Charley Williams and Granddaughter 330

Oklahoma Writers' Project

Ex-Slaves

ISAAC ADAMS

Age 87 yrs.

Tulsa, Okla.

I was born in Louisiana, way before the War. I think it was about ten

years before, because I can remember everything so well about the

start of the War, and I believe I was about ten years old.

My Mammy belonged to Mr. Sack P. Gee. I don't know what his real given

name was, but it maybe was Saxon. Anyways we all called him Master

Sack.

He was a kind of youngish man, and was mighty rich. I think he was

born in England. Anyway his pappy was from England, and I think he

went back before I was born.

Master Sack had a big plantation ten miles north of Arcadia,

Louisiana, and his land run ten miles along both sides. He would leave

in a buggy and be gone all day and still not get all over it.

There was all kinds of land on it, and he raised cane and oats and

wheat and lots of corn and cotton. His cotton fields was the biggest

anywheres in that part, and when chopping and picking times come he

would get negroes from other people to help out. I never was no good

at picking, but I was a terror with a hoe!

I was the only child my Mammy had. She was just a young girl, and my

Master did not own her very long. He got her from Mr. Addison

Hilliard, where my pappy belonged. I think she was going to have me

when he got her; anyways I come along pretty soon, and my mammy never

was very well afterwards. Maybe Master Sack sent her back over to my

pappy. I don't know.

Mammy was the house girl at Mr. Sack's because she wasn't very strong,

and when I was four or five years old she died. I was big enough to do

little things for Mr. Sack and his daughter, so they kept me at the

mansion, and I helped the house boys. Time I was nine or ten Mr.

Sack's daughter was getting to be a young woman--fifteen or sixteen

years old--and that was old enough to get married off in them days.

They had a lot of company just before the War, and they had whole

bunch of house negroes around all the time.

Old Mistress died when I was a baby, so I don't remember anything

about her, but Young Mistress was a winder! She would ride horseback

nearly all the time, and I had to go along with her when I got big

enough. She never did go around the quarters, so I don't know nothing

much about the negroes Mr. Sack had for the fields. They all looked

pretty clean and healthy, though, when they would come up to the Big

House. He fed them all good and they all liked him.

He had so much different kinds of land that they could raise anything

they wanted, and he had more mules and horses and cattle than anybody

around there. Some of the boys worked with his fillies all the time,

and he went off to New Orleans ever once in a while with his race

horses. He took his daughter but they never took me.

Some of his land was in pasture but most of it was all open fields,

with just miles and miles of cotton rows. There was a pretty good

strip along one side he called the "old" fields. That's what they

called the land that was wore out and turned back. It was all growed

up in young trees, and that's where he kept his horses most of the

time.

The first I knowed about the War coming on was when Mr. Sack had a

whole bunch of whitefolks at the Big House at a function. They didn't

talk about anything else all evening and then the next time they come

nearly all their menfolks wasn't there--just the womenfolks. It wasn't

very long till Mr. Sack went off to Houma with some other men, and

pretty soon we knew he was in the War. I don't remember ever seeing

him come home. I don't think he did until it was nearly all over.

Next thing we knowed they was Confederate soldiers riding by pretty

nearly every day in big droves. Sometimes they would come and buy corn

and wheat and hogs, but they never did take any anyhow, like the

Yankees done later on. They would pay with billets, Young Missy called

them, and she didn't send them to git them cashed but saved them a

long time, and then she got them cashed, but you couldn't buy anything

with the money she got for them.

That Confederate money she got wasn't no good. I was in Arcadia with

her at a store, and she had to pay seventy-five cents for a can of

sardines for me to eat with some bread I had, and before the War you

could get a can like that for two cents. Things was even higher then

than later on, but that's the only time I saw her buy anything.

When the Yankees got down in that country the most of the big men paid

for all the corn and meat and things they got, but some of the little

bunches of them would ride up and take hogs and things like that and

just ride off. They wasn't anybody at our place but the womenfolks and

the negroes. Some of Mr. Sack's women kinfolks stayed there with Young

Mistress.

Along at the last the negroes on our place didn't put in much

stuff--jest what they would need, and could hide from the Yankees,

because they would get it all took away from them if the Yankees found

out they had plenty of corn and oats.

