"It used to scare me. The folks would go off to a party or a show and leave me alone with the baby. No, Miss Mary, I wasn't scared for myself. I thought somebody might come in and kidnap that baby. No matter how late they was I'd sit on the top step of the stairs leading upstairs—just outside the door where Lansing was asleep. No matter what time they come home they'd find me there. 'Why don't you go on in your bedroom and lie down?' they'd ask me. 'No,' I'd tell 'em, 'somebody might come in, and they would have to get that baby over my dead body.'

"Jonnie, that's my daughter" (Mrs. D.G. Murphy, 338 Walnut Street, a large stucco house with well cared for lawn) "she wants me to quit work. I told her, 'You put that over on Mrs. Murphy—you made her quit work and took care of her. What happened to her? She died! You're not going to make me old.'

"Twice she's got me to quit work. Once, she told me it was against the law. Told me there was a law old folks couldn't work. I believed her and I quit. Then I come on down and I asked Mr. Eisele" (an important business executive and prominent in civic affairs, [HW: aged 83]) "He rared back and he said, 'I'd like to see anybody stop me from working.' So I come on back.

"Another time, it was when the old age pensions come in. They tried to stop me again. Told me I had to take it. I asked Mr. Eisele if I could work just the same. 'No,' he says 'if you take it, you'll have to quit work.' So I stamped my foot and I says, 'I won't take nobody's pension.'

"The other day Jonnie called up here and she started to crying. Lots of folks write her notes and say she's bad to let me work. Somebody told her that they had seen me going by to work at 4 o'clock in the morning. It wasn't no such. I asked a man when I was on the way and it was 25 minutes until 5. Besides, my clock had stopped and I couldn't tell what time it was. Yes, Miss Mary, I does get here sort of early, but then I like it. I just sit in the kitchen until the folks get up.

"You see that picture over there, it's Mr. Eisele when he was 17. I'd know that smiling face anywhere. He's always good to me. When they go away to Florida I can go to the store and get money whenever I need it. But it's always good to see them come back. Miss Maud says I'm sure to go to Heaven, I'm such a good worker. No, Miss Mary, I'm not going to quit work. Not until I get old."



Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor Person interviewed: Evelina Morgan 1317 W. Sixteenth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas Age: App. 81 [TR: Original first page moved to follow second page per HW: Insert this page before Par. 1, P. 3]

"I was born in Wedgeboro, North Carolina, on the plantation of—let me see what that man's name was. He was an old lawyer. I done forgot that old white man's name. Old Tom Ash! Senator Ash—that's his name. He was good to his slaves. He had so many niggers he didn't know them all.

"My father's name was Alphonso Dorgens and my mother's name was Lizzie Dorgens. Both of them dead. I don't know what her name was before she married. My pa belonged to the Dorgens' and he married my ma. That is how she come to be a Dorgen. Old Man Ash never did buy him. He just visited my mother. They all was in the same neighborhood. Big plantations. Both of them had masters that owned lots of land. I don't know how often he visited my mother after he married her. He was over there all the time. They were right adjoining plantations.

"I was born in a frame house. I don't know nothin' about it no more than that. It was j'ined to the kitchen. My mother had two rooms j'ined to the kitchen. She was the old mistress' cook. She could come right out of the kitchen and go on in her room.

"My father worked on the farm. They fed the slaves meat and bread. That is all I remember—meat and bread and potatoes. They made lots of potatoes. They gave 'em what they raised. You could raise stuff for yourself if you wanted to.

"My mother took care of her children. We children was on the place there with her. She didn't have nobody's children to take care of but us.

"I was six years old during of the War. My ma told me my age, but I forgot it; I never did have it put down. The only way I gits a pension, I just tells 'em I was six years old during of the War, and they figures out the age. Sorta like that. But I know I was six years old when the Rebels and the Yankees was fighting.

"I seed the Yankees come through. I seed that. They come in the time old master was gone. He run off—he run away. He didn't let 'em git him. I was a little child. They stayed there all day breaking into things—breaking into the molasses and all like that. Old mistress stayed upstairs hiding. The soldiers went down in the basement and throwed things around. Old master was a senator; they wanted to git him. They sure did cuss him: 'The ——, ——, ——, old senator,' they would say. He took his finest horses and all the gold and silver with him somewheres. They couldn't git 'im. They was after senators and high-ups like that.

"The soldiers tickled me. They sung. The white people's yard was jus' full of them playing 'Yankee Doodle' and 'Hang Jeff Davis on a Sour Apple Tree.'

"All the white people gone! Funny how they run away like that. They had to save their selves. I 'member they took one old boss man and hung him up in a tree across a drain of water, jus' let his foot touch—and somebody cut him down after 'while. Those white folks had to run away.

Patrollers

"I used to hear them all talk about the patrollers. I used to hear my mother talking about them. My ma said my master wouldn't let the patrollers come on his place. They could go on anybody else's place but he never did let them come on his place. Some of the slaves were treated very bad. But my ma said he didn't allow a patroller on the place and he didn't allow no other white man to touch his niggers. He was a big white man—a senator. He didn't know all his Negroes but he didn't allow nobody to impose on them. He didn't let no patroller and nobody else beat up his niggers.

How Freedom Came

"I don't know how freedom came. I know the Yankees came through and they'd pat we little niggers on the head and say, 'Nigger, you are just as free as I am.' And I would say, 'Yes'm.'

Right After Freedom

"Right after the War my mother and father moved off the place and went on another plantation somewheres—I don't know where. They share cropped. I don't know how long. Old mistress didn't want them to move at all. I never will forget that.

Present Occupation and Opinions

"I used to cook out all the time when I got grown. I couldn't tell you when I married. You got enough junk down there now. So I ain't giving you no more. My husband's been dead about seven years. I goes to the Methodist church on Ninth and Broadway. I ain't able to do no work now. I gets a little pension, and the Lord takes care of me. I have a hard time sometime.

"I ain't bothered about these young folks. They is somethin' awful. It would be wonderful to write a book from that. They ought to git a history of these young people. You could git a wonderful book out of that.

"The colored folks have come a long way since freedom. And if the white folks didn't pin 'em down they'd go further. Old Jeff Davis said when the niggers was turned loose, 'Dive up your knives and forks with them.' But they didn't do it.

"Some niggers was sharp and got something. And they lost it just like they got it. Look at Bush. I know two or three big niggers got a lot and ain't got nothin' left now. Well, I ain't got no time for no more junk. You got enough down there. You take that and go on."

Interviewer's Comment

During the interview, a little "pickaninny" came in with his mother. His grandmother and a forlorn little dog were also along. "Tell grandma what you want," his mother prompted. "Is that your grandson?" I interrupted. "No," she said, "He ain't no kin to me, but he calls me 'ma' and acts as if I was his grandma." The little fellow hung back. He was just about twenty-two months old, but large and mature for that age.

"Tell 'ma' what you want," his grandmother put in. Finally, he made up his mind and stood in front of her and said, "Buh—er." His mother explained, "I've done made him some corn bread, but he ain't got no butter to put on it and he wants you to give him some."

Sister Morgan sat silent awhile. Then she rose deliberately and went slowly to the ancient ice-box, opened it and took out a tin of butter which she had evidently churned herself in some manner and carefully cut out a small piece and wrapped it neatly and handed it to the little one. After a few amenities, they passed out.

Even with her pitiful and meagre lot, the old lady evidently means to share her bare necessities with others.

The manner of her calculation of her age is interesting. She was six years old when the War was going on. She definitely remembers seeing Sherman's army and Wheeler's cavalry after she was six. Since they were in her neighborhood in 1864, she is undoubtedly more than eighty. Eighty-one is a fair estimate.



Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor Person interviewed: James Morgan 819 Rice Street, Little Rock, Arkansas Age: 65

"During the slave time, the pateroles used to go from one plantation to the other hunting Negroes. They would catch them at the door and throw hot ashes in their faces. You could go to another plantation and steal or do anything you wanted if you could manage to get back to your old master's place. But if you got caught away from your plantation, they would get you. Sometimes a nigger didn't want to get caught and beat, so he would throw a shovel of hot ashes in the pateroles' faces and beat it away.

"My daddy used to tell lots of stories about slavery times. He's been dead forty-three years and my mother has been dead forty-one years—forty-one years this May. I was quite young and lots of the things they told me, I remember, and some of them, I don't.

"I was born in 1873. That was eight years after the War ended. My father's name was Aaron and my mother's name was Rosa. Both of them was in slavery.[TR: sentence lined out.] I got a brother that was a baby in her lap when the Yankee soldiers got after a chicken. The chicken flew up in her lap and they never got that one. The white folks lost it, but the Yankees didn't get it. I have heard my mother tell all sorts of things. But they just come to me at times. The soldiers would take chickens or anything they could get their hands on—those soldiers would.

"My mother married the first time in slavery. Her first husband was sold in slavery. That is the onliest brother I'm got living now out of ten—that one that was settin' in her lap when the soldiers come through. He's in Boydell, Arkansas now. It used to be called Morrell. It is about one hundred twenty-one miles from here, because Dermott is one hundred nine and Boydell is about twelve miles further on. It's in Nashville[HW:?] County. My brother was a great big old baby in slavery times. He was my mother's child by her first husband. All the rest of them is dead and he is the onliest one that is living.

"I was a section foreman for the Missouri Pacific for twenty-two years. I worked there altogether for thirty-five years, but I was section foreman for twenty-two years. There's my card. Lots of men stayed on the job till it wore them out. Lewis Holmes did that. It would take him two hours to walk from here to his home—if he ever managed it at all.

