PHYLLIS PETITE Age 83 yrs. Fort Gibson, Okla.
I was born in Rusk County, Texas, on a plantation about eight miles east of Belleview. There wasn't no town where
I was born, but they had a church.
My mammy and pappy belonged to a part Cherokee named W. P. Thompson when I was born. He had kinfolks in the Cherokee
Nation, and we all moved up here to a place on Fourteen-Mile Creek close to where Hulbert now is, 'way before I
was big enough to remember anything. Then, so I been told, old master Thompson sell my pappy and mammy and one
of my baby brothers and me back to one of his neighbors in Texas name of John Harnage.
Mammy's name was Letitia Thompson and pappy's was Riley Thompson. My little brother was named Johnson Thompson,
but I had another brother sold to a Vann and he always call hisself Harry Vann. His Cherokee master lived on the
Arkansas river close to Webber's Falls and I never did know him until we was both grown. My only sister was Patsy
and she was borned after slavery and died at Wagoner, Oklahoma.
I can just remember when Master John Harnage took us to Texas. We went in a covered wagon with oxen and camped
out all along the way. Mammy done the cooking in big wash kettles and pappy done the driving of the oxen. I would
set in a wagon and listen to him pop his whip and holler.
Master John took us to his plantation and it was a big one, too. You could look from the field up to the Big House
and any grown body in the yard look like a little body, it was so far away.
We negroes lived in quarters not far from the Big House and ours was a single log house with a stick and dirt chimney.
We cooked over the hot coals in the fireplace.
I just played around until I was about six years old I reckon, and then they put me up at the Big House with my
mammy to work. She done all the cording and spinning and weaving, and I done a whole lot of sweeping and minding
the baby. The baby was only about six months old I reckon. I used to stand by the cradle and rock it all day, and
when I quit I would go to sleep right by the cradle sometimes before mammy would come and get me.
The Big House had great big rooms in front, and they was fixed up nice, too. I remember when old Mistress Harnage
tried me out sweeping up the front rooms. They had two or three great big pictures of some old people hanging on
the wall. They was full blood Indians it look like, and I was sure scared of them pictures! I would go here and
there and every which-a-way, and anywheres I go them big pictures always looking straight at me and watching me
sweep! I kept my eyes right on them so I could run if they moved, and old Mistress take me back to the kitchen
and say I can't sweep because I miss all the dirt.
We always have good eating, like turnip greens cooked in a kettle with hog skins and crackling grease, and skinned
corn, and rabbit or possum stew. I liked big fish tolerable well too, but I was afraid of the bones in the little
ones.
That skinned corn aint like the boiled hominy we have today. To make it you boil some wood ashes, or have some
drip lye from the hopper to put in the hot water. Let the corn boil in the lye water until the skin drops off and
the eyes drop out and then wash that corn in fresh water about a dozen times, or just keep carrying water from
the spring until you are wore out, like I did. Then you put the corn in a crock and set it in the spring, and you
got good skinned corn as long as it last, all ready to warm up a little batch at a time.
Master had a big, long log kitchen setting away from the house, and we set a big table for the family first, and
when they was gone we negroes at the house eat at that table too, but we don't use the china dishes.
The negro cook was Tilda Chisholm. She and my mammy didn't do no out-work. Aunt Tilda sure could make them corn-dodgers.
Us children would catch her eating her dinner first out of the kettles and when we say something she say: "Go
on child, I jest tasting that dinner."
In the summer we had cotton homespun clothes, and in winter it had wool mixed in. They was dyed with copperas and
wild indigo.
My brother, Johnson Thompson, would get up behind old Master Harnage on his horse and go with him to hunt squirrels
so they would go 'round on Master's side so's he could shoot them. Master's old mare was named "Old Willow",
and she knowed when to stop and stand real still so he could shoot.
His children was just all over the place! He had two houses full of them! I only remember Bell, Ida, Maley, Mary
and Will, but they was plenty more I don't remember.
That old horn blowed 'way before daylight, and all the field negroes had to be out in the row by the time of sun
up. House negroes got up too, because old Master always up to see everybody get out to work.
Old Master Harnage bought and sold slaves most all the time, and some of the new negroes always acted up and needed
a licking. The worst ones got beat up good, too! They didn't have no jail to put slaves in because when the Masters
got done licking them they didn't need no jail.
My husband was George Petite. He tell me his mammy was sold away from him when he was a little boy. He looked down
a long lane after her just as long as he could see her, and cried after her. He went down to the big road and set
down by his mammy's barefooted tracks in the sand and set there until it got dark, and then he come on back to
the quarters.
I just saw one slave try to get away right in hand. They caught him with bloodhounds and brung him back in. The
hounds had nearly tore him up, and he was sick a long time. I don't remember his name, but he wasn't one of the
old regular negroes.
In Texas we had a church where we could go. I think it was a white church and they just let the negroes have it
when they got a preacher sometimes. My mammy took me sometimes, and she loved to sing them salvation songs.
We used to carry news from one plantation to the other I reckon, 'cause mammy would tell about things going on
some other plantation and I know she never been there.
Christmas morning we always got some brown sugar candy or some molasses to pull, and we children was up bright
and early to get that 'lasses pull, I tell you! And in the winter we played skeeting on the ice when the water
froze over. No, I don't mean skating. That's when you got iron skates, and we didn't have them things. We just
get a running start and jump on the ice and skeet as far as we could go, and then run some more.
I nearly busted my head open, and brother Johnson said: "Try it again," but after that I was scared to
skeet any more.
Mammy say we was down in Texas to get away from the War, but I didn't see any war and any soldiers. But one day
old Master stay after he eat breakfast and when us negroes come in to eat he say: "After today I ain't your
master any more. You all as free as I am." We just stand and look and don't know what to say about it.
After while pappy got a wagon and some oxen to drive for a white man who was coming to the Cherokee Nation because
he had folks here. His name was Dave Mounts and he had a boy named John.
We come with them and stopped at Fort Gibson where my own grand mammy was cooking for the soldiers at the garrison.
Her name was Phyllis Brewer and I was named after her. She had a good Cherokee master. My mammy was born on his
place.
We stayed with her about a week and then we moved out on Four Mile Creek to live. She died on Fourteen-Mile Creek
about a year later.
When we first went to Four Mile Creek I seen negro women chopping wood and asked them who they work for and I found
out they didn't know they was free yet.
After a while my pappy and mammy both died, and I was took care of by my aunt Elsie Vann. She took my brother Johnson
too, but I don't know who took Harry Vann.
I was married to George Petite, and I had on a white underdress and black high-top shoes, and a large cream colored
hat, and on top of all I had a blue wool dress with tassels all around the bottom of it. That dress was for me
to eat the terrible supper in. That what we called the wedding supper because we eat too much of it. Just danced
all night, too! I was at Mandy Foster's house in Fort Gibson, and the preacher was Reverend Barrows, I had that
dress a long time, but its gone now. I still got the little sun bonnet I wore to church in Texas.
We had six children, but all are dead but George, Tish, and Annie now.
Yes, they tell me Abraham Lincoln set me free, and I love to look at his picture on the wall in the school house
at Four Mile branch where they have church. My grand mammy kind of help start that church, and I think everybody
ought to belong to some church.
I want to say again my Master Harnage was Indian, but he was a good man and mighty good to us slaves, and you can
see I am more than six feet high, and they say I weighs over a hundred and sixty, even if my hair is snow white.
MATILDA POE
Age 80 yrs. McAlester, Okla.
I was born in Indian Territory on de plantation of Isaac Love. He was old Master, and Henry Love was young Master.
Isaac Love was a full blood Chickasaw Indian but his wife was a white woman.
Old Master was sure good to his slaves. The young niggers never done no heavy work till dey was fully grown. Dey
would carry water to de men in de field and do other light jobs 'round de place.
De Big House set way back from de road 'bout a quarter of a mile. It was a two-story log house, and the rooms was
awful big and they was purty furniture in it. The furniture in de parlor was red plush and I loved to slip in and
rub my hand over it, it was so soft like. The house was made of square logs and de cracks was filled out even with
the edges of de logs. It was white washed and my but it was purty. They was a long gallery clean across de front
of de house and big posts to support de roof. Back a ways from de house was de kitchen and nearby was de smokehouse.
Old Master kept it well filled with meat, lard and molasses all de time. He seen to it that we always had plenty
to eat. The old women done all de cooking in big iron pots that hung over the fire. De slaves was all served together.
The slave quarters was about two hundred yards back of de Big House. Our furniture was made of oak 'cepting de
chairs, and dey was made out of hackberry. I still have a chair dat belonged to my mammy.
The boys didn't wear no britches in de summer time. Dey just wore long shirts. De girls wore homespun dresses,
either blue or gray.
Old Master never hired no overseer for his slaves, but he looked after 'em hisself. He punished dem hisself too.
He had to go away one time and he hired a white man to oversee while he was gone. The only orders he left was to
keep dem busy. Granny Lucy was awful old but he made her go to the field. She couldn't hold out to work so he ups
and whips her. He beat her scandalous. He cut her back so bad she couldn't wear her dress. Old Master come home
and my, he was mad when he see Granny Lucy. He told de man to leave and iffen he ever set foot on his ground again
he's shoot him, sure!
Old Master had a big plantation and a hundred or more slaves. Dey always got up at daylight and de men went out
and fed de horses. When de bell rang dey was ready to eat. After breakfast dey took de teams and went out to plow.
Dey come in 'bout half past 'leven and at twelve de bell rung agin. Dey eat their dinner and back to plowing dey
went. 'Bout five o'clock dey come in again, and den they'd talk, sing and jig dance till bedtime.
Old Master never punished his niggers 'cepting dey was sassy or lazy. He never sold his slaves neither. A owner
once sold several babies to traders. Dey stopped at our plantation to stay awhile. My mammy and de other women
had to take care of dem babies for two days, and teach dem to nuss a bottle or drink from a glass. Dat was awful,
dem little children crying for they mothers. Sometimes dey sold de mothers away from they husbands and children.
Master wasn't a believer in church but he let us have church. My we'd have happy times singing an shouting. They'd
have church when dey had a preacher and prayer meeting when dey didn't.
Slaves didn't leave de plantation much on 'count of de Patrollers. De patroller was low white trash what jest wanted
a excuse to shoot niggers. I don't think I ever saw one but I heard lots of 'em.
I don't believe in luck charms and things of the such. Iffen you is in trouble, there ain't nothing gonna save
you but de Good Lawd. I heard of folks keeping all kind of things for good luck charms. When I was a child different
people gave me buttons to string and we called them our charm string and wore 'em round our necks. If we was mean
dey would tell us "Old Raw Head and Bloody Bones" would git us. Grand mammy told us ghost stories after
supper, but I don't remember any of dem.
I never did know I was a slave, 'cause I couldn't tell I wasn't free. I always had a good time, didn't have to
work much, and allus had something to eat and wear and that was better than it is with me now.
When de War was over old Master told us we was free. Mammy she say, "Well, I'm heading for Texas." I
went out and old Master ask me to bring him a coal of fire to light his pipe. I went after it and mammy left pretty
soon. My pappy wouldn't leave old Master right then but old Master told us we was free to go where we pleased,
so me an' pappy left and went to Texas where my mammy was. We never saw old Master any more. We stayed a while
in Texas and then come back to de Indian Territory.
Abe Lincoln was a good man, everybody liked him. See, I've got his picture. Jeff Davis was a good man too, he just
made a mistake. I like Mr. Roosevelt, too.
HENRY F. PYLES
Age 81 yrs. Tulsa, Okla.
Little pinch o' pepper----Little bunch o' wool----
Mumbledy--Mumbledy----
Two, three Pammy Christy beans----Little piece o' rusty iron----
Mumbledy--Mumbledy----
Wrop it in a rag and tie it wid hair, Two fum a hoss an' one fum a mare----
Mumbledy, Mumbledy, Mumbledy----
Wet it in whiskey Boughten wid silver; Dat make you wash so hard your sweat pop out, And he come to pass, sho'!
That's how the niggers say old Bab Russ used to make the hoodoo "hands" he made for the young bucks and
wenches, but I don't know, 'cause I was too trusting to look inside de one he make for me, and anyways I lose it,
and it no good nohow!
Old Bab Russ live about two mile from me, and I went to him one night at midnight and ask him to make me de hand.
I was a young strapper about sixteen years old, and thinking about wenches pretty hard and wanting something to
help me out wid the one I liked best.
Old Bab Russ charge me four bits for dat hand, and I had to give four bits more for a pint of whiskey to wet it
wid, and it wasn't no good nohow!
Course dat was five-six years after de War. I wasn't yet quite eleven when de War close. Most all the niggers was
farming on de shares and whole lots of them was still working for their old Master yet. Old Bab come in there from
deep South Carolina two-three years befo', and live all by hisself. De gal I was worrying about had come wid her
old pappy and mammy to pick cotton on de place, and dey was staying in one of de cabins in the "settlement",
but dey didn't live there all de time.
I don't know whether I believed in conjure much or not in dem days, but anyways I tried it that once and it stirred
up sech a rumpus everybody called me "Hand" after that until after I was married and had a pack of children.
Old Bab Russ was coal black, and he could talk African or some other unknown tongue, and all the young bucks and
wenches was mortal 'fraid of him!
Well sir, I took dat hand he made for me and set out to try it on dat gal. She never had give me a friendly look
even, and when I would speak to her polite she just hang her head and say nothing!
We was all picking cotton, and I come along up behind her and decided to use my "Hand." I had bought
me a pint of whiskey to wet the hand wid, but I was scared to take out of my pocket and let the other niggers see
it, so I jest set down in de cotton row and taken a big mouthful. I figgered to hold it in my mouth until I catched
up wid that gal and then blow it on the hand jest before I tech her on the arm and speak to her.
Well, I take me a big mouthful, but it was so hot and scaldy it jest slip right on down my throat! Then I had to
take another, and when I was gitting up I kind of stumbled and it slip down, too!
Then I see all the others get way on ahead, and I took another big mouthful--the last in the bottle--and drap the
bottle under a big stalk and start picking fast and holding the whiskey in my mouth this time. I missed about half
the cotton I guess, but at last I catch up with de rest and git close up behind dat purty gal. Then I started to
speak to her, but forgot I had de whiskey in mouth and I lost most of it down my neck and all over my chin, and
then I strangled a little on the rest, so as when I went to squirt it on de "hand" I didn't have nothing
left to squirt but a little spit.
That make me a little nervous right then, but anyways I step up behind dat gal and lay my hand on her arm and speak
polite and start to say something, but I finish up what I start to say laying on my neck with my nose shoved up
under a cotton stalk about four rows away!
De way that gal lam me across the head was a caution! We was in new ground, and she jest pick up a piece of old
root and whopped me right in de neck with it!
That raise sech a laugh on me that I never say nothing to her for three-four days, but after while I gets myself
wound up to go see her at her home. I didn't know how she going to act, but I jest took my foot in my hand and
went on over.
Her old pappy and mammy was asleep in the back of the room on a pallet, and we set in front of the fireplace on
our hunches and jest looked at the fire and punched it up a little. It wasn't cold, but de malary fog was thick
all through de bottoms.
After while I could smell the whiskey soaked up in dat "hand" I had in my pocket, and I was scared she
could smell it too. So I jest reached in my pocket and teched it for luck, then I reached over and teched her arm.
She jerked it back so quick she knocked over the churn and spilled buttermilk all over de floor! Dat make de old
folks mad, and dey grumble and holler and told de gal, "Send dat black rapscallion on out of here!" But
I didn't go.
I kept on moving over closer and she kept on backing away, but after while I reach over and put my hand on her
knee. All I was going to do was say something but I shore forgot what it was the next minnit, 'cause she jest whinnied
lak a scared hoss and give me a big push. I was settin straddledy-legged on the floor, and that push sent me on
my head in the hot ashes in the fur corner of the chimney.
Then the old man jump up and make for me and I make for the door! It was dark, all 'cepting the light from the
chimney, and I fumble all up and down the door jamb before I find de latch pin. The old man shorely git me if he
hadn't stumble over the eating table and whop his hand right down in de dish of fresh made butter. That make him
so mad he jest stand and holler and cuss.
I git de pin loose and jerk de door open so quick and hard I knock de powder gourd down what was hanging over it,
and my feet git caught in the string. The stopper gits knocked out, and when I untangle it from my feet and throw
it back in de house it fall in the fireplace.
I was running all de time, but I hear dat gourd go "Blammity Blam!" and then all de yelling, but I didn't
go back to see how dey git the hot coals all put out what was scattered all over de cabin!
I done drap dat "hand" and I never did see it again. Never did see the gal but two-three times after
that, and we never mention about dat night. Her old pappy was too old to work, so I never did see him neither,
but she must of told about it because all the young bucks called me "Hand" after that for a long time.
Old Bab kept on trying to work his conjure with the old niggers, but the young ones didn't pay him much mind cause
they was hearing about the Gospel and de Lord Jesus Christ. We was all free then, and we could go and come without
a pass, and they was always some kind of church meeting going on close enough to go to. Our niggers never did hear
about de Lord Jesus until after we was free, but lots of niggers on de other plantations had masters that told
them all about him, and some of dem niggers was pretty good at preaching. Then de good church people in de North
was sending white preachers amongst us all the time too. Most of de young niggers was Christians by that time.
One day old Bab was hoeing in a field and got in a squabble about something with a young gal name Polly, same name
as his wife. After while he git so mad he reach up with his fingers and wet them on his tongue and point straight
up and say, "Now you got a trick on you! Dere's a heavy trick on you now! Iffen you don't change your mind
you going pass on before de sun go down!"
All de young niggers looked like they want to giggle but afraid to, and the old ones start begging old Bab to take
the trick off, but that Polly git her dander up and take in after him with a hoe!
She knocked him down, and he jest laid there kicking his feet in the air and trying to keep her from hitting him
in the head!
Well, that kind of broke up Bab's charm, so he set out to be a preacher. The Northern whites was paying some of
the Negro preachers, so he tried to be one too. He didn't know nothing about de Bible but to shout loud, so the
preacher board at Red Mound never would give him a paper to preach. Then he had to go back to tricking and trancing
again.
One day he come in at dinner and told his wife to git him something to eat. She told him they aint nothing but
some buttermilk, and he says give me some of that. He hollered around till she fix him a big ash cake and he ate
that and she made him another and he ate that. Then he drunk the rest of de gallon of buttermilk and went out and
laid down on a tobacco scaffold in de yard and nearly died.
After while he jest stiffened out and looked like he was dead, and nobody couldn't wake him up. 'Bout forty niggers
gathered round and tried but it done no good. Old mammy Polly got scared and sent after the white judge, old Squire
Wilson, and he tried, and then the white preacher Reverend Dennison tried and old man Gorman tried. He was a infidel,
but that didn't do no good.
By that time it was getting dark, and every nigger in a square mile was there, looking on and acting scared. Me
and my partner who was a little bit cripple but mighty smart come up to see what all the rumpus was about, and
we was jest the age to do anything.
He whispered to me to let him start it off and then me finish it while he got a head running start. I ast him what
he talking about.
Then he fooled round the house and got a little ball of cotton and soaked it in kerosene from a lamp. It was a
brass lamp with a hole and a stopper in the side of the bowl. Wonder he didn't burn his fool head off! Then he
sidle up close and stuck dat cotton 'tween old Bab's toes. Old Bab had the biggest feet I ever see, too.
'Bout that time I lit a corn shuck in de lamp and run out in de yard and stuck it to de cotton and jest kept right
on running!
My partner had a big start but I catch up wid him and we lay down in de bresh and listened to everybody hollering
and old Bab hollering louder than anybody. Old Bab moved away after that.
All that foolishness happen after the War, but before de War while I was a little boy they wasn't much foolishness
went on I warrant you.
I was born on de 15th of August in 1856, and belonged to Mister Addison Pyles. He lived in town, in Jackson, Tennessee,
and was a old man when de War broke. He had a nephew named Irvin T. Pyles he raised from a baby, and Mister Irvin
kept a store at de corner of de roads at our plantation. The plantation covered about 300 or 400 acres I reckon,
and they had about 25 slaves counting de children.
The plantation was about 9 miles north of Red Mound, close to Lexington, Tennessee, and about a mile and a half
from Parker's Crossroads where they had a big battle in de War.
They wasn't no white overseer on the place, except Mister Irvin, and he stayed in de store or in town and didn't
bother about the farm work. We had a Negro overlooker who was my stepdaddy. His name was Jordan, and he run away
wid de Yankees about de middle of de War and was in a Negro Yankee regiment. After he left we jest worked on as
usual because we was afraid not to. Several of de men got away like that but he was de only one that got in de
army.
They was a big house in de middle of de place and a settlement of Negro cabins behind and around it. We called
it de settlement, but on other plantations where white folks lived there too they called it de quarters. We always
kept this big house clean and ready, and sometimes de white folks come out from town and stay a few days and hunt
and fish and look over de crops.
We all worked at farm work. Cotton and corn and tobacco mostly. We all laid off Sunday after noontime, but we didn't
have no church nor preaching and we didn't hear anything 'bout Jesus much until after de emancipation.
I reckon old Master wasn't very religious, 'cause he never tell us 'bout the Holy Word. He jest said to behave
ourselves and tell him when we wanted to marry, and not have but one wife.
We had little garden patches and cotton patches we could work on Sunday and what de stuff brung we could sell and
keep the money. Old Master let us have what we made that way on Sunday. We could buy ribbons and hand soap and
coal oil and such at de store. Master Irvin was always honest 'bout continuing de money, too.
We didn't have no carders and spinners nor no weavers on de plantation. They cost too much money to buy just for
25 niggers, and they cost a lot more than field niggers. So we got our clothes sent out to us from in town, and
sometimes we was give cloth from de store to make our clothes out of.