The Yankees was mighty nice about their manners, though. They camped

all around our place for a while. There was three camps of them close

by at one time, but they never did come and use any of our houses or

cabins. There was lots of poor whites and Cajuns that lived down below

us, between us and the Gulf, and the Yankees just moved into their

houses and cabins and used them to camp in.

The negroes at our place and all of them around there didn't try to

get away or leave when the Yankees come in. They wasn't no place to

go, anyway, so they all stayed on. But they didn't do very much work.

Just enough to take care of themselves and their whitefolks.

Master Sack come home before the War was quite over. I think he had

been sick, because he looked thin and old and worried. All the negroes

picked up and worked mighty hard after he come home, too.

One day he went into Arcadia and come home and told us the War was

over and we was all free. The negroes didn't know what to make of it,

and didn't know where to go, so he told all that wanted to stay on

that they could just go on like they had been and pay him shares.

About half of his negroes stayed on, and he marked off land for them

to farm and made arrangements with them to let them use their cabins,

and let them have mules and tools. They paid him out of their shares,

and some of them finally bought the mules and some of the land. But

about half went on off and tried to do better somewheres else.

I didn't stay with him because I was jest a boy and he didn't need me

at the house anyway.

Late in the War my Pappy belonged to a man named Sander or Zander.

Might been Alexander, but the negroes called him Mr. Sander. When

pappy got free he come and asked me to go with him, and I went along

and lived with him. He had a share-cropper deal with Mr. Sander and I

helped him work his patch. That place was just a little east of Houma,

a few miles.

When my Pappy was born his parents belonged to a Mr. Adams, so he took

Adams for his last name, and I did too, because I was his son. I don't

know where Mr. Adams lived, but I don't think my Pappy was born in

Louisiana. Alabama, maybe. I think his parents come off the boat,

because he was very black--even blacker than I am.

I lived there with my Pappy until I was about eighteen and then I

married and moved around all over Louisiana from time to time. My wife

give me twelve boys and five girls, but all my children are dead now

but five. My wife died in 1920 and I come up here to Tulsa to live.

One of my daughters takes care and looks out for me now.

I seen the old Sack P. Gee place about twenty years ago, and it was

all cut up in little places and all run down. Never would have known

it was one time a big plantation ten miles long.

I seen places going to rack and ruin all around--all the places I

lived at in Louisiana--but I'm glad I wasn't there to see Master

Sack's place go down. He was a good man and done right by all his

negroes.

Yes, Lord, my old feets have been in mighty nigh every parish in

Louisiana, and I seen some mighty pretty places, but I'll never forget

how that old Gee plantation looked when I was a boy.

Oklahoma Writers' Project

Ex-Slaves

ALICE ALEXANDER

Age 88 yrs.

Oklahoma City, Okla.

I was 88 years old the 15th of March. I was born in 1849, at Jackson

Parish, Louisiana. My mother's name was Mary Marlow, and father's

Henry Marlow.

I can't remember very much 'bout slavery 'cause I was awful small, but

I can remember that my mother's master, Colonel Threff died, and my

mother, her husband, and us three chillun was handed down to Colonel

Threff's poor kin folks. Colonel Threff owned about two or three

hundred head of niggers, and all of 'em was tributed to his poor kin.

Ooh wee! he sho' had jest a lot of them too! Master Joe Threff, one of

his poor kin, took my mother, her husband, and three of us chillun

from Louisiana to the Mississippi Line.

Down there we lived in a one-room log hut, and slept on homemade rail

bed steads with cotton, and sometimes straw, mostly straw summers and

cotton winners. I worked round the house and looked after de smaller

chillun--I mean my mother's chillun. Mostly we ate yeller meal corn

bread and sorghum malasses. I ate possums when we could get 'em, but

jest couldn't stand rabbit meat. Didn't know there was any Christmas

or holidays in dem days.

I can't 'membuh nothing 'bout no churches in slavery. I was a sinner

and loved to dance. I remembuh I was on the floor one night dancing

and I had four daughters on the floor with me and my son was playing

de music--that got me! I jest stopped and said I wouldn't cut another

step and I haven't. I'm a member of the Baptist Church and been for 25

or 30 years. I jined 'cause I wanted to be good 'cause I was an awful

sinner.

We had a overseer back on Colonel Threff's plantation and my mother

said he was the meanest man on earth. He'd jest go out in de fields

and beat dem niggers, and my mother told me one day he come out in de

field beating her sister and she jumped on him and nearly beat him

half to death and old Master come up jest in time to see it all and

fired dat overseer. Said he didn't want no man working fer him dat a

woman could whip.

