Chapter VIII: Part 8

"All the chillun, when they was clearin' up new ground, had to pick up brush and pile it up. Ever'body knowed how much he had to do. Ever' woman knowed how much she had to weave. They made ever'thing--shoes and all.

"Them Yankees sure did bad--burned up the cotton and the corn. I seen one of 'em get up in a tree and take his spyglass and look all around; directly he'd come down and went just as straight to that cotton as a bird to its nest. Oh, yes ma'am, they burned up everything. I was a little scared of 'em but they said they wasn't goin' to hurt us. Old master had done left home and gone to the woods. It was enough to scare you--all them guns stacked up and bayonets that long and just as keen. Come in and have old missis cook for 'em. Sometimes they'd go and leave lots to eat for the colored folks and maybe give 'em a blanket. Wouldn't give old missis anything; try to make her tell where the money was though.

"When they said Vicksburg was captured, old master come out hollerin' and cryin' and said they taken Vicksburg and we was free. Some of 'em stayed and some of 'em left. Me and my grandma and my aunt stayed there after we was freed 'bout two years. They took care of me; I was raised motherless.

"I farmed all my life. Never done public work two weeks in my life. Don't know what it is.

"Old master had them blue back spellers and 'fore freedom sometimes he'd make us learn our ABC's.

"And he'd let you go to church too. He'd ask if you got 'ligion and say, 'Now, when the preacher ask you, go up and give him your hand and then go to the back.' In them days, didn't have any but the white folks' church. But I was pretty rough in them days and I didn't j'ine.

"But I tell you, you'd better not leave the plantation without a pass or them paddyrollers would make you shout. If they kotch you and you didn't have a pass, a whippin' took place right there.

"Oh Lord, that's been a long time. I sits here sometimes and looks back and think it's been a long time, but I'm still livin'.

"I've always tried to keep out of trouble. 'Co'se I've had some pretty tough times. I ain't never been 'rested fer nothin'. I ain't never been inside of a jail house. I've had some kin folks in there though.

"I've been a preacher forty years. Don't preach much now. My lungs done got decayed and I can't hold up. Some people thinks preachin' is an easy thing but it's not.

"Prettiest thing I ever saw when the Yankees was travelin' was the drums and kettledrums and them horses. It was the prettiest sight I ever saw. Them horses knowed their business, too. You couldn't go up to 'em either. They had gold bits in their mouths and looked like their bridles was covered with gold. And Yankees sittin' up there with a sword.

"Old boss had a fine saddle horse and you know the Yankees had a old horse with the footevil and you know they turned him loose and took old boss's saddle horse. He didn't know it though; he was in the woods.

"I believe there is people that can give you good luck. I know a woman that told me that I was goin' to have some good luck and it worked just like she said. She told us I would be the onliest man on the place that would pay out my mule and sure 'nough I was. I cleared forty dollars outside my mule and my corn. She said I was born to be lucky. Told me they would be lots of people work agin me but it wouldn't do no good."

Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden Person interviewed: William Lattimore 606 West Pullen Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas Age: 78

"Yes'm I was a slave--I was born in 1859 in Mississippi. During the war I wasn't grown but I can remember when the Yankee soldiers come to Canton, Mississippi. We was sittin' out in the yard and the white folks was on the porch when they was bombardin' Jackson. We could hear the cannons. The white people said the Yankees was tryin' to whip the rebellion and set the niggers free. When they got done I didn't know what had happened but I remember the colored people packed up and we all went to Vicksburg. My father ran off and jined the Yankee army. He was in Colonel Zeigler's regiment in the infantry. I knowed General Grant when I seed him. I know when Abraham Lincoln died the soldiers (Yankees) all wore that black band around their arms.

"After my father was mustered out we went to Warren County, Mississippi to live. He worked on the halves with a schoolteacher named Mr. Hannum. He said he was my godfather.

"One time after the war Mr. Lattimore came and wanted my father to live with him but I didn't want him to because before the surrender old master whipped my father over the head with a walking stick 'cause he stayed too long and I was afraid he would whip him again.

"'Did you ever vote?' Me? Yes ma'm I voted. I don't remember who I voted for first--my 'membrance don't serve me--I ain't got that fresh enough in my memory. I served eight years as Justice of the Peace after I come to Arkansas. I remember one time they put one colored man in office and I said that's pluckin' before it is ripe. We elected a colored sheriff in Warren County once. The white men went on his bond, but after awhile the Ku Klux compelled them to get off and then he couldn't make bond. He appealed to the citizens to let him stay in office without bond but they wouldn't do it. When a man is trying to get elected they promise a lot of things but afterwards they is just like a duck--they swim off on the other side.

"I went to school after freedom and kept a goin' till I was married. I was a school director when I was eighteen. I didn't have any children and the superintendent who was very rigid and strict said 'Boy you is not even a patron of the school.' But he let me serve. I used to visit the school 'bout twice a week and if the teacher was not doin' right, I sure did lift my voice against it.

