Smith is sensitive about his first name--doesn't like to give it--and
about his condition. He doesn't like to mention it or to have it
referred to.
He has an excellent memory for some things and a rather poor one for
some others. He got angry when his granddaughter supplied data about his
wife which he apparently could not recall.
His physical condition is deplorable and his circumstances extremely
straitened.
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: John H. Smith
2602 W. Twelfth Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 81
"I reckon I was here, I member seein' the smoke from the guns look like
a cloud.
"I was born in Missouri in 1856. I member _way_ back. Yes'm. I'm
old--I'm _old_.
"I member seein' the soldiers--Yankees--eight or ten in a squad and they
asked me did I want to ride with em? Old mistress say, 'That's my boy!'
I member way back when they used to put the folks upon a block and sell
em. I member one night we was in the cabin and the Ku Klux come up on
horses. And I member when they was hollerin' peace was declared.
"Mama told me I was born in 1856. Mama had all our ages in that big
Bible.
"We stayed in St. Louis six years then we went to Chrystal City.
Missouri and I went to the glass factory and went to work.
"Did I vote? Me? Yes'm, I voted many a time--Republican. I'm still a
Republican--always will be I reckon. I haven't voted for a long time but
I think everybody ought to have the liberty to vote.
"I like to live in the North better cause the white folks treats you
better. They treats me all right here cause I don't do nothin'.
"I member my white folks was good to me.
"I went to school after the war whar I was born. C.N. Douglas, the son
of Napoleon Douglas, was my teacher. First teacher we had was Miss
Mary Strotter. I know she couldn't learn us anything so they got C.N.
Douglas. He brought that paddle with the little holes and he learned
us something. I know my sister was next to me and she couldn't get her
spelling and I'd work my mouf so she could see. C.N. Douglas caught me
at it and he whipped me that day. I never worked my mouf again.
"I was the best speller in the school. I won a gold pen and ink stand
and George Washington picture.
"Before the war I member the overseer would say, 'If you don't have that
done tonight, I'll whip you tomorrow.' They had one man was pretty bad
and I know they give him a thimble and a barrel and told him he had to
fill up that barrel, but he couldn't do it you know and so they whipped
him.
"Mama used to whip me. She called me the 'Devil's Egg Bag' for a long
time. I used to take a darning needle and punch the eyes out of guineas
or chickens just to see em run around. She broke me of that. I know now
she never whip me enough, but she made a man of me. I got a good name
now. Always been a good worker. Done my work good and that's what they
want to know. Yes ma'm, I'm _old_."
Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Persons interviewed: Maggie Snow and Charlie Snow
R.F.D., Brinkley, Arkansas
Ages: 69 and 75
"My parents' names was Mary and Henderson Kurkendall. They had seven
children. Mama died when I was three years old. Papa was a Yankee
soldier.
"They belong to the same white folks, Moster Jake and Peggy Kurkendall.
They had a big farm.
"My papa told me that one morning they woke up and looked out over the
field. The Yankees had pitched their camps far as you could see on
Moster Jake's farm. They come up to his house. Moster Jake had a big
house and a big family. The Yankees come up there and throwed out all
they had and told the slaves to take it. No, they didn't; they was
scared to take it and it belong to them. They didn't want it all wasted
like they was doing. Papa said they rode their horses up to the house.
They took all the soldiers on the place to the camp. They was scared not
to go.
"Papa left mama at the old home place and Moster Jake let them work all
they could. Papa stayed in the war till after the battle at Vicksburg.
Then he come home. They stayed awhile at Moster Jake's and worked. He
got his knee hurt and his health ruined. He never was no count after he
got back home. Mama could pick six hundred pounds of cotton a day he
said. They worked from daybreak till pitch dark in them days.
"Little Jake Kurkendall is living now Enoch or Harrison Station,
Mississippi. He is older than I am. He got a family. But he is all the
son old Moster Jake had that I know living now.
"Papa said the Yankees made all the slaves fight they could run across.
Some kept hid in the woods. Seem like from way he told bout it they
wanted freedom but they didn't want to go to war.
"When we heard bout Arkansas being so rich and a new country, we wanted
to come. Some white and some colored come. We come to Aubrey, Arkansas.
We got six living, five dead children. I been here fourteen years (at
Brinkley). I hired out to cook in Mississippi but I wash and iron
and work in the field till I bout wore out. My husband in a terrible
condition. He picked some cotton. He got rheumatism in his legs.
"We own a little home bout a mile from town and a pig. I wish I could
get a cow. I ain't got the money to buy one. Jess can't get one no way.
We had a fine garden. Two of us get $10 and commodities. Times so far
this year been good. When it gets cold times may be hard. Times better
this year than last or it been for a long time.
"I didn't know I could vote. Guess my husband done my part of the
voting."
"I am seventy-three years old. There was two boys and two girls of us.
My aunts and uncles raised me. My mother died when I was little and fore
that my papa went to the army and never come home. They said he got
killed or died--they didn't know. My parents belong to Berry Bruce. He
had a family I heard em say. He lived at Louisville, Mississippi.