We got de shorts and seconds from de mill when we had wheat ground, and so we had good wheat bread as well as corn
pone, and de big smokehouse was on de place and we had all de meat we wanted to eat. Old Master sent out after
de meat he wanted every day or so and we kept him in garden sass that way too.
We was right between de forks of Big Beaver and Little Beaver and we could go fishing without getting far off de
place. We couldn't go far away without a pass, though, and they wasn't nobody on the place to write us a pass,
so we couldn't go to meeting and dances and sech.
But de niggers on de other plantations could get passes to come to our place, and so we had parties sometimes there
at our place. We always had them on Sundays, 'cause in the evening we would be too tired to work if we set up,
and the other masters wouldn't give passes to their niggers to come over in de evening.
We had a white doctor lived at de next plantation, and old Master had a contract with old Dr. Brown to look after
us. He had a beard as long as your arm. He come for all kinds of misery except bornings. Then we had a mid-wife
who was a white woman lived down below us. They was poor people renting or living on war land. Nearly all de white
folks in that country been there a long time and their old people got de land from de government for fighting in
the Revolutionary War. Most all was from North Carolina--way back. I think old Master's pappy was from dere in
de first place.
Old Master had two sons named Newton and Willis. Newton was in de War and was killed, and Willis went to war later
and was sick a long time and come home early. Old Master was too old to go.
There was two daughters, Mary, de oldest, married a Holmes, and Miss Laura never did marry I don't think.
My mammy's name was Jane, and she was born on de 10th day of May in 1836. I know de dates 'cause old Master kept
his book on all his niggers de same as on his own family. Mammy was the nurse of all de children but I think old
Master sent her to de plantation about the time I was born. I don't think I had any pappy. I think I was jest one
of them things that happened sometimes in slavery days, but I know old Master didn't have nothing to do with it--I'm
too black.
Mammy married a man named Jordan when I was a little baby. He was the overlooker and went off to de Yankees, when
dey come for foraging through dat country de first time.
He served in de Negro regiment in de battle at Fort Piller and a lot of Sesesh was killed in dat battle, so when
de War was over and Jordan come back home he was a changed nigger and all de whites and a lot of de niggers hated
him. All 'cepting old Master, and he never said a word out of de way to him. Jest told him to come on and work
on de place as long as he wanted to.
But Jordan had a hard time, and he brung it on his self I reckon.
'Bout de first thing, he went down to Wildersville Schoolhouse, about a mile from Wildersville, to a nigger and
carpet bagger convention and took me and mammy along. That was de first picnic and de first brass band I ever see.
De band men was all white men and they still had on their blue soldier clothes.
Lots of de niggers there had been in de Union army too, and they had on parts of their army clothes. They took
them out from under their coats and their wagon seats an put them on for de picnic.
There was a saloon over in Wildersville, and a lot of them went over there but they was scared to go in, most of
them. But a colored delegate named Taylor and my pappy went in and ordered a drink. The bartender didn't pay them
no mind.
Then a white man named Billy Britt walked up and throwed a glass of whiskey in Jordan's face and cussed him for
being in de Yankee army. Then a white man from the North named Pearson took up the fight and him and Jordan jumped
on Billy Britt, but de crowd stopped them and told pappy to git on back to whar he come from.
He got elected a delegate at de convention and went on down to Nashville and helped nominate Brownlow for governor.
Then he couldn't come back home for a while, but finally he did.
Old Master was uneasy about de way things was going on, and he come out to de farm and stayed in de big house a
while.
One day in broad daylight he was on de gallery and down de road come 'bout 20 bushwhackers in Sesesh clothes on
horses and rid up to de gate. Old Master knowed all of them, and Captain Clay Taylor, who had been de master of
de nigger delegate, was at the head of them.
They had Jordan Pyles tied with a rope and walked along on de ground betwixt two horses.
"Whar you taking my nigger?", Old Master say. He run down off de gallery and out in de road.
"He ain't your nigger no more--you know that", old Captain Taylor holler back.
"He jest as much my nigger as that Taylor nigger was your nigger, and you ain't laid hands on him! Now you
jest have pity on my nigger!"
"Your nigger Jordan been in de Yankee army, and he was in de battle at Fort Piller and help kill our white
folks, and you know it!" Old Captain Taylor say, and argue on like that, but old Master jest take hold his
bridle and shake his head.
"No, Clay", he say, "that boy maybe didn't kill Confederates, but you and him both know my two boys
killed plenty Yankees, and you forgot I lost one of my boys in de War. Ain't that enough to pay for letting my
nigger alone?"
And old Captain Taylor give the word to turn Jordan loose, and they rid on down de road.
That's one reason my stepdaddy never did leave old Master's place, and I stayed on dere till I was grown and had
children.
The Yankees come through past our place three-four times, and one time they had a big battle jest a mile and a
half away at Parker's Crossroads.
I was in de field hoeing, and I remember I hadn't watered the cows we had hid way down in de woods, so I started
down to water them when I first heard de shooting.
We had de stock hid down in de woods and all de corn and stuff hid too, 'cause the Yankees and the Sesesh had been
riding through quite a lot, and either one take anything they needed iffen they found it.
First I hear something way off say "Br-r-rump!" Then again, and again. Then something sound like popcorn
beginning to pop real slow. Then it git faster and I start for de settlement and de big house.
All Master's folks was staying at de big house then, and couldn't git back to town 'count of de soldiers, so they
all put on they good clothes, with de hoop skirts and little sunshades and the lace pantaloons and got in the buggy
to go see de battle!
They rid off and it wasn't long till all the niggers was following behind. We all got to a hill 'bout a half a
mile from the crossroads and stopped when we couldn't see nothing but thick smoke all over de whole place.
We could see men on horses come in and out of de smoke, going this way and that way, and then some Yankees on horses
broke through de woods right close to us and scattered off down through de field. One of de white officers rid
up close and yelled at us and took off his hat, but I couldn't hear nothing he said.
Then he rid on and catch up with his men. They had stopped and was turning off to one side. He looked back and
waved his hat again for us to git away from that, and jest then he clapped his hand to his belly and fell off his
hoss.
Our white folks turned their buggy round and made it for home and no mistake! The niggers wasn't fur behind neither!
They fit on back toward our plantation, and some of the fighting was inside it at one corner. For three-four days
after that they was burying soldiers 'round there, and some of de graves was on our old place.
Long time afterwards people come and moved all them to other graveyards at Shiloh and Corinth and other places.
They was about a hundred killed all around there.
After de War I married Molly Timberlake and we lived on there 'til 1902, when we come to Indian Territory at Haskell.
They wasn't no Haskell there then, and I helped to build dat town, doing carpenter work and the like.
We had two boys, Bill and Jim Dick, and eight daughters, Effie, Ida, Etta, Eva, Jessie, Tommie, Bennie and Timmie.
Her real name is Timberlake after her mammy. They all went to school and graduated in the high schools.
My wife has been dead about ten years.
10-13-1937 [Date stamp: NOV 5 1937]
CHANEY RICHARDSON
Age 90 years Fort Gibson, Okla.
I was born in the old Caney settlement southeast of Tahlequah on the banks of Caney Creek. Off to the north we
could see the big old ridge of Sugar Mountain when the sun shine on him first thing in the morning when we all
getting up.
I didn't know nothing else but some kind of war until I was a grown woman, because when I first can remember my
old Master, Charley Rogers, was always on the lookout for somebody or other he was lined up against in the big
feud.
My master and all the rest of the folks was Cherokees, and they'd been killing each other off in the feud ever
since long before I was borned, and jest because old Master have a big farm and three-four families of Negroes
them other Cherokees keep on pestering his stuff all the time. Us children was always afeared to go any place less'n
some of the grown folks was along.
We didn't know what we was a-feared of, but we heard the Master and Mistress keep talking 'bout "another Party
killing" and we stuck close to the place.
Old Mistress' name was Nancy Rogers, but I was a orphan after I was a big girl and I called her "Aunt"
and "Mamma" like I did when I was little. You see my own mammy was the house woman and I was raised in
the house, and I heard the little children call old mistress "mamma" and so I did too. She never did
make me stop.
My pappy and mammy and us children lived in a one-room log cabin close to the creek bank and jest a little piece
from old Master's house.
My pappy's name was Joe Tucker and my mammy's name was Ruth Tucker. They belonged to a man named Tucker before
I was born and he sold them to Master Charley Rogers and he just let them go on by the same name if they wanted
to, because last name didn't mean nothing to a slave anyways. The folks jest called my pappy "Charley Rogers'
boy Joe."
I already had two sisters, Mary and Mandy, when I was born, and purty soon I had a baby brother, Louis. Mammy worked
at the Big House and took me along every day. When I was a little bigger I would help hold the hank when she done
the spinning and old Mistress done a lot of the weaving and some knitting. She jest set by the window and knit
most all of the time.
When we weave the cloth we had a big loom out on the gallery, and Miss Nancy tell us how to do it.
Mammy eat at our own cabin, and we had lots of game meat and fish the boys get in the Caney Creek. Mammy bring
down deer meat and wild turkey sometimes, that the Indian boys git on Sugar Mountain.
Then we had corn bread, dried bean bread and green stuff out'n Master's patch. Mammy make the bean bread when we
git short of corn meal and nobody going to the mill right away. She take and bile the beans and mash them up in
some meal and that make it go a long ways.
The slaves didn't have no garden 'cause they work the old Master's garden and make enough for everybody to have
some anyway.
When I was about 10 years old that feud got so bad the Indians was always talking about getting their horses and
cattle killed and their slaves harmed. I was too little to know how bad it was until one morning my own mammy went
off somewhere down the road to git some stuff to dye cloth and she didn't come back.
Lots of the young Indian bucks on both sides of the feud would ride around the woods at night, and old Master got
powerful oneasy about my mammy and had all the neighbors and slaves out looking for her, but nobody find her.
It was about a week later that two Indian men rid up and ast old master wasn't his gal Ruth gone. He says yes,
and they take one of the slaves along with a wagon to show where they seen her.
They find her in some bushes where she'd been getting bark to set the dyes, and she been dead all the time. Somebody
done hit her in the head with a club and shot her through and through with a bullet too. She was so swole up they
couldn't lift her up and jest had to make a deep hole right along side of her and roll her in it she was so bad
mortified.
Old Master nearly go crazy he was so mad, and the young Cherokee men ride the woods every night for about a month,
but they never catch on to who done it.
I think old Master sell the children or give them out to somebody then, because I never see my sisters and brother
for a long time after the Civil War, and for me, I have to go live with a new mistress that was a Cherokee neighbor.
Her name was Hannah Ross, and she raised me until I was grown.
I was her home girl, and she and me done a lot of spinning and weaving too. I helped the cook and carried water
and milked. I carried the water in a home-made pegging set on my head. Them peggings was kind of buckets made out
of staves set around a bottom and didn't have no handle.
I can remember weaving with Miss Hannah Ross. She would weave a strip of white and one of yellow and one of brown
to make it pretty. She had a reel that would pop every time it got to a half skein so she would know to stop and
fill it up again. We used copperas and some kind of bark she bought at the store to dye with. It was cotton clothes
winter and summer for the slaves, too, I'll tell you.
When the Civil War come along we seen lots of white soldiers in them brown butternut suits all over the place,
and about all the Indian men was in it too. Old master Charley Rogers' boy Charley went along too. Then pretty
soon--it seem like about a year--a lot of the Cherokee men come back home and say they not going back to the War
with that General Cooper and some of them go off the Federal side because the captain go to the Federal side too.
Somebody come along and tell me my own pappy have to go in the war and I think they say he on the Copper side,
and then after while Miss Hannah tell me he git kilt over in Arkansas.
I was so grieved all the time I don't remember much what went on, but I know pretty soon my Cherokee folks had
all the stuff they had et up by the soldiers and they was jest a few wagons and mules left.
All the slaves was piled in together and some of the grown ones walking, and they took us way down across the big
river and kept us in the bottoms a long time until the War was over.
We lived in a kind of a camp, but I was too little to know where they got the grub to feed us with. Most all the
Negro men was off somewhere in the War.
Then one day they had to bust up the camp and some Federal soldiers go with us and we all start back home. We git
to a place where all the houses is burned down and I ask what is that place. Miss Hannah say: "Skullyville,
child. That's where they had part of the War."
All the slaves was set out when we git to Fort Gibson, and the soldiers say we all free now. They give us grub
and clothes to the Negroes at that place. It wasn't no town but a fort place and a patch of big trees.
Miss Hannah take me to her place and I work there until I was grown. I didn't git any money that I seen, but I
got a good place to stay.
Pretty soon I married Ran Lovely and we lived in a double log house here at Fort Gibson. Then my second husband
was Henry Richardson, but he's been dead for years, too. We had six children, but they all dead but one.
I didn't want slavery to be over with, mostly because we had the War I reckon. All that trouble made me the loss
of my mammy and pappy, and I was always treated good when I was a slave. When it was over I had rather be at home
like I was. None of the Cherokees ever whipped us, and my mistress give me some mighty fine rules to live by to
git along in this world, too.
The Cherokee didn't have no jail for Negroes and no jail for themselves either. If a man done a crime he come back
to take his punishment without being locked up.
None of the Negroes ran away when I was a child that I know of. We all had plenty to eat. The Negroes didn't have
no school and so I can't read and write, but they did have a school after the War, I hear. But we had a church
made out of a brush arbor and we would sing good songs in Cherokee sometimes.
I always got Sunday off to play, and at night I could go git a piece of sugar or something to eat before I went
to bed and Mistress didn't care.
We played bread-and-butter and the boys played hide the switch. The one found the switch got to whip the one he
wanted to.
When I got sick they give me some kind of tea from weeds, and if I et too many roasting ears and swole up they
biled gourds and give me the liquor off'n them to make me throw up.
I've been a good church-goer all my life until I git too feeble, and I still understand and talk Cherokee language
and love to hear songs and parts of the Bible in it because it make me think about the time I was a little girl
before my mammy and pappy leave me.
[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]
RED RICHARDSON
Age 75 yrs. Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
I was born July 21, 1862, at Grimes County, Texas. Smith Richardson was my father's name, and Eliza Richardson
my mother's. My father came from Virginia. My mother she was born in Texas.
We lived in so many places round there I can't tell jest what, but we lived in a log house most of the time. We
slept on the flo' on pallets on one quilt. We ate cornbread, beans, vegetables, and got to drink plenty milk. We
ate rabbits, fish, possums and such as that but we didn't get no chicken. I don't have no fav'rite food, I don't
guess.
We wore shirts, long shirts slit up the side. I didn't know what pants was until I was 14. In Grimes County it
ain't even cold these days, and I never wore no shoes. I married in a suit made of broad cloth. It had a tail on
the coat.
Master Ben Hadley, and Mistress Minnie Hadley, they had three sons: Josh, Henry and Charley. Didn't have no overseer.
We had to call all white folks, poor or rich, Mr. Master and Mistress. Master Hadley owned 'bout 2,000 acres. He
had a big number of slaves. They used to wake 'em up early in the mornings by ringing a large bell. They said they
used to whip 'em, drive 'em, and sell 'em away from their chillun,--I'd hear my old folks talk about it. Say they
wasn't no such a thing as going to jail. The master stood good for anything his nigger done. If the master's nigger
killed 'im another nigger, the old master stood good.
They never had no schools for the Negro chillun. I can't remember the date of the first school--its in a book someplace--but
anyway I went to one of the first schools that was established for the education of Negro chillun.
You know Mr. Negro always was a church man, but he don't mean nothing. I don't have no fav'rite spiritual. All
of them's good ones. Whenever they'd baptise they'd sing:
"Harp From the Tune the Domeful Sound."
Which starts like this:
"Come live in man and view this ground where we must sho'ly lie."
I'm a member of Tabernacle Baptist Church myself, and I think all people should be religious 'cause Jesus died
for us all.
The patrollers used to run after me but I'd jump 'em. They used to have a permit to go from one plantation to another.
You had to go to old master and say, "I want to go to such and such a place." And if you had a permit
they didn't bother you. The pateroller would stop you and say, "Where you going? You got a permit to go to
such and such a place?" You'd say, yes suh, and show that pass. Den he wouldn't bother you and iffen he did
old master would git on 'em.
When 10 o'clock come which was bed time the slaves would go to their cabins and some of 'em would go stealing chickens,
hogs, steal sweet potatoes, and cook and eat 'em. Jest git in to all kind of devilment.
Old master would give 'em Sadday afternoon off, and they'd have them Sadday night breakdowns. We played a few games
such as marbles, mumble peg, and cards--jest anything to pass off the time. Heahs one of the games we'd play an'
I sho did like it too:
She is my sweetheart as I stand, Come and stand beside of me, Kiss her sweet and; Hug her near.
On Christmas they'd make egg nog, drink whiskey and kiss their girls.
Some wore charms to ward off the devil, but I don't believe in such. I do believe in voodoo like this: People can
put propositions up to you and fool you. Don't believe in ghost. Tried to see 'em but I never could.
Old master didn't turn my father loose and tell 'em we was free. They didn't turn us loose 'til they got the second
threat from President Lincoln. Good old Lincoln; they wasn't nothing like 'im. Booker T. Washington was one of
the finest Negro Educators in the world, but old Jefferson Davis was against the cullud man.
I think since slavery is all over, it has been a benefit to the cullud man. He's got more freedom now.
BETTY ROBERTSON
Age 93 yrs. Fort Gibson, Oklahoma
I was born close to Webber's Falls, in the Canadian District of the Cherokee Nation, in the same year that my pappy
was blowed up and killed in the big boat accident that killed my old Master.
I never did see my daddy excepting when I was a baby and I only know what my mammy told me about him. He come from
across the water when he was a little boy, and was grown when old Master Joseph Vann bought him, so he never did
learn to talk much Cherokee. My mammy was a Cherokee slave, and talked it good. My husband was a Cherokee born
negro, too, and when he got mad he forgit all the English he knowed.
Old Master Joe had a mighty big farm and several families of negroes, and he was a powerful rich man. Pappy's name
was Kalet Vann, and mammy's name was Sally. My brothers was name Sone and Frank. I had one brother and one sister
sold when I was little and I don't remember the names. My other sisters was Polly, Ruth and Liddie. I had to work
in the kitchen when I was a gal, and they was ten or twelve children smaller than me for me to look after, too.
Sometime Young Master Joe and the other boys give me a piece of money and say I worked for it, and I reckon I did
for I have to cook five or six times a day. Some of the Master's family was always going down to the river and
back, and every time they come in I have to fix something to eat. Old Mistress had a good cookin' stove, but most
Cherokees had only a big fireplace and pot hooks. We had meat, bread, rice, potatoes and plenty of fish and chicken.
The spring time give us plenty of green corn and beans too. I couldn't buy anything in slavery time, so I jest
give the piece of money to the Vann children. I got all the clothes I need from old Mistress, and in winter I had
high top shoes with brass caps on the toe. In the summer I wear them on Sunday, too. I wore loom cloth clothes,
dyed in copperas what the old negro women and the old Cherokee women made.
The slaves had a pretty easy time I think. Young Master Vann never very hard on us and he never whupped us, and
old Mistress was a widow woman and a good Christian and always kind. I sure did love her. Maybe old Master Joe
Vann was harder, I don't know, but that was before my time. Young Master never whip his slaves, but if they don't
mind good he sell them off sometimes. He sold one of my brothers and one sister because they kept running off.
They wasn't very big either, but one day two Cherokees rode up and talked a long time, then young Master came to
the cabin and said they were sold because mammy couldn't make them mind him. They got on the horses behind the
men and went off.
Old Master Joe had a big steam boat he called the Lucy Walker, and he run it up and down the Arkansas and the Mississippi
and the Ohio river, old Mistress say. He went clean to Louisville, Kentucky, and back. My pappy was a kind of a
boss of the negroes that run the boat, and they all belong to old Master Joe. Some had been in a big run-away and
had been brung back, and wasn't so good, so he keep them on the boat all the time mostly. Mistress say old Master
and my pappy on the boat somewhere close to Louisville and the boiler bust and tear the boat up. Some niggers say
my pappy kept hollering, "Run it to the bank! Run it to the bank!" but it sunk and him and old Master
died.
Old Master Joe was a big man in the Cherokees, I hear, and was good to his negroes before I was born. My pappy
run away one time, four or five years before I was born, mammy tell me, and at that time a whole lot of Cherokee
slaves run off at once. They got over in the Creek country and stood off the Cherokee officers that went to git
them, but pretty soon they give up and come home. Mammy say they was lots of excitement on old Master's place and
all the negroes mighty scared, but he didn't sell my pappy off. He jest kept him and he was a good negro after
that. He had to work on the boat, though, and never got to come home but once in a long while.
Young Master Joe let us have singing and be baptized if we want to, but I wasn't baptized till after the War. But
we couldn't learn to read or have a book, and the Cherokee folks was afraid to tell us about the letters and figgers
because they have a law you go to jail and a big fine if you show a slave about the letters.
When the War come they have a big battle away west of us, but I never see any battles. Lots of soldiers around
all the time though.
One day young Master come to the cabins and say we all free and can't stay there less'n we want to go on working
for him just like we'd been, for our feed and clothes. Mammy got a wagon and we traveled around a few days and
go to Fort Gibson. When we git to Fort Gibson they was a lot of negroes there, and they had a camp meeting and
I was baptized. It was in the Grand River close to the ford, and winter time. Snow on the ground and the water
was muddy and all full of pieces of ice. The place was all woods, and the Cherokees and the soldiers all come down
to see the baptizing.