"It's warm today and it will bring a lot of flies. Flies don't die in the winter. Lots of folks think they do. They go up in cracks and little places like that under the weatherboard there—any place where it is warm—and there they huddle up and stay till it gets warm. Then they come out and get something to eat and go back again when it cools off. They live right on through the winter in their hiding places.

"Both of my parents said they always did their work whatever the task might be. And my daddy said he never got no whipping at all. You know they would put a task on you and if you didn't do it, you would get a whipping. My daddy wouldn't stand to be whipped by a paterole, and he didn't have to be whipped by nobody else, because he always did his work.

"He was one of the ones that the pateroles couldn't catch. When the pateroles would be trying to break in some place where he was, and the other niggers would be standing 'round frightened to death and wonderin' what to do, he would be gettin' up a shovelful of ashes. When the door would be opened and they would be rushin' in, he would scatter the ashes in their faces and rush out. If he couldn't find no ashes, he would always have a handful of pepper with him, and he would throw that in their faces and beat it.

"He would fool dogs that my too. My daddy never did run away. He said he didn't have no need to run away. They treated him all right. He did his work. He would get through with everything and sometimes he would be home before six o'clock. My mother said that lots of times she would pick cotton and give it to the others that couldn't keep up so that they wouldn't be punished. She had a brother they used to whip all the time because he didn't keep up.

"My father told me that his old master told him he was free. He stayed with his master till he retired and sold the place. He worked on shares with him. His old master sold the place and went to Monticello and died. He stayed with him about fifteen or sixteen years after he was freed, stayed on that place till the Government donated him one hundred sixty acres and charged him only a dollar and sixty cents for it. He built a house on it and cleared it up. That's what my daddy did. Some folks don't believe me when I tell 'em the Government gave him a hundred and sixty acres of land and charged him only a dollar and sixty cents for it—a penny a acre.

"I am retired now. Been retired since 1938. The Government took over the railroad pension and it pays me now. That is under the Security Act. Each and every man on the railroad pays in to the Government.

"I have been married right around thirty-nine years.

"I was born in Chicot County, Arkansas.[TR: sentence lined out.] My father was born in Georgia and brought here by his master. He come here in a old covered ox wagon. I don't know how they happened to decide to come here. My mother was born in South Carolina. She met my father here in Arkansas. They sold her husband and she was brought here. After peace was declared she met my daddy. Her first husband was sold in South Carolina and she never did know that became of him. They put him up on the block and sold him and she never did know which way he went. He left her with two boys right then. She had a sister that stayed in South Carolina. Somebody bought her there and kept her and somebody bought my mother and brought her here. My father's master was named McDermott. My mother's last master was named Belcher or something like that.

"I don't belong to any church. I have always lived decent and kept out of trouble."

Interviewer's Comment

When Morgan said "there is my record", he showed me a pass for the year 1938-39 for himself and his wife between all stations on the Missouri Pacific lines signed by L.W. Baldwin, Chief Executive Officer.

He is a good man even if he is not a Christian as to church membership.



Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson Person Interviewed: Olivia Morgan Hazen, Ark. Age: 62

"I am 62 years old. I was born in Lafayette County close to New Lewisville. I heard mama say many a time she was named after her state—North Carolina. Her name was Carolina Alexandria. They brought her a slave girl to this new country. She and papa must of met up toreckly after freedom. She had some children and I'm one of my papa's oldest children.

"Papa come here long fore the war started. The old master in Atlanta, Georgia—Abe Smith—give his son three boys and one girl. He emigrated to Arkansas.

"Mama said her first husband and the young master went off and he never come back as she knowed of. Young master played with mama's second girl a whole heap. One day they was playing hiding round. Just as she come running to the base from round the house, young master hit her on the forehead with a rock. It killed her. Old master tried to school him but he worried so they sent him off—thought it would do his health good to travel. I don't think they ever come back.

"After freedom mama married and went over to papa's master's. Papa stayed round there a long time. They got news some way they was to get forty acres land and a mule to start out with but they said they never got nothing.

"My papa said he knowed it to be a fact, the Ku Klux cut a colored woman's breast off. I don't recollect why he said they got after her. The Jayhawkers was bad too. They all went wild; some of em left men hanging up in trees. They needed a good master to protect em worse after the war than they needed em before. They said they had a Yankee government then was reason of the Ku Klux. They run the Jayhawkers out and made the Yankees go on home. Everybody had a hard time. Bread was mighty scarce when I was a child. Times was hard. Men that had land had to let it lay out. They had nothin' to feed the hands on, no money to pay, no seed, no stock to work. The fences all went to rack and all the houses nearly down. When I was a child they was havin' hard times.

"I'm a country woman. I farmed all my life. I been married two times; I married Holmes, then Morgan. They dead. I washed, ironed, cooked, all at Mr. Jim Buchannan's sawmill close to Lewisville two years and eight months; then I went back to farmin' up at Pine Bluff. My oldest sister washed and ironed for Mrs. Buchannan till she moved from the sawmill to Texarkana. He lived right at the sawmill ground.

"My papa voted a Republican ticket. I don't vote. My husbands have voted along. If the women would let the men have the business I think times would be better. I don't believe in women voting. The men ought to make the livings for the families, but the women doing too much. They crowding the men out of work.

"Some folks is sorry in all colors. Seems like the young folks ain't got no use for quiet country life. They buying too much. They say they have to buy everything. I ain't had no depression yet. I been at work and we had crop failures but I made it through. Some folks good and some ain't. Times is bout to run away with some of the folks. They all say times is better than they been since 1928. I hope times is on the mend."



Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson Person interviewed: Tom Morgan, Madison, Arkansas Age: 71

"My mother was the mother of fourteen of us children. Their names was Sarah and Richard Morgan.

"My great-grandfather b'long to Bill Woods. They had b'long to the Morgans and when freedom come they changed their names back. Some of them still owned by Morgans.

"Mother's owners was Auris and Lucella Harris. They had a boy named Harley Harris and a girl. He had a small farm.

"Mother said her master wasn't bad, but my father said his owner was tough on him—tough on all of them. They was all field hands. They had to git up and be doing. He said they fed by torch morning and night and rested in the heat of the day two or three hours. Feed the oxen and mules. In them days stock and folks all et three times a day. I does real well now to get two meals a day, sometimes but one. They done some kind of work all the year 'round. He said they had tasks. They better git the task done or they would get a beating.

"I haven't voted in so long a time. I voted Republican. I thought I did.

"I worked at the railroad till they put me off. They put me off on disability. Trying to git my papers fixed up to work or get something one. Back on the railroad job. I farmed when I was young."



El Dorado District FOLKLORE SUBJECTS Name of Interviewer: Pernella Anderson Subject: Slavery Days—Cruel Master Murdered by Slaves Story:—Information

This Information given by: Charity Morris Place of Residence: Camden, Arkansas Age: 90 [TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]

Ah wuz born in Carolina uh slave an ah was de eldest daughtuh of Christiana Webb whose owner wuz Master Louis Amos. Mah mammy had lots uv chillun an she also mammied de white chillun, whut wuz lef' mammyless. When ah wuz very small dey rented me out tuh some very po' white fokes. Dey wuzn use tuh slaves so mah marster made him promise [HW: not] tuh beat me or knock me bout. Dey promise dey wouldn. Dey cahried me home an ah clare dey wuz so mean tuh me till ah run off an tried tuh fin' de way back tuh mah marster. Night caught me in de woods. Ah sho' wuz skeered. Ah wuz skeered uv bears an panthers so ah crawled up in a ole bandoned crib an crouched down gainst de loft. Ah went off tuh sleep but wuz woke by somethin scratchin on de wall below. Ah stayed close as ah could tuh de wall an 'gin er prayin. Dat things scratched all night an ah prayed all night. De nex' mawnin dese white fokes sent word tuh Marster dat ah had lef' so Marster foun' me an took me home and let me stay dar too. Ah didn' work in de fiel' ah worked in de house. We lived in uh log cabin. Evah Sunda mawnin Marster Louis would have all us slaves tuh de house while he would sing an pray an read de Bible tuh us all.

De people dat owned de plantation near us had lots of slaves. Dey owned lots uv mah kin fokes. Dey marster would beat dem at night when dey come fum de fiel' an lock em up. He'd whoop um an sen' um tuh de fiel'. Dey couldn' visit no slaves an no slaves was 'lowed tuh visit em. So mah cousin Sallie watched him hide de key so she moved dem a li'l further back so dat he had tuh lean ovah tuh reach dem. Dat mawnin soon when he come tuh let em out she cracked him in de haid wid de poker an made little Joe help put his haid in de fiuh place. Dat day in de fiel' Little Joe made er song; "If yo don' bleave Aunt Sallie kilt Marse Jim de blood is on huh under dress". He jes hollered hit. "Aunt Sallie kilt Marse Jim." Dey zamined Aunt Sallie's under dress so dey put huh in jail till de baby come den dey tried huh an sentenced huh tuh be hung an she wuz.

Our Marster use tuh tell us if we left de house de patarollers would catch us. One night de patarollers run mah two brothers home, Joe an Henry.

When de ole haid died out dey chillun got de property. Yo see we slaves wuz de property. Den we got separated. Some sent one way an some nother. Hit jes happent dat Marse Jim drawed me.