"I lived in Chicot County when I first come to Arkansas and when I moved to Jefferson County, Judge Harry E. Cook sent my reputation up here. I ain't never peeped into a jailhouse or had handcuffs on these hands.

"We've got to do something 'bout this younger generation. You never saw anything sicker. They is degenerating.

"I hold up my right hand, swear to uphold the Constitution and preserve the flag and I don't think justice is being done when they won't let the colored folks vote. We'd like to harmonize things here. God made us all and said 'You is my chillun.'"

Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson Person interviewed: Bessie Lawsom, Helena, Arkansas Age: 76 [Date Stamp: MAY 31 1938]

"I was born in Georgia. My mama was brought from Virginia to one of the Carolina states, then to Georgia. She was sold twice. I don't recollect but one of her masters. I heard her speak of Master Bracknell. His wife, now I remember her well. She nursed me. I was sickly and they needed her to work in the crop so bad. She done had a baby leetle older than I was, so I nursed one breast and Jim the other. She raised me and Jim together. Mama was name Sallie and papa Mathew Bracknell. They called him Mat Bracknell. I don't know my master's name. They had other children.

"Me and Jim dug wells out in the yard and buried all the little ducks and chickens and made graves. We had a regular burying ground we made. They treated us pretty good as fur as I knowed. I never heard mama complain. She lived till I was forty years old. Papa died a few years after freedom. He had typhoid fever. He was great to fish. I believe now he got some bad water to drink out fishing. There was six of us and three half children. I'm the onliest one living as I knows of. One sister died in 1923 in Atlanta. She come to see me. She lived with big rich folks there. She was a white man's girl. She never had so much bad luck as we dark skin children the way it was. My papa had to go to war with some of Master Bracknell's kin folks, maybe his wife's kin folks, and they took him to wait on them at the battle-fields. Some soldiers camped by at the last of the war. They stole her out. She went to take something to a sick widow woman for old mistress. She never got back for a week. She said she was so scared and one day when her man, the man that claimed her, went off on a scout trip she asked a man, seemed to be a big boss, could she go to that thicket and get some black gum toothbrushes. He let her ride a little old broken down horse out there. She had a bridle but she was bare back. She come home through the pasture and one of the colored boys took the horse back nearly to the camps and turned him loose. 'Fo'e my own papa got back she had a white chile. Master Bracknell was proud of her. Papa didn't make no difference in her and his children. After the War he bought a whole bolt of cloth when he went to town. Mama would make us all a dress alike. The Yankees whooped mama at their camp. She said she was afraid to try to get away and that come in her mind. Old mistress thought that widow woman was keeping her to wait on her and take care of her small children. She wasn't uneasy and they took care of me.

"I don't recollect freedom. I heard mama say a drove come by and ask her to come go to Atlanta; they said Yankees give 'em Atlanta. She said she knowed if she went off papa wouldn't know where she was. She told 'em she had two young children she couldn't leave. They went on. She told old mistress and she said she done right not to go.

"The Yankees stole mama's feather bed. Old mistress had great big high feather beds and big pillows. Mama had a bed in a shed room open out on the back piazza. They put them big beds across their horses and some took pillows and down the road they went. It was cold and the ground froze. They made cotton beds then and the Yankees done got all the geese and chickens. They nearly starved. The Yankees took all the cows and stock.

"Master Bracknell was cripple. He had a store at Cross Roads. It was twenty-five miles from Marietta, Georgia. They never troubled him like they did old mistress. She was scared of them. She knowed if they come and caught her gone they would set fire to the house. No, they never burned nothing on our place but they did some in sight. I can remember seeing big fires about at night and day time too.

"We lived on Master Bracknell's place till I was eight years old and my sister five. We come to South, Alabama, then to Mississippi and then up the river to Helena. I married in Jackson, Mississippi. A white boy married us. We lived on his place and he was going to preach. He wasn't a preacher then. Richard Moore was his name. It took him several weeks to learn what to say. He practiced on us. He thought a heap of me and he ask Jesse if he could marry us. He brought us a big fine cake his mother cooked for us when he come. My husband named Jesse Lawsom. He was raised in Louisiana. We lived together till he died. My mother went blind before she died. His mother lived there, then we took care of them and after he died his mother lived with me. Now I lives with this niece here some and my daughter in Jackson. I had fourteen children. I just got one left and grandchildren I go to see. I make the rounds. Some of 'em good and some of them ain't no account at tall.

"I used to take advice. They get up and leave the place. They don't want old folks to advise 'em. If they can't get their price they sit around and go hungry. They won't work for what I used to be glad to get. I keep my girl on the right path and that is all I can do. My niece don't work out but her husband works on the farm all the time. She helps him. They go out and live till the work is done. He is off now ploughing. Times is fast sure as you born, girl. Faster 'an ever I seen."

Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson Person interviewed: Henry Lee R.F.D., two and one-half miles, Palestine, Arkansas Age: 87

"I was born close to Huntsville, Alabama during slavery. My master was Tom Laughinghouse and Miss Fannie, his wife. They had two children, Jarman and Mattie. He was Dr. George Laughinghouse's brother. Dr. George lived at Forrest City.