We settled down a little ways above Fort Gibson. Mammy had the wagon and two oxen, and we worked a good size patch
there until she died, and then I git married to Cal Robertson to have somebody to take care of me. Cal Robertson
was eighty-nine years old when I married him forty years ago, right on this porch. I had on my old clothes for
the wedding, and I aint had any good clothes since I was a little slave girl. Then I had clean warm clothes and
I had to keep them clean, too!
I got my allotment as a Cherokee Freedman, and so did Cal, but we lived here at this place because we was too old
to work the land ourselves. In slavery time the Cherokee negroes do like anybody else when they is a death--jest
listen to a chapter in the Bible and all cry. We had a good song I remember. It was "Don't Call the Roll,
Jesus, Because I'm Coming Home." The only song I remember from the soldiers was: "Hang Jeff Davis to
a Sour Apple Tree", and I remember that because they said he used to be at Fort Gibson one time. I don't know
what he done after that.
I don't know about Robert Lee, but I know about Lee's Creek.
I been a good Christian ever since I was baptized, but I keep a little charm here on my neck anyways, to keep me
from having the nose bleed. Its got a buckeye and a lead bullet in it. I had a silver dime on it, too, for a long
time, but I took it off and got me a box of snuff. I'm glad the War's over and I am free to meet God like anybody
else, and my grandchildren can learn to read and write.
[Date stamp: AUG 18 1937]
HARRIET ROBINSON
Age 95 yrs. 500 Block N. Fonshill Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
I was born September 1, 1842, in Bastrop, Texas, on Colorado River. My pappy was named Harvey Wheeler and my mammy
was named Carolina Sims. My brothers and sisters was named Alex, Taylor, Mary, Cicero, Tennessee, Sarah, Jeff,
Ella and Nora. We lived in cedar log houses with dirt floors and double chimneys, and doors hung on wooden hinges.
One side of our beds was bored in the walls and had one leg on the other. Them white folks give each nigger family
a blanket in winter.
I nussed 3 white chillun, Lulu, Helen Augusta, and Lola Sims. I done this before that War that set us free. We
kids use to make extra money by toting gravel in our aprons. They'd give us dimes and silver nickles.
Our clothes was wool and cotton mixed. We had red rustic shoes, soles one-half inch thick. They'd go a-whick a-whack.
The mens had pants wid one seam and a right-hand pocket. Boys wore shirts.
We ate hominy, mush, grits and pone bread for the most part. Many of them ate out of one tray with wooden spoons.
All vittles for field hands was fixed together.
Women broke in mules throwed 'em down and roped 'em. They'd do it better'n men. While mammy made some hominy one
day both my foots was scalded and when they clipped them blisters, they jest put some cotton round them and catched
all dat yellow water and made me a yellow dress out of it. This was 'way back yonder in slavery, before the War.
Whenever white folks had a baby born den all de old niggers had to come thoo the room and the master would be over
'hind the bed and he'd say, "Here's a new little mistress or master you got to work for." You had to
say, "Yessuh Master" and bow real low or the overseer would crack you. Them was slavery days, dog days.
I remember in slavery time we had stages. Them devilish things had jest as many wrecks as cars do today. Only thing,
we jest didn't have as many.
My mammy belonged to Master Colonel Sam Sims and his old mean wife Julia. My pappy belonged to Master Meke Smith
and his good wife Harriett. She was sho' a good woman. I was named after her. Master Sam and Master Meke was partners.
Ever year them rich men would send so many wagons to New Mexico for different things. It took 6 months to go and
come.
Slaves was punished by whip and starving. Decker was sho' a mean slave-holder. He lived close to us. Master Sam
didn't never whip me, but Miss Julia whipped me every day in the mawning. During the war she beat us so terrible.
She say, "Your master's out fighting and losing blood trying to save you from them Yankees, so you kin git
your'n here." Miss Julia would take me by my ears and butt my head against the wall. She wanted to whip my
mother, but old Master told her, naw sir. When his father done give my mammy to Master Sam, he told him not to
beat her, and iffen he got to whar he jest had to, jest bring her back and place her in his yard from whar he got
her.
White folks didn't 'low you to read or write. Them what did know come from Virginny. Mistress Julia used to drill
her chillun in spelling any words. At every word them chillun missed, she gived me a lick 'cross the head for it.
Meanest woman I ever seen in my whole life.
This skin I got now, it ain't my first skin. That was burnt off when I was a little child. Mistress used to have
a fire made on the fireplace and she made me scour the brass round it and my skin jest blistered. I jest had to
keep pulling it off'n me.
We didn't had no church, though my pappy was a preacher. He preached in the quarters. Our baptizing song was "On
Jordan's Stormy Bank I stand" and "Hark From The Tomb." Now all dat was before the War. We had all
our funerals at the graveyard. Everybody, chillun and all picked up a clod of dirt and throwed in on top the coffin
to help fill up the grave.
Taling 'bout niggers running away, didn't my step-pappy run away? Didn't my uncle Gabe run away? The frost would
jest bite they toes most nigh off too, whiles they was gone. They put Uncle Isom (my step-pappy) in jail and while's
he was in there he killed a white guardman. Then they put in the paper, "A nigger to kill", and our Master
seen it and bought him. He was a double-strengthed man, he was so strong. He'd run off so help you God. They had
the blood hounds after him once and he caught the hound what was leading and beat the rest of the dogs. The white
folks run up on him before he knowed it and made them dogs eat his ear plumb out. But don't you know he got away
anyhow. One morning I was sweeping out the hall in the big house and somebody come a-knocking on the front door
and I goes to the door. There was Uncle Isom wid rags all on his head. He said, "Tell ole master heah I am."
I goes to Master's door and says, "Master Colonel Sam, Uncle Isom said heah he am." He say, "Go
'round to the kitchen and tell black mammy to give you breakfast." When he was thoo' eating they give him
300 lashes and, bless my soul, he run off again.
When we went to a party the nigger fiddlers would play a chune dat went lak this:
I fooled Ole Mastah 7 years Fooled the overseer three; Hand me down my banjo And I'll tickle your bel-lee.
We had the same doctors the white folks had and we wore asafetida and garlic and onions to keep from taking all
them ailments.
I 'member the battle being fit. The white folks buried all the jewelry and silver and all the gold in the Blue
Ridge Mountains, in Orange, Texas. Master made all us niggers come together and git ready to leave 'cause the Yankees
was coming. We took a steamer. Now this was in slavery time, sho' 'nuff slavery. Then we got on a steamship and
pulled out to Galveston. Then he told the captain to feed we niggers. We was on the bay, not the ocean. We left
Galveston and went on trains for Houston.
One, my sister Liza, was mulatto and Master Colonel Sims' son had 3 chillun by her. We never seen her no more after
her last child was born. I found out though that she was in Canada.
After the War, Master Colonel Sims went to git the mail and so he call Daniel Ivory, the overseer, and say to him,
"Go round to all the quarters and tell all the niggers to come up, I got a paper to read to 'em. They're free
now, so you kin git you another job, 'cause I ain't got no more niggers which is my own." Niggers come up
from the cabins nappy-headed, jest lak they gwine to the field. Master Colonel Sims say, "Caroline (that's
my mammy), you is free as me. Pa said bring you back and I'se gwina do jest that. So you go on and work and I'll
pay you and your three oldest chillun $10.00 a month a head and $4.00 fer Harriet," that's me, and then he
turned to the rest and say "Now all you'uns will receive $10.00 a head till the crops is laid by." Don't
you know before he got half way thoo', over half them niggers was gone.
Them Klu Klux Klans come and ask for water with the false stomachs and make lak they was drinking three bucketsful.
They done some terrible things, but God seen it all and marked it down.
We didn't had no law, we had "bureau." Why, in them days iffen somebody stole anything from you, they
had to pay you and not the Law. Now they done turned that round and you don't git nothing.
One day whiles master was gone hunting, Mistress Julia told her brother to give Miss Harriett (me) a free whipping.
She was a nigger killer. Master Colonel Sam come home and he said, "You infernal sons o' bitches don't you
know there is 300 Yankees camped out here and iffen they knowed you'd whipped this nigger the way you done done,
they'd kill all us. Iffen they find it out, I'll kill all you all." Old rich devils, I'm here, but they is
gone.
God choosed Abraham Lincoln to free us. It took one of them to free us so's they couldn't say nothing.
Doing one 'lection they sung:
Clark et the watermelon J. D. Giddings et the vine! Clark gone to Congress An' J. D. Giddings left behind.
They hung Jeff Davis up a sour apple tree. They say he was a president, but he wasn't, he was a big senator man.
Booker T. Washington was all right in his way, I guess, but Bruce and Fred Douglass, or big mens jest sold us back
to the white folks.
I married Haywood Telford and had 13 head of chillun by him. My oldest daughter is the mammy of 14. All my chillun
but four done gone to heaven before me.
I jined the church in Chapel Hill, Texas. I am born of the Spirit of God sho' nuff. I played with him seven years
and would go right on dancing at Christmas time. Now I got religion. Everybody oughta live right, though you won't
have no friends iffen you do.
Our overseer was a poor man. Had us up before day and lak-a-that. He was paid to be the head of punishment. I jest
didn't like to think of them old slavery days, dogs' days.
[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]
KATIE ROWE
Age 88 yrs. Tulsa, Oklahoma
I can set on de gallery, whar de sunlight shine bright, and sew a powerful fine seam when my grandchillun wants
a special purty dress for de school doings, but I ain't worth much for nothing else I reckon.
These same old eyes seen powerful lot of tribulations in my time, and when I shets 'em now I can see lots of l'il
chillun jest lak my grandchillun, toting hoes bigger dan dey is, and dey pore little black hands and legs bleeding
whar dey scratched by de brambledy weeds, and whar dey got whuppings 'cause dey didn't git out all de work de overseer
set out for 'em.
I was one of dem little slave gals my own self, and I never seen nothing but work and tribulations till I was a
grown up woman, jest about.
De niggers had hard traveling on de plantation whar I was born and raised, 'cause old Master live in town and jest
had de overseer on de place, but iffen he had lived out dar hisself I speck it been as bad, 'cause he was a hard
driver his own self.
He git biling mad when de Yankees have dat big battle at Pea Ridge and scatter de 'Federates all down through our
country all bleeding and tied up and hungry, and he jest mount on his hoss and ride out to de plantation whar we
all hoeing corn.
He ride up and tell old man Saunders--dat de overseer--to bunch us all up round de lead row man--dat my own uncle
Sandy--and den he tell us de law!
"You niggers been seeing de 'Federate soldiers coming by here looking purty raggedy and hurt and wore out,"
he say, "but dat no sign dey licked!
"Dem Yankees ain't gwine git dis fur, but iffen dey do you all ain't gwine git free by 'em, 'cause I gwine
free you befo' dat. When dey git here dey going find you already free, 'cause I gwine line you up on de bank of
Bois d' Arc Creek and free you wid my shotgun! Anybody miss jest one lick wid de hoe, or one step in de line, or
one clap of dat bell, or one toot of de horn, and he gwine be free and talking to de debil long befo' he ever see
a pair of blue britches!"
Dat de way he talk to us, and dat de way he act wid us all de time.
We live in de log quarters on de plantation, not far from Washington, Arkansas, close to Bois d' Arc Creek, in
de edge of de Little River bottom.
Old Master's name was Dr. Isaac Jones, and he live in de town, whar he keep four, five house niggers, but he have
about 200 on de plantation, big and little, and old man Saunders oversee 'em at de time of de War. Old Mistress
name was Betty, and she had a daughter name Betty about grown, and then they was three boys, Tom, Bryan, and Bob,
but they was too young to go to de War. I never did see 'em but once or twice 'til after de War.
Old Master didn't go to de War, 'cause he was a doctor and de onliest one left in Washington, and purty soon he
was dead anyhow.
Next fall after he ride out and tell us dat he gwine shoot us befo' he let us free he come out to see how his steam
gin doing. De gin box was a little old thing 'bout as big as a bedstead, wid a long belt running through de side
of de gin house out to de engine and boiler in de yard. De boiler burn cord wood, and it have a little crack in
it whar de nigger ginner been trying to fix it.
Old Master come out, hopping mad 'cause de gin shet down, and ast de ginner, old Brown, what de matter. Old Brown
say de boiler weak and it liable to bust, but old Master jump down off'n his hoss and go 'round to de boiler and
say, "Cuss fire to your black heart! Dat boiler all right! Throw on some cordwood, cuss fire to your heart!"
Old Brown start to de wood pile grumbling to hisself and old Master stoop down to look at de boiler again, and
it blow right up and him standing right dar!
Old Master was blowed all to pieces, and dey jest find little bitsy chunks of his clothes and parts of him to bury.
De wood pile blow down, and old Brown land way off in de woods, but he wasn't killed.
Two wagons of cotton blowed over, and de mules run away, and all de niggers was scared nearly to death 'cause we
knowed de overseer gwine be a lot worse, now dat old Master gone.
Before de War when Master was a young man de slaves didn't have it so hard, my mammy tell me. Her name was Fanny
and her old mammy name was Nanny. Grandma Nanny was alive during de War yet.
How she come in de Jones family was dis way: old Mistress was jest a little girl, and her older brother bought
Nanny and give her to her. I think his name was Little John, anyways we called him Master Little John. He drawed
up a paper what say dat Nanny allus belong to Miss Betty and all de chillun Nanny ever have belong to her, too,
and nobody can't take 'em for a debt and things like dat. When Miss Betty marry, old Master he can't sell Nanny
or any of her chillun neither.
Dat paper hold good too, and grandmammy tell me about one time it hold good and keep my own mammy on de place.
Grandmammy say mammy was jest a little gal and was playing out in de road wid three, four other little chillun
when a white man and old Master rid up. The white man had a paper about some kind of a debt, and old Master say
take his pick of de nigger chillun and give him back de paper.
Jest as Grandmammy go to de cabin door and hear him say dat de man git off his hoss and pick up my mammy and put
her up in front of him and start to ride off down de road.
Pretty soon Mr. Little John come riding up and say something to old Master, and see grandmammy standing in de yard
screaming and crying. He jest job de spur in his hoss and go kiting off down de road after dat white man.
Mammy say he ketch up wid him jest as he git to Bois d' Arc Creek and start to wade de hoss across. Mr. Little
John holler to him to come back wid dat little nigger 'cause de paper don't kiver dat child, 'cause she old Mistress'
own child, and when de man jest ride on, Mr. Little John throw his big old long hoss-pistol down on him and make
him come back.
De man hopping mad, but he have to give over my mammy and take one de other chillun on de debt paper.
Old Master allus kind of techy 'bout old Mistress having niggers he can't trade or sell, and one day he have his
whole family and some more white folks out at de plantation. He showing 'em all de quarters when we all come in
from de field in de evening, and he call all de niggers up to let de folks see 'em.
He make grandmammy and mammy and me stand to one side and den he say to the other niggers, "Dese niggers belong
to my wife but you belong to me, and I'm de only one you is to call Master.
"Dis is Tom, and Bryan, and Bob, and Miss Betty, and you is to call 'em dat, and don't you ever call one of
'em Young Master or Young Mistress, cuss fire to your black hearts!" All de other white folks look kind of
funny, and old Mistress look 'shamed of old Master.
My own pappy was in dat bunch, too. His name was Frank, and after de War he took de name of Frank Henderson, 'cause
he was born under dat name, but I allus went by Jones, de name I was born under.
Long about de middle of de War, after old Master was killed, de soldiers begin coming 'round de place and camping.
Dey was Southern soldiers and dey say dey have to take de mules and most de corn to git along on. Jest go in de
barns and cribs and take anything dey want, and us niggers didn't have no sweet 'taters nor Irish 'taters to eat
on when dey gone neither.
One bunch come and stay in de woods across de road from de overseer's house, and dey was all on hosses. Dey lead
de hosses down to Bois d' Arc Creek every morning at daylight and late every evening to git water. When we going
to de field and when we coming in we allus see dem leading big bunches of hosses.
Dey bugle go jest 'bout de time our old horn blow in de morning and when we come in dey eating supper, and we smell
it and sho' git hungry!
Before old Master died he sold off a whole lot of hosses and cattle, and some niggers too. He had de sales on de
plantation, and white men from around dar come to bid, and some traders come. He had a big stump whar he made de
niggers stand while dey was being sold, and de men and boys had to strip off to de waist to show dey muscle and
iffen dey had any scars or hurt places, but de women and gals didn't have to strip to de waist.
De white men come up and look in de slave's mouth jest lak he was a mule or a hoss.
After old Master go, de overseer hold one sale, but mostly he jest trade wid de traders what come by. He make de
niggers git on de stump, through. De traders all had big bunches of slaves and dey have 'em all strung out in a
line going down de road. Some had wagons and de chillun could ride, but not many. Dey didn't chain or tie 'em 'cause
dey didn't have no place dey could run to anyway.
I seen chillun sold off and de mammy not sold, and, sometimes de mammy sold and a little baby kept on de place
and give to another woman to raise. Dem white folks didn't care nothing 'bout how de slaves grieved when dey tore
up a family.
Old man Saunders was de hardest overseer of anybody. He would git mad and give a whipping some time and de slave
wouldn't even know what it was about.
My uncle Sandy was de lead row nigger, and he was a good nigger and never would tech a drap of likker. One night
some de niggers git hold of some likker somehow, and dey leave de jug half full on de step of Sandy's cabin. Next
morning old man Saunders come out in de field so mad he was pale.
He jest go to de lead row and tell Sandy to go wid him, and start toward de woods along Bois d' Arc Creek wid Sandy
follering behind. De overseer always carry a big heavy stick, but we didn't know he was so mad, and dey jest went
off in de woods.
Purty soon we hear Sandy hollering and we know old overseer pouring in on, den de overseer come back by his self
and go on up to de house.
Come late evening he come and see what we done in de day's work, and go back to de quarters wid us all. Then he
git to mammy's cabin, whar grandmammy live too, he say to grandmammy, "I sent Sandy down in de woods to hunt
a hoss, he gwine come in hungry purty soon. You better make him a extra hoe cake," and he kind of laugh and
go on to his house.
Jest soon as he gone we all tell grandmammy we think he got a whipping, and sho' nuff he didn't come in.
De next day some white boys find uncle Sandy whar dat overseer done killed him and throwed him in a little pond,
and dey never done nothing to old man Saunders at all!
When he go to whip a nigger he make him strip to de waist, and he take a cat-o-nine tails and bring de blisters,
and den bust de blisters wid a wide strap of leather fastened to a stick handle. I seen de blood running out'n
many a back, all de way from de neck to de waist!
Many de time a nigger git blistered and cut up so dat we have to git a sheet and grease it wid lard and wrap 'em
up in it, and dey have to wear a greasy cloth wrapped around dey body under de shirt for three-four days after
dey git a big whipping!
Later on in de War de Yankees come in all around us and camp, and de overseer git sweet as honey in de comb! Nobody
git a whipping all de time de Yankees dar!
Dey come and took all de meat and corn and 'taters dey want too, and dey tell us, "Why don't you poor darkeys
take all de meat and molasses you want? You made it and it's your's much as anybody's!" But we know dey soon
be gone, and den we git a whipping iffen we do. Some niggers run off and went wid de Yankees, but dey had to work
jest as hard for dem, and dey didn't eat so good and often wid de soldiers.
I never forget de day we was set free!
Dat morning we all go to de cotton field early, and den a house nigger come out from old Mistress on a hoss and
say she want de overseer to come into town, and he leave and go in. After while de old horn blow up at de overseer's
house, and we all stop and listen, 'cause it de wrong time of day for de horn.
We start chopping again, and dar go de horn again.
De lead row nigger holler "Hold up!" And we all stop again. "We better go on in. Dat our horn,"
he holler at de head nigger, and de head nigger think so too, but he say he afraid we catch de devil from de overseer
iffen we quit widout him dar, and de lead row man say maybe he back from town and blowing de horn hisself, so we
line up and go in.
When we git to de quarters we see all de old ones and de chillun up in de overseer's yard, so we go on up dar.
De overseer setting on de end of de gallery wid a paper in his hand, and when we all come up he say come and stand
close to de gallery. Den he call off everybody's name and see we all dar.
Setting on de gallery in a hide-bottom chair was a man we never see before. He had on a big broad black hat lak
de Yankees wore but it din't have no yaller string on it lak most de Yankees had, and he was in store clothes dat
wasn't homespun or jeans, and dey was black. His hair was plumb gray and so was his beard, and it come way down
here on his chest, but he didn't look lak he was very old, 'cause his face was kind of fleshy and healthy looking.
I think we all been sold off in a bunch, and I notice some kind of smiling, and I think they sho' glad of it.
De man say, "You darkies know what day dis is?" He talk kind, and smile.
We all don't know of course, and we jest stand dar and grin. Pretty soon he ask again and de head man say, No,
we don't know.
"Well dis de fourth day of June, and dis is 1865, and I want you all to 'member de date, 'cause you allus
going 'member de day. Today you is free, Jest lak I is, and Mr. Saunders and your Mistress and all us white people,"
de man say.
"I come to tell you", he say, "and I wants to be sho' you all understand, 'cause you don't have
to git up and go by de horn no more. You is your own bosses now, and you don't have to have no passes to go and
come."
We never did have no passes, nohow, but we knowed lots of other niggers on other plantations got 'em.
"I wants to bless you and hope you always is happy, and tell you got all de right and lief [TR: sic] dat any
white people got", de man say, and den he git on his hoss and ride off.
We all jest watch him go on down de road, and den we go up to Mr. Saunders and ask him what he want us to do. He
jest grunt and say do lak we dam please, he reckon, but git off dat place to do it, less'n any of us wants to stay
and make de crop for half of what we make.
None of us know whar to go, so we all stay, and he split up de fields and show us which part we got to work in,
and we go on lak we was, and make de crop and git it in, but dey ain't no more horn after dat day. Some de niggers
lazy and don't git in de field early, and dey git it took away from 'em, but dey plead around and git it back and
work better de rest of dat year.
