheres I want. And I tell her this talk about being free +sounds like foolishment to me—anyway, where can I go? She just pat me on +the shoulder and say I better stay right there with her, and that's what I +do for a long time. Then I hears about how the white folks down at Dallas +pays big money for house girls and there I goes.</p> + +<p>That's all I ever do after that—work at the houses till I gets +too old to hobble on these tired old feets and legs, then I just sits down.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span></p> + +<p>Just sits down and wishes for old Master Ben to come and get me, and +take care of this old woman like he use to do when she is just a little black +child on the plantation in Missouri!</p> + +<p>God Bless old Master Ben—he was good white folks!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>ELIZA EVANS<br /> +Age 87<br /> +McAlester, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I sho' remember de days when I was a slave and belonged to de +best old Master what ever was, Mr. John Mixon. We lived in Selma, Dallas +County, Alabama.</p> + +<p>My grandma was a refugee from Africa. You know dey was white +men who went slipping 'round and would capture or entice black folks onto +their boats and fetch them over here and sell 'em for slaves. Well, +grandma was a little girl 'bout eight or nine years old and her parents +had sent her out to get wood. Dey was going to have a feast. Dey was going +to roast a baby. Wasn't that awful? Well, they captured her and put a +stick in her mouth. The stick held her mouth wide open so she wouldn't cry +out. When she got to de boat she was so tired out she didn't do nothing.</p> + +<p>They was a lot of more colored folks on de boat. It took about +four months to get across on de boat and Mr. John Mixon met the boat and +bought her. I think he gave five hundred dollars for her. She was named +Gigi, but Master John called her Gracie. She was so good and they thought +so much of her dat they gave her a grand wedding when she was married. +Master John told her he'd never sell none of her chillun. He kept dat promise +and he never did sell any of her grandchillun either. He thought it +was wrong to separate famblys. She was one hundred and three years old +when she died. I guess her mind got kind of feeble 'cause she wandered off +and fell into a mill race and was drowned.</p> + +<p>Master John Mixon had two big plantations. I believe he owned about +four hundred slaves, chillun and all. He allowed us to have church one time +a month with de white folks and we had prayer meeting every Sunday. Sometimes +when de men would do something like being sassy or lazy and dey knowed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> +dey was gonna be whipped, dey'd slip off and hide in de woods. When dey'd +slip back to get some food dey would all pray for 'em dat Master wouldn't +have 'em whipped too hard, and for fear the Patroller would hear 'em they'd +put their faces down in a dinner pot. I'd sit out and watch for the Patroller. +He was a white man who was appointed to catch runaway niggers. We all knew +him. His name was Howard Campbell. He had a big pack of dogs. The lead +hound was named Venus. There was five or six in the pack, and they was +vicious too.</p> + +<p>My father was a carriage driver and he allus took the family to +church. My mother went along to take care of the little chilluns. She'd +take me too. They was Methodist and after they would take the sacrament +we would allus go up and take it. The niggers could use the whitefolks +church in the afternoon.</p> + +<p>De Big House was a grand place. It was a two-story house made +out of logs dat had been peeled and smoothed off. There was five big +rooms and a big open hall wid a wide front porch clean across de front. De +porch had big posts and pretty banisters. It was painted white and had green +shutters on de windows. De kitchen was back of de Big House.</p> + +<p>De slaves quarters was about a quarter of a mile from de Big House. +Their houses was made of logs and the cracks was daubed with mud. They +would have two rooms. Our bedsteads was made of poplar wood and we kept +them scrubbed white with sand. We used roped woven together for slats. Our +mattresses were made of cotton, grass, or even shucks. My mother had a feather +bed. The chairs was made from cedar with split white oak bottoms.</p> + +<p>Each family kept their own home and cooked and served their own +meals. We used wooden trays and wooden spoons. Once a week all the cullud +chillun went to the Big House to eat dinner. The table was out in de yard.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> +My nickname was "Speck". I didn't like to eat bread and milk when I went up +there and I'd just sit there. Finally they'd let me go in de house and my +mother would feed me. She was the house woman and my Auntie was cook. I +don't know why they had us up there unless it was so they could laugh at us.</p> + +<p>None of old Master's young niggers never did much work. He say +he want 'em to grow up strong. He gave us lots to eat. He had a store of +bacon, milk, bread, beans and molasses. In summer we had vegetables. My +mother could make awful good corn pone. She would take meal and put salt +in it and pour boiling water over it and make into pones. She'd wrap these +pones in wet cabbage or collard leaves and roll dem into hot ashes and bake +dem. They sho' was good. We'd have possum and coon and fish too.</p> + +<p>The boys never wore no britches in de summer time. Boys fifteen +years old would wear long shirts with no sleeves and they went barefooted. +De girls dressed in shimmys. They was a sort of dress with two seams in it +and no sleeves.</p> + +<p>Old Master had his slaves to get up about five o'clock. Dey did +an ordinary day's work. He never whipped them unless they was lazy or sassy +or had a fight. Sometimes his slaves would run away but they allus come +back. We didn't have no truck with railroaders 'cause we like our home.</p> + +<p>A woman cussed my mother and it made her mad and they had a fight. +Old Master had them both whipped. My mother got ten licks and de other woman +got twenty-five. Old Mistress sho' was mad 'cause mother got whipped. Said +he wouldn't have done it if she had known it. Old Mistress taught mother +how to read and write and mother taught my father. I went to school jest +one day so I can't read and write now.</p> + +<p>Weddings was big days. We'd have big dinners and dances once in a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> +while [HW: and] when somebody died they'd hold a wake. They'd sit up all night and +sing and pray and talk. At midnight they'd serve sandwiches and coffee. +Sometimes we'd all get together and play ring plays and dance.</p> + +<p>Once the Yankee soldiers come. I was big enough to tote pails and +piggins then. These soldiers made us chillun tote water to fill their canteens +and water their horses. We toted the water on our heads. Another +time we heard the Yankee's was coming and old Master had about fifteen hundred +pounds of meat. They was hauling it off to bury it and hide it when the +Yankees caught them. The soldiers ate and wasted every bit of that good +meat. We didn't like them a bit.</p> + +<p>One time some Yankee soldiers stopped and started talking to me—they +asked me what my name was. "I say Liza," and they say, "Liza who?" +I thought a minute and I shook my head, "Jest Liza, I ain't got no other +name."</p> + +<p>He say, "Who live up yonder in dat Big House?" I say, "Mr. John +Mixon." He say, "You are Liza Mixon." He say, "Do anybody ever call you +nigger?" And I say, "Yes Sir." He say, "Next time anybody call you nigger +you tell 'em dat you is a Negro and your name is Miss Liza Mixon." The more +I thought of that the more I liked it and I made up my mind to do jest what +he told me to.</p> + +<p>My job was minding the calves back while the cows was being milked. +One evening I was minding the calves and old Master come along. He say, +"What you doin' nigger?" I say real pert like, "I ain't no nigger, I'se a +Negro and I'm Miss Liza Mixon." Old Master sho' was surprised and he picks +up a switch and starts at me.</p> + +<p>Law, but I was skeered! I hadn't never had no whipping so I run +fast as I can to Grandma Gracie. I hid behind her and she say, "What's the +matter of you child?" And I say, "Master John gwine whip me." And she say,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> +"What you done?" And I say, "Nothing." She say she know better and 'bout +that time Master John got there. He say, "Gracie, dat little nigger sassed +me." She say, "Lawsie child, what does ail you?" I told them what the +Yankee soldier told me to say and Grandma Gracie took my dress and lift it +over my head and pins my hands inside, and Lawsie, how she whipped me and I +dassent holler loud either. I jest said dat [HW: to] de wrong person. +[TR: "didn't I?" at end was crossed out.]</p> + +<p>I'se getting old now and can't work no more. I jest sits here and +thinks about old times. They was good times. We didn't want to be freed. +We hated the Yankee soldiers. Abe Lincoln was a good man though, wasn't he? +I tries to be a good Christian 'cause I wants to go to Heaven when I die.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>LIZZIE FARMER<br /> +Age 80 years<br /> +McAlester, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>"Cousin Lizzie!"</p> + +<p>"What."</p> + +<p>"I'se seventy years old."</p> + +<p>And I say, "Whut's you telling me for. I ain't got nothing to +do with your age!"</p> + +<p>I knowed I was one year older than she was and it sorta riled me +for her to talk about it. I never would tell folks my age for I knowed +white folks didn't want no old woman working for 'em and I just wouldn't +tell 'em how old I really was. Dat was nine years ago and I guess I'm +seventy five now. I can't work much now.</p> + +<p>I was born four years before de War.—"The one what set the cullud +folks free." We lived on a big plantation in Texas. Old Master's name was +John Booker and he was good to us all. My mammy died just at de close of de +War and de young mistress took me and kept me and I growed up with her chillun. +I thought I was quality sure nuff and I never would go to school 'cause I +couldn't go 'long to de same school with de white chillun. Young mistress +taught me how to knit, spin, weave, crochet, sew and embroider. I couldn't +recollect my age and young Mistress told me to say, "I'se born de second year +of de War dat set de cullud folks free," and the only time she ever git mad +at me was when I forgot to say it jest as she told me to. She take hold of +me and shook me. I recollects all it, all de time.</p> + +<p>Young mistress' name was Elizabeth Booker McNew. I'se named after +her. She finally gave me to my aunt when I was a big girl and I never lived +wid white folks any more. I never saw my pappy till I was grown.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span></p> + +<p>In the cullud quarters, we cooked on a fireplace in big iron pots. +Our bread was baked in iron skillets with lids and we would set the skillet +on de fire and put coals of fire on de lid. Bread was mighty good cooked +like dat. We made our own candles. We had a candle mold and we would put +a string in the center of the mold and pour melted tallow in it and let it +harden. We would make eight at one time. Quality folks had brass lamps.</p> + +<p>When we went to cook our vegetables we would put a big piece of +hog jowl in de pot. We'd put in a lot of snap beans and when dey was about +half done we'd put in a mess of cabbage and when it was about half done we'd +put in some squash and when it was about half done we'd put in some okra. +Then when it was done we would take it out a layer at a time. Go 'way! It +makes me hungry to talk about it.</p> + +<p>When we cooked possum dat was a feast. We would skin him and dress +him and put him on top de house and let him freeze for two days or nights. +Then we'd boil him with red pepper, and take him out and put him in a pan +and slice sweet 'taters and put round him and roast him. My, dat was good +eating.</p> + +<p>It was a long time after de War 'fore all de niggers knowed dey +was really free. My grandpappy was Master Booker's overseer. He wouldn't +have a white man over his niggers. I saw grandpappy whip one man with a long +whip. Master Booker was good and wouldn't whip 'em less'n he had to. De +niggers dassent leave de farm without a pass for fear of de Ku Kluxers and +patrolers.</p> + +<p>We would have dances and play parties and have sho' nuff good times. +We had "ring plays." We'd all catch hands and march round, den we'd drop all +hands 'cept our pardners and we'd swing round and sing:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"You steal my pardner, and I steal yours,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Miss Mary Jane.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My true lover's gone away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Miss Mary Jane!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Steal all round and don't slight none,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Miss Mary Jane.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He's lost out but I'se got one,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Miss Mary Jane!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>We always played at log rollin's an' cotton pickin's.</p> + +<p>Sometimes we would have a wedding and my what a good time we'd +have. Old Master's daughter, Miss Janie, got married and it took us more'n +three weeks to get ready for it. De house was cleaned from top to bottom and +us chillun had to run errands. Seemed like we was allers under foot, at +least dat was what mammy said. I never will fergit all the good things they +cooked up. Rows of pies and cakes, baked chicken and ham, my, it makes my +mouth water jest thinking of it. After de wedding and de feast de white +folks danced all night and us cullud folks ate all night.</p> + +<p>When one of de cullud folks die we would allers hold a "wake." +We would set up with de corpse and sing and pray and at midnight we'd all eat +and den we'd sing and pray some more.</p> + +<p>In de evening after work was done we'd sit round and de older folks +would sing songs. One of de favorites was:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Miss Ca'line gal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yes Ma'am<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Did you see dem buzzards?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yes Ma'am,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Did you see dem floppin',<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How did ye' like 'em?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mighty well.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Miss Ca'line gal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yes Ma'am,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Did you see dem buzzards?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yes Ma'am,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Did you see dem sailin',<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yes Ma'am.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How did you like 'em?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mighty well."<br /></span> +</div></div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span></p> + +<p>I've heered folks talk about conjures and hoodoo charms. I have +a hoss shoe over de door dat will bring good luck. I sho' do believe certain +things bring bad luck. I hate to hear a scrinch (screech) owl holler +at night. Whenever a scrinch owl git in dat tree at night and start to +holler I gits me a stick and I say, "Confound you, I'll make yet set up dar +and say 'Umph huh'," so I goes out and time I gits dar he is gone. If you +tie a knot in de corner of de bed sheet he will leave, or turn your hat +wrong side out too. Dey's all good and will make a scrinch owl leave every +time.</p> + +<p>I believes in dreams and visions too. I dreamed one night dat I +had tall palings all 'round my house and I went out in de yard and dere was +a big black hoss and I say, "How come you is in my yard? I'll jest put you +out jest lak you got in." I opened de gate but he wouldn't go out and finally +he run in de door and through the house and went towards de East. Right after +dat my son died. I saw dat hoss again de other night. A black hoss allus +means death. Seeing it de other night might mean I'se gwineter die.</p> + +<p>I know one time a woman named May Runnels wanted to go to church +about a mile away and her old man wouldn't go with her. It made her mad and +she say, "I'll be dammed if I don't go." She had to go through a grave yard +and when she was about half way across it a icy hand jest slap her and her +mouth was twisted way 'round fer about three months. Dat was a lesson to her +fer cussing.</p> + +<p>One time there was a nigger what belonged on a adjoining farm to +Master John Bookers and dey told us dis story:</p> + +<p>"Dis nigger went down to de spring and found a terrapin and he say, +'What brung you here?' Jest imagine how he felt when it say to him, 'Teeth +and tongue brung me here, and teeth and tongue will bring you here.' He run<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> +to de house and told his Master dat he found a terrapin dat could talk. Dey +went back and he asked de terrapin what bring him here and it wouldn't say a +word. Old Master didn't like it 'cause he went down there jest to see a common +ordinary terrapin and he told de nigger he was going to git into trouble fer +telling him a lie. Next day the nigger seen de terrapin and it say de same +thing again. Soon after dat dis nigger was lynched right close to de place +he saw de terrapin."</p> + +<p>Master John Booker had two niggers what had a habit of slipping +across de river and killing old Master's hogs and hiding de meat in de loft +of de house. Master had a big blue hog and one day he missed him and he +sent Ned to look fer him. Ned knowed all de time dat he had killed it and +had it hid in his loft. He hunted and called "Pig-ooie, Pig." Somebody +done stole old Master's big blue hog. Dey couldn't find it but old Master +thought Ned knowed something 'bout it. One night he found out Ned was gonna +kill another hog and had asked John to go with him. He borrowed John's +clothes and blacked his face and met Ned at de river. Soon dey find a nice +big one and Ned say, "John, I'll drive him round and you kill him." So he +drove him past old Master but he didn't want to kill his own hog so he made +lak he'd like to kill him but he missed him. Finally Ned got tired and said. +"I'll kill him, you drive him by me." So Master John drove him by him and +Ned knock de hog on de head and cut his throat and dey load him on de canoe. +When dey was nearly 'cross de river Old Master dip up some water and wash his +face a little, then he look at Ned and he say, "Ned you look sick, I believe +you've got lepersy." Ned row on little more and he jump in de river and +Master had a hard time finding him again. He had the overseer whip Ned for +that.</p> + +<p>I think Lincoln was a wonderful man. Everybody was sorry when he +died, but I never heerd of Jeff Davis.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +10-19-38<br /> +1,876-words</p> + +<h3>DELLA FOUNTAIN<br /> +Age 69 years<br /> +McAlester, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born after de War of de Rebellion but I 'member lots o' things dat +my parents told me 'bout slavery.</p> + +<p>My grandmother was captured in Africa. Traders come dere in a big boat and +dey had all sorts of purty gew-gaws—red handkerchiefs, dress goods, beads, +bells, and trinkets in bright colors. Dey would pull up at de shore and entice +de colored folks onto de boat to see de purty things. Befo' de darkies realized +it dey would be out from shore. Dat's de way she was captured. Fifteen to twenty-five +would pay dem for de trip as dey all brought good prices.</p> + +<p>I was born and raised in Louisiana, near Winfield. My mother's Master was +John Rogers and his wife was Miss Millie. Dey was awful good to deir slaves and +he never whupped his grown niggers.</p> + +<p>I 'member when I was a child dat we didn't have hardly anything to keep +house wid, but we got along purty well I guess. Our furniture was home-made and +we cooked on de fireplace.</p> + +<p>We saved all our oak-wood ashes, and would put a barrel on a slanting scaffold +and put sticks and shucks in de bottom of de barrel and den fill it wid de ashes. +We'd pour water in it and let it drip. Dese drippings made pure lye. We used dis +wid cracklings and meat scraps to make our soap.</p> + +<p>Father took a good-sized pine long and split it open, planed it down smooth +and bored holes in de bottom and drove pegs in dem for legs; dis was our battling<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> +bench. We'd spread our wet clothes on dis and rub soap on 'em and take a paddle +and beat de dirt out. We got 'em clean but had to be careful not to wear 'em out +wid de paddle.</p> + +<p>We had no tubs either, so father took a hollow log and split it open and put +partitions in it. He bored a hole in each section and drove a peg in it. He next +cut two forked poles and drove 'em in de ground and rested de ends of de hollow +log in dese forks. We'd fill de log trough wid water and rinse our clothes. We +could pull out de pegs and let de water out. We had no brooms either, so we made +brush brooms to sweep our floors.</p> + +<p>Dere was lots of wild game near our home. I 'member father and two more men +going out and killing six deer in jest a little while. Dey was plentiful, and so +was squirrels, coon, possums and quail. Dere was lots of bears, too. We'd be in +de field working and hear de dogs, and father and de boys would go to 'em and maybe +dey'd have a bear. We liked bear meat. It was dark, but awful good and sweet.</p> + +<p>De grown folks used to have big times at log-rollings, corn-shuckings and +quiltings. Dey'd have a big supper and a big dance at night. Us children would +play ring plays, play with home-made rag dolls, or we'd take big leaves and pin +'em together wid thorns and make hats and dresses. We'd ride saplings, too. All +of us would pull a sapling down and one would climb up in it near de top and git a +good hold on it, and dey would turn it loose. It took a purty good holding to stay +wid it, I can tell you.</p> + +<p>All de ladies rode horseback, and dey rode side-saddles. I had a purty side-saddle +when I growed up. De saddle seat was flowered plush. I had a purty riding +habit, too. De skirt was so long dat it almost touched de ground.</p> + +<p>We spun and wove all our clothes. I had to spin three broaches ever night +before bedtime. Mother would take bark and make dye to give us different colored<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> +dresses.</p> + +<p>Red oak and sweet gum made purple. Bois d'arc made yellow or orange. Walnut +made a purty brown. We knitted our socks and stockings, too.</p> + +<p>We celebrated Christmas by having a big dance and egg-nog for ever' body.</p> + +<p>During slavery young colored boys and girls didn't do much work but just growed +up, care-free and happy. De first work boys done was to learn to hitch up de team +to Master's carriage and take de young folks for a drive.</p> + +<p>My older brothers and sisters told me lots of things dey done during slave +days. My brother Joe felt mighty big after freedom and strutted about. One day +he took his younger brother, Ol wid him to where father was building a house. Dey +played 'bout de house and come up to where a white man and father was talking. De +white man was rolling a little ball of mud in his hands and he just pitched it +over on Ol's foot. It didn't hurt him a mite, but Joe bridled up and he started +to git smart, and father told him he'd break his neck if he didn't go on home and +keep his mouth shet. Father finally had to whup Joe to make him know he was black. +He give father and mother lots of concern, for dey was afraid the Ku Kluxers would +git him. One day he was playing wid a axe and chopped off brother Ol's finger. +Mother told him she was going to kill him when she caught him. He took to de woods. +His three sisters and two neighbor girls run him nearly all day but couldn't catch +him. Late in de evening, he come up to a white neighbor's house and she told him +to go in and git under de bed and dey couldn't find him. Curtains come down to de +floor and as he was tired he decided to risk it. He hadn't much more dan got hid +when he heard de girls coming. He heard de woman say, "He's under de bed." He +knowed he was caught, and he put up a fight, but dey took him to mother. He got +a whupping, but he was shocked dat mother didn't kill him like she said she was. +He didn't mind de whupping. He growed up to be a good man, and was de apple of my +mother's eye.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span></p> + +<p>Father knowed a man that stole his Master's horse out and rode him to a dance. +For some reason de horse died. De poor man knowed he was up against it, and he let +in to begging de men to help him git de horse on his back so he could put him back +in his stable and his Master would think he died dere. Poor fellow, he really did +think he could tote dat horse on his back. He couldn't git anybody to help him, so +he went to the woods. He was shot by a patroller 'cause he wouldn't surrender. +Dey captured him but he died.</p> + +<p>Paul Castleberry was a white preacher. De colored would go to church de same +as de whites. He give de colored instructions on obeying Masters. He say, "while +your Master is going f'om pillar to post, looking after your intrusts, you is +always doing some devilment." I 'spect dat was jest about de truth.</p> + +<p>My sister played wid Miss Millie's little girl, Mollie. De big house was on +a high hill and at de foot of de hill. Nearly a half-mile away was a big creek wid +a big wooden bridge across it. Soldiers come by ever' few days, and you could hear +deir horses when dey struck de bridge. Sister and Mollie would run upstairs and +look down de hill, and if it was Confederate soldiers dey would run back and tell +Miss Millie and dey would start putting out de best food dey had. If dey saw Yankee +soldiers, dey would run down and tell 'em and dey'd start hiding things.</p> + +<p>De Yankees come through dere and took ever' body's horses. Lots of people took +deir horses and cows and hid 'em in some low place in de deep wood.</p> + +<p>Miss Millie had a young horse and she had 'em take him to de wheat field and +hide him. De wheat was as high as he was. De Yankees come by, and a man had +stopped dere just before dey come. He was riding an old horse, and he was wearing +a long linen-duster—a duster was a long coat dat was worn over de suit to protect +it from de dust.</p> + +<p>Dis smart-aleck hid behind de house and as de soldiers rode up he shot at +'em. Dey started shooting at him and he started running, and his coat was sticking<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> +straight out behind him. De soldiers surely wasn't trying to hit him, but dey +sure did scare him plenty. Miss Millie was certain dey was going to find her +horse but dey didn't.</p> + +<p>Master John Rogers was good to all his slaves, and they all loved him and +would a'died for him. One day he was sitting in his yard and Mollie come running +down stairs and told him de Yankees was coming. He never say nothing, but kept +sitting dere. Dat morning he had a big sack of money and he give it to my mother +to hide for him. She ripped her mattress, and put it in de middle of it and +sewed it up. She den made up de bed and put de covers on it. De Yankees searched +de house and took de jewelry and silverware and old Master's gold mug, but dey didn't +find his money.</p> + +<p>My parents lived close to de old plantation dat they lived on when dey was +slaves. De big house was still dere, but it was sure dilapidated. Ever'body was +poor after de War, whites and blacks alike. I really think de colored was de best +off, for they knowed all 'bout hardships and hard work and de white folks didn't.</p> + +<p>At first some of 'em was too proud to do drudgery work, but most of 'em went +right to work and build up deir homes again. Food, clothes, and in fact everything +needed, was scarce.</p> + +<p>Mother always say, "If you visit on New Years, you'll visit all de year." We +always had black-eyed peas and hog jowl for New Year's dinner, for it brought good +luck.</p> + +<p>The Nineteenth of June was Emancipation Day, and we always had a big picnic and +speeches.</p> + +<p>I knowed one woman who was a conjur woman. Lots of people went to her to git +her to break a evil spell dat some one had over them. She'd brew a tea from herbs +and give to 'em to drink, and it always cured 'em.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span></p> + +<p>I've seen people use all kinds o' roots and herbs for medicine, and I also +seen 'em use all kind of things for cures. I've knowed 'em to put wood lice in +a bag and tie 'em 'round a baby's neck so it'd teeth easy.</p> + +<p>Black-haw root, sour dock, bear grass, grape root, bull nettle, sweet-gum +bark and red-oak bark boiled separately and mixed, makes a good blood medicine.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>NANCY GARDNER<br /> +Age 79 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>Well, to tell you de truth I don't know my age, but I was born in +1858, in Franklin, Tennessee. Now, you can figger for yourself and tell +how old I is. I is de daughter of Prophet and Callie Isaiah, and dey was +natives of Tennessee. Dere was three of us children, two boys and myself. +I'm de only girl. My brothers names was Prophet and Billie Isaiah. I +don't 'member much about dem as we was separated when I was seven years +old. I'll never forget when me, my ma and my auntie had to leave my pa +and brothers. It is jest as clear in my mind now as it was den, and dat's +been about seventy years ago.</p> + +<p>Oh God! I tell you it was awful dat day when old Jeff Davis had a +bunch of us sent to Memphis to be sold. I can see old Major Clifton now. +He was a big nigger trader you know. Well, dey took us on up dere to Memphis +and we was sold jest like cattle. Dey sold me and ma together and dey sold +pa and de boys together. Dey was sent to Mississippi and we was sent to +Alabama. My pa, O how my ma was grieved to death about him! She didn't +live long after dat. She didn't live long enough to be set free. Poor ma, +she died a slave, but she is saved though. I know she is, and I'll be wid +her some day.</p> + +<p>It was thirty years before my pa knew if we was still living. Finally +in some way he heard dat I was still alive, and he began writing me. Course +I was grown and married den and me and my husband had moved to Missouri. Well, +my pa started out to see me and on his way he was drowned in de Missouri River, +and I never saw him alive after we was sold in Memphis.</p> + +<p>I can't tell you much 'bout work during de slave days 'cause you see +I was jest a baby you might say when de War broke out. I do remember our<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> +Master's name though, it was Dr. Perkins, and he was a good Master. Ma +and pa sure hated to have to leave him, he was so good to dem. He was a +rich man, and had a big fine house and thousands of acres of land. He was +good to his niggers too. We had a good house too, better dan some of dese +houses I see folks living in now. Course Dr. Perkins niggers had to work, +but dey didn't mind 'cause he would let dem have little patches of dey own +such as 'tatoes, corn, cotton and garden. Jest a little, you know. He +couldn't let dem have much, there was so many on Dr. Perkins plantation.</p> + +<p>I don't remember seeing anybody sick in slavery time. You see I was +jest a kid and dere's a lot of things I can't remember.</p> + +<p>I am a Christian. I jined de church nigh on seventy years ago and +when I say dat, I don't mean I jest jined de church. I mean I gave myself +up to de Heavenly Father, and I've been gwine straight down de line for Him +ever since. You know in dem days, we didn't get religion like young folks +do now. Young folks today jest find de church and den call theyselves +Christians, but they aint.</p> + +<p>I remember jest as well when I was converted. One day I was thinking +'bout a sermon de preacher had preached and a voice spoke to me and said, +"De Holy Ghost is over your head. Accept it!" Right den I got down on my +knees and prayed to God dat I might understand dat voice, and God Almighty +in a vision told me dat I should find de church. I could hardly wait for +de next service so I could find it, and when I was in de water getting my +baptisement, dat same voice spoke and said, "Now you have accepted don't +turn back 'cause I will be wid you always!" O you don't know nothing 'bout +dat kind of religion!</p> + +<p>I 'member one night shortly after I jined de church I was laying in +bed and dere was a vine tied 'round my waist and dat vine extended into de<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> +elements. O my God! I can see it now! I looked up dat vine and away in +de elements I could see my Divine Master and he spoke to me and said, "When +you get in trouble shake dis vine; I'm your Master and I will hear your cry."</p> + +<p>I knowed old Jeff Davis good. Why I was jest as close to him as I am +to dat table. I've talked wid him too. I reckon I <span class="u">do</span> know dat scoundrel! +Why, he didn't want de niggers to be free! He was known as a mean old rascal +all over de South.</p> + +<p>Abraham Lincoln? Now you is talking 'bout de niggers friend! Why dat +was de best man God ever let tramp de earth! Everybody was mighty sad when +poor old Abraham was 'sassinated, 'cause he did a mighty good deed for de +colored race before he left dis world.</p> + +<p>I wasn't here long during slavery, but I saw enough of it to know it +was mighty hard going for most of de niggers den, and young folks wouldn't +stand for dat kind of treatment now. I know most of the young folks would +be killed, but they jest wouldn't stand for it. I would hate to have to go +through wid my little share of it again.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>OCTAVIA GEORGE<br /> +Age 85 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in Mansieur, Louisiana, 1852, Avoir Parish. I am the +daughter of Alfred and Clementine Joseph. I don't know much about my grandparents +other than my mother told me my grandfather's name was Fransuai, and +was one time a king in Africa.</p> + +<p>Most of the slaves lived in log cabins, and the beds were home-made. +The mattresses were made out of moss gathered from trees, and we used to have +lots of fun gathering that moss to make those mattresses.</p> + +<p>My job was taking care of the white children up at the Big House +(that is what they called the house where our master lived), and I also had +to feed the little Negro children. I remember quite well how those poor +little children used to have to eat. They were fed in boxes and troughs, +under the house. They were fed corn meal mush and beans. When this was poured +into their box they would gather around it the same as we see pigs, horses and +cattle gather around troughs today.</p> + +<p>We were never given any money, but were able to get a little money +this way: our Master would let us have two or three acres of land each year +to plant for ourselves, and we could have what we raised on it. We could not +allow our work on these two or three acres to interfere with Master's work, +but we had to work our little crops on Sundays. Now remind you, all the +Negroes didn't get these two or three acres, only good masters allowed their +slaves to have a little crop of their own. We would take the money from our +little crops and buy a few clothes and something for Christmas. The men would +save enough money out of the crops to buy their Christmas whiskey. It was all<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> +right for the slaves to get drunk on Christmas and New Years Day; no one was +whipped for getting drunk on those days. We were allowed to have a garden and +from this we gathered vegetables to eat; on Sundays we could have duck, fish, +and pork.</p> + +<p>We didn't know anything about any clothes other than cotton; everything +we wore was made of cotton, except our shoes, they were made from pieces +of leather cut out of a raw cowhide.</p> + +<p>Our Master and Mistress was good, they let us go to church with +them, have our little two- or three-acre crops and any other thing that the +good masters would let their slaves do. They lived in a big fine house and +had a fine barn. Their barn was much better than the house we lived in. +Master Depriest (our master) was a Frenchman, and had eight or nine children, +and they were sure mean. They would fight us, but we were not allowed to +fight our little Master or Mistress as we had to call them.</p> + +<p>The overseer on Master's plantation was a mean old fellow, he +carried his gun all the time and would ride a big fine horse and go from one +bunch of slaves to the other. Some poor white folks lived close to us. They +could not own slaves and they had to work for the rich plantation owners. I +believe that those poor white folk are to blame for the Negroes stealing because +they would get the Negroes to steal their master's corn, hogs, chickens +and many other things and sell it to them for practically nothing.</p> + +<p>We had to work plenty hard, because our Master had a large plantation. +Don't know just how many acres it was, but we had to be up at 5 o'clock +in the morning and would work until dark than we would have to go home and do +our night work, that is cook, milk, and feed the stock.</p> + +<p>The slaves were punished for stealing, running off, not doing what<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> +their master told them and for talking back to their master. If any of these +rules were disobeyed their feet and hands were chained together and they were +put across a log or a barrel and whipped until the blood came from them.</p> + +<p>There were no jails; the white man was the slaves' jail. If whipping +didn't settle the crime the Negro committed—the next thing would be to hang +him or burn him at stake.</p> + +<p>I've seen them sell slaves. The whites would auction them off just +as we do cattle and horses today. The big fine healthy slaves were worth more +than those that were not quite so good. I have seen men sold from their wives +and I thought that was such a crime. I knew that God would settle thing +someday.</p> + +<p>Slaves would run away but most of the time they were caught. The +Master would put blood hounds on their trail, and sometimes the slave would +kill the blood hound and make his escape. If a slave once tried to run away +and was caught, he would be whipped almost to death, and from then on if he +was sent any place they would chain their meanest blood hound to him.</p> + +<p>Funerals were very simple for slaves, they could not carry the body +to the church they would just take it to the grave yard and bury it. They +were not even allowed to sing a song at the cemetery. Old Mistress used to +tell us ghost stories after funerals and they would nearly scare me to death. +She would tell of seeing men with no head, and see cattle that would suddenly +turn to cats, and she made us believe if a fire was close to a cemetery it +was coming from a ghost.</p> + +<p>I used to hear quite a bit about voodoo, but that some thing I +never believed in, therefore, I didn't pay any attention to it.</p> + +<p>When a slave was sick, the master would get a good doctor for him +if he was a good slave, but if he wasn't considered a good slave he would be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> +given cheap medical care. Some of the doctors would not go to the cabin where +the slaves were, and the slave would have to be carried on his bed to his +master's back porch and the doctor would see him there.</p> + +<p>When the news came that we were free, all of us were hid on the +Mississippi River. We had been there for several days, and we had to catch +fish with our hands and roast them for food. I remember quite well when old +Master came down to there and hollered, Come on out niggers; you are free now +and you can do as you please! We all went to the Big House and there we +found old Miss crying and talking about how she hated to lose her good niggers.</p> + +<p>Abraham Lincoln! Why we mourned three months for that man when he +died! I wouldn't miss a morning getting my black arm band and placing it on +in remembrance of Abraham, who was the best friend the Negroes ever had. Now +old Jeff Davis, I didn't care a thing about him. He was a Democrat and none +of them mean anything to the Negro. And if these young Negroes don't quit +messing with the democratic bunch they are going to be right back where we +started from. If they only knew as I know they would struggle to keep such +from happening, because although I had a good master I wouldn't want to go +through it again.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>MARY GRAYSON<br /> +Age 83 yrs.<br /> +Tulsa, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I am what we colored people call a "native." That means that I +didn't come into the Indian country from somewhere in the Old South, after +the War, like so many negroes did, but I was born here in the old Creek +Nation, and my master was a Creek Indian. That was eighty three years ago, +so I am told.</p> + +<p>My mammy belonged to white people back in Alabama when she was +born—down in the southern part I think, for she told me that after she +was a sizeable girl her white people moved into the eastern part of Alabama +where there was a lot of Creeks. Some of them Creeks was mixed up with +the whites, and some of the big men in the Creeks who come to talk to her +master was almost white, it looked like. "My white folks moved around a +lot when I was a little girl", she told me.</p> + +<p>When mammy was about 10 or 13 years old some of the Creeks begun +to come out to the Territory in little bunches. They wasn't the ones who +was taken out here by the soldiers and contractor men—they come on ahead +by themselves and most of them had plenty of money, too. A Creek come to my +mammy's master and bought her to bring out here, but she heard she was being +sold and run off into the woods. There was an old clay pit, dug way back +into a high bank, where the slaves had been getting clay to mix with hog +hair scrapings to make chinking for the big log houses that they built for +the master and the cabins they made for themselves. Well, my mammy run and +hid way back in that old clay pit, and it was way after dark before the master +and the other man found her.</p> + +<p>The Creek man that bought her was a kind sort of a man, mammy said, +and wouldn't let the master punish her. He took her away and was kind to her, +but he decided she was too young to breed and he sold her to another Creek who<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> +had several slaves already, and he brought her out to the Territory.</p> + +<p>The McIntosh men was the leaders in the bunch that come out at +that time, and one of the bunch, named Jim Perryman, bought my mammy and +married her to one of his "boys", but after he waited a while and she +didn't have a baby he decided she was no good breeder and he sold her to +Mose Perryman.</p> + +<p>Mose Perryman was my master, and he was a cousin to Legus Perryman, +who was a big man in the Tribe. He was a lot younger than Mose, and laughed +at Mose for buying my mammy, but he got fooled, because my mammy got married +to Mose's slave boy Jacob, the way the slaves was married them days, and went +ahead and had ten children for Mr. Mose.</p> + +<p>Mose Perryman owned my pappy and his older brother, Hector, and one +of the McIntosh men, Oona, I think his name was, owned my pappy's brother +William. I can remember when I first heard about there was going to be a war. +The older children would talk about it, but they didn't say it was a war all +over the country. They would talk about a war going to be "back in Alabama", +and I guess they had heard the Creeks talking about it that way.</p> + +<p>When I was born we lived in the Choska bottoms, and Mr. Mose Perryman +had a lot of land broke in all up and down the Arkansas river along there. After +the War, when I had got to be a young woman, there was quite a settlement grew +up at Choska (pronounced Choe-skey) right across the river east of where Haskell +now is, but when I was a child before the War all the whole bottoms was marshy +kind of wilderness except where farms had been cleared out. The land was very +rich, and the Creeks who got to settle there were lucky. They always had big +crops. All west of us was high ground, toward Gibson station and Fort Gibson, +and the land was sandy. Some of the McIntoshes lived over that way, and my +Uncle William belonged to one of them.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span></p> + +<p>We slaves didn't have a hard time at all before the War. I have +had people who were slaves of white folks back in the old states tell me +that they had to work awfully hard and their masters were cruel to them +sometimes, but all the Negroes I knew who belonged to Creeks always had plenty +of clothes and lots to eat and we all lived in good log cabins we built. We +worked the farm and tended to the horses and cattle and hogs, and some of the +older women worked around the owner's house, but each Negro family looked +after a part of the fields and worked the crops like they belonged to us.</p> + +<p>When I first heard talk about the War the slaves were allowed to +go and see one another sometimes and often they were sent on errands several +miles with a wagon or on a horse, but pretty soon we were all kept at home, +and nobody was allowed to come around and talk to us. But we heard what was +going on.</p> + +<p>The McIntosh men got nearly everybody to side with them about the +War, but we Negroes got word somehow that the Cherokees over back of Ft. Gibson +was not going to be in the War, and that there were some Union people over +there who would help slaves to get away, but we children didn't know anything +about what we heard our parents whispering about, and they would stop if they +heard us listening. Most of the Creeks who lived in our part of the country, +between the Arkansas and the Verdigris, and some even south of the Arkansas, +belonged to the Lower Creeks and sided with the South, but down below us +along the Canadian River they were Upper Creeks and there was a good deal of +talk about them going with the North. Some of the Negroes tried to get +away and go down to them, but I don't know of any from our neighborhood that +went to them.</p> + +<p>Some Upper Creeks came up into the Choska bottoms talking around +among the folks there about siding with the North. They were talking, they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> +said, for old man Gouge, who was a big man among the Upper Creeks. His +Indian name was Opoeth-le-ya-hola, and he got away into Kansas with a big +bunch of Creeks and Seminoles during the War.</p> + +<p>Before that time, I remember one night my uncle William brought +another Negro man to our cabin and talked a long time with my pappy, but +pretty soon some of the Perryman Negroes told them that Mr. Mose was coming +down and they went off into the woods to talk. But Mr. Mose didn't come +down. When pappy came back Mammy cried quite a while, and we children could +hear them arguing late at night. Then my uncle Hector slipped over to our +cabin several times and talked to pappy, and mammy began to fix up grub, +but she didn't give us children but a little bit of it, and told us to stay +around with her at the cabin and not go playing with the other children.</p> + +<p>Then early one morning, about daylight, old Mr. Mose came down to +the cabin in his buggy, waving a shot gun and hollering at the top of his +voice. I never saw a man so mad in all my life, before nor since!</p> + +<p>He yelled in at mammy to "git them children together and git up +to my house before I beat you and all of them to death!" Mammy began to +cry and plead that she didn't know anything, but he acted like he was going +to shoot sure enough, so we all ran to mammy and started for Mr. Mose's +house as fast as we could trot.</p> + +<p>We had to pass all the other Negro cabins on the way, and we could +see that they were all empty, and it looked like everything in them had been +tore up. Straw and corn shucks all over the place, where somebody had tore +up the mattresses, and all the pans and kettles gone off the outside walls +where they used to hang them.</p> + +<p>At one place we saw two Negro boys loading some iron kettles on +a wagon, and a little further on was some boys catching chickens in a yard,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> +but we could see all the Negroes had left in a big hurry.</p> + +<p>I asked mammy where everybody had gone and she said, "Up to Mr. +Mose's house, where we are going. He's calling us all in."</p> + +<p>"Will pappy be up there too?" I asked her.</p> + +<p>"No. Your pappy and your Uncle Hector and your Uncle William and +a lot of other menfolks won't be here any more. They went away. That's +why Mr. Mose is so mad, so if any of you younguns say anything about any +strange men coming to our place I'll break your necks!" Mammy was sure +scared!</p> + +<p>We all thought sure she was going to get a big whipping, but Mr. +Mose just looked at her a minute and then told her to get back to the cabin +and bring all the clothes, and bed ticks and all kinds of cloth we had and +come back ready to travel.</p> + +<p>"We're going to take all you black devils to a place where there +won't no more of you run away!" he yelled after us. So we got ready to +leave as quick as we could. I kept crying about my pappy, but mammy would +say, "Don't you worry about your pappy, he's free now. Better be worrying +about us. No telling where we all will end up!" There was four or five +Creek families and their Negroes all got together to leave, with all their +stuff packed in buggies and wagons, and being toted by the Negroes or carried +tied on horses, jack asses, mules and milk cattle. I reckon it was a funny +looking sight, or it would be to a person now; the way we was all loaded +down with all manner of baggage when we met at the old ford across the +Arkansas that lead to the Creek Agency. The Agency stood on a high hill a +few miles across the river from where we lived, but we couldn't see it from +our place down in the Choska bottoms. But as soon as we got up on the upland +east of the bottoms we could look across and see the hill.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span></p> + +<p>When we got to a grove at the foot of the hill near the agency Mr. +Mose and the other masters went up to the Agency for a while. I suppose +they found out up there what everybody was supposed to do and where they +was supposed to go, for when we started on it wasn't long until several more +families and their slaves had joined the party and we made quite a big crowd.</p> + +<p>The little Negro boys had to carry a little bundle apiece, but Mr. +Mose didn't make the little girls carry anything and let us ride if we could +find anything to ride on. My mammy had to help lead the cows part of the time, +but a lot of the time she got to ride an old horse, and she would put me up +behind her. It nearly scared me to death, because I had never been on a horse +before, and she had to hold on to me all the time to keep me from falling off.</p> + +<p>Of course I was too small to know what was going on then, but I +could tell that all the masters and the Negroes seemed to be mighty worried +and careful all the time. Of course I know now that the Creeks were all +split up over the War, and nobody was able to tell who would be friendly +to us or who would try to poison us or kill us, or at least rob us. There +was a lot of bushwhacking all through that country by little groups of men +who was just out to get all they could. They would appear like they was the +enemy of anybody they run across, just to have an excuse to rob them or +burn up their stuff. If you said you was with the South they would be +with the North and if you claimed to be with the Yankees they would be with +the South, so our party was kind of upset all the time we was passing through +the country along the Canadian. That was where old Gouge had been talking +against the South. I've heard my folks say that he was a wonderful speaker, +too.</p> + +<p>We all had to move along mighty slow, on account of the ones on foot, +and we wouldn't get very far in one day, then we Negroes had to fix up a place +to camp and get wood and cook supper for everybody. Sometimes we would come to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> +a place to camp that somebody knew about and we would find it all tromped down +by horses and the spring all filled in and ruined. I reckon old Gouge's people +would tear up things when they left, or maybe some Southern bushwhackers +would do it. I don't know which.</p> + +<p>When we got down to where the North Fork runs into the Canadian we +went around the place where the Creek town was. There was lots of Creeks +down there who was on the other side, so we passed around that place and forded +across west of there. The ford was a bad one, and it took us a long time to +get across. Everybody got wet and a lot of the stuff on the wagons got wet. +Pretty soon we got down into the Chickasaw country, and everybody was friendly +to us, but the Chickasaw people didn't treat their slaves like the Creeks did. +They was more strict, like the people in Texas and other places. The +Chickasaws seemed lighter color than the Creeks but they talked more in +Indian among themselves and to their slaves. Our masters talked English +nearly all the time except when they were talking to Creeks who didn't talk +good English, and we Negroes never did learn very good Creek. I could always +understand it, and can yet, a little, but I never did try to talk it much. +Mammy and pappy used English to us all the time.</p> + +<p>Mr. Mose found a place for us to stop close to Fort Washita, and +got us places to stay and work. I don't know which direction we were from +Fort Washita, but I know we were not very far. I don't know how many years +we were down in there, but I know it was over two for we worked on crops +at two different places, I remember. Then one day Mr. Mose came and told +us that the War was over and that we would have to root for ourselves after +that. Then he just rode away and I never saw him after that until after +we had got back up into the Choska country. Mammy heard that the Negroes<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> +were going to get equal rights with the Creeks, and that she should go to +the Creek Agency to draw for us, so we set out to try to get back.</p> + +<p>We started out on foot, and would go a little ways each day, and +mammy would try to get a little something to do to get us some food. Two +or three times she got paid in money, so she had some money when we got +back. After three or four days of walking we came across some more Negroes +who had a horse, and mammy paid them to let us children ride and tie with +their children for a day or two. They had their children on the horse, so +two or three little ones would get on with a larger one to guide the horse +and we would ride a while and get off and tie the horse and start walking +on down the road. Then when the others caught up with the horse they would +ride until they caught up with us. Pretty soon the old people got afraid to +have us do that, so we just led the horse and some of the little ones rode +it.</p> + +<p>We had our hardest times when we would get to a river or big creek. +If the water was swift the horse didn't do any good, for it would shy at the +water and the little ones couldn't stay on, so we would have to just wait until +someone came along in a wagon and maybe have to pay them with some of our money +or some of our goods we were bringing back to haul us across. Sometimes we +had to wait all day before anyone would come along in a wagon.</p> + +<p>We were coming north all this time, up through the Seminole Nation, +but when we got to Weeleetka we met a Creek family of freedmen who were going +to the Agency too, and mammy paid them to take us along in their wagon. When +we got to the Agency mammy met a Negro who had seen pappy and knew where he +was, so we sent word to him and he came and found us. He had been through +most of the War in the Union army.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span></p> + +<p>When we got away into the Cherokee country some of them called the +"Pins" helped to smuggle him on up into Missouri and over into Kansas, but +he soon found that he couldn't get along and stay safe unless he went with +the Army. He went with them until the War was over, and was around Gibson +quite a lot. When he was there he tried to find out where we had gone but +said he never could find out. He was in the battle of Honey Springs, he +said, but never was hurt or sick. When we got back together we cleared a +selection of land a little east of the Choska bottoms, near where Clarksville +now is, and farmed until I was a great big girl.</p> + +<p>I went to school at a little school called Blackjack school. I +think it was a kind of mission school and not one of the Creek nation +schools, because my first teacher was Miss Betty Weaver and she was not +a Creek but a Cherokee. Then we had two white teachers, Miss King and +John Kernan, and another Cherokee was in charge. His name was Ross, and +he was killed one day when his horse fell off a bridge across the Verdigris, +on the way from Tullahassee to Gibson Station.</p> + +<p>When I got to be a young woman I went to Okmulgee and worked for +some people near there for several years, then I married Tate Grayson. We +got our freedmen's allotments on Mingo Creek, east of Tulsa, and lived there +until our children were grown and Tate died, then I came to live with my daughter +in Tulsa.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>ROBERT R. GRINSTEAD<br /> +Age 80 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in Lawrence County, Mississippi, February 17, 1857. My +father's name is Elias Grinstead, a German, and my mother's name is Ann Greenstead +after that of her master. I am a son by my mother and her Master. I +have four other half brothers William (Bill) oldest, Albert, Silas, and John.</p> + +<p>I was only eight years of age at freedom and for that reason I was +too young to work and on account of being the son of my Master's I received +no hard treatment and did little or no work. Yet, I wore the same clothing +as did the rest of the slaves: a shirt of lowell for summer and shirt and +trousers for winter and no shoes. I could walk through a briar patch in my +bare feet without sticking one in the bottom of my feet as they were so hard +and resistant.</p> + +<p>I was the only child of my Master as he had no wife. When the War +broke out he went to the War and left the plantation in charge of his overseer +and his two sisters. As the overseers were hard for them to get along +with they were oftener without an overseer as with one, and therefore they +used one of the Negroes as overseer for the most of the time.</p> + +<p>Across the river was another large plantation and slave owner by the +name of Master Wilson. We called him Master too, for he was a close friend +and neighbor to our Mistresses. There was one Negro man slave who decided to +not work after Master went to the War and the white overseer was fired and +the Negro overseer was acting as overseer, so my Mistress gave him a note to +take across the river to Master Wilson. The note was an order to whip this +Negro and as he couldn't read he didn't know what the note contained until +after Master Wilson read it and gave orders to his men to tie him for his whipping. +After this, the whipping was so severe that they never had any more<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> +trouble in making this Negro slave work and they never had to send him back +again to Master Wilson to be whipped. The fun part of this above incidence +was the Negro carried his own note and went alone to be whipped and didn't +know it 'til the lashes was being put on him.</p> + +<p>My Master's plantation was about 2 miles long and 1-1/2 mile wide and he +owned between 30 or 40 slaves. The Negro overseer would wake up the slaves and +have them in the field before they could see how to work each morning and as +they would go to work so soon their breakfast was carried to the field to them. +One morning the breakfast was taken to the field and the slaves were hoeing +cotton and among them was a lad about 15 years of age who could not hoe as fast +as the older slaves and the breakfast was sat at the end of the rows and as +they would hoe out to the end they would eat, and if you would be late hoeing +to the end the first to go to the end would began eating and eat everything. +So, this 15 year old lad in order to get out to eat before everything was gone +did not hoe his row good and the overseer, who was white at this time, whipped +him so severely that he could not eat nor work, that day.</p> + +<p>The Negroes went to church with the white people and joined their +church. The church was Baptist in denomination, and they built a pen in the +church in which the Negroes sat, and when they would take sacrament the +Negroes would be served after the whites were through and one of the Negro +group would pass it around to the others within the pen.</p> + +<p>As there were no dances held on the plantation the Negroes would oftimes +slip off and go at nights to a nearby dance or peanut parching or rice suppers +at nights after work. Some of the slaves would be allowed to make for themselves +rice patches which they would gather and save for the dances. To prepare +this rice for cooking after harvested they would burn a trough into a +log, they called mortar and with a large wooden mallet they called pessel, and +which they would pound upon the rice until hulled and ready for cooking. This<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> +rice would be boiled with just salt and water and eaten as a great feast with +delight.</p> + +<p>During slavery some of the Negro slaves would kill snakes and skin +them and wear these snake skins to prevent being voodooed they said. When +some of the slaves would take sick and the home remedies would fail to cure +them our Mistress would allow one of the Negro men slaves to go to the white +doctor and get some medicine for the patient. The doctor would ask questions +as to the actions of the patient and from said description would send medicine +without ever going to see the patient and his medicine would always cure +the patient of his disease if consulted in time.</p> + +<p>After the news came that brought our freedom a white union officer +with 20 trained Negro soldiers visited the plantations and saw that the +Negroes received their freedom. He would put on a demonstration with his +Negro soldiers by having them line up and then at a command they would all +rush forward and stand their guns up together on the stock end without a one +falling and get back into line and upon another command they would rush +forward and each get his gun again without allowing one to fall and again +reline up.</p> + +<p>When I was large enough to pay attention to my color and to that +of the other slaves I wondered to myself why I was not black like the rest +of the slaves and concluded to myself that I would when I got grown like they +were as I knew not then that I was the son of my Master.</p> + +<p>During the War and as the men and our Master all went to the War the +Negroes or a Negro would have to go to the Mistress' homes each morning and +start fires and never, did I ever hear of a rape case under such close conditions +as Negroes going into the bed rooms each morning of the white mistress +to start fires.</p> + +<p>My first wife was name Tracy Smith. As I had been free for over<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> +12 years. We had ordinary marriage ceremony. I have 11 grown children, 15 or +20 grandchildren and 3 great grandchildren.</p> + +<p>I think Abraham Lincoln was a fine old gentlemen and as to Jeff Davis +I don't think he was what he should have been, and as to Booker T. Washington +I think his idea of educating or training Negroes as servants to serve the +white race appealed more to the white race than the Negroes.</p> + +<p>My viewpoint as to slavery is that it was as much detrimental to +the white race as it was to the Negroes, as one elevated ones minds too highly, +and the other degraded ones mind too lowly.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937]</p> + +<h3>MATTIE HARDMAN<br /> +Age 78 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born January 2, 1859, at Gunalis, Texas. My father's name +was William Tensley and my mother's name Mildred Howard. They was brought +from Virginia. I did have 8 brothers and sisters but all of them are dead.</p> + +<p>My Master was name William Henry Howard. Since I was too young +to work I nursed my sisters' children while they worked. The cooking was +done all up to the general kitchen at Masters house and when slaves come +from work they would send their children up to the kitchen to bring their +meals to their homes in the quarters. Our Mistress would have one of the +cooks to dish up vegetables and she herself would slice or serve the meat +to see that it wasn't wasted, as seemingly it was thought so precious.</p> + +<p>As my mother worked 'round the Big House quite a deal I would +go up to the Big House with her and play with the white children who seemed +to like for me to come to play with them. One day in anger while playing +I called one of the white girls, "old black dog" and they pretended they +would tell their mother (my Mistress) about it. I was scared, as they saw, +and they promised me they would not tell if I'd promise to not do it again, +and which I was so glad to do and be let off so lightly.</p> + +<p>For summer I wore a cotton slip and for winter my mother knitted +at nights after her days work was done so I wore red flannels for underwear +and thick linsey for an over-dress, and had knitted stockings and bought +shoes. As my Master was a doctor he made his slaves wear suitable clothes +in accordance to the weather. We also wore gloves my mother knitted in +winter.</p> + +<p>My Mistress was good to all of the slaves. On Sunday morning she +would make all the Negro children come to the Big House and she would stand<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> +on the front steps and read the Catechism to us who sat or stood in front +on the ground.</p> + +<p>My Master was also good. On Wednesdays and Friday nights he would +make the slaves come up to the Big House and he would read the Bible to them +and he would pray. He was a doctor and very fractious and exact. He didn't +allow the slaves to claim they forgot to do thus and so nor did he allow +them to make the expression, "I thought so and so." He would say to them +if they did: "Who told you, you could think!"</p> + +<p>They had 10 children, 7 boys and 3 girls. Their house was a +large 2-story log house painted white. My father was overseer on the plantation.</p> + +<p>The plantation consisted of 400 acres and about 40 slaves including +children. The slaves were so seldom punished until they never'd worry about +being punished. They treated their slaves as though they loved them. The +poor white neighbors were also good and treated the slaves good, for my +Master would warn them to not bother his Negroes. My Mistress always told +the slaves she wanted all of them to visit her and come to her funeral and +burial when she died and named the men slaves she wanted to be her pallbearers, +all of which was carried out as she planned even though it was after +freedom.</p> + +<p>The slaves even who lived adjoining our plantation would have +church at our Big House. They would hold church on Sundays and Sunday nights.</p> + +<p>As my mother worked a deal for her Mistress she had an inkling or +overheard that they was going to be set free long before the day they were. +She called all the slaves on the plantation together and broke to them this +news after they had promised her they would not spread the news so that it +would get back to our Master. So, everybody kept the news until Saturday<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> +night June 19th, when Master called all the slaves to the big gate and told +them they were all free, but could stay right on in their homes if they had +no places to go and which all of them did. They went right out and gathered +the crop just like they'd always done, and some of them remained there +several years.</p> + +<p>My first husband was name, S. W. Warnley. We had 4 children, 1 +girl and three boys and 3 grandchildren. I now have two grandchildren.</p> + +<p>Now that slavery is over I sometime wish 'twas still existing for +some of our lazy folks, so that so many of them wouldn't or couldn't loaf +around so much lowering our race, walking the streets day by day and running +from house to house living corruptible lives which is keeping the race +down as though there be no good ones among us.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]</p> + +<h3>ANNIE HAWKINS<br /> +Age 90<br /> +Colbert, Okla<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I calls myself 90, but I don't know jest how old I really am but +I was a good sized gal when we moved from Georgia to Texas. We come on a +big boat and one night the stars fell. Talk about being scared! We all run +and hid and hollered and prayed. We thought the end of the world had come.</p> + +<p>I never had no whitefolks that was good to me. We all worked jest +like dogs and had about half enough to eat and got whupped for everything. +Our days was a constant misery to us. I know lots of niggers that was +slaves had a good time but we never did. Seems hard that I can't say anything +good for any of 'em but I sho' can't. When I was small my job was to +tote cool water to the field to the hands. It kept me busy going back and +forth and I had to be sho' my old Mistress had a cool drink when she wanted +it, too. Mother and my sister and me worked in the field all day and come +in time to clear away the things and cook supper. When we was through in +the kitchen we would spin fer a long time. Mother would spin and we would +card.</p> + +<p>My old Master was Dave Giles, the meanest man that ever lived. He +didn't have many slaves, my mammy, and me, and my sister, Uncle Bill, and +Truman. He had owned my grandma but he give her a bad whupping and she never +did git over it and died. We all done as much work as a dozen niggers—we +knowed we had to.</p> + +<p>I seen old Master git mad at Truman and he buckled him down across +a barrel and whupped him till he cut the blood out of him and then he rubbed +salt and pepper in the raw places. It looked like Truman would die it hurt +so bad. I know that don't sound reasonable that a white man in a Christian +community would do such a thing but you can't realize how heartless he was. +People didn't know about it and we dassent tell for we knowed he'd kill us<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> +if we did. You must remember he owned us body and soul and they wasn't anything +we could do about it. Old Mistress and her three girls was mean to +us too.</p> + +<p>One time me and my sister was spinning and old Mistress went to +the well-house and she found a chicken snake and killed it. She brought it +back and she throwed it around my sister's neck. She jest laughed and laughed +about it. She thought it was a big joke.</p> + +<p>Old Master stayed drunk all the time. I reckon that is the reason +he was so fetched mean. My, how we hated him! He finally killed hisself +drinking and I remember Old Mistress called us in to look at him in his +coffin. We all marched by him slow like and I jest happened to look up and +caught my sister's eye and we both jest natchelly laughed—Why shouldn't +we? We was glad he was dead. It's a good thing we had our laugh fer old +Mistress took us out and whupped us with a broomstick. She didn't make us +sorry though.</p> + +<p>Old Master and Mistress lived in a nice big house on top of a hill +and us darkies lived in log cabins with log floors. Our dresses was made +out of coarse cloth like cotton sacking and and [TR: sic] it sho' lasted a long time. +It ort to been called mule-hide for it was about that tough.</p> + +<p>We went to church sometimes. They had to let us do that or folks +would have found out how mean they was to us. Old Master'd give us a pass +to show the patroller. We was glad to git the chance to git away and we +always went to church.</p> + +<p>During the War we seen lots of soldiers. Some of them was Yankees +and some were Sesesh soldiers. My job every day was to take a big tray of +food and set it on a stump about a quarter of a mile from our house. I done +this twice a day and ever time I went back the dishes would be empty. I never<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> +did see nobody and didn't nobody tell me why I was to take the food up there +but of course it was either for soliders [TR: sic] that was scouting 'round or it may +been for some lowdown dirty bushwhacker, and again it might a been for some +of old Master's folks scouting 'round to keep out of the army.</p> + +<p>We was the happiest folks in the world when we knowed we was free. +We couldn't realize it at first but how we did shout and cry for joy when +we did realize it. We was afraid to leave the place at first for fear old +Mistress would bring us back or the pateroller would git us. Old Mistress +died soon after the War and we didn't care either. She didn't never do +nothing to make us love her. We was jest as glad as when old Master died. +I don't know what become of the three gals. They was about grown.</p> + +<p>We moved away jest as far away as we could and I married soon after. +My husband died and I married again. I been married four times and all my +husbands died. The last time I married it was to a man that belonged to a +Indian man, Sam Love. He was a good owner and was one of the best men that +ever lived. My husband never did move far away from him and he loved him +like a father. He always looked after him till he died. My husband has +been dead five years.</p> + +<p>I have had fifteen children. Four pairs of twins, and only four +of them are living. The good Lawd wouldn't let me keep them. I'se lived +through three wars so you see I'se no baby.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937]</p> + +<h3>IDA HENRY<br /> +Age 83<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in Marshall, Texas, in 1854. Me mother was named Millie +Henderson and me father Silas Hall. Me mother was sold in South Carolina +to Mister Hall, who brought her to Texas. Me father was born and raised +by Master John Hall. Me mother's and father's family consisted of five +girls and one boy. My sisters' names were: Margrette, Chalette, Lottie, +Gracy and Loyo, and me brother's name was Dock Howard. I lived with me mother +and father in a log house on Master Hall's plantation. We would be sorry when +dark, as de patrollers would walk through de quarters and homes of de slaves +all times of night wid pine torch lights to whip de niggers found away from +deir home.</p> + +<p>At nights when me mother would slip away for a visit to some of de +neighbors homes, she would raise up the old plank floor to de log cabin and +make pallets on de ground and put us to bed and put the floor back down so +dat we couldn't be seen or found by the patrollers on their stroll around at +nights.</p> + +<p>My grandmother Lottie would always tell us to not let Master catch you +in a lie, and to always tell him de truth.</p> + +<p>I was a house girl to me Mistress and nursed, cooked, and carried de +children to and from school. In summer we girls wore cotton slips and yarn +dresses for winter. When I got married I was dress in blue serge and was de +third person to marry in it. Wedding dresses was not worn after de wedding in +dem days by niggers as we was taught by our Mistress dat it was bad luck to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> +wear de wedding dress after marriage. Therefore, 'twas handed down from one +generation to the other one.</p> + +<p>Me Mistress was sometimes good and sometimes mean. One day de cook was +waiting de table and when passing around de potatoes, old Mistress felt of one +and as hit wasn't soft done, she exclaimed to de cook, "What you bring these +raw potatoes out here for?" and grab a fork and stuck it in her eye and put +hit out. She, de cook, lived about 10 years and died.</p> + +<p>Me Mistress was de mother of five children, Crock, Jim, Boss and two +girls name, Lea and Annie.</p> + +<p>Dere home was a large two-story white house wid de large white posts.</p> + +<p>As me Master went to de War de old overseer tried himself in meanness +over de slaves as seemingly he tried to be important. One day de slaves +caught him and one held him whilst another knocked him in de head and killed +him.</p> + +<p>Master's plantation was about 300 acres and he had 'bout 160 slaves. Before +de slaves killed our overseer, he would work 'em night and day. De slaves +was punished when dey didn't do as much work as de overseer wanted 'em to do.</p> + +<p>He would lock 'em in jail some nights without food and kept 'em dere all +night, and after whipping 'em de next morning would only give 'em bread and +water to work on till noon.</p> + +<p>When a slave was hard to catch for punishment dey would make 'em wear +ball and chains. De ball was 'bout de size of de head and made of lead.</p> + +<p>On Sunday mornings before breakfast our Mistress would call us together, +read de Bible and show us pictures of de Devil in de Bible and tell us dat +if we was not good and if we would steal and tell lies dat old Satan would +git us.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span></p> + +<p>Close to our Master's plantation lived several families of old "poor +white trash" who would steal me Master's hogs and chickens and come and tell +me Mistress dat dey seen some of de slaves knock one of dere hogs in de head. +Dis continued up till Master returned from de War and caught de old white +trash stealing his hogs. De niggers did at times steal Master's hogs and +chickens, and I would put biscuits and pieces of chicken in a sack under me +dress dat hung from me waist, as I waited de table for me Mistress, and later +would slip off and eat it as dey never gave de slaves none of dis sort of food.</p> + +<p>We had church Sundays and our preacher Rev. Pat Williams would preach +and our Master and family and other nearby white neighbors would ofttime +attend our services. De patrollers wouldn't allow de slaves to hold night +services, and one night dey caught me mother out praying. Dey stripped her +naked and tied her hands together and wid a rope tied to de hand cuffs and +threw one end of de rope over a limb and tied de other end to de pommel of +a saddle on a horse. As me mother weighed 'bout 200, dey pulled her up so +dat her toes could barely touch de ground and whipped her. Dat same night she +ran away and stayed over a day and returned.</p> + +<p>During de fall months dey would have corn shucking and cotton pickings +and would give a prize to de one who would pick de highest amount of cotton +or shuck de largest pile of corn. De prize would usually be a suit of clothes +or something to wear and which would be given at some later date.</p> + +<p>We could only have dances during holidays, but dances was held on other +plantations. One night a traveler visiting me Master and wanted his boots +shined. So Master gave de boots to one of de slaves to shine and de slave +put de boots on and went to a dance and danced so much dat his feet swelled +so dat when he returned he could not pull 'em off.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span></p> + +<p>De next morning as de slave did not show up with de boots dey went to +look for him and found him lying down trying to pull de boots off. He told +his Master dat he had put de boots on to shine 'em and could not pull 'em +off. So Master had to go to town and buy de traveler another pair of boots. +Before he could run away de slave was beaten wid 500 lashes.</p> + +<p>De War dat brought our freedom lasted about two years. Me Master went +and carried one of de slaves for a servant. He was kind and good and from +dat day on he never whipped another slave nor did he allow any of his slaves +whipped. Dis time lasted from January to June de 19th when we was set free +in de State of Texas.</p> + +<p>Lincoln and Davis both died short of promise. I means dat dey both +died before dey carried out dere plans and promises for freeing de slaves.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>MORRIS HILLYER<br /> +Age 84 yrs.<br /> +Alderson, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>My father was Gabe Hillyer and my mother was Clarisay Hillyer, and +our home was in Rome, Georgia. Our owner was Judge Hillyer. He was de +last United States senator to Washington, D. C., before de War.</p> + +<p>My mother died when I was only a few days old and the only mother I +ever knew was Judge Hillyer's wife, Miss Jane. Her nine children were +all older than I was and when mother died Miss Jane said mother had raised +her children and she would raise hers. So she took us into her house and +we never lived at de quarters any more. I had two sisters, Sally and +Sylvia, and we had a room in de Big House and sister Sally didn't do +nothing else but look after me. I used to stand with my thumb in my +mouth and hold to Miss Jane's apron while she knitted.</p> + +<p>When Judge Hillyer was elected he sold out his farm and gave his slaves +to his children. He owned about twelve or fourteen slaves at this time. +He gave me and my sister Sylvia to his son, Dr. Hillyer, and my father to +another one of his sons who was studying law. Father stayed with him and +took care of him until he graduated. Father learned to be a good carpenter +while he lived with George Hillyer. George never married until after de +War.</p> + +<p>Dr. Hillyer lived on a big plantation but he practiced medicine all de +time. He didn't have much time to look after de farm but he had good overseers +and they sure didn't beat his slaves or mistreat 'em in any way. Dr. +Hillyer married a rich girl, Miss Mary Cooley, and her father gave her +fifteen slaves when she married and Judge Hillyer gave him five so he had +a purty good start from de first and he knowed how to make money so he was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> +a wealthy man when de Rebellion started.</p> + +<p>My sister and I didn't know how to act when we was sent out there +among strangers. We had to live in de quarters just like de other +niggers, and we didn't especially like it. I guess I was a sort of bad +boy.</p> + +<p>There was several more boys about my age and we didn't have any work +to do but just busy ourselves by getting into mischief. We'd ride de calves, +chase de pigs, kill de chickens, break up hens nests, and in fact do most +everything we hadn't ought to do. Finally they put us to toting water to +de field hands, minding de gaps, taking de cows to pasture and as dat kept +us purty busy we wasn't so bad after dat.</p> + +<p>My happiest days was when I was with de old Judge and Miss Jane. I +can sit here and think of them old times and it seems like it was just +yesterday dat it all happened. He was a great hand to go to town every day +and lounge around wid his cronies. I used to go with him, and my how they +would argue. Sometimes they would get mad and shake their canes in each +other's faces. I guess they was talking politics.</p> + +<p>Our old Master liked cats better than any man I ever saw, and he always +had five or six that followed him about de place like dogs. When he went to +eat they was always close to him and just as soon as he finished he would +always feed them. When he was gone us boys used to throw at his cats or +set de dogs on 'em. We was always careful dat no one saw us for if he had +known about it he would a-whipped us and no mistake. I wouldn't a-blamed him +either, for I like cats now. I think they are lots of company.</p> + +<p>He was a typical Southern gentleman, medium sized, and wore a Van Dyke +beard. He never whipped his slaves, and he didn't have a one dat wouldn't +a-died for him.</p> + +<p>Judge Hillyer had one son, William, dat wouldn't go to college. He<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> +made fun of his brothers for going to school so long, and said that he would +be ashamed to go and stay five or six years. After de War he settled down +and studied law in Judge Akin's office and opened a office in Athens, Georgia, +and he made de best lawyer of them all.</p> + +<p>Us boys used to go hunting with Master William. He hunted rabbits, +quails, squirrels, and sometimes he would kill a deer. He hunted mostly +with dogs. He never used a gun but very little. Lead was so scarce and cost +so much dat he couldn't afford to waste a bullet on rabbits or snakes. He +made his own bullets. The dogs would chase a rabbit into a hollow tree and +we'd take a stick and twist him out. Sometimes we'd have nearly all de hide +twisted off him when we'd git him out.</p> + +<p>Old Judge Hillyer smoked a pipe with a long stem. He used to give me +ten cents a day to fill it for him. He told me I had to have $36 at the end +of the year, but I never made it. There was a store right close to us and +I'd go down there and spend my money for lemon stick candy, ginger cakes, +peanuts, and firecrackers. Old Master knowed I wouldn't save it, and he +didn't care if I did spent it for it was mine to do with just as I pleased.</p> + +<p>Every time a circus come to town I'd run off and they wouldn't see me +again all day. Seemed like I just couldn't help it. I wouldn't take time +to git permission to go. One time to punish me for running off he tied me +up by my thumbs, and I had to stay home while de rest went. I didn't dare +try to git loose and run off for I knowed I'd git my jacket tanned if I did. +Old Master never laid his hand on me, but I knowed he would if I didn't do +as he told me. He never told us twice to do anything either.</p> + +<p>Coins had curious names in them days. A dime was called a thrip. Fourpen +was about the same value as three cents or maybe a little more. It took +three of 'em to make a thrip. There was all sorts of paper money.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span></p> + +<p>Every first Tuesday slaves were brought in from Virginia and sold on de +block. De auctioneer was Cap'n Dorsey. E. M. Cobb was de slave bringer. +They would stand de slaves up on de block and talk about what a fine looking +specimen of black manhood or womanhood dey was, tell how healthy dey was, +look in their mouth and examine their teeth just like they was a horse, and +talk about de kind of work they would be fit for and could do. Young healthy +boys and girls brought the best prices. I guess they figured dat they would +grow to be valuable. I used to stand around and watch de sales take place +but it never entered my mind to be afraid for I knowed old Judge wasn't going +to sell me. I thought I was an important member of his family.</p> + +<p>Old Judge bought every roguish nigger in the country. He'd take him +home and give him the key to everything on de place and say to help hisself. +Soon as he got all he wanted to eat he'd quit being a rogue. Old Judge said +that was what made niggers steal—they was hungry.</p> + +<p>They used to scare us kids by telling us dat a runaway nigger would git +us. De timber was awful heavy in de river bottoms, and dey was one nigger +dat run off from his master and lived for years in these bottoms. He was +there all during de War and come out after de surrender. Every man in dat +country owned him at some time or other. His owner sold him to a man who +was sure he could catch him—he never did, so he sold him to another slave +owner and so on till nearly everybody had him. He changed hands about six +or seven times. They would come in droves with blood hounds and hunt for +him but dey couldn't catch him for he knowed them woods too well. He'd +feed de dogs and make friends with 'em and they wouldn't bother him. He lived +on nuts, fruit, and wild game, and niggers would slip food to him. He'd slip +into town and get whiskey and trade it to de niggers for food.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span></p> + +<p>Judge Hillyer never 'lowanced his niggers and dey could always have +anything on de place to eat. We had so much freedom dat other slave owners +in our neighborhood didn't like for us to come among their slaves for they +said we was free niggers and would make their slaves discontented.</p> + +<p>After I went to live with Judge Hillyer's son, Dr. Hillyer, one of +my jobs was to tote the girls books to school every morning. All the +plantation owners had a colored boy dat did that. After we had toted de +books to de school house we'd go back down de road a piece and line up and +have the "gone-bying-est" fight you ever see. We'd have regular battles. +If I got licked in de morning I'd go home and rest up and I'd give somebody +a good licking dat evening. I reckon I caught up with my fighting for in +all my working life I have always worked with gangs of men of from one to +two-hundred and I never struck a man and no man ever struck me.</p> + +<p>Jim Williams was a patroller, and how he did like to catch a nigger +off de farm without a permit so he could whip him. Jim thought he was de +best man in de country and could whip de best of 'em. One night John +Hardin, a big husky feller, was out late. He met Jim and knowed he was +in for it. Jim said, "John I'm gonna give you a white man's chance. I'm +gonna let you fight me and if you are de best man, well and good."</p> + +<p>John say, "Master Jim, I can't fight wid you. Come on and give me my +licking, and let me go on home."</p> + +<p>But Jim wouldn't do it, and he slapped John and called him some names +and told him he is a coward to fight him. All dis made John awful mad and +he flew into him and give him the terriblest licking a man ever toted. He +went on home but knew he would git into trouble over it.</p> + +<p>Jim talked around over the country about what he was going to do to +John but everybody told him dat he brought it all on hisself. He never<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> +did try to git another nigger to fight with him.</p> + +<p>Yes, I guess charms keep off bad luck. I have wore 'em but money +always was my best lucky piece. I've made lots of money but I never made +good use of it.</p> + +<p>I was always afraid of ghosts but I never saw one. There was a graveyard +beside de road from our house to town and I always was afraid to go by +it. I'd shut my eyes and run for dear life till I was past de grave yard. +I had heard dat there was a headless man dat stayed there on cold rainy +days or foggy nights he'd hide by de fence and throw his head at you. Once +a man got hit and he fell right down dead. I believed dat tale and you can +imagine how I felt whenever I had to go past there by myself and on foot.</p> + +<p>I saw lots of Ku Kluxers but I wasn't afraid of them. I knowed I hadn't +done nothing and they wasn't after me. One time I met a bunch of 'em and one +of 'em said, "Who is dis feller?" Another one said, "Oh, dat's Gabe's foolish +boy, come on, don't bother him." I always did think dat voice sounded natural +but I never did say anything about it. It sounded powerful like one of old +Judge's boys. Dey rode on and didn't bother me and I never was a bit afraid +of 'em any more.</p> + +<p>I went to school one month after de War. I never learned much but I +learned to read some where along de road dat I come over. My father come +from Athens, Georgia, and took us away with him. I learned the carpenter's +trade from him. He was so mean to me dat I run away when I was nineteen. +I went back to Rome, Georgia, and got a job with a bridge gang and spent +two years with 'em. I went then to Henderson, Kentucky, and worked for +ten years. There was hundreds of colored people coming to de mines at +Krebs and Alderson and I decided to come along, too. I never worked in +de mines but I did all sorts of carpentering for them.</p> + +<p>I married in Atoka, Oklahoma, thirty-three years ago. I never had no<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> +children.</p> + +<p>I've made lots of money but somehow it always got away from me. But +me and my wife have our little home here and we are both still able to +work a little, so I guess we are making it all right.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>HAL HUTSON<br /> +Age 90 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born at Galveston, Tennessee, October 12, 1847. There were +11 children: 7 brothers; Andrew, George, Clent, Gilbert, Frank, Mack and +Horace; and 3 girls: Rosie, Marie and Nancy. We were all Hutsons. Together +with my mother and father we worked for the same man whose name was Mr. +Barton Brown, but who we all call Master Brown, and sometimes Mr. Brown.</p> + +<p>Master Brown had a good weather-board house, two story, with five +or six rooms. They lived pretty well. He had eight children. We lived in +one-room log huts. There were a long string of them huts. We slept on the +floor like hogs. Girls and boys slept together—jest everybody slept every +whar. We never knew what biscuits were! We ate "seconds and shorts" (wheat +ground once) for bread. Ate rabbits, possums baked with taters, beans, and +bean soup. No chicken, fish and the like. My favorite dish now is beans.</p> + +<p>Master Brown owned about 36 or 40 slaves, I can't recall jest now, +and about 200 acres of ground. There was very little cotton raised in +Galveston—I mean jest some corn. Sometimes we would shuck corn all night. +He would not let us raise gardens of our own, but didn't mind us raising +corn and a few other truck vegetables to sell for a little spending change.</p> + +<p>I learned to read, write and figger at an early age. Master Brown's +boy and I were the same age you see (14 years old) and he would send me to +school to protect his kids, and I would have to sit up there until school was +out. So while sitting there I listened to what the white teacher was telling +the kids, and caught on how to read, write and figger—but I never let on,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> +'cause if I was caught trying to read or figger dey would whip me something +terrible. After I caught on how to figger the white kids would ask me to +teach them. Master Brown would often say: "My God O'mighty, never do for +that nigger to learn to figger."</p> + +<p>We weren't allowed to count change. If we borrowed a fifty-cent +piece, we would have to pay back a fifty-cent piece—not five dimes or +fifty pennies or ten nickels.</p> + +<p>We went barefooted the year round and wore long shirts split on +each side. All of us niggers called all the whites "poor white trash." The +overseer was nothing but poor white trash and the meanest man that ever walked +on earth. He never did whip me much 'cause I was kind of a pet. I worked up +to the Big House, but he sho' did whip them others. Why, one day he was beating +my mother, and I was too small to say anything, so my big brother heard her +crying and came running, picked up a chunk and that overseer stopped a'beating +her. The white boy was holding her on the ground and he was whipping her with +a long leather whip. They said they couldn't teach her no sense and she said +"I don't wanna learn no sense." The overseer's name was Charlie Clark. One +day he whipped a man until he was bloody as a pig 'cause he went to the mill +and stayed too long.</p> + +<p>The patroller rode all night and iffen we were caught out later than +10:00 o'clock they would beat us, but we would git each other word by sending +a man round way late at night. Always take news by night. Of course the Ku +Klux Klan didn't come 'til after the war. They was something like the patrollers. +Never heard of no trouble between the black and whites 'cause them +niggers were afraid to resist them.</p> + +<p>My biggest job was keeping flies off'n the table up at the Big House. +When time come to go in for the day we would cut up and dance. I can't remember +any of the songs jest now, but we had some that we sung. We danced a whole lots<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> +and jest sung "made up" songs.</p> + +<p>Old Master would stay up to hear us come in. Of course Saturday +afternoon was a holiday. We didn't work no holidays. Master gave us one week +off for Christmas, and never worked us on Sunday, unless the "ox was in the +ditch." When the slaves got sick we had white doctors, and we would wait on +each other. Drink dock root tea, mullin tea, and flaxweed tea, but we never +wore charms.</p> + +<p>I think it's a good thing that slavery's over. It ought to been over +a good while ago. But its going to be slavery all over again if things don't +git better. But I thank God I've been a Christian for 70 years, and now is a +member of Tabernacle Baptist Church and deacon of the church, and a Christian +'cause the Bible teaches me to be.</p> + +<p>That war was a awful thing. I used to pack them soldiers water on +my head, and then I worked at Fort Sill and Fort Dawson in Tennessee. Those +Yankees came by nights—got behind those rebels, and took their hams, drove +horses in the houses, killed their chickens and ate up the rebels food, but the +Yanks didn't bother us niggers.</p> + +<p>When freedom come old Master called us all in from the fields and told +us, "All of you niggers are free as frogs now to go wherever you choose. You +are your own man now." We all continued working for him at $5.00 a month. After +the crops were gathered the niggers scattered out. Some went North—and we +would say when they went North that they had "crossed the water."</p> + +<p>I never married 'till after the War. Married at my mother's house +'cause my wife's mother didn't let us marry at her house, so I sent Jack Perry +after her on a hoss and we had a big dinner—and jest got married.</p> + +<p>I am the father of nine children, but jest three is living. One is +a dentist in Muskogge, Dr. Andrew Hutson. All of the children are pretty well +read. We never had schools for niggers until after slavery.</p> + +<p>I think Abraham Lincoln was a great man, but I don't know much about +Jeff Davis. Booker T. Washington was a fine man.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]</p> + +<h3>WILLIAM HUTSON<br /> +Age 98 yrs.<br /> +Tulsa, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>When a feller gets as old as me it's a heap easier to forget things +than it is to remember, but I ain't never forgot that old plantation where good +old Doctor Allison lived back there in Georgia long before the War that brought +us slaves the freedom.</p> + +<p>I hear the slaves talking about mean masters when I was a boy. They +wasn't talking about Master Allison though, 'cause he was a good man and took +part for the slaves when any trouble come up with the overseer.</p> + +<p>The Mistress' name was Louisa (the same name as the gal I was married +to later after the War), and she was just about as mean as was the old Master +good. I was the house boy when I gets old enough to understand what the Master +wants done and I does it just like he says, so I reckon that's why we always get +along together.</p> + +<p>The Master helped to raise my mammy. When I was born he says to her +(my mammy tells me when I gets older): "Cheney", the old Master say, "that boy +is going be different from these other children. I aims to see that he is. +He's going be in the house all the time, he ain't going work in the fields; he's +going to stay right with me all the time."</p> + +<p>They was about twenty slaves on the plantation but I was the one old +Master called for when he wanted something special for himself. I was the one +he took with him on the trips to town, I was the one who fetch him the cooling +drink after he look about the fields and sometimes I carry the little black +bag when he goes a-doctoring folks with the misery away off some other farm.</p> + +<p>The Master hear about there going be an auction one day and he figgered +maybe he needed some more slaves if they was good ones, so he took me and started<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span> +out early in the morning. It wasn't very far and we got there early before +the auction started. Rockon that was the first time I ever see any slaves sold.</p> + +<p>They was a long platform made of heavy planks and all the slaves was +lined up on the platform, and they was stripped to the waist, men, women, and +children. One or two of the women folks was bare naked. They wasn't young +women neither, just middle age ones, but they was built good. Some of them was +well greased and that grease covered up many a scar they'd earned for some foolishment +or other.</p> + +<p>The Master don't buy none and pretty soon we starts home. The Master +was riding horseback,—he didn't ever use no buggy 'cause he said that was the +way for folks to travel who was too feeble to sit in the saddle—and I rode back +of him on another horse, but that horse I rides is just horse while the Master's +was a real thoroughbred like maybe you see on race tracks down in the South.</p> + +<p>That auction kept bothering me all the way back to the plantation. I +kept seeing them little children standing on the flatform (platform), their +mammy and pappy crying hard 'cause their young'uns is being sold. They was a +lot of heartaches even they was slaves and it gets me worried.</p> + +<p>I asked the Master is he going to have an auction and he jest laugh. +I ain't never sold no slaves yet and I ain't going to, he says. And I gets +easier right then. I kind of hates to think about standing up on one of them +platforms, kinder sorry to leave my old mammy and the Master, so I was easy in +the heart when he talked like that.</p> + +<p>The plantation house was a big frame and the yard was shaded with trees +all around. The Master's children—four boys and two girls—would play in the +yard with me just like I was one of the family. And we'd go hunting and fishing. +There was a creek not far away and they was good fishing in the stream and +squirrels in the trees. Mighty lot of fun to catch them fishes but more fun +when they is all fried brown and ready for to eat with a piece of hot pone.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span> +Ain't no fish ever taste that good since!</p> + +<p>One thing I sort of ponders about. The old Master don't let us have +no religion meetings and reading and writing is something I learn after the +War. Some of the slaves talk about meeting 'round the country and wants to +have preaching on the plantation. Master says NO. No preacher around here to +tell about the Bible and religion will be just a puzzlement, the Master say, +and we let it go at that. I reckon that was the only thing he was set against.</p> + +<p>That and the Yankees. The Master went to the War and stayed 'til +it was most over. He was a mighty sick man when he come back to the old place, +but I was there waiting for him just like always. All the time he was away I +take care around the house. That's what he say for me to do when he rides away +to fight the Yankees. Lot's of talk about the War but the slaves goes right on +working just the same, raising cotton and tobacco.</p> + +<p>The slaves talk a heap about Lincoln and some trys to run away to the +North. Don't hear much about Jeff Davis, mostly Lincoln. He give us slaves the +freedom but we was better off as we was.</p> + +<p>The day of freedom come around just [HW: like] any other day, except the Master +say for me to bring up the horses, we is going to town. That's when he hears +about the slaves being free. We gets to the town and the Master goes into the +store. It's pretty early but the streets was filled with folks talking and I +wonder what makes the Master in such a hurry when he comes out of the store.</p> + +<p>He gets on his horse and tells me to follow fast. When we gets back +to the plantation he sounds the horn calling the slaves. They come in from the +fields and meet 'round back of the kitchen building that stood separate from +the Master's house. They all keeps quiet while the Master talks: "You-all is +free now, and all the rest of the slaves is free too. Nobody owns you now and +nobody going to own you anymore!" That was good news, I reckon, but nobody know<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> +what to do about it.</p> + +<p>The crops was mostly in and the Master wants the folks to stay +'til the crop is finished. They talk about it the rest of that day. They +wasn't no celebration 'round the place, but they wasn't no work after the +Master tells us we is free. Nobody leave the place though. Not 'til in the +fall when the work is through. Then some of us go into the town and gets work +'cause everybody knows the Allison slaves was the right kind of folks to have +around.</p> + +<p>That was the first money I earn and then I have to learn how to spend +it. That was the hardest part 'cause the prices was high and the wages was low.</p> + +<p>Then I moves on and meets the gal that maybe I been looking for, +Louisa Baker, and right away she takes to me and we is married. Ain't been no +other woman but her and she's waiting for me wherever the dead waits for the +living.</p> + +<p>I reckon she won't have so long to wait now, even if I is feeling +pretty spry and got good use of the feets and hands. Ninety-eight years brings +a heap of wear and some of these days the old body'll need a long time rest and +then I'll join her for all the time.</p> + +<p>I is ready for the New Day a-coming!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]</p> + +<h3>MRS. ISABELLA JACKSON<br /> +Age 79 yrs.<br /> +Tulsa, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>"Boom ... Boom! Boom ... Boom!" That's the way the old weaver go +all day long when my sister, Margaret, is making cloth for the slaves down +on old Doc Joe Jackson's plantation in Louisiana.</p> + +<p>That was near the little place of Bunker, and its my birthplace, +and I guess where all Mammy's children were born because she was never sold +but once and nobody but the old Doc ever did own her after she come to his +place.</p> + +<p>He always say couldn't nobody get work out of Mammy but him. I +guess that's just his foolery 'cause if she ain't no good the Old Doc most +likely sell her to some of them white folks in Texas.</p> + +<p>That's what they done to them mean, no account slaves—just send +them to Texas. Them folks sure knew how for to handle 'em!</p> + +<p>But I was talking about my sister, Margaret. I can still see her +weaving the cloth—Boom!... Boom!—and she hear that all the day and get +mighty tired. Sometimes she drop her head and go to sleep. The Mistress +get her then sure. Rap her on the head with almost anything handy, but she +hit pretty easy, just trying to scare her that's all.</p> + +<p>The old Master though, he ain't so easy as that. The whippings +was done by the master and the overseer just tell the old Doc about the +troubles, like the old Doc say:</p> + +<p>"You just watch the slaves and see they works and works hard, but +don't lay on with the whip, because I is the only one who knows how to do +it right!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span></p> + +<p>Maybe the old Master was sickened of whippings from the stories the +slaves told about the plantation that joined ours on the north.</p> + +<p>If they ever was a living Devil that plantation was his home and the +owner was It! That's what the old slaves say, and when I tell you about it +see if I is right.</p> + +<p>That man got so mean even the white folks was scared of him, +'specially if he was filled with drink. That's the way he was most of the +time, just before the slaves was freed.</p> + +<p>All the time we hear about slaves on that place getting whipped or +being locked in the stock—that one of them things where your head and hands +is fastened through holes in a wide board, and you stands there all the day +and all the night—and sometimes we hears of them staying in the stock for +three-four weeks if they trys to run away to the north.</p> + +<p>Sometimes we hears about some slave who is shot by that man while +he is wild with the drink. That's what I'm telling about now.</p> + +<p>Don't nobody know what made the master mad at the old slave—one +of the oldest on the place. Anyway, the master didn't whip him; instead of +that he kills him with the gun and scares the others so bad most of 'em runs +off and hides in the woods.</p> + +<p>The drunk master just drags the old dead slave to the graveyard +which is down in the corner away from the growing crops, and hunts up two of +the young boys who was hiding in the barn. He takes them to dig the grave.</p> + +<p>The master stands watching every move they make, the dead man lays +there with his face to the sky, and the boys is so scared they could hardly +dig. The master keeps telling them to hurry with the digging.</p> + +<p>After while he tells them to stop and put the body in the grave. +They wasn't no coffin, no box, for him. Just the old clothes that he wears +in the fields.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span></p> + +<p>But the grave was too short and they start to digging some more, +but the master stop them. He says to put back the body in the grave, and +then he jumps into the grave hisself. Right on the dead he jumps and stomps +'til the body is mashed and twisted to fit the hole. Then the old nigger is +buried.</p> + +<p>That's the way my Mammy hears it and told it to us children. She +was a Christian and I know she told the truth.</p> + +<p>Like I said, Mammy was never sold only to Master Jackson. But she's +seen them slave auctions where the men, women and children was stripped naked +and lined up so's the buyers could see what kind of animals they was getting +for their money.</p> + +<p>My pappy's name was Jacob Keller and my mother was Maria. They's +both dead long ago, and I'm waiting for the old ship Zion that took my Mammy +away, like we use to sing of in the woods:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"It has landed my old Mammy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It has landed my old Mammy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Get on board, Get on board,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Tis the Old Ship of Zion—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Get on board!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]</p> + +<h3>NELLIE JOHNSON<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I don't know how old I is, but I is a great big half grown gal +when the time of the War come, and I can remember how everything look at that +time, and what all the people do, too.</p> + +<p>I'm pretty nigh to blind right now, and all I can do is set on +this little old front porch and maybe try to keep the things picked up behing +my grandchild and his wife, because she has to work and he is out selling +wood most of the time.</p> + +<p>But I didn't have to live in any such a house during the time I +was young like they is, because I belonged to old Chief Rolley McIntosh, and +my pappy and mammy have a big, nice, clean log house to live in, and everything +round it look better than most renters got these days.</p> + +<p>We never did call old Master anything but the Chief or the General +for that's what everybody called him in them days, and he never did act towards +us like we was slaves, much anyways. He was the mikko of the Kawita +town long before the War and long before I was borned, and he was the chief +of the Lower Creeks even before he got to be the chief of all the Creeks.</p> + +<p>But just at the time of the War the Lower Creeks stayed with him +and the Upper Creeks, at least them that lived along to the south of where +we live, all go off after that old man Gouge, and he take most of the Seminole +too. I hear old Tuskenugge, the big man with the Seminoles, but I never did +see him, nor mighty few of the Seminoles.</p> + +<p>My mammy tells me old General ain't been living in that Kawita +town very many years when I was borned. He come up there from down in the +fork of the river where the Arkansas and the Verdigris run together a little +while after all the last of the Creeks come out to the Territory. His brother<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span> +old Chili McIntosh, live down in that forks of the rivers too, but I don't +think he ever move up into that Kawita town. It was in the narrow stretch +where the Verdigris come close to the Arkansas. They got a pretty good sized +white folks town there now they call Coweta, but the old Creek town was different +from that. The folks lived all around in that stretch between the +rivers, and my old Master was the boss of all of them.</p> + +<p>For a long time after the Civil War they had a court at the new +town called Coweta court, and a school house too, but before I was born they +had a mission school down the Kawita Creek from where the town now is.</p> + +<p>Earliest I can remember about my master was when he come to the +slave settlement where we live and get out of the buggy and show a preacher +all around the place. That preacher named Mr. Loughridge, and he was the +man had the mission down on Kawita Creek before I was born, but at that time +he had a school off at some other place. He git down out the buggy and talk +to all us children, and ask us how we getting along.</p> + +<p>I didn't even know at that time that old Chief was my master, +until my pappy tell me after he was gone. I think all the time he was another +preacher.</p> + +<p>My pappy's name was Jackson McInotsh, and my mammy name was Hagar. +I think old Chief bring them out to the Territory when he come out with his +brother Chili and the rest of the Creek people. My pappy tell me that old +Master's pappy was killed by the Creeks because he signed up a treaty to bring +his folks out here, and old Master always hated that bunch of Creeks that done +that.</p> + +<p>I think old man Gouge was one of the big men in that bunch, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span> +he fit in the War on the Government side, after he done holler and go on so +about the Government making him come out here.</p> + +<p>Old Master have lots of land took up all around that Kawita +place, and I don't know how much, but a lot more than anybody else. He have +it all fenced in with good rail fence, and all the Negroes have all the +horses and mules and tools they need to work it with. They all live in good +log houses they built themselves, and everything they need.</p> + +<p>Old Master's land wasn't all in one big field, but a lot of +little fields scattered all over the place. He just take up land what already +was a kind of prairie, and the niggers don't have to clear up much woods.</p> + +<p>We all live around on them little farms, and we didn't have to +be under any overseer like the Cherokee Negroes had lots of times. We didn't +have to work if they wasn't no work to do that day.</p> + +<p>Everybody could have a little patch of his own, too, and work it +between times, on Saturdays and Sundays if he wanted to. What he made on that +patch belong to him, and the old Chief never bothered the slaves about anything.</p> + +<p>Every slave can fix up his own cabin any way he want to, and pick +out a good place with a spring if he can find one. Mostly the slave houses +had just one big room with a stick-and-mud chimney, just like the poor people +among the Creeks had. Then they had a brush shelter built out of four poles +with a roof made out of brush, set out to one side of the house where they +do the cooking and eating, and sometimes the sleeping too. They set there +when they is done working, and lay around on corn shuck beds, because they +never did use the log house much only in cold and rainy weather.</p> + +<p>Old Chief just treat all the Negroes like they was just hired +hands, and I was a big girl before I knowed very much about belonging to him.</p> + +<p>I was one of the youngest children in my family; only Sammy and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> +Millie was younger than I was. My big brothers was Adam, August and Nero, +and my big sisters was Flora, Nancy and Rhoda. We could work a mighty big patch +for our own selves when we was all at home together, and put in all the work +we had to for the old Master too, but after the War the big children all get +married off and took up land of they own.</p> + +<p>Old Chief lived in a big log house made double with a hall in +between, and a lot of white folks was always coming there to see him about +something. He was gone off somewhere a lot of the time, too, and he just +trusted the Negroes to look after his farms and stuff. We would just go +on out in the fields and work the crops just like they was our own, and he +never come around excepting when we had harvest time, or to tell us what he +wanted planted.</p> + +<p>Sometimes he would send a Negro to tell us to gather up some +chickens or turkeys or shoats he wanted to sell off, and sometimes he would +send after loads of corn and wheat to sell. I heard my pappy say old Chief +and Mr. Chili McIntosh was the first ones to have any wheat in the Territory, +but I don't know about that.</p> + +<p>Along during the War the Negro men got pretty lazy and shiftless, +but my pappy and my big brothers just go right on and work like they always +did. My pappy always said we better off to stay on the place and work good +and behave ourselves because old Master take care of us that way. But on +lots of other places the men slipped off.</p> + +<p>I never did see many soldiers during the War, and there wasn't +any fighting close to where we live. It was kind of down in the bottoms, +not far from the Verdigris and that Gar Creek, and the soldiers would have +bad crossings if the come by our place.</p> + +<p>We did see some whackers riding around sometimes, in little<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> +bunches of about a dozen, but they never did bother us and never did stop. +Some of the Negro girls that I knowed of mixed up with the poor Creeks and +Seminoles, and some got married to them after the War, but none of my family +ever did mix up with them that I knows of.</p> + +<p>Along towards the last of the War I never did see old Chief come +around any more, and somebody say he went down into Texas. He never did come +back that I knows of, and I think he died down there.</p> + +<p>One day my pappy come home and tell us all that the Creek done +sign up to quit the War, and that old Master send word that we all free now +and can take up some land for our own selves or just stay where we is if we +want to. Pappy stayed on that place where he was at until he died.</p> + +<p>I got to be a big girl and went down to work for a Creek family +close to where they got that Checotah town now. At that time it was just all +a scattered settlement of Creeks and they call it Eufaula town. After while +I marry a man name Joe Johnson, at a little settlement they call Rentesville. +He have his freedmen's allotment close to that place, but mine is up on the +Verdigris, and we move up there to live.</p> + +<p>We just had one child, named Louisa, and she married Tom Armstrong. +They had three-four children, but one was named Ton, and it is him I live with +now. My husband's been dead a long, long time now.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]</p> + +<h3>MS. JOSIE JORDAN<br /> +Age 75 yrs.<br /> +840 East King St.,<br /> +Tulsa, Oklahoma.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born right in the middle of the War on the Mark Lowery plantation +at Sparta, in White County, Tennessee, so I don't know anything much +about them slave days except what my mammy told me long years ago. 'Course +I mean the Civil War, for to us colored folks they just wasn't no other war +as meanful as that one.</p> + +<p>My mother she come from Virginia when a little girl, but never nobody +tells me where at my pappy is from. His name was David Lowery when I was born, +but I guess he had plenty other names, for like my mammy he was sold lots of +times.</p> + +<p>Salina was my mammy's name, and she belonged to a Mister Clark, who +sold her and pappy to Mark Lowery 'cause she was a fighting, mule-headed woman.</p> + +<p>It wasn't her fault 'cause she was a fighter. The master who owned +her before Mister Clark was one of them white mens who was always whipping +and beating his slaves and mammy couldn't stand it no more.</p> + +<p>That's the way she tells me about it. She just figgured she would +be better off dead and out of her misery as to be whipped all the time, so +one day the master claimed they was something wrong with her work and started +to raise his whip, but mammy fought back and when the ruckus was over the Master +was laying still on the ground and folks thought he was dead, he got such a +heavy beating.</p> + +<p>Mammy says he don't die and right after that she was sold to Mister +Clark I been telling you about. And mammy was full of misery for a long time<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> +after she was carried to Mark Lowery's plantation where at I was born +during of the War.</p> + +<p>She had two children while belonging to Mister Clark and he +wouldn't let them go with mammy and pappy. That's what caused her misery. +Pappy tried to ease her mind but she jest kept a'crying for her babies, Ann +and Reuban, till Mister Lowery got Clark to leave them visit with her once +a month.</p> + +<p>Mammy always says that Mark Lowery was a good master. But he'd +heard things about mammy before he got her and I reckon was curious to know +if they was all true. Mammy says he found out mighty quick they was.</p> + +<p>It was mammy's second day on the plantation and Mark Lowery acted +like he was going to whip her for something she'd done or hadn't, but mammy +knocked him plumb through the open cellar door. He wasn't hurt, not even +mad for mammy says he climbed out the cellar a'laughing, saying he was +only fooling to see if she would fight.</p> + +<p>But mammy's troubles wasn't over then, for Mark Lowery he got +himself a new young wife (his first wife was dead), and mammy was round of +the house most of the time after that.</p> + +<p>Right away they had trouble. The Mistress was trying to make mammy +hurry up with the work and she hit mammy with the broom stick. Mammy's mule +temper boiled up all over the kitchen and the Master had to stop the fighting.</p> + +<p>He wouldn't whip mammy for her part in the trouble, so the Mistress +she sent word to her father and brothers and they come to Mister Lowery's place.</p> + +<p>They was going to whip mammy, they was good and mad. Master was +good and mad, too, and he warned 'em home.</p> + +<p>"Whip your own slaves." He told them. "Mine have to work and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> +if they're beat up they can't do a days work. Get on home—I'll take care +of this." And they left.</p> + +<p>My folks didn't have no food troubles at Mark Lowery's like they +did somewheres else. I remember mammy told me about one master who almost +starved his slaves. Mighty stingy I reckon he was.</p> + +<p>Some of them slaves was so poorly thin they ribs would kinder +rustle against each other like corn stalks a-drying in the hot winds. But +they gets even one hog-killing time, and it was funny too, mammy said.</p> + +<p>They was seven hogs, fat and ready for fall hog-killing time. +Just the day before old master told off they was to be killed something +happened to all them porkers. One of the field boys found them and come +a-telling the master: "The hogs is all died, now they won't be any meats +for the winter."</p> + +<p>When the master gets to where at the hogs is laying, they's a lot +of Negroes standing round looking sorrow-eyed at the wasted meat. The master +asks: "What's the illness with 'em?"</p> + +<p>"Malitis." They tell him, and they acts like they don't want to +touch the hogs. Master says to dress them anyway for they ain't no more meat +on the place.</p> + +<p>He says to keep all the meat for the slave families, but that's +because he's afraid to eat it hisself account of the hogs' got malitis.</p> + +<p>"Don't you-all know what is malitis?" Mammy would ask the children +when she was telling of the seven fat hogs and seventy lean slaves. And she +would laugh, remembering how they fooled the old master so's to get all them +good meats.</p> + +<p>"One of the strongest Negroes got up early in the morning," Mammy +would explain, "long 'fore the rising horn called the slaves from their cabins.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> +He skitted to the hog pen with a heavy mallet in his hand. When he tapped +Mister Hog 'tween the eyes with that mallet 'malitis' set in mighty quick, but +it was a uncommon 'disease', even with hungry Negroes around all the time."</p> + +<p>Mammy had me three sisters and a brother while on the Lowery +plantation. They was Lisa, Addie, Alice and Lincoln. It was a long time +after the War and we was all freed before we left old Master Lowery.</p> + +<p>Stayed right there where we was at home, working in the fields, +living in the same old cabins, just like before the War. Never did have no +big troubles after the War, except one time the Ku Klux Klan broke up a church +meeting and whipped some of the Negroes.</p> + +<p>The preacher was telling about the Bible days when the Klan rode +up. They was all masked up and everybody crawled under the benches when they +shouted: "We'll make you damn niggers wish you wasn't free!"</p> + +<p>And they just about did. The preacher got the worst whipping, blood +was running from his nose and mouth and ears, and they left him laying on the +floor.</p> + +<p>They whipped the women just like the men, but Mammy and the girls +wasn't touched none and we run all the way back to the cabin. Layed down with +all our clothes on and tried to sleep, but we's too scairt to close our eyes.</p> + +<p>Mammy reckoned old Master Lowery was a-riding with the Klan that +night, else we'd got a flogging too.</p> + +<p>We first moved about a mile from Master Lowery's place and ever week +we'd ask mammy if we children could go see old Master and she'd say: "Yes, +if you-all are good niggers."</p> + +<p>The old Master was always glad to see us children and he would give +us candy and apples and treat us mighty fine.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span></p> + +<p>The old plantations gone, the old Masters gone, the old slaves is +gone, and I'll be a going some of these days, too, for I been here a mighty +long time and they ain't nobody needs me now 'cause I is too old for any good.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>"UNCLE" GEORGE G. KING<br /> +Age 83 yrs<br /> +Tulsa, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>"Prayers for sale.... Prayers for sale...." Uncle George chants +in sing-song fashion as he roams around Tulsa's Greenwood Negro district—pockets +filled with prayer papers that are soiled and dirty with constant +handling.</p> + +<p>But they are potent, Uncle George tells those who fear the +coming of some trouble, disaster or just ordinary misery, and there's a +special prayer for each and every trouble—including one to keep away the +bill collector when the young folks forget to make payments on the radio, +the furniture, the car, or the Spring outfit purchased months ago from the +credit clothier.</p> + +<p>Its all in the Bible and the Bible is his workshop—'cause folks +don't know how to pray.</p> + +<p>He's mighty old, is Uncle George King, and he'll tell you that +he was born on two-hundred acres of Hell, but the whitefolks called it +Samuel Roll's plantation (six miles N.E. of Lexington, South Carolina).</p> + +<p>Kinder small for a plantation, Uncle George explains, but plenty +room for that devil overseer to lay on the lash, and plenty room for the old +she-devil Mistress to whip his mammy til' she was just a piece of living raw +meat!</p> + +<p>The old Master talked hard words, but the Mistress whipped. Lot's +of difference, and Uncle George ought to know, 'cause he's felt the lash +layed on pretty heavy when he was no older than kindergarten children of today.</p> + +<p>The Mistress owned the slaves and they couldn't be sold without +her say-so. That's the reason George was never sold, but the Master once tried<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> +to sell him 'cause the beatings was breaking him down. Old Mistress said +"No", and used it for an excuse to whip his Mammy. Uncle George remembers +that, too.</p> + +<p>They crossed her wrists and tied them with a stout cord. They +made her bend over so that her arms was sticking back between her legs and +fastened the arms with a stick so's she couldn't straighten up.</p> + +<p>He saw the Mistress pull his Mammy's clothes over her head so's +the lash would reach the skin. He saw the overseer lay on the whip with hide +busting blows that left her laying, all a shiver, on the ground, like a +wounded animal dying from the chase.</p> + +<p>He saw the Mistress walk away, laughing, while his Mammy screamed +and groaned—the old Master standing there looking sad and wretched, like he +could feel the blows on Mammy's bared back and legs as much as she.</p> + +<p>The Mistress was a great believer in the power of punishment, +and Uncle George remembers the old log cabin jail built before the War, right +on the plantation, where runaway slaves were stowed away 'till they would +promise to behave themselves.</p> + +<p>The old jail was full up during most of the War. Three runaway +slaves were still chained to its floor when the Master gave word the Negroes +were free.</p> + +<p>They were Prince, Sanovey (his wife), and Henry, who were caught +and whipped by the patrollers, and then brought back to the plantation for +another beating before being locked in jail.</p> + +<p>The Mistress ordered them chained, and the overseer would come +every morning with the same question: "Will you niggers promise not to runaway +no more?"</p> + +<p>But they wouldn't promise. One at a time the overseer would +loosen the chains, and lead them from the jail to cut them with powerful blows<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span> +from the lash, then drag them back to be chained until the next day when +more lickings were given 'cause they wouldn't promise.</p> + +<p>The jail was emptied on the day Master Roll called together all +the men, women and children to tell them they wasn't slaves no more. Uncle +George tells it this way:</p> + +<p>"The Master he says we are all free, but it don't mean we is +white. And it don't mean we is equal. Just equal for to work and earn our +own living and not depend on him for no more meats and clother." [TR: clothes?]</p> + +<p>Food was scarce before the War; it was worse after the shooting +and killing was over, and Uncle George says: "There wasn't no corn bread, +no bacon—just trash eating trash, like when General Sherman marched down +through the country taking everything the soldiers could lug away, and burning +all along the way.</p> + +<p>"Wasn't nothing to eat after he march by. Darkies search 'round +the barns, maybe find some grains of corn in the manure, and they'd parch +the grains—nothing else to eat, except sometimes at night Mammy would skit +out and steal scraps from the Master's house for the children.</p> + +<p>"She had lots of hungry mouths, too. They was seven of us then, +six boys and a girl, Eliza. The boys was Wesley, Simeon, Moses, Peter, +William and me, George. This pappy's name was Griffin.</p> + +<p>"But they was other pappys (Mammy told him) when Eva was born +long before any of us, and Laura come next, but from a white daddy. Mammy +lost them when she was sold around on the markets.</p> + +<p>"The Klan they done lots of riding round the country. One night +the come down to the old slave quarters where the cabins is all squared round +each other, and called everybody outdoors. They's looking for two women.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span></p> + +<p>"They picks 'em out of the crowd right quick and say they been +with white men. Says their children is by white men, and they're going to +get whipped so's they'll remember to stay with their own kind. The women +kick and scream, but the mens grab them and roll them over a barrel and let +fly with the whip."</p> + +<p>It was a long time after the Civil War that Uncle George got his +first schooling or attended regular church meetings. Like he says:</p> + +<p>"Getting up at four o'clock in the morning, hoeing in the fields +all day, doing chores when they come in from the fields, and then piddling +with the weaver 'til nine or ten every night—it just didn't leave no time +for reading and such, even if we was allowed to."</p> + +<p>And religion, that came later too, for during the old plantation +days Uncle George's white folks didn't think a Negro needed religion—there +wasn't a Heaven for Negroes anyhow.</p> + +<p>Finally, though, the Master gave them right to hold meetings +on the plantation, and old Peter Coon was the preacher. The overseer was +there with guards to keep the Negroes from getting too much riled up when +old Peter started talking about Paul or some of the things in the Old Testament. +That's all he would talk about; nothing 'bout Jesus, just Paul and +the Old Testament.</p> + +<p>His Mammy went to every meeting. Like he says: "She knew them +good things was good for her children and she told us about the Bible."</p> + +<p>Like his old Mammy, Uncle George is a firm believer in the power +of the word. "Prayers are saving!" Uncle George says, "But they's lots of +folks' don't know how to pray."</p> + +<p>That's why he has prayers for sale—and he knows they are never +failing, "If you tack 'em up on the wall and say 'em over and over every day +they's sure to be answered."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937]</p> + +<h3>MARTHA KING<br /> +Age 85 yrs.<br /> +McAlester, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"They hung Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They hung Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They hung Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While we go marching on!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Dat was de song de Yankees sang when they marched by our house. +They didn't harm us in any way. I guess de War was over then 'cause a few +days after dat old Master say, "Matt", and I say, "Suh?" He say, "Come here. +You go tell Henry I say come out here and to bring the rest of the niggers +with him." I went to the north door and I say, "Henry, Master Willis say +ever one of you come out here." We all went outside and line up in front of +old Master. He say, "Henry". Henry say, "Yes sah". Old Master say, "Every +one of you is free—as free as I am. You all can leave or stay 'round here +if you want to."