Reeves told the Phill-la-me-york story which was told by Austin Pen
Parnell. You will find it in his story. The only difference between his
story and Parnell's is that Reeves had the conclusion. He claimed that
the old master got in a fight with one of the slaves present and yelled
out his identity when he was getting badly beaten. The story sounds
like it came from the Arkansas folklore collection or from someone who
contributed it to that collection.
An aftermath of Reeves' story is finding out that most people consider
Henry Banner, whose story has been previously given and whose age was
given as eighty-nine, is considered by many persons to be ninety-four.
Neely, one of the adult school-teachers, says that he has gone over
Banner's life carefully with him, and that he must have been twenty-one
or twenty-two at the close of the War because during slavery, he had
experience at logging, or rather at logrolling, a work so difficult that
only full-grown men were used at it. Since Banner is slightly built,
there is scarcely a possibility that he did such work before the normal
time.
[HW: Cf. 30715 for interview with Parnell.]
Interviewer: Bernice Bowden
Person Interviewed: Shepherd Rhone
10th and Kentucky
Pine Bluff, Ark.
Age: 75
"Yes ma'am, I was bred and born in 'sixty-three in Phillips County,
Arkansas, close to Helena, on old Judge Jones' plantation. Judge Jones,
he was a lawyer. Remember him? I ought to, he whiped me enough. His
wife's name was Caroline Jones. She used to smack my jaws and pull
my ears but she was a pretty good woman. The old judge was a raw one
though. You had to step around or he'd step around for you.
"I stayed right there till I was grown. My mother was named Katie Rhone
and my father was named Daniel Rhone. My mother was born in Richmond,
Virginia and my father in Petersburg, Virginia.
"Judge Jones brought em here to Arkansas. My father was a bodyguard for
old Judge Jones' son Tom in the War. My father stuck with him till peace
declared--had to do it.
"They was thirteen of us chillun and they is all gone but me, and I'll
soon be gone.
"I know when the Yankees come I run from em. When peace declared, the
Yankees come all through our house and took everything they could get
hold of to eat.
"The only reason the Yankees whipped the South was they starved em.
"I know one time when peace declared I caught afire and I run and jumped
in a tub of water and I had sense enough not to tell my mother. A girl I
was raised up with went and told her though.
"After freedom I worked for old Judge Jones on the half system. He give
me everthing that was due me. When he was eighty years old, he called
all his old tenants up and give em a mule and twenty-five dollars. He
was pretty good to em after all.
"I went to free school in the summertime after the crops was laid by, I
can read and write pretty good.
"I came here to Jefferson County in 'eighty-six and I put in thirty-six
years at the Cotton Belt Shops. When that strike come on they told us
colored folks to quit and I never went back. I worked for em when she
was a narrow gauge.
"I worked in the North three years. I nightwatched all over St. Louis
and Madison, Illinois. I liked it fine up there--white folks is more
familiar up there and seems like you can get favors. If I don't get
somethin' here, I'm goin' back up there.
"When I got big enough I voted the Republican ticket and after they got
this primary. I think the colored people ought to vote now cause they
make em pay taxes.
"I'll tell you right now, the younger generation is goin' to the dogs.
We'll never make a nation of em as long as they go out to these places
at night. They ought to be a law passed. When nine o'clock comes they
ought to be home in bed, but they is just gettin' started then.
"I belong to the Catholic Church. I think it's a pretty good church. We
have a white priest and I'll tell you one thing thing--you can't get a
divorce and marry again and stay in the Catholic Church."
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Dora Richard
3301 W. 14th Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 76
"I was born in South Carolina and I was my mother's baby chile.
"Jacob Foster was our old master and he sold my mother over in east
Tennessee. Now of cose she wasn't put upon the block and sold. She was
the house woman and spin and wove. After they sold her my father run
off. Oh sure, they caught him and I know old mistress said, 'Now, Jacob,
if you want to go where Lydia is, you can go.' So they sold him near
her.
"I stayed with the Fosters till peace was declared and ever'thing was
declared free. Then my father come after me.
"I can just sketch things. I try to forget it. My mother and father was
pretty agreeable when they was set free.