"He brung us to the old Pope place close to Forrest City after 'mancipation. We didn't know we was free. Finally we kept hearing folks talk, then Master Tom told us we was free. We cleared land right on after freedom like we was slaves.

"General Lee, a white man, owned a boat on the Mississippi River. He owned my father. We took on his name way after freedom. Mother was Becky Laughinghouse and father was Willis Lee. They had six children.

"After I come to Arkansas I went to school three days to a white man. He was sont here from the North somewhere.

"My folks was all black pure stock niggers and field folks same as I is.

"Mother's owners was good to her. They give them all day Saturday to wash and iron and cook for her folks. They got a whooping if they went to the field Monday morning dirty. They was very good to us. I can recollect that. They was a reasonable set of white folks. They weighed out everything. They whooped their hands. They had a white overseer but he wasn't hired to whoop Laughinghouse's slaves.

"They 'lowed mother to weave at her home at night. He had seven or eight families on his farm.

"The well was a curiosity to me then and would sure be one now. We had a walled and curbed well. A long forked pole, a short chain and a long rope. We pulled up the water by the long forked pole. Cold! It was good cold water. Beats our water all to pieces.

"The soldiers come up in a drove one day and ask mother for me. She didn't let any of us go.

"Our master got killed over here close to Forrest City. We all picked cotton, then we all went to gin. A coupling pin broke and let a wooden block come down on him. It weighed one thousand pounds I expect. He was spreading a sheet and smoothing the cotton. It mashed and smothered him both. That was first of our scattering.

"The colored folks raised gardens in the fence corners. They raised a heap of stuff that way. We lived a heap better then than now.

"My father died and mother started sharecropping. First, one-half and then, one-third went to us. Things went on very well till the commissary come about. The nigger got figured clean out.

"Nearly all the women of them days wore bonnets or what they called hoods one the other. Boys wore long shirts to calf of their legs.

"We rode oxen to church. Many time rode to church and home in ox wagon.

"Ku Kluxes followed Pattyrollers, then come on White Caps. If the Pattyrollers kilt a slave he had to pay the master the price. The Ku Kluxes rode at night. All of 'em's main business was to keep the slaves at their own places and at work. Iffen the master instructed them to keep offen his place they kept off. They never come on our place. But though I was feared of 'em.

"I needs help and I don't git it. I applied. 'Cause a grandson helps us a little I don't git the welfare pension. I need it and I think I ought to git it. I worked hard, bought this house, paid my taxes--still trying. Still they don't aid me now and I passed aiding my own self. I think I oughten to git lef' out 'cause I help myself when I could. I sure is left out. Been left out.

"A part of the people is accountable for the way the times is going on. Some of them is getting it all and don't give the others no show a tall. Times is powerful hard for some and too easy for others. Some is turned mean and some cowed down and times hard for them what can't work hard."

Interviewer: Miss Sallie C. Miller Person interviewed: Mandy Lee, Coal Hill, Arkansas Age: 85

"Yes'm I was a slave. I been here. I heard the bugles blowing, the fife beat, the drums beat, and the cannons roar. We started to Texas but never got across the river. I don't know what town it was but it was just across the river from Texas. My white folks was good to me. I staid with them till they died. Missy died first, then master died. I never was away from them. They was both good. My mammy was sold but I never was. They said they was surrendered when we come back from Texas. I heard the drums beat at Ft. Smith when we come back but I don't know what they was doing. I worked in the house with the children and in the field too. I help herd the horses. I would card and spin and eat peaches. No, that wasn't all I had to eat. I didn't have enough meat but I had plenty of milk and potatoes. I was born right here in Coal Hill. I ain't never lived anywhere else except when we went South during the war.

"Law woman I can't tell you what I think of the present generation. They are good in their way but they don't do like we did. I never did go naked. I don't see how they stand it.

"I could sing when I was young. We sang everything, the good and bad."

Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden Person interviewed: Mary Lee 1308 Texas Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas Age: 74 [Date Stamp: MAY 31 1938]

"I was born in 1864, March the fourth, the year before the Civil War ended. All I know is what they told me and what I read.

"Born in Texas, but my mother and father was both born in Georgia.

"My mother said her white folks was good to her. She was the house girl, she didn't have to work in no field.

"I went to school when I was six or eight. I don't remember which. I had right smart schooling.

"I remember my mother's young missis run off and got married. She was just a young girl, 'bout seventeen. That's been a long time.

"I got a book sent to me a while back. It's a Catholic book--'History of Church and State.' Yes'm, I'm a Catholic. Used to belong to the Methodist church, but I wouldn't be a Methodist no more. I like the Catholics. You would too if you was one of 'em.

"I been here in Arkansas since 1891. That's goin' right on up the road.

"I can't do much work now, my breath gets short.

"I used to make thirty-five dollars a month washin' and ironin'. Oh, that was a long time 'fore the depression.

"I don't think nothin' of this younger generation. All goin' the same way. Oh lord, you better let 'em alone, they won't take no foolishness."

Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden Person interviewed: Talitha Lewis 300 E. 21st Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas Age: 86 [Date Stamp: MAY 31 1938]

"I should say I was born in slavery times! Now if you ask me something I don't know, I couldn't tell you, honey, 'cause I believe in people tellin' the truth.

"In a way I know how old I is. I give what my white folks give me. They told me I was born in 1852. Yes ma'am, my young missis used to set down and work on me. She'd say, 'Get it in your head' 'cause I ain't got no education.

"I 'member my old missis. Know her name as good as I do mine. Name was Maria Whitley. After old master died, his property was divided and Jim Whitley drawed me and my mother and my sister. Yes ma'am, it was my sister.

"Goldsboro, North Carolina is where I was born, in Johnston County.

"Do I 'member anything 'bout peace declared? I should say I do--'member long time 'fore it come.

"I seed so many different regiments of people I didn't know which was which. I know the Yankees called ever'body Dinah. They'd say to me, 'Dinah, hold my horse,' and my hands would be full of bridles. And they'd say, 'You got anything buried?' The white folks had done buried the meat under my mother's house. And say, 'Is they good to you?' If they hadn't a been we wouldn't a known any better than to tell it.

"I 'member they found where the meat was buried and they ripped up my mother's feather bed and filled it full of hams and shoulders, and there wasn't a middlin' in the lot. And kill chickens and geese! They got ever'thing and anything they wanted.

"There was a battle-field about four miles from us where they fit at.

"Honey, I can't tell it like I know it, but I _know_ it.

"Old master was a good man. You had plenty to eat and plenty to wear. And on Monday morning all his colored folks had clean clothes. I wish I could tell it like I know. He was a good man but he had as mean a wife as I ever saw. She used to be Nettie Sherrod and she _did_ _not_ like a black face. Yes ma'am, Jim Whitley was a good man but his father was a devil.

"If Massa Jim had a hand he couldn't control, he sold him. He said he wasn't goin' to beat 'em or have 'em run off and stay in the woods. Yes'm, that was my master, Jim Whitley.

"His overseer was Zack Hill when peace declared.

"How long I been in Arkansas? Me? We landed at Marianna, Arkansas in 1889. They emigranted us here. They sure said they had fritter trees and a molasses pond. They said to just shake the tree and the fritters would fall in the pond. You know anybody that had any sense wouldn't believe that. Yes ma'am, they sure told that lie. 'Course there was times when you could make good money here.

"I know I is a slave time chile. I fared well but I sure did see some that didn't.

"Our white folks had hands that didn't do nothin' but make clothes and sheets and kivers.

"Baby, them Ku Klux was a pain. The paddyrollers was bad enough but them Ku Klux done lots of devilment. Yes ma'am, they _done_ some devilment.

"I worked for a white man once was a Ku Klux, but I didn't know it for a long time. One time he said, 'Now when you're foolin' around in my closet cleanin' up, I want you to be pertickler.' I seed them rubber pants what they filled with water. I reckon he had enough things for a hundred men. His wife say, 'Now, Talitha, don't let on you know what them things is.'

"Now my father belonged to the Adkins. He and my mother was married with a stiffcate 'fore peace declared and after peace declared they got a license and was married just like they marry now.

"My master used to ask us chillun, 'Do your folks pray at night?' We said 'no' 'cause our folks had told us what to say. But the Lawd have mercy, there was plenty of that goin' on. They'd pray, 'Lawd, deliver us from under bondage.'

"Colored folks used to go to the white folks' church. I was raised up under the old Primitive Baptist feet washin' church. Oh, that's a time, baby!

"What I think of the younger generation? I don't know what to think of 'em. I don't _think_--I know they is goin' too fast.

"I learned how to read the Bible after I 'fessed religion. Yes ma'am, I can read the Bible, praise the Lawd!"

Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor Person interviewed: Abbie Lindsay 914 W. Tenth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas Age: 84 [HW: cf. Will Glass' story, No. ----?]

"I was born June 1, 1856; the place at that time was called Lynngrove, Louisiana. It was just about a mile from the post office, and was in Morehouse Parish in the first ward--in the tenth ward I mean.

Relatives

"My father was named Alec Summerville. He named himself after the Civil War. They were going around letting the people choose their names. He had belonged to Alec Watts; but when they allowed him to select his own name after the war, he called himself Summerville after the town Summerville (Somerville), Alabama. His mother was named Charlotte Dantzler. She was born in North Carolina. John Haynes bought her and brought her to Arkansas. My father was an overseer's child. You know they whipped people in those days and forced them. That is why he didn't go by the name of Watts after he got free and could select his own name.

"The name of my mother's mother was Celia Watts. I don't know my grandfather's first name. Old man Alec Watts' father gave my mother to him. I didn't know anything about that except what was told to me. They bought her from South Carolina. They came to Louisiana. My father was bought in South Carolina too. After the Haynes met the Watts, Watts married old man Haynes' daughter. He gave my father to his daughter, Mary Watts. She was Mary Watts after she was married. She was Mary Haynes before. Watts' father gave my mother to Alec Watts. That is just the way it was.