After de war set us free my pappy moved us away and I stayed round

down there till I got to be a grown woman and married. You know I had

a pretty fine wedding 'cause my pappy had worked hard and commenced to

be prosperous. He had cattle, hogs, chickens and all those things like

that.

A college of dem niggers got together and packed up to leave

Louisiana. Me and my husband went with them. We had covered wagons,

and let me tell you I walked nearly all the way from Louisiana to

Oklahoma. We left in March but didn't git here till May. We came in

search of education. I got a pretty fair education down there but

didn't take care of it. We come to Oklahoma looking for de same thing

then that darkies go North looking fer now. But we got dissapointed.

What little I learned I quit taking care of it and seeing after it and

lost it all.

I love to fish. I've worked hard in my days. Washed and ironed for 30

years, and paid for dis home that way. Yes sir, dis is my home. My

mother died right here in dis house. She was 111 yeahs old. She is

been dead 'bout 20 yeahs.

I have three daughters here married, Sussie Pruitt, Bertie Shannon,

and Irene Freeman. Irene lost her husband, and he's dead now.

Oklahoma Writers' Project

Ex-Slaves

10-19-1938

1,428 words

PHOEBE BANKS

Age 78

Muskogee, Oklahoma.

In 1860, there was a little Creek Indian town of Sodom on the north

bank of the Arkansas River, in a section the Indians called Chocka

Bottoms, where Mose Perryman had a big farm or ranch for a long time

before the Civil War. That same year, on October 17, I was born on the

Perryman place, which was northwest of where I live now in Muskogee;

only in them days Fort Gibson and Okmulgee was the biggest towns

around and Muskogee hadn't shaped up yet.

My mother belonged to Mose Perryman when I was born; he was one of the

best known Creeks in the whole nation, and one of his younger

brothers, Legus Perryman, was made the big chief of the Creeks (1887)

a long time after the slaves was freed. Mother's name was Eldee; my

father's name was William McIntosh, because he belonged to a Creek

Indian family by that name. Everybody say the McIntoshes was leaders

in the Creek doings away back there in Alabama long before they come

out here.

With me, there was twelve children in our family; Daniel, Stroy,

Scott, Segal, Neil, Joe, Phillip, Mollie, Harriett, Sally and Queenie.

The Perryman slave cabins was all alike--just two-room log cabins,

with a fireplace where mother do the cooking for us children at night

after she get through working in the Master's house.

Mother was the house girl--cooking, waiting on the table, cleaning the

house, spinning the yarn, knitting some of the winter clothes, taking

care of the mistress girl, washing the clothes--yes, she was always

busy and worked mighty hard all the time, while them Indians wouldn't

hardly do nothing for themselves.

On the McIntosh plantation, my daddy said there was a big number of

slaves and lots of slave children. The slave men work in the fields,

chopping cotton, raising corn, cutting rails for the fences, building

log cabins and fireplaces. One time when father was cutting down a

tree it fell on him and after that he was only strong enough to rub

down the horses and do light work around the yard. He got to be a good

horse trainer and long time after slavery he helped to train horses

for the Free Fairs around the country, and I suppose the first money

he ever earned was made that way.

Lots of the slave owners didn't want their slaves to learn reading and

writing, but the Perrymans didn't care; they even helped the younger

slaves with that stuff. Mother said her master didn't care much what

the slaves do; he was so lazy he didn't care for nothing.

They tell me about the war times, and that's all I remember of it.

Before the War is over some of the Perryman slaves and some from the

McIntosh place fix up to run away from their masters.

My father and my uncle, Jacob Perryman, was some of the fixers. Some

of the Creek Indians had already lost a few slaves who slip off to the

North, and they take what was left down into Texas so's they couldn't

get away. Some of the other Creeks was friendly to the North and was

fixing to get away up there; that's the ones my daddy and uncle was

fixing to join, for they was afraid their masters would take up and

move to Texas before they could get away.

They call the old Creek, who was leaving for the North, "Old Gouge"

(Opoethleyohola). All our family join up with him, and there was lots

of Creek Indians and slaves in the outfit when they made a break for

the North. The runaways was riding ponies stolen from their masters.

