The spelling of the name Sunnaville is phonetic. I don't recognize the
name and he couldn't spell it of course.
When I called, he had potatoes that weighed at least seven pounds. They
were laid out on the porch for sale. He had a small patch in his yard
which he cultivated, and had gotten about ten bushels from it.
His account of slavery times is so vivid that you would consider his age
nearer eighty than sixty-eight. A little questioning reveals that he
has no idea of his age although he readily gives it as sixty-eight--a
memorized figure.
Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person Interviewed: Lula Taylor, R.F.D., east of town,
Brinkley, Arkansas
Age: 71
"My mother was sold five times. She was sold when she was too little to
remember her mother. Her mother was Charity Linnerman. They favored. She
was dark and granny was light colored. My mother didn't love her mother
like I loved her.
"Granny lived in a house behind the white church (?) in Helena. After
freedom we kept writing till we got in tetch with her. We finally got
granny with us on the Jefferies place at Clarendon.
"A man (Negro) come by and conjured my mother. She was with Miss Betty
Reed (or Reid) up north of Lonoke. They was my mother's last owners.
That old man made out like she stole things when he stole them his own
black self. He'd make her hide out like she stole things. She had a
sweetheart and him and his wife. She had to live with them. They stole
her off from her last owner, Miss Betty Reed. They didn't like her
sweetheart. They was going to marry. He bought all her wedding clothes.
When she didn't marry him she let him have back all the weddin' clothes
and he buried his sister in them. This old man was a conjurer. He give
my mother a cup of some kind of herbs and made her drink it. He tole her
all her love would go to Henry Deal. He liked him. He was my papa. Her
love sure did leave her sweetheart and go to my papa. He bought her some
nice clothes. She married in the clothes he got her. She was so glad
to let go that old man and woman what conjured her 'way from her white
folks to wait on them.
"Granny's head was all split open. I lived to see all that. White folks
said her husband done it but she said one of her old master's struck her
on the head with a shoe last.
"My papa said he'd hit boards and stood on them all day one after
another working cold days.
"Master Wade Deal at freedom give papa a pair of chickens, goats, sheep,
turkeys, a cow; and papa cleared ten acres of ground to pay for his
first mule. He bought the mule from Master Wade Deal.
"Old Master Deal used to run us from behind him plowing. We tease
him, say what he'd say to the horse or mule. He'd lock us up in the
smokehouse. We'd eat dried beef and go to sleep. He was a good old man.
"Grandpa Henry Pool went to war. Papa was sold from the Pools to the
Deals. Grandpa played with us. He'd put us all up on a horse we called
Old Bill. He said he got so used to sleeping on his blanket on the
ground in war times till he couldn't sleep on a bed. He couldn't get off
asleep.
"Grandpa found a pitcher of gold money been buried in old Master Pool's
stable. He give it to them. They knowed it was out there.
"Mother was with Miss Betty Reed in most of war times. Miss Betty hid
their jewelry and money. She spoke of the Yankees coming and kill pretty
chickens and drink up a churn of fresh milk turned ready for churning.
It be in the chimney corner to keep warm. They'd take fat horses and
turn their poor ones in the lot. They never could pass up a fat hog.
They cleaned out the corn crib.
"All my kin folks was field hands. I ploughed all day long.
"Papa said his ole mistress Deal was out under an apple tree peeling
apples to dry. A white crane flew over the tree and fluttered about over
her. Next day she died. Then the old man married a younger woman.
"It is so about the pigeons at Pigeon Roost (Wattensaw, Arkansas). They
weighted trees down till they actually broke limbs and swayed plenty of
them. That was the richest land you ever seen in your life when it was
cleared off. Folks couldn't rest for killing pigeons and wasted them
all up. I was born at Pigeon Roost on Jim High's place. I seen a whole
washpot full of stewed pigeon. It was fine eating. It was a shame to
waste up all the pigeons and clear out the place."
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Millie Taylor
1418 Texas Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 78
"Yes'm, I was born in slavery times in Calhoun County, Mississippi.
"Bill Armstrong was my owner. He's been dead a long time.
"My folks stayed on there a good while.
"Pa said they was good to him but they wasn't good to my ma. I heered pa
say they beat her till she died. I don't remember a thing 'bout my ma.
"I heered 'em talk 'bout the Ku Klux. They kep' that in my hearin' so
much that I kep' that in my remembrance.
"I know when we stayed on the place pa said was old master's. Yes'm, I
sure 'members dat. I know we stayed there till pa married again.
"Bill Armstrong's wife made our clothes. I know we stayed right in the
yard with some more colored folks.
"Pa worked on the shares and rented too.
"I was twenty-four when I come from Mississippi here. I was married
then and had three chillun. But they all dead now. I stays here with my
grandson. I don't know what I'd do if it wasn't for him. I reckon I'd
just be knockin' around--no tellin'.