But we all gits fooled on dat first go-out! When de crop all in we don't git half! Old Mistress sick in town, and
de overseer was still on de place and he charge us half de crop for de quarters and de mules and tools and grub!
Den he leave, and we gits another white man, and he sets up a book, and give us half de next year, and take out
for what we use up, but we all got something left over after dat first go-out.
Old Mistress never git well after she lose all her niggers, and one day de white boss tell us she jest drap over
dead setting in her chair, and we know her heart jest broke.
Next year de chillun sell off most de place and we scatter off, and I and mammy go into Little Rock and do work
in de town. Grandmammy done dead.
I git married to John White in Little Rock, but he died and we didn't have no chillun. Den in four, five years
I marry Billy Rowe. He was a Cherokee citizen and he had belonged to a Cherokee name Dave Rowe, and lived east
of Tahlequah before de War. We married in Little Rock, but he had land in de Cherokee Nation, and we come to east
of Tahlequah and lived 'til he died, and den I come to Tulsa to live wid my youngest daughter.
Billy Rowe and me had three chillun, Ellie, John, and Lula. Lula married a Thomas, and it's her I lives with.
Lots of old people lak me say dat dey was happy in slavery, and dat dey had de worst tribulations after freedom,
but I knows dey didn't have no white master and overseer lak we all had on our place. Dey both dead now I reckon,
and dey no use talking 'bout de dead, but I know I been gone long ago iffen dat white man Saunder didn't lose his
hold on me.
It was de fourth day of June in 1865 I begins to live, and I gwine take de picture of dat old man in de big black
hat and long whiskers, setting on de gallery and talking kind to us, clean into my grave wid me.
No, bless God, I ain't never seen no more black boys bleeding all up and down de back under a cat o' nine tails,
and I never go by no cabin and hear no poor nigger groaning, all wrapped up in a lardy sheet no more!
I hear my chillun read about General Lee, and I know he was a good man, I didn't know nothing about him den, but
I know now he wasn't fighting for dat kind of white folks.
Maybe dey dat kind still yet, but dey don't show it up no more, and I got lots of white friends too. All my chillun
and grandchillun been to school, and dey git along good, and I know we living in a better world, what dey ain't
nobody "cussing fire to my black heart!"
I sho' thank de good Lawd I got to see it.
MORRIS SHEPPARD
Age 85 yrs. Fort Gibson, Okla.
Old Master tell me I was borned in November 1852, at de old home place about five miles east of Webber's Falls,
mebbe kind of northeast, not far from de east bank of de Illinois River.
Master's name was Joe Sheppard, and he was a Cherokee Indian. Tall and slim and handsome. He had black eyes and
mustache but his hair was iron gray, and everybody liked him because he was so good-natured and kind.
I don't remember old Mistress' name. My mammy was a Crossland negro before she come to belong to Master Joe and
marry my pappy, and I think she come wid old Mistress and belong to her. Old Mistress was small and mighty pretty
too, and she was only half Cherokee. She inherit about half a dozen slaves, and say dey was her own and old Master
can't sell one unless she give him leave to do it.
Dey only had two families of slaves wid about twenty in all, and dey only worked about fifty acres, so we sure
did work every foot of it good. We git three or four crops of different things out of dat farm every year, and
something growing on dat place winter and summer.
Pappy's name was Caesar Sheppard and Mammy's name was Easter. Dey was both raised 'round Webber's Falls somewhere.
I had two brothers, Silas and George, dat belong to Mr. George Holt in Webber's Falls town. I got a pass and went
to see dem sometimes, and dey was both treated mighty fine.
The Big House was a double log wid a big hall and a stone chimney but no porches, wid two rooms at each end, one
top side of de other. I thought it was mighty big and fine.
Us slaves lived in log cabins dat only had one room and no windows so we kept de doors open most of de time. We
had home-made wooden beds wid rope springs, and de little ones slept on trundle beds dat was home made too.
At night dem trundles was jest all over de floor, and in de morning we shove dem back under de big beds to git
dem out'n de way. No nails in none of dem nor in de chairs and tables. Nails cost big money and old Master's blacksmith
wouldn't make none 'cepting a few for old Master now and den, so we used wooden dowels to put things together.
They was so many of us for dat little field we never did have to work hard. Up at five o'clock and back in sometimes
about de middle of de evening, long before sundown, unless they was a crop to git in before it rain or something
like dat.
When crop was laid by de slaves jest work 'round at dis and dat and keep tol'able busy. I never did have much of
a job, jest tending de calves mostly. We had about twenty calves and I would take dem out and graze 'em while some
grown-up negro was grazing de cows so as to keep de cows milk. I had me a good blaze-faced horse for dat.
One time old Master and another man come and took some calves off and Pappy say old Master taking dem off to sell.
I didn't know what "sell" meant and I ast Pappy, "Is he going to bring 'em back when he git through
selling them?" I never did see no money neither, until time of de War or a little before.
Master Joe was sure a good provider, and we always had plenty of corn pone, sow belly and greens, sweet potatoes,
cow peas and cane molasses. We even had brown sugar and cane molasses most of de time before de War. Sometimes
coffee, too.
De clothes wasn't no worry neither. Everything we had was made by my folks. My aunt done de carding and spinning
and my mammy done de weaving and cutting and sewing, and my pappy could make cowhide shoes wid wooden pegs. Dey
was for bad winter only.
Old Master bought de cotton in Ft. Smith because he didn't raise no cotton, but he had a few sheep and we had wool-mix
for winter.
Everything was stripedy 'cause Mammy like to make it fancy. She dye wid copperas and walnut and wild indigo and
things like dat and make pretty cloth. I wore a stripedy shirt till I was about eleven years old, and den one day
while we was down in de Choctaw Country old Mistress see me and nearly fall off'n her horse! She holler, "Easter,
you go right now and make dat big buck of a boy some britches!"
We never put on de shoes until about late November when de frost begin to hit regular and split our feet up, and
den when it git good and cold and de crop all gathered in anyways, they is nothing to do 'cepting hog killing and
a lot of wood chopping, and you don't git cold doing dem two things.
De hog killing mean we gits lots of spare-ribs and chitlings, and somebody always git sick eating too much of dat
fresh pork. I always pick a whole passel of muskatines for old Master and he make up sour wine, and dat helps out
when we git the bowel complaint from eating dat fresh pork.
If somebody bad sick he git de doctor right quick, and he don't let no negroes mess around wid no poultices and
teas and sech things like cupping-horns neither!
Us Cherokee slaves seen lots of green corn shootings and de like of dat, but we never had no games of our own.
We was too tired when we come in to play any games. We had to have a pass to go any place to have singing or praying,
and den they was always a bunch of patrollers around to watch everything we done. Dey would come up in a bunch
of about nine men on horses, and look at all our passes, and if a negro didn't have no pass dey wore him out good
and made him go home. Dey didn't let us have much enjoyment.
Right after de War de Cherokees that had been wid the South kind of pestered the freedmen some, but I was so small
dey never bothered me; jest de grown ones. Old Master and Mistress kept on asking me did de night riders persecute
me any but dey never did. Dey told me some of dem was bad on negroes but I never did see none of dem night riding
like some said dey did.
Old Master had some kind of business in Fort Smith, I think, 'cause he used to ride in to dat town 'bout every
day on his horse. He would start at de crack of daylight and not git home till way after dark. When he get home
he call my uncle in and ask about what we done all day and tell him what we better do de next day. My uncle Joe
was de slave boss and he tell us what de Master say do.
When dat Civil War come along I was a pretty big boy and I 'remember it good as anybody. Uncle Joe tell us all
to lay low and work hard and nobody bother us, and he would look after us. He sure stood good with de Cherokee
neighbors we had, and dey all liked him. There was Mr. Jim Collins, and Mr. Bell, and Mr. Dave Franklin, and Mr.
Jim Sutton and Mr. Blackburn that lived around close to us and dey all had slaves. Dey was all wid the South, but
dey was a lot of dem Pin Indians all up on de Illinois River and dey was wid de North and dey taken it out on de
slave owners a lot before de War and during it too.
Dey would come in de night and hamstring de horses and maybe set fire to de barn, and two of 'em named Joab Scarrel
and Tom Starr killed my pappy one night just before de War broke out.
I don't know what dey done it for, only to be mean, and I guess they was drunk.
Them Pins was after Master all de time for a while at de first of de War, and he was afraid to ride into Fort Smith
much. Dey come to de house one time when he was gone to Fort Smith and us children told dem he was at Honey Springs,
but they knowed better and when he got home he said somebody shot at him and bushwhacked him all the way from Wilson's
Rock to dem Wildhorse Mountains, but he run his horse like de devil was setting on his tail and dey never did hit
him. He never seen them neither. We told him 'bout de Pins coming for him and he just laughed.
When de War come old Master seen he was going into trouble and he sold off most of de slaves. In de second year
of de War he sold my mammy and my aunt dat was Uncle Joe's wife and my two brothers and my little sister. Mammy
went to a mean old man named Peper Goodman and he took her off down de river, and pretty soon Mistress tell me
she died 'cause she can't stand de rough treatment.
When Mammy went old Mistress took me to de Big House to help her, and she was kind to me like I was part of her
own family. I never forget when they sold off some more negroes at de same time, too, and put dem all in a pen
for de trader to come and look at.
He never come until the next day, so dey had to sleep in dat pen in a pile like hogs.
It wasn't my Master done dat. He done already sold 'em to a man and it was dat man was waiting for de trader. It
made my Master mad, but dey didn't belong to him no more and he couldn't say nothing.
The man put dem on a block and sold 'em to a man dat had come in on a steamboat, and he took dem off on it when
de freshet come down and de boat could go back to Fort Smith. It was tied up at de dock at Webber's Falls about
a week and we went down and talked to my aunt and brothers and sister. De brothers was Sam and Eli. Old Mistress
cried jest like any of de rest of us when de boat pull out with dem on it.
Pretty soon all de young Cherokee menfolks all gone off to de War, and de Pins was riding 'round all de time, and
it aint safe to be in dat part around Webber's Falls, so old Master take us all to Fort Smith where they was a
lot of Confederate soldiers.
We camp at dat place a while and old Mistress stay in de town wid some kinfolks. Den old Master get three wagons
and ox teams and take us all way down on Red River in de Choctaw Nation.
We went by Webber's Falls and filled de wagons. We left de furniture and only took grub and tools and bedding and
clothes, 'cause they wasn't very big wagons and was only single-yoke.
We went on a place in de Red River bottoms close to Shawneetown and not far from de place where all de wagons crossed
over to go into Texas. We was at dat place two years and made two little crops.
One night a runaway negro come across from Texas and he had de blood hounds after him. His britches was all muddy
and tore where de hounds had cut him up in de legs when he clumb a tree in de bottoms. He come to our house and
Mistress said for us negroes to give him something to eat and we did.
Then up come de man from Texas with de hounds and wid him was young Mr. Joe Vann and my uncle that belong to young
Joe. Dey called young Mr. Joe "Little Joe Vann" even after he was grown on account of when he was a little
boy before his pappy was killed. His pappy was old Captain "Rich Joe" Vann, and he been dead ever since
long before de War. My uncle belong to old Captain Joe nearly all his life.
Mistress try to get de man to tell her who de negro belong to so she can buy him, but de man say he can't sell
him and he take him on back to Texas wid a chain around his two ankles. Dat was one poor negro dat never got away
to de North, and I was sorry for him 'cause I know he must have had a mean master, but none of us Sheppard negroes,
I mean the grown ones, tried to git away.
I never seen any fighting in de War, but I seen soldiers in de South army doing a lot of blacksmithing 'long side
de road one day. Dey was fixing wagons and shoeing horses.
After de War was over, old Master tell me I am free but he will look out after me 'cause I am just a little negro
and I aint got no sense. I know he is right, too.
Well, I go ahead and make me a crop of corn all by myself and then I don't know what to do wid it. I was afraid
I would get cheated out of it 'cause I can't figure and read, so I tell old Master about it and he bought it off'n
me.
We never had no school in slavery and it was agin the law for anybody to even show a negro de letters and figures,
so no Cherokee slave could read.
We all come back to de old place and find de negro cabins and barns burned down and de fences all gone and de field
in crab grass and cockleburrs. But de Big House aint hurt 'cepting it need a new roof. De furniture is all gone,
and some said de soldiers burned it up for firewood. Some officers stayed in de house for a while and tore everything
up or took it off.
Master give me over to de National Freedmen's Bureau and I was bound out to a Cherokee woman name Lizzie McGee.
Then one day one of my uncles named Wash Sheppard come and tried to git me to go live wid him. He say he wanted
to git de family all together agin.
He had run off after he was sold and joined de North army and discharged at Fort Scott in Kansas, and he said lots
of freedmen was living close to each other up by Coffeyville in de Coo-ee-scoo-ee District.
I wouldn't go, so he sent Isaac and Joe Vann dat had been two of old Captain Joe's negroes to talk to me. Isaac
had been Young Joe's driver, and he told me all about how rich Master Joe was and how he would look after us negroes.
Dey kept after me 'bout a year, but I didn't go anyways.
But later on I got a freedman's allotment up in dat part close to Coffeyville, and I lived in Coffeyville a while
but I didn't like it in Kansas.
I lost my land trying to live honest and pay my debts. I raised eleven children just on de sweat of my hands and
none of dem ever tasted anything dat was stole.
When I left Mrs. McGee's I worked about three years for Mr. Sterling Scott and Mr. Roddy Reese. Mr. Reese had a
big flock of peafowls dat had belonged to Mr. Scott and I had to take care of dem.
Whitefolks, I would have to tromp seven miles to Mr. Scott's house two or three times a week to bring back some
old peafowl dat had got out and gone back to de old place!
Poor old Master and Mistress only lived a few years after de War. Master went plumb blind after he move back to
Webber's Falls and so he move up on de Illinois River 'bout three miles from de Arkansas, and there old Mistress
take de white swelling and die and den he die pretty soon. I went to see dem lots of times and they was always
glad to see me.
I would stay around about a week and help 'em, and dey would try to git me to take something but I never would.
Dey didn't have much and couldn't make anymore and dem so old. Old Mistress had inherited some property from her
pappy and dey had de slave money and when dey turned everything into good money after de War dat stuff only come
to about six thousand dollars in good money, she told me. Dat just about lasted 'em through until dey died, I reckon.
By and by I married Nancy Hildebrand what lived on Greenleaf Creek, 'bout four miles northwest of Gore. She had
belonged to Joe Hildebrand and he was kin to old Steve Hildebrand dat owned de mill on Flint Creek up in de Going
Snake District. She was raised up at dat mill, but she was borned in Tennessee before dey come out to de Nation.
Her master was white but he had married into de Nation and so she got a freedmen's allotment too. She had some
land close to Catoosa and some down on Greenleaf Creek.
We was married at my home in Coffeyville, and she bore me eleven children and then went on to her reward. A long
time ago I came to live wid my daughter Emma here at dis place, but my wife just died last year. She was eighty
three.
I reckon I wasn't cut out on de church pattern, but I raised my children right. We never had no church in slavery,
and no schooling, and you had better not be caught wid a book in your hand even, so I never did go to church hardly
any.
Wife belong to de church and all de children too, and I think all should look after saving their souls so as to
drive de nail in, and den go about de earth spreading kindness and hoeing de row clean so as to clinch dat nail
and make dem safe for Glory.
Of course I hear about Abraham Lincoln and he was a great man, but I was told mostly by my children when dey come
home from school about him. I always think of my old Master as de one dat freed me, and anyways Abraham Lincoln
and none of his North people didn't look after me and buy my crop right after I was free like old Master did. Dat
was de time dat was de hardest and everything was dark and confusion.
[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]
ANDREW SIMMS
Age 80 Sapulpa, Okla.
My parents come over on a slave ship from Africa about twenty year before I was born on the William Driver plantation
down in Florida. My folks didn't know each other in Africa but my old Mammy told me she was captured by Negro slave
hunters over there and brought to some coast town where the white buyers took her and carried her to America.
She was kinder a young gal then and was sold to some white folks when the boat landed here. Dunno who they was.
The same thing happen to my pappy. Must have been about the same time from the way they tells it. Maybe they was
on the [HW: same] boat, I dunno.
They was traded around and then mammy was sold to William Driver. The plantation was down in Florida. Another white
folks had a plantation close by. Mister Simms was the owner. Bill Simms--that's the name pappy kept after the War.
Somehow or other mammy and pappy meets 'round the place and the first thing happens they is in love. That's what
mammy say. And the next thing happen is me. They didn't get married. The Master's say it is alright for them to
have a baby. They never gets married, even after the War. Just jumped the broomstick and goes to living with somebody
else I reckon.
Then when I was four year old along come the War and Master Driver takes up his slaves and leaves the Florida country
and goes way out to Texas. Mammy goes along, I goes along, all the children goes along. I don't remember nothing
about the trip but I hears mammy talk about it when I gets older.
Texas, that was the place, down near Fairfield. That's where I learn to do the chores. But the work was easy for
the Master was kind as old Mammy herself and he never give me no hard jobs that would wear me down. All the slaves
on our place was treated good. All the time. They didn't whip. The Master feeds all the slaves on good clean foods
and lean meats so's they be strong and healthy.
Master Driver had four children, Mary, Julia, Frank and George. Every one of them children kind and good just the
old Master. They was never mean and could I find some of 'em now hard times would leave me on the run! They'd help
this old man get catched up on his eating!
Makes me think of the old song we use to sing:
Don't mind working from Sun to Sun, Iffen you give me my dinner--When the dinner time comes!
Nowadays I gets me something to eat when I can catch it. The trouble is sometimes I don't catch! But that ain't
telling about the slave days.
In them times it was mostly the overseers and the drivers who was the mean ones. They caused all the misery. There
was other whitefolks caused troubles too. Sneak around where there was lots of the black children on the plantation
and steal them. Take them poor children away off and sell them.
There wasn't any Sunday Schooling. There was no place to learn to read and write--no big brick schools like they
is now. The old Master say we can teach ourselves but we can't do it. Old Elam Bowman owned the place next door
to Mister Driver. If he catch his slaves toying with the pencil, why, he cut off one of their fingers. Then I reckon
they lost interest in education and get their mind back on the hoe and plow like he say for them to do.
I didn't see no fighting during of the War. If they was any Yankees soldiering around the country I don't remember
nothing of it.
Long time after the War is over, about 1885, I meets a gal named Angeline. We courts pretty fast and gets married.
The wedding was a sure enough affair with the preacher saying the words just like the whitefolks marriage. We is
sure married.
The best thing we do after that is raise us a family. One of them old fashioned families. Big 'uns! Seventeen children
does we have and twelve of them still living. Wants to know they names? I ain't never forgets a one! There was
Lucy, Bill, Ebbie, Cora, Minnie, George, Frank, Kizzie, Necie, Andrew, Joe, Sammie, David, Fannie, Jacob, Bob and
Myrtle.
All good children. Just like their old pappy who's tried to care for 'em just like the old Master takes care of
their old daddy when he was a boy on that plantation down Texas way.
When the age comes on a man I reckon religion gets kind of meanful. Thinks about it more'n when he's young and
busy in the fields. I believes in the Bible and what it says to do. Some of the Colored folks takes to the voodoo.
I don't believe in it. Neither does I believe in the fortune telling or charms. I aims to live by the Bible and
leave the rabbit foots alone!
10-19-1938
LIZA SMITH
Age 91 Muskogee, Oklahoma
Both my mammy and pappy was brought from Africa on a slave boat and sold on de Richmond (Va.) slave market. What
year dey come over I don't know. My mammy was Jane Mason, belonging to Frank Mason; pappy was Frank Smith, belonging
to a master wid de same name. I mean, my pappy took his Master's name, and den after my folks married mammy took
de name of Smith, but she stayed on wid de Masons and never did belong to my pappy's master. Den, after Frank Mason
took all his slaves out of de Virginia county, mammy met up wid another man, Ben Humphries, and married him.
In Richmond, dat's where I was born, 'bout 1847, de Master said; and dat make me more dan 90-year old dis good
year. I had two brothers named Webb and Norman, a half-brother Charley, and two half-sisters, Mealey and Ann. Me,
I was born a slave and so was my son. His father, Toney, was one of de Mason slave boys; de Master said I was 'bout
13-year old when de boy was born.
Frank Mason was a young man when de War started, living wid his mother. Dey had lots of slaves, maybe a hundred,
and dey always try to take good care of 'em; even after de War was over he worried 'bout trying to get us settled
so's we wouldn't starve. De Master had overseer, but dere was no whuppings.
All de way from Richmond to a place dey call Waco, Texas, we traveled by ox-wagon and boats, and den de Master
figures we all be better off over in Arkansas and goes to Pine Bluff.
What wid all de running 'round de slaves was kept clean and always wid plenty to eat and good clothes to wear.
De Master was a plenty rich man and done what his mother, Mrs. Betsy Mason, told him when we all left de Big Mansion,
way back dere in Richmond. De Mistress said, "Frank, you watch over dem Negroes cause dey's good men and women;
keep dem clean!" Dat's what he done, up until we was freed, and den times was so hard nobody wanted us many
Negroes around, and de work was scarce, too. Hard times! Folks don't know what hard times is.
When a Negro get sick de master would send out for herbs and roots. Den one of de slaves who knew how to cook and
mix 'em up for medicine use would give de doses. All de men and women wore charms, something like beads, and if
dey was any good or not I don't know, but we didn't have no bad diseases like after dey set us free.
I was at Pine Bluff when de Yankees was shooting all over de place. De fighting got so hot we all had to leave;
dat's the way it was all de time for us during de War--running away to some place or de next place, and we was
all glad when it stopped and we could settle down in a place.