When they get into the hilly country farther north in the country that

belong to the Cherokee Indians, they make camp on a big creek and

there the Rebel Indian soldiers catch up, but they was fought back.

Then long before morning lighten the sky, the men hurry and sling the

camp kettles across the pack horses, tie the littlest children to the

horses backs and get on the move farther into the mountains. They kept

moving fast as they could, but the wagons made it mighty slow in the

brush and the lowland swamps, so just about the time they ready to

ford another creek the Indian soldiers catch up and the fighting begin

all over again.

The Creek Indians and the slaves with them try to fight off them

soldiers like they did before, but they get scattered around and

separated so's they lose the battle. Lost their horses and wagons, and

the soldiers killed lots of the Creeks and Negroes, and some of the

slaves was captured and took back to their masters.

Dead all over the hills when we get away; some of the Negroes shot and

wounded so bad the blood run down the saddle skirts, and some fall off

their horses miles from the battle ground, and lay still on the

ground. Daddy and Uncle Jacob keep our family together somehow and

head across the line into Kansas. We all get to Fort Scott where there

was a big army camp; daddy work in the blacksmith shop and Uncle Jacob

join with the Northern soldiers to fight against the South. He come

through the war and live to tell me about the fighting he been in.

He went with the soldiers down around Fort Gibson where they fight the

Indians who stayed with the South. Uncle Jacob say he killed many a

man during the war, and showed me the musket and sword he used to

fight with; said he didn't shoot the women and children--just whack

their heads off with the sword, and almost could I see the blood

dripping from the point! It made me scared at his stories.

The captain of this company want his men to be brave and not get

scared, so before the fighting start he put out a tub of white liquor

(corn whiskey) and steam them up so's they'd be mean enough to whip

their grannie! The soldiers do lots of riding and the saddle-sores get

so bad they grease their body every night with snake oil so's they

could keep going on.

Uncle Jacob said the biggest battle was at Honey Springs (1863). That

was down near Elk Creek, close by Checotah, below Rentiersville. He

said it was the most terrible fighting he seen, but the Union soldiers

whipped and went back into Fort Gibson. The Rebels was chased all over

the country and couldn't find each other for a long time, the way he

tell it.

After the war our family come back here and settle at Fort Gibson, but

it ain't like the place my mother told me about. There was big houses

and buildings of brick setting on the high land above the river when I

first see it, not like she know it when the Perrymans come here years

ago.

She heard the Indians talk about the old fort (1824), the one that rot

down long before the Civil War. And she seen it herself when she go

with the Master for trading with the stores. She said it was made by

Matthew Arbuckle and his soldiers, and she talk about Companys B, C,

D, K, and the Seventh Infantry who was there and made the Osage

Indians stop fighting the Creeks and Cherokees. She talk of it, but

that old place all gone when I first see the Fort.

Then I hear about how after the Arbuckle soldiers leave the old log

fort, the Cherokee Indians take over the land and start up the town of

Keetoowah. The folks who move in there make the place so wild and

rascally the Cherokees give up trying to make a good town and it

kinder blow away.

My husband was Tom Banks, but the boy I got ain't my own son, but I

found him on my doorstep when he's about three weeks old and raise him

like he is my own blood. He went to school at the manual training

school at Tullahassee and the education he got get him a teacher job

at Taft (Okla), where he is now.

Oklahoma Writers' Project

Ex-Slaves

10-19-38

520 Words

NANCY ROGERS BEAN

Age about 82

Hulbert, Okla.

I'm getting old and it's easy to forget most of the happenings of

slave days; anyway I was too little to know much about them, for my

mammy told me I was born about six years before the War. My folks was

on their way to Fort Gibson, and on the trip I was born at Boggy

Depot, down in southern Oklahoma.

There was a lot of us children; I got their names somewheres here.

Yes, there was George, Sarah, Emma, Stella, Sylvia, Lucinda, Rose,

Dan, Pamp, Jeff, Austin, Jessie, Isaac and Andrew; we all lived in a

one-room log cabin on Master Rogers' place not far from the old

military road near Choteau. Mammy was raised around the Cherokee town

of Tahlequah.

I got my name from the Rogers', but I was loaned around to their

relatives most of the time. I helped around the house for Bill

McCracken, then I was with Cornelius and Carline Wright, and when I

was freed my Mistress was a Mrs. O'Neal, wife of a officer at Fort

Gibson. She treated me the best of all and gave me the first doll I

ever had. It was a rag doll with charcoal eyes and red thread worked

in for the mouth. She allowed me one hour every day to play with it.