</p> + +<p>We all stayed on for a long time 'cause we didn't have no other +home and didn't know how to take keer of ourselves. We was kind of scared +I reckon. Finally I heard my mother was in Walker County, Alabama, and I +left and went to live with her.</p> + +<p>My mother was Harriet Davis and she was born in Virginia. I don't +know who my father was. My grandmother was captured in Africa when she was +a little girl. A big boat was down at the edge of a bay an' the people was +all excited about it an' some of the bravest went up purty close to look at +it. The men on the boat told them to come on board and they could have the +pretty red handkerchiefs, red and blue beads and big rings. A lot of them +went on board and the ship sailed away with them. My grandmother never saw +any of her folks again.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span></p> + +<p>When I was about five years old they brought my grandmother, my +mother and my two aunts and two uncles to Tuskaloosa from Fayettesville, +Alabama. We crossed a big river on a ferry boat. They put us on the "block" +and sold us. I can remember it well. A white man "cried" me off just like +I was a animal or varmint or something. He said, "Here's a little nigger, +who will give me a bid on her. She will make a good house gal someday." +Old man Davis give him $300.00 for me. I don't know whether I was afraid or +not; I don't think I cared just so I had something to eat. I was allus hungry. +Miss Davis' grandmother and one of my aunts and uncles. Old man Davis bought +the rest of us. Uncle Henry looked after me when he could. I could see my +mother once in awhile but not often.</p> + +<p>I had a purty easy time. I didn't have to work very hard 'till I +was about ten years old. I started working in the field and I had to work +in the weaving room too. We made all our own clothes. I spun and wove +cotton and wool. Old Master bought our shoes. We made fancy cloth. We +could stripe the cloth or check it or leave it plain. We also wove coverlids +and jeans to make mens suits out of. I could still do that if I had to.</p> + +<p>We all went to church with the white folks. We didn't have no +colored preachers. The niggers would get happy and shout all over the +place. Sometimes they'd fall out doors.</p> + +<p>The Big House was a double log, two story house, not very fine but +awful comfortable. They was four big fireplace rooms downstairs and two +upstairs. Then they was two sort of shed rooms. There was a big piazza +across the front. The kitchen was a way off from the house, seems like it +was 200 feet at least. Our quarters were close by at the back. He didn't have +many slaves and they was nearly all my kinfolks. There was Aunt Emmy and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> +Phillis, Uncles Henry, Mitchell, Louis and Andy, and the others were Uncle +Logan and Uncle Nathan. They was old Mistress' slaves when she done married.</p> + +<p>Old Master and old Mistress had three boys, Eli, Billy and Dock. +They had to go to war and old Mistress sho' did cry. She say they might get +killed and she might not see 'em any more. I wonder why all dem white folks +didn't think of that when they sold mothers away from they chillun. I had +to be sold away from my mother. Two of her boys was badly wounded but they +all come back.</p> + +<p>Abe Lincoln done everything he could for the niggers. We lost our +best friend when he got killed.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>GEORGE KYE<br /> +Age 110 yrs.<br /> +Fort Gibson, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in Arkansas under Mr. Abraham Stover, on a big farm about +twenty miles north of Van Buren. I was plumb grown when the Civil War +come along, but I can remember back when the Cherokee Indians was in all +that part of the country.</p> + +<p>Joe Kye was my pappy's name what he was born under back in Garrison +County, Virginia, and I took that name when I was freed, but I don't +know whether he took it or not because he was sold off by old Master Stover +when I was a child. I never have seen him since. I think he wouldn't mind +good, leastways that what my mammy say.</p> + +<p>My mammy was named Jennie and I don't think I had any brothers or +sisters, but they was a whole lot of children at the quarters that I played +and lived with. I didn't live with mammy because she worked all the time, +and us children all stayed in one house.</p> + +<p>It was a little one room log cabin, chinked and daubed, and you +couldn't stir us with a stick. When we went to eat we had a big pan and +all ate out of it. One what ate the fastest got the most.</p> + +<p>Us children wore homespun shirts and britches and little slips, +and nobody but the big boys wore any britches. I wore just a shirt until +I was about 12 years old, but it had a long tall down to my calves. Four +or five of us boys slept in one bed, and it was made of hewed logs with +rope laced acrost it and a shuck mattress. We had stew made out of pork +and potatoes, and sometimes greens and pot liquor, and we had ash cake +mostly, but biscuits about once a month.</p> + +<p>In the winter time I had brass toed shoes made on the place, and a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> +cloth cap with ear flaps.</p> + +<p>The work I done was hoeing and plowing, and I rid a horse a lot for +old Master because I was a good rider. He would send me to run chores +for him, like going to the mill. He never beat his negroes but he talked +mighty cross and glared at us until he would nearly scare us to death sometimes.</p> + +<p>He told us the rules and we lived by them and didn't make trouble, +but they was a neighbor man that had some mean negroes and he nearly beat +them to death. We could hear them hollering in the field sometimes. They +would sleep in the cotton rows, and run off, and then they would catch the +cat-o-nine tails sure nuff. He would chain them up, too, and keep them +tied out to trees, and when they went to the field they would be chained +together in bunches sometimes after they had been cutting up.</p> + +<p>We didn't have no place to go to church, but old Master didn't care if +we had singing and praying, and we would tie our shoes on our backs and go +down the road close to the white church and all set down and put our shoes +on and go up close and listen to the service.</p> + +<p>Old Master was baptized almost every Sunday and cussed us all out on +Monday. I didn't join the church until after freedom, and I always was a +scoundrel for dancing. My favorite preacher was old Pete Conway. He was +the only ordained colored preacher we had after freedom, and he married +me.</p> + +<p>Old Master wouldn't let us take herb medicine, and he got all our +medicine in Van Buren when we was sick. But I wore a buckeye on my neck +just the same.</p> + +<p>When the War come along I was a grown man, and I went off to serve<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> +because old Master was too old to go, but he had to send somebody anyways. +I served as George Stover, but every time the sergeant would call +out "Abe Stover", I would answer "Here".</p> + +<p>They had me driving a mule team wagon that Old Master furnished, +and I went with the Sesesh soldiers from Van Buren to Texarkana and back +a dozen times or more. I was in the War two years, right up to the day +of freedom. We had a battle close to Texarkana and another big one near +Van Buren, but I never left Arkansas and never got a scratch.</p> + +<p>One time in the Texarkana battle I was behind some pine trees and the +bullets cut the limbs down all over me. I dug a big hole with my bare +hands before I hardly knowed how I done it.</p> + +<p>One time two white soldiers named Levy and Briggs come to the wagon +train and said they was hunting slaves for some purpose. Some of us black +boys got scared because we heard they was going to Squire Mack and get a +reward for catching runaways, so me and two more lit out of there.</p> + +<p>They took out after us and we got to a big mound in the woods and hid. +Somebody shot at me and I rolled into some bushes. He rid up and got down +to look for me but I was on t'other side of his horse and he never did see +me. When they was gone we went back to the wagons just as the regiment +was pulling out and the officer didn't say nothing.</p> + +<p>They was eleven negro boys served in my regiment for their masters. +The first year was mighty hard because we couldn't get enough to eat. Some +ate poke greens without no grease and took down and died.</p> + +<p>How I knowed I was free, we was bad licked, I reckon. Anyways, we +quit fighting and a Federal soldier come up to my wagon and say: "Whose +mules?" "Abe Stover's mules," I says, and he tells me then, "Let me tell<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> +you, black boy, you are as free now as old Abe Stover his own self!" +When he said that I jumped on top of one of them mules' back before I +knowed anything!</p> + +<p>I married Sarah Richardson, February 10, 1870, and had only eleven +children. One son is a deacon and one grandson is a preacher. I am a good +Baptist. Before I was married I said to the gal's old man, "I'll go to +the mourners bench if you'll let me have Sal," and sure nuff I joined up +just a month after I got her. I am head of the Sunday School and deacon +in the St. Paul Baptist church in Muskogee now.</p> + +<p>I lived about five miles from Van Buren until about twelve years ago +when they found oil and then they run all the negroes out and leased up the +land. They never did treat the negroes good around there anyways.</p> + +<p>I never had a hard time as a slave, but I'm glad we was set free. +Sometimes we can't figger out the best thing to do, but anyways we can +lead our own life now, and I'm glad the young ones can learn and get somewhere +these days.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937]</p> + +<h3>BEN LAWSON<br /> +Age 84 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in Danville, Illinois. De best I can get at my age I +is 84 years old. My father dey tell me was name Dennis Lawson and died before +I was born. My mother's name was Ann Lawson, who I saw once. I was +given by her to my Mistress, Mrs. Jane Brazier, when a kid and she was too. +My mother raised me, she and her son to manhood. I got no brothers or +sisters to my knowledge. I was de only slave dey had and dey raised me to +be humble and fear dem as a slave and servant. As I was de only slave I +slept in de same room wid my Mistress and her son who was grown, her husband +and father being dead.</p> + +<p>I worked on the farm doing general farm work, hoeing, plowing, +harvesting the crop of wheat, corn, barley, oats, rice, peas, etc. To make +and harvest the crops dey would hire poor white help and as dey was +grown and I was a lad, dey kept me in a strain in order to keep up wid dem +for if I didn't it was just too bad for my back. So's dere would be work +for me to do during the bad days of winter dey built a pen under a shed and +dey would lay a cloth on de ground covering the ground in the pen and wid +small mesh wire on top of de pen on which de wheat was laid and wid a wooden +maul I would pounder out wheat all day long, even though dey could have +thrashed it as dey did de biggest part of it.</p> + +<p>At meal time dey would give me what was left of de scraps off dey +table in a plate, which I would eat most de time on de back porch in warm +weather and in de kitchen in winter.</p> + +<p>For summer I wore a lowell shirt and for winter I wore de same old +lowell shirt only wid outing slips and a pair of brogan shoes or a pair of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> +old shoes dat was thrown away by my Mistress' son.</p> + +<p>Their house was a 3-room log house unpainted, wid only one bed room +and a dining room and kitchen.</p> + +<p>The plantation had 'bout 160 acres and was worked by my Mistress' +son and myself plus poor white hired help, my being de only slave.</p> + +<p>I was treated most harshly 'mongst a group of just white people +and who seemed to think me de old work ox for all de hardest work. De nearest +other Negro slaves were 'bout 15 or 20 miles from me.</p> + +<p>When I was grown I ran away one night and walked and rode de rods +under stage coaches to Paducah, Kentucky. I got me a job and worked as a +roustabout on a boat where I learned to gamble wid dice. I fought and gambled +all up and down de Mississippi River, and in de course of time I had 'bout +$3,000, but I lost it.</p> + +<p>I don't know de month or de year I was born in but I can 'member +de sinking of de biggest circus show in de Mississippi River at Mobile, Alabama +when I was 10 to 14 years old, I ain't sure which.</p> + +<p>There wasn't no children for me to play with and it seem like I +never was a child but was just always a man. I wasn't never told dat I was +free, and I didn't know nothing 'bout de War much dat brought my freedom. Dey +kept all of dat away from me and I couldn't read or write so I didn't know.</p> + +<p>I've been married only once. My wife is 54 years old, and her name +is Hattie Lawson. We have no children. Since we married after freedom there +wasn't nothing unusual at our wedding.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]</p> + +<h3>MARY LINDSAY<br /> +Age 91 yrs.<br /> +Tulsa, Oklahoma.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>My slavery days wasn't like most people tell you about, 'cause I was +give to my young Mistress and sent away to Texas when I was jest a little girl, +and I didn't live on a big plantation a very long tine.</p> + +<p>I got an old family Bible what say I was born on September 20, in +1846, but I don't know who put de writing in it unless it was my mammy's +mistress. My mammy had de book when she die.</p> + +<p>My mammy come out to the Indian country from Mississippi two years +before I was born. She was the slave of a Chickasaw part-breed name Sobe +Love. He was the kinsfolks of Mr. Benjamin Love, and Mr. Henry Love what +bring two big bunches of the Chickasaws out from Mississippi to the Choctaw +country when the Chickasaws sign up de treaty to leave Mississippi, and the +whole Love family settle 'round on the Red River below Fort Washita. There +whar I was born.</p> + +<p>My mammy say dey have a terrible hard time again the sickness when +they first come out into that country, because it was low and swampy and all +full of cane brakes, and everybody have the smallpox and the malaria and +fever all the time. Lots of the Chickasaw families nearly died off.</p> + +<p>Old Sobe Love marry her off to a slave named William, what belong to +a full-blood Chickasaw man name Chick-a-lathe, and I was one of de children.</p> + +<p>De children belong to the owner of the mother, and me and my brother +Franklin, what we called "Bruner", was born under the name of Love and then old +Master Sobe bought my pappy William, and we was all Love slaves then. My +mammy had two more girls, name Hatty and Rena.</p> + +<p>My mammy name was Mary, and I was named after her. Old Mistress<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span> +name was Lottie, and they had a daughter name Mary. Old Master Sobe was +powerful rich, and he had about a hundred slaves and four or five big +pieces of that bottom land broke out for farms. He had niggers on all +the places, but didn't have no overseers, jest hisself and he went around +and seen that everybody behave and do they work right.</p> + +<p>Old Master Sobe was a mighty big man in the tribe, and so was all +his kinfolks, and they went to Fort Washita and to Boggy Depot all the time +on business, and leave the Negroes to look after old Mistress and the young +daughter. She was almost grown along about that time, when I can first +remember about things.</p> + +<p>'Cause my name was Mary, and so was my mammy's and my young Mistress' +too. Old Master Sobe called me Mary-Ka-Chubbe to show which Mary he was +talking about.</p> + +<p>Miss Mary have a black woman name Vici what wait on her all the time, +and do the carding and spinning and cooking 'round the house, and Vici belong +to Miss Mary. I never did go 'round the Big House, but jest stayed in the +quarters with my mammy and pappy and helped in the field a little.</p> + +<p>Then one day Miss Mary run off with a man and married him, and old +Master Sobe nearly went crazy! The man was name Bill Merrick, and he was a +poor blacksmith and didn't have two pair of britches to his name, and old +Master Sobe said he jest stole Miss Mary 'cause she was rich, and no other +reason. 'Cause he was a white man and she was mostly Chickasaw Indian.</p> + +<p>Anyways old Master Sobe wouldn't even speak to Mr. Bill, and wouldn't +let him set foot on the place. He jest reared and pitched around, and +threatened to shoot him if he set eyes on him, and Mr. Bill took Miss Mary +and left out for Texas. He set up a blacksmith shop on the big road between +Bonham and Honey Grove, and lived there until he died.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span></p> + +<p>Miss Mary done took Vici along with her, and pretty soon she come back +home and stay a while, and old Master Sobe kind of soften up a little bit +and give her some money to git started on, and he give her me too.</p> + +<p>Dat jest nearly broke my old mammy's and pappy's heart, to have me took +away off from them, but they couldn't say nothing and I had to go along +with Miss Mary back to Texas. When we git away from the Big House I jest +cried and cried until I couldn't hardly see, my eyes was so swole up, but +Miss Mary said she gwine to be good to me.</p> + +<p>I ask her how come Master Sobe didn't give her some of the grown boys +and she say she reckon it because he didn't want to help her husband out none, +but jest wanted to help her. If he give her a man her husband have him working +in the blacksmith shop, she reckon.</p> + +<p>Master Bill Merrick was a hard worker, and he was more sober than most +the men in them days, and he never tell me to do nothing. He jest let Miss +Mary tell me what to do. They have a log house close to the shop, and a +little patch of a field at first, but after awhile he git more land, and then +Miss Mary tell me and Vici we got to help in the field too.</p> + +<p>That sho' was hard living then! I have to git up at three o'clock +sometimes so I have time to water the hosses and slop the hogs and feed +the chickens and milk the cows, and then git back to the house and git the +breakfast. That was during the times when Miss Mary was having and nursing +her two children, and old Vici had to stay with her all the time. Master +Bill never did do none of that kind of work, but he had to be in the shop +sometimes until way late in the night, and sometimes before daylight, to +shoe peoples hosses and oxen and fix wagons.</p> + +<p>He never did tell me to do that work, but he never done it his own +self and I had to do it if anybody do it.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span></p> + +<p>He was the slowest one white man I ever did see. He jest move 'round +like de dead lice falling off'n him all the time, and everytime he go to say +anything he talk so slow that when he say one word you could walk from here +to way over there before he say de next word. He don't look sick, and he +was powerful strong in his arms, but he act like he don't feel good jest the +same.</p> + +<p>I remember when the War come. Mostly by the people passing 'long the +big road, we heard about it. First they was a lot of wagons hauling farm stuff +into town to sell, and then purty soon they was soldiers on the wagons, and they +was coming out into the country to git the stuff and buying it right at the +place they find it.</p> + +<p>Then purty soon they commence to be little bunches of mens in soldier +clothes riding up and down the road going somewhar. They seem like they +was mostly young boys like, and they jest laughing and jollying and going +on like they was on a picnic.</p> + +<p>Then the soldiers come 'round and got a lot of the white men and took +them off to the War even iffen they didn't want to go. Master Bill never did +want to go, 'cause he had his wife and two little children, and anyways he +was gitting all the work he could do fixing wagons and shoeing hosses, with +all the traffic on de road at that time. Master Bill had jest two hosses, +for him and his wife to ride and to work to the buggy, and he had one old yoke +of oxen and some more cattle. He got some kind of a paper in town and he +kept it with him all the time, and when the soldiers would come to git his +hosses or his cattle he would jest draw that paper on 'em and they let 'em +alone.</p> + +<p>By and by the people got so thick on the big road that they was somebody +in sight all the time. They jest keep a dust kicked up all day and all night<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> +'cepting when it rain, and they git all bogged down and be strung all up +and down the road camping. They kept Master Bill in the shop all the time, +fixing the things they bust trying to git the wagons out'n the mud. They +was whole families of them, with they children and they slaves along, and +they was coming in from every place because the Yankees was gitting in their +part of the country, they say.</p> + +<p>We all git mighty scared about the Yankees coming but I don't reckon +they ever git thar, 'cause I never seen none, and we was right on the big +road and we would of seen them. They was a whole lot more soldiers in them +brown looking jeans, round-about jackets and cotton britches a-faunching up +and down the road on their hosses, though. Them hoss soldiers would come +b'iling by, going east, all day and night, and the two-three days later on they +would all come tearing by going west! Dey acted like dey didn't know whar dey +gwine, but I reckon dey did.</p> + +<p>Den Master Bill git sick. I reckon he more wore out and worried than +anything else, but he go down with de fever one day and it raining so hard +Mistress and me and Vici can't neither one go nowhar to git no help.</p> + +<p>We puts peach tree poultices on his head and wash him off all the +time, until it quit raining so Mistress can go out on de road, and then a +doctor man come from one of the bunches of soldiers and see Master Bill. He +say he going be all right and jest keep him quiet, and go on.</p> + +<p>Mistress have to tend de children and Vici have to take care of +Master Bill and look after the house, and dat leave me all by myself wid all +the rest of everything around the place.</p> + +<p>I got to feed all the stock and milk the cows and work in the field +too. Dat the first time I ever try to plow, and I nearly git killed, too! I got me<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> +a young yoke of oxens I broke to pull the wagon, 'cause Vici have to use +the old oxens to work the field. I had to take the wagon and go 'bout +ten miles west to a patch of woods Master Bill owned to git fire wood, +'cause we lived right on a flat patch of prairie, and I had to chop and +haul the wood by myself. I had to git postoak to burn in the kitchen fireplace +and willow for Master Bill to make charcoal out of to burn in his +blacksmith fire.</p> + +<p>Well, I hitch up them young oxen to the plow and they won't follow +the row, and so I go git the old oxens. One of them old oxens didn't know +me and took in after me, and I couldn't hitch 'em up. And then it begins +to rain again.</p> + +<p>After the rain was quit I git the bucket and go milk the cows, and +it is time to water the hosses too, so I starts to the house with the milk +and leading one of the hosses. When I gits to the gate I drops the halter +across my arm and hooks the bucket of milk on my arm too, and starts to +open the gate. The wind blow the gate wide open, and it slap the hoss on +the flank. That was when I nearly git killed!</p> + +<p>Out the hoss go through the gate to the yard, and down the big road, +and my arm all tangled up in the halter rope and me dragging on the ground!</p> + +<p>The first jump knock the wind out of me and I can't git loose, and +that hoss drag me down the road on the run until he meet up with a passel +of soldiers and they stop him.</p> + +<p>The next thing I knowed I was laying on the back kitchen gallery, +and some soldiers was pouring water on me with a bucket. My arm was broke, +and I was stove up so bad that I have to lay down for a whole week, and Mistress +and Vici have to do all the work.</p> + +<p>Jest as I gitting able to walk 'round here come some soldiers and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> +say they come to git Master Bill for the War. He still in the bed sick, +and so they leave a parole paper for him to stay until he git well, and +then he got to go into Bonham and go with the soldiers to blacksmith for them +that got the cannons, the man said.</p> + +<p>Mistress take on and cry and hold onto the man's coat and beg, but it +don't do no good. She say they don't belong in Texas but they belong in the +Chickasaw Nation, but he say that don't do no good, 'cause they living in +Texas now.</p> + +<p>Master Bill jest stew and fret so, one night he fever git way up and +he go off into a kind of a sleep and about morning he died.</p> + +<p>My broke arm begin to swell up and hurt me, and I git sick with it +again, and Mistress git another doctor to come look at it.</p> + +<p>He say I got bad blood from it how come I git so sick, and he git out +his knife out'n his satchel and bleed me in the other arm. The next day he +come back and bleed me again two times, and the next day one more time, and +then I git so sick I puke and he quit bleeding me.</p> + +<p>While I still sick Mistress pick up and go off to the Territory to +her pappy and leave the children thar for Vici and me to look after. After while +she come home for a day or two and go off again somewhere else. Then the next +time she come home she say they been having big battles in the Territory and her +pappy moved all his stuff down on the river, and she home to stay now.</p> + +<p>We git along the best we can for a whole winter, but we nearly starve +to death, and then the next spring when we getting a little patch planted +Mistress go into Bonham and come back and say we all free and the War over.</p> + +<p>She say, "You and Vici jest as free as I am, and a lot freer, I reckon, +and they say I got to pay you if you work for me, but I ain't got no money to +pay you. If you stay on with me and help me I will feed and home you and I +can weave you some good dresses if you card and spin the cotton and wool."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span></p> + +<p>Well, I stayed on, 'cause I didn't have no place to go, and I carded +and spinned the cotton and wool and she make me just one dress. Vici didn't +do nothing but jest wait on the children and Mistress.</p> + +<p>Mistress go off again about a week, and when she come back I see she +got some money, but she didn't give us any of it.</p> + +<p>After while I asked her ain't she got some money for me, and she say +no, ain't she giving me a good home? Den I starts to feeling like I aint +treated right.</p> + +<p>Every evening I git done with the work and go out in the back yard +and jest stand and look off to the west towards Bonham, and wish I was at that +place or some other place.</p> + +<p>Den along come a nigger boy and say he working for a family in Bonham +and he git a dollar every week. He say Mistress got some kinfolks in Bonham +and some of Master Sobe Love's niggers living close to there.</p> + +<p>So one night I jest put that new dress in a bundle and set foot right +down the big road a-walking west, and don't say nothing to nobody!</p> + +<p>Its ten miles into Bonham, and I gits in town about daylight. I keeps +on being afraid, 'cause I con't git it out'n my mind I still belong to Mistress.</p> + +<p>Purty soon some niggers tells me a nigger name Bruner Love living down +west of Greenville, and I know that my brother Franklin, 'cause we all called +him Bruner. I don't remember how all I gits down to Greenville, but I know +I walks most the way, and I finds Bruner. Him and his wife working on a farm, +and they say my sister Hetty and my sister Rena what was little is living with +my mammy way back up on the Red River. My pappy done died in time of the War +and I didn't know it.</p> + +<p>Bruner taken me in a wagon and we went to my mammy, and I lived with +her until she died and Hetty was married. Then I married a boy name Henry +Lindsay. His people was from Georgia and he live with them way west at Cedar<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span> +Mills, Texas. That was right close to Gordonville, on the Red River.</p> + +<p>We live at Cedar Mills until three my children was born and then +we come to the Creek Nation in 1887. My last one was born here.</p> + +<p>My oldest is named Georgia on account of her pappy. He was born +in Georgia and that was in 1838, so his whitefolks got a book that say. My +next child was Henry. We called him William Henry, after my pappy and his +pappy. Then come Donie, and after we come here we had Madison, my youngest +boy.</p> + +<p>I lives with Henry here on this little place we got in Tulsa.</p> + +<p>When we first come here we got some land for $15 an acre from the +Creek Nation, but our papers said we can only stay as long as it is the Creek +Nation. Then in 1901 comes the allotments, and we found out our land belong +to a Creek Indian, and we have to pay him to let us stay on it. After while +he makes us move off and we lose out all around.</p> + +<p>But my daughter Donie git a little lot, and we trade it for this +place about thirty year ago, when this town was a little place.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>MRS. MATTIE LOGAN<br /> +Age 79 yrs.<br /> +Route 5, West Tulsa, Oklahoma.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>This is a mighty fitting time to be telling about the slave days, +for I'm just finished up celebrating my seventy-nine years of being around +and the first part of my life was spent on the old John B. Lewis plantation +down in old Mississippi.</p> + +<p>Yes, sir! my birthday is just over. September 1 it was and the +year was 1858. Borned on the John B. Lewis plantation just ten mile south +of Jackson in the Mississippi country. Rankin County it was.</p> + +<p>My mother's name was Lucinda, and father's name was Levi Miles. +My mother was part Indian, for her mother was a half-blood Cherokee Indian +from Virginia.</p> + +<p>There was children a-plenty besides me. There was Sally, Julia, +Hubbard, Ada, Ira, Anthony, Henry, Amanda, Mary, John, Lucinda, Daniel and +me, Mattie. That was my family.</p> + +<p>The master's family was a large one, too. Six children was +born to the Master and Mistress. Her name, his first wife, was Jennie, the +second and last was named, Louise. The children was, Rebecca, Mollie, +Jennie, Susie, Silas, and Begerlan. They kind of leaned to females.</p> + +<p>My mother belonged to Mistress Jennie who thought a heap of +her, and why shouldn't she? Mother nursed all Miss Jennie's children +because all of her young ones and my mammy's was born so close together it +wasn't no trouble at all for mammy to raise the whole kaboodle of them. I +was born about the same time as the baby Jennie. They say I nursed on one +breast while that white child, Jennie, pulled away at the other!</p> + +<p>That was a pretty good idea for the Mistress, for it didn't keep +her tied to the place and she could visit around with her friends most any +time she wanted 'thout having to worry if the babies would be fed or not.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span></p> + +<p>Mammy was the house girl and account of that and because her +family was so large, the Mistress fixed up a two room cabin right back of +the Big House and that's where we lived. The cabin had a fireplace in one +of the rooms, just like the rest of the slave cabins which was set in a row +away from the Big House. In one room was bunk beds, just plain old two-by-fours +with holes bored through the plank so's ropes could be fastened in +and across for to hold the corn-shuck mattress.</p> + +<p>My brothers and sisters was allowed to play with the Master's +children, but not with the children who belonged to the field Negroes. +We just played yard games like marbles and tossing a ball. I don't +rightly remember much about games, for there wasn't too much fun in them +days even if we did get raised with the Master's family. We wasn't allowed +to learn any reading or writing. They say if they catched a slave learning +them things they'd pull his finger nails off! I never saw that done, though.</p> + +<p>Each slave cabin had a stone fireplace in the end, just like ours, +and over the flames at daybreak was prepared the morning meal. That was +the only meal the field negroes had to cook.</p> + +<p>All the other meals was fixed up by an old man and woman who was +too old for field trucking. The peas, the beans, the turnips, the potatoes, +all seasoned up with fat meats and sometimes a ham bone, was cooked in a big +iron kettle and when meal time come they all gathered around the pot for +a-plenty of helpings! Corn bread and buttermilk made up the rest of the +meal.</p> + +<p>Ten or fifteen hogs was butchered every fall and the slaves +would get the skins and maybe a ham bone. That was all, except what was +mixed in with the stews. Flour was given out every Sunday morning and if +a family run out of that before the next week, well, they was just out that's +all!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span></p> + +<p>The slaves got small amounts of vegetables from the plantation +garden, but they didn't have any gardens of their own. Everybody took what +old Master rationed out.</p> + +<p>Once in a while we had rabbits and fish, but the best dish of all +was the 'possum and sweet potatoes—baked together over red-hot coals in +the fireplace. Now, that was something to eat!</p> + +<p>The Lewis plantation was about three hundred acres, with usually +fifty slaves working on the place. Master Lewis was a trader. He couldn't +sell of our family, for we belonged to Mistress Jennie. Negro girls, the +fat ones who was kinder pretty, was the most sold. Folks wanted them pretty +bad but the Mistress said there wasn't going to be any selling of the girls +who was mammy's children.</p> + +<p>There was no overseer on our place, just the old Master who +did all the bossing. He wasn't too mean, but I've seen him whip Old John. +I'd run in the house to get away from the sight, but I could still hear +Old John yelling, 'Pray, Master! Oh! Pray, Master!', but I guess that there +was more howling than there was hurting at that.</p> + +<p>My uncle Ed Miles run away to the North and joined with Yankees +during the War. He was lucky to get away, for lots of them who tried it +was ketched up by the patrollers. I seen some of them once. They had +chains fastened around their legs, fastened short, too, just long enough +to take a short step. No more running away with them chains anchoring the +feets!</p> + +<p>There wasn't any negro churches close by our plantation. All +the slaves who wanted religion was allowed to join the Methodist church +because that was the Mistress' church.</p> + +<p>A doctor was called in when the slaves would get sick. He'd +give pills for most all the ailments, but once in a while, like when the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> +children would get the whooping cough, some old negro would try to cure +them with home made remedies.</p> + +<p>The whooping cough cure was by using a land turtle. Cut off +his head and drain the blood into a cup. Then take a lump of sugar and +dip in the blood, eat the sugar and the coughing was supposed to stop. +If it did or not I don't know.</p> + +<p>And that makes me think about another cure they use to tell +about. A cure for mean overseers. And I don't mean kill, just scare him, +that's all. They say the cure was tried on an overseer who worked for +Silas Stien, who was a slave owner living close by the Lewis plantation.</p> + +<p>It seems like this overseer was of the meanest kind, always +whipping the slaves for no reason at all, and the slaves tried to figure +out a way to even up with him by chasing him off the place.</p> + +<p>One of the slaves told how to cure him. Get a King snake and +put the snake in the overseer's cabin. Slip the snake in about, no, not +about, but just exactly nine o'clock at night. Seems like the time was +important, why so, I don't remember now.</p> + +<p>That's what the slaves did. Put in the snake and out went the +overseer. Never no more did he whip the slaves on that plantation because +he wasn't working there no more! When he went, when he went, or how he +went nobody knows, but they all say he went. That's what counted—he was +gone!</p> + +<p>The Yankees didn't come around our plantation during the war. +All we heard was, 'They'll kill all the slaves,' and such hearing was +a-plenty!</p> + +<p>After the war some man come to the plantation and told the +field negroes they was free. But he didn't know about the cabin we lived +in and didn't tell my folks nothing about it. They learned about the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> +freedom from the old Master.</p> + +<p>That was some days after the man left the place. The Master +called my mother and father into the Big House and told them they was +free. Free like him. But he didn't want my folks to leave and they +stayed, stayed there three year after they was free to go anywhere they +wanted.</p> + +<p>The master paid them $200 a month to work for him and that +wasn't so much if you stop to figure there was two grown folks and thirteen +children who could do plenty of work around the place.</p> + +<p>But that money paid for an 80-acre farm my folks bought not +far from the old plantation and they moved onto it three year after the +freedom come.</p> + +<p>I think Lincoln was a mighty good man, and I think Roosevelt +is trying to carry some of the good ideas Lincoln had. Lincoln would +have done a heap more if he had lived.</p> + +<p>The young negroes who are living now are selfish and shiftless. +They're not worth two cents and don't have the respect for other folks +to get along right. That's what I think.</p> + +<p>I been married three times, but no children did I have. The +first man was Frank Morris, the next was Jim White, and the last was +John Logan. All gone. Dead.</p> + +<p>From Mississippi I come to Idabel, Oklahoma, in 1909, two year +after statehood. I moved to Muskogee in 1910, staying there while the +times was good and coming to Tulsa some years ago.</p> + +<p>I'm pretty old and can't work hard anymore, but I manage to +get along. I'm glad to be free and I don't believe I could stand them +slavery days now at all.</p> + +<p>I'm my own boss, get up when I want, go to bed the same way. +Nobody to say this or that about what I do.</p> + +<p>Yes, I'm glad to be free!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]</p> + +<h3>KIZIAH LOVE<br /> +Age 93<br /> +Colbert, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>Lawd help us, I sho' remembers all about slavery times for I was a +grown woman, married and had one baby when de War done broke out. That was a +sorry time for some poor black folks but I guess Master Frank Colbert's niggers +was about as well off as the best of 'em. I can recollect things that happened +way back better than I can things that happen now. Funny ain't it?</p> + +<p>Frank Colbert, a full blood Choctaw Indian, was my owner. He owned +my mother but I don't remember much about my father. He died when I was a +little youngun. My Mistress' name was Julie Colbert. She and Master Frank +was de best folks that ever lived. All the niggers loved Master Frank and +knowed jest what he wanted done and they tried their best to do it, too.</p> + +<p>I married Isom Love, a slave of Sam Love, another full-blood Indian +that lived on a jining farm. We lived on Master Frank's farm and Isom went back +and forth to work fer his master and I worked ever day fer mine. I don't +'spect we could of done that way iffen we hadn't of had Indian masters. They +let us do a lot like we pleased jest so we got our work done and didn't run +off.</p> + +<p>Old Master Frank never worked us hard and we had plenty of good food +to eat. He never did like to put us under white overseers and never tried it +but once. A white man come through here and stopped overnight. He looked +'round the farm and told Master Frank that he wasn't gitting half what he +ought to out of his rich land. He said he could take his bunch of hands and +double his amount of corn and cotton.</p> + +<p>Master Frank told him that he never used white overseers, that he +had one nigger that bossed around some when he didn't do it hisself. He also<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> +told the white man that he had one nigger named Bill that was kind of bad, +that he was a good worker but he didn't like to be bothered as he liked to do +his own work in his own way. The white boss told him he wouldn't have any +trouble and that he could handle him all right.</p> + +<p>Old Master hired him and things went very well for a few days. He +hadn't said anything to Bill and they had got along fine. I guess the new +boss got to thinking it was time for him to take Bill in hand so one morning +he told him to hitch up another team before he caught his own team to go to +work.</p> + +<p>Uncle Bill told him that he didn't have time, that he had a lot of +plowing to git done that morning and besides it was customary for every man +to catch his own team. Of course this made the overseer mad and he grabbed +a stick and started cussing and run at Uncle Bill. Old Bill grabbed a single-tree +and went meeting him. Dat white man all on a sudden turned 'round and +run fer dear life and I tell you, he fairly bust old Red River wide open +gitting away from there and nobody never did see hide nor hair of him 'round +to this day.</p> + +<p>Master Colbert run a stage stand and a ferry on Red River and he +didn't have much time to look after his farm and his niggers. He had lots of +land and lots of slaves. His house was a big log house, three rooms on one +side and three on the other, and there was a big open hall between them. There +was a big gallery clean across the front of the house. Behind the house was +the kitchen and the smokehouse. The smokehouse was always filled with plenty +of good meat and lard. They would kill the polecat and dress it and take a +sharp stick and run it up their back jest under the flesh. They would also +run one up each leg and then turn him on his back and put him on top of the +house and let him freeze all night. The next morning they'd pull the sticks<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> +out and all the scent would be on them sticks and the cat wouldn't smell at +all. They'd cook it like they did possum, bake it with taters or make +dumplings.</p> + +<p>We had plenty of salt. We got that from Grand Saline. Our coffee +was made from parched meal or wheat bran. We made it from dried sweet potatoes +that had been parched, too.</p> + +<p>One of our choicest dishes was "Tom Pashofa", an Indian dish. We'd +take corn and beat it in a mortar with a pestle. They took out the husks with +a riddle and a fanner. The riddle was a kind of a sifter. When it was beat +fine enough to go through the riddle we'd put it in a pot and cook it with +fresh pork or beef. We cooked our bread in a Dutch oven or in the ashes.</p> + +<p>When we got sick we would take butterfly root and life-everlasting +and boil it and made a syrup and take it for colds. Balmony and queen's +delight boiled and mixed would make good blood medicine.</p> + +<p>The slaves lived in log cabins scattered back of the house. He +wasn't afraid they'd run off. They didn't know as much as the slaves in the +states, I reckon. But Master Frank had a half brother that was as mean as he +was good. I believe he was the meanest man the sun ever shined on. His name +was Buck Colbert and he claimed he was a patroller. He was sho' bad to whup +niggers. He'd stop a nigger and ask him if he had a pass and even if they +did he'd read it and tell them they had stayed over time and he'd beat 'em +most to death. He'd say they didn't have any business off the farm and to +git back there and stay there.</p> + +<p>One time he got mad at his baby's nurse because she couldn't git +the baby to stop crying and he hit her on the head with some fire-tongs and +she died. His wife got sick and she sent for me to come and take care of her +baby. I sho' didn't want to go and I begged so hard for them not to make me +that they sent an older woman who had a baby of her own so she could nurse<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> +the baby if necessary.</p> + +<p>In the night the baby woke up and got to crying and Master Buck +called the woman and told her to git him quiet. She was sleepy and was sort +of slow and this made Buck mad and he made her strip her clothes off to her +waist and he began to whip her. His wife tried to git him to quit and he +told her he'd beat her iffen she didn't shut up. Sick as as she was she +slipped off and went to Master Frank's and woke him up and got him to go and +make Buck quit whipping her. He had beat her so that she was cut up so bad +she couldn't nurse her own baby any more.</p> + +<p>Master Buck kept on being bad till one day he got mad at one of his +own brothers and killed him. This made another one of his brothers mad and he +went to his house and killed him. Everybody was glad that Buck was dead.</p> + +<p>We had lots of visitors. They'd stop at the stage inn that we kept. +One morning I was cleaning the rooms and I found a piece of money in the bed +where two men had slept. I thought it was a dime and I showed it to my mammy +and she told me it was a five dollar piece. I sho' was happy fer I had been +wanting some hoops fer my skirts like Misstress had so Mammy said she would +keep my money 'til I could send fer the hoops. My brother got my money from +my mammy and I didn't git my hoops fer a long time. Miss Julie give me some +later.</p> + +<p>When me and my husband got married we built us a log cabin about +half-way from Master Frank's house and Master Sam Love's house. I would go to +work at Master Frank's and Isom would go to work at Mister Sam's. One day I +was at home with jest my baby and a runner come by and said the Yankee soldiers +was coming. I looked 'round and I knowed they would git my chickens. I had +'em in a pen right close to the house to keep the varmints from gitting 'em so +I decided to take up the boards in the floor and put 'em in there as the wall +logs come to the ground and they couldn't git out. By the time I got my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span> +chickens under the floor and the house locked tight the soldiers had got so +close I could hear their bugles blowing so I jest fairly flew over to old +Master's house. Them Yankees clumb down the chimbley and got every one of my +chickens and they killed about fifteen of Master Frank's hogs. He went down +to their camp and told the captain about it and he paid him for his hogs and +sent me some money for my chickens.</p> + +<p>We went to church all the time. We had both white and colored +preachers. Master Frank wasn't a Christian but he would help build brush-arbors +fer us to have church under and we sho' would have big meetings I'll +tell you.</p> + +<p>One day Master Frank was going through the woods close to where +niggers was having church. All on a sudden he started running and beating +hisself and hollering and the niggers all went to shouting and saying "Thank +the Lawd, Master Frank has done come through!" Master Frank after a minute +say, "Yes, through the worst of 'em." He had run into a yellow jacket's nest.</p> + + +<p>One night my old man's master sent him to Sherman, Texas. He aimed +to come back that night so I stayed at home with jest my baby. It went to +sleep so I set down on the steps to wait and ever minute I thought I could +hear Isom coming through the woods. All a sudden I heard a scream that fairly +made my hair stand up. My dog that was laying out in the yard give a low growl +and come and set down right by me. He kept growling real low.</p> + +<p>Directly, right close to the house I heard that scream again. It +sounded like a woman in mortal misery. I run into the house and made the dog +stay outside. I locked the door and then thought what must I do. Supposing +Isom did come home now and should meet that awful thing? I heard it again. +It wasn't more'n a hundred yards from the house. The dog scratched on the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span> +door but I dassent open it to let him in. I knowed by this time that it was a +panther screaming. I turned my table over and put it against the opening of +the fireplace. I didn't aim fer that thing to come down the chimbley and git +us.</p> + +<p>Purty soon I heard it again a little mite further away—it was +going on by. I heard a gun fire. Thank God, I said, somebody else heard it +and was shooting at it. I set there on the side of my bed fer the rest of the +night with my baby in my arms and praying that Isom wouldn't come home. He +didn't come till about nine o'clock the next morning and I was that glad to +see him that I jest cried and cried.</p> + +<p>I ain't never seen many sperits but I've seen a few. One day I was +laying on my bed here by myself. My son Ed was cutting wood. I'd been awful +sick and I was powerful weak. I heard somebody walking real light like they +was barefooted. I said, "Who's dat?"</p> + +<p>He catch hold of my hand and he has the littlest hand I ever seen, +and he say, "You been mighty sick and I want you to come and go with me to +Sherman to see a doctor."</p> + +<p>I say, "I ain't got nobody at Sherman what knows me."</p> + +<p>He say, "You'd better come and go with me anyway."</p> + +<p>I jest lay there fer a minute and didn't say nothing and purty soon +he say, "Have you got any water?"</p> + +<p>I told him the water was on the porch and he got up and went outside +and I set in to calling Ed. He come hurrying and I asked him why he didn't +lock the door when he went out and I told him to go see if he could see the +little man and find out what he wanted. He went out and looked everywhere +but he couldn't find him nor he couldn't even find his tracks.</p> + +<p>I always keep a butcher-knife near me but it was between the mattress +and the feather bed and I couldn't get to it. I don't guess it would<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span> +have done any good though fer I guess it was jest a sperit.</p> + +<p>The funniest thing that ever happened to me was when I was a real +young gal. Master and Miss Julie was going to see one of his sisters that was +sick. I went along to take care of the baby fer Miss Julie. The baby was +about a year old. I had a bag of clothes and the baby to carry. I was riding +a pacing mule and it was plumb gentle. I was riding along behind Master Frank +and Miss Julie and I went to sleep. I lost the bag of clothes and never +missed it. Purty soon I let the baby slip out of my lap and I don't know how +far I went before I nearly fell off myself and jest think how I felt when I +missed that baby! I turned around and went back and found the baby setting +in the trail sort of crying. He wasn't hurt a mite as he fell in the grass. +I got off the mule and picked him up and had to look fer a log so I could get +back on again.</p> + +<p>Jest as I got back on Master Frank rode up. He had missed me and +come back to see what was wrong. I told him that I had lost the bag of clothes +but I didn't say anything about losing the baby. We never did find the +clothes and I sho' kept awake the rest of the way. I wasn't going to risk +losing that precious baby again! I guess the reason he didn't cry much was because +he was a Indian baby. He was sho' a sweet baby though.</p> + +<p>Jest before the War people would come through the Territory stealing +niggers and selling 'em in the states. Us women dassent git fur from the +house. We wouldn't even go to the spring if we happened to see a strange +wagon or horsebacker. One of Master Sam Love's women was stole and sold down +in Texas. After freedom she made her way back to her fambly. Master Frank +sent one of my brothers to Sherman on an errand. After several days the mule +come back but we never did see my brother again. We didn't know whether he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span> +run off or was stole and sold.</p> + +<p>I was glad to be free. What did I do and say? Well, I jest clapped +my hands together and said, "Thank God Almighty, I'se free at last!"</p> + +<p>I live on the forty acres that the government give me. I have been +blind for nine years and don't git off my bed much. I live here with my son, +Ed. Isom has been dead for over forty years. I had fifteen children, but +only ten of them are living.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>DANIEL WILLIAM LUCAS<br /> +Age 94 yrs.<br /> +Red Bird, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I remember them slave days well as it was yesterday, and when I get +to remembering the very first thing comes back to me is the little log cabin +where at I lived when I was a slave boy back 'fore the War.</p> + +<p>Just like yesterday—I see that little old cabin standing on a bit +of hill about a quarter-mile from the Master's brick mansion, and I see into +the cabin and there's the old home-made bed with rope cords a-holding up the +corn shuck bedding where on I use to sleep after putting in the day at hoeing +cotton or following a slow time mule team down the corn rows 'till it got so +dark the old overseer just naturally had to call it a day.</p> + +<p>And then I see the old baker swinging in the fireplace. That cooked +up the corn pone to go with the fat side meats the Master Doctor (didn't I +tell you the Master was a doctor?) give us for the meals of the week day. +But on a Sunday morning we always had flour bread, excepting after the War is +over and then we is lucky do we get anything.</p> + +<p>Just like yesterday—I hear the old overseer making round of the +cabins every day at four, and I means in the morning, too, when the night +sleep is the best, and the folkses tumbling out of the door getting ready for +the fields.</p> + +<p>All the mens dressed about the same. Just like me. Wearing the +grey jeans with the blue shirt stuck in loose around the belt, brogan shoes +that feels like brakes on the feet about the hot time of day when the old sun's +a-grinning down like he was saying: "work, niggers, work!" And the overseer +is saying the same thing, only we pays more attention to him 'cause of the whip +he shakes around when the going gets kinder slow down the row.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span></p> + +<p>Now I sees them getting ready for the slave auction. Many of 'em +there was. The Master Doctor done owned about two hundred slaves and sometimes +he sell some for to beat the bad crops.</p> + +<p>There they'd stand on the wooden blocks, their faces greased and +shiny, their arms and bodies pretty well greased too; seemed like they looked +better and stronger that way, maybe some other reason, I dunno. And when the +auction was over lots of the slaves would try to figger out when would the +next one be and worry some afraid they'd be standing up there waiting for the +buyers to punch and slap to see is they sound of limb and able to do the days +work without loafing down the rows.</p> + +<p>There's the old white preacher who tried to tell the slaves about +the Lord. He had a mighty hard job sometimes, 'cause of the teaching was hard +to understand. And then—then he'd just seem to be riled with anger and lay +down the law of the Lord between cuss-words that all the slaves could understand. +So finally I guess everybody was religionized even it was cussed into +'em right from the pulpit!</p> + +<p>That old preacher always makes me think of haunts, 'cause every +evening when I drive up the cows for milking, there's a old, old log cabin +right on the way that I pass every night—and it's so haunted won't nobody +pass it after the darkness covers in the daylight.</p> + +<p>I didn't always get by 'fore then, and the sounds I hear! Like they +was people inside jumping and knocking on the floor, maybe they was dancing, I +dunno. But they was a light in the big room. Wasn't the moon a-shining +through the windows either, 'cause sometimes I would stop at the gate and say +HELLO, then out go the light and the noises would stop quick, like them haunts +was a-scairt as me—and then, then I run like the old preacher's Devil is +after me with all his forks.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span></p> + +<p>Then along come the War. The slaves would go around from cabin to +cabin telling each other about how mean and cruel was the master or the overseer, +and maybe some of them would make for the North. They was the unlucky +ones, 'cause lots of times they was caught.</p> + +<p>And when the patrollers get 'em caught, they was due for a heavy +licking that would last for a long time.</p> + +<p>The slaves didn't know how to travel. The way would be marked when +they'd start North, but somehow they'd get lost, 'cause they didn't know one +direction from another, they was so scairt.</p> + +<p>Just like yesterday—I remember the close of the War. Nothing exciting +about it down on the plantation. Just the old overseer come around and +say:</p> + +<p>"The Yankees has whipped the Rebels and the War is over. But the +Old Master don't want you to leave. He just wants you to stay right on here +where at is your home. That's what the Master say is best for you to do."</p> + +<p>That's what I do, but some of them other slaves is kinder filled up +with the idea of freedom and wants to find out is it good or bad, so they +leave and scatter round.</p> + +<p>But I stays, and the Master Doctor he pays me ten dollars every +month, gives me board and my sleeping place just like always, and when I gets +sick there he is with the herb medicine for my ailment and I is well again.</p> + +<p>It's long after the War before I leaves the old place. And that's +when I gets married in 1885. That was my first licensed wife and we is +married in Holly Springs. Her name was Josephine and we has maybe eight-ten +children, I dunno.</p> + +<p>And I is thankful they ain't none of my children born slaves and +have to remember all them terrible days when we was ruled by the whip—like +I remember it, just like it was yesterday.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937]</p> + +<h3>BERT LUSTER<br /> +Age 85 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I'll be jest frank, I'm not for sho' when I was born, but it was in +1853. Don't know the month, but I was sho' born in 1853 in Watson County, +Tennessee. You see my father was owned by Master Luster and my mother was +owned by Masters Joe and Bill Asterns (father and son). I can remember when +Master Astern moved from Watson County, Tennessee he brought me and my mother +with him to Barnum County Seat, Texas. Master Astern owned about twelve +slaves, and dey was all Astern 'cept Miriah Elmore's son Jim. He owned 'bout +five or six hundred acres of ground, and de slaves raised and shucked all de +corn and picked all de cotton. De whites folks lived in a big double log +house and we slaves lived in log cabins. Our white folks fed us darkies! We +ate nearly ever'thing dey ate. Dey ate turkey, chickens, ducks, geese, fish +and we killed beef, pork, rabbits and deer. Yes, and possums too. And whenever +we killed beef we tanned the hide and dere was a white man who made shoes +for de white folks and us darkies. I tell you I'm not gonna lie, dem white +folks was good to us darkies. We didn't have no mean overseer. Master Astern +and his son jest told us niggers what to do and we did it, but 50 miles away +dem niggers had a mean overseer, and dey called him "poor white trash", "old +whooser", and sometime "old red neck", and he would sho' beat 'em turrible +iffen dey didn't do jest like he wanted 'em to.</p> + +<p>Seem like I can hear dem "nigger hounds" barking now. You see whenever +a darky would get a permit to go off and wouldn't come back dey would put +de "nigger hounds" on his trail and run dat nigger down.</p> + +<p>De white women wove and spin our clothes. You know dey had looms, +spins, and weavers. Us darkies would stay up all night sometime sep'rating<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> +cotton from the seed. When dem old darkies got sleepy dey would prop their +eyes open wid straws.</p> + +<p>Sho', we wore very fine clothes for dem days. You know dey dyed +the cloth with poke berries.</p> + +<p>We cradled de wheat on pins, caught the grain, carried it to de +mill and had it ground. Sho', I ate biscuits and cornbread too. Keep telling +you dat we ate.</p> + +<p>We got de very best of care when we got sick. Don't you let nobody +tell you dem white folks tried to kill out dem darkies 'cause when a darkey +took sick dey would send and git de very best doctors round dat country. Dey +would give us ice water when we got sick. You see we put up ice in saw dust +in winter and when a slave got sick dey give him ice water, sometimes sage tea +and chicken gruel. Dey wanted to keep dem darkies fat so dey could git top +price for 'em. I never saw a slave sold, but my half brother's white folks +let him work and buy hisself.</p> + +<p>I was about 14, and I milked the cows, packed water, seeded cotton, +churned milk up at de Big House and jest first one chore and den another. My +mother cooked up at de Big House.</p> + +<p>Dey was a lot of talk 'bout conjure but I didn't believe in it. +Course dem darkies could do everything to one another, and have one another +scared, but dey couldn't conjure dat overseer and stop him from beating 'em +near to death. Course he didn't flog 'em till dey done sumping.</p> + +<p>I married my woman, Nannie Wilkerson, 58 years ago. Dat was after +slavery, and I love her, honest to God I does. Course in dem days we didn't +buy no license, we jest got permits from old Master and jumped over a broom +stick and jest got married.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span></p> + +<p>I sho' did hate when de Yanks come 'cause our white folks was good +to us, and jest take us right along to church with 'em. We didn't work on +Sad'days or Christmas.</p> + +<p>We raised gardens, truck patches and such for spending change.</p> + +<p>I sho' caught hell after dem Yanks come. Befo' de war, you see de +patroller rode all nite but wouldn't bother a darkey iffen he wouldn't run +off. Why dem darkeys would run off I jest couldn't see.</p> + +<p>Dose Yanks treated old master and mistress so mean. Dey took all +his hams, chickens, and drove his cattle out of the pasture, but didn't bother +us niggers honest. Dey drove old master Aster off'n his own plantation and +we all hid in de corn field.</p> + +<p>My mother took me to Greenville, Texas, 'cause my step-pappy was one +of dem half smart niggers round dere trying to preach and de Ku Klux Klan beat +him half to death.</p> + +<p>Dere was some white folks who would take us to church wid 'em—dis +dis [TR: sic] was aftah the war now—and one night we was all sitting up thar and one +old woman with one leg was dah and when dem Klans shot in amongst us niggers +and white folks aunt Mandy beat all of us home. Yes suh.</p> + +<p>My first two teachers was two white men, and dem Klans shot in de +hotel what dey lived in, but dey had school for us niggers jest de same. +After dat, dose Klans got so bad Uncle Sam sent soljers down dere to keep +peace.</p> + +<p>After de soljers come and run de Klans out we worked hard dat fall +and made good crops. 'Bout three years later I came to Indian Territory in +search of educating my kids.</p> + +<p>I landed here 46 years ago on a farm not far from now Oklahoma City. +I got to be a prosperous farmer. My bale of cotton amongst 5,000 bales won +the blue ribbon at Guthrie, Oklahoma, and dat bale of cotton and being a good<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> +democrat won for me a good job as a clerk on the Agriculture Board at the State +Capitol. All de white folks liked me and still like me and called me "cotton +king."</p> + +<p>I have jest three chillun living. Walter is parcel post clerk here +at de post office downtown. Delia Jenkins, my daughter is a housewife and +Cleo Luckett, my other daughter, a common laborer.</p> + +<p>Have been a christian 20 years. Jest got sorry for my wicked ways. +I am a member of the Church of God. My wife is a member of the Church of +Christ. I'm a good democrat and she is a good republican.</p> + +<p>My fav'rite songs is: "Dark Was the Nite, and Cold the Ground" and +"Couldn't Hear Nobody Pray."</p> + +<p>I'm glad slavery is over, but I don't think dem white folks was +fighting to free us niggers. God freed us. Of course, Abraham Lincoln was a +pretty fine man. Don't know much about Jeff Davis. Never seen him. Yes, and +Booker T. Washington. He was one of the Negro leaders. The first Negro to +represent the Negroes in Washington. He was a great leader.</p> + +<p>During slavery time never heerd of a cullud man committing 'sault on +a white woman. The white and cullud all went to church together too. Niggers +and white shouted alike.</p> + +<p>I remember some of the little games we played now: "Fox in the +wall", "Mollie, Mollie Bride", and "Hide and go seek."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937]</p> + +<h3>STEPHEN McCRAY<br /> +Age 88 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in Huntsville County, Alabama, right where the +Scottsboro boys was in jail, in 1850.</p> + +<p>My parents was Wash and Winnie McCray. They was the mother and +father of 22 chillun. Jest five lived to be grown and the rest died at baby +age. My father's mother and father was named Mandy and Peter McCray, and my +mother's mother and father was Ruthie and Charlie McCray. They all had the same +Master, Mister McCray, all the way thoo'.</p> + +<p>We live in log huts and when I left home grown, I left my folks +living in the same log huts. Beds was put together with ropes and called rope +beds. No springs was ever heard of by white or cullud as I knows of.</p> + +<p>All the work I ever done was pick up chips for my grandma to cook +with. I was kept busy doing this all day.</p> + +<p>The big boys went out and got rabbits, possums and fish. I would sho' +lak to be in old Alabama fishing, 'cause I am a fisherman. There is sho' some +pretty water in Alabama and as swift as cars run here. Water so clear and blue +you can see the fish way down, and dey wouldn't bite to save your life.</p> + +<p>Slaves had their own gardens. All got Friday and Sadday to work in +garden during garden time. I liked cornbread best and I'd give a dollar to git +some of the bread we had on those good old days and I ain't joking. I went in +shirt tail all the time. Never had on no pants 'til I was 15 years old. No +shoes, 'cept two or three winters. Never had a hat 'til I was a great big boy.</p> + +<p>Marriage was performed by getting permission from Master and go where +the woman of your choice had prepared the bed, undress and flat-footed jump a +broom-stick together into the bed.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span></p> + +<p>Master had a brick house for hisself and the overseer. They was the +only ones on the place. The overseer woke up the slaves all the way from 2 +o'clock till 4 o'clock of mornings. He wasn't nothing but white trash. Nothing +else in the world but that. They worked till they couldn't see how to work. +I jest couldn't jedge the size of that big place, and there was a mess of slaves, +not less'n three hundred.</p> + +<p>I doesn't have no eggycation, edgecation, or ejecation, and about all +I can do is spell. I jest spell till I get the pronouncements.</p> + +<p>We had church, but iffen the white folks caught you at it, you was beat +most nigh to death. We used a big pot turned down to keep our voices down. When +we went to hear white preachers, he would say, "Obey your master and mistress." +I am a hard shell-flint Baptist. I was baptised in Pine Bluff, Arkansas. Our +baptizing song was mostly "On Jordan's Stormy Banks I Stand" and our funeral +song was "Hark From The Tomb."</p> + +<p>We had some slaves who would try to run off to the North but the white +folks would catch 'em with blood hounds and beat 'em to death. Them patrollers +done their work mostly at night. One night I was sleeping on cotton and the +patrollers come to our house and ask for water. Happen we had plenty. They +drunk a whole lot and got warm and told my father to be a good nigger and they +wouldn't bother him at all. They raided till General Grant come thoo'. He sent +troops out looking for Klu Klux Klanners and killed 'em jest lak killing black +birds. General Grant was one of the men that caused us to set heah free today +and able to talk together without being killed.</p> + +<p>I didn't and don't believe in no conjure. No sensible person do either. +We had a doctor on the place. Ever master had a doctor who waited on his slaves, +but we wore asafetida or onion 'round our necks to keep off diseases. A dime +was put 'round a teething baby's neck to make it tooth easy, and it sho' helped +too. But today all folks done got 'bove that.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span></p> + +<p>The old folks talked very little of freedom and the chillun knew +nothing at all of it, and that they heard they was daresome to mention it.</p> + +<p>Bushwhacker, nothing but poor white trash, come thoo' and killed all +the little nigger chillun they could lay hands on. I was hid under the house with +a big rag on my mouf many a time. Them Klu Klux after slavery sho' got enough +from them soldiers to last 'em.</p> + +<p>I was married to Kan Pry in 1884. Two chillun was born. The girl is +living and the boy might be, but I don't know. My daughter works out in service.</p> + +<p>I wish Lincoln was here now. He done more for the black face than any +one in that seat. Old Jeff Davis kept slavery up till General Grant met him at +the battle. Lincoln sho' snowed him under. General Grant put fire under him +jest lak I'm fixing to do my pipe. Booker T. Washington was jest all right.</p> + +<p>Every time I think of slavery and if it done the race any good, I think +of the story of the coon and dog who met. The coon said to the dog "Why is it +you're so fat and I am so poor, and we is both animals?" The dog said: "I lay +round Master's house and let him kick me and he gives me a piece of bread right +on." Said the coon to the dog: "Better then that I stay poor." Them's my +sentiment. I'm lak the coon, I don't believe in 'buse.</p> + +<p>I used to be the most wicked man in the world but a voice converted me +by saying, "Friend, friend, why is you better to everybody else than you is to +your self? You are sending your soul to hell." And from that day I lived like +a Christian. People here don't live right and I don't lak to 'tend church. I +base my Christian life on: "Believe in me, trust my work and you shall be saved, +for I am God and beside me there is no other."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>HANNAH McFARLAND<br /> +Age 85 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in Georgetown, South Carolina, February 29, 1853. My +father was name James Gainey and my mother was name Katie Gainey. There was +three chillun born to my folks doing slavery. My father was a free man, but +my mother was de slave of the Sampsons, some Jews. My father was de richest +Negro in South Carolina doing this time. He bought all three of we chillun +for $1,000 apiece, but dem Jews jest wouldn't sell mamma. Dey was mighty +sweet to her. She come home ever night and stayed with us. Doing the day +a Virginian nigger woman stayed with us and she sho' was mean to we chillun. +She used to beat us sumpin' terrible. You know Virginia people is mean to +cullud people. My father bought her from some white folks too.</p> + +<p>We lived in town and in a good house.</p> + +<p>It was a good deal of confusion doing de War. I waited on the Yankees. +Dey captured mamma's white people's house. Dey tried to git mamma to tell dem +jest whut de white folks done done to her and all she could say was dey was good +to her. Shucks, dey wouldn't sell her. She jest told them she had a free husband.</p> + +<p>My father was a blockader. He run rafts from one place to another +and sho' made a lot of money. He was drowned while doing this while I was a +good size child.</p> + +<p>Dem patrollers tied you to a whipping post iffen dey caught you out +after 10 o'clock. They 'tempted to do my mother that way, but my papa sho' +stopped dat. I can't say I lak white people even now, 'cause dey done done +so much agin us.</p> + +<p>I was free, but I couldn't go to school, 'cause we didn't had none. +I been in Oklahoma over 40 years. Have done some traveling and could go some<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> +whar else, but I jest stays here 'cause I ain't got no desire to travel.</p> + +<p>All we ever wore to keep off diseases was asafetida, nothing else.</p> + +<p>I done heard more 'bout conjure in Oklahoma than I ever heerd in +South Carolina. All dat stuff is in Louisiana. I didn't heah nothing 'bout +the Klu Klux Klan till I come to Oklahoma neither. More devilment in Oklahoma +than any place I know. South got more religion too. I jest as soon be +back with the Rebels.</p> + +<p>Bushwhackers whipped you iffen you stayed out late, and sho' nuff +if dey didn't lak you.</p> + +<p>I felt sorry for Jeff Davis when the Yankees drilled him through the +streets. I saw it all. I said, "Mama, Mama, look, dey got old Jeff Davis." +She said, "Be quiet, dey'll lynch you." She didn't know no better! She was +a old slave nigger. I showed the Yankees where the white folks hid their +silver and money and jewelry, and Mamma sho' whipped me about it too. She +was no fool 'bout slavery. Slavery sho' didn't he'p us none to my belief.</p> + +<p>I didn't care much 'bout Lincoln. It was nice of him to free us, +but 'course he didn't want to.</p> + +<p>The overseer was sho' nothing but poor white trash, the kind who +didn't lak niggers and dey still don't, old devils. Don't let 'em fool you, +dey don't lak a nigger a'tall.</p> + +<p>I'm a Methodist. People ought to praise God 'cause he done done so +much for dese sinners. Dey was heap more religious in my early days. I jined +church in 1863. I jined the Holiness so I could git baptized and the Methodist +wouldn't baptize you. After my baptism, I went back to the Methodist Church. +You know my pastor, Reverend Miller, is the first Methodist preacher I ever +knowed that was baptized, and that baptizes everybody.</p> + +<p>I was married in Akin, South Carolina to Andrew Pew. We had 12 +chillun. Jest one boy is my only living child today.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>MARSHALL MACK<br /> +Age 83 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born September 10, 1854. I am the second child of five. My +mother was named Sylvestus Mack and my father Booker Huddleston. I do not +remember my mother's master, 'cause he died before I was born. My Mistress +was named Nancy Mack. She was the mother of six children, four boys and two +girls. Three of dem boys went to the War and one packed and went off somewhar +and nobody heard from him doing of the whole War. But soon as the War +was over he come home and he never told whar he had been.</p> + +<p>I never saw but one grown person flogged during slavery and dat +was my mother. The younger son of my mistress whipped her one morning in de +kitchen. His name was Jack. De slaves on Mistress' place was treated so +good, all de people round and 'bout called us "Mack's Free Niggers." Dis was +14 miles northwest of Liberty, county seat of Bedford County, Virginia.</p> + +<p>One day while de War was going on, my Mistress got a letter from +her son Jim wid jest one line. Dat was "Mother: Jack's brains spattered on +my gun this morning." That was all he written.</p> + +<p>Jack Huddleston owned my father, who was his half-brother, and he +was the meanest man I ever seen. He flogged my father with tobacco sticks +and my mother after these floggings (which I never seen) had to pick splinters +out of his back. My father had to slip off a night to come and visit us. He +lived a mile and a half from our house on the south side of the Blue Ridge +Mountains, and it sho' is a rocky country. He'd oversleep hisself and git up +running. We would stand in our door and hear him running over them rocks til +he got home. He was trying to git dere before his master called him.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span></p> + +<p>It was a law among the slave-holders that if you left your master's +place, you had to have a pass, for if the patroller caught you without one, +he would give you 9 and 30 lashes and carry you to your master, and if he was +mean, you got the same again!</p> + +<p>On the 3-foot fireplace my mother and father cooked ash cakes and +my father having to run to work, had to wash his cakes off in a spring betwixt +our house and his. My mother was the cook in the Big House.</p> + +<p>All the time we would see "nigger traders" coming through the +country. I have seen men and women cuffed to 60-foot chains being took to +Lynchburg, Va., to the block to be sold. Now I am talking 'bout what I know, +for it would not mean one thing for me to lie. I ain't jest heard dis. +My uncle John was a carpenter and always took Mistress' chillun to school +in a two-horse surrey. On sech trips, the chillun learned my uncle to read +and write. Dey slipped and done this, for it was a law among slave-holders +that a slave not be caught wid a book.</p> + +<p>One morning when I was on my way to de mill with a sack of corn, I +had to go down de main pike. I saw sech a fog 'til I rid close enough to see +what was gwine on. I heard someone say "close up." I was told since dat +it was Hood's Raid. They took every slave that could carry a gun. It was +at dis time, Negroes went into de service. Lee was whipping Grant two battles +to one 'til them raids, and den Grant whipped Lee two battles to one, 'cause +he had Negroes in the Union Army. Dey took Negroes and all de white people's +food. Dey killed chickens and picked dem on horseback. I never will forgit +that time long as I live.</p> + +<p>Ever day I had to get the mail for three families. I carried it +around in a bag and each family took his'n out. I guess I was one of the +first Negro mailmen.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span></p> + +<p>We had church on the place and had right good meetings. Everybody +went and took part in the service. We had to have passes to go off the place +to the meetings.</p> + +<p>The children wore just one garment from this time of year (spring) +till the frost fell. Mistress' daughters made dese. We sure kept healthy +and fat.</p> + +<p>I will be 83 years of age September 10, 1937 and am enjoying my +second eyesight. I could not see a thing hardly for some few years, but now +I can read sometimes without glasses. I keep my lawn in first class shape +and work all the time. I think this is 'cause I never was treated bad during +slavery.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937]</p> + +<h3>ALLEN V. MANNING<br /> +Age 87<br /> +Tulsa, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I always been somewhar in the South, mostly in Texas when I was +a young man, and of course us Negroes never got much of a show in court matters, +but I reckon if I had of had the chance to set on a jury I would of +made a mighty poor out at it.</p> + +<p>No sir, I jest can't set in judgement on nobody, 'cause I learned +when I was jest a little boy that good people and bad people—makes no +difference which—jest keep on living and doing like they been taught, and +I jest can't seem to blame them none for what they do iffen they been taught +that way.</p> + +<p>I was born in slavery, and I belonged to a Baptist preacher. Until +I was fifteen years old I was taught that I was his own chattel-property, and +he could do with me like he wanted to, but he had been taught that way too, +and we both believed it. I never did hold nothing against him for being hard +on Negroes sometimes, and I don't think I ever would of had any trouble even +if I had of growed up and died in slavery.</p> + +<p>The young Negroes don't know nothing 'bout that today, and lots +of them are rising up and amounting to something, and all us Negroes is proud +of them. You see, it's because they been taught that they got as good a show +to be something as anybody, if they tries hard.</p> + +<p>Well, this old Negro knows one thing: they getting somewheres 'cause +the young whitefolks is letting them and helping them to do it, 'cause the +whitefolks has been taught the same way, and I praise God its getting to be +that way, too. But it all go to show, people do like they been taught to do.</p> + +<p>Like I say, my master was a preacher and a kind man, but he treated +the Negroes jest like they treated him. He been taught that they was jest<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> +like his work hosses, and if they act like they his work hosses they git +along all right. But if they don't—Oh, oh!</p> + +<p>Like the Dixie song say, I was born "on a frosty mornin'" at the +plantation in Clarke County, Mississippi, in the fall of 1850 they tell me. +The old place looked the same all the time I was a child, clean up to when +we pull out and leave the second year of the War.</p> + +<p>I can shet my eyes and think about it and it seem to come right +up in front of me jest like it looked. From my Pappy's cabin the Big House +was off to the west, close to the big road, and most of the fields stretched +off to the north. They was a big patch of woods off to the east, and no +much open land between us and the Chickasawhay River. Off to the southwest +a few miles was the Bucatunna Creek, and the plantation was kind of in the +forks between them, a little ways east of Quitman, Mississippi.</p> + +<p>Old Master's people been living at that place a mighty long time, +and most the houses and barns was old and been repaired time and time again, +but it was a mighty pretty place. The Big House was built long, with a lot +of rooms all in a row and a long porch, but it wasn't fine like a lot of the +houses we seen as we passed by when we left that place to go to Louisiana.</p> + +<p>Old Master didn't have any overseer hired, but him and his boys looked +after the place and had a Negro we called the driver. We-all shore hated that +old black man, but I forget his name now. That driver never was allowed to +think up nothing for the slaves to do, but jest was told to make them work +hard at what the master and his boys told them to do. Whitefolks had to set +them at a job and then old driver would whoopity and whoopity around, and egg +them and egg them until they finish up, so they can go at something else. He +worked hard hisself, though, and set a mighty hard pattern for the rest to keep +up with. Like I say, he been taught he didn't know how to think, so he didn't +try.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span></p> + +<p>Old Mistress name was Mary, and they had two daughters, Levia and +Betty. Then they had three sons. The oldest was named Bill Junior, and he +was plumb grown when I was a boy, but the other two, Jedson and Jim, was jest +a little older then me.</p> + +<p>Old Master didn't have but two or three single Negroes, but he +had several families, and most of them was big ones. My own family was pretty +good size, but three of the children was born free. Pappy's name was William +and Mammy's was Lucy. My brother Joe was the oldest child and then come +Adeline, Harriet, and Texana and Betty before the surrender, and then Henry, +Mattie and Louisa after it.</p> + +<p>When the War come along old Master jest didn't know what to do. +He always been taught not to raise his hand up and kill nobody—no matter +how come—and he jest kept holding out against all them that was talking +about fighting, and he wouldn't go and fight. He been taught that it was +all right to have slaves and treat them like he want to, but he been taught +it was sinful to go fight and kill to keep them, and he lived up to what he +been taught.</p> + +<p>They was some Choctaw people lived 'round there, and they flew up +and went right off to the War, and Mr. Trot Hand and Mr. Joe Brown that had +plantations on the big road towards Quitman both went off with their grown +boys right at the start, but old Master was a preacher and he jest stayed out +of it. I remember one day I was sent up to the Big House and I heard old +Master and some men out at the gate 'xpounding about the War. Some of the +men had on soldier clothes, and they acted like they was mad. Somebody tell +me later on that they was getting up a home guard because the yankees done +got down in Alabama not far away, but old Master wouldn't go in with them.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span></p> + +<p>Two, three days after that, it seems like, old Master come down to +the quarters and say git everything bundled up and in the wagons for a long +trip. The Negroes all come in and everybody pitch in to help pack up the +wagons. Then old Master look around and he can't find Andy. Andy was one +Negro that never did act like he been taught, and old Master's patience about +wore out with him anyways.</p> + +<p>We all know that Andy done run off again, but we didn't know where +to. Leastwise all the Negroes tell old Master that. But old Master soon +show us we done the work and he done the thinking! He jest goes ahead and +keeps all the Negroes busy fixing up the wagons and bundling up the stuff to +travel, and keeps us all in his sight all the time, and says nothing about +Andy being gone.</p> + +<p>Then that night he sends for a white man name Clements that got +some blood hounds, and him and Mr. Clements takes time about staying awake +and watching all the cabins to see nobody slips out of them. Everybody was +afraid to stick their head out.</p> + +<p>Early next morning we has all the wagons ready to drive right off, +and old Master call Andy's brother up to him. He say, "You go down to that +spring and wait, and when Andy come down to the spring to fill that cedar +bucket you stole out'n the smokehouse for him to git water in you tell him +to come on in here. Tell him I know he is hiding out way down the branch +whar he can come up wading the water clean up to the cornfield and the melon +patch, so the hounds won't git his scent, but I'm going to send the hounds +down there if he don't come on in right now." Then we all knowed we was for +the work and old Master was for the thinking, 'cause pretty soon Andy come +on in. He'd been right whar old Master think he is.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span></p> + +<p>About that time Mr. Sears come riding down the big road. He was +a deacon in old Master's church, and he see us all packed up to leave and +so he light at the big gate and walk up to whar we is. He ask old Master +where we all lighting out for, and old Master say for Louisiana. We Negroes +don't know where that is. Then old deacon say what old Master going to do +with Andy, 'cause there stood Mr. Clements holding his bloodhounds and old +Master had his cat-o-nine-tails in his hand.</p> + +<p>Old Master say just watch him, and he tell Andy if he can make +it to that big black gum tree down at the gate before the hounds git him he +can stay right up in that tree and watch us all drive off. Then he tell +Andy to git!</p> + +<p>Poor Andy jest git hold of the bottom limbs when the blood hounds +grab him and pull him down onto the ground. Time old Master and Mr. Clements +git down there the hounds done tore off all Andy's clothes and bit him all +over bad. He was rolling on the ground and holding his shirt up 'round +his throat when Mr. Clements git there and pull the hounds off of him.</p> + +<p>Then old Master light in on him with that cat-o-nine-tails, and +I don't know how many lashes he give him, but he jest bloody all over +and done fainted pretty soon. Old Deacon Sears stand it as long as he can +and then he step up and grab old Master's arm and say, "Time to stop, Brother! +I'm speaking in the name of Jesus!" Old Master quit then, but he still +powerful mad. I don't think he believe Andy going to make that tree when he +tell him that.</p> + +<p>Then he turn on Andy's brother and give him a good beating too, and +we all drive off and leave Andy setting on the ground under a tree and old +Deacon standing by him. I don't know what ever become of Andy, but I reckon +maybe he went and live with old Deacon Sears until he was free.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span></p> + +<p>When I think back and remember it, it all seems kind of strange, +but it seem like old Master and old Deacon both think the same way. They +kind of understand that old Master had a right to beat his Negro all he +wanted to for running off, and he had a right to set the hounds on him if +he did, but he shouldn't of beat him so hard after he told him he was +going let him off if he made the tree, and he ought to keep his word even if +Andy was his own slave. That's the way both them white men had been taught, +and that was the way they both lived.</p> + +<p>Old Master had about five wagons on that trip down into Louisiana, +but they was all full of stuff and only the old slaves and children could +ride in them. I was big enough to walk most of the time, but one time I +walked in the sun so long that I got sick and they put me in the wagon for +most the rest of the way.</p> + +<p>We would come to places where the people said the Yankees had been +and gone, but we didn't run into any Yankees. They was most to the north of +us I reckon, because we went on down to the south part of Mississippi and +ferried across the big river at Baton Rouge. Then we went on to Lafayette, +Louisiana, before we settled down anywhere.</p> + +<p>All us Negroes thought that was a mighty strange place. We would +hear white folks talking and we couldn't understand what they said, and lots +of the Negroes talked the same way, too. It was all full of French people +around Lafayette, but they had all their menfolks in the Confederate Army +just the same. I seen lots of men in butternut clothes coming and going +hither and yon, but they wasn't in bunches. They was mostly coming home to +see their folks.</p> + +<p>Everybody was scared all the time, and two—three times when old +Master hired his Negroes out to work the man that hired them quit his place<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> +and went on west before they got the crop in. But old Master got a place +and we put in a cotton crop, and I think he got some money by selling his +place in Mississippi. Anyway, pretty soon after the cotton was all in he +moves again and goes to a place on Simonette Lake for the winter. It aint +a bit cold in that place, and we didn't have no fire 'cepting to cook, and +sometimes a little charcoal fire in some crock pots that the people left on +the place when they went on out to Texas.</p> + +<p>The next spring old Master loaded up again and we struck out +for Texas, when the Yankees got too close again. But Master Bill didn't +go to Texas, because the Confederates done come that winter and made him +go to the army. I think they took him to New Orleans, and old Master was +hopping mad, but he couldn't do anything or they would make him go too, +even if he was a preacher.</p> + +<p>I think he left out of there partly because he didn't like the +people at that place. They wasn't no Baptists around anywheres, they +was all Catholics, and old Master didn't like them.</p> + +<p>About that time it look like everybody in the world was going to +Texas. When we would be going down the road we would have to walk along the +side all the time to let the wagons go past, all loaded with folks going +to Texas.</p> + +<p>Pretty soon old Master say git the wagons loaded again, and this +time we start out with some other people, going north. We go north a while +and then turn west, and cross the Sabine River and go to Nachedoches, Texas. +Me and my brother Joe and my sister Adeline walked nearly all the way, but +my little sister Harriet and my mammy rid in a wagon. Mammy was mighty +poorly, and jest when we got to the Sabine bottoms she had another baby. Old +Master didn't like it 'cause it was a girl, but he named her Texana on account<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span> +of where she was born and told us children to wait on Mammy good and maybe +we would get a little brother next time.</p> + +<p>But we didn't. Old Master went with a whole bunch of wagons on +out to the prairie country in Coryell County and set up a farm where we +just had to break the sod and didn't have to clear off much. And the next +baby Mammy had the next year was a girl. We named her Betty because Mistress +jest have a baby a little while before and its name was Betty.</p> + +<p>Old Master's place was right at the corner where Coryell and +McLennan and Bosque Counties come together, and we raised mostly cotton and +jest a little corn for feed. He seem like he changed a lot since we left +Mississippi, and seem like he paid more attention to us and looked after us +better. But most the people that already live there when we git there was +mighty hard on their Negroes. They was mostly hard drinkers and hard talkers, +and they work and fight jest as hard as they talk, too!</p> + +<p>One day Old Master come out from town and tell us that we all been +set free, and we can go or stay jest as we wish. All of my family stay on +the place and he pay us half as shares on all we make. Pretty soon the +whitefolks begin to cut down on the shares, and the renters git only a third +and some less, and the Negroes begin to drift out to other places, but old +Master stick to the halves a year or so after that. Then he come down to a +third too.</p> + +<p>It seem like the white people can't git over us being free, and +they do everything to hold us down all the time. We don't git no schools +for a long time, and I never see the inside of a school. I jest grow up on +hard work. And we can't go 'round where they have the voting, unless we +want to ketch a whipping some night, and we have to jest keep on bowing and +scraping when we are 'round white folks like we did when we was slaves. They +had us down and they kept us down. But that was the way they been taught, +and I don't blame them for it none, I reckon.</p> + +<p>When I git about thirty years old I marry Betty Sadler close to +Waco, and we come up to the Creek Nation forty years ago. We come to Muskogee +first, and then to Tulsa about thirty seven years ago.</p> + +<p>We had ten children but only seven are alive. Three girls and a +boy live here in Tulsa and we got one boy in Muskogee and one at Frederick, +Oklahoma.</p> + +<p>I sells milk and makes my living, and I keeps so busy I don't think +back on the old days much, but if anybody ask me why the Texas Negroes been +kept down so much I can tell them. If they set like I did on the bank at +that ferry across the Sabine, and see all that long line of covered wagons, +miles and miles of them, crossing that river and going west with all they +got left out of the War, it aint hard to understand.</p> + +<p>Them whitefolks done had everything they had tore up, or had to +run away from the places they lived, and they brung their Negroes out to +Texas and then right away they lost them too. They always had them Negroes, +and lots of them had mighty fine places back in the old states, and then they +had to go out and live in sod houses and little old boxed shotguns and turn +their Negroes loose. They didn't see no justice in it then, and most of them +never did until they died. The folks that stayed at home and didn't straggle +all over the country had their old places to live on and their old friends +around them, but them Texans was different.</p> + +<p>So I says, when they done us the way they did they was jest doing +the way they was taught. I don't blame them, because anybody will do that.</p> + +<p>Whitefolks mighty decent to me now, and I always tried to teach my +children to be respectful and act like they think the whitefolks they dealing +with expects them to act. That the way to git along, because some folks been +taught one way and some been taught another, and folks always thinks the way +they been taught.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>BOB MAYNARD, AGE 79<br /> +23 East Choctaw<br /> +Weleetka, Oklahoma.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born near what is now Marlin, Texas, Falls County. +My father was Robert Maynard and my mother was Chanie Maynard, both born +slaves. Our Master, Gerard Branum, was a very old man and wore long white +whiskers. He sho' was a fine built man, and walked straight and tall like +a young man.</p> + +<p>I was too little to do much work so my job was to carry the key +basket for old Mistress. I sho' was proud of that job. The basket held the +keys to the pantry, the kitchen, the linen closet, and extra keys to the rooms +and smokehouse. When old Mistress started out on her rounds every morning she'd +call to me to get de basket and away we'd go. I'd run errands for all the +house help too, so I was kept purty busy.</p> + +<p>The "big house" was a fine one. It was a big two-story white +house made of pine lumber. There was a big porch or veranda across the front +and wings on the east and west. The house faced south. There was big round +white posts that went clean up to the roof and there was a big porch upstairs +too. I believe the house was what you'd call colonial style. There was twelve +or fifteen rooms and a big wide stairway. It was a purty place, with a yard +and big trees and the house that set in a walnut and pecan grove. They was +graveled walks and driveways and all along by the driveway was cedars. There +was a hedge close to the house and a flower garden with purty roses, holly +hocks and a lot of others I don't know the name of.</p> + +<p>Back to the right of the house was the smokehouse, kept full of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span> +meat, and further back was the big barns. Old Master kept a spanking pair +of carriage horses and several fine riding horses. He kept several pairs +of mules, too, to pull the plow. He had some ox teams too.</p> + +<p>To the left and back of the "big house" was the quarters. He +owned about two thousand acres of land and three hundred slaves. He kept a +white overseer and the colored overlooker was my uncle. He sho' saw that the +gang worked. He saw to it that the cotton was took to the gin. They used +oxen to pull the wagons full of cotton. There was two gins on the plantation. +Had to have two for it was slow work to gin a bale of cotton as it was run +by horse power.</p> + +<p>Old Master raised hundreds of hogs; he raised practically all +the food we et. He gave the food out to each family and they done their own +cooking except during harvest. The farm hands was fed at the "big house." +They was called in from the farm by a big bell.</p> + +<p>Sunday was our only day for recreation. We went to church at our +own church, and we could sing and shout jest as loud as we pleased and it didn't +disturb nobody.</p> + +<p>During the week after supper we would all set round the doors outside +and sing or play music. The only musical instruments we had was a jug +or big bottle, a skillet lid or frying pan that they'd hit with a stick or a +bone. We had a flute too, made out of reed cane and it'd make good music. Sometimes +we'd sing and dance so long and loud old Master'd have to make us stop +and go to bed.</p> + +<p>The Patrollers, Ku Kluxers or night riders come by sometimes at +night to scare the niggers and make 'em behave. Sometimes the slaves would +run off and the Patroller would catch 'em and have 'em whipped. I've seen +that done lots of times. They was some wooden stocks (a sort of trough) and +they'd put the darky in this and strap him down, take off his clothers and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> +give him 25 to 50 licks, 'cording to what he had done.</p> + +<p>I reckon old Master had everything his heart could wish for at +this time. Old Mistress was a fine lady and she always went dressed up. She +wore long trains on her skirts and I'd walk behind her and hold her train up +when she made de rounds. She was awful good to me. I slept on the floor in +her little boy's room, and she give me apples and candy just like she did him. +Old Master gave ever chick and child good warm clothes for winter. We had +store boughten shoes but the women made our clothes. For underwear we all +wore 'lowers' but no shirts.</p> + +<p>After the war started old Master took a lot of his slaves and +went to Natchez, Mississippi. He thought he'd have a better chance of keeping +us there I guess, and he was afraid we'd be greed [TR: freed?] and he started running with +us. I remember when General Grant blowed up Vicksburg. I had a free born +Uncle and Aunt who sometimes visited in the North and they'd till us how easy +it was up there and it sho' made us all want to be free.</p> + +<p>I think Abe Lincoln was next to de Lawd. He done all he could +for de slaves; he set 'em free. People in the South knowed they'd lose their +slaves when he was elected president. 'Fore the election he traveled all over +the South and he come to our house and slept in old Mistress' bed. Didn't nobody +know who he was. It was a custom to take strangers in and put them up +for one night or longer, so he come to our house and he watched close. He seen +how the niggers come in on Saturday and drawed four pounds of meat and a peck +of meal for a week's rations. He also saw 'em whipped and sold. When he +got back up north he writ old Master a letter and told him he was going to +have to free his slaves, that everybody was going to have to, that the North +was going to see to it. He also told him that he had visited at his house +and if he doubted it to go in the room he slept in and look on the bedstead<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span> +at the head and he'd see where he'd writ his name. Sho' nuff, there was his +name: A. Lincoln.</p> + +<p>Didn't none of us like Jeff Davis. We all liked Robert E. Lee, +but we was glad that Grant whipped him.</p> + +<p>When the War was over, old Master called all the darkies in and +lined 'em up in a row. He told 'em they was free to go and do as they pleased. +It was six months before any of us left him.</p> + +<p>Darkies could vote in Mississippi. Fred Douglas, a colored man, +came to Natchez and made political speeches for General Grant.</p> + +<p>After the war they was a big steam boat line on the Mississippi +River known as the Robert E. Lee Line. They sho' was fine boats too.</p> + +<p>We used to have lots of Confederate money. Five cent pieces, two +bit pieces, half dollar bills and half dimes. During the war old Master dug +a long trench and buried all de silver ware, fine clothes, jewelry and a lot +of money. I guess he dug it up, but I don't remember.</p> + +<p>Master died three years after the War. He took it purty good, +losing his niggers and all. Lots of men killed theirselves. Old Master was +a good old man.</p> + +<p>I'm getting old, I reckon. I've been married twice and am the +father of 19 chillun. The oldest if 57 and my youngest is two boys, ten and +twelve. I has great grandchillun older than them two boys.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937]</p> + +<h3>JANE MONTGOMERY<br /> +Age 80 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born March 15, 1857, in Homer, Louisiana. I claim to be 75 +years old, but that's jest my way of counting. My mother was Sarah Strong +and my father was Edmond Beavers. We lived in a log cabin that had jest one +door. I had two sisters named Peggy and Katie. Mammy was bought from the +Strong family and my pappy was bought from Beavers by Mister Eason.</p> + +<p>We slept on wooden slabs which was jest make-shift beds. I didn't +do no work in slave times 'cause I was too little. You jest had to be good +and husky to work on that place. I listened and told mammy everything I heerd. +I ate right side dat old white woman on the flo'. I was a little busy-body. +I don't recollect eating in our quarters on Sunday and no other time.</p> + +<p>I don't remember no possums and rabbits being on our place, 'cause +when white folks killed a chicken for their selves, dey killed one for the +niggers. My pappy never ate no cornbread in all his put-together. Meat was +my favorite food. I never ate no dry bread without no meat.</p> + +<p>We wore homespun clothes. My first pair of shoes was squirrel skin. +Mammy had 'em made. We wore clothes called linsey that was wool and cotton +mixed.</p> + +<p>My father was the onliest overseer. It was sho' a great big old +place. My master jest seen the place on Sundays. They was jest seven Niggers +on our plantation. No working late at night but we had to git up at daylight. +When our day's work was done, we went to bed, but sometimes they sung. Sadday +was a holiday from working on the plantation. You had Sadday to wash for +yourself. We didn't do nothing on Christmas and all holidays.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span></p> + +<p>Mistress never whip us and iffen master would start, mistress would +git a gun and make him stop. She said, "Let ever bitch whip her own chillun." +I never seen no patrollers, I jest heerd of 'em. They never come on our place. +I guess they was scared to. The Klu Klux whipped niggers when so never they +could catch 'em. They rid at night mostly.</p> + +<p>I am a Baptist. I belong to Calvary Baptist Church. I was baptized +in a creek. Our favorite hymn was "Dark Was the Night an' Cold the Ground." +Our favorite revival hymn was "Lord I'd Come to Thee, a Sinner Undefiled." +Our favorite funeral song was "Hark From the Tomb."</p> + +<p>My family didn't believe in conjure an' all that stuff, 'though +they's a heap of it was going on and still is for that matter. They had "hands" +that was made up of all kinds of junk. You used 'em to make folks love you +more'n they did. We used asafetida to keep off smallpox and measles. Put +mole foots round a baby's neck to make him teethe easy. We used to use nine +red ants tied in a sack round they neck to make 'em teethe easy and never had +no trouble with 'em neither.</p> + +<p>I think I seen a haunt once, 'cause when I looked the second time, +what I seen the first time was gone.</p> + +<p>When the War was over, mistress' son come home and he cleaned his +guns on my dress tail. It sho' stunk up my dress and made me sick too. He +told old mistress that niggers was free now. I went and told mammy that old +Betsy's son told her the niggers was free and what did he mean. She said, +"Shhhhhh!" They never did jest come out and tell us we was free. We was free +in July and mammy left in September. We lived in Jordan Saline, out from +Smith County. Then my mother give me to my father 'cause she was married to +another man. Her and my step-father moved to Gilmore, Texas. They sent for +me round 'bout Christmas and we lived on Sampers' farm.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span></p> + +<p>We lived so far out, we couldn't go to school, 'though they was for +us. We didn't own no land. Didn't nobody learn me to read and write.</p> + +<p>Abe Lincoln was a good man. It was through Mr. Lincoln that God fit +to free us. I don't know much 'bout Jeff Davis and don't care nothing 'bout +him. Booker T. Washington built that school through God. He used to live in +a cabin jest lak I done. He was sho' a great man.</p> + +<p>I married Trole Kemp in 1883. I 'mind you they didn't marry in +slavery, they jest took up. Master jest give a permit. I am the mother of +10 chillun and 5 grandchillun. Four of my chillun died young. Them what's +living is doing different things sech as: writing policy, working on made +work, housework, government clerk and hotel maid. One is in the pen.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 13 1937]</p> + +<h3>AMANDA OLIVER<br /> +Age 80 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I 'membuh what my mother say—I was born November 9, 1857, in +Missouri. I was 'bout eight years old, when she was sold to a master named +Harrison Davis. They said he had two farms in Missouri, but when he moved +to northern Texas he brought me, my mother, Uncle George, Uncle Dick and a +cullud girl they said was 15 with 'im. He owned 'bout 6 acres on de edge of +town near Sherman, Texas, and my mother and 'em was all de slaves he had. +They said he sold off some of de folks.</p> + +<p>We didn't have no overseers in northern Texas, but in southern +Texas dey did. Dey didn't raise cotton either; but dey raised a whole lots +of corn. Sometime de men would shuck corn all night long. Whenever dey was +going to shuck all night de women would piece quilts while de men shuck de +corn and you could hear 'em singing and shucking corn. After de cornshucking, +de cullud folks would have big dances.</p> + +<p>Master Davis lived in a big white frame house. My mother lived +in the yard in a big one-room log hut with a brick chimney. De logs was +"pinted" (what dey call plastered now with lime). I don't know whether young +folks know much 'bout dat sort of thing now.</p> + +<p>I slept on de floor up at de "Big House" in de white woman's room +on a quilt. I'd git up in de mornings, make fires, put on de coffee, and tend +to my little brother. Jest do little odd jobs sech as that.</p> + +<p>We ate vegetables from de garden, sech as that. My favorite dish +is vegetables now.</p> + +<p>I don't remember seeing any slaves sold. My mother said dey sold +'em on de block in Kentucky where she was raised.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span></p> + +<p>I don't remembuh when de War broke out, but I remembuh seeing the soldiers +with de blue uniforms on. I was afraid of 'em.</p> + +<p>Old mistress didn't tell us when he was free, but another white +woman told my mother and I remembuh. One day old mistress told my mother to git +to that wheel and git to work, and my mother said, "I ain't gwineter, I'm jest +as free as you air." So dat very day my mother packed up all our belongings +and moved us to town, Sherman, Texas. She worked awful hard, doing day work +for 50¢ a day, and sometimes she'd work for food, clothes or whatever she could +git.</p> + +<p>I don't believe in conjuring though I heard lotta talk 'bout it. +Sometimes I have pains and aches in my hands, feel like sometime dat somebody +puts dey hands on me, but I think jest de way my nerves is.</p> + +<p>I can't say much 'bout Abe Lincoln. He was a republican in favor of +de cullud folk being free. Jeff Davis? Yeah, the boys usta sing a song 'bout +'im:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lincoln rides a fine hoss,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Jeff Davis rides a mule,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lincoln is de President,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Jeff Davis is de fool.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Booker T. Washington—I guess he is a right good man. He's for +the cullud people I guess.</p> + +<p>I been a Christian thirty some odd years. I've been here some thirty +odd years. Had to come when my husband did. He died in 1902. We married in +18—I've forgot, but we went to de preacher and got married. We did more +than jump over de broom stick.</p> + +<p>In those days we went to church with de white folks. Dey had church +at eleven and the cullud folks at three, but all of us had white preachers. +Our church is standing right there now, at least it was de last time I was there.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span></p> + +<p>I don't have a favorite song, theys so many good ones, but I like, +"Bound for the Promised Land." I'm a Baptist, my mother was a Baptist, and +her white folks was Baptist.</p> + +<p>I have two daughters, Julia Goodwin and Bertha Frazier, and four +grandchildren, both of 'ems been separated. Dey do housework.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>SALOMON OLIVER<br /> +Age 78 yrs.<br /> +Tulsa, Oklahoma.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>John A. Miller owned the finest plantation in Washington County, +Mississippi, about 12-mile east of Greenville. I was born on this 20,000-acre +plantation November 17, 1859, being one of about four hundred slave children +on the place.</p> + +<p>About three hundred negro families living in box-type cabins made it +seem like a small town. Built in rows, the cabins were kept whitewashed, neat +and orderly, for the Master was strict about such things. Several large barns +and storage buildings were scattered around the plantation. Also, two cotton +gins and two old fashioned presses, operated by horses and mules, made Miller's +plantation one of the best equipped in Mississippi.</p> + +<p>Master John was quite a character. The big plantation didn't occupy +all his time. He owned a bank in Vicksburg and another in New Orleans, and only +came to the plantation two or three times a year for a week or two visit.</p> + +<p>Things happened around there mighty quick when the Master showed up. +If the slaves were not being treated right—out go the white overseer. Fired! +The Master was a good man and tried to hire good boss men. Master John was +bad after the slave women. A yellow child show up every once in a while. Those +kind always got special privileges because the Master said he didn't want his +children whipped like the rest of them slaves.</p> + +<p>My own Mammy, Mary, was the Master's own daughter! She married Salomon +Oliver (who took the name of Oliver after the War), and the Master told all the +slave drivers to leave her alone and not whip her. This made the overseers jealous +of her and caused trouble. John Santhers was one of the white overseers who +treated her bad, and after I was born and got strong enough (I was a weakling for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span> +three-four years after birth), to do light chores he would whip me just for the +fun of it. It was fun for him but not for me. I hoped to whip him when I grew +up. That is the one thing I won't ever forget. He died about the end of the +War so that's one thing I won't ever get to do.</p> + +<p>My mother was high-tempered and she knew about the Master's orders +not to whip her. I guess sometimes she took advantage and tried to do things +that maybe wasn't right. But it did her no good and one of the white men +flogged her to death. She died with scars on her back!</p> + +<p>Father use to preach to the slaves when a crowd of them could slip +off into the woods. I don't remember much about the religious things, only +just what Daddy told me when I was older. He was caught several times slipping +off to the woods and because he was the preacher I guess they layed on the lash +a little harder trying to make him give up preaching.</p> + +<p>Ration day was Saturday. Each person was given a peck of corn meal, +four pounds of wheat flour, four pounds of pork meat, quart of molasses, one +pound of sugar, the same of coffee and a plug of tobacco. Potatoes and vegetables +came from the family garden and each slave family was required to cultivate a +separate garden.</p> + +<p>During the Civil War a battle was fought near the Miller plantation. +The Yankees under General Grant came through the country. They burned 2,000 +bales of Miller cotton. When the Yankee wagons crossed Bayou Creek the bridge +gave way and quite a number of soldiers and horses were seriously injured.</p> + +<p>For many years after the War folks would find bullets in the ground. +Some of the bullets were 'twins' fastened together with a chain.</p> + +<p>Master Miller settled my father upon a piece of land after the War +and we stayed on it several years, doing well.</p> + +<p>I moved to Muskogee in 1902, coming on to Tulsa in 1907, the same +year Oklahoma was made a state. My six wives are all dead,—Liza, Lizzie, Ellen,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> +Lula, Elizabeth and Henrietta. Six children, too. George, Anna, Salomon, +Nelson, Garfield, Cosmos—all good children. They remember the Tulsa riot and +don't aim ever to come back to Oklahoma.</p> + +<p>When the riot started in 1922 (I think it was), I had a place on the +corner of Pine and Owasso Streets. Two hundred of my people gathered at my place, +because I was so well known everybody figured we wouldn't be molested. I was +wrong. Two of my horses was shot and killed. Two of my boys, Salomon and Nelson, +was wounded, one in the hip, the other in the shoulder. They wasn't bad and got +well alright. Some of my people wasn't so lucky. The dead wagon hauled them +away!</p> + +<p>White men came into the negro district and gathered up the homeless. +The houses were most all burned. No place to go except to the camps where +armed whites kept everybody quiet. They took my clothes and all my money—$298.00—and +the police couldn't do nothing about my loss when I reported it to them.</p> + +<p>That was a terrible time, but we people are better off today that any +time during the days of slavery. We have some privileges and they are worth +more than all the money in the world!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>PHYLLIS PETITE<br /> +Age 83 yrs.<br /> +Fort Gibson, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in Rusk County, Texas, on a plantation about eight miles +east of Belleview. There wasn't no town where I was born, but they had +a church.</p> + +<p>My mammy and pappy belonged to a part Cherokee named W. P. Thompson +when I was born. He had kinfolks in the Cherokee Nation, and we all +moved up here to a place on Fourteen-Mile Creek close to where Hulbert +now is, 'way before I was big enough to remember anything. Then, so I been +told, old master Thompson sell my pappy and mammy and one of my baby +brothers and me back to one of his neighbors in Texas name of John Harnage.</p> + +<p>Mammy's name was Letitia Thompson and pappy's was Riley Thompson. +My little brother was named Johnson Thompson, but I had another brother +sold to a Vann and he always call hisself Harry Vann. His Cherokee master +lived on the Arkansas river close to Webber's Falls and I never did know +him until we was both grown. My only sister was Patsy and she was borned +after slavery and died at Wagoner, Oklahoma.</p> + +<p>I can just remember when Master John Harnage took us to Texas. We +went in a covered wagon with oxen and camped out all along the way. Mammy +done the cooking in big wash kettles and pappy done the driving of the oxen. +I would set in a wagon and listen to him pop his whip and holler.</p> + +<p>Master John took us to his plantation and it was a big one, too. You +could look from the field up to the Big House and any grown body in the yard +look like a little body, it was so far away.</p> + +<p>We negroes lived in quarters not far from the Big House and ours was +a single log house with a stick and dirt chimney. We cooked over the hot +coals in the fireplace.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span></p> + +<p>I just played around until I was about six years old I reckon, and +then they put me up at the Big House with my mammy to work. She done all +the cording and spinning and weaving, and I done a whole lot of sweeping +and minding the baby. The baby was only about six months old I reckon. +I used to stand by the cradle and rock it all day, and when I quit I would +go to sleep right by the cradle sometimes before mammy would come and get +me.</p> + +<p>The Big House had great big rooms in front, and they was fixed up nice, +too. I remember when old Mistress Harnage tried me out sweeping up the +front rooms. They had two or three great big pictures of some old people +hanging on the wall. They was full blood Indians it look like, and I was +sure scared of them pictures! I would go here and there and every which-a-way, +and anywheres I go them big pictures always looking straight at me and watching +me sweep! I kept my eyes right on them so I could run if they moved, +and old Mistress take me back to the kitchen and say I can't sweep because +I miss all the dirt.</p> + +<p>We always have good eating, like turnip greens cooked in a kettle with +hog skins and crackling grease, and skinned corn, and rabbit or possum stew. +I liked big fish tolerable well too, but I was afraid of the bones in the +little ones.</p> + +<p>That skinned corn aint like the boiled hominy we have today. To make +it you boil some wood ashes, or have some drip lye from the hopper to put +in the hot water. Let the corn boil in the lye water until the skin drops +off and the eyes drop out and then wash that corn in fresh water about a +dozen times, or just keep carrying water from the spring until you are +wore out, like I did. Then you put the corn in a crock and set it in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> +spring, and you got good skinned corn as long as it last, all ready to +warm up a little batch at a time.</p> + +<p>Master had a big, long log kitchen setting away from the house, and we +set a big table for the family first, and when they was gone we negroes at +the house eat at that table too, but we don't use the china dishes.</p> + +<p>The negro cook was Tilda Chisholm. She and my mammy didn't do no out-work. +Aunt Tilda sure could make them corn-dodgers. Us children would +catch her eating her dinner first out of the kettles and when we say something +she say: "Go on child, I jest tasting that dinner."</p> + +<p>In the summer we had cotton homespun clothes, and in winter it had +wool mixed in. They was dyed with copperas and wild indigo.</p> + +<p>My brother, Johnson Thompson, would get up behind old Master Harnage +on his horse and go with him to hunt squirrels so they would go 'round +on Master's side so's he could shoot them. Master's old mare was named +"Old Willow", and she knowed when to stop and stand real still so he could +shoot.</p> + +<p>His children was just all over the place! He had two houses full of +them! I only remember Bell, Ida, Maley, Mary and Will, but they was plenty +more I don't remember.</p> + +<p>That old horn blowed 'way before daylight, and all the field negroes +had to be out in the row by the time of sun up. House negroes got up too, +because old Master always up to see everybody get out to work.</p> + +<p>Old Master Harnage bought and sold slaves most all the time, and some +of the new negroes always acted up and needed a licking. The worst ones +got beat up good, too! They didn't have no jail to put slaves in because +when the Masters got done licking them they didn't need no jail.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span></p> + +<p>My husband was George Petite. He tell me his mammy was sold away from +him when he was a little boy. He looked down a long lane after her just as +long as he could see her, and cried after her. He went down to the big road +and set down by his mammy's barefooted tracks in the sand and set there until +it got dark, and then he come on back to the quarters.</p> + +<p>I just saw one slave try to get away right in hand. They caught him +with bloodhounds and brung him back in. The hounds had nearly tore him up, +and he was sick a long time. I don't remember his name, but he wasn't one +of the old regular negroes.</p> + +<p>In Texas we had a church where we could go. I think it was a white +church and they just let the negroes have it when they got a preacher +sometimes. My mammy took me sometimes, and she loved to sing them salvation +songs.</p> + +<p>We used to carry news from one plantation to the other I reckon, +'cause mammy would tell about things going on some other plantation and +I know she never been there.</p> + +<p>Christmas morning we always got some brown sugar candy or some molasses +to pull, and we children was up bright and early to get that 'lasses pull, +I tell you! And in the winter we played skeeting on the ice when the water +froze over. No, I don't mean skating. That's when you got iron skates, +and we didn't have them things. We just get a running start and jump on +the ice and skeet as far as we could go, and then run some more.</p> + +<p>I nearly busted my head open, and brother Johnson said: "Try it +again," but after that I was scared to skeet any more.</p> + +<p>Mammy say we was down in Texas to get away from the War, but I didn't +see any war and any soldiers. But one day old Master stay after he eat +breakfast and when us negroes come in to eat he say: "After today I ain't<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span> +your master any more. You all as free as I am." We just stand and look +and don't know what to say about it.</p> + +<p>After while pappy got a wagon and some oxen to drive for a white man +who was coming to the Cherokee Nation because he had folks here. His name +was Dave Mounts and he had a boy named John.</p> + +<p>We come with them and stopped at Fort Gibson where my own grand mammy +was cooking for the soldiers at the garrison. Her name was Phyllis Brewer +and I was named after her. She had a good Cherokee master. My mammy was +born on his place.</p> + +<p>We stayed with her about a week and then we moved out on Four Mile +Creek to live. She died on Fourteen-Mile Creek about a year later.</p> + +<p>When we first went to Four Mile Creek I seen negro women chopping +wood and asked them who they work for and I found out they didn't know they +was free yet.</p> + +<p>After a while my pappy and mammy both died, and I was took care of by +my aunt Elsie Vann. She took my brother Johnson too, but I don't know who +took Harry Vann.</p> + +<p>I was married to George Petite, and I had on a white underdress and +black high-top shoes, and a large cream colored hat, and on top of all I +had a blue wool dress with tassels all around the bottom of it. That +dress was for me to eat the terrible supper in. That what we called the +wedding supper because we eat too much of it. Just danced all night, too! +I was at Mandy Foster's house in Fort Gibson, and the preacher was Reverend +Barrows, I had that dress a long time, but its gone now. I still got the +little sun bonnet I wore to church in Texas.</p> + +<p>We had six children, but all are dead but George, Tish, and Annie now.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span></p> + +<p>Yes, they tell me Abraham Lincoln set me free, and I love to look at +his picture on the wall in the school house at Four Mile branch where they +have church. My grand mammy kind of help start that church, and I think +everybody ought to belong to some church.</p> + +<p>I want to say again my Master Harnage was Indian, but he was a good +man and mighty good to us slaves, and you can see I am more than six feet +high, and they say I weighs over a hundred and sixty, even if my hair is +snow white.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>MATILDA POE<br /> +Age 80 yrs.<br /> +McAlester, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in Indian Territory on de plantation of Isaac Love. He +was old Master, and Henry Love was young Master. Isaac Love was a full blood +Chickasaw Indian but his wife was a white woman.</p> + +<p>Old Master was sure good to his slaves. The young niggers never done +no heavy work till dey was fully grown. Dey would carry water to de men +in de field and do other light jobs 'round de place.</p> + +<p>De Big House set way back from de road 'bout a quarter of a mile. It +was a two-story log house, and the rooms was awful big and they was purty +furniture in it. The furniture in de parlor was red plush and I loved to +slip in and rub my hand over it, it was so soft like. The house was made +of square logs and de cracks was filled out even with the edges of de logs. +It was white washed and my but it was purty. They was a long gallery clean +across de front of de house and big posts to support de roof. Back a ways +from de house was de kitchen and nearby was de smokehouse. Old Master kept +it well filled with meat, lard and molasses all de time. He seen to it that +we always had plenty to eat. The old women done all de cooking in big iron +pots that hung over the fire. De slaves was all served together.</p> + +<p>The slave quarters was about two hundred yards back of de Big House. +Our furniture was made of oak 'cepting de chairs, and dey was made out of +hackberry. I still have a chair dat belonged to my mammy.</p> + +<p>The boys didn't wear no britches in de summer time. Dey just wore +long shirts. De girls wore homespun dresses, either blue or gray.</p> + +<p>Old Master never hired no overseer for his slaves, but he looked +after 'em hisself. He punished dem hisself too. He had to go away one<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span> +time and he hired a white man to oversee while he was gone. The only +orders he left was to keep dem busy. Granny Lucy was awful old but he made +her go to the field. She couldn't hold out to work so he ups and whips her. +He beat her scandalous. He cut her back so bad she couldn't wear her dress. +Old Master come home and my, he was mad when he see Granny Lucy. He told +de man to leave and iffen he ever set foot on his ground again he's shoot +him, sure!</p> + +<p>Old Master had a big plantation and a hundred or more slaves. Dey +always got up at daylight and de men went out and fed de horses. When de +bell rang dey was ready to eat. After breakfast dey took de teams and +went out to plow. Dey come in 'bout half past 'leven and at twelve de bell +rung agin. Dey eat their dinner and back to plowing dey went. 'Bout five +o'clock dey come in again, and den they'd talk, sing and jig dance till +bedtime.</p> + +<p>Old Master never punished his niggers 'cepting dey was sassy or lazy. +He never sold his slaves neither. A owner once sold several babies to +traders. Dey stopped at our plantation to stay awhile. My mammy and de +other women had to take care of dem babies for two days, and teach dem to +nuss a bottle or drink from a glass. Dat was awful, dem little children +crying for they mothers. Sometimes dey sold de mothers away from they +husbands and children.</p> + +<p>Master wasn't a believer in church but he let us have church. My +we'd have happy times singing an shouting. They'd have church when dey +had a preacher and prayer meeting when dey didn't.</p> + +<p>Slaves didn't leave de plantation much on 'count of de Patrollers. +De patroller was low white trash what jest wanted a excuse to shoot +niggers. I don't think I ever saw one but I heard lots of 'em.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span></p> + +<p>I don't believe in luck charms and things of the such. Iffen you +is in trouble, there ain't nothing gonna save you but de Good Lawd. I +heard of folks keeping all kind of things for good luck charms. When I +was a child different people gave me buttons to string and we called +them our charm string and wore 'em round our necks. If we was mean dey +would tell us "Old Raw Head and Bloody Bones" would git us. Grand mammy +told us ghost stories after supper, but I don't remember any of dem.</p> + +<p>I never did know I was a slave, 'cause I couldn't tell I wasn't +free. I always had a good time, didn't have to work much, and allus +had something to eat and wear and that was better than it is with me now.</p> + +<p>When de War was over old Master told us we was free. Mammy she say, +"Well, I'm heading for Texas." I went out and old Master ask me to bring +him a coal of fire to light his pipe. I went after it and mammy left pretty +soon. My pappy wouldn't leave old Master right then but old Master told us +we was free to go where we pleased, so me an' pappy left and went to Texas +where my mammy was. We never saw old Master any more. We stayed a while +in Texas and then come back to de Indian Territory.</p> + +<p>Abe Lincoln was a good man, everybody liked him. See, I've got his +picture. Jeff Davis was a good man too, he just made a mistake. I like +Mr. Roosevelt, too.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>HENRY F. PYLES<br /> +Age 81 yrs.<br /> +Tulsa, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Little pinch o' pepper——<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Little bunch o' wool——<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mumbledy—Mumbledy——<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Two, three Pammy Christy beans——<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Little piece o' rusty iron——<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mumbledy—Mumbledy——<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wrop it in a rag and tie it wid hair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Two fum a hoss an' one fum a mare——<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mumbledy, Mumbledy, Mumbledy——<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wet it in whiskey<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Boughten wid silver;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dat make you wash so hard your sweat pop out,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he come to pass, sho'!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>That's how the niggers say old Bab Russ used to make the hoodoo +"hands" he made for the young bucks and wenches, but I don't know, 'cause +I was too trusting to look inside de one he make for me, and anyways I lose +it, and it no good nohow!</p> + +<p>Old Bab Russ live about two mile from me, and I went to him one +night at midnight and ask him to make me de hand. I was a young strapper +about sixteen years old, and thinking about wenches pretty hard and wanting +something to help me out wid the one I liked best.</p> + +<p>Old Bab Russ charge me four bits for dat hand, and I had to give +four bits more for a pint of whiskey to wet it wid, and it wasn't no good +nohow!</p> + +<p>Course dat was five-six years after de War. I wasn't yet quite +eleven when de War close. Most all the niggers was farming on de shares +and whole lots of them was still working for their old Master yet. Old<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> +Bab come in there from deep South Carolina two-three years befo', and live +all by hisself. De gal I was worrying about had come wid her old pappy +and mammy to pick cotton on de place, and dey was staying in one of de +cabins in the "settlement", but dey didn't live there all de time.</p> + +<p>I don't know whether I believed in conjure much or not in dem +days, but anyways I tried it that once and it stirred up sech a rumpus +everybody called me "Hand" after that until after I was married and had a +pack of children.</p> + +<p>Old Bab Russ was coal black, and he could talk African or some +other unknown tongue, and all the young bucks and wenches was mortal 'fraid +of him!</p> + +<p>Well sir, I took dat hand he made for me and set out to try it on +dat gal. She never had give me a friendly look even, and when I would speak +to her polite she just hang her head and say nothing!</p> + +<p>We was all picking cotton, and I come along up behind her and decided +to use my "Hand." I had bought me a pint of whiskey to wet the hand +wid, but I was scared to take out of my pocket and let the other niggers +see it, so I jest set down in de cotton row and taken a big mouthful. I +figgered to hold it in my mouth until I catched up wid that gal and then +blow it on the hand jest before I tech her on the arm and speak to her.