*Abram Sells was born a slave on the Rimes Plantation, which was located
about 18 miles southeast of Newton, Texas. He does not know his age, but
must be well along in the 80's, as his recollections of slavery days are
keen. He lives at Jamestown, Texas.*
"I was birthed on the Rimes Plantation, now called Harrisburg. My
great-grand-daddy's name was Bowser Rimes and he was brung to Texas from
Louisiana and die at 138 year old. He's buried on the old Ben Powell
place close to Jasper. My grand-daddy, that's John, he lives to be 103
year old and he buried on the Eddy plantation at Jasper. My daddy, Mose
Rimes, he die young at 86 and he buried in Jasper County, too. My
mammy's name was Phoebe and she was birthed a Rimes nigger and brung to
Texas from back in Louisiana. The year slaves was freed I was inherit by
a man named Sells, what marry into the Rimes family and that's why my
name's Sells, 'cause it change 'long with the marriage. Us was jes'
ready to be ship back to Louisiana to the new massa's plantation when
the end of the war break up the trip.
"You see, we all had purty good time on Massa Rimes's plantation. None
of them carin' 'bout being sot free. They has to work hard all time, but
that don' mean so much, 'cause they have to work iffen they was on they
own, too. The old folks was 'lowed Saturday evenin' off or when they's
sick, and us little ones, us not do much but bring in the wood and
kindle the fires and tote water and he'p wash clothes and feed the
little pigs and chickens.
"Us chillen hang round close to the big house and us have a old man that
went round with us and look after us, white chillen and black chillen,
and that old man was my great grand-daddy. Us sho' have to mind him,
'cause iffen we didn't, us sho' have bad luck. He allus have the pocket
full of things to conjure with. That rabbit foot, he took it out and he
work that on you till you take the creeps and git shakin' all over. Then
there's a pocket full of fish scales and he kind of squeak and rattle
them in the hand and right then you wish you was dead and promise to do
anything. Another thing he allus have in the pocket was a li'l old
dry-up turtle, jes' a mud turtle 'bout the size of a man's thumb, the
whole thing jes' dry up and dead. With that thing he say he could do
mos' anything, but he never use it iffen he ain't have to. A few times I
seed him git all tangle up and boddered and he go off by hisself and sot
down in a quiet place, take out this very turtle and put it in the palm
of the hand and turn it round and round and say somethin' all the time.
After while he git everything ontwisted and he come back with a smile on
he face and maybe whistlin'.
"They fed all us nigger chillen in a big trough made out'n wood, maybe
more a wood tray, dug out'n soft timber like magnolia or cypress. They
put it under a tree in the shade in summer time and give each chile a
wood spoon, then mix all the food up in the trough and us goes to
eatin'. Mos' the food was potlicker, jes' common old potlicker; turnip
green and the juice, Irish 'taters and the juice, cabbages and peas and
beans, jes' anything what make potlicker. All us git round like so many
li'l pigs and then us dish in with our wood spoon till it all gone.
"We has lots of meat at times. Old grand-daddy allus ketchin' rabbit in
some kind of trap, mostly make out'n a holler log. He sot 'em round in
the garden and sho' kotch the rabbits. And possums, us have a good
possum dog, sometimes two or three, and every night you heered them dogs
barkin' in the field down by the branch. Sho' 'nuf, they git possum
treed and us go git him and parbile him and put him in the oven and bake
him plumb tender. Then we stacks sweet 'taters round him and po' the
juice over the whole thing. Now, there is somethin' good 'nuf for a
king.
"There was lots of deer and turkey and squirrel in the wil' wood and
somebody out huntin' nearly every day. Course Massa Rime's folks
couldn't eat up all this meat befo' it spile and the niggers allus git a
great big part of it. Then we kilt lots of hawgs and then talk 'bout
eatin'! O, them chitlin's, sousemeat and the haslets, thats the liver
and the lights all biled up together. Us li'l niggers fill up on sich as
that and go to bed and mos' dream us is li'l pigs.
"Us allus have plenty to eat but didn't pay much 'tention to clothes.