When de Wah broke out we could heah li'l things bein said. We couldn' make out. So we begin tuh move erbout. Later we learnt we wuz runnin fum de wah. In runnin we run intuh a bunch uv soldiers dat had got kilt. Oh dat wuz terrible. Aftuh mah brudders foun out dat dey wuz fightin tuh free us dey stole hosses an run erway tuh keep fum bein set free. Aftuh we got tuh Morris Creek hit wuz bloody an dar wuz one uv de hosses turnin roun an roun in de watuh wid his eyes shot out. We nevah saw nuthin else uv Joe nor Henry nor de othuh horse from dat day tuh dis one. But we went on an on till we come tuh a red house and dat red house represented free. De white fokes wouldn go dat way cause dey hated tuh give us up. Dey turnt an went de othuh way but hit wuz too late. De news come dat Mr. Lincoln had signed de papuhs dat made us all free an dere wuz some 'joicing ah tells yo. Ah wuz a grown woman at dat time. Ole Moster Amos brought us on as fur as Fo'dyce an turnt us a loose. Dat's wha' dey settled. Some uv de slaves stayed wid em an some went tuh othuh places. Me an mah sistuh come tuh Camden an settled. Ah mahried George Morris. We havn' seen our pa an ma since we wuz 'vided and since we wuz chillun. When we got tuh Camden and settled down we went tuh work an sont back tuh de ole country aftuh ma an pa. Enroute tuh dis country we come through Tennessee an ah membuh comin through Memphis an Pine Bluff to Fordyce.

As we wuz comin we stopped at de Mississippi Rivuh. Ah wuz standin on de bank lookin at de great roll uv watuh high in de air. Somebody snatched me back and de watuh took in de bank wha ah wuz standin. Yo cound'n stand too close tuh de rivuh 'count uv de waves.

Der wuz a col' wintuh and at night we would gather roun a large camp fire an play sich games as "Jack-in-de-bush cut him down" an "Ole gray mule-out ride him." Yaul know dem games ah know. An in de summer times at night we played Julands. On our way tuh Arkansas we drove ox-teams, jinnie teams, donkey teams, mule teams an horse teams. We sho had a good time.



Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson Person interviewed: Emma Morris, Forrest City, Arkansas Age: 71

"My parents was Jane and Sam McCaslin. They come from close to Atlanta, Georgia to Hernando, Mississippi after slavery. Ma was heired and they bought pa before they left North Carolina. They bought pa out of a nigger drove after he was grown. He raised tobacco and corn. Pa helped farm and they raised hogs. He drove hogs to sell. He didn't say where they took the hogs, only they would have to stay up all night driving the hogs, and they rode horses and walked too and had shepherd dogs to keep them in a drove.

"Pa was a Bwick (B(our)ick) but I never heard him say nothing bout Master Bowick, so I don't know his other name. He said they got in a tight [TR: missing word?] and had to sell some of the slaves and he being young would bring more than one of the older men. He was real black. Ma was lighter but not very light.

"McCaslin was a low heavy set man and he rented out hacks and horses in Atlanta and pa drove, greased the harness and curried and sheared the horses. Master McCaslin brought them in town and rented them out. He didn't have a livery stable. He just furnished conveyances. I heard him tell about a good hitching post where he could more than apt rent out his rig and how he always stopped and fed the horses when eating time come. He took a feed box all the time. Master McCaslin would tell him to not drive too hard when he had to make long drives. He never would let him take a whoop.

"He had some girls I heard him say. May and Alice was their names. He didn't say much about the family. He took a basket of provision with him to eat Miss May and Miss Alice fixed up. The basket was close wove and had a lid. The old man farmed. He drove too. He drove a hack. Ma worked in the field. I heard her tell about the cockleburs. Well, she said they would stick on your dress and stick your legs and you would have to pick them off and sometimes the beggar's-lice would be thick on their clothes and they would pick them off.

"When they would clean out the fence corners (rail fence) they would leave every little wild plum tree and leave a whole lot of briers so they would have wild plums and berries. They raised cotton. Sometime during the War old Master McCaslin took all his slaves and stock way back in the bottoms. The cane was big as ma's wrist she said. They put up some cabins to live in and shelter the stock. Pa said some of em went in the army. He didn't want to go. They worked a corn crop over in there.

"They left soon as they was freed. I don't know how they found it out. They walked to way over in Alabama and pa made terms with a man, to come to Mississippi. Then they come in a wagon and walked too. She had three little children. I was [HW: born] close to Montgomery, Alabama in September but I don't know how long it was after the War. I was the first girl. There was two more boys and three more girls after me. Ma had children born in three states.

"Ma died with the typhoid fever. Then two sisters and a brother died. Pa had it all summer and he got well. Miss (Mrs.) Betty Chamlin took us children to a house and fed us away from ma and the sick girls and boy. We was on her place. She had two families then. We got water from a spring. It was a pretty spring under a big hill. We would wade where the spring run off. She moved us out of that house.

"Miss Betty was a widow. She had several boys. They worked in the field all the time. We stayed till the boys left and she sold her place. She went back to her folks. I never did see her no more. We scattered out. Pa lived about wid us till he died. I got three girls living. I got five children dead. I got one girl out here from town and one girl at Meridian and my oldest girl in Memphis. I takes it time around wid em.

"I seen the Ku Klux but they never bothered us. I seen them in Alabama, I recken it was. I was so small I jes' do remember seeing them. I was the onliest child born in Alabama. Pa made one crop. I don't know how they got along the rest of the time there. We started share cropping in Mississippi. Pa was always a good hand with stock. If they got sick they sent for him to tell them what to do. He never owned no land, no home neither.

"I farmed all my life. I used to make a little money along during the year washing and ironing. I don't get no help. I live with the girls. My girl in Memphis sends me a little change to buy my snuff and little things I have to have. She cooks for a lawyer now. She did take care of an lady. She died since I been here and she moved. I rather work in the field than do what she done when that old lady lived. She was like a baby to tend to. She had to stay in that house all the time.

"The young folks don't learn manners now like they used to. Times is better than I ever seen em. Poor folks have a hard time any time. Some folks got a lot and some ain't got nothing everywhere."



Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor Person interviewed: Claiborne Moss 1812 Marshall Street, Little Rock, Arkansas Age: 81

"I was born in Washington County, Georgia, on Archie Duggins' plantation, fifteen miles from Sandersville, the county-seat, June 18, 1857.

"My mother's name was Ellen Moss. She was born in Georgia too, in Hancock County, near Sparta, the county-seat. My father was Fluellen Moss. He, too, was born in Hancock County. Bill Moss was his owner. Jesse Battle was my mother's owner before she married. My mother and father had ten children, none of them living now but me, so far as I know. I was the fifth in line. There were four older than I. The oldest was ten years older than I.

"Bill Moss' and Jesse Battle's plantations ware not far apart. I never heard my father say how he first met my mother. I was only eight years old when he died. They were all right there in the same neighborhood, and they would go visiting. Battle and Moss and Evans all had plantations in the same neighborhood and they would go from one place to the other.

"When Bill Moss went to Texas, he gave my mother and father to Mrs. Beck. Mrs. Beck was Battle's daughter and Mrs. Beck bought my father from Moss and that kept them together. He was that good. Moss sold out and went to Texas and all his slaves went walking while he went on the train. He had about a hundred of them. When he got there, he couldn't hear from them. He didn't know where they was—they was walking and he had got on the train—so he killed hisself. When they got there, just walking along, they found him dead.

"Moss' nephew, Whaley, got two parts of all he had. Another fellow—I can't call his name—got one part. His sister, they sent her back five—three of my uncles and two of my aunties.

"Where I was raised, Duggins wasn't a mean man. His slaves didn't get out to work till after sunup. His brother, who lived three miles out from us, made his folks get up before sunup. But Duggins didn't do that. He seemed to think something of his folks. Every Saturday, he'd give lard, flour, hog meat, syrup. That was all he had to give. That was extra. War was going on and he couldn't get nothing else. On Wednesday night he'd give it to them again. Of course, they would get corn-meal and other things from the kitchen. They didn't eat in the kitchen or any place together. Everybody got what there was on the place and cooked it in his cabin.

"Before I was born, Beck sold my mother and father to Duggins. I don't know why he sold them. They had an auction block in the town, but out in the country they didn't have no block. If I had seen a nigger and wanted to buy him, I would just go up to the owner and do business with him. That was the way it was with Beck and Duggins. Selling my mother and father was just a private transaction between them.

Rations

"Twice a week, flour, syrup, meat, and lard were given to the slaves. you got other food from the kitchen. Meat, vegetables, milk,—all the milk you wanted—bread.

A Mean Owner

"Beck, Moss, Battle, and Duggins, they was all good people. But Kenyon Morps, now talk about a mean man, there was one. He lived on a hill a little off from the Duggins plantation. His women never give birth to children in the house. He'd never let 'em quit work before the time. He wanted them to work—work right up to the last minute. Children were all born in the field and in fence corners. Then he had to let 'em stay in about a week. Last I seen him, he didn't have nothin', and was ragged as a jay bird.

Houses

"Our house was a log house. It had a large room, and then it had another room as large as that one or larger built on to it. Both of these rooms were for our use. My mother and father slept in the log cabin and the kids slept back in the other room. My sister stayed with Joe Duggins. Her missis was a school-teacher, and she loved sister. My master gave my sister to Joe Duggins. Mrs. Duggins taught my sister, Fannie, to read and spell but not to write. If there was a slave man that knowed how to write, they used to cut off his thumb so that he couldn't write.

"There was some white people wouldn't have the darkies eating butter; our white people let us have butter, biscuits, and ham every day. They would put it up for me.

"I had more sense than any kid on the plantation. I would do anything they wanted done no matter how hard it was. I walked five miles through the woods once on an errand. The old lady who I went to said:

"'You walk way down here by yourself?'

"I told her, 'yes'.

"She said, 'Well, you ain't going back by yo'self because you're too little,' and she sent her oldest son back with me. He was white.

"My boss was sick once, and he wanted to get his mail. The post office was five miles away. He said to me:

"'Can't you get my mail if I let you ride on my horse?'