</p> + +<p>Well, I take me a big mouthful, but it was so hot and scaldy it +jest slip right on down my throat! Then I had to take another, and when I +was gitting up I kind of stumbled and it slip down, too!</p> + +<p>Then I see all the others get way on ahead, and I took another big +mouthful—the last in the bottle—and drap the bottle under a big stalk and +start picking fast and holding the whiskey in my mouth this time. I missed +about half the cotton I guess, but at last I catch up with de rest and git<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span> +close up behind dat purty gal. Then I started to speak to her, but forgot +I had de whiskey in mouth and I lost most of it down my neck and all over +my chin, and then I strangled a little on the rest, so as when I went to +squirt it on de "hand" I didn't have nothing left to squirt but a little +spit.</p> + +<p>That make me a little nervous right then, but anyways I step up +behind dat gal and lay my hand on her arm and speak polite and start to say +something, but I finish up what I start to say laying on my neck with my nose +shoved up under a cotton stalk about four rows away!</p> + +<p>De way that gal lam me across the head was a caution! We was in +new ground, and she jest pick up a piece of old root and whopped me right +in de neck with it!</p> + +<p>That raise sech a laugh on me that I never say nothing to her for +three-four days, but after while I gets myself wound up to go see her at her +home. I didn't know how she going to act, but I jest took my foot in my +hand and went on over.</p> + +<p>Her old pappy and mammy was asleep in the back of the room on a +pallet, and we set in front of the fireplace on our hunches and jest looked +at the fire and punched it up a little. It wasn't cold, but de malary fog +was thick all through de bottoms.</p> + +<p>After while I could smell the whiskey soaked up in dat "hand" I +had in my pocket, and I was scared she could smell it too. So I jest reached +in my pocket and teched it for luck, then I reached over and teched her arm. +She jerked it back so quick she knocked over the churn and spilled buttermilk +all over de floor! Dat make de old folks mad, and dey grumble and holler +and told de gal, "Send dat black rapscallion on out of here!" But I didn't +go.</p> + +<p>I kept on moving over closer and she kept on backing away, but after<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span> +while I reach over and put my hand on her knee. All I was going to do was +say something but I shore forgot what it was the next minnit, 'cause she +jest whinnied lak a scared hoss and give me a big push. I was settin straddledy-legged +on the floor, and that push sent me on my head in the hot ashes +in the fur corner of the chimney.</p> + +<p>Then the old man jump up and make for me and I make for the door! +It was dark, all 'cepting the light from the chimney, and I fumble all up +and down the door jamb before I find de latch pin. The old man shorely git +me if he hadn't stumble over the eating table and whop his hand right down +in de dish of fresh made butter. That make him so mad he jest stand and +holler and cuss.</p> + +<p>I git de pin loose and jerk de door open so quick and hard I knock +de powder gourd down what was hanging over it, and my feet git caught in the +string. The stopper gits knocked out, and when I untangle it from my feet +and throw it back in de house it fall in the fireplace.</p> + +<p>I was running all de time, but I hear dat gourd go "Blammity Blam!" +and then all de yelling, but I didn't go back to see how dey git the hot +coals all put out what was scattered all over de cabin!</p> + +<p>I done drap dat "hand" and I never did see it again. Never did see +the gal but two-three times after that, and we never mention about dat night. +Her old pappy was too old to work, so I never did see him neither, but she +must of told about it because all the young bucks called me "Hand" after that +for a long time.</p> + +<p>Old Bab kept on trying to work his conjure with the old niggers, but +the young ones didn't pay him much mind cause they was hearing about the +Gospel and de Lord Jesus Christ. We was all free then, and we could go and +come without a pass, and they was always some kind of church meeting going on +close enough to go to. Our niggers never did hear about de Lord Jesus until<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span> +after we was free, but lots of niggers on de other plantations had masters +that told them all about him, and some of dem niggers was pretty good at +preaching. Then de good church people in de North was sending white preachers +amongst us all the time too. Most of de young niggers was Christians by that +time.</p> + +<p>One day old Bab was hoeing in a field and got in a squabble about +something with a young gal name Polly, same name as his wife. After while +he git so mad he reach up with his fingers and wet them on his tongue and +point straight up and say, "Now you got a trick on you! Dere's a heavy trick +on you now! Iffen you don't change your mind you going pass on before de sun +go down!"</p> + +<p>All de young niggers looked like they want to giggle but afraid to, +and the old ones start begging old Bab to take the trick off, but that Polly +git her dander up and take in after him with a hoe!</p> + +<p>She knocked him down, and he jest laid there kicking his feet in +the air and trying to keep her from hitting him in the head!</p> + +<p>Well, that kind of broke up Bab's charm, so he set out to be a +preacher. The Northern whites was paying some of the Negro preachers, so he +tried to be one too. He didn't know nothing about de Bible but to shout loud, +so the preacher board at Red Mound never would give him a paper to preach. +Then he had to go back to tricking and trancing again.</p> + +<p>One day he come in at dinner and told his wife to git him something +to eat. She told him they aint nothing but some buttermilk, and he says give +me some of that. He hollered around till she fix him a big ash cake and he +ate that and she made him another and he ate that. Then he drunk the rest of +de gallon of buttermilk and went out and laid down on a tobacco scaffold in +de yard and nearly died.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span></p> + +<p>After while he jest stiffened out and looked like he was dead, +and nobody couldn't wake him up. 'Bout forty niggers gathered round and +tried but it done no good. Old mammy Polly got scared and sent after the +white judge, old Squire Wilson, and he tried, and then the white preacher +Reverend Dennison tried and old man Gorman tried. He was a infidel, but +that didn't do no good.</p> + +<p>By that time it was getting dark, and every nigger in a square +mile was there, looking on and acting scared. Me and my partner who was a +little bit cripple but mighty smart come up to see what all the rumpus was +about, and we was jest the age to do anything.</p> + +<p>He whispered to me to let him start it off and then me finish it +while he got a head running start. I ast him what he talking about.</p> + +<p>Then he fooled round the house and got a little ball of cotton and +soaked it in kerosene from a lamp. It was a brass lamp with a hole and a +stopper in the side of the bowl. Wonder he didn't burn his fool head off! Then +he sidle up close and stuck dat cotton 'tween old Bab's toes. Old Bab had +the biggest feet I ever see, too.</p> + +<p>'Bout that time I lit a corn shuck in de lamp and run out in de yard +and stuck it to de cotton and jest kept right on running!</p> + +<p>My partner had a big start but I catch up wid him and we lay down +in de bresh and listened to everybody hollering and old Bab hollering louder +than anybody. Old Bab moved away after that.</p> + +<p>All that foolishness happen after the War, but before de War while +I was a little boy they wasn't much foolishness went on I warrant you.</p> + +<p>I was born on de 15th of August in 1856, and belonged to Mister Addison +Pyles. He lived in town, in Jackson, Tennessee, and was a old man when +de War broke. He had a nephew named Irvin T. Pyles he raised from a baby, and +Mister Irvin kept a store at de corner of de roads at our plantation. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span> +plantation covered about 300 or 400 acres I reckon, and they had about 25 +slaves counting de children.</p> + +<p>The plantation was about 9 miles north of Red Mound, close to +Lexington, Tennessee, and about a mile and a half from Parker's Crossroads +where they had a big battle in de War.</p> + +<p>They wasn't no white overseer on the place, except Mister Irvin, and +he stayed in de store or in town and didn't bother about the farm work. We +had a Negro overlooker who was my stepdaddy. His name was Jordan, and he run +away wid de Yankees about de middle of de War and was in a Negro Yankee regiment. +After he left we jest worked on as usual because we was afraid not to. +Several of de men got away like that but he was de only one that got in de +army.</p> + +<p>They was a big house in de middle of de place and a settlement of +Negro cabins behind and around it. We called it de settlement, but on other +plantations where white folks lived there too they called it de quarters. We +always kept this big house clean and ready, and sometimes de white folks come +out from town and stay a few days and hunt and fish and look over de crops.</p> + +<p>We all worked at farm work. Cotton and corn and tobacco mostly. +We all laid off Sunday after noontime, but we didn't have no church nor +preaching and we didn't hear anything 'bout Jesus much until after de emancipation.</p> + +<p>I reckon old Master wasn't very religious, 'cause he never tell us +'bout the Holy Word. He jest said to behave ourselves and tell him when we +wanted to marry, and not have but one wife.</p> + +<p>We had little garden patches and cotton patches we could work on +Sunday and what de stuff brung we could sell and keep the money. Old Master +let us have what we made that way on Sunday. We could buy ribbons and hand +soap and coal oil and such at de store. Master Irvin was always honest 'bout<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span> +continuing de money, too.</p> + +<p>We didn't have no carders and spinners nor no weavers on de plantation. +They cost too much money to buy just for 25 niggers, and they cost a lot more +than field niggers. So we got our clothes sent out to us from in town, and +sometimes we was give cloth from de store to make our clothes out of.</p> + +<p>We got de shorts and seconds from de mill when we had wheat ground, +and so we had good wheat bread as well as corn pone, and de big smokehouse was +on de place and we had all de meat we wanted to eat. Old Master sent out after +de meat he wanted every day or so and we kept him in garden sass that way too.</p> + +<p>We was right between de forks of Big Beaver and Little Beaver and we +could go fishing without getting far off de place. We couldn't go far away +without a pass, though, and they wasn't nobody on the place to write us a pass, +so we couldn't go to meeting and dances and sech.</p> + +<p>But de niggers on de other plantations could get passes to come to +our place, and so we had parties sometimes there at our place. We always had +them on Sundays, 'cause in the evening we would be too tired to work if we set +up, and the other masters wouldn't give passes to their niggers to come over +in de evening.</p> + +<p>We had a white doctor lived at de next plantation, and old Master +had a contract with old Dr. Brown to look after us. He had a beard as long as +your arm. He come for all kinds of misery except bornings. Then we had a mid-wife +who was a white woman lived down below us. They was poor people renting +or living on war land. Nearly all de white folks in that country been there a +long time and their old people got de land from de government for fighting in +the Revolutionary War. Most all was from North Carolina—way back. I think +old Master's pappy was from dere in de first place.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span></p> + +<p>Old Master had two sons named Newton and Willis. Newton was in de +War and was killed, and Willis went to war later and was sick a long time and +come home early. Old Master was too old to go.</p> + +<p>There was two daughters, Mary, de oldest, married a Holmes, and Miss +Laura never did marry I don't think.</p> + +<p>My mammy's name was Jane, and she was born on de 10th day of May +in 1836. I know de dates 'cause old Master kept his book on all his niggers +de same as on his own family. Mammy was the nurse of all de children but I +think old Master sent her to de plantation about the time I was born. I +don't think I had any pappy. I think I was jest one of them things that +happened sometimes in slavery days, but I know old Master didn't have nothing +to do with it—I'm too black.</p> + +<p>Mammy married a man named Jordan when I was a little baby. He was +the overlooker and went off to de Yankees, when dey come for foraging through +dat country de first time.</p> + +<p>He served in de Negro regiment in de battle at Fort Piller and a +lot of Sesesh was killed in dat battle, so when de War was over and Jordan come +back home he was a changed nigger and all de whites and a lot of de niggers +hated him. All 'cepting old Master, and he never said a word out of de way +to him. Jest told him to come on and work on de place as long as he wanted +to.</p> + +<p>But Jordan had a hard time, and he brung it on his self I reckon.</p> + +<p>'Bout de first thing, he went down to Wildersville Schoolhouse, about +a mile from Wildersville, to a nigger and carpet bagger convention and +took me and mammy along. That was de first picnic and de first brass band I +ever see. De band men was all white men and they still had on their blue +soldier clothes.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span></p> + +<p>Lots of de niggers there had been in de Union army too, and they +had on parts of their army clothes. They took them out from under their coats +and their wagon seats an put them on for de picnic.</p> + +<p>There was a saloon over in Wildersville, and a lot of them went over +there but they was scared to go in, most of them. But a colored delegate +named Taylor and my pappy went in and ordered a drink. The bartender didn't +pay them no mind.</p> + +<p>Then a white man named Billy Britt walked up and throwed a glass of +whiskey in Jordan's face and cussed him for being in de Yankee army. Then a +white man from the North named Pearson took up the fight and him and Jordan +jumped on Billy Britt, but de crowd stopped them and told pappy to git on +back to whar he come from.</p> + +<p>He got elected a delegate at de convention and went on down to Nashville +and helped nominate Brownlow for governor. Then he couldn't come back home +for a while, but finally he did.</p> + +<p>Old Master was uneasy about de way things was going on, and he come +out to de farm and stayed in de big house a while.</p> + +<p>One day in broad daylight he was on de gallery and down de road come +'bout 20 bushwhackers in Sesesh clothes on horses and rid up to de gate. Old +Master knowed all of them, and Captain Clay Taylor, who had been de master of +de nigger delegate, was at the head of them.</p> + +<p>They had Jordan Pyles tied with a rope and walked along on de ground +betwixt two horses.</p> + +<p>"Whar you taking my nigger?", Old Master say. He run down off de +gallery and out in de road.</p> + +<p>"He ain't your nigger no more—you know that", old Captain Taylor +holler back.</p> + +<p>"He jest as much my nigger as that Taylor nigger was your nigger,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span> +and you ain't laid hands on him! Now you jest have pity on my nigger!"</p> + +<p>"Your nigger Jordan been in de Yankee army, and he was in de +battle at Fort Piller and help kill our white folks, and you know it!" Old +Captain Taylor say, and argue on like that, but old Master jest take hold his +bridle and shake his head.</p> + +<p>"No, Clay", he say, "that boy maybe didn't kill Confederates, but +you and him both know my two boys killed plenty Yankees, and you forgot I lost +one of my boys in de War. Ain't that enough to pay for letting my nigger alone?"</p> + +<p>And old Captain Taylor give the word to turn Jordan loose, and they +rid on down de road.</p> + +<p>That's one reason my stepdaddy never did leave old Master's place, +and I stayed on dere till I was grown and had children.</p> + +<p>The Yankees come through past our place three-four times, and one +time they had a big battle jest a mile and a half away at Parker's Crossroads.</p> + +<p>I was in de field hoeing, and I remember I hadn't watered the cows +we had hid way down in de woods, so I started down to water them when I first +heard de shooting.</p> + +<p>We had de stock hid down in de woods and all de corn and stuff hid +too, 'cause the Yankees and the Sesesh had been riding through quite a lot, +and either one take anything they needed iffen they found it.</p> + +<p>First I hear something way off say "Br-r-rump!" Then again, and again. +Then something sound like popcorn beginning to pop real slow. Then it git +faster and I start for de settlement and de big house.</p> + +<p>All Master's folks was staying at de big house then, and couldn't git +back to town 'count of de soldiers, so they all put on they good clothes, with +de hoop skirts and little sunshades and the lace pantaloons and got in the +buggy to go see de battle!</p> + +<p>They rid off and it wasn't long till all the niggers was following<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span> +behind. We all got to a hill 'bout a half a mile from the crossroads and +stopped when we couldn't see nothing but thick smoke all over de whole place.</p> + +<p>We could see men on horses come in and out of de smoke, going this +way and that way, and then some Yankees on horses broke through de woods right +close to us and scattered off down through de field. One of de white officers +rid up close and yelled at us and took off his hat, but I couldn't hear +nothing he said.</p> + +<p>Then he rid on and catch up with his men. They had stopped and was +turning off to one side. He looked back and waved his hat again for us to +git away from that, and jest then he clapped his hand to his belly and fell +off his hoss.</p> + +<p>Our white folks turned their buggy round and made it for home and +no mistake! The niggers wasn't fur behind neither!</p> + +<p>They fit on back toward our plantation, and some of the fighting was +inside it at one corner. For three-four days after that they was burying soldiers +'round there, and some of de graves was on our old place.</p> + +<p>Long time afterwards people come and moved all them to other graveyards +at Shiloh and Corinth and other places. They was about a hundred killed +all around there.</p> + +<p>After de War I married Molly Timberlake and we lived on there 'til +1902, when we come to Indian Territory at Haskell. They wasn't no Haskell there +then, and I helped to build dat town, doing carpenter work and the like.</p> + +<p>We had two boys, Bill and Jim Dick, and eight daughters, Effie, Ida, +Etta, Eva, Jessie, Tommie, Bennie and Timmie. Her real name is Timberlake after +her mammy. They all went to school and graduated in the high schools.</p> + +<p>My wife has been dead about ten years.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +10-13-37<br /> +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937]</p> + +<h3>CHANEY RICHARDSON<br /> +Age 90 years<br /> +Fort Gibson, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in the old Caney settlement southeast of Tahlequah on +the banks of Caney Creek. Off to the north we could see the big old ridge +of Sugar Mountain when the sun shine on him first thing in the morning when +we all getting up.</p> + +<p>I didn't know nothing else but some kind of war until I was a +grown woman, because when I first can remember my old Master, Charley +Rogers, was always on the lookout for somebody or other he was lined up +against in the big feud.</p> + +<p>My master and all the rest of the folks was Cherokees, and they'd +been killing each other off in the feud ever since long before I was borned, +and jest because old Master have a big farm and three-four families of +Negroes them other Cherokees keep on pestering his stuff all the time. Us +children was always afeared to go any place less'n some of the grown folks +was along.</p> + +<p>We didn't know what we was a-feared of, but we heard the Master +and Mistress keep talking 'bout "another Party killing" and we stuck close +to the place.</p> + +<p>Old Mistress' name was Nancy Rogers, but I was a orphan after I +was a big girl and I called her "Aunt" and "Mamma" like I did when I was +little. You see my own mammy was the house woman and I was raised in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span> +house, and I heard the little children call old mistress "mamma" and so I +did too. She never did make me stop.</p> + +<p>My pappy and mammy and us children lived in a one-room log cabin +close to the creek bank and jest a little piece from old Master's house.</p> + +<p>My pappy's name was Joe Tucker and my mammy's name was Ruth Tucker. +They belonged to a man named Tucker before I was born and he sold them to +Master Charley Rogers and he just let them go on by the same name if they +wanted to, because last name didn't mean nothing to a slave anyways. The +folks jest called my pappy "Charley Rogers' boy Joe."</p> + +<p>I already had two sisters, Mary and Mandy, when I was born, and +purty soon I had a baby brother, Louis. Mammy worked at the Big House and +took me along every day. When I was a little bigger I would help hold the +hank when she done the spinning and old Mistress done a lot of the weaving +and some knitting. She jest set by the window and knit most all of the +time.</p> + +<p>When we weave the cloth we had a big loom out on the gallery, and +Miss Nancy tell us how to do it.</p> + +<p>Mammy eat at our own cabin, and we had lots of game meat and fish +the boys get in the Caney Creek. Mammy bring down deer meat and wild turkey +sometimes, that the Indian boys git on Sugar Mountain.</p> + +<p>Then we had corn bread, dried bean bread and green stuff out'n +Master's patch. Mammy make the bean bread when we git short of corn meal and +nobody going to the mill right away. She take and bile the beans and mash +them up in some meal and that make it go a long ways.</p> + +<p>The slaves didn't have no garden 'cause they work the old +Master's garden and make enough for everybody to have some anyway.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span></p> + +<p>When I was about 10 years old that feud got so bad the Indians was +always talking about getting their horses and cattle killed and their slaves +harmed. I was too little to know how bad it was until one morning my own +mammy went off somewhere down the road to git some stuff to dye cloth and +she didn't come back.</p> + +<p>Lots of the young Indian bucks on both sides of the feud would +ride around the woods at night, and old Master got powerful oneasy about +my mammy and had all the neighbors and slaves out looking for her, but nobody +find her.</p> + +<p>It was about a week later that two Indian men rid up and ast old +master wasn't his gal Ruth gone. He says yes, and they take one of the +slaves along with a wagon to show where they seen her.</p> + +<p>They find her in some bushes where she'd been getting bark to +set the dyes, and she been dead all the time. Somebody done hit her in the +head with a club and shot her through and through with a bullet too. She +was so swole up they couldn't lift her up and jest had to make a deep hole +right along side of her and roll her in it she was so bad mortified.</p> + +<p>Old Master nearly go crazy he was so mad, and the young Cherokee +men ride the woods every night for about a month, but they never catch on +to who done it.</p> + +<p>I think old Master sell the children or give them out to somebody +then, because I never see my sisters and brother for a long time after +the Civil War, and for me, I have to go live with a new mistress that was a +Cherokee neighbor. Her name was Hannah Ross, and she raised me until I was +grown.</p> + +<p>I was her home girl, and she and me done a lot of spinning and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> +weaving too. I helped the cook and carried water and milked. I carried +the water in a home-made pegging set on my head. Them peggings was kind +of buckets made out of staves set around a bottom and didn't have no handle.</p> + +<p>I can remember weaving with Miss Hannah Ross. She would weave a +strip of white and one of yellow and one of brown to make it pretty. She +had a reel that would pop every time it got to a half skein so she would +know to stop and fill it up again. We used copperas and some kind of bark +she bought at the store to dye with. It was cotton clothes winter and +summer for the slaves, too, I'll tell you.</p> + +<p>When the Civil War come along we seen lots of white soldiers in +them brown butternut suits all over the place, and about all the Indian +men was in it too. Old master Charley Rogers' boy Charley went along too. +Then pretty soon—it seem like about a year—a lot of the Cherokee men +come back home and say they not going back to the War with that General +Cooper and some of them go off the Federal side because the captain go to +the Federal side too.</p> + +<p>Somebody come along and tell me my own pappy have to go in the +war and I think they say he on the Copper side, and then after while Miss +Hannah tell me he git kilt over in Arkansas.</p> + +<p>I was so grieved all the time I don't remember much what went +on, but I know pretty soon my Cherokee folks had all the stuff they had et +up by the soldiers and they was jest a few wagons and mules left.</p> + +<p>All the slaves was piled in together and some of the grown ones +walking, and they took us way down across the big river and kept us in +the bottoms a long time until the War was over.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span></p> + +<p>We lived in a kind of a camp, but I was too little to know where +they got the grub to feed us with. Most all the Negro men was off somewhere +in the War.</p> + +<p>Then one day they had to bust up the camp and some Federal soldiers +go with us and we all start back home. We git to a place where all the +houses is burned down and I ask what is that place. Miss Hannah say: +"Skullyville, child. That's where they had part of the War."</p> + +<p>All the slaves was set out when we git to Fort Gibson, and the +soldiers say we all free now. They give us grub and clothes to the Negroes +at that place. It wasn't no town but a fort place and a patch of big trees.</p> + +<p>Miss Hannah take me to her place and I work there until I was +grown. I didn't git any money that I seen, but I got a good place to stay.</p> + +<p>Pretty soon I married Ran Lovely and we lived in a double log +house here at Fort Gibson. Then my second husband was Henry Richardson, +but he's been dead for years, too. We had six children, but they all dead +but one.</p> + +<p>I didn't want slavery to be over with, mostly because we had the +War I reckon. All that trouble made me the loss of my mammy and pappy, and +I was always treated good when I was a slave. When it was over I had +rather be at home like I was. None of the Cherokees ever whipped us, and +my mistress give me some mighty fine rules to live by to git along in this +world, too.</p> + +<p>The Cherokee didn't have no jail for Negroes and no jail for +themselves either. If a man done a crime he come back to take his punishment +without being locked up.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span></p> + +<p>None of the Negroes ran away when I was a child that I know of. +We all had plenty to eat. The Negroes didn't have no school and so I can't +read and write, but they did have a school after the War, I hear. But we +had a church made out of a brush arbor and we would sing good songs in +Cherokee sometimes.</p> + +<p>I always got Sunday off to play, and at night I could go git a +piece of sugar or something to eat before I went to bed and Mistress didn't +care.</p> + +<p>We played bread-and-butter and the boys played hide the switch. +The one found the switch got to whip the one he wanted to.</p> + +<p>When I got sick they give me some kind of tea from weeds, and if +I et too many roasting ears and swole up they biled gourds and give me the +liquor off'n them to make me throw up.</p> + +<p>I've been a good church-goer all my life until I git too feeble, +and I still understand and talk Cherokee language and love to hear songs and +parts of the Bible in it because it make me think about the time I was a +little girl before my mammy and pappy leave me.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]</p> + +<h3>RED RICHARDSON<br /> +Age 75 yrs.<br /> +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born July 21, 1862, at Grimes County, Texas. Smith Richardson +was my father's name, and Eliza Richardson my mother's. My father came from +Virginia. My mother she was born in Texas.</p> + +<p>We lived in so many places round there I can't tell jest what, but +we lived in a log house most of the time. We slept on the flo' on pallets on +one quilt. We ate cornbread, beans, vegetables, and got to drink plenty milk. +We ate rabbits, fish, possums and such as that but we didn't get no chicken. +I don't have no fav'rite food, I don't guess.</p> + +<p>We wore shirts, long shirts slit up the side. I didn't know what +pants was until I was 14. In Grimes County it ain't even cold these days, +and I never wore no shoes. I married in a suit made of broad cloth. It had +a tail on the coat.</p> + +<p>Master Ben Hadley, and Mistress Minnie Hadley, they had three sons: +Josh, Henry and Charley. Didn't have no overseer. We had to call all white +folks, poor or rich, Mr. Master and Mistress. Master Hadley owned 'bout +2,000 acres. He had a big number of slaves. They used to wake 'em up early +in the mornings by ringing a large bell. They said they used to whip 'em, +drive 'em, and sell 'em away from their chillun,—I'd hear my old folks +talk about it. Say they wasn't no such a thing as going to jail. The master +stood good for anything his nigger done. If the master's nigger killed 'im +another nigger, the old master stood good.</p> + +<p>They never had no schools for the Negro chillun. I can't remember +the date of the first school—its in a book someplace—but anyway I went +to one of the first schools that was established for the education of Negro +chillun.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span></p> + +<p>You know Mr. Negro always was a church man, but he don't mean +nothing. I don't have no fav'rite spiritual. All of them's good ones. +Whenever they'd baptise they'd sing:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Harp From the Tune the Domeful Sound."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Which starts like this:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Come live in man and view this ground<br /></span> +<span class="i0">where we must sho'ly lie."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I'm a member of Tabernacle Baptist Church myself, and I think all +people should be religious 'cause Jesus died for us all.</p> + +<p>The patrollers used to run after me but I'd jump 'em. They used to +have a permit to go from one plantation to another. You had to go to old +master and say, "I want to go to such and such a place." And if you had a +permit they didn't bother you. The pateroller would stop you and say, "Where +you going? You got a permit to go to such and such a place?" You'd say, +yes suh, and show that pass. Den he wouldn't bother you and iffen he did +old master would git on 'em.</p> + +<p>When 10 o'clock come which was bed time the slaves would go to +their cabins and some of 'em would go stealing chickens, hogs, steal sweet +potatoes, and cook and eat 'em. Jest git in to all kind of devilment.</p> + +<p>Old master would give 'em Sadday afternoon off, and they'd have +them Sadday night breakdowns. We played a few games such as marbles, mumble +peg, and cards—jest anything to pass off the time. Heahs one of the games +we'd play an' I sho did like it too:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">She is my sweetheart as I stand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come and stand beside of me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kiss her sweet and;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hug her near.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>On Christmas they'd make egg nog, drink whiskey and kiss their girls.</p> + +<p>Some wore charms to ward off the devil, but I don't believe in such.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span> +I do believe in voodoo like this: People can put propositions up to you and +fool you. Don't believe in ghost. Tried to see 'em but I never could.</p> + +<p>Old master didn't turn my father loose and tell 'em we was free. +They didn't turn us loose 'til they got the second threat from President +Lincoln. Good old Lincoln; they wasn't nothing like 'im. Booker T. Washington +was one of the finest Negro Educators in the world, but old Jefferson Davis +was against the cullud man.</p> + +<p>I think since slavery is all over, it has been a benefit to the +cullud man. He's got more freedom now.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writer's Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>BETTY ROBERTSON<br /> +Age 93 yrs.<br /> +Fort Gibson, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born close to Webber's Falls, in the Canadian District of the +Cherokee Nation, in the same year that my pappy was blowed up and killed +in the big boat accident that killed my old Master.</p> + +<p>I never did see my daddy excepting when I was a baby and I only know +what my mammy told me about him. He come from across the water when he +was a little boy, and was grown when old Master Joseph Vann bought him, +so he never did learn to talk much Cherokee. My mammy was a Cherokee +slave, and talked it good. My husband was a Cherokee born negro, too, +and when he got mad he forgit all the English he knowed.</p> + +<p>Old Master Joe had a mighty big farm and several families of negroes, +and he was a powerful rich man. Pappy's name was Kalet Vann, and mammy's +name was Sally. My brothers was name Sone and Frank. I had one brother +and one sister sold when I was little and I don't remember the names. My +other sisters was Polly, Ruth and Liddie. I had to work in the kitchen +when I was a gal, and they was ten or twelve children smaller than me for +me to look after, too. Sometime Young Master Joe and the other boys give +me a piece of money and say I worked for it, and I reckon I did for I have +to cook five or six times a day. Some of the Master's family was always +going down to the river and back, and every time they come in I have to +fix something to eat. Old Mistress had a good cookin' stove, but most +Cherokees had only a big fireplace and pot hooks. We had meat, bread, rice, +potatoes and plenty of fish and chicken. The spring time give us plenty +of green corn and beans too. I couldn't buy anything in slavery time, +so I jest give the piece of money to the Vann children. I got all the +clothes I need from old Mistress, and in winter I had high top shoes with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span> +brass caps on the toe. In the summer I wear them on Sunday, too. I wore +loom cloth clothes, dyed in copperas what the old negro women and the old +Cherokee women made.</p> + +<p>The slaves had a pretty easy time I think. Young Master Vann never +very hard on us and he never whupped us, and old Mistress was a widow woman +and a good Christian and always kind. I sure did love her. Maybe old +Master Joe Vann was harder, I don't know, but that was before my time. Young +Master never whip his slaves, but if they don't mind good he sell them off +sometimes. He sold one of my brothers and one sister because they kept +running off. They wasn't very big either, but one day two Cherokees rode +up and talked a long time, then young Master came to the cabin and said +they were sold because mammy couldn't make them mind him. They got on the +horses behind the men and went off.</p> + +<p>Old Master Joe had a big steam boat he called the Lucy Walker, and +he run it up and down the Arkansas and the Mississippi and the Ohio river, +old Mistress say. He went clean to Louisville, Kentucky, and back. My +pappy was a kind of a boss of the negroes that run the boat, and they all +belong to old Master Joe. Some had been in a big run-away and had been +brung back, and wasn't so good, so he keep them on the boat all the time +mostly. Mistress say old Master and my pappy on the boat somewhere close +to Louisville and the boiler bust and tear the boat up. Some niggers say +my pappy kept hollering, "Run it to the bank! Run it to the bank!" but it +sunk and him and old Master died.</p> + +<p>Old Master Joe was a big man in the Cherokees, I hear, and was good +to his negroes before I was born. My pappy run away one time, four or +five years before I was born, mammy tell me, and at that time a whole lot +of Cherokee slaves run off at once. They got over in the Creek country<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span> +and stood off the Cherokee officers that went to git them, but pretty soon +they give up and come home. Mammy say they was lots of excitement on +old Master's place and all the negroes mighty scared, but he didn't sell +my pappy off. He jest kept him and he was a good negro after that. He +had to work on the boat, though, and never got to come home but once in +a long while.</p> + +<p>Young Master Joe let us have singing and be baptized if we want to, +but I wasn't baptized till after the War. But we couldn't learn to read +or have a book, and the Cherokee folks was afraid to tell us about the +letters and figgers because they have a law you go to jail and a big +fine if you show a slave about the letters.</p> + +<p>When the War come they have a big battle away west of us, but I +never see any battles. Lots of soldiers around all the time though.</p> + +<p>One day young Master come to the cabins and say we all free and +can't stay there less'n we want to go on working for him just like we'd +been, for our feed and clothes. Mammy got a wagon and we traveled around +a few days and go to Fort Gibson. When we git to Fort Gibson they was +a lot of negroes there, and they had a camp meeting and I was baptized. +It was in the Grand River close to the ford, and winter time. Snow on the +ground and the water was muddy and all full of pieces of ice. The place +was all woods, and the Cherokees and the soldiers all come down to see the +baptizing.</p> + +<p>We settled down a little ways above Fort Gibson. Mammy had the wagon +and two oxen, and we worked a good size patch there until she died, and then +I git married to Cal Robertson to have somebody to take care of me. Cal +Robertson was eighty-nine years old when I married him forty years ago, right +on this porch. I had on my old clothes for the wedding, and I aint had any<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span> +good clothes since I was a little slave girl. Then I had clean warm +clothes and I had to keep them clean, too!</p> + +<p>I got my allotment as a Cherokee Freedman, and so did Cal, but we +lived here at this place because we was too old to work the land ourselves. +In slavery time the Cherokee negroes do like anybody else when +they is a death—jest listen to a chapter in the Bible and all cry. We +had a good song I remember. It was "Don't Call the Roll, Jesus, Because +I'm Coming Home." The only song I remember from the soldiers was: "Hang +Jeff Davis to a Sour Apple Tree", and I remember that because they said he +used to be at Fort Gibson one time. I don't know what he done after that.</p> + +<p>I don't know about Robert Lee, but I know about Lee's Creek.</p> + +<p>I been a good Christian ever since I was baptized, but I keep a little +charm here on my neck anyways, to keep me from having the nose bleed. Its +got a buckeye and a lead bullet in it. I had a silver dime on it, too, +for a long time, but I took it off and got me a box of snuff. I'm glad the +War's over and I am free to meet God like anybody else, and my grandchildren +can learn to read and write.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[Pg 270]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 18 1937]</p> + +<h3>HARRIET ROBINSON<br /> +Age 95 yrs.<br /> +500 Block N. Fonshill<br /> +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born September 1, 1842, in Bastrop, Texas, on Colorado River. +My pappy was named Harvey Wheeler and my mammy was named Carolina Sims. My +brothers and sisters was named Alex, Taylor, Mary, Cicero, Tennessee, Sarah, +Jeff, Ella and Nora. We lived in cedar log houses with dirt floors and double +chimneys, and doors hung on wooden hinges. One side of our beds was bored in +the walls and had one leg on the other. Them white folks give each nigger family +a blanket in winter.</p> + +<p>I nussed 3 white chillun, Lulu, Helen Augusta, and Lola Sims. I +done this before that War that set us free. We kids use to make extra money by +toting gravel in our aprons. They'd give us dimes and silver nickles.</p> + +<p>Our clothes was wool and cotton mixed. We had red rustic shoes, +soles one-half inch thick. They'd go a-whick a-whack. The mens had pants wid +one seam and a right-hand pocket. Boys wore shirts.</p> + +<p>We ate hominy, mush, grits and pone bread for the most part. Many +of them ate out of one tray with wooden spoons. All vittles for field hands +was fixed together.</p> + +<p>Women broke in mules throwed 'em down and roped 'em. They'd do it +better'n men. While mammy made some hominy one day both my foots was scalded +and when they clipped them blisters, they jest put some cotton round them and +catched all dat yellow water and made me a yellow dress out of it. This was +'way back yonder in slavery, before the War.</p> + +<p>Whenever white folks had a baby born den all de old niggers had to +come thoo the room and the master would be over 'hind the bed and he'd say,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[Pg 271]</a></span> +"Here's a new little mistress or master you got to work for." You had to say, +"Yessuh Master" and bow real low or the overseer would crack you. Them was +slavery days, dog days.</p> + +<p>I remember in slavery time we had stages. Them devilish things had +jest as many wrecks as cars do today. Only thing, we jest didn't have as many.</p> + +<p>My mammy belonged to Master Colonel Sam Sims and his old mean wife +Julia. My pappy belonged to Master Meke Smith and his good wife Harriett. She +was sho' a good woman. I was named after her. Master Sam and Master Meke was +partners. Ever year them rich men would send so many wagons to New Mexico for +different things. It took 6 months to go and come.</p> + +<p>Slaves was punished by whip and starving. Decker was sho' a mean +slave-holder. He lived close to us. Master Sam didn't never whip me, but Miss +Julia whipped me every day in the mawning. During the war she beat us so terrible. +She say, "Your master's out fighting and losing blood trying to save +you from them Yankees, so you kin git your'n here." Miss Julia would take me +by my ears and butt my head against the wall. She wanted to whip my mother, but +old Master told her, naw sir. When his father done give my mammy to Master +Sam, he told him not to beat her, and iffen he got to whar he jest had to, jest +bring her back and place her in his yard from whar he got her.</p> + +<p>White folks didn't 'low you to read or write. Them what did know +come from Virginny. Mistress Julia used to drill her chillun in spelling any +words. At every word them chillun missed, she gived me a lick 'cross the head +for it. Meanest woman I ever seen in my whole life.</p> + +<p>This skin I got now, it ain't my first skin. That was burnt off when +I was a little child. Mistress used to have a fire made on the fireplace<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[Pg 272]</a></span> +and she made me scour the brass round it and my skin jest blistered. I +jest had to keep pulling it off'n me.</p> + +<p>We didn't had no church, though my pappy was a preacher. He preached +in the quarters. Our baptizing song was "On Jordan's Stormy Bank I stand" and +"Hark From The Tomb." Now all dat was before the War. We had all our funerals +at the graveyard. Everybody, chillun and all picked up a clod of dirt and +throwed in on top the coffin to help fill up the grave.</p> + +<p>Taling 'bout niggers running away, didn't my step-pappy run away? +Didn't my uncle Gabe run away? The frost would jest bite they toes most nigh +off too, whiles they was gone. They put Uncle Isom (my step-pappy) in jail and +while's he was in there he killed a white guardman. Then they put in the paper, +"A nigger to kill", and our Master seen it and bought him. He was a double-strengthed +man, he was so strong. He'd run off so help you God. They had the +blood hounds after him once and he caught the hound what was leading and beat +the rest of the dogs. The white folks run up on him before he knowed it and +made them dogs eat his ear plumb out. But don't you know he got away anyhow. +One morning I was sweeping out the hall in the big house and somebody come a-knocking +on the front door and I goes to the door. There was Uncle Isom wid +rags all on his head. He said, "Tell ole master heah I am." I goes to Master's +door and says, "Master Colonel Sam, Uncle Isom said heah he am." He say, "Go +'round to the kitchen and tell black mammy to give you breakfast." When he was +thoo' eating they give him 300 lashes and, bless my soul, he run off again.</p> + +<p>When we went to a party the nigger fiddlers would play a chune dat +went lak this:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I fooled Ole Mastah 7 years<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fooled the overseer three;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hand me down my banjo<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I'll tickle your bel-lee.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[Pg 273]</a></span></div></div> + +<p>We had the same doctors the white folks had and we wore asafetida +and garlic and onions to keep from taking all them ailments.</p> + +<p>I 'member the battle being fit. The white folks buried all the +jewelry and silver and all the gold in the Blue Ridge Mountains, in Orange, +Texas. Master made all us niggers come together and git ready to leave 'cause +the Yankees was coming. We took a steamer. Now this was in slavery time, sho' +'nuff slavery. Then we got on a steamship and pulled out to Galveston. Then +he told the captain to feed we niggers. We was on the bay, not the ocean. We +left Galveston and went on trains for Houston.</p> + +<p>One, my sister Liza, was mulatto and Master Colonel Sims' son had 3 +chillun by her. We never seen her no more after her last child was born. I +found out though that she was in Canada.</p> + +<p>After the War, Master Colonel Sims went to git the mail and so he +call Daniel Ivory, the overseer, and say to him, "Go round to all the quarters +and tell all the niggers to come up, I got a paper to read to 'em. They're +free now, so you kin git you another job, 'cause I ain't got no more niggers +which is my own." Niggers come up from the cabins nappy-headed, jest lak they +gwine to the field. Master Colonel Sims say, "Caroline (that's my mammy), you +is free as me. Pa said bring you back and I'se gwina do jest that. So you +go on and work and I'll pay you and your three oldest chillun $10.00 a month +a head and $4.00 fer Harriet," that's me, and then he turned to the rest and +say "Now all you'uns will receive $10.00 a head till the crops is laid by." +Don't you know before he got half way thoo', over half them niggers was gone.</p> + +<p>Them Klu Klux Klans come and ask for water with the false stomachs +and make lak they was drinking three bucketsful. They done some terrible things, +but God seen it all and marked it down.</p> + +<p>We didn't had no law, we had "bureau." Why, in them days iffen somebody +stole anything from you, they had to pay you and not the Law.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[Pg 274]</a></span> +Now they done turned that round and you don't git nothing.</p> + +<p>One day whiles master was gone hunting, Mistress Julia told +her brother to give Miss Harriett (me) a free whipping. She was a nigger +killer. Master Colonel Sam come home and he said, "You infernal sons o' +bitches don't you know there is 300 Yankees camped out here and iffen they +knowed you'd whipped this nigger the way you done done, they'd kill all us. +Iffen they find it out, I'll kill all you all." Old rich devils, I'm here, +but they is gone.</p> + +<p>God choosed Abraham Lincoln to free us. It took one of them to +free us so's they couldn't say nothing.</p> + +<p>Doing one 'lection they sung:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Clark et the watermelon<br /></span> +<span class="i0">J. D. Giddings et the vine!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Clark gone to Congress<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An' J. D. Giddings left behind.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>They hung Jeff Davis up a sour apple tree. They say he was a +president, but he wasn't, he was a big senator man.</p> + +<p>Booker T. Washington was all right in his way, I guess, but Bruce +and Fred Douglass, or big mens jest sold us back to the white folks.</p> + +<p>I married Haywood Telford and had 13 head of chillun by him. My +oldest daughter is the mammy of 14. All my chillun but four done gone to +heaven before me.</p> + +<p>I jined the church in Chapel Hill, Texas. I am born of the Spirit +of God sho' nuff. I played with him seven years and would go right on dancing +at Christmas time. Now I got religion. Everybody oughta live right, though +you won't have no friends iffen you do.</p> + +<p>Our overseer was a poor man. Had us up before day and lak-a-that. +He was paid to be the head of punishment. I jest didn't like to think of them +old slavery days, dogs' days.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /> +<p class="figcenter" style="width: 760px;"> +<a name="Katie_Rowe" id="Katie_Rowe"></a> +<img src="images/image275.jpg" width="760" height="600" alt="Katie Rowe" title="Katie Rowe" /> +</p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[Pg 275]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[HW: (photo)]<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]</p> + +<h3>KATIE ROWE<br /> +Age 88 yrs.<br /> +Tulsa, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I can set on de gallery, whar de sunlight shine bright, and sew a +powerful fine seam when my grandchillun wants a special purty dress for de +school doings, but I ain't worth much for nothing else I reckon.</p> + +<p>These same old eyes seen powerful lot of tribulations in my time, +and when I shets 'em now I can see lots of l'il chillun jest lak my grandchillun, +toting hoes bigger dan dey is, and dey pore little black hands and +legs bleeding whar dey scratched by de brambledy weeds, and whar dey got +whuppings 'cause dey didn't git out all de work de overseer set out for 'em.</p> + +<p>I was one of dem little slave gals my own self, and I never seen +nothing but work and tribulations till I was a grown up woman, jest about.</p> + +<p>De niggers had hard traveling on de plantation whar I was born and +raised, 'cause old Master live in town and jest had de overseer on de place, +but iffen he had lived out dar hisself I speck it been as bad, 'cause he was +a hard driver his own self.</p> + +<p>He git biling mad when de Yankees have dat big battle at Pea Ridge +and scatter de 'Federates all down through our country all bleeding and tied +up and hungry, and he jest mount on his hoss and ride out to de plantation +whar we all hoeing corn.</p> + +<p>He ride up and tell old man Saunders—dat de overseer—to bunch us +all up round de lead row man—dat my own uncle Sandy—and den he tell us de +law!</p> + +<p>"You niggers been seeing de 'Federate soldiers coming by here looking +purty raggedy and hurt and wore out," he say, "but dat no sign dey licked!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[Pg 276]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Dem Yankees ain't gwine git dis fur, but iffen dey do you all +ain't gwine git free by 'em, 'cause I gwine free you befo' dat. When dey +git here dey going find you already free, 'cause I gwine line you up on de +bank of Bois d' Arc Creek and free you wid my shotgun! Anybody miss jest one +lick wid de hoe, or one step in de line, or one clap of dat bell, or one toot +of de horn, and he gwine be free and talking to de debil long befo' he ever see +a pair of blue britches!"</p> + +<p>Dat de way he talk to us, and dat de way he act wid us all de time.</p> + +<p>We live in de log quarters on de plantation, not far from Washington, +Arkansas, close to Bois d' Arc Creek, in de edge of de Little River bottom.</p> + +<p>Old Master's name was Dr. Isaac Jones, and he live in de town, whar +he keep four, five house niggers, but he have about 200 on de plantation, big and +little, and old man Saunders oversee 'em at de time of de War. Old Mistress name +was Betty, and she had a daughter name Betty about grown, and then they was three +boys, Tom, Bryan, and Bob, but they was too young to go to de War. I never did +see 'em but once or twice 'til after de War.</p> + +<p>Old Master didn't go to de War, 'cause he was a doctor and de onliest +one left in Washington, and purty soon he was dead anyhow.</p> + +<p>Next fall after he ride out and tell us dat he gwine shoot us befo' +he let us free he come out to see how his steam gin doing. De gin box was a +little old thing 'bout as big as a bedstead, wid a long belt running through +de side of de gin house out to de engine and boiler in de yard. De boiler +burn cord wood, and it have a little crack in it whar de nigger ginner been +trying to fix it.</p> + +<p>Old Master come out, hopping mad 'cause de gin shet down, and +ast de ginner, old Brown, what de matter. Old Brown say de boiler weak and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[Pg 277]</a></span> +it liable to bust, but old Master jump down off'n his hoss and go 'round to de +boiler and say, "Cuss fire to your black heart! Dat boiler all right! Throw +on some cordwood, cuss fire to your heart!"</p> + +<p>Old Brown start to de wood pile grumbling to hisself and old Master +stoop down to look at de boiler again, and it blow right up and him standing +right dar!</p> + +<p>Old Master was blowed all to pieces, and dey jest find little bitsy +chunks of his clothes and parts of him to bury.</p> + +<p>De wood pile blow down, and old Brown land way off in de woods, but +he wasn't killed.</p> + +<p>Two wagons of cotton blowed over, and de mules run away, and all de +niggers was scared nearly to death 'cause we knowed de overseer gwine be a lot +worse, now dat old Master gone.</p> + +<p>Before de War when Master was a young man de slaves didn't have it so +hard, my mammy tell me. Her name was Fanny and her old mammy name was Nanny. +Grandma Nanny was alive during de War yet.</p> + +<p>How she come in de Jones family was dis way: old Mistress was jest +a little girl, and her older brother bought Nanny and give her to her. I think +his name was Little John, anyways we called him Master Little John. He drawed +up a paper what say dat Nanny allus belong to Miss Betty and all de chillun +Nanny ever have belong to her, too, and nobody can't take 'em for a debt and +things like dat. When Miss Betty marry, old Master he can't sell Nanny or any of +her chillun neither.</p> + +<p>Dat paper hold good too, and grandmammy tell me about one time it +hold good and keep my own mammy on de place.</p> + +<p>Grandmammy say mammy was jest a little gal and was playing out in +de road wid three, four other little chillun when a white man and old Master rid +up. The white man had a paper about some kind of a debt, and old Master say<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[Pg 278]</a></span> +take his pick of de nigger chillun and give him back de paper.</p> + +<p>Jest as Grandmammy go to de cabin door and hear him say dat de man +git off his hoss and pick up my mammy and put her up in front of him and start +to ride off down de road.</p> + +<p>Pretty soon Mr. Little John come riding up and say something to old +Master, and see grandmammy standing in de yard screaming and crying. He jest +job de spur in his hoss and go kiting off down de road after dat white man.</p> + +<p>Mammy say he ketch up wid him jest as he git to Bois d' Arc Creek +and start to wade de hoss across. Mr. Little John holler to him to come back wid +dat little nigger 'cause de paper don't kiver dat child, 'cause she old Mistress' +own child, and when de man jest ride on, Mr. Little John throw his big old long +hoss-pistol down on him and make him come back.</p> + +<p>De man hopping mad, but he have to give over my mammy and take one +de other chillun on de debt paper.</p> + +<p>Old Master allus kind of techy 'bout old Mistress having niggers he +can't trade or sell, and one day he have his whole family and some more white +folks out at de plantation. He showing 'em all de quarters when we all come +in from de field in de evening, and he call all de niggers up to let de folks +see 'em.</p> + +<p>He make grandmammy and mammy and me stand to one side and den he +say to the other niggers, "Dese niggers belong to my wife but you belong to +me, and I'm de only one you is to call Master.</p> + +<p>"Dis is Tom, and Bryan, and Bob, and Miss Betty, and you is to call +'em dat, and don't you ever call one of 'em Young Master or Young Mistress, +cuss fire to your black hearts!" All de other white folks look kind of funny, +and old Mistress look 'shamed of old Master.</p> + +<p>My own pappy was in dat bunch, too. His name was Frank, and after de +War he took de name of Frank Henderson, 'cause he was born under dat name, but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[Pg 279]</a></span> +I allus went by Jones, de name I was born under.</p> + +<p>Long about de middle of de War, after old Master was killed, de +soldiers begin coming 'round de place and camping. Dey was Southern soldiers +and dey say dey have to take de mules and most de corn to git along on. Jest +go in de barns and cribs and take anything dey want, and us niggers didn't have +no sweet 'taters nor Irish 'taters to eat on when dey gone neither.</p> + +<p>One bunch come and stay in de woods across de road from de overseer's +house, and dey was all on hosses. Dey lead de hosses down to Bois d' Arc Creek +every morning at daylight and late every evening to git water. When we going to +de field and when we coming in we allus see dem leading big bunches of hosses.</p> + +<p>Dey bugle go jest 'bout de time our old horn blow in de morning and +when we come in dey eating supper, and we smell it and sho' git hungry!</p> + +<p>Before old Master died he sold off a whole lot of hosses and cattle, +and some niggers too. He had de sales on de plantation, and white men from +around dar come to bid, and some traders come. He had a big stump whar he made +de niggers stand while dey was being sold, and de men and boys had to strip off +to de waist to show dey muscle and iffen dey had any scars or hurt places, but +de women and gals didn't have to strip to de waist.</p> + +<p>De white men come up and look in de slave's mouth jest lak he was a +mule or a hoss.</p> + +<p>After old Master go, de overseer hold one sale, but mostly he jest +trade wid de traders what come by. He make de niggers git on de stump, through. +De traders all had big bunches of slaves and dey have 'em all strung out in a +line going down de road. Some had wagons and de chillun could ride, but not +many. Dey didn't chain or tie 'em 'cause dey didn't have no place dey could run +to anyway.</p> + +<p>I seen chillun sold off and de mammy not sold, and, sometimes de mammy +sold and a little baby kept on de place and give to another woman to raise. Dem<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[Pg 280]</a></span> +white folks didn't care nothing 'bout how de slaves grieved when dey tore up a +family.</p> + +<p>Old man Saunders was de hardest overseer of anybody. He would git +mad and give a whipping some time and de slave wouldn't even know what it was +about.</p> + +<p>My uncle Sandy was de lead row nigger, and he was a good nigger and +never would tech a drap of likker. One night some de niggers git hold of +some likker somehow, and dey leave de jug half full on de step of Sandy's cabin. +Next morning old man Saunders come out in de field so mad he was pale.</p> + +<p>He jest go to de lead row and tell Sandy to go wid him, and start +toward de woods along Bois d' Arc Creek wid Sandy follering behind. De overseer +always carry a big heavy stick, but we didn't know he was so mad, and dey jest +went off in de woods.</p> + +<p>Purty soon we hear Sandy hollering and we know old overseer pouring +in on, den de overseer come back by his self and go on up to de house.</p> + +<p>Come late evening he come and see what we done in de day's work, and +go back to de quarters wid us all. Then he git to mammy's cabin, whar grandmammy +live too, he say to grandmammy, "I sent Sandy down in de woods to hunt a hoss, +he gwine come in hungry purty soon. You better make him a extra hoe cake," +and he kind of laugh and go on to his house.</p> + +<p>Jest soon as he gone we all tell grandmammy we think he got a whipping, +and sho' nuff he didn't come in.</p> + +<p>De next day some white boys find uncle Sandy whar dat overseer done +killed him and throwed him in a little pond, and dey never done nothing to old +man Saunders at all!</p> + +<p>When he go to whip a nigger he make him strip to de waist, and he +take a cat-o-nine tails and bring de blisters, and den bust de blisters wid<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[Pg 281]</a></span> +a wide strap of leather fastened to a stick handle. I seen de blood running +out'n many a back, all de way from de neck to de waist!</p> + +<p>Many de time a nigger git blistered and cut up so dat we have to git +a sheet and grease it wid lard and wrap 'em up in it, and dey have to wear a +greasy cloth wrapped around dey body under de shirt for three-four days after +dey git a big whipping!</p> + +<p>Later on in de War de Yankees come in all around us and camp, and de +overseer git sweet as honey in de comb! Nobody git a whipping all de time de +Yankees dar!</p> + +<p>Dey come and took all de meat and corn and 'taters dey want too, and +dey tell us, "Why don't you poor darkeys take all de meat and molasses you want? +You made it and it's your's much as anybody's!" But we know dey soon be gone, +and den we git a whipping iffen we do. Some niggers run off and went wid de Yankees, +but dey had to work jest as hard for dem, and dey didn't eat so good and often +wid de soldiers.</p> + +<p>I never forget de day we was set free!</p> + +<p>Dat morning we all go to de cotton field early, and den a house nigger +come out from old Mistress on a hoss and say she want de overseer to come into +town, and he leave and go in. After while de old horn blow up at de overseer's +house, and we all stop and listen, 'cause it de wrong time of day for de horn.</p> + +<p>We start chopping again, and dar go de horn again.</p> + +<p>De lead row nigger holler "Hold up!" And we all stop again. "We better +go on in. Dat our horn," he holler at de head nigger, and de head nigger think +so too, but he say he afraid we catch de devil from de overseer iffen we quit +widout him dar, and de lead row man say maybe he back from town and blowing de +horn hisself, so we line up and go in.</p> + +<p>When we git to de quarters we see all de old ones and de chillun +up in de overseer's yard, so we go on up dar. De overseer setting on de end of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[Pg 282]</a></span> +de gallery wid a paper in his hand, and when we all come up he say come and +stand close to de gallery. Den he call off everybody's name and see we all dar.</p> + +<p>Setting on de gallery in a hide-bottom chair was a man we never see +before. He had on a big broad black hat lak de Yankees wore but it din't have +no yaller string on it lak most de Yankees had, and he was in store clothes dat +wasn't homespun or jeans, and dey was black. His hair was plumb gray and so +was his beard, and it come way down here on his chest, but he didn't look lak +he was very old, 'cause his face was kind of fleshy and healthy looking. I think +we all been sold off in a bunch, and I notice some kind of smiling, and I think +they sho' glad of it.</p> + +<p>De man say, "You darkies know what day dis is?" He talk kind, and smile.</p> + +<p>We all don't know of course, and we jest stand dar and grin. Pretty +soon he ask again and de head man say, No, we don't know.</p> + +<p>"Well dis de fourth day of June, and dis is 1865, and I want you all +to 'member de date, 'cause you allus going 'member de day. Today you is free, +Jest lak I is, and Mr. Saunders and your Mistress and all us white people," de +man say.</p> + +<p>"I come to tell you", he say, "and I wants to be sho' you all understand, +'cause you don't have to git up and go by de horn no more. You is +your own bosses now, and you don't have to have no passes to go and come."</p> + +<p>We never did have no passes, nohow, but we knowed lots of other +niggers on other plantations got 'em.</p> + +<p>"I wants to bless you and hope you always is happy, and tell you +got all de right and lief [TR: sic] dat any white people got", de man say, and den he +git on his hoss and ride off.</p> + +<p>We all jest watch him go on down de road, and den we go up to +Mr. Saunders and ask him what he want us to do. He jest grunt and say do lak we<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[Pg 283]</a></span> +dam please, he reckon, but git off dat place to do it, less'n any of us wants +to stay and make de crop for half of what we make.</p> + +<p>None of us know whar to go, so we all stay, and he split up de +fields and show us which part we got to work in, and we go on lak we was, and +make de crop and git it in, but dey ain't no more horn after dat day. Some +de niggers lazy and don't git in de field early, and dey git it took away from +'em, but dey plead around and git it back and work better de rest of dat year.</p> + +<p>But we all gits fooled on dat first go-out! When de crop all in we +don't git half! Old Mistress sick in town, and de overseer was still on de +place and he charge us half de crop for de quarters and de mules and tools and +grub!</p> + +<p>Den he leave, and we gits another white man, and he sets up a +book, and give us half de next year, and take out for what we use up, but we +all got something left over after dat first go-out.</p> + +<p>Old Mistress never git well after she lose all her niggers, and one +day de white boss tell us she jest drap over dead setting in her chair, and +we know her heart jest broke.</p> + +<p>Next year de chillun sell off most de place and we scatter off, and +I and mammy go into Little Rock and do work in de town. Grandmammy done dead.</p> + +<p>I git married to John White in Little Rock, but he died and we didn't +have no chillun. Den in four, five years I marry Billy Rowe. He was a Cherokee +citizen and he had belonged to a Cherokee name Dave Rowe, and lived east of +Tahlequah before de War. We married in Little Rock, but he had land in de +Cherokee Nation, and we come to east of Tahlequah and lived 'til he died, and +den I come to Tulsa to live wid my youngest daughter.</p> + +<p>Billy Rowe and me had three chillun, Ellie, John, and Lula. Lula +married a Thomas, and it's her I lives with.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[Pg 284]</a></span></p> + +<p>Lots of old people lak me say dat dey was happy in slavery, and dat +dey had de worst tribulations after freedom, but I knows dey didn't have no +white master and overseer lak we all had on our place. Dey both dead now I +reckon, and dey no use talking 'bout de dead, but I know I been gone long ago +iffen dat white man Saunder didn't lose his hold on me.</p> + +<p>It was de fourth day of June in 1865 I begins to live, and I gwine +take de picture of dat old man in de big black hat and long whiskers, setting +on de gallery and talking kind to us, clean into my grave wid me.</p> + +<p>No, bless God, I ain't never seen no more black boys bleeding +all up and down de back under a cat o' nine tails, and I never go by no +cabin and hear no poor nigger groaning, all wrapped up in a lardy sheet no more!</p> + +<p>I hear my chillun read about General Lee, and I know he was a good man, +I didn't know nothing about him den, but I know now he wasn't fighting for dat +kind of white folks.</p> + +<p>Maybe dey dat kind still yet, but dey don't show it up no more, and I +got lots of white friends too. All my chillun and grandchillun been to school, +and dey git along good, and I know we living in a better world, what dey ain't +nobody "cussing fire to my black heart!"</p> + +<p>I sho' thank de good Lawd I got to see it.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[Pg 285]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>MORRIS SHEPPARD<br /> +Age 85 yrs.<br /> +Fort Gibson, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>Old Master tell me I was borned in November 1852, at de old home place +about five miles east of Webber's Falls, mebbe kind of northeast, not far +from de east bank of de Illinois River.</p> + +<p>Master's name was Joe Sheppard, and he was a Cherokee Indian. Tall and +slim and handsome. He had black eyes and mustache but his hair was iron +gray, and everybody liked him because he was so good-natured and kind.</p> + +<p>I don't remember old Mistress' name. My mammy was a Crossland negro +before she come to belong to Master Joe and marry my pappy, and I think she +come wid old Mistress and belong to her. Old Mistress was small and mighty +pretty too, and she was only half Cherokee. She inherit about half a dozen +slaves, and say dey was her own and old Master can't sell one unless she +give him leave to do it.</p> + +<p>Dey only had two families of slaves wid about twenty in all, and dey +only worked about fifty acres, so we sure did work every foot of it good. +We git three or four crops of different things out of dat farm every year, +and something growing on dat place winter and summer.</p> + +<p>Pappy's name was Caesar Sheppard and Mammy's name was Easter. Dey was +both raised 'round Webber's Falls somewhere. I had two brothers, Silas and +George, dat belong to Mr. George Holt in Webber's Falls town. I got a pass +and went to see dem sometimes, and dey was both treated mighty fine.</p> + +<p>The Big House was a double log wid a big hall and a stone chimney but +no porches, wid two rooms at each end, one top side of de other. I thought +it was mighty big and fine.</p> + +<p>Us slaves lived in log cabins dat only had one room and no windows +so we kept de doors open most of de time. We had home-made wooden beds wid<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[Pg 286]</a></span> +rope springs, and de little ones slept on trundle beds dat was home made +too.</p> + +<p>At night dem trundles was jest all over de floor, and in de morning we +shove dem back under de big beds to git dem out'n de way. No nails in none +of dem nor in de chairs and tables. Nails cost big money and old Master's +blacksmith wouldn't make none 'cepting a few for old Master now and den, +so we used wooden dowels to put things together.</p> + +<p>They was so many of us for dat little field we never did have to work +hard. Up at five o'clock and back in sometimes about de middle of de +evening, long before sundown, unless they was a crop to git in before it +rain or something like dat.</p> + +<p>When crop was laid by de slaves jest work 'round at dis and dat and keep +tol'able busy. I never did have much of a job, jest tending de calves +mostly. We had about twenty calves and I would take dem out and graze 'em +while some grown-up negro was grazing de cows so as to keep de cows milk. I +had me a good blaze-faced horse for dat.</p> + +<p>One time old Master and another man come and took some calves off and +Pappy say old Master taking dem off to sell. I didn't know what "sell" meant +and I ast Pappy, "Is he going to bring 'em back when he git through selling +them?" I never did see no money neither, until time of de War or a little +before.</p> + +<p>Master Joe was sure a good provider, and we always had plenty of corn +pone, sow belly and greens, sweet potatoes, cow peas and cane molasses. We +even had brown sugar and cane molasses most of de time before de War. Sometimes +coffee, too.</p> + +<p>De clothes wasn't no worry neither. Everything we had was made by my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[Pg 287]</a></span> +folks. My aunt done de carding and spinning and my mammy done de weaving +and cutting and sewing, and my pappy could make cowhide shoes wid wooden +pegs. Dey was for bad winter only.</p> + +<p>Old Master bought de cotton in Ft. Smith because he didn't raise no +cotton, but he had a few sheep and we had wool-mix for winter.</p> + +<p>Everything was stripedy 'cause Mammy like to make it fancy. She dye +wid copperas and walnut and wild indigo and things like dat and make pretty +cloth. I wore a stripedy shirt till I was about eleven years old, and den +one day while we was down in de Choctaw Country old Mistress see me and +nearly fall off'n her horse! She holler, "Easter, you go right now and +make dat big buck of a boy some britches!"</p> + +<p>We never put on de shoes until about late November when de frost begin +to hit regular and split our feet up, and den when it git good and cold +and de crop all gathered in anyways, they is nothing to do 'cepting hog +killing and a lot of wood chopping, and you don't git cold doing dem two +things.</p> + +<p>De hog killing mean we gits lots of spare-ribs and chitlings, and somebody +always git sick eating too much of dat fresh pork. I always pick a whole +passel of muskatines for old Master and he make up sour wine, and dat helps +out when we git the bowel complaint from eating dat fresh pork.</p> + +<p>If somebody bad sick he git de doctor right quick, and he don't let no +negroes mess around wid no poultices and teas and sech things like cupping-horns +neither!</p> + +<p>Us Cherokee slaves seen lots of green corn shootings and de like of +dat, but we never had no games of our own. We was too tired when we come in +to play any games. We had to have a pass to go any place to have singing or +praying, and den they was always a bunch of patrollers around to watch everything<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[Pg 288]</a></span> +we done. Dey would come up in a bunch of about nine men on horses, +and look at all our passes, and if a negro didn't have no pass dey wore +him out good and made him go home. Dey didn't let us have much enjoyment.</p> + +<p>Right after de War de Cherokees that had been wid the South kind of +pestered the freedmen some, but I was so small dey never bothered me; jest +de grown ones. Old Master and Mistress kept on asking me did de night +riders persecute me any but dey never did. Dey told me some of dem was bad +on negroes but I never did see none of dem night riding like some said dey +did.</p> + +<p>Old Master had some kind of business in Fort Smith, I think, 'cause he +used to ride in to dat town 'bout every day on his horse. He would start at +de crack of daylight and not git home till way after dark. When he get home +he call my uncle in and ask about what we done all day and tell him what we +better do de next day. My uncle Joe was de slave boss and he tell us what +de Master say do.</p> + +<p>When dat Civil War come along I was a pretty big boy and I 'remember it +good as anybody. Uncle Joe tell us all to lay low and work hard and nobody +bother us, and he would look after us. He sure stood good with de Cherokee +neighbors we had, and dey all liked him. There was Mr. Jim Collins, and Mr. +Bell, and Mr. Dave Franklin, and Mr. Jim Sutton and Mr. Blackburn that lived +around close to us and dey all had slaves. Dey was all wid the South, but +dey was a lot of dem Pin Indians all up on de Illinois River and dey was wid +de North and dey taken it out on de slave owners a lot before de War and +during it too.</p> + +<p>Dey would come in de night and hamstring de horses and maybe set fire to +de barn, and two of 'em named Joab Scarrel and Tom Starr killed my pappy one +night just before de War broke out.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[Pg 289]</a></span></p> + +<p>I don't know what dey done it for, only to be mean, and I guess they +was drunk.</p> + +<p>Them Pins was after Master all de time for a while at de first of de +War, and he was afraid to ride into Fort Smith much. Dey come to de house +one time when he was gone to Fort Smith and us children told dem he was at +Honey Springs, but they knowed better and when he got home he said somebody +shot at him and bushwhacked him all the way from Wilson's Rock to dem Wildhorse +Mountains, but he run his horse like de devil was setting on his tail +and dey never did hit him. He never seen them neither. We told him 'bout +de Pins coming for him and he just laughed.</p> + +<p>When de War come old Master seen he was going into trouble and he sold +off most of de slaves. In de second year of de War he sold my mammy and my +aunt dat was Uncle Joe's wife and my two brothers and my little sister. Mammy +went to a mean old man named Peper Goodman and he took her off down de river, +and pretty soon Mistress tell me she died 'cause she can't stand de rough +treatment.</p> + +<p>When Mammy went old Mistress took me to de Big House to help her, and +she was kind to me like I was part of her own family. I never forget when +they sold off some more negroes at de same time, too, and put dem all in a +pen for de trader to come and look at.</p> + +<p>He never come until the next day, so dey had to sleep in dat pen in a +pile like hogs.</p> + +<p>It wasn't my Master done dat. He done already sold 'em to a man and +it was dat man was waiting for de trader. It made my Master mad, but dey +didn't belong to him no more and he couldn't say nothing.</p> + +<p>The man put dem on a block and sold 'em to a man dat had come in on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[Pg 290]</a></span> +a steamboat, and he took dem off on it when de freshet come down and de +boat could go back to Fort Smith. It was tied up at de dock at Webber's +Falls about a week and we went down and talked to my aunt and brothers +and sister. De brothers was Sam and Eli. Old Mistress cried jest like +any of de rest of us when de boat pull out with dem on it.</p> + +<p>Pretty soon all de young Cherokee menfolks all gone off to de War, +and de Pins was riding 'round all de time, and it aint safe to be in dat +part around Webber's Falls, so old Master take us all to Fort Smith where +they was a lot of Confederate soldiers.</p> + +<p>We camp at dat place a while and old Mistress stay in de town wid +some kinfolks. Den old Master get three wagons and ox teams and take us +all way down on Red River in de Choctaw Nation.</p> + +<p>We went by Webber's Falls and filled de wagons. We left de furniture +and only took grub and tools and bedding and clothes, 'cause they wasn't +very big wagons and was only single-yoke.</p> + +<p>We went on a place in de Red River bottoms close to Shawneetown and +not far from de place where all de wagons crossed over to go into Texas. +We was at dat place two years and made two little crops.</p> + +<p>One night a runaway negro come across from Texas and he had de blood +hounds after him. His britches was all muddy and tore where de hounds had +cut him up in de legs when he clumb a tree in de bottoms. He come to our +house and Mistress said for us negroes to give him something to eat and we +did.</p> + +<p>Then up come de man from Texas with de hounds and wid him was young +Mr. Joe Vann and my uncle that belong to young Joe. Dey called young Mr. +Joe "Little Joe Vann" even after he was grown on account of when he was a +little boy before his pappy was killed. His pappy was old Captain "Rich<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[Pg 291]</a></span> +Joe" Vann, and he been dead ever since long before de War. My uncle belong +to old Captain Joe nearly all his life.</p> + +<p>Mistress try to get de man to tell her who de negro belong to so she +can buy him, but de man say he can't sell him and he take him on back to +Texas wid a chain around his two ankles. Dat was one poor negro dat never +got away to de North, and I was sorry for him 'cause I know he must have had +a mean master, but none of us Sheppard negroes, I mean the grown ones, tried +to git away.</p> + +<p>I never seen any fighting in de War, but I seen soldiers in de South +army doing a lot of blacksmithing 'long side de road one day. Dey was fixing +wagons and shoeing horses.</p> + +<p>After de War was over, old Master tell me I am free but he will look out +after me 'cause I am just a little negro and I aint got no sense. I know he +is right, too.</p> + +<p>Well, I go ahead and make me a crop of corn all by myself and then I +don't know what to do wid it. I was afraid I would get cheated out of it +'cause I can't figure and read, so I tell old Master about it and he bought +it off'n me.</p> + +<p>We never had no school in slavery and it was agin the law for anybody to +even show a negro de letters and figures, so no Cherokee slave could read.</p> + +<p>We all come back to de old place and find de negro cabins and barns +burned down and de fences all gone and de field in crab grass and cockleburrs. +But de Big House aint hurt 'cepting it need a new roof. De furniture is all +gone, and some said de soldiers burned it up for firewood. Some officers +stayed in de house for a while and tore everything up or took it off.</p> + +<p>Master give me over to de National Freedmen's Bureau and I was bound +out to a Cherokee woman name Lizzie McGee. Then one day one of my uncles<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[Pg 292]</a></span> +named Wash Sheppard come and tried to git me to go live wid him. He say +he wanted to git de family all together agin.</p> + +<p>He had run off after he was sold and joined de North army and discharged +at Fort Scott in Kansas, and he said lots of freedmen was living close to +each other up by Coffeyville in de Coo-ee-scoo-ee District.</p> + +<p>I wouldn't go, so he sent Isaac and Joe Vann dat had been two of old +Captain Joe's negroes to talk to me. Isaac had been Young Joe's driver, +and he told me all about how rich Master Joe was and how he would look after +us negroes. Dey kept after me 'bout a year, but I didn't go anyways.</p> + +<p>But later on I got a freedman's allotment up in dat part close to +Coffeyville, and I lived in Coffeyville a while but I didn't like it in +Kansas.</p> + +<p>I lost my land trying to live honest and pay my debts. I raised eleven +children just on de sweat of my hands and none of dem ever tasted anything +dat was stole.</p> + +<p>When I left Mrs. McGee's I worked about three years for Mr. Sterling +Scott and Mr. Roddy Reese. Mr. Reese had a big flock of peafowls dat had +belonged to Mr. Scott and I had to take care of dem.</p> + +<p>Whitefolks, I would have to tromp seven miles to Mr. Scott's house +two or three times a week to bring back some old peafowl dat had got out +and gone back to de old place!</p> + +<p>Poor old Master and Mistress only lived a few years after de War. +Master went plumb blind after he move back to Webber's Falls and so he +move up on de Illinois River 'bout three miles from de Arkansas, and there +old Mistress take de white swelling and die and den he die pretty soon. I +went to see dem lots of times and they was always glad to see me.</p> + +<p>I would stay around about a week and help 'em, and dey would try to git<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[Pg 293]</a></span> +me to take something but I never would. Dey didn't have much and couldn't +make anymore and dem so old. Old Mistress had inherited some property from +her pappy and dey had de slave money and when dey turned everything into +good money after de War dat stuff only come to about six thousand dollars +in good money, she told me. Dat just about lasted 'em through until dey +died, I reckon.</p> + +<p>By and by I married Nancy Hildebrand what lived on Greenleaf Creek, +'bout four miles northwest of Gore. She had belonged to Joe Hildebrand +and he was kin to old Steve Hildebrand dat owned de mill on Flint Creek +up in de Going Snake District. She was raised up at dat mill, but she was +borned in Tennessee before dey come out to de Nation. Her master was white +but he had married into de Nation and so she got a freedmen's allotment too. +She had some land close to Catoosa and some down on Greenleaf Creek.</p> + +<p>We was married at my home in Coffeyville, and she bore me eleven children +and then went on to her reward. A long time ago I came to live wid my +daughter Emma here at dis place, but my wife just died last year. She was +eighty three.</p> + +<p>I reckon I wasn't cut out on de church pattern, but I raised my children +right. We never had no church in slavery, and no schooling, and you +had better not be caught wid a book in your hand even, so I never did go to +church hardly any.</p> + +<p>Wife belong to de church and all de children too, and I think all should +look after saving their souls so as to drive de nail in, and den go about de +earth spreading kindness and hoeing de row clean so as to clinch dat nail and +make dem safe for Glory.</p> + +<p>Of course I hear about Abraham Lincoln and he was a great man, but I +was told mostly by my children when dey come home from school about him. I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[Pg 294]</a></span> +always think of my old Master as de one dat freed me, and anyways Abraham +Lincoln and none of his North people didn't look after me and buy my crop +right after I was free like old Master did. Dat was de time dat was de +hardest and everything was dark and confusion.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[Pg 295]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]</p> + +<h3>ANDREW SIMMS<br /> +Age 80<br /> +Sapulpa, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>My parents come over on a slave ship from Africa about twenty year +before I was born on the William Driver plantation down in Florida. My folks +didn't know each other in Africa but my old Mammy told me she was captured +by Negro slave hunters over there and brought to some coast town where the +white buyers took her and carried her to America.</p> + +<p>She was kinder a young gal then and was sold to some white folks +when the boat landed here. Dunno who they was. The same thing happen to +my pappy. Must have been about the same time from the way they tells it. +Maybe they was on the [HW: same] boat, I dunno.</p> + +<p>They was traded around and then mammy was sold to William Driver. +The plantation was down in Florida. Another white folks had a plantation +close by. Mister Simms was the owner. Bill Simms—that's the name pappy +kept after the War.</p> + +<p>Somehow or other mammy and pappy meets 'round the place and the +first thing happens they is in love. That's what mammy say. And the next +thing happen is me. They didn't get married. The Master's say it is alright +for them to have a baby. They never gets married, even after the War. Just +jumped the broomstick and goes to living with somebody else I reckon.</p> + +<p>Then when I was four year old along come the War and Master Driver +takes up his slaves and leaves the Florida country and goes way out to Texas. +Mammy goes along, I goes along, all the children goes along. I don't remember +nothing about the trip but I hears mammy talk about it when I gets older.</p> + +<p>Texas, that was the place, down near Fairfield. That's where I +learn to do the chores. But the work was easy for the Master was kind as +old Mammy herself and he never give me no hard jobs that would wear me down.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[Pg 296]</a></span> +All the slaves on our place was treated good. All the time. They didn't +whip. The Master feeds all the slaves on good clean foods and lean meats +so's they be strong and healthy.</p> + +<p>Master Driver had four children, Mary, Julia, Frank and George. +Every one of them children kind and good just the old Master. They was +never mean and could I find some of 'em now hard times would leave me on the +run! They'd help this old man get catched up on his eating!</p> + +<p>Makes me think of the old song we use to sing:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Don't mind working from Sun to Sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Iffen you give me my dinner—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When the dinner time comes!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Nowadays I gets me something to eat when I can catch it. The +trouble is sometimes I don't catch! But that ain't telling about the slave +days.</p> + +<p>In them times it was mostly the overseers and the drivers who was +the mean ones. They caused all the misery. There was other whitefolks +caused troubles too. Sneak around where there was lots of the black children +on the plantation and steal them. Take them poor children away off and sell +them.</p> + +<p>There wasn't any Sunday Schooling. There was no place to learn +to read and write—no big brick schools like they is now. The old Master +say we can teach ourselves but we can't do it. Old Elam Bowman owned the +place next door to Mister Driver. If he catch his slaves toying with the +pencil, why, he cut off one of their fingers. Then I reckon they lost interest +in education and get their mind back on the hoe and plow like he say for them +to do.</p> + +<p>I didn't see no fighting during of the War. If they was any +Yankees soldiering around the country I don't remember nothing of it.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[Pg 297]</a></span></p> + +<p>Long time after the War is over, about 1885, I meets a gal named +Angeline. We courts pretty fast and gets married. The wedding was a sure +enough affair with the preacher saying the words just like the whitefolks +marriage. We is sure married.</p> + +<p>The best thing we do after that is raise us a family. One of them +old fashioned families. Big 'uns! Seventeen children does we have and +twelve of them still living. Wants to know they names? I ain't never forgets +a one! There was Lucy, Bill, Ebbie, Cora, Minnie, George, Frank, Kizzie, +Necie, Andrew, Joe, Sammie, David, Fannie, Jacob, Bob and Myrtle.</p> + +<p>All good children. Just like their old pappy who's tried to care +for 'em just like the old Master takes care of their old daddy when he was +a boy on that plantation down Texas way.</p> + +<p>When the age comes on a man I reckon religion gets kind of meanful. +Thinks about it more'n when he's young and busy in the fields. I believes +in the Bible and what it says to do. Some of the Colored folks takes to +the voodoo. I don't believe in it. Neither does I believe in the fortune +telling or charms. I aims to live by the Bible and leave the rabbit foots +alone!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[Pg 298]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +10-19-38<br /> +718 words</p> + +<h3>LIZA SMITH<br /> +Age 91<br /> +Muskogee, Oklahoma<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>Both my mammy and pappy was brought from Africa on a slave boat and +sold on de Richmond (Va.) slave market. What year dey come over I don't +know. My mammy was Jane Mason, belonging to Frank Mason; pappy was Frank +Smith, belonging to a master wid de same name. I mean, my pappy took his +Master's name, and den after my folks married mammy took de name of Smith, +but she stayed on wid de Masons and never did belong to my pappy's master. +Den, after Frank Mason took all his slaves out of de Virginia county, +mammy met up wid another man, Ben Humphries, and married him.</p> + +<p>In Richmond, dat's where I was born, 'bout 1847, de Master said; and dat +make me more dan 90-year old dis good year. I had two brothers named Webb and +Norman, a half-brother Charley, and two half-sisters, Mealey and Ann. Me, I +was born a slave and so was my son. His father, Toney, was one of de Mason +slave boys; de Master said I was 'bout 13-year old when de boy was born.</p> + +<p>Frank Mason was a young man when de War started, living wid his mother. +Dey had lots of slaves, maybe a hundred, and dey always try to take good care +of 'em; even after de War was over he worried 'bout trying to get us settled +so's we wouldn't starve. De Master had overseer, but dere was no whuppings.</p> + +<p>All de way from Richmond to a place dey call Waco, Texas, we traveled by +ox-wagon and boats, and den de Master figures we all be better off over in Arkansas +and goes to Pine Bluff.</p> + +<p>What wid all de running 'round de slaves was kept clean and always wid +plenty to eat and good clothes to wear. De Master was a plenty rich man and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[Pg 299]</a></span> +done what his mother, Mrs. Betsy Mason, told him when we all left de Big +Mansion, way back dere in Richmond. De Mistress said, "Frank, you watch +over dem Negroes cause dey's good men and women; keep dem clean!" Dat's +what he done, up until we was freed, and den times was so hard nobody wanted +us many Negroes around, and de work was scarce, too. Hard times! Folks +don't know what hard times is.</p> + +<p>When a Negro get sick de master would send out for herbs and roots. +Den one of de slaves who knew how to cook and mix 'em up for medicine use +would give de doses. All de men and women wore charms, something like beads, +and if dey was any good or not I don't know, but we didn't have no bad diseases +like after dey set us free.</p> + +<p>I was at Pine Bluff when de Yankees was shooting all over de place. De +fighting got so hot we all had to leave; dat's the way it was all de time for +us during de War—running away to some place or de next place, and we was all +glad when it stopped and we could settle down in a place.</p> + +<p>We was back at Waco when de peace come, but Master Frank was away from +home when dat happen. It was on a Sunday when he got back and called all de +slaves up in de yard and counted all of dem, young and old.</p> + +<p>The first thing he said was, "You men and women is all free! I'm going +back to my own mammy in old Virginia, but I ain't going back until all de old +people is settled in cabins and de young folks fix up wid tents!"</p> + +<p>Den he kinder stopped talking. Seem now like he was too excited to talk, +or maybe he was feeling bad and worried 'bout what he going to do wid all of us. +Pretty soon he said, "You men and women, can't none of you tell anybody I ain't +always been a good master. Old folks, have I ever treated you mean?" He asked. +Everybody shout, "No, sir!" And Master Frank smiled; den he told us he was going +'round and find places for us to live.</p> + +<p>He went to see Jim Tinsley, who owned some slaves, about keeping us. +Tinsley said he had cabins and could fix up tents for extra ones, if his +own Negroes was willing to share up with us. Dat was the way it worked +out. We stayed on dere for a while, but times was so hard we finally get +dirty and ragged like all de Tinsley Negroes. But Master Frank figure he +done the best he could for us.</p> + +<p>After he go back to Virginia we never hear no more of him, but every +day I still pray if he has any folks in Richmond dey will find me someway +before I die. Is dere someway I could find dem, you s'pose?</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[Pg 300]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[Date Stamp: Aug 12 1937]</p> + +<h3>LOU SMITH<br /> +Age 83 yrs.<br /> +Platter, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>Sho', I remembers de slavery days! I was a little gal but I can +tell you lots of things about dem days. My job was nussing de younguns. I +took keer of them from daylight to dark. I'd have to sing them to sleep too. +I'd sing:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"By-lo Baby Bunting<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Daddy's gone a-hunting<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To get a rabbit skin<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To wrap Baby Bunting in."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Sometimes I'd sing:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Rock-a-bye baby, in a tree top<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When de wind blows your cradle'll rock.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When de bough breaks de crad'll fall<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Down comes baby cradle'n all."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>My father was Jackson Longacre and he was born in Mississippi. My +mother, Caroline, was born in South Carolina. Both of them was born slaves. +My father belonged to Huriah Longacre. He had a big plantation and lots of +niggers. He put up a lot of his slaves as security on a debt and he took sick +and died so they put them all on de block and sold them. My father and his +mother (my grandma) was sold together. My old Mistress bought my grandmother +and old Mistress' sister bought my grandma's sister. These white women agreed +that they would never go off so far that the two slave women couldn't see each +other. They allus kept this promise. A Mr. Covington offered old Master $700 +for me when I was about ten years old, but he wouldn't sell me. He didn't +need to for he was rich as cream and my, how good he was to us.</p> + +<p>Young Master married Miss Jo Arnold and old Master sent me and my +mother over to live with them. I was small when I was took out of old man<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[Pg 301]</a></span> +McWilliams' yard. It was his wife that bought my grandmother and my father. +My mother's folks had always belonged to his family. They all moved to Texas +and we all lived there until after the surrender.</p> + +<p>Miss Jo wasn't a good Mistress and mother and me wasn't happy. When +young Master was there he made her treat us good but when he was gone she made +our lives a misery to us. She was what we called a "low-brow." She never had +been used to slaves and she treated us like dogs. She said us kids didn't +need to wear any clothes and one day she told us we could jest take'em off as +it cost too much to clothe us. I was jest a little child but I knowed I +oughten to go without my clothes. We wore little enough as it was. In summer +we just wore one garment, a sort of slip without any sleeves. Well, anyway +she made me take off my clothes and I just crept off and cried. Purty soon +young Master come home.</p> + +<p>He wanted to know what on earth I was doing without my dress on. I +told him, and my goodness, but he raised the roof. He told her if she didn't +treat us better he was going to take us back to old Master. I never did have +any more good times 'cepting when I'd get to go to visit at old Master's. +None of our family could be sold and that was why old Master just loaned us to +young Master. When old Master died, dey put all our names in a hat and all +the chilluns draw out a name. This was done to 'vide us niggers satisfactory. +Young Master drawed my mother's name and they all agreed that I should go with +her, so back we went to Miss Jo. She wouldn't feed us niggers. She'd make +me set in a corner like a little dog. I got so hungry and howled so loud they +had to feed me. When the surrender come, I was eleven years old, and they +told us we was free. I ran off and hid in the plum orchard and I said over'n +over, "I'se free, I'se free; I ain't never going back to Miss Jo." My mother +come out and got me and in a few days my father came and lived with us. He +worked for young Master and the crops was divided with him. Miss Jo died and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[Pg 302]</a></span> +we lived on there. My mother took over the charge of the house and the chillun +for young Master and we was all purty happy after that.</p> + +<p>They was a white man come into our settlement and bought a plantation +and some slaves. My, but he treated them bad. He owned a boy about fifteen +years old. One day he sent him on a errand. On the way home he got off his +mule and set down in the shade of a tree to rest. He fell asleep and the mule +went home. When he woke up he was scared to go home and he stayed out in de +woods for several days. Finally they caught him and took him home and his +master beat him nearly to death. He then dug a hole and put him in it and +piled corn shucks all around him. This nearly killed him 'cause his body +was cut up so with the whip. One of the niggers slipped off and went to the +jining plantation and told about the way the boy was being treated and a +bunch of white men came over and made him take the child out and doctor his +wounds. This man lived there about ten years and he was so mean to his slaves +'til all the white men round who owned niggers finally went to him and told +him they would just give him so long to sell out and leave. They made him sell +his slaves to people there in the community, and he went back north.</p> + +<p>My mother told me that he owned a woman who was the mother of several +chillun and when her babies would get about a year or two of age he'd sell +them and it would break her heart. She never got to keep them. When her +fourth baby was born and was about two months old she just studied all the time +about how she would have to give it up and one day she said, "I just decided +I'm not going to let old Master sell this baby; he just ain't going to do it." +She got up and give it something out of a bottle and purty soon it was dead. +'Course didn't nobody tell on her or he'd of beat her nearly to death. There +wasn't many folks that was mean to their slaves.</p> + +<p>Old Master's boys played with the nigger boys all the time. They'd +go swimming, fishing and hunting together. One of his boys name was Robert<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[Pg 303]</a></span> +but everybody called him Bud. They all would catch rabbits and mark them and +turn them loose. One day a boy come along with a rabbit he had caught in a +trap. Old Master's boy noticed that it had Bud's mark on it and they made him +turn it loose.</p> + +<p>Old Master was his own overseer, but my daddy was the overlooker. He +was purty hard on them too, as they had to work just like they never got tired. +The women had to do housework, spinning, sewing and work in the fields too. My +mother was housewoman and she could keep herself looking nice. My, she went +around with her hair and clothes all Jenny-Lynned-up all the time until we +went to live with Miss Jo. She took all the spirit out of poor mother and me +too.</p> + +<p>I remember she allus kept our cabin as clean and neat as a pin. When +other niggers come to visit her they would say, "My you are Buckry Niggers +(meaning we tried to live like white folks)."</p> + +<p>I love to think of when we lived with old Master. We had a good +time. Our cabin was nice and had a chimbley in it. Mother would cook and +serve our breakfast at home every morning and dinner and supper on Sundays. +We'd have biscuit every Sunday morning for our breakfast. That was something +to look forward to.</p> + +<p>We all went to church every Sunday. We would go to the white folks +church in the morning and to our church in the evening. Bill McWilliams, old +Master's oldest boy, didn't take much stock in church. He owned a nigger named +Bird, who preached for us. Bill said, "Bird, you can't preach, you can't read, +how on earth can you get a text out of the Bible when you can't even read? +How'n hell can a man preach that don't know nothing?" Bird told him the Lord +had called him to preach and he'd put the things in his mouth that he ought +to say. One night Bill went to church and Bird preached the hair-raisingest<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[Pg 304]</a></span> +sermon you ever heard. Bill told him all right to go and preach, and he gave +Bird a horse and set him free to go anywhere he wanted to and preach.</p> + +<p>Old Master and old Mistress lived in grand style. Bob was the +driver of their carriage. My, but he was always slick and shiny. He'd set +up in front with his white shirt and black clothes. He looked like a black +martin (bird) with a white breast. The nurse set in the back with the chillun. +Old Master and Mistress set together in the front seat.</p> + +<p>Old Master and Mistress would come down to the quarters to eat +Christmas dinners sometimes and also birthday dinners. It was sho' a big day +when they done that. They'd eat first, and the niggers would sing and dance to +entertain them. Old Master would walk 'round through the quarters talking to +the ones that was sick or too old to work. He was awful kind. I never knowed +him to whip much. Once he whipped a woman for stealing. She and mother had +to spin and weave. She couldn't or didn't work as fast as Ma and wouldn't +have as much to show for her days work. She'd steal hanks of Ma's thread so +she couldn't do more work than she did. She'd also steal old Master's tobacco. +He caught up with her and whipped her.</p> + +<p>I never saw any niggers on the block but I remember once they had a +sale in town and I seen them pass our house in gangs, the little ones in +wagons and others walking. I've seen slaves who run away from their masters +and they'd have to work in the field with a big ball and chain on their leg. +They'd hoe out to the end of the chain and then drag it up a piece and hoe on +to the end of the row.</p> + +<p>Times was awful hard during the War. We actually suffered for some +salt. We'd go to the smoke house where meat had been salted down for years, +dig a hole in the ground and fill it with water. After it would stand for a +while we'd dip the water up carefully and strain it and cook our food in it.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[Pg 305]</a></span> +We parched corn and meal for coffee. We used syrup for sugar. Some folks +parched okra for coffee. When the War was over you'd see men, women and chillun +walk out of their cabins with a bundle under their arms. All going by in droves, +just going nowhere in particular. My mother and father didn't join them; we +stayed on at the plantation. I run off and got married when I was twenty. Ma +never did want me to get married. My husband died five years ago. I never had +no chillun.</p> + +<p>I reckon I'm a mite superstitious. If a man comes to your house first +on New Years you will have good luck; if a woman is your first visitor you'll +have bad luck. When I was a young woman I knowed I'd be left alone in my old +age. I seen it in my sleep. I dreamed I spit every tooth in my head right +out in my hand and something tell me I would be a widow. That's a bad thing +to dream about, losing your teeth.</p> + +<p>Once my sister was at my house. She had a little baby and we was +setting on the porch. They was a big pine tree in front of the house, and we +seen something that looked like a big bird light in the tree. She begun to cry +and say that's a sign my baby is going to die. Sho' nuff it just lived two +weeks. Another time a big owl lit in a tree near a house and we heard it holler. +The baby died that night. It was already sick, we's setting up with it.</p> + +<p>I don't know where they's hants or not but I'se sho heard things I +couldn't see.</p> + +<p>We allus has made our own medicines. We used herbs and roots. If +you'll take poke root and cut it in small pieces and string it and put it +'round a baby's neck it will cut teeth easy. A tea made out of dog fennel or +corn shucks will cure chills and malaria. It'll make 'em throw up. We used +to take button snake root, black snake root, chips of anvil iron and whiskey +and make a tonic to cure consumption. It would cure it too.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[Pg 306]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +10-13-37<br /> +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937]</p> + +<h3>JAMES SOUTHALL<br /> +Age 82 years,<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in Clarksville, Tenn. My father was Wesley and my +mother was Hagar Southall. Our owner was Dr. John Southall, an old man. +Father always belonged to him but he bought my mother when she was a +young girl and raised her. She never knew anything 'bout her people but my +father's mother lived with us in de quarter's at Master Southall's. Master +John never sold any of his slaves.</p> + +<p>We was known as "Free Niggers." Master said he didn't believe +it was right to own human beings just because dey was black, and he freed +all his slaves long before de War. He give 'em all freedom papers and +told dem dat dey was as free as he was and could go anywhere dey wanted. +Dey didn't have no where to go so we all stayed on wid him. It was nice +though to know we could go where we pleased 'thout having to get a pass +and could come back when we pleased even if we didn't take advantage of it.</p> + +<p>He told his slaves dat dey could stay on at his farm but dey would +have to work and make a living for deyselves and families. Old Master +managed de farm and bought all de food and clothes for us all. Everybody +had to work, but dey had a good time.</p> + +<p>We had good clothes, plenty of food and good cabins. We had what +was known as Georgia bedsteads. Dey was wooden bedsteads wid holes bored in +de side pieces and in de foot and head-boards. Ropes was laced back and +forth across and this took de place of both slats and springs. De ropes +would git loose and we had what was called a "following-pin" to tighten +'em wid. We'd take a block of wood wid a notch in it and catch de rope<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[Pg 307]</a></span> +and hold it till de following-pin could be driven in and den we'd twist de +ropes tight again. We had grass or cotton beds and we slept good, too.</p> + +<p>We had tin plates but no knives or forks so we et with our fingers. +Old Master was a doctor and we had good attention when we was sick. We had +no wish to take advantage of our freedom for we was a lot better off even +than we is now and we knowed it. We never had to worry about anything.</p> + +<p>De quarters was about a half mile from de "Big House" as we called +Master John's house. It really wasn't such a big house as it had only four +or five rooms in it. It was a common boxed house, painted white and wid a +long gallery across de front. Maybe it was de gallery dat made it look so +big to us. We liked to set on de steps at night and listen to Master John +talk and to hear old Mistress and de girls sing. Sometimes we'd join in wid +dem and fairly make de woods ring. Everybody thought dey was crazy to let +us have so much freedom but dey wasn't nothing any of us black folks wouldn't +a-done for that family.</p> + +<p>He never employed any overseers as he done his own overseeing. He'd +tell de older hands what he wanted done and dey would see it was done. We +was never punished. Just iffen dey didn't work dey didn't have nothing to +eat and wear and de hands what did work wouldn't divide wid 'em iffen dey +didn't work. Old Master sho' was wise fer he knowed iffen we was ever set +free dat we would have to work and he sure didn't bide no laziness in his +hands. Dey got up 'bout four o'clock in de morning and was at work as soon +as dey could see. Dey would work and sing as happy as you please.</p> + +<p>We used to hear stories 'bout how slaves was punished but we never +saw any of it. Dey would punish 'em by whupping 'em or by making 'em stand +on one foot for a long time, tie 'em up by de thumbs as high as dey could +reach and by making 'em do hard tasks and by going without food for two-three<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[Pg 308]</a></span> +days.</p> + +<p>Niggers was very religious and dey had church often. Dey would +annoy de white folks wid shouting and singing and praying and dey would +take cooking pots and put over dey mouths so de white folks couldn't hear +'em. Dey would dig holes in de ground too, and lie down when dey prayed.</p> + +<p>Old Master let us have church in de homes. We had prayer-meeting +every Wednesday night. All our cullud preachers could read de Bible. He let +dem teach us how to read iffen we wanted to learn.</p> + +<p>In de evening when we was through wid our work dey would gather +at one of de cabins and visit and sing or dance. We'd pop corn, eat walnuts, +peanuts, hickory nuts, and tell ghost stories. We didn't have any music +instruments so de music we danced by wasn't so very good. Everybody sang +and one or two would beat on tin pans or beat bones together.</p> + +<p>Us boys played marbles. I got to be a professional. I could hit +de middler ever time. We made a square and put a marble in each corner and +one in de middle and got off several feet from de ring and shot at de marbles. +Iffen you hit de middler you got de game. I could beat 'em all.</p> + +<p>Old Master kept us through de War. We saw Yankee soldiers come +through in droves lak Coxsey's Army. We wasn't afraid for ourselves but we +was afraid dey would catch old Master or one of de boys when dey would come +home on a furlough. We'd hep 'em git away and just swear dat dey hadn't been +home a-tall.</p> + +<p>After de war we stayed until old Master died. It broke us all up +for we knowed we had lost de best friend dat we ever had or ever would have. +He was a sort of father to all of us. Old Mistress went to live with her +daughter and we started wandering 'round. Some folks from de North come +down and made de cullud folks move on. I guess dey was afraid dat we'd hep +our masters rebuild dey homes again. We lived in a sort of bondage for a long time.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[Pg 309]</a></span></p> + +<p>De white folks in de South as well as de cullud folks lost de +best friend dey had when Abe Lincoln was killed. He was God's man and it +was a great loss when he died.</p> + +<p>God created us all free and equal. Somewhere along de road we +lost out.</p> + +<p>Cullud folks would have been better off iffen dey had been left +alone in Africa. We'd a-had better opportunities. We should have some +compensation fer what we have suffered. Yes, we could be sent back and +we'd like it if dey would help us to get started out again. Dat's where +our forefathers come from.</p> + +<p>I learned a long time ago dat dey was nothing to charms. How +could a rabbit's foot bring me good luck? De Bible teaches me better'n +dat. I believes in dreams though. I've seen de end of time in my dreams. +Saw de great trouble we going through right now, years ago in a dream. It's +clear in my mind how de world is coming to a end.</p> + +<p>I believe all Christians should all join up together as dat +makes 'em stronger. I believe in praying fer what we want and need. I'm +a licensed preacher in de Baptist church. I've been a member for forty +years but have just been a licensed preacher about ten years.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[Pg 310]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>BEAUREGARD TENNEYSON<br /> +Age 87 yrs.<br /> +West Tulsa, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>My mother and father just about stocked Jess Tenneyson's plantation +with slaves. That's a fact. The old folks had one big family—twenty-three +Children was the number. With the old folks that make twenty-five (there +were only five more slaves), so I reckon they done mighty well by Master Jess.</p> + +<p>The Master done well by them, too. Master Jess and Mistress Lula +was Christian peoples. They raised their two sons, Henry and George, the same +way.</p> + +<p>There was so many of us children I don't remember all the names. +Three of the boys was named after good southern gentlemen who soldiered in the +War. Price, Lee and Beaugard. Beaugard is me. Proud of that name just like +I'm proud of the Master's name.</p> + +<p>My folks named Patrick and Harriett. Mother worked round the house +And father was the field boss. They was close by the Master all the time.</p> + +<p>The plantation was down in Craig County, Texas. Nine hundred acre +it was. They raise everything, but mostly corn and cotton. Big times when +come the harvest. Master fix up a cotton gin right on the place. It was an +old-fashioned press. Six horses run it with two boys tromping down the cotton +with their feets.</p> + +<p>In the fall time was the best of all. Come cotton picking time, all +the master from miles around send in their best pickers—and how they'd work, +sometimes pick the whole crop in one day! The one who picked the most win a +prize. Then come noon and the big feast, and at night come the dancing.</p> + +<p>Something like that when the corn was ready. All the folks have the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[Pg 311]</a></span> +biggest time. Log rollings. Clearing the new ground for planting. Cutting +the trees, burning the bresh, making ready for the plow. The best worker wins +hisself a prize at these log rollings, too.</p> + +<p>Them kind of good times makes me think of Christmas. Didn't have no +Christmas tree, but they set up a long pine table in the house and that plank +table was covered with presents and none of the Negroes was ever forgot on +that day.</p> + +<p>Master Jess didn't work his slaves like other white folks done. +Wasn't no four o'clock wake-up horns and the field work started at seven +o'clock. Quitting time was five o'clock—just about union hours nowadays. +The Master believed in plenty of rest for the slaves and they work better +that way, too.</p> + +<p>One of my brother took care of the Master's horse while on the +plantation. When the Master join in with rebels that horse went along. So +did brother. Master need them both and my brother mighty pleased when he get +to go.</p> + +<p>When Master come back from the War and tell us that brother is dead, +he said brother was the best boy in all the army.</p> + +<p>The Tenneyson slaves wasn't bothered with patrollers, neither the +Klan. The Master said we was all good Negroes—nobody going to bother a good +Negro.</p> + +<p>We was taught to work and have good manners. And to be honest. Just +doing them three things will keep anybody out of trouble.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[Pg 312]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>WILLIAM WALTERS<br /> +Age 85 yrs.<br /> +Tulsa, Oklahoma.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>Mammy Ann (that was my mother) was owned by Mistress Betsy, and +lived on the Bradford plantation in Relsford County, Tennessee, when I was +born in 1852.</p> + +<p>My daddy, Jim Walters, then lived in Nashville, where my mammy +carried me when she ran away from the Mistress after the Rebs and Yanks started +to fight. My daddy died in Nashville in 1875.</p> + +<p>We were runaway slaves. The slipper-offers were often captured, but +Mammy Ann and her little boy William (that's me) escaped the sharp eyes of the +patrollers and found refuge with a family of northern symphatizers living in +Nashville.</p> + +<p>Nashville was a fort town, filled with trenches and barricades. +Right across the road from where we stayed was a vacant block used by the Rebs +as an emergency place for treating the wounded.</p> + +<p>I remember the boom of cannons one whole day, and I heard the rumble +of army wagons as they crossed through the town. But there was nothing to see +as the fog of powder smoke became thicker with every blast of Sesesh cannon.</p> + +<p>When the smoke fog cleared away I watched the wounded being carried +to the clearing across the road—fighting men with arms shot off, legs gone, +faces blood smeared—some of them just laying there cussing God and Man with +their dying breath!</p> + +<p>Those were awful times. Yet I have heard many of the older Negroes +say the old days were better.</p> + +<p>Such talk always seemed to me but an expression of sentiment for some +good old master, or else the older Negroes were just too handicapped with ignorance +to recognize the benefits of liberty or the opportunities of freedom.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[Pg 313]</a></span></p> + +<p>But I've always been proud of my freedom, and proud of my old mother +who faced death for her freedom and mine when she escaped from the Bradford +plantation a long time before freedom came to the Negro race as a whole.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[Pg 314]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +570 words<br /> +10-19-1938</p> + +<h3>MARY FRANCES WEBB<br /> +Grand daughter of Sarah Vest, aged 92, (deceased)<br /> +McAlester, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I've heard my grandmother tell a lot of her experiences during slavery. +She remembered things well as she was a grown woman at the time of the War of the +Rebellion.</p> + +<p>Her home was at Sedalia, Mo., and her owner was Baxter West, a prominent +farmer and politician. He was very kind and good to his slaves. He provided them +with plenty of food and good clothes. He would go to town and buy six or eight +bolts of cloth at a time and the women could pick out two dresses apiece off it. +These would be their dresses for dressing up. They wove the cloth for their everyday +clothes.</p> + +<p>The men wore jeans suits in winter. He bought shoes for all his slaves, young +and old. He had about twenty slaves counting the children.</p> + +<p>My grandmother was a field hand. She plowed and hoed the crops in the summer +and spring, and in the winter she sawed and cut cord wood just like a man. She +said it didn't hurt her as she was as strong as an ox.</p> + +<p>She could spin and weave and sew. She helped make all the cloth for their +clothes and in the spring one of the jobs for the women was to weave hats for the +men. They used oat-straw, grass, and cane which had been split and dried and +soaked in hot water until it was pliant, and they wove it into hats. The women +wore a cloth tied around their head.</p> + +<p>They didn't have many matches so they always kept a log heap burning to keep +a fire. It was a common thing for a neighbor to come in to borrow a coal of fire +as their fire had died out.</p> + +<p>On wash days all the neighbors would send several of their women to the creek<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[Pg 315]</a></span> +to do the family wash. They all had a regular picnic of it as they would wash and +spread the clothes on the bushes and low branches of the trees to dry. They would +get to spend the day together.</p> + +<p>They had no tubs or wash boards. They had a large flat block of wood and a +wooden paddle. They'd spread the wet garment on the block, spread soap on it and +paddle the garment till it was clean. They would rinse the clothes in the creek. +Their soap was made from lye, dripped from ashes, and meat scraps.</p> + +<p>The slaves had no lamps in their cabins. In winter they would pile wood on +the fire in their fireplace and have the light from the fire.</p> + +<p>The colored men went with their master to the army. They made regular soldiers +and endured the same hardships that the white soldiers did. They told of one battle +when so many men were killed that a little stream seemed to be running pure blood +as the water was so bloody.</p> + +<p>After the war the slaves returned home with their masters and some of the +older ones stayed on with them and helped them to rebuild their farms. None of +them seemed to think it strange that they had been fighting on the wrong side in +the army as they were following their white folks.</p> + +<p>Those who stayed with their old master were taught to read and write and were +taught to handle their own business and to help themselves in every way possible to +take their place in life.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[Pg 316]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +10-14-37<br /> +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937]</p> + +<h3>EASTER WELLS<br /> +Age 83<br /> +Colbert, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in Arkansas, in 1854, but we moved to Texas in 1855. I've +heard 'em tell about de trip to Texas. De grown folks rode in wagons and +carts but de chaps all walked dat was big enuff. De men walked and toted +their guns and hunted all de way. Dey had plenty of fresh game to eat.</p> + +<p>My mother's name was Nellie Bell. I had one sister, Liza. I never +saw my father; in fact, I never heard my mammy say anything about him and +I don't guess I ever asked her anything about him for I never thought anything +about not having a father. I guess he belonged to another family +and when we moved away he was left behind and he didn't try to find us +after de War.</p> + +<p>My mammy and my sister and me belonged to young Master Jason Bell. We +was his onliest slaves and as he wasn't married and lived at home wid his +parents we was worked and bossed by his father, Cap'n William Bell and his +wife, Miss Mary.</p> + +<p>After we moved to Texas, old Master built a big double log house, +weather-boarded on de inside and out. It was painted white. Dey was a +long gallery clean across de front of de house and a big open hall between +de two front rooms. Dey was three rooms on each side of de hall and a +wide gallery across de back. De kitchen set back from de house and dey +was a board walk leading to it. Vines was planted 'round de gallery and +on each side of de walk in de summer time. De house was on a hill and set<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[Pg 317]</a></span> +back from de big road about a quarter of a mile and dey was big oak and pine +trees all 'round de yard. We had purty flowers, too.</p> + +<p>We had good quarters. Dey was log cabins, but de logs was peeled and +square-adzed and put together with white plaster and had shuttered windows +and pine floors. Our furniture was home made but it was good and made our +cabins comfortable.</p> + +<p>Old Master give us our allowance of staple food and it had to run us, +too. We could raise our own gardens and in dat way we had purty plenty to +eat. Dey took good care of us sick or well and old Mistress was awful good +to us.</p> + +<p>My mammy was de cook. I remember old Master had some purty strict +rules and one of 'em was iffen you burnt de bread you had to eat it. One +day mammy burnt de bread. She was awful busy and forgot it and it burnt +purty bad. She knowed dat old Master would be mad and she'd be punished so +she got some grub and her bonnet and she lit out. She hid in de woods and +cane brakes for two weeks and dey couldn't find her either. One of de women +slipped food out to her. Finally she come home and old Master give her a +whipping but he didn't hurt her none. He was glad to git her back. She +told us dat she could'a slipped off to de North but she didn't want to leave +us children. She was afraid young Master would be mad and sell us and we'd +a-had a hard time so she come back. I don't know whether she ever burnt de +bread any more or not.</p> + +<p>Once one of de men got his 'lowance and he decided he'd have de meat +all cooked at once so he come to our cabin and got mammy to cook it for him. +She cooked it and he took it home. One day he was at work and a dog got in +and et de meat all up. He didn't have much food for de rest of de week. He +had to make out wid parched corn.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[Pg 318]</a></span></p> + +<p>We all kept parched corn all de time and went 'round eating it. It was +good to fill you up iffen you was hungry and was nourishing, too.</p> + +<p>When de niggers cooked in dere own cabins dey put de food in a sort of +tray or trough and everybody et together. Dey didn't have no dishes. We +allus ate at de Big House as mammy had to do de cooking for de family.</p> + +<p>I never had to work hard as old Master wanted us to grow up strong. +He'd have mammy boil Jerusalem Oak and make a tea for us to drink to cure +us of worms and we'd run races and get exercise so we would be healthy.</p> + +<p>Old Mistress and old Master had three children. Dey was two children +dead between Master Jason and Miss Jane. Dey was a little girl 'bout my +age, named Arline. We played together all de time. We used to set on de +steps at night and old Mistress would tell us about de stars. She'd tell +us and show us de Big Dipper, Little Dipper, Milky Way, Ellen's Yard, Job's +Coffin, and de Seven Sisters. I can show 'em to you and tell you all about +'em yet.</p> + +<p>I scared Arline and made her fall and break her leg twice. One time +we was on de porch after dark one night and I told her dat I heard something +and I made like I could see it and she couldn't so she got scared and run +and hung her toe in a crack and fell off de high porch and broke her leg. +Another time while de War was going on we was dressed up in long dresses +playing grown-ups. We had playhouses under some big castor-bean bushes. +We climbed up on de fence and jest for fun I told her dat I seen some +Yankees coming. She started to run and got tangled up in her long dress +and fell and broke her leg again. It nigh broke my heart for I loved her +and she loved me and she didn't tell on me either time. I used to visit +her after she was married and we'd sure have a good visit talking 'bout<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[Pg 319]</a></span> +de things we used to do. We was separated when we was about fifteen and +didn't see [HW: each] other any more till we was both married and had children. I went +to visit her at Bryant, Brazos County, Texas and I ain't seen her since. I +don't know whether she is still living or not.</p> + +<p>I 'members hearing a man say dat once he was a nigger trader. He'd +buy and trade or sell 'em like they was stock. He become a Christian and +never sold any more.</p> + +<p>Our young Master went to de War and got wounded and come home and died. +Old Master den took full charge of us and when de War ended he kept us because +he said we didn't have no folks and he said as our owner was dead we +wasn't free. Mother died about a year after de War, and some white folks +took my sister but I was afraid to go. Old Master told me iffen I left him +he would cut my ears off end I'd starve and I don't know what all he did +tell me he'd do. I must a-been a fool but I was afraid to try it.</p> + +<p>I had so much work to do and I never did git to go anywhere. I reckon +he was afraid to let me go off de place for fear some one would tell me +what a fool I was, so I never did git to go anywhere but had to work all de +time. I was de only one to work and old Mistress and de girls never had +done no work and didn't know much about it. I had a harder time den when +we was slaves.</p> + +<p>I got to wanting to see my sister so I made up my mind to run off. +One of old Master's motherless nephews lived with him and I got him to go +with me one night to the potato bank and I got me a lap full of potatoes +to eat so I wouldn't starve like old Master said I would. Dis white boy +went nearly to a house where some white folks lived. I went to de house +and told 'em I wanted to go to where my sister was and dey let me stay fer +a few days and sent me on to my sister.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[Pg 320]</a></span></p> + +<p>I saw old Master lots of times after I run away but he wasn't mad at me. +I heard him tell de white folks dat I lived wid dat he raised me and I sure +wouldn't steal nor tell a lie. I used to steal brown sugar lumps when +mammy would be cooking but he didn't know 'bout dat.</p> + +<p>On holidays we used to allus have big dinners, 'specially on Christmas, +and we allus had egg-nog.</p> + +<p>We allus had hog-jowl and peas on New Years Day 'cause iffen you'd +have dat on New Years Day you'd have good luck all de year.</p> + +<p>Iffen you have money on New Years' Day you will have money all de year.</p> + +<p>My husband, Lewis Wells, lived to be one-hundred and seven years old. +He died five years ago. He could see witches, spirits and ghosts but I +never could. Dere are a few things dat I've noticed and dey never fail.</p> + +<p>Dogs howling and scritch owls hollering is allus a warning. My mother +was sick and we didn't think she was much sick. A dog howled and howled +right outside de house. Old Master say, "Nellie gonna die." Sure nuff she +died dat night.</p> + +<p>Another time a gentle old mule we had got after de children and run +'em to do house and den he lay down and wallow and wallow. One of our +children was dead 'fore a week.</p> + +<p>One of our neighbors say his dog been gone 'bout a week. He was walking +and met de dog and it lay down and stretch out on de ground and measure a +grave wid his body. He made him git up and he went home jest as fast as he +could. When he got dere one of his children was dead.</p> + +<p>Iffen my left eye quiver I know I'm gwineter cry and iffen both my eyes +quiver I know I gwinter laugh till I cry. I don't like for my eyes to +quiver.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">[Pg 321]</a></span></p> + +<p>We has allus made our own medicine. Iffen we hadn't we never could +astood de chills and fevers. We made a tea out'n bitter weeds and bathed +in it to cure malaria. We also made bread pills and soaked 'em in dis tea +and swallowed 'em. After bathing in dis tea we'd go to bed and kiver up and +sweat de malaria out.</p> + +<p>Horse mint and palm of crystal (Castor-bean) and bullnettle root boiled +together will make a cure fer swelling. Jest bathe de swollen part in dis +hot tea.</p> + +<p>Anvil dust and apple vinegar will cure dropsy. One tea cup of anvil +dust to a quart of vinegar. Shake up well and bathe in it. It sure will +cure de worse kind of a case.</p> + +<p>God worked through Abraham Lincoln and he answered de prayers of dem dat +was wearing de burden of slavery. We cullud folks all love and honor Abraham +Lincoln's memory and don't you think we ought to?</p> + +<p>I love to hear good singing. My favorite songs are: "Am I A Soldier Of +The Cross", an "How Can I Live In Sin and Doubt My Savior's Love." I belongs +to de Baptist church.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322">[Pg 322]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +Revision of story sent in 8-13-37.</p> + +<h3>JOHN WHITE<br /> +Age 121 years<br /> +Sand Springs, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>Of all my Mammy's children I am the first born and the longest living. +The others all gone to join Mammy. She was named Mary White, the same name +as her Mistress, the wife of my first master, James White.</p> + +<p>About my pappy. I never hear his name and I never see him, not even +when I was the least child around the old Master's place 'way back there in +Georgia more'n one-hundred twenty years ago!</p> + +<p>Mammy try to make it clear to me about my daddy. She married like the +most of the slaves in them days.