When the War ended Mistress O'Neal wanted to take me with her to

Richmond, Virginia, but my people wouldn't let me go. I wanted to stay

with her, she was so good, and she promised to come back for me when I

get older, but she never did.

All the time I was at the fort I hear the bugles and see the soldiers

marching around, but never did I see any battles. The fighting must

have been too far away.

Master Rogers kept all our family together, but my folks have told me

about how the slaves was sold. One of my aunts was a mean, fighting

woman. She was to be sold and when the bidding started she grabbed a

hatchet, laid her hand on a log and chopped it off. Then she throwed

the bleeding hand right in her master's face. Not long ago I hear she

is still living in the country around Nowata, Oklahoma.

Sometimes I would try to get mean, but always I got me a whipping for

it. When I was a little girl, moving around from one family to

another, I done housework, ironing, peeling potatoes and helping the

main cook. I went barefoot most of my life, but the master would get

his shoes from the Government at Fort Gibson.

I wore cotton dresses, and the Mistress wore long dresses, with

different colors for Sunday clothes, but us slaves didn't know much

about Sunday in a religious way. The Master had a brother who used to

preach to the Negroes on the sly. One time he was caught and the

Master whipped him something awful.

Years ago I married Joe Bean. Our children died as babies. Twenty year

ago Joe Bean and I separated for good and all.

The good Lord knows I'm glad slavery is over. Now I can stay peaceful

in one place--that's all I aim to do.

Oklahoma Writers' Project

Ex-Slaves

[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]

PRINCE BEE

Age 85 yrs.

Red Bird, Okla.

I don't know how old I was when I found myself standing on the toppen

part of a high stump with a lot of white folks walking around looking

at the little scared boy that was me. Pretty soon the old master,

(that's my first master) Saul Nudville, he say to me that I'm now

belonging to Major Bee and for me to get down off the auction block.

I do that. Major Bee he comes over and right away I know I'm going to

like him. Then when I get to the Major's plantation and see his oldest

daughter Mary and all her brothers and sisters, and see how kind she

is to all them and to all the colored children, why, I just keeps

right on liking 'em more all the time.

They was about nine white children on the place and Mary had to watch

out for them 'cause the mother was dead.

That Mary gal seen to it that we children got the best food on the

place, the fattest possum and the hottest fish. When the possum was

all browned, and the sweet 'taters swimming in the good mellow gravy,

then she call us for to eat. Um-um-h! That was tasty eating!

And from the garden come the vegetables like okra and corn and onions

that Mary would mix all up in the soup pot with lean meats. That would

rest kinder easy on the stomach too, 'specially if they was a bit of

red squirrel meats in with the stew!

Major Bee say it wasn't good for me to learn reading and writing.

Reckoned it would ruin me. But they sent me to Sunday School.

Sometimes. Wasn't many of the slaves knew how to read the Bible

either, but they all got the religion anyhow. I believed in it then

and I still do.

That religion I got in them way back days is still with me. And it

ain't this pie crust religion such as the folks are getting these

days. The old time religion had some filling between the crusts,

wasn't so many empty words like they is today.

They was haunts in them way back days, too. How's I know? 'Cause I

stayed right with the haunts one whole night when I get caught in a

norther when the Major sends me to another plantation for to bring

back some cows he's bargained for. That was a cold night and a

frightful one.

The blizzard overtook me and it was dark on the way. I come to an old

gin house that everybody said was the hauntinest place in all the

county. But I went in account of the cold and then when the noises

started I was just too scared to move, so there I stood in the corner,

all the time 'til morning come.

There was nobody I could see, but I could hear peoples feet a-tromping

and stomping around the room and they go up and down the stairway like

they was running a race.

Sometimes the noises would be right by my side and I would feel like a

hot wind passing around me, and lights would flash all over the room.

Nobody could I see. When daylight come I went through that door

without looking back and headed for the plantation, forgetting all

about the cows that Major Bee sent me for to get.

When I tells them about the thing, Mary she won't let the old Major

scold, and she fixes me up with some warm foods and I is all right

again. But I stays me away from that gin place, even in the daylight,

account of the haunts.

When the War come along the Major got kinder mean with some of the

slaves, but not with me. I never did try to run off, but some of 'em

did. One of my brothers tried and got caught.