We was back at Waco when de peace come, but Master Frank was away from home when dat happen. It was on a Sunday
when he got back and called all de slaves up in de yard and counted all of dem, young and old.
The first thing he said was, "You men and women is all free! I'm going back to my own mammy in old Virginia,
but I ain't going back until all de old people is settled in cabins and de young folks fix up wid tents!"
Den he kinder stopped talking. Seem now like he was too excited to talk, or maybe he was feeling bad and worried
'bout what he going to do wid all of us. Pretty soon he said, "You men and women, can't none of you tell anybody
I ain't always been a good master. Old folks, have I ever treated you mean?" He asked. Everybody shout, "No,
sir!" And Master Frank smiled; den he told us he was going 'round and find places for us to live.
He went to see Jim Tinsley, who owned some slaves, about keeping us. Tinsley said he had cabins and could fix up
tents for extra ones, if his own Negroes was willing to share up with us. Dat was the way it worked out. We stayed
on dere for a while, but times was so hard we finally get dirty and ragged like all de Tinsley Negroes. But Master
Frank figure he done the best he could for us.
After he go back to Virginia we never hear no more of him, but every day I still pray if he has any folks in Richmond
dey will find me someway before I die. Is dere someway I could find dem, you s'pose?
[Date Stamp: Aug 12 1937]
LOU SMITH
Age 83 yrs. Platter, Okla.
Sho', I remembers de slavery days! I was a little gal but I can tell you lots of things about dem days. My job
was nussing de younguns. I took keer of them from daylight to dark. I'd have to sing them to sleep too. I'd sing:
"By-lo Baby Bunting Daddy's gone a-hunting To get a rabbit skin To wrap Baby Bunting in."
Sometimes I'd sing:
"Rock-a-bye baby, in a tree top When de wind blows your cradle'll rock. When de bough breaks de crad'll fall
Down comes baby cradle'n all."
My father was Jackson Longacre and he was born in Mississippi. My mother, Caroline, was born in South Carolina.
Both of them was born slaves. My father belonged to Huriah Longacre. He had a big plantation and lots of niggers.
He put up a lot of his slaves as security on a debt and he took sick and died so they put them all on de block
and sold them. My father and his mother (my grandma) was sold together. My old Mistress bought my grandmother and
old Mistress' sister bought my grandma's sister. These white women agreed that they would never go off so far that
the two slave women couldn't see each other. They allus kept this promise. A Mr. Covington offered old Master $700
for me when I was about ten years old, but he wouldn't sell me. He didn't need to for he was rich as cream and
my, how good he was to us.
Young Master married Miss Jo Arnold and old Master sent me and my mother over to live with them. I was small when
I was took out of old man McWilliams' yard. It was his wife that bought my grandmother and my father. My mother's
folks had always belonged to his family. They all moved to Texas and we all lived there until after the surrender.
Miss Jo wasn't a good Mistress and mother and me wasn't happy. When young Master was there he made her treat us
good but when he was gone she made our lives a misery to us. She was what we called a "low-brow." She
never had been used to slaves and she treated us like dogs. She said us kids didn't need to wear any clothes and
one day she told us we could jest take'em off as it cost too much to clothe us. I was jest a little child but I
knowed I oughten to go without my clothes. We wore little enough as it was. In summer we just wore one garment,
a sort of slip without any sleeves. Well, anyway she made me take off my clothes and I just crept off and cried.
Purty soon young Master come home.
He wanted to know what on earth I was doing without my dress on. I told him, and my goodness, but he raised the
roof. He told her if she didn't treat us better he was going to take us back to old Master. I never did have any
more good times 'cepting when I'd get to go to visit at old Master's. None of our family could be sold and that
was why old Master just loaned us to young Master. When old Master died, dey put all our names in a hat and all
the chilluns draw out a name. This was done to 'vide us niggers satisfactory. Young Master drawed my mother's name
and they all agreed that I should go with her, so back we went to Miss Jo. She wouldn't feed us niggers. She'd
make me set in a corner like a little dog. I got so hungry and howled so loud they had to feed me. When the surrender
come, I was eleven years old, and they told us we was free. I ran off and hid in the plum orchard and I said over'n
over, "I'se free, I'se free; I ain't never going back to Miss Jo." My mother come out and got me and
in a few days my father came and lived with us. He worked for young Master and the crops was divided with him.
Miss Jo died and we lived on there. My mother took over the charge of the house and the chillun for young Master
and we was all purty happy after that.
They was a white man come into our settlement and bought a plantation and some slaves. My, but he treated them
bad. He owned a boy about fifteen years old. One day he sent him on a errand. On the way home he got off his mule
and set down in the shade of a tree to rest. He fell asleep and the mule went home. When he woke up he was scared
to go home and he stayed out in de woods for several days. Finally they caught him and took him home and his master
beat him nearly to death. He then dug a hole and put him in it and piled corn shucks all around him. This nearly
killed him 'cause his body was cut up so with the whip. One of the niggers slipped off and went to the jining plantation
and told about the way the boy was being treated and a bunch of white men came over and made him take the child
out and doctor his wounds. This man lived there about ten years and he was so mean to his slaves 'til all the white
men round who owned niggers finally went to him and told him they would just give him so long to sell out and leave.
They made him sell his slaves to people there in the community, and he went back north.
My mother told me that he owned a woman who was the mother of several chillun and when her babies would get about
a year or two of age he'd sell them and it would break her heart. She never got to keep them. When her fourth baby
was born and was about two months old she just studied all the time about how she would have to give it up and
one day she said, "I just decided I'm not going to let old Master sell this baby; he just ain't going to do
it." She got up and give it something out of a bottle and purty soon it was dead. 'Course didn't nobody tell
on her or he'd of beat her nearly to death. There wasn't many folks that was mean to their slaves.
Old Master's boys played with the nigger boys all the time. They'd go swimming, fishing and hunting together. One
of his boys name was Robert but everybody called him Bud. They all would catch rabbits and mark them and turn them
loose. One day a boy come along with a rabbit he had caught in a trap. Old Master's boy noticed that it had Bud's
mark on it and they made him turn it loose.
Old Master was his own overseer, but my daddy was the overlooker. He was purty hard on them too, as they had to
work just like they never got tired. The women had to do housework, spinning, sewing and work in the fields too.
My mother was housewoman and she could keep herself looking nice. My, she went around with her hair and clothes
all Jenny-Lynned-up all the time until we went to live with Miss Jo. She took all the spirit out of poor mother
and me too.
I remember she allus kept our cabin as clean and neat as a pin. When other niggers come to visit her they would
say, "My you are Buckry Niggers (meaning we tried to live like white folks)."
I love to think of when we lived with old Master. We had a good time. Our cabin was nice and had a chimbley in
it. Mother would cook and serve our breakfast at home every morning and dinner and supper on Sundays. We'd have
biscuit every Sunday morning for our breakfast. That was something to look forward to.
We all went to church every Sunday. We would go to the white folks church in the morning and to our church in the
evening. Bill McWilliams, old Master's oldest boy, didn't take much stock in church. He owned a nigger named Bird,
who preached for us. Bill said, "Bird, you can't preach, you can't read, how on earth can you get a text out
of the Bible when you can't even read? How'n hell can a man preach that don't know nothing?" Bird told him
the Lord had called him to preach and he'd put the things in his mouth that he ought to say. One night Bill went
to church and Bird preached the hair-raisingest sermon you ever heard. Bill told him all right to go and preach,
and he gave Bird a horse and set him free to go anywhere he wanted to and preach.
Old Master and old Mistress lived in grand style. Bob was the driver of their carriage. My, but he was always slick
and shiny. He'd set up in front with his white shirt and black clothes. He looked like a black martin (bird) with
a white breast. The nurse set in the back with the chillun. Old Master and Mistress set together in the front seat.
Old Master and Mistress would come down to the quarters to eat Christmas dinners sometimes and also birthday dinners.
It was sho' a big day when they done that. They'd eat first, and the niggers would sing and dance to entertain
them. Old Master would walk 'round through the quarters talking to the ones that was sick or too old to work. He
was awful kind. I never knowed him to whip much. Once he whipped a woman for stealing. She and mother had to spin
and weave. She couldn't or didn't work as fast as Ma and wouldn't have as much to show for her days work. She'd
steal hanks of Ma's thread so she couldn't do more work than she did. She'd also steal old Master's tobacco. He
caught up with her and whipped her.
I never saw any niggers on the block but I remember once they had a sale in town and I seen them pass our house
in gangs, the little ones in wagons and others walking. I've seen slaves who run away from their masters and they'd
have to work in the field with a big ball and chain on their leg. They'd hoe out to the end of the chain and then
drag it up a piece and hoe on to the end of the row.
Times was awful hard during the War. We actually suffered for some salt. We'd go to the smoke house where meat
had been salted down for years, dig a hole in the ground and fill it with water. After it would stand for a while
we'd dip the water up carefully and strain it and cook our food in it. We parched corn and meal for coffee. We
used syrup for sugar. Some folks parched okra for coffee. When the War was over you'd see men, women and chillun
walk out of their cabins with a bundle under their arms. All going by in droves, just going nowhere in particular.
My mother and father didn't join them; we stayed on at the plantation. I run off and got married when I was twenty.
Ma never did want me to get married. My husband died five years ago. I never had no chillun.
I reckon I'm a mite superstitious. If a man comes to your house first on New Years you will have good luck; if
a woman is your first visitor you'll have bad luck. When I was a young woman I knowed I'd be left alone in my old
age. I seen it in my sleep. I dreamed I spit every tooth in my head right out in my hand and something tell me
I would be a widow. That's a bad thing to dream about, losing your teeth.
Once my sister was at my house. She had a little baby and we was setting on the porch. They was a big pine tree
in front of the house, and we seen something that looked like a big bird light in the tree. She begun to cry and
say that's a sign my baby is going to die. Sho' nuff it just lived two weeks. Another time a big owl lit in a tree
near a house and we heard it holler. The baby died that night. It was already sick, we's setting up with it.
I don't know where they's hants or not but I'se sho heard things I couldn't see.
We allus has made our own medicines. We used herbs and roots. If you'll take poke root and cut it in small pieces
and string it and put it 'round a baby's neck it will cut teeth easy. A tea made out of dog fennel or corn shucks
will cure chills and malaria. It'll make 'em throw up. We used to take button snake root, black snake root, chips
of anvil iron and whiskey and make a tonic to cure consumption. It would cure it too.
10-13-1937 [Date stamp: NOV 5 1937]
JAMES SOUTHALL
Age 82 years, Oklahoma City, Okla.
I was born in Clarksville, Tenn. My father was Wesley and my mother was Hagar Southall. Our owner was Dr. John
Southall, an old man. Father always belonged to him but he bought my mother when she was a young girl and raised
her. She never knew anything 'bout her people but my father's mother lived with us in de quarter's at Master Southall's.
Master John never sold any of his slaves.
We was known as "Free Niggers." Master said he didn't believe it was right to own human beings just because
dey was black, and he freed all his slaves long before de War. He give 'em all freedom papers and told dem dat
dey was as free as he was and could go anywhere dey wanted. Dey didn't have no where to go so we all stayed on
wid him. It was nice though to know we could go where we pleased 'thout having to get a pass and could come back
when we pleased even if we didn't take advantage of it.
He told his slaves dat dey could stay on at his farm but dey would have to work and make a living for deyselves
and families. Old Master managed de farm and bought all de food and clothes for us all. Everybody had to work,
but dey had a good time.
We had good clothes, plenty of food and good cabins. We had what was known as Georgia bedsteads. Dey was wooden
bedsteads wid holes bored in de side pieces and in de foot and head-boards. Ropes was laced back and forth across
and this took de place of both slats and springs. De ropes would git loose and we had what was called a "following-pin"
to tighten 'em wid. We'd take a block of wood wid a notch in it and catch de rope and hold it till de following-pin
could be driven in and den we'd twist de ropes tight again. We had grass or cotton beds and we slept good, too.
We had tin plates but no knives or forks so we et with our fingers. Old Master was a doctor and we had good attention
when we was sick. We had no wish to take advantage of our freedom for we was a lot better off even than we is now
and we knowed it. We never had to worry about anything.
De quarters was about a half mile from de "Big House" as we called Master John's house. It really wasn't
such a big house as it had only four or five rooms in it. It was a common boxed house, painted white and wid a
long gallery across de front. Maybe it was de gallery dat made it look so big to us. We liked to set on de steps
at night and listen to Master John talk and to hear old Mistress and de girls sing. Sometimes we'd join in wid
dem and fairly make de woods ring. Everybody thought dey was crazy to let us have so much freedom but dey wasn't
nothing any of us black folks wouldn't a-done for that family.
He never employed any overseers as he done his own overseeing. He'd tell de older hands what he wanted done and
dey would see it was done. We was never punished. Just iffen dey didn't work dey didn't have nothing to eat and
wear and de hands what did work wouldn't divide wid 'em iffen dey didn't work. Old Master sho' was wise fer he
knowed iffen we was ever set free dat we would have to work and he sure didn't bide no laziness in his hands. Dey
got up 'bout four o'clock in de morning and was at work as soon as dey could see. Dey would work and sing as happy
as you please.
We used to hear stories 'bout how slaves was punished but we never saw any of it. Dey would punish 'em by whupping
'em or by making 'em stand on one foot for a long time, tie 'em up by de thumbs as high as dey could reach and
by making 'em do hard tasks and by going without food for two-three days.
Niggers was very religious and dey had church often. Dey would annoy de white folks wid shouting and singing and
praying and dey would take cooking pots and put over dey mouths so de white folks couldn't hear 'em. Dey would
dig holes in de ground too, and lie down when dey prayed.
Old Master let us have church in de homes. We had prayer-meeting every Wednesday night. All our cullud preachers
could read de Bible. He let dem teach us how to read iffen we wanted to learn.
In de evening when we was through wid our work dey would gather at one of de cabins and visit and sing or dance.
We'd pop corn, eat walnuts, peanuts, hickory nuts, and tell ghost stories. We didn't have any music instruments
so de music we danced by wasn't so very good. Everybody sang and one or two would beat on tin pans or beat bones
together.
Us boys played marbles. I got to be a professional. I could hit de middler ever time. We made a square and put
a marble in each corner and one in de middle and got off several feet from de ring and shot at de marbles. Iffen
you hit de middler you got de game. I could beat 'em all.
Old Master kept us through de War. We saw Yankee soldiers come through in droves lak Coxsey's Army. We wasn't afraid
for ourselves but we was afraid dey would catch old Master or one of de boys when dey would come home on a furlough.
We'd hep 'em git away and just swear dat dey hadn't been home a-tall.
After de war we stayed until old Master died. It broke us all up for we knowed we had lost de best friend dat we
ever had or ever would have. He was a sort of father to all of us. Old Mistress went to live with her daughter
and we started wandering 'round. Some folks from de North come down and made de cullud folks move on. I guess dey
was afraid dat we'd hep our masters rebuild dey homes again. We lived in a sort of bondage for a long time.
De white folks in de South as well as de cullud folks lost de best friend dey had when Abe Lincoln was killed.
He was God's man and it was a great loss when he died.
God created us all free and equal. Somewhere along de road we lost out.
Cullud folks would have been better off iffen dey had been left alone in Africa. We'd a-had better opportunities.
We should have some compensation fer what we have suffered. Yes, we could be sent back and we'd like it if dey
would help us to get started out again. Dat's where our forefathers come from.
I learned a long time ago dat dey was nothing to charms. How could a rabbit's foot bring me good luck? De Bible
teaches me better'n dat. I believes in dreams though. I've seen de end of time in my dreams. Saw de great trouble
we going through right now, years ago in a dream. It's clear in my mind how de world is coming to a end.
I believe all Christians should all join up together as dat makes 'em stronger. I believe in praying fer what we
want and need. I'm a licensed preacher in de Baptist church. I've been a member for forty years but have just been
a licensed preacher about ten years.
BEAUREGARD TENNEYSON
Age 87 yrs. West Tulsa, Okla.
My mother and father just about stocked Jess Tenneyson's plantation with slaves. That's a fact. The old folks had
one big family--twenty-three Children was the number. With the old folks that make twenty-five (there were only
five more slaves), so I reckon they done mighty well by Master Jess.
The Master done well by them, too. Master Jess and Mistress Lula was Christian peoples. They raised their two sons,
Henry and George, the same way.
There was so many of us children I don't remember all the names. Three of the boys was named after good southern
gentlemen who soldiered in the War. Price, Lee and Beaugard. Beaugard is me. Proud of that name just like I'm proud
of the Master's name.
My folks named Patrick and Harriett. Mother worked round the house And father was the field boss. They was close
by the Master all the time.
The plantation was down in Craig County, Texas. Nine hundred acre it was. They raise everything, but mostly corn
and cotton. Big times when come the harvest. Master fix up a cotton gin right on the place. It was an old-fashioned
press. Six horses run it with two boys tromping down the cotton with their feets.
In the fall time was the best of all. Come cotton picking time, all the master from miles around send in their
best pickers--and how they'd work, sometimes pick the whole crop in one day! The one who picked the most win a
prize. Then come noon and the big feast, and at night come the dancing.
Something like that when the corn was ready. All the folks have the biggest time. Log rollings. Clearing the new
ground for planting. Cutting the trees, burning the bresh, making ready for the plow. The best worker wins hisself
a prize at these log rollings, too.
Them kind of good times makes me think of Christmas. Didn't have no Christmas tree, but they set up a long pine
table in the house and that plank table was covered with presents and none of the Negroes was ever forgot on that
day.
Master Jess didn't work his slaves like other white folks done. Wasn't no four o'clock wake-up horns and the field
work started at seven o'clock. Quitting time was five o'clock--just about union hours nowadays. The Master believed
in plenty of rest for the slaves and they work better that way, too.
One of my brother took care of the Master's horse while on the plantation. When the Master join in with rebels
that horse went along. So did brother. Master need them both and my brother mighty pleased when he get to go.
When Master come back from the War and tell us that brother is dead, he said brother was the best boy in all the
army.
The Tenneyson slaves wasn't bothered with patrollers, neither the Klan. The Master said we was all good Negroes--nobody
going to bother a good Negro.
We was taught to work and have good manners. And to be honest. Just doing them three things will keep anybody out
of trouble.
WILLIAM WALTERS
Age 85 yrs. Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Mammy Ann (that was my mother) was owned by Mistress Betsy, and lived on the Bradford plantation in Relsford County,
Tennessee, when I was born in 1852.
My daddy, Jim Walters, then lived in Nashville, where my mammy carried me when she ran away from the Mistress after
the Rebs and Yanks started to fight. My daddy died in Nashville in 1875.
We were runaway slaves. The slipper-offers were often captured, but Mammy Ann and her little boy William (that's
me) escaped the sharp eyes of the patrollers and found refuge with a family of northern symphatizers living in
Nashville.
Nashville was a fort town, filled with trenches and barricades. Right across the road from where we stayed was
a vacant block used by the Rebs as an emergency place for treating the wounded.
I remember the boom of cannons one whole day, and I heard the rumble of army wagons as they crossed through the
town. But there was nothing to see as the fog of powder smoke became thicker with every blast of Sesesh cannon.
When the smoke fog cleared away I watched the wounded being carried to the clearing across the road--fighting men
with arms shot off, legs gone, faces blood smeared--some of them just laying there cussing God and Man with their
dying breath!
Those were awful times. Yet I have heard many of the older Negroes say the old days were better.
Such talk always seemed to me but an expression of sentiment for some good old master, or else the older Negroes
were just too handicapped with ignorance to recognize the benefits of liberty or the opportunities of freedom.
But I've always been proud of my freedom, and proud of my old mother who faced death for her freedom and mine when
she escaped from the Bradford plantation a long time before freedom came to the Negro race as a whole.
10-19-1938
MARY FRANCES WEBB
Grand daughter of Sarah Vest, aged 92, (deceased) McAlester, Okla.
I've heard my grandmother tell a lot of her experiences during slavery. She remembered things well as she was a
grown woman at the time of the War of the Rebellion.
Her home was at Sedalia, Mo., and her owner was Baxter West, a prominent farmer and politician. He was very kind
and good to his slaves. He provided them with plenty of food and good clothes. He would go to town and buy six
or eight bolts of cloth at a time and the women could pick out two dresses apiece off it. These would be their
dresses for dressing up. They wove the cloth for their everyday clothes.
The men wore jeans suits in winter. He bought shoes for all his slaves, young and old. He had about twenty slaves
counting the children.
My grandmother was a field hand. She plowed and hoed the crops in the summer and spring, and in the winter she
sawed and cut cord wood just like a man. She said it didn't hurt her as she was as strong as an ox.
She could spin and weave and sew. She helped make all the cloth for their clothes and in the spring one of the
jobs for the women was to weave hats for the men. They used oat-straw, grass, and cane which had been split and
dried and soaked in hot water until it was pliant, and they wove it into hats. The women wore a cloth tied around
their head.
They didn't have many matches so they always kept a log heap burning to keep a fire. It was a common thing for
a neighbor to come in to borrow a coal of fire as their fire had died out.
On wash days all the neighbors would send several of their women to the creek to do the family wash. They all had
a regular picnic of it as they would wash and spread the clothes on the bushes and low branches of the trees to
dry. They would get to spend the day together.
They had no tubs or wash boards. They had a large flat block of wood and a wooden paddle. They'd spread the wet
garment on the block, spread soap on it and paddle the garment till it was clean. They would rinse the clothes
in the creek. Their soap was made from lye, dripped from ashes, and meat scraps.
The slaves had no lamps in their cabins. In winter they would pile wood on the fire in their fireplace and have
the light from the fire.
The colored men went with their master to the army. They made regular soldiers and endured the same hardships that
the white soldiers did. They told of one battle when so many men were killed that a little stream seemed to be
running pure blood as the water was so bloody.