Boys and gals all dress jes' alike, one long shirt or dress. They call
it a shirt iffen a boy wear it and call it a dress iffen the gal wear
it. There wasn't no difference, 'cause they's all made out'n somethin'
like duck and all white. That is, they's white when you fus' put them
on, but after you wears them a while they git kind of pig-cullud, kind
of grey, but still they's all the same color. Us all go barefoot in
summer, li'l ones and big ones, but in winter us have homemake shoes.
They tan the leather at home and make the shoe at home, allus some old
nigger that kin make shoe. They was more like moc'sin, with lace made of
deerskin. The soles was peg on with wood pegs out'n maple and sharpen
down with a shoe knife.
"Us have hats make out'n pine straw, long leaf pine straw, tied together
in li'l bunches and platted round and round till it make a kinder hat.
That pine straw great stuff in them days and us use it in lots of ways.
Us kivered sweet 'taters with it to keep them from git freeze and hogs
made beds out'n it and folks too. Yes, sir, us slep' on it. The beds had
jes' one leg. They bored two hole in the wall up in the corner and stuck
two pole in them holes and lay plank on that like slats and pile lots of
pine straw on that. Then they spread a homemake blanket or quilt on that
and sometime four or five li'l niggers slep' in there to keep us warm.
"The li'l folks slep' mos' as long as they want to in daylight, but the
big niggers have to come out'n that bed 'bout fo' o'clock when the big
horn blow. The overseer have one nigger, he wake up early for to blow
the horn and when he blow this horn he make sich a holler then all the
res' of the niggers better git out'n that bed and 'pear at the barn
'bout daylight. He might not whip him for being late the fus' time, but
that nigger better not forgit the secon' time and be late!
"Massa Rimes didn't whip them much, but iffen they was bad niggers he
jes' sold them offen the place and let somebody else do the whippin'.
Never have no church house or school, but Massa Rimes, he call them in
and read the Bible to them. Then he turn the service over to some good,
old, 'ligious niggers and let them finish with the singin' and prayin'
and 'zorting. After peach [HW: "?"] cleared, a school was 'stablish and
a white man come from the north to teach the cullud chillen, but befo'
that they didn' take no pains to teach the niggers nothin' 'ceptin' to
work, and the white chillen didn't have much school neither.
"That was one plantation what was run 'sclusively by itself. Massa Rimes
have a commissary or sto' house, whar he kep' whatnot things--them what
make on the plantation and things the slaves couldn' make for themselfs.
That wasn't much, 'cause we make us own clothes and shoes and plow and
all farm tools and us even make our own plow line out'n cotton and iffen
us run short of cotton sometime make them out'n bear grass and we make
buttons for us clothes out'n li'l round pieces of gourds and kiver them
with cloth.
[Illustration: _Abram Sells_]
"That wasn't sich a big plantation, 'bout a t'ousand acre and only 'bout
forty niggers. There was'n no jail and they didn't need none. Us have no
real doctor, but of course there was a doctor man at Jasper and one at
Newton, but a nigger have to be purty sick 'fore they call a doctor.
There's allus some old time nigger what knowed lots of remedies and
knowed all dif'rent kinds of yarbs and roots. My grand-daddy, he could
stop blood, and he could conjure off the fever and rub his fingers over
warts and they'd git away. He make ile out'n rattlesnake for the
rheumatis'. For the cramp he git a kind of bark offen a tree and it done
the job, too. Some niggers wo' brass rings to keep off the rheumatis'
and punch hole in a penny or dime and wear that on the ankle to keep off
sickness.
"'Member the war? Course I does. I 'member how some of them march off in
their uniforms, lookin' so grand, and how some of them hide out in the
wood to keep from lookin' so grand. They was lots of talkin' 'bout
fighting, and rubbing and scrubbing the old shotgun. The oldes' niggers
was settin' round the fire late in the night, stirrin' the ashes with
the poker and rakin' out the roas' 'taters. They's smokin' the old corn
cob pipe and homemake tobacco and whisperin' right low and quiet like
what they's gwineter do and whar they's gwineter to when Mister Lincoln,
he turn them free.
"The more they talk, the more I git scared that the niggers is going to
git sot free and wondering what I's gwine to do if they is. No, I guess
I don't want to live back in them times no mo', but I sho' seed lots of
niggers not doin' so well as they did when they was slaves and not
havin' nigh as much to eat."