"I recollect the Ku Klux. I heard em talk a whole lot about em. One time
they rode round our house and through the hall of our house. Yes ma'am,
it scared us so bad it most paralyzed us all. They went on. We didn't
know what they wanted. We never did find out.
"I don't vote. I never voted in my life. I don't recken I ever will. I
have been a hard worker all my life. I farmed. I loaded and unloaded on
a steamboat with my family farmin' in the country. The boat I run on
went from Memphis to New Orleans.
"My family farmed at Batesville in the country out from there. For a
long time I made staves with the Sweeds. They was good workers. We would
make 1,000, then load the barge and send or take them to Vicksburg. I
got my board and $1 a day.
"The present conditions for the cotton farmer has been better this year
than last. When it gets cold and no work, makes it hard on old men. I
got no job in view for the winter.
"I would like to have a cow if I could raise the money to get one. I
been tryin' to figure out how to get us a cow to help out. I can't make
it.
"I suffer all the time. I can't sit still, I can't sleep I suffer so wid
rheumatism. Nobody knows how I do suffer. My general health is fine.
"This President has sure been merciful to the poor and aged. Surely he
will be greatly rewarded hereafter."
Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: Robert Solomon, Des Arc, Arkansas
Age: 73
My father was African. He was born in Atlanta. My mother was a Cherokee
Indian. Her name was Alice Gamage. I was born in 1864. I don't know
where I was born--think it was in the Territory--my father stole my
mother one night. He couldn't understand them and he was afraid of her
people. He went back to Savannah after so long a time and they was in
Florida when I first seen any of her people. When I got up any size I
asked my father all about him and my mother marrying. He said he knowed
her 'bout two year 'fore they married. They sorter courted by signs--my
mother learned me her language and it was natural fur me to speak my
father's tongue. I talked for them. She was bout fifteen when she run
away. I don't know if a preacher ever did marry em or not. My father
said she was just so pretty he couldn't help lovin' her. He kept makin'
signs and she made signs. I liked my Gramma Gamage. She couldn't
understand much. We all went to the Indian Territory from Florida and
Georgia. That's how I come out here.
I don't remember the Ku Klux. I remember hearing ma and gramma talk
'bout the way they tried to get way from 'em. My father was a farmer
till freedom. He farmed around here and at Pine Bluff. He died at West
Point. My mother and step-mother both died at Pine Bluff. They took my
mother to her nation in Oklahoma. She was sick a good while and they
took her to wait on her. Then come and took her after she died. There
show is a fambly. My father had twenty-two in his fambly. My mother
had five boys and three girls and me. My stepmother had fourteen more
children. That's some fambly aint it? All my brothers and sisters died
when I was little and they was little. My father's other children jess
somewhar down round Pine Bluff. I guess I'd know em but I aint seed none
of them in I don't know how long.
The first work I ever done was sawmilling at Pine Bluff. Then I went
down in Louziana, still sawmilling--I followed dat trade five or six
years. Den I got to railroading. I was puttin down cross ties and layin'
steel. I got to be straw boss at dat. I worked at dat fifteen years. I
worked doing that in six different states. That was show fine livin'--we
carried our train right along to live in. I married and went to farming.
Then I come to work at this oil mill here (in Des Arc). The reason I
quit. I didn't quit till it went down and moved off. I aint had nothin'
much to do since. I been carryin' water and wood fur Mrs. Norfleet
twenty years and they cooks fur me now. My wife died 'bout a year ago.
She been dead a year last January. She was sick a long time 'fore she
died. Well the relief gives me a little to eat, some clothes and I gets
$5.00 a month and I takes it and buys my groceries and I takes it up to
Mrs. Norfleet's. They says come there and eat. They show is good to me
'cept I aint able to carry the wood up the steps much no more. It hurt
me when I worked at the oil mill. I helped them 'bout the house all the
time.
What I do wid my money I made? I educated my girls. Yes maam I show is
got children. One my girls teaches school in St. Louis and de other at
Hot Springs. They both went to college at Pine Bluff. I sent em. No'm
dey don't help me. They is by my second wife and my first wife live with
my son, down close to Star City. Dey farm. It's down in Lincoln County.
They let me live in this house. It belongs to him. I went to the bank
fo' it closed and got my money whut I had left. I been livin' on it but
it give out.
The conditions are all right. They kin make a right smart but everything
is so high it don't buy much. Some of 'em say they ain't goiner do the
hardest work, hot or cold and liftin' for no dollar a day. Don't nobody
work hard as I used to. There's goiner be another war and a lot of them
killed--'cause people ain't doin right. Some don't treat the others
right. No'm they never did. They used to threaten em and take 'em out in
cars and beat 'em up, just for disputin' their word or not paying 'em
and de lack. The white man has cheated a heap because we was ignorant
and black. They gamble on the cotton and take might' near all of it for
the cheap grub they let out to make de crop on. Conditions are better
but a heap of the young black and white too deblish lazy to work. Some
of dem get killed out goin' on at their meanness.