"I said, 'Yes sir.' I rode up to the platform on the horse. They run out and took me off the horse and filled up the saddle bags. Then they put me back on and told me not to get off until I reached my master. When I got back, everybody was standing out watching for me. When my boss heard me coming, he jumped out the bed and ran out and took me off the horse and carried me and the sacks and all back into the house.

Soldiers

"I saw all of Wheeler's cavalry. Sherman come through first. He came and stayed all night. Thousands and thousands of soldiers passed through during the night. Cooper Cuck was with them. He was a fellow that used to peddle around in all that country before the War. He went all through the South and learned everything. Then he joined up with the Yankees. He come there. Nobody seen him that night. He knowed everybody knowed him. He went and hid under something somewhere. He was under the hill at daybreak, but nobody seen him. When the last of the soldiers was going out in the morning, one fellow lagged behind and rounded a corner. Then he galloped a little ways and motioned with his arms. Cooper Cuck come out from under the hill, and he and Cooper Cuck both came back and stole everything that they could lay their hands on—all the gold and silver that was in the house, and everything they could carry.

"Wheeler's cavalry was about three days behind Sherman. They caught up with Sherman, but it would have been better if they hadn't, 'cause he whipped 'em and drove 'em back and went right on. They didn't have much fighting in my country. They had a little scrimmage once—thirty-six men was all they was in it. One of the Yankees got lost from his company. He come back and inquired the way to Louisville. The old boss pointed the way with his left hand and while the fellow was looking that way, he drug him off his horse and cut his throat and took his gun off'n him and killed him.

"Sherman's men stayed one night and left. I mean, his officers stayed. We had to feed them. They didn't pay nothing for what they was fed. The other men cooked and ate their own grub. They took every horse and mule we had. I was sitting beside my old missis. She said:

"'Please don't let 'em take all our horses.'

"The fellows she was talking to never looked around. He just said: 'Every damn horse goes.'

"The Yankees took my Uncle Ben with them when they left. He didn't stay but a couple of days. They got in a fight. They give Uncle Ben five horses, five sacks of silverware, and five saddles. The goods was taken in the fight. Uncle Ben brought it back with him. The boss took all that silver away from him. Uncle Ben didn't know what to do with it. The Yankees had taken all my master's and he took Ben's. Ben give it to him. He come back 'cause he wanted to.

"When Wheeler's cavalry came through they didn't take nothing—nothing but what they et. I heard a fellow say, 'Have you got anything to eat?'

"My mother said, 'I ain't got nothin' but some chitlins.'

"He said, 'Gimme some of those; I love chitlins.' "Mother gave 'em to me to carry to him. I didn't get half way to him before the rest of the men grabbed me and took 'em away from me and et 'em up. The man that asked for them didn't get a one.

Slave Money

"The slaves would sometimes have five or six dollars. Mostly, they would make charcoal and sell it to get money.

Patrollers

"I seen patrollers. They come to our house. They didn't whip nobody. Our folks didn't care nothin' about 'em. They come looking for keys and whiskey. They couldn't whip nobody on my master's plantation. When they would come there, he would be sitting up with 'em. He would sit there in his back door and look at 'em. Wouldn't let 'em hit nobody.

"Them colored women had more fun that enough—laughing at them patrollers. Fool 'em and then laugh at 'em. Make out like they was trying to hide something and the patrollers would come running up, grab 'em and try to see what it was. And the women would laugh and show they had nothing. Couldn't do nothin' about it. Never whipped anybody 'round there. Couldn't whip nobody on our place; couldn't whip nobody on Jessie Mills' place; couldn't whip nobody on Stephen Mills' place; couldn't whip nobody on Betsy Geesley's place; couldn't whip nobody on Nancy Mills' place; couldn't whip nobody on Potter Duggins' place. Potter Duggins was a cousin to my master. Nobody run them peoples' plantations but theirselves.

Social Life

"When slaves wanted to, they would have dances. They would have dances from one plantation to the other. The master didn't object. They had fiddles, banjo and quills. They made the quills and blowed 'em to beat the band. Good music. They would make the quills out of reeds. Those reeds would sound just like a piano. They didn't have no piano. They didn't serve nothing. Nothing to eat and nothing to drink except them that brought whiskey. The white folks made the whiskey, but the colored folks would get it.

"We had church twice a month. The Union Church was three miles away from us. My father and I would go when they had a meeting. Bethlehem Church was five miles away. Everybody on the plantation belonged to that church. Both the colored and the white belonged and went there. They had the same pastor for Bethlehem, Union, and Dairy Ann. His name was Tom Adams. He was a white man. Colored folks would go to Dairy Ann sometimes. They would go to Union too.

"Sometimes they would have meetings from house to house, the colored folks. The colored folks had those house to house meetings any time they felt like it. The masters didn't care. They didn't care how much they prayed.

"Sometimes they had corn shuckings. That was where they did the serving, and that was where they had the big eatings. They'd lay out a big pile of corn. Everybody would get down and throw the corn out as they shucked it. They would have a fellow there they would call the general. He would walk from one person to another and from one end of the pile to the other and holler and the boys would answer. His idea was to keep them working. If they didn't do something to keep them working, they wouldn't get that corn shucked that night. Them people would be shucking corn! There would be a prize to the one who got the most done or who would be the first to get done. They would sing while they were shucking. They had one song they would sing when they were getting close to the finish. Part of it went like this:

'Red shirt, red shirt Nigger got a red shirt.'

After the shucking was over, they would have pies, beef, biscuits, corn bread, whiskey if you wanted it. I believe that was the most they had. They didn't have any ice-cream. They didn't use ice-cream much in those days. Didn't have no ice down there in the country. Not a bit of ice there. If they had anything they wanted to save, they would let it down in the well with a rope and keep it cool down there. They used to do that here until they stopped them from having the wells.

"Ring plays too. Sometimes when they wanted to amuse themselves, they would play ring plays. They all take hands and form a ring and there would be one in the center of the ring. Now he is got to get out. He would come up and say, 'I am in this lady's garden, and I'll bet you five dollars I can get out of here.' And d'reckly he would break somebody's hands apart and get out.

How Freedom Came

"The old boss called 'em up to the house and told 'em, 'You are free as I am.' That was one day in June. I went on in the house and got something to eat. My mother and father, he hired them to stay and look after the crop. Next year, my mother and father went to Ben Hook's place and farmed on shares. But my father died there about May. Then it wasn't nobody working but me and my sister and mother.

What the Slaves Got

"The slaves never got nothing. Alexander Stephens, the Vice-President of the Confederacy, divided his plantation up and gave it to his darkies when he died. I knew him and his brother too. Alexander[HW: *] never did walk. He was deformed. Big headed rascal, but he had sense! His brother was named Leonard[HW: *]. He was a lawyer. He really killed himself. He was one of these die-hard Southerners. He did something and they arrested him. It made him so mad. He'd bought him a horse. He got on that horse and fell off and broke his neck. That was right after the War. They kept garrisons in all the counties right after the War.

"I was in Hancock County when I knew Vice-President Stephens. I don't know where he was born but he had a plantation in Toliver [HW: Taliaferro] County. Most of the Stephenses was lawyers. He was a lawyer too, and he would come to Sparta. That is where I was living then. There was more politics and political doings in Sparta than there was in Crawfordville where he lived. He lived between Montgomery and Richmond during the War, for the capital of the Confederacy was at Montgomery one time and Richmond another.

"After the War, the Republicans nominated Alexander Stephens for governor. The Democrats knew they couldn't beat him, so they turned 'round and nominated him too. He had a lot of sense. He said, 'What we lost on the battle-field, we will get it back at the ballot box.' Seeb Reese, United States Senator from Hancock County, said, 'If you let the nigger have four or five dollars in his pocket he never will steal.'

Life Since Freedom

"After my father died, my mother stayed where she was till Christmas. Then she moved back to the place she came from. We went to farming. My brother and my uncle went and farmed up in Hancock County; so the next year we moved up there. We stayed there and farmed for a long while. My mother married three years afterwards. We still farmed. After awhile, I got to be sixteen years old and I wouldn't work with my stepfather, I told my mother to hire me out; if she didn't I would be gone. She hired me out all right. But the old man used all my money. The next year I made it plain to her that I wanted her to hire me out again but that nobody was to use a dollar of my money. My mother could get as much of it as she wanted but he couldn't. The first year I bought a buggy for them. The old man didn't want me to use it at all. I said, 'Well then, he can't use my money no more.' But I didn't stop helping him and giving him things. I would buy beef and give it to my mother. I knew they would all eat it. He asked me for some wheat. I wouldn't steal it like he wanted me to but I asked the man I was working for for it. He said, 'Take just as much as you want.' So I let him come up and get it. He would carry it to the mill.

Ku Klux Klan

"The Ku Klux got after Uncle Will once. He was a brave man. He had a little mare that was a race horse. Will rode right through the bunch before they ever realized that it was him. He got on the other side of them. She was gone! They kept on after him. They went down to his house one night. He wouldn't run for nothing. He shot two of them and they went away. Then he was out of ammunition. People urged him to leave, for they knew he didn't have no more bullets; but he wouldn't and they came back and killed him.

"They came down to Hancock County one night and the boys hid on both sides of the bridge. When they got in the middle of the bridge, the boys commenced to fire on them from both sides, and they jumped into the river. The darkies went on home when they got through shooting at them; but there wasn't no more Ku Klux in Hancock County. The better thinking white folks got together and stopped it.

"The Ku Klux kept the niggers scared. They cowed them down so that they wouldn't go to the polls. I stood there one night when they were counting ballots. I belonged to the County Central Committee. I went in and stood and looked. Our ballot was long; theirs was short. I stood and seen Clait Turner calling their names from our ballots. I went out and got Rube Turner and then we both went back. They couldn't call the votes that they had put down they had. Rube saw it.