"My mother and father had three children to live. I think there were about thirteen in all. There are just two of us living now. I couldn't tell you where Jeffrey Summerville, my living brother, is living now.

Slave Houses

"The slaves lived in hewed-log houses. I have often seen hewed-log houses. Have you ever seen one? You cut big logs and split them open with a maul and a wedge. Then you take a pole ax and hack it on both sides. Then you notch it--cut it into a sort of tongue and groove joint in each end. Before you cut the notches in the end, you take a broad ax and hew it on both sides. The notch holds the corners of the house-ties every corner. You put the rafters up just like you do now. Then you lathe the rafters and then put boards on top of the rafters. Sometimes shingles were used on the rafters instead of boards.

"You would finish off the outside of the walls by making clay cakes out of mud and filling up the cracks with them. When that clay got hard, nothing could go through the walls. Sometimes thin boards were nailed on the inside to finish the interior.

Furniture and Food

"They had planks--homemade wooden beds. They made tables and chairs. They caned the chairs. They made the tables with four legs. You made it just like you would make a box, adding the legs.

"A little house called the smokehouse was built in one of the corners of the yard. They would weigh out to each one so much food for the week's supply--mostly meat and meal, sometimes rice. They'd give you parched meal and rye too.

"Sometimes they had the slaves cook their food in the cabins. Mostly all the time. My people ate in the kitchen because my mother was the cook and my father was the yard man. The others mostly cooked at home--in their cabins.

Work

"My mother and father worked around the house and yard. Slaves in the field had to pick a certain amount of cotton. The man had to pick from two to three hundred pounds of cotton a day if he wasn't sick, and the woman had to pick about one hundred fifty. Of course some of them could pick more. They worked in a way of speaking from can till can't, from the time they could see until the time they couldn't. They do about the same thing now.

Recreation

"I remember the time the white folks used to make the slaves all come around in the yard and sing every Sunday evening. I can't remember any of the songs straight through. I can just remember them in spots.

'Give me Jesus, you can have all the world
In the morning when I arise, Give me Jesus.'
(Fragment)

* * * * *

'Lie on him if you sing right
Lie on him if you pray right
God knows that your heart is not right
Come, let us go to heaven anyhow.'
(Fragment)

* * * * *

'The ark was seen at rest upon the hill
On the hills of Calvary
And Great Jehovah spoke
Sanctify to God upon the hill.'
(First verse)

* * * * *

'Peter spied the promised land
On the hill of Calvary
And Great Jehovah spoke
Sanctify to God upon the hill.'
(Second verse)

There was lots more that they sung.

"They could go to parties too, but when they went to them or to anything else, they had to have a pass. When they went to a party the most they did was to play the fiddle and dance. They had corn huskings every Friday night, and they ground the meal every Saturday. The corn husking was the same as fun. They didn't serve anything on the place where I was. I never knew them to serve anything at the corn shuckings or at the parties. Sometimes they would give a picnic, and they would kill a hog for that.

Life Since Freedom

"Right after the war, my father hired me out to nurse. Then I stayed around the house and helped my stepmother, and the white girls taught me a little until I got to be thirteen years old. Then I got three months' schooling in a regular school. I came here in 1915. I had been living in Newport before that. Yes, I been married, and that's all you need to know about that. I got two children: one fifty-three years old, and the other sixty.

Opinions

"I don't have much thinking to do about the young people. It's a lost race without a change."

Interviewer's Comment

"Mother" Lindsay is a Bible-reading, neat and clean-appearing, pleasant-mannered business woman, a little bulky, but carrying herself like a woman thirty years. She runs a cafe on Ninth Street and manages her own business competently. She refers to it as "Hole in the Wall." I had been trying for sometime to catch her away from her home. It was almost impossible for me to get a story from her at her restaurant or at her home.

She doesn't like to sit long at a time and doesn't like to tell too much. When she feels quarters are a little close and that she is telling more than she wants to, she says, "Honey, I ain't got no more time to talk to you; I got to get back to the cafe and get me a cup of coffee."

Will Glass, who has a story of his own, collaborated with her on her story. He has an accurate and detailed memory of many things. He is too young to have any personal memories. But he remembers everything he has been told by his grandparents and parents, and they seem to have talked freely to him unlike the usual parents of that period.

Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden Person interviewed: Rosa Lindsey 302 S. Miller Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas Age: 83

"I was born in Georgia and I'm 83.

"My white folks was named Abercrombie.

"I don't remember my mother and I hardly remember my father. My white folks raised me up. I 'member my missis had me bound to her when I was twelve. I know when my grandma come to take me home with her, I run away from her and went back to my white folks.

"My white folks was rich. I belonged to my young missis. She didn't 'low nobody to hit me. When she went to school she had me straddle the horse behind her. The first readin' I ever learned was from the white folks.

"I think the Yankees took Columbus, Georgia on a Sunday morning. I know they just come through there and tore up things and did as they pleased.