"I got another grandson lives in Marvell. I went there to visit and I
got so I couldn't walk, so my grandson carried me to the doctor. And he
just looked at me--he had been knowin' me so long. I said, 'Don't you
know me?' And he said, 'If you'd take off your hat I think I'd know
you.' And he said, 'Well, for the Lawd, if it ain't Millie Taylor!'
"I've always done farmin'. That's the way I was raised--farmin'. I just
looks at these folks in town and it seems funny to me to buy ever'thing
you need. Looks to me like they would rather raise it.
"Oh, Lawd, don't talk about this young race. It looks to me like they is
more heathe'nish. The Bible say they would be weaker and wiser but they
is just too wise for their own good. I just looks at 'em and I don't
know what to think about this young race. They is a few respects you and
theirselves.
"I seen things here in town I didn't think I'd ever see. Seems like the
people in the country act like they recognize you more.
"I has a good remembrance. Seems like I gets to studyin' 'bout it and it
just comes to me like ABC. I know pa used to talk and tell us things and
if I didn't believe it, I didn't give him no cross talk. But nowadays if
chillun don't believe what you say, they goin' try to show you a point.
"Yes ma'am, folks is livin' a fast life--white and colored.
"Looks like the old folks has worked long enough for the white folks
till they ought to have enough to live on."
Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: Sarah Taylor, R.F.D., Madison, Arkansas
Age: 70
"I was born in Releford County, Tennessee, ten miles from Murfreesboro.
My parents belonged to Dr. Jimmy Manson. He was off and gone from home
nearly all the time. He didn't have a Negro driver. Because he didn't
they called us all Manson's free niggers. Folks didn't like it because
we had so much freedom. One day a terrible thing happened broke up our
happy way of living on Dr. Manson's place.
"Grandpa was part Indian. Dr. Jimmy didn't whoop. He visited and he'd
get a jug of whiskey, call his niggers and give them a little, make them
feel good and get them in a humor for working. Dr. Jimmy had a nigger
overseer. They was digging a ditch and making a turnpike from Dr.
Manson's place to Murfreesboro. They told grandpa to drive down in the
ditch with his load of rock and let the white folks drive up on the
dump. They was hauling and placing rock on the dump to make a turnpike.
In Tennessee it was a law if a man owned a nigger he had to whoop him or
have him whooped. If he didn't he had to sell him. They told grandpa
if he didn't do as they said they would whoop him, then they said they
would break his back. They took the fussing to Dr. Jimmy for him to
whoop grandpa. He sold him to nigger traders and they drove him to
Mississippi. Mother never seen him no more. Grandma died of grief. She
had nine girls and no boys. After freedom seven went North and mama,
was Jane, and Aunt Betty lived on in Tennessee, and I lived some in
Mississippi. That's the reason I hate Mississippi to this very day.
"The day they fit on Stone River in Tennessee, brother Hood was born. He
was born during the battle. I guess they moved off of Dr. Jimmy's place
at freedom, for I was born on Jack Little's place.
"The times is passing faster than I want it to and I'm doing very well.
I don't never meddle in young folks' business and I don't 'low them
meddling in mine. Folks is the ones making times so hard. Some making
times hard for all rest of us can't help ourselves. It is sin and
selfishness makes times so hard. Young folks no worse than some not so
very old. It ain't young folks making times hard. It's older ones so
greedy. They don't have no happiness and don't want to see old ones live
nor the young ones neither."
Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor
Person interviewed: Warren Taylor
3200 W. Seventeenth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas
Age: 74
My people are all from Richmond, Virginia. I was just four years old
when they come here. My father was in charge of all the machinery. He
ran the gin. Didn't do anything else. My mother was a house girl. The
kids learned her everything they learned in school. She knew everything.
My father died when I was young. My mother lived till she was eighty.
But the time she was fifty, I bought her a home and sat her down on
Pulaski Street in that home. And that is why I have so little trouble.
"My ma belonged to Hoffman. He sold her to Wiley Adams. He carried her
to Mississippi. She stayed there for a short time and then came to
Arkansas. He settled in a little place called Tulip, Arkansas. Then
freedom came and we came to Little Rock and settled at what is now
Seventh and Ringo Streets; but then it was just a stage road leading to
Benton, Arkadelphia, and other places. Stages passed twice a day with
passengers and freight. No railroads at all then. The government kept
the roads up. They had the arsenal hall where the city park is and had
a regiment of soldiers there. The work on that road was kept up by the
soldiers. That was under Grant's administration. I never saw but
three presidents--three Democratic presidents--Cleveland, Wilson, and
Roosevelt.
"My father's master was named Lee. He married my mother back in
Virginia. My daddy's people when he was freed was named Taylor. He died
when I was young and he never gave me any details about them.