"Then they said, 'Are you going to test this?'

"Rube said, 'Yes.' But he didn't because it would have cost too much money. Rube was chairman of the committee.

"The Ku Klux did a whole lot to keep the niggers away from the polls in Washington and Baldwin counties. They killed a many a nigger down there.

"They hanged a Ku Klux for killing his wife and he said he didn't mind being hung but he didn't want a damn nigger to see him die.

"But they couldn't keep the niggers in Hancock County away from the polls. There was too many of them.

Work in Little Rock

"I came to Little Rock, November 1, 1903. I came here with surveyors. They wanted to send me to Miami but I wouldn't go. Then I went to the mortar box and made mortar. Then I went to the school board. After that I ain't had no job. I was too old. I get a little help from the government.

Opinions of the Present

"I think that the young folks ought to make great men and women. But I don't see that they are making that stride. Most of them is dropping below the mark. I think we ought to have some powerful men and women but what I see they don't stand up like they should.

Own Family

"I have three daughters, no sons. These three daughters have twelve grandchildren."



Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson Person interviewed: Frozie Moss (dark mulatto), Brinkley, Arkansas Age: 69

"When my grandma whut raised me got free she and grandpa come to Memphis and didn't stay there long till they went to Crittenden County on a man's farm. My grandma was born in Alabama and my grandpa in Virginia. I know he wasn't in the Nat Turner rebellion, for my mother had nine children and all but me at Holly Grove, Mississippi. I was born up in Crittenden County. She died. I remember very little about my father. I jes' remember father a little. He died too. My grand parents lived at Holly Grove all during the war. They used to talk about how they did. She said hardest time she ever lived through was at Memphis. Nothing to do, nothing to eat and no places to stay. I don't know why they left and come on to Memphis. She said her master's name was Pig'ge. He wasn't married. He and his sisters lived together. My grandmother was a slave thirty years. She was a field hand. She said she would be right back in the field when her baby was two weeks old. They didn't wont the slaves to die, they cost too much money, but they give them mighty hard work to do sometimes. Grandma and grandpa was heap stronger I am at my age. They didn't know how old they was. Her master told her how long he had her when they left him and his father owned her before he died. I think they had a heap easier time after they come to Arkansas from what she said. I can't answer yo questions because I'm just tellin' you what I remembers and I was little when they used to talk so much.

"If the young generation would save anything for the time when they can't work I think they would be all right. I don't hear about them saving. They buys too much. That their only trouble. They don't know how to see ahead.

"I owns this house is all. I been sick a whole heap, spent a lot on my medicines and doctor bill. I worked on the farm till after I come to Brinkley. We bought this place here and I cooks. I cooked for Miss Molly Brinkkell, Mr. Adams and Mrs. Fowler. I washes and irons some when I can get it. Washing and ironing 'bout gone out of fashion now. I don't get no moneys. I get commodities from the Sociable Welfare. My son works and they don't give me no money."



Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lucy Person interviewed: Mose Moss, Russellville, Arkansas Age: 65

"Mose Moss is my name, suh, and I was born in 1875 in Yell County. My father was born in old Virginny in 1831 and died in Yell County, Arkansas, eight miles from Dardanelle, in 1916. Yes suh, I've lived in Pope County a good many years. I recollects some things pretty well and some not so good.

"Yes suh, my father used to talk a heap about the Ku Klux Klan, and a lot of the Negroes were afraid of em and would run when they heard they was comin' around.

"My father's name was Henry Moss. He run away from the plantation in Virginia before the War had been goin' on very long, and he j'ined the army in Tennessee—yes suh, the Confedrit army. Ho suh, his name was never found on the records, so didn't never draw no pension.

"After he was freed he always voted the Republican ticket till he died.

"After the War he served as Justice of the Peace in his township in Yell County. Yes suh, that was the time they called the Re-con-struc-tion.

"I vote the Republican ticket, but sometimes I don't vote at the reg'lar elections. No, I've never had any trouble with my votin'.

"I works at first one thing and another but ain't doin' much now. Work is hard to get. Used to work mostly at the mines. Not able to do much of late years.

"Oh, yes, I remember some of the old songs they used to sing when my parents was living: 'Old-Time Religion' was one of em, and 'Swing Low, Sweet Chariot' was another one we liked to sing."



Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson Person interviewed: S.O. Mullins, Clarendon, Arkansas Janitor for Masonic Hall He wears a Masonic ring Age: 80

"My master was B.F. Wallace—Benjamin Franklin Wallace and Katie Wallace. They had no children to my recollection.

"I was born at Brittville, Alabama. My parents' names was George W. Mullins and Millie. They had, to my recollection, one girl and three boys. Mr. Wallace moved to Arkansas before the Civil War. They moved to Phillips County. My mother and father both farm hands and when my grandmother was no longer able to do the cookin' my mother took her place. I was rally too little to recollect but they always praised Wallace. They said he never whipped one of his slaves in his life. His slaves was about free before freedom was declared. They said he was a good man. Well when freedom was declared all the white folks knowed it first. He come down to the cabins and told us. He said you can stay and finish the crops. I will feed and clothe you and give you men $10 and you women $5 apiece Christmas. That was more money then than it is now. We all stayed on and worked on shares the next year. We stayed around Poplar Grove till he died. When I was nineteen I got a job, porter on the railroad. I brought my mother to Clarendon to live with me. I was in the railroad service at least fifteen years. I was on the passenger train. Then I went to a sawmill here and then I farmed, I been doing every little thing I find to do since I been old. All I owns is a little house and six lots in the new addition. I live with my wife. She is my second wife. Cause I am old they wouldn't let me work on the levy. If I been young I could have got work. My age knocks me out of 'bout all the jobs. Some of it I could do. I sure don't get no old age pension. I gets $4 every two months janitor of the Masonic Hall.

"I have a garden. No place for hog nor cow.

"My boys in Chicago. They need 'bout all they can get. They don't help.

"The present conditions seem good. They can get cotton to pick and two sawmills run in the winter (100 men each) where folks can get work if they hire them. The stay (stave) mill is shut down and so is the button factory. That cuts out a lot of work here. The present generation is beyond me. Seems like they are gone hog wild."

Interviewer's Note

The next afternoon he met me and told me the following story:——

"One night the servants quarters was overflowin' wid Yankee soldiers. I was scared nearly to death. My mother left me and my little brother cause she didn't wanter sleep in the house where the soldiers was. We slept on the floor and they used our beds. They left next mornin'. They camped in our yard under the trees. Next morning they was ridin' out when old mistress saw 'em. She said they'd get it pretty soon. When they crossed the creek—Big Creek—half mile from our cabins I heard the guns turn in on 'em. The neighbors all fell out wid my master. They say he orter go fight too. He was sick all time. Course he wasn't sick. They come and took off 25 mules and all the chickens and he never got up. They took two fine carriage horses weighed 2,000 pounds apiece I speck. One named Lee and one Stone Wall. He never went out there. He claimed he was sick all time. One of the carriage horses was a fine big white horse and had a bay match. Folks didn't like him—said he was a coward. When I went over cross the creek after the fightin' was over, men just lay like dis[A] piled on top each other." [A: He used his fingers to show me how the soldiers were crossed.]



Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson Person interviewed: Alex Murdock, Edmondson, Arkansas Age: 65

"My owner or least my folks was owned by Dr. [HW: 'Murder'] (Murdock). He had a big farm. He was a widower. He had no children as ever I knowed of. Dr. 'Murder' raised my father's mother. He bought her at Tupelo, Mississippi. He raised mother too. She was bright color. I'm sure they stayed on after freedom 'cause I stayed there till we come to Arkansas. Father was a teamster. He followed that till he died. He owned a dray and died at Brinkley. He was well-known and honorable.

"I worked in the oil mill at Brinkley-American Oil Company.

"Mother was learned durin' slavery but I couldn't say who done it. She taught school 'round Buena Vista and Okolona, Mississippi. She learned me. I was born 1874—November 25, 1874. I heard her say she worked in the field one year. They give her some land and ploughed it so she could have a patch. It was all she could work. I don't know how much. It was her patch. Our depot was Prairie Station, Mississippi. My parents was Monroe [HW: 'Murder'] Murdock[TR: lined out] and Lucy Ann Murdock[TR: lined out] [HW: Murder]. It is spelled M-u-r-d-o-c-k.

"I farmed all my whole life. Oil milling was the surest, quickest living but I likes farmin' all right.

"I never contacted the Ku Kluxes. They was 'bout gone when I come on.

"I voted off an' on. This is the white folks' country and they going to run their gov'mint. The thing balls us up is, some tells us one way and some more tells us a different way to do. And we don't know the best way. That balls us up. Times is better than ever I seen them, for the man that wants to work.

"I get $8 a month. I work all I can."



Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson Person interviewed: Bessie Myers, Brassfield, Arkansas Age: 50? didn't know

"My mother was named Jennie Bell. She was born in North Ca'lina (Carolina). She worked about the house. She said there was others at the house working all the time with her.

"She said they daresn't to cross the fence on other folks' land or go off up the road 'lessen you had a writing to show. One woman could write. She got a pass and this woman made some more. She said couldn't find nothing to make passes on. It happened they never got caught up. That woman didn't live very close by. She talked like she was free but was one time a slave her own self.

"Mother said she would run hide every time the Yankee men come. She said she felt safer in the dark. They took so many young women to wait on them and mother was afraid every time they would take her.

"She said she had been at the end of a corn row at daylight ready to start chopping it over, or pull fodder, or pull ears either. She said they thought to lie in bed late made you weak. Said the early fresh air what made children strong.