"I stayed there a long time after the Yankees went back.

"Old master wasn't too old to go to war but he didn't go. I think he had to dodge around to keep the Yankees from gettin' him. I think he went to Texas but we didn't go.

"I loved my white folks 'cause I knowed more about them than anybody else.

"I come here to Arkansas with a young white lady just married. She 'suaded me to come with her and I just stayed.

"Biggest thing I have did is washin' and ironin'. But now I am doing missionary work in the Sanctified church.

"I don't know 'bout the younger generation. Looks like 'bout near ever'body lost now. There's some few young people is saved now but they ain't many."

Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lucy Person interviewed: William Little, Atkins, Arkansas Age: 83

"I was born on the plantation of Dr. Andrew Scott, but my old ma'ster was Col. Ben T. Embry. The 14th of March, in the year 1855, was my birthday. Yes suh, I was born right here at old Galla Rock! My old Ma'ster Embry had a good many slaves. He went to Texas and stayed about three years. Took a lot of us along, and de first work I ever done after I was set free was pickin' cotton at $2 a hundred pounds. Dere was seventy-five or a hundred of us freed at once. Yes suh! Den we drove five hundred miles back here from Texas, and drove five hundred head of stock. We was refigees--dat's de reason we had to go to Texas.

"Father and mother both passed away a good many years ago. Oh, yes, dey was mighty well treated while dey was in slavery; never was a kinder mas'r anywhere dan my old mas'r. And he was wealthy, too--had lots of land, and a store, and plenty of other property. Many of the slaves stayed on as servants long after the War, and lived right around here at old Galla Rock.

"No suh, I never belonged to no chu'ch; dey thought I done too much of the devil's work--playin' the fiddle. Used to play the fiddle for dances all around the neighborhood. One white man gave me $10 once for playin' at a dance. Played lots of the old-time pieces like 'Turkey in the Straw', 'Dixie', and so on.

"We owns our home here, and I has another one. Been married twice and raised eighteen chillun. Yes suh, we've lived here eighteen years, and had fine health till last few years, but my health is sorter po'ly now. Got a swellin' in my laigs.

"(Chuckling) I sure remembers lots of happy occasions down here in days before the War. One day the steamboat come up to the landin'. It was named the Maumelle--yes suh, Maumelle, and lots of hosses and cattle was unloaded from the steamer. Sure was busy days then. And our old mas'r was mighty kind to us."

NOTE: "Uncle Bill" did not know how he came about the name "Little." Perhaps it was a nickname bestowed upon him to distinguish him from some other William of larger stature. However, he stands fully six feet in height, and has a strong, vigorous voice. He is the sole surveying ex-slave of the Galla Rock community.

Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lucy Person interviewed: "Aunt Minerva" Lofton Russellville, Arkansas Age: 69

"Come in! Yes, my name's Minerva Lofton--at least it was yistiddy. Now, whatcha gonna ask me? Hope you ain't saying something that'll git me in bad. Don't want to git in any more trouble. Hard times' bad enough.

"I was born in the country nine miles from Clarendon, Monroe County, December 3, 1869. Father died before I was born. My mother came from Virginia, and her mistress' name was Bettie Clark. They lived close to Richmond, and people used to say 'Blue Ridge,' so I think it was Blue Ridge County, Virginia. Mother was sold to Henry Cargile--C-a-r-g-i-l-e.

"When they were expecting peace to be declared soon a lot of the colored people named Parks took many of the slaves to Texas to escape from the Yankees, but when they got to Corpus Christi they found the Yankee soldiers there just the same, so they came back to Arkansas. I sure used to laugh at my dear old mother when she'd tell about the long trip to Corpus Christi, and things that happened on the way. They stopped over at Camden as they went through, and one of the colored gals who hated her played a prank on her to take out her spite on mother: They had stopped at a dairyman's home near Camden, and she sent my mother in to get a gallon of buttermilk. After drinking all she could hold she grabbed mother by the hair of the head and churned her up and down in the buttermilk till it streamed down her face, and on her clothes--a sight to behold. I laughed and laughed until my sides ached when mother told me about this.

"Old mistis' name (that is, one of the old mistis') was Bettie Young, and my mother was named Bettie for her; she was a namesake--sort of a wedding present, I think.

"I've been a member of the Pentecostal church for nineteen years.

"No sir, I never have voted and never expect to. Why? Because I have a religious opinion about votin'. I think a woman should not vote; her place is in the home raising her family and attending to the household duties. We have raised only two boys (stepchildren)--had no children of our own--but I have decided ideas about women runnin' around among and votin'. When I see em settin' around the ballot box at the polls, sometimes with a cigarette in their mouths, and again slingin' out a 'damn' or two, I want to slap em good and hard.

"Yes, the old time religious songs--I sure remember some of them! Used to be able to sing lots of em, but have forgotten the words of many. Let's see:

'I'm a-goin' to tell my Lord, Daniel in de lion's den;
I'm a-goin' to tell my Lord, I'm a-goin' to tell my Lord,
Daniel in de lion's den.'