The old Master whipped him 'til the blood spurted all over his body,

the bull whip cutting in deeper all the time. He finish up the

whipping with a wet coarse towel and the end got my brother in the

eye. He was blinded in the one eye but the other eye is good enough he

can see they ain't no use trying to run away no more.

After the War they was more whippings. This time it was the night

riders--them Klan folks didn't fool with mean Negroes. The mean

Negroes was whipped and some of them shot when they do something the

Klan folks didn't like, and when they come a-riding up in the night,

all covered with white spreads, they was something bound to happen.

Them way back days is gone and I is mighty glad. The Negroes of today

needs another leader like Booker Washington. Get the young folks to

working, that's what they need, and get some filling in their pie

crust religion so's when they meet the Lord their soul won't be empty

like is their pocketbooks today!

Oklahoma Writers' Project

Ex-Slaves

LEWIS BONNER

Age 87 yrs.

507 N. Durland

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

I was born 7 miles north of Palestine, Texas, on Matt Swanson's place

in 1850, but I kin not remember the date. My mistress was name Celia

Swanson. My mistress was so good to me till I jest loved her.

My family and all slaves on our place was treated good. Mighty few

floggings went on 'round and about. Master was the overseer over his

darkies and didn't use no other'n. I waited table and churned in the

Big House.

I ate at the table with my mistress and her family and nothing was

evah said. We ate bacon, greens, Irish potatoes and such as we git

now. Aunt Chaddy was the cook and nurse for all the chillun on the

place.

We used to hear slaves on de other places hollering from whippings,

but master never whipped his niggers 'less they lied. Sometimes slaves

from other places would run off and come to our place. Master would

take them back and tell the slave-holders how to treat them so dey

wouldn't run off again.

Mistress had a little stool for me in the big house, and if I got

sleepy, she put me on the foot of her bed and I stayed there til

morning, got up washed my face and hands and got ready to wait on the

table.

There was four or five hundred slaves on our place. One morning during

slavery, my father killed 18 white men and ran away. They said he was

lazy and whipped him, and he just killed all of 'em he could, which

was 18 of 'em. He stayed away 3 years without being found. He come

back and killed 7 before they could kill him. When he was on the place

he jest made bluing.

My mother worked in the field and weaved cloth. Shirts dat she made

lasted 12 months, even if wore and washed and ironed every day. Pants

could not be ripped with two men pulling on dem with all their might.

You talking 'bout clothes, them was some clothes then. Clothes made

now jest don't come up to them near abouts.

Doing of slavery, we had the best church, lots better than today. I am

a Baptist from head to foot, yes sir, yes sir. Jest couldn't be

nothing else. In the first place, I wouldn't even try.

I knows when the war started and ceaseted. I tell you it was some war.

When it was all over, the Yankees come thoo' singing, "You may die

poor but you won't die a slave."

When the War was over, master told us that we could go out and take

care of the crops already planted and plant the ones that need

planting 'cause we knowed all 'bout the place and we would go halvers.

We stayed on 3 years after slavery. We got a little money, but we got

room and board and didn't have to work too hard. It was enough

difference to tell you was no slaves any more.

After slavery and when I was old enough I got married. I married a gal

that was a daughter of her master. He wanted to own her, but she sho'

didn't return it. He kept up with her till he died and sent her money

jest all the time. Before he died, he put her name in his will and

told his oldest son to be sure and keep up with her. The son was sure

true to his promise, for till she died, she was forever hearing from

him or he would visit us, even after we moved to Oklahoma from Texas.

Our chillun and grandchillun will git her part since she is gone. She

was sure a good wife and for no reason did I take the second look at

no woman. That was love, which don't live no more in our hearts.

I make a few pennies selling fish worms and doing a little yard work

and raising vegetables. Not much money in circulation. When I gets my

old age pension, it will make things a little mite better. I guess the

time will be soon.

Tain't nothing but bad treatment that makes people die young and I

ain't had none.

Oklahoma Writers' Project

Ex-Slaves

[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937]

FRANCIS BRIDGES

Age 73 yrs.

Oklahoma City, Okla.

I was born in Red River County, Texas in 1864, and that makes me 73

years old. I had myself 75, and I went to my white folks and they

counted it up and told me I was 73, but I always felt like I was older

than that.