"In Tennessee we stayed at the foot of Lookout Mountain and I can
remember seein' the cannon balls.
"Here's the way I want to tell you. Some of the white people are as good
to the colored people as they could be and some of em are mean. My own
folks do so bad I'm ashamed of em.
"So many of the colored of the South have emigrated to the North. I have
lived there and I don't know why I'm here now.
"Some of my color don't like that about the Jim Crow Law, but I say if
they furnish us a nice comfortable coach I would rather be with my own
people. And I don't care to go to the white folks' church.
"My mother used to tell me how they used to hide behind trees so the
boss man couldn't see em when they was prayin' and at night put out the
light and turn the pot down.
"I went to school in Tennessee. I never will forget it. I had a white
teacher. He was in the War and he had a leg shot off. I went through the
sixth grade and was ready for the seventh Ray's Arithmetic. I walked
four miles there and four miles back--eight miles a day.
"I can remember too when my mother and father was baptized. I know mama
come out of the water a shoutin'. Oh, that was good times then. I felt
better when I was under my mother cause when I married my life was over.
I raised about ten children.
"I remember when the Ku Klux come to my sister's house lookin' for her
husband. I know I was in the bed and I raised up. I was scared you know.
"When I hear some colored folks say they wish the old slavery times was
back, I just knows they is lazy. They don't want any responsibility."
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Jim Ricks
517 E. 22nd Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 79
"I was born in slavery times. I 'member runnin' from the Yankees when
they wanted to carry me off. Just devilin' me, you know. You know how
little chillun was 'bout white folks in them days.
"I went to school three weeks and my daddy stopped me and put me to
work.
"Old master was named Jimmie Ricks. They named me after him, I think.
"My mother said he was a mighty good master. Didn't 'low his niggers
whipped.
"Yes'm, I was born and raised in Arkansas, down here in Calhoun County.
"I had a chance to learn but I was a rowdy. I wanted to hunt. I was a
mighty huntsman.
"I was a good worker too. White folks was all stuck on me 'cause I was a
good worker.
"I did farm work and then did public work after the crops was laid by.
But now I got too old to work.
"I seen the Ku Klux once or twice when they was Ku Klukin' around. Some
of 'em would holler 'Kluk, kluk, kluk.' I was quite small, but I could
remember 'am 'cause I was scared of 'em.
"I farmed all my life till year before last. I was a good farmer too.
"I used to vote years ago. I voted Republican. Yes ma'am.
"Younger generation ain't near like they was when I was young. I was
well thought of. Couldn't be out after sundown or they'd bump my head.
My stepfather would give me a flailin'. I thought he was mean to me but
I see now he done right by whippin' me.
"I know in slavery times they got plenty of somethin' to eat. Old master
fed us well."
Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: Charlie Rigger
R.F.D., three miles, Palestine, Arkansas
Age: 85 plus, doesn't know age
"I was born six miles from Mounticellar close to the line of Morgan and
Jasper County. Mother belong to the Smiths. Her father was part Creek
(Indian). They all was sold to Floyd Malone. His wife was Betsy Malone.
They had five children.
"When I was a child I lay under the loom day after day picking up the
sickle. Ma was a cook and a weaver too.
"Malone was a good man but his wife was one of 'em. She was a terrible
piece of humanity. Father was a farm hand. They had a gin, a shoe shop,
and a blacksmith shop all on Floyd Malone's place. I picked a little
cotton before 'mancipation. Floyd Malone had to buy my mother to git her
where my father was.
"Some of the boys wore dresses till they was twelve or fifteen years
old. One fellar rode a mule or cow one the other to preaching. While
he sit talking to his gal at the window a steer cone up and et off his
dress tail. Boys got to courting before they got to take off their long
shirts.
"They wasn't so good to mother. She run off several times. She went
'bout one and one-half miles to her mother on the Compton place. They
didn't whoop her. They promised her a whooping. They whooped her and me
too but I never knowed 'em to whoop my father. When they whoop my mother
I'd run off to place we lived and crawl under the house.
"We chillun had nothing to do wid coffee. We drunk milk out little
bowls. We'd turn it up or lap it out which one could do the best. They
fed us. We'd ask for more till we got filled up.