After the war the slaves returned home with their masters and some of the older ones stayed on with them and helped
them to rebuild their farms. None of them seemed to think it strange that they had been fighting on the wrong side
in the army as they were following their white folks.
Those who stayed with their old master were taught to read and write and were taught to handle their own business
and to help themselves in every way possible to take their place in life.
10-14-1937 [Date stamp: NOV 5 1937]
EASTER WELLS
Age 83 Colbert, Okla.
I was born in Arkansas, in 1854, but we moved to Texas in 1855. I've heard 'em tell about de trip to Texas. De
grown folks rode in wagons and carts but de chaps all walked dat was big enuff. De men walked and toted their guns
and hunted all de way. Dey had plenty of fresh game to eat.
My mother's name was Nellie Bell. I had one sister, Liza. I never saw my father; in fact, I never heard my mammy
say anything about him and I don't guess I ever asked her anything about him for I never thought anything about
not having a father. I guess he belonged to another family and when we moved away he was left behind and he didn't
try to find us after de War.
My mammy and my sister and me belonged to young Master Jason Bell. We was his onliest slaves and as he wasn't married
and lived at home wid his parents we was worked and bossed by his father, Cap'n William Bell and his wife, Miss
Mary.
After we moved to Texas, old Master built a big double log house, weather-boarded on de inside and out. It was
painted white. Dey was a long gallery clean across de front of de house and a big open hall between de two front
rooms. Dey was three rooms on each side of de hall and a wide gallery across de back. De kitchen set back from
de house and dey was a board walk leading to it. Vines was planted 'round de gallery and on each side of de walk
in de summer time. De house was on a hill and set back from de big road about a quarter of a mile and dey was big
oak and pine trees all 'round de yard. We had purty flowers, too.
We had good quarters. Dey was log cabins, but de logs was peeled and square-adzed and put together with white plaster
and had shuttered windows and pine floors. Our furniture was home made but it was good and made our cabins comfortable.
Old Master give us our allowance of staple food and it had to run us, too. We could raise our own gardens and in
dat way we had purty plenty to eat. Dey took good care of us sick or well and old Mistress was awful good to us.
My mammy was de cook. I remember old Master had some purty strict rules and one of 'em was iffen you burnt de bread
you had to eat it. One day mammy burnt de bread. She was awful busy and forgot it and it burnt purty bad. She knowed
dat old Master would be mad and she'd be punished so she got some grub and her bonnet and she lit out. She hid
in de woods and cane brakes for two weeks and dey couldn't find her either. One of de women slipped food out to
her. Finally she come home and old Master give her a whipping but he didn't hurt her none. He was glad to git her
back. She told us dat she could'a slipped off to de North but she didn't want to leave us children. She was afraid
young Master would be mad and sell us and we'd a-had a hard time so she come back. I don't know whether she ever
burnt de bread any more or not.
Once one of de men got his 'lowance and he decided he'd have de meat all cooked at once so he come to our cabin
and got mammy to cook it for him. She cooked it and he took it home. One day he was at work and a dog got in and
et de meat all up. He didn't have much food for de rest of de week. He had to make out wid parched corn.
We all kept parched corn all de time and went 'round eating it. It was good to fill you up iffen you was hungry
and was nourishing, too.
When de niggers cooked in dere own cabins dey put de food in a sort of tray or trough and everybody et together.
Dey didn't have no dishes. We allus ate at de Big House as mammy had to do de cooking for de family.
I never had to work hard as old Master wanted us to grow up strong. He'd have mammy boil Jerusalem Oak and make
a tea for us to drink to cure us of worms and we'd run races and get exercise so we would be healthy.
Old Mistress and old Master had three children. Dey was two children dead between Master Jason and Miss Jane. Dey
was a little girl 'bout my age, named Arline. We played together all de time. We used to set on de steps at night
and old Mistress would tell us about de stars. She'd tell us and show us de Big Dipper, Little Dipper, Milky Way,
Ellen's Yard, Job's Coffin, and de Seven Sisters. I can show 'em to you and tell you all about 'em yet.
I scared Arline and made her fall and break her leg twice. One time we was on de porch after dark one night and
I told her dat I heard something and I made like I could see it and she couldn't so she got scared and run and
hung her toe in a crack and fell off de high porch and broke her leg. Another time while de War was going on we
was dressed up in long dresses playing grown-ups. We had playhouses under some big castor-bean bushes. We climbed
up on de fence and jest for fun I told her dat I seen some Yankees coming. She started to run and got tangled up
in her long dress and fell and broke her leg again. It nigh broke my heart for I loved her and she loved me and
she didn't tell on me either time. I used to visit her after she was married and we'd sure have a good visit talking
'bout de things we used to do. We was separated when we was about fifteen and didn't see [HW: each] other any more
till we was both married and had children. I went to visit her at Bryant, Brazos County, Texas and I ain't seen
her since. I don't know whether she is still living or not.
I 'members hearing a man say dat once he was a nigger trader. He'd buy and trade or sell 'em like they was stock.
He become a Christian and never sold any more.
Our young Master went to de War and got wounded and come home and died. Old Master den took full charge of us and
when de War ended he kept us because he said we didn't have no folks and he said as our owner was dead we wasn't
free. Mother died about a year after de War, and some white folks took my sister but I was afraid to go. Old Master
told me iffen I left him he would cut my ears off end I'd starve and I don't know what all he did tell me he'd
do. I must a-been a fool but I was afraid to try it.
I had so much work to do and I never did git to go anywhere. I reckon he was afraid to let me go off de place for
fear some one would tell me what a fool I was, so I never did git to go anywhere but had to work all de time. I
was de only one to work and old Mistress and de girls never had done no work and didn't know much about it. I had
a harder time den when we was slaves.
I got to wanting to see my sister so I made up my mind to run off. One of old Master's motherless nephews lived
with him and I got him to go with me one night to the potato bank and I got me a lap full of potatoes to eat so
I wouldn't starve like old Master said I would. Dis white boy went nearly to a house where some white folks lived.
I went to de house and told 'em I wanted to go to where my sister was and dey let me stay fer a few days and sent
me on to my sister.
I saw old Master lots of times after I run away but he wasn't mad at me. I heard him tell de white folks dat I
lived wid dat he raised me and I sure wouldn't steal nor tell a lie. I used to steal brown sugar lumps when mammy
would be cooking but he didn't know 'bout dat.
On holidays we used to allus have big dinners, 'specially on Christmas, and we allus had egg-nog.
We allus had hog-jowl and peas on New Years Day 'cause iffen you'd have dat on New Years Day you'd have good luck
all de year.
Iffen you have money on New Years' Day you will have money all de year.
My husband, Lewis Wells, lived to be one-hundred and seven years old. He died five years ago. He could see witches,
spirits and ghosts but I never could. Dere are a few things dat I've noticed and dey never fail.
Dogs howling and scritch owls hollering is allus a warning. My mother was sick and we didn't think she was much
sick. A dog howled and howled right outside de house. Old Master say, "Nellie gonna die." Sure nuff she
died dat night.
Another time a gentle old mule we had got after de children and run 'em to do house and den he lay down and wallow
and wallow. One of our children was dead 'fore a week.
One of our neighbors say his dog been gone 'bout a week. He was walking and met de dog and it lay down and stretch
out on de ground and measure a grave wid his body. He made him git up and he went home jest as fast as he could.
When he got dere one of his children was dead.
Iffen my left eye quiver I know I'm gwineter cry and iffen both my eyes quiver I know I gwinter laugh till I cry.
I don't like for my eyes to quiver.
We has allus made our own medicine. Iffen we hadn't we never could astood de chills and fevers. We made a tea out'n
bitter weeds and bathed in it to cure malaria. We also made bread pills and soaked 'em in dis tea and swallowed
'em. After bathing in dis tea we'd go to bed and kiver up and sweat de malaria out.
Horse mint and palm of crystal (Castor-bean) and bullnettle root boiled together will make a cure fer swelling.
Jest bathe de swollen part in dis hot tea.
Anvil dust and apple vinegar will cure dropsy. One tea cup of anvil dust to a quart of vinegar. Shake up well and
bathe in it. It sure will cure de worse kind of a case.
God worked through Abraham Lincoln and he answered de prayers of dem dat was wearing de burden of slavery. We cullud
folks all love and honor Abraham Lincoln's memory and don't you think we ought to?
I love to hear good singing. My favorite songs are: "Am I A Soldier Of The Cross", an "How Can I
Live In Sin and Doubt My Savior's Love." I belongs to de Baptist church.
Revision of story sent in 8-13-1937.
JOHN WHITE
Age 121 years Sand Springs, Okla.
Of all my Mammy's children I am the first born and the longest living. The others all gone to join Mammy. She was
named Mary White, the same name as her Mistress, the wife of my first master, James White.
About my pappy. I never hear his name and I never see him, not even when I was the least child around the old Master's
place 'way back there in Georgia more'n one-hundred twenty years ago!
Mammy try to make it clear to me about my daddy. She married like the most of the slaves in them days.
He was a slave on another plantation. One day he come for to borrow something from Master White. He sees a likely
looking gal, and the way it work out that gal was to be my Mammy. After that he got a paper saying it was all right
for him to be off his own plantation. He come a'courting over to Master White's. After a while he talks with the
Master. Says he wants to marry the gal, Mary. The Master says it's all right if it's all right with Mary and the
other white folks. He finds out it is and they makes ready for the wedding.
Mary says a preacher wedding is the best but Master say he can marry them just as good. There wasn't no Bible,
just an old Almanac. Master White read something out of that. That's all and they was married. The wedding was
over!
Every night he gets a leave paper from his Master and come over to be with his wife, Mary. The next morning he
leaves her to work in the fields. Then one night Mammy says he don't come home. The next night is the same, and
the next. From then on Mammy don't see him no more--never find out what happen to my pappy.
When I was born Mammy named me John, John White. She tells me I was the blackest 'white' boy she ever see. I stays
with her till I was eleven year old. The Master wrote down in the book when I was born, April 10, 1816, and I know
it's right. Mammy told me so, and Master told me when I was eleven and he sold me to Sarah Davenport.
Mistress Sarah lived in Texas. Master White always selling and trading to folks all over the country. I hates to
leave on account of Mammy and the good way Master White fared the slaves--they was good people. Mammy cry but I
has to go just the same. The tears are on my face a long time after the leaving. I was hoping all the time to see
Mammy again, but that's the last time.
We travels and travels on the stage coach. Once we cross the Big River (Mississippi) on the boat and pick up with
the horses on the other side. A new outfit and we rides some more. Seems like we going to wear out all the horses
before we gets to the place.
The Davenport plantation was way north of Linden, Texas, up in the Red River country. That's where I stayed for
thirty-eight year. There I was drug through the hackles by the meanest master that ever lived. The Mistress was
the best white woman I ever knew but Master Presley used his whip all the time, reason or no reason, and I got
scars to remember by!
I remembers the house. A heavy log house with a gallery clear across the front. The kitchen was back of the house.
I work in there and I live in there. It wasn't built so good as the Master's house. The cold winds in the winter
go through the cracks between the logs like the walls was somewheres else, and I shivers with the misery all the
time.
The cooking got to be my job. The washing too. Washday come around and I fills the tub with clothes. Puts the tub
on my head and walks half a mile to the spring where I washes the clothes. Sometimes I run out of soap. Then I
make ash soap right by the spring. I learns to be careful about streaks in the clothes. I learns by the bull whip.
One day the Master finds a soapy streak in his shirt. Then he finds me.
The Military Road goes by the place and the Master drives me down the road and ties me to a tree. First he tears
off the old shirt and then he throws the bull whip to me. When he is tired of beating me more torture is a-coming.
The salt water cure. It don't cure nothing but that's what the white folks called it. "Here's at you,"
the Master say, and slap the salt water into the bleeding cuts. "Here's at you!" The blisters burst every
time he slap me with the brine.
Then I was loosened to stagger back into the kitchen. The Mistress couldn't do nothing about it 'cept to lay on
the grease thick, with a kind word to help stop the misery.
Ration time was Saturday night. Every slave get enough fat pork, corn meal and such to last out the week. I reckon
the Master figure it to the last bite because they was no leavings over. Most likely the shortage catch them!
Sometimes they'd borrow, sometimes I'd slip somethings from out the kitchen. The single women folks was bad that
way. I favors them with something extra from the kitchen. Then they favors me--at night when the overseer thinks
everybody asleep in they own places!
I was always back to my kitchen bed long before the overseer give the get-up-knock. I hear the knock, he hear me
answer. Then he blow the horn and shout the loud call, ARE YOU UP, and everybody know it was four o'clock and pour
out of the cabins ready for the chores.
Sometimes the white folks go around the slave quarters for the night. Not on the Davenport plantation, but some
others close around. The slaves talked about it amongst themselves.
After a while they'd be a new baby. Yellow. When the child got old enough for chore work the master would sell
him (or her). No difference was it his own flesh and blood--if the price was right!
I traffic with lots of the women, but never marries. Not even when I was free after the War. I sees too many married
troubles to mess up with such doings!
Sometimes the master sent me alone to the grinding mill. Load in the yellow corn, hitch in the oxen, I was ready
to go. I gets me fixed up with a pass and takes to the road.
That was the trip I like best. On the way was a still. Off in the bresh. If the still was lonely I stop, not on
the way to but on the way back. Mighty good whiskey, too! Maybe I drinks too much, then I was sorry.
Not that I swipe the whiskey, just sorry because I gets sick! Then I figures a woods camp meeting will steady me
up and I goes.
The preacher meet me and want to know how is my feelings. I says I is low with the misery and he say to join up
with the Lord.
I never join because he don't talk about the Lord. Just about the Master and Mistress. How the slaves must obey
around the plantation--how the white folks know what is good for the slaves. Nothing about obeying the Lord and
working for him.
I reckon the old preacher was worrying more about the bull whip than he was the Bible, else he say something about
the Lord! But I always obeys the Lord--that's why I is still living!
The slaves would pray for to get out of bondage. Some of them say the Lord told them to run away. Get to the North.
Cross the Red River. Over there would be folks to guide them to the Free State (Kansas).
The Lord never tell me to run away. I never tried it, maybe, because mostly they was caught by patrollers and fetched
back for a flogging--and I had whippings enough already!
Before the Civil War was the fighting with Mexico. Some of the troops on they way south passed on the Military
Road. Wasn't any fighting around Linden or Jefferson during the time.
They was lots of traveling on the Military Road. Most of the time you could see covered wagons pulled by mules
and horses, and sometimes a crawling string of wagons with oxen on the pulling end.
From up in Arkansas come the stage coach along the road. To San Antonio. The drivers bring news the Mexicans just
about all killed off and the white folks say Texas was going to join the Union. The country's going to be run different
they say, but I never see no difference. Maybe, because I ain't white folks.
Wasn't many Mexicans around the old plantation. Come and go. Lots of Indians. Cherokees and Choctaws. Living in
mud huts and cabin shacks. I never see them bother the whites, it was the other way around.
During the Civil War, when the Red River was bank high with muddy water, the Yankee's made a target of Jefferson.
That was a small town down south of Linden.
Down the river come a flat barge with cannon fastened to the deck. The Yankee soldiers stopped across the river
from Jefferson and the shooting started.
When the cannon went to popping the folks went arunning--hard to tell who run the fastest, the whites or the blacks!
Almost the town was wiped out. Buildings was smashed and big trees cut through with the cannon balls.
And all the time the Yankee drums was a-beating and the soldiers singing:
We'll hang Jeff Davis on a sour apple tree, As we go marching on!
Before the Civil War everybody had money. The white folks, not the negroes. Sometimes the master take me to the
town stores. They was full of money. Cigar boxes on the counter, boxes on the shelf, all filled with money. Not
the crinkley paper kind, but hard, jingley gold and silver! Not like these scarce times!
After the War I stay on the plantation 'til a soldier man tells me of the freedom. The master never tell us--negroes
working just like before the War.
That's when I leave the first time. Slip off, saying nothing, to Jefferson. There I found some good white folks
going to New Orleans. First place we go is Shreveport, by wagon. They took me because I fix up with them to do
the cooking.
On to the Big River (Mississippi) and boards a river steamboat for New Orleans. Lots of negroes going down there--to
work on the canal.
The whole town was built on logs covered with dirt. Trying to raise itself right out of the swamp. Sometimes the
water get high and folks run for the hills. When I got there almost was I ready to leave.
I like Texas the best. Back to Jefferson is where I go. Fifteen-twenty mile below Linden. Almost the first person
I see was Master Davenport.
He says, "Black rascal, you is coming with me." And I do. He tried to keep his slaves and just laugh
when I tell him about the freedom. I worked for food and quarters 'til his meanness come cropping out again.
That wasn't long and he threatened me with the whip and the buck and gag. The buck and gag was maybe worse. I got
to feeling that iron stick in my mouth, fastened around my head with chains, pressing hard on my tongue. No drinking,
no eating, no talking!
So I slip off again. That night I goes through Linden. Crawling on my hands and knees! Keeping in the dark spots,
hiding from the whites, 'til I pass the last house, then my feets hurries me to Jefferson, where I gets a ride
to Arkansas.
In Russelville is where I stop. There I worked around in the yards, cutting the grass, fancying the flower beds,
and earned a little money for clothes and eats, with some of it spent for good whiskey.
That was the reason I left Arkansas. Whiskey. The law got after me to tell where was a man's whiskey still. I just
leave so's I won't have to tell.
But while I was making a little money in Russelville, I lose out on some big money, account some white folks beat
me to it.
I was out in the hills west of town, walking along the banks of a little creek, when I heard a voice. Queer like.
I called out who is that talking and I hears it again.
"Go to the white oak tree and you will find Ninety Thousand Dollars!" That's what I hear. I look around,
nobody in sight, but I see the tree. A big white oak tree standing taller than all the rest 'round about.
Under the tree was a grave. An old grave. I scratch around but finds no money and thinks of getting some help.
I done some work for a white man in town and told him about the voice. He promised to go with me, but the next
day he took two white mens and dug around the tree. Then he says they was nothing to find.
To this day I know better. I know wherever they's a ghost, money is around someplace! That's what the ghost comes
back for.
Somebody dies and leaves buried money. The ghost watches over it 'til it sees somebody it likes. Then ghost shows
himself--lets know he's around. Sometimes the ghost tells where is the money buried, like that time at Russelville.
That ain't the only ghost I've seen or heard. I see one around the yard where I is living now. A woman. Some of
these times she'll tell me where the buried money is.
Maybe the ghost woman thinks I is too old to dig. But I been a-digging all these long years. For a bite to eat
and a sleep-under cover.
I reckon pretty soon she's going to tell where to dig. When she does, then old Uncle John won't have to dig for
the eats no more!
[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]
CHARLEY WILLIAMS
Age 94 yrs. Tulsa, Okla.
Iffen I could see better out'n my old eyes, and I had me something to work with and de feebleness in my back and
head would let me 'lone, I would have me plenty to eat in de kitchen all de time, and plenty tobaccy in my pipe,
too, bless God!
And dey wouldn't be no rain trickling through de holes in de roof, and no planks all fell out'n de flo' on de gallery
neither, 'cause dis one old nigger knows everything about making all he need to git along! Old Master done showed
him how to git along in dis world, jest as long as he live on a plantation, but living in de town is a different
way of living, and all you got to have is a silver dime to lay down for everything you want, and I don't git de
dime very often.
But I aint give up! Nothing like dat! On de days when I don't feel so feeble and trembly I jest keep patching 'round
de place. I got to keep patching so as to keep it whar it will hold de winter out, in case I git to see another
winter.
Iffen I don't, it don't grieve me none, 'cause I wants to see old Master again anyways. I reckon maybe I'll jest
go up an ask him what he want me to do, and he'll tell me, and iffen I don't know how he'll show me how, and I'll
try to do it to please him. And when I git it done I wants to hear him grumble like he used to and say, "Charley,
you ain't got no sense but you is a good boy. Dis here ain't very good but it'll do, I reckon. Git yourself a little
piece o' dat brown sugar, but don't let no niggers see you eating it--if you do I'll whup your black behind!"
Dat ain't de way it going be in Heaven, I reckon, but I can't set here on dis old rottendy gallery and think of
no way I better like to have it!
I was a great big hulking buck of a boy when de War come along and bust up everything, and I can 'member back when
everybody was living peaceful and happy, and nobody never had no notion about no war.
I was borned on the 'leventh of January, in 1843, and was old enough to vote when I got my freedom, but I didn't
take no stock in all dat politics and goings on at dat time, and I didn't vote till a long time after old Master
passed away, but I was big enough before de War to remember everything pretty plain.
Old Master name was John Williams, and old Mistress name was Miss Betty, and she was a Campbell before she married.
Young Missy was named Betty after her mommy, and Young Master was named Frank, but I don't know who after. Our
overseer was Mr. Simmons, and he was mighty smart and had a lot of patience, but he wouldn't take no talk nor foolishness.
He didn't whup nobody very often, but he only had to whup 'em jest one time! He never did whup a nigger at de time
the nigger done something, but he would wait till evening and have old Master come and watch him do it. He never
whupped very hard 'cept when he had told a nigger about something and promised a whupping next time and the nigger
done it again. Then that nigger got what he had been hearing 'bout!
De plantation was about as big as any. I think it had about three hundred acres, and it was about two miles northwest
of Monroe, Louisiana. Then he had another one not so big, two--three miles south of the big one, kind of down in
the woodsy part along the White river bottoms. He had another overseer on that place and a big passel of niggers,
but I never did go down to that one. That was where he raised most of his corn and shoats, and lots of sorghum
cane.