My husband's name is Henry Bridges. We was raised up children together

and married. I had five sisters. My brother died here in Oklahoma

about two years ago. He was a Fisher. Mary Russell, my sister, she

lives in Parish, Texas; Willie Ann Poke, she lives in Greenville,

Texas; Winnie Jackson, lives in Adonia, Texas, and Mattie White, my

other sister, lives in Long Oak, Texas, White Hunt County.

Our Master was named Master Travis Wright, and we all ate nearly the

same thing. Such things as barbecued rabbits, coon, possums baked with

sweet potatoes and all such as that. I used to hang round the kitchen.

The cook, Mama Winnie Long, used to feed all us little niggers on the

flo', jest like little pigs, in tin cups and wooden spoons. We ate

fish too, and I like to go fishing right this very day.

We lived right in old Master Wright's yard. His house sat way up on a

high hill. It was jest a little old log hut we lived in a little old

shack around the yard. They was a lot of little shacks in the yard, I

can't tell jest how many, but it was quite a number of 'em. We slept

in old-fashion beds that we called "corded beds", 'cause they had

ropes crossed to hold the mattresses for slats. Some of 'em had beds

nailed to the wall.

Master Travis Wright had one son named Sam Wright, and after old

Master Travis Wright died, young Master Sam Wright come to be my

mother's master. He jest died a few years ago.

My mother say dey had a nigger driver and he'd whip 'em all but his

daughter. I never seen no slaves whipped, but my mother say dey had to

whip her Uncle Charley Mills once for telling a story. She say he

bored a hole in de wall of de store 'til he bored de hole in old

Master's whiskey barrel, and he caught two jugs of whiskey and buried

it in de banks of de river. When old Master found out de whiskey was

gone, he tried to make Uncle Charley 'fess up, and Uncle Charley

wouldn't so he brung him in and hung him and barely let his toes

touch. After Uncle Charley thought he was going to kill him, he told

where de whiskey was.

We didn't go to church before freedom, land no! 'cause the closest

church was so far--it was 30 miles off. But I'm a member of the

Baptist Church and I've been a member for some 40-odd years. I was

past 40 when I heerd of a Methodist Church. My favorite song is

"Companion." I didn't get to go to school 'til after slavery.

I 'member more after de War. I 'member my mother said dey had

patrollers, and if de slaves would get passes from de Master to go to

de dances and didn't git back before ten o'clock dey'd beat 'em half

to death.

I used to hear 'em talking 'bout Ku Klux Klan coming to the well to

get water. They'd draw up a bucket of water and pour the water in they

false stomachs. They false stomachs was tied on 'em with a big leather

buckle. They'd jest pour de water in there to scare 'em and say, "This

is the first drink of water I've had since I left Hell." They'd say

all sech things to scare the cullud folks.

I heerd my mother say they sold slaves on what they called an auction

block. Jest like if a slave had any portly fine looking children

they'd sell them chillun jest like selling cattle. I didn't see this,

jest heerd it.

After freedom, when I was old enough then to work in the field, we

lived on Mr. Martin's plantation. We worked awful hard in the fields.

Lawd yes'm! I've heard 'bout shucking up de corn, but give me dem

cotton pickings. Fry'd pick out all de crop of cotton in one day. The

women would cook and de men'd pick the cotton, I mean on dem big

cotton pickings. Some would work for they meals. Then after dey'd

gather all de crops, dey'd give big dances, drink whiskey, and jest

cut up sumpin terrible. We didn't know anything 'bout holidays.

I've heard my husband talk 'bout "Raw head an' bloody bones." Said

whenever dey mothers wanted to scare 'em to make 'em be good dey'd

tell 'em dat a man was outside de door and asked her if she'd hold his

head while he fixed his back bone. I don't believe in voodooing, and I

don't believe in hants. I used to believe in both of 'em when I was

young.

I married Jake Bridges. We had a ordinary wedding. The preacher

married us and we had a license. We have two sons grown living here.

My husband told me that in slavery if your Master told you to live

with your brother, you had to live with him. My father's mother and

dad was first cousins.

I can 'member my husband telling me he was hauling lumber from

Jefferson where the saw mill was and it was cold that night, and when

they got halfway back it snowed, and he stopped with an old cullud

family, and he said way in the night, a knock come at de door--woke

'em up, and it was an old cullud man, and he said dis old man commence

inquiring, trying to find out who dey people was and dey told him best

dey could remember, and bless de Lawd, 'fore dey finished talking de

found out dis old cullud man and de other cullud woman an' man dat was

married was all brothers and sisters, and he told his brother it was

a shame he had married his sister and dey had nine chillun. My husband

sho' told me dis.

