"The only patrollers I knew of was some that come on the place once and
got hurt. My mother had a brother Hobb and the patroller tried to whip
him. Hobb knocked all his front teeth out with a stick. Ches[TR:?] Wood
was the name of the patroller. It was like it is now. There were certain
white people who didn't allow any of their niggers to be whipped. I
never seen a patroller on my place. I have heard of them in other
places, but the only one to come on our place was the one Uncle Hobb
beat up. He had to take it, because you couldn't put anything over on
Harris' plantation. My people was rich people. They didn't allow anybody
to come on their places and interfere with then--their niggers.
"I have heard my mother say that no white man ever struck her in her
life. I have had uncles that were struck. Two of them, and both of them
killed the men that struck them. Uncle Saul killed Edmund Smith and
Uncle George killed Ed McGehee. Uncle George's full white sister (his
half-sister) sent him away and saved him. They electrocuted Uncle
Saul--they executed him.
"White men struck them and they wouldn't take it. They didn't do nothin'
at all to Hobb Baron. He got to his boss and the white folks was 'fraid
to come there after him. All of this was in slavery. My people ain't
never had no trouble with anybody since freedom; white people would get
mad with my uncles and try to do something to them, and they wouldn't
take it.
"There were three races in the neighborhood where I was raised--niggers,
Indians, and white folks. They never sent the Indians out until 1876
when I was a grown man. They sent them over there to Utah when it became
a state. I had a lot of Indian friends that went along at that time.
"Bad blood was mixed up there and you couldn't do nothing to anybody and
get away with it.