Our plantation was up on higher ground, and it was more open country, but still they was lots of woods all around
and lots of the plantations had been whacked right out of de new ground and was full of stumps. Master's place
was more open, though, and all in the fields was good plowing.
The big road runned right along past our plantation, and it come from Shreveport and run into Monroe. There wasn't
any town at Monroe in them days, jest a little cross roads place with a general store and a big hide house. I think
there was about two big hide houses, and you could smell that place a mile before you got into it. Old Master had
a part in de store, I think.
De hide houses was jest long sheds, all open along de sides and kivered over wid cypress clapboards.
Down below de hide houses and de store was jest a little settlement of one or two houses, but they was a school
for white boys. Somebody said there was a place where they had been an old fort, but I never did see it.
Everything boughten we got come from Shreveport, and was brung in by the stage and the freighters, and that was
only a little coffee or gunpowder, or some needles for the sewing, or some strap iron for the blacksmith, or something
like dat. We made and raised everything else we needed right on the place.
I never did even see any quinine till after I was free. My mammy knowed jest what root to go out and pull up to
knock de chills right out'n me. And de bellyache and de running off de same way, too.
Our plantation was a lot different from some I seen other places, like way east of there, around Vicksburg. Some
of them was fixed up fancier but dey didn't have no more comforts than we had.
Old Master come out into that country when he was a young man, and they didn't have even so much then as they had
when I was a boy. I think he come from Alabama or Tennessee, and way back his people had come from Virginia, or
maybe North Carolina, 'cause he knowed all about tobacco on the place. Cotton and tobacco was de long crops on
his big place, and of course lots of horses and cattle and mules.
De big house was made out'n square hewed logs, and chinked wid little rocks and daubed wid white clay, and kivered
wid cypress clapboards. I remember one time we put on a new roof, and de niggers hauled up de cypress logs and
sawed dem and frowed out de clapboards by hand.
De house had two setting rooms on one side and a big kitchen room on de other, wid a wide passage in between, and
den about was de sleeping rooms. They wasn't no stairways 'cepting on de outside. Steps run up to de sleeping rooms
on one side from de passageway and on de other side from clean outside de house. Jest one big chimbley was all
he had, and it was on de kitchen end, and we done all de cooking in a fireplace dat was purty nigh as wide as de
whole room.
In de sleeping rooms day wasn't no fires 'cepting in brazers made out of clay, and we toted up charcoal to burn
in 'em when it was cold mornings in de winter. Dey kept warm wide de bed clothes and de knitten clothes dey had.
Master never did make a big gallery on de house, but our white folks would set out in de yard under de big trees
in de shade. They was long benches made out'n hewed logs and all padded wid gray moss and corn shuck padding, and
dey set pretty soft. All de furniture in de house was home-made, too. De beds had square posts as big around as
my shank and de frame was mortised into 'em, and holes bored in de frame and home-made rope laced in to make it
springy. Den a great big mattress full of goose feathers and two--three comforts as thick as my foot wid carded
wool inside! Dey didn't need no fireplaces!
De quarters was a little piece from de big house, and dey run along both sides of de road dat go to de fields.
All one-room log cabins, but dey was good and warm, and every one had a little open shed at de side whar we sleep
in de summer to keep cool.
They was two or three wells at de quarters for water, and some good springs in de branch at de back of de fields.
You could ketch a fish now and den in dat branch, but Young Master used to do his fishing in White River, and take
a nigger or two along to do de work at his camp.
It wasn't very fancy at de Big House, but it was mighty pretty jest de same, wid de gray moss hanging from de big
trees, and de cool green grass all over de yard, and I can shet my old eyes and see it jest like it was before
de War come along and bust it up.
I can see old Master setting out under a big tree smoking one of his long cheroots his tobacco nigger made by hand,
and fanning hisself wid his big wide hat another nigger platted out'n young inside corn shucks for him, and I can
hear him holler at a big bunch of white geeses what's gitting in his flower beds and see 'em string off behind
de old gander towards de big road.
When de day begin to crack de whole plantation break out wid all kinds of noises, and you could tell what going
on by de kind of noise you hear.
Come de daybreak you hear de guinea fowls start potracking down at de edge of de woods lot, and den de roosters
all start up 'round de barn and de ducks finally wake up and jine in. You can smell de sow belly frying down at
the cabins in de "row", to go wid de hoecake and de buttermilk.
Den purty soon de wind rise a little, and you can hear a old bell donging way on some plantation a mile or two
off, and den more bells at other places and maybe a horn, and purty soon younder go old Master's old ram horn wid
a long toot and den some short toots, and here come de overseer down de row of cabins, hollering right and left,
and picking de ham out'n his teeth wid a long shiny goose quill pick.
Bells and horns! Bells for dis and horns for dat! All we knowed was go and come by de bells and horns!
Old ram horn blow to send us all to de field. We all line up, about seventy-five field niggers, and go by de tool
shed and git our hoes, or maybe go hitch up de mules to de plows and lay de plows out on de side so de overseer
can see iffen de points is shart. Any plow gits broke or de point gits bungled up on de rocks it goes to de blacksmith
nigger, den we all git on down in de field.
Den de anvil start dangling in de blacksmith shop: "Tank! Deling-ding! Tank! Deling-ding!", and dat ole
bull tongue gitting straightened out!
Course you can't hear de shoemaker awling and pegging, and de card spinners, and de old mammy sewing by hand, but
maybe you can hear de old loom going "frump, frump", and you know it all right iffen your clothes do
be wearing out, 'cause you gwine git new britches purty soon!
We had about a hundred niggers on dat place, young and old, and about twenty on de little place down below. We
could make about every kind of thing but coffee and gunpowder dat our whitefolks and us needed.
When we needs a hat we gits inside cornshucks and weave one out, and makes horse collars de same way. Jest tie
two little soft shucks together and begin plaiting.
All de cloth 'cepting de Mistress' Sunday dresses come from de sheep to de carders and de spinners and de weaver,
den we dye it wid "butternut" and hickory bark and indigo and other things and set it wid copperas. Leather
tanned on de place made de shoes, and I never see a store boughten wagon wheel 'cepting among de stages and de
freighters along de big road.
We made purty, long back-combs out'n cow horn, and knitting needles out'n second hickory. Split a young hickory
and put in a big wedge to prize it open, then cut it down and let it season, and you got good bent grain for wagon
hames and chair rockers and such.
It was jest like dat until I was grown, and den one day come a neighbor man and say we in de War.
Little while young Master Frank ride over to Vicksburg and jine de Sesesh army, but old Master jest go on lak nothing
happen, and we all don't hear nothing more until long come some Sesesh soldiers and take most old Master's hosses
and all his wagons.
I bin working on de tobacco, and when I come back to de barns everything was gone. I would go into de woods and
git good hickory and burn it till it was all coals and put it out wid water to make hickory charcoal for curing
de tobacco. I had me some charcoal in de fire trenches under de curing houses, all full of new tobacco, and overseer
come and say bundle all de tobacco up and he going take it to Shreveport and sell it befo' de soldiers take it
too.
After de hosses all gone and most de cattle and de cotton and de tobacco gone too, here come de Yankees and spread
out all over de whole country. Dey had a big camp down below our plantation.
One evening a big bunch of Yankee officers come up to de Big House and old Master set out de brandy in de yard
and dey act purty nice. Next day de whole bunch leave on out of dat part.
When de hosses and stuff all go old Master sold all de slaves but about four, but he kept my pappy and mammy and
my brother Jimmie and my sister Betty. She was named after old Mistress. Pappy's name was Charley and mammy's was
Sally. De niggers he kept didn't have much work without any hosses and wagons, but de blacksmith started in fixing
up more wagons and he kept them hid in de woods till they was all fixed.
Den along come some more Yankees, and dey tore everything we had up, and old Master was afeared to shoot at them
on account his womenfolks, so he tried to sneak the fambly out but they kotched him and brung him back to de plantation.
We niggers didn't know dat he was gone until we seen de Yankees bringing dem back. De Yankees had done took charge
of everything and was camping in de big yard, and us was all down at de quarters scared to death, but dey was jest
letting us alone.
It was night when de white folks tried to go away, and still night when de Yankees brung dem back, and a house
nigger come down to de quarters wid three--four mens in blue clothes and told us to come up to de Big House.
De Yankees didn't seem to be mad wid old Master, but jest laughed and talked wid him, but he didn't take de jokes
any too good.
Den dey asked him could he dance and he said no, and dey told him to dance or make us dance. Dar he stood inside
a big ring of dem mens in blue clothes, wid dey brass buttons shining in de light from de fire dey had in front
of de tents, and he jest stood and said nothing, and it look lak he wasn't wanting to tell us to dance.
So some of us young bucks jest step up and say we was good dancers, and we start shuffling while de rest of de
niggers pat.
Some nigger women go back to de quarters and git de gourd fiddles and de clapping bones made out'n beef ribs, and
bring dem back so we could have some music. We git all warmed up and dance lak we never did dance befo'! I speck
we invent some new steps dat night!
We act lak we dancing for de Yankees, but we trying to please Master and old Mistress more than anything, and purty
soon he begin to smile a little and we all feel a lot better.
Next day de Yankees move on away from our place, and old Master start gitting ready to move out. We git de wagons
we hid, and de whole passel of us leaves out for Shreveport. Jest left de old place standing like it was.
In Shreveport old Master git his cotton and tobacco money what he been afraid to have sent back to de plantation
when he sell his stuff, and we strike out north through Arkansas.
Dat was de awfullest trip any man ever make! We had to hide from everybody until we find out if dey Yankees or
Sesesh, and we go along little old back roads and up one mountain and down another, through de woods all de way.
After a long time we git to the Missouri line, and kind of cut off through de corner of dat state into Kansas.
I don't know how we ever git across some of dem rivers but we did. Dey nearly always would be some soldiers around
de fords, and dey would help us find de best crossing. Sometimes we had to unload de wagons and dry out de stuff
what all got wet, and camp a day or two to fix up again.
Purty soon we git to Fort Scott, and that was whar de roads forked ever whichaways. One went on north and one east
and one went down into de Indian country. It was full of soldiers coming and going back and forth to Arkansas and
Fort Gibson.
We took de road on west through Kansas, and made for Colorado Springs.
Fort Scott was all run down, and the old places whar dey used to have de soldiers was all fell in in most places.
Jest old rackety walls and leaky roofs, and a big pole fence made out'n poles sot in de ground all tied together,
but it was falling down too.
They was lots of wagons all around what belong to de army, hauling stuff for de soldiers, and some folks told old
Master he couldn't make us niggers go wid him, but we said we wanted to anyways, so we jest went on west across
Kansas.
When we got away on west we come to a fork, and de best road went kinda south into Mexico, and we come to a little
place called Clayton, Mexico whar we camped a while and then went north.
Dat place is in New Mexico now, but old Master jest called it Mexico. Somebody showed me whar it is on de map,
and it look lak it a long ways off'n our road to Colorado Springs, but I guess de road jest wind off down dat ways
at de time we went over it. It was jest two or three houses made out'n mud at dat time, and a store whar de soldiers
and de Indians come and done trading.
About dat time old Master sell off some of de stuff he been taking along, 'cause de wagons loaded too heavy for
de mountains and he figger he better have de money than some of de stuff, I reckon.
On de way north it was a funny country. We jest climb all day long gitting up one side of one bunch of mountains,
and all de nigger men have to push on de wheels while de mules pull and den scotch de wheels while de mules rest.
Everybody but de whitefolks has to walk most de time.
Down in de valleys it was warm like in Louisiana, but it seem lak de sun aint so hot on de head, but it look lak
every time night come it ketch us up on top of one of dem mountains, and it almost as cold as in de winter time!
All de niggers had shoes and plenty warm clothes and we wrop up at night in everything we can git.
We git to Fort Scott again, and den de Yankee officers come and ask all us niggers iffen we want to leave old Master
and stay dar and work, 'cause we all free now. Old Master say we can do what we please about it.
A few of de niggers stay dar in Fort Scott, but most of us say we gwine stay wid old Master, and we don't care
iffen we is free or not.
When we git back to Monroe to de old place us niggers git a big surprise. We didn't hear about it, but some old
Master's kinfolks back in Virginia done come out dar an fix de place up and kept it for him while we in Colorado,
and it look 'bout as good as when we left it.
He cut it up in chunks and put us niggers out on it on de halves, but he had to sell part of it to git de money
to git us mules and tools and found to run on. Den after while he had to sell some more, and he seem lak he git
old mighty fast.
Young Master bin in de big battles in Virginia, and he git hit, and den he git sick, and when he come home he jest
lak a old man he was so feeble.
About dat time they was a lot of people coming into dat country from de North, and dey kept telling de niggers
dat de thing for dem to do was to be free, and come and go whar dey please.
Dey try to git de darkeys to go and vote but none us folks took much stock by what dey say. Old Master tell us
plenty time to mix in de politics when de younguns git educated and know what to do.
Jest de same he never mind iffen we go to de dances and de singing and sech. He allus lent us a wagon iffen we
want to borry one to go in, too.
Some de niggers what work for de white folks from de North act purty uppity and big, and come pestering 'round
de dance places and try to talk up ructions amongst us, but it don't last long.
De Ku Kluckers start riding 'round at night, and dey pass de word dat de darkeys got to have a pass to go and come
and to stay at de dances. Dey have to git de pass from de white folks dey work for, and passes writ from de Northern
people wouldn't do no good. Dat de way de Kluckers keep the darkies in line.
De Kluckers jest ride up to de dance ground and look at everybody's passes, and iffen some darkey dar widout a
pass or got a pass from de wrong man dey run him home, and iffen he talk big and won't go home dey whop him and
make him go.
Any nigger out on de road after dark liable to run across de Kluckers, and he better have a good pass! All de dances
got to bust up at about 'leven o'clock, too.
One time I seen three-four Kluckers on hosses, all wrapped up in white, and dey was making a black boy git home.
Dey was riding hosses and he was trotting down de road ahead of 'em. Ever time he stop and start talking dey pop
de whip at his heels and he start trotting on. He was so made he was crying, but he was gitting on down de road
jest de same.
I seen 'em coming and I gits out my pass young Master writ so I could show it, but when dey ride by one in front
jest turns in his saddle and look back at tother men and nod his head, and they jest ride on by widout stopping
to see my pass. Dat man knowed me, I reckon. I looks to see iffen I knowed de hoss, but de Kluckers sometime swapped
dey hosses 'round amongst 'em, so de hoss maybe wasn't hisn.
Dey wasn't very bad 'cause de niggers 'round dar wasn't bad, but I hear plenty of darkeys git whopped in other
places 'cause dey act up and say dey don't have to take off dey hats in de white stores and such.
Any nigger dat behave hisself and don't go running 'round late at night and drinking never had no trouble wid de
Kluckers.
Young Mistress go off and git married, but I don't remember de name 'cause she live off somewhar else, and de next
year, I think it was, my pappy and mammy go on a place about five miles away owned by a man named Mr. Bumpus, and
I go 'long wid my sister Betty and brother Jimmie to help 'em.
I live around dat place and never marry till old mammy and pappy both gone, and Jimmie and Betty both married and
I was gitting about forty year old myself, and den I go up in Kansas and work around till I git married at last.
I was in Fort Scott, and I married Mathilda Black in 1900, and she is 73 years old now and was born in Tennessee.
We went to Pittsburg, Kansas, and lived from 1907 to 1913 when we come to Tulsa.
Young Master's children writ to me once in a while and telled me how dey gitting 'long up to about twenty year
ago, and den I never heard no more about 'em. I never had no children, and it look lak my wife going outlive me,
so my mainest hope when I goes on is seeing Mammy and Pappy and old Master. Old overseer, I speck, was too devilish
mean to be thar!
'Course I loves my Lord Jesus same as anybody, but you see I never hear much about Him until I was grown, and it
seem lak you got to hear about religion when you little to soak it up and put much by it. Nobody could read de
Bible when I was a boy, and dey wasn't no white preachers talked to de niggers. We had meeting sometimes, but de
nigger preacher jest talk about bein a good nigger and "doing to please de Master," and I allus thought
he meant to please old Master, and I allus wanted to do dat anyways.
So dat de reason I allus remember de time old Master pass on.
It was about two years after de War, and old Master been mighty porely all de time. One day we was working in de
Bumpus field and a nigger come on a mule and say old Mistress like to have us go over to de old place 'cause old
Master mighty low and calling mine and Pappy's and Mammy's name. Old man Bumpus say go right ahead.
When we git to de Big House old Master setting propped up in de bed and you can see he mighty low and out'n his
head.
He been talking about gitting de oats stacked, 'cause it seem to him lak it gitting gloomy-dark, and it gwine to
rain, and hail gwine to ketch de oats in de shocks. Some nigger come running up to de back door wid an old horn
old Mistress sent him out to hunt up, and he blowed it so old Master could hear it.
Den purty soon de doctor come to de door and say old Master wants de bell rung 'cause de slaves should ought to
be in from de fields, 'cause it gitting too dark to work. Somebody git a wagon tire and beat on it like a bell
ringing, right outside old Master's window, and den we all go up on de porch and peep in. Every body was snuffling
kind of quiet, 'cause we can't help it.
We hear old Master say, "Dat's all right, Simmons. I don't want my niggers working in de rain. Go down to
de quarters and see dey all dried off good. Dey ain't got no sense but dey all good niggers." Everybody around
de bed was crying, and we all was crying too.
Den old Mistress come to de door and say we can go in and look at him if we want to. He was still setting propped
up, but he was gone.
I stayed in Louisiana a long time after dat, but I didn't care nothing about it, and it look lak I'm staying a
long time past my time in dis world, 'cause I don't care much about staying no longer only I hates to leave Mathilda.
But any time de Lord want me I'm ready, and I likes to think when He ready He going tell old Master to ring de
bell for me to come on in.
SARAH WILSON
Age 87 yrs. Fort Gibson, Okla.
I was a Cherokee slave and now I am a Cherokee freedwoman, and besides that I am a quarter Cherokee my own self.
And this is the way it is.
I was born in 1850 along the Arkansas river about half way between Fort Smith and old Fort Coffee and the Skullyville
boat landing on the river. The farm place was on the north side of the river on the old wagon road what run from
Fort Smith out to Fort Gibson, and that old road was like you couldn't hardly call a road when I first remember
seeing it. The ox teams bog down to they bellies in some places, and the wagon wheel mighty nigh bust on the big
rocks in some places.
I remember seeing soldiers coming along that old road lots of times, and freighting wagons, and wagons what we
all know carry mostly wiskey, and that was breaking the law, too! Them soldiers catch the man with that whiskey
they sure put him up for a long time, less'n he put some silver in they hands. That's what my Uncle Nick say. That
Uncle Nick a mean Negro, and he ought to know about that.
Like I tell you, I am quarter Cherokee. My mammy was named Adeline and she belong to old Master Ben Johnson. Old
Master Ben bring my grandmammy out to that Sequoyah district way back when they call it Arkansas, mammy tell me,
and God only know who my mammy's pa is, but mine was old Master Ben's boy, Ned Johnson.
Old Master Ben come from Tennessee when he was still a young man, and he bring a whole passel of slaves and my
mammy say they all was kin to one another, all the slaves I mean. He was a white man that married a Cherokee woman,
and he was a devil on this earth. I don't want to talk about him none.
White folks was mean to us like the devil, and so I jest let them pass. When I say my brothers and sisters I mean
my half brothers and sisters, you know, but maybe some of them was my whole kin anyways, I don't know. They was
Lottie that was sold off to a Starr because she wouldn't have a baby, and Ed, Dave, Ben, Jim and Ned.
My name is Sarah now but it was Annie until I was eight years old. My old Mistress' name was Annie and she name
me that, and Mammy was afraid to change it until old Mistress died, then she change it. She hate old Mistress and
that name too.
Lottie's name was Annie, too, but Mammy changed it in her own mind but she was afraid to say it out loud, a-feared
she would get a whipping. When sister was sold off Mammy tell her to call herself Annie when she was leaving but
call herself Lottie when she git over to the Starrs. And she done it too. I seen her after that and she was called
Lottie all right.
The Negroes lived all huddled up in a bunch in little one-room log cabins with stick and mud chimneys. We lived
in one, and it had beds for us children like shelves in the wall. Mammy need to help us up into them.
Grandmammy was mighty old and Mistress was old too. Grandmammy set on the Master's porch and minded the baby mostly.
I think it was Young Master's. He was married to a Cherokee girl. They was several of the boys but only one girl,
Nicie. The old Master's boys were Aaron, John, Ned, Cy and Nathan. They lived in a double log house made out of
square hewed logs, and with a double fireplace out of rock where they warmed theirselves on one side and cooked
on the other. They had a long front porch where they set most of the time in the summer, and slept on it too.
There was over a hundred acres in the Master's farm, and it was all bottom land too, and maybe you think he let
them slaves off easy! Work from daylight to dark! They all hated him and the overseer too, and before slavery ended
my grandmammy was dead and old Mistress was dead and old Master was mighty feeble and Uncle Nick had run away to
the North soldiers and they never got him back. He run away once before, about ten years before I was born, Mammy
say, but the Cherokees went over in the Creek Nation and got him back that time.
The way he made the Negroes work so hard, old Master must have been trying to get rich. When they wouldn't stand
for a whipping he would sell them.
I saw him sell a old woman and her son. Must have been my aunt. She was always pestering around trying to get something
for herself, and one day she was cleaning the yard he seen her pick up something and put it inside her apron. He
flew at her and cussed her, and started like he was going to hit her but she just stood right up to him and never
budged, and when he come close she just screamed out loud and ran at him with her fingers stuck out straight and
jabbed him in the belly. He had a big soft belly, too, and it hurt him. He seen she wasn't going to be afraid,
and he set out to sell her. He went off on his horse to get some men to come and bid on her and her boy, and all
us children was mighty scared about it.