</p> + +<p>He was a slave on another plantation. One day he come for to borrow +something from Master White. He sees a likely looking gal, and the way it +work out that gal was to be my Mammy. After that he got a paper saying it +was all right for him to be off his own plantation. He come a'courting over +to Master White's. After a while he talks with the Master. Says he wants to +marry the gal, Mary. The Master says it's all right if it's all right with +Mary and the other white folks. He finds out it is and they makes ready for +the wedding.</p> + +<p>Mary says a preacher wedding is the best but Master say he can marry +them just as good. There wasn't no Bible, just an old Almanac. Master White +read something out of that. That's all and they was married. The wedding was +over!</p> + +<p>Every night he gets a leave paper from his Master and come over to be with +his wife, Mary. The next morning he leaves her to work in the fields. Then +one night Mammy says he don't come home. The next night is the same, and the +next. From then on Mammy don't see him no more—never find out what happen<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323">[Pg 323]</a></span> +to my pappy.</p> + +<p>When I was born Mammy named me John, John White. She tells me I was the +blackest 'white' boy she ever see. I stays with her till I was eleven year +old. The Master wrote down in the book when I was born, April 10, 1816, and +I know it's right. Mammy told me so, and Master told me when I was eleven +and he sold me to Sarah Davenport.</p> + +<p>Mistress Sarah lived in Texas. Master White always selling and trading +to folks all over the country. I hates to leave on account of Mammy and the +good way Master White fared the slaves—they was good people. Mammy cry but +I has to go just the same. The tears are on my face a long time after the +leaving. I was hoping all the time to see Mammy again, but that's the last +time.</p> + +<p>We travels and travels on the stage coach. Once we cross the Big River +(Mississippi) on the boat and pick up with the horses on the other side. A +new outfit and we rides some more. Seems like we going to wear out all the +horses before we gets to the place.</p> + +<p>The Davenport plantation was way north of Linden, Texas, up in the +Red River country. That's where I stayed for thirty-eight year. There I was +drug through the hackles by the meanest master that ever lived. The Mistress +was the best white woman I ever knew but Master Presley used his whip all the +time, reason or no reason, and I got scars to remember by!</p> + +<p>I remembers the house. A heavy log house with a gallery clear +across the front. The kitchen was back of the house. I work in there and I +live in there. It wasn't built so good as the Master's house. The cold winds +in the winter go through the cracks between the logs like the walls was +somewheres else, and I shivers with the misery all the time.</p> + +<p>The cooking got to be my job. The washing too. Washday come around<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">[Pg 324]</a></span> +and I fills the tub with clothes. Puts the tub on my head and walks half a +mile to the spring where I washes the clothes. Sometimes I run out of soap. +Then I make ash soap right by the spring. I learns to be careful about +streaks in the clothes. I learns by the bull whip. One day the Master finds +a soapy streak in his shirt. Then he finds me.</p> + +<p>The Military Road goes by the place and the Master drives me down the +road and ties me to a tree. First he tears off the old shirt and then he +throws the bull whip to me. When he is tired of beating me more torture is +a-coming. The salt water cure. It don't cure nothing but that's what the white +folks called it. "Here's at you," the Master say, and slap the salt water into +the bleeding cuts. "Here's at you!" The blisters burst every time he slap me +with the brine.</p> + +<p>Then I was loosened to stagger back into the kitchen. The Mistress +couldn't do nothing about it 'cept to lay on the grease thick, with a kind +word to help stop the misery.</p> + +<p>Ration time was Saturday night. Every slave get enough fat pork, corn +meal and such to last out the week. I reckon the Master figure it to the +last bite because they was no leavings over. Most likely the shortage catch +them!</p> + +<p>Sometimes they'd borrow, sometimes I'd slip somethings from out the +kitchen. The single women folks was bad that way. I favors them with something +extra from the kitchen. Then they favors me—at night when the overseer +thinks everybody asleep in they own places!</p> + +<p>I was always back to my kitchen bed long before the overseer give the +get-up-knock. I hear the knock, he hear me answer. Then he blow the horn +and shout the loud call, ARE YOU UP, and everybody know it was four o'clock +and pour out of the cabins ready for the chores.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_325" id="Page_325">[Pg 325]</a></span></p> + +<p>Sometimes the white folks go around the slave quarters for the night. +Not on the Davenport plantation, but some others close around. The slaves +talked about it amongst themselves.</p> + +<p>After a while they'd be a new baby. Yellow. When the child got old +enough for chore work the master would sell him (or her). No difference was +it his own flesh and blood—if the price was right!</p> + +<p>I traffic with lots of the women, but never marries. Not even when I +was free after the War. I sees too many married troubles to mess up with +such doings!</p> + +<p>Sometimes the master sent me alone to the grinding mill. Load in the +yellow corn, hitch in the oxen, I was ready to go. I gets me fixed up with +a pass and takes to the road.</p> + +<p>That was the trip I like best. On the way was a still. Off in the +bresh. If the still was lonely I stop, not on the way to but on the way +back. Mighty good whiskey, too! Maybe I drinks too much, then I was sorry.</p> + +<p>Not that I swipe the whiskey, just sorry because I gets sick! Then I +figures a woods camp meeting will steady me up and I goes.</p> + +<p>The preacher meet me and want to know how is my feelings. I says I +is low with the misery and he say to join up with the Lord.</p> + +<p>I never join because he don't talk about the Lord. Just about the +Master and Mistress. How the slaves must obey around the plantation—how +the white folks know what is good for the slaves. Nothing about obeying the +Lord and working for him.</p> + +<p>I reckon the old preacher was worrying more about the bull whip than +he was the Bible, else he say something about the Lord! But I always obeys +the Lord—that's why I is still living!</p> + +<p>The slaves would pray for to get out of bondage. Some of them say the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_326" id="Page_326">[Pg 326]</a></span> +Lord told them to run away. Get to the North. Cross the Red River. Over +there would be folks to guide them to the Free State (Kansas).</p> + +<p>The Lord never tell me to run away. I never tried it, maybe, because +mostly they was caught by patrollers and fetched back for a flogging—and +I had whippings enough already!</p> + +<p>Before the Civil War was the fighting with Mexico. Some of the troops +on they way south passed on the Military Road. Wasn't any fighting around +Linden or Jefferson during the time.</p> + +<p>They was lots of traveling on the Military Road. Most of the time +you could see covered wagons pulled by mules and horses, and sometimes a +crawling string of wagons with oxen on the pulling end.</p> + +<p>From up in Arkansas come the stage coach along the road. To San +Antonio. The drivers bring news the Mexicans just about all killed off +and the white folks say Texas was going to join the Union. The country's +going to be run different they say, but I never see no difference. Maybe, +because I ain't white folks.</p> + +<p>Wasn't many Mexicans around the old plantation. Come and go. Lots of +Indians. Cherokees and Choctaws. Living in mud huts and cabin shacks. I +never see them bother the whites, it was the other way around.</p> + +<p>During the Civil War, when the Red River was bank high with muddy water, +the Yankee's made a target of Jefferson. That was a small town down south +of Linden.</p> + +<p>Down the river come a flat barge with cannon fastened to the deck. The +Yankee soldiers stopped across the river from Jefferson and the shooting +started.</p> + +<p>When the cannon went to popping the folks went arunning—hard to tell +who run the fastest, the whites or the blacks! Almost the town was wiped out. +Buildings was smashed and big trees cut through with the cannon balls.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_327" id="Page_327">[Pg 327]</a></span></p> + +<p>And all the time the Yankee drums was a-beating and the soldiers singing:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We'll hang Jeff Davis on a sour apple tree,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As we go marching on!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Before the Civil War everybody had money. The white folks, not the +negroes. Sometimes the master take me to the town stores. They was full of +money. Cigar boxes on the counter, boxes on the shelf, all filled with money. +Not the crinkley paper kind, but hard, jingley gold and silver! Not like +these scarce times!</p> + +<p>After the War I stay on the plantation 'til a soldier man tells me of +the freedom. The master never tell us—negroes working just like before +the War.</p> + +<p>That's when I leave the first time. Slip off, saying nothing, to +Jefferson. There I found some good white folks going to New Orleans. First +place we go is Shreveport, by wagon. They took me because I fix up with them +to do the cooking.</p> + +<p>On to the Big River (Mississippi) and boards a river steamboat for New +Orleans. Lots of negroes going down there—to work on the canal.</p> + +<p>The whole town was built on logs covered with dirt. Trying to raise +itself right out of the swamp. Sometimes the water get high and folks run +for the hills. When I got there almost was I ready to leave.</p> + +<p>I like Texas the best. Back to Jefferson is where I go. Fifteen-twenty +mile below Linden. Almost the first person I see was Master Davenport.</p> + +<p>He says, "Black rascal, you is coming with me." And I do. He tried to +keep his slaves and just laugh when I tell him about the freedom. I worked +for food and quarters 'til his meanness come cropping out again.</p> + +<p>That wasn't long and he threatened me with the whip and the buck and +gag. The buck and gag was maybe worse. I got to feeling that iron stick in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_328" id="Page_328">[Pg 328]</a></span> +my mouth, fastened around my head with chains, pressing hard on my tongue. No +drinking, no eating, no talking!</p> + +<p>So I slip off again. That night I goes through Linden. Crawling on my +hands and knees! Keeping in the dark spots, hiding from the whites, 'til I +pass the last house, then my feets hurries me to Jefferson, where I gets a +ride to Arkansas.</p> + +<p>In Russelville is where I stop. There I worked around in the yards, +cutting the grass, fancying the flower beds, and earned a little money for +clothes and eats, with some of it spent for good whiskey.</p> + +<p>That was the reason I left Arkansas. Whiskey. The law got after me to +tell where was a man's whiskey still. I just leave so's I won't have to tell.</p> + +<p>But while I was making a little money in Russelville, I lose out on some +big money, account some white folks beat me to it.</p> + +<p>I was out in the hills west of town, walking along the banks of a little +creek, when I heard a voice. Queer like. I called out who is that talking +and I hears it again.</p> + +<p>"Go to the white oak tree and you will find Ninety Thousand Dollars!" That's +what I hear. I look around, nobody in sight, but I see the tree. A big white +oak tree standing taller than all the rest 'round about.</p> + +<p>Under the tree was a grave. An old grave. I scratch around but finds no +money and thinks of getting some help.</p> + +<p>I done some work for a white man in town and told him about the voice. +He promised to go with me, but the next day he took two white mens and dug +around the tree. Then he says they was nothing to find.</p> + +<p>To this day I know better. I know wherever they's a ghost, money is +around someplace! That's what the ghost comes back for.</p> + +<p>Somebody dies and leaves buried money. The ghost watches over it 'til it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">[Pg 329]</a></span> +sees somebody it likes. Then ghost shows himself—lets know he's around. +Sometimes the ghost tells where is the money buried, like that time at +Russelville.</p> + +<p>That ain't the only ghost I've seen or heard. I see one around the +yard where I is living now. A woman. Some of these times she'll tell me +where the buried money is.</p> + +<p>Maybe the ghost woman thinks I is too old to dig. But I been a-digging +all these long years. For a bite to eat and a sleep-under cover.</p> + +<p>I reckon pretty soon she's going to tell where to dig. When she does, +then old Uncle John won't have to dig for the eats no more!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /> +<p class="figcenter" style="width: 791px;"> +<a name="Charley_Williams_and_Granddaughter" id="Charley_Williams_and_Granddaughter"></a> +<img src="images/image330.jpg" width="791" height="600" alt="Charley Williams and Granddaughter" title="Charley Williams and Granddaughter" /> +</p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_330" id="Page_330">[Pg 330]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +[HW: (photo)]<br /> +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]</p> + +<h3>CHARLEY WILLIAMS<br /> +Age 94 yrs.<br /> +Tulsa, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>Iffen I could see better out'n my old eyes, and I had me something +to work with and de feebleness in my back and head would let me 'lone, I +would have me plenty to eat in de kitchen all de time, and plenty tobaccy +in my pipe, too, bless God!</p> + +<p>And dey wouldn't be no rain trickling through de holes in de roof, +and no planks all fell out'n de flo' on de gallery neither, 'cause dis one +old nigger knows everything about making all he need to git along! Old +Master done showed him how to git along in dis world, jest as long as he +live on a plantation, but living in de town is a different way of living, +and all you got to have is a silver dime to lay down for everything you +want, and I don't git de dime very often.</p> + +<p>But I aint give up! Nothing like dat! On de days when I don't +feel so feeble and trembly I jest keep patching 'round de place. I got to +keep patching so as to keep it whar it will hold de winter out, in case I +git to see another winter.</p> + +<p>Iffen I don't, it don't grieve me none, 'cause I wants to see old +Master again anyways. I reckon maybe I'll jest go up an ask him what he +want me to do, and he'll tell me, and iffen I don't know how he'll show me +how, and I'll try to do it to please him. And when I git it done I wants to +hear him grumble like he used to and say, "Charley, you ain't got no sense +but you is a good boy. Dis here ain't very good but it'll do, I reckon. +Git yourself a little piece o' dat brown sugar, but don't let no niggers see +you eating it—if you do I'll whup your black behind!"</p> + +<p>Dat ain't de way it going be in Heaven, I reckon, but I can't set +here on dis old rottendy gallery and think of no way I better like to have it!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331">[Pg 331]</a></span></p> + +<p>I was a great big hulking buck of a boy when de War come along +and bust up everything, and I can 'member back when everybody was living +peaceful and happy, and nobody never had no notion about no war.</p> + +<p>I was borned on the 'leventh of January, in 1843, and was old +enough to vote when I got my freedom, but I didn't take no stock in all dat +politics and goings on at dat time, and I didn't vote till a long time after +old Master passed away, but I was big enough before de War to remember +everything pretty plain.</p> + +<p>Old Master name was John Williams, and old Mistress name was Miss +Betty, and she was a Campbell before she married. Young Missy was named Betty +after her mommy, and Young Master was named Frank, but I don't know who after. +Our overseer was Mr. Simmons, and he was mighty smart and had a lot of +patience, but he wouldn't take no talk nor foolishness. He didn't whup +nobody very often, but he only had to whup 'em jest one time! He never did +whup a nigger at de time the nigger done something, but he would wait till +evening and have old Master come and watch him do it. He never whupped very +hard 'cept when he had told a nigger about something and promised a whupping +next time and the nigger done it again. Then that nigger got what he had +been hearing 'bout!</p> + +<p>De plantation was about as big as any. I think it had about three +hundred acres, and it was about two miles northwest of Monroe, Louisiana. +Then he had another one not so big, two—three miles south of the big one, +kind of down in the woodsy part along the White river bottoms. He had another +overseer on that place and a big passel of niggers, but I never did go down +to that one. That was where he raised most of his corn and shoats, and lots +of sorghum cane.</p> + +<p>Our plantation was up on higher ground, and it was more open country,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_332" id="Page_332">[Pg 332]</a></span> +but still they was lots of woods all around and lots of the plantations had +been whacked right out of de new ground and was full of stumps. Master's +place was more open, though, and all in the fields was good plowing.</p> + +<p>The big road runned right along past our plantation, and it come +from Shreveport and run into Monroe. There wasn't any town at Monroe in +them days, jest a little cross roads place with a general store and a big +hide house. I think there was about two big hide houses, and you could +smell that place a mile before you got into it. Old Master had a part in de +store, I think.</p> + +<p>De hide houses was jest long sheds, all open along de sides and +kivered over wid cypress clapboards.</p> + +<p>Down below de hide houses and de store was jest a little settlement +of one or two houses, but they was a school for white boys. Somebody +said there was a place where they had been an old fort, but I never did see it.</p> + +<p>Everything boughten we got come from Shreveport, and was brung in +by the stage and the freighters, and that was only a little coffee or gunpowder, +or some needles for the sewing, or some strap iron for the blacksmith, +or something like dat. We made and raised everything else we needed +right on the place.</p> + +<p>I never did even see any quinine till after I was free. My mammy +knowed jest what root to go out and pull up to knock de chills right out'n +me. And de bellyache and de running off de same way, too.</p> + +<p>Our plantation was a lot different from some I seen other places, +like way east of there, around Vicksburg. Some of them was fixed up fancier +but dey didn't have no more comforts than we had.</p> + +<p>Old Master come out into that country when he was a young man, and +they didn't have even so much then as they had when I was a boy. I think he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_333" id="Page_333">[Pg 333]</a></span> +come from Alabama or Tennessee, and way back his people had come from Virginia, +or maybe North Carolina, 'cause he knowed all about tobacco on the place. +Cotton and tobacco was de long crops on his big place, and of course lots of +horses and cattle and mules.</p> + +<p>De big house was made out'n square hewed logs, and chinked wid +little rocks and daubed wid white clay, and kivered wid cypress clapboards. +I remember one time we put on a new roof, and de niggers hauled up de cypress +logs and sawed dem and frowed out de clapboards by hand.</p> + +<p>De house had two setting rooms on one side and a big kitchen room +on de other, wid a wide passage in between, and den about was de sleeping +rooms. They wasn't no stairways 'cepting on de outside. Steps run up to +de sleeping rooms on one side from de passageway and on de other side from +clean outside de house. Jest one big chimbley was all he had, and it was on +de kitchen end, and we done all de cooking in a fireplace dat was purty nigh +as wide as de whole room.</p> + +<p>In de sleeping rooms day wasn't no fires 'cepting in brazers made +out of clay, and we toted up charcoal to burn in 'em when it was cold mornings +in de winter. Dey kept warm wide de bed clothes and de knitten clothes dey had.</p> + +<p>Master never did make a big gallery on de house, but our white +folks would set out in de yard under de big trees in de shade. They was long +benches made out'n hewed logs and all padded wid gray moss and corn shuck +padding, and dey set pretty soft. All de furniture in de house was home-made, +too. De beds had square posts as big around as my shank and de frame was +mortised into 'em, and holes bored in de frame and home-made rope laced in to +make it springy. Den a great big mattress full of goose feathers and two—three +comforts as thick as my foot wid carded wool inside! Dey didn't need no fireplaces!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_334" id="Page_334">[Pg 334]</a></span></p> + +<p>De quarters was a little piece from de big house, and dey run along +both sides of de road dat go to de fields. All one-room log cabins, but dey +was good and warm, and every one had a little open shed at de side whar we +sleep in de summer to keep cool.</p> + +<p>They was two or three wells at de quarters for water, and some +good springs in de branch at de back of de fields. You could ketch a fish +now and den in dat branch, but Young Master used to do his fishing in White +River, and take a nigger or two along to do de work at his camp.</p> + +<p>It wasn't very fancy at de Big House, but it was mighty pretty +jest de same, wid de gray moss hanging from de big trees, and de cool green +grass all over de yard, and I can shet my old eyes and see it jest like it +was before de War come along and bust it up.</p> + +<p>I can see old Master setting out under a big tree smoking one of +his long cheroots his tobacco nigger made by hand, and fanning hisself wid +his big wide hat another nigger platted out'n young inside corn shucks for +him, and I can hear him holler at a big bunch of white geeses what's gitting +in his flower beds and see 'em string off behind de old gander towards de +big road.</p> + +<p>When de day begin to crack de whole plantation break out wid all +kinds of noises, and you could tell what going on by de kind of noise you hear.</p> + +<p>Come de daybreak you hear de guinea fowls start potracking down at +de edge of de woods lot, and den de roosters all start up 'round de barn and +de ducks finally wake up and jine in. You can smell de sow belly frying down +at the cabins in de "row", to go wid de hoecake and de buttermilk.</p> + +<p>Den purty soon de wind rise a little, and you can hear a old bell +donging way on some plantation a mile or two off, and den more bells at other +places and maybe a horn, and purty soon younder go old Master's old ram horn<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_335" id="Page_335">[Pg 335]</a></span> +wid a long toot and den some short toots, and here come de overseer down de +row of cabins, hollering right and left, and picking de ham out'n his teeth +wid a long shiny goose quill pick.</p> + +<p>Bells and horns! Bells for dis and horns for dat! All we knowed +was go and come by de bells and horns!</p> + +<p>Old ram horn blow to send us all to de field. We all line up, +about seventy-five field niggers, and go by de tool shed and git our hoes, +or maybe go hitch up de mules to de plows and lay de plows out on de side so +de overseer can see iffen de points is shart. Any plow gits broke or de point +gits bungled up on de rocks it goes to de blacksmith nigger, den we all git +on down in de field.</p> + +<p>Den de anvil start dangling in de blacksmith shop: "Tank! Deling-ding! +Tank! Deling-ding!", and dat ole bull tongue gitting straightened +out!</p> + +<p>Course you can't hear de shoemaker awling and pegging, and de card +spinners, and de old mammy sewing by hand, but maybe you can hear de old loom +going "frump, frump", and you know it all right iffen your clothes do be +wearing out, 'cause you gwine git new britches purty soon!</p> + +<p>We had about a hundred niggers on dat place, young and old, and +about twenty on de little place down below. We could make about every kind +of thing but coffee and gunpowder dat our whitefolks and us needed.</p> + +<p>When we needs a hat we gits inside cornshucks and weave one out, +and makes horse collars de same way. Jest tie two little soft shucks together +and begin plaiting.</p> + +<p>All de cloth 'cepting de Mistress' Sunday dresses come from de sheep +to de carders and de spinners and de weaver, den we dye it wid "butternut" +and hickory bark and indigo and other things and set it wid copperas. Leather +tanned on de place made de shoes, and I never see a store boughten wagon wheel<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336">[Pg 336]</a></span> +'cepting among de stages and de freighters along de big road.</p> + +<p>We made purty, long back-combs out'n cow horn, and knitting needles +out'n second hickory. Split a young hickory and put in a big wedge to prize +it open, then cut it down and let it season, and you got good bent grain for +wagon hames and chair rockers and such.</p> + +<p>It was jest like dat until I was grown, and den one day come a +neighbor man and say we in de War.</p> + +<p>Little while young Master Frank ride over to Vicksburg and jine de +Sesesh army, but old Master jest go on lak nothing happen, and we all don't +hear nothing more until long come some Sesesh soldiers and take most old +Master's hosses and all his wagons.</p> + +<p>I bin working on de tobacco, and when I come back to de barns everything +was gone. I would go into de woods and git good hickory and burn it +till it was all coals and put it out wid water to make hickory charcoal for +curing de tobacco. I had me some charcoal in de fire trenches under de curing +houses, all full of new tobacco, and overseer come and say bundle all de +tobacco up and he going take it to Shreveport and sell it befo' de soldiers +take it too.</p> + +<p>After de hosses all gone and most de cattle and de cotton and de +tobacco gone too, here come de Yankees and spread out all over de whole +country. Dey had a big camp down below our plantation.</p> + +<p>One evening a big bunch of Yankee officers come up to de Big +House and old Master set out de brandy in de yard and dey act purty nice. +Next day de whole bunch leave on out of dat part.</p> + +<p>When de hosses and stuff all go old Master sold all de slaves but +about four, but he kept my pappy and mammy and my brother Jimmie and my sister +Betty. She was named after old Mistress. Pappy's name was Charley and mammy's +was Sally. De niggers he kept didn't have much work without any hosses and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_337" id="Page_337">[Pg 337]</a></span> +wagons, but de blacksmith started in fixing up more wagons and he kept them +hid in de woods till they was all fixed.</p> + +<p>Den along come some more Yankees, and dey tore everything we had +up, and old Master was afeared to shoot at them on account his womenfolks, +so he tried to sneak the fambly out but they kotched him and brung him back +to de plantation.</p> + +<p>We niggers didn't know dat he was gone until we seen de Yankees +bringing dem back. De Yankees had done took charge of everything and was +camping in de big yard, and us was all down at de quarters scared to death, +but dey was jest letting us alone.</p> + +<p>It was night when de white folks tried to go away, and still +night when de Yankees brung dem back, and a house nigger come down to de +quarters wid three—four mens in blue clothes and told us to come up to de +Big House.</p> + +<p>De Yankees didn't seem to be mad wid old Master, but jest laughed +and talked wid him, but he didn't take de jokes any too good.</p> + +<p>Den dey asked him could he dance and he said no, and dey told him +to dance or make us dance. Dar he stood inside a big ring of dem mens in blue +clothes, wid dey brass buttons shining in de light from de fire dey had in +front of de tents, and he jest stood and said nothing, and it look lak he +wasn't wanting to tell us to dance.</p> + +<p>So some of us young bucks jest step up and say we was good dancers, +and we start shuffling while de rest of de niggers pat.</p> + +<p>Some nigger women go back to de quarters and git de gourd fiddles +and de clapping bones made out'n beef ribs, and bring dem back so we could +have some music. We git all warmed up and dance lak we never did dance befo'! +I speck we invent some new steps dat night!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_338" id="Page_338">[Pg 338]</a></span></p> + +<p>We act lak we dancing for de Yankees, but we trying to please +Master and old Mistress more than anything, and purty soon he begin to smile +a little and we all feel a lot better.</p> + +<p>Next day de Yankees move on away from our place, and old Master +start gitting ready to move out. We git de wagons we hid, and de whole +passel of us leaves out for Shreveport. Jest left de old place standing +like it was.</p> + +<p>In Shreveport old Master git his cotton and tobacco money what he +been afraid to have sent back to de plantation when he sell his stuff, and +we strike out north through Arkansas.</p> + +<p>Dat was de awfullest trip any man ever make! We had to hide from +everybody until we find out if dey Yankees or Sesesh, and we go along little +old back roads and up one mountain and down another, through de woods all de +way.</p> + +<p>After a long time we git to the Missouri line, and kind of cut off +through de corner of dat state into Kansas. I don't know how we ever git +across some of dem rivers but we did. Dey nearly always would be some soldiers +around de fords, and dey would help us find de best crossing. Sometimes we +had to unload de wagons and dry out de stuff what all got wet, and camp a day +or two to fix up again.</p> + +<p>Purty soon we git to Fort Scott, and that was whar de roads forked +ever whichaways. One went on north and one east and one went down into de +Indian country. It was full of soldiers coming and going back and forth to +Arkansas and Fort Gibson.</p> + +<p>We took de road on west through Kansas, and made for Colorado Springs.</p> + +<p>Fort Scott was all run down, and the old places whar dey used to have +de soldiers was all fell in in most places. Jest old rackety walls and leaky +roofs, and a big pole fence made out'n poles sot in de ground all tied together,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_339" id="Page_339">[Pg 339]</a></span> +but it was falling down too.</p> + +<p>They was lots of wagons all around what belong to de army, hauling +stuff for de soldiers, and some folks told old Master he couldn't make us +niggers go wid him, but we said we wanted to anyways, so we jest went on west +across Kansas.</p> + +<p>When we got away on west we come to a fork, and de best road went +kinda south into Mexico, and we come to a little place called Clayton, Mexico +whar we camped a while and then went north.</p> + +<p>Dat place is in New Mexico now, but old Master jest called it +Mexico. Somebody showed me whar it is on de map, and it look lak it a long +ways off'n our road to Colorado Springs, but I guess de road jest wind off +down dat ways at de time we went over it. It was jest two or three houses +made out'n mud at dat time, and a store whar de soldiers and de Indians +come and done trading.</p> + +<p>About dat time old Master sell off some of de stuff he been taking +along, 'cause de wagons loaded too heavy for de mountains and he figger he +better have de money than some of de stuff, I reckon.</p> + +<p>On de way north it was a funny country. We jest climb all day long +gitting up one side of one bunch of mountains, and all de nigger men have to +push on de wheels while de mules pull and den scotch de wheels while de mules +rest. Everybody but de whitefolks has to walk most de time.</p> + +<p>Down in de valleys it was warm like in Louisiana, but it seem lak +de sun aint so hot on de head, but it look lak every time night come it ketch +us up on top of one of dem mountains, and it almost as cold as in de winter +time!</p> + +<p>All de niggers had shoes and plenty warm clothes and we wrop up at +night in everything we can git.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_340" id="Page_340">[Pg 340]</a></span></p> + +<p>We git to Fort Scott again, and den de Yankee officers come and ask all us +niggers iffen we want to leave old Master and stay dar and work, 'cause we +all free now. Old Master say we can do what we please about it.</p> + +<p>A few of de niggers stay dar in Fort Scott, but most of us say +we gwine stay wid old Master, and we don't care iffen we is free or not.</p> + +<p>When we git back to Monroe to de old place us niggers git a big +surprise. We didn't hear about it, but some old Master's kinfolks back in +Virginia done come out dar an fix de place up and kept it for him while we +in Colorado, and it look 'bout as good as when we left it.</p> + +<p>He cut it up in chunks and put us niggers out on it on de halves, +but he had to sell part of it to git de money to git us mules and tools and +found to run on. Den after while he had to sell some more, and he seem lak +he git old mighty fast.</p> + +<p>Young Master bin in de big battles in Virginia, and he git hit, +and den he git sick, and when he come home he jest lak a old man he was so +feeble.</p> + +<p>About dat time they was a lot of people coming into dat country +from de North, and dey kept telling de niggers dat de thing for dem to do +was to be free, and come and go whar dey please.</p> + +<p>Dey try to git de darkeys to go and vote but none us folks took +much stock by what dey say. Old Master tell us plenty time to mix in de +politics when de younguns git educated and know what to do.</p> + +<p>Jest de same he never mind iffen we go to de dances and de singing +and sech. He allus lent us a wagon iffen we want to borry one to go in, too.</p> + +<p>Some de niggers what work for de white folks from de North act +purty uppity and big, and come pestering 'round de dance places and try to +talk up ructions amongst us, but it don't last long.</p> + +<p>De Ku Kluckers start riding 'round at night, and dey pass de word<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_341" id="Page_341">[Pg 341]</a></span> +dat de darkeys got to have a pass to go and come and to stay at de dances. +Dey have to git de pass from de white folks dey work for, and passes writ +from de Northern people wouldn't do no good. Dat de way de Kluckers keep +the darkies in line.</p> + +<p>De Kluckers jest ride up to de dance ground and look at everybody's +passes, and iffen some darkey dar widout a pass or got a pass from de wrong +man dey run him home, and iffen he talk big and won't go home dey whop him +and make him go.</p> + +<p>Any nigger out on de road after dark liable to run across de +Kluckers, and he better have a good pass! All de dances got to bust up at +about 'leven o'clock, too.</p> + +<p>One time I seen three-four Kluckers on hosses, all wrapped up in +white, and dey was making a black boy git home. Dey was riding hosses and he +was trotting down de road ahead of 'em. Ever time he stop and start talking +dey pop de whip at his heels and he start trotting on. He was so made he was +crying, but he was gitting on down de road jest de same.</p> + +<p>I seen 'em coming and I gits out my pass young Master writ so I +could show it, but when dey ride by one in front jest turns in his saddle and +look back at tother men and nod his head, and they jest ride on by widout +stopping to see my pass. Dat man knowed me, I reckon. I looks to see iffen +I knowed de hoss, but de Kluckers sometime swapped dey hosses 'round amongst +'em, so de hoss maybe wasn't hisn.</p> + +<p>Dey wasn't very bad 'cause de niggers 'round dar wasn't bad, but +I hear plenty of darkeys git whopped in other places 'cause dey act up and +say dey don't have to take off dey hats in de white stores and such.</p> + +<p>Any nigger dat behave hisself and don't go running 'round late at +night and drinking never had no trouble wid de Kluckers.</p> + +<p>Young Mistress go off and git married, but I don't remember de name<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_342" id="Page_342">[Pg 342]</a></span> +'cause she live off somewhar else, and de next year, I think it was, my +pappy and mammy go on a place about five miles away owned by a man named +Mr. Bumpus, and I go 'long wid my sister Betty and brother Jimmie to help 'em.</p> + +<p>I live around dat place and never marry till old mammy and pappy +both gone, and Jimmie and Betty both married and I was gitting about forty +year old myself, and den I go up in Kansas and work around till I git married +at last.</p> + +<p>I was in Fort Scott, and I married Mathilda Black in 1900, and +she is 73 years old now and was born in Tennessee. We went to Pittsburg, +Kansas, and lived from 1907 to 1913 when we come to Tulsa.</p> + +<p>Young Master's children writ to me once in a while and telled me +how dey gitting 'long up to about twenty year ago, and den I never heard +no more about 'em. I never had no children, and it look lak my wife going +outlive me, so my mainest hope when I goes on is seeing Mammy and Pappy and +old Master. Old overseer, I speck, was too devilish mean to be thar!</p> + +<p>'Course I loves my Lord Jesus same as anybody, but you see I never +hear much about Him until I was grown, and it seem lak you got to hear about +religion when you little to soak it up and put much by it. Nobody could +read de Bible when I was a boy, and dey wasn't no white preachers talked to +de niggers. We had meeting sometimes, but de nigger preacher jest talk +about bein a good nigger and "doing to please de Master," and I allus thought +he meant to please old Master, and I allus wanted to do dat anyways.</p> + +<p>So dat de reason I allus remember de time old Master pass on.</p> + +<p>It was about two years after de War, and old Master been mighty +porely all de time. One day we was working in de Bumpus field and a nigger +come on a mule and say old Mistress like to have us go over to de old place +'cause old Master mighty low and calling mine and Pappy's and Mammy's name.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_343" id="Page_343">[Pg 343]</a></span> +Old man Bumpus say go right ahead.</p> + +<p>When we git to de Big House old Master setting propped up in de bed and +you can see he mighty low and out'n his head.</p> + +<p>He been talking about gitting de oats stacked, 'cause it seem to him +lak it gitting gloomy-dark, and it gwine to rain, and hail gwine to ketch de +oats in de shocks. Some nigger come running up to de back door wid an old horn +old Mistress sent him out to hunt up, and he blowed it so old Master could hear +it.</p> + +<p>Den purty soon de doctor come to de door and say old Master wants +de bell rung 'cause de slaves should ought to be in from de fields, 'cause +it gitting too dark to work. Somebody git a wagon tire and beat on it like +a bell ringing, right outside old Master's window, and den we all go up on de +porch and peep in. Every body was snuffling kind of quiet, 'cause we can't +help it.</p> + +<p>We hear old Master say, "Dat's all right, Simmons. I don't want my +niggers working in de rain. Go down to de quarters and see dey all dried off +good. Dey ain't got no sense but dey all good niggers." Everybody around +de bed was crying, and we all was crying too.</p> + +<p>Den old Mistress come to de door and say we can go in and look at +him if we want to. He was still setting propped up, but he was gone.</p> + +<p>I stayed in Louisiana a long time after dat, but I didn't care +nothing about it, and it look lak I'm staying a long time past my time in dis +world, 'cause I don't care much about staying no longer only I hates to leave +Mathilda.</p> + +<p>But any time de Lord want me I'm ready, and I likes to think when +He ready He going tell old Master to ring de bell for me to come on in.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_344" id="Page_344">[Pg 344]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>SARAH WILSON<br /> +Age 87 yrs.<br /> +Fort Gibson, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was a Cherokee slave and now I am a Cherokee freedwoman, and besides +that I am a quarter Cherokee my own self. And this is the way it is.</p> + +<p>I was born in 1850 along the Arkansas river about half way between Fort +Smith and old Fort Coffee and the Skullyville boat landing on the river. +The farm place was on the north side of the river on the old wagon road what +run from Fort Smith out to Fort Gibson, and that old road was like you +couldn't hardly call a road when I first remember seeing it. The ox teams +bog down to they bellies in some places, and the wagon wheel mighty nigh +bust on the big rocks in some places.</p> + +<p>I remember seeing soldiers coming along that old road lots of times, +and freighting wagons, and wagons what we all know carry mostly wiskey, +and that was breaking the law, too! Them soldiers catch the man with that +whiskey they sure put him up for a long time, less'n he put some silver in +they hands. That's what my Uncle Nick say. That Uncle Nick a mean Negro, +and he ought to know about that.</p> + +<p>Like I tell you, I am quarter Cherokee. My mammy was named Adeline and +she belong to old Master Ben Johnson. Old Master Ben bring my grandmammy +out to that Sequoyah district way back when they call it Arkansas, mammy tell +me, and God only know who my mammy's pa is, but mine was old Master Ben's +boy, Ned Johnson.</p> + +<p>Old Master Ben come from Tennessee when he was still a young man, and he +bring a whole passel of slaves and my mammy say they all was kin to one +another, all the slaves I mean. He was a white man that married a Cherokee<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_345" id="Page_345">[Pg 345]</a></span> +woman, and he was a devil on this earth. I don't want to talk about him none.</p> + +<p>White folks was mean to us like the devil, and so I jest let them pass. +When I say my brothers and sisters I mean my half brothers and sisters, you +know, but maybe some of them was my whole kin anyways, I don't know. They +was Lottie that was sold off to a Starr because she wouldn't have a baby, +and Ed, Dave, Ben, Jim and Ned.</p> + +<p>My name is Sarah now but it was Annie until I was eight years old. My +old Mistress' name was Annie and she name me that, and Mammy was afraid to +change it until old Mistress died, then she change it. She hate old Mistress +and that name too.</p> + +<p>Lottie's name was Annie, too, but Mammy changed it in her own mind but +she was afraid to say it out loud, a-feared she would get a whipping. When +sister was sold off Mammy tell her to call herself Annie when she was +leaving but call herself Lottie when she git over to the Starrs. And she +done it too. I seen her after that and she was called Lottie all right.</p> + +<p>The Negroes lived all huddled up in a bunch in little one-room log +cabins with stick and mud chimneys. We lived in one, and it had beds for us +children like shelves in the wall. Mammy need to help us up into them.</p> + +<p>Grandmammy was mighty old and Mistress was old too. Grandmammy set on +the Master's porch and minded the baby mostly. I think it was Young Master's. +He was married to a Cherokee girl. They was several of the boys but only +one girl, Nicie. The old Master's boys were Aaron, John, Ned, Cy and Nathan. +They lived in a double log house made out of square hewed logs, and with a +double fireplace out of rock where they warmed theirselves on one side and +cooked on the other. They had a long front porch where they set most of the +time in the summer, and slept on it too.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_346" id="Page_346">[Pg 346]</a></span></p> + +<p>There was over a hundred acres in the Master's farm, and it was all +bottom land too, and maybe you think he let them slaves off easy! Work +from daylight to dark! They all hated him and the overseer too, and before +slavery ended my grandmammy was dead and old Mistress was dead and old +Master was mighty feeble and Uncle Nick had run away to the North soldiers +and they never got him back. He run away once before, about ten years before +I was born, Mammy say, but the Cherokees went over in the Creek Nation +and got him back that time.</p> + +<p>The way he made the Negroes work so hard, old Master must have been +trying to get rich. When they wouldn't stand for a whipping he would sell +them.</p> + +<p>I saw him sell a old woman and her son. Must have been my aunt. She +was always pestering around trying to get something for herself, and one +day she was cleaning the yard he seen her pick up something and put it inside +her apron. He flew at her and cussed her, and started like he was +going to hit her but she just stood right up to him and never budged, and +when he come close she just screamed out loud and ran at him with her +fingers stuck out straight and jabbed him in the belly. He had a big soft +belly, too, and it hurt him. He seen she wasn't going to be afraid, and +he set out to sell her. He went off on his horse to get some men to come +and bid on her and her boy, and all us children was mighty scared about it.</p> + +<p>They would have hangings at Fort Smith courthouse, and old Master would +take a slave there sometimes to see the hanging, and that slave would come +back and tell us all scary stories about the hanging.</p> + +<p>One time he whipped a whole bunch of the men on account of a fight in +the quarters, and then he took them all to Fort Smith to see a hanging. He<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_347" id="Page_347">[Pg 347]</a></span> +tied them all in the wagon, and when they had seen the hanging he asked them +if they was scared of them dead men hanging up there. They all said yes, of +course, but my old uncle Nick was a bad Negro and he said, "No, I aint +a-feared of them nor nothing else in this world", and old Master jumped on +him while he was tied and beat him with a rope, and then when they got home +he tied old Nick to a tree and took his shirt off and poured the cat-o-nine-tails +to him until he fainted away and fell over like he was dead.</p> + +<p>I never forget seeing all that blood all over my uncle, and if I +could hate that old Indian any more I guess I would, but I hated him all I +could already I reckon.</p> + +<p>Old Master wasn't the only hellion neither. Old Mistress just as bad, +and she took most of her wrath out hitting us children all the time. She +was afraid of the grown Negroes. Afraid of what they might do while old +Master was away, but she beat us children all the time.</p> + +<p>She would call me, "Come here Annie!" and I wouldn't know what to do. +If I went when she called "Annie" my mammy would beat me for answering to +that name, and if I didn't go old Mistress would beat me for that. That +made me hate both of them, and I got the devil in me and I wouldn't come to +either one. My grandmammy minded the Master's yard, and she set on the +front porch all the time, and when I was called I would run to her and she +wouldn't let anybody touch me.</p> + +<p>When I was eight years old old Mistress died, and Grandmammy told me why +old Mistress picked on me so. She told me about me being half Mister Ned's +blood. Then I knowed why Mister Ned would say, "Let her along, she got big +big blood in her", and then laugh.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_348" id="Page_348">[Pg 348]</a></span></p> + +<p>Young Mister Ned was a devil, too. When his mammy died he went out and +"blanket married." I mean he brung in a half white and half Indian woman +and just lived with her.</p> + +<p>The slaves would get rations every Monday morning to do them all week. +The Overseer would weigh and measure according to how many in the family, and +if you run out you just starve till you get some more. We all know the +overseer steal some of it for his own self but we can't do anything, so we +get it from the old Master some other way.</p> + +<p>One day I was carrying water from the spring and I run up on Grandmammy +and Uncle Nick skinning a cow. "What you-all doing?", I say, and they say +keep my mouth shut or they kill me. They was stealing from the Master to +piece out down at the quarters with. Old Master had so many cows he never +did count the difference.</p> + +<p>I guess I wasn't any worse than any the rest of the Negroes, but I was +bad to tell little lies. I carry scars on my legs to this day where Old +Master whip me for lying, with a rawhide quirt he carry all the time for +his horse. When I lie to him he just jump down off'n his horse and whip me +good right there.</p> + +<p>In slavery days we all ate sweet potatoes all the time. When they +didn't measure out enough of the tame kind we would go out in the woods and +get the wild kind. They growed along the river sand betaween where we lived +and Wilson's Rock, out west of our place.</p> + +<p>Then we had boiled sheep and goat, mostly goat, and milk and wild greens +and corn pone. I think the goat meat was the best, but I aint had no teeth +for forty years now, and a chunk of meat hurts my stomach. So I just eats<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_349" id="Page_349">[Pg 349]</a></span> +grits mostly. Besides hoeing in the field, chopping sprouts, shearing sheep, +carrying water, cutting firewood, picking cotton and sewing I was the one they +picked to work Mistress' little garden where she raised things from seed they +got in Fort Smith. Green peas and beans and radishes and things like that. +If we raised a good garden she give me a little of it, and if we had a poor +one I got a little anyhow even when she didn't give it.</p> + +<p>For clothes we had homespun cotton all the year round, but in winter we +had a sheep skin jacket with the wool left on the inside. Sometimes sheep +skin shoes with the wool on the inside and sometimes real cow leather shoes +with wood peggings for winter, but always barefooted in summer, all the men +and women too.</p> + +<p>Lord, I never earned a dime of money in slave days for myself but +plenty for the old Master. He would send us out to work the neighbors field +and he got paid for it, but we never did see any money.</p> + +<p>I remember the first money I ever did see. It was a little while after +we was free, and I found a greenback in the road at Fort Gibson and I didn't +know what it was. Mammy said it was money and grabbed for it, but I was +still a hell cat and I run with it. I went to the little sutler store and +laid it down and pointed to a pitcher I been wanting. The man took the +money and give me the pitcher, but I don't know to this day how much money +it was and how much was the pitcher, but I still got that pitcher put away. +It's all blue and white stripedy.</p> + +<p>Most of the work I done off the plantation was sewing. I learned from +my Granny and I loved to sew. That was about the only thing I was industrious +in. When I was just a little bitsy girl I found a steel needle in the yard +that belong to old Mistress. My mammy took it and I cried. She put it in her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_350" id="Page_350">[Pg 350]</a></span> +dress and started for the field. I cried so old Mistress found out why and +made Mammy give me the needle for my own.</p> + +<p>We had some neighbor Indians named Starr, and Mrs. Starr used me sometimes +to sew. She had nine boys and one girl, and she would sew up all they +clothes at once to do for a year. She would cut out the cloth for about a +week, and then send the word around to all the neighbors, and old Mistress +would send me because she couldn't see good to sew. They would have stacks +of drawers, shirts, pants and some dresses all cut out to sew up.</p> + +<p>I was the only Negro that would set there and sew in that bunch of +women, and they always talked to me nice and when they eat I get part of it +too, out in the kitchen.</p> + +<p>One Negro girl, Eula Davis, had a mistress sent her too, one time, but +she wouldn't sew. She didn't like me because she said I was too white and +she played off to spite the white people. She got sent home, too.</p> + +<p>When old Mistress die I done all the sewing for the family almost. I +could sew good enough to go out before I was eight years old, and when I +got to be about ten I was better than any other girl on the place for sewing.</p> + +<p>I can still quilt without my glasses, and I have sewed all night long +many a time while I was watching Young Master's baby after old Mistress died.</p> + +<p>They was over a hundred acres in the plantation, and I don't know how +many slaves, but before the War ended lots of the men had run away. Uncle +Nick went to the North and never come home, and Grandmammy died about that +time.</p> + +<p>We was way down across the Red river in Texas at that time, close to +Shawneetown of the Choctaw Nation but just across the river on the other +side in Texas bottoms. Old Master took us there in covered wagons when the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_351" id="Page_351">[Pg 351]</a></span> +Yankee soldiers got too close by in the first part of the War. He hired +the slaves out to Texas people because he didn't make any crops down there, +and we all lived in kind of camps. That's how some of the men and my uncle +Nick got to slip off to the north that way.</p> + +<p>Old Master just rant and rave all the time we was in Texas. That's +the first time I ever saw a doctor. Before that when a slave sick the old +women give them herbs, but down there one day old Master whip a Negro girl +and she fall in the fire, and he had a doctor come out to fix her up where +she was burnt. I remember Granny giving me clabber milk when I was sick, +and when I was grown I found out it had had medicine in it.</p> + +<p>Before freedom we didn't have no church, but slipped around to the +other cabins and had a little singing sometimes. Couldn't have anybody +show us the letters either, and you better not let them catch you pick up a +book even to look at the pictures, for it was against a Cherokee law to have +a Negro read and write or to teach a Negro.</p> + +<p>Some Negroes believed in buckeyes and charms but I never did. Old +Master had some good boys, named Aaron, John, Ned, Cy and Nat and they told +me the charms was no good. Their sister Nicie told me too, and said when I +was sick just come and tell her.</p> + +<p>They didn't tell us anything about Christmas and New Year though, and +all we done was work.</p> + +<p>When the War was ended we was still in Texas, and when old Master got a +letter from Fort Smith telling him the slaves was free he couldn't read, and +Young Miss read it to him. He went wild and jumped on her and beat the +devil out of her. Said she was lying to him. It near about killed him to +let us loose, but he cooled down after awhile and said he would help us all<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_352" id="Page_352">[Pg 352]</a></span> +get back home if we wanted to come.</p> + +<p>Mammy told him she could bear her own expenses. I remember I didn't +know what "expenses" was, and I thought it was something I was going to have +to help carry all the way back.</p> + +<p>It was a long time after he knew we was free before he told us. He +tried to keep us, I reckon, but had to let us go. He died pretty soon after +he told us, and some said his heart just broke and some said some Negroes +poisoned him. I didn't know which.</p> + +<p>Anyways we had to straggle back the best way we could, and me and mammy +just got along one way and another till we got to a ferry over the Red River +and into Arkansas. Then we got some rides and walked some until we got to +Fort Smith. They was a lot of Negro camps there and we stayed awhile and +then started out to Fort Gibson because we heard they was giving rations out +there. Mammy knew we was Cherokee anyway, I guess.</p> + +<p>That trip was hell on earth. Nobody let us ride and it took us nearly +two weeks to walk all that ways, and we nearly starved all the time. We was +skin and bones and feet all bloody when we got to the Fort.</p> + +<p>We come here to Four Mile Branch to where the Negroes was all setting +down, and pretty soon Mammy died.</p> + +<p>I married Oliver Wilson on January second, 1878. He used to belong to +Mr. DeWitt Wilson of Tahlequah, and I think the old people used to live down +at Wilson Rock because my husband used to know all about that place and the +place where I was borned. Old Mister DeWitt Wilson give me a pear tree the +next year after I was married, and it is still out in my yard and bears every +year.</p> + +<p>I was married in a white and black checkedy calico apron that I washed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_353" id="Page_353">[Pg 353]</a></span> +for Mr. Tim Walker's mother Lizzie all day for, over close to Ft. Gibson, and +I was sure a happy woman when I married that day. Him and me both got our +land on our Cherokee freedman blood and I have lived to bury my husband and +see two great grandchildren so far.</p> + +<p>I bless God about Abraham Lincoln. I remember when my mammy sold +pictures of him in Fort Smith for a Jew. If he give me my freedom I know +he is in Heaven now.</p> + +<p>I heard a lot about Jefferson Davis in my life. During the War we hear +the Negroes singing the soldier song about hand Jeff Davis to a apple tree, +and old Master tell about the time we know Jeff Davis. Old Master say Jeff +Davis was just a dragoon soldier out of Fort Gibson when he bring his family +out here from Tennessee, and while they was on the road from Fort Smith to +where they settled young Jeff Davis and some more dragoon soldiers rid up and +talked to him a long time. He say my grandmammy had a bundle on her head, +and Jeff Davis say, "Where you going Aunty?" and she was tired and mad and +she said, "I don't know, to Hell I reckon", and all the white soldiers laughed +at her and made her that much madder.</p> + +<p>I joined the Four Mile Branch church in 1879 and Sam Solomon was a Creek +negro and the first preacher I ever heard preach. Everybody ought to be in +the church and ready for that better home on the other side.</p> + +<p>All the old slaves I know are dead excepting two, and I will be going +pretty soon I reckon, but I'm glad I lived to see the day the Negroes get +the right treatment if they work good and behave themselves right. They don't +have to have no pass to walk abroad no more, and they can all read and write +now, but it's a tarnation shame some of them go and read the wrong kind of +things anyways.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_354" id="Page_354">[Pg 354]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves<br /> +10-19-38<br /> +1,534 words</p> + +<h3>TOM W. WOODS<br /> +Age 83.<br /> +Alderson, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>Lady, if de nigger hadn't been set free dis country wouldn't ever +been what it is now! Poor white folks wouldn't never had a chance. De +slave holders had most of de money and de land and dey wouldn't let de +poor white folks have a chance to own any land or anything else to speak +of. Dese white folks wasn't much better off den we was. Dey had to work +hard and dey had to worry 'bout food, clothes and shelter and we didn't. +Lots of slave owners wouldn't allow dem on deir farms among deir slaves +without orders from de overseer. I don't know why, unless he was afraid +dey would stir up discontent among de niggers. Dere was lots of "underground +railroading" and I rekon dat was what Old Master and others was +afraid of.</p> + +<p>Us darkies was taught dat poor white folks didn't amount to much. +Course we knowed dey was white and we was black and dey was to be respected +for dat, but dat was about all.</p> + +<p>White folks as well as niggers profited by emancipation. Lincoln was +a friend to all poor white folks as well as black ones and if he could a' +lived things would a'been different for ever'body.</p> + +<p>Dis has been a good old world to live in. I always been able to make +a purty good living and de only trouble I ever had has been sickness and +death. I've had a sight of dat kind of trouble. I've outlived two wives +and eight children. I had 13 brothers and sisters and I was de oldest, and +I'm de only one left.</p> + +<p>I sits here at night by myself and gits to wondering what de good Lord<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_355" id="Page_355">[Pg 355]</a></span> +is sparing me for. I reckon it's for some good reason, and I'd like to +live to be a hundred if He wants me to. I'm not tired of living yet!</p> + +<p>I was born in Florence, Alabama. My father's name was Thomas Woods +and my mammy was Frances Foster. Mammy belonged to Wash Foster and father +was owned by Moses Woods, who lived on an adjoining plantation. He worked +for his Master ever' day but spent each night wid us. He walked 'bout a +mile to his work ever' day.</p> + +<p>Master Wash was a poor man when he married Miss Sarah Watkins of Richmond, +Virginia. Her father was as rich as cream, he owned 7 plantations +and 200 slaves to each plantation. When Master Wash and Miss Sarah got +married her father give her 50 slaves. Ever'body said Miss Mary jest married +Master Wash because he was a purty boy, and he sure was a fine looking man.</p> + +<p>He was good and kind to all his slaves when he was sober, but he was +awful crabbed and cross when he was drunk, and he was drunk most of de time. +He was hard to please and sometimes he would whip de slaves. I remember +seeing Master Wash whup two men once. He give 'em 200 lashes.</p> + +<p>Miss Sarah was de best woman in de world. It takes a good woman to live +wid a drunkard.</p> + +<p>Two of the men ran away one time and was gone till dey got tired of +staying away. Master Wash wouldn't let anyone hunt 'em. When dey finally +come home he had dem strapped in stocks and den deir bodies bared to de +waist and he sure did ply de lash. I guess he whupped 'em harder dan he +would if he hadn't been so full of whisky.</p> + +<p>He never did sell any of his slaves. He kept the 50 dat Miss Sarah's +father give 'em and deir increase. He bought some ever' time dey had a sale. +He owned two plantations and dey was about a hundred slaves on each one.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_356" id="Page_356">[Pg 356]</a></span> +Him and his family lived in town.</p> + +<p>Me and a boy named John was sized and put to work when we was about +nine or ten years old. We was so bad dey had to put us to work as dey +couldn't do any thing else with us. We'd chase de pigs and ride de calves +and to punish us dey made us tote water to de hands. Dey was so many hands +to water dat it kept us busy running back and forth with de water. De next +year dey put me to plowing and him to hoeing. We made regular hands from +den on.</p> + +<p>If we had behaved ourselves we wouldn't a'had to go to work till we was +fourteen or fifteen anyway. Slave owners was awful good to deir nigger chaps +for dey wanted 'em to grow up to be strong men and women.</p> + +<p>Dey was about thirty children on our plantation. Two women looked after +us and took care of us till our parents come in from de field. Dey cooked for +us and always gave us our supper and sent us home to our parents for de night.</p> + +<p>Our food was placed on a long table in a trough. Each child had a spoon +and four of us eat out of one trough. Our food at night was mostly milk and +bread. At noon we had vegetables, bread, meat and milk. He gave us more and +better food than he did his field hands. He said he didn't want none of us +to be stunted in our growing.</p> + +<p>He bought our shoes for us but cloth for our clothes was spun and wove +right there on de farm. In summer us boys wore long tailed shirts and no +pants. I've plowed dat way a many a day. We was glad to see it git warm in +de spring so we could go barefooted and go wid out our pants.</p> + +<p>Our overseers lived near de quarters and every morning about four o' clock +dey'd blow a horn [HW: to] wake us up. We knowed it meant to git up and start de day. +We was in de field by de time we could see. We always fed our teams at night. +We'd give 'em enough to keep 'em eating all night so we wouldn't have to feed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_357" id="Page_357">[Pg 357]</a></span> +'em in de morning.</p> + +<p>Master Wash Foster and his family lived in de finest house in Florence, +Ala. It was a fine, large two-story house, painted white as nearly all de +houses was in dem days. Dere was big gallery in front and back and a fine +lawn wid big cedar and chestnut trees all 'round de house.</p> + +<p>He had a fine carriage and a pair of spanking bays dat cost him $500 +apiece. Old Monroe was his coachman and dey made a grand sight. Monroe +kept de nickel plated harness and carriage trimmings shining and de team was +brushed slick and clean and dey sure stepped out.</p> + +<p>We lived on de plantation about eight miles from town and we liked for +de family to come out to de farm. Dey was four children, Wash, Jack, Sarah +and Sally and dey always played with us. When dey come we always had a regular +feast as dey children would eat wid us children. Dey had dishes though +to eat out of. After dinner we would run and play Peep Squirrel. I think +dey call it hide-and-seek now.</p> + +<p>My mother was a regular field hand till Miss Sarah decided to take her +into town to take care of her children. Dey all called her Frank instead of +Frances. I used to get to go to town to visit my mother and we'd have glorious +times I tell you.</p> + +<p>We'd go out and gather hickory nuts, hazel nuts, pig nuts, and walnuts. +We'd all set around de fire and eat nuts and tell ghost tales ever' night. +Master Wash raised lots of apples too, and we had all that we wanted of dem +to eat.</p> + +<p>I saw lots of Yankee soldiers. Sherman and Grant's armies marched by +our house and camped at DeCatur, Ala. It took dem three days to pass. We +wasn't afraid of dem.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_358" id="Page_358">[Pg 358]</a></span></p> + +<p>In the second year of de war some Yankee soldiers come through and +gathered up all de slaves and took us to Athens, Ala., and put us on a +Government farm. We stayed dere till de end of de War. My father died +jest before dey took us away.</p> + +<p>My mother and us children were on de farm together and dey treated +us all mighty good. We had plenty of good food and clothes.</p> + +<p>Master Wash came to see us while we was on de Government farm. He +was left in a bad shape and we was all sorry for him. A lot of his hands +went back to him after de Surrender but we never did. Mother married another +man named Goodloe and we all went to Arkansas, near Little Rock. Dis was +his former home. I was about nineteen or twenty years old at this time.</p> + +<p>I never sent to school. My wife taught me how to read de Bible but I +never learned to write. I have good eyesight. I guess dat is cause I never +put dem out reading and going to moving picture shows.</p> + +<p>When any of my family was sick I always sent for de doctor. We had a +few of our own home remedies dat we used also. We boiled poke root and bathed +in it for a cure for rheumatism.</p> + +<p>A tea made from May apples was used for a physic.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 95%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_359" id="Page_359">[Pg 359]</a></span></p> +<p> +Oklahoma Writers' Project<br /> +Ex-Slaves</p> + +<h3>ANNIE YOUNG<br /> +Age 86<br /> +Oklahoma City, Okla.<br /> +</h3> + + +<p>I was born in 1851, makes me 86 years old. I was born in Middle +Tennessee, Summers County. My mother was put on a block and sold from me when +I was a child. I don't remember my father real good. Sister Martha, Sister +Sallie, nor Sister Jane wasn't sold. But my brother John was. My mother's +name is Rachel Donnahue. We lived in a log hut. The white folks lived in a +frame white building sitting in a big grove yard. Old master owned a big farm.</p> + +<p>We ate molasses, bread and butter and milk in wooden bowls and +crumbled our bread up in it. Old master had big smokehouses of meat. Dey ate +chickens, possums and coons, and my old auntie would barbecue rabbits for de +white folks. We ate ash cakes too.</p> + +<p>I washed dishes, swept de yard, and kept de yard clean wid weed +brush brooms. I never earned no money. All de slaves had gardens, and chickens +too. My auntie, dey let her have chickens of her own and she raised chickens, +and had a chicken house and garden down in de woods.</p> + +<p>I remember in time of de War dey'd send me down in de woods to pick +up chips and git wood. All de men had gone to de army. One morning and t'was +cold dey sent me down in de woods and my hands got frostbitten. All de skin +come off and dey had to tie my hands up in roasted turnips. Sallie she had +gloves, and didn't get frostbitten. After my old master died, Master Donnahue +was his name, his old son-in-law come to take over de plantation. He was mean, +but my sister whipped him.</p> + +<p>We had no nigger driver or overseer. We raised wheat, corn and vegetables, +not much cotton, jest enough to spun de clothes out of.</p> + +<p>At night when we'd go to our cabins we'd pick cotton from de seeds +to make our clothes. Boys and girls alike wore dem long shirts slit up de side<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_360" id="Page_360">[Pg 360]</a></span> +nearly to your necks. They'd have cornshuckings sometimes all night long. +You see I didn't have no mother, no father, nobody to lead me, teach me or +tell me, and so jest lived with anybody was good enough to let me stay and +done what they did. They'd have log rollings, with all de whiskey dey could +drink.</p> + +<p>I remember going to church, de Methodist Church dey call it. We +used to sing dis song and I sho did like it too:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"I went down in de valley to pray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Studying dat good old way."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I been a Christian long before most of dese young niggers was born. My other +favorites are:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Must Jesus bear This Cross Alone."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>and</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"The Consecrated Cross I'll Bear 'til<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Death Shall Set Me Free,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yea, There's a Crown for Everyone,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And There's a Crown for Me."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Yes Lawd, there sho is.</p> + +<p>One day a nigger killed one of his master's shoats and he catch +him and when he'd ask him, "What's that you got there?" The nigger said, "a +possum." De master said, "Let me see." He looked and seen it was a shoat. +De nigger said, "Master it may be a shoat now, but it sho was a possum while +ago when I put 'im in dis sack."</p> + +<p>Dey didn't whip our folks much, but one day I saw a overseer on +another place. He staked a man down with two forked sticks 'cross his wrist +nailed in de ground and beat him half to death with a hand saw 'til it drawed +blisters. Den he mopped his back wid vinegar, salt and pepper. Sometimes +dey'd drop dat hot rosin from pine knots on dose blisters.</p> + +<p>When de Yanks come, business took place. I remember white folks<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_361" id="Page_361">[Pg 361]</a></span> +was running and hiding, gitting everything dey could from de Yanks. Dey hid +dey jewelry and fine dishes and such. Dose Yanks had on big boots. Dey'd +drive up, feed dey hosses from old Master's corn, catch dey chickens, and tell +old Master's cook to cook 'em, and they'd shoot down old Master's hogs and +skin 'em.</p> + +<p>De Yanks used to make my nephew drunk, and have him sing (dis is +kind of bad):</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"I'll be God O'Mighty<br /></span> +<span class="i0">God Dammed if I don't<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kill a nigger,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh Whooey boys! Oh Whooey!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oh Whooey boys! Oh Whooey!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>I don't remember never seeing no funerals. Jest took 'em off and +buried 'em. I remember dat old Master's son-in-law dat my sister whipped, he +called hisself a doctor and he killed Aunt Clo. Give her some medicine but he +didn't know what he was doing and killed her.</p> + +<p>I married William Young and we had a pretty good wedding. Married +in Crittington County Arkansas. When I left Tennessee and went to Arkansas I +followed some hands. You know after de War dey immigrated niggers from one +place to another. I owned a good farm in Arkansas. I came out here some 42 +years ago.</p> + +<p>I have three daughters. Mattie Brockins runs a rooming house in +Kansas City. Jessie Cotton, lives right up de street here. Osie Olla Anderson +is working out in North town.</p> + +<p>Well I think Abraham Lincoln is more than a type a man than Moses. +I believe he is a square man, believe in union that every man has a right to +be a free man regardless to color. He was a republican man. Don't know much +'bout Jeff Davis but I think Booker T. Washington was a pretty good man. He's +a right good man I guess, but he is dead ain't he?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_362" id="Page_362">[Pg 362]</a></span></p> + +<p>I can remember once my auntie's old Master tried to have her and +she run off out in de woods, and when he put those blood hounds or nigger +hounds on her trail he catched her and hit her in de head wid something like +de stick de police carry, and he knocked a hole in her head and she bled like +a hog, and he made her have him. She told her mistress, and mistress told +her to go ahead and be wid him 'cause he's gonna kill you. And he had dem +two women and she had some chillun nearly white, and master and dey all +worked in de fields side by side.</p> + + + + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Slave Narratives, Oklahoma, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SLAVE NARRATIVES, OKLAHOMA *** + +***** This file should be named 20785-h.htm or 20785-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/0/7/8/20785/ + +Produced by Diane Monico and The Project Gutenberg Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net. (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by the Library of Congress, Manuscript Division.) This +file is gratefully uploaded to the PG collection in honor +of Distributed Proofreaders having posted over 10,000 +ebooks. + + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +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 + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + + +</pre> + +</body> +</html> diff --git a/20785-h/images/image053.jpg b/20785-h/images/image053.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..9c7cf03 --- /dev/null +++ b/20785-h/images/image053.jpg diff --git a/20785-h/images/image065.jpg b/20785-h/images/image065.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..80d61bc --- /dev/null +++ b/20785-h/images/image065.jpg diff --git a/20785-h/images/image275.jpg b/20785-h/images/image275.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..d5a9eac --- /dev/null +++ b/20785-h/images/image275.jpg diff --git a/20785-h/images/image330.jpg b/20785-h/images/image330.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..ca13d4b --- /dev/null +++ b/20785-h/images/image330.jpg diff --git a/20785-page-images.zip b/20785-page-images.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f1df32f --- /dev/null +++ b/20785-page-images.zip diff --git a/20785.txt b/20785.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a5719ec --- /dev/null +++ b/20785.txt @@ -0,0 +1,12868 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Slave Narratives, Oklahoma, by Various + +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, Oklahoma + A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From + Interviews with Former Slaves + +Author: Various + +Release Date: March 8, 2007 [EBook #20785] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SLAVE NARRATIVES, OKLAHOMA *** + + + + +Produced by Diane Monico and The Project Gutenberg Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net. (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by the Library of Congress, Manuscript Division.) This +file is gratefully uploaded to the PG collection in honor +of Distributed Proofreaders having posted over 10,000 +ebooks. + + + + + +[HW: ***] = Handwritten Note +[TR: ***] = Transcriber 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 + + +_Illustrated with Photographs_ + + +WASHINGTON 1941 + + + + +VOLUME XIII + +OKLAHOMA NARRATIVES + + +Prepared by +the Federal Writers' Project of +the Works Progress Administration +for the State of Oklahoma + + + + +INFORMANTS + + +Adams, Isaac 1 +Alexander, Alice 6 + +Banks, Phoebe 8 +Bean, Nancy Rogers 12 +Bee, Prince 14 +Bonner, Lewis 17 +Bridges, Francis 20 +Brown, John 24 + +Carder, Sallie 27 +Chessier, Betty Foreman 30 +Colbert, Polly 33 +Conrad, Jr., George 39 +Cunningham, Martha 45 +Curtis, William 48 + +Davis, Lucinda 53 +Dawson, Anthony 65 +Douglass, Alice 73 +Dowdy, Doc Daniel 76 +Draper, Joanna 81 + +Easter, Esther 88 +Evans, Eliza 92 + +Farmer, Lizzie 97 +Fountain, Della 102 + +Gardner, Nancy 108 +George, Octavia 111 +Grayson, Mary 115 + +Grinstead, Robert R. 124 + +Hardman, Mattie 128 +Hawkins, Annie 131 +Henry, Ida 134 +Hillyer, Morris 138 +Hutson, Hal 145 +Hutson, William 148 + +Jackson, Isabella 152 +Johnson, Nellie 155 +Jordan, Josie 160 + +King, George G. 165 +King, Martha 169 +Kye, George 172 + +Lawson, Ben 176 +Lindsay, Mary 178 +Logan, Mattie 187 +Love, Kiziah 192 +Lucas, Daniel William 200 +Luster, Bert 203 + +McCray, Stephen 207 +McFarland, Hannah 210 +Mack, Marshall 212 +Manning, Allen B. 215 +Maynard, Bob 223 +Montgomery, Jane 227 + +Oliver, Amanda 230 +Oliver, Salomon 233 + +Petite, Phyllis 236 +Poe, Matilda 242 +Pyles, Henry F. 245 + +Richardson, Chaney 257 +Richardson, Red 263 +Robertson, Betty 266 +Robinson, Harriett 270 +Rowe, Katie 275 + +Sheppard, Morris 285 +Simms, Andrew 295 +Smith, Liza 298 +Smith, Lou 300 +Southall, James 306 + +Tenneyson, Beauregard 310 + +Walters, William 312 +Webb, Mary Frances 314 +Wells, Easter 316 +White, John 322 +Williams, Charley 330 +Wilson, Sarah 344 +Woods, Tom 354 + +Young, Annie 359 + + + + +ILLUSTRATIONS + + + Facing Page + +Lucinda Davis 53 + +Anthony Dawson 65 + +Katie Rowe 275 + +Charley Williams and Granddaughter 330 + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +ISAAC ADAMS +Age 87 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + +I was born in Louisiana, way before the War. I think it was about ten +years before, because I can remember everything so well about the +start of the War, and I believe I was about ten years old. + +My Mammy belonged to Mr. Sack P. Gee. I don't know what his real given +name was, but it maybe was Saxon. Anyways we all called him Master +Sack. + +He was a kind of youngish man, and was mighty rich. I think he was +born in England. Anyway his pappy was from England, and I think he +went back before I was born. + +Master Sack had a big plantation ten miles north of Arcadia, +Louisiana, and his land run ten miles along both sides. He would leave +in a buggy and be gone all day and still not get all over it. + +There was all kinds of land on it, and he raised cane and oats and +wheat and lots of corn and cotton. His cotton fields was the biggest +anywheres in that part, and when chopping and picking times come he +would get negroes from other people to help out. I never was no good +at picking, but I was a terror with a hoe! + +I was the only child my Mammy had. She was just a young girl, and my +Master did not own her very long. He got her from Mr. Addison +Hilliard, where my pappy belonged. I think she was going to have me +when he got her; anyways I come along pretty soon, and my mammy never +was very well afterwards. Maybe Master Sack sent her back over to my +pappy. I don't know. + +Mammy was the house girl at Mr. Sack's because she wasn't very strong, +and when I was four or five years old she died. I was big enough to do +little things for Mr. Sack and his daughter, so they kept me at the +mansion, and I helped the house boys. Time I was nine or ten Mr. +Sack's daughter was getting to be a young woman--fifteen or sixteen +years old--and that was old enough to get married off in them days. +They had a lot of company just before the War, and they had whole +bunch of house negroes around all the time. + +Old Mistress died when I was a baby, so I don't remember anything +about her, but Young Mistress was a winder! She would ride horseback +nearly all the time, and I had to go along with her when I got big +enough. She never did go around the quarters, so I don't know nothing +much about the negroes Mr. Sack had for the fields. They all looked +pretty clean and healthy, though, when they would come up to the Big +House. He fed them all good and they all liked him. + +He had so much different kinds of land that they could raise anything +they wanted, and he had more mules and horses and cattle than anybody +around there. Some of the boys worked with his fillies all the time, +and he went off to New Orleans ever once in a while with his race +horses. He took his daughter but they never took me. + +Some of his land was in pasture but most of it was all open fields, +with just miles and miles of cotton rows. There was a pretty good +strip along one side he called the "old" fields. That's what they +called the land that was wore out and turned back. It was all growed +up in young trees, and that's where he kept his horses most of the +time. + +The first I knowed about the War coming on was when Mr. Sack had a +whole bunch of whitefolks at the Big House at a function. They didn't +talk about anything else all evening and then the next time they come +nearly all their menfolks wasn't there--just the womenfolks. It wasn't +very long till Mr. Sack went off to Houma with some other men, and +pretty soon we knew he was in the War. I don't remember ever seeing +him come home. I don't think he did until it was nearly all over. + +Next thing we knowed they was Confederate soldiers riding by pretty +nearly every day in big droves. Sometimes they would come and buy corn +and wheat and hogs, but they never did take any anyhow, like the +Yankees done later on. They would pay with billets, Young Missy called +them, and she didn't send them to git them cashed but saved them a +long time, and then she got them cashed, but you couldn't buy anything +with the money she got for them. + +That Confederate money she got wasn't no good. I was in Arcadia with +her at a store, and she had to pay seventy-five cents for a can of +sardines for me to eat with some bread I had, and before the War you +could get a can like that for two cents. Things was even higher then +than later on, but that's the only time I saw her buy anything. + +When the Yankees got down in that country the most of the big men paid +for all the corn and meat and things they got, but some of the little +bunches of them would ride up and take hogs and things like that and +just ride off. They wasn't anybody at our place but the womenfolks and +the negroes. Some of Mr. Sack's women kinfolks stayed there with Young +Mistress. + +Along at the last the negroes on our place didn't put in much +stuff--jest what they would need, and could hide from the Yankees, +because they would get it all took away from them if the Yankees found +out they had plenty of corn and oats. + +The Yankees was mighty nice about their manners, though. They camped +all around our place for a while. There was three camps of them close +by at one time, but they never did come and use any of our houses or +cabins. There was lots of poor whites and Cajuns that lived down below +us, between us and the Gulf, and the Yankees just moved into their +houses and cabins and used them to camp in. + +The negroes at our place and all of them around there didn't try to +get away or leave when the Yankees come in. They wasn't no place to +go, anyway, so they all stayed on. But they didn't do very much work. +Just enough to take care of themselves and their whitefolks. + +Master Sack come home before the War was quite over. I think he had +been sick, because he looked thin and old and worried. All the negroes +picked up and worked mighty hard after he come home, too. + +One day he went into Arcadia and come home and told us the War was +over and we was all free. The negroes didn't know what to make of it, +and didn't know where to go, so he told all that wanted to stay on +that they could just go on like they had been and pay him shares. + +About half of his negroes stayed on, and he marked off land for them +to farm and made arrangements with them to let them use their cabins, +and let them have mules and tools. They paid him out of their shares, +and some of them finally bought the mules and some of the land. But +about half went on off and tried to do better somewheres else. + +I didn't stay with him because I was jest a boy and he didn't need me +at the house anyway. + +Late in the War my Pappy belonged to a man named Sander or Zander. +Might been Alexander, but the negroes called him Mr. Sander. When +pappy got free he come and asked me to go with him, and I went along +and lived with him. He had a share-cropper deal with Mr. Sander and I +helped him work his patch. That place was just a little east of Houma, +a few miles. + +When my Pappy was born his parents belonged to a Mr. Adams, so he took +Adams for his last name, and I did too, because I was his son. I don't +know where Mr. Adams lived, but I don't think my Pappy was born in +Louisiana. Alabama, maybe. I think his parents come off the boat, +because he was very black--even blacker than I am. + +I lived there with my Pappy until I was about eighteen and then I +married and moved around all over Louisiana from time to time. My wife +give me twelve boys and five girls, but all my children are dead now +but five. My wife died in 1920 and I come up here to Tulsa to live. +One of my daughters takes care and looks out for me now. + +I seen the old Sack P. Gee place about twenty years ago, and it was +all cut up in little places and all run down. Never would have known +it was one time a big plantation ten miles long. + +I seen places going to rack and ruin all around--all the places I +lived at in Louisiana--but I'm glad I wasn't there to see Master +Sack's place go down. He was a good man and done right by all his +negroes. + +Yes, Lord, my old feets have been in mighty nigh every parish in +Louisiana, and I seen some mighty pretty places, but I'll never forget +how that old Gee plantation looked when I was a boy. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +ALICE ALEXANDER +Age 88 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was 88 years old the 15th of March. I was born in 1849, at Jackson +Parish, Louisiana. My mother's name was Mary Marlow, and father's +Henry Marlow. + +I can't remember very much 'bout slavery 'cause I was awful small, but +I can remember that my mother's master, Colonel Threff died, and my +mother, her husband, and us three chillun was handed down to Colonel +Threff's poor kin folks. Colonel Threff owned about two or three +hundred head of niggers, and all of 'em was tributed to his poor kin. +Ooh wee! he sho' had jest a lot of them too! Master Joe Threff, one of +his poor kin, took my mother, her husband, and three of us chillun +from Louisiana to the Mississippi Line. + +Down there we lived in a one-room log hut, and slept on homemade rail +bed steads with cotton, and sometimes straw, mostly straw summers and +cotton winners. I worked round the house and looked after de smaller +chillun--I mean my mother's chillun. Mostly we ate yeller meal corn +bread and sorghum malasses. I ate possums when we could get 'em, but +jest couldn't stand rabbit meat. Didn't know there was any Christmas +or holidays in dem days. + +I can't 'membuh nothing 'bout no churches in slavery. I was a sinner +and loved to dance. I remembuh I was on the floor one night dancing +and I had four daughters on the floor with me and my son was playing +de music--that got me! I jest stopped and said I wouldn't cut another +step and I haven't. I'm a member of the Baptist Church and been for 25 +or 30 years. I jined 'cause I wanted to be good 'cause I was an awful +sinner. + +We had a overseer back on Colonel Threff's plantation and my mother +said he was the meanest man on earth. He'd jest go out in de fields +and beat dem niggers, and my mother told me one day he come out in de +field beating her sister and she jumped on him and nearly beat him +half to death and old Master come up jest in time to see it all and +fired dat overseer. Said he didn't want no man working fer him dat a +woman could whip. + +After de war set us free my pappy moved us away and I stayed round +down there till I got to be a grown woman and married. You know I had +a pretty fine wedding 'cause my pappy had worked hard and commenced to +be prosperous. He had cattle, hogs, chickens and all those things like +that. + +A college of dem niggers got together and packed up to leave +Louisiana. Me and my husband went with them. We had covered wagons, +and let me tell you I walked nearly all the way from Louisiana to +Oklahoma. We left in March but didn't git here till May. We came in +search of education. I got a pretty fair education down there but +didn't take care of it. We come to Oklahoma looking for de same thing +then that darkies go North looking fer now. But we got dissapointed. +What little I learned I quit taking care of it and seeing after it and +lost it all. + +I love to fish. I've worked hard in my days. Washed and ironed for 30 +years, and paid for dis home that way. Yes sir, dis is my home. My +mother died right here in dis house. She was 111 yeahs old. She is +been dead 'bout 20 yeahs. + +I have three daughters here married, Sussie Pruitt, Bertie Shannon, +and Irene Freeman. Irene lost her husband, and he's dead now. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +10-19-1938 +1,428 words + +PHOEBE BANKS +Age 78 +Muskogee, Oklahoma. + + +In 1860, there was a little Creek Indian town of Sodom on the north +bank of the Arkansas River, in a section the Indians called Chocka +Bottoms, where Mose Perryman had a big farm or ranch for a long time +before the Civil War. That same year, on October 17, I was born on the +Perryman place, which was northwest of where I live now in Muskogee; +only in them days Fort Gibson and Okmulgee was the biggest towns +around and Muskogee hadn't shaped up yet. + +My mother belonged to Mose Perryman when I was born; he was one of the +best known Creeks in the whole nation, and one of his younger +brothers, Legus Perryman, was made the big chief of the Creeks (1887) +a long time after the slaves was freed. Mother's name was Eldee; my +father's name was William McIntosh, because he belonged to a Creek +Indian family by that name. Everybody say the McIntoshes was leaders +in the Creek doings away back there in Alabama long before they come +out here. + +With me, there was twelve children in our family; Daniel, Stroy, +Scott, Segal, Neil, Joe, Phillip, Mollie, Harriett, Sally and Queenie. + +The Perryman slave cabins was all alike--just two-room log cabins, +with a fireplace where mother do the cooking for us children at night +after she get through working in the Master's house. + +Mother was the house girl--cooking, waiting on the table, cleaning the +house, spinning the yarn, knitting some of the winter clothes, taking +care of the mistress girl, washing the clothes--yes, she was always +busy and worked mighty hard all the time, while them Indians wouldn't +hardly do nothing for themselves. + +On the McIntosh plantation, my daddy said there was a big number of +slaves and lots of slave children. The slave men work in the fields, +chopping cotton, raising corn, cutting rails for the fences, building +log cabins and fireplaces. One time when father was cutting down a +tree it fell on him and after that he was only strong enough to rub +down the horses and do light work around the yard. He got to be a good +horse trainer and long time after slavery he helped to train horses +for the Free Fairs around the country, and I suppose the first money +he ever earned was made that way. + +Lots of the slave owners didn't want their slaves to learn reading and +writing, but the Perrymans didn't care; they even helped the younger +slaves with that stuff. Mother said her master didn't care much what +the slaves do; he was so lazy he didn't care for nothing. + +They tell me about the war times, and that's all I remember of it. +Before the War is over some of the Perryman slaves and some from the +McIntosh place fix up to run away from their masters. + +My father and my uncle, Jacob Perryman, was some of the fixers. Some +of the Creek Indians had already lost a few slaves who slip off to the +North, and they take what was left down into Texas so's they couldn't +get away. Some of the other Creeks was friendly to the North and was +fixing to get away up there; that's the ones my daddy and uncle was +fixing to join, for they was afraid their masters would take up and +move to Texas before they could get away. + +They call the old Creek, who was leaving for the North, "Old Gouge" +(Opoethleyohola). All our family join up with him, and there was lots +of Creek Indians and slaves in the outfit when they made a break for +the North. The runaways was riding ponies stolen from their masters. + +When they get into the hilly country farther north in the country that +belong to the Cherokee Indians, they make camp on a big creek and +there the Rebel Indian soldiers catch up, but they was fought back. + +Then long before morning lighten the sky, the men hurry and sling the +camp kettles across the pack horses, tie the littlest children to the +horses backs and get on the move farther into the mountains. They kept +moving fast as they could, but the wagons made it mighty slow in the +brush and the lowland swamps, so just about the time they ready to +ford another creek the Indian soldiers catch up and the fighting begin +all over again. + +The Creek Indians and the slaves with them try to fight off them +soldiers like they did before, but they get scattered around and +separated so's they lose the battle. Lost their horses and wagons, and +the soldiers killed lots of the Creeks and Negroes, and some of the +slaves was captured and took back to their masters. + +Dead all over the hills when we get away; some of the Negroes shot and +wounded so bad the blood run down the saddle skirts, and some fall off +their horses miles from the battle ground, and lay still on the +ground. Daddy and Uncle Jacob keep our family together somehow and +head across the line into Kansas. We all get to Fort Scott where there +was a big army camp; daddy work in the blacksmith shop and Uncle Jacob +join with the Northern soldiers to fight against the South. He come +through the war and live to tell me about the fighting he been in. + +He went with the soldiers down around Fort Gibson where they fight the +Indians who stayed with the South. Uncle Jacob say he killed many a +man during the war, and showed me the musket and sword he used to +fight with; said he didn't shoot the women and children--just whack +their heads off with the sword, and almost could I see the blood +dripping from the point! It made me scared at his stories. + +The captain of this company want his men to be brave and not get +scared, so before the fighting start he put out a tub of white liquor +(corn whiskey) and steam them up so's they'd be mean enough to whip +their grannie! The soldiers do lots of riding and the saddle-sores get +so bad they grease their body every night with snake oil so's they +could keep going on. + +Uncle Jacob said the biggest battle was at Honey Springs (1863). That +was down near Elk Creek, close by Checotah, below Rentiersville. He +said it was the most terrible fighting he seen, but the Union soldiers +whipped and went back into Fort Gibson. The Rebels was chased all over +the country and couldn't find each other for a long time, the way he +tell it. + +After the war our family come back here and settle at Fort Gibson, but +it ain't like the place my mother told me about. There was big houses +and buildings of brick setting on the high land above the river when I +first see it, not like she know it when the Perrymans come here years +ago. + +She heard the Indians talk about the old fort (1824), the one that rot +down long before the Civil War. And she seen it herself when she go +with the Master for trading with the stores. She said it was made by +Matthew Arbuckle and his soldiers, and she talk about Companys B, C, +D, K, and the Seventh Infantry who was there and made the Osage +Indians stop fighting the Creeks and Cherokees. She talk of it, but +that old place all gone when I first see the Fort. + +Then I hear about how after the Arbuckle soldiers leave the old log +fort, the Cherokee Indians take over the land and start up the town of +Keetoowah. The folks who move in there make the place so wild and +rascally the Cherokees give up trying to make a good town and it +kinder blow away. + +My husband was Tom Banks, but the boy I got ain't my own son, but I +found him on my doorstep when he's about three weeks old and raise him +like he is my own blood. He went to school at the manual training +school at Tullahassee and the education he got get him a teacher job +at Taft (Okla), where he is now. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +10-19-38 +520 Words + +NANCY ROGERS BEAN +Age about 82 +Hulbert, Okla. + + +I'm getting old and it's easy to forget most of the happenings of +slave days; anyway I was too little to know much about them, for my +mammy told me I was born about six years before the War. My folks was +on their way to Fort Gibson, and on the trip I was born at Boggy +Depot, down in southern Oklahoma. + +There was a lot of us children; I got their names somewheres here. +Yes, there was George, Sarah, Emma, Stella, Sylvia, Lucinda, Rose, +Dan, Pamp, Jeff, Austin, Jessie, Isaac and Andrew; we all lived in a +one-room log cabin on Master Rogers' place not far from the old +military road near Choteau. Mammy was raised around the Cherokee town +of Tahlequah. + +I got my name from the Rogers', but I was loaned around to their +relatives most of the time. I helped around the house for Bill +McCracken, then I was with Cornelius and Carline Wright, and when I +was freed my Mistress was a Mrs. O'Neal, wife of a officer at Fort +Gibson. She treated me the best of all and gave me the first doll I +ever had. It was a rag doll with charcoal eyes and red thread worked +in for the mouth. She allowed me one hour every day to play with it. +When the War ended Mistress O'Neal wanted to take me with her to +Richmond, Virginia, but my people wouldn't let me go. I wanted to stay +with her, she was so good, and she promised to come back for me when I +get older, but she never did. + +All the time I was at the fort I hear the bugles and see the soldiers +marching around, but never did I see any battles. The fighting must +have been too far away. + +Master Rogers kept all our family together, but my folks have told me +about how the slaves was sold. One of my aunts was a mean, fighting +woman. She was to be sold and when the bidding started she grabbed a +hatchet, laid her hand on a log and chopped it off. Then she throwed +the bleeding hand right in her master's face. Not long ago I hear she +is still living in the country around Nowata, Oklahoma. + +Sometimes I would try to get mean, but always I got me a whipping for +it. When I was a little girl, moving around from one family to +another, I done housework, ironing, peeling potatoes and helping the +main cook. I went barefoot most of my life, but the master would get +his shoes from the Government at Fort Gibson. + +I wore cotton dresses, and the Mistress wore long dresses, with +different colors for Sunday clothes, but us slaves didn't know much +about Sunday in a religious way. The Master had a brother who used to +preach to the Negroes on the sly. One time he was caught and the +Master whipped him something awful. + +Years ago I married Joe Bean. Our children died as babies. Twenty year +ago Joe Bean and I separated for good and all. + +The good Lord knows I'm glad slavery is over. Now I can stay peaceful +in one place--that's all I aim to do. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + + +PRINCE BEE +Age 85 yrs. +Red Bird, Okla. + + +I don't know how old I was when I found myself standing on the toppen +part of a high stump with a lot of white folks walking around looking +at the little scared boy that was me. Pretty soon the old master, +(that's my first master) Saul Nudville, he say to me that I'm now +belonging to Major Bee and for me to get down off the auction block. + +I do that. Major Bee he comes over and right away I know I'm going to +like him. Then when I get to the Major's plantation and see his oldest +daughter Mary and all her brothers and sisters, and see how kind she +is to all them and to all the colored children, why, I just keeps +right on liking 'em more all the time. + +They was about nine white children on the place and Mary had to watch +out for them 'cause the mother was dead. + +That Mary gal seen to it that we children got the best food on the +place, the fattest possum and the hottest fish. When the possum was +all browned, and the sweet 'taters swimming in the good mellow gravy, +then she call us for to eat. Um-um-h! That was tasty eating! + +And from the garden come the vegetables like okra and corn and onions +that Mary would mix all up in the soup pot with lean meats. That would +rest kinder easy on the stomach too, 'specially if they was a bit of +red squirrel meats in with the stew! + +Major Bee say it wasn't good for me to learn reading and writing. +Reckoned it would ruin me. But they sent me to Sunday School. +Sometimes. Wasn't many of the slaves knew how to read the Bible +either, but they all got the religion anyhow. I believed in it then +and I still do. + +That religion I got in them way back days is still with me. And it +ain't this pie crust religion such as the folks are getting these +days. The old time religion had some filling between the crusts, +wasn't so many empty words like they is today. + +They was haunts in them way back days, too. How's I know? 'Cause I +stayed right with the haunts one whole night when I get caught in a +norther when the Major sends me to another plantation for to bring +back some cows he's bargained for. That was a cold night and a +frightful one. + +The blizzard overtook me and it was dark on the way. I come to an old +gin house that everybody said was the hauntinest place in all the +county. But I went in account of the cold and then when the noises +started I was just too scared to move, so there I stood in the corner, +all the time 'til morning come. + +There was nobody I could see, but I could hear peoples feet a-tromping +and stomping around the room and they go up and down the stairway like +they was running a race. + +Sometimes the noises would be right by my side and I would feel like a +hot wind passing around me, and lights would flash all over the room. +Nobody could I see. When daylight come I went through that door +without looking back and headed for the plantation, forgetting all +about the cows that Major Bee sent me for to get. + +When I tells them about the thing, Mary she won't let the old Major +scold, and she fixes me up with some warm foods and I is all right +again. But I stays me away from that gin place, even in the daylight, +account of the haunts. + +When the War come along the Major got kinder mean with some of the +slaves, but not with me. I never did try to run off, but some of 'em +did. One of my brothers tried and got caught. + +The old Master whipped him 'til the blood spurted all over his body, +the bull whip cutting in deeper all the time. He finish up the +whipping with a wet coarse towel and the end got my brother in the +eye. He was blinded in the one eye but the other eye is good enough he +can see they ain't no use trying to run away no more. + +After the War they was more whippings. This time it was the night +riders--them Klan folks didn't fool with mean Negroes. The mean +Negroes was whipped and some of them shot when they do something the +Klan folks didn't like, and when they come a-riding up in the night, +all covered with white spreads, they was something bound to happen. + +Them way back days is gone and I is mighty glad. The Negroes of today +needs another leader like Booker Washington. Get the young folks to +working, that's what they need, and get some filling in their pie +crust religion so's when they meet the Lord their soul won't be empty +like is their pocketbooks today! + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +LEWIS BONNER +Age 87 yrs. +507 N. Durland +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma + + +I was born 7 miles north of Palestine, Texas, on Matt Swanson's place +in 1850, but I kin not remember the date. My mistress was name Celia +Swanson. My mistress was so good to me till I jest loved her. + +My family and all slaves on our place was treated good. Mighty few +floggings went on 'round and about. Master was the overseer over his +darkies and didn't use no other'n. I waited table and churned in the +Big House. + +I ate at the table with my mistress and her family and nothing was +evah said. We ate bacon, greens, Irish potatoes and such as we git +now. Aunt Chaddy was the cook and nurse for all the chillun on the +place. + +We used to hear slaves on de other places hollering from whippings, +but master never whipped his niggers 'less they lied. Sometimes slaves +from other places would run off and come to our place. Master would +take them back and tell the slave-holders how to treat them so dey +wouldn't run off again. + +Mistress had a little stool for me in the big house, and if I got +sleepy, she put me on the foot of her bed and I stayed there til +morning, got up washed my face and hands and got ready to wait on the +table. + +There was four or five hundred slaves on our place. One morning during +slavery, my father killed 18 white men and ran away. They said he was +lazy and whipped him, and he just killed all of 'em he could, which +was 18 of 'em. He stayed away 3 years without being found. He come +back and killed 7 before they could kill him. When he was on the place +he jest made bluing. + +My mother worked in the field and weaved cloth. Shirts dat she made +lasted 12 months, even if wore and washed and ironed every day. Pants +could not be ripped with two men pulling on dem with all their might. +You talking 'bout clothes, them was some clothes then. Clothes made +now jest don't come up to them near abouts. + +Doing of slavery, we had the best church, lots better than today. I am +a Baptist from head to foot, yes sir, yes sir. Jest couldn't be +nothing else. In the first place, I wouldn't even try. + +I knows when the war started and ceaseted. I tell you it was some war. +When it was all over, the Yankees come thoo' singing, "You may die +poor but you won't die a slave." + +When the War was over, master told us that we could go out and take +care of the crops already planted and plant the ones that need +planting 'cause we knowed all 'bout the place and we would go halvers. +We stayed on 3 years after slavery. We got a little money, but we got +room and board and didn't have to work too hard. It was enough +difference to tell you was no slaves any more. + +After slavery and when I was old enough I got married. I married a gal +that was a daughter of her master. He wanted to own her, but she sho' +didn't return it. He kept up with her till he died and sent her money +jest all the time. Before he died, he put her name in his will and +told his oldest son to be sure and keep up with her. The son was sure +true to his promise, for till she died, she was forever hearing from +him or he would visit us, even after we moved to Oklahoma from Texas. + +Our chillun and grandchillun will git her part since she is gone. She +was sure a good wife and for no reason did I take the second look at +no woman. That was love, which don't live no more in our hearts. + +I make a few pennies selling fish worms and doing a little yard work +and raising vegetables. Not much money in circulation. When I gets my +old age pension, it will make things a little mite better. I guess the +time will be soon. + +Tain't nothing but bad treatment that makes people die young and I +ain't had none. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + +FRANCIS BRIDGES +Age 73 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Red River County, Texas in 1864, and that makes me 73 +years old. I had myself 75, and I went to my white folks and they +counted it up and told me I was 73, but I always felt like I was older +than that. + +My husband's name is Henry Bridges. We was raised up children together +and married. I had five sisters. My brother died here in Oklahoma +about two years ago. He was a Fisher. Mary Russell, my sister, she +lives in Parish, Texas; Willie Ann Poke, she lives in Greenville, +Texas; Winnie Jackson, lives in Adonia, Texas, and Mattie White, my +other sister, lives in Long Oak, Texas, White Hunt County. + +Our Master was named Master Travis Wright, and we all ate nearly the +same thing. Such things as barbecued rabbits, coon, possums baked with +sweet potatoes and all such as that. I used to hang round the kitchen. +The cook, Mama Winnie Long, used to feed all us little niggers on the +flo', jest like little pigs, in tin cups and wooden spoons. We ate +fish too, and I like to go fishing right this very day. + +We lived right in old Master Wright's yard. His house sat way up on a +high hill. It was jest a little old log hut we lived in a little old +shack around the yard. They was a lot of little shacks in the yard, I +can't tell jest how many, but it was quite a number of 'em. We slept +in old-fashion beds that we called "corded beds", 'cause they had +ropes crossed to hold the mattresses for slats. Some of 'em had beds +nailed to the wall. + +Master Travis Wright had one son named Sam Wright, and after old +Master Travis Wright died, young Master Sam Wright come to be my +mother's master. He jest died a few years ago. + +My mother say dey had a nigger driver and he'd whip 'em all but his +daughter. I never seen no slaves whipped, but my mother say dey had to +whip her Uncle Charley Mills once for telling a story. She say he +bored a hole in de wall of de store 'til he bored de hole in old +Master's whiskey barrel, and he caught two jugs of whiskey and buried +it in de banks of de river. When old Master found out de whiskey was +gone, he tried to make Uncle Charley 'fess up, and Uncle Charley +wouldn't so he brung him in and hung him and barely let his toes +touch. After Uncle Charley thought he was going to kill him, he told +where de whiskey was. + +We didn't go to church before freedom, land no! 'cause the closest +church was so far--it was 30 miles off. But I'm a member of the +Baptist Church and I've been a member for some 40-odd years. I was +past 40 when I heerd of a Methodist Church. My favorite song is +"Companion." I didn't get to go to school 'til after slavery. + +I 'member more after de War. I 'member my mother said dey had +patrollers, and if de slaves would get passes from de Master to go to +de dances and didn't git back before ten o'clock dey'd beat 'em half +to death. + +I used to hear 'em talking 'bout Ku Klux Klan coming to the well to +get water. They'd draw up a bucket of water and pour the water in they +false stomachs. They false stomachs was tied on 'em with a big leather +buckle. They'd jest pour de water in there to scare 'em and say, "This +is the first drink of water I've had since I left Hell." They'd say +all sech things to scare the cullud folks. + +I heerd my mother say they sold slaves on what they called an auction +block. Jest like if a slave had any portly fine looking children +they'd sell them chillun jest like selling cattle. I didn't see this, +jest heerd it. + +After freedom, when I was old enough then to work in the field, we +lived on Mr. Martin's plantation. We worked awful hard in the fields. +Lawd yes'm! I've heard 'bout shucking up de corn, but give me dem +cotton pickings. Fry'd pick out all de crop of cotton in one day. The +women would cook and de men'd pick the cotton, I mean on dem big +cotton pickings. Some would work for they meals. Then after dey'd +gather all de crops, dey'd give big dances, drink whiskey, and jest +cut up sumpin terrible. We didn't know anything 'bout holidays. + +I've heard my husband talk 'bout "Raw head an' bloody bones." Said +whenever dey mothers wanted to scare 'em to make 'em be good dey'd +tell 'em dat a man was outside de door and asked her if she'd hold his +head while he fixed his back bone. I don't believe in voodooing, and I +don't believe in hants. I used to believe in both of 'em when I was +young. + +I married Jake Bridges. We had a ordinary wedding. The preacher +married us and we had a license. We have two sons grown living here. +My husband told me that in slavery if your Master told you to live +with your brother, you had to live with him. My father's mother and +dad was first cousins. + +I can 'member my husband telling me he was hauling lumber from +Jefferson where the saw mill was and it was cold that night, and when +they got halfway back it snowed, and he stopped with an old cullud +family, and he said way in the night, a knock come at de door--woke +'em up, and it was an old cullud man, and he said dis old man commence +inquiring, trying to find out who dey people was and dey told him best +dey could remember, and bless de Lawd, 'fore dey finished talking de +found out dis old cullud man and de other cullud woman an' man dat was +married was all brothers and sisters, and he told his brother it was +a shame he had married his sister and dey had nine chillun. My husband +sho' told me dis. + +I've heerd 'em say dey old master raised chillun by those cullud +women. Why, there was one white man in Texas had a cullud woman, but +didn't have no chillun by her, and he had this cullud woman and her +old mistress there on the same place. So, when old Mistress died he +wouldn't let this cullud woman leave, and he gave her a swell home +right there on the place, and she is still there I guess. They say she +say sometime, she didn't want no Negro man smutting her sheets up. + +I think Abraham Lincoln was a good man, and I have read a whole lots +'bout him, but I don't know much 'bout Jeff Davis. I think Booker T. +Washington is a fine man, but I aint heerd so much about him. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +JOHN BROWN +Age (about) 87 yrs. +West Tulsa, Okla. + + +Most of the folks have themselves a regular birthday but this old +colored man just pick out any of the days during the year--one day +just about as good as another. + +I been around a long time but I don't know when I got here. That's the +truth. Nearest I figures it the year was 1850--the month don't make no +difference nohow. + +But I know the borning was down in Taloga County, Alabama, near the +county seat town. Miss Abby was with my Mammy that day. She was the +wife of Master John Brown. She was with all the slave women every time +a baby was born, or when a plague of misery hit the folks she knew +what to do and what kind of medicine to chase off the aches and pains. +God bless her! She sure loved us Negroes. + +Most of the time there was more'n three hundred slaves on the +plantation. The oldest ones come right from Africa. My Grandmother was +one of them. A savage in Africa--a slave in America. Mammy told it to +me. Over there all the natives dressed naked and lived on fruits and +nuts. Never see many white mens. + +One day a big ship stopped off the shore and the natives hid in the +brush along the beach. Grandmother was there. The ship men sent a +little boat to the shore and scattered bright things and trinkets on +the beach. The natives were curious. Grandmother said everybody made a +rush for them things soon as the boat left. The trinkets was fewer +than the peoples. Next day the white folks scatter some more. There +was another scramble. The natives was feeling less scared, and the +next day some of them walked up the gangplank to get things off the +plank and off the deck. + +The deck was covered with things like they'd found on the beach. +Two-three hundred natives on the ship when they feel it move. They +rush to the side but the plank was gone. Just dropped in the water +when the ship moved away. + +Folks on the beach started to crying and shouting. The ones on the +boat was wild with fear. Grandmother was one of them who got fooled, +and she say the last thing seen of that place was the natives running +up and down the beach waving their arms and shouting like they was +mad. The boat men come up from below where they had been hiding and +drive the slaves down in the bottom and keep them quiet with the whips +and clubs. + +The slaves was landed at Charleston. The town folks was mighty mad +'cause the blacks was driven through the streets without any clothes, +and drove off the boat men after the slaves was sold on the market. +Most of that load was sold to the Brown plantation in Alabama. +Grandmother was one of the bunch. + +The Browns taught them to work. Made clothes for them. For a long time +the natives didn't like the clothes and try to shake them off. There +was three Brown boys--John, Charley and Henry. Nephews of old Lady +Hyatt who was the real owner of the plantation, but the boys run the +place. The old lady she lived in the town. Come out in the spring and +fall to see how is the plantation doing. + +She was a fine woman. The Brown boys and their wives was just as good. +Wouldn't let nobody mistreat the slaves. Whippings was few and nobody +get the whip 'less he need it bad. They teach the young ones how to +read and write; say it was good for the Negroes to know about such +things. + +Sunday was a great day around the plantation. The fields was +forgotten, the light chores was hurried through and everybody got +ready for the church meeting. + +It was out of the doors, in the yard fronting the big log where the +Browns all lived. Master John's wife would start the meeting with a +prayer and then would come the singing. The old timey songs. + +The white folks on the next plantation would lick their slaves for +trying to do like we did. No praying there, and no singing. + +The Master gave out the week's supply on Saturday. Plenty of hams, +lean bacon, flour, corn meal, coffee and more'n enough for the week. +Nobody go hungry on that place! During the growing season all the +slaves have a garden spot all their own. Three thousand acres on that +place--plenty of room for gardens and field crops. + +Even during the war foods was plentiful. One time the Yankee soldiers +visit the place. The white folks gone and I talks with them. Asks me +lots of questions--got any meats--got any potatoes--got any this--some +of that--but I just shake my head and they don't look around. + +The old cook fixes them up though. She fry all the eggs on the place, +skillet the ham and pan the biscuits! Them soldiers fill up and leave +the house friendly as anybody I ever see! + +The Browns wasn't bothered with the Ku Klux Klan either. The Negroes +minded their own business just like before they was free. + +I stayed on the plantation 'til the last Brown die. Then I come to +Oklahoma and works on the railroad 'til I was too old to hustle the +grips and packages. Now I just sits thinking how much better off would +I be on the old plantation. + +Homesick! Just homesick for that Alabama farm like it was in them good +old times! + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +SALLIE CARDER +Age 83 yrs. +Burwin, Okla. + + +I was born in Jackson, Tennessee, and I'm going on 83 years. My mother +was Harriett Neel and father Jeff Bills, both of them named after +their masters. I has one brother, J. B. Bills, but all de rest of my +brothers and sisters is dead. + +No sir, we never had no money while I was a slave. We jest didn't have +nothing a-tall! We ate greens, corn bread, and ash cake. De only time +I ever got a biscuit would be when a misdemeanor was did, and my +Mistress would give a buttered biscuit to de one who could tell her +who done it. + +In hot weather and cold weather dere was no difference as to what we +wore. We wore dresses my mother wove for us and no shoes a-tall. I +never wore any shoes till I was grown and den dey was old brogans wid +only two holes to lace, one on each side. During my wedding I wore a +blue calico dress, a man's shirt tail as a head rag, and a pair of +brogan shoes. + +My Master lived in a three-story frame house painted white. My +Mistress was very mean. Sometimes she would make de overseer whip +negroes for looking too hard at her when she was talking to dem. Dey +had four children, three girls and one boy. + +I was a servant to my Master, and as he had de palsy I had to care for +him, feed him and push him around. I don't know how many slaves, but +he had a good deal of 'em. + +About four o' clock mornings de overseer or negro carriage driver who +stayed at the Big House would ring de bell to git up and git to work. +De slaves would pick a heap of cotton and work till late on +moonshining nights. + +Dere was a white post in front of my door with ropes to tie the slaves +to whip dem. Dey used a plain strap, another one with holes in it, and +one dey call de cat wid nine tails which was a number of straps plated +and de ends unplated. Dey would whip de slaves wid a wide strap wid +holes in it and de holes would make blisters. Den dey would take de +cat wid nine tails and burst de blisters and den rub de sores wid +turpentine and red pepper. + +I never saw any slaves auctioned off but I seen dem pass our house +chained together on de way to be sold, including both men and women +wid babies all chained to each other. Dere was no churches for slaves, +but at nights dey would slip off and git in ditches and sing and pray, +and when dey would sometimes be caught at it dey would be whipped. +Some of de slaves would turn down big pots and put dere heads in dem +and pray. My Mistress would tell me to be a good obedient slave and I +would go to heaven. When slaves would attempt to run off dey would +catch dem and chain dem and fetch 'em back and whip dem before dey was +turned loose again. + +De patrollers would go about in de quarters at nights to see if any of +de slaves was out or slipped off. As we sleep on de dirt floors on +pallets, de patrollers would walk all over and on us and if we even +grunt dey would whip us. De only trouble between de whites and blacks +on our plantation was when de overseer tied my mother to whip her and +my father untied her and de overseer shot and killed him. + +Negroes never was allowed to git sick, and when dey would look +somewhat sick, de overseer would give dem some blue-mass pills and oil +of some sort and make dem continue to work. + +During de War de Yankees would pass through and kill up de chickens, +and hogs, and cattle, and eat up all dey could find. De day of freedom +de overseer went into de field and told de slaves dat dey was free, +and de slaves replied, "free how?" and he told dem: "free to work and +live for demselves." And dey said dey didn't know what to do, and so +some of dem stayed on. I married Josh Forch. I am mother of four +children and 35 grand children. + +I like Abraham Lincoln. I think he was a good man and president. I +didn't know much who Jeff Davis was. What I heard 'bout Booker T. +Washington, he was a good man. + +Now dat slavery is over, I don't want to be in nary 'nother slavery, +and if ever nary 'nothern come up I wouldn't stay here. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +BETTY FOREMAN CHESSIER +Age 94 years +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born July 11, 1843 in Raleigh, N. C. My mother was named Melinda +Manley, the slave of Governor Manley of North Carolina, and my father +was named Arnold Foreman, slave of Bob and John Foreman, two young +masters. They come over from Arkansas to visit my master and my pappy +and mammy met and got married, 'though my pappy only seen my mammy in +the summer when his masters come to visit our master and dey took him +right back. I had three sisters and two brothers and none of dem was +my whole brothers and sisters. I stayed in the Big House all the time, +but my sisters and brothers was gived to the master's sons and +daughters whey dey got married and dey was told to send back for some +more when dem died. I didn't never stay with my mammy doing of +slavery. I stayed in the Big House. I slept under the dining room +table with three other darkies. The flo' was well carpeted. Don't +remembah my grandmammy and grandpappy, but my master was they master. + +I waited on the table, kept flies off'n my mistress and went for the +mail. Never made no money, but dey did give the slaves money at +Christmas time. I never had over two dresses. One was calico and one +gingham. I had such underclothes as dey wore then. + +Master Manley and Mistress had six sons an' six darters. Dey raised +dem all till dey was grown too. Dey lived in a great big house 'cross +from the mansion, right in town before Master was 'lected Governor, +den dey all moved in dat mansion. + +Plantation folks had barbecues and "lay crop feasts" and invited the +city darkies out. When I first come here I couldn't understand the +folks here, 'cause dey didn't quit work on Easter Monday. That is some +day in North Carolina even today. I doesn't remember any play songs, +'cause I was almost in prison. I couldn't play with any of the darkies +and I doesn't remember playing in my life when I was a little girl and +when I got grown I didn't want to. I wasn't hongry, I wasn't naked and +I got only five licks from the white folks in my life. Dey was for +being such a big forgitful girl. I saw 'em sell niggers once. The only +pusson I ever seen whipped at dat whipping post was a white man. + +I never got no learning; dey kept us from dat, but you know some of +dem darkies learnt anyhow. We had church in the heart of town or in +the basement of some old building. I went to the 'piscopal church most +all the time, till I got to be a Baptist. + +The slaves run away to the North 'cause dey wanted to be free. Some of +my family run away sometime and dey didn't catch 'em neither. The +patrollers sho' watched the streets. But when dey caught any of +master's niggers without passes, dey jest locked him up in the guard +house and master come down in the mawnin' and git 'em out, but dem +patrollers better not whip one. + +I know when the War commenced and ended. Master Manley sent me from +the Big House to the office about a mile away. Jest as I got to the +office door, three men rid up in blue uniforms and said, "Dinah, do +you have any milk in there?" I was sent down to the office for some +beans for to cook dinner, but dem men most nigh scared me to death. +They never did go in dat office, but jest rid off on horseback about a +quarter a mile and seem lak right now, Yankees fell out of the very +sky, 'cause hundeds and hundeds was everywhere you could look to save +your life. Old Mistress sent one of her grandchillun to tell me to +come on, and one of the Yankees told dat child, "You tell your +grandmother she ain't coming now and never will come back there as a +slave." Master was setting on the mansion porch. Dem Yankees come up +on de porch, go down in cellar and didn't tech one blessed thing. Old +Mistress took heart trouble, 'cause dem Yankees whipped white folks +going and coming. + +I laid in my bed a many night scared to death of Klu Klux Klan. Dey +would come to your house and ask for a drink and no more want a drink +than nothing. + +After the War, I went to mammy and my step-pappy. She done married +again, so I left and went to Warrington and Halifax, North Carolina, +jest for a little while nursing some white chillun. I stayed in +Raleigh, where I was born till 7 years ago, when I come to Oklahoma to +live with my only living child. I am the mother of 4 chillun and 11 +grandchillun. + +When I got married I jumped a broomstick. To git unmarried, all you +had to do was to jump backwards over the same broomstick. + +Lincoln and Booker T. Washington was two of the finest men ever lived. +Don't think nothing of Jeff Davis, 'cause he was a traitor. Freedom +for us was the best thing ever happened. Prayer is best thing in the +world. Everybody ought to pray, 'cause prayer got us out of slavery. + + + + +Oklahoma Writer's Project +Ex-Slaves + +POLLY COLBERT +Age 83 yrs. +Colbert, Oklahoma + + +I am now living on de forty-acre farm dat de Government give me and it +is just about three miles from my old home on Master Holmes Colbert's +plantation where I lived when I was a slave. + +Lawsy me, times sure has changed since slavery times! Maybe I notice +it more since I been living here all de time, but dere's farms 'round +here dat I've seen grown timber cleared off of twice during my +lifetime. Dis land was first cleared up and worked by niggers when dey +was slaves. After de War nobody worked it and it just naturally growed +up again wid all sorts of trees. Later, white folks cleared it up +again and took grown trees off'n it and now dey are still cultivating +it but it is most wore out now. Some of it won't even sprout peas. Dis +same land used to grow corn without hardly any work but it sure won't +do it now. + +I reckon it was on account of de rich land dat us niggers dat was +owned by Indians didn't have to work so hard as dey did in de old +states, but I think dat Indian masters was just naturally kinder any +way, leastways mine was. + +My mother, Liza, was owned by de Colbert family and my father, Tony, +was owned by de Love family. When Master Holmes and Miss Betty Love +was married dey fathers give my father and mother to dem for a wedding +gift. I was born at Tishomingo and we moved to de farm on Red River +soon after dat and I been here ever since. I had a sister and a +brother, but I ain't seen dem since den. + +My mother died when I was real small, and about a year after dat my +father died. Master Holmes told us children not to cry, dat he and +Miss Betsy would take good care of us. Dey did, too. Dey took us in de +house wid dem and look after us jest as good as dey could colored +children. We slept in a little room close to them and she allus seen +dat we was covered up good before she went to bed. I guess she got a +sight of satisfaction from taking care of us 'cause she didn't have no +babies to care for. + +Master Holmes and Miss Betsy was real young folks but dey was purty +well fixed. He owned about 100 acres of land dat was cleared and ready +for de plow and a lot dat was not in cultivation. He had de woods full +of hogs and cows and he owned seven or eight grown slaves and several +children. I remember Uncle Shed, Uncle Lige, Aunt Chaney, Aunt Lizzie, +and Aunt Susy just as well as if it was yesterday. Master Holmes and +Miss Betsy was both half-breed Choctaw Indians. Dey had both been away +to school somewhere in de states and was well educated. Dey had two +children but dey died when dey was little. Another little girl was +born to dem after de War and she lived to be a grown woman. + +Dey sure was fine young folks and provided well for us. He allus had a +smokehouse full of meat, lard, sausage, dried beans, peas, corn, +potatoes, turnips and collards banked up for winter. He had plenty of +milk and butter for all of us, too. + +Master Holmes allus say, "A hungry man caint work." And he allus saw +to it that we had lots to eat. + +We cooked all sorts of Indian dishes: Tom-fuller, pashofa, hickory-nut +grot, Tom-budha, ash-cakes, and pound cakes besides vegetables and +meat dishes. Corn or corn meal was used in all de Indian dishes. We +made hominy out'n de whole grains. Tom-fuller was made from beaten +corn and tasted sort of like hominy. + +We would take corn and beat it like in a wooden mortar wid a wooden +pestle. We would husk it by fanning it and we would den put it on to +cook in a big pot. While it was cooking we'd pick out a lot of +hickory-nuts, tie 'em up in a cloth and beat 'em a little and drop 'em +in and cook for a long time. We called dis dish hickory-nut grot. When +we made pashofa we beat de corn and cook for a little while and den we +add fresh pork and cook until de meat was done. Tom-budha was green +corn and fresh meat cooked together and seasoned wid tongue or +pepper-grass. + +We cooked on de fire place wid de pots hanging over de fire on racks +and den we baked bread and cakes in a oven-skillet. We didn't use soda +and baking powder. We'd put salt in de meal and scald it wid boiling +water and make it into pones and bake it. We'd roll de ash cakes in +wet cabbage leaves and put 'em in de hot ashes and bake 'em. We cooked +potatoes, and roasting ears dat way also. We sweetened our cakes wid +molasses, and dey was plenty sweet too. + +Dey was lots of possums and coons and squirrels and we nearly always +had some one of these to eat. We'd parboil de possum or coon and put +it in a pan and bake him wid potatoes 'round him. We used de broth to +baste him and for gravy. Hit sure was fine eating dem days. + +I never had much work to do. I helped 'round de house when I wanted to +and I run errands for Miss Betsy. I liked to do things for her. When I +got a little bigger my brother and I toted cool water to de field for +de hands. + +Didn't none of Master Holmes' niggers work when dey was sick. He allus +saw dat dey had medicine and a doctor iffen dey needed one. 