"On wash days they all met at a lake and washed. They had good times then. They put the clothes about on the bushes and briers and rail fences. Some one or two had to stay about to keep the clothes from a stray hog or goat till they dried. And they would forage about in the woods. It was cool and pleasant. They had to gather up the clothes in hamper baskets and bring them up to iron. Mother said they didn't mind work much. They got used to it.

"Mother told about men carried money in sacks. When they bought a slave, they open up a sack and pull out gold and silver.

"The way she talked she didn't mind slavery much. Papa lived till a few years ago but he never would talk about slavery at all. His name was Willis Bell."



Interviewer: Miss Sallie C. Miller Person interviewed: Mary Myhand, Clarksville, Arkansas Age: 85

"My mammie died when I was a little girl She had three children and our white folks took us in their house and raised us. Two of us had fever and would have died if they hadn't got us a good doctor. The doctor they had first was a quack and we were getting worse until they called the other doctor, then we commence to get well. I don't know how old I am. Our birthdays was down in the mistress' Bible and when the old war come up, the house was burned and lost everything but I know I am at least 83 or 84 years old. Our white folks was so good to us. They never whipped us, and we eat what they eat and when they eat. I was born in White County, Tennessee and moved to Missouri but the folks did not like it there so we come to Benton County, Arkansas. One side of the road was Benton County and the other side was Washington County but we always had to go to Bentonville, the county seat, to tend to business. I was a little tod of a girl when the war come up. One day word come that the 'Feds' were coming through and kill all of the old men and take all the boys with them, so master took my brother and a grandson of his and started South. I was so scared. I followed them about a half mile before they found me and I begged so hard they took me with them. We went to Texas and was there about one year when the Feds gave the women on our place orders to leave their home. Said they owned it now. They had just got to Texas where we was when the South surrendered and we all come back home.

"We stayed with our white folks for about twenty years after the war. They shore was good to me. I worked for them in the house but never worked in the field. I came across the mountain to Clarksville with a Methodist preacher and his family and married here. My husband worked in a livery stable until he died, then I worked for the white folks until I fell and hurt my knee and got too old. I draws my old age pension.

"I do not know about the young generation. I am old and crippled and don't go out none."



Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden Person interviewed: Griffin Myrax 913 Missouri Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas Age 77?

"I don't know my age exactly. You know in them days people didn't take care of their ages like they do now. I couldn't give you any trace of the war, but I do remember when the Ku Klux was runnin' around.

"Oh Lord, so much of the time I heard my mother talk about the slavery. I was born in Oklahoma and my grandfather was a full-blooded Crete Indian. He was very much of a man and lived to be one hundred thirty years old. All Crete Indians named after some herb—that's what the name Myrax means.

"I heard my mother say that in slavery times the man worked all day with weights on their feet so when night come they take them off and their feet feel so light they could outran the Ku Klux. Now I heard her tell that.

"My parents moved from Oklahoma to Texas and I went to school in Marshall, Texas. All my schoolin' was in Texas—my people was tied up there. My last schoolin' was in Buchanan, Texas. The professor told my mother she would have to take me out of school for awhile, I studied too hard. I treasured my books. When other children was out playin' I was studyin'.

"There was some folks in that country that didn't get along so well. I remember there was a blind woman that the folks sent something to eat by another colored woman. But she eat it up and cooked a toadfrog for the old blind woman. That didn't occur on our place but in the neighborhood. When the people found it out they whipped her sufficient.

"When my grandfather died he didn't have a decayed tooth in his head. They was worn off like a horse's teeth but he had all of them.

"I always followed sawmill work and after I left that I followed railroading. I liked railroading. I more or less kept that in my view.

"About this slavery—I couldn't hardly pass my sentiments on it. The world is so far gone, it would be the hardest thing to put the bridle on some of the people that's runnin' wild now."



Name of Interviewer: Irene Robertson Subject: Ex-slaves—Dreams—Herbs: Cures and Remedies Story:—

This information given by: Tom Wylie Neal Place of Residence: Hazen, Arkansas—Near Green Grove Occupation: Farmer—Feeds cattle in the winter for a man in Hazen. Age: 85 [TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.]

His father and mother belonged to Tom Neal at Calhoun, Georgia. He remembers the big battle at Atlanta Ga. He was eight years old. He saw the lights, [saw the bullets in the air at night] and heard the boom, boom of guns and cannons. They passed along with loaded wagons and in uniforms. The horses were beautiful, and he saw lots of fine saddles and bridles. His mistress' name was Mrs. Tom Neal. She had the property and married Tom Neal. She had been married before and her first husband died but her first husband's name can't be recalled. She had two children—girls—by her first husband. Her second husband just married her to protect them all he could. He didn't do anything unless the old mistress told him to do it and how to do it. Wylie Neal was raised up with the old mistress' children. He was born a slave and lived to thirteen years. "The family had some better to eat and lots more to wear, but they gave me plenty and never did mistreat me. They had a peafowl. That was good luck, to keep some of them about on the place." They had guineas, chickens and turkeys. They never had a farm bell. He never saw one till he came to Arkansas. They blew a big "Conch shell" instead. Mistress had cows and she would pour milk or pot-liquor out in a big pewter bowl on a stump and the children would come up there from the cabins and eat [till the field hands had time to cook a meal.][HW:?] Wylie's mother was a field hand. They drank out of tin cans and gourds. The master mated his hands. Some times he would ask his young man or woman if they knew anybody they would like to marry that he was going to buy more help and if they knew anybody he would buy them if he could. The way they met folks they would get asked to corn shuckings and log rollings and Mrs. Neal always took some of her colored people to church to attend to the stock, tie the horses and hitch up, maybe feed and to nurse her little girls at church. The colored folks sat on the back seats over in a corner together. If they didn't behave or talked out they got a whipping or didn't go no more. "They kept the colored people scared to be bad."

The colored folks believed in hoodoo and witches. Heard them talking lots about witches. They said if they found anybody was a witch they would kill them. Witches took on other forms and went out to do meaness. They said sometimes some of them got through latch holes. They used buttons and door knobs whittled out of wood, and door latches with strings.

People married early in "Them days"—when Mistress' oldest girl married she gave her Sumanthy, Wylie's oldest sister when they come home [they would let her come.] They sent their children to school some but the colored folks didn't go because it was "pay school." Every year they had "pertracted meeting." Looked like a thousand people come and stayed two or three weeks along in August, in tents. "We had a big time then and some times we'd see a colored girl we'd ask the master to buy. They'd preach to the colored folks some days. Tell them the law. How to behave and serve the Lord." When Wylie was twelve years old the "Yanks" came and tore up the farm. "It was just like these cyclones that is [TR: illegible word] around here in Arkansas, exactly like that."

His mistress left and he never saw her again. General [HW: John Bell] Hood was the [TR: illegible word] he thinks, but he was given to Captain Condennens to wait on him. They went to Marietta, Ga., and Kingston, Ga. "Rumors came about that we were free and everybody was drifting around. The U.S. Government gave us food then like they do now and we hunted work. Everybody nearly froze and starved. We wore old uniforms and slept anywhere we could find, an old house or piece of a house. In 1865-1869—the Ku Klux was miserable on the colored folks. Lots of folks died out of consumption in the spring and pneumonia all winter.

"There wasn't any doctors seeing after colored folks for they had no money and they used herbs—only medicine they could get."

Only herbs he remembers he used is: chew black snake roots to settle sick stomach. Flux weed tea for disordered stomach. People eat so much "messed up food" lot of them got sick.

Wylie Neal wandered about and finally came to Chattanooga. They got old uniforms and victuals from the "Yanks" about a year.

Colonel Stocker come and got up a lot of hands and paid their way to Memphis on the train. From there they were put on the Molly Hamilton boat and went to Linden, Arkansas, on the St. Francis River. "He fared fine" there. In 1906[TR: ?] he came to Hazen and since then he has owned small farms at Biscoe and forty acres near Hazen. It was joining the old Joe Perry place. Dr. —— got a mortgage on it and took it. Wylie Neal lives with his niece and she is old too so they get relief and a pension.

"He don't believe in dreams but some dreams like when you dream of the dead there's sho' goner be falling weather." He "don't dream much" he says.

He has a birthmark on his leg. It looks like a bunch of berries. He never heard what caused it. It has always been there.



Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden Person interviewed: Sally Nealy 105 Mulberry Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas Age: 91

"Yes mam, I was a slave! I was sixteen years old when the war begun. I was born in Texas.

"My old master was John Hall and my young master was Marse Dick. Marse John went to war the 5th day of May in 1861 and he was killed in June. They wasn't nothin' left to bring home but his right leg and his left arm. They knowed it was him cause his name was tattooed on his leg.

"He was a mean rascal. He brought us up from the plantation and pat us on the head and give us a little whisky and say 'Your name is Sally or Mary or Mose' just like we was dogs.

"My old mistress, Miss Caroline, was a mean one too. She was the mother of eight children—five girls and three boys. When she combed her hair down low on her neck she was all right but when she come down with it done up on the top of her head—look out.

"It was my job to scrub the big cedar churns with brick dust and Irish potato and polish the knives and forks the same way. Then every other day I had to mold twelve dozen candles and sweep the yard with a dogwood bresh broom.

"She didn't give us no biscuits or sugar 'cept on Christmas. Jest shorts and molasses for our coffee. When the Yankee soldiers come through old mistress run and hide in the cellar but the Yankees went down in the collar too and took all the hams and honey and brandied peaches she had.

"They didn't have no doctors for the niggers then. Old mistress just give us some blue mass and castor oil and they didn't give you nothin' to take the taste out your mouth either.