They would have hangings at Fort Smith courthouse, and old Master would take a slave there sometimes to see the
hanging, and that slave would come back and tell us all scary stories about the hanging.
One time he whipped a whole bunch of the men on account of a fight in the quarters, and then he took them all to
Fort Smith to see a hanging. He tied them all in the wagon, and when they had seen the hanging he asked them if
they was scared of them dead men hanging up there. They all said yes, of course, but my old uncle Nick was a bad
Negro and he said, "No, I aint a-feared of them nor nothing else in this world", and old Master jumped
on him while he was tied and beat him with a rope, and then when they got home he tied old Nick to a tree and took
his shirt off and poured the cat-o-nine-tails to him until he fainted away and fell over like he was dead.
I never forget seeing all that blood all over my uncle, and if I could hate that old Indian any more I guess I
would, but I hated him all I could already I reckon.
Old Master wasn't the only hellion neither. Old Mistress just as bad, and she took most of her wrath out hitting
us children all the time. She was afraid of the grown Negroes. Afraid of what they might do while old Master was
away, but she beat us children all the time.
She would call me, "Come here Annie!" and I wouldn't know what to do. If I went when she called "Annie"
my mammy would beat me for answering to that name, and if I didn't go old Mistress would beat me for that. That
made me hate both of them, and I got the devil in me and I wouldn't come to either one. My grandmammy minded the
Master's yard, and she set on the front porch all the time, and when I was called I would run to her and she wouldn't
let anybody touch me.
When I was eight years old old Mistress died, and Grandmammy told me why old Mistress picked on me so. She told
me about me being half Mister Ned's blood. Then I knowed why Mister Ned would say, "Let her along, she got
big big blood in her", and then laugh.
Young Mister Ned was a devil, too. When his mammy died he went out and "blanket married." I mean he brung
in a half white and half Indian woman and just lived with her.
The slaves would get rations every Monday morning to do them all week. The Overseer would weigh and measure according
to how many in the family, and if you run out you just starve till you get some more. We all know the overseer
steal some of it for his own self but we can't do anything, so we get it from the old Master some other way.
One day I was carrying water from the spring and I run up on Grandmammy and Uncle Nick skinning a cow. "What
you-all doing?", I say, and they say keep my mouth shut or they kill me. They was stealing from the Master
to piece out down at the quarters with. Old Master had so many cows he never did count the difference.
I guess I wasn't any worse than any the rest of the Negroes, but I was bad to tell little lies. I carry scars on
my legs to this day where Old Master whip me for lying, with a rawhide quirt he carry all the time for his horse.
When I lie to him he just jump down off'n his horse and whip me good right there.
In slavery days we all ate sweet potatoes all the time. When they didn't measure out enough of the tame kind we
would go out in the woods and get the wild kind. They growed along the river sand betaween where we lived and Wilson's
Rock, out west of our place.
Then we had boiled sheep and goat, mostly goat, and milk and wild greens and corn pone. I think the goat meat was
the best, but I aint had no teeth for forty years now, and a chunk of meat hurts my stomach. So I just eats grits
mostly. Besides hoeing in the field, chopping sprouts, shearing sheep, carrying water, cutting firewood, picking
cotton and sewing I was the one they picked to work Mistress' little garden where she raised things from seed they
got in Fort Smith. Green peas and beans and radishes and things like that. If we raised a good garden she give
me a little of it, and if we had a poor one I got a little anyhow even when she didn't give it.
For clothes we had homespun cotton all the year round, but in winter we had a sheep skin jacket with the wool left
on the inside. Sometimes sheep skin shoes with the wool on the inside and sometimes real cow leather shoes with
wood peggings for winter, but always barefooted in summer, all the men and women too.
Lord, I never earned a dime of money in slave days for myself but plenty for the old Master. He would send us out
to work the neighbors field and he got paid for it, but we never did see any money.
I remember the first money I ever did see. It was a little while after we was free, and I found a greenback in
the road at Fort Gibson and I didn't know what it was. Mammy said it was money and grabbed for it, but I was still
a hell cat and I run with it. I went to the little sutler store and laid it down and pointed to a pitcher I been
wanting. The man took the money and give me the pitcher, but I don't know to this day how much money it was and
how much was the pitcher, but I still got that pitcher put away. It's all blue and white stripedy.
Most of the work I done off the plantation was sewing. I learned from my Granny and I loved to sew. That was about
the only thing I was industrious in. When I was just a little bitsy girl I found a steel needle in the yard that
belong to old Mistress. My mammy took it and I cried. She put it in her dress and started for the field. I cried
so old Mistress found out why and made Mammy give me the needle for my own.
We had some neighbor Indians named Starr, and Mrs. Starr used me sometimes to sew. She had nine boys and one girl,
and she would sew up all they clothes at once to do for a year. She would cut out the cloth for about a week, and
then send the word around to all the neighbors, and old Mistress would send me because she couldn't see good to
sew. They would have stacks of drawers, shirts, pants and some dresses all cut out to sew up.
I was the only Negro that would set there and sew in that bunch of women, and they always talked to me nice and
when they eat I get part of it too, out in the kitchen.
One Negro girl, Eula Davis, had a mistress sent her too, one time, but she wouldn't sew. She didn't like me because
she said I was too white and she played off to spite the white people. She got sent home, too.
When old Mistress die I done all the sewing for the family almost. I could sew good enough to go out before I was
eight years old, and when I got to be about ten I was better than any other girl on the place for sewing.
I can still quilt without my glasses, and I have sewed all night long many a time while I was watching Young Master's
baby after old Mistress died.
They was over a hundred acres in the plantation, and I don't know how many slaves, but before the War ended lots
of the men had run away. Uncle Nick went to the North and never come home, and Grandmammy died about that time.
We was way down across the Red river in Texas at that time, close to Shawneetown of the Choctaw Nation but just
across the river on the other side in Texas bottoms. Old Master took us there in covered wagons when the Yankee
soldiers got too close by in the first part of the War. He hired the slaves out to Texas people because he didn't
make any crops down there, and we all lived in kind of camps. That's how some of the men and my uncle Nick got
to slip off to the north that way.
Old Master just rant and rave all the time we was in Texas. That's the first time I ever saw a doctor. Before that
when a slave sick the old women give them herbs, but down there one day old Master whip a Negro girl and she fall
in the fire, and he had a doctor come out to fix her up where she was burnt. I remember Granny giving me clabber
milk when I was sick, and when I was grown I found out it had had medicine in it.
Before freedom we didn't have no church, but slipped around to the other cabins and had a little singing sometimes.
Couldn't have anybody show us the letters either, and you better not let them catch you pick up a book even to
look at the pictures, for it was against a Cherokee law to have a Negro read and write or to teach a Negro.
Some Negroes believed in buckeyes and charms but I never did. Old Master had some good boys, named Aaron, John,
Ned, Cy and Nat and they told me the charms was no good. Their sister Nicie told me too, and said when I was sick
just come and tell her.
They didn't tell us anything about Christmas and New Year though, and all we done was work.
When the War was ended we was still in Texas, and when old Master got a letter from Fort Smith telling him the
slaves was free he couldn't read, and Young Miss read it to him. He went wild and jumped on her and beat the devil
out of her. Said she was lying to him. It near about killed him to let us loose, but he cooled down after awhile
and said he would help us all get back home if we wanted to come.
Mammy told him she could bear her own expenses. I remember I didn't know what "expenses" was, and I thought
it was something I was going to have to help carry all the way back.
It was a long time after he knew we was free before he told us. He tried to keep us, I reckon, but had to let us
go. He died pretty soon after he told us, and some said his heart just broke and some said some Negroes poisoned
him. I didn't know which.
Anyways we had to straggle back the best way we could, and me and mammy just got along one way and another till
we got to a ferry over the Red River and into Arkansas. Then we got some rides and walked some until we got to
Fort Smith. They was a lot of Negro camps there and we stayed awhile and then started out to Fort Gibson because
we heard they was giving rations out there. Mammy knew we was Cherokee anyway, I guess.
That trip was hell on earth. Nobody let us ride and it took us nearly two weeks to walk all that ways, and we nearly
starved all the time. We was skin and bones and feet all bloody when we got to the Fort.
We come here to Four Mile Branch to where the Negroes was all setting down, and pretty soon Mammy died.
I married Oliver Wilson on January second, 1878. He used to belong to Mr. DeWitt Wilson of Tahlequah, and I think
the old people used to live down at Wilson Rock because my husband used to know all about that place and the place
where I was borned. Old Mister DeWitt Wilson give me a pear tree the next year after I was married, and it is still
out in my yard and bears every year.
I was married in a white and black checkedy calico apron that I washed for Mr. Tim Walker's mother Lizzie all day
for, over close to Ft. Gibson, and I was sure a happy woman when I married that day. Him and me both got our land
on our Cherokee freedman blood and I have lived to bury my husband and see two great grandchildren so far.
I bless God about Abraham Lincoln. I remember when my mammy sold pictures of him in Fort Smith for a Jew. If he
give me my freedom I know he is in Heaven now.
I heard a lot about Jefferson Davis in my life. During the War we hear the Negroes singing the soldier song about
hand Jeff Davis to a apple tree, and old Master tell about the time we know Jeff Davis. Old Master say Jeff Davis
was just a dragoon soldier out of Fort Gibson when he bring his family out here from Tennessee, and while they
was on the road from Fort Smith to where they settled young Jeff Davis and some more dragoon soldiers rid up and
talked to him a long time. He say my grandmammy had a bundle on her head, and Jeff Davis say, "Where you going
Aunty?" and she was tired and mad and she said, "I don't know, to Hell I reckon", and all the white
soldiers laughed at her and made her that much madder.
I joined the Four Mile Branch church in 1879 and Sam Solomon was a Creek negro and the first preacher I ever heard
preach. Everybody ought to be in the church and ready for that better home on the other side.
All the old slaves I know are dead excepting two, and I will be going pretty soon I reckon, but I'm glad I lived
to see the day the Negroes get the right treatment if they work good and behave themselves right. They don't have
to have no pass to walk abroad no more, and they can all read and write now, but it's a tarnation shame some of
them go and read the wrong kind of things anyways.
10-19-1938
TOM W. WOODS
Age 83. Alderson, Okla.
Lady, if de nigger hadn't been set free dis country wouldn't ever been what it is now! Poor white folks wouldn't
never had a chance. De slave holders had most of de money and de land and dey wouldn't let de poor white folks
have a chance to own any land or anything else to speak of. Dese white folks wasn't much better off den we was.
Dey had to work hard and dey had to worry 'bout food, clothes and shelter and we didn't. Lots of slave owners wouldn't
allow dem on deir farms among deir slaves without orders from de overseer. I don't know why, unless he was afraid
dey would stir up discontent among de niggers. Dere was lots of "underground railroading" and I rekon
dat was what Old Master and others was afraid of.
Us darkies was taught dat poor white folks didn't amount to much. Course we knowed dey was white and we was black
and dey was to be respected for dat, but dat was about all.
White folks as well as niggers profited by emancipation. Lincoln was a friend to all poor white folks as well as
black ones and if he could a' lived things would a'been different for ever'body.
Dis has been a good old world to live in. I always been able to make a purty good living and de only trouble I
ever had has been sickness and death. I've had a sight of dat kind of trouble. I've outlived two wives and eight
children. I had 13 brothers and sisters and I was de oldest, and I'm de only one left.
I sits here at night by myself and gits to wondering what de good Lord is sparing me for. I reckon it's for some
good reason, and I'd like to live to be a hundred if He wants me to. I'm not tired of living yet!
I was born in Florence, Alabama. My father's name was Thomas Woods and my mammy was Frances Foster. Mammy belonged
to Wash Foster and father was owned by Moses Woods, who lived on an adjoining plantation. He worked for his Master
ever' day but spent each night wid us. He walked 'bout a mile to his work ever' day.
Master Wash was a poor man when he married Miss Sarah Watkins of Richmond, Virginia. Her father was as rich as
cream, he owned 7 plantations and 200 slaves to each plantation. When Master Wash and Miss Sarah got married her
father give her 50 slaves. Ever'body said Miss Mary jest married Master Wash because he was a purty boy, and he
sure was a fine looking man.
He was good and kind to all his slaves when he was sober, but he was awful crabbed and cross when he was drunk,
and he was drunk most of de time. He was hard to please and sometimes he would whip de slaves. I remember seeing
Master Wash whup two men once. He give 'em 200 lashes.
Miss Sarah was de best woman in de world. It takes a good woman to live wid a drunkard.
Two of the men ran away one time and was gone till dey got tired of staying away. Master Wash wouldn't let anyone
hunt 'em. When dey finally come home he had dem strapped in stocks and den deir bodies bared to de waist and he
sure did ply de lash. I guess he whupped 'em harder dan he would if he hadn't been so full of whisky.
He never did sell any of his slaves. He kept the 50 dat Miss Sarah's father give 'em and deir increase. He bought
some ever' time dey had a sale. He owned two plantations and dey was about a hundred slaves on each one. Him and
his family lived in town.
Me and a boy named John was sized and put to work when we was about nine or ten years old. We was so bad dey had
to put us to work as dey couldn't do any thing else with us. We'd chase de pigs and ride de calves and to punish
us dey made us tote water to de hands. Dey was so many hands to water dat it kept us busy running back and forth
with de water. De next year dey put me to plowing and him to hoeing. We made regular hands from den on.
If we had behaved ourselves we wouldn't a'had to go to work till we was fourteen or fifteen anyway. Slave owners
was awful good to deir nigger chaps for dey wanted 'em to grow up to be strong men and women.
Dey was about thirty children on our plantation. Two women looked after us and took care of us till our parents
come in from de field. Dey cooked for us and always gave us our supper and sent us home to our parents for de night.
Our food was placed on a long table in a trough. Each child had a spoon and four of us eat out of one trough. Our
food at night was mostly milk and bread. At noon we had vegetables, bread, meat and milk. He gave us more and better
food than he did his field hands. He said he didn't want none of us to be stunted in our growing.
He bought our shoes for us but cloth for our clothes was spun and wove right there on de farm. In summer us boys
wore long tailed shirts and no pants. I've plowed dat way a many a day. We was glad to see it git warm in de spring
so we could go barefooted and go wid out our pants.
Our overseers lived near de quarters and every morning about four o' clock dey'd blow a horn [HW: to] wake us up.
We knowed it meant to git up and start de day. We was in de field by de time we could see. We always fed our teams
at night. We'd give 'em enough to keep 'em eating all night so we wouldn't have to feed 'em in de morning.
Master Wash Foster and his family lived in de finest house in Florence, Ala. It was a fine, large two-story house,
painted white as nearly all de houses was in dem days. Dere was big gallery in front and back and a fine lawn wid
big cedar and chestnut trees all 'round de house.
He had a fine carriage and a pair of spanking bays dat cost him $500 apiece. Old Monroe was his coachman and dey
made a grand sight. Monroe kept de nickel plated harness and carriage trimmings shining and de team was brushed
slick and clean and dey sure stepped out.
We lived on de plantation about eight miles from town and we liked for de family to come out to de farm. Dey was
four children, Wash, Jack, Sarah and Sally and dey always played with us. When dey come we always had a regular
feast as dey children would eat wid us children. Dey had dishes though to eat out of. After dinner we would run
and play Peep Squirrel. I think dey call it hide-and-seek now.
My mother was a regular field hand till Miss Sarah decided to take her into town to take care of her children.
Dey all called her Frank instead of Frances. I used to get to go to town to visit my mother and we'd have glorious
times I tell you.
We'd go out and gather hickory nuts, hazel nuts, pig nuts, and walnuts. We'd all set around de fire and eat nuts
and tell ghost tales ever' night. Master Wash raised lots of apples too, and we had all that we wanted of dem to
eat.
I saw lots of Yankee soldiers. Sherman and Grant's armies marched by our house and camped at DeCatur, Ala. It took
dem three days to pass. We wasn't afraid of dem.
In the second year of de war some Yankee soldiers come through and gathered up all de slaves and took us to Athens,
Ala., and put us on a Government farm. We stayed dere till de end of de War. My father died jest before dey took
us away.
My mother and us children were on de farm together and dey treated us all mighty good. We had plenty of good food
and clothes.
Master Wash came to see us while we was on de Government farm. He was left in a bad shape and we was all sorry
for him. A lot of his hands went back to him after de Surrender but we never did. Mother married another man named
Goodloe and we all went to Arkansas, near Little Rock. Dis was his former home. I was about nineteen or twenty
years old at this time.
I never sent to school. My wife taught me how to read de Bible but I never learned to write. I have good eyesight.
I guess dat is cause I never put dem out reading and going to moving picture shows.
When any of my family was sick I always sent for de doctor. We had a few of our own home remedies dat we used also.
We boiled poke root and bathed in it for a cure for rheumatism.
A tea made from May apples was used for a physic.
ANNIE YOUNG
Age 86 Oklahoma City, Okla.
I was born in 1851, makes me 86 years old. I was born in Middle Tennessee, Summers County. My mother was put on
a block and sold from me when I was a child. I don't remember my father real good. Sister Martha, Sister Sallie,
nor Sister Jane wasn't sold. But my brother John was. My mother's name is Rachel Donnahue. We lived in a log hut.
The white folks lived in a frame white building sitting in a big grove yard. Old master owned a big farm.
We ate molasses, bread and butter and milk in wooden bowls and crumbled our bread up in it. Old master had big
smokehouses of meat. Dey ate chickens, possums and coons, and my old auntie would barbecue rabbits for de white
folks. We ate ash cakes too.
I washed dishes, swept de yard, and kept de yard clean wid weed brush brooms. I never earned no money. All de slaves
had gardens, and chickens too. My auntie, dey let her have chickens of her own and she raised chickens, and had
a chicken house and garden down in de woods.
I remember in time of de War dey'd send me down in de woods to pick up chips and git wood. All de men had gone
to de army. One morning and t'was cold dey sent me down in de woods and my hands got frostbitten. All de skin come
off and dey had to tie my hands up in roasted turnips. Sallie she had gloves, and didn't get frostbitten. After
my old master died, Master Donnahue was his name, his old son-in-law come to take over de plantation. He was mean,
but my sister whipped him.
We had no nigger driver or overseer. We raised wheat, corn and vegetables, not much cotton, jest enough to spun
de clothes out of.
At night when we'd go to our cabins we'd pick cotton from de seeds to make our clothes. Boys and girls alike wore
dem long shirts slit up de side nearly to your necks. They'd have cornshuckings sometimes all night long. You see
I didn't have no mother, no father, nobody to lead me, teach me or tell me, and so jest lived with anybody was
good enough to let me stay and done what they did. They'd have log rollings, with all de whiskey dey could drink.
I remember going to church, de Methodist Church dey call it. We used to sing dis song and I sho did like it too:
"I went down in de valley to pray, Studying dat good old way."
I been a Christian long before most of dese young niggers was born. My other favorites are:
"Must Jesus bear This Cross Alone."
and
"The Consecrated Cross I'll Bear 'til Death Shall Set Me Free, Yea, There's a Crown for Everyone, And There's
a Crown for Me."
Yes Lawd, there sho is.
One day a nigger killed one of his master's shoats and he catch him and when he'd ask him, "What's that you
got there?" The nigger said, "a possum." De master said, "Let me see." He looked and seen
it was a shoat. De nigger said, "Master it may be a shoat now, but it sho was a possum while ago when I put
'im in dis sack."
Dey didn't whip our folks much, but one day I saw a overseer on another place. He staked a man down with two forked
sticks 'cross his wrist nailed in de ground and beat him half to death with a hand saw 'til it drawed blisters.
Den he mopped his back wid vinegar, salt and pepper. Sometimes dey'd drop dat hot rosin from pine knots on dose
blisters.
When de Yanks come, business took place. I remember white folks was running and hiding, gitting everything dey
could from de Yanks. Dey hid dey jewelry and fine dishes and such. Dose Yanks had on big boots. Dey'd drive up,
feed dey hosses from old Master's corn, catch dey chickens, and tell old Master's cook to cook 'em, and they'd
shoot down old Master's hogs and skin 'em.
De Yanks used to make my nephew drunk, and have him sing (dis is kind of bad):
"I'll be God O'Mighty God Dammed if I don't Kill a nigger, Oh Whooey boys! Oh Whooey! Oh Whooey boys! Oh Whooey!"
I don't remember never seeing no funerals. Jest took 'em off and buried 'em. I remember dat old Master's son-in-law
dat my sister whipped, he called hisself a doctor and he killed Aunt Clo. Give her some medicine but he didn't
know what he was doing and killed her.
I married William Young and we had a pretty good wedding. Married in Crittington County Arkansas. When I left Tennessee
and went to Arkansas I followed some hands. You know after de War dey immigrated niggers from one place to another.
I owned a good farm in Arkansas. I came out here some 42 years ago.
I have three daughters. Mattie Brockins runs a rooming house in Kansas City. Jessie Cotton, lives right up de street
here. Osie Olla Anderson is working out in North town.
Well I think Abraham Lincoln is more than a type a man than Moses. I believe he is a square man, believe in union
that every man has a right to be a free man regardless to color. He was a republican man. Don't know much 'bout
Jeff Davis but I think Booker T. Washington was a pretty good man. He's a right good man I guess, but he is dead
ain't he?
I can remember once my auntie's old Master tried to have her and she run off out in de woods, and when he put those
blood hounds or nigger hounds on her trail he catched her and hit her in de head wid something like de stick de
police carry, and he knocked a hole in her head and she bled like a hog, and he made her have him. She told her
mistress, and mistress told her to go ahead and be wid him 'cause he's gonna kill you. And he had dem two women
and she had some chillun nearly white, and master and dey all worked in de fields side by side.