"I recollect the soldiers come by in July 1863 or 1864 and back in
December. I heard talk so long 'fore they got there I knowed who they
was. They took my oldest brother. He didn't want to go. We never heard
from him. He never come back. My white master hid out. He didn't go
to war. One son went and come back. It was the Yankees made my oldest
brother go. The first crowd in July swapped their wore-out scrub stock
for our good stock. That second crowd cleaned them out, took our hogs.
Miss Betty had died 'fore they come in July. That second crowd come in
December. They cleaned out everything to eat and wear. They set the
house 'fire several times with paper and coal oil (kerosene). It went
out every time. One told the captain. He come up behind. It went out
every time. He said, 'Let's move on.' They left it clean and bare. We
didn't like them. We had meat hid in the cellar. We got hungry that
spring sure as you born.
"The old man married pretty soon after freedom. He married young to what
he was.
"I didn't find much fault to slavery 'cepting the abuse. We et three
times a day and now if I get one piece I do well. Mother cooked, washed,
ironed and spun four cuts a day. We all et at the master's kitchen three
times a day. We had thirty-two families. I've heard that ag'in time and
ag'in so as I recollect it till now. We didn't have to work no harder
'en we do now if you have a living.
"Master waited till all there. He had a horn made sorter like a bugle
for that business. Called us to our meals. We stayed a year. Went to his
brother's one year, then to Major Lane's big farm. We had to work about
the same as b'fore freedom. Not much change.
"The Ku Klux come 'round right smart. Some had on skin coverings, cow
heads and horns. Some wore white sheets and black dresses on white
horses. They was scary looking. They would whoop and kill too. I was too
scared to get caught off at night.
"Mother died. I was traveling about. I spent thirteen months in
Mississippi. Three winters right in Memphis. I married in Mississippi. I
left two daughters in Georgia. My wife died. I come to Arkansas in 1902.
I live all alone.
"This present generation is traveling too fast. It-is-to-be. Fast
traveling and education. Times not good as it always have been b'fore
that last war (World War). When the white folks start jowing we black
folks suffers. It ain't a bit our fault. Education causes the black man
to see he is bit (cheated) but he better not say a word. It very good
thing if it is used right. Fast traveling is all right in its place. But
too many is traveling and they all want to be going. We got into pretty
fast time of it now. It-is-to-be and it's getting shoved on faster."
Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: Ida Rigley, Forrest City, Arkansas
Age: 82
"I was born in Richmond, Virginia. Colonel Radford and Emma Radford
owned my mother. They had a older girl, Emma and Betty and three boys. I
called her Miss Betty.
"My mother was Sylvia Jones and she had five children. Bill Jones was my
father. He was a born free man and a blacksmith at Lynchburg, Virginia
in slavery times.
"He asked Colonel Radford could he come to see my mama and marry her.
They had a wedding in Colonel Radford's dining room and a preacher on
the place married them. They told me. My father was a Presbyterian
preacher. I heard papa preach at Lynchburg. He had a white principle but
no white blood. I never knew him very much till long after freedom.
"Miss Betty Radford was raising me for a house girl. I was younger
than her children. Mother was a weaver for all on the place. Old aunt
Caroline was the regular cook but my mother helped to cook for hands he
hired at busy seasons of the year. My sisters lived in the quarters and
mama slept with them. She helped them. They worked in the field some.
They was careful not to overwork young hands. They cooked down at the
quarters. They had a real old man and woman to set about and see after
the children and feed them. The older children looked after the babies.
When Miss Betty went off visiting she would send me down there. I did
love it.
"Emma and Betty went to school at Richmond in a buggy. They had a
colored boy driver. He was the carriage driver. Emma and Betty would
play with me too. Miss Betty fed me all the time. She made me a bonnet
and I can't get shed of my bonnet yet. I got four bonnets now.
"When the white folks had a wedding it lasted a week. They had a second
day dress and a third day dress and had suppers and dinner receptions
about among the kin folks. They had big chests full of quilts and
coverlets and counterpanes they been packing back. Some of them would
have big dances. A wedding would last a week, night and day.