"Oh lord, I know 'bout them Ku Klux. They wore false faces and went around whippin' people.

"After the surrender I went to stay with Miss Fulton. She was good to me and I stayed with her eleven years. She wanted to know how old I was so my father went to Miss Caroline and she say I 'bout twenty now.

"Some white folks was good to their slaves. I know one man, Alec Yates, when he killed hogs he give the niggers five of 'em. Course he took the best but that was all right.

"After freedom the Yankees come and took the colored folks away to the marshal's yard and kept them till they got jobs for 'em. They went to the white folks houses and took things to feed the niggers.

"I ain't been married but once. I thought I was in love but I wasn't. Love is a itchin' 'round the heart you can't get at to scratch.

"I 'member one song they sung durin' the war

'The Yankees are comin' through By fall sez I We'll all drink stone blind Johnny fill up the bowl.'"



FOLKLORE SUBJECTS Name of interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden Subject: Songs of Civil War Days Story:—Information

This information given by: Sally Neeley Place of residence: 105 N. Mulberry, Pine Bluff, Arkansas Occupation: None Age: 90 [TR: Information moved from bottom of first page.] [TR: Same as previous informant (Sally Nealy).]

(1) "In eighteen hundred and sixty-one Football (?) sez I; In eighteen hundred and sixty-one That's the year the war begun We'll all drink stone blind, Johnny, come fill up the bowl.

(2) "In eighteen hundred and sixty-two Football (?) sez I; In eighteen hundred and sixty-two That's the year we put 'em through We'll all drink stone blind, Johnny, come fill up the bowl.

(3) "In eighteen hundred and sixty-three Football (?) sez I; In eighteen hundred and sixty-three That's the year we didn't agree We'll all drink stone blind. Johnny, come fill up the bowl.

(4) "In eighteen hundred and sixty-four Football (?) sez I; In eighteen hundred and sixty-four We'll all go home and fight no more We'll all drink stone blind. Johnny, come fill up the bowl.

(5) "In eighteen hundred and sixty-five Football (?) sez I; In eighteen hundred and sixty-five We'll have the Rebels dead or alive We'll all drink stone blind, Johnny, come fill up the bowl.

(6) "In eighteen hundred and sixty-six Football (?) sez I; In eighteen hundred and sixty-six We'll have the Rebels in a helava fix We'll all drink stone blind, Johnny, come fill up the bowl.

(7) "In eighteen hundred and sixty-seven Football (?) sez I; In eighteen hundred and sixty-seven We'll have the Rebels dead and at the devil We'll all drink stone blind. Johnny, came fill up the bowl."

Interviewer's Comment

The word "football" doesn't sound right in this song, but I was unable to find it in print, and Sally seemed to think it was the right word.

Sally is a very wicked old woman and swears like a sailor, but she has a remarkable memory.

She was "bred and born" in Rusk County, Texas and says she came to Pine Bluff when it was "just a little pig."

Says she was sixteen when the Civil War began.

I have previously reported an interview with her.



Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson Person interviewed: Wylie Nealy [HW: Biscoe Arkansas?] Age: 85

I was born in 1852. I am 85 years old. I was born in Gordon County. The closest town was Calhoun, South Carolina. My sister died in '59. That's the first dead, person I ever saw. One of my sisters was give away and another one was sold before the Civil War started. Sister Mariah was give to the young mistress, Miss Ella Conley. I didn't see her sold. I never seed nobody sold but I heard 'em talking about it. I had five sisters and one brother. My father was a free man always. He was a Choctaw Indian. Mother was part Cherokee Indian. My mother's mistress was Mrs. Martha Christian. He died and she married Tom Nealy, the one they call me fur, Wylie Nealy.

Liberty and Freedom was all I ever heard any colored folks say dey expected to get out of de war, and mighty proud of dot. Nobody knowed they was goin to have a war till it was done broke out and they was fightin about it. Didn't nobody want land, they jess wanted freedom. I remembers when Lincoln was made the President both times and when he was killed. I recollects all that like yesterday.

The army had been through and swept out everything. There wasn't a chicken or hog nowhere to be had, took the stock and cattle and all the provisions. So de slaves jess had to scatter out and leave right now. And after de army come through. I was goin back down to the old place and some soldiers passed riding along and one said "Boy where you goin? Said nothing up there." I says, "I knows it." Then he say "Come on here, walk along back there" and I followed him. I was twelve years old. He was Captain McClendenny. Then when I got to the camp wid him he say "You help around here." I got sick and they let me go back home then to Resacca, Georgia and my mother died. When I went back they sent me to Chattanooga with Captain Story. I was in a colored regiment nine months, I saw my father several times while I was at Chattanooga. We was in Shermans army till it went past Atlanta. They burned up the city. Two of my masters come out of the war alive and two dead. I was mustered out in August 1865. I stayed in camp till my sisters found a cabin to move in. Everybody got rations issued out. It was a hard time. I got hungry lots times. No plantations was divided and the masters didn't have no more than the slaves had when the war was done. After the Yankees come in and ripped them up old missus left and Mr. Tom Nealy was a Home Guard. He had a class of old men. Never went back or seen any more of them. Everybody left and a heap of the colored folks went where rations could be issued to them and some followed on in the armies. After I was mustered out I stayed around the camps and went to my sister's cabin till we left there. Made anything we could pick up. Men come in there getting people to go work for them. Some folks went to Chicago. A heap of the slaves went to the northern cities. Colonel Stocker, a officer in the Yankee army, got us to come to a farm in Arkansas. We wanted to stay together is why we all went on the farm. May 1866, when we come to Arkansas is the first farmin I had seen done since I left Tom Nealy's place. Colonel Stocker is mighty well known in St. Francis County. He brought lots of families, brought me and my brother, my two brothers and a nephew. We come on the train. It took four or five days. When we got to Memphis we come to Linden on a boat "Molly Hamilton" they called it. I heard it was sunk at Madison long time after that. Colonel Stocker promised to pay $6 a month and feed us. When Christmas come he said all I was due was $12.45. We made a good crop. That wasn't it. Been there since May. Had to stay till got all the train and boat fare paid. There wasn't no difference in that and slavery 'cept they couldn't sell us.

I heard a heap about the Ku Klux but I nebber seed them. Everybody was scared of them.

The first votin I ever heard of was in Grant's election. Both black and white voted. I voted Republican for Grant. Lot of the southern soldiers was franchised and couldn't vote. Just the private soldiers could vote at tall. I don't know why it was. I was a slave for thirteen years from birth. Every slave could vote after freedom. Some colored folks held office. I knew several magistrates and sheriffs. There was one at Helena (Arkansas) and one at Marianna. He was a High Sheriff. I voted some after that but I never voted in the last Presidento election. I heard 'em say it wasn't no use, this man would be elected anyhow. I sorter quit off long time ago.

In 1874 and 1875 I worked for halves and made nough to buy a farm in St. Francis County. It cost $925. I bought it in 1887. Eighty acres to be cleared down in the bottoms. My family helped and when my help got shallow, the children leaving me, I sold it for $2,000, in 1904. I was married jess once and had eight children; five livin and three dead. Me and the old woman went to Oklahoma. We went in January and come back to Biscoe (Arkansas) in September. It wasn't no place for farming. I bought 40 acres from Mr. Aydelott and paid him $500. I sold it and come to Mr. Joe Perry's place, paid $500 for 40 acres of timber land. We cleared it and I got way in debt and lost it. Clear lost it! Ize been working anywhere I could make a little since then. My wife died and I been doing little jobs and stays about with my children. The Welfare gives me a little check and some supplies now and then.

No maam, I can't read much. I was not learnt. I could figure a little before my eyes got bad. The white folks did send their children to pay schools but we colored children had to stay around the house and about in the field to work. I never got no schoolin. I went with old missus to camp meeting down in Georgia one time and got to go to white church sometimes. At the camp meeting there was a big tent and all around it there was brush harbors and tents where people stayed to attend the meetins. They had four meetins a day. Lots of folk got converted and shouted. They had a lot of singings They had a lots to eat and a big time.

I don't think much about these young folks now. It seems lack everybody is having a hard time to live among us colored folks. Some white folks has got a heap and fine cars to get about in. I don't know what go in to become of 'em.

People did sing more than I hear them now but I never could sing. They sing a lot of foolish songs and mostly religious songs.

I don't recollect of any slave uprising. I never heard of any. We didn't know they was going to have a war till they was fighting. Yes maam, they heard Lincoln was going to set 'em free, but they didn't know how he was going to do it. Everybody wanted freedom. Mr. Hammond (white) ask me not long ago if I didn't think it best to bring us from Africa and be slaves than like wild animals in Africa. He said we was taught about God and the Gospel over here if we was slaves. I told him I thought dot freedom was de best anywhere.

We had a pretty hard time before freedom. My mother was a field woman. When they didn't need her to work they hired her out and they got the pay. The master mated the colored people. I got fed from the white folks table whenever I curried the horses. I was sorter raised up with Mr. Nealy's children. They didn't mistreat me. On Saturday the mistress would blow a cone shell and they knowed to go and get the rations. We got plenty to eat. They had chickens and ducks and geese and plenty milk. They did have hogs. They had seven or eight guineas and a lot of peafowls. I never heard a farm bell till I come to Arkansas. The children et from pewter bowls or earthen ware. Sometimes they et greens or milk from the same bowl, all jess dip in. The Yankees took me to General Hood's army and I was Captain McCondennen's helper at the camps.[HW: ?] We went down through Marietta and Atlanta and through Kingston. Shells come over where we lived. I saw 'em fight all the time. Saw the light and heard the roaring of de guns miles away. It looked like a storm where the army went along. They tramped the wheat and oats and cotton down and turned the horses in on the corn. The slaves show did hate to see the Yankees waste everything. They promised a lot and wasn't as good as the old masters. All dey wanted was to be waited on too. The colored folks was freed when the Yankees took all the stock and cattle and rations. Everybody had to leave and let the government issue them rations. Everybody was proud to be free. They shouted and sung. They all did pretty well till the war was about to end then they was told to scatter and no whars to go. Cabins all tore down or burned. No work to do. There was no money to pay. I wore old uniforms pretty well till I come to Arkansas. I been here in Hazen since 1906. I come on a boat from Memphis to Linden. Colonel Stocker brought a lot of us on the train. The name of the boat was Molly Hamilton. It was a big boat and we about filled it. I show was glad to get back on a farm.