Here's another:

'Big bells a-ringin' in de army of de Lord;
Big bells a-ringin' in de army.
I'm so glad I'm in de army of de Lord;
My soul's a-shoutin' in de army.'

"Modern youth? Humph! I think they are just a fulfilling of what Christ said: 'They shall grow wiser as they grow older, but weaker.' Where is it in the Scripture? Wait a minute and I'll look it up. Now, let's see--where was that passage? It says 'weaker' here and 'weaken'. Never mind--wait--I'll find it. Well, anyway, I don't know jest how to describe this generation. I heard a white woman once say that she had to do a little cussin' to make herself understood. 'Cussin'?' Why, 'cussin'' is jist a polite word for it.

"Good-bye, mister. You oughta thank the Lawd you've got a job!"

FOLKLORE SUBJECTS

Name of Interviewer: S. S. Taylor Subject: Biographical Sketch of Robert Lofton Story--Information (If not enough space on this page add page)

This information given by: Robert Lofton Place of Residence: 1904 Cross Street, Little Rock, Arkansas Occupation: Farmer (no longer able to work) Age: 82 [TR: Personal information moved from bottom of form.]

Robert Lofton was born March 11, 1855 in McDonogh, Georgia. His master lived in town and owned two Negro women and their children. One of these was Lofton's mother.

His father was a Negro who lived back of him and belonged to the local postmaster. He had a wagon and did public hauling for his master, Dr. Tie. He was allowed to visit his wife and children at nights, and was kept plentifully supplied with money by his master.

Lofton's master, Asa Brown, bought, or acquired from time to time in payment of debts, other slaves. These he hired out to farmers, collecting the wages for their labor.

After the war, the Lofton family came to Arkansas and lived in Lee County just outside of Oak Forest. They were share croppers and farmers throughout their lives. He has a son, however, a war veteran and unusually intelligent.

Robert Lofton is a fine looking old man, with silky white hair and an octoroon appearance, although the son of two colored persons.

He remembers scarcely anything because of fading mental powers, but he is able to take long walks and contends that only in that way can he keep free from rheumatic pains. He speaks of having died recently and come back to life, is extremely religious, and is fearful of saying something that he should not.

"I was in McDonogh, Georgia when the surrender came. [HW: That is where I was born on March 11, 1855.] There was plenty of soldiers in that little town--Yankees and Rebels. And they was sending mail out through the whole country. The Rebels had as good chance to know what was in the mail as the Yanks (his mother's husband's master was postmaster) did.

How Freedom Came

"The slaves learned through their masters that they were free. The Yankees never told the niggers anything. They could tell those who were with them that they were free. And they notified the people to notify their niggers that they were free. 'Release him. If he wants to stay with you yet, he may. We don't require him to go away but you must let him know he is free.'

"The masters said, 'You are free now, Johnnie, just as free as I am.' Many of them put their things in a little wagon and moved to some other plantation or town or house. But a heap of them stayed right where they were.

"My father found out before my mother did. He was living across town behind us about one-fourth of a mile. Dr. Tie, his master, had a post office, and that post office was where they got the news. My father got the news before my master did. He got on to it through being on with Dr. Tie. So my father got the news before my master, Asa Brown, did and he come over and told my mother before my master did. But my master came out the next thing and told her she could go or come as she pleased. She said she'd stay right along. And we got along just as we always did--until my father came and told us he was going to Atlanta with a crew of Yankees.

Employment and Post-War Changes in Residence

"He got a wagon and a team and run us off to the railroad. He got a job at Atlanta directly. After he made a year in Atlanta, he got dissatisfied. He had two girls who were big enough to cut cotton. So he decided to go farm. He went to Tennessee and we made a crop there. Then he heard about Arkansas and came here.

"When he came here, somehow or other, he got in a fight with a colored man. He got the advantage of that man and killed him. The officers came after him, but he left and I ain't never seen nor heard of him since. He went and left my poor mother and her five children alone. But I was getting big enough to be some help. And we made crops and got along somehow.

"I don't know what we expected. I never heerd anyone say a word. I was children you know, and it was mighty little that children knew because the old folks did not talk with them much.

What They Got

"I never heerd of anything any of them got. I never heerd of any of them getting anything except work. I don't recollect any pension or anything being given them--nothing but work.

Folks on this place would leave and go over on that place, and folks on that place would come over here. They ate as long as the white folks ate. We stayed with our old master and mistress, (Mr. Asa Brown and Mrs. Sallie Brown).

Good Master and Mistress

"They did not whip us. They didn't whip nobody they had. They were good white folks. My mother never was whipped. She was not whipped after the surrender and she wasn't whipped before. [We lived in the same house as our master] [HW: (in margin) see p. 6] and we ate what he ate.

Wives and Husbands

"There was another woman my master owned. Her husband belonged to another white man. My father also belonged to another white man. Both of them would come and stay with their wives at night and go back to work with their masters during the day. My mother had her kin folks who lived down in the country and my mother used to go out and visit them. I had a grandmother way out in the country. My mother used to take me and go out and stay a day or so. She would arrange with mistress and master and go down Saturday and she would take me along and leave her other children with this other woman. Sunday night she would make it back. Sometimes she wouldn't come back until Monday.