'Bout de +only sickness we had was chills and fever. In de old days we made lots +of our own medicine and I still does it yet. We used polecat grease +for croup and rheumatism. Dog-fennel, butterfly-root, and +life-everlasting boiled and mixed and made into a syrup will cure +pneumonia and pleurisy. Pursley-weed, called squirrel physic, boiled +into a syrup will cure chills and fever. Snake-root steeped for a long +time and mixed with whiskey will cure chills and fever also. + +Our clothes was all made of homespun. De women done all de spinning +and de weaving but Miss Betsy cut out all de clothes and helped wid de +sewing. She learned to sew when she was away to school and she learnt +all her women to sew. She done all the sewing for de children. Master +Holmes bought our shoes and we all had 'em to wear in de winter. We +all went barefoot in de summer. + +He kept mighty good teams and he had two fine saddle horses. He and +Miss Betsy rode 'em all de time. She would ride wid him all over de +farm and dey would go hunting a lot, too. She could shoot a gun as +good as any man. + +Master Holmes sure did love his wife and children and he was so proud +of her. It nearly killed 'em both to give up de little boy and girl. I +never did hear of him taking a drink and he was kind to everybody, +both black and white, and everybody liked him. Dey had lots of company +and dey never turned anybody away. We lived about four miles from de +ferry on Red River on de Texas Road and lots of travelers stopped at +our house. + +We was 'lowed to visit de colored folks on de Eastman and Carter +plantations dat joined our farm. Eastman and Carter was both white men +dat married Indian wives. Dey was good to dey slaves, too, and let 'em +visit us. + +Old Uncle Kellup (Caleb) Colbert, Uncle Billy Hogan, Rev. John Carr, +Rev. Baker, Rev. Hogue, and old Father Murrow preached for de white +folks all de time and us colored folks went to church wid dem. Dey had +church under brush arbors and we set off to ourselves but we could +take part in de singing and sometimes a colored person would get happy +and pray and shout but nobody didn't think nothing 'bout dat. + +De Patrollers was de law, kind of like de policeman now. Dey sure +never did whip one of Master Holmes' niggers for he didn't allow it. +He didn't whip 'em hisself and he sure didn't allow anybody else to +either. I was afraid of de Ku Kluxers too, and I 'spects dat Master +Holmes was one of de leaders iffen de truth was known. Dey sure was +scary looking. + +I was scared of de Yankee soldiers. Dey come by and killed some of our +cattle for beef and took our meat and lard out'n de smokehouse and dey +took some corn, too. Us niggers was awful mad. We didn't know anything +'bout dem fighting to free us. We didn't specially want to be free dat +I knows of. + +Right after de War I went over to Bloomfield Academy to take care of a +little girl, but I went back to Master Holmes and Miss Betsy at de end +of two years to take care of de little girl dat was born to dem and I +stayed with her until I was about fifteen. Master Holmes went to +Washington as a delegate, for something for de Indians, and he took +sick and died and dey buried him dere. Poor Miss Betsy nearly grieved +herself to death. She stayed on at de farm till her little girl was +grown and married. Her nigger men stayed on with her and rented land +from her and dey sure raised a sight of truck. Didn't none of her old +slaves ever move very far from her and most of them worked for her +till dey was too old to work. + +I left Miss Betsy purty soon after Master Holmes died and went back +to de Academy and stayed three years. I married a man dat belonged to +Master Holmes' cousin. His name was Colbert, too. I had a big wedding. +Miss Betsy and a lot of white folks come and stayed for dinner. We +danced all evening and after supper we started again and danced all +night and de next day and de next night. We'd eat awhile and den we'd +dance awhile. + +My husband and I had nine children and now I've got seven +grandchildren. My husband has been dead a long time. + +My sister, Chaney, lives here close to me but her mind has got feeble +and she can't recollect as much as I can. I live with my son and he is +mighty good to me. I know I ain't long for dis world but I don't mind +for I has lived a long time and I'll have a lot of friends in de other +world and I won't be lonesome. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937] + +GEORGE CONRAD, JR., +Age 77 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born February 23, 1860 at Connersville, Harrison County, +Kentucky. I was born and lived just 13 miles from Parish. My mother's +name is Rachel Conrad, born at Bourbon County, Kentucky. My father, +George Conrad, was born at Bourbon County Kentucky. My grandmother's +name is Sallie Amos, and grandfather's name is Peter Amos. My +grandfather, his old Master freed him and he bought my grandmother, +Aunt Liza and Uncle Cy. He made the money by freighting groceries from +Ohio to Maysville, Kentucky. + +Our Master was named Master Joe Conrad. We sometimes called him "Mos" +Joe Conrad. Master Joe Conrad stayed in a big log house with weather +boarding on the outside. + +I was born in a log cabin. We slept in wooden beds with rope cords for +slats, and the beds had curtains around them. You see my mother was +the cook for the Master, and she cooked everything--chicken, roasting +ears. She cooked mostly everything we have now. They didn't have +stoves; they cooked in big ovens. The skillets had three legs. I can +remember the first stove that we had. I guess I was about six years +old. + +My old Master had 900 acres of land. My father was a stiller. He made +three barrels of whisky a day. Before the War whisky sold for 12-1/2c +and 13c a gallon. After the War it went up to $3 and $4 per gallon. +When War broke out he had 300 barrels hid under old Master's barn. + +There was 14 colored men working for old Master Joe and 7 women. I +think it was on the 13th of May, all 14 of these colored men, and my +father, went to the Army. When old Master Joe come to wake 'em up the +next morning--I remember he called real loud, Miles, Esau, George, +Frank, Arch, on down the line, and my mother told him they'd all gone +to the army. Old Master went to Cynthia, Kentucky, where they had +gone to enlist and begged the officer in charge to let him see all of +his boys, but the officer said "No." Some way or 'nother he got a +chance to see Arch, and Arch came back with him to help raise the +crops. + +My mother cooked and took care of the house. Aunt Sarah took care of +the children. I had two little baby brothers, Charlie and John. The +old Mistress would let my mother put them in her cradle and Aunt Sarah +got jealous, and killed both of the babies. When they cut one of the +babies open they took out two frogs. Some say she conjured the babies. +Them niggers could conjure each other but they couldn't do nothing to +the whitefolks, but I don't believe in it. There's an old woman living +back there now (pointing around the corner of the house where he was +sitting) they said her husband put a spell on her. They call 'em +two-headed Negroes. + +Old Master never whipped any of his slaves, except two of my +uncles--Pete Conrad and Richard Sherman, now living at Falsmouth, +Kentucky. + +We raised corn, wheat, oats, rye and barley, in the spring. In +January, February and March we'd go up to the Sugar Camp where he had +a grove of maple trees. We'd make maple syrup and put up sugar in +cakes. Sugar sold for $2.5O and $3 a cake. He had a regular sugar +house. My old Master was rich I tell you. + +Whenever a member of the white family die all the slaves would turn +out, and whenever a slave would die, whitefolks and all the slaves +would go. My Master had a big vault. My Mistress was buried in an iron +coffin that they called a potanic coffin. I went back to see her after +I was 21 years old and she look jest like she did when they buried +her. All of the family was buried in them vaults, and I expect if +you'd go there today they'd look the same. The slaves was buried in +good handmade coffins. + +I heard a lot of talk 'bout the patrollers. In them days if you went +away from home and didn't have a pass they'd whip you. Sometimes +they'd whip you with a long black cow whip, and then sometime they'd +roast elm switches in the fire. This was called "cat-o-nine-tails", +and they'd whip you with dat. We never had no jails; only punishment +was just to whip you. + +Now, the way the slaves travel. If a slave had been good sometimes old +Master would let him ride his hoss; then, sometime they'd steal a hoss +out and ride 'em and slip him back before old Master ever found it +out. There was a man in them days by the name of John Brown. We called +him an underground railroad man, 'cause he'd steal the slaves and +carry 'em across the river in a boat. When you got on the other side +you was free, 'cause you was in a free State, Ohio. + +We used to sing, and I guess young folks today does too: + + "John Brown's Body Lies A 'moulding In the Clay." + +and + + "They Hung John Brown On a Sour Apple Tree." + +Our slaves all got very good attention when they got sick. They'd send +and get a doctor for 'em. You see old Mistress Mary bought my mother, +father and two children throwed in for $1,100 and she told Master Joe +to always keep her slaves, not to sell 'em and always take good care +of 'em. + +When my father went to the army old Master told us he was gone to +fight for us niggers freedom. My daddy was the only one that come back +out of the 13 men that enlisted, and when my daddy come back old +Master give him a buggy and hoss. + +When the Yanks come, I never will forget one of 'em was named John +Morgan. We carried old Master down to the barn and hid him in the hay. +I felt so sorry for old Master they took all his hams, some of his +whiskey, and all dey could find, hogs, chickens, and jest treated him +something terrible. + +The whitefolks learned my father how to read and write, but I didn't +learn how to read and write 'til I enlisted in the U. S. Army in +1883. + +They sent us here (Oklahoma Territory) to keep the immigrants from +settling up Oklahoma. I went to Fort Riley the 1st day of October +1883, and stayed there three weeks. Left Fort Riley and went to Ft. +Worth, Texas, and landed in Henryetta, Texas, on the 14th day of +October 1883. Then, we had 65 miles to walk to Ft. Sill. We walked +there in three days. I was assigned to my Company, Troop G. 9th +Calvary, and we stayed and drilled in Ft. Sill six months, when we was +assigned to duty. We got orders to come to Ft. Reno, Okla., on the 6th +day of January 1885 where we was ordered to Stillwater, Okla., to move +five hundred immigrants under Capt. Couch. We landed there on the 23rd +day of January, Saturday evening, and Sunday was the 24th. We had +general inspection Monday, January 25, 1885. We fell in line of +battle, sixteen companies of soldiers, to move 500 immigrants to the +Arkansas City, Kansas line. + +We formed a line at 9:00 o'clock Monday morning and Captain Couch run +up his white flag, and Colonel Hatch he sent the orderly up to see +what he meant by putting up the flag, so Captain Couch sent word back, +"If you don't fire on me, I'll leave tomorrow." Colonel Hatch turned +around to the Major and told him to turn his troops back to the camp, +and detailed three camps of soldiers of the 8th Cavalry to carry +Captain Couch's troop of 500 immigrants to Arkansas City, Kansas. +Troop L., Troop D., and Troop B. taken them back with 43 wagons and +put them over the line of Kansas. Then we were ordered back to our +supply camp at Camp Alice, 9 miles north of Guthrie in the Cimarron +horseshoe bottom. We stayed there about three months, and Capt. Couch +and his colony came back into the territory at Caldwell, Kansas June +1885. + +I laid there 'til August 8, then we changed regiments with the 5th +Calvary to go to Nebraska. There was a breakout with the Indians at +Ft. Reno the 1st of July 1885. The Indian Agency tried to make the +Indians wear citizens' clothes. They had to call General Sheridan +from Washington, D. C., to quiet the Indians down. Now, we had to make +a line in three divisions, fifteen miles a part, one non-commissioned +officer to each squad, and these men was to go to Caldwell, Kansas and +bring him to Ft. Reno that night. He came that night, so the next +morning Colonel Brisbane and General Hatch reported to General +Sheridan what the trouble was. General Sheridan called all the Indian +Chiefs together and asked them why they rebelled against the agency, +and they told them they weren't going to wear citizen's clothes. +General Sheridan called his corporals and sergeants together and told +them to go behind the guard house and dig a grave for this Indian +agent in order to fool the Indian Chiefs. Then, he sent a detachment +of soldiers to order the Indian Chiefs away from the guard house and +to put this Indian agent in the ambulance that brought him to Ft. Reno +and take him back to Washington, D. C., to remain there 'til he +returned. The next morning he called all the Indian Chiefs to the +guard house and pointed down to the grave and said that, "I have +killed the agent and buried him there." The Indians tore the feathers +out of their hats rejoicing that they killed the agent. + +On the 12th of the same July, we had general inspection with General +Foresides from Washington, then we was ordered back to our supply camp +to stay there 'til we got orders of our change. On August 8, we got +orders to change to go to Nebraska, to Ft. Robinson, Ft. Nibrary, and +Ft. McKinney, and we left on the 8th of August. + +This is my Oklahoma history. I gave this story to the Daily Oklahoman +and Times at one time and they are supposed to publish it but they +haven't. + +Now you see that tree up there in front of my house? That tree is 50 +years old. It is called the potopic tree. That was the only tree +around here in 1882. This was a bald prairie. I enlisted over there +where the City Market sets now. That was our starting camp under Capt. +Payne, but he died. + +I joined the A. M. E. Methodist Church in 1874. I love this song +better than all the rest: + + "Am I a Soldier of the Cross?" + +Abraham Lincoln was a smart man, but he would have done more if he was +not killed. I don't think his work was finished. I'll tell you the +truth about Booker T. Washington. He argued our people to stay out of +town and stay in the country. He was a Democrat. He was a smart man, +but I think a man should live wherever he choose regardless. I never +stopped work whenever I'd hear he was coming to town to speak. You +know they wasn't fighting for freeing the slaves; they was fighting to +keep Kansas from being a slave State; so when they had the North +whipped, I mean the South had 'em whipped, they called for the Negroes +to go out and fight for his freedom. Don't know nothing 'bout Jeff +Davis. I've handled a lots of his money. It was counterfeited after +the War. + +I've been married four times. I had one wife and three women. I mean +the three wasn't no good. My first wife's name: Amanda Nelson. 2nd: +Pocahuntas Jackson. 3rd: Nannie Shumpard. We lived together 9 years. +She tried to beat me out of my home. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +MARTHA CUNNINGHAM +(white) Age 81 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma + + +My father's name was A. J. Brown, and my mother's name was Hattie +Brown. I was born in the East, in Saveer County, Tennessee. I had +twelve sisters and brothers, all are dead but two. W. S. Brown lives +at 327 W. California, and Maudie Reynolds, my sister lives at +Minrovie, California. + +We lived in different kinds of houses just like we do now. Some was of +log, some frame and some rock. I remember when we didn't have stoves +to cook on, no lamps, and not even any candles until I was about six +years old. We would take a rag and sop it in lard to make lights. + +All of our furniture was home made, but it was nice. We had just +plenty of every thing. It wasn't like it is in these days where you +have to pick and scrape for something to eat. + +My grandfather and grandmother gave my mother and father two slaves, +an old woman and man, when they married. My grandfather owned a large +plantation, and had a large number of slaves, and my father and mother +owned several farms at different places. Our mother and father treated +our slaves good. They ate what we ate, and they stayed with us a long +time after the War. I remember though all of the slave owners weren't +good to their slaves. I have seen 'em take those young fine looking +negroes, put them in a pen when they got ready to whip them, strip +them and lay them face down, and beat them until white whelps arose on +their bodies. Yes, some of them was treated awful mean. + +I saw mothers sold from their babies, and babies sold from their +mothers. They would strip them, put them on the auction block and sell +them--bid them off just like you would cattle. Some would sell for +lots of money. + +They wouldn't take the slaves to church. I don't remember when the +negroes had their first schools, but it was a long time after the War. + +Why, I remember when they'd have those big corn shuckings, flax +pullings, and quilting parties. They would sow acres after acres of +flax, then they would meet at some house or plantation and pull flax +until they had finished, then give a big party. There'd be the same +thing at the next plantation and so on until they'd all in that +neighborhood get their crops gathered. I remember they'd have all +kinds of good eats--pies, cakes, chicken, fish, fresh pork, +beef,--just plenty of good eats. + +I went over the battlefield at Knoxville, Tennessee, two or three +hours after the Yankees and the Rebels had a battle. It was about a +mile from our house, and I walked over hundreds of dead men lying on +the ground. Some were fatally wounded, and we carried about six or +seven to our house. I saw the doctor pick the bullets out of their +flesh. + +When the Yankees came they treated the slave owners awful mean. They +drew a gun on my mother, made her walk for several miles one real cold +night and take them up on the top of a mountain and show them where a +still was. They would make her cook for 'em. They took every thing we +had. I was about twelve years old at that time. + +I stayed there with my mother until after my father died, then we +moved to Alabama. I was about 22 years old. I married a man named +Kelley. He and my brothers were railroad graders. We traveled all over +Texas. + +I made the Run. Came here in '89 with my mother, husband and eight +children. My husband and brothers graded the streets for the townsite +of Oklahoma City and platted it off. + +When we made the Run, we just stood on the property until it was +surveyed, then we'd pay $1.00, and the lot was ours. I camped on the +corner of Robinson and Pottawatomie Streets and Robinson and +Chickasaw. I owned the Northwest corner. I later sold both lots. + +I am a Christian, Baptist mostly, I guess, and I believe in the Great +Beyond. I don't think you have to go to church all the time to be +saved, but you have to be right with the Man up yonder before you can +be saved. + +I am a Republican, and it makes my blood boil whenever I hear a negro +say he is a democrat. They should all be Republicans. + +I have been married twice. I married William Cunningham here in 1922. +He is dead; in fact, both my husbands are dead, so I don't see much +need of talking about them. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + + +WILLIAM CURTIS +Age 93 yrs. +McAlester, Oklahoma + + + "Run Nigger, run, + De Patteroll git ye! + Run Nigger, run, + He's almost here!" + + "Please Mr. Patteroll, + Don't ketch me! + Jest take dat nigger + What's behind dat tree." + +Lawsy, I done heard dat song all my life and it warn't no joke +neither. De Patrol would git ye too if he caught ye off the plantation +without a pass from your Master, and he'd whup ye too. None of us +dassn't leave without a pass. + +We chillun sung lots of songs and we played marbles, mumble peg, and +town ball. In de winter we would set around de fire and listen to our +Mammy and Pappy tell ghost tales and witch tales. I don't guess dey +was sho' nuff so, but we all thought dey was. + +My Mammy was bought in Virginia by our Master, Hugh McKeown. He owned +a big plantation in Georgia. Soon after she come to Georgia she +married my pa. Old Master was good to us. We lived for a while in the +quarters behind the Big House, and my mammy was de house woman. + +Somehow, in a trade, or maybe my pa was mortgaged, but anyway old +Master let a man in Virginia have him and we never see him no more +'till after the War. It nigh broke our hearts when he had to leave and +old Master sho' done everything he could to make it up to us. + +There was four of us chillun. I didn't do no work 'till I was about +fifteen years old. Old Master bought a tavern and mammy worked as +house woman and I went to work at the stables. I drove the carriage +and took keer of the team and carriage. I kept 'em shining too. I'd +curry the horses 'till they was slick and shiny. I'd polish the +harness and the carriage. Old Master and Mistress was quality and I +wanted everybody to know it. They had three girls and three boys and +we boys played together and went swimming together. We loved each +other, I tell ye. + +Old Master built us a little house jest back of de tavern and mammy +raised us jest like Old Mistress did her chillun. When I didn't have +to work de boys and me would go hunting. We'd kill possum, coon, +squirrels and wild hogs. Old Master killed a wild hog and he give +mammy her ten tiny pigs. She raised 'em and my, at the meat we had +when they was butchered. + +They had lots of company at de Big House, and it was de only tavern +too, so they was lots of cooking to do. They would go to church on +Sunday and they would spread their dinners on the ground. My, but they +was feasts. We'd allus git to go as I drive the carriage and mammy +looked after the food. We had our own church too, with our own +preacher. + +We had a spinning house where all the old women would card and spin +wool in de winter and cotton in de summer. Dey made all our clothes, +what few we wore. Us boys just wore long tailed shirts 'till we was 12 +or 13 years old, sometimes older. I was 15 when I started driving the +fambly carriage and I got to put on pants then. + +Our suits was made out of jeans. That cloth wore like buckskin. We'd +wear 'em for a year before they had to be patched. + +We made our own brogan shoes too. We'd kill a beef and skin it and +spread the skin out and let it dry a while. We'd put the hide in lime +water to get the hair off, then we'd oil it and work it 'till it was +soft. Next we'd take it to the bench and scrape or 'plesh' it with +knives. It was then put in a tight cabinet and smoked with oak wood +for about 24 hours. Smoking loosened the skin. We'd then take it out +and rub it to soften it. It was blacked and oiled and it was ready to +be made into shoes. It took nearly a year to get a green hide made +into shoes. Twan't no wonder we had to go barefooted. + +Sometimes I'd work in the wood shop, dressing wagon spokes. We made +spokes with a plane, by hand on a bench. + +I didn't have much work to do before I was 15 except to run errands. +One of my jobs was to take corn to the mill to be ground into meal. +Some one would put my sack of corn on the mule's back and help me up +and I'd ride to the mill and have it ground and they'd load me back on +and I'd go back home. + +I remember once my meal fell off and I waited and waited for somebody +to come by and help me. I got tired waiting so I toted the sack to a +big log and laid it acrost it. I led my mule up to the log and after +working hard for a long time I managed to get it on his back. I +climbed up and jest as we started off the mule jumped and I fell off +and pulled the sack off with me. I couldn't do nothing but wait and +finally old Master came after me. He knowed something was wrong. + +Old Master was good to all of his slaves but his overseers had orders +to make 'em work. He fed 'em good and took good keer of 'em and never +made 'em work iffen they was sick or even felt bad. They was two +things old Master jest wouldn't 'bide and dat was for a slave to be +sassy or lazy. Sometimes if dey wouldn't work or slipped off de farm +dey would whip 'em. He didn't whip often. Colored overseers was worse +to whip than white ones, but Master allus said, "Hadn't you all rather +have a nigger overseer than a white one? I don't want to white man +over my niggers." I've seen the overseer whip some but I never did +get no whipping. He would strip 'em to the waist and whip 'em with a +long leather strop, about as wide as two fingers and fastened to a +handle. + +When de war broke out everthing was changed. My young Masters had to +go. T. H. McKeown, the oldest was a Lieutenant and was one of the +first to go. It nigh broke all of our hearts. Pretty soon he sent for +me to come and keep him company. Old Master let me go and I stayed in +his quarters. He was stationed at Atlanta and Griffin, Georgia. I'd +stay with him a week or two and I'd go home for a few days and I'd +take back food and fruit. I stayed with him and waited on him 'till he +got used to being in the army and they moved him out to fighting. I +wanted to go on with him but he wouldn't let me, he told me to go back +and take care of Old Master and Old Mistress. They was getting old by +then. Purty soon Young Master got wounded purty bad and they sent me +home. I never went back. I got a "pass" to go home. Course, after the +war nothing was right no more. Yes, we was free but we didn't know +what to do. We didn't want to leave our old Master and our old home. +We stayed on and after a while my pappy come home to us. Dat was de +best thing about de war setting us free, he could come back to us. + +We all lived on at the old plantation. Old Master and old Mistress +died and young Master took charge of de farm. He couldn't a'done +nothing without us niggers. He didn't know how to work. He was good to +us and divided the crops with us. + +I never went to school much but my white folks learned me to read and +write. I could always have any of their books to read, and they had +lots of 'em. + +Times has changed a lot since that time. I don't know where the world +is much better now, that it has everthing or then when we didn't have +hardly nothing, but I believe there was more religion then. We always +went to church and I've seen 'em baptize from in the early morning +'till afternoon in the Chatahooche river. Folks don't hardly know +nowadays jest what to believe they's so many religions, but they's +only one God. + +I was eighteen when I married. I had eight chillun. My wife is 86, and +she lives in St. Louis, Missouri. + + + + +[Illustration: Lucinda Davis] + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[HW: (photo)] +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +LUCINDA DAVIS +Age (about) 89 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + + "What yo' gwine do when de meat give out? + What yo' gwine do when de meat give out? + Set in de corner wid my lips pooched out! + Lawsy! + + What yo' gwine do when de meat come in? + What yo' gwine do when de meat come in? + Set in de corner wid a greasy chin! + Lawsy!" + +Dat's about de only little nigger song I know, less'n it be de one +about: + + "Great big nigger, laying 'hind de log-- + Finger on de trigger and eye on the hawg! + Click go de trigger and bang go de gun! + Here come de owner and de buck nigger run!" + +And I think I learn both of dem long after I been grown, 'cause I +belong to a full-blood Creek Indian and I didn't know nothing but +Creek talk long after de Civil War. My mistress was part white and +knowed English talk, but she never did talk it because none of de +people talked it. I heard it sometime, but it sound like whole lot of +wild shoat in de cedar brake scared at something when I do hear it. +Dat was when I was little girl in time of de War. + +I don't know where I been born. Nobody never did tell me. But my mammy +and pappy git me after de War and I know den whose child I is. De men +at de Creek Agency help 'em git me, I reckon, maybe. + +First thing I remember is when I was a little girl, and I belong to +old Tuskaya-hiniha. He was big man in de Upper Creek, and we have a +purty good size farm, jest a little bit to de north of de wagon depot +houses on de old road at Honey Springs. Dat place was about +twenty-five mile south of Fort Gibson, but I don't know nothing about +whar de fort is when I was a little girl at dat time. I know de Elk +River 'bout two mile north of whar we live, 'cause I been there many +de time. + +I don't know if old Master have a white name. Lots de Upper Creek +didn't have no white name. Maybe he have another Indian name, too, +because Tuskaya-hiniha mean "head man warrior" in Creek, but dat what +everybody call him and dat what de family call him too. + +My Mistress' name was Nancy, and she was a Lott before she marry old +man Tuskaya-hiniha. Her pappy name was Lott and he was purty near +white. Maybe so all white. Dey have two chillun, I think, but only one +stayed on de place. She was name Luwina, and her husband was dead. His +name was Walker, and Luwina bring Mr. Walker's little sister, Nancy, +to live at de place too. + +Luwina had a little baby boy and dat de reason old Master buy me, to +look after de little baby boy. He didn't have no name cause he wasn't +big enough when I was with dem, but he git a name later on, I reckon. +We all call him "Istidji." Dat mean "little man." + +When I first remember, before de War, old Master had 'bout as many +slave as I got fingers, I reckon. I can think dem off on my fingers +like dis, but I can't recollect de names. + +Dey call all de slaves "Istilusti." Dat mean "Black man." + +Old man Tuskaya-hiniha was near 'bout blind before de War, and 'bout +time of de War he go plumb blind and have to set on de long seat under +de bresh shelter of de house all de time. Sometime I lead him around +de yard a little, but not very much. Dat about de time all de slave +begin to slip out and run off. + +My own pappy was name Stephany. I think he take dat name 'cause when +he little his mammy call him "Istifani." Dat mean a skeleton, and he +was a skinny man. He belong to de Grayson family and I think his +master name George, but I don't know. Dey big people in de Creek, and +with de white folks too. My mammy name was Serena and she belong to +some of de Gouge family. Dey was big people in de Upper Creek, and one +de biggest men of the Gouge was name Hopoethleyoholo for his Creek +name. He was a big man and went to de North in de War and died up in +Kansas, I think. Dey say when he was a little boy he was called +Hopoethli, which mean "good little boy", and when he git grown he make +big speeches and dey stick on de "yoholo." Dat mean "loud whooper." + +Dat de way de Creek made de name for young boys when I was a little +girl. When de boy git old enough de big men in de town give him a +name, and sometime later on when he git to going round wid de grown +men dey stick on some more name. If he a good talker dey sometime +stick on "yoholo", and iffen he make lots of jokes dey call him +"Hadjo." If he is a good leader dey call him "Imala" and if he kind of +mean dey sometime call him "fixigo." + +My mammy and pappy belong to two masters, but dey live together on a +place. Dat de way de Creek slaves do lots of times. Dey work patches +and give de masters most all dey make, but dey have some for +demselves. Dey didn't have to stay on de master's place and work like +I hear de slaves of de white people and de Cherokee and Choctaw people +say dey had to do. + +Maybe my pappy and mammy run off and git free, or maybeso dey buy +demselves out, but anyway dey move away some time and my mammy's +master sell me to old man Tuskaya-hiniha when I was jest a little gal. +All I have to do is stay at de house and mind de baby. + +Master had a good log house and a bresh shelter out in front like all +de houses had. Like a gallery, only it had de dirt for de flo' and +bresh for de roof. Dey cook everything out in de yard in big pots, and +dey eat out in de yard too. + +Dat was sho' good stuff to eat, and it make you fat too! Roast de +green corn on de ears in de ashes, and scrape off some and fry it! +Grind de dry corn or pound it up and make ash cake. Den bile de +greens--all kinds of greens from out in de woods--and chop up de pork +and de deer meat, or de wild turkey meat; maybe all of dem, in de big +pot at de same time! Fish too, and de big turtle dat lay out on de +bank! + +Dey always have a pot full of sofki settin right inside de house, and +anybody eat when dey feel hungry. Anybody come on a visit, always give +'em some of de sofki. Ef dey don't take none de old man git mad, too! + +When you make de sofki you pound up de corn real fine, den pour in de +water an dreen it off to git all de little skin from off'n de grain. +Den you let de grits soak and den bile it and let it stand. Sometime +you put in some pounded hickory nut meats. Dat make it real good. + +I don't know whar old Master git de cloth for de clothes, less'n he +buy it. Befo' I can remember I think he had some slaves dat weave de +cloth, but when I was dar he git it at de wagon depot at Honey +Springs, I think. He go dar all de time to sell his corn, and he raise +lots of corn, too. + +Dat place was on de big road, what we called de road to Texas, but it +go all de way up to de North, too. De traders stop at Honey Springs +and old Master trade corn for what he want. He git some purty checkedy +cloth one time, and everybody git a dress or a shirt made off'n it. I +have dat dress 'till I git too big for it. + +Everybody dress up fine when dey is a funeral. Dey take me along to +mind de baby at two-three funerals, but I don't know who it is dat +die. De Creek sho' take on when somebody die! + +Long in de night you wake up and hear a gun go off, way off yonder +somewhar. Den it go again, and den again, jest as fast as dey can ram +de load in. Dat mean somebody dead. When somebody die de men go out in +de yard and let de people know dat way. Den dey jest go back in de +house and let de fire go out, and don't even tech de dead person till +somebody git dar what has de right to tech de dead. + +When somebody bad sick dey build a fire in de house, even in de +summer, and don't let it die down till dat person git well or die. +When dey die dey let de fire go out. + +In de morning everybody dress up fine and go to de house whar de dead +is and stand around in de yard outside de house and don't go in. +Pretty soon along come somebody what got a right to tech and handle de +dead and dey go in. I don't know what give dem de right, but I think +dey has to go through some kind of medicine to git de right, and I +know dey has to drink de red root and purge good before dey tech de +body. When dey git de body ready dey come out and all go to de +graveyard, mostly de family graveyard, right on de place or at some of +the kinfolkses. + +When dey git to de grave somebody shoots a gun at de north, den de +west, den de south, and den de east. Iffen dey had four guns dey used +'em. + +Den dey put de body down in de grave and put some extra clothes in +with it and some food and a cup of coffee, maybe. Den dey takes strips +of elm bark and lays over de body till it all covered up, and den +throw in de dirt. + +When de last dirt throwed on, everybody must clap dey hands and smile, +but you sho hadn't better step on any of de new dirt around de grave, +because it bring sickness right along wid you back to your own house. +Dat what dey said, anyways. + +Jest soon as de grave filled up dey built a little shelter over it wid +poles like a pig pen and kiver it over wid elm bark to keep de rain +from soaking down in de new dirt. + +Den everybody go back to de house and de family go in and scatter +some kind of medicine 'round de place and build a new fire. Sometime +dey feed everybody befo' dey all leave for home. + +Every time dey have a funeral dey always a lot of de people say, +"Didn't you hear de stikini squalling in de night?" "I hear dat +stikini all de night!" De "stikini" is de screech owl, and he suppose +to tell when anybody going to die right soon. I hear lots of Creek +people say dey hear de screech owl close to de house, and sho' nuff +somebody in de family die soon. + +When de big battle come at our place at Honey Springs dey jest git +through having de green corn "busk." De green corn was just ripened +enough to eat. It must of been along in July. + +Dat busk was jest a little busk. Dey wasn't enough men around to have +a good one. But I seen lots of big ones. Ones whar dey had all de +different kinds of "banga." Dey call all de dances some kind of banga. +De chicken dance is de "Tolosabanga", and de "Istifanibanga" is de one +whar dey make lak dey is skeletons and raw heads coming to git you. + +De "Hadjobanga" is de crazy dance, and dat is a funny one. Dey all +dance crazy and make up funny songs to go wid de dance. Everybody +think up funny songs to sing and everybody whoop and laugh all de +time. + +But de worse one was de drunk dance. Dey jest dance ever whichaway, de +men and de women together, and dey wrassle and hug and carry on awful! +De good people don't dance dat one. Everybody sing about going to +somebody elses house and sleeping wid dem, and shout, "We is all drunk +and we don't know what we doing and we ain't doing wrong 'cause we is +all drunk" and things like dat. Sometime de bad ones leave and go to +de woods, too! + +Dat kind of doing make de good people mad, and sometime dey have +killings about it. When a man catch one his women--maybeso his wife or +one of his daughters--been to de woods he catch her and beat her and +cut off de rim of her ears! + +People think maybeso dat ain't so, but I know it is! + +I was combing somebody's hair one time--I ain't going tell who--and +when I lift it up off'n her ears I nearly drap dead! Dar de rims cut +right off'n 'em! But she was a married woman, and I think maybeso it +happen when she was a young gal and got into it at one of dem drunk +dances. + +Dem Upper Creek took de marrying kind of light anyways. Iffen de +younguns wanted to be man and wife and de old ones didn't care dey +jest went ahead and dat was about all, 'cepting some presents maybe. +But de Baptists changed dat a lot amongst de young ones. + +I never forgit de day dat battle of de Civil War happen at Honey +Springs! Old Master jest had de green corn all in, and us had been +having a time gitting it in, too. Jest de women was all dat was left, +'cause de men slaves had all slipped off and left out. My uncle Abe +done got up a bunch and gone to de North wid dem to fight, but I +didn't know den whar he went. He was in dat same battle, and after de +War dey called him Abe Colonel. Most all de slaves 'round dat place +done gone off a long time before dat wid dey masters when dey go wid +old man Gouge and a man named McDaniel. + +We had a big tree in de yard, and a grape vine swing in it for de +little baby "Istidji", and I was swinging him real early in de morning +befo' de sun up. De house set in a little patch of woods wid de field +in de back, but all out on de north side was a little open space, like +a kind of prairie. I was swinging de baby, and all at once I seen +somebody riding dis way 'cross dat prairie--jest coming a-kiting and +a-laying flat out on his hoss. When he see de house he begin to give +de war whoop, "Eya-a-a-a-he-ah!" When he git close to de house he +holler to git out de way 'cause dey gwine be a big fight, and old +Master start rapping wid his cane and yelling to git some grub and +blankets in de wagon right now! + +We jest leave everything setting right whar it is, 'cepting putting +out de fire and grabbing all de pots and kettles. Some de nigger women +run to git de mules and de wagon and some start gitting meat and corn +out of de place whar we done hid it to keep de scouters from finding +it befo' now. All de time we gitting ready to travel we hear dat boy +on dat horse going on down de big Texas road hollering. +"Eya-a-a-he-he-hah!" + +Den jest as we starting to leave here come something across dat little +prairie sho' nuff! We know dey is Indians de way dey is riding, and de +way dey is all strung out. Dey had a flag, and it was all red and had +a big criss-cross on it dat look lak a saw horse. De man carry it and +rear back on it when de wind whip it, but it flap all 'round de +horse's head and de horse pitch and rear lak he know something going +happen, sho! + +'Bout dat time it turn kind of dark and begin to rain a little, and we +git out to de big road and de rain come down hard. It rain so hard for +a little while dat we jest have to stop de wagon and set dar, and den +long come more soldiers dan I ever see befo'. Dey all white men, I +think, and dey have on dat brown clothes dyed wid walnut and +butternut, and old Master say dey de Confederate soldiers. Dey +dragging some big guns on wheels and most de men slopping 'long in de +rain on foot. + +Den we hear de fighting up to de north 'long about what de river is, +and de guns sound lak hosses loping 'cross a plank bridge way off +somewhar. De head men start hollering and some de hosses start rearing +and de soldiers start trotting faster up de road. We can't git out on +de road so we jest strike off through de prairie and make for a creek +dat got high banks and a place on it we call Rocky Cliff. + +We git in a big cave in dat cliff, and spend de whole day and dat +night in dar, and listen to de battle going on. + +Dat place was about half-a-mile from de wagon depot at Honey Springs, +and a little east of it. We can hear de guns going all day, and along +in de evening here come de South side making for a getaway. Dey come +riding and running by whar we is, and it don't make no difference how +much de head men hollers at 'em dey can't make dat bunch slow up and +stop. + +After while here come de Yankees, right after 'em, and dey goes on +into Honey Springs and pretty soon we see de blaze whar dey is burning +de wagon depot and de houses. + +De next morning we goes back to de house and find de soldiers ain't +hurt nothing much. De hogs is whar dey is in de pen and de chickens +come cackling 'round too. Dem soldiers going so fast dey didn't have +no time to stop and take nothing, I reckon. + +Den long come lots of de Yankee soldiers going back to de North, and +dey looks purty wore out, but dey is laughing and joshing and going +on. + +Old Master pack up de wagon wid everything he can carry den, and we +strike out down de big road to git out de way of any more war, is dey +going be any. + +Dat old Texas road jest crowded wid wagons! Everybody doing de same +thing we is, and de rains done made de road so muddy and de soldiers +done tromp up de mud so bad dat de wagons git stuck all de time. + +De people all moving along in bunches, and every little while one +bunch of wagons come up wid another bunch all stuck in de mud, and dey +put all de hosses and mules on together and pull em out, and den dey +go on together awhile. + +At night dey camp, and de women and what few niggers dey is have to +git de supper in de big pots, and de men so tired dey eat everything +up from de women and de niggers, purty nigh. + +After while we come to de Canadian town. Dat whar old man Gouge been +and took a whole lot de folks up north wid him, and de South soldiers +got in dar ahead of us and took up all de houses to sleep in. + +Dey was some of de white soldiers camped dar, and dey was singing at +de camp. I couldn't understand what dey sing, and I asked a Creek man +what dey say and he tell me dey sing, "I wish I was in Dixie, look +away--look away." + +I ask him whar dat is, and he laugh and talk to de soldiers and dey +all laugh, and make me mad. + +De next morning we leave dat town and git to de big river. De rain +make de river rise, and I never see so much water! Jest look out dar +and dar all dat water! + +Dey got some boats we put de stuff on, and float de wagons and swim de +mules and finally git across, but it look lak we gwine all drown. + +Most de folks say dey going to Boggy Depot and around Fort Washita, +but old Master strike off by hisself and go way down in de bottom +somewhar to live. + +I don't know whar it was, but dey been some kind of fighting all +around dar, 'cause we camp in houses and cabins all de time and nobody +live in any of 'em. + +Look like de people all git away quick, 'cause all de stuff was in de +houses, but you better scout up around de house before you go up to +it. Liable to be some scouters already in it! + +Dem Indian soldiers jest quit de army and lots went scouting in little +bunches and took everything dey find. Iffen somebody try to stop dem +dey git killed. + +Sometime we find graves in de yard whar somebody jest been buried +fresh, and one house had some dead people in it when old Mistress poke +her head in it. We git away from dar, and no mistake! + +By and by we find a little cabin and stop and stay all de time. I was +de only slave by dat time. All de others done slip out and run off. We +stay dar two year I reckon, 'cause we make two little crop of corn. +For meat a man name Mr. Walker wid us jest went out in de woods and +shoot de wild hogs. De woods was full of dem wild hogs, and lots of +fish in de holes whar he could sicken 'em wid buck root and catch 'em +wid his hands, all we wanted. + +I don't know when de War quit off, and when I git free, but I stayed +wid old man Tuskaya-hiniha long time after I was free, I reckon. I was +jest a little girl, and he didn't know whar to send me to, anyways. + +One day three men rid up and talk to de old man awhile in English +talk. Den he called me and tell me to go wid dem to find my own +family. He jest laugh and slap my behind and set me up on de hoss in +front of one de men and dey take me off and leave my good checkedy +dress at de house! + +Before long we git to dat Canadian river again, and de men tie me on +de hoss so I can't fall off. Dar was all dat water, and dey ain't no +boat, and dey ain't no bridge, and we jest swim de hosses. I knowed +sho' I was going to be gone dat time, but we git across. + +When we come to de Creek Agency dar is my pappy and my mammy to claim +me, and I live wid dem in de Verdigris bottom above Fort Gibson till I +was grown and dey is both dead. Den I marries Anderson Davis at Gibson +Station, and we git our allotments on de Verdigris east of Tulsa--kind +of south too, close to de Broken Arrow town. + +I knowed old man Jim McHenry at dat Broken Arrow town. He done some +preaching and was a good old man, I think. + +I knowed when dey started dat Wealaka school across de river from de +Broken Arrow town. Dey name it for de Wilaki town, but dat town was +way down in de Upper Creek country close to whar I lived when I was a +girl. + +I had lots of children, but only two is alive now. My boy Anderson got +in a mess and went to dat McAlester prison, but he got to be a trusty +and dey let him marry a good woman dat got lots of property dar, and +dey living all right now. + +When my old man die I come to live here wid Josephine, but I'se blind +and can't see nothing and all de noises pesters me a lot in de town. +And de children is all so ill mannered, too. Dey jest holler at you +all de time! Dey don't mind you neither! + +When I could see and had my own younguns I could jest set in de corner +and tell 'em what to do, and iffen dey didn't do it right I could +whack 'em on de head, 'cause dey was raised de old Creek way, and dey +know de old folks know de best! + + + + +[Illustration: Anthony Dawson] + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[HR: (photo)] +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +ANTHONY DAWSON +Age 105 yrs. +1008 E. Owen St., +Tulsa, Okla. + + + "Run nigger, run, + De Patteroll git you! + Run nigger, run, + De Patteroll come! + + "Watch nigger, watch-- + De Patteroll trick you! + Watch nigger, watch, + He got a big gun!" + +Dat one of the songs de slaves all knowed, and de children down on de +"twenty acres" used to sing it when dey playing in de moonlight 'round +de cabins in de quarters. Sometime I wonder iffen de white folks +didn't make dat song up so us niggers would keep in line. + +None of my old Master's boys tried to git away 'cepting two, and dey +met up wid evil, both of 'em. + +One of dem niggers was fotching a bull-tongue from a piece of new +ground way at de back of de plantation, and bringing it to my pappy to +git it sharped. My pappy was de blacksmith. + +Dis boy got out in de big road to walk in de soft sand, and long come +a wagon wid a white overseer and five, six, niggers going somewhar. +Dey stopped and told dat boy to git in and ride. Dat was de last +anybody seen him. + +Dat overseer and another one was cotched after awhile, and showed up +to be underground railroaders. Dey would take a bunch of niggers into +town for some excuse, and on de way jest pick up a extra nigger and +show him whar to go to git on de "railroad system." When de runaway +niggers got to de North dey had to go in de army, and dat boy from our +place got killed. He was a good boy, but dey jest talked him into it. +Dem railroaders was honest, and dey didn't take no presents, but de +patrollers was low white trash! + +We all knowed dat if a patroller jest rode right by and didn't say +nothing dat he was doing his honest job, but iffen he stopped his hoss +and talked to a nigger he was after some kind of trade. + +Dat other black boy was hoeing cotton way in de back of de field and +de patroller rid up and down de big road, saying nothing to nobody. + +De next day another white man was on de job, and long in de evening a +man come by and axed de niggers about de fishing and hunting! Dat +black boy seen he was de same man what was riding de day befo' and he +knowed it was a underground trick. But he didn't see all de trick, +bless God! + +We found out afterwards dat he told his mammy about it. She worked at +de big house and she stole something for him to give dat low white +trash I reckon, 'cause de next day he played sick along in de evening +and de black overlooker--he was my uncle--sent him back to de +quarters. + +He never did git there, but when dey started de hunt dey found him +about a mile away in de woods wid his head shot off, and old Master +sold his mammy to a trader right away. He never whipped his grown +niggers. + +Dat was de way it worked. Dey was all kinds of white folks jest like +dey is now. One man in Sesesh clothes would shoot you if you tried to +run away. Maybe another Sesesh would help slip you out to the +underground and say "God bless you poor black devil", and some of dem +dat was poor would help you if you could bring 'em sumpin you stole, +lak a silver dish or spoons or a couple big hams. I couldn't blame +them poor white folks, wid the men in the War and the women and +children hongry. The niggers didn't belong to them nohow, and they had +to live somehow. But now and then they was a devil on earth, walking +in the sight of God and spreading iniquity before him. He was de +low-down Sesesh dat would take what a poor runaway nigger had to give +for his chance to git away, and den give him 'structions dat would +lead him right into de hands of de patrollers and git him caught or +shot! + +Yes, dat's de way it was. Devils and good people walking in de road at +de same time, and nobody could tell one from t'other. + +I remember about de trickery so good 'cause I was "grown and out" at +that time. When I was a little boy I was a house boy, 'cause my mammy +was the house woman, but when the war broke I already been sent to the +fields and mammy was still at de house. + +I was born on July 25, 1832. I know, 'cause old Master keep de book on +his slaves jest like on his own family. He was a good man, and old +Mistress was de best woman in de world! + +De plantation had more than 500 acres and most was in cotton and +tobacco. But we raised corn and oats, and lots of cattle and horses, +and plenty of sheep for wool. + +I was born on the plantation, soon after my pappy and mammy was +brought to it. I don't remember whether they was bought or come from +my Mistress's father. He was mighty rich and had several hundred +niggers. When she was married he give her 40 niggers. One of them was +my pappy's brother. His name was John, and he was my master's +overlooker. + +We called a white man boss the "overseer", but a nigger was a +overlooker. John could read and write and figger, and old Master +didn't have no white overseer. + +Master's name was Levi Dawson, and his plantation was 18 miles east of +Greenville, North Carolina. It was a beautiful place, with all the +fences around the Big House and along the front made out of barked +poles, rider style, and all whitewashed. + +The Big House set back from the big road about a quarter of a mile. It +was only one story, but it had lots of rooms. + +There was four rooms in a bunch on one side and four in a bunch on the +other, with a wide hall in between. They was made of square adzed +logs, all weatherboarded on the outside and planked up and plastered +on the inside. Then they was a long gallery clean across the front +with big pillars made out of bricks and plastered over. They called it +the passage 'cause it din't have no floor excepting bricks, and a +buggy could drive right under it. Mostly it was used to set under and +talk and play cards and drink the best whiskey old Master could buy. + +Back in behind the big house was the kitchen, and the smokehouse in +another place made of plank, and all was whitewashed and painted white +all the time. + +Old Mistress was named Miss Susie and she was born an Isley. She +brought 40 niggers from her pappy as a present, and Master Levi jest +had 4 or 5, but he had got all his land from his pappy. She had the +niggers and he had the land. That's the way it was, and that's the way +it stayed! She never let him punish one of her niggers and he never +asked her about buying or selling land. Her pappy was richer than his +pappy, and she was sure quality! + +My pappy's name was Anthony, and mammy's name was Chanie. He was the +blacksmith and fixed the wagons, but he couldn't read and figger like +uncle John. Mammy was the head house woman but didn't know any letters +either. + +They was both black like me. Old man Isley, where they come from, had +lots of niggers, but I don't think they was off the boat. + +You can set the letters up and I can't tell them, but you can't fool +me with the figgers, 'less they are mighty big numbers. + +Master Levi had three sons and no daughters. The oldest son was +Simeon. He was in the Sesesh army. The other two boys was too young. I +can't remember their names. They was a lot younger and I was grown and +out befo' they got big. + +Old Master was a fine Christian but he like his juleps anyways. He let +us niggers have preachings and prayers, and would give us a parole to +go 10 or 15 miles to a camp meeting and stay two or three days with +nobody but Uncle John to stand for us. Mostly we had white preachers, +but when we had a black preacher that was Heaven. + +We didn't have no voodoo women nor conjure folks at our 20 acres. We +all knowed about the Word and the unseen Son of God and we didn't put +no stock in conjure. + +Course we had luck charms and good and bad signs, but everybody got +dem things even nowadays. My boy had a white officer in the Big War +and he tells me that man had a li'l old doll tied around his wrist on +a gold chain. + +We used herbs and roots for common ailments, like sassafras and +boneset and peach tree poultices and coon root tea, but when a nigger +got bad sick Old Master sent for a white doctor. I remember that old +doctor. He lived in Greenville and he had to come 18 miles in a buggy. + +When he give some nigger medicine he would be afraid the nigger was +like lots of them that believed in conjure, and he would say, "If you +don't take that medicine like I tell you and I have to come back here +to see you I going to break your dam black neck next time I come out +here!" + +When it was bad weather sometime the black boy sent after him had to +carry a lantern to show him the way back. If that nigger on his mule +got too fur ahead so old doctor couldn't see de light he sho' catch de +devil from that old doctor and from old Master, too, less'n he was one +of old Missy's house niggers, and then old Master jest grumble to +satisfy the doctor. + +Down in the quarters we had the spinning house, where the old woman +card the wool and run the loom. They made double weave for the winter +time, and all the white folks and slaves had good clothes and good +food. + +Master made us all eat all we could hold. He would come to the +smokehouse and look in and say, "You niggers ain't cutting down that +smoke side and that souse lak you ought to! You made dat meat and you +got to help eat it up!" + +Never no work on Sunday 'cepting the regular chores. The overlooker +made everybody clean up and wash de children up and after the praying +we had games. Antny over and marbles and "I Spy" and de likes of that. +Some times de boys would go down in de woods and git a possum. I love +possum and sweet taters, but de coon meat more delicate and de har +don't stink up de meat. + +I wasn't at the quarters much as a boy. I was at the big house with my +mammy, and I had to swing the fly bresh over my old Mistress when she +was sewing or eating or taking her nap. Sometime I would keep the +flies off'n old Master, and when I would get tired and let the bresh +slap his neck he would kick at me and cuss me, but he never did reach +me. He had a way of keeping us little niggers scared to death and +never hurting nobody. + +I was down in the field burning bresh when I first heard the guns in +the War. De fighting was de battle at Kingston, North Carolina, and it +lasted four days and nights. After while bunches of Sesesh come riding +by hauling wounded people in wagons, and then pretty soon big bunches +of Yankees come by, but dey didn't ack like dey was trying very hard +to ketch up. + +Dey had de country in charge quite some time, and they had forages +coming round all the time. By dat time old Master done buried his +money and all de silver and de big clock, but the Yankees didn't pear +to search out dat kind of stuff. All dey ask about was did anybody +find a bottle of brandy! + +When de War ended up most all de niggers stay with old Master and work +on de shares, until de land git divided up and sold off and the young +niggers git scattered to town. + +I never did have no truck wid de Ku Kluckers, but I had to step mighty +high to keep out'n it! De sho' nuff Kluxes never did bother around us +'cause we minded our own business and never give no trouble. + +We wouldn't let no niggers come 'round our place talking 'bout +delegates and voting, and we jest all stayed on the place. But dey was +some low white trash and some devilish niggers made out like dey was +Ku Klux ranging 'round de country stealing hosses and taking things. +Old Master said dey wasn't shore enough, so I reckon he knowed who the +regular ones was. + +These bunches that come around robbing got into our neighborhood and +old Master told me I better not have my old horse at the house, 'cause +if I had him they would know nobody had been there stealing and it +wouldn't do no good to hide anything 'cause they would tear up the +place hunting what I had and maybe whip or kill me. + +"Your old hoss aint no good, Tony, and you better kill him to make +them think you already been raided on," old Master told me, so I led +him out and knocked him in the head with an axe, and then we hid all +our grub and waited for the Kluckers to come most any night, but they +never did come. I borried a hoss to use in the day and took him back +home every night for about a year. + +The niggers kept talking about being free, but they wasn't free then +and they ain't now. + +Putting them free jest like putting goat hair on a sheep. When it rain +de goat come a running and git in de shelter, 'cause his hair won't +shed the rain and he git cold, but de sheep ain't got sense enough to +git in the shelter but jest stand out and let it rain on him all day. + +But the good Lord fix the sheep up wid a woolly jacket that turn the +water off, and he don't git cold, so he don't have to have no brains. + +De nigger during slavery was like de sheep. He couldn't take care of +hisself but his Master looked out for him and he didn't have to use +his brains. De master's protection was like de wooly coat. + +But de 'mancipation come and take off de woolly coat and leave de +nigger wid no protection and he cain't take care of hisself either. + +When de niggers was sot free lots of them got mighty uppity, and +everybody wanted to be a delegate to something or other. The Yankees +told us we could go down and vote in the 'lections and our color was +good enough to run for anything. Heaps of niggers believed them. You +cain't fault them for that, 'cause they didn't have no better sense, +but I knowed the black folks didn't have no business mixing in until +they knowed more. + +It was a long time after the War before I went down to vote and +everything quiet by that time, but I heard people talk about the +fights at the schoolhouse when they had the first election. + +I jest stayed on around the old place a long time, and then I got on +another piece of ground and farmed, not far from Greenville until +1900. Then I moved to Hearn, Texas, and stayed with my son Ed until +1903 when we moved to Sapulpa in the Creek Nation. We come to Tulsa +several years ago, and I been living with him ever since. + +I can't move off my bed now, but one time I was strong as a young +bull. I raised seven boys and seven girls. My boys was named Edward, +Joseph, Furney, Julius, James, and William, and my girls was Luvenia, +Olivia, Chanie Mamie, Rebecca and Susie. + +I always been a deep Christian and depend on God and know his unseen +Son, the King of Glory. I learned about Him when I was a little boy. +Old Master was a good man, but on some of the plantations the masters +wasn't good men and the niggers didn't get the Word. + +I never did get no reading and writing 'cause I never did go to the +schools. I thought I was too big, but they had schools and the young +ones went. + +But I could figger, and I was a good farmer, and now I bless the Lord +for all his good works. Everybody don't know it I reckon, but we all +needed each other. The blacks needed the whites, and still do. + +There's a difference in the color of the skin, but the souls is all +white, or all black, 'pending on the man's life and not on his skin. +The old fashioned meetings is busted up into a thousand different +kinds of churches and only one God to look after them. All is +confusion, but I ain't going to worry my old head about 'em. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp AUG 19 1937] + +ALICE DOUGLASS +Age 77 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born December 22, 1860 in Sumner County, Tennessee. My mother--I +mean mammy, 'cause what did we know 'bout mother and mamma. Master and +Mistress made dey chillun call all nigger women, "Black Mammy." Jest +as I was saying my mammy was named Millie Elkins and my pappy was +named Isaac Garrett. My sisters and brothers was Frank, Susie and +Mollie. They is all in Nashville, Tennessee right now. They lived in +log houses. I 'member my grandpappy and when he died. I allus slept in +the Big House in a cradle wid white babies. + +We all the time wore cotton dresses and we weaved our own cloth. The +boys jest wore shirts. Some wore shoes, and I sho' did. I kin see 'em +now as they measured my feets to git my shoes. We had doctors to wait +on us iffen we got sick and ailing. We wore asafedida to keep all +diseases offen us. + +When a nigger man got ready to marry, he go and tell his master that +they was a woman on sech and sech a farm that he'd lak to have. Iffen +master give his resent, then he go and ask her master and iffen he say +yes, well, they jest jump the broomstick. Mens could jest see their +wives on Sadday nite. + +They laid peoples 'cross barrels and whupped 'em wid bull whups till +the blood come. They'd half feed 'em and niggers'd steal food and cook +all night. The things we was forced to do then the whites is doing of +their own free will now. You gotta reap jest what you sow 'cause the +Good Book says it. + +They used to bid niggers off and then load 'em on wagons and take 'em +to cotton farms to work. I never seen no cotton till I come heah. +Peoples make big miration 'bout girls having babies at 11 years old. +And you better have them whitefolks some babies iffen you didn't wanta +be sold. Though a funny thing to me is, iffen a nigger woman had a +baby on the boat on the way to the cotton farms, they throwed it in +the river. Taking 'em to them cotton farms is jest the reason niggers +is so plentiful in the South today. + +I ain't got no education a'tall. In dem days you better not be caught +with a newspaper, else you got a beating and your back almost cut off. +When niggers got free, whitefolks killed 'em by the carload, 'cause +they said it was a nigger uprising. I used to lay on the flo' with the +whitefolks and hear 'em pass. Them patrollers roved trying to ketch +niggers without passes to whup 'em. They was sometimes called bush +whackers. + +We went to white folks' church. I was a great big girl before we went +to cullud church. We'd stay out and play while they worshipped. We +jest played marbles--girls, white chillun and all. + +The Yankees come thoo' and took all the meat and everything they could +find. They took horses, food and all. Mammy cooked their vittles. One +come in our cabin and took a sack of dried fruit with my mammy's shoes +on the top. I tried to make 'em leave mammy's shoes too but he didn't. + +I stayed in the house with the whitefolks till I was 19. They lak to +kept me in there too long. That's why I'm selfish as I am. Within +three weeks after I was out of the house, I married William Douglass. +Whitefolks now don't want you to tech 'em, and I slept with white +chillun till I was 19. You kin cook for 'em and put your hands in they +vittles and they don't say nothing, but jest you tech one! + +We stayed on, on the place, three or four years and it was right then +mammy give us our pappy's name. We moved from the place to one three +or four miles from our master's place, and mammy cooked there a long +time. + +Abraham Lincoln gits too much praise. I say, shucks, give God the +praise. Lincoln come thoo' Gallitan, Tennessee and stopped at Hotel +Tavern with his wife. They was dressed jest lak tramps and nobody +knowed it was him and his wife till he got to the White House and +writ back and told 'em to look 'twixt the leaves in the table where he +had set and they sho' nuff found out it was him. + +I never mentions Jeff Davis. He ain't wuff it. + +Booker T. Washington was all right in his place. He come here and told +these whitefolks jest what he thought. Course he wouldn't have done +that way down South. I declare to God he sho' told 'em enough. They +toted him 'round on their hands. No Jim Crow here then. + +I jined the church 'cause I had religion round 60 years ago. People +oughta be religious sho'; what for they wanta live in sin and die and +go to the Bad Man. To git to Heaven, you sho' ought to work some. I +want a resting place somewhar, 'cause I ain't got none here. I am a +member of Tabernacle Baptist Church, and I help build the first church +in Oklahoma City. + +I got three boys and three girls. I don't know none's age. I give 'em +the best education I could. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 13 1937] + +DOC DANIEL DOWDY +Age 81 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma + + +I was born June 6, 1856 in Madison County, Georgia. Father was named +Joe Dowdy and mother was named Mary Dowdy. There was 9 of us boys, +George, Smith, Lewis, Henry, William, myself, Newt, James and Jeff. +There was one girl and she was my twin, and her name was Sarah. My +mother and father come from Richmond, Va., to Georgia. Father lived on +one side of the river and my mother on the other side. My father would +come over ever week to visit us. Noah Meadows bought my father and +Elizabeth Davis, daughter of the old master took my mother. They +married in Noah Meadows' house. + +My mother was the cook in the Big House. They'd give us pot likker +with bread crumbs in it. Sometimes meat, jest sometimes, very seldom. +I liked black-eyed peas and still do till now. We lived in +weatherboard house. Our parents had corded-up beds with ropes and us +chillun slept on the floor for most part or in a hole bored in a log. +Our house had one window jest big enough to stick your head out of, +and one door, and this one door faced the Big House which was your +master's house. This was so that you couldn't git out 'less somebody +seen you. + +My job was picking up chips and keeping the calves and cows separate +so that the calves wouldn't suck the cows dry. Mostly, we had Saturday +afternoons off to wash. I was show boy doing [HW: during] the war, me +and my sister, 'cause we was twins. My mother couldn't be bought +'cause she done had 9 boys for one farm and neither my father, 'cause +he was the father of 'em. I was religious and didn't play much, but I +sho' did like to listen to preachings. I did used to play marbles +sometimes. + +We jest wore shirts and nothing else both winter and summer. They was +a little heavier in winter and that's all. No shoes ever. I had none +till after I was set free. I guess I was almost 12 years old then. + +The overseer on our place was a large tall, black man. We had plenty +poor white neighbors. They was one of our biggest troubles. They'd +allus look in our window and door all the time. + +I saw slaves sold. I can see that old block now. My cousin Eliza was a +pretty girl, really good looking. Her master was her father. When the +girls in the big house had beaux coming to see 'em, they'd ask, "Who +is that pretty gal?" So they decided to git rid of her right away. The +day they sold her will allus be remembered. They stripped her to be +bid off and looked at. I wasn't allowed to stand in the crowd. I was +laying down under a fig brush. The man that bought Eliza was from New +York. The Negroes had made up nuff money to buy her off theyself, but +they wouldn't let that happen. There was a man bidding for her who was +a Swedeland. He allus bid for the good looking cullud gals and bought +'em for his own use. He ask the man from New York, "Whut you gonna do +with her when you git 'er?" The man from New York said, "None of your +damn business, but you ain't got money nuff to buy 'er." When the man +from New York had done bought her, he said, "Eliza, you are free from +now on." She left and went to New York with him. Mama and Eliza both +cried when she was being showed off, and master told 'em to shet up +before he knocked they brains out. + +Iffen you didn't do nothing wrong, they whipped you now and then +anyhow. I called a boy Johnny once and he took me 'hind the garden and +poured it on me and made me call him master. It was from then on I +started to fear the white man. I come to think of him as a bear. +Sometimes fellows would be a little late making it in and they got +whipped with a cow-hide. The same man whut whipped me to make me call +him master, well, he whipped my mamma. He tied her to a tree and beat +her unmerciful and cut her tender parts. I don't know why he tied her +to that tree. + +The first time you was caught trying to read or write, you was whipped +with a cow-hide, the next time with a cat-o-nine tails and the third +time they cut the first jint offen your forefinger. They was very +severe. You most allus got 30 and 9 lashes. + +They carried news from one plantation by whut they call relay. Iffen +you was caught, they whipped you till you said, "Oh, pray Master!" One +day a man gitting whipped was saying "Oh pray master, Lord have +mercy!" They'd say "Keep whipping that nigger Goddamn him." He was +whipped till he said, "Oh pray Master, I gotta nuff." Then they said, +"Let him up now, 'cause he's praying to the right man." + +My father was the preacher and an educated man. You know the sermon +they give him to preach?--Servant, Obey Your Master. Our favorite +baptizing hymn was On Jordan's Stormy Bank I Stand. My favorite song +is Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen. + +Oh, them patrollers! They had a chief and he git'em together and iffen +they caught you without a pass and sometimes with a pass, they'd beat +you. But iffen you had a pass, they had to answer to the law. One old +master had two slaves, brothers, on his place. They was both +preachers. Mitchell was a hardshell Baptist and Andrew was a +Missionary Baptist. One day the patroller chief was rambling thoo' the +place and found some letters writ to Mitchell and Andrew. He went to +the master and said, "Did you know you had some niggers that could +read and write?" Master said, "No, but I might have, who do you +'spect?" The patroller answered, "Mitchell and Andrew." The old master +said, "I never knowed Andrew to tell me a lie 'bout nothing!" + +Mitchell was called first and asked could he read and write. He was +scared stiff. He said, "Naw-sir." Andrew was called and asked. He +said, "Yes-sir." He was asked iffen Mitchell could. He said, "Sho', +better'n me." The master told John Arnold, the patroller chief, not to +bother 'em. He gloried in they spunk. When the old master died, he +left all of his niggers a home apiece. We had Ku Klux Klans till the +government sent Federal officers out and put a stop to their ravaging +and sent 'em to Sing Sing. + +Doing the war my father was carpenter. His young master come to him +'cause he was a preacher and asked him must he go to the front and my +father told him not to go 'cause he wouldn't make it. He went on jest +the same and when he come back my father had to tote him in the house +'cause he had one leg tore off. The Yankees come thoo', ramshacked +houses, leave poor horses and take fat ones and turn the poor ones in +the corn they left. They took everthing they could. They cussed +niggers who dodged 'em for being fools and make 'em show 'em +everything they knowed whar was. + +Our old master was mighty old and him and the women folks cried when +we was freed. He told us we was free as he was. + +I come to Oklahoma in 1906. I come out of that riot in 1906. Some +fellow knocked up a colored woman or something and we waded right in +and believe me we made Atlanta a fit place to live in. It is one of +the best cities in America. + +I married Miss Emmaline Witt. I carried her to the preacher one of the +coldest nights I ever rid. I have three chillun and don't know how +many grandchillun. My chillun is one a nurse, one in Arizona for his +health and the other doing first one thing and another. + +I think Abraham Lincoln was the greatest human being ever been on +earth 'cepting the Apostle Paul. Who any better'n a man who liberated +4,000,000 Negroes? Some said he wasn't a Christian, but he told some +friends once, "I'm going to leave you and may never see you again (and +he didn't) so I'm going to take the Divine Spirit with me and leave it +with you." + +Jeff Davis was as bloody as he could be. I don't lak him a'tall. But +you know good things come from enemies. I don't even admire George +Washington. White men from the south that will help the Negro is far +and few between. Booker T. Washington was a great man. He made some +blunders and mistakes, but he was a great man. He is the father of +industrial education and you know that sho' is a great thing. + +The white folks was ignorant. You know the better you prepare yourself +the better you act. Iffen they had put some sense in our heads 'stead +of sticks on our heads, we'ud been better off and more benefit to 'em. + +I had something from within that made me fear God and taught me how to +pray. People say God don't hear sinners pray, but he do. Everybody +ought to be Christians so not to be lost. + +I work in real estate and can do a lot of work. I don't use no +crutches and no cane and walk all the time, never hardly ride. I come +in at 1 and 2 o'clock a. m. and get up between 8 and 9 a. m. 'cept +Sundays, I get up at 7 or 8 a. m. so I can be ready to go to Sunday +School. I cook for my own self all the time too. I am a Baptist and a +member of Tabernacle Baptist Church. I am a trustee in my church too. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + +JOANNA DRAPER +Age 83 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + +Most folks can't remember many things happened to 'em when they only +eight years old, but one of my biggest tribulations come about dat +time and I never will forget it! That was when I was took away from my +own mammy and pappy and sent off and bound out to another man, way off +two-three hundred miles away from whar I live. And dat's the last time +I ever see either one of them, or any my own kinfolks! + +Whar I was born was at Hazelhurst, Mississippi. Jest a little piece +east of Hazelhurst, close to the Pearl River, and that place was a +kind of new plantation what my Master, Dr. Alexander, bought when he +moved into Mississippi from up in Virginia awhile before the War. + +They said my mammy brings me down to Mississippi, and I was born jest +right after she got there. My mammy's name was Margaret, and she was +born under the Ramson's, back in Tennessee. She belonged to Dave +Ramson, and his pappy had come to Tennessee to settle on war land, and +he had knowed Dr. Alexander's people back in Virginia too. My pappy's +name was Addison, and he always belonged to Dr. Alexander. Old doctor +bought my mammy 'cause my pappy liked her. Old doctor live in +Tennessee a little while before he go on down in Mississippi. + +Old doctor's wife named Dinah, and she sho' was a good woman, but I +don't remember about old doctor much. He was away all the time, it +seem like. + +When I is about six year old they take me into the Big House to learn +to be a house woman, and they show me how to cook and clean up and +take care of babies. That Big House wasn't very fine, but it was +mighty big and cool, and made out of logs with a big hall, but it +didn't have no long gallery like most the houses around there had. + +They was lots of big trees in the yard, and most the ground was new +ground 'round that place, 'cause the old Doctor jest started to done +farming on it when I was took away, but he had some more places not so +far away, over towards the river that was old ground and made big +crops for him. I went to one of the places one time, but they wasn't +nobody on 'em but niggers and a white overseer. I don't know how many +niggers old Doctor had, but Master John Deeson say he had about a +hundred. + +At old Doctor's house I didn't have to work very hard. Jest had to +help the cooks and peel the potatoes and pick the guineas and chickens +and do things like that. Sometime I had to watch the baby. He was a +little boy, and they would bring him into the kitchen for me to watch. +I had to git up way before daylight and make the fire in the kitchen +fireplace and bring in some fresh water, and go get the milk what been +down in the spring all night, and do things like that until breakfast +ready. Old Master and old Mistress come in the big hall to eat in the +summer, and I stand behind them and shoo off the flies. + +Old doctor didn't have no spinning and weaving niggers 'cause he say +they don't do enough work and he buy all the cloth he use for +everybody's clothes. He can do that 'cause he had lots of money. He +was big rich, and he keep a whole lot of hard money in the house all +the time, but none of the slaves know it but me. Sometimes I would +have the baby in the Mistress' room and she would go git three or four +big wood boxes full of hard money for us to play with. I would make +fences out of the money all across the floor, to keep the baby +satisfied, and when he go to sleep I would put the money back in the +boxes. I never did know how much they is, but a whole lot. + +Even after the War start old Doctor have that money, and he would +exchange money for people. Sometimes he would go out and be gone a +long time, and come back with a lot more money he got from somewhar. + +Right at the first they made him a high officer in the War and he done +doctoring somewhar at a hospital most of the time. But he could go on +both sides of the War, and sometime he would come in at night and +bring old Mistress pretty little things, and I heard him tell her he +got them in the North. + +One day I was fanning him and I asked him is he been to the North and +he kick out at me and tell to shut up my black mouth, and it nearly +scared me to death the way he look at me! Nearly every time he been +gone and come in and tell Mistress he been in the North he have a lot +more hard money to put away in them boxes, too! + +One evening long come a man and eat supper at the house and stay all +night. He was a nice mannered man, and I like to wait on him. The next +morning I hear him ask old Doctor what is my name, and old Doctor +start in to try to sell me to that man. The man say he can't buy me +'cause old Doctor say he want a thousand dollars, and then old Doctor +say he will bind me out to him. + +I run away from the house and went out to the cabin whar my mammy and +pappy was, but they tell me to go on back to the Big House 'cause +maybe I am just scared. But about that time old Doctor and the man +come and old Doctor make me go with the man. We go in his buggy a long +ways off to the South, and after he stop two or three night at peoples +houses and put me out to stay with the niggers he come to his own +house. I ask him how far it is back home and he say about a hundred +miles or more, and laugh, and ask me if I know how far that is. + +I wants to know if I can go back to my mammy some time, and he say +"Sho', of course you can, some of these times. You don't belong to me, +Jo, I'se jest your boss and not your master." + +He live in a big old rottendy house, but he aint farming none of the +land. Jest as soon as he git home he go off again, and sometimes he +only come in at night for a little while. + +His wife's name was Kate and his name was Mr. John. I was there about +a week before I found out they name was Deeson. They had two children, +a girl about my size name Joanna like me, and a little baby boy name +Johnny. One day Mistress Kate tell me I the only nigger they got. I +been thinking maybe they had some somewhar on a plantation, but she +say they aint got no plantation and they aint been at that place very +long either. + +That little girl Joanna and me kind of take up together, and she was a +mighty nice mannered little girl, too. Her mammy raised her good. Her +mammy was mighty sickly all the time, and that's the reason they bind +me to do the work. + +Mr. John was in some kind of business in the War too, but I never see +him with no soldier clothes on but one time. One night he come in with +them on, but the next morning he come to breakfast in jest his plain +clothes again. Then he go off again. + +I sho' had a hard row at that house. It was old and rackady, and I had +to scrub off the staircase and the floors all the time, and git the +breakfast for Mistress Kate and the two children. Then I could have my +own breakfast in the kitchen. Mistress Kate always get the supper, +though. + +Some days she go off with the two children and leave me at the house +all day by myself, and I think maybe I run off, but I didn't know whar +to go. + +After I been at that place two years Mr. John come home and stay. He +done some kind of trading in Jackson, Mississippi, and he would be +gone three or four days at a time, but I never did know what kind of +trading it was. + +About the time he come home to stay I seen the first Ku Klux I ever +seen one night. I was going down the road in the moonlight and I heard +a hog grunting out in the bushes at the side of the road. I jest walk +right on and in a little ways I hear another hog in some more bushes. +This time I stop and listen, and they's another hog grunts across the +road, and about that time two mens dressed up in long white skirts +steps out into the road in front of me! I was so scared the goose +bumps jump up all over me 'cause I didn't know what they is! They +didn't say a word to me, but jest walked on past me and went on back +the way I had come. Then I see two more mens step out of the woods and +I run from that as fast as I can go! + +I ast Miss Kate what they is and she say they Ku Klux, and I better +not go walking off down the road any more. I seen them two, three +times after that, though, but they was riding hosses them times. + +I stayed at Mr. John's place two more years, and he got so grumpy and +his wife got so mean I make up my mind to run off. I bundle up my +clothes in a little bundle and hide them, and then I wait until Miss +Kate take the children and go off somewhere, and I light out on foot. +I had me a piece of that hard money what Master Dr. Alexander had give +me one time at Christmas. I had kept it all that time and nobody +knowed I had it, not even Joanna. Old Doctor told me it was fifty +dollars, and I thought I could live on it for a while. + +I never had been away from that place, not even to another plantation +in all the four years I was with the Deesons, and I didn't know +which-a-way to go, so I jest started west. + +I been walking about all evening it seem like, and I come to a little +town with jest a few houses. I see a nigger man and ask him whar I can +git something to eat, and I say I got fifty dollars. + +"What you doing wid fifty dollars, child? Where you belong at, +anyhow?" He ask me, and I tell him I belong to Master John Deeson, but +I is running away. I explain that I jest bound out to Mr. John, but +Dr. Alexander my real master, and then that man tell me the first time +I knowed it that I aint a slave no more! + +That man Deeson never did tell me, and his wife never did! + +Well, dat man asked me about the fifty dollars, and then I found out +that it was jest fifty cents! + +I can't begin to tell about all the hard times I had working for +something to eat and roaming around after that. I don't know why I +never did try to git back up around Hazelhurst and hunt up my pappy +and mammy, but I reckon I was jest ignorant and didn't know how to go +about it. Anyways I never did see them no more. + +In about three years or a little over I met Bryce Draper on a farm in +Mississippi and we was married. His mammy had had a harder time than I +had. She had five children by a man that belong to her master, Mr. +Bryce and already named one of the boys--that my husband--Bryce after +him, and then he take her in and sell her off away from all her +children! + +One was jest a little baby, and the master give it laudanum, but it +didn't die, and he sold her off and lied and said she was a young girl +and didn't have no husband, 'cause the man what bought her said he +didn't want to buy no woman and take her away from a family. That new +master name was Draper. + +The last year of the War Mr. Draper die, and his wife already dead, +and he give all his farm to his two slaves and set them free. One of +them slaves was my husband's mammy. + +Then right away the whites come and robbed the place of every thing +they could haul off, and run his mammy and the other niggers off! Then +she went and found her boy, that was my husband, and he live with her +until she died, jest before we is married. + +We lived in Mississippi a long time, and then we hear about how they +better to the Negroes up in the North, and we go up to Kansas, but +they ain't no better there, and we come down to Indian Territory in +the Creek Nation in 1898, jest as they getting in that Spanish War. + +We leased a little farm from the Creek Nation for $15 an acre, but +when they give out the allotments we had to give it up. Then we rent +100 acres from some Indians close to Wagoner, and we farm it all with +my family. We had enough to do it too! + +For children we had John and Joe, and Henry, and Jim and Robert and +Will that was big enough to work, and then the girls big enough was +Mary, Nellie, Izora, Dora, and the baby. Dora married Max Colbert. His +people belonged to the Colberts that had Colbert's Crossin' on the Red +River way before the War, and he was a freedman and got allotment. + +I lives with Dora now, and we is all happy, and I don't like to talk +about the days of the slavery times, 'cause they never did mean +nothing to me but misery, from the time I was eight years old. + +I never will forgive that white man for not telling me I was free, and +not helping me to git back to my mammy and pappy! Lots of white people +done that. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +MRS. ESTHER EASTER +Age 85 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + +I was born near Memphis, Tenn., on the old Ben Moore plantation, but I +don't know anything about the Old South because Master Ben moves us +all up into Missouri (about 14-miles east of Westport, now Kansas +City), long before they started fighting about slavery. + +Mary Collier was my mother's name before she was a Moore. About my +father, I dunno. Mammy was sickly most of the time when I was a baby, +and she was so thin and poorly when they move to Missouri the white +folks afraid she going die on the way. + +But she fool 'em, and she live two-three year after that. That's what +good Old Master Ben tells me when I gets older. + +I stay with Master Ben's married daughter, Mary, till the coming of +the War. Times was good before the War, and I wasn't suffering none +from slavery, except once in a while the Mistress would fan me with +the stick--bet I needed it, too. + +When the War come along Master he say to leave Mistress Mary and get +ready to go to Texas. Jim Moore, one of the meanest men I ever see, +was the son of Master Ben; he's going take us there. + +Demon Jim, that's what I call him when he ain't round the place, but +when he's home it was always Master Jim 'cause he was reckless with +the whip. He was a Rebel officer fighting round the country and didn't +take us slaves to Texas right away. So I stayed on at his place not +far from Master Ben's plantation. + +Master Jim's wife was a demon, just like her husband. Used the whip +all the time, and every time Master Jim come home he whip me 'cause +the Mistress say I been mean. + +One time I tell him, you better put me in your pocket (sell me), +Master Jim, else I'se going run away'. He don't pay no mind, and I +don't try to run away 'cause of the whips. + +I done see one whipping and that enough. They wasn't no fooling about +it. A runaway slave from the Jenkin's plantation was brought back, and +there was a public whipping, so's the slaves could see what happens +when they tries to get away. + +The runaway was chained to the whipping post, and I was full of misery +when I see the lash cutting deep into that boy's skin. He swell up +like a dead horse, but he gets over it, only he was never no count for +work no more. + +While Master Jim is out fighting the Yanks, the Mistress is fiddling +round with a neighbor man, Mister Headsmith. I is young then, but I +knows enough that Master Jim's going be mighty mad when he hears about +it. + +The Mistress didn't know I knows her secret, and I'm fixing to even up +for some of them whippings she put off on me. That's why I tell Master +Jim next time he come home. + +See that crack in the wall? Master Jim say yes, and I say, it's just +like the open door when the eyes are close to the wall. He peek and +see into the bedroom. + +That's how I find out about the Mistress and Mister Headsmith, I tells +him, and I see he's getting mad. + +What you mean? And Master Jim grabs me hard by the arm like I was +trying to get away. + +I see them in the bed. + +That's all I say. The Demon's got him and Master Jim tears out of the +room looking for the Mistress. + +Then I hears loud talking and pretty soon the Mistress is screaming +and calling for help, and if old Master Ben hadn't drop in just then +and stop the fight, why, I guess she be beat almost to death, that how +mad the Master was. + +Then Master Ben gets mad 'cause his boy Jim ain't got us down in Texas +yet. Then we stay up all the night packing for the trip. Master Jim +takes us, but the Mistress stay at home, and I wonder if Master Jim +beat her again when he gets back. + +We rides the wagons all the way, how many days, I dunno. The country +was wild most of the way, and I know now that we come through the same +country where I lives now, only it was to the east. (The trip was +evidently made over the "Texas Road.") And we keeps on riding and +comes to the big river that's all brown and red looking, (Red River) +and the next thing I was sold to Mrs. Vaughn at Bonham, Texas, and +there I stays till after the slaves is free. + +The new Mistress was a widow, no children round the place, and she +treat me mighty good. She was good white folks--like old Master Ben, +powerful good. + +When the word get to us that the slaves is free, the Mistress says I +is free to go anywheres I want. And I tell her this talk about being +free sounds like foolishment to me--anyway, where can I go? She just +pat me on the shoulder and say I better stay right there with her, and +that's what I do for a long time. Then I hears about how the white +folks down at Dallas pays big money for house girls and there I goes. + +That's all I ever do after that--work at the houses till I gets too +old to hobble on these tired old feets and legs, then I just sits +down. + +Just sits down and wishes for old Master Ben to come and get me, and +take care of this old woman like he use to do when she is just a +little black child on the plantation in Missouri! + +God Bless old Master Ben--he was good white folks! + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +ELIZA EVANS +Age 87 +McAlester, Okla. + + +I sho' remember de days when I was a slave and belonged to de best old +Master what ever was, Mr. John Mixon. We lived in Selma, Dallas +County, Alabama. + +My grandma was a refugee from Africa. You know dey was white men who +went slipping 'round and would capture or entice black folks onto +their boats and fetch them over here and sell 'em for slaves. Well, +grandma was a little girl 'bout eight or nine years old and her +parents had sent her out to get wood. Dey was going to have a feast. +Dey was going to roast a baby. Wasn't that awful? Well, they captured +her and put a stick in her mouth. The stick held her mouth wide open +so she wouldn't cry out. When she got to de boat she was so tired out +she didn't do nothing. + +They was a lot of more colored folks on de boat. It took about four +months to get across on de boat and Mr. John Mixon met the boat and +bought her. I think he gave five hundred dollars for her. She was +named Gigi, but Master John called her Gracie. She was so good and +they thought so much of her dat they gave her a grand wedding when she +was married. Master John told her he'd never sell none of her chillun. +He kept dat promise and he never did sell any of her grandchillun +either. He thought it was wrong to separate famblys. She was one +hundred and three years old when she died. I guess her mind got kind +of feeble 'cause she wandered off and fell into a mill race and was +drowned. + +Master John Mixon had two big plantations. I believe he owned about +four hundred slaves, chillun and all. He allowed us to have church one +time a month with de white folks and we had prayer meeting every +Sunday. Sometimes when de men would do something like being sassy or +lazy and dey knowed dey was gonna be whipped, dey'd slip off and hide +in de woods. When dey'd slip back to get some food dey would all pray +for 'em dat Master wouldn't have 'em whipped too hard, and for fear +the Patroller would hear 'em they'd put their faces down in a dinner +pot. I'd sit out and watch for the Patroller. He was a white man who +was appointed to catch runaway niggers. We all knew him. His name was +Howard Campbell. He had a big pack of dogs. The lead hound was named +Venus. There was five or six in the pack, and they was vicious too. + +My father was a carriage driver and he allus took the family to +church. My mother went along to take care of the little chilluns. +She'd take me too. They was Methodist and after they would take the +sacrament we would allus go up and take it. The niggers could use the +whitefolks church in the afternoon. + +De Big House was a grand place. It was a two-story house made out of +logs dat had been peeled and smoothed off. There was five big rooms +and a big open hall wid a wide front porch clean across de front. De +porch had big posts and pretty banisters. It was painted white and had +green shutters on de windows. De kitchen was back of de Big House. + +De slaves quarters was about a quarter of a mile from de Big House. +Their houses was made of logs and the cracks was daubed with mud. They +would have two rooms. Our bedsteads was made of poplar wood and we +kept them scrubbed white with sand. We used roped woven together for +slats. Our mattresses were made of cotton, grass, or even shucks. My +mother had a feather bed. The chairs was made from cedar with split +white oak bottoms. + +Each family kept their own home and cooked and served their own meals. +We used wooden trays and wooden spoons. Once a week all the cullud +chillun went to the Big House to eat dinner. The table was out in de +yard. My nickname was "Speck". I didn't like to eat bread and milk +when I went up there and I'd just sit there. Finally they'd let me go +in de house and my mother would feed me. She was the house woman and +my Auntie was cook. I don't know why they had us up there unless it +was so they could laugh at us. + +None of old Master's young niggers never did much work. He say he want +'em to grow up strong. He gave us lots to eat. He had a store of +bacon, milk, bread, beans and molasses. In summer we had vegetables. +My mother could make awful good corn pone. She would take meal and put +salt in it and pour boiling water over it and make into pones. She'd +wrap these pones in wet cabbage or collard leaves and roll dem into +hot ashes and bake dem. They sho' was good. We'd have possum and coon +and fish too. + +The boys never wore no britches in de summer time. Boys fifteen years +old would wear long shirts with no sleeves and they went barefooted. +De girls dressed in shimmys. They was a sort of dress with two seams +in it and no sleeves. + +Old Master had his slaves to get up about five o'clock. Dey did an +ordinary day's work. He never whipped them unless they was lazy or +sassy or had a fight. Sometimes his slaves would run away but they +allus come back. We didn't have no truck with railroaders 'cause we +like our home. + +A woman cussed my mother and it made her mad and they had a fight. Old +Master had them both whipped. My mother got ten licks and de other +woman got twenty-five. Old Mistress sho' was mad 'cause mother got +whipped. Said he wouldn't have done it if she had known it. Old +Mistress taught mother how to read and write and mother taught my +father. I went to school jest one day so I can't read and write now. + +Weddings was big days. We'd have big dinners and dances once in a +while [HW: and] when somebody died they'd hold a wake. They'd sit up +all night and sing and pray and talk. At midnight they'd serve +sandwiches and coffee. Sometimes we'd all get together and play ring +plays and dance. + +Once the Yankee soldiers come. I was big enough to tote pails and +piggins then. These soldiers made us chillun tote water to fill their +canteens and water their horses. We toted the water on our heads. +Another time we heard the Yankee's was coming and old Master had about +fifteen hundred pounds of meat. They was hauling it off to bury it and +hide it when the Yankees caught them. The soldiers ate and wasted +every bit of that good meat. We didn't like them a bit. + +One time some Yankee soldiers stopped and started talking to me--they +asked me what my name was. "I say Liza," and they say, "Liza who?" I +thought a minute and I shook my head, "Jest Liza, I ain't got no other +name." + +He say, "Who live up yonder in dat Big House?" I say, "Mr. John +Mixon." He say, "You are Liza Mixon." He say, "Do anybody ever call +you nigger?" And I say, "Yes Sir." He say, "Next time anybody call you +nigger you tell 'em dat you is a Negro and your name is Miss Liza +Mixon." The more I thought of that the more I liked it and I made up +my mind to do jest what he told me to. + +My job was minding the calves back while the cows was being milked. +One evening I was minding the calves and old Master come along. He +say, "What you doin' nigger?" I say real pert like, "I ain't no +nigger, I'se a Negro and I'm Miss Liza Mixon." Old Master sho' was +surprised and he picks up a switch and starts at me. + +Law, but I was skeered! I hadn't never had no whipping so I run fast +as I can to Grandma Gracie. I hid behind her and she say, "What's the +matter of you child?" And I say, "Master John gwine whip me." And she +say, "What you done?" And I say, "Nothing." She say she know better +and 'bout that time Master John got there. He say, "Gracie, dat little +nigger sassed me." She say, "Lawsie child, what does ail you?" I told +them what the Yankee soldier told me to say and Grandma Gracie took my +dress and lift it over my head and pins my hands inside, and Lawsie, +how she whipped me and I dassent holler loud either. I jest said dat +[HW: to] de wrong person. [TR: "didn't I?" at end was crossed out.] + +I'se getting old now and can't work no more. I jest sits here and +thinks about old times. They was good times. We didn't want to be +freed. We hated the Yankee soldiers. Abe Lincoln was a good man +though, wasn't he? I tries to be a good Christian 'cause I wants to go +to Heaven when I die. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +LIZZIE FARMER +Age 80 years +McAlester, Okla. + + +"Cousin Lizzie!" + +"What." + +"I'se seventy years old." + +And I say, "Whut's you telling me for. I ain't got nothing to do with +your age!" + +I knowed I was one year older than she was and it sorta riled me for +her to talk about it. I never would tell folks my age for I knowed +white folks didn't want no old woman working for 'em and I just +wouldn't tell 'em how old I really was. Dat was nine years ago and I +guess I'm seventy five now. I can't work much now. + +I was born four years before de War.--"The one what set the cullud +folks free." We lived on a big plantation in Texas. Old Master's name +was John Booker and he was good to us all. My mammy died just at de +close of de War and de young mistress took me and kept me and I growed +up with her chillun. I thought I was quality sure nuff and I never +would go to school 'cause I couldn't go 'long to de same school with +de white chillun. Young mistress taught me how to knit, spin, weave, +crochet, sew and embroider. I couldn't recollect my age and young +Mistress told me to say, "I'se born de second year of de War dat set +de cullud folks free," and the only time she ever git mad at me was +when I forgot to say it jest as she told me to. She take hold of me +and shook me. I recollects all it, all de time. + +Young mistress' name was Elizabeth Booker McNew. I'se named after her. +She finally gave me to my aunt when I was a big girl and I never lived +wid white folks any more. I never saw my pappy till I was grown. + +In the cullud quarters, we cooked on a fireplace in big iron pots. Our +bread was baked in iron skillets with lids and we would set the +skillet on de fire and put coals of fire on de lid. Bread was mighty +good cooked like dat. We made our own candles. We had a candle mold +and we would put a string in the center of the mold and pour melted +tallow in it and let it harden. We would make eight at one time. +Quality folks had brass lamps. + +When we went to cook our vegetables we would put a big piece of hog +jowl in de pot. We'd put in a lot of snap beans and when dey was about +half done we'd put in a mess of cabbage and when it was about half +done we'd put in some squash and when it was about half done we'd put +in some okra. Then when it was done we would take it out a layer at a +time. Go 'way! It makes me hungry to talk about it. + +When we cooked possum dat was a feast. We would skin him and dress him +and put him on top de house and let him freeze for two days or nights. +Then we'd boil him with red pepper, and take him out and put him in a +pan and slice sweet 'taters and put round him and roast him. My, dat +was good eating. + +It was a long time after de War 'fore all de niggers knowed dey was +really free. My grandpappy was Master Booker's overseer. He wouldn't +have a white man over his niggers. I saw grandpappy whip one man with +a long whip. Master Booker was good and wouldn't whip 'em less'n he +had to. De niggers dassent leave de farm without a pass for fear of de +Ku Kluxers and patrolers. + +We would have dances and play parties and have sho' nuff good times. +We had "ring plays." We'd all catch hands and march round, den we'd +drop all hands 'cept our pardners and we'd swing round and sing: + + "You steal my pardner, and I steal yours, + Miss Mary Jane. + My true lover's gone away, + Miss Mary Jane! + + "Steal all round and don't slight none, + Miss Mary Jane. + He's lost out but I'se got one, + Miss Mary Jane!" + +We always played at log rollin's an' cotton pickin's. + +Sometimes we would have a wedding and my what a good time we'd have. +Old Master's daughter, Miss Janie, got married and it took us more'n +three weeks to get ready for it. De house was cleaned from top to +bottom and us chillun had to run errands. Seemed like we was allers +under foot, at least dat was what mammy said. I never will fergit all +the good things they cooked up. Rows of pies and cakes, baked chicken +and ham, my, it makes my mouth water jest thinking of it. After de +wedding and de feast de white folks danced all night and us cullud +folks ate all night. + +When one of de cullud folks die we would allers hold a "wake." We +would set up with de corpse and sing and pray and at midnight we'd all +eat and den we'd sing and pray some more. + +In de evening after work was done we'd sit round and de older folks +would sing songs. One of de favorites was: + + "Miss Ca'line gal, + Yes Ma'am + Did you see dem buzzards? + Yes Ma'am, + Did you see dem floppin', + How did ye' like 'em? + Mighty well. + + "Miss Ca'line gal, + Yes Ma'am, + Did you see dem buzzards? + Yes Ma'am, + Did you see dem sailin', + Yes Ma'am. + How did you like 'em? + Mighty well." + +I've heered folks talk about conjures and hoodoo charms. I have a hoss +shoe over de door dat will bring good luck. I sho' do believe certain +things bring bad luck. I hate to hear a scrinch (screech) owl holler +at night. Whenever a scrinch owl git in dat tree at night and start to +holler I gits me a stick and I say, "Confound you, I'll make yet set +up dar and say 'Umph huh'," so I goes out and time I gits dar he is +gone. If you tie a knot in de corner of de bed sheet he will leave, or +turn your hat wrong side out too. Dey's all good and will make a +scrinch owl leave every time. + +I believes in dreams and visions too. I dreamed one night dat I had +tall palings all 'round my house and I went out in de yard and dere +was a big black hoss and I say, "How come you is in my yard? I'll jest +put you out jest lak you got in." I opened de gate but he wouldn't go +out and finally he run in de door and through the house and went +towards de East. Right after dat my son died. I saw dat hoss again de +other night. A black hoss allus means death. Seeing it de other night +might mean I'se gwineter die. + +I know one time a woman named May Runnels wanted to go to church about +a mile away and her old man wouldn't go with her. It made her mad and +she say, "I'll be dammed if I don't go." She had to go through a grave +yard and when she was about half way across it a icy hand jest slap +her and her mouth was twisted way 'round fer about three months. Dat +was a lesson to her fer cussing. + +One time there was a nigger what belonged on a adjoining farm to +Master John Bookers and dey told us dis story: + +"Dis nigger went down to de spring and found a terrapin and he say, +'What brung you here?' Jest imagine how he felt when it say to him, +'Teeth and tongue brung me here, and teeth and tongue will bring you +here.' He run to de house and told his Master dat he found a terrapin +dat could talk. Dey went back and he asked de terrapin what bring him +here and it wouldn't say a word. Old Master didn't like it 'cause he +went down there jest to see a common ordinary terrapin and he told de +nigger he was going to git into trouble fer telling him a lie. Next +day the nigger seen de terrapin and it say de same thing again. Soon +after dat dis nigger was lynched right close to de place he saw de +terrapin." + +Master John Booker had two niggers what had a habit of slipping across +de river and killing old Master's hogs and hiding de meat in de loft +of de house. Master had a big blue hog and one day he missed him and +he sent Ned to look fer him. Ned knowed all de time dat he had killed +it and had it hid in his loft. He hunted and called "Pig-ooie, Pig." +Somebody done stole old Master's big blue hog. Dey couldn't find it +but old Master thought Ned knowed something 'bout it. One night he +found out Ned was gonna kill another hog and had asked John to go with +him. He borrowed John's clothes and blacked his face and met Ned at de +river. Soon dey find a nice big one and Ned say, "John, I'll drive him +round and you kill him." So he drove him past old Master but he didn't +want to kill his own hog so he made lak he'd like to kill him but he +missed him. Finally Ned got tired and said. "I'll kill him, you drive +him by me." So Master John drove him by him and Ned knock de hog on de +head and cut his throat and dey load him on de canoe. When dey was +nearly 'cross de river Old Master dip up some water and wash his face +a little, then he look at Ned and he say, "Ned you look sick, I +believe you've got lepersy." Ned row on little more and he jump in de +river and Master had a hard time finding him again. He had the +overseer whip Ned for that. + +I think Lincoln was a wonderful man. Everybody was sorry when he died, +but I never heerd of Jeff Davis. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +10-19-38 +1,876-words + +DELLA FOUNTAIN +Age 69 years +McAlester, Oklahoma + + +I was born after de War of de Rebellion but I 'member lots o' things +dat my parents told me 'bout slavery. + +My grandmother was captured in Africa. Traders come dere in a big boat +and dey had all sorts of purty gew-gaws--red handkerchiefs, dress +goods, beads, bells, and trinkets in bright colors. Dey would pull up +at de shore and entice de colored folks onto de boat to see de purty +things. Befo' de darkies realized it dey would be out from shore. +Dat's de way she was captured. Fifteen to twenty-five would pay dem +for de trip as dey all brought good prices. + +I was born and raised in Louisiana, near Winfield. My mother's Master +was John Rogers and his wife was Miss Millie. Dey was awful good to +deir slaves and he never whupped his grown niggers. + +I 'member when I was a child dat we didn't have hardly anything to +keep house wid, but we got along purty well I guess. Our furniture was +home-made and we cooked on de fireplace. + +We saved all our oak-wood ashes, and would put a barrel on a slanting +scaffold and put sticks and shucks in de bottom of de barrel and den +fill it wid de ashes. We'd pour water in it and let it drip. Dese +drippings made pure lye. We used dis wid cracklings and meat scraps to +make our soap. + +Father took a good-sized pine long and split it open, planed it down +smooth and bored holes in de bottom and drove pegs in dem for legs; +dis was our battling bench. We'd spread our wet clothes on dis and +rub soap on 'em and take a paddle and beat de dirt out. We got 'em +clean but had to be careful not to wear 'em out wid de paddle. + +We had no tubs either, so father took a hollow log and split it open +and put partitions in it. He bored a hole in each section and drove a +peg in it. He next cut two forked poles and drove 'em in de ground and +rested de ends of de hollow log in dese forks. We'd fill de log trough +wid water and rinse our clothes. We could pull out de pegs and let de +water out. We had no brooms either, so we made brush brooms to sweep +our floors. + +Dere was lots of wild game near our home. I 'member father and two +more men going out and killing six deer in jest a little while. Dey +was plentiful, and so was squirrels, coon, possums and quail. Dere was +lots of bears, too. We'd be in de field working and hear de dogs, and +father and de boys would go to 'em and maybe dey'd have a bear. We +liked bear meat. It was dark, but awful good and sweet. + +De grown folks used to have big times at log-rollings, corn-shuckings +and quiltings. Dey'd have a big supper and a big dance at night. Us +children would play ring plays, play with home-made rag dolls, or we'd +take big leaves and pin 'em together wid thorns and make hats and +dresses. We'd ride saplings, too. All of us would pull a sapling down +and one would climb up in it near de top and git a good hold on it, +and dey would turn it loose. It took a purty good holding to stay wid +it, I can tell you. + +All de ladies rode horseback, and dey rode side-saddles. I had a purty +side-saddle when I growed up. De saddle seat was flowered plush. I had +a purty riding habit, too. De skirt was so long dat it almost touched +de ground. + +We spun and wove all our clothes. I had to spin three broaches ever +night before bedtime. Mother would take bark and make dye to give us +different colored dresses. + +Red oak and sweet gum made purple. Bois d'arc made yellow or orange. +Walnut made a purty brown. We knitted our socks and stockings, too. + +We celebrated Christmas by having a big dance and egg-nog for ever' +body. + +During slavery young colored boys and girls didn't do much work but +just growed up, care-free and happy. De first work boys done was to +learn to hitch up de team to Master's carriage and take de young folks +for a drive. + +My older brothers and sisters told me lots of things dey done during +slave days. My brother Joe felt mighty big after freedom and strutted +about. One day he took his younger brother, Ol wid him to where father +was building a house. Dey played 'bout de house and come up to where a +white man and father was talking. De white man was rolling a little +ball of mud in his hands and he just pitched it over on Ol's foot. It +didn't hurt him a mite, but Joe bridled up and he started to git +smart, and father told him he'd break his neck if he didn't go on home +and keep his mouth shet. Father finally had to whup Joe to make him +know he was black. He give father and mother lots of concern, for dey +was afraid the Ku Kluxers would git him. One day he was playing wid a +axe and chopped off brother Ol's finger. Mother told him she was going +to kill him when she caught him. He took to de woods. His three +sisters and two neighbor girls run him nearly all day but couldn't +catch him. Late in de evening, he come up to a white neighbor's house +and she told him to go in and git under de bed and dey couldn't find +him. Curtains come down to de floor and as he was tired he decided to +risk it. He hadn't much more dan got hid when he heard de girls +coming. He heard de woman say, "He's under de bed." He knowed he was +caught, and he put up a fight, but dey took him to mother. He got a +whupping, but he was shocked dat mother didn't kill him like she said +she was. He didn't mind de whupping. He growed up to be a good man, +and was de apple of my mother's eye. + +Father knowed a man that stole his Master's horse out and rode him to +a dance. For some reason de horse died. De poor man knowed he was up +against it, and he let in to begging de men to help him git de horse +on his back so he could put him back in his stable and his Master +would think he died dere. Poor fellow, he really did think he could +tote dat horse on his back. He couldn't git anybody to help him, so he +went to the woods. He was shot by a patroller 'cause he wouldn't +surrender. Dey captured him but he died. + +Paul Castleberry was a white preacher. De colored would go to church +de same as de whites. He give de colored instructions on obeying +Masters. He say, "while your Master is going f'om pillar to post, +looking after your intrusts, you is always doing some devilment." I +'spect dat was jest about de truth. + +My sister played wid Miss Millie's little girl, Mollie. De big house +was on a high hill and at de foot of de hill. Nearly a half-mile away +was a big creek wid a big wooden bridge across it. Soldiers come by +ever' few days, and you could hear deir horses when dey struck de +bridge. Sister and Mollie would run upstairs and look down de hill, +and if it was Confederate soldiers dey would run back and tell Miss +Millie and dey would start putting out de best food dey had. If dey +saw Yankee soldiers, dey would run down and tell 'em and dey'd start +hiding things. + +De Yankees come through dere and took ever' body's horses. Lots of +people took deir horses and cows and hid 'em in some low place in de +deep wood. + +Miss Millie had a young horse and she had 'em take him to de wheat +field and hide him. De wheat was as high as he was. De Yankees come +by, and a man had stopped dere just before dey come. He was riding an +old horse, and he was wearing a long linen-duster--a duster was a long +coat dat was worn over de suit to protect it from de dust. + +Dis smart-aleck hid behind de house and as de soldiers rode up he shot +at 'em. Dey started shooting at him and he started running, and his +coat was sticking straight out behind him. De soldiers surely wasn't +trying to hit him, but dey sure did scare him plenty. Miss Millie was +certain dey was going to find her horse but dey didn't. + +Master John Rogers was good to all his slaves, and they all loved him +and would a'died for him. One day he was sitting in his yard and +Mollie come running down stairs and told him de Yankees was coming. He +never say nothing, but kept sitting dere. Dat morning he had a big +sack of money and he give it to my mother to hide for him. She ripped +her mattress, and put it in de middle of it and sewed it up. She den +made up de bed and put de covers on it. De Yankees searched de house +and took de jewelry and silverware and old Master's gold mug, but dey +didn't find his money. + +My parents lived close to de old plantation dat they lived on when dey +was slaves. De big house was still dere, but it was sure dilapidated. +Ever'body was poor after de War, whites and blacks alike. I really +think de colored was de best off, for they knowed all 'bout hardships +and hard work and de white folks didn't. + +At first some of 'em was too proud to do drudgery work, but most of +'em went right to work and build up deir homes again. Food, clothes, +and in fact everything needed, was scarce. + +Mother always say, "If you visit on New Years, you'll visit all de +year." We always had black-eyed peas and hog jowl for New Year's +dinner, for it brought good luck. + +The Nineteenth of June was Emancipation Day, and we always had a big +picnic and speeches. + +I knowed one woman who was a conjur woman. Lots of people went to her +to git her to break a evil spell dat some one had over them. She'd +brew a tea from herbs and give to 'em to drink, and it always cured +'em. + +I've seen people use all kinds o' roots and herbs for medicine, and I +also seen 'em use all kind of things for cures. I've knowed 'em to put +wood lice in a bag and tie 'em 'round a baby's neck so it'd teeth +easy. + +Black-haw root, sour dock, bear grass, grape root, bull nettle, +sweet-gum bark and red-oak bark boiled separately and mixed, makes a +good blood medicine. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +NANCY GARDNER +Age 79 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma + + +Well, to tell you de truth I don't know my age, but I was born in +1858, in Franklin, Tennessee. Now, you can figger for yourself and +tell how old I is. I is de daughter of Prophet and Callie Isaiah, and +dey was natives of Tennessee. Dere was three of us children, two boys +and myself. I'm de only girl. My brothers names was Prophet and Billie +Isaiah. I don't 'member much about dem as we was separated when I was +seven years old. I'll never forget when me, my ma and my auntie had to +leave my pa and brothers. It is jest as clear in my mind now as it was +den, and dat's been about seventy years ago. + +Oh God! I tell you it was awful dat day when old Jeff Davis had a +bunch of us sent to Memphis to be sold. I can see old Major Clifton +now. He was a big nigger trader you know. Well, dey took us on up dere +to Memphis and we was sold jest like cattle. Dey sold me and ma +together and dey sold pa and de boys together. Dey was sent to +Mississippi and we was sent to Alabama. My pa, O how my ma was grieved +to death about him! She didn't live long after dat. She didn't live +long enough to be set free. Poor ma, she died a slave, but she is +saved though. I know she is, and I'll be wid her some day. + +It was thirty years before my pa knew if we was still living. Finally +in some way he heard dat I was still alive, and he began writing me. +Course I was grown and married den and me and my husband had moved to +Missouri. Well, my pa started out to see me and on his way he was +drowned in de Missouri River, and I never saw him alive after we was +sold in Memphis. + +I can't tell you much 'bout work during de slave days 'cause you see I +was jest a baby you might say when de War broke out. I do remember +our Master's name though, it was Dr. Perkins, and he was a good +Master. Ma and pa sure hated to have to leave him, he was so good to +dem. He was a rich man, and had a big fine house and thousands of +acres of land. He was good to his niggers too. We had a good house +too, better dan some of dese houses I see folks living in now. Course +Dr. Perkins niggers had to work, but dey didn't mind 'cause he would +let dem have little patches of dey own such as 'tatoes, corn, cotton +and garden. Jest a little, you know. He couldn't let dem have much, +there was so many on Dr. Perkins plantation. + +I don't remember seeing anybody sick in slavery time. You see I was +jest a kid and dere's a lot of things I can't remember. + +I am a Christian. I jined de church nigh on seventy years ago and when +I say dat, I don't mean I jest jined de church. I mean I gave myself +up to de Heavenly Father, and I've been gwine straight down de line +for Him ever since. You know in dem days, we didn't get religion like +young folks do now. Young folks today jest find de church and den call +theyselves Christians, but they aint. + +I remember jest as well when I was converted. One day I was thinking +'bout a sermon de preacher had preached and a voice spoke to me and +said, "De Holy Ghost is over your head. Accept it!" Right den I got +down on my knees and prayed to God dat I might understand dat voice, +and God Almighty in a vision told me dat I should find de church. I +could hardly wait for de next service so I could find it, and when I +was in de water getting my baptisement, dat same voice spoke and said, +"Now you have accepted don't turn back 'cause I will be wid you +always!" O you don't know nothing 'bout dat kind of religion! + +I 'member one night shortly after I jined de church I was laying in +bed and dere was a vine tied 'round my waist and dat vine extended +into de elements. O my God! I can see it now! I looked up dat vine +and away in de elements I could see my Divine Master and he spoke to +me and said, "When you get in trouble shake dis vine; I'm your Master +and I will hear your cry." + +I knowed old Jeff Davis good. Why I was jest as close to him as I am +to dat table. I've talked wid him too. I reckon I _do_ know dat +scoundrel! Why, he didn't want de niggers to be free! He was known as +a mean old rascal all over de South. + +Abraham Lincoln? Now you is talking 'bout de niggers friend! Why dat +was de best man God ever let tramp de earth! Everybody was mighty sad +when poor old Abraham was 'sassinated, 'cause he did a mighty good +deed for de colored race before he left dis world. + +I wasn't here long during slavery, but I saw enough of it to know it +was mighty hard going for most of de niggers den, and young folks +wouldn't stand for dat kind of treatment now. I know most of the young +folks would be killed, but they jest wouldn't stand for it. I would +hate to have to go through wid my little share of it again. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +OCTAVIA GEORGE +Age 85 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Mansieur, Louisiana, 1852, Avoir Parish. I am the +daughter of Alfred and Clementine Joseph. I don't know much about my +grandparents other than my mother told me my grandfather's name was +Fransuai, and was one time a king in Africa. + +Most of the slaves lived in log cabins, and the beds were home-made. +The mattresses were made out of moss gathered from trees, and we used +to have lots of fun gathering that moss to make those mattresses. + +My job was taking care of the white children up at the Big House (that +is what they called the house where our master lived), and I also had +to feed the little Negro children. I remember quite well how those +poor little children used to have to eat. They were fed in boxes and +troughs, under the house. They were fed corn meal mush and beans. When +this was poured into their box they would gather around it the same as +we see pigs, horses and cattle gather around troughs today. + +We were never given any money, but were able to get a little money +this way: our Master would let us have two or three acres of land each +year to plant for ourselves, and we could have what we raised on it. +We could not allow our work on these two or three acres to interfere +with Master's work, but we had to work our little crops on Sundays. +Now remind you, all the Negroes didn't get these two or three acres, +only good masters allowed their slaves to have a little crop of their +own. We would take the money from our little crops and buy a few +clothes and something for Christmas. The men would save enough money +out of the crops to buy their Christmas whiskey. It was all right for +the slaves to get drunk on Christmas and New Years Day; no one was +whipped for getting drunk on those days. We were allowed to have a +garden and from this we gathered vegetables to eat; on Sundays we +could have duck, fish, and pork. + +We didn't know anything about any clothes other than cotton; +everything we wore was made of cotton, except our shoes, they were +made from pieces of leather cut out of a raw cowhide. + +Our Master and Mistress was good, they let us go to church with them, +have our little two- or three-acre crops and any other thing that the +good masters would let their slaves do. They lived in a big fine house +and had a fine barn. Their barn was much better than the house we +lived in. Master Depriest (our master) was a Frenchman, and had eight +or nine children, and they were sure mean. They would fight us, but we +were not allowed to fight our little Master or Mistress as we had to +call them. + +The overseer on Master's plantation was a mean old fellow, he carried +his gun all the time and would ride a big fine horse and go from one +bunch of slaves to the other. Some poor white folks lived close to us. +They could not own slaves and they had to work for the rich plantation +owners. I believe that those poor white folk are to blame for the +Negroes stealing because they would get the Negroes to steal their +master's corn, hogs, chickens and many other things and sell it to +them for practically nothing. + +We had to work plenty hard, because our Master had a large plantation. +Don't know just how many acres it was, but we had to be up at 5 +o'clock in the morning and would work until dark than we would have to +go home and do our night work, that is cook, milk, and feed the stock. + +The slaves were punished for stealing, running off, not doing what +their master told them and for talking back to their master. If any of +these rules were disobeyed their feet and hands were chained together +and they were put across a log or a barrel and whipped until the blood +came from them. + +There were no jails; the white man was the slaves' jail. If whipping +didn't settle the crime the Negro committed--the next thing would be +to hang him or burn him at stake. + +I've seen them sell slaves. The whites would auction them off just as +we do cattle and horses today. The big fine healthy slaves were worth +more than those that were not quite so good. I have seen men sold from +their wives and I thought that was such a crime. I knew that God would +settle thing someday. + +Slaves would run away but most of the time they were caught. The +Master would put blood hounds on their trail, and sometimes the slave +would kill the blood hound and make his escape. If a slave once tried +to run away and was caught, he would be whipped almost to death, and +from then on if he was sent any place they would chain their meanest +blood hound to him. + +Funerals were very simple for slaves, they could not carry the body to +the church they would just take it to the grave yard and bury it. They +were not even allowed to sing a song at the cemetery. Old Mistress +used to tell us ghost stories after funerals and they would nearly +scare me to death. She would tell of seeing men with no head, and see +cattle that would suddenly turn to cats, and she made us believe if a +fire was close to a cemetery it was coming from a ghost. + +I used to hear quite a bit about voodoo, but that some thing I never +believed in, therefore, I didn't pay any attention to it. + +When a slave was sick, the master would get a good doctor for him if +he was a good slave, but if he wasn't considered a good slave he would +be given cheap medical care. Some of the doctors would not go to the +cabin where the slaves were, and the slave would have to be carried on +his bed to his master's back porch and the doctor would see him there. + +When the news came that we were free, all of us were hid on the +Mississippi River. We had been there for several days, and we had to +catch fish with our hands and roast them for food. I remember quite +well when old Master came down to there and hollered, Come on out +niggers; you are free now and you can do as you please! We all went to +the Big House and there we found old Miss crying and talking about how +she hated to lose her good niggers. + +Abraham Lincoln! Why we mourned three months for that man when he +died! I wouldn't miss a morning getting my black arm band and placing +it on in remembrance of Abraham, who was the best friend the Negroes +ever had. Now old Jeff Davis, I didn't care a thing about him. He was +a Democrat and none of them mean anything to the Negro. And if these +young Negroes don't quit messing with the democratic bunch they are +going to be right back where we started from. If they only knew as I +know they would struggle to keep such from happening, because although +I had a good master I wouldn't want to go through it again. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +MARY GRAYSON +Age 83 yrs. +Tulsa, Oklahoma + + +I am what we colored people call a "native." That means that I didn't +come into the Indian country from somewhere in the Old South, after +the War, like so many negroes did, but I was born here in the old +Creek Nation, and my master was a Creek Indian. That was eighty three +years ago, so I am told. + +My mammy belonged to white people back in Alabama when she was +born--down in the southern part I think, for she told me that after +she was a sizeable girl her white people moved into the eastern part +of Alabama where there was a lot of Creeks. Some of them Creeks was +mixed up with the whites, and some of the big men in the Creeks who +come to talk to her master was almost white, it looked like. "My white +folks moved around a lot when I was a little girl", she told me. + +When mammy was about 10 or 13 years old some of the Creeks begun to +come out to the Territory in little bunches. They wasn't the ones who +was taken out here by the soldiers and contractor men--they come on +ahead by themselves and most of them had plenty of money, too. A Creek +come to my mammy's master and bought her to bring out here, but she +heard she was being sold and run off into the woods. There was an old +clay pit, dug way back into a high bank, where the slaves had been +getting clay to mix with hog hair scrapings to make chinking for the +big log houses that they built for the master and the cabins they made +for themselves. Well, my mammy run and hid way back in that old clay +pit, and it was way after dark before the master and the other man +found her. + +The Creek man that bought her was a kind sort of a man, mammy said, +and wouldn't let the master punish her. He took her away and was kind +to her, but he decided she was too young to breed and he sold her to +another Creek who had several slaves already, and he brought her out +to the Territory. + +The McIntosh men was the leaders in the bunch that come out at that +time, and one of the bunch, named Jim Perryman, bought my mammy and +married her to one of his "boys", but after he waited a while and she +didn't have a baby he decided she was no good breeder and he sold her +to Mose Perryman. + +Mose Perryman was my master, and he was a cousin to Legus Perryman, +who was a big man in the Tribe. He was a lot younger than Mose, and +laughed at Mose for buying my mammy, but he got fooled, because my +mammy got married to Mose's slave boy Jacob, the way the slaves was +married them days, and went ahead and had ten children for Mr. Mose. + +Mose Perryman owned my pappy and his older brother, Hector, and one of +the McIntosh men, Oona, I think his name was, owned my pappy's brother +William. I can remember when I first heard about there was going to be +a war. The older children would talk about it, but they didn't say it +was a war all over the country. They would talk about a war going to +be "back in Alabama", and I guess they had heard the Creeks talking +about it that way. + +When I was born we lived in the Choska bottoms, and Mr. Mose Perryman +had a lot of land broke in all up and down the Arkansas river along +there. After the War, when I had got to be a young woman, there was +quite a settlement grew up at Choska (pronounced Choe-skey) right +across the river east of where Haskell now is, but when I was a child +before the War all the whole bottoms was marshy kind of wilderness +except where farms had been cleared out. The land was very rich, and +the Creeks who got to settle there were lucky. They always had big +crops. All west of us was high ground, toward Gibson station and Fort +Gibson, and the land was sandy. Some of the McIntoshes lived over that +way, and my Uncle William belonged to one of them. + +We slaves didn't have a hard time at all before the War. I have had +people who were slaves of white folks back in the old states tell me +that they had to work awfully hard and their masters were cruel to +them sometimes, but all the Negroes I knew who belonged to Creeks +always had plenty of clothes and lots to eat and we all lived in good +log cabins we built. We worked the farm and tended to the horses and +cattle and hogs, and some of the older women worked around the owner's +house, but each Negro family looked after a part of the fields and +worked the crops like they belonged to us. + +When I first heard talk about the War the slaves were allowed to go +and see one another sometimes and often they were sent on errands +several miles with a wagon or on a horse, but pretty soon we were all +kept at home, and nobody was allowed to come around and talk to us. +But we heard what was going on. + +The McIntosh men got nearly everybody to side with them about the War, +but we Negroes got word somehow that the Cherokees over back of Ft. +Gibson was not going to be in the War, and that there were some Union +people over there who would help slaves to get away, but we children +didn't know anything about what we heard our parents whispering about, +and they would stop if they heard us listening. Most of the Creeks who +lived in our part of the country, between the Arkansas and the +Verdigris, and some even south of the Arkansas, belonged to the Lower +Creeks and sided with the South, but down below us along the Canadian +River they were Upper Creeks and there was a good deal of talk about +them going with the North. Some of the Negroes tried to get away and +go down to them, but I don't know of any from our neighborhood that +went to them. + +Some Upper Creeks came up into the Choska bottoms talking around among +the folks there about siding with the North. They were talking, they +said, for old man Gouge, who was a big man among the Upper Creeks. His +Indian name was Opoeth-le-ya-hola, and he got away into Kansas with a +big bunch of Creeks and Seminoles during the War. + +Before that time, I remember one night my uncle William brought +another Negro man to our cabin and talked a long time with my pappy, +but pretty soon some of the Perryman Negroes told them that Mr. Mose +was coming down and they went off into the woods to talk. But Mr. Mose +didn't come down. When pappy came back Mammy cried quite a while, and +we children could hear them arguing late at night. Then my uncle +Hector slipped over to our cabin several times and talked to pappy, +and mammy began to fix up grub, but she didn't give us children but a +little bit of it, and told us to stay around with her at the cabin and +not go playing with the other children. + +Then early one morning, about daylight, old Mr. Mose came down to the +cabin in his buggy, waving a shot gun and hollering at the top of his +voice. I never saw a man so mad in all my life, before nor since! + +He yelled in at mammy to "git them children together and git up to my +house before I beat you and all of them to death!" Mammy began to cry +and plead that she didn't know anything, but he acted like he was +going to shoot sure enough, so we all ran to mammy and started for Mr. +Mose's house as fast as we could trot. + +We had to pass all the other Negro cabins on the way, and we could see +that they were all empty, and it looked like everything in them had +been tore up. Straw and corn shucks all over the place, where somebody +had tore up the mattresses, and all the pans and kettles gone off the +outside walls where they used to hang them. + +At one place we saw two Negro boys loading some iron kettles on a +wagon, and a little further on was some boys catching chickens in a +yard, but we could see all the Negroes had left in a big hurry. + +I asked mammy where everybody had gone and she said, "Up to Mr. Mose's +house, where we are going. He's calling us all in." + +"Will pappy be up there too?" I asked her. + +"No. Your pappy and your Uncle Hector and your Uncle William and a lot +of other menfolks won't be here any more. They went away. That's why +Mr. Mose is so mad, so if any of you younguns say anything about any +strange men coming to our place I'll break your necks!" Mammy was sure +scared! + +We all thought sure she was going to get a big whipping, but Mr. Mose +just looked at her a minute and then told her to get back to the cabin +and bring all the clothes, and bed ticks and all kinds of cloth we had +and come back ready to travel. + +"We're going to take all you black devils to a place where there won't +no more of you run away!" he yelled after us. So we got ready to leave +as quick as we could. I kept crying about my pappy, but mammy would +say, "Don't you worry about your pappy, he's free now. Better be +worrying about us. No telling where we all will end up!" There was +four or five Creek families and their Negroes all got together to +leave, with all their stuff packed in buggies and wagons, and being +toted by the Negroes or carried tied on horses, jack asses, mules and +milk cattle. I reckon it was a funny looking sight, or it would be to +a person now; the way we was all loaded down with all manner of +baggage when we met at the old ford across the Arkansas that lead to +the Creek Agency. The Agency stood on a high hill a few miles across +the river from where we lived, but we couldn't see it from our place +down in the Choska bottoms. But as soon as we got up on the upland +east of the bottoms we could look across and see the hill. + +When we got to a grove at the foot of the hill near the agency Mr. +Mose and the other masters went up to the Agency for a while. I +suppose they found out up there what everybody was supposed to do and +where they was supposed to go, for when we started on it wasn't long +until several more families and their slaves had joined the party and +we made quite a big crowd. + +The little Negro boys had to carry a little bundle apiece, but Mr. +Mose didn't make the little girls carry anything and let us ride if we +could find anything to ride on. My mammy had to help lead the cows +part of the time, but a lot of the time she got to ride an old horse, +and she would put me up behind her. It nearly scared me to death, +because I had never been on a horse before, and she had to hold on to +me all the time to keep me from falling off. + +Of course I was too small to know what was going on then, but I could +tell that all the masters and the Negroes seemed to be mighty worried +and careful all the time. Of course I know now that the Creeks were +all split up over the War, and nobody was able to tell who would be +friendly to us or who would try to poison us or kill us, or at least +rob us. There was a lot of bushwhacking all through that country by +little groups of men who was just out to get all they could. They +would appear like they was the enemy of anybody they run across, just +to have an excuse to rob them or burn up their stuff. If you said you +was with the South they would be with the North and if you claimed to +be with the Yankees they would be with the South, so our party was +kind of upset all the time we was passing through the country along +the Canadian. That was where old Gouge had been talking against the +South. I've heard my folks say that he was a wonderful speaker, too. + +We all had to move along mighty slow, on account of the ones on foot, +and we wouldn't get very far in one day, then we Negroes had to fix up +a place to camp and get wood and cook supper for everybody. Sometimes +we would come to a place to camp that somebody knew about and we +would find it all tromped down by horses and the spring all filled in +and ruined. I reckon old Gouge's people would tear up things when they +left, or maybe some Southern bushwhackers would do it. I don't know +which. + +When we got down to where the North Fork runs into the Canadian we +went around the place where the Creek town was. There was lots of +Creeks down there who was on the other side, so we passed around that +place and forded across west of there. The ford was a bad one, and it +took us a long time to get across. Everybody got wet and a lot of the +stuff on the wagons got wet. Pretty soon we got down into the +Chickasaw country, and everybody was friendly to us, but the Chickasaw +people didn't treat their slaves like the Creeks did. They was more +strict, like the people in Texas and other places. The Chickasaws +seemed lighter color than the Creeks but they talked more in Indian +among themselves and to their slaves. Our masters talked English +nearly all the time except when they were talking to Creeks who didn't +talk good English, and we Negroes never did learn very good Creek. I +could always understand it, and can yet, a little, but I never did try +to talk it much. Mammy and pappy used English to us all the time. + +Mr. Mose found a place for us to stop close to Fort Washita, and got +us places to stay and work. I don't know which direction we were from +Fort Washita, but I know we were not very far. I don't know how many +years we were down in there, but I know it was over two for we worked +on crops at two different places, I remember. Then one day Mr. Mose +came and told us that the War was over and that we would have to root +for ourselves after that. Then he just rode away and I never saw him +after that until after we had got back up into the Choska country. +Mammy heard that the Negroes were going to get equal rights with the +Creeks, and that she should go to the Creek Agency to draw for us, so +we set out to try to get back. + +We started out on foot, and would go a little ways each day, and mammy +would try to get a little something to do to get us some food. Two or +three times she got paid in money, so she had some money when we got +back. After three or four days of walking we came across some more +Negroes who had a horse, and mammy paid them to let us children ride +and tie with their children for a day or two. They had their children +on the horse, so two or three little ones would get on with a larger +one to guide the horse and we would ride a while and get off and tie +the horse and start walking on down the road. Then when the others +caught up with the horse they would ride until they caught up with us. +Pretty soon the old people got afraid to have us do that, so we just +led the horse and some of the little ones rode it. + +We had our hardest times when we would get to a river or big creek. If +the water was swift the horse didn't do any good, for it would shy at +the water and the little ones couldn't stay on, so we would have to +just wait until someone came along in a wagon and maybe have to pay +them with some of our money or some of our goods we were bringing back +to haul us across. Sometimes we had to wait all day before anyone +would come along in a wagon. + +We were coming north all this time, up through the Seminole Nation, +but when we got to Weeleetka we met a Creek family of freedmen who +were going to the Agency too, and mammy paid them to take us along in +their wagon. When we got to the Agency mammy met a Negro who had seen +pappy and knew where he was, so we sent word to him and he came and +found us. He had been through most of the War in the Union army. + +When we got away into the Cherokee country some of them called the +"Pins" helped to smuggle him on up into Missouri and over into Kansas, +but he soon found that he couldn't get along and stay safe unless he +went with the Army. He went with them until the War was over, and was +around Gibson quite a lot. When he was there he tried to find out +where we had gone but said he never could find out. He was in the +battle of Honey Springs, he said, but never was hurt or sick. When we +got back together we cleared a selection of land a little east of the +Choska bottoms, near where Clarksville now is, and farmed until I was +a great big girl. + +I went to school at a little school called Blackjack school. I think +it was a kind of mission school and not one of the Creek nation +schools, because my first teacher was Miss Betty Weaver and she was +not a Creek but a Cherokee. Then we had two white teachers, Miss King +and John Kernan, and another Cherokee was in charge. His name was +Ross, and he was killed one day when his horse fell off a bridge +across the Verdigris, on the way from Tullahassee to Gibson Station. + +When I got to be a young woman I went to Okmulgee and worked for some +people near there for several years, then I married Tate Grayson. We +got our freedmen's allotments on Mingo Creek, east of Tulsa, and lived +there until our children were grown and Tate died, then I came to live +with my daughter in Tulsa. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +ROBERT R. GRINSTEAD +Age 80 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Lawrence County, Mississippi, February 17, 1857. My +father's name is Elias Grinstead, a German, and my mother's name is +Ann Greenstead after that of her master. I am a son by my mother and +her Master. I have four other half brothers William (Bill) oldest, +Albert, Silas, and John. + +I was only eight years of age at freedom and for that reason I was too +young to work and on account of being the son of my Master's I +received no hard treatment and did little or no work. Yet, I wore the +same clothing as did the rest of the slaves: a shirt of lowell for +summer and shirt and trousers for winter and no shoes. I could walk +through a briar patch in my bare feet without sticking one in the +bottom of my feet as they were so hard and resistant. + +I was the only child of my Master as he had no wife. When the War +broke out he went to the War and left the plantation in charge of his +overseer and his two sisters. As the overseers were hard for them to +get along with they were oftener without an overseer as with one, and +therefore they used one of the Negroes as overseer for the most of the +time. + +Across the river was another large plantation and slave owner by the +name of Master Wilson. We called him Master too, for he was a close +friend and neighbor to our Mistresses. There was one Negro man slave +who decided to not work after Master went to the War and the white +overseer was fired and the Negro overseer was acting as overseer, so +my Mistress gave him a note to take across the river to Master Wilson. +The note was an order to whip this Negro and as he couldn't read he +didn't know what the note contained until after Master Wilson read it +and gave orders to his men to tie him for his whipping. After this, +the whipping was so severe that they never had any more trouble in +making this Negro slave work and they never had to send him back again +to Master Wilson to be whipped. The fun part of this above incidence +was the Negro carried his own note and went alone to be whipped and +didn't know it 'til the lashes was being put on him. + +My Master's plantation was about 2 miles long and 1-1/2 mile wide and +he owned between 30 or 40 slaves. The Negro overseer would wake up the +slaves and have them in the field before they could see how to work +each morning and as they would go to work so soon their breakfast was +carried to the field to them. One morning the breakfast was taken to +the field and the slaves were hoeing cotton and among them was a lad +about 15 years of age who could not hoe as fast as the older slaves +and the breakfast was sat at the end of the rows and as they would hoe +out to the end they would eat, and if you would be late hoeing to the +end the first to go to the end would began eating and eat everything. +So, this 15 year old lad in order to get out to eat before everything +was gone did not hoe his row good and the overseer, who was white at +this time, whipped him so severely that he could not eat nor work, +that day. + +The Negroes went to church with the white people and joined their +church. The church was Baptist in denomination, and they built a pen +in the church in which the Negroes sat, and when they would take +sacrament the Negroes would be served after the whites were through +and one of the Negro group would pass it around to the others within +the pen. + +As there were no dances held on the plantation the Negroes would +oftimes slip off and go at nights to a nearby dance or peanut parching +or rice suppers at nights after work. Some of the slaves would be +allowed to make for themselves rice patches which they would gather +and save for the dances. To prepare this rice for cooking after +harvested they would burn a trough into a log, they called mortar and +with a large wooden mallet they called pessel, and which they would +pound upon the rice until hulled and ready for cooking. This rice +would be boiled with just salt and water and eaten as a great feast +with delight. + +During slavery some of the Negro slaves would kill snakes and skin +them and wear these snake skins to prevent being voodooed they said. +When some of the slaves would take sick and the home remedies would +fail to cure them our Mistress would allow one of the Negro men slaves +to go to the white doctor and get some medicine for the patient. The +doctor would ask questions as to the actions of the patient and from +said description would send medicine without ever going to see the +patient and his medicine would always cure the patient of his disease +if consulted in time. + +After the news came that brought our freedom a white union officer +with 20 trained Negro soldiers visited the plantations and saw that +the Negroes received their freedom. He would put on a demonstration +with his Negro soldiers by having them line up and then at a command +they would all rush forward and stand their guns up together on the +stock end without a one falling and get back into line and upon +another command they would rush forward and each get his gun again +without allowing one to fall and again reline up. + +When I was large enough to pay attention to my color and to that of +the other slaves I wondered to myself why I was not black like the +rest of the slaves and concluded to myself that I would when I got +grown like they were as I knew not then that I was the son of my +Master. + +During the War and as the men and our Master all went to the War the +Negroes or a Negro would have to go to the Mistress' homes each +morning and start fires and never, did I ever hear of a rape case +under such close conditions as Negroes going into the bed rooms each +morning of the white mistress to start fires. + +My first wife was name Tracy Smith. As I had been free for over 12 +years. We had ordinary marriage ceremony. I have 11 grown children, 15 +or 20 grandchildren and 3 great grandchildren. + +I think Abraham Lincoln was a fine old gentlemen and as to Jeff Davis +I don't think he was what he should have been, and as to Booker T. +Washington I think his idea of educating or training Negroes as +servants to serve the white race appealed more to the white race than +the Negroes. + +My viewpoint as to slavery is that it was as much detrimental to the +white race as it was to the Negroes, as one elevated ones minds too +highly, and the other degraded ones mind too lowly. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937] + +MATTIE HARDMAN +Age 78 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born January 2, 1859, at Gunalis, Texas. My father's name was +William Tensley and my mother's name Mildred Howard. They was brought +from Virginia. I did have 8 brothers and sisters but all of them are +dead. + +My Master was name William Henry Howard. Since I was too young to work +I nursed my sisters' children while they worked. The cooking was done +all up to the general kitchen at Masters house and when slaves come +from work they would send their children up to the kitchen to bring +their meals to their homes in the quarters. Our Mistress would have +one of the cooks to dish up vegetables and she herself would slice or +serve the meat to see that it wasn't wasted, as seemingly it was +thought so precious. + +As my mother worked 'round the Big House quite a deal I would go up to +the Big House with her and play with the white children who seemed to +like for me to come to play with them. One day in anger while playing +I called one of the white girls, "old black dog" and they pretended +they would tell their mother (my Mistress) about it. I was scared, as +they saw, and they promised me they would not tell if I'd promise to +not do it again, and which I was so glad to do and be let off so +lightly. + +For summer I wore a cotton slip and for winter my mother knitted at +nights after her days work was done so I wore red flannels for +underwear and thick linsey for an over-dress, and had knitted +stockings and bought shoes. As my Master was a doctor he made his +slaves wear suitable clothes in accordance to the weather. We also +wore gloves my mother knitted in winter. + +My Mistress was good to all of the slaves. On Sunday morning she would +make all the Negro children come to the Big House and she would stand +on the front steps and read the Catechism to us who sat or stood in +front on the ground. + +My Master was also good. On Wednesdays and Friday nights he would make +the slaves come up to the Big House and he would read the Bible to +them and he would pray. He was a doctor and very fractious and exact. +He didn't allow the slaves to claim they forgot to do thus and so nor +did he allow them to make the expression, "I thought so and so." He +would say to them if they did: "Who told you, you could think!" + +They had 10 children, 7 boys and 3 girls. Their house was a large +2-story log house painted white. My father was overseer on the +plantation. + +The plantation consisted of 400 acres and about 40 slaves including +children. The slaves were so seldom punished until they never'd worry +about being punished. They treated their slaves as though they loved +them. The poor white neighbors were also good and treated the slaves +good, for my Master would warn them to not bother his Negroes. My +Mistress always told the slaves she wanted all of them to visit her +and come to her funeral and burial when she died and named the men +slaves she wanted to be her pallbearers, all of which was carried out +as she planned even though it was after freedom. + +The slaves even who lived adjoining our plantation would have church +at our Big House. They would hold church on Sundays and Sunday nights. + +As my mother worked a deal for her Mistress she had an inkling or +overheard that they was going to be set free long before the day they +were. She called all the slaves on the plantation together and broke +to them this news after they had promised her they would not spread +the news so that it would get back to our Master. So, everybody kept +the news until Saturday night June 19th, when Master called all the +slaves to the big gate and told them they were all free, but could +stay right on in their homes if they had no places to go and which all +of them did. They went right out and gathered the crop just like +they'd always done, and some of them remained there several years. + +My first husband was name, S. W. Warnley. We had 4 children, 1 girl +and three boys and 3 grandchildren. I now have two grandchildren. + +Now that slavery is over I sometime wish 'twas still existing for some +of our lazy folks, so that so many of them wouldn't or couldn't loaf +around so much lowering our race, walking the streets day by day and +running from house to house living corruptible lives which is keeping +the race down as though there be no good ones among us. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +ANNIE HAWKINS +Age 90 +Colbert, Okla + + +I calls myself 90, but I don't know jest how old I really am but I was +a good sized gal when we moved from Georgia to Texas. We come on a big +boat and one night the stars fell. Talk about being scared! We all run +and hid and hollered and prayed. We thought the end of the world had +come. + +I never had no whitefolks that was good to me. We all worked jest like +dogs and had about half enough to eat and got whupped for everything. +Our days was a constant misery to us. I know lots of niggers that was +slaves had a good time but we never did. Seems hard that I can't say +anything good for any of 'em but I sho' can't. When I was small my job +was to tote cool water to the field to the hands. It kept me busy +going back and forth and I had to be sho' my old Mistress had a cool +drink when she wanted it, too. Mother and my sister and me worked in +the field all day and come in time to clear away the things and cook +supper. When we was through in the kitchen we would spin fer a long +time. Mother would spin and we would card. + +My old Master was Dave Giles, the meanest man that ever lived. He +didn't have many slaves, my mammy, and me, and my sister, Uncle Bill, +and Truman. He had owned my grandma but he give her a bad whupping and +she never did git over it and died. We all done as much work as a +dozen niggers--we knowed we had to. + +I seen old Master git mad at Truman and he buckled him down across a +barrel and whupped him till he cut the blood out of him and then he +rubbed salt and pepper in the raw places. It looked like Truman would +die it hurt so bad. I know that don't sound reasonable that a white +man in a Christian community would do such a thing but you can't +realize how heartless he was. People didn't know about it and we +dassent tell for we knowed he'd kill us if we did. You must remember +he owned us body and soul and they wasn't anything we could do about +it. Old Mistress and her three girls was mean to us too. + +One time me and my sister was spinning and old Mistress went to the +well-house and she found a chicken snake and killed it. She brought it +back and she throwed it around my sister's neck. She jest laughed and +laughed about it. She thought it was a big joke. + +Old Master stayed drunk all the time. I reckon that is the reason he +was so fetched mean. My, how we hated him! He finally killed hisself +drinking and I remember Old Mistress called us in to look at him in +his coffin. We all marched by him slow like and I jest happened to +look up and caught my sister's eye and we both jest natchelly +laughed--Why shouldn't we? We was glad he was dead. It's a good thing +we had our laugh fer old Mistress took us out and whupped us with a +broomstick. She didn't make us sorry though. + +Old Master and Mistress lived in a nice big house on top of a hill and +us darkies lived in log cabins with log floors. Our dresses was made +out of coarse cloth like cotton sacking and and [TR: sic] it sho' +lasted a long time. It ort to been called mule-hide for it was about +that tough. + +We went to church sometimes. They had to let us do that or folks would +have found out how mean they was to us. Old Master'd give us a pass to +show the patroller. We was glad to git the chance to git away and we +always went to church. + +During the War we seen lots of soldiers. Some of them was Yankees and +some were Sesesh soldiers. My job every day was to take a big tray of +food and set it on a stump about a quarter of a mile from our house. I +done this twice a day and ever time I went back the dishes would be +empty. I never did see nobody and didn't nobody tell me why I was to +take the food up there but of course it was either for soliders [TR: +sic] that was scouting 'round or it may been for some lowdown dirty +bushwhacker, and again it might a been for some of old Master's folks +scouting 'round to keep out of the army. + +We was the happiest folks in the world when we knowed we was free. We +couldn't realize it at first but how we did shout and cry for joy when +we did realize it. We was afraid to leave the place at first for fear +old Mistress would bring us back or the pateroller would git us. Old +Mistress died soon after the War and we didn't care either. She didn't +never do nothing to make us love her. We was jest as glad as when old +Master died. I don't know what become of the three gals. They was +about grown. + +We moved away jest as far away as we could and I married soon after. +My husband died and I married again. I been married four times and all +my husbands died. The last time I married it was to a man that +belonged to a Indian man, Sam Love. He was a good owner and was one of +the best men that ever lived. My husband never did move far away from +him and he loved him like a father. He always looked after him till he +died. My husband has been dead five years. + +I have had fifteen children. Four pairs of twins, and only four of +them are living. The good Lawd wouldn't let me keep them. I'se lived +through three wars so you see I'se no baby. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937] + +IDA HENRY +Age 83 +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Marshall, Texas, in 1854. Me mother was named Millie +Henderson and me father Silas Hall. Me mother was sold in South +Carolina to Mister Hall, who brought her to Texas. Me father was born +and raised by Master John Hall. Me mother's and father's family +consisted of five girls and one boy. My sisters' names were: +Margrette, Chalette, Lottie, Gracy and Loyo, and me brother's name was +Dock Howard. I lived with me mother and father in a log house on +Master Hall's plantation. We would be sorry when dark, as de +patrollers would walk through de quarters and homes of de slaves all +times of night wid pine torch lights to whip de niggers found away +from deir home. + +At nights when me mother would slip away for a visit to some of de +neighbors homes, she would raise up the old plank floor to de log +cabin and make pallets on de ground and put us to bed and put the +floor back down so dat we couldn't be seen or found by the patrollers +on their stroll around at nights. + +My grandmother Lottie would always tell us to not let Master catch you +in a lie, and to always tell him de truth. + +I was a house girl to me Mistress and nursed, cooked, and carried de +children to and from school. In summer we girls wore cotton slips and +yarn dresses for winter. When I got married I was dress in blue serge +and was de third person to marry in it. Wedding dresses was not worn +after de wedding in dem days by niggers as we was taught by our +Mistress dat it was bad luck to wear de wedding dress after marriage. +Therefore, 'twas handed down from one generation to the other one. + +Me Mistress was sometimes good and sometimes mean. One day de cook was +waiting de table and when passing around de potatoes, old Mistress +felt of one and as hit wasn't soft done, she exclaimed to de cook, +"What you bring these raw potatoes out here for?" and grab a fork and +stuck it in her eye and put hit out. She, de cook, lived about 10 +years and died. + +Me Mistress was de mother of five children, Crock, Jim, Boss and two +girls name, Lea and Annie. + +Dere home was a large two-story white house wid de large white posts. + +As me Master went to de War de old overseer tried himself in meanness +over de slaves as seemingly he tried to be important. One day de +slaves caught him and one held him whilst another knocked him in de +head and killed him. + +Master's plantation was about 300 acres and he had 'bout 160 slaves. +Before de slaves killed our overseer, he would work 'em night and day. +De slaves was punished when dey didn't do as much work as de overseer +wanted 'em to do. + +He would lock 'em in jail some nights without food and kept 'em dere +all night, and after whipping 'em de next morning would only give 'em +bread and water to work on till noon. + +When a slave was hard to catch for punishment dey would make 'em wear +ball and chains. De ball was 'bout de size of de head and made of +lead. + +On Sunday mornings before breakfast our Mistress would call us +together, read de Bible and show us pictures of de Devil in de Bible +and tell us dat if we was not good and if we would steal and tell lies +dat old Satan would git us. + +Close to our Master's plantation lived several families of old "poor +white trash" who would steal me Master's hogs and chickens and come +and tell me Mistress dat dey seen some of de slaves knock one of dere +hogs in de head. Dis continued up till Master returned from de War and +caught de old white trash stealing his hogs. De niggers did at times +steal Master's hogs and chickens, and I would put biscuits and pieces +of chicken in a sack under me dress dat hung from me waist, as I +waited de table for me Mistress, and later would slip off and eat it +as dey never gave de slaves none of dis sort of food. + +We had church Sundays and our preacher Rev. Pat Williams would preach +and our Master and family and other nearby white neighbors would +ofttime attend our services. De patrollers wouldn't allow de slaves to +hold night services, and one night dey caught me mother out praying. +Dey stripped her naked and tied her hands together and wid a rope tied +to de hand cuffs and threw one end of de rope over a limb and tied de +other end to de pommel of a saddle on a horse. As me mother weighed +'bout 200, dey pulled her up so dat her toes could barely touch de +ground and whipped her. Dat same night she ran away and stayed over a +day and returned. + +During de fall months dey would have corn shucking and cotton pickings +and would give a prize to de one who would pick de highest amount of +cotton or shuck de largest pile of corn. De prize would usually be a +suit of clothes or something to wear and which would be given at some +later date. + +We could only have dances during holidays, but dances was held on +other plantations. One night a traveler visiting me Master and wanted +his boots shined. So Master gave de boots to one of de slaves to shine +and de slave put de boots on and went to a dance and danced so much +dat his feet swelled so dat when he returned he could not pull 'em +off. + +De next morning as de slave did not show up with de boots dey went to +look for him and found him lying down trying to pull de boots off. He +told his Master dat he had put de boots on to shine 'em and could not +pull 'em off. So Master had to go to town and buy de traveler another +pair of boots. Before he could run away de slave was beaten wid 500 +lashes. + +De War dat brought our freedom lasted about two years. Me Master went +and carried one of de slaves for a servant. He was kind and good and +from dat day on he never whipped another slave nor did he allow any of +his slaves whipped. Dis time lasted from January to June de 19th when +we was set free in de State of Texas. + +Lincoln and Davis both died short of promise. I means dat dey both +died before dey carried out dere plans and promises for freeing de +slaves. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +MORRIS HILLYER +Age 84 yrs. +Alderson, Okla. + + +My father was Gabe Hillyer and my mother was Clarisay Hillyer, and our +home was in Rome, Georgia. Our owner was Judge Hillyer. He was de last +United States senator to Washington, D. C., before de War. + +My mother died when I was only a few days old and the only mother I +ever knew was Judge Hillyer's wife, Miss Jane. Her nine children were +all older than I was and when mother died Miss Jane said mother had +raised her children and she would raise hers. So she took us into her +house and we never lived at de quarters any more. I had two sisters, +Sally and Sylvia, and we had a room in de Big House and sister Sally +didn't do nothing else but look after me. I used to stand with my +thumb in my mouth and hold to Miss Jane's apron while she knitted. + +When Judge Hillyer was elected he sold out his farm and gave his +slaves to his children. He owned about twelve or fourteen slaves at +this time. He gave me and my sister Sylvia to his son, Dr. Hillyer, +and my father to another one of his sons who was studying law. Father +stayed with him and took care of him until he graduated. Father +learned to be a good carpenter while he lived with George Hillyer. +George never married until after de War. + +Dr. Hillyer lived on a big plantation but he practiced medicine all de +time. He didn't have much time to look after de farm but he had good +overseers and they sure didn't beat his slaves or mistreat 'em in any +way. Dr. Hillyer married a rich girl, Miss Mary Cooley, and her father +gave her fifteen slaves when she married and Judge Hillyer gave him +five so he had a purty good start from de first and he knowed how to +make money so he was a wealthy man when de Rebellion started. + +My sister and I didn't know how to act when we was sent out there +among strangers. We had to live in de quarters just like de other +niggers, and we didn't especially like it. I guess I was a sort of bad +boy. + +There was several more boys about my age and we didn't have any work +to do but just busy ourselves by getting into mischief. We'd ride de +calves, chase de pigs, kill de chickens, break up hens nests, and in +fact do most everything we hadn't ought to do. Finally they put us to +toting water to de field hands, minding de gaps, taking de cows to +pasture and as dat kept us purty busy we wasn't so bad after dat. + +My happiest days was when I was with de old Judge and Miss Jane. I can +sit here and think of them old times and it seems like it was just +yesterday dat it all happened. He was a great hand to go to town every +day and lounge around wid his cronies. I used to go with him, and my +how they would argue. Sometimes they would get mad and shake their +canes in each other's faces. I guess they was talking politics. + +Our old Master liked cats better than any man I ever saw, and he +always had five or six that followed him about de place like dogs. +When he went to eat they was always close to him and just as soon as +he finished he would always feed them. When he was gone us boys used +to throw at his cats or set de dogs on 'em. We was always careful dat +no one saw us for if he had known about it he would a-whipped us and +no mistake. I wouldn't a-blamed him either, for I like cats now. I +think they are lots of company. + +He was a typical Southern gentleman, medium sized, and wore a Van Dyke +beard. He never whipped his slaves, and he didn't have a one dat +wouldn't a-died for him. + +Judge Hillyer had one son, William, dat wouldn't go to college. He +made fun of his brothers for going to school so long, and said that he +would be ashamed to go and stay five or six years. After de War he +settled down and studied law in Judge Akin's office and opened a +office in Athens, Georgia, and he made de best lawyer of them all. + +Us boys used to go hunting with Master William. He hunted rabbits, +quails, squirrels, and sometimes he would kill a deer. He hunted +mostly with dogs. He never used a gun but very little. Lead was so +scarce and cost so much dat he couldn't afford to waste a bullet on +rabbits or snakes. He made his own bullets. The dogs would chase a +rabbit into a hollow tree and we'd take a stick and twist him out. +Sometimes we'd have nearly all de hide twisted off him when we'd git +him out. + +Old Judge Hillyer smoked a pipe with a long stem. He used to give me +ten cents a day to fill it for him. He told me I had to have $36 at +the end of the year, but I never made it. There was a store right +close to us and I'd go down there and spend my money for lemon stick +candy, ginger cakes, peanuts, and firecrackers. Old Master knowed I +wouldn't save it, and he didn't care if I did spent it for it was mine +to do with just as I pleased. + +Every time a circus come to town I'd run off and they wouldn't see me +again all day. Seemed like I just couldn't help it. I wouldn't take +time to git permission to go. One time to punish me for running off he +tied me up by my thumbs, and I had to stay home while de rest went. I +didn't dare try to git loose and run off for I knowed I'd git my +jacket tanned if I did. Old Master never laid his hand on me, but I +knowed he would if I didn't do as he told me. He never told us twice +to do anything either. + +Coins had curious names in them days. A dime was called a thrip. +Fourpen was about the same value as three cents or maybe a little +more. It took three of 'em to make a thrip. There was all sorts of +paper money. + +Every first Tuesday slaves were brought in from Virginia and sold on +de block. De auctioneer was Cap'n Dorsey. E. M. Cobb was de slave +bringer. They would stand de slaves up on de block and talk about what +a fine looking specimen of black manhood or womanhood dey was, tell +how healthy dey was, look in their mouth and examine their teeth just +like they was a horse, and talk about de kind of work they would be +fit for and could do. Young healthy boys and girls brought the best +prices. I guess they figured dat they would grow to be valuable. I +used to stand around and watch de sales take place but it never +entered my mind to be afraid for I knowed old Judge wasn't going to +sell me. I thought I was an important member of his family. + +Old Judge bought every roguish nigger in the country. He'd take him +home and give him the key to everything on de place and say to help +hisself. Soon as he got all he wanted to eat he'd quit being a rogue. +Old Judge said that was what made niggers steal--they was hungry. + +They used to scare us kids by telling us dat a runaway nigger would +git us. De timber was awful heavy in de river bottoms, and dey was one +nigger dat run off from his master and lived for years in these +bottoms. He was there all during de War and come out after de +surrender. Every man in dat country owned him at some time or other. +His owner sold him to a man who was sure he could catch him--he never +did, so he sold him to another slave owner and so on till nearly +everybody had him. He changed hands about six or seven times. They +would come in droves with blood hounds and hunt for him but dey +couldn't catch him for he knowed them woods too well. He'd feed de +dogs and make friends with 'em and they wouldn't bother him. He lived +on nuts, fruit, and wild game, and niggers would slip food to him. +He'd slip into town and get whiskey and trade it to de niggers for +food. + +Judge Hillyer never 'lowanced his niggers and dey could always have +anything on de place to eat. We had so much freedom dat other slave +owners in our neighborhood didn't like for us to come among their +slaves for they said we was free niggers and would make their slaves +discontented. + +After I went to live with Judge Hillyer's son, Dr. Hillyer, one of my +jobs was to tote the girls books to school every morning. All the +plantation owners had a colored boy dat did that. After we had toted +de books to de school house we'd go back down de road a piece and line +up and have the "gone-bying-est" fight you ever see. We'd have regular +battles. If I got licked in de morning I'd go home and rest up and I'd +give somebody a good licking dat evening. I reckon I caught up with my +fighting for in all my working life I have always worked with gangs of +men of from one to two-hundred and I never struck a man and no man +ever struck me. + +Jim Williams was a patroller, and how he did like to catch a nigger +off de farm without a permit so he could whip him. Jim thought he was +de best man in de country and could whip de best of 'em. One night +John Hardin, a big husky feller, was out late. He met Jim and knowed +he was in for it. Jim said, "John I'm gonna give you a white man's +chance. I'm gonna let you fight me and if you are de best man, well +and good." + +John say, "Master Jim, I can't fight wid you. Come on and give me my +licking, and let me go on home." + +But Jim wouldn't do it, and he slapped John and called him some names +and told him he is a coward to fight him. All dis made John awful mad +and he flew into him and give him the terriblest licking a man ever +toted. He went on home but knew he would git into trouble over it. + +Jim talked around over the country about what he was going to do to +John but everybody told him dat he brought it all on hisself. He +never did try to git another nigger to fight with him. + +Yes, I guess charms keep off bad luck. I have wore 'em but money +always was my best lucky piece. I've made lots of money but I never +made good use of it. + +I was always afraid of ghosts but I never saw one. There was a +graveyard beside de road from our house to town and I always was +afraid to go by it. I'd shut my eyes and run for dear life till I was +past de grave yard. I had heard dat there was a headless man dat +stayed there on cold rainy days or foggy nights he'd hide by de fence +and throw his head at you. Once a man got hit and he fell right down +dead. I believed dat tale and you can imagine how I felt whenever I +had to go past there by myself and on foot. + +I saw lots of Ku Kluxers but I wasn't afraid of them. I knowed I +hadn't done nothing and they wasn't after me. One time I met a bunch +of 'em and one of 'em said, "Who is dis feller?" Another one said, +"Oh, dat's Gabe's foolish boy, come on, don't bother him." I always +did think dat voice sounded natural but I never did say anything about +it. It sounded powerful like one of old Judge's boys. Dey rode on and +didn't bother me and I never was a bit afraid of 'em any more. + +I went to school one month after de War. I never learned much but I +learned to read some where along de road dat I come over. My father +come from Athens, Georgia, and took us away with him. I learned the +carpenter's trade from him. He was so mean to me dat I run away when I +was nineteen. I went back to Rome, Georgia, and got a job with a +bridge gang and spent two years with 'em. I went then to Henderson, +Kentucky, and worked for ten years. There was hundreds of colored +people coming to de mines at Krebs and Alderson and I decided to come +along, too. I never worked in de mines but I did all sorts of +carpentering for them. + +I married in Atoka, Oklahoma, thirty-three years ago. I never had no +children. + +I've made lots of money but somehow it always got away from me. But me +and my wife have our little home here and we are both still able to +work a little, so I guess we are making it all right. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +HAL HUTSON +Age 90 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born at Galveston, Tennessee, October 12, 1847. There were 11 +children: 7 brothers; Andrew, George, Clent, Gilbert, Frank, Mack and +Horace; and 3 girls: Rosie, Marie and Nancy. We were all Hutsons. +Together with my mother and father we worked for the same man whose +name was Mr. Barton Brown, but who we all call Master Brown, and +sometimes Mr. Brown. + +Master Brown had a good weather-board house, two story, with five or +six rooms. They lived pretty well. He had eight children. We lived in +one-room log huts. There were a long string of them huts. We slept on +the floor like hogs. Girls and boys slept together--jest everybody +slept every whar. We never knew what biscuits were! We ate "seconds +and shorts" (wheat ground once) for bread. Ate rabbits, possums baked +with taters, beans, and bean soup. No chicken, fish and the like. My +favorite dish now is beans. + +Master Brown owned about 36 or 40 slaves, I can't recall jest now, and +about 200 acres of ground. There was very little cotton raised in +Galveston--I mean jest some corn. Sometimes we would shuck corn all +night. He would not let us raise gardens of our own, but didn't mind +us raising corn and a few other truck vegetables to sell for a little +spending change. + +I learned to read, write and figger at an early age. Master Brown's +boy and I were the same age you see (14 years old) and he would send +me to school to protect his kids, and I would have to sit up there +until school was out. So while sitting there I listened to what the +white teacher was telling the kids, and caught on how to read, write +and figger--but I never let on, 'cause if I was caught trying to read +or figger dey would whip me something terrible. After I caught on how +to figger the white kids would ask me to teach them. Master Brown +would often say: "My God O'mighty, never do for that nigger to learn +to figger." + +We weren't allowed to count change. If we borrowed a fifty-cent piece, +we would have to pay back a fifty-cent piece--not five dimes or fifty +pennies or ten nickels. + +We went barefooted the year round and wore long shirts split on each +side. All of us niggers called all the whites "poor white trash." The +overseer was nothing but poor white trash and the meanest man that +ever walked on earth. He never did whip me much 'cause I was kind of a +pet. I worked up to the Big House, but he sho' did whip them others. +Why, one day he was beating my mother, and I was too small to say +anything, so my big brother heard her crying and came running, picked +up a chunk and that overseer stopped a'beating her. The white boy was +holding her on the ground and he was whipping her with a long leather +whip. They said they couldn't teach her no sense and she said "I don't +wanna learn no sense." The overseer's name was Charlie Clark. One day +he whipped a man until he was bloody as a pig 'cause he went to the +mill and stayed too long. + +The patroller rode all night and iffen we were caught out later than +10:00 o'clock they would beat us, but we would git each other word by +sending a man round way late at night. Always take news by night. Of +course the Ku Klux Klan didn't come 'til after the war. They was +something like the patrollers. Never heard of no trouble between the +black and whites 'cause them niggers were afraid to resist them. + +My biggest job was keeping flies off'n the table up at the Big House. +When time come to go in for the day we would cut up and dance. I can't +remember any of the songs jest now, but we had some that we sung. We +danced a whole lots and jest sung "made up" songs. + +Old Master would stay up to hear us come in. Of course Saturday +afternoon was a holiday. We didn't work no holidays. Master gave us +one week off for Christmas, and never worked us on Sunday, unless the +"ox was in the ditch." When the slaves got sick we had white doctors, +and we would wait on each other. Drink dock root tea, mullin tea, and +flaxweed tea, but we never wore charms. + +I think it's a good thing that slavery's over. It ought to been over a +good while ago. But its going to be slavery all over again if things +don't git better. But I thank God I've been a Christian for 70 years, +and now is a member of Tabernacle Baptist Church and deacon of the +church, and a Christian 'cause the Bible teaches me to be. + +That war was a awful thing. I used to pack them soldiers water on my +head, and then I worked at Fort Sill and Fort Dawson in Tennessee. +Those Yankees came by nights--got behind those rebels, and took their +hams, drove horses in the houses, killed their chickens and ate up the +rebels food, but the Yanks didn't bother us niggers. + +When freedom come old Master called us all in from the fields and told +us, "All of you niggers are free as frogs now to go wherever you +choose. You are your own man now." We all continued working for him at +$5.00 a month. After the crops were gathered the niggers scattered +out. Some went North--and we would say when they went North that they +had "crossed the water." + +I never married 'till after the War. Married at my mother's house +'cause my wife's mother didn't let us marry at her house, so I sent +Jack Perry after her on a hoss and we had a big dinner--and jest got +married. + +I am the father of nine children, but jest three is living. One is a +dentist in Muskogge, Dr. Andrew Hutson. All of the children are pretty +well read. We never had schools for niggers until after slavery. + +I think Abraham Lincoln was a great man, but I don't know much about +Jeff Davis. Booker T. Washington was a fine man. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +WILLIAM HUTSON +Age 98 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + +When a feller gets as old as me it's a heap easier to forget things +than it is to remember, but I ain't never forgot that old plantation +where good old Doctor Allison lived back there in Georgia long before +the War that brought us slaves the freedom. + +I hear the slaves talking about mean masters when I was a boy. They +wasn't talking about Master Allison though, 'cause he was a good man +and took part for the slaves when any trouble come up with the +overseer. + +The Mistress' name was Louisa (the same name as the gal I was married +to later after the War), and she was just about as mean as was the old +Master good. I was the house boy when I gets old enough to understand +what the Master wants done and I does it just like he says, so I +reckon that's why we always get along together. + +The Master helped to raise my mammy. When I was born he says to her +(my mammy tells me when I gets older): "Cheney", the old Master say, +"that boy is going be different from these other children. I aims to +see that he is. He's going be in the house all the time, he ain't +going work in the fields; he's going to stay right with me all the +time." + +They was about twenty slaves on the plantation but I was the one old +Master called for when he wanted something special for himself. I was +the one he took with him on the trips to town, I was the one who fetch +him the cooling drink after he look about the fields and sometimes I +carry the little black bag when he goes a-doctoring folks with the +misery away off some other farm. + +The Master hear about there going be an auction one day and he +figgered maybe he needed some more slaves if they was good ones, so he +took me and started out early in the morning. It wasn't very far and +we got there early before the auction started. Rockon that was the +first time I ever see any slaves sold. + +They was a long platform made of heavy planks and all the slaves was +lined up on the platform, and they was stripped to the waist, men, +women, and children. One or two of the women folks was bare naked. +They wasn't young women neither, just middle age ones, but they was +built good. Some of them was well greased and that grease covered up +many a scar they'd earned for some foolishment or other. + +The Master don't buy none and pretty soon we starts home. The Master +was riding horseback,--he didn't ever use no buggy 'cause he said that +was the way for folks to travel who was too feeble to sit in the +saddle--and I rode back of him on another horse, but that horse I +rides is just horse while the Master's was a real thoroughbred like +maybe you see on race tracks down in the South. + +That auction kept bothering me all the way back to the plantation. I +kept seeing them little children standing on the flatform (platform), +their mammy and pappy crying hard 'cause their young'uns is being +sold. They was a lot of heartaches even they was slaves and it gets me +worried. + +I asked the Master is he going to have an auction and he jest laugh. I +ain't never sold no slaves yet and I ain't going to, he says. And I +gets easier right then. I kind of hates to think about standing up on +one of them platforms, kinder sorry to leave my old mammy and the +Master, so I was easy in the heart when he talked like that. + +The plantation house was a big frame and the yard was shaded with +trees all around. The Master's children--four boys and two +girls--would play in the yard with me just like I was one of the +family. And we'd go hunting and fishing. There was a creek not far +away and they was good fishing in the stream and squirrels in the +trees. Mighty lot of fun to catch them fishes but more fun when they +is all fried brown and ready for to eat with a piece of hot pone. +Ain't no fish ever taste that good since! + +One thing I sort of ponders about. The old Master don't let us have no +religion meetings and reading and writing is something I learn after +the War. Some of the slaves talk about meeting 'round the country and +wants to have preaching on the plantation. Master says NO. No preacher +around here to tell about the Bible and religion will be just a +puzzlement, the Master say, and we let it go at that. I reckon that +was the only thing he was set against. + +That and the Yankees. The Master went to the War and stayed 'til it +was most over. He was a mighty sick man when he come back to the old +place, but I was there waiting for him just like always. All the time +he was away I take care around the house. That's what he say for me to +do when he rides away to fight the Yankees. Lot's of talk about the +War but the slaves goes right on working just the same, raising cotton +and tobacco. + +The slaves talk a heap about Lincoln and some trys to run away to the +North. Don't hear much about Jeff Davis, mostly Lincoln. He give us +slaves the freedom but we was better off as we was. + +The day of freedom come around just [HW: like] any other day, except +the Master say for me to bring up the horses, we is going to town. +That's when he hears about the slaves being free. We gets to the town +and the Master goes into the store. It's pretty early but the streets +was filled with folks talking and I wonder what makes the Master in +such a hurry when he comes out of the store. + +He gets on his horse and tells me to follow fast. When we gets back to +the plantation he sounds the horn calling the slaves. They come in +from the fields and meet 'round back of the kitchen building that +stood separate from the Master's house. They all keeps quiet while the +Master talks: "You-all is free now, and all the rest of the slaves is +free too. Nobody owns you now and nobody going to own you anymore!" +That was good news, I reckon, but nobody know what to do about it. + +The crops was mostly in and the Master wants the folks to stay 'til +the crop is finished. They talk about it the rest of that day. They +wasn't no celebration 'round the place, but they wasn't no work after +the Master tells us we is free. Nobody leave the place though. Not +'til in the fall when the work is through. Then some of us go into the +town and gets work 'cause everybody knows the Allison slaves was the +right kind of folks to have around. + +That was the first money I earn and then I have to learn how to spend +it. That was the hardest part 'cause the prices was high and the wages +was low. + +Then I moves on and meets the gal that maybe I been looking for, +Louisa Baker, and right away she takes to me and we is married. Ain't +been no other woman but her and she's waiting for me wherever the dead +waits for the living. + +I reckon she won't have so long to wait now, even if I is feeling +pretty spry and got good use of the feets and hands. Ninety-eight +years brings a heap of wear and some of these days the old body'll +need a long time rest and then I'll join her for all the time. + +I is ready for the New Day a-coming! + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +MRS. ISABELLA JACKSON +Age 79 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + +"Boom ... Boom! Boom ... Boom!" That's the way the old weaver go all +day long when my sister, Margaret, is making cloth for the slaves down +on old Doc Joe Jackson's plantation in Louisiana. + +That was near the little place of Bunker, and its my birthplace, and I +guess where all Mammy's children were born because she was never sold +but once and nobody but the old Doc ever did own her after she come to +his place. + +He always say couldn't nobody get work out of Mammy but him. I guess +that's just his foolery 'cause if she ain't no good the Old Doc most +likely sell her to some of them white folks in Texas. + +That's what they done to them mean, no account slaves--just send them +to Texas. Them folks sure knew how for to handle 'em! + +But I was talking about my sister, Margaret. I can still see her +weaving the cloth--Boom!... Boom!--and she hear that all the day and +get mighty tired. Sometimes she drop her head and go to sleep. The +Mistress get her then sure. Rap her on the head with almost anything +handy, but she hit pretty easy, just trying to scare her that's all. + +The old Master though, he ain't so easy as that. The whippings was +done by the master and the overseer just tell the old Doc about the +troubles, like the old Doc say: + +"You just watch the slaves and see they works and works hard, but +don't lay on with the whip, because I is the only one who knows how to +do it right!" + +Maybe the old Master was sickened of whippings from the stories the +slaves told about the plantation that joined ours on the north. + +If they ever was a living Devil that plantation was his home and the +owner was It! That's what the old slaves say, and when I tell you +about it see if I is right. + +That man got so mean even the white folks was scared of him, +'specially if he was filled with drink. That's the way he was most of +the time, just before the slaves was freed. + +All the time we hear about slaves on that place getting whipped or +being locked in the stock--that one of them things where your head and +hands is fastened through holes in a wide board, and you stands there +all the day and all the night--and sometimes we hears of them staying +in the stock for three-four weeks if they trys to run away to the +north. + +Sometimes we hears about some slave who is shot by that man while he +is wild with the drink. That's what I'm telling about now. + +Don't nobody know what made the master mad at the old slave--one of +the oldest on the place. Anyway, the master didn't whip him; instead +of that he kills him with the gun and scares the others so bad most of +'em runs off and hides in the woods. + +The drunk master just drags the old dead slave to the graveyard which +is down in the corner away from the growing crops, and hunts up two of +the young boys who was hiding in the barn. He takes them to dig the +grave. + +The master stands watching every move they make, the dead man lays +there with his face to the sky, and the boys is so scared they could +hardly dig. The master keeps telling them to hurry with the digging. + +After while he tells them to stop and put the body in the grave. They +wasn't no coffin, no box, for him. Just the old clothes that he wears +in the fields. + +But the grave was too short and they start to digging some more, but +the master stop them. He says to put back the body in the grave, and +then he jumps into the grave hisself. Right on the dead he jumps and +stomps 'til the body is mashed and twisted to fit the hole. Then the +old nigger is buried. + +That's the way my Mammy hears it and told it to us children. She was a +Christian and I know she told the truth. + +Like I said, Mammy was never sold only to Master Jackson. But she's +seen them slave auctions where the men, women and children was +stripped naked and lined up so's the buyers could see what kind of +animals they was getting for their money. + +My pappy's name was Jacob Keller and my mother was Maria. They's both +dead long ago, and I'm waiting for the old ship Zion that took my +Mammy away, like we use to sing of in the woods: + + "It has landed my old Mammy, + It has landed my old Mammy, + Get on board, Get on board, + 'Tis the Old Ship of Zion-- + Get on board!" + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +NELLIE JOHNSON + + +I don't know how old I is, but I is a great big half grown gal when +the time of the War come, and I can remember how everything look at +that time, and what all the people do, too. + +I'm pretty nigh to blind right now, and all I can do is set on this +little old front porch and maybe try to keep the things picked up +behing my grandchild and his wife, because she has to work and he is +out selling wood most of the time. + +But I didn't have to live in any such a house during the time I was +young like they is, because I belonged to old Chief Rolley McIntosh, +and my pappy and mammy have a big, nice, clean log house to live in, +and everything round it look better than most renters got these days. + +We never did call old Master anything but the Chief or the General for +that's what everybody called him in them days, and he never did act +towards us like we was slaves, much anyways. He was the mikko of the +Kawita town long before the War and long before I was borned, and he +was the chief of the Lower Creeks even before he got to be the chief +of all the Creeks. + +But just at the time of the War the Lower Creeks stayed with him and +the Upper Creeks, at least them that lived along to the south of where +we live, all go off after that old man Gouge, and he take most of the +Seminole too. I hear old Tuskenugge, the big man with the Seminoles, +but I never did see him, nor mighty few of the Seminoles. + +My mammy tells me old General ain't been living in that Kawita town +very many years when I was borned. He come up there from down in the +fork of the river where the Arkansas and the Verdigris run together a +little while after all the last of the Creeks come out to the +Territory. His brother old Chili McIntosh, live down in that forks of +the rivers too, but I don't think he ever move up into that Kawita +town. It was in the narrow stretch where the Verdigris come close to +the Arkansas. They got a pretty good sized white folks town there now +they call Coweta, but the old Creek town was different from that. The +folks lived all around in that stretch between the rivers, and my old +Master was the boss of all of them. + +For a long time after the Civil War they had a court at the new town +called Coweta court, and a school house too, but before I was born +they had a mission school down the Kawita Creek from where the town +now is. + +Earliest I can remember about my master was when he come to the slave +settlement where we live and get out of the buggy and show a preacher +all around the place. That preacher named Mr. Loughridge, and he was +the man had the mission down on Kawita Creek before I was born, but at +that time he had a school off at some other place. He git down out the +buggy and talk to all us children, and ask us how we getting along. + +I didn't even know at that time that old Chief was my master, until my +pappy tell me after he was gone. I think all the time he was another +preacher. + +My pappy's name was Jackson McInotsh, and my mammy name was Hagar. I +think old Chief bring them out to the Territory when he come out with +his brother Chili and the rest of the Creek people. My pappy tell me +that old Master's pappy was killed by the Creeks because he signed up +a treaty to bring his folks out here, and old Master always hated that +bunch of Creeks that done that. + +I think old man Gouge was one of the big men in that bunch, and he +fit in the War on the Government side, after he done holler and go on +so about the Government making him come out here. + +Old Master have lots of land took up all around that Kawita place, and +I don't know how much, but a lot more than anybody else. He have it +all fenced in with good rail fence, and all the Negroes have all the +horses and mules and tools they need to work it with. They all live in +good log houses they built themselves, and everything they need. + +Old Master's land wasn't all in one big field, but a lot of little +fields scattered all over the place. He just take up land what already +was a kind of prairie, and the niggers don't have to clear up much +woods. + +We all live around on them little farms, and we didn't have to be +under any overseer like the Cherokee Negroes had lots of times. We +didn't have to work if they wasn't no work to do that day. + +Everybody could have a little patch of his own, too, and work it +between times, on Saturdays and Sundays if he wanted to. What he made +on that patch belong to him, and the old Chief never bothered the +slaves about anything. + +Every slave can fix up his own cabin any way he want to, and pick out +a good place with a spring if he can find one. Mostly the slave houses +had just one big room with a stick-and-mud chimney, just like the poor +people among the Creeks had. Then they had a brush shelter built out +of four poles with a roof made out of brush, set out to one side of +the house where they do the cooking and eating, and sometimes the +sleeping too. They set there when they is done working, and lay around +on corn shuck beds, because they never did use the log house much only +in cold and rainy weather. + +Old Chief just treat all the Negroes like they was just hired hands, +and I was a big girl before I knowed very much about belonging to him. + +I was one of the youngest children in my family; only Sammy and +Millie was younger than I was. My big brothers was Adam, August and +Nero, and my big sisters was Flora, Nancy and Rhoda. We could work a +mighty big patch for our own selves when we was all at home together, +and put in all the work we had to for the old Master too, but after +the War the big children all get married off and took up land of they +own. + +Old Chief lived in a big log house made double with a hall in between, +and a lot of white folks was always coming there to see him about +something. He was gone off somewhere a lot of the time, too, and he +just trusted the Negroes to look after his farms and stuff. We would +just go on out in the fields and work the crops just like they was our +own, and he never come around excepting when we had harvest time, or +to tell us what he wanted planted. + +Sometimes he would send a Negro to tell us to gather up some chickens +or turkeys or shoats he wanted to sell off, and sometimes he would +send after loads of corn and wheat to sell. I heard my pappy say old +Chief and Mr. Chili McIntosh was the first ones to have any wheat in +the Territory, but I don't know about that. + +Along during the War the Negro men got pretty lazy and shiftless, but +my pappy and my big brothers just go right on and work like they +always did. My pappy always said we better off to stay on the place +and work good and behave ourselves because old Master take care of us +that way. But on lots of other places the men slipped off. + +I never did see many soldiers during the War, and there wasn't any +fighting close to where we live. It was kind of down in the bottoms, +not far from the Verdigris and that Gar Creek, and the soldiers would +have bad crossings if the come by our place. + +We did see some whackers riding around sometimes, in little bunches +of about a dozen, but they never did bother us and never did stop. +Some of the Negro girls that I knowed of mixed up with the poor Creeks +and Seminoles, and some got married to them after the War, but none of +my family ever did mix up with them that I knows of. + +Along towards the last of the War I never did see old Chief come +around any more, and somebody say he went down into Texas. He never +did come back that I knows of, and I think he died down there. + +One day my pappy come home and tell us all that the Creek done sign up +to quit the War, and that old Master send word that we all free now +and can take up some land for our own selves or just stay where we is +if we want to. Pappy stayed on that place where he was at until he +died. + +I got to be a big girl and went down to work for a Creek family close +to where they got that Checotah town now. At that time it was just all +a scattered settlement of Creeks and they call it Eufaula town. After +while I marry a man name Joe Johnson, at a little settlement they call +Rentesville. He have his freedmen's allotment close to that place, but +mine is up on the Verdigris, and we move up there to live. + +We just had one child, named Louisa, and she married Tom Armstrong. +They had three-four children, but one was named Ton, and it is him I +live with now. My husband's been dead a long, long time now. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +MS. JOSIE JORDAN +Age 75 yrs. +840 East King St., +Tulsa, Oklahoma. + + +I was born right in the middle of the War on the Mark Lowery +plantation at Sparta, in White County, Tennessee, so I don't know +anything much about them slave days except what my mammy told me long +years ago. 'Course I mean the Civil War, for to us colored folks they +just wasn't no other war as meanful as that one. + +My mother she come from Virginia when a little girl, but never nobody +tells me where at my pappy is from. His name was David Lowery when I +was born, but I guess he had plenty other names, for like my mammy he +was sold lots of times. + +Salina was my mammy's name, and she belonged to a Mister Clark, who +sold her and pappy to Mark Lowery 'cause she was a fighting, +mule-headed woman. + +It wasn't her fault 'cause she was a fighter. The master who owned her +before Mister Clark was one of them white mens who was always whipping +and beating his slaves and mammy couldn't stand it no more. + +That's the way she tells me about it. She just figgured she would be +better off dead and out of her misery as to be whipped all the time, +so one day the master claimed they was something wrong with her work +and started to raise his whip, but mammy fought back and when the +ruckus was over the Master was laying still on the ground and folks +thought he was dead, he got such a heavy beating. + +Mammy says he don't die and right after that she was sold to Mister +Clark I been telling you about. And mammy was full of misery for a +long time after she was carried to Mark Lowery's plantation where at +I was born during of the War. + +She had two children while belonging to Mister Clark and he wouldn't +let them go with mammy and pappy. That's what caused her misery. Pappy +tried to ease her mind but she jest kept a'crying for her babies, Ann +and Reuban, till Mister Lowery got Clark to leave them visit with her +once a month. + +Mammy always says that Mark Lowery was a good master. But he'd heard +things about mammy before he got her and I reckon was curious to know +if they was all true. Mammy says he found out mighty quick they was. + +It was mammy's second day on the plantation and Mark Lowery acted like +he was going to whip her for something she'd done or hadn't, but mammy +knocked him plumb through the open cellar door. He wasn't hurt, not +even mad for mammy says he climbed out the cellar a'laughing, saying +he was only fooling to see if she would fight. + +But mammy's troubles wasn't over then, for Mark Lowery he got himself +a new young wife (his first wife was dead), and mammy was round of the +house most of the time after that. + +Right away they had trouble. The Mistress was trying to make mammy +hurry up with the work and she hit mammy with the broom stick. Mammy's +mule temper boiled up all over the kitchen and the Master had to stop +the fighting. + +He wouldn't whip mammy for her part in the trouble, so the Mistress +she sent word to her father and brothers and they come to Mister +Lowery's place. + +They was going to whip mammy, they was good and mad. Master was good +and mad, too, and he warned 'em home. + +"Whip your own slaves." He told them. "Mine have to work and if +they're beat up they can't do a days work. Get on home--I'll take care +of this." And they left. + +My folks didn't have no food troubles at Mark Lowery's like they did +somewheres else. I remember mammy told me about one master who almost +starved his slaves. Mighty stingy I reckon he was. + +Some of them slaves was so poorly thin they ribs would kinder rustle +against each other like corn stalks a-drying in the hot winds. But +they gets even one hog-killing time, and it was funny too, mammy said. + +They was seven hogs, fat and ready for fall hog-killing time. Just the +day before old master told off they was to be killed something +happened to all them porkers. One of the field boys found them and +come a-telling the master: "The hogs is all died, now they won't be +any meats for the winter." + +When the master gets to where at the hogs is laying, they's a lot of +Negroes standing round looking sorrow-eyed at the wasted meat. The +master asks: "What's the illness with 'em?" + +"Malitis." They tell him, and they acts like they don't want to touch +the hogs. Master says to dress them anyway for they ain't no more meat +on the place. + +He says to keep all the meat for the slave families, but that's +because he's afraid to eat it hisself account of the hogs' got +malitis. + +"Don't you-all know what is malitis?" Mammy would ask the children +when she was telling of the seven fat hogs and seventy lean slaves. +And she would laugh, remembering how they fooled the old master so's +to get all them good meats. + +"One of the strongest Negroes got up early in the morning," Mammy +would explain, "long 'fore the rising horn called the slaves from +their cabins. He skitted to the hog pen with a heavy mallet in his +hand. When he tapped Mister Hog 'tween the eyes with that mallet +'malitis' set in mighty quick, but it was a uncommon 'disease', even +with hungry Negroes around all the time." + +Mammy had me three sisters and a brother while on the Lowery +plantation. They was Lisa, Addie, Alice and Lincoln. It was a long +time after the War and we was all freed before we left old Master +Lowery. + +Stayed right there where we was at home, working in the fields, living +in the same old cabins, just like before the War. Never did have no +big troubles after the War, except one time the Ku Klux Klan broke up +a church meeting and whipped some of the Negroes. + +The preacher was telling about the Bible days when the Klan rode up. +They was all masked up and everybody crawled under the benches when +they shouted: "We'll make you damn niggers wish you wasn't free!" + +And they just about did. The preacher got the worst whipping, blood +was running from his nose and mouth and ears, and they left him laying +on the floor. + +They whipped the women just like the men, but Mammy and the girls +wasn't touched none and we run all the way back to the cabin. Layed +down with all our clothes on and tried to sleep, but we's too scairt +to close our eyes. + +Mammy reckoned old Master Lowery was a-riding with the Klan that +night, else we'd got a flogging too. + +We first moved about a mile from Master Lowery's place and ever week +we'd ask mammy if we children could go see old Master and she'd say: +"Yes, if you-all are good niggers." + +The old Master was always glad to see us children and he would give us +candy and apples and treat us mighty fine. + +The old plantations gone, the old Masters gone, the old slaves is +gone, and I'll be a going some of these days, too, for I been here a +mighty long time and they ain't nobody needs me now 'cause I is too +old for any good. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +"UNCLE" GEORGE G. KING +Age 83 yrs +Tulsa, Oklahoma + + +"Prayers for sale.... Prayers for sale...." Uncle George chants in +sing-song fashion as he roams around Tulsa's Greenwood Negro +district--pockets filled with prayer papers that are soiled and dirty +with constant handling. + +But they are potent, Uncle George tells those who fear the coming of +some trouble, disaster or just ordinary misery, and there's a special +prayer for each and every trouble--including one to keep away the bill +collector when the young folks forget to make payments on the radio, +the furniture, the car, or the Spring outfit purchased months ago from +the credit clothier. + +Its all in the Bible and the Bible is his workshop--'cause folks don't +know how to pray. + +He's mighty old, is Uncle George King, and he'll tell you that he was +born on two-hundred acres of Hell, but the whitefolks called it Samuel +Roll's plantation (six miles N.E. of Lexington, South Carolina). + +Kinder small for a plantation, Uncle George explains, but plenty room +for that devil overseer to lay on the lash, and plenty room for the +old she-devil Mistress to whip his mammy til' she was just a piece of +living raw meat! + +The old Master talked hard words, but the Mistress whipped. Lot's of +difference, and Uncle George ought to know, 'cause he's felt the lash +layed on pretty heavy when he was no older than kindergarten children +of today. + +The Mistress owned the slaves and they couldn't be sold without her +say-so. That's the reason George was never sold, but the Master once +tried to sell him 'cause the beatings was breaking him down. Old +Mistress said "No", and used it for an excuse to whip his Mammy. Uncle +George remembers that, too. + +They crossed her wrists and tied them with a stout cord. They made her +bend over so that her arms was sticking back between her legs and +fastened the arms with a stick so's she couldn't straighten up. + +He saw the Mistress pull his Mammy's clothes over her head so's the +lash would reach the skin. He saw the overseer lay on the whip with +hide busting blows that left her laying, all a shiver, on the ground, +like a wounded animal dying from the chase. + +He saw the Mistress walk away, laughing, while his Mammy screamed and +groaned--the old Master standing there looking sad and wretched, like +he could feel the blows on Mammy's bared back and legs as much as she. + +The Mistress was a great believer in the power of punishment, and +Uncle George remembers the old log cabin jail built before the War, +right on the plantation, where runaway slaves were stowed away 'till +they would promise to behave themselves. + +The old jail was full up during most of the War. Three runaway slaves +were still chained to its floor when the Master gave word the Negroes +were free. + +They were Prince, Sanovey (his wife), and Henry, who were caught and +whipped by the patrollers, and then brought back to the plantation for +another beating before being locked in jail. + +The Mistress ordered them chained, and the overseer would come every +morning with the same question: "Will you niggers promise not to +runaway no more?" + +But they wouldn't promise. One at a time the overseer would loosen the +chains, and lead them from the jail to cut them with powerful blows +from the lash, then drag them back to be chained until the next day +when more lickings were given 'cause they wouldn't promise. + +The jail was emptied on the day Master Roll called together all the +men, women and children to tell them they wasn't slaves no more. Uncle +George tells it this way: + +"The Master he says we are all free, but it don't mean we is white. +And it don't mean we is equal. Just equal for to work and earn our own +living and not depend on him for no more meats and clother." [TR: clothes?] + +Food was scarce before the War; it was worse after the shooting and +killing was over, and Uncle George says: "There wasn't no corn bread, +no bacon--just trash eating trash, like when General Sherman marched +down through the country taking everything the soldiers could lug +away, and burning all along the way. + +"Wasn't nothing to eat after he march by. Darkies search 'round the +barns, maybe find some grains of corn in the manure, and they'd parch +the grains--nothing else to eat, except sometimes at night Mammy would +skit out and steal scraps from the Master's house for the children. + +"She had lots of hungry mouths, too. They was seven of us then, six +boys and a girl, Eliza. The boys was Wesley, Simeon, Moses, Peter, +William and me, George. This pappy's name was Griffin. + +"But they was other pappys (Mammy told him) when Eva was born long +before any of us, and Laura come next, but from a white daddy. Mammy +lost them when she was sold around on the markets. + +"The Klan they done lots of riding round the country. One night the +come down to the old slave quarters where the cabins is all squared +round each other, and called everybody outdoors. They's looking for +two women. + +"They picks 'em out of the crowd right quick and say they been with +white men. Says their children is by white men, and they're going to +get whipped so's they'll remember to stay with their own kind. The +women kick and scream, but the mens grab them and roll them over a +barrel and let fly with the whip." + +It was a long time after the Civil War that Uncle George got his first +schooling or attended regular church meetings. Like he says: + +"Getting up at four o'clock in the morning, hoeing in the fields all +day, doing chores when they come in from the fields, and then piddling +with the weaver 'til nine or ten every night--it just didn't leave no +time for reading and such, even if we was allowed to." + +And religion, that came later too, for during the old plantation days +Uncle George's white folks didn't think a Negro needed religion--there +wasn't a Heaven for Negroes anyhow. + +Finally, though, the Master gave them right to hold meetings on the +plantation, and old Peter Coon was the preacher. The overseer was +there with guards to keep the Negroes from getting too much riled up +when old Peter started talking about Paul or some of the things in the +Old Testament. That's all he would talk about; nothing 'bout Jesus, +just Paul and the Old Testament. + +His Mammy went to every meeting. Like he says: "She knew them good +things was good for her children and she told us about the Bible." + +Like his old Mammy, Uncle George is a firm believer in the power of +the word. "Prayers are saving!" Uncle George says, "But they's lots of +folks' don't know how to pray." + +That's why he has prayers for sale--and he knows they are never +failing, "If you tack 'em up on the wall and say 'em over and over +every day they's sure to be answered." + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + +MARTHA KING +Age 85 yrs. +McAlester, Oklahoma + + + "They hung Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree! + They hung Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree! + They hung Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree! + While we go marching on!" + +Dat was de song de Yankees sang when they marched by our house. They +didn't harm us in any way. I guess de War was over then 'cause a few +days after dat old Master say, "Matt", and I say, "Suh?" He say, "Come +here. You go tell Henry I say come out here and to bring the rest of +the niggers with him." I went to the north door and I say, "Henry, +Master Willis say ever one of you come out here." We all went outside +and line up in front of old Master. He say, "Henry". Henry say, "Yes +sah". Old Master say, "Every one of you is free--as free as I am. You +all can leave or stay 'round here if you want to." + +We all stayed on for a long time 'cause we didn't have no other home +and didn't know how to take keer of ourselves. We was kind of scared I +reckon. Finally I heard my mother was in Walker County, Alabama, and I +left and went to live with her. + +My mother was Harriet Davis and she was born in Virginia. I don't know +who my father was. My grandmother was captured in Africa when she was +a little girl. A big boat was down at the edge of a bay an' the people +was all excited about it an' some of the bravest went up purty close +to look at it. The men on the boat told them to come on board and they +could have the pretty red handkerchiefs, red and blue beads and big +rings. A lot of them went on board and the ship sailed away with them. +My grandmother never saw any of her folks again. + +When I was about five years old they brought my grandmother, my mother +and my two aunts and two uncles to Tuskaloosa from Fayettesville, +Alabama. We crossed a big river on a ferry boat. They put us on the +"block" and sold us. I can remember it well. A white man "cried" me +off just like I was a animal or varmint or something. He said, "Here's +a little nigger, who will give me a bid on her. She will make a good +house gal someday." Old man Davis give him $300.00 for me. I don't +know whether I was afraid or not; I don't think I cared just so I had +something to eat. I was allus hungry. Miss Davis' grandmother and one +of my aunts and uncles. Old man Davis bought the rest of us. Uncle +Henry looked after me when he could. I could see my mother once in +awhile but not often. + +I had a purty easy time. I didn't have to work very hard 'till I was +about ten years old. I started working in the field and I had to work +in the weaving room too. We made all our own clothes. I spun and wove +cotton and wool. Old Master bought our shoes. We made fancy cloth. We +could stripe the cloth or check it or leave it plain. We also wove +coverlids and jeans to make mens suits out of. I could still do that +if I had to. + +We all went to church with the white folks. We didn't have no colored +preachers. The niggers would get happy and shout all over the place. +Sometimes they'd fall out doors. + +The Big House was a double log, two story house, not very fine but +awful comfortable. They was four big fireplace rooms downstairs and +two upstairs. Then they was two sort of shed rooms. There was a big +piazza across the front. The kitchen was a way off from the house, +seems like it was 200 feet at least. Our quarters were close by at the +back. He didn't have many slaves and they was nearly all my kinfolks. +There was Aunt Emmy and Phillis, Uncles Henry, Mitchell, Louis and +Andy, and the others were Uncle Logan and Uncle Nathan. They was old +Mistress' slaves when she done married. + +Old Master and old Mistress had three boys, Eli, Billy and Dock. They +had to go to war and old Mistress sho' did cry. She say they might get +killed and she might not see 'em any more. I wonder why all dem white +folks didn't think of that when they sold mothers away from they +chillun. I had to be sold away from my mother. Two of her boys was +badly wounded but they all come back. + +Abe Lincoln done everything he could for the niggers. We lost our best +friend when he got killed. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +GEORGE KYE +Age 110 yrs. +Fort Gibson, Okla. + + +I was born in Arkansas under Mr. Abraham Stover, on a big farm about +twenty miles north of Van Buren. I was plumb grown when the Civil War +come along, but I can remember back when the Cherokee Indians was in +all that part of the country. + +Joe Kye was my pappy's name what he was born under back in Garrison +County, Virginia, and I took that name when I was freed, but I don't +know whether he took it or not because he was sold off by old Master +Stover when I was a child. I never have seen him since. I think he +wouldn't mind good, leastways that what my mammy say. + +My mammy was named Jennie and I don't think I had any brothers or +sisters, but they was a whole lot of children at the quarters that I +played and lived with. I didn't live with mammy because she worked all +the time, and us children all stayed in one house. + +It was a little one room log cabin, chinked and daubed, and you +couldn't stir us with a stick. When we went to eat we had a big pan +and all ate out of it. One what ate the fastest got the most. + +Us children wore homespun shirts and britches and little slips, and +nobody but the big boys wore any britches. I wore just a shirt until I +was about 12 years old, but it had a long tall down to my calves. Four +or five of us boys slept in one bed, and it was made of hewed logs +with rope laced acrost it and a shuck mattress. We had stew made out +of pork and potatoes, and sometimes greens and pot liquor, and we had +ash cake mostly, but biscuits about once a month. + +In the winter time I had brass toed shoes made on the place, and a +cloth cap with ear flaps. + +The work I done was hoeing and plowing, and I rid a horse a lot for +old Master because I was a good rider. He would send me to run chores +for him, like going to the mill. He never beat his negroes but he +talked mighty cross and glared at us until he would nearly scare us to +death sometimes. + +He told us the rules and we lived by them and didn't make trouble, but +they was a neighbor man that had some mean negroes and he nearly beat +them to death. We could hear them hollering in the field sometimes. +They would sleep in the cotton rows, and run off, and then they would +catch the cat-o-nine tails sure nuff. He would chain them up, too, and +keep them tied out to trees, and when they went to the field they +would be chained together in bunches sometimes after they had been +cutting up. + +We didn't have no place to go to church, but old Master didn't care if +we had singing and praying, and we would tie our shoes on our backs +and go down the road close to the white church and all set down and +put our shoes on and go up close and listen to the service. + +Old Master was baptized almost every Sunday and cussed us all out on +Monday. I didn't join the church until after freedom, and I always was +a scoundrel for dancing. My favorite preacher was old Pete Conway. He +was the only ordained colored preacher we had after freedom, and he +married me. + +Old Master wouldn't let us take herb medicine, and he got all our +medicine in Van Buren when we was sick. But I wore a buckeye on my +neck just the same. + +When the War come along I was a grown man, and I went off to serve +because old Master was too old to go, but he had to send somebody +anyways. I served as George Stover, but every time the sergeant would +call out "Abe Stover", I would answer "Here". + +They had me driving a mule team wagon that Old Master furnished, and I +went with the Sesesh soldiers from Van Buren to Texarkana and back a +dozen times or more. I was in the War two years, right up to the day +of freedom. We had a battle close to Texarkana and another big one +near Van Buren, but I never left Arkansas and never got a scratch. + +One time in the Texarkana battle I was behind some pine trees and the +bullets cut the limbs down all over me. I dug a big hole with my bare +hands before I hardly knowed how I done it. + +One time two white soldiers named Levy and Briggs come to the wagon +train and said they was hunting slaves for some purpose. Some of us +black boys got scared because we heard they was going to Squire Mack +and get a reward for catching runaways, so me and two more lit out of +there. + +They took out after us and we got to a big mound in the woods and hid. +Somebody shot at me and I rolled into some bushes. He rid up and got +down to look for me but I was on t'other side of his horse and he +never did see me. When they was gone we went back to the wagons just +as the regiment was pulling out and the officer didn't say nothing. + +They was eleven negro boys served in my regiment for their masters. +The first year was mighty hard because we couldn't get enough to eat. +Some ate poke greens without no grease and took down and died. + +How I knowed I was free, we was bad licked, I reckon. Anyways, we quit +fighting and a Federal soldier come up to my wagon and say: "Whose +mules?" "Abe Stover's mules," I says, and he tells me then, "Let me +tell you, black boy, you are as free now as old Abe Stover his own +self!" When he said that I jumped on top of one of them mules' back +before I knowed anything! + +I married Sarah Richardson, February 10, 1870, and had only eleven +children. One son is a deacon and one grandson is a preacher. I am a +good Baptist. Before I was married I said to the gal's old man, "I'll +go to the mourners bench if you'll let me have Sal," and sure nuff I +joined up just a month after I got her. I am head of the Sunday School +and deacon in the St. Paul Baptist church in Muskogee now. + +I lived about five miles from Van Buren until about twelve years ago +when they found oil and then they run all the negroes out and leased +up the land. They never did treat the negroes good around there +anyways. + +I never had a hard time as a slave, but I'm glad we was set free. +Sometimes we can't figger out the best thing to do, but anyways we can +lead our own life now, and I'm glad the young ones can learn and get +somewhere these days. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937] + +BEN LAWSON +Age 84 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Danville, Illinois. De best I can get at my age I is 84 +years old. My father dey tell me was name Dennis Lawson and died +before I was born. My mother's name was Ann Lawson, who I saw once. I +was given by her to my Mistress, Mrs. Jane Brazier, when a kid and she +was too. My mother raised me, she and her son to manhood. I got no +brothers or sisters to my knowledge. I was de only slave dey had and +dey raised me to be humble and fear dem as a slave and servant. As I +was de only slave I slept in de same room wid my Mistress and her son +who was grown, her husband and father being dead. + +I worked on the farm doing general farm work, hoeing, plowing, +harvesting the crop of wheat, corn, barley, oats, rice, peas, etc. To +make and harvest the crops dey would hire poor white help and as dey +was grown and I was a lad, dey kept me in a strain in order to keep up +wid dem for if I didn't it was just too bad for my back. So's dere +would be work for me to do during the bad days of winter dey built a +pen under a shed and dey would lay a cloth on de ground covering the +ground in the pen and wid small mesh wire on top of de pen on which de +wheat was laid and wid a wooden maul I would pounder out wheat all day +long, even though dey could have thrashed it as dey did de biggest +part of it. + +At meal time dey would give me what was left of de scraps off dey +table in a plate, which I would eat most de time on de back porch in +warm weather and in de kitchen in winter. + +For summer I wore a lowell shirt and for winter I wore de same old +lowell shirt only wid outing slips and a pair of brogan shoes or a +pair of old shoes dat was thrown away by my Mistress' son. + +Their house was a 3-room log house unpainted, wid only one bed room +and a dining room and kitchen. + +The plantation had 'bout 160 acres and was worked by my Mistress' son +and myself plus poor white hired help, my being de only slave. + +I was treated most harshly 'mongst a group of just white people and +who seemed to think me de old work ox for all de hardest work. De +nearest other Negro slaves were 'bout 15 or 20 miles from me. + +When I was grown I ran away one night and walked and rode de rods +under stage coaches to Paducah, Kentucky. I got me a job and worked as +a roustabout on a boat where I learned to gamble wid dice. I fought +and gambled all up and down de Mississippi River, and in de course of +time I had 'bout $3,000, but I lost it. + +I don't know de month or de year I was born in but I can 'member de +sinking of de biggest circus show in de Mississippi River at Mobile, +Alabama when I was 10 to 14 years old, I ain't sure which. + +There wasn't no children for me to play with and it seem like I never +was a child but was just always a man. I wasn't never told dat I was +free, and I didn't know nothing 'bout de War much dat brought my +freedom. Dey kept all of dat away from me and I couldn't read or write +so I didn't know. + +I've been married only once. My wife is 54 years old, and her name is +Hattie Lawson. We have no children. Since we married after freedom +there wasn't nothing unusual at our wedding. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +MARY LINDSAY +Age 91 yrs. +Tulsa, Oklahoma. + + +My slavery days wasn't like most people tell you about, 'cause I was +give to my young Mistress and sent away to Texas when I was jest a +little girl, and I didn't live on a big plantation a very long tine. + +I got an old family Bible what say I was born on September 20, in +1846, but I don't know who put de writing in it unless it was my +mammy's mistress. My mammy had de book when she die. + +My mammy come out to the Indian country from Mississippi two years +before I was born. She was the slave of a Chickasaw part-breed name +Sobe Love. He was the kinsfolks of Mr. Benjamin Love, and Mr. Henry +Love what bring two big bunches of the Chickasaws out from Mississippi +to the Choctaw country when the Chickasaws sign up de treaty to leave +Mississippi, and the whole Love family settle 'round on the Red River +below Fort Washita. There whar I was born. + +My mammy say dey have a terrible hard time again the sickness when +they first come out into that country, because it was low and swampy +and all full of cane brakes, and everybody have the smallpox and the +malaria and fever all the time. Lots of the Chickasaw families nearly +died off. + +Old Sobe Love marry her off to a slave named William, what belong to a +full-blood Chickasaw man name Chick-a-lathe, and I was one of de +children. + +De children belong to the owner of the mother, and me and my brother +Franklin, what we called "Bruner", was born under the name of Love and +then old Master Sobe bought my pappy William, and we was all Love +slaves then. My mammy had two more girls, name Hatty and Rena. + +My mammy name was Mary, and I was named after her. Old Mistress name +was Lottie, and they had a daughter name Mary. Old Master Sobe was +powerful rich, and he had about a hundred slaves and four or five big +pieces of that bottom land broke out for farms. He had niggers on all +the places, but didn't have no overseers, jest hisself and he went +around and seen that everybody behave and do they work right. + +Old Master Sobe was a mighty big man in the tribe, and so was all his +kinfolks, and they went to Fort Washita and to Boggy Depot all the +time on business, and leave the Negroes to look after old Mistress and +the young daughter. She was almost grown along about that time, when I +can first remember about things. + +'Cause my name was Mary, and so was my mammy's and my young Mistress' +too. Old Master Sobe called me Mary-Ka-Chubbe to show which Mary he +was talking about. + +Miss Mary have a black woman name Vici what wait on her all the time, +and do the carding and spinning and cooking 'round the house, and Vici +belong to Miss Mary. I never did go 'round the Big House, but jest +stayed in the quarters with my mammy and pappy and helped in the field +a little. + +Then one day Miss Mary run off with a man and married him, and old +Master Sobe nearly went crazy! The man was name Bill Merrick, and he +was a poor blacksmith and didn't have two pair of britches to his +name, and old Master Sobe said he jest stole Miss Mary 'cause she was +rich, and no other reason. 'Cause he was a white man and she was +mostly Chickasaw Indian. + +Anyways old Master Sobe wouldn't even speak to Mr. Bill, and wouldn't +let him set foot on the place. He jest reared and pitched around, and +threatened to shoot him if he set eyes on him, and Mr. Bill took Miss +Mary and left out for Texas. He set up a blacksmith shop on the big +road between Bonham and Honey Grove, and lived there until he died. + +Miss Mary done took Vici along with her, and pretty soon she come back +home and stay a while, and old Master Sobe kind of soften up a little +bit and give her some money to git started on, and he give her me too. + +Dat jest nearly broke my old mammy's and pappy's heart, to have me +took away off from them, but they couldn't say nothing and I had to go +along with Miss Mary back to Texas. When we git away from the Big +House I jest cried and cried until I couldn't hardly see, my eyes was +so swole up, but Miss Mary said she gwine to be good to me. + +I ask her how come Master Sobe didn't give her some of the grown boys +and she say she reckon it because he didn't want to help her husband +out none, but jest wanted to help her. If he give her a man her +husband have him working in the blacksmith shop, she reckon. + +Master Bill Merrick was a hard worker, and he was more sober than most +the men in them days, and he never tell me to do nothing. He jest let +Miss Mary tell me what to do. They have a log house close to the shop, +and a little patch of a field at first, but after awhile he git more +land, and then Miss Mary tell me and Vici we got to help in the field +too. + +That sho' was hard living then! I have to git up at three o'clock +sometimes so I have time to water the hosses and slop the hogs and +feed the chickens and milk the cows, and then git back to the house +and git the breakfast. That was during the times when Miss Mary was +having and nursing her two children, and old Vici had to stay with her +all the time. Master Bill never did do none of that kind of work, but +he had to be in the shop sometimes until way late in the night, and +sometimes before daylight, to shoe peoples hosses and oxen and fix +wagons. + +He never did tell me to do that work, but he never done it his own +self and I had to do it if anybody do it. + +He was the slowest one white man I ever did see. He jest move 'round +like de dead lice falling off'n him all the time, and everytime he go +to say anything he talk so slow that when he say one word you could +walk from here to way over there before he say de next word. He don't +look sick, and he was powerful strong in his arms, but he act like he +don't feel good jest the same. + +I remember when the War come. Mostly by the people passing 'long the +big road, we heard about it. First they was a lot of wagons hauling +farm stuff into town to sell, and then purty soon they was soldiers on +the wagons, and they was coming out into the country to git the stuff +and buying it right at the place they find it. + +Then purty soon they commence to be little bunches of mens in soldier +clothes riding up and down the road going somewhar. They seem like +they was mostly young boys like, and they jest laughing and jollying +and going on like they was on a picnic. + +Then the soldiers come 'round and got a lot of the white men and took +them off to the War even iffen they didn't want to go. Master Bill +never did want to go, 'cause he had his wife and two little children, +and anyways he was gitting all the work he could do fixing wagons and +shoeing hosses, with all the traffic on de road at that time. Master +Bill had jest two hosses, for him and his wife to ride and to work to +the buggy, and he had one old yoke of oxen and some more cattle. He +got some kind of a paper in town and he kept it with him all the time, +and when the soldiers would come to git his hosses or his cattle he +would jest draw that paper on 'em and they let 'em alone. + +By and by the people got so thick on the big road that they was +somebody in sight all the time. They jest keep a dust kicked up all +day and all night 'cepting when it rain, and they git all bogged down +and be strung all up and down the road camping. They kept Master Bill +in the shop all the time, fixing the things they bust trying to git +the wagons out'n the mud. They was whole families of them, with they +children and they slaves along, and they was coming in from every +place because the Yankees was gitting in their part of the country, +they say. + +We all git mighty scared about the Yankees coming but I don't reckon +they ever git thar, 'cause I never seen none, and we was right on the +big road and we would of seen them. They was a whole lot more soldiers +in them brown looking jeans, round-about jackets and cotton britches +a-faunching up and down the road on their hosses, though. Them hoss +soldiers would come b'iling by, going east, all day and night, and the +two-three days later on they would all come tearing by going west! Dey +acted like dey didn't know whar dey gwine, but I reckon dey did. + +Den Master Bill git sick. I reckon he more wore out and worried than +anything else, but he go down with de fever one day and it raining so +hard Mistress and me and Vici can't neither one go nowhar to git no +help. + +We puts peach tree poultices on his head and wash him off all the +time, until it quit raining so Mistress can go out on de road, and +then a doctor man come from one of the bunches of soldiers and see +Master Bill. He say he going be all right and jest keep him quiet, and +go on. + +Mistress have to tend de children and Vici have to take care of Master +Bill and look after the house, and dat leave me all by myself wid all +the rest of everything around the place. + +I got to feed all the stock and milk the cows and work in the field +too. Dat the first time I ever try to plow, and I nearly git killed, +too! I got me a young yoke of oxens I broke to pull the wagon, 'cause +Vici have to use the old oxens to work the field. I had to take the +wagon and go 'bout ten miles west to a patch of woods Master Bill +owned to git fire wood, 'cause we lived right on a flat patch of +prairie, and I had to chop and haul the wood by myself. I had to git +postoak to burn in the kitchen fireplace and willow for Master Bill to +make charcoal out of to burn in his blacksmith fire. + +Well, I hitch up them young oxen to the plow and they won't follow the +row, and so I go git the old oxens. One of them old oxens didn't know +me and took in after me, and I couldn't hitch 'em up. And then it +begins to rain again. + +After the rain was quit I git the bucket and go milk the cows, and it +is time to water the hosses too, so I starts to the house with the +milk and leading one of the hosses. When I gits to the gate I drops +the halter across my arm and hooks the bucket of milk on my arm too, +and starts to open the gate. The wind blow the gate wide open, and it +slap the hoss on the flank. That was when I nearly git killed! + +Out the hoss go through the gate to the yard, and down the big road, +and my arm all tangled up in the halter rope and me dragging on the +ground! + +The first jump knock the wind out of me and I can't git loose, and +that hoss drag me down the road on the run until he meet up with a +passel of soldiers and they stop him. + +The next thing I knowed I was laying on the back kitchen gallery, and +some soldiers was pouring water on me with a bucket. My arm was broke, +and I was stove up so bad that I have to lay down for a whole week, +and Mistress and Vici have to do all the work. + +Jest as I gitting able to walk 'round here come some soldiers and say +they come to git Master Bill for the War. He still in the bed sick, +and so they leave a parole paper for him to stay until he git well, +and then he got to go into Bonham and go with the soldiers to +blacksmith for them that got the cannons, the man said. + +Mistress take on and cry and hold onto the man's coat and beg, but it +don't do no good. She say they don't belong in Texas but they belong +in the Chickasaw Nation, but he say that don't do no good, 'cause they +living in Texas now. + +Master Bill jest stew and fret so, one night he fever git way up and +he go off into a kind of a sleep and about morning he died. + +My broke arm begin to swell up and hurt me, and I git sick with it +again, and Mistress git another doctor to come look at it. + +He say I got bad blood from it how come I git so sick, and he git out +his knife out'n his satchel and bleed me in the other arm. The next +day he come back and bleed me again two times, and the next day one +more time, and then I git so sick I puke and he quit bleeding me. + +While I still sick Mistress pick up and go off to the Territory to her +pappy and leave the children thar for Vici and me to look after. After +while she come home for a day or two and go off again somewhere else. +Then the next time she come home she say they been having big battles +in the Territory and her pappy moved all his stuff down on the river, +and she home to stay now. + +We git along the best we can for a whole winter, but we nearly starve +to death, and then the next spring when we getting a little patch +planted Mistress go into Bonham and come back and say we all free and +the War over. + +She say, "You and Vici jest as free as I am, and a lot freer, I +reckon, and they say I got to pay you if you work for me, but I ain't +got no money to pay you. If you stay on with me and help me I will +feed and home you and I can weave you some good dresses if you card +and spin the cotton and wool." + +Well, I stayed on, 'cause I didn't have no place to go, and I carded +and spinned the cotton and wool and she make me just one dress. Vici +didn't do nothing but jest wait on the children and Mistress. + +Mistress go off again about a week, and when she come back I see she +got some money, but she didn't give us any of it. + +After while I asked her ain't she got some money for me, and she say +no, ain't she giving me a good home? Den I starts to feeling like I +aint treated right. + +Every evening I git done with the work and go out in the back yard and +jest stand and look off to the west towards Bonham, and wish I was at +that place or some other place. + +Den along come a nigger boy and say he working for a family in Bonham +and he git a dollar every week. He say Mistress got some kinfolks in +Bonham and some of Master Sobe Love's niggers living close to there. + +So one night I jest put that new dress in a bundle and set foot right +down the big road a-walking west, and don't say nothing to nobody! + +Its ten miles into Bonham, and I gits in town about daylight. I keeps +on being afraid, 'cause I con't git it out'n my mind I still belong to +Mistress. + +Purty soon some niggers tells me a nigger name Bruner Love living down +west of Greenville, and I know that my brother Franklin, 'cause we all +called him Bruner. I don't remember how all I gits down to Greenville, +but I know I walks most the way, and I finds Bruner. Him and his wife +working on a farm, and they say my sister Hetty and my sister Rena +what was little is living with my mammy way back up on the Red River. +My pappy done died in time of the War and I didn't know it. + +Bruner taken me in a wagon and we went to my mammy, and I lived with +her until she died and Hetty was married. Then I married a boy name +Henry Lindsay. His people was from Georgia and he live with them way +west at Cedar Mills, Texas. That was right close to Gordonville, on +the Red River. + +We live at Cedar Mills until three my children was born and then we +come to the Creek Nation in 1887. My last one was born here. + +My oldest is named Georgia on account of her pappy. He was born in +Georgia and that was in 1838, so his whitefolks got a book that say. +My next child was Henry. We called him William Henry, after my pappy +and his pappy. Then come Donie, and after we come here we had Madison, +my youngest boy. + +I lives with Henry here on this little place we got in Tulsa. + +When we first come here we got some land for $15 an acre from the +Creek Nation, but our papers said we can only stay as long as it is +the Creek Nation. Then in 1901 comes the allotments, and we found out +our land belong to a Creek Indian, and we have to pay him to let us +stay on it. After while he makes us move off and we lose out all +around. + +But my daughter Donie git a little lot, and we trade it for this place +about thirty year ago, when this town was a little place. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +MRS. MATTIE LOGAN +Age 79 yrs. +Route 5, West Tulsa, Oklahoma. + + +This is a mighty fitting time to be telling about the slave days, for +I'm just finished up celebrating my seventy-nine years of being around +and the first part of my life was spent on the old John B. Lewis +plantation down in old Mississippi. + +Yes, sir! my birthday is just over. September 1 it was and the year +was 1858. Borned on the John B. Lewis plantation just ten mile south +of Jackson in the Mississippi country. Rankin County it was. + +My mother's name was Lucinda, and father's name was Levi Miles. My +mother was part Indian, for her mother was a half-blood Cherokee +Indian from Virginia. + +There was children a-plenty besides me. There was Sally, Julia, +Hubbard, Ada, Ira, Anthony, Henry, Amanda, Mary, John, Lucinda, Daniel +and me, Mattie. That was my family. + +The master's family was a large one, too. Six children was born to the +Master and Mistress. Her name, his first wife, was Jennie, the second +and last was named, Louise. The children was, Rebecca, Mollie, Jennie, +Susie, Silas, and Begerlan. They kind of leaned to females. + +My mother belonged to Mistress Jennie who thought a heap of her, and +why shouldn't she? Mother nursed all Miss Jennie's children because +all of her young ones and my mammy's was born so close together it +wasn't no trouble at all for mammy to raise the whole kaboodle of +them. I was born about the same time as the baby Jennie. They say I +nursed on one breast while that white child, Jennie, pulled away at +the other! + +That was a pretty good idea for the Mistress, for it didn't keep her +tied to the place and she could visit around with her friends most any +time she wanted 'thout having to worry if the babies would be fed or +not. + +Mammy was the house girl and account of that and because her family +was so large, the Mistress fixed up a two room cabin right back of the +Big House and that's where we lived. The cabin had a fireplace in one +of the rooms, just like the rest of the slave cabins which was set in +a row away from the Big House. In one room was bunk beds, just plain +old two-by-fours with holes bored through the plank so's ropes could +be fastened in and across for to hold the corn-shuck mattress. + +My brothers and sisters was allowed to play with the Master's +children, but not with the children who belonged to the field Negroes. +We just played yard games like marbles and tossing a ball. I don't +rightly remember much about games, for there wasn't too much fun in +them days even if we did get raised with the Master's family. We +wasn't allowed to learn any reading or writing. They say if they +catched a slave learning them things they'd pull his finger nails off! +I never saw that done, though. + +Each slave cabin had a stone fireplace in the end, just like ours, and +over the flames at daybreak was prepared the morning meal. That was +the only meal the field negroes had to cook. + +All the other meals was fixed up by an old man and woman who was too +old for field trucking. The peas, the beans, the turnips, the +potatoes, all seasoned up with fat meats and sometimes a ham bone, was +cooked in a big iron kettle and when meal time come they all gathered +around the pot for a-plenty of helpings! Corn bread and buttermilk +made up the rest of the meal. + +Ten or fifteen hogs was butchered every fall and the slaves would get +the skins and maybe a ham bone. That was all, except what was mixed in +with the stews. Flour was given out every Sunday morning and if a +family run out of that before the next week, well, they was just out +that's all! + +The slaves got small amounts of vegetables from the plantation garden, +but they didn't have any gardens of their own. Everybody took what old +Master rationed out. + +Once in a while we had rabbits and fish, but the best dish of all was +the 'possum and sweet potatoes--baked together over red-hot coals in +the fireplace. Now, that was something to eat! + +The Lewis plantation was about three hundred acres, with usually fifty +slaves working on the place. Master Lewis was a trader. He couldn't +sell of our family, for we belonged to Mistress Jennie. Negro girls, +the fat ones who was kinder pretty, was the most sold. Folks wanted +them pretty bad but the Mistress said there wasn't going to be any +selling of the girls who was mammy's children. + +There was no overseer on our place, just the old Master who did all +the bossing. He wasn't too mean, but I've seen him whip Old John. I'd +run in the house to get away from the sight, but I could still hear +Old John yelling, 'Pray, Master! Oh! Pray, Master!', but I guess that +there was more howling than there was hurting at that. + +My uncle Ed Miles run away to the North and joined with Yankees during +the War. He was lucky to get away, for lots of them who tried it was +ketched up by the patrollers. I seen some of them once. They had +chains fastened around their legs, fastened short, too, just long +enough to take a short step. No more running away with them chains +anchoring the feets! + +There wasn't any negro churches close by our plantation. All the +slaves who wanted religion was allowed to join the Methodist church +because that was the Mistress' church. + +A doctor was called in when the slaves would get sick. He'd give pills +for most all the ailments, but once in a while, like when the +children would get the whooping cough, some old negro would try to +cure them with home made remedies. + +The whooping cough cure was by using a land turtle. Cut off his head +and drain the blood into a cup. Then take a lump of sugar and dip in +the blood, eat the sugar and the coughing was supposed to stop. If it +did or not I don't know. + +And that makes me think about another cure they use to tell about. A +cure for mean overseers. And I don't mean kill, just scare him, that's +all. They say the cure was tried on an overseer who worked for Silas +Stien, who was a slave owner living close by the Lewis plantation. + +It seems like this overseer was of the meanest kind, always whipping +the slaves for no reason at all, and the slaves tried to figure out a +way to even up with him by chasing him off the place. + +One of the slaves told how to cure him. Get a King snake and put the +snake in the overseer's cabin. Slip the snake in about, no, not about, +but just exactly nine o'clock at night. Seems like the time was +important, why so, I don't remember now. + +That's what the slaves did. Put in the snake and out went the +overseer. Never no more did he whip the slaves on that plantation +because he wasn't working there no more! When he went, when he went, +or how he went nobody knows, but they all say he went. That's what +counted--he was gone! + +The Yankees didn't come around our plantation during the war. All we +heard was, 'They'll kill all the slaves,' and such hearing was +a-plenty! + +After the war some man come to the plantation and told the field +negroes they was free. But he didn't know about the cabin we lived in +and didn't tell my folks nothing about it. They learned about the +freedom from the old Master. + +That was some days after the man left the place. The Master called my +mother and father into the Big House and told them they was free. Free +like him. But he didn't want my folks to leave and they stayed, stayed +there three year after they was free to go anywhere they wanted. + +The master paid them $200 a month to work for him and that wasn't so +much if you stop to figure there was two grown folks and thirteen +children who could do plenty of work around the place. + +But that money paid for an 80-acre farm my folks bought not far from +the old plantation and they moved onto it three year after the freedom +come. + +I think Lincoln was a mighty good man, and I think Roosevelt is trying +to carry some of the good ideas Lincoln had. Lincoln would have done a +heap more if he had lived. + +The young negroes who are living now are selfish and shiftless. +They're not worth two cents and don't have the respect for other folks +to get along right. That's what I think. + +I been married three times, but no children did I have. The first man +was Frank Morris, the next was Jim White, and the last was John Logan. +All gone. Dead. + +From Mississippi I come to Idabel, Oklahoma, in 1909, two year after +statehood. I moved to Muskogee in 1910, staying there while the times +was good and coming to Tulsa some years ago. + +I'm pretty old and can't work hard anymore, but I manage to get along. +I'm glad to be free and I don't believe I could stand them slavery +days now at all. + +I'm my own boss, get up when I want, go to bed the same way. Nobody to +say this or that about what I do. + +Yes, I'm glad to be free! + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +KIZIAH LOVE +Age 93 +Colbert, Okla. + + +Lawd help us, I sho' remembers all about slavery times for I was a +grown woman, married and had one baby when de War done broke out. That +was a sorry time for some poor black folks but I guess Master Frank +Colbert's niggers was about as well off as the best of 'em. I can +recollect things that happened way back better than I can things that +happen now. Funny ain't it? + +Frank Colbert, a full blood Choctaw Indian, was my owner. He owned my +mother but I don't remember much about my father. He died when I was a +little youngun. My Mistress' name was Julie Colbert. She and Master +Frank was de best folks that ever lived. All the niggers loved Master +Frank and knowed jest what he wanted done and they tried their best to +do it, too. + +I married Isom Love, a slave of Sam Love, another full-blood Indian +that lived on a jining farm. We lived on Master Frank's farm and Isom +went back and forth to work fer his master and I worked ever day fer +mine. I don't 'spect we could of done that way iffen we hadn't of had +Indian masters. They let us do a lot like we pleased jest so we got +our work done and didn't run off. + +Old Master Frank never worked us hard and we had plenty of good food +to eat. He never did like to put us under white overseers and never +tried it but once. A white man come through here and stopped +overnight. He looked 'round the farm and told Master Frank that he +wasn't gitting half what he ought to out of his rich land. He said he +could take his bunch of hands and double his amount of corn and +cotton. + +Master Frank told him that he never used white overseers, that he had +one nigger that bossed around some when he didn't do it hisself. He +also told the white man that he had one nigger named Bill that was +kind of bad, that he was a good worker but he didn't like to be +bothered as he liked to do his own work in his own way. The white boss +told him he wouldn't have any trouble and that he could handle him all +right. + +Old Master hired him and things went very well for a few days. He +hadn't said anything to Bill and they had got along fine. I guess the +new boss got to thinking it was time for him to take Bill in hand so +one morning he told him to hitch up another team before he caught his +own team to go to work. + +Uncle Bill told him that he didn't have time, that he had a lot of +plowing to git done that morning and besides it was customary for +every man to catch his own team. Of course this made the overseer mad +and he grabbed a stick and started cussing and run at Uncle Bill. Old +Bill grabbed a single-tree and went meeting him. Dat white man all on +a sudden turned 'round and run fer dear life and I tell you, he fairly +bust old Red River wide open gitting away from there and nobody never +did see hide nor hair of him 'round to this day. + +Master Colbert run a stage stand and a ferry on Red River and he +didn't have much time to look after his farm and his niggers. He had +lots of land and lots of slaves. His house was a big log house, three +rooms on one side and three on the other, and there was a big open +hall between them. There was a big gallery clean across the front of +the house. Behind the house was the kitchen and the smokehouse. The +smokehouse was always filled with plenty of good meat and lard. They +would kill the polecat and dress it and take a sharp stick and run it +up their back jest under the flesh. They would also run one up each +leg and then turn him on his back and put him on top of the house and +let him freeze all night. The next morning they'd pull the sticks out +and all the scent would be on them sticks and the cat wouldn't smell +at all. They'd cook it like they did possum, bake it with taters or +make dumplings. + +We had plenty of salt. We got that from Grand Saline. Our coffee was +made from parched meal or wheat bran. We made it from dried sweet +potatoes that had been parched, too. + +One of our choicest dishes was "Tom Pashofa", an Indian dish. We'd +take corn and beat it in a mortar with a pestle. They took out the +husks with a riddle and a fanner. The riddle was a kind of a sifter. +When it was beat fine enough to go through the riddle we'd put it in a +pot and cook it with fresh pork or beef. We cooked our bread in a +Dutch oven or in the ashes. + +When we got sick we would take butterfly root and life-everlasting and +boil it and made a syrup and take it for colds. Balmony and queen's +delight boiled and mixed would make good blood medicine. + +The slaves lived in log cabins scattered back of the house. He wasn't +afraid they'd run off. They didn't know as much as the slaves in the +states, I reckon. But Master Frank had a half brother that was as mean +as he was good. I believe he was the meanest man the sun ever shined +on. His name was Buck Colbert and he claimed he was a patroller. He +was sho' bad to whup niggers. He'd stop a nigger and ask him if he had +a pass and even if they did he'd read it and tell them they had stayed +over time and he'd beat 'em most to death. He'd say they didn't have +any business off the farm and to git back there and stay there. + +One time he got mad at his baby's nurse because she couldn't git the +baby to stop crying and he hit her on the head with some fire-tongs +and she died. His wife got sick and she sent for me to come and take +care of her baby. I sho' didn't want to go and I begged so hard for +them not to make me that they sent an older woman who had a baby of +her own so she could nurse the baby if necessary. + +In the night the baby woke up and got to crying and Master Buck called +the woman and told her to git him quiet. She was sleepy and was sort +of slow and this made Buck mad and he made her strip her clothes off +to her waist and he began to whip her. His wife tried to git him to +quit and he told her he'd beat her iffen she didn't shut up. Sick as +as she was she slipped off and went to Master Frank's and woke him up +and got him to go and make Buck quit whipping her. He had beat her so +that she was cut up so bad she couldn't nurse her own baby any more. + +Master Buck kept on being bad till one day he got mad at one of his +own brothers and killed him. This made another one of his brothers mad +and he went to his house and killed him. Everybody was glad that Buck +was dead. + +We had lots of visitors. They'd stop at the stage inn that we kept. +One morning I was cleaning the rooms and I found a piece of money in +the bed where two men had slept. I thought it was a dime and I showed +it to my mammy and she told me it was a five dollar piece. I sho' was +happy fer I had been wanting some hoops fer my skirts like Misstress +had so Mammy said she would keep my money 'til I could send fer the +hoops. My brother got my money from my mammy and I didn't git my hoops +fer a long time. Miss Julie give me some later. + +When me and my husband got married we built us a log cabin about +half-way from Master Frank's house and Master Sam Love's house. I +would go to work at Master Frank's and Isom would go to work at Mister +Sam's. One day I was at home with jest my baby and a runner come by +and said the Yankee soldiers was coming. I looked 'round and I knowed +they would git my chickens. I had 'em in a pen right close to the +house to keep the varmints from gitting 'em so I decided to take up +the boards in the floor and put 'em in there as the wall logs come to +the ground and they couldn't git out. By the time I got my chickens +under the floor and the house locked tight the soldiers had got so +close I could hear their bugles blowing so I jest fairly flew over to +old Master's house. Them Yankees clumb down the chimbley and got every +one of my chickens and they killed about fifteen of Master Frank's +hogs. He went down to their camp and told the captain about it and he +paid him for his hogs and sent me some money for my chickens. + +We went to church all the time. We had both white and colored +preachers. Master Frank wasn't a Christian but he would help build +brush-arbors fer us to have church under and we sho' would have big +meetings I'll tell you. + +One day Master Frank was going through the woods close to where +niggers was having church. All on a sudden he started running and +beating hisself and hollering and the niggers all went to shouting and +saying "Thank the Lawd, Master Frank has done come through!" Master +Frank after a minute say, "Yes, through the worst of 'em." He had run +into a yellow jacket's nest. + + +One night my old man's master sent him to Sherman, Texas. He aimed to +come back that night so I stayed at home with jest my baby. It went to +sleep so I set down on the steps to wait and ever minute I thought I +could hear Isom coming through the woods. All a sudden I heard a +scream that fairly made my hair stand up. My dog that was laying out +in the yard give a low growl and come and set down right by me. He +kept growling real low. + +Directly, right close to the house I heard that scream again. It +sounded like a woman in mortal misery. I run into the house and made +the dog stay outside. I locked the door and then thought what must I +do. Supposing Isom did come home now and should meet that awful thing? +I heard it again. It wasn't more'n a hundred yards from the house. The +dog scratched on the door but I dassent open it to let him in. I +knowed by this time that it was a panther screaming. I turned my table +over and put it against the opening of the fireplace. I didn't aim fer +that thing to come down the chimbley and git us. + +Purty soon I heard it again a little mite further away--it was going +on by. I heard a gun fire. Thank God, I said, somebody else heard it +and was shooting at it. I set there on the side of my bed fer the rest +of the night with my baby in my arms and praying that Isom wouldn't +come home. He didn't come till about nine o'clock the next morning and +I was that glad to see him that I jest cried and cried. + +I ain't never seen many sperits but I've seen a few. One day I was +laying on my bed here by myself. My son Ed was cutting wood. I'd been +awful sick and I was powerful weak. I heard somebody walking real +light like they was barefooted. I said, "Who's dat?" + +He catch hold of my hand and he has the littlest hand I ever seen, and +he say, "You been mighty sick and I want you to come and go with me to +Sherman to see a doctor." + +I say, "I ain't got nobody at Sherman what knows me." + +He say, "You'd better come and go with me anyway." + +I jest lay there fer a minute and didn't say nothing and purty soon he +say, "Have you got any water?" + +I told him the water was on the porch and he got up and went outside +and I set in to calling Ed. He come hurrying and I asked him why he +didn't lock the door when he went out and I told him to go see if he +could see the little man and find out what he wanted. He went out and +looked everywhere but he couldn't find him nor he couldn't even find +his tracks. + +I always keep a butcher-knife near me but it was between the mattress +and the feather bed and I couldn't get to it. I don't guess it would +have done any good though fer I guess it was jest a sperit. + +The funniest thing that ever happened to me was when I was a real +young gal. Master and Miss Julie was going to see one of his sisters +that was sick. I went along to take care of the baby fer Miss Julie. +The baby was about a year old. I had a bag of clothes and the baby to +carry. I was riding a pacing mule and it was plumb gentle. I was +riding along behind Master Frank and Miss Julie and I went to sleep. I +lost the bag of clothes and never missed it. Purty soon I let the baby +slip out of my lap and I don't know how far I went before I nearly +fell off myself and jest think how I felt when I missed that baby! I +turned around and went back and found the baby setting in the trail +sort of crying. He wasn't hurt a mite as he fell in the grass. I got +off the mule and picked him up and had to look fer a log so I could +get back on again. + +Jest as I got back on Master Frank rode up. He had missed me and come +back to see what was wrong. I told him that I had lost the bag of +clothes but I didn't say anything about losing the baby. We never did +find the clothes and I sho' kept awake the rest of the way. I wasn't +going to risk losing that precious baby again! I guess the reason he +didn't cry much was because he was a Indian baby. He was sho' a sweet +baby though. + +Jest before the War people would come through the Territory stealing +niggers and selling 'em in the states. Us women dassent git fur from +the house. We wouldn't even go to the spring if we happened to see a +strange wagon or horsebacker. One of Master Sam Love's women was stole +and sold down in Texas. After freedom she made her way back to her +fambly. Master Frank sent one of my brothers to Sherman on an errand. +After several days the mule come back but we never did see my brother +again. We didn't know whether he run off or was stole and sold. + +I was glad to be free. What did I do and say? Well, I jest clapped my +hands together and said, "Thank God Almighty, I'se free at last!" + +I live on the forty acres that the government give me. I have been +blind for nine years and don't git off my bed much. I live here with +my son, Ed. Isom has been dead for over forty years. I had fifteen +children, but only ten of them are living. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +DANIEL WILLIAM LUCAS +Age 94 yrs. +Red Bird, Okla. + + +I remember them slave days well as it was yesterday, and when I get to +remembering the very first thing comes back to me is the little log +cabin where at I lived when I was a slave boy back 'fore the War. + +Just like yesterday--I see that little old cabin standing on a bit of +hill about a quarter-mile from the Master's brick mansion, and I see +into the cabin and there's the old home-made bed with rope cords +a-holding up the corn shuck bedding where on I use to sleep after +putting in the day at hoeing cotton or following a slow time mule team +down the corn rows 'till it got so dark the old overseer just +naturally had to call it a day. + +And then I see the old baker swinging in the fireplace. That cooked up +the corn pone to go with the fat side meats the Master Doctor (didn't +I tell you the Master was a doctor?) give us for the meals of the week +day. But on a Sunday morning we always had flour bread, excepting +after the War is over and then we is lucky do we get anything. + +Just like yesterday--I hear the old overseer making round of the +cabins every day at four, and I means in the morning, too, when the +night sleep is the best, and the folkses tumbling out of the door +getting ready for the fields. + +All the mens dressed about the same. Just like me. Wearing the grey +jeans with the blue shirt stuck in loose around the belt, brogan shoes +that feels like brakes on the feet about the hot time of day when the +old sun's a-grinning down like he was saying: "work, niggers, work!" +And the overseer is saying the same thing, only we pays more attention +to him 'cause of the whip he shakes around when the going gets kinder +slow down the row. + +Now I sees them getting ready for the slave auction. Many of 'em there +was. The Master Doctor done owned about two hundred slaves and +sometimes he sell some for to beat the bad crops. + +There they'd stand on the wooden blocks, their faces greased and +shiny, their arms and bodies pretty well greased too; seemed like they +looked better and stronger that way, maybe some other reason, I dunno. +And when the auction was over lots of the slaves would try to figger +out when would the next one be and worry some afraid they'd be +standing up there waiting for the buyers to punch and slap to see is +they sound of limb and able to do the days work without loafing down +the rows. + +There's the old white preacher who tried to tell the slaves about the +Lord. He had a mighty hard job sometimes, 'cause of the teaching was +hard to understand. And then--then he'd just seem to be riled with +anger and lay down the law of the Lord between cuss-words that all the +slaves could understand. So finally I guess everybody was religionized +even it was cussed into 'em right from the pulpit! + +That old preacher always makes me think of haunts, 'cause every +evening when I drive up the cows for milking, there's a old, old log +cabin right on the way that I pass every night--and it's so haunted +won't nobody pass it after the darkness covers in the daylight. + +I didn't always get by 'fore then, and the sounds I hear! Like they +was people inside jumping and knocking on the floor, maybe they was +dancing, I dunno. But they was a light in the big room. Wasn't the +moon a-shining through the windows either, 'cause sometimes I would +stop at the gate and say HELLO, then out go the light and the noises +would stop quick, like them haunts was a-scairt as me--and then, then +I run like the old preacher's Devil is after me with all his forks. + +Then along come the War. The slaves would go around from cabin to +cabin telling each other about how mean and cruel was the master or +the overseer, and maybe some of them would make for the North. They +was the unlucky ones, 'cause lots of times they was caught. + +And when the patrollers get 'em caught, they was due for a heavy +licking that would last for a long time. + +The slaves didn't know how to travel. The way would be marked when +they'd start North, but somehow they'd get lost, 'cause they didn't +know one direction from another, they was so scairt. + +Just like yesterday--I remember the close of the War. Nothing exciting +about it down on the plantation. Just the old overseer come around and +say: + +"The Yankees has whipped the Rebels and the War is over. But the Old +Master don't want you to leave. He just wants you to stay right on +here where at is your home. That's what the Master say is best for you +to do." + +That's what I do, but some of them other slaves is kinder filled up +with the idea of freedom and wants to find out is it good or bad, so +they leave and scatter round. + +But I stays, and the Master Doctor he pays me ten dollars every month, +gives me board and my sleeping place just like always, and when I gets +sick there he is with the herb medicine for my ailment and I is well +again. + +It's long after the War before I leaves the old place. And that's when +I gets married in 1885. That was my first licensed wife and we is +married in Holly Springs. Her name was Josephine and we has maybe +eight-ten children, I dunno. + +And I is thankful they ain't none of my children born slaves and have +to remember all them terrible days when we was ruled by the whip--like +I remember it, just like it was yesterday. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + +BERT LUSTER +Age 85 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma + + +I'll be jest frank, I'm not for sho' when I was born, but it was in +1853. Don't know the month, but I was sho' born in 1853 in Watson +County, Tennessee. You see my father was owned by Master Luster and my +mother was owned by Masters Joe and Bill Asterns (father and son). I +can remember when Master Astern moved from Watson County, Tennessee he +brought me and my mother with him to Barnum County Seat, Texas. Master +Astern owned about twelve slaves, and dey was all Astern 'cept Miriah +Elmore's son Jim. He owned 'bout five or six hundred acres of ground, +and de slaves raised and shucked all de corn and picked all de cotton. +De whites folks lived in a big double log house and we slaves lived in +log cabins. Our white folks fed us darkies! We ate nearly ever'thing +dey ate. Dey ate turkey, chickens, ducks, geese, fish and we killed +beef, pork, rabbits and deer. Yes, and possums too. And whenever we +killed beef we tanned the hide and dere was a white man who made shoes +for de white folks and us darkies. I tell you I'm not gonna lie, dem +white folks was good to us darkies. We didn't have no mean overseer. +Master Astern and his son jest told us niggers what to do and we did +it, but 50 miles away dem niggers had a mean overseer, and dey called +him "poor white trash", "old whooser", and sometime "old red neck", +and he would sho' beat 'em turrible iffen dey didn't do jest like he +wanted 'em to. + +Seem like I can hear dem "nigger hounds" barking now. You see whenever +a darky would get a permit to go off and wouldn't come back dey would +put de "nigger hounds" on his trail and run dat nigger down. + +De white women wove and spin our clothes. You know dey had looms, +spins, and weavers. Us darkies would stay up all night sometime +sep'rating cotton from the seed. When dem old darkies got sleepy dey +would prop their eyes open wid straws. + +Sho', we wore very fine clothes for dem days. You know dey dyed the +cloth with poke berries. + +We cradled de wheat on pins, caught the grain, carried it to de mill +and had it ground. Sho', I ate biscuits and cornbread too. Keep +telling you dat we ate. + +We got de very best of care when we got sick. Don't you let nobody +tell you dem white folks tried to kill out dem darkies 'cause when a +darkey took sick dey would send and git de very best doctors round dat +country. Dey would give us ice water when we got sick. You see we put +up ice in saw dust in winter and when a slave got sick dey give him +ice water, sometimes sage tea and chicken gruel. Dey wanted to keep +dem darkies fat so dey could git top price for 'em. I never saw a +slave sold, but my half brother's white folks let him work and buy +hisself. + +I was about 14, and I milked the cows, packed water, seeded cotton, +churned milk up at de Big House and jest first one chore and den +another. My mother cooked up at de Big House. + +Dey was a lot of talk 'bout conjure but I didn't believe in it. Course +dem darkies could do everything to one another, and have one another +scared, but dey couldn't conjure dat overseer and stop him from +beating 'em near to death. Course he didn't flog 'em till dey done +sumping. + +I married my woman, Nannie Wilkerson, 58 years ago. Dat was after +slavery, and I love her, honest to God I does. Course in dem days we +didn't buy no license, we jest got permits from old Master and jumped +over a broom stick and jest got married. + +I sho' did hate when de Yanks come 'cause our white folks was good to +us, and jest take us right along to church with 'em. We didn't work on +Sad'days or Christmas. + +We raised gardens, truck patches and such for spending change. + +I sho' caught hell after dem Yanks come. Befo' de war, you see de +patroller rode all nite but wouldn't bother a darkey iffen he wouldn't +run off. Why dem darkeys would run off I jest couldn't see. + +Dose Yanks treated old master and mistress so mean. Dey took all his +hams, chickens, and drove his cattle out of the pasture, but didn't +bother us niggers honest. Dey drove old master Aster off'n his own +plantation and we all hid in de corn field. + +My mother took me to Greenville, Texas, 'cause my step-pappy was one +of dem half smart niggers round dere trying to preach and de Ku Klux +Klan beat him half to death. + +Dere was some white folks who would take us to church wid 'em--dis dis +[TR: sic] was aftah the war now--and one night we was all sitting up +thar and one old woman with one leg was dah and when dem Klans shot in +amongst us niggers and white folks aunt Mandy beat all of us home. Yes +suh. + +My first two teachers was two white men, and dem Klans shot in de +hotel what dey lived in, but dey had school for us niggers jest de +same. After dat, dose Klans got so bad Uncle Sam sent soljers down +dere to keep peace. + +After de soljers come and run de Klans out we worked hard dat fall and +made good crops. 'Bout three years later I came to Indian Territory in +search of educating my kids. + +I landed here 46 years ago on a farm not far from now Oklahoma City. I +got to be a prosperous farmer. My bale of cotton amongst 5,000 bales +won the blue ribbon at Guthrie, Oklahoma, and dat bale of cotton and +being a good democrat won for me a good job as a clerk on the +Agriculture Board at the State Capitol. All de white folks liked me +and still like me and called me "cotton king." + +I have jest three chillun living. Walter is parcel post clerk here at +de post office downtown. Delia Jenkins, my daughter is a housewife and +Cleo Luckett, my other daughter, a common laborer. + +Have been a christian 20 years. Jest got sorry for my wicked ways. I +am a member of the Church of God. My wife is a member of the Church of +Christ. I'm a good democrat and she is a good republican. + +My fav'rite songs is: "Dark Was the Nite, and Cold the Ground" and +"Couldn't Hear Nobody Pray." + +I'm glad slavery is over, but I don't think dem white folks was +fighting to free us niggers. God freed us. Of course, Abraham Lincoln +was a pretty fine man. Don't know much about Jeff Davis. Never seen +him. Yes, and Booker T. Washington. He was one of the Negro leaders. +The first Negro to represent the Negroes in Washington. He was a great +leader. + +During slavery time never heerd of a cullud man committing 'sault on a +white woman. The white and cullud all went to church together too. +Niggers and white shouted alike. + +I remember some of the little games we played now: "Fox in the wall", +"Mollie, Mollie Bride", and "Hide and go seek." + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + +STEPHEN McCRAY +Age 88 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Huntsville County, Alabama, right where the Scottsboro +boys was in jail, in 1850. + +My parents was Wash and Winnie McCray. They was the mother and father +of 22 chillun. Jest five lived to be grown and the rest died at baby +age. My father's mother and father was named Mandy and Peter McCray, +and my mother's mother and father was Ruthie and Charlie McCray. They +all had the same Master, Mister McCray, all the way thoo'. + +We live in log huts and when I left home grown, I left my folks living +in the same log huts. Beds was put together with ropes and called rope +beds. No springs was ever heard of by white or cullud as I knows of. + +All the work I ever done was pick up chips for my grandma to cook +with. I was kept busy doing this all day. + +The big boys went out and got rabbits, possums and fish. I would sho' +lak to be in old Alabama fishing, 'cause I am a fisherman. There is +sho' some pretty water in Alabama and as swift as cars run here. Water +so clear and blue you can see the fish way down, and dey wouldn't bite +to save your life. + +Slaves had their own gardens. All got Friday and Sadday to work in +garden during garden time. I liked cornbread best and I'd give a +dollar to git some of the bread we had on those good old days and I +ain't joking. I went in shirt tail all the time. Never had on no pants +'til I was 15 years old. No shoes, 'cept two or three winters. Never +had a hat 'til I was a great big boy. + +Marriage was performed by getting permission from Master and go where +the woman of your choice had prepared the bed, undress and flat-footed +jump a broom-stick together into the bed. + +Master had a brick house for hisself and the overseer. They was the +only ones on the place. The overseer woke up the slaves all the way +from 2 o'clock till 4 o'clock of mornings. He wasn't nothing but white +trash. Nothing else in the world but that. They worked till they +couldn't see how to work. I jest couldn't jedge the size of that big +place, and there was a mess of slaves, not less'n three hundred. + +I doesn't have no eggycation, edgecation, or ejecation, and about all +I can do is spell. I jest spell till I get the pronouncements. + +We had church, but iffen the white folks caught you at it, you was +beat most nigh to death. We used a big pot turned down to keep our +voices down. When we went to hear white preachers, he would say, "Obey +your master and mistress." I am a hard shell-flint Baptist. I was +baptised in Pine Bluff, Arkansas. Our baptizing song was mostly "On +Jordan's Stormy Banks I Stand" and our funeral song was "Hark From The +Tomb." + +We had some slaves who would try to run off to the North but the white +folks would catch 'em with blood hounds and beat 'em to death. Them +patrollers done their work mostly at night. One night I was sleeping +on cotton and the patrollers come to our house and ask for water. +Happen we had plenty. They drunk a whole lot and got warm and told my +father to be a good nigger and they wouldn't bother him at all. They +raided till General Grant come thoo'. He sent troops out looking for +Klu Klux Klanners and killed 'em jest lak killing black birds. General +Grant was one of the men that caused us to set heah free today and +able to talk together without being killed. + +I didn't and don't believe in no conjure. No sensible person do +either. We had a doctor on the place. Ever master had a doctor who +waited on his slaves, but we wore asafetida or onion 'round our necks +to keep off diseases. A dime was put 'round a teething baby's neck to +make it tooth easy, and it sho' helped too. But today all folks done +got 'bove that. + +The old folks talked very little of freedom and the chillun knew +nothing at all of it, and that they heard they was daresome to mention +it. + +Bushwhacker, nothing but poor white trash, come thoo' and killed all +the little nigger chillun they could lay hands on. I was hid under the +house with a big rag on my mouf many a time. Them Klu Klux after +slavery sho' got enough from them soldiers to last 'em. + +I was married to Kan Pry in 1884. Two chillun was born. The girl is +living and the boy might be, but I don't know. My daughter works out +in service. + +I wish Lincoln was here now. He done more for the black face than any +one in that seat. Old Jeff Davis kept slavery up till General Grant +met him at the battle. Lincoln sho' snowed him under. General Grant +put fire under him jest lak I'm fixing to do my pipe. Booker T. +Washington was jest all right. + +Every time I think of slavery and if it done the race any good, I +think of the story of the coon and dog who met. The coon said to the +dog "Why is it you're so fat and I am so poor, and we is both +animals?" The dog said: "I lay round Master's house and let him kick +me and he gives me a piece of bread right on." Said the coon to the +dog: "Better then that I stay poor." Them's my sentiment. I'm lak the +coon, I don't believe in 'buse. + +I used to be the most wicked man in the world but a voice converted me +by saying, "Friend, friend, why is you better to everybody else than +you is to your self? You are sending your soul to hell." And from that +day I lived like a Christian. People here don't live right and I don't +lak to 'tend church. I base my Christian life on: "Believe in me, +trust my work and you shall be saved, for I am God and beside me there +is no other." + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +HANNAH McFARLAND +Age 85 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Georgetown, South Carolina, February 29, 1853. My father +was name James Gainey and my mother was name Katie Gainey. There was +three chillun born to my folks doing slavery. My father was a free +man, but my mother was de slave of the Sampsons, some Jews. My father +was de richest Negro in South Carolina doing this time. He bought all +three of we chillun for $1,000 apiece, but dem Jews jest wouldn't sell +mamma. Dey was mighty sweet to her. She come home ever night and +stayed with us. Doing the day a Virginian nigger woman stayed with us +and she sho' was mean to we chillun. She used to beat us sumpin' +terrible. You know Virginia people is mean to cullud people. My father +bought her from some white folks too. + +We lived in town and in a good house. + +It was a good deal of confusion doing de War. I waited on the Yankees. +Dey captured mamma's white people's house. Dey tried to git mamma to +tell dem jest whut de white folks done done to her and all she could +say was dey was good to her. Shucks, dey wouldn't sell her. She jest +told them she had a free husband. + +My father was a blockader. He run rafts from one place to another and +sho' made a lot of money. He was drowned while doing this while I was +a good size child. + +Dem patrollers tied you to a whipping post iffen dey caught you out +after 10 o'clock. They 'tempted to do my mother that way, but my papa +sho' stopped dat. I can't say I lak white people even now, 'cause dey +done done so much agin us. + +I was free, but I couldn't go to school, 'cause we didn't had none. I +been in Oklahoma over 40 years. Have done some traveling and could go +some whar else, but I jest stays here 'cause I ain't got no desire to +travel. + +All we ever wore to keep off diseases was asafetida, nothing else. + +I done heard more 'bout conjure in Oklahoma than I ever heerd in South +Carolina. All dat stuff is in Louisiana. I didn't heah nothing 'bout +the Klu Klux Klan till I come to Oklahoma neither. More devilment in +Oklahoma than any place I know. South got more religion too. I jest as +soon be back with the Rebels. + +Bushwhackers whipped you iffen you stayed out late, and sho' nuff if +dey didn't lak you. + +I felt sorry for Jeff Davis when the Yankees drilled him through the +streets. I saw it all. I said, "Mama, Mama, look, dey got old Jeff +Davis." She said, "Be quiet, dey'll lynch you." She didn't know no +better! She was a old slave nigger. I showed the Yankees where the +white folks hid their silver and money and jewelry, and Mamma sho' +whipped me about it too. She was no fool 'bout slavery. Slavery sho' +didn't he'p us none to my belief. + +I didn't care much 'bout Lincoln. It was nice of him to free us, but +'course he didn't want to. + +The overseer was sho' nothing but poor white trash, the kind who +didn't lak niggers and dey still don't, old devils. Don't let 'em fool +you, dey don't lak a nigger a'tall. + +I'm a Methodist. People ought to praise God 'cause he done done so +much for dese sinners. Dey was heap more religious in my early days. I +jined church in 1863. I jined the Holiness so I could git baptized and +the Methodist wouldn't baptize you. After my baptism, I went back to +the Methodist Church. You know my pastor, Reverend Miller, is the +first Methodist preacher I ever knowed that was baptized, and that +baptizes everybody. + +I was married in Akin, South Carolina to Andrew Pew. We had 12 +chillun. Jest one boy is my only living child today. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +MARSHALL MACK +Age 83 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born September 10, 1854. I am the second child of five. My +mother was named Sylvestus Mack and my father Booker Huddleston. I do +not remember my mother's master, 'cause he died before I was born. My +Mistress was named Nancy Mack. She was the mother of six children, +four boys and two girls. Three of dem boys went to the War and one +packed and went off somewhar and nobody heard from him doing of the +whole War. But soon as the War was over he come home and he never told +whar he had been. + +I never saw but one grown person flogged during slavery and dat was my +mother. The younger son of my mistress whipped her one morning in de +kitchen. His name was Jack. De slaves on Mistress' place was treated +so good, all de people round and 'bout called us "Mack's Free +Niggers." Dis was 14 miles northwest of Liberty, county seat of +Bedford County, Virginia. + +One day while de War was going on, my Mistress got a letter from her +son Jim wid jest one line. Dat was "Mother: Jack's brains spattered on +my gun this morning." That was all he written. + +Jack Huddleston owned my father, who was his half-brother, and he was +the meanest man I ever seen. He flogged my father with tobacco sticks +and my mother after these floggings (which I never seen) had to pick +splinters out of his back. My father had to slip off a night to come +and visit us. He lived a mile and a half from our house on the south +side of the Blue Ridge Mountains, and it sho' is a rocky country. He'd +oversleep hisself and git up running. We would stand in our door and +hear him running over them rocks til he got home. He was trying to git +dere before his master called him. + +It was a law among the slave-holders that if you left your master's +place, you had to have a pass, for if the patroller caught you without +one, he would give you 9 and 30 lashes and carry you to your master, +and if he was mean, you got the same again! + +On the 3-foot fireplace my mother and father cooked ash cakes and my +father having to run to work, had to wash his cakes off in a spring +betwixt our house and his. My mother was the cook in the Big House. + +All the time we would see "nigger traders" coming through the country. +I have seen men and women cuffed to 60-foot chains being took to +Lynchburg, Va., to the block to be sold. Now I am talking 'bout what I +know, for it would not mean one thing for me to lie. I ain't jest +heard dis. My uncle John was a carpenter and always took Mistress' +chillun to school in a two-horse surrey. On sech trips, the chillun +learned my uncle to read and write. Dey slipped and done this, for it +was a law among slave-holders that a slave not be caught wid a book. + +One morning when I was on my way to de mill with a sack of corn, I had +to go down de main pike. I saw sech a fog 'til I rid close enough to +see what was gwine on. I heard someone say "close up." I was told +since dat it was Hood's Raid. They took every slave that could carry a +gun. It was at dis time, Negroes went into de service. Lee was +whipping Grant two battles to one 'til them raids, and den Grant +whipped Lee two battles to one, 'cause he had Negroes in the Union +Army. Dey took Negroes and all de white people's food. Dey killed +chickens and picked dem on horseback. I never will forgit that time +long as I live. + +Ever day I had to get the mail for three families. I carried it around +in a bag and each family took his'n out. I guess I was one of the +first Negro mailmen. + +We had church on the place and had right good meetings. Everybody went +and took part in the service. We had to have passes to go off the +place to the meetings. + +The children wore just one garment from this time of year (spring) +till the frost fell. Mistress' daughters made dese. We sure kept +healthy and fat. + +I will be 83 years of age September 10, 1937 and am enjoying my second +eyesight. I could not see a thing hardly for some few years, but now I +can read sometimes without glasses. I keep my lawn in first class +shape and work all the time. I think this is 'cause I never was +treated bad during slavery. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + +ALLEN V. MANNING +Age 87 +Tulsa, Okla. + + +I always been somewhar in the South, mostly in Texas when I was a +young man, and of course us Negroes never got much of a show in court +matters, but I reckon if I had of had the chance to set on a jury I +would of made a mighty poor out at it. + +No sir, I jest can't set in judgement on nobody, 'cause I learned when +I was jest a little boy that good people and bad people--makes no +difference which--jest keep on living and doing like they been taught, +and I jest can't seem to blame them none for what they do iffen they +been taught that way. + +I was born in slavery, and I belonged to a Baptist preacher. Until I +was fifteen years old I was taught that I was his own chattel-property, +and he could do with me like he wanted to, but he had been taught that +way too, and we both believed it. I never did hold nothing against him +for being hard on Negroes sometimes, and I don't think I ever would of +had any trouble even if I had of growed up and died in slavery. + +The young Negroes don't know nothing 'bout that today, and lots of +them are rising up and amounting to something, and all us Negroes is +proud of them. You see, it's because they been taught that they got as +good a show to be something as anybody, if they tries hard. + +Well, this old Negro knows one thing: they getting somewheres 'cause +the young whitefolks is letting them and helping them to do it, 'cause +the whitefolks has been taught the same way, and I praise God its +getting to be that way, too. But it all go to show, people do like +they been taught to do. + +Like I say, my master was a preacher and a kind man, but he treated +the Negroes jest like they treated him. He been taught that they was +jest like his work hosses, and if they act like they his work hosses +they git along all right. But if they don't--Oh, oh! + +Like the Dixie song say, I was born "on a frosty mornin'" at the +plantation in Clarke County, Mississippi, in the fall of 1850 they +tell me. The old place looked the same all the time I was a child, +clean up to when we pull out and leave the second year of the War. + +I can shet my eyes and think about it and it seem to come right up in +front of me jest like it looked. From my Pappy's cabin the Big House +was off to the west, close to the big road, and most of the fields +stretched off to the north. They was a big patch of woods off to the +east, and no much open land between us and the Chickasawhay River. Off +to the southwest a few miles was the Bucatunna Creek, and the +plantation was kind of in the forks between them, a little ways east +of Quitman, Mississippi. + +Old Master's people been living at that place a mighty long time, and +most the houses and barns was old and been repaired time and time +again, but it was a mighty pretty place. The Big House was built long, +with a lot of rooms all in a row and a long porch, but it wasn't fine +like a lot of the houses we seen as we passed by when we left that +place to go to Louisiana. + +Old Master didn't have any overseer hired, but him and his boys looked +after the place and had a Negro we called the driver. We-all shore +hated that old black man, but I forget his name now. That driver never +was allowed to think up nothing for the slaves to do, but jest was +told to make them work hard at what the master and his boys told them +to do. Whitefolks had to set them at a job and then old driver would +whoopity and whoopity around, and egg them and egg them until they +finish up, so they can go at something else. He worked hard hisself, +though, and set a mighty hard pattern for the rest to keep up with. +Like I say, he been taught he didn't know how to think, so he didn't +try. + +Old Mistress name was Mary, and they had two daughters, Levia and +Betty. Then they had three sons. The oldest was named Bill Junior, and +he was plumb grown when I was a boy, but the other two, Jedson and +Jim, was jest a little older then me. + +Old Master didn't have but two or three single Negroes, but he had +several families, and most of them was big ones. My own family was +pretty good size, but three of the children was born free. Pappy's +name was William and Mammy's was Lucy. My brother Joe was the oldest +child and then come Adeline, Harriet, and Texana and Betty before the +surrender, and then Henry, Mattie and Louisa after it. + +When the War come along old Master jest didn't know what to do. He +always been taught not to raise his hand up and kill nobody--no matter +how come--and he jest kept holding out against all them that was +talking about fighting, and he wouldn't go and fight. He been taught +that it was all right to have slaves and treat them like he want to, +but he been taught it was sinful to go fight and kill to keep them, +and he lived up to what he been taught. + +They was some Choctaw people lived 'round there, and they flew up and +went right off to the War, and Mr. Trot Hand and Mr. Joe Brown that +had plantations on the big road towards Quitman both went off with +their grown boys right at the start, but old Master was a preacher and +he jest stayed out of it. I remember one day I was sent up to the Big +House and I heard old Master and some men out at the gate 'xpounding +about the War. Some of the men had on soldier clothes, and they acted +like they was mad. Somebody tell me later on that they was getting up +a home guard because the yankees done got down in Alabama not far +away, but old Master wouldn't go in with them. + +Two, three days after that, it seems like, old Master come down to the +quarters and say git everything bundled up and in the wagons for a +long trip. The Negroes all come in and everybody pitch in to help pack +up the wagons. Then old Master look around and he can't find Andy. +Andy was one Negro that never did act like he been taught, and old +Master's patience about wore out with him anyways. + +We all know that Andy done run off again, but we didn't know where to. +Leastwise all the Negroes tell old Master that. But old Master soon +show us we done the work and he done the thinking! He jest goes ahead +and keeps all the Negroes busy fixing up the wagons and bundling up +the stuff to travel, and keeps us all in his sight all the time, and +says nothing about Andy being gone. + +Then that night he sends for a white man name Clements that got some +blood hounds, and him and Mr. Clements takes time about staying awake +and watching all the cabins to see nobody slips out of them. Everybody +was afraid to stick their head out. + +Early next morning we has all the wagons ready to drive right off, and +old Master call Andy's brother up to him. He say, "You go down to that +spring and wait, and when Andy come down to the spring to fill that +cedar bucket you stole out'n the smokehouse for him to git water in +you tell him to come on in here. Tell him I know he is hiding out way +down the branch whar he can come up wading the water clean up to the +cornfield and the melon patch, so the hounds won't git his scent, but +I'm going to send the hounds down there if he don't come on in right +now." Then we all knowed we was for the work and old Master was for +the thinking, 'cause pretty soon Andy come on in. He'd been right whar +old Master think he is. + +About that time Mr. Sears come riding down the big road. He was a +deacon in old Master's church, and he see us all packed up to leave +and so he light at the big gate and walk up to whar we is. He ask old +Master where we all lighting out for, and old Master say for +Louisiana. We Negroes don't know where that is. Then old deacon say +what old Master going to do with Andy, 'cause there stood Mr. Clements +holding his bloodhounds and old Master had his cat-o-nine-tails in his +hand. + +Old Master say just watch him, and he tell Andy if he can make it to +that big black gum tree down at the gate before the hounds git him he +can stay right up in that tree and watch us all drive off. Then he +tell Andy to git! + +Poor Andy jest git hold of the bottom limbs when the blood hounds grab +him and pull him down onto the ground. Time old Master and Mr. +Clements git down there the hounds done tore off all Andy's clothes +and bit him all over bad. He was rolling on the ground and holding his +shirt up 'round his throat when Mr. Clements git there and pull the +hounds off of him. + +Then old Master light in on him with that cat-o-nine-tails, and I +don't know how many lashes he give him, but he jest bloody all over +and done fainted pretty soon. Old Deacon Sears stand it as long as he +can and then he step up and grab old Master's arm and say, "Time to +stop, Brother! I'm speaking in the name of Jesus!" Old Master quit +then, but he still powerful mad. I don't think he believe Andy going +to make that tree when he tell him that. + +Then he turn on Andy's brother and give him a good beating too, and we +all drive off and leave Andy setting on the ground under a tree and +old Deacon standing by him. I don't know what ever become of Andy, but +I reckon maybe he went and live with old Deacon Sears until he was +free. + +When I think back and remember it, it all seems kind of strange, but +it seem like old Master and old Deacon both think the same way. They +kind of understand that old Master had a right to beat his Negro all +he wanted to for running off, and he had a right to set the hounds on +him if he did, but he shouldn't of beat him so hard after he told him +he was going let him off if he made the tree, and he ought to keep his +word even if Andy was his own slave. That's the way both them white +men had been taught, and that was the way they both lived. + +Old Master had about five wagons on that trip down into Louisiana, but +they was all full of stuff and only the old slaves and children could +ride in them. I was big enough to walk most of the time, but one time +I walked in the sun so long that I got sick and they put me in the +wagon for most the rest of the way. + +We would come to places where the people said the Yankees had been and +gone, but we didn't run into any Yankees. They was most to the north +of us I reckon, because we went on down to the south part of +Mississippi and ferried across the big river at Baton Rouge. Then we +went on to Lafayette, Louisiana, before we settled down anywhere. + +All us Negroes thought that was a mighty strange place. We would hear +white folks talking and we couldn't understand what they said, and +lots of the Negroes talked the same way, too. It was all full of +French people around Lafayette, but they had all their menfolks in the +Confederate Army just the same. I seen lots of men in butternut +clothes coming and going hither and yon, but they wasn't in bunches. +They was mostly coming home to see their folks. + +Everybody was scared all the time, and two--three times when old +Master hired his Negroes out to work the man that hired them quit his +place and went on west before they got the crop in. But old Master +got a place and we put in a cotton crop, and I think he got some money +by selling his place in Mississippi. Anyway, pretty soon after the +cotton was all in he moves again and goes to a place on Simonette Lake +for the winter. It aint a bit cold in that place, and we didn't have +no fire 'cepting to cook, and sometimes a little charcoal fire in some +crock pots that the people left on the place when they went on out to +Texas. + +The next spring old Master loaded up again and we struck out for +Texas, when the Yankees got too close again. But Master Bill didn't go +to Texas, because the Confederates done come that winter and made him +go to the army. I think they took him to New Orleans, and old Master +was hopping mad, but he couldn't do anything or they would make him go +too, even if he was a preacher. + +I think he left out of there partly because he didn't like the people +at that place. They wasn't no Baptists around anywheres, they was all +Catholics, and old Master didn't like them. + +About that time it look like everybody in the world was going to +Texas. When we would be going down the road we would have to walk +along the side all the time to let the wagons go past, all loaded with +folks going to Texas. + +Pretty soon old Master say git the wagons loaded again, and this time +we start out with some other people, going north. We go north a while +and then turn west, and cross the Sabine River and go to Nachedoches, +Texas. Me and my brother Joe and my sister Adeline walked nearly all +the way, but my little sister Harriet and my mammy rid in a wagon. +Mammy was mighty poorly, and jest when we got to the Sabine bottoms +she had another baby. Old Master didn't like it 'cause it was a girl, +but he named her Texana on account of where she was born and told us +children to wait on Mammy good and maybe we would get a little brother +next time. + +But we didn't. Old Master went with a whole bunch of wagons on out to +the prairie country in Coryell County and set up a farm where we just +had to break the sod and didn't have to clear off much. And the next +baby Mammy had the next year was a girl. We named her Betty because +Mistress jest have a baby a little while before and its name was +Betty. + +Old Master's place was right at the corner where Coryell and McLennan +and Bosque Counties come together, and we raised mostly cotton and +jest a little corn for feed. He seem like he changed a lot since we +left Mississippi, and seem like he paid more attention to us and +looked after us better. But most the people that already live there +when we git there was mighty hard on their Negroes. They was mostly +hard drinkers and hard talkers, and they work and fight jest as hard +as they talk, too! + +One day Old Master come out from town and tell us that we all been set +free, and we can go or stay jest as we wish. All of my family stay on +the place and he pay us half as shares on all we make. Pretty soon the +whitefolks begin to cut down on the shares, and the renters git only a +third and some less, and the Negroes begin to drift out to other +places, but old Master stick to the halves a year or so after that. +Then he come down to a third too. + +It seem like the white people can't git over us being free, and they +do everything to hold us down all the time. We don't git no schools +for a long time, and I never see the inside of a school. I jest grow +up on hard work. And we can't go 'round where they have the voting, +unless we want to ketch a whipping some night, and we have to jest +keep on bowing and scraping when we are 'round white folks like we did +when we was slaves. They had us down and they kept us down. But that +was the way they been taught, and I don't blame them for it none, I +reckon. + +When I git about thirty years old I marry Betty Sadler close to Waco, +and we come up to the Creek Nation forty years ago. We come to +Muskogee first, and then to Tulsa about thirty seven years ago. + +We had ten children but only seven are alive. Three girls and a boy +live here in Tulsa and we got one boy in Muskogee and one at +Frederick, Oklahoma. + +I sells milk and makes my living, and I keeps so busy I don't think +back on the old days much, but if anybody ask me why the Texas Negroes +been kept down so much I can tell them. If they set like I did on the +bank at that ferry across the Sabine, and see all that long line of +covered wagons, miles and miles of them, crossing that river and going +west with all they got left out of the War, it aint hard to +understand. + +Them whitefolks done had everything they had tore up, or had to run +away from the places they lived, and they brung their Negroes out to +Texas and then right away they lost them too. They always had them +Negroes, and lots of them had mighty fine places back in the old +states, and then they had to go out and live in sod houses and little +old boxed shotguns and turn their Negroes loose. They didn't see no +justice in it then, and most of them never did until they died. The +folks that stayed at home and didn't straggle all over the country had +their old places to live on and their old friends around them, but +them Texans was different. + +So I says, when they done us the way they did they was jest doing the +way they was taught. I don't blame them, because anybody will do that. + +Whitefolks mighty decent to me now, and I always tried to teach my +children to be respectful and act like they think the whitefolks they +dealing with expects them to act. That the way to git along, because +some folks been taught one way and some been taught another, and folks +always thinks the way they been taught. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +BOB MAYNARD, AGE 79 +23 East Choctaw +Weleetka, Oklahoma. + + +I was born near what is now Marlin, Texas, Falls County. My father was +Robert Maynard and my mother was Chanie Maynard, both born slaves. Our +Master, Gerard Branum, was a very old man and wore long white +whiskers. He sho' was a fine built man, and walked straight and tall +like a young man. + +I was too little to do much work so my job was to carry the key basket +for old Mistress. I sho' was proud of that job. The basket held the +keys to the pantry, the kitchen, the linen closet, and extra keys to +the rooms and smokehouse. When old Mistress started out on her rounds +every morning she'd call to me to get de basket and away we'd go. I'd +run errands for all the house help too, so I was kept purty busy. + +The "big house" was a fine one. It was a big two-story white house +made of pine lumber. There was a big porch or veranda across the front +and wings on the east and west. The house faced south. There was big +round white posts that went clean up to the roof and there was a big +porch upstairs too. I believe the house was what you'd call colonial +style. There was twelve or fifteen rooms and a big wide stairway. It +was a purty place, with a yard and big trees and the house that set in +a walnut and pecan grove. They was graveled walks and driveways and +all along by the driveway was cedars. There was a hedge close to the +house and a flower garden with purty roses, holly hocks and a lot of +others I don't know the name of. + +Back to the right of the house was the smokehouse, kept full of meat, +and further back was the big barns. Old Master kept a spanking pair of +carriage horses and several fine riding horses. He kept several pairs +of mules, too, to pull the plow. He had some ox teams too. + +To the left and back of the "big house" was the quarters. He owned +about two thousand acres of land and three hundred slaves. He kept a +white overseer and the colored overlooker was my uncle. He sho' saw +that the gang worked. He saw to it that the cotton was took to the +gin. They used oxen to pull the wagons full of cotton. There was two +gins on the plantation. Had to have two for it was slow work to gin a +bale of cotton as it was run by horse power. + +Old Master raised hundreds of hogs; he raised practically all the food +we et. He gave the food out to each family and they done their own +cooking except during harvest. The farm hands was fed at the "big +house." They was called in from the farm by a big bell. + +Sunday was our only day for recreation. We went to church at our own +church, and we could sing and shout jest as loud as we pleased and it +didn't disturb nobody. + +During the week after supper we would all set round the doors outside +and sing or play music. The only musical instruments we had was a jug +or big bottle, a skillet lid or frying pan that they'd hit with a +stick or a bone. We had a flute too, made out of reed cane and it'd +make good music. Sometimes we'd sing and dance so long and loud old +Master'd have to make us stop and go to bed. + +The Patrollers, Ku Kluxers or night riders come by sometimes at night +to scare the niggers and make 'em behave. Sometimes the slaves would +run off and the Patroller would catch 'em and have 'em whipped. I've +seen that done lots of times. They was some wooden stocks (a sort of +trough) and they'd put the darky in this and strap him down, take off +his clothers and give him 25 to 50 licks, 'cording to what he had +done. + +I reckon old Master had everything his heart could wish for at this +time. Old Mistress was a fine lady and she always went dressed up. She +wore long trains on her skirts and I'd walk behind her and hold her +train up when she made de rounds. She was awful good to me. I slept on +the floor in her little boy's room, and she give me apples and candy +just like she did him. Old Master gave ever chick and child good warm +clothes for winter. We had store boughten shoes but the women made our +clothes. For underwear we all wore 'lowers' but no shirts. + +After the war started old Master took a lot of his slaves and went to +Natchez, Mississippi. He thought he'd have a better chance of keeping +us there I guess, and he was afraid we'd be greed [TR: freed?] and he +started running with us. I remember when General Grant blowed up +Vicksburg. I had a free born Uncle and Aunt who sometimes visited in +the North and they'd till us how easy it was up there and it sho' made +us all want to be free. + +I think Abe Lincoln was next to de Lawd. He done all he could for de +slaves; he set 'em free. People in the South knowed they'd lose their +slaves when he was elected president. 'Fore the election he traveled +all over the South and he come to our house and slept in old Mistress' +bed. Didn't nobody know who he was. It was a custom to take strangers +in and put them up for one night or longer, so he come to our house +and he watched close. He seen how the niggers come in on Saturday and +drawed four pounds of meat and a peck of meal for a week's rations. He +also saw 'em whipped and sold. When he got back up north he writ old +Master a letter and told him he was going to have to free his slaves, +that everybody was going to have to, that the North was going to see +to it. He also told him that he had visited at his house and if he +doubted it to go in the room he slept in and look on the bedstead at +the head and he'd see where he'd writ his name. Sho' nuff, there was +his name: A. Lincoln. + +Didn't none of us like Jeff Davis. We all liked Robert E. Lee, but we +was glad that Grant whipped him. + +When the War was over, old Master called all the darkies in and lined +'em up in a row. He told 'em they was free to go and do as they +pleased. It was six months before any of us left him. + +Darkies could vote in Mississippi. Fred Douglas, a colored man, came +to Natchez and made political speeches for General Grant. + +After the war they was a big steam boat line on the Mississippi River +known as the Robert E. Lee Line. They sho' was fine boats too. + +We used to have lots of Confederate money. Five cent pieces, two bit +pieces, half dollar bills and half dimes. During the war old Master +dug a long trench and buried all de silver ware, fine clothes, jewelry +and a lot of money. I guess he dug it up, but I don't remember. + +Master died three years after the War. He took it purty good, losing +his niggers and all. Lots of men killed theirselves. Old Master was a +good old man. + +I'm getting old, I reckon. I've been married twice and am the father +of 19 chillun. The oldest if 57 and my youngest is two boys, ten and +twelve. I has great grandchillun older than them two boys. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937] + +JANE MONTGOMERY +Age 80 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma + + +I was born March 15, 1857, in Homer, Louisiana. I claim to be 75 years +old, but that's jest my way of counting. My mother was Sarah Strong +and my father was Edmond Beavers. We lived in a log cabin that had +jest one door. I had two sisters named Peggy and Katie. Mammy was +bought from the Strong family and my pappy was bought from Beavers by +Mister Eason. + +We slept on wooden slabs which was jest make-shift beds. I didn't do +no work in slave times 'cause I was too little. You jest had to be +good and husky to work on that place. I listened and told mammy +everything I heerd. I ate right side dat old white woman on the flo'. +I was a little busy-body. I don't recollect eating in our quarters on +Sunday and no other time. + +I don't remember no possums and rabbits being on our place, 'cause +when white folks killed a chicken for their selves, dey killed one for +the niggers. My pappy never ate no cornbread in all his put-together. +Meat was my favorite food. I never ate no dry bread without no meat. + +We wore homespun clothes. My first pair of shoes was squirrel skin. +Mammy had 'em made. We wore clothes called linsey that was wool and +cotton mixed. + +My father was the onliest overseer. It was sho' a great big old place. +My master jest seen the place on Sundays. They was jest seven Niggers +on our plantation. No working late at night but we had to git up at +daylight. When our day's work was done, we went to bed, but sometimes +they sung. Sadday was a holiday from working on the plantation. You +had Sadday to wash for yourself. We didn't do nothing on Christmas and +all holidays. + +Mistress never whip us and iffen master would start, mistress would +git a gun and make him stop. She said, "Let ever bitch whip her own +chillun." I never seen no patrollers, I jest heerd of 'em. They never +come on our place. I guess they was scared to. The Klu Klux whipped +niggers when so never they could catch 'em. They rid at night mostly. + +I am a Baptist. I belong to Calvary Baptist Church. I was baptized in +a creek. Our favorite hymn was "Dark Was the Night an' Cold the +Ground." Our favorite revival hymn was "Lord I'd Come to Thee, a +Sinner Undefiled." Our favorite funeral song was "Hark From the Tomb." + +My family didn't believe in conjure an' all that stuff, 'though they's +a heap of it was going on and still is for that matter. They had +"hands" that was made up of all kinds of junk. You used 'em to make +folks love you more'n they did. We used asafetida to keep off smallpox +and measles. Put mole foots round a baby's neck to make him teethe +easy. We used to use nine red ants tied in a sack round they neck to +make 'em teethe easy and never had no trouble with 'em neither. + +I think I seen a haunt once, 'cause when I looked the second time, +what I seen the first time was gone. + +When the War was over, mistress' son come home and he cleaned his guns +on my dress tail. It sho' stunk up my dress and made me sick too. He +told old mistress that niggers was free now. I went and told mammy +that old Betsy's son told her the niggers was free and what did he +mean. She said, "Shhhhhh!" They never did jest come out and tell us we +was free. We was free in July and mammy left in September. We lived in +Jordan Saline, out from Smith County. Then my mother give me to my +father 'cause she was married to another man. Her and my step-father +moved to Gilmore, Texas. They sent for me round 'bout Christmas and we +lived on Sampers' farm. + +We lived so far out, we couldn't go to school, 'though they was for +us. We didn't own no land. Didn't nobody learn me to read and write. + +Abe Lincoln was a good man. It was through Mr. Lincoln that God fit to +free us. I don't know much 'bout Jeff Davis and don't care nothing +'bout him. Booker T. Washington built that school through God. He used +to live in a cabin jest lak I done. He was sho' a great man. + +I married Trole Kemp in 1883. I 'mind you they didn't marry in +slavery, they jest took up. Master jest give a permit. I am the mother +of 10 chillun and 5 grandchillun. Four of my chillun died young. Them +what's living is doing different things sech as: writing policy, +working on made work, housework, government clerk and hotel maid. One +is in the pen. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 13 1937] + +AMANDA OLIVER +Age 80 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I 'membuh what my mother say--I was born November 9, 1857, in +Missouri. I was 'bout eight years old, when she was sold to a master +named Harrison Davis. They said he had two farms in Missouri, but when +he moved to northern Texas he brought me, my mother, Uncle George, +Uncle Dick and a cullud girl they said was 15 with 'im. He owned 'bout +6 acres on de edge of town near Sherman, Texas, and my mother and 'em +was all de slaves he had. They said he sold off some of de folks. + +We didn't have no overseers in northern Texas, but in southern Texas +dey did. Dey didn't raise cotton either; but dey raised a whole lots +of corn. Sometime de men would shuck corn all night long. Whenever dey +was going to shuck all night de women would piece quilts while de men +shuck de corn and you could hear 'em singing and shucking corn. After +de cornshucking, de cullud folks would have big dances. + +Master Davis lived in a big white frame house. My mother lived in the +yard in a big one-room log hut with a brick chimney. De logs was +"pinted" (what dey call plastered now with lime). I don't know whether +young folks know much 'bout dat sort of thing now. + +I slept on de floor up at de "Big House" in de white woman's room on a +quilt. I'd git up in de mornings, make fires, put on de coffee, and +tend to my little brother. Jest do little odd jobs sech as that. + +We ate vegetables from de garden, sech as that. My favorite dish is +vegetables now. + +I don't remember seeing any slaves sold. My mother said dey sold 'em +on de block in Kentucky where she was raised. + +I don't remembuh when de War broke out, but I remembuh seeing the +soldiers with de blue uniforms on. I was afraid of 'em. + +Old mistress didn't tell us when he was free, but another white woman +told my mother and I remembuh. One day old mistress told my mother to +git to that wheel and git to work, and my mother said, "I ain't +gwineter, I'm jest as free as you air." So dat very day my mother +packed up all our belongings and moved us to town, Sherman, Texas. She +worked awful hard, doing day work for 50c a day, and sometimes she'd +work for food, clothes or whatever she could git. + +I don't believe in conjuring though I heard lotta talk 'bout it. +Sometimes I have pains and aches in my hands, feel like sometime dat +somebody puts dey hands on me, but I think jest de way my nerves is. + +I can't say much 'bout Abe Lincoln. He was a republican in favor of de +cullud folk being free. Jeff Davis? Yeah, the boys usta sing a song +'bout 'im: + + Lincoln rides a fine hoss, + Jeff Davis rides a mule, + Lincoln is de President, + Jeff Davis is de fool. + +Booker T. Washington--I guess he is a right good man. He's for the +cullud people I guess. + +I been a Christian thirty some odd years. I've been here some thirty +odd years. Had to come when my husband did. He died in 1902. We +married in 18--I've forgot, but we went to de preacher and got +married. We did more than jump over de broom stick. + +In those days we went to church with de white folks. Dey had church at +eleven and the cullud folks at three, but all of us had white +preachers. Our church is standing right there now, at least it was de +last time I was there. + +I don't have a favorite song, theys so many good ones, but I like, +"Bound for the Promised Land." I'm a Baptist, my mother was a Baptist, +and her white folks was Baptist. + +I have two daughters, Julia Goodwin and Bertha Frazier, and four +grandchildren, both of 'ems been separated. Dey do housework. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +SALOMON OLIVER +Age 78 yrs. +Tulsa, Oklahoma. + + +John A. Miller owned the finest plantation in Washington County, +Mississippi, about 12-mile east of Greenville. I was born on this +20,000-acre plantation November 17, 1859, being one of about four +hundred slave children on the place. + +About three hundred negro families living in box-type cabins made it +seem like a small town. Built in rows, the cabins were kept +whitewashed, neat and orderly, for the Master was strict about such +things. Several large barns and storage buildings were scattered +around the plantation. Also, two cotton gins and two old fashioned +presses, operated by horses and mules, made Miller's plantation one of +the best equipped in Mississippi. + +Master John was quite a character. The big plantation didn't occupy +all his time. He owned a bank in Vicksburg and another in New Orleans, +and only came to the plantation two or three times a year for a week +or two visit. + +Things happened around there mighty quick when the Master showed up. +If the slaves were not being treated right--out go the white overseer. +Fired! The Master was a good man and tried to hire good boss men. +Master John was bad after the slave women. A yellow child show up +every once in a while. Those kind always got special privileges +because the Master said he didn't want his children whipped like the +rest of them slaves. + +My own Mammy, Mary, was the Master's own daughter! She married Salomon +Oliver (who took the name of Oliver after the War), and the Master +told all the slave drivers to leave her alone and not whip her. This +made the overseers jealous of her and caused trouble. John Santhers +was one of the white overseers who treated her bad, and after I was +born and got strong enough (I was a weakling for three-four years +after birth), to do light chores he would whip me just for the fun of +it. It was fun for him but not for me. I hoped to whip him when I grew +up. That is the one thing I won't ever forget. He died about the end +of the War so that's one thing I won't ever get to do. + +My mother was high-tempered and she knew about the Master's orders not +to whip her. I guess sometimes she took advantage and tried to do +things that maybe wasn't right. But it did her no good and one of the +white men flogged her to death. She died with scars on her back! + +Father use to preach to the slaves when a crowd of them could slip off +into the woods. I don't remember much about the religious things, only +just what Daddy told me when I was older. He was caught several times +slipping off to the woods and because he was the preacher I guess they +layed on the lash a little harder trying to make him give up +preaching. + +Ration day was Saturday. Each person was given a peck of corn meal, +four pounds of wheat flour, four pounds of pork meat, quart of +molasses, one pound of sugar, the same of coffee and a plug of +tobacco. Potatoes and vegetables came from the family garden and each +slave family was required to cultivate a separate garden. + +During the Civil War a battle was fought near the Miller plantation. +The Yankees under General Grant came through the country. They burned +2,000 bales of Miller cotton. When the Yankee wagons crossed Bayou +Creek the bridge gave way and quite a number of soldiers and horses +were seriously injured. + +For many years after the War folks would find bullets in the ground. +Some of the bullets were 'twins' fastened together with a chain. + +Master Miller settled my father upon a piece of land after the War and +we stayed on it several years, doing well. + +I moved to Muskogee in 1902, coming on to Tulsa in 1907, the same year +Oklahoma was made a state. My six wives are all dead,--Liza, Lizzie, +Ellen, Lula, Elizabeth and Henrietta. Six children, too. George, +Anna, Salomon, Nelson, Garfield, Cosmos--all good children. They +remember the Tulsa riot and don't aim ever to come back to Oklahoma. + +When the riot started in 1922 (I think it was), I had a place on the +corner of Pine and Owasso Streets. Two hundred of my people gathered +at my place, because I was so well known everybody figured we wouldn't +be molested. I was wrong. Two of my horses was shot and killed. Two of +my boys, Salomon and Nelson, was wounded, one in the hip, the other in +the shoulder. They wasn't bad and got well alright. Some of my people +wasn't so lucky. The dead wagon hauled them away! + +White men came into the negro district and gathered up the homeless. +The houses were most all burned. No place to go except to the camps +where armed whites kept everybody quiet. They took my clothes and all +my money--$298.00--and the police couldn't do nothing about my loss +when I reported it to them. + +That was a terrible time, but we people are better off today that any +time during the days of slavery. We have some privileges and they are +worth more than all the money in the world! + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +PHYLLIS PETITE +Age 83 yrs. +Fort Gibson, Okla. + + +I was born in Rusk County, Texas, on a plantation about eight miles +east of Belleview. There wasn't no town where I was born, but they had +a church. + +My mammy and pappy belonged to a part Cherokee named W. P. Thompson +when I was born. He had kinfolks in the Cherokee Nation, and we all +moved up here to a place on Fourteen-Mile Creek close to where Hulbert +now is, 'way before I was big enough to remember anything. Then, so I +been told, old master Thompson sell my pappy and mammy and one of my +baby brothers and me back to one of his neighbors in Texas name of +John Harnage. + +Mammy's name was Letitia Thompson and pappy's was Riley Thompson. My +little brother was named Johnson Thompson, but I had another brother +sold to a Vann and he always call hisself Harry Vann. His Cherokee +master lived on the Arkansas river close to Webber's Falls and I never +did know him until we was both grown. My only sister was Patsy and she +was borned after slavery and died at Wagoner, Oklahoma. + +I can just remember when Master John Harnage took us to Texas. We went +in a covered wagon with oxen and camped out all along the way. Mammy +done the cooking in big wash kettles and pappy done the driving of the +oxen. I would set in a wagon and listen to him pop his whip and +holler. + +Master John took us to his plantation and it was a big one, too. You +could look from the field up to the Big House and any grown body in +the yard look like a little body, it was so far away. + +We negroes lived in quarters not far from the Big House and ours was a +single log house with a stick and dirt chimney. We cooked over the hot +coals in the fireplace. + +I just played around until I was about six years old I reckon, and +then they put me up at the Big House with my mammy to work. She done +all the cording and spinning and weaving, and I done a whole lot of +sweeping and minding the baby. The baby was only about six months old +I reckon. I used to stand by the cradle and rock it all day, and when +I quit I would go to sleep right by the cradle sometimes before mammy +would come and get me. + +The Big House had great big rooms in front, and they was fixed up +nice, too. I remember when old Mistress Harnage tried me out sweeping +up the front rooms. They had two or three great big pictures of some +old people hanging on the wall. They was full blood Indians it look +like, and I was sure scared of them pictures! I would go here and +there and every which-a-way, and anywheres I go them big pictures +always looking straight at me and watching me sweep! I kept my eyes +right on them so I could run if they moved, and old Mistress take me +back to the kitchen and say I can't sweep because I miss all the dirt. + +We always have good eating, like turnip greens cooked in a kettle with +hog skins and crackling grease, and skinned corn, and rabbit or possum +stew. I liked big fish tolerable well too, but I was afraid of the +bones in the little ones. + +That skinned corn aint like the boiled hominy we have today. To make +it you boil some wood ashes, or have some drip lye from the hopper to +put in the hot water. Let the corn boil in the lye water until the +skin drops off and the eyes drop out and then wash that corn in fresh +water about a dozen times, or just keep carrying water from the spring +until you are wore out, like I did. Then you put the corn in a crock +and set it in the spring, and you got good skinned corn as long as it +last, all ready to warm up a little batch at a time. + +Master had a big, long log kitchen setting away from the house, and we +set a big table for the family first, and when they was gone we +negroes at the house eat at that table too, but we don't use the china +dishes. + +The negro cook was Tilda Chisholm. She and my mammy didn't do no +out-work. Aunt Tilda sure could make them corn-dodgers. Us children +would catch her eating her dinner first out of the kettles and when we +say something she say: "Go on child, I jest tasting that dinner." + +In the summer we had cotton homespun clothes, and in winter it had +wool mixed in. They was dyed with copperas and wild indigo. + +My brother, Johnson Thompson, would get up behind old Master Harnage +on his horse and go with him to hunt squirrels so they would go 'round +on Master's side so's he could shoot them. Master's old mare was named +"Old Willow", and she knowed when to stop and stand real still so he +could shoot. + +His children was just all over the place! He had two houses full of +them! I only remember Bell, Ida, Maley, Mary and Will, but they was +plenty more I don't remember. + +That old horn blowed 'way before daylight, and all the field negroes +had to be out in the row by the time of sun up. House negroes got up +too, because old Master always up to see everybody get out to work. + +Old Master Harnage bought and sold slaves most all the time, and some +of the new negroes always acted up and needed a licking. The worst +ones got beat up good, too! They didn't have no jail to put slaves in +because when the Masters got done licking them they didn't need no +jail. + +My husband was George Petite. He tell me his mammy was sold away from +him when he was a little boy. He looked down a long lane after her +just as long as he could see her, and cried after her. He went down to +the big road and set down by his mammy's barefooted tracks in the sand +and set there until it got dark, and then he come on back to the +quarters. + +I just saw one slave try to get away right in hand. They caught him +with bloodhounds and brung him back in. The hounds had nearly tore him +up, and he was sick a long time. I don't remember his name, but he +wasn't one of the old regular negroes. + +In Texas we had a church where we could go. I think it was a white +church and they just let the negroes have it when they got a preacher +sometimes. My mammy took me sometimes, and she loved to sing them +salvation songs. + +We used to carry news from one plantation to the other I reckon, +'cause mammy would tell about things going on some other plantation +and I know she never been there. + +Christmas morning we always got some brown sugar candy or some +molasses to pull, and we children was up bright and early to get that +'lasses pull, I tell you! And in the winter we played skeeting on the +ice when the water froze over. No, I don't mean skating. That's when +you got iron skates, and we didn't have them things. We just get a +running start and jump on the ice and skeet as far as we could go, and +then run some more. + +I nearly busted my head open, and brother Johnson said: "Try it +again," but after that I was scared to skeet any more. + +Mammy say we was down in Texas to get away from the War, but I didn't +see any war and any soldiers. But one day old Master stay after he eat +breakfast and when us negroes come in to eat he say: "After today I +ain't your master any more. You all as free as I am." We just stand +and look and don't know what to say about it. + +After while pappy got a wagon and some oxen to drive for a white man +who was coming to the Cherokee Nation because he had folks here. His +name was Dave Mounts and he had a boy named John. + +We come with them and stopped at Fort Gibson where my own grand mammy +was cooking for the soldiers at the garrison. Her name was Phyllis +Brewer and I was named after her. She had a good Cherokee master. My +mammy was born on his place. + +We stayed with her about a week and then we moved out on Four Mile +Creek to live. She died on Fourteen-Mile Creek about a year later. + +When we first went to Four Mile Creek I seen negro women chopping wood +and asked them who they work for and I found out they didn't know they +was free yet. + +After a while my pappy and mammy both died, and I was took care of by +my aunt Elsie Vann. She took my brother Johnson too, but I don't know +who took Harry Vann. + +I was married to George Petite, and I had on a white underdress and +black high-top shoes, and a large cream colored hat, and on top of all +I had a blue wool dress with tassels all around the bottom of it. That +dress was for me to eat the terrible supper in. That what we called +the wedding supper because we eat too much of it. Just danced all +night, too! I was at Mandy Foster's house in Fort Gibson, and the +preacher was Reverend Barrows, I had that dress a long time, but its +gone now. I still got the little sun bonnet I wore to church in Texas. + +We had six children, but all are dead but George, Tish, and Annie +now. + +Yes, they tell me Abraham Lincoln set me free, and I love to look at +his picture on the wall in the school house at Four Mile branch where +they have church. My grand mammy kind of help start that church, and I +think everybody ought to belong to some church. + +I want to say again my Master Harnage was Indian, but he was a good +man and mighty good to us slaves, and you can see I am more than six +feet high, and they say I weighs over a hundred and sixty, even if my +hair is snow white. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +MATILDA POE +Age 80 yrs. +McAlester, Okla. + + +I was born in Indian Territory on de plantation of Isaac Love. He was +old Master, and Henry Love was young Master. Isaac Love was a full +blood Chickasaw Indian but his wife was a white woman. + +Old Master was sure good to his slaves. The young niggers never done +no heavy work till dey was fully grown. Dey would carry water to de +men in de field and do other light jobs 'round de place. + +De Big House set way back from de road 'bout a quarter of a mile. It +was a two-story log house, and the rooms was awful big and they was +purty furniture in it. The furniture in de parlor was red plush and I +loved to slip in and rub my hand over it, it was so soft like. The +house was made of square logs and de cracks was filled out even with +the edges of de logs. It was white washed and my but it was purty. +They was a long gallery clean across de front of de house and big +posts to support de roof. Back a ways from de house was de kitchen and +nearby was de smokehouse. Old Master kept it well filled with meat, +lard and molasses all de time. He seen to it that we always had plenty +to eat. The old women done all de cooking in big iron pots that hung +over the fire. De slaves was all served together. + +The slave quarters was about two hundred yards back of de Big House. +Our furniture was made of oak 'cepting de chairs, and dey was made out +of hackberry. I still have a chair dat belonged to my mammy. + +The boys didn't wear no britches in de summer time. Dey just wore long +shirts. De girls wore homespun dresses, either blue or gray. + +Old Master never hired no overseer for his slaves, but he looked after +'em hisself. He punished dem hisself too. He had to go away one time +and he hired a white man to oversee while he was gone. The only orders +he left was to keep dem busy. Granny Lucy was awful old but he made +her go to the field. She couldn't hold out to work so he ups and whips +her. He beat her scandalous. He cut her back so bad she couldn't wear +her dress. Old Master come home and my, he was mad when he see Granny +Lucy. He told de man to leave and iffen he ever set foot on his ground +again he's shoot him, sure! + +Old Master had a big plantation and a hundred or more slaves. Dey +always got up at daylight and de men went out and fed de horses. When +de bell rang dey was ready to eat. After breakfast dey took de teams +and went out to plow. Dey come in 'bout half past 'leven and at twelve +de bell rung agin. Dey eat their dinner and back to plowing dey went. +'Bout five o'clock dey come in again, and den they'd talk, sing and +jig dance till bedtime. + +Old Master never punished his niggers 'cepting dey was sassy or lazy. +He never sold his slaves neither. A owner once sold several babies to +traders. Dey stopped at our plantation to stay awhile. My mammy and de +other women had to take care of dem babies for two days, and teach dem +to nuss a bottle or drink from a glass. Dat was awful, dem little +children crying for they mothers. Sometimes dey sold de mothers away +from they husbands and children. + +Master wasn't a believer in church but he let us have church. My we'd +have happy times singing an shouting. They'd have church when dey had +a preacher and prayer meeting when dey didn't. + +Slaves didn't leave de plantation much on 'count of de Patrollers. De +patroller was low white trash what jest wanted a excuse to shoot +niggers. I don't think I ever saw one but I heard lots of 'em. + +I don't believe in luck charms and things of the such. Iffen you is in +trouble, there ain't nothing gonna save you but de Good Lawd. I heard +of folks keeping all kind of things for good luck charms. When I was a +child different people gave me buttons to string and we called them +our charm string and wore 'em round our necks. If we was mean dey +would tell us "Old Raw Head and Bloody Bones" would git us. Grand +mammy told us ghost stories after supper, but I don't remember any of +dem. + +I never did know I was a slave, 'cause I couldn't tell I wasn't free. +I always had a good time, didn't have to work much, and allus had +something to eat and wear and that was better than it is with me now. + +When de War was over old Master told us we was free. Mammy she say, +"Well, I'm heading for Texas." I went out and old Master ask me to +bring him a coal of fire to light his pipe. I went after it and mammy +left pretty soon. My pappy wouldn't leave old Master right then but +old Master told us we was free to go where we pleased, so me an' pappy +left and went to Texas where my mammy was. We never saw old Master any +more. We stayed a while in Texas and then come back to de Indian +Territory. + +Abe Lincoln was a good man, everybody liked him. See, I've got his +picture. Jeff Davis was a good man too, he just made a mistake. I like +Mr. Roosevelt, too. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +HENRY F. PYLES +Age 81 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + + Little pinch o' pepper---- + Little bunch o' wool---- + + Mumbledy--Mumbledy---- + + Two, three Pammy Christy beans---- + Little piece o' rusty iron---- + + Mumbledy--Mumbledy---- + + Wrop it in a rag and tie it wid hair, + Two fum a hoss an' one fum a mare---- + + Mumbledy, Mumbledy, Mumbledy---- + + Wet it in whiskey + Boughten wid silver; + Dat make you wash so hard your sweat pop out, + And he come to pass, sho'! + +That's how the niggers say old Bab Russ used to make the hoodoo +"hands" he made for the young bucks and wenches, but I don't know, +'cause I was too trusting to look inside de one he make for me, and +anyways I lose it, and it no good nohow! + +Old Bab Russ live about two mile from me, and I went to him one night +at midnight and ask him to make me de hand. I was a young strapper +about sixteen years old, and thinking about wenches pretty hard and +wanting something to help me out wid the one I liked best. + +Old Bab Russ charge me four bits for dat hand, and I had to give four +bits more for a pint of whiskey to wet it wid, and it wasn't no good +nohow! + +Course dat was five-six years after de War. I wasn't yet quite eleven +when de War close. Most all the niggers was farming on de shares and +whole lots of them was still working for their old Master yet. Old +Bab come in there from deep South Carolina two-three years befo', and +live all by hisself. De gal I was worrying about had come wid her old +pappy and mammy to pick cotton on de place, and dey was staying in one +of de cabins in the "settlement", but dey didn't live there all de +time. + +I don't know whether I believed in conjure much or not in dem days, +but anyways I tried it that once and it stirred up sech a rumpus +everybody called me "Hand" after that until after I was married and +had a pack of children. + +Old Bab Russ was coal black, and he could talk African or some other +unknown tongue, and all the young bucks and wenches was mortal 'fraid +of him! + +Well sir, I took dat hand he made for me and set out to try it on dat +gal. She never had give me a friendly look even, and when I would +speak to her polite she just hang her head and say nothing! + +We was all picking cotton, and I come along up behind her and decided +to use my "Hand." I had bought me a pint of whiskey to wet the hand +wid, but I was scared to take out of my pocket and let the other +niggers see it, so I jest set down in de cotton row and taken a big +mouthful. I figgered to hold it in my mouth until I catched up wid +that gal and then blow it on the hand jest before I tech her on the +arm and speak to her. + +Well, I take me a big mouthful, but it was so hot and scaldy it jest +slip right on down my throat! Then I had to take another, and when I +was gitting up I kind of stumbled and it slip down, too! + +Then I see all the others get way on ahead, and I took another big +mouthful--the last in the bottle--and drap the bottle under a big +stalk and start picking fast and holding the whiskey in my mouth this +time. I missed about half the cotton I guess, but at last I catch up +with de rest and git close up behind dat purty gal. Then I started to +speak to her, but forgot I had de whiskey in mouth and I lost most of +it down my neck and all over my chin, and then I strangled a little on +the rest, so as when I went to squirt it on de "hand" I didn't have +nothing left to squirt but a little spit. + +That make me a little nervous right then, but anyways I step up behind +dat gal and lay my hand on her arm and speak polite and start to say +something, but I finish up what I start to say laying on my neck with +my nose shoved up under a cotton stalk about four rows away! + +De way that gal lam me across the head was a caution! We was in new +ground, and she jest pick up a piece of old root and whopped me right +in de neck with it! + +That raise sech a laugh on me that I never say nothing to her for +three-four days, but after while I gets myself wound up to go see her +at her home. I didn't know how she going to act, but I jest took my +foot in my hand and went on over. + +Her old pappy and mammy was asleep in the back of the room on a +pallet, and we set in front of the fireplace on our hunches and jest +looked at the fire and punched it up a little. It wasn't cold, but de +malary fog was thick all through de bottoms. + +After while I could smell the whiskey soaked up in dat "hand" I had in +my pocket, and I was scared she could smell it too. So I jest reached +in my pocket and teched it for luck, then I reached over and teched +her arm. She jerked it back so quick she knocked over the churn and +spilled buttermilk all over de floor! Dat make de old folks mad, and +dey grumble and holler and told de gal, "Send dat black rapscallion on +out of here!" But I didn't go. + +I kept on moving over closer and she kept on backing away, but after +while I reach over and put my hand on her knee. All I was going to do +was say something but I shore forgot what it was the next minnit, +'cause she jest whinnied lak a scared hoss and give me a big push. I +was settin straddledy-legged on the floor, and that push sent me on my +head in the hot ashes in the fur corner of the chimney. + +Then the old man jump up and make for me and I make for the door! It +was dark, all 'cepting the light from the chimney, and I fumble all up +and down the door jamb before I find de latch pin. The old man shorely +git me if he hadn't stumble over the eating table and whop his hand +right down in de dish of fresh made butter. That make him so mad he +jest stand and holler and cuss. + +I git de pin loose and jerk de door open so quick and hard I knock de +powder gourd down what was hanging over it, and my feet git caught in +the string. The stopper gits knocked out, and when I untangle it from +my feet and throw it back in de house it fall in the fireplace. + +I was running all de time, but I hear dat gourd go "Blammity Blam!" +and then all de yelling, but I didn't go back to see how dey git the +hot coals all put out what was scattered all over de cabin! + +I done drap dat "hand" and I never did see it again. Never did see the +gal but two-three times after that, and we never mention about dat +night. Her old pappy was too old to work, so I never did see him +neither, but she must of told about it because all the young bucks +called me "Hand" after that for a long time. + +Old Bab kept on trying to work his conjure with the old niggers, but +the young ones didn't pay him much mind cause they was hearing about +the Gospel and de Lord Jesus Christ. We was all free then, and we +could go and come without a pass, and they was always some kind of +church meeting going on close enough to go to. Our niggers never did +hear about de Lord Jesus until after we was free, but lots of niggers +on de other plantations had masters that told them all about him, and +some of dem niggers was pretty good at preaching. Then de good church +people in de North was sending white preachers amongst us all the time +too. Most of de young niggers was Christians by that time. + +One day old Bab was hoeing in a field and got in a squabble about +something with a young gal name Polly, same name as his wife. After +while he git so mad he reach up with his fingers and wet them on his +tongue and point straight up and say, "Now you got a trick on you! +Dere's a heavy trick on you now! Iffen you don't change your mind you +going pass on before de sun go down!" + +All de young niggers looked like they want to giggle but afraid to, +and the old ones start begging old Bab to take the trick off, but that +Polly git her dander up and take in after him with a hoe! + +She knocked him down, and he jest laid there kicking his feet in the +air and trying to keep her from hitting him in the head! + +Well, that kind of broke up Bab's charm, so he set out to be a +preacher. The Northern whites was paying some of the Negro preachers, +so he tried to be one too. He didn't know nothing about de Bible but +to shout loud, so the preacher board at Red Mound never would give him +a paper to preach. Then he had to go back to tricking and trancing +again. + +One day he come in at dinner and told his wife to git him something to +eat. She told him they aint nothing but some buttermilk, and he says +give me some of that. He hollered around till she fix him a big ash +cake and he ate that and she made him another and he ate that. Then he +drunk the rest of de gallon of buttermilk and went out and laid down +on a tobacco scaffold in de yard and nearly died. + +After while he jest stiffened out and looked like he was dead, and +nobody couldn't wake him up. 'Bout forty niggers gathered round and +tried but it done no good. Old mammy Polly got scared and sent after +the white judge, old Squire Wilson, and he tried, and then the white +preacher Reverend Dennison tried and old man Gorman tried. He was a +infidel, but that didn't do no good. + +By that time it was getting dark, and every nigger in a square mile +was there, looking on and acting scared. Me and my partner who was a +little bit cripple but mighty smart come up to see what all the rumpus +was about, and we was jest the age to do anything. + +He whispered to me to let him start it off and then me finish it while +he got a head running start. I ast him what he talking about. + +Then he fooled round the house and got a little ball of cotton and +soaked it in kerosene from a lamp. It was a brass lamp with a hole and +a stopper in the side of the bowl. Wonder he didn't burn his fool head +off! Then he sidle up close and stuck dat cotton 'tween old Bab's +toes. Old Bab had the biggest feet I ever see, too. + +'Bout that time I lit a corn shuck in de lamp and run out in de yard +and stuck it to de cotton and jest kept right on running! + +My partner had a big start but I catch up wid him and we lay down in +de bresh and listened to everybody hollering and old Bab hollering +louder than anybody. Old Bab moved away after that. + +All that foolishness happen after the War, but before de War while I +was a little boy they wasn't much foolishness went on I warrant you. + +I was born on de 15th of August in 1856, and belonged to Mister +Addison Pyles. He lived in town, in Jackson, Tennessee, and was a old +man when de War broke. He had a nephew named Irvin T. Pyles he raised +from a baby, and Mister Irvin kept a store at de corner of de roads at +our plantation. The plantation covered about 300 or 400 acres I +reckon, and they had about 25 slaves counting de children. + +The plantation was about 9 miles north of Red Mound, close to +Lexington, Tennessee, and about a mile and a half from Parker's +Crossroads where they had a big battle in de War. + +They wasn't no white overseer on the place, except Mister Irvin, and +he stayed in de store or in town and didn't bother about the farm +work. We had a Negro overlooker who was my stepdaddy. His name was +Jordan, and he run away wid de Yankees about de middle of de War and +was in a Negro Yankee regiment. After he left we jest worked on as +usual because we was afraid not to. Several of de men got away like +that but he was de only one that got in de army. + +They was a big house in de middle of de place and a settlement of +Negro cabins behind and around it. We called it de settlement, but on +other plantations where white folks lived there too they called it de +quarters. We always kept this big house clean and ready, and sometimes +de white folks come out from town and stay a few days and hunt and +fish and look over de crops. + +We all worked at farm work. Cotton and corn and tobacco mostly. We all +laid off Sunday after noontime, but we didn't have no church nor +preaching and we didn't hear anything 'bout Jesus much until after de +emancipation. + +I reckon old Master wasn't very religious, 'cause he never tell us +'bout the Holy Word. He jest said to behave ourselves and tell him +when we wanted to marry, and not have but one wife. + +We had little garden patches and cotton patches we could work on +Sunday and what de stuff brung we could sell and keep the money. Old +Master let us have what we made that way on Sunday. We could buy +ribbons and hand soap and coal oil and such at de store. Master Irvin +was always honest 'bout continuing de money, too. + +We didn't have no carders and spinners nor no weavers on de +plantation. They cost too much money to buy just for 25 niggers, and +they cost a lot more than field niggers. So we got our clothes sent +out to us from in town, and sometimes we was give cloth from de store +to make our clothes out of. + +We got de shorts and seconds from de mill when we had wheat ground, +and so we had good wheat bread as well as corn pone, and de big +smokehouse was on de place and we had all de meat we wanted to eat. +Old Master sent out after de meat he wanted every day or so and we +kept him in garden sass that way too. + +We was right between de forks of Big Beaver and Little Beaver and we +could go fishing without getting far off de place. We couldn't go far +away without a pass, though, and they wasn't nobody on the place to +write us a pass, so we couldn't go to meeting and dances and sech. + +But de niggers on de other plantations could get passes to come to our +place, and so we had parties sometimes there at our place. We always +had them on Sundays, 'cause in the evening we would be too tired to +work if we set up, and the other masters wouldn't give passes to their +niggers to come over in de evening. + +We had a white doctor lived at de next plantation, and old Master had +a contract with old Dr. Brown to look after us. He had a beard as long +as your arm. He come for all kinds of misery except bornings. Then we +had a mid-wife who was a white woman lived down below us. They was +poor people renting or living on war land. Nearly all de white folks +in that country been there a long time and their old people got de +land from de government for fighting in the Revolutionary War. Most +all was from North Carolina--way back. I think old Master's pappy was +from dere in de first place. + +Old Master had two sons named Newton and Willis. Newton was in de War +and was killed, and Willis went to war later and was sick a long time +and come home early. Old Master was too old to go. + +There was two daughters, Mary, de oldest, married a Holmes, and Miss +Laura never did marry I don't think. + +My mammy's name was Jane, and she was born on de 10th day of May in +1836. I know de dates 'cause old Master kept his book on all his +niggers de same as on his own family. Mammy was the nurse of all de +children but I think old Master sent her to de plantation about the +time I was born. I don't think I had any pappy. I think I was jest one +of them things that happened sometimes in slavery days, but I know old +Master didn't have nothing to do with it--I'm too black. + +Mammy married a man named Jordan when I was a little baby. He was the +overlooker and went off to de Yankees, when dey come for foraging +through dat country de first time. + +He served in de Negro regiment in de battle at Fort Piller and a lot +of Sesesh was killed in dat battle, so when de War was over and Jordan +come back home he was a changed nigger and all de whites and a lot of +de niggers hated him. All 'cepting old Master, and he never said a +word out of de way to him. Jest told him to come on and work on de +place as long as he wanted to. + +But Jordan had a hard time, and he brung it on his self I reckon. + +'Bout de first thing, he went down to Wildersville Schoolhouse, about +a mile from Wildersville, to a nigger and carpet bagger convention and +took me and mammy along. That was de first picnic and de first brass +band I ever see. De band men was all white men and they still had on +their blue soldier clothes. + +Lots of de niggers there had been in de Union army too, and they had +on parts of their army clothes. They took them out from under their +coats and their wagon seats an put them on for de picnic. + +There was a saloon over in Wildersville, and a lot of them went over +there but they was scared to go in, most of them. But a colored +delegate named Taylor and my pappy went in and ordered a drink. The +bartender didn't pay them no mind. + +Then a white man named Billy Britt walked up and throwed a glass of +whiskey in Jordan's face and cussed him for being in de Yankee army. +Then a white man from the North named Pearson took up the fight and +him and Jordan jumped on Billy Britt, but de crowd stopped them and +told pappy to git on back to whar he come from. + +He got elected a delegate at de convention and went on down to +Nashville and helped nominate Brownlow for governor. Then he couldn't +come back home for a while, but finally he did. + +Old Master was uneasy about de way things was going on, and he come +out to de farm and stayed in de big house a while. + +One day in broad daylight he was on de gallery and down de road come +'bout 20 bushwhackers in Sesesh clothes on horses and rid up to de +gate. Old Master knowed all of them, and Captain Clay Taylor, who had +been de master of de nigger delegate, was at the head of them. + +They had Jordan Pyles tied with a rope and walked along on de ground +betwixt two horses. + +"Whar you taking my nigger?", Old Master say. He run down off de +gallery and out in de road. + +"He ain't your nigger no more--you know that", old Captain Taylor +holler back. + +"He jest as much my nigger as that Taylor nigger was your nigger, and +you ain't laid hands on him! Now you jest have pity on my nigger!" + +"Your nigger Jordan been in de Yankee army, and he was in de battle at +Fort Piller and help kill our white folks, and you know it!" Old +Captain Taylor say, and argue on like that, but old Master jest take +hold his bridle and shake his head. + +"No, Clay", he say, "that boy maybe didn't kill Confederates, but you +and him both know my two boys killed plenty Yankees, and you forgot I +lost one of my boys in de War. Ain't that enough to pay for letting my +nigger alone?" + +And old Captain Taylor give the word to turn Jordan loose, and they +rid on down de road. + +That's one reason my stepdaddy never did leave old Master's place, and +I stayed on dere till I was grown and had children. + +The Yankees come through past our place three-four times, and one time +they had a big battle jest a mile and a half away at Parker's +Crossroads. + +I was in de field hoeing, and I remember I hadn't watered the cows we +had hid way down in de woods, so I started down to water them when I +first heard de shooting. + +We had de stock hid down in de woods and all de corn and stuff hid +too, 'cause the Yankees and the Sesesh had been riding through quite a +lot, and either one take anything they needed iffen they found it. + +First I hear something way off say "Br-r-rump!" Then again, and again. +Then something sound like popcorn beginning to pop real slow. Then it +git faster and I start for de settlement and de big house. + +All Master's folks was staying at de big house then, and couldn't git +back to town 'count of de soldiers, so they all put on they good +clothes, with de hoop skirts and little sunshades and the lace +pantaloons and got in the buggy to go see de battle! + +They rid off and it wasn't long till all the niggers was following +behind. We all got to a hill 'bout a half a mile from the crossroads +and stopped when we couldn't see nothing but thick smoke all over de +whole place. + +We could see men on horses come in and out of de smoke, going this way +and that way, and then some Yankees on horses broke through de woods +right close to us and scattered off down through de field. One of de +white officers rid up close and yelled at us and took off his hat, but +I couldn't hear nothing he said. + +Then he rid on and catch up with his men. They had stopped and was +turning off to one side. He looked back and waved his hat again for us +to git away from that, and jest then he clapped his hand to his belly +and fell off his hoss. + +Our white folks turned their buggy round and made it for home and no +mistake! The niggers wasn't fur behind neither! + +They fit on back toward our plantation, and some of the fighting was +inside it at one corner. For three-four days after that they was +burying soldiers 'round there, and some of de graves was on our old +place. + +Long time afterwards people come and moved all them to other +graveyards at Shiloh and Corinth and other places. They was about a +hundred killed all around there. + +After de War I married Molly Timberlake and we lived on there 'til +1902, when we come to Indian Territory at Haskell. They wasn't no +Haskell there then, and I helped to build dat town, doing carpenter +work and the like. + +We had two boys, Bill and Jim Dick, and eight daughters, Effie, Ida, +Etta, Eva, Jessie, Tommie, Bennie and Timmie. Her real name is +Timberlake after her mammy. They all went to school and graduated in +the high schools. + +My wife has been dead about ten years. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +10-13-37 +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937] + +CHANEY RICHARDSON +Age 90 years +Fort Gibson, Okla. + + +I was born in the old Caney settlement southeast of Tahlequah on the +banks of Caney Creek. Off to the north we could see the big old ridge +of Sugar Mountain when the sun shine on him first thing in the morning +when we all getting up. + +I didn't know nothing else but some kind of war until I was a grown +woman, because when I first can remember my old Master, Charley +Rogers, was always on the lookout for somebody or other he was lined +up against in the big feud. + +My master and all the rest of the folks was Cherokees, and they'd been +killing each other off in the feud ever since long before I was +borned, and jest because old Master have a big farm and three-four +families of Negroes them other Cherokees keep on pestering his stuff +all the time. Us children was always afeared to go any place less'n +some of the grown folks was along. + +We didn't know what we was a-feared of, but we heard the Master and +Mistress keep talking 'bout "another Party killing" and we stuck close +to the place. + +Old Mistress' name was Nancy Rogers, but I was a orphan after I was a +big girl and I called her "Aunt" and "Mamma" like I did when I was +little. You see my own mammy was the house woman and I was raised in +the house, and I heard the little children call old mistress "mamma" +and so I did too. She never did make me stop. + +My pappy and mammy and us children lived in a one-room log cabin close +to the creek bank and jest a little piece from old Master's house. + +My pappy's name was Joe Tucker and my mammy's name was Ruth Tucker. +They belonged to a man named Tucker before I was born and he sold them +to Master Charley Rogers and he just let them go on by the same name +if they wanted to, because last name didn't mean nothing to a slave +anyways. The folks jest called my pappy "Charley Rogers' boy Joe." + +I already had two sisters, Mary and Mandy, when I was born, and purty +soon I had a baby brother, Louis. Mammy worked at the Big House and +took me along every day. When I was a little bigger I would help hold +the hank when she done the spinning and old Mistress done a lot of the +weaving and some knitting. She jest set by the window and knit most +all of the time. + +When we weave the cloth we had a big loom out on the gallery, and Miss +Nancy tell us how to do it. + +Mammy eat at our own cabin, and we had lots of game meat and fish the +boys get in the Caney Creek. Mammy bring down deer meat and wild +turkey sometimes, that the Indian boys git on Sugar Mountain. + +Then we had corn bread, dried bean bread and green stuff out'n +Master's patch. Mammy make the bean bread when we git short of corn +meal and nobody going to the mill right away. She take and bile the +beans and mash them up in some meal and that make it go a long ways. + +The slaves didn't have no garden 'cause they work the old Master's +garden and make enough for everybody to have some anyway. + +When I was about 10 years old that feud got so bad the Indians was +always talking about getting their horses and cattle killed and their +slaves harmed. I was too little to know how bad it was until one +morning my own mammy went off somewhere down the road to git some +stuff to dye cloth and she didn't come back. + +Lots of the young Indian bucks on both sides of the feud would ride +around the woods at night, and old Master got powerful oneasy about my +mammy and had all the neighbors and slaves out looking for her, but +nobody find her. + +It was about a week later that two Indian men rid up and ast old +master wasn't his gal Ruth gone. He says yes, and they take one of the +slaves along with a wagon to show where they seen her. + +They find her in some bushes where she'd been getting bark to set the +dyes, and she been dead all the time. Somebody done hit her in the +head with a club and shot her through and through with a bullet too. +She was so swole up they couldn't lift her up and jest had to make a +deep hole right along side of her and roll her in it she was so bad +mortified. + +Old Master nearly go crazy he was so mad, and the young Cherokee men +ride the woods every night for about a month, but they never catch on +to who done it. + +I think old Master sell the children or give them out to somebody +then, because I never see my sisters and brother for a long time after +the Civil War, and for me, I have to go live with a new mistress that +was a Cherokee neighbor. Her name was Hannah Ross, and she raised me +until I was grown. + +I was her home girl, and she and me done a lot of spinning and +weaving too. I helped the cook and carried water and milked. I carried +the water in a home-made pegging set on my head. Them peggings was +kind of buckets made out of staves set around a bottom and didn't have +no handle. + +I can remember weaving with Miss Hannah Ross. She would weave a strip +of white and one of yellow and one of brown to make it pretty. She had +a reel that would pop every time it got to a half skein so she would +know to stop and fill it up again. We used copperas and some kind of +bark she bought at the store to dye with. It was cotton clothes winter +and summer for the slaves, too, I'll tell you. + +When the Civil War come along we seen lots of white soldiers in them +brown butternut suits all over the place, and about all the Indian men +was in it too. Old master Charley Rogers' boy Charley went along too. +Then pretty soon--it seem like about a year--a lot of the Cherokee men +come back home and say they not going back to the War with that +General Cooper and some of them go off the Federal side because the +captain go to the Federal side too. + +Somebody come along and tell me my own pappy have to go in the war and +I think they say he on the Copper side, and then after while Miss +Hannah tell me he git kilt over in Arkansas. + +I was so grieved all the time I don't remember much what went on, but +I know pretty soon my Cherokee folks had all the stuff they had et up +by the soldiers and they was jest a few wagons and mules left. + +All the slaves was piled in together and some of the grown ones +walking, and they took us way down across the big river and kept us in +the bottoms a long time until the War was over. + +We lived in a kind of a camp, but I was too little to know where they +got the grub to feed us with. Most all the Negro men was off somewhere +in the War. + +Then one day they had to bust up the camp and some Federal soldiers go +with us and we all start back home. We git to a place where all the +houses is burned down and I ask what is that place. Miss Hannah say: +"Skullyville, child. That's where they had part of the War." + +All the slaves was set out when we git to Fort Gibson, and the +soldiers say we all free now. They give us grub and clothes to the +Negroes at that place. It wasn't no town but a fort place and a patch +of big trees. + +Miss Hannah take me to her place and I work there until I was grown. I +didn't git any money that I seen, but I got a good place to stay. + +Pretty soon I married Ran Lovely and we lived in a double log house +here at Fort Gibson. Then my second husband was Henry Richardson, but +he's been dead for years, too. We had six children, but they all dead +but one. + +I didn't want slavery to be over with, mostly because we had the War I +reckon. All that trouble made me the loss of my mammy and pappy, and I +was always treated good when I was a slave. When it was over I had +rather be at home like I was. None of the Cherokees ever whipped us, +and my mistress give me some mighty fine rules to live by to git along +in this world, too. + +The Cherokee didn't have no jail for Negroes and no jail for +themselves either. If a man done a crime he come back to take his +punishment without being locked up. + +None of the Negroes ran away when I was a child that I know of. We all +had plenty to eat. The Negroes didn't have no school and so I can't +read and write, but they did have a school after the War, I hear. But +we had a church made out of a brush arbor and we would sing good songs +in Cherokee sometimes. + +I always got Sunday off to play, and at night I could go git a piece +of sugar or something to eat before I went to bed and Mistress didn't +care. + +We played bread-and-butter and the boys played hide the switch. The +one found the switch got to whip the one he wanted to. + +When I got sick they give me some kind of tea from weeds, and if I et +too many roasting ears and swole up they biled gourds and give me the +liquor off'n them to make me throw up. + +I've been a good church-goer all my life until I git too feeble, and I +still understand and talk Cherokee language and love to hear songs and +parts of the Bible in it because it make me think about the time I was +a little girl before my mammy and pappy leave me. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +RED RICHARDSON +Age 75 yrs. +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma + + +I was born July 21, 1862, at Grimes County, Texas. Smith Richardson +was my father's name, and Eliza Richardson my mother's. My father came +from Virginia. My mother she was born in Texas. + +We lived in so many places round there I can't tell jest what, but we +lived in a log house most of the time. We slept on the flo' on pallets +on one quilt. We ate cornbread, beans, vegetables, and got to drink +plenty milk. We ate rabbits, fish, possums and such as that but we +didn't get no chicken. I don't have no fav'rite food, I don't guess. + +We wore shirts, long shirts slit up the side. I didn't know what pants +was until I was 14. In Grimes County it ain't even cold these days, +and I never wore no shoes. I married in a suit made of broad cloth. It +had a tail on the coat. + +Master Ben Hadley, and Mistress Minnie Hadley, they had three sons: +Josh, Henry and Charley. Didn't have no overseer. We had to call all +white folks, poor or rich, Mr. Master and Mistress. Master Hadley +owned 'bout 2,000 acres. He had a big number of slaves. They used to +wake 'em up early in the mornings by ringing a large bell. They said +they used to whip 'em, drive 'em, and sell 'em away from their +chillun,--I'd hear my old folks talk about it. Say they wasn't no such +a thing as going to jail. The master stood good for anything his +nigger done. If the master's nigger killed 'im another nigger, the old +master stood good. + +They never had no schools for the Negro chillun. I can't remember the +date of the first school--its in a book someplace--but anyway I went +to one of the first schools that was established for the education of +Negro chillun. + +You know Mr. Negro always was a church man, but he don't mean nothing. +I don't have no fav'rite spiritual. All of them's good ones. Whenever +they'd baptise they'd sing: + +"Harp From the Tune the Domeful Sound." + +Which starts like this: + + "Come live in man and view this ground + where we must sho'ly lie." + +I'm a member of Tabernacle Baptist Church myself, and I think all +people should be religious 'cause Jesus died for us all. + +The patrollers used to run after me but I'd jump 'em. They used to +have a permit to go from one plantation to another. You had to go to +old master and say, "I want to go to such and such a place." And if +you had a permit they didn't bother you. The pateroller would stop you +and say, "Where you going? You got a permit to go to such and such a +place?" You'd say, yes suh, and show that pass. Den he wouldn't bother +you and iffen he did old master would git on 'em. + +When 10 o'clock come which was bed time the slaves would go to their +cabins and some of 'em would go stealing chickens, hogs, steal sweet +potatoes, and cook and eat 'em. Jest git in to all kind of devilment. + +Old master would give 'em Sadday afternoon off, and they'd have them +Sadday night breakdowns. We played a few games such as marbles, mumble +peg, and cards--jest anything to pass off the time. Heahs one of the +games we'd play an' I sho did like it too: + + She is my sweetheart as I stand, + Come and stand beside of me, + Kiss her sweet and; + Hug her near. + +On Christmas they'd make egg nog, drink whiskey and kiss their girls. + +Some wore charms to ward off the devil, but I don't believe in such. +I do believe in voodoo like this: People can put propositions up to +you and fool you. Don't believe in ghost. Tried to see 'em but I never +could. + +Old master didn't turn my father loose and tell 'em we was free. They +didn't turn us loose 'til they got the second threat from President +Lincoln. Good old Lincoln; they wasn't nothing like 'im. Booker T. +Washington was one of the finest Negro Educators in the world, but old +Jefferson Davis was against the cullud man. + +I think since slavery is all over, it has been a benefit to the cullud +man. He's got more freedom now. + + + + +Oklahoma Writer's Project +Ex-Slaves + +BETTY ROBERTSON +Age 93 yrs. +Fort Gibson, Oklahoma + + +I was born close to Webber's Falls, in the Canadian District of the +Cherokee Nation, in the same year that my pappy was blowed up and +killed in the big boat accident that killed my old Master. + +I never did see my daddy excepting when I was a baby and I only know +what my mammy told me about him. He come from across the water when he +was a little boy, and was grown when old Master Joseph Vann bought +him, so he never did learn to talk much Cherokee. My mammy was a +Cherokee slave, and talked it good. My husband was a Cherokee born +negro, too, and when he got mad he forgit all the English he knowed. + +Old Master Joe had a mighty big farm and several families of negroes, +and he was a powerful rich man. Pappy's name was Kalet Vann, and +mammy's name was Sally. My brothers was name Sone and Frank. I had one +brother and one sister sold when I was little and I don't remember the +names. My other sisters was Polly, Ruth and Liddie. I had to work in +the kitchen when I was a gal, and they was ten or twelve children +smaller than me for me to look after, too. Sometime Young Master Joe +and the other boys give me a piece of money and say I worked for it, +and I reckon I did for I have to cook five or six times a day. Some of +the Master's family was always going down to the river and back, and +every time they come in I have to fix something to eat. Old Mistress +had a good cookin' stove, but most Cherokees had only a big fireplace +and pot hooks. We had meat, bread, rice, potatoes and plenty of fish +and chicken. The spring time give us plenty of green corn and beans +too. I couldn't buy anything in slavery time, so I jest give the piece +of money to the Vann children. I got all the clothes I need from old +Mistress, and in winter I had high top shoes with brass caps on the +toe. In the summer I wear them on Sunday, too. I wore loom cloth +clothes, dyed in copperas what the old negro women and the old +Cherokee women made. + +The slaves had a pretty easy time I think. Young Master Vann never +very hard on us and he never whupped us, and old Mistress was a widow +woman and a good Christian and always kind. I sure did love her. Maybe +old Master Joe Vann was harder, I don't know, but that was before my +time. Young Master never whip his slaves, but if they don't mind good +he sell them off sometimes. He sold one of my brothers and one sister +because they kept running off. They wasn't very big either, but one +day two Cherokees rode up and talked a long time, then young Master +came to the cabin and said they were sold because mammy couldn't make +them mind him. They got on the horses behind the men and went off. + +Old Master Joe had a big steam boat he called the Lucy Walker, and he +run it up and down the Arkansas and the Mississippi and the Ohio +river, old Mistress say. He went clean to Louisville, Kentucky, and +back. My pappy was a kind of a boss of the negroes that run the boat, +and they all belong to old Master Joe. Some had been in a big run-away +and had been brung back, and wasn't so good, so he keep them on the +boat all the time mostly. Mistress say old Master and my pappy on the +boat somewhere close to Louisville and the boiler bust and tear the +boat up. Some niggers say my pappy kept hollering, "Run it to the +bank! Run it to the bank!" but it sunk and him and old Master died. + +Old Master Joe was a big man in the Cherokees, I hear, and was good to +his negroes before I was born. My pappy run away one time, four or +five years before I was born, mammy tell me, and at that time a whole +lot of Cherokee slaves run off at once. They got over in the Creek +country and stood off the Cherokee officers that went to git them, +but pretty soon they give up and come home. Mammy say they was lots of +excitement on old Master's place and all the negroes mighty scared, +but he didn't sell my pappy off. He jest kept him and he was a good +negro after that. He had to work on the boat, though, and never got to +come home but once in a long while. + +Young Master Joe let us have singing and be baptized if we want to, +but I wasn't baptized till after the War. But we couldn't learn to +read or have a book, and the Cherokee folks was afraid to tell us +about the letters and figgers because they have a law you go to jail +and a big fine if you show a slave about the letters. + +When the War come they have a big battle away west of us, but I never +see any battles. Lots of soldiers around all the time though. + +One day young Master come to the cabins and say we all free and can't +stay there less'n we want to go on working for him just like we'd +been, for our feed and clothes. Mammy got a wagon and we traveled +around a few days and go to Fort Gibson. When we git to Fort Gibson +they was a lot of negroes there, and they had a camp meeting and I was +baptized. It was in the Grand River close to the ford, and winter +time. Snow on the ground and the water was muddy and all full of +pieces of ice. The place was all woods, and the Cherokees and the +soldiers all come down to see the baptizing. + +We settled down a little ways above Fort Gibson. Mammy had the wagon +and two oxen, and we worked a good size patch there until she died, +and then I git married to Cal Robertson to have somebody to take care +of me. Cal Robertson was eighty-nine years old when I married him +forty years ago, right on this porch. I had on my old clothes for the +wedding, and I aint had any good clothes since I was a little slave +girl. Then I had clean warm clothes and I had to keep them clean, too! + +I got my allotment as a Cherokee Freedman, and so did Cal, but we +lived here at this place because we was too old to work the land +ourselves. In slavery time the Cherokee negroes do like anybody else +when they is a death--jest listen to a chapter in the Bible and all +cry. We had a good song I remember. It was "Don't Call the Roll, +Jesus, Because I'm Coming Home." The only song I remember from the +soldiers was: "Hang Jeff Davis to a Sour Apple Tree", and I remember +that because they said he used to be at Fort Gibson one time. I don't +know what he done after that. + +I don't know about Robert Lee, but I know about Lee's Creek. + +I been a good Christian ever since I was baptized, but I keep a little +charm here on my neck anyways, to keep me from having the nose bleed. +Its got a buckeye and a lead bullet in it. I had a silver dime on it, +too, for a long time, but I took it off and got me a box of snuff. I'm +glad the War's over and I am free to meet God like anybody else, and +my grandchildren can learn to read and write. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 18 1937] + +HARRIET ROBINSON +Age 95 yrs. +500 Block N. Fonshill +Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. + + +I was born September 1, 1842, in Bastrop, Texas, on Colorado River. My +pappy was named Harvey Wheeler and my mammy was named Carolina Sims. +My brothers and sisters was named Alex, Taylor, Mary, Cicero, +Tennessee, Sarah, Jeff, Ella and Nora. We lived in cedar log houses +with dirt floors and double chimneys, and doors hung on wooden hinges. +One side of our beds was bored in the walls and had one leg on the +other. Them white folks give each nigger family a blanket in winter. + +I nussed 3 white chillun, Lulu, Helen Augusta, and Lola Sims. I done +this before that War that set us free. We kids use to make extra money +by toting gravel in our aprons. They'd give us dimes and silver +nickles. + +Our clothes was wool and cotton mixed. We had red rustic shoes, soles +one-half inch thick. They'd go a-whick a-whack. The mens had pants wid +one seam and a right-hand pocket. Boys wore shirts. + +We ate hominy, mush, grits and pone bread for the most part. Many of +them ate out of one tray with wooden spoons. All vittles for field +hands was fixed together. + +Women broke in mules throwed 'em down and roped 'em. They'd do it +better'n men. While mammy made some hominy one day both my foots was +scalded and when they clipped them blisters, they jest put some cotton +round them and catched all dat yellow water and made me a yellow dress +out of it. This was 'way back yonder in slavery, before the War. + +Whenever white folks had a baby born den all de old niggers had to +come thoo the room and the master would be over 'hind the bed and he'd +say, "Here's a new little mistress or master you got to work for." +You had to say, "Yessuh Master" and bow real low or the overseer would +crack you. Them was slavery days, dog days. + +I remember in slavery time we had stages. Them devilish things had +jest as many wrecks as cars do today. Only thing, we jest didn't have +as many. + +My mammy belonged to Master Colonel Sam Sims and his old mean wife +Julia. My pappy belonged to Master Meke Smith and his good wife +Harriett. She was sho' a good woman. I was named after her. Master Sam +and Master Meke was partners. Ever year them rich men would send so +many wagons to New Mexico for different things. It took 6 months to go +and come. + +Slaves was punished by whip and starving. Decker was sho' a mean +slave-holder. He lived close to us. Master Sam didn't never whip me, +but Miss Julia whipped me every day in the mawning. During the war she +beat us so terrible. She say, "Your master's out fighting and losing +blood trying to save you from them Yankees, so you kin git your'n +here." Miss Julia would take me by my ears and butt my head against +the wall. She wanted to whip my mother, but old Master told her, naw +sir. When his father done give my mammy to Master Sam, he told him not +to beat her, and iffen he got to whar he jest had to, jest bring her +back and place her in his yard from whar he got her. + +White folks didn't 'low you to read or write. Them what did know come +from Virginny. Mistress Julia used to drill her chillun in spelling +any words. At every word them chillun missed, she gived me a lick +'cross the head for it. Meanest woman I ever seen in my whole life. + +This skin I got now, it ain't my first skin. That was burnt off when I +was a little child. Mistress used to have a fire made on the +fireplace and she made me scour the brass round it and my skin jest +blistered. I jest had to keep pulling it off'n me. + +We didn't had no church, though my pappy was a preacher. He preached +in the quarters. Our baptizing song was "On Jordan's Stormy Bank I +stand" and "Hark From The Tomb." Now all dat was before the War. We +had all our funerals at the graveyard. Everybody, chillun and all +picked up a clod of dirt and throwed in on top the coffin to help fill +up the grave. + +Taling 'bout niggers running away, didn't my step-pappy run away? +Didn't my uncle Gabe run away? The frost would jest bite they toes +most nigh off too, whiles they was gone. They put Uncle Isom (my +step-pappy) in jail and while's he was in there he killed a white +guardman. Then they put in the paper, "A nigger to kill", and our +Master seen it and bought him. He was a double-strengthed man, he was +so strong. He'd run off so help you God. They had the blood hounds +after him once and he caught the hound what was leading and beat the +rest of the dogs. The white folks run up on him before he knowed it +and made them dogs eat his ear plumb out. But don't you know he got +away anyhow. One morning I was sweeping out the hall in the big house +and somebody come a-knocking on the front door and I goes to the door. +There was Uncle Isom wid rags all on his head. He said, "Tell ole +master heah I am." I goes to Master's door and says, "Master Colonel +Sam, Uncle Isom said heah he am." He say, "Go 'round to the kitchen +and tell black mammy to give you breakfast." When he was thoo' eating +they give him 300 lashes and, bless my soul, he run off again. + +When we went to a party the nigger fiddlers would play a chune dat +went lak this: + + I fooled Ole Mastah 7 years + Fooled the overseer three; + Hand me down my banjo + And I'll tickle your bel-lee. + +We had the same doctors the white folks had and we wore asafetida and +garlic and onions to keep from taking all them ailments. + +I 'member the battle being fit. The white folks buried all the jewelry +and silver and all the gold in the Blue Ridge Mountains, in Orange, +Texas. Master made all us niggers come together and git ready to leave +'cause the Yankees was coming. We took a steamer. Now this was in +slavery time, sho' 'nuff slavery. Then we got on a steamship and +pulled out to Galveston. Then he told the captain to feed we niggers. +We was on the bay, not the ocean. We left Galveston and went on trains +for Houston. + +One, my sister Liza, was mulatto and Master Colonel Sims' son had 3 +chillun by her. We never seen her no more after her last child was +born. I found out though that she was in Canada. + +After the War, Master Colonel Sims went to git the mail and so he call +Daniel Ivory, the overseer, and say to him, "Go round to all the +quarters and tell all the niggers to come up, I got a paper to read to +'em. They're free now, so you kin git you another job, 'cause I ain't +got no more niggers which is my own." Niggers come up from the cabins +nappy-headed, jest lak they gwine to the field. Master Colonel Sims +say, "Caroline (that's my mammy), you is free as me. Pa said bring you +back and I'se gwina do jest that. So you go on and work and I'll pay +you and your three oldest chillun $10.00 a month a head and $4.00 fer +Harriet," that's me, and then he turned to the rest and say "Now all +you'uns will receive $10.00 a head till the crops is laid by." Don't +you know before he got half way thoo', over half them niggers was +gone. + +Them Klu Klux Klans come and ask for water with the false stomachs and +make lak they was drinking three bucketsful. They done some terrible +things, but God seen it all and marked it down. + +We didn't had no law, we had "bureau." Why, in them days iffen +somebody stole anything from you, they had to pay you and not the +Law. Now they done turned that round and you don't git nothing. + +One day whiles master was gone hunting, Mistress Julia told her +brother to give Miss Harriett (me) a free whipping. She was a nigger +killer. Master Colonel Sam come home and he said, "You infernal sons +o' bitches don't you know there is 300 Yankees camped out here and +iffen they knowed you'd whipped this nigger the way you done done, +they'd kill all us. Iffen they find it out, I'll kill all you all." +Old rich devils, I'm here, but they is gone. + +God choosed Abraham Lincoln to free us. It took one of them to free us +so's they couldn't say nothing. + +Doing one 'lection they sung: + + Clark et the watermelon + J. D. Giddings et the vine! + Clark gone to Congress + An' J. D. Giddings left behind. + +They hung Jeff Davis up a sour apple tree. They say he was a +president, but he wasn't, he was a big senator man. + +Booker T. Washington was all right in his way, I guess, but Bruce and +Fred Douglass, or big mens jest sold us back to the white folks. + +I married Haywood Telford and had 13 head of chillun by him. My oldest +daughter is the mammy of 14. All my chillun but four done gone to +heaven before me. + +I jined the church in Chapel Hill, Texas. I am born of the Spirit of +God sho' nuff. I played with him seven years and would go right on +dancing at Christmas time. Now I got religion. Everybody oughta live +right, though you won't have no friends iffen you do. + +Our overseer was a poor man. Had us up before day and lak-a-that. He +was paid to be the head of punishment. I jest didn't like to think of +them old slavery days, dogs' days. + + + + +[Illustration: Katie Rowe] + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[HW: (photo)] +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +KATIE ROWE +Age 88 yrs. +Tulsa, Oklahoma + + +I can set on de gallery, whar de sunlight shine bright, and sew a +powerful fine seam when my grandchillun wants a special purty dress +for de school doings, but I ain't worth much for nothing else I +reckon. + +These same old eyes seen powerful lot of tribulations in my time, and +when I shets 'em now I can see lots of l'il chillun jest lak my +grandchillun, toting hoes bigger dan dey is, and dey pore little black +hands and legs bleeding whar dey scratched by de brambledy weeds, and +whar dey got whuppings 'cause dey didn't git out all de work de +overseer set out for 'em. + +I was one of dem little slave gals my own self, and I never seen +nothing but work and tribulations till I was a grown up woman, jest +about. + +De niggers had hard traveling on de plantation whar I was born and +raised, 'cause old Master live in town and jest had de overseer on de +place, but iffen he had lived out dar hisself I speck it been as bad, +'cause he was a hard driver his own self. + +He git biling mad when de Yankees have dat big battle at Pea Ridge and +scatter de 'Federates all down through our country all bleeding and +tied up and hungry, and he jest mount on his hoss and ride out to de +plantation whar we all hoeing corn. + +He ride up and tell old man Saunders--dat de overseer--to bunch us all +up round de lead row man--dat my own uncle Sandy--and den he tell us +de law! + +"You niggers been seeing de 'Federate soldiers coming by here looking +purty raggedy and hurt and wore out," he say, "but dat no sign dey +licked! + +"Dem Yankees ain't gwine git dis fur, but iffen dey do you all ain't +gwine git free by 'em, 'cause I gwine free you befo' dat. When dey git +here dey going find you already free, 'cause I gwine line you up on de +bank of Bois d' Arc Creek and free you wid my shotgun! Anybody miss +jest one lick wid de hoe, or one step in de line, or one clap of dat +bell, or one toot of de horn, and he gwine be free and talking to de +debil long befo' he ever see a pair of blue britches!" + +Dat de way he talk to us, and dat de way he act wid us all de time. + +We live in de log quarters on de plantation, not far from Washington, +Arkansas, close to Bois d' Arc Creek, in de edge of de Little River +bottom. + +Old Master's name was Dr. Isaac Jones, and he live in de town, whar he +keep four, five house niggers, but he have about 200 on de plantation, +big and little, and old man Saunders oversee 'em at de time of de War. +Old Mistress name was Betty, and she had a daughter name Betty about +grown, and then they was three boys, Tom, Bryan, and Bob, but they was +too young to go to de War. I never did see 'em but once or twice 'til +after de War. + +Old Master didn't go to de War, 'cause he was a doctor and de onliest +one left in Washington, and purty soon he was dead anyhow. + +Next fall after he ride out and tell us dat he gwine shoot us befo' he +let us free he come out to see how his steam gin doing. De gin box was +a little old thing 'bout as big as a bedstead, wid a long belt running +through de side of de gin house out to de engine and boiler in de +yard. De boiler burn cord wood, and it have a little crack in it whar +de nigger ginner been trying to fix it. + +Old Master come out, hopping mad 'cause de gin shet down, and ast de +ginner, old Brown, what de matter. Old Brown say de boiler weak and +it liable to bust, but old Master jump down off'n his hoss and go +'round to de boiler and say, "Cuss fire to your black heart! Dat +boiler all right! Throw on some cordwood, cuss fire to your heart!" + +Old Brown start to de wood pile grumbling to hisself and old Master +stoop down to look at de boiler again, and it blow right up and him +standing right dar! + +Old Master was blowed all to pieces, and dey jest find little bitsy +chunks of his clothes and parts of him to bury. + +De wood pile blow down, and old Brown land way off in de woods, but he +wasn't killed. + +Two wagons of cotton blowed over, and de mules run away, and all de +niggers was scared nearly to death 'cause we knowed de overseer gwine +be a lot worse, now dat old Master gone. + +Before de War when Master was a young man de slaves didn't have it so +hard, my mammy tell me. Her name was Fanny and her old mammy name was +Nanny. Grandma Nanny was alive during de War yet. + +How she come in de Jones family was dis way: old Mistress was jest a +little girl, and her older brother bought Nanny and give her to her. I +think his name was Little John, anyways we called him Master Little +John. He drawed up a paper what say dat Nanny allus belong to Miss +Betty and all de chillun Nanny ever have belong to her, too, and +nobody can't take 'em for a debt and things like dat. When Miss Betty +marry, old Master he can't sell Nanny or any of her chillun neither. + +Dat paper hold good too, and grandmammy tell me about one time it hold +good and keep my own mammy on de place. + +Grandmammy say mammy was jest a little gal and was playing out in de +road wid three, four other little chillun when a white man and old +Master rid up. The white man had a paper about some kind of a debt, +and old Master say take his pick of de nigger chillun and give him +back de paper. + +Jest as Grandmammy go to de cabin door and hear him say dat de man git +off his hoss and pick up my mammy and put her up in front of him and +start to ride off down de road. + +Pretty soon Mr. Little John come riding up and say something to old +Master, and see grandmammy standing in de yard screaming and crying. +He jest job de spur in his hoss and go kiting off down de road after +dat white man. + +Mammy say he ketch up wid him jest as he git to Bois d' Arc Creek and +start to wade de hoss across. Mr. Little John holler to him to come +back wid dat little nigger 'cause de paper don't kiver dat child, +'cause she old Mistress' own child, and when de man jest ride on, Mr. +Little John throw his big old long hoss-pistol down on him and make +him come back. + +De man hopping mad, but he have to give over my mammy and take one de +other chillun on de debt paper. + +Old Master allus kind of techy 'bout old Mistress having niggers he +can't trade or sell, and one day he have his whole family and some +more white folks out at de plantation. He showing 'em all de quarters +when we all come in from de field in de evening, and he call all de +niggers up to let de folks see 'em. + +He make grandmammy and mammy and me stand to one side and den he say +to the other niggers, "Dese niggers belong to my wife but you belong +to me, and I'm de only one you is to call Master. + +"Dis is Tom, and Bryan, and Bob, and Miss Betty, and you is to call +'em dat, and don't you ever call one of 'em Young Master or Young +Mistress, cuss fire to your black hearts!" All de other white folks +look kind of funny, and old Mistress look 'shamed of old Master. + +My own pappy was in dat bunch, too. His name was Frank, and after de +War he took de name of Frank Henderson, 'cause he was born under dat +name, but I allus went by Jones, de name I was born under. + +Long about de middle of de War, after old Master was killed, de +soldiers begin coming 'round de place and camping. Dey was Southern +soldiers and dey say dey have to take de mules and most de corn to git +along on. Jest go in de barns and cribs and take anything dey want, +and us niggers didn't have no sweet 'taters nor Irish 'taters to eat +on when dey gone neither. + +One bunch come and stay in de woods across de road from de overseer's +house, and dey was all on hosses. Dey lead de hosses down to Bois d' +Arc Creek every morning at daylight and late every evening to git +water. When we going to de field and when we coming in we allus see +dem leading big bunches of hosses. + +Dey bugle go jest 'bout de time our old horn blow in de morning and +when we come in dey eating supper, and we smell it and sho' git +hungry! + +Before old Master died he sold off a whole lot of hosses and cattle, +and some niggers too. He had de sales on de plantation, and white men +from around dar come to bid, and some traders come. He had a big stump +whar he made de niggers stand while dey was being sold, and de men and +boys had to strip off to de waist to show dey muscle and iffen dey had +any scars or hurt places, but de women and gals didn't have to strip +to de waist. + +De white men come up and look in de slave's mouth jest lak he was a +mule or a hoss. + +After old Master go, de overseer hold one sale, but mostly he jest +trade wid de traders what come by. He make de niggers git on de stump, +through. De traders all had big bunches of slaves and dey have 'em all +strung out in a line going down de road. Some had wagons and de +chillun could ride, but not many. Dey didn't chain or tie 'em 'cause +dey didn't have no place dey could run to anyway. + +I seen chillun sold off and de mammy not sold, and, sometimes de mammy +sold and a little baby kept on de place and give to another woman to +raise. Dem white folks didn't care nothing 'bout how de slaves +grieved when dey tore up a family. + +Old man Saunders was de hardest overseer of anybody. He would git mad +and give a whipping some time and de slave wouldn't even know what it +was about. + +My uncle Sandy was de lead row nigger, and he was a good nigger and +never would tech a drap of likker. One night some de niggers git hold +of some likker somehow, and dey leave de jug half full on de step of +Sandy's cabin. Next morning old man Saunders come out in de field so +mad he was pale. + +He jest go to de lead row and tell Sandy to go wid him, and start +toward de woods along Bois d' Arc Creek wid Sandy follering behind. De +overseer always carry a big heavy stick, but we didn't know he was so +mad, and dey jest went off in de woods. + +Purty soon we hear Sandy hollering and we know old overseer pouring in +on, den de overseer come back by his self and go on up to de house. + +Come late evening he come and see what we done in de day's work, and +go back to de quarters wid us all. Then he git to mammy's cabin, whar +grandmammy live too, he say to grandmammy, "I sent Sandy down in de +woods to hunt a hoss, he gwine come in hungry purty soon. You better +make him a extra hoe cake," and he kind of laugh and go on to his +house. + +Jest soon as he gone we all tell grandmammy we think he got a +whipping, and sho' nuff he didn't come in. + +De next day some white boys find uncle Sandy whar dat overseer done +killed him and throwed him in a little pond, and dey never done +nothing to old man Saunders at all! + +When he go to whip a nigger he make him strip to de waist, and he take +a cat-o-nine tails and bring de blisters, and den bust de blisters +wid a wide strap of leather fastened to a stick handle. I seen de +blood running out'n many a back, all de way from de neck to de waist! + +Many de time a nigger git blistered and cut up so dat we have to git a +sheet and grease it wid lard and wrap 'em up in it, and dey have to +wear a greasy cloth wrapped around dey body under de shirt for +three-four days after dey git a big whipping! + +Later on in de War de Yankees come in all around us and camp, and de +overseer git sweet as honey in de comb! Nobody git a whipping all de +time de Yankees dar! + +Dey come and took all de meat and corn and 'taters dey want too, and +dey tell us, "Why don't you poor darkeys take all de meat and molasses +you want? You made it and it's your's much as anybody's!" But we know +dey soon be gone, and den we git a whipping iffen we do. Some niggers +run off and went wid de Yankees, but dey had to work jest as hard for +dem, and dey didn't eat so good and often wid de soldiers. + +I never forget de day we was set free! + +Dat morning we all go to de cotton field early, and den a house nigger +come out from old Mistress on a hoss and say she want de overseer to +come into town, and he leave and go in. After while de old horn blow +up at de overseer's house, and we all stop and listen, 'cause it de +wrong time of day for de horn. + +We start chopping again, and dar go de horn again. + +De lead row nigger holler "Hold up!" And we all stop again. "We better +go on in. Dat our horn," he holler at de head nigger, and de head +nigger think so too, but he say he afraid we catch de devil from de +overseer iffen we quit widout him dar, and de lead row man say maybe +he back from town and blowing de horn hisself, so we line up and go +in. + +When we git to de quarters we see all de old ones and de chillun up in +de overseer's yard, so we go on up dar. De overseer setting on de end +of de gallery wid a paper in his hand, and when we all come up he say +come and stand close to de gallery. Den he call off everybody's name +and see we all dar. + +Setting on de gallery in a hide-bottom chair was a man we never see +before. He had on a big broad black hat lak de Yankees wore but it +din't have no yaller string on it lak most de Yankees had, and he was +in store clothes dat wasn't homespun or jeans, and dey was black. His +hair was plumb gray and so was his beard, and it come way down here on +his chest, but he didn't look lak he was very old, 'cause his face was +kind of fleshy and healthy looking. I think we all been sold off in a +bunch, and I notice some kind of smiling, and I think they sho' glad +of it. + +De man say, "You darkies know what day dis is?" He talk kind, and +smile. + +We all don't know of course, and we jest stand dar and grin. Pretty +soon he ask again and de head man say, No, we don't know. + +"Well dis de fourth day of June, and dis is 1865, and I want you all +to 'member de date, 'cause you allus going 'member de day. Today you +is free, Jest lak I is, and Mr. Saunders and your Mistress and all us +white people," de man say. + +"I come to tell you", he say, "and I wants to be sho' you all +understand, 'cause you don't have to git up and go by de horn no more. +You is your own bosses now, and you don't have to have no passes to go +and come." + +We never did have no passes, nohow, but we knowed lots of other +niggers on other plantations got 'em. + +"I wants to bless you and hope you always is happy, and tell you got +all de right and lief [TR: sic] dat any white people got", de man say, +and den he git on his hoss and ride off. + +We all jest watch him go on down de road, and den we go up to Mr. +Saunders and ask him what he want us to do. He jest grunt and say do +lak we dam please, he reckon, but git off dat place to do it, less'n +any of us wants to stay and make de crop for half of what we make. + +None of us know whar to go, so we all stay, and he split up de fields +and show us which part we got to work in, and we go on lak we was, and +make de crop and git it in, but dey ain't no more horn after dat day. +Some de niggers lazy and don't git in de field early, and dey git it +took away from 'em, but dey plead around and git it back and work +better de rest of dat year. + +But we all gits fooled on dat first go-out! When de crop all in we +don't git half! Old Mistress sick in town, and de overseer was still +on de place and he charge us half de crop for de quarters and de mules +and tools and grub! + +Den he leave, and we gits another white man, and he sets up a book, +and give us half de next year, and take out for what we use up, but we +all got something left over after dat first go-out. + +Old Mistress never git well after she lose all her niggers, and one +day de white boss tell us she jest drap over dead setting in her +chair, and we know her heart jest broke. + +Next year de chillun sell off most de place and we scatter off, and I +and mammy go into Little Rock and do work in de town. Grandmammy done +dead. + +I git married to John White in Little Rock, but he died and we didn't +have no chillun. Den in four, five years I marry Billy Rowe. He was a +Cherokee citizen and he had belonged to a Cherokee name Dave Rowe, and +lived east of Tahlequah before de War. We married in Little Rock, but +he had land in de Cherokee Nation, and we come to east of Tahlequah +and lived 'til he died, and den I come to Tulsa to live wid my +youngest daughter. + +Billy Rowe and me had three chillun, Ellie, John, and Lula. Lula +married a Thomas, and it's her I lives with. + +Lots of old people lak me say dat dey was happy in slavery, and dat +dey had de worst tribulations after freedom, but I knows dey didn't +have no white master and overseer lak we all had on our place. Dey +both dead now I reckon, and dey no use talking 'bout de dead, but I +know I been gone long ago iffen dat white man Saunder didn't lose his +hold on me. + +It was de fourth day of June in 1865 I begins to live, and I gwine +take de picture of dat old man in de big black hat and long whiskers, +setting on de gallery and talking kind to us, clean into my grave wid +me. + +No, bless God, I ain't never seen no more black boys bleeding all up +and down de back under a cat o' nine tails, and I never go by no cabin +and hear no poor nigger groaning, all wrapped up in a lardy sheet no +more! + +I hear my chillun read about General Lee, and I know he was a good +man, I didn't know nothing about him den, but I know now he wasn't +fighting for dat kind of white folks. + +Maybe dey dat kind still yet, but dey don't show it up no more, and I +got lots of white friends too. All my chillun and grandchillun been to +school, and dey git along good, and I know we living in a better +world, what dey ain't nobody "cussing fire to my black heart!" + +I sho' thank de good Lawd I got to see it. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + + +MORRIS SHEPPARD +Age 85 yrs. +Fort Gibson, Okla. + + +Old Master tell me I was borned in November 1852, at de old home place +about five miles east of Webber's Falls, mebbe kind of northeast, not +far from de east bank of de Illinois River. + +Master's name was Joe Sheppard, and he was a Cherokee Indian. Tall and +slim and handsome. He had black eyes and mustache but his hair was +iron gray, and everybody liked him because he was so good-natured and +kind. + +I don't remember old Mistress' name. My mammy was a Crossland negro +before she come to belong to Master Joe and marry my pappy, and I +think she come wid old Mistress and belong to her. Old Mistress was +small and mighty pretty too, and she was only half Cherokee. She +inherit about half a dozen slaves, and say dey was her own and old +Master can't sell one unless she give him leave to do it. + +Dey only had two families of slaves wid about twenty in all, and dey +only worked about fifty acres, so we sure did work every foot of it +good. We git three or four crops of different things out of dat farm +every year, and something growing on dat place winter and summer. + +Pappy's name was Caesar Sheppard and Mammy's name was Easter. Dey was +both raised 'round Webber's Falls somewhere. I had two brothers, Silas +and George, dat belong to Mr. George Holt in Webber's Falls town. I +got a pass and went to see dem sometimes, and dey was both treated +mighty fine. + +The Big House was a double log wid a big hall and a stone chimney but +no porches, wid two rooms at each end, one top side of de other. I +thought it was mighty big and fine. + +Us slaves lived in log cabins dat only had one room and no windows so +we kept de doors open most of de time. We had home-made wooden beds +wid rope springs, and de little ones slept on trundle beds dat was +home made too. + +At night dem trundles was jest all over de floor, and in de morning we +shove dem back under de big beds to git dem out'n de way. No nails in +none of dem nor in de chairs and tables. Nails cost big money and old +Master's blacksmith wouldn't make none 'cepting a few for old Master +now and den, so we used wooden dowels to put things together. + +They was so many of us for dat little field we never did have to work +hard. Up at five o'clock and back in sometimes about de middle of de +evening, long before sundown, unless they was a crop to git in before +it rain or something like dat. + +When crop was laid by de slaves jest work 'round at dis and dat and +keep tol'able busy. I never did have much of a job, jest tending de +calves mostly. We had about twenty calves and I would take dem out and +graze 'em while some grown-up negro was grazing de cows so as to keep +de cows milk. I had me a good blaze-faced horse for dat. + +One time old Master and another man come and took some calves off and +Pappy say old Master taking dem off to sell. I didn't know what "sell" +meant and I ast Pappy, "Is he going to bring 'em back when he git +through selling them?" I never did see no money neither, until time of +de War or a little before. + +Master Joe was sure a good provider, and we always had plenty of corn +pone, sow belly and greens, sweet potatoes, cow peas and cane +molasses. We even had brown sugar and cane molasses most of de time +before de War. Sometimes coffee, too. + +De clothes wasn't no worry neither. Everything we had was made by my +folks. My aunt done de carding and spinning and my mammy done de +weaving and cutting and sewing, and my pappy could make cowhide shoes +wid wooden pegs. Dey was for bad winter only. + +Old Master bought de cotton in Ft. Smith because he didn't raise no +cotton, but he had a few sheep and we had wool-mix for winter. + +Everything was stripedy 'cause Mammy like to make it fancy. She dye +wid copperas and walnut and wild indigo and things like dat and make +pretty cloth. I wore a stripedy shirt till I was about eleven years +old, and den one day while we was down in de Choctaw Country old +Mistress see me and nearly fall off'n her horse! She holler, "Easter, +you go right now and make dat big buck of a boy some britches!" + +We never put on de shoes until about late November when de frost begin +to hit regular and split our feet up, and den when it git good and +cold and de crop all gathered in anyways, they is nothing to do +'cepting hog killing and a lot of wood chopping, and you don't git +cold doing dem two things. + +De hog killing mean we gits lots of spare-ribs and chitlings, and +somebody always git sick eating too much of dat fresh pork. I always +pick a whole passel of muskatines for old Master and he make up sour +wine, and dat helps out when we git the bowel complaint from eating +dat fresh pork. + +If somebody bad sick he git de doctor right quick, and he don't let no +negroes mess around wid no poultices and teas and sech things like +cupping-horns neither! + +Us Cherokee slaves seen lots of green corn shootings and de like of +dat, but we never had no games of our own. We was too tired when we +come in to play any games. We had to have a pass to go any place to +have singing or praying, and den they was always a bunch of patrollers +around to watch everything we done. Dey would come up in a bunch of +about nine men on horses, and look at all our passes, and if a negro +didn't have no pass dey wore him out good and made him go home. Dey +didn't let us have much enjoyment. + +Right after de War de Cherokees that had been wid the South kind of +pestered the freedmen some, but I was so small dey never bothered me; +jest de grown ones. Old Master and Mistress kept on asking me did de +night riders persecute me any but dey never did. Dey told me some of +dem was bad on negroes but I never did see none of dem night riding +like some said dey did. + +Old Master had some kind of business in Fort Smith, I think, 'cause he +used to ride in to dat town 'bout every day on his horse. He would +start at de crack of daylight and not git home till way after dark. +When he get home he call my uncle in and ask about what we done all +day and tell him what we better do de next day. My uncle Joe was de +slave boss and he tell us what de Master say do. + +When dat Civil War come along I was a pretty big boy and I 'remember +it good as anybody. Uncle Joe tell us all to lay low and work hard and +nobody bother us, and he would look after us. He sure stood good with +de Cherokee neighbors we had, and dey all liked him. There was Mr. Jim +Collins, and Mr. Bell, and Mr. Dave Franklin, and Mr. Jim Sutton and +Mr. Blackburn that lived around close to us and dey all had slaves. +Dey was all wid the South, but dey was a lot of dem Pin Indians all up +on de Illinois River and dey was wid de North and dey taken it out on +de slave owners a lot before de War and during it too. + +Dey would come in de night and hamstring de horses and maybe set fire +to de barn, and two of 'em named Joab Scarrel and Tom Starr killed my +pappy one night just before de War broke out. + +I don't know what dey done it for, only to be mean, and I guess they +was drunk. + +Them Pins was after Master all de time for a while at de first of de +War, and he was afraid to ride into Fort Smith much. Dey come to de +house one time when he was gone to Fort Smith and us children told dem +he was at Honey Springs, but they knowed better and when he got home +he said somebody shot at him and bushwhacked him all the way from +Wilson's Rock to dem Wildhorse Mountains, but he run his horse like de +devil was setting on his tail and dey never did hit him. He never seen +them neither. We told him 'bout de Pins coming for him and he just +laughed. + +When de War come old Master seen he was going into trouble and he sold +off most of de slaves. In de second year of de War he sold my mammy +and my aunt dat was Uncle Joe's wife and my two brothers and my little +sister. Mammy went to a mean old man named Peper Goodman and he took +her off down de river, and pretty soon Mistress tell me she died +'cause she can't stand de rough treatment. + +When Mammy went old Mistress took me to de Big House to help her, and +she was kind to me like I was part of her own family. I never forget +when they sold off some more negroes at de same time, too, and put dem +all in a pen for de trader to come and look at. + +He never come until the next day, so dey had to sleep in dat pen in a +pile like hogs. + +It wasn't my Master done dat. He done already sold 'em to a man and it +was dat man was waiting for de trader. It made my Master mad, but dey +didn't belong to him no more and he couldn't say nothing. + +The man put dem on a block and sold 'em to a man dat had come in on a +steamboat, and he took dem off on it when de freshet come down and de +boat could go back to Fort Smith. It was tied up at de dock at +Webber's Falls about a week and we went down and talked to my aunt and +brothers and sister. De brothers was Sam and Eli. Old Mistress cried +jest like any of de rest of us when de boat pull out with dem on it. + +Pretty soon all de young Cherokee menfolks all gone off to de War, and +de Pins was riding 'round all de time, and it aint safe to be in dat +part around Webber's Falls, so old Master take us all to Fort Smith +where they was a lot of Confederate soldiers. + +We camp at dat place a while and old Mistress stay in de town wid some +kinfolks. Den old Master get three wagons and ox teams and take us all +way down on Red River in de Choctaw Nation. + +We went by Webber's Falls and filled de wagons. We left de furniture +and only took grub and tools and bedding and clothes, 'cause they +wasn't very big wagons and was only single-yoke. + +We went on a place in de Red River bottoms close to Shawneetown and +not far from de place where all de wagons crossed over to go into +Texas. We was at dat place two years and made two little crops. + +One night a runaway negro come across from Texas and he had de blood +hounds after him. His britches was all muddy and tore where de hounds +had cut him up in de legs when he clumb a tree in de bottoms. He come +to our house and Mistress said for us negroes to give him something to +eat and we did. + +Then up come de man from Texas with de hounds and wid him was young +Mr. Joe Vann and my uncle that belong to young Joe. Dey called young +Mr. Joe "Little Joe Vann" even after he was grown on account of when +he was a little boy before his pappy was killed. His pappy was old +Captain "Rich Joe" Vann, and he been dead ever since long before de +War. My uncle belong to old Captain Joe nearly all his life. + +Mistress try to get de man to tell her who de negro belong to so she +can buy him, but de man say he can't sell him and he take him on back +to Texas wid a chain around his two ankles. Dat was one poor negro dat +never got away to de North, and I was sorry for him 'cause I know he +must have had a mean master, but none of us Sheppard negroes, I mean +the grown ones, tried to git away. + +I never seen any fighting in de War, but I seen soldiers in de South +army doing a lot of blacksmithing 'long side de road one day. Dey was +fixing wagons and shoeing horses. + +After de War was over, old Master tell me I am free but he will look +out after me 'cause I am just a little negro and I aint got no sense. +I know he is right, too. + +Well, I go ahead and make me a crop of corn all by myself and then I +don't know what to do wid it. I was afraid I would get cheated out of +it 'cause I can't figure and read, so I tell old Master about it and +he bought it off'n me. + +We never had no school in slavery and it was agin the law for anybody +to even show a negro de letters and figures, so no Cherokee slave +could read. + +We all come back to de old place and find de negro cabins and barns +burned down and de fences all gone and de field in crab grass and +cockleburrs. But de Big House aint hurt 'cepting it need a new roof. +De furniture is all gone, and some said de soldiers burned it up for +firewood. Some officers stayed in de house for a while and tore +everything up or took it off. + +Master give me over to de National Freedmen's Bureau and I was bound +out to a Cherokee woman name Lizzie McGee. Then one day one of my +uncles named Wash Sheppard come and tried to git me to go live wid +him. He say he wanted to git de family all together agin. + +He had run off after he was sold and joined de North army and +discharged at Fort Scott in Kansas, and he said lots of freedmen was +living close to each other up by Coffeyville in de Coo-ee-scoo-ee +District. + +I wouldn't go, so he sent Isaac and Joe Vann dat had been two of old +Captain Joe's negroes to talk to me. Isaac had been Young Joe's +driver, and he told me all about how rich Master Joe was and how he +would look after us negroes. Dey kept after me 'bout a year, but I +didn't go anyways. + +But later on I got a freedman's allotment up in dat part close to +Coffeyville, and I lived in Coffeyville a while but I didn't like it +in Kansas. + +I lost my land trying to live honest and pay my debts. I raised eleven +children just on de sweat of my hands and none of dem ever tasted +anything dat was stole. + +When I left Mrs. McGee's I worked about three years for Mr. Sterling +Scott and Mr. Roddy Reese. Mr. Reese had a big flock of peafowls dat +had belonged to Mr. Scott and I had to take care of dem. + +Whitefolks, I would have to tromp seven miles to Mr. Scott's house two +or three times a week to bring back some old peafowl dat had got out +and gone back to de old place! + +Poor old Master and Mistress only lived a few years after de War. +Master went plumb blind after he move back to Webber's Falls and so he +move up on de Illinois River 'bout three miles from de Arkansas, and +there old Mistress take de white swelling and die and den he die +pretty soon. I went to see dem lots of times and they was always glad +to see me. + +I would stay around about a week and help 'em, and dey would try to +git me to take something but I never would. Dey didn't have much and +couldn't make anymore and dem so old. Old Mistress had inherited some +property from her pappy and dey had de slave money and when dey turned +everything into good money after de War dat stuff only come to about +six thousand dollars in good money, she told me. Dat just about lasted +'em through until dey died, I reckon. + +By and by I married Nancy Hildebrand what lived on Greenleaf Creek, +'bout four miles northwest of Gore. She had belonged to Joe Hildebrand +and he was kin to old Steve Hildebrand dat owned de mill on Flint +Creek up in de Going Snake District. She was raised up at dat mill, +but she was borned in Tennessee before dey come out to de Nation. Her +master was white but he had married into de Nation and so she got a +freedmen's allotment too. She had some land close to Catoosa and some +down on Greenleaf Creek. + +We was married at my home in Coffeyville, and she bore me eleven +children and then went on to her reward. A long time ago I came to +live wid my daughter Emma here at dis place, but my wife just died +last year. She was eighty three. + +I reckon I wasn't cut out on de church pattern, but I raised my +children right. We never had no church in slavery, and no schooling, +and you had better not be caught wid a book in your hand even, so I +never did go to church hardly any. + +Wife belong to de church and all de children too, and I think all +should look after saving their souls so as to drive de nail in, and +den go about de earth spreading kindness and hoeing de row clean so as +to clinch dat nail and make dem safe for Glory. + +Of course I hear about Abraham Lincoln and he was a great man, but I +was told mostly by my children when dey come home from school about +him. I always think of my old Master as de one dat freed me, and +anyways Abraham Lincoln and none of his North people didn't look after +me and buy my crop right after I was free like old Master did. Dat was +de time dat was de hardest and everything was dark and confusion. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +ANDREW SIMMS +Age 80 +Sapulpa, Okla. + + +My parents come over on a slave ship from Africa about twenty year +before I was born on the William Driver plantation down in Florida. My +folks didn't know each other in Africa but my old Mammy told me she +was captured by Negro slave hunters over there and brought to some +coast town where the white buyers took her and carried her to America. + +She was kinder a young gal then and was sold to some white folks when +the boat landed here. Dunno who they was. The same thing happen to my +pappy. Must have been about the same time from the way they tells it. +Maybe they was on the [HW: same] boat, I dunno. + +They was traded around and then mammy was sold to William Driver. The +plantation was down in Florida. Another white folks had a plantation +close by. Mister Simms was the owner. Bill Simms--that's the name +pappy kept after the War. + +Somehow or other mammy and pappy meets 'round the place and the first +thing happens they is in love. That's what mammy say. And the next +thing happen is me. They didn't get married. The Master's say it is +alright for them to have a baby. They never gets married, even after +the War. Just jumped the broomstick and goes to living with somebody +else I reckon. + +Then when I was four year old along come the War and Master Driver +takes up his slaves and leaves the Florida country and goes way out to +Texas. Mammy goes along, I goes along, all the children goes along. I +don't remember nothing about the trip but I hears mammy talk about it +when I gets older. + +Texas, that was the place, down near Fairfield. That's where I learn +to do the chores. But the work was easy for the Master was kind as old +Mammy herself and he never give me no hard jobs that would wear me +down. All the slaves on our place was treated good. All the time. +They didn't whip. The Master feeds all the slaves on good clean foods +and lean meats so's they be strong and healthy. + +Master Driver had four children, Mary, Julia, Frank and George. Every +one of them children kind and good just the old Master. They was never +mean and could I find some of 'em now hard times would leave me on the +run! They'd help this old man get catched up on his eating! + +Makes me think of the old song we use to sing: + + Don't mind working from Sun to Sun, + Iffen you give me my dinner-- + When the dinner time comes! + +Nowadays I gets me something to eat when I can catch it. The trouble +is sometimes I don't catch! But that ain't telling about the slave +days. + +In them times it was mostly the overseers and the drivers who was the +mean ones. They caused all the misery. There was other whitefolks +caused troubles too. Sneak around where there was lots of the black +children on the plantation and steal them. Take them poor children +away off and sell them. + +There wasn't any Sunday Schooling. There was no place to learn to read +and write--no big brick schools like they is now. The old Master say +we can teach ourselves but we can't do it. Old Elam Bowman owned the +place next door to Mister Driver. If he catch his slaves toying with +the pencil, why, he cut off one of their fingers. Then I reckon they +lost interest in education and get their mind back on the hoe and plow +like he say for them to do. + +I didn't see no fighting during of the War. If they was any Yankees +soldiering around the country I don't remember nothing of it. + +Long time after the War is over, about 1885, I meets a gal named +Angeline. We courts pretty fast and gets married. The wedding was a +sure enough affair with the preacher saying the words just like the +whitefolks marriage. We is sure married. + +The best thing we do after that is raise us a family. One of them old +fashioned families. Big 'uns! Seventeen children does we have and +twelve of them still living. Wants to know they names? I ain't never +forgets a one! There was Lucy, Bill, Ebbie, Cora, Minnie, George, +Frank, Kizzie, Necie, Andrew, Joe, Sammie, David, Fannie, Jacob, Bob +and Myrtle. + +All good children. Just like their old pappy who's tried to care for +'em just like the old Master takes care of their old daddy when he was +a boy on that plantation down Texas way. + +When the age comes on a man I reckon religion gets kind of meanful. +Thinks about it more'n when he's young and busy in the fields. I +believes in the Bible and what it says to do. Some of the Colored +folks takes to the voodoo. I don't believe in it. Neither does I +believe in the fortune telling or charms. I aims to live by the Bible +and leave the rabbit foots alone! + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +10-19-38 +718 words + +LIZA SMITH +Age 91 +Muskogee, Oklahoma + + +Both my mammy and pappy was brought from Africa on a slave boat and +sold on de Richmond (Va.) slave market. What year dey come over I +don't know. My mammy was Jane Mason, belonging to Frank Mason; pappy +was Frank Smith, belonging to a master wid de same name. I mean, my +pappy took his Master's name, and den after my folks married mammy +took de name of Smith, but she stayed on wid de Masons and never did +belong to my pappy's master. Den, after Frank Mason took all his +slaves out of de Virginia county, mammy met up wid another man, Ben +Humphries, and married him. + +In Richmond, dat's where I was born, 'bout 1847, de Master said; and +dat make me more dan 90-year old dis good year. I had two brothers +named Webb and Norman, a half-brother Charley, and two half-sisters, +Mealey and Ann. Me, I was born a slave and so was my son. His father, +Toney, was one of de Mason slave boys; de Master said I was 'bout +13-year old when de boy was born. + +Frank Mason was a young man when de War started, living wid his +mother. Dey had lots of slaves, maybe a hundred, and dey always try to +take good care of 'em; even after de War was over he worried 'bout +trying to get us settled so's we wouldn't starve. De Master had +overseer, but dere was no whuppings. + +All de way from Richmond to a place dey call Waco, Texas, we traveled +by ox-wagon and boats, and den de Master figures we all be better off +over in Arkansas and goes to Pine Bluff. + +What wid all de running 'round de slaves was kept clean and always wid +plenty to eat and good clothes to wear. De Master was a plenty rich +man and done what his mother, Mrs. Betsy Mason, told him when we all +left de Big Mansion, way back dere in Richmond. De Mistress said, +"Frank, you watch over dem Negroes cause dey's good men and women; +keep dem clean!" Dat's what he done, up until we was freed, and den +times was so hard nobody wanted us many Negroes around, and de work +was scarce, too. Hard times! Folks don't know what hard times is. + +When a Negro get sick de master would send out for herbs and roots. +Den one of de slaves who knew how to cook and mix 'em up for medicine +use would give de doses. All de men and women wore charms, something +like beads, and if dey was any good or not I don't know, but we didn't +have no bad diseases like after dey set us free. + +I was at Pine Bluff when de Yankees was shooting all over de place. De +fighting got so hot we all had to leave; dat's the way it was all de +time for us during de War--running away to some place or de next +place, and we was all glad when it stopped and we could settle down in +a place. + +We was back at Waco when de peace come, but Master Frank was away from +home when dat happen. It was on a Sunday when he got back and called +all de slaves up in de yard and counted all of dem, young and old. + +The first thing he said was, "You men and women is all free! I'm going +back to my own mammy in old Virginia, but I ain't going back until all +de old people is settled in cabins and de young folks fix up wid +tents!" + +Den he kinder stopped talking. Seem now like he was too excited to +talk, or maybe he was feeling bad and worried 'bout what he going to +do wid all of us. Pretty soon he said, "You men and women, can't none +of you tell anybody I ain't always been a good master. Old folks, have +I ever treated you mean?" He asked. Everybody shout, "No, sir!" And +Master Frank smiled; den he told us he was going 'round and find +places for us to live. + +He went to see Jim Tinsley, who owned some slaves, about keeping us. +Tinsley said he had cabins and could fix up tents for extra ones, if +his own Negroes was willing to share up with us. Dat was the way it +worked out. We stayed on dere for a while, but times was so hard we +finally get dirty and ragged like all de Tinsley Negroes. But Master +Frank figure he done the best he could for us. + +After he go back to Virginia we never hear no more of him, but every +day I still pray if he has any folks in Richmond dey will find me +someway before I die. Is dere someway I could find dem, you s'pose? + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[Date Stamp: Aug 12 1937] + +LOU SMITH +Age 83 yrs. +Platter, Okla. + + +Sho', I remembers de slavery days! I was a little gal but I can tell +you lots of things about dem days. My job was nussing de younguns. I +took keer of them from daylight to dark. I'd have to sing them to +sleep too. I'd sing: + + "By-lo Baby Bunting + Daddy's gone a-hunting + To get a rabbit skin + To wrap Baby Bunting in." + +Sometimes I'd sing: + + "Rock-a-bye baby, in a tree top + When de wind blows your cradle'll rock. + When de bough breaks de crad'll fall + Down comes baby cradle'n all." + +My father was Jackson Longacre and he was born in Mississippi. My +mother, Caroline, was born in South Carolina. Both of them was born +slaves. My father belonged to Huriah Longacre. He had a big plantation +and lots of niggers. He put up a lot of his slaves as security on a +debt and he took sick and died so they put them all on de block and +sold them. My father and his mother (my grandma) was sold together. My +old Mistress bought my grandmother and old Mistress' sister bought my +grandma's sister. These white women agreed that they would never go +off so far that the two slave women couldn't see each other. They +allus kept this promise. A Mr. Covington offered old Master $700 for +me when I was about ten years old, but he wouldn't sell me. He didn't +need to for he was rich as cream and my, how good he was to us. + +Young Master married Miss Jo Arnold and old Master sent me and my +mother over to live with them. I was small when I was took out of old +man McWilliams' yard. It was his wife that bought my grandmother and +my father. My mother's folks had always belonged to his family. They +all moved to Texas and we all lived there until after the surrender. + +Miss Jo wasn't a good Mistress and mother and me wasn't happy. When +young Master was there he made her treat us good but when he was gone +she made our lives a misery to us. She was what we called a +"low-brow." She never had been used to slaves and she treated us like +dogs. She said us kids didn't need to wear any clothes and one day she +told us we could jest take'em off as it cost too much to clothe us. I +was jest a little child but I knowed I oughten to go without my +clothes. We wore little enough as it was. In summer we just wore one +garment, a sort of slip without any sleeves. Well, anyway she made me +take off my clothes and I just crept off and cried. Purty soon young +Master come home. + +He wanted to know what on earth I was doing without my dress on. I +told him, and my goodness, but he raised the roof. He told her if she +didn't treat us better he was going to take us back to old Master. I +never did have any more good times 'cepting when I'd get to go to +visit at old Master's. None of our family could be sold and that was +why old Master just loaned us to young Master. When old Master died, +dey put all our names in a hat and all the chilluns draw out a name. +This was done to 'vide us niggers satisfactory. Young Master drawed my +mother's name and they all agreed that I should go with her, so back +we went to Miss Jo. She wouldn't feed us niggers. She'd make me set in +a corner like a little dog. I got so hungry and howled so loud they +had to feed me. When the surrender come, I was eleven years old, and +they told us we was free. I ran off and hid in the plum orchard and I +said over'n over, "I'se free, I'se free; I ain't never going back to +Miss Jo." My mother come out and got me and in a few days my father +came and lived with us. He worked for young Master and the crops was +divided with him. Miss Jo died and we lived on there. My mother took +over the charge of the house and the chillun for young Master and we +was all purty happy after that. + +They was a white man come into our settlement and bought a plantation +and some slaves. My, but he treated them bad. He owned a boy about +fifteen years old. One day he sent him on a errand. On the way home he +got off his mule and set down in the shade of a tree to rest. He fell +asleep and the mule went home. When he woke up he was scared to go +home and he stayed out in de woods for several days. Finally they +caught him and took him home and his master beat him nearly to death. +He then dug a hole and put him in it and piled corn shucks all around +him. This nearly killed him 'cause his body was cut up so with the +whip. One of the niggers slipped off and went to the jining plantation +and told about the way the boy was being treated and a bunch of white +men came over and made him take the child out and doctor his wounds. +This man lived there about ten years and he was so mean to his slaves +'til all the white men round who owned niggers finally went to him and +told him they would just give him so long to sell out and leave. They +made him sell his slaves to people there in the community, and he went +back north. + +My mother told me that he owned a woman who was the mother of several +chillun and when her babies would get about a year or two of age he'd +sell them and it would break her heart. She never got to keep them. +When her fourth baby was born and was about two months old she just +studied all the time about how she would have to give it up and one +day she said, "I just decided I'm not going to let old Master sell +this baby; he just ain't going to do it." She got up and give it +something out of a bottle and purty soon it was dead. 'Course didn't +nobody tell on her or he'd of beat her nearly to death. There wasn't +many folks that was mean to their slaves. + +Old Master's boys played with the nigger boys all the time. They'd go +swimming, fishing and hunting together. One of his boys name was +Robert but everybody called him Bud. They all would catch rabbits and +mark them and turn them loose. One day a boy come along with a rabbit +he had caught in a trap. Old Master's boy noticed that it had Bud's +mark on it and they made him turn it loose. + +Old Master was his own overseer, but my daddy was the overlooker. He +was purty hard on them too, as they had to work just like they never +got tired. The women had to do housework, spinning, sewing and work in +the fields too. My mother was housewoman and she could keep herself +looking nice. My, she went around with her hair and clothes all +Jenny-Lynned-up all the time until we went to live with Miss Jo. She +took all the spirit out of poor mother and me too. + +I remember she allus kept our cabin as clean and neat as a pin. When +other niggers come to visit her they would say, "My you are Buckry +Niggers (meaning we tried to live like white folks)." + +I love to think of when we lived with old Master. We had a good time. +Our cabin was nice and had a chimbley in it. Mother would cook and +serve our breakfast at home every morning and dinner and supper on +Sundays. We'd have biscuit every Sunday morning for our breakfast. +That was something to look forward to. + +We all went to church every Sunday. We would go to the white folks +church in the morning and to our church in the evening. Bill +McWilliams, old Master's oldest boy, didn't take much stock in church. +He owned a nigger named Bird, who preached for us. Bill said, "Bird, +you can't preach, you can't read, how on earth can you get a text out +of the Bible when you can't even read? How'n hell can a man preach +that don't know nothing?" Bird told him the Lord had called him to +preach and he'd put the things in his mouth that he ought to say. One +night Bill went to church and Bird preached the hair-raisingest +sermon you ever heard. Bill told him all right to go and preach, and +he gave Bird a horse and set him free to go anywhere he wanted to and +preach. + +Old Master and old Mistress lived in grand style. Bob was the driver +of their carriage. My, but he was always slick and shiny. He'd set up +in front with his white shirt and black clothes. He looked like a +black martin (bird) with a white breast. The nurse set in the back +with the chillun. Old Master and Mistress set together in the front +seat. + +Old Master and Mistress would come down to the quarters to eat +Christmas dinners sometimes and also birthday dinners. It was sho' a +big day when they done that. They'd eat first, and the niggers would +sing and dance to entertain them. Old Master would walk 'round through +the quarters talking to the ones that was sick or too old to work. He +was awful kind. I never knowed him to whip much. Once he whipped a +woman for stealing. She and mother had to spin and weave. She couldn't +or didn't work as fast as Ma and wouldn't have as much to show for her +days work. She'd steal hanks of Ma's thread so she couldn't do more +work than she did. She'd also steal old Master's tobacco. He caught up +with her and whipped her. + +I never saw any niggers on the block but I remember once they had a +sale in town and I seen them pass our house in gangs, the little ones +in wagons and others walking. I've seen slaves who run away from their +masters and they'd have to work in the field with a big ball and chain +on their leg. They'd hoe out to the end of the chain and then drag it +up a piece and hoe on to the end of the row. + +Times was awful hard during the War. We actually suffered for some +salt. We'd go to the smoke house where meat had been salted down for +years, dig a hole in the ground and fill it with water. After it would +stand for a while we'd dip the water up carefully and strain it and +cook our food in it. We parched corn and meal for coffee. We used +syrup for sugar. Some folks parched okra for coffee. When the War was +over you'd see men, women and chillun walk out of their cabins with a +bundle under their arms. All going by in droves, just going nowhere in +particular. My mother and father didn't join them; we stayed on at the +plantation. I run off and got married when I was twenty. Ma never did +want me to get married. My husband died five years ago. I never had no +chillun. + +I reckon I'm a mite superstitious. If a man comes to your house first +on New Years you will have good luck; if a woman is your first visitor +you'll have bad luck. When I was a young woman I knowed I'd be left +alone in my old age. I seen it in my sleep. I dreamed I spit every +tooth in my head right out in my hand and something tell me I would be +a widow. That's a bad thing to dream about, losing your teeth. + +Once my sister was at my house. She had a little baby and we was +setting on the porch. They was a big pine tree in front of the house, +and we seen something that looked like a big bird light in the tree. +She begun to cry and say that's a sign my baby is going to die. Sho' +nuff it just lived two weeks. Another time a big owl lit in a tree +near a house and we heard it holler. The baby died that night. It was +already sick, we's setting up with it. + +I don't know where they's hants or not but I'se sho heard things I +couldn't see. + +We allus has made our own medicines. We used herbs and roots. If +you'll take poke root and cut it in small pieces and string it and put +it 'round a baby's neck it will cut teeth easy. A tea made out of dog +fennel or corn shucks will cure chills and malaria. It'll make 'em +throw up. We used to take button snake root, black snake root, chips +of anvil iron and whiskey and make a tonic to cure consumption. It +would cure it too. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +10-13-37 +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937] + +JAMES SOUTHALL +Age 82 years, +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in Clarksville, Tenn. My father was Wesley and my mother +was Hagar Southall. Our owner was Dr. John Southall, an old man. +Father always belonged to him but he bought my mother when she was a +young girl and raised her. She never knew anything 'bout her people +but my father's mother lived with us in de quarter's at Master +Southall's. Master John never sold any of his slaves. + +We was known as "Free Niggers." Master said he didn't believe it was +right to own human beings just because dey was black, and he freed all +his slaves long before de War. He give 'em all freedom papers and told +dem dat dey was as free as he was and could go anywhere dey wanted. +Dey didn't have no where to go so we all stayed on wid him. It was +nice though to know we could go where we pleased 'thout having to get +a pass and could come back when we pleased even if we didn't take +advantage of it. + +He told his slaves dat dey could stay on at his farm but dey would +have to work and make a living for deyselves and families. Old Master +managed de farm and bought all de food and clothes for us all. +Everybody had to work, but dey had a good time. + +We had good clothes, plenty of food and good cabins. We had what was +known as Georgia bedsteads. Dey was wooden bedsteads wid holes bored +in de side pieces and in de foot and head-boards. Ropes was laced back +and forth across and this took de place of both slats and springs. De +ropes would git loose and we had what was called a "following-pin" to +tighten 'em wid. We'd take a block of wood wid a notch in it and catch +de rope and hold it till de following-pin could be driven in and den +we'd twist de ropes tight again. We had grass or cotton beds and we +slept good, too. + +We had tin plates but no knives or forks so we et with our fingers. +Old Master was a doctor and we had good attention when we was sick. We +had no wish to take advantage of our freedom for we was a lot better +off even than we is now and we knowed it. We never had to worry about +anything. + +De quarters was about a half mile from de "Big House" as we called +Master John's house. It really wasn't such a big house as it had only +four or five rooms in it. It was a common boxed house, painted white +and wid a long gallery across de front. Maybe it was de gallery dat +made it look so big to us. We liked to set on de steps at night and +listen to Master John talk and to hear old Mistress and de girls sing. +Sometimes we'd join in wid dem and fairly make de woods ring. +Everybody thought dey was crazy to let us have so much freedom but dey +wasn't nothing any of us black folks wouldn't a-done for that family. + +He never employed any overseers as he done his own overseeing. He'd +tell de older hands what he wanted done and dey would see it was done. +We was never punished. Just iffen dey didn't work dey didn't have +nothing to eat and wear and de hands what did work wouldn't divide wid +'em iffen dey didn't work. Old Master sho' was wise fer he knowed +iffen we was ever set free dat we would have to work and he sure +didn't bide no laziness in his hands. Dey got up 'bout four o'clock in +de morning and was at work as soon as dey could see. Dey would work +and sing as happy as you please. + +We used to hear stories 'bout how slaves was punished but we never saw +any of it. Dey would punish 'em by whupping 'em or by making 'em stand +on one foot for a long time, tie 'em up by de thumbs as high as dey +could reach and by making 'em do hard tasks and by going without food +for two-three days. + +Niggers was very religious and dey had church often. Dey would annoy +de white folks wid shouting and singing and praying and dey would take +cooking pots and put over dey mouths so de white folks couldn't hear +'em. Dey would dig holes in de ground too, and lie down when dey +prayed. + +Old Master let us have church in de homes. We had prayer-meeting every +Wednesday night. All our cullud preachers could read de Bible. He let +dem teach us how to read iffen we wanted to learn. + +In de evening when we was through wid our work dey would gather at one +of de cabins and visit and sing or dance. We'd pop corn, eat walnuts, +peanuts, hickory nuts, and tell ghost stories. We didn't have any +music instruments so de music we danced by wasn't so very good. +Everybody sang and one or two would beat on tin pans or beat bones +together. + +Us boys played marbles. I got to be a professional. I could hit de +middler ever time. We made a square and put a marble in each corner +and one in de middle and got off several feet from de ring and shot at +de marbles. Iffen you hit de middler you got de game. I could beat 'em +all. + +Old Master kept us through de War. We saw Yankee soldiers come through +in droves lak Coxsey's Army. We wasn't afraid for ourselves but we was +afraid dey would catch old Master or one of de boys when dey would +come home on a furlough. We'd hep 'em git away and just swear dat dey +hadn't been home a-tall. + +After de war we stayed until old Master died. It broke us all up for +we knowed we had lost de best friend dat we ever had or ever would +have. He was a sort of father to all of us. Old Mistress went to live +with her daughter and we started wandering 'round. Some folks from de +North come down and made de cullud folks move on. I guess dey was +afraid dat we'd hep our masters rebuild dey homes again. We lived in a +sort of bondage for a long time. + +De white folks in de South as well as de cullud folks lost de best +friend dey had when Abe Lincoln was killed. He was God's man and it +was a great loss when he died. + +God created us all free and equal. Somewhere along de road we lost +out. + +Cullud folks would have been better off iffen dey had been left alone +in Africa. We'd a-had better opportunities. We should have some +compensation fer what we have suffered. Yes, we could be sent back and +we'd like it if dey would help us to get started out again. Dat's +where our forefathers come from. + +I learned a long time ago dat dey was nothing to charms. How could a +rabbit's foot bring me good luck? De Bible teaches me better'n dat. I +believes in dreams though. I've seen de end of time in my dreams. Saw +de great trouble we going through right now, years ago in a dream. +It's clear in my mind how de world is coming to a end. + +I believe all Christians should all join up together as dat makes 'em +stronger. I believe in praying fer what we want and need. I'm a +licensed preacher in de Baptist church. I've been a member for forty +years but have just been a licensed preacher about ten years. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +BEAUREGARD TENNEYSON +Age 87 yrs. +West Tulsa, Okla. + + +My mother and father just about stocked Jess Tenneyson's plantation +with slaves. That's a fact. The old folks had one big +family--twenty-three Children was the number. With the old folks that +make twenty-five (there were only five more slaves), so I reckon they +done mighty well by Master Jess. + +The Master done well by them, too. Master Jess and Mistress Lula was +Christian peoples. They raised their two sons, Henry and George, the +same way. + +There was so many of us children I don't remember all the names. Three +of the boys was named after good southern gentlemen who soldiered in +the War. Price, Lee and Beaugard. Beaugard is me. Proud of that name +just like I'm proud of the Master's name. + +My folks named Patrick and Harriett. Mother worked round the house And +father was the field boss. They was close by the Master all the time. + +The plantation was down in Craig County, Texas. Nine hundred acre it +was. They raise everything, but mostly corn and cotton. Big times when +come the harvest. Master fix up a cotton gin right on the place. It +was an old-fashioned press. Six horses run it with two boys tromping +down the cotton with their feets. + +In the fall time was the best of all. Come cotton picking time, all +the master from miles around send in their best pickers--and how +they'd work, sometimes pick the whole crop in one day! The one who +picked the most win a prize. Then come noon and the big feast, and at +night come the dancing. + +Something like that when the corn was ready. All the folks have the +biggest time. Log rollings. Clearing the new ground for planting. +Cutting the trees, burning the bresh, making ready for the plow. The +best worker wins hisself a prize at these log rollings, too. + +Them kind of good times makes me think of Christmas. Didn't have no +Christmas tree, but they set up a long pine table in the house and +that plank table was covered with presents and none of the Negroes was +ever forgot on that day. + +Master Jess didn't work his slaves like other white folks done. Wasn't +no four o'clock wake-up horns and the field work started at seven +o'clock. Quitting time was five o'clock--just about union hours +nowadays. The Master believed in plenty of rest for the slaves and +they work better that way, too. + +One of my brother took care of the Master's horse while on the +plantation. When the Master join in with rebels that horse went along. +So did brother. Master need them both and my brother mighty pleased +when he get to go. + +When Master come back from the War and tell us that brother is dead, +he said brother was the best boy in all the army. + +The Tenneyson slaves wasn't bothered with patrollers, neither the +Klan. The Master said we was all good Negroes--nobody going to bother +a good Negro. + +We was taught to work and have good manners. And to be honest. Just +doing them three things will keep anybody out of trouble. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +WILLIAM WALTERS +Age 85 yrs. +Tulsa, Oklahoma. + + +Mammy Ann (that was my mother) was owned by Mistress Betsy, and lived +on the Bradford plantation in Relsford County, Tennessee, when I was +born in 1852. + +My daddy, Jim Walters, then lived in Nashville, where my mammy carried +me when she ran away from the Mistress after the Rebs and Yanks +started to fight. My daddy died in Nashville in 1875. + +We were runaway slaves. The slipper-offers were often captured, but +Mammy Ann and her little boy William (that's me) escaped the sharp +eyes of the patrollers and found refuge with a family of northern +symphatizers living in Nashville. + +Nashville was a fort town, filled with trenches and barricades. Right +across the road from where we stayed was a vacant block used by the +Rebs as an emergency place for treating the wounded. + +I remember the boom of cannons one whole day, and I heard the rumble +of army wagons as they crossed through the town. But there was nothing +to see as the fog of powder smoke became thicker with every blast of +Sesesh cannon. + +When the smoke fog cleared away I watched the wounded being carried to +the clearing across the road--fighting men with arms shot off, legs +gone, faces blood smeared--some of them just laying there cussing God +and Man with their dying breath! + +Those were awful times. Yet I have heard many of the older Negroes say +the old days were better. + +Such talk always seemed to me but an expression of sentiment for some +good old master, or else the older Negroes were just too handicapped +with ignorance to recognize the benefits of liberty or the +opportunities of freedom. + +But I've always been proud of my freedom, and proud of my old mother +who faced death for her freedom and mine when she escaped from the +Bradford plantation a long time before freedom came to the Negro race +as a whole. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +570 words +10-19-1938 + +MARY FRANCES WEBB +Grand daughter of Sarah Vest, aged 92, (deceased) +McAlester, Okla. + + +I've heard my grandmother tell a lot of her experiences during +slavery. She remembered things well as she was a grown woman at the +time of the War of the Rebellion. + +Her home was at Sedalia, Mo., and her owner was Baxter West, a +prominent farmer and politician. He was very kind and good to his +slaves. He provided them with plenty of food and good clothes. He +would go to town and buy six or eight bolts of cloth at a time and the +women could pick out two dresses apiece off it. These would be their +dresses for dressing up. They wove the cloth for their everyday +clothes. + +The men wore jeans suits in winter. He bought shoes for all his +slaves, young and old. He had about twenty slaves counting the +children. + +My grandmother was a field hand. She plowed and hoed the crops in the +summer and spring, and in the winter she sawed and cut cord wood just +like a man. She said it didn't hurt her as she was as strong as an ox. + +She could spin and weave and sew. She helped make all the cloth for +their clothes and in the spring one of the jobs for the women was to +weave hats for the men. They used oat-straw, grass, and cane which had +been split and dried and soaked in hot water until it was pliant, and +they wove it into hats. The women wore a cloth tied around their head. + +They didn't have many matches so they always kept a log heap burning +to keep a fire. It was a common thing for a neighbor to come in to +borrow a coal of fire as their fire had died out. + +On wash days all the neighbors would send several of their women to +the creek to do the family wash. They all had a regular picnic of it +as they would wash and spread the clothes on the bushes and low +branches of the trees to dry. They would get to spend the day +together. + +They had no tubs or wash boards. They had a large flat block of wood +and a wooden paddle. They'd spread the wet garment on the block, +spread soap on it and paddle the garment till it was clean. They would +rinse the clothes in the creek. Their soap was made from lye, dripped +from ashes, and meat scraps. + +The slaves had no lamps in their cabins. In winter they would pile +wood on the fire in their fireplace and have the light from the fire. + +The colored men went with their master to the army. They made regular +soldiers and endured the same hardships that the white soldiers did. +They told of one battle when so many men were killed that a little +stream seemed to be running pure blood as the water was so bloody. + +After the war the slaves returned home with their masters and some of +the older ones stayed on with them and helped them to rebuild their +farms. None of them seemed to think it strange that they had been +fighting on the wrong side in the army as they were following their +white folks. + +Those who stayed with their old master were taught to read and write +and were taught to handle their own business and to help themselves in +every way possible to take their place in life. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +10-14-37 +[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937] + +EASTER WELLS +Age 83 +Colbert, Okla. + + +I was born in Arkansas, in 1854, but we moved to Texas in 1855. I've +heard 'em tell about de trip to Texas. De grown folks rode in wagons +and carts but de chaps all walked dat was big enuff. De men walked and +toted their guns and hunted all de way. Dey had plenty of fresh game +to eat. + +My mother's name was Nellie Bell. I had one sister, Liza. I never saw +my father; in fact, I never heard my mammy say anything about him and +I don't guess I ever asked her anything about him for I never thought +anything about not having a father. I guess he belonged to another +family and when we moved away he was left behind and he didn't try to +find us after de War. + +My mammy and my sister and me belonged to young Master Jason Bell. We +was his onliest slaves and as he wasn't married and lived at home wid +his parents we was worked and bossed by his father, Cap'n William Bell +and his wife, Miss Mary. + +After we moved to Texas, old Master built a big double log house, +weather-boarded on de inside and out. It was painted white. Dey was a +long gallery clean across de front of de house and a big open hall +between de two front rooms. Dey was three rooms on each side of de +hall and a wide gallery across de back. De kitchen set back from de +house and dey was a board walk leading to it. Vines was planted 'round +de gallery and on each side of de walk in de summer time. De house was +on a hill and set back from de big road about a quarter of a mile and +dey was big oak and pine trees all 'round de yard. We had purty +flowers, too. + +We had good quarters. Dey was log cabins, but de logs was peeled and +square-adzed and put together with white plaster and had shuttered +windows and pine floors. Our furniture was home made but it was good +and made our cabins comfortable. + +Old Master give us our allowance of staple food and it had to run us, +too. We could raise our own gardens and in dat way we had purty plenty +to eat. Dey took good care of us sick or well and old Mistress was +awful good to us. + +My mammy was de cook. I remember old Master had some purty strict +rules and one of 'em was iffen you burnt de bread you had to eat it. +One day mammy burnt de bread. She was awful busy and forgot it and it +burnt purty bad. She knowed dat old Master would be mad and she'd be +punished so she got some grub and her bonnet and she lit out. She hid +in de woods and cane brakes for two weeks and dey couldn't find her +either. One of de women slipped food out to her. Finally she come home +and old Master give her a whipping but he didn't hurt her none. He was +glad to git her back. She told us dat she could'a slipped off to de +North but she didn't want to leave us children. She was afraid young +Master would be mad and sell us and we'd a-had a hard time so she come +back. I don't know whether she ever burnt de bread any more or not. + +Once one of de men got his 'lowance and he decided he'd have de meat +all cooked at once so he come to our cabin and got mammy to cook it +for him. She cooked it and he took it home. One day he was at work and +a dog got in and et de meat all up. He didn't have much food for de +rest of de week. He had to make out wid parched corn. + +We all kept parched corn all de time and went 'round eating it. It was +good to fill you up iffen you was hungry and was nourishing, too. + +When de niggers cooked in dere own cabins dey put de food in a sort of +tray or trough and everybody et together. Dey didn't have no dishes. +We allus ate at de Big House as mammy had to do de cooking for de +family. + +I never had to work hard as old Master wanted us to grow up strong. +He'd have mammy boil Jerusalem Oak and make a tea for us to drink to +cure us of worms and we'd run races and get exercise so we would be +healthy. + +Old Mistress and old Master had three children. Dey was two children +dead between Master Jason and Miss Jane. Dey was a little girl 'bout +my age, named Arline. We played together all de time. We used to set +on de steps at night and old Mistress would tell us about de stars. +She'd tell us and show us de Big Dipper, Little Dipper, Milky Way, +Ellen's Yard, Job's Coffin, and de Seven Sisters. I can show 'em to +you and tell you all about 'em yet. + +I scared Arline and made her fall and break her leg twice. One time we +was on de porch after dark one night and I told her dat I heard +something and I made like I could see it and she couldn't so she got +scared and run and hung her toe in a crack and fell off de high porch +and broke her leg. Another time while de War was going on we was +dressed up in long dresses playing grown-ups. We had playhouses under +some big castor-bean bushes. We climbed up on de fence and jest for +fun I told her dat I seen some Yankees coming. She started to run and +got tangled up in her long dress and fell and broke her leg again. It +nigh broke my heart for I loved her and she loved me and she didn't +tell on me either time. I used to visit her after she was married and +we'd sure have a good visit talking 'bout de things we used to do. We +was separated when we was about fifteen and didn't see [HW: each] +other any more till we was both married and had children. I went to +visit her at Bryant, Brazos County, Texas and I ain't seen her since. +I don't know whether she is still living or not. + +I 'members hearing a man say dat once he was a nigger trader. He'd buy +and trade or sell 'em like they was stock. He become a Christian and +never sold any more. + +Our young Master went to de War and got wounded and come home and +died. Old Master den took full charge of us and when de War ended he +kept us because he said we didn't have no folks and he said as our +owner was dead we wasn't free. Mother died about a year after de War, +and some white folks took my sister but I was afraid to go. Old Master +told me iffen I left him he would cut my ears off end I'd starve and I +don't know what all he did tell me he'd do. I must a-been a fool but I +was afraid to try it. + +I had so much work to do and I never did git to go anywhere. I reckon +he was afraid to let me go off de place for fear some one would tell +me what a fool I was, so I never did git to go anywhere but had to +work all de time. I was de only one to work and old Mistress and de +girls never had done no work and didn't know much about it. I had a +harder time den when we was slaves. + +I got to wanting to see my sister so I made up my mind to run off. One +of old Master's motherless nephews lived with him and I got him to go +with me one night to the potato bank and I got me a lap full of +potatoes to eat so I wouldn't starve like old Master said I would. Dis +white boy went nearly to a house where some white folks lived. I went +to de house and told 'em I wanted to go to where my sister was and dey +let me stay fer a few days and sent me on to my sister. + +I saw old Master lots of times after I run away but he wasn't mad at +me. I heard him tell de white folks dat I lived wid dat he raised me +and I sure wouldn't steal nor tell a lie. I used to steal brown sugar +lumps when mammy would be cooking but he didn't know 'bout dat. + +On holidays we used to allus have big dinners, 'specially on +Christmas, and we allus had egg-nog. + +We allus had hog-jowl and peas on New Years Day 'cause iffen you'd +have dat on New Years Day you'd have good luck all de year. + +Iffen you have money on New Years' Day you will have money all de +year. + +My husband, Lewis Wells, lived to be one-hundred and seven years old. +He died five years ago. He could see witches, spirits and ghosts but I +never could. Dere are a few things dat I've noticed and dey never +fail. + +Dogs howling and scritch owls hollering is allus a warning. My mother +was sick and we didn't think she was much sick. A dog howled and +howled right outside de house. Old Master say, "Nellie gonna die." +Sure nuff she died dat night. + +Another time a gentle old mule we had got after de children and run +'em to do house and den he lay down and wallow and wallow. One of our +children was dead 'fore a week. + +One of our neighbors say his dog been gone 'bout a week. He was +walking and met de dog and it lay down and stretch out on de ground +and measure a grave wid his body. He made him git up and he went home +jest as fast as he could. When he got dere one of his children was +dead. + +Iffen my left eye quiver I know I'm gwineter cry and iffen both my +eyes quiver I know I gwinter laugh till I cry. I don't like for my +eyes to quiver. + +We has allus made our own medicine. Iffen we hadn't we never could +astood de chills and fevers. We made a tea out'n bitter weeds and +bathed in it to cure malaria. We also made bread pills and soaked 'em +in dis tea and swallowed 'em. After bathing in dis tea we'd go to bed +and kiver up and sweat de malaria out. + +Horse mint and palm of crystal (Castor-bean) and bullnettle root +boiled together will make a cure fer swelling. Jest bathe de swollen +part in dis hot tea. + +Anvil dust and apple vinegar will cure dropsy. One tea cup of anvil +dust to a quart of vinegar. Shake up well and bathe in it. It sure +will cure de worse kind of a case. + +God worked through Abraham Lincoln and he answered de prayers of dem +dat was wearing de burden of slavery. We cullud folks all love and +honor Abraham Lincoln's memory and don't you think we ought to? + +I love to hear good singing. My favorite songs are: "Am I A Soldier Of +The Cross", an "How Can I Live In Sin and Doubt My Savior's Love." I +belongs to de Baptist church. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +Revision of story sent in 8-13-37. + +JOHN WHITE +Age 121 years +Sand Springs, Okla. + + +Of all my Mammy's children I am the first born and the longest living. +The others all gone to join Mammy. She was named Mary White, the same +name as her Mistress, the wife of my first master, James White. + +About my pappy. I never hear his name and I never see him, not even +when I was the least child around the old Master's place 'way back +there in Georgia more'n one-hundred twenty years ago! + +Mammy try to make it clear to me about my daddy. She married like the +most of the slaves in them days. + +He was a slave on another plantation. One day he come for to borrow +something from Master White. He sees a likely looking gal, and the way +it work out that gal was to be my Mammy. After that he got a paper +saying it was all right for him to be off his own plantation. He come +a'courting over to Master White's. After a while he talks with the +Master. Says he wants to marry the gal, Mary. The Master says it's all +right if it's all right with Mary and the other white folks. He finds +out it is and they makes ready for the wedding. + +Mary says a preacher wedding is the best but Master say he can marry +them just as good. There wasn't no Bible, just an old Almanac. Master +White read something out of that. That's all and they was married. The +wedding was over! + +Every night he gets a leave paper from his Master and come over to be +with his wife, Mary. The next morning he leaves her to work in the +fields. Then one night Mammy says he don't come home. The next night +is the same, and the next. From then on Mammy don't see him no +more--never find out what happen to my pappy. + +When I was born Mammy named me John, John White. She tells me I was +the blackest 'white' boy she ever see. I stays with her till I was +eleven year old. The Master wrote down in the book when I was born, +April 10, 1816, and I know it's right. Mammy told me so, and Master +told me when I was eleven and he sold me to Sarah Davenport. + +Mistress Sarah lived in Texas. Master White always selling and trading +to folks all over the country. I hates to leave on account of Mammy +and the good way Master White fared the slaves--they was good people. +Mammy cry but I has to go just the same. The tears are on my face a +long time after the leaving. I was hoping all the time to see Mammy +again, but that's the last time. + +We travels and travels on the stage coach. Once we cross the Big River +(Mississippi) on the boat and pick up with the horses on the other +side. A new outfit and we rides some more. Seems like we going to wear +out all the horses before we gets to the place. + +The Davenport plantation was way north of Linden, Texas, up in the Red +River country. That's where I stayed for thirty-eight year. There I +was drug through the hackles by the meanest master that ever lived. +The Mistress was the best white woman I ever knew but Master Presley +used his whip all the time, reason or no reason, and I got scars to +remember by! + +I remembers the house. A heavy log house with a gallery clear across +the front. The kitchen was back of the house. I work in there and I +live in there. It wasn't built so good as the Master's house. The cold +winds in the winter go through the cracks between the logs like the +walls was somewheres else, and I shivers with the misery all the time. + +The cooking got to be my job. The washing too. Washday come around +and I fills the tub with clothes. Puts the tub on my head and walks +half a mile to the spring where I washes the clothes. Sometimes I run +out of soap. Then I make ash soap right by the spring. I learns to be +careful about streaks in the clothes. I learns by the bull whip. One +day the Master finds a soapy streak in his shirt. Then he finds me. + +The Military Road goes by the place and the Master drives me down the +road and ties me to a tree. First he tears off the old shirt and then +he throws the bull whip to me. When he is tired of beating me more +torture is a-coming. The salt water cure. It don't cure nothing but +that's what the white folks called it. "Here's at you," the Master +say, and slap the salt water into the bleeding cuts. "Here's at you!" +The blisters burst every time he slap me with the brine. + +Then I was loosened to stagger back into the kitchen. The Mistress +couldn't do nothing about it 'cept to lay on the grease thick, with a +kind word to help stop the misery. + +Ration time was Saturday night. Every slave get enough fat pork, corn +meal and such to last out the week. I reckon the Master figure it to +the last bite because they was no leavings over. Most likely the +shortage catch them! + +Sometimes they'd borrow, sometimes I'd slip somethings from out the +kitchen. The single women folks was bad that way. I favors them with +something extra from the kitchen. Then they favors me--at night when +the overseer thinks everybody asleep in they own places! + +I was always back to my kitchen bed long before the overseer give the +get-up-knock. I hear the knock, he hear me answer. Then he blow the +horn and shout the loud call, ARE YOU UP, and everybody know it was +four o'clock and pour out of the cabins ready for the chores. + +Sometimes the white folks go around the slave quarters for the night. +Not on the Davenport plantation, but some others close around. The +slaves talked about it amongst themselves. + +After a while they'd be a new baby. Yellow. When the child got old +enough for chore work the master would sell him (or her). No +difference was it his own flesh and blood--if the price was right! + +I traffic with lots of the women, but never marries. Not even when I +was free after the War. I sees too many married troubles to mess up +with such doings! + +Sometimes the master sent me alone to the grinding mill. Load in the +yellow corn, hitch in the oxen, I was ready to go. I gets me fixed up +with a pass and takes to the road. + +That was the trip I like best. On the way was a still. Off in the +bresh. If the still was lonely I stop, not on the way to but on the +way back. Mighty good whiskey, too! Maybe I drinks too much, then I +was sorry. + +Not that I swipe the whiskey, just sorry because I gets sick! Then I +figures a woods camp meeting will steady me up and I goes. + +The preacher meet me and want to know how is my feelings. I says I is +low with the misery and he say to join up with the Lord. + +I never join because he don't talk about the Lord. Just about the +Master and Mistress. How the slaves must obey around the +plantation--how the white folks know what is good for the slaves. +Nothing about obeying the Lord and working for him. + +I reckon the old preacher was worrying more about the bull whip than +he was the Bible, else he say something about the Lord! But I always +obeys the Lord--that's why I is still living! + +The slaves would pray for to get out of bondage. Some of them say the +Lord told them to run away. Get to the North. Cross the Red River. +Over there would be folks to guide them to the Free State (Kansas). + +The Lord never tell me to run away. I never tried it, maybe, because +mostly they was caught by patrollers and fetched back for a +flogging--and I had whippings enough already! + +Before the Civil War was the fighting with Mexico. Some of the troops +on they way south passed on the Military Road. Wasn't any fighting +around Linden or Jefferson during the time. + +They was lots of traveling on the Military Road. Most of the time you +could see covered wagons pulled by mules and horses, and sometimes a +crawling string of wagons with oxen on the pulling end. + +From up in Arkansas come the stage coach along the road. To San +Antonio. The drivers bring news the Mexicans just about all killed off +and the white folks say Texas was going to join the Union. The +country's going to be run different they say, but I never see no +difference. Maybe, because I ain't white folks. + +Wasn't many Mexicans around the old plantation. Come and go. Lots of +Indians. Cherokees and Choctaws. Living in mud huts and cabin shacks. +I never see them bother the whites, it was the other way around. + +During the Civil War, when the Red River was bank high with muddy +water, the Yankee's made a target of Jefferson. That was a small town +down south of Linden. + +Down the river come a flat barge with cannon fastened to the deck. The +Yankee soldiers stopped across the river from Jefferson and the +shooting started. + +When the cannon went to popping the folks went arunning--hard to tell +who run the fastest, the whites or the blacks! Almost the town was +wiped out. Buildings was smashed and big trees cut through with the +cannon balls. + +And all the time the Yankee drums was a-beating and the soldiers +singing: + + We'll hang Jeff Davis on a sour apple tree, + As we go marching on! + +Before the Civil War everybody had money. The white folks, not the +negroes. Sometimes the master take me to the town stores. They was +full of money. Cigar boxes on the counter, boxes on the shelf, all +filled with money. Not the crinkley paper kind, but hard, jingley gold +and silver! Not like these scarce times! + +After the War I stay on the plantation 'til a soldier man tells me of +the freedom. The master never tell us--negroes working just like +before the War. + +That's when I leave the first time. Slip off, saying nothing, to +Jefferson. There I found some good white folks going to New Orleans. +First place we go is Shreveport, by wagon. They took me because I fix +up with them to do the cooking. + +On to the Big River (Mississippi) and boards a river steamboat for New +Orleans. Lots of negroes going down there--to work on the canal. + +The whole town was built on logs covered with dirt. Trying to raise +itself right out of the swamp. Sometimes the water get high and folks +run for the hills. When I got there almost was I ready to leave. + +I like Texas the best. Back to Jefferson is where I go. Fifteen-twenty +mile below Linden. Almost the first person I see was Master Davenport. + +He says, "Black rascal, you is coming with me." And I do. He tried to +keep his slaves and just laugh when I tell him about the freedom. I +worked for food and quarters 'til his meanness come cropping out +again. + +That wasn't long and he threatened me with the whip and the buck and +gag. The buck and gag was maybe worse. I got to feeling that iron +stick in my mouth, fastened around my head with chains, pressing hard +on my tongue. No drinking, no eating, no talking! + +So I slip off again. That night I goes through Linden. Crawling on my +hands and knees! Keeping in the dark spots, hiding from the whites, +'til I pass the last house, then my feets hurries me to Jefferson, +where I gets a ride to Arkansas. + +In Russelville is where I stop. There I worked around in the yards, +cutting the grass, fancying the flower beds, and earned a little money +for clothes and eats, with some of it spent for good whiskey. + +That was the reason I left Arkansas. Whiskey. The law got after me to +tell where was a man's whiskey still. I just leave so's I won't have +to tell. + +But while I was making a little money in Russelville, I lose out on +some big money, account some white folks beat me to it. + +I was out in the hills west of town, walking along the banks of a +little creek, when I heard a voice. Queer like. I called out who is +that talking and I hears it again. + +"Go to the white oak tree and you will find Ninety Thousand Dollars!" +That's what I hear. I look around, nobody in sight, but I see the +tree. A big white oak tree standing taller than all the rest 'round +about. + +Under the tree was a grave. An old grave. I scratch around but finds +no money and thinks of getting some help. + +I done some work for a white man in town and told him about the voice. +He promised to go with me, but the next day he took two white mens and +dug around the tree. Then he says they was nothing to find. + +To this day I know better. I know wherever they's a ghost, money is +around someplace! That's what the ghost comes back for. + +Somebody dies and leaves buried money. The ghost watches over it 'til +it sees somebody it likes. Then ghost shows himself--lets know he's +around. Sometimes the ghost tells where is the money buried, like that +time at Russelville. + +That ain't the only ghost I've seen or heard. I see one around the +yard where I is living now. A woman. Some of these times she'll tell +me where the buried money is. + +Maybe the ghost woman thinks I is too old to dig. But I been a-digging +all these long years. For a bite to eat and a sleep-under cover. + +I reckon pretty soon she's going to tell where to dig. When she does, +then old Uncle John won't have to dig for the eats no more! + + + + +[Illustration: Charley Williams and Granddaughter] + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +[HW: (photo)] +[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937] + +CHARLEY WILLIAMS +Age 94 yrs. +Tulsa, Okla. + + +Iffen I could see better out'n my old eyes, and I had me something to +work with and de feebleness in my back and head would let me 'lone, I +would have me plenty to eat in de kitchen all de time, and plenty +tobaccy in my pipe, too, bless God! + +And dey wouldn't be no rain trickling through de holes in de roof, and +no planks all fell out'n de flo' on de gallery neither, 'cause dis one +old nigger knows everything about making all he need to git along! Old +Master done showed him how to git along in dis world, jest as long as +he live on a plantation, but living in de town is a different way of +living, and all you got to have is a silver dime to lay down for +everything you want, and I don't git de dime very often. + +But I aint give up! Nothing like dat! On de days when I don't feel so +feeble and trembly I jest keep patching 'round de place. I got to keep +patching so as to keep it whar it will hold de winter out, in case I +git to see another winter. + +Iffen I don't, it don't grieve me none, 'cause I wants to see old +Master again anyways. I reckon maybe I'll jest go up an ask him what +he want me to do, and he'll tell me, and iffen I don't know how he'll +show me how, and I'll try to do it to please him. And when I git it +done I wants to hear him grumble like he used to and say, "Charley, +you ain't got no sense but you is a good boy. Dis here ain't very good +but it'll do, I reckon. Git yourself a little piece o' dat brown +sugar, but don't let no niggers see you eating it--if you do I'll whup +your black behind!" + +Dat ain't de way it going be in Heaven, I reckon, but I can't set here +on dis old rottendy gallery and think of no way I better like to have +it! + +I was a great big hulking buck of a boy when de War come along and +bust up everything, and I can 'member back when everybody was living +peaceful and happy, and nobody never had no notion about no war. + +I was borned on the 'leventh of January, in 1843, and was old enough +to vote when I got my freedom, but I didn't take no stock in all dat +politics and goings on at dat time, and I didn't vote till a long time +after old Master passed away, but I was big enough before de War to +remember everything pretty plain. + +Old Master name was John Williams, and old Mistress name was Miss +Betty, and she was a Campbell before she married. Young Missy was +named Betty after her mommy, and Young Master was named Frank, but I +don't know who after. Our overseer was Mr. Simmons, and he was mighty +smart and had a lot of patience, but he wouldn't take no talk nor +foolishness. He didn't whup nobody very often, but he only had to whup +'em jest one time! He never did whup a nigger at de time the nigger +done something, but he would wait till evening and have old Master +come and watch him do it. He never whupped very hard 'cept when he had +told a nigger about something and promised a whupping next time and +the nigger done it again. Then that nigger got what he had been +hearing 'bout! + +De plantation was about as big as any. I think it had about three +hundred acres, and it was about two miles northwest of Monroe, +Louisiana. Then he had another one not so big, two--three miles south +of the big one, kind of down in the woodsy part along the White river +bottoms. He had another overseer on that place and a big passel of +niggers, but I never did go down to that one. That was where he raised +most of his corn and shoats, and lots of sorghum cane. + +Our plantation was up on higher ground, and it was more open country, +but still they was lots of woods all around and lots of the +plantations had been whacked right out of de new ground and was full +of stumps. Master's place was more open, though, and all in the fields +was good plowing. + +The big road runned right along past our plantation, and it come from +Shreveport and run into Monroe. There wasn't any town at Monroe in +them days, jest a little cross roads place with a general store and a +big hide house. I think there was about two big hide houses, and you +could smell that place a mile before you got into it. Old Master had a +part in de store, I think. + +De hide houses was jest long sheds, all open along de sides and +kivered over wid cypress clapboards. + +Down below de hide houses and de store was jest a little settlement of +one or two houses, but they was a school for white boys. Somebody said +there was a place where they had been an old fort, but I never did see +it. + +Everything boughten we got come from Shreveport, and was brung in by +the stage and the freighters, and that was only a little coffee or +gunpowder, or some needles for the sewing, or some strap iron for the +blacksmith, or something like dat. We made and raised everything else +we needed right on the place. + +I never did even see any quinine till after I was free. My mammy +knowed jest what root to go out and pull up to knock de chills right +out'n me. And de bellyache and de running off de same way, too. + +Our plantation was a lot different from some I seen other places, like +way east of there, around Vicksburg. Some of them was fixed up fancier +but dey didn't have no more comforts than we had. + +Old Master come out into that country when he was a young man, and +they didn't have even so much then as they had when I was a boy. I +think he come from Alabama or Tennessee, and way back his people had +come from Virginia, or maybe North Carolina, 'cause he knowed all +about tobacco on the place. Cotton and tobacco was de long crops on +his big place, and of course lots of horses and cattle and mules. + +De big house was made out'n square hewed logs, and chinked wid little +rocks and daubed wid white clay, and kivered wid cypress clapboards. I +remember one time we put on a new roof, and de niggers hauled up de +cypress logs and sawed dem and frowed out de clapboards by hand. + +De house had two setting rooms on one side and a big kitchen room on +de other, wid a wide passage in between, and den about was de sleeping +rooms. They wasn't no stairways 'cepting on de outside. Steps run up +to de sleeping rooms on one side from de passageway and on de other +side from clean outside de house. Jest one big chimbley was all he +had, and it was on de kitchen end, and we done all de cooking in a +fireplace dat was purty nigh as wide as de whole room. + +In de sleeping rooms day wasn't no fires 'cepting in brazers made out +of clay, and we toted up charcoal to burn in 'em when it was cold +mornings in de winter. Dey kept warm wide de bed clothes and de +knitten clothes dey had. + +Master never did make a big gallery on de house, but our white folks +would set out in de yard under de big trees in de shade. They was long +benches made out'n hewed logs and all padded wid gray moss and corn +shuck padding, and dey set pretty soft. All de furniture in de house +was home-made, too. De beds had square posts as big around as my shank +and de frame was mortised into 'em, and holes bored in de frame and +home-made rope laced in to make it springy. Den a great big mattress +full of goose feathers and two--three comforts as thick as my foot wid +carded wool inside! Dey didn't need no fireplaces! + +De quarters was a little piece from de big house, and dey run along +both sides of de road dat go to de fields. All one-room log cabins, +but dey was good and warm, and every one had a little open shed at de +side whar we sleep in de summer to keep cool. + +They was two or three wells at de quarters for water, and some good +springs in de branch at de back of de fields. You could ketch a fish +now and den in dat branch, but Young Master used to do his fishing in +White River, and take a nigger or two along to do de work at his camp. + +It wasn't very fancy at de Big House, but it was mighty pretty jest de +same, wid de gray moss hanging from de big trees, and de cool green +grass all over de yard, and I can shet my old eyes and see it jest +like it was before de War come along and bust it up. + +I can see old Master setting out under a big tree smoking one of his +long cheroots his tobacco nigger made by hand, and fanning hisself wid +his big wide hat another nigger platted out'n young inside corn shucks +for him, and I can hear him holler at a big bunch of white geeses +what's gitting in his flower beds and see 'em string off behind de old +gander towards de big road. + +When de day begin to crack de whole plantation break out wid all kinds +of noises, and you could tell what going on by de kind of noise you +hear. + +Come de daybreak you hear de guinea fowls start potracking down at de +edge of de woods lot, and den de roosters all start up 'round de barn +and de ducks finally wake up and jine in. You can smell de sow belly +frying down at the cabins in de "row", to go wid de hoecake and de +buttermilk. + +Den purty soon de wind rise a little, and you can hear a old bell +donging way on some plantation a mile or two off, and den more bells +at other places and maybe a horn, and purty soon younder go old +Master's old ram horn wid a long toot and den some short toots, and +here come de overseer down de row of cabins, hollering right and left, +and picking de ham out'n his teeth wid a long shiny goose quill pick. + +Bells and horns! Bells for dis and horns for dat! All we knowed was go +and come by de bells and horns! + +Old ram horn blow to send us all to de field. We all line up, about +seventy-five field niggers, and go by de tool shed and git our hoes, +or maybe go hitch up de mules to de plows and lay de plows out on de +side so de overseer can see iffen de points is shart. Any plow gits +broke or de point gits bungled up on de rocks it goes to de blacksmith +nigger, den we all git on down in de field. + +Den de anvil start dangling in de blacksmith shop: "Tank! Deling-ding! +Tank! Deling-ding!", and dat ole bull tongue gitting straightened out! + +Course you can't hear de shoemaker awling and pegging, and de card +spinners, and de old mammy sewing by hand, but maybe you can hear de +old loom going "frump, frump", and you know it all right iffen your +clothes do be wearing out, 'cause you gwine git new britches purty +soon! + +We had about a hundred niggers on dat place, young and old, and about +twenty on de little place down below. We could make about every kind +of thing but coffee and gunpowder dat our whitefolks and us needed. + +When we needs a hat we gits inside cornshucks and weave one out, and +makes horse collars de same way. Jest tie two little soft shucks +together and begin plaiting. + +All de cloth 'cepting de Mistress' Sunday dresses come from de sheep +to de carders and de spinners and de weaver, den we dye it wid +"butternut" and hickory bark and indigo and other things and set it +wid copperas. Leather tanned on de place made de shoes, and I never +see a store boughten wagon wheel 'cepting among de stages and de +freighters along de big road. + +We made purty, long back-combs out'n cow horn, and knitting needles +out'n second hickory. Split a young hickory and put in a big wedge to +prize it open, then cut it down and let it season, and you got good +bent grain for wagon hames and chair rockers and such. + +It was jest like dat until I was grown, and den one day come a +neighbor man and say we in de War. + +Little while young Master Frank ride over to Vicksburg and jine de +Sesesh army, but old Master jest go on lak nothing happen, and we all +don't hear nothing more until long come some Sesesh soldiers and take +most old Master's hosses and all his wagons. + +I bin working on de tobacco, and when I come back to de barns +everything was gone. I would go into de woods and git good hickory and +burn it till it was all coals and put it out wid water to make hickory +charcoal for curing de tobacco. I had me some charcoal in de fire +trenches under de curing houses, all full of new tobacco, and overseer +come and say bundle all de tobacco up and he going take it to +Shreveport and sell it befo' de soldiers take it too. + +After de hosses all gone and most de cattle and de cotton and de +tobacco gone too, here come de Yankees and spread out all over de +whole country. Dey had a big camp down below our plantation. + +One evening a big bunch of Yankee officers come up to de Big House and +old Master set out de brandy in de yard and dey act purty nice. Next +day de whole bunch leave on out of dat part. + +When de hosses and stuff all go old Master sold all de slaves but +about four, but he kept my pappy and mammy and my brother Jimmie and +my sister Betty. She was named after old Mistress. Pappy's name was +Charley and mammy's was Sally. De niggers he kept didn't have much +work without any hosses and wagons, but de blacksmith started in +fixing up more wagons and he kept them hid in de woods till they was +all fixed. + +Den along come some more Yankees, and dey tore everything we had up, +and old Master was afeared to shoot at them on account his womenfolks, +so he tried to sneak the fambly out but they kotched him and brung him +back to de plantation. + +We niggers didn't know dat he was gone until we seen de Yankees +bringing dem back. De Yankees had done took charge of everything and +was camping in de big yard, and us was all down at de quarters scared +to death, but dey was jest letting us alone. + +It was night when de white folks tried to go away, and still night +when de Yankees brung dem back, and a house nigger come down to de +quarters wid three--four mens in blue clothes and told us to come up +to de Big House. + +De Yankees didn't seem to be mad wid old Master, but jest laughed and +talked wid him, but he didn't take de jokes any too good. + +Den dey asked him could he dance and he said no, and dey told him to +dance or make us dance. Dar he stood inside a big ring of dem mens in +blue clothes, wid dey brass buttons shining in de light from de fire +dey had in front of de tents, and he jest stood and said nothing, and +it look lak he wasn't wanting to tell us to dance. + +So some of us young bucks jest step up and say we was good dancers, +and we start shuffling while de rest of de niggers pat. + +Some nigger women go back to de quarters and git de gourd fiddles and +de clapping bones made out'n beef ribs, and bring dem back so we could +have some music. We git all warmed up and dance lak we never did dance +befo'! I speck we invent some new steps dat night! + +We act lak we dancing for de Yankees, but we trying to please Master +and old Mistress more than anything, and purty soon he begin to smile +a little and we all feel a lot better. + +Next day de Yankees move on away from our place, and old Master start +gitting ready to move out. We git de wagons we hid, and de whole +passel of us leaves out for Shreveport. Jest left de old place +standing like it was. + +In Shreveport old Master git his cotton and tobacco money what he been +afraid to have sent back to de plantation when he sell his stuff, and +we strike out north through Arkansas. + +Dat was de awfullest trip any man ever make! We had to hide from +everybody until we find out if dey Yankees or Sesesh, and we go along +little old back roads and up one mountain and down another, through de +woods all de way. + +After a long time we git to the Missouri line, and kind of cut off +through de corner of dat state into Kansas. I don't know how we ever +git across some of dem rivers but we did. Dey nearly always would be +some soldiers around de fords, and dey would help us find de best +crossing. Sometimes we had to unload de wagons and dry out de stuff +what all got wet, and camp a day or two to fix up again. + +Purty soon we git to Fort Scott, and that was whar de roads forked +ever whichaways. One went on north and one east and one went down into +de Indian country. It was full of soldiers coming and going back and +forth to Arkansas and Fort Gibson. + +We took de road on west through Kansas, and made for Colorado Springs. + +Fort Scott was all run down, and the old places whar dey used to have +de soldiers was all fell in in most places. Jest old rackety walls and +leaky roofs, and a big pole fence made out'n poles sot in de ground +all tied together, but it was falling down too. + +They was lots of wagons all around what belong to de army, hauling +stuff for de soldiers, and some folks told old Master he couldn't make +us niggers go wid him, but we said we wanted to anyways, so we jest +went on west across Kansas. + +When we got away on west we come to a fork, and de best road went +kinda south into Mexico, and we come to a little place called Clayton, +Mexico whar we camped a while and then went north. + +Dat place is in New Mexico now, but old Master jest called it Mexico. +Somebody showed me whar it is on de map, and it look lak it a long +ways off'n our road to Colorado Springs, but I guess de road jest wind +off down dat ways at de time we went over it. It was jest two or three +houses made out'n mud at dat time, and a store whar de soldiers and de +Indians come and done trading. + +About dat time old Master sell off some of de stuff he been taking +along, 'cause de wagons loaded too heavy for de mountains and he +figger he better have de money than some of de stuff, I reckon. + +On de way north it was a funny country. We jest climb all day long +gitting up one side of one bunch of mountains, and all de nigger men +have to push on de wheels while de mules pull and den scotch de wheels +while de mules rest. Everybody but de whitefolks has to walk most de +time. + +Down in de valleys it was warm like in Louisiana, but it seem lak de +sun aint so hot on de head, but it look lak every time night come it +ketch us up on top of one of dem mountains, and it almost as cold as +in de winter time! + +All de niggers had shoes and plenty warm clothes and we wrop up at +night in everything we can git. + +We git to Fort Scott again, and den de Yankee officers come and ask +all us niggers iffen we want to leave old Master and stay dar and +work, 'cause we all free now. Old Master say we can do what we please +about it. + +A few of de niggers stay dar in Fort Scott, but most of us say we +gwine stay wid old Master, and we don't care iffen we is free or not. + +When we git back to Monroe to de old place us niggers git a big +surprise. We didn't hear about it, but some old Master's kinfolks back +in Virginia done come out dar an fix de place up and kept it for him +while we in Colorado, and it look 'bout as good as when we left it. + +He cut it up in chunks and put us niggers out on it on de halves, but +he had to sell part of it to git de money to git us mules and tools +and found to run on. Den after while he had to sell some more, and he +seem lak he git old mighty fast. + +Young Master bin in de big battles in Virginia, and he git hit, and +den he git sick, and when he come home he jest lak a old man he was so +feeble. + +About dat time they was a lot of people coming into dat country from +de North, and dey kept telling de niggers dat de thing for dem to do +was to be free, and come and go whar dey please. + +Dey try to git de darkeys to go and vote but none us folks took much +stock by what dey say. Old Master tell us plenty time to mix in de +politics when de younguns git educated and know what to do. + +Jest de same he never mind iffen we go to de dances and de singing and +sech. He allus lent us a wagon iffen we want to borry one to go in, +too. + +Some de niggers what work for de white folks from de North act purty +uppity and big, and come pestering 'round de dance places and try to +talk up ructions amongst us, but it don't last long. + +De Ku Kluckers start riding 'round at night, and dey pass de word dat +de darkeys got to have a pass to go and come and to stay at de dances. +Dey have to git de pass from de white folks dey work for, and passes +writ from de Northern people wouldn't do no good. Dat de way de +Kluckers keep the darkies in line. + +De Kluckers jest ride up to de dance ground and look at everybody's +passes, and iffen some darkey dar widout a pass or got a pass from de +wrong man dey run him home, and iffen he talk big and won't go home +dey whop him and make him go. + +Any nigger out on de road after dark liable to run across de Kluckers, +and he better have a good pass! All de dances got to bust up at about +'leven o'clock, too. + +One time I seen three-four Kluckers on hosses, all wrapped up in +white, and dey was making a black boy git home. Dey was riding hosses +and he was trotting down de road ahead of 'em. Ever time he stop and +start talking dey pop de whip at his heels and he start trotting on. +He was so made he was crying, but he was gitting on down de road jest +de same. + +I seen 'em coming and I gits out my pass young Master writ so I could +show it, but when dey ride by one in front jest turns in his saddle +and look back at tother men and nod his head, and they jest ride on by +widout stopping to see my pass. Dat man knowed me, I reckon. I looks +to see iffen I knowed de hoss, but de Kluckers sometime swapped dey +hosses 'round amongst 'em, so de hoss maybe wasn't hisn. + +Dey wasn't very bad 'cause de niggers 'round dar wasn't bad, but I +hear plenty of darkeys git whopped in other places 'cause dey act up +and say dey don't have to take off dey hats in de white stores and +such. + +Any nigger dat behave hisself and don't go running 'round late at +night and drinking never had no trouble wid de Kluckers. + +Young Mistress go off and git married, but I don't remember de name +'cause she live off somewhar else, and de next year, I think it was, +my pappy and mammy go on a place about five miles away owned by a man +named Mr. Bumpus, and I go 'long wid my sister Betty and brother +Jimmie to help 'em. + +I live around dat place and never marry till old mammy and pappy both +gone, and Jimmie and Betty both married and I was gitting about forty +year old myself, and den I go up in Kansas and work around till I git +married at last. + +I was in Fort Scott, and I married Mathilda Black in 1900, and she is +73 years old now and was born in Tennessee. We went to Pittsburg, +Kansas, and lived from 1907 to 1913 when we come to Tulsa. + +Young Master's children writ to me once in a while and telled me how +dey gitting 'long up to about twenty year ago, and den I never heard +no more about 'em. I never had no children, and it look lak my wife +going outlive me, so my mainest hope when I goes on is seeing Mammy +and Pappy and old Master. Old overseer, I speck, was too devilish mean +to be thar! + +'Course I loves my Lord Jesus same as anybody, but you see I never +hear much about Him until I was grown, and it seem lak you got to hear +about religion when you little to soak it up and put much by it. +Nobody could read de Bible when I was a boy, and dey wasn't no white +preachers talked to de niggers. We had meeting sometimes, but de +nigger preacher jest talk about bein a good nigger and "doing to +please de Master," and I allus thought he meant to please old Master, +and I allus wanted to do dat anyways. + +So dat de reason I allus remember de time old Master pass on. + +It was about two years after de War, and old Master been mighty porely +all de time. One day we was working in de Bumpus field and a nigger +come on a mule and say old Mistress like to have us go over to de old +place 'cause old Master mighty low and calling mine and Pappy's and +Mammy's name. Old man Bumpus say go right ahead. + +When we git to de Big House old Master setting propped up in de bed +and you can see he mighty low and out'n his head. + +He been talking about gitting de oats stacked, 'cause it seem to him +lak it gitting gloomy-dark, and it gwine to rain, and hail gwine to +ketch de oats in de shocks. Some nigger come running up to de back +door wid an old horn old Mistress sent him out to hunt up, and he +blowed it so old Master could hear it. + +Den purty soon de doctor come to de door and say old Master wants de +bell rung 'cause de slaves should ought to be in from de fields, +'cause it gitting too dark to work. Somebody git a wagon tire and beat +on it like a bell ringing, right outside old Master's window, and den +we all go up on de porch and peep in. Every body was snuffling kind of +quiet, 'cause we can't help it. + +We hear old Master say, "Dat's all right, Simmons. I don't want my +niggers working in de rain. Go down to de quarters and see dey all +dried off good. Dey ain't got no sense but dey all good niggers." +Everybody around de bed was crying, and we all was crying too. + +Den old Mistress come to de door and say we can go in and look at him +if we want to. He was still setting propped up, but he was gone. + +I stayed in Louisiana a long time after dat, but I didn't care nothing +about it, and it look lak I'm staying a long time past my time in dis +world, 'cause I don't care much about staying no longer only I hates +to leave Mathilda. + +But any time de Lord want me I'm ready, and I likes to think when He +ready He going tell old Master to ring de bell for me to come on in. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +SARAH WILSON +Age 87 yrs. +Fort Gibson, Okla. + + +I was a Cherokee slave and now I am a Cherokee freedwoman, and besides +that I am a quarter Cherokee my own self. And this is the way it is. + +I was born in 1850 along the Arkansas river about half way between +Fort Smith and old Fort Coffee and the Skullyville boat landing on the +river. The farm place was on the north side of the river on the old +wagon road what run from Fort Smith out to Fort Gibson, and that old +road was like you couldn't hardly call a road when I first remember +seeing it. The ox teams bog down to they bellies in some places, and +the wagon wheel mighty nigh bust on the big rocks in some places. + +I remember seeing soldiers coming along that old road lots of times, +and freighting wagons, and wagons what we all know carry mostly +wiskey, and that was breaking the law, too! Them soldiers catch the +man with that whiskey they sure put him up for a long time, less'n he +put some silver in they hands. That's what my Uncle Nick say. That +Uncle Nick a mean Negro, and he ought to know about that. + +Like I tell you, I am quarter Cherokee. My mammy was named Adeline and +she belong to old Master Ben Johnson. Old Master Ben bring my +grandmammy out to that Sequoyah district way back when they call it +Arkansas, mammy tell me, and God only know who my mammy's pa is, but +mine was old Master Ben's boy, Ned Johnson. + +Old Master Ben come from Tennessee when he was still a young man, and +he bring a whole passel of slaves and my mammy say they all was kin to +one another, all the slaves I mean. He was a white man that married a +Cherokee woman, and he was a devil on this earth. I don't want to +talk about him none. + +White folks was mean to us like the devil, and so I jest let them +pass. When I say my brothers and sisters I mean my half brothers and +sisters, you know, but maybe some of them was my whole kin anyways, I +don't know. They was Lottie that was sold off to a Starr because she +wouldn't have a baby, and Ed, Dave, Ben, Jim and Ned. + +My name is Sarah now but it was Annie until I was eight years old. My +old Mistress' name was Annie and she name me that, and Mammy was +afraid to change it until old Mistress died, then she change it. She +hate old Mistress and that name too. + +Lottie's name was Annie, too, but Mammy changed it in her own mind but +she was afraid to say it out loud, a-feared she would get a whipping. +When sister was sold off Mammy tell her to call herself Annie when she +was leaving but call herself Lottie when she git over to the Starrs. +And she done it too. I seen her after that and she was called Lottie +all right. + +The Negroes lived all huddled up in a bunch in little one-room log +cabins with stick and mud chimneys. We lived in one, and it had beds +for us children like shelves in the wall. Mammy need to help us up +into them. + +Grandmammy was mighty old and Mistress was old too. Grandmammy set on +the Master's porch and minded the baby mostly. I think it was Young +Master's. He was married to a Cherokee girl. They was several of the +boys but only one girl, Nicie. The old Master's boys were Aaron, John, +Ned, Cy and Nathan. They lived in a double log house made out of +square hewed logs, and with a double fireplace out of rock where they +warmed theirselves on one side and cooked on the other. They had a +long front porch where they set most of the time in the summer, and +slept on it too. + +There was over a hundred acres in the Master's farm, and it was all +bottom land too, and maybe you think he let them slaves off easy! Work +from daylight to dark! They all hated him and the overseer too, and +before slavery ended my grandmammy was dead and old Mistress was dead +and old Master was mighty feeble and Uncle Nick had run away to the +North soldiers and they never got him back. He run away once before, +about ten years before I was born, Mammy say, but the Cherokees went +over in the Creek Nation and got him back that time. + +The way he made the Negroes work so hard, old Master must have been +trying to get rich. When they wouldn't stand for a whipping he would +sell them. + +I saw him sell a old woman and her son. Must have been my aunt. She +was always pestering around trying to get something for herself, and +one day she was cleaning the yard he seen her pick up something and +put it inside her apron. He flew at her and cussed her, and started +like he was going to hit her but she just stood right up to him and +never budged, and when he come close she just screamed out loud and +ran at him with her fingers stuck out straight and jabbed him in the +belly. He had a big soft belly, too, and it hurt him. He seen she +wasn't going to be afraid, and he set out to sell her. He went off on +his horse to get some men to come and bid on her and her boy, and all +us children was mighty scared about it. + +They would have hangings at Fort Smith courthouse, and old Master +would take a slave there sometimes to see the hanging, and that slave +would come back and tell us all scary stories about the hanging. + +One time he whipped a whole bunch of the men on account of a fight in +the quarters, and then he took them all to Fort Smith to see a +hanging. He tied them all in the wagon, and when they had seen the +hanging he asked them if they was scared of them dead men hanging up +there. They all said yes, of course, but my old uncle Nick was a bad +Negro and he said, "No, I aint a-feared of them nor nothing else in +this world", and old Master jumped on him while he was tied and beat +him with a rope, and then when they got home he tied old Nick to a +tree and took his shirt off and poured the cat-o-nine-tails to him +until he fainted away and fell over like he was dead. + +I never forget seeing all that blood all over my uncle, and if I could +hate that old Indian any more I guess I would, but I hated him all I +could already I reckon. + +Old Master wasn't the only hellion neither. Old Mistress just as bad, +and she took most of her wrath out hitting us children all the time. +She was afraid of the grown Negroes. Afraid of what they might do +while old Master was away, but she beat us children all the time. + +She would call me, "Come here Annie!" and I wouldn't know what to do. +If I went when she called "Annie" my mammy would beat me for answering +to that name, and if I didn't go old Mistress would beat me for that. +That made me hate both of them, and I got the devil in me and I +wouldn't come to either one. My grandmammy minded the Master's yard, +and she set on the front porch all the time, and when I was called I +would run to her and she wouldn't let anybody touch me. + +When I was eight years old old Mistress died, and Grandmammy told me +why old Mistress picked on me so. She told me about me being half +Mister Ned's blood. Then I knowed why Mister Ned would say, "Let her +along, she got big big blood in her", and then laugh. + +Young Mister Ned was a devil, too. When his mammy died he went out and +"blanket married." I mean he brung in a half white and half Indian +woman and just lived with her. + +The slaves would get rations every Monday morning to do them all week. +The Overseer would weigh and measure according to how many in the +family, and if you run out you just starve till you get some more. We +all know the overseer steal some of it for his own self but we can't +do anything, so we get it from the old Master some other way. + +One day I was carrying water from the spring and I run up on +Grandmammy and Uncle Nick skinning a cow. "What you-all doing?", I +say, and they say keep my mouth shut or they kill me. They was +stealing from the Master to piece out down at the quarters with. Old +Master had so many cows he never did count the difference. + +I guess I wasn't any worse than any the rest of the Negroes, but I was +bad to tell little lies. I carry scars on my legs to this day where +Old Master whip me for lying, with a rawhide quirt he carry all the +time for his horse. When I lie to him he just jump down off'n his +horse and whip me good right there. + +In slavery days we all ate sweet potatoes all the time. When they +didn't measure out enough of the tame kind we would go out in the +woods and get the wild kind. They growed along the river sand betaween +where we lived and Wilson's Rock, out west of our place. + +Then we had boiled sheep and goat, mostly goat, and milk and wild +greens and corn pone. I think the goat meat was the best, but I aint +had no teeth for forty years now, and a chunk of meat hurts my +stomach. So I just eats grits mostly. Besides hoeing in the field, +chopping sprouts, shearing sheep, carrying water, cutting firewood, +picking cotton and sewing I was the one they picked to work Mistress' +little garden where she raised things from seed they got in Fort +Smith. Green peas and beans and radishes and things like that. If we +raised a good garden she give me a little of it, and if we had a poor +one I got a little anyhow even when she didn't give it. + +For clothes we had homespun cotton all the year round, but in winter +we had a sheep skin jacket with the wool left on the inside. Sometimes +sheep skin shoes with the wool on the inside and sometimes real cow +leather shoes with wood peggings for winter, but always barefooted in +summer, all the men and women too. + +Lord, I never earned a dime of money in slave days for myself but +plenty for the old Master. He would send us out to work the neighbors +field and he got paid for it, but we never did see any money. + +I remember the first money I ever did see. It was a little while after +we was free, and I found a greenback in the road at Fort Gibson and I +didn't know what it was. Mammy said it was money and grabbed for it, +but I was still a hell cat and I run with it. I went to the little +sutler store and laid it down and pointed to a pitcher I been wanting. +The man took the money and give me the pitcher, but I don't know to +this day how much money it was and how much was the pitcher, but I +still got that pitcher put away. It's all blue and white stripedy. + +Most of the work I done off the plantation was sewing. I learned from +my Granny and I loved to sew. That was about the only thing I was +industrious in. When I was just a little bitsy girl I found a steel +needle in the yard that belong to old Mistress. My mammy took it and I +cried. She put it in her dress and started for the field. I cried so +old Mistress found out why and made Mammy give me the needle for my +own. + +We had some neighbor Indians named Starr, and Mrs. Starr used me +sometimes to sew. She had nine boys and one girl, and she would sew up +all they clothes at once to do for a year. She would cut out the cloth +for about a week, and then send the word around to all the neighbors, +and old Mistress would send me because she couldn't see good to sew. +They would have stacks of drawers, shirts, pants and some dresses all +cut out to sew up. + +I was the only Negro that would set there and sew in that bunch of +women, and they always talked to me nice and when they eat I get part +of it too, out in the kitchen. + +One Negro girl, Eula Davis, had a mistress sent her too, one time, but +she wouldn't sew. She didn't like me because she said I was too white +and she played off to spite the white people. She got sent home, too. + +When old Mistress die I done all the sewing for the family almost. I +could sew good enough to go out before I was eight years old, and when +I got to be about ten I was better than any other girl on the place +for sewing. + +I can still quilt without my glasses, and I have sewed all night long +many a time while I was watching Young Master's baby after old +Mistress died. + +They was over a hundred acres in the plantation, and I don't know how +many slaves, but before the War ended lots of the men had run away. +Uncle Nick went to the North and never come home, and Grandmammy died +about that time. + +We was way down across the Red river in Texas at that time, close to +Shawneetown of the Choctaw Nation but just across the river on the +other side in Texas bottoms. Old Master took us there in covered +wagons when the Yankee soldiers got too close by in the first part of +the War. He hired the slaves out to Texas people because he didn't +make any crops down there, and we all lived in kind of camps. That's +how some of the men and my uncle Nick got to slip off to the north +that way. + +Old Master just rant and rave all the time we was in Texas. That's the +first time I ever saw a doctor. Before that when a slave sick the old +women give them herbs, but down there one day old Master whip a Negro +girl and she fall in the fire, and he had a doctor come out to fix her +up where she was burnt. I remember Granny giving me clabber milk when +I was sick, and when I was grown I found out it had had medicine in +it. + +Before freedom we didn't have no church, but slipped around to the +other cabins and had a little singing sometimes. Couldn't have anybody +show us the letters either, and you better not let them catch you pick +up a book even to look at the pictures, for it was against a Cherokee +law to have a Negro read and write or to teach a Negro. + +Some Negroes believed in buckeyes and charms but I never did. Old +Master had some good boys, named Aaron, John, Ned, Cy and Nat and they +told me the charms was no good. Their sister Nicie told me too, and +said when I was sick just come and tell her. + +They didn't tell us anything about Christmas and New Year though, and +all we done was work. + +When the War was ended we was still in Texas, and when old Master got +a letter from Fort Smith telling him the slaves was free he couldn't +read, and Young Miss read it to him. He went wild and jumped on her +and beat the devil out of her. Said she was lying to him. It near +about killed him to let us loose, but he cooled down after awhile and +said he would help us all get back home if we wanted to come. + +Mammy told him she could bear her own expenses. I remember I didn't +know what "expenses" was, and I thought it was something I was going +to have to help carry all the way back. + +It was a long time after he knew we was free before he told us. He +tried to keep us, I reckon, but had to let us go. He died pretty soon +after he told us, and some said his heart just broke and some said +some Negroes poisoned him. I didn't know which. + +Anyways we had to straggle back the best way we could, and me and +mammy just got along one way and another till we got to a ferry over +the Red River and into Arkansas. Then we got some rides and walked +some until we got to Fort Smith. They was a lot of Negro camps there +and we stayed awhile and then started out to Fort Gibson because we +heard they was giving rations out there. Mammy knew we was Cherokee +anyway, I guess. + +That trip was hell on earth. Nobody let us ride and it took us nearly +two weeks to walk all that ways, and we nearly starved all the time. +We was skin and bones and feet all bloody when we got to the Fort. + +We come here to Four Mile Branch to where the Negroes was all setting +down, and pretty soon Mammy died. + +I married Oliver Wilson on January second, 1878. He used to belong to +Mr. DeWitt Wilson of Tahlequah, and I think the old people used to +live down at Wilson Rock because my husband used to know all about +that place and the place where I was borned. Old Mister DeWitt Wilson +give me a pear tree the next year after I was married, and it is still +out in my yard and bears every year. + +I was married in a white and black checkedy calico apron that I +washed for Mr. Tim Walker's mother Lizzie all day for, over close to +Ft. Gibson, and I was sure a happy woman when I married that day. Him +and me both got our land on our Cherokee freedman blood and I have +lived to bury my husband and see two great grandchildren so far. + +I bless God about Abraham Lincoln. I remember when my mammy sold +pictures of him in Fort Smith for a Jew. If he give me my freedom I +know he is in Heaven now. + +I heard a lot about Jefferson Davis in my life. During the War we hear +the Negroes singing the soldier song about hand Jeff Davis to a apple +tree, and old Master tell about the time we know Jeff Davis. Old +Master say Jeff Davis was just a dragoon soldier out of Fort Gibson +when he bring his family out here from Tennessee, and while they was +on the road from Fort Smith to where they settled young Jeff Davis and +some more dragoon soldiers rid up and talked to him a long time. He +say my grandmammy had a bundle on her head, and Jeff Davis say, "Where +you going Aunty?" and she was tired and mad and she said, "I don't +know, to Hell I reckon", and all the white soldiers laughed at her and +made her that much madder. + +I joined the Four Mile Branch church in 1879 and Sam Solomon was a +Creek negro and the first preacher I ever heard preach. Everybody +ought to be in the church and ready for that better home on the other +side. + +All the old slaves I know are dead excepting two, and I will be going +pretty soon I reckon, but I'm glad I lived to see the day the Negroes +get the right treatment if they work good and behave themselves right. +They don't have to have no pass to walk abroad no more, and they can +all read and write now, but it's a tarnation shame some of them go and +read the wrong kind of things anyways. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves +10-19-38 +1,534 words + +TOM W. WOODS +Age 83. +Alderson, Okla. + + +Lady, if de nigger hadn't been set free dis country wouldn't ever been +what it is now! Poor white folks wouldn't never had a chance. De slave +holders had most of de money and de land and dey wouldn't let de poor +white folks have a chance to own any land or anything else to speak +of. Dese white folks wasn't much better off den we was. Dey had to +work hard and dey had to worry 'bout food, clothes and shelter and we +didn't. Lots of slave owners wouldn't allow dem on deir farms among +deir slaves without orders from de overseer. I don't know why, unless +he was afraid dey would stir up discontent among de niggers. Dere was +lots of "underground railroading" and I rekon dat was what Old Master +and others was afraid of. + +Us darkies was taught dat poor white folks didn't amount to much. +Course we knowed dey was white and we was black and dey was to be +respected for dat, but dat was about all. + +White folks as well as niggers profited by emancipation. Lincoln was a +friend to all poor white folks as well as black ones and if he could +a' lived things would a'been different for ever'body. + +Dis has been a good old world to live in. I always been able to make a +purty good living and de only trouble I ever had has been sickness and +death. I've had a sight of dat kind of trouble. I've outlived two +wives and eight children. I had 13 brothers and sisters and I was de +oldest, and I'm de only one left. + +I sits here at night by myself and gits to wondering what de good +Lord is sparing me for. I reckon it's for some good reason, and I'd +like to live to be a hundred if He wants me to. I'm not tired of +living yet! + +I was born in Florence, Alabama. My father's name was Thomas Woods and +my mammy was Frances Foster. Mammy belonged to Wash Foster and father +was owned by Moses Woods, who lived on an adjoining plantation. He +worked for his Master ever' day but spent each night wid us. He walked +'bout a mile to his work ever' day. + +Master Wash was a poor man when he married Miss Sarah Watkins of +Richmond, Virginia. Her father was as rich as cream, he owned 7 +plantations and 200 slaves to each plantation. When Master Wash and +Miss Sarah got married her father give her 50 slaves. Ever'body said +Miss Mary jest married Master Wash because he was a purty boy, and he +sure was a fine looking man. + +He was good and kind to all his slaves when he was sober, but he was +awful crabbed and cross when he was drunk, and he was drunk most of de +time. He was hard to please and sometimes he would whip de slaves. I +remember seeing Master Wash whup two men once. He give 'em 200 lashes. + +Miss Sarah was de best woman in de world. It takes a good woman to +live wid a drunkard. + +Two of the men ran away one time and was gone till dey got tired of +staying away. Master Wash wouldn't let anyone hunt 'em. When dey +finally come home he had dem strapped in stocks and den deir bodies +bared to de waist and he sure did ply de lash. I guess he whupped 'em +harder dan he would if he hadn't been so full of whisky. + +He never did sell any of his slaves. He kept the 50 dat Miss Sarah's +father give 'em and deir increase. He bought some ever' time dey had a +sale. He owned two plantations and dey was about a hundred slaves on +each one. Him and his family lived in town. + +Me and a boy named John was sized and put to work when we was about +nine or ten years old. We was so bad dey had to put us to work as dey +couldn't do any thing else with us. We'd chase de pigs and ride de +calves and to punish us dey made us tote water to de hands. Dey was so +many hands to water dat it kept us busy running back and forth with de +water. De next year dey put me to plowing and him to hoeing. We made +regular hands from den on. + +If we had behaved ourselves we wouldn't a'had to go to work till we +was fourteen or fifteen anyway. Slave owners was awful good to deir +nigger chaps for dey wanted 'em to grow up to be strong men and women. + +Dey was about thirty children on our plantation. Two women looked +after us and took care of us till our parents come in from de field. +Dey cooked for us and always gave us our supper and sent us home to +our parents for de night. + +Our food was placed on a long table in a trough. Each child had a +spoon and four of us eat out of one trough. Our food at night was +mostly milk and bread. At noon we had vegetables, bread, meat and +milk. He gave us more and better food than he did his field hands. He +said he didn't want none of us to be stunted in our growing. + +He bought our shoes for us but cloth for our clothes was spun and wove +right there on de farm. In summer us boys wore long tailed shirts and +no pants. I've plowed dat way a many a day. We was glad to see it git +warm in de spring so we could go barefooted and go wid out our pants. + +Our overseers lived near de quarters and every morning about four o' +clock dey'd blow a horn [HW: to] wake us up. We knowed it meant to git +up and start de day. We was in de field by de time we could see. We +always fed our teams at night. We'd give 'em enough to keep 'em eating +all night so we wouldn't have to feed 'em in de morning. + +Master Wash Foster and his family lived in de finest house in +Florence, Ala. It was a fine, large two-story house, painted white as +nearly all de houses was in dem days. Dere was big gallery in front +and back and a fine lawn wid big cedar and chestnut trees all 'round +de house. + +He had a fine carriage and a pair of spanking bays dat cost him $500 +apiece. Old Monroe was his coachman and dey made a grand sight. Monroe +kept de nickel plated harness and carriage trimmings shining and de +team was brushed slick and clean and dey sure stepped out. + +We lived on de plantation about eight miles from town and we liked for +de family to come out to de farm. Dey was four children, Wash, Jack, +Sarah and Sally and dey always played with us. When dey come we always +had a regular feast as dey children would eat wid us children. Dey had +dishes though to eat out of. After dinner we would run and play Peep +Squirrel. I think dey call it hide-and-seek now. + +My mother was a regular field hand till Miss Sarah decided to take her +into town to take care of her children. Dey all called her Frank +instead of Frances. I used to get to go to town to visit my mother and +we'd have glorious times I tell you. + +We'd go out and gather hickory nuts, hazel nuts, pig nuts, and +walnuts. We'd all set around de fire and eat nuts and tell ghost tales +ever' night. Master Wash raised lots of apples too, and we had all +that we wanted of dem to eat. + +I saw lots of Yankee soldiers. Sherman and Grant's armies marched by +our house and camped at DeCatur, Ala. It took dem three days to pass. +We wasn't afraid of dem. + +In the second year of de war some Yankee soldiers come through and +gathered up all de slaves and took us to Athens, Ala., and put us on a +Government farm. We stayed dere till de end of de War. My father died +jest before dey took us away. + +My mother and us children were on de farm together and dey treated us +all mighty good. We had plenty of good food and clothes. + +Master Wash came to see us while we was on de Government farm. He was +left in a bad shape and we was all sorry for him. A lot of his hands +went back to him after de Surrender but we never did. Mother married +another man named Goodloe and we all went to Arkansas, near Little +Rock. Dis was his former home. I was about nineteen or twenty years +old at this time. + +I never sent to school. My wife taught me how to read de Bible but I +never learned to write. I have good eyesight. I guess dat is cause I +never put dem out reading and going to moving picture shows. + +When any of my family was sick I always sent for de doctor. We had a +few of our own home remedies dat we used also. We boiled poke root and +bathed in it for a cure for rheumatism. + +A tea made from May apples was used for a physic. + + + + +Oklahoma Writers' Project +Ex-Slaves + +ANNIE YOUNG +Age 86 +Oklahoma City, Okla. + + +I was born in 1851, makes me 86 years old. I was born in Middle +Tennessee, Summers County. My mother was put on a block and sold from +me when I was a child. I don't remember my father real good. Sister +Martha, Sister Sallie, nor Sister Jane wasn't sold. But my brother +John was. My mother's name is Rachel Donnahue. We lived in a log hut. +The white folks lived in a frame white building sitting in a big grove +yard. Old master owned a big farm. + +We ate molasses, bread and butter and milk in wooden bowls and +crumbled our bread up in it. Old master had big smokehouses of meat. +Dey ate chickens, possums and coons, and my old auntie would barbecue +rabbits for de white folks. We ate ash cakes too. + +I washed dishes, swept de yard, and kept de yard clean wid weed brush +brooms. I never earned no money. All de slaves had gardens, and +chickens too. My auntie, dey let her have chickens of her own and she +raised chickens, and had a chicken house and garden down in de woods. + +I remember in time of de War dey'd send me down in de woods to pick up +chips and git wood. All de men had gone to de army. One morning and +t'was cold dey sent me down in de woods and my hands got frostbitten. +All de skin come off and dey had to tie my hands up in roasted +turnips. Sallie she had gloves, and didn't get frostbitten. After my +old master died, Master Donnahue was his name, his old son-in-law come +to take over de plantation. He was mean, but my sister whipped him. + +We had no nigger driver or overseer. We raised wheat, corn and +vegetables, not much cotton, jest enough to spun de clothes out of. + +At night when we'd go to our cabins we'd pick cotton from de seeds to +make our clothes. Boys and girls alike wore dem long shirts slit up de +side nearly to your necks. They'd have cornshuckings sometimes all +night long. You see I didn't have no mother, no father, nobody to lead +me, teach me or tell me, and so jest lived with anybody was good +enough to let me stay and done what they did. They'd have log +rollings, with all de whiskey dey could drink. + +I remember going to church, de Methodist Church dey call it. We used +to sing dis song and I sho did like it too: + + "I went down in de valley to pray, + Studying dat good old way." + +I been a Christian long before most of dese young niggers was born. My +other favorites are: + + "Must Jesus bear This Cross Alone." + +and + + "The Consecrated Cross I'll Bear 'til + Death Shall Set Me Free, + Yea, There's a Crown for Everyone, + And There's a Crown for Me." + +Yes Lawd, there sho is. + +One day a nigger killed one of his master's shoats and he catch him +and when he'd ask him, "What's that you got there?" The nigger said, +"a possum." De master said, "Let me see." He looked and seen it was a +shoat. De nigger said, "Master it may be a shoat now, but it sho was a +possum while ago when I put 'im in dis sack." + +Dey didn't whip our folks much, but one day I saw a overseer on +another place. He staked a man down with two forked sticks 'cross his +wrist nailed in de ground and beat him half to death with a hand saw +'til it drawed blisters. Den he mopped his back wid vinegar, salt and +pepper. Sometimes dey'd drop dat hot rosin from pine knots on dose +blisters. + +When de Yanks come, business took place. I remember white folks was +running and hiding, gitting everything dey could from de Yanks. Dey +hid dey jewelry and fine dishes and such. Dose Yanks had on big boots. +Dey'd drive up, feed dey hosses from old Master's corn, catch dey +chickens, and tell old Master's cook to cook 'em, and they'd shoot +down old Master's hogs and skin 'em. + +De Yanks used to make my nephew drunk, and have him sing (dis is kind +of bad): + + "I'll be God O'Mighty + God Dammed if I don't + Kill a nigger, + Oh Whooey boys! Oh Whooey! + Oh Whooey boys! Oh Whooey!" + +I don't remember never seeing no funerals. Jest took 'em off and +buried 'em. I remember dat old Master's son-in-law dat my sister +whipped, he called hisself a doctor and he killed Aunt Clo. Give her +some medicine but he didn't know what he was doing and killed her. + +I married William Young and we had a pretty good wedding. Married in +Crittington County Arkansas. When I left Tennessee and went to +Arkansas I followed some hands. You know after de War dey immigrated +niggers from one place to another. I owned a good farm in Arkansas. I +came out here some 42 years ago. + +I have three daughters. Mattie Brockins runs a rooming house in Kansas +City. Jessie Cotton, lives right up de street here. Osie Olla Anderson +is working out in North town. + +Well I think Abraham Lincoln is more than a type a man than Moses. I +believe he is a square man, believe in union that every man has a +right to be a free man regardless to color. He was a republican man. +Don't know much 'bout Jeff Davis but I think Booker T. Washington was +a pretty good man. He's a right good man I guess, but he is dead ain't +he? + +I can remember once my auntie's old Master tried to have her and she +run off out in de woods, and when he put those blood hounds or nigger +hounds on her trail he catched her and hit her in de head wid +something like de stick de police carry, and he knocked a hole in her +head and she bled like a hog, and he made her have him. She told her +mistress, and mistress told her to go ahead and be wid him 'cause he's +gonna kill you. And he had dem two women and she had some chillun +nearly white, and master and dey all worked in de fields side by side. + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Slave Narratives, Oklahoma, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SLAVE NARRATIVES, OKLAHOMA *** + +***** This file should be named 20785.txt or 20785.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/0/7/8/20785/ + +Produced by Diane Monico and The Project Gutenberg Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net. (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by the Library of Congress, Manuscript Division.) This +file is gratefully uploaded to the PG collection in honor +of Distributed Proofreaders having posted over 10,000 +ebooks. + + +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. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +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 + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/20785.zip b/20785.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..282c0d5 --- /dev/null +++ b/20785.zip 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..4c6f682 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #20785 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/20785) |