I don't know what is goin to become of the young folks. Everything is so different now and when I was growin up I don't know what will become of the younger generation.



Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson Person interviewed: Emaline Neland, Marianna, Arkansas Age: Born 1859

"I was born two years before the War. I was born in Murray County, Tennessee. It was middle Tennessee. When I come to remembrance I was in Grant County, Arkansas. When I remember they raised wheat and corn and tobacco. Mother's master was Dr. Harrison. His son was married and me and my brother Anderson was give to him. He come to Arkansas 'fore ever I could remember. He was a farmer but I never seen him hit a lick of work in my life. He was good to me and my brother. She was good too. I was the nurse. They had two children. Brother was a house boy. Me and her girl was about the same size but I was the oldest. Being with the other children I called her mother too. I didn't know no other mother till freedom.

"Freedom! Well, here is the very way it all was: Old master told her (mother) she was free. He say, 'Go get your children, you free as I is now.' Ain't I heard her say it many a time? Well, mother come in a ox wagon what belong to him and got us. They run me down, caught me and got me in the wagon. They drove twenty-five miles. Old Dr. Harrison had moved to Arkansas. Being with the other children I soon learnt to call her ma. She had in all ten or eleven children. She was real dark.

"Pa was a slave too. He was a low man. He was a real bright man. He was brighter than I is. He belong to a widow woman named Tedford. He renamed his self after freedom. He took the name Brown 'stead of Tedford. I never heard him say why he wasn't satisfied with his own name. He was a soldier. He worked for the Yankees.

"After the War pa and ma got back together and lived together till she died. There was five days' difference in their deaths. They died of pneumonia. He was 64 years old and she was 54 years old. I was at home when pa come from the War. All my sisters was light, one sister had sandy hair like pa. She was real light. Ma was a good all 'round woman. She cooked more than anything else. She nursed. Dr. Harrison told her to stay till her husband come back or all the time if he didn't ever come back. Ma never worked in the field. When pa come he moved us on a place to share crop. Ma never worked in the field. He was buying a home in Grant County. He started to Mississippi and stopped close to Helena and ten or twelve miles from Marianna. He had a soldier friend wouldn't let him go. He told him this was a better country. He decided to stay down in here.

"I heard a whole heap about the Ku Klux. One time when a crowd was going to church, we heard horse's feet coming; sound like they would run over us. We all got clear out of reach so they wouldn't run over us. They had on funny caps was all I could see, they went so fast. We give them the clear road and they went on. That is all I ever seen of the Ku Klux.

"I seen Dr. Harrison's wife. She was a little old lady but we left after I went there.

"I used to sew for the public. Yes, white and colored folks. I learnt my own self to sew. I never had but one boy in my life. He died at seven weeks old. I raised a stepson. I married twice. I married at home both times. Just a quiet marriage and a colored preacher married me both times.

"The present conditions is hard. I want things and can't get 'em. If I had the strength to hold out to work I could get along.

"The present generation—young white and black—blinds me. They turns corners too fast. They going so fast they don't have time to take advice. They promise to do better but they don't. They do like they want to do and don't tell nobody till they done it. I say they just running way with their selves.

"I get $8 and a little help along. I'm thankful for it. It is a blessing I tell you."



Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor Person interviewed: Henry Nelson 904 E. Fifth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas Age: About 70

"My name is Henry Nelson. I was born in Arkansas—Crittenden County near Memphis, Tennessee. I was born not far from Memphis but on this side.

"My mother's name was Adeline Taylor. That was her old slavery folks' name. She was a Taylor before she married my father—Nelson. My father's first name was Green. I don't remember none of my grandparents. My father's mother died before I come to remember and I know my mother's mother died before I could remember.

"My father was born in Mississippi—Sardis, Mississippi—and my mother was a Tennesseean—Cartersville[HW:?] Tennessee, twenty-five miles above Memphis. [HW: Carter, in Carter County, about 35 m. north of Memphis, but no Cartersville.] [TR: moved from bottom of following page.]

"After peace was declared, they met in Tennessee. That was where my mother was born, you know. They fell in love with one another in Shelby County, and married there. My mother had been married once before during slavery time. She had been made to marry by her master. Her first husband was named Eli. He was my oldest sister's father. Him and my mother had the same master and missis. She was made to marry him. She was only thirteen years old when she married him. She was fine and stout and her husband was fine and stout, and they wanted more from that stock. I don't know how old he was but he was a lot older than she was. He was a kind of an elderly man. She had just one child by him—my oldest sister, Georgia. She was only married a short time before freedom came.

"My father farmed. He was always a farmer—raised cotton and corn. My mother was a farmer too. Both of them—that is both of her husbands—were farmers.

"My mother and father used to go off to places to dance and the pateroles would get after them. You had to have a pass to go off your place and if you didn't have a pass, they would make you warm. Some of them would get caught sometimes and the pateroles would whip them. They would sure got whipped if they didn't have a pass.

"The old master come out and told them they were free when peace was declared. He said, 'You are free this morning—free as I am.'

"Right after the War, my mother come further down in Tennessee, and that is how she met my father where she was when she was married. They went farming. They farmed on shares—sharecropped. They were on a big place called Ensley place. The man that owned the place was called Nuck Ensley.

"My mother and father didn't have no schooling. I never heard that they were bothered by the Ku Klux.

"She didn't live with her first husband after slavery. She left him when she was freed. She never did intend to marry him. She was forced to that."

Interviewer's Comment

Nelson evidently rents rooms. A yellow sallow-faced, cadaverous, and dissatisfied looking "gentleman" went into the house eyeing me suspiciously as he passed. In a moment he was out again interrupting the old man with pointless remarks. In—out again—standing over me—peering on my paper in the offensive way that ill-bred people have. He straightened up with a disgusted look on his face. He couldn't read shorthand.

"What's that you're writin'?"

"Shorthand."

"What's that about?"

"History."

"History uv whut?"

"Slavery."

"He don't know nothin' about slavery."

"Thank you. However, if he says he does, I'll just continue to listen to him if you don't mind."

"Humph," and the "yellow gentleman" passed in.

Out again—eyeing both the old man and me with disgust that was unconcealed. To him, "You don't know whutchu're doin'."

Deep silence by all. Exit the yellow brother.

To the old man, I said, "Is that your son?"

"Lawd, no, that's jus' a roomer."

Out came the yellow brother again. "See here, Uncle, if you want me to fix that fence you'd bettuh come awn out heah now. It's gettin' dark."

I closed my notebook and arose. "Don't let me interfere with your program, Brother Nelson."

The old man settled back in his chair. His eyes inspected the sky, his jaw "sorta" set. The yellow brother looked at him a minute and passed on.

Five minutes later. Enter, the Madam. She also was of the yellow variety with the suspicious and spiteful look of an undersized black Belgian police dog. A moment of silence—a word to him.

"You don't know whutchu're doin'." Silence all around. To me, "You're upsettin' my work."

I arose. "Madam, I'm sorry."

The old man spoke, "You ain't keepin' me from nothin'."

"Well, I said, you've given me a nice start; I'll come again and get the rest."



Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson Person interviewed: Henry Nelson, Edmondson, Arkansas Age: 70 [TR: Appears to be same as last informant despite different address.]

"My mother belong to the Taylors close to Carterville, Tennessee. My father never was sold. He belong to the Nelsons. My parents married toreckly after the surrender and come on to this state. I was born ten miles from Edmondson. Their names was Adeline and Green Nelson. They didn't get nothing after freedom like land or a horse. I'm seventy years old and I would have known.

"I was at Alton, Illinois in the lead works thirteen years ago and I had a stroke. I been cripple ever since.

"My folks never spoke of being nothing but field hands. Folks used to be proud of their crops, go look over them on Sunday when company come. Now if they got a garden they hide it and don't mention it. Times is changed that way.

"Clothes ain't as lasty as they used to be. People has a heap more money to spend and don't raise and have much at home as they did when I was a child. Times is all turned around and folks too. I always had plenty till I couldn't do hard work. I farmed my early life. We didn't have much money but we had rations and warm clothes. I cleared new ground, hauled wood, big logs. I steamboated on the Sun, Kate Adams, and One Arm John. I helped with the freight. I railroaded with pick and shovel and in the lead mines. I worked from Memphis to Helena on boats a good while. I come back here to farm. Time is changed and I'm changed.

"It has been so long since I heard my parents tell about slavery I couldn't tell you straight. She told till she died, talked about how the Yankees done when they come through. They took axes and busted up good furniture. They et up and wasted the rations, then humor up the black folks like they was in their favor when they was settin' out wasting their living. They done made it to live on. Some followed them and some stayed on. They wanted freedom but it wasn't like they thought it would be. They didn't know how it would be. They didn't know it meant set out. Seem like they left. In some ways times was better and some ways it was worse. They had to work or starve is what they told me. That's the way I found freedom. 'Course their owners made them work and he looked out for the ration and in slavery.