"It didn't look like she was any freer after freedom than she was before. She was free all the time she was a slave. They never whipped her. Asa Brown never whipped his niggers.

Letting Out Slaves

"Asa Brown used to rent out his niggers, sometimes. You know, they used to rent them. But he never rented my mother though. He needed her all the time. She was the cook. He needed her all the time and he kept her all the time. He let her go to see grandmother and he let her go to church.

"Sometimes my mother went to the white church and sometimes she went to the colored folks church. When we went to the white folks church, we took and sat down in the back and behaved ourselves and that was all there was to it. When they'd have these here big meetings--revivals or protracted meetings they call them--she'd go to the white and black. They wouldn't have them all at the same time and everybody would have a chance to go to all of them.

"They wouldn't allow the colored to preach and they wouldn't even call on them to pray but he could sing as good as any of them.

"Generally all colored preachers that I knowed of was slaves. The slaves attended the churches all right enough--Methodists and Baptists both white and black. I never heard of the preachers saying anything the white folks did not like.

"The Methodists' church started in the North. There was fourteen or fifteen members that got dissatisfied with the Baptist church and went over to the Methodist church. The trouble was that they weren't satisfied with our Baptism. The Baptists were here before the Methodists were thought of. These here fourteen or fifteen members came out of the North and started the Methodist church going.

Share Cropping

"Share cropping has been ever since I knowed anything. It was the way I started. I was working the white man's land and stock and living in his house and getting half of the cotton and corn. We had a garden and raised potatoes and greens and so on, but cotton and corn was our crop. Of course we had them little patches and raised watermelon and such like.

Food and Quarters

"We ate whatever the white man ate. My mother was the cook. She had a cook-room joined to her room [which reached clear over to the white folks' house.] [HW: see p. 4] Everything she cooked on that stove, we all ate it, white and black--some of the putting, [HW: pudding] some of the cakes, some of the pies, some of the custard, some of the biscuits, some of the corn bread--we all had it, white and black. I don't know no difference at all. Asa Brown was a good old man. There was some mean slave owners, but he wasn't one.

Whippings

"You could hear of some mean slave owners taking switches and beating their niggers nearly to death. But I never heard of my old master doing that. Slaves would run away and it would be a year or two before they would be caught. Sometimes they would take him and strip him naked and whip him till he wasn't able to stand for running away. But I never heard of nothing like that happening with Asa Brown. But he sometimes would sell a hand or buy one sometimes. He'd take a nigger in exchange for a debt and rent him out.

Voting

"There wasn't any voting by the slaves. But ever since freedom they have been voting. None of my friends ever held any office. I don't know anything about the niggers not voting now. Don't they vote?

Patter Rollers, K. K. K., White Carmelias, Etc.

"My mother and father knowed about Patter Rollers, but I don't know nothing about them. But they are dead and gone. I have heard of the Ku Klux but I don't know nothing about it. I don't know what I used to know. No sir, I am out of the question now.

"There is one thing I keep straight. When I wants to drink or when I wants to eat--oh yes, I know how to go to bed.

"You know I have seen the time when they would get in a close place and they would make me preach, but it's all gone from me now. I can't recollect."

Mary D. Hudgins 107 Palm Street, Hot Springs, Ark.

Interviewer: Mary D. Hudgins Person interviewed: John H. Logan Aged: c. 89 Home: 449 Gaines Avenue. [Date Stamp: MAY 11 1938]

Gaines Avenue was once a "Quality Street". It runs on a diagonal from Malvern Avenue, a one-time first class residential thorofare to the Missouri Pacific Tracks. Time was when Gaines led almost to the gates of the fashionable Combes Racetrack.

Built up during the days of bay windows Gaines Avenue has preserved half a dozen land marks of former genteelity. Long stretches between are filled "shot gun" houses, unaquainted for many years with a paintbrush.

Within half a block of the streetcar line on Malvern an early spring had encouraged plowing of a 200 foot square garden. Signs such as "Hand Laundry" appear frequently. But by far the most frequent placard is "FOR SALE" a study in black and white, the insignia of a local real estate firm specializing in foreclosures.

The street number sought proved to be two doors beyond the red brick church. A third knock brought a slight, wrinkled face to the door, its features aquiline, in coloring only the mildest of mocha. Its owner Laura Burton Logan, after satisfying herself that the visitor wasn't just an intruder, opened the door wide and invited her to come inside.

"Logan, oh Logan, come on here, come on in here," she called to an old man in the next room. "Law, I don't know whether he can tell you anything or not. He's getting pretty feeble. Now five or six years ago he could have told you lots of things. But now----I don't know."

Into the "front room" hobbled the old fellow. His back was bent, his eyes dimmed with age. His face was the sort often called "good"--not good in the sense stupid acquiescence--but rather evidence of an intelligent, non-preditory meeting of the problems of life.