"They had a farm right. We had peacocks, white guinea and big black
turkeys, cows, sheep, goats, hogs; he had deer. He kept their horns cut
off and some of the cow's horns were off. We had a acre in a garden and
had roses and all kinds of flowers. I like flowers now. Tries to have
'em. They had a gin on the place. He raised corn, rye, cotton, and
tobacco. The hands got their supplies on Saturday. On rainy days all the
women would knit, white and colored both. Miss Betty knitted some at
night in winter. They had a shop to sharpen and keep all the tools in. A
particular old man made the brooms and rakes.
"It seem like there wasn't so many flies. Miss Betty mixed up molasses
and flour and poison and killed flies sometimes. She spread it on brown
paper. We had fly weed tea to set about too sometimes. We didn't have
to use anything regular. We didn't have no screens. We had mighty few
mosquitoes. We had peafowl fly brushes. They was mighty pretty.
"One thing we had was a deep walled well and an ice-house. They cut ice
in blocks and put it up for winter[HW:?]. We had one spring on the place
I know.
"They kept hounds. Colonel Radford's boys and the colored boys all went
hunting. We had 'possum and potatoes all along in winter; 'possum grease
won't make you sick. Eat all you want. I'd hear their horn and the dogs.
They would come in hungry every time. I never seen no whiskey. He had
his cider and vinegar press and made wine. We had cider and wine all
along. Colonel Radford was his own overseer and Charlie his oldest boy.
They whooped mighty little. They would stand up and be whooped. Some of
the young ones was hard-headed and rude. He advised them and they minded
him pretty well.
"Our yards was large and beautiful; some had grass and some clean spots
about in the shade. Friday was wash day. Saturday was iron day. Miss
Betty would go about in the quarters to see if the houses was scrubbed
every week after washing. They had to wear clean clothes and have clean
beds about her place. She'd shame them to death.
"Colonel Radford had a colored church for us all. It was a log house and
he had a office for his boys to read and write and smoke cob pipes in.
The white folks' church was at the corner of his place. I went there
most. They shouted and pat their hands. Colonel Radford was a Baptist.
"Nearly every farm had a fiddler. Ever so often he had a big dance in
their parlor. I'd try to dance by myself. He had his own music by the
hands on his place. He let them have dances at the quarters every now
and then. Dancing was a piece of his religion.
"I don't think our everyday frocks was stiffened but our dress up
clothes was. It was made out of flour--boiled flour starch. We had
striped dresses and stockings too. We had checked dresses. We had
goobers and a chestnut grove. We had a huckleberry patch. We had maple
sugar to eat. It was good. We had popcorn and chinquapins in the fall
of the year, I used to pick up chips to use at the pot. I had a little
basket. I picked up corn cobs. They burnt them and made corn cob soda to
use in the bread and cakes. We parched peeled sweet potatoes slice thin
and made coffee.
"The Civil War was terrible. One morning before we was all out of bed
the Yankees come. It was about daylight. He and the three boys were
there. They didn't burn any houses and they didn't hesitate but they
took everything. They took all Miss Betty's nice silverware. They took
fine quilts and feather beds. That was in the fall of the year. They
drove off a line of our slaves (a block long) fer as from me to that
railroad. Made them go. They walked fast in front of the cavalrymen.
They took mama and my sisters. She got away from them with her girls and
found her way back to papa at Lynchburg.
"Colonel Radford went and took some of the slave men and his boys. They
brought home plenty beds and a barrel of salt. He brought back plenty.
He sent his slave man to town any time. They had no notion leaving.
"One time some Yankees come. I run hid around Miss Betty's long dress.
She was crying. They was pulling her rings off her fingers. I told them
to quit that. One of the mean things said, 'Little nigger, I shoot your
head off.' They took all her nice clothes. They said they took all
niggers. I sassed them. They went in another room. I shot under Miss
Betty's big skirt. They looked about for me but they thought I run off
to my mama. She was gone but they didn't know it. I seen my best times
then. We had a good time there. Miss Betty was good and kind to me. Good
as I wanted. I wish I had that good now.