I've heerd 'em say dey old master raised chillun by those cullud

women. Why, there was one white man in Texas had a cullud woman, but

didn't have no chillun by her, and he had this cullud woman and her

old mistress there on the same place. So, when old Mistress died he

wouldn't let this cullud woman leave, and he gave her a swell home

right there on the place, and she is still there I guess. They say she

say sometime, she didn't want no Negro man smutting her sheets up.

I think Abraham Lincoln was a good man, and I have read a whole lots

'bout him, but I don't know much 'bout Jeff Davis. I think Booker T.

Washington is a fine man, but I aint heerd so much about him.

Oklahoma Writers' Project

Ex-Slaves

[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]

JOHN BROWN

Age (about) 87 yrs.

West Tulsa, Okla.

Most of the folks have themselves a regular birthday but this old

colored man just pick out any of the days during the year--one day

just about as good as another.

I been around a long time but I don't know when I got here. That's the

truth. Nearest I figures it the year was 1850--the month don't make no

difference nohow.

But I know the borning was down in Taloga County, Alabama, near the

county seat town. Miss Abby was with my Mammy that day. She was the

wife of Master John Brown. She was with all the slave women every time

a baby was born, or when a plague of misery hit the folks she knew

what to do and what kind of medicine to chase off the aches and pains.

God bless her! She sure loved us Negroes.

Most of the time there was more'n three hundred slaves on the

plantation. The oldest ones come right from Africa. My Grandmother was

one of them. A savage in Africa--a slave in America. Mammy told it to

me. Over there all the natives dressed naked and lived on fruits and

nuts. Never see many white mens.

One day a big ship stopped off the shore and the natives hid in the

brush along the beach. Grandmother was there. The ship men sent a

little boat to the shore and scattered bright things and trinkets on

the beach. The natives were curious. Grandmother said everybody made a

rush for them things soon as the boat left. The trinkets was fewer

than the peoples. Next day the white folks scatter some more. There

was another scramble. The natives was feeling less scared, and the

next day some of them walked up the gangplank to get things off the

plank and off the deck.

The deck was covered with things like they'd found on the beach.

Two-three hundred natives on the ship when they feel it move. They

rush to the side but the plank was gone. Just dropped in the water

when the ship moved away.

Folks on the beach started to crying and shouting. The ones on the

boat was wild with fear. Grandmother was one of them who got fooled,

and she say the last thing seen of that place was the natives running

up and down the beach waving their arms and shouting like they was

mad. The boat men come up from below where they had been hiding and

drive the slaves down in the bottom and keep them quiet with the whips

and clubs.

The slaves was landed at Charleston. The town folks was mighty mad

'cause the blacks was driven through the streets without any clothes,

and drove off the boat men after the slaves was sold on the market.

Most of that load was sold to the Brown plantation in Alabama.

Grandmother was one of the bunch.

The Browns taught them to work. Made clothes for them. For a long time

the natives didn't like the clothes and try to shake them off. There

was three Brown boys--John, Charley and Henry. Nephews of old Lady

Hyatt who was the real owner of the plantation, but the boys run the

place. The old lady she lived in the town. Come out in the spring and

fall to see how is the plantation doing.

She was a fine woman. The Brown boys and their wives was just as good.

Wouldn't let nobody mistreat the slaves. Whippings was few and nobody

get the whip 'less he need it bad. They teach the young ones how to

read and write; say it was good for the Negroes to know about such

things.

Sunday was a great day around the plantation. The fields was

forgotten, the light chores was hurried through and everybody got

ready for the church meeting.

It was out of the doors, in the yard fronting the big log where the

Browns all lived. Master John's wife would start the meeting with a

prayer and then would come the singing. The old timey songs.

The white folks on the next plantation would lick their slaves for

trying to do like we did. No praying there, and no singing.

The Master gave out the week's supply on Saturday. Plenty of hams,

lean bacon, flour, corn meal, coffee and more'n enough for the week.

Nobody go hungry on that place! During the growing season all the

slaves have a garden spot all their own. Three thousand acres on that

place--plenty of room for gardens and field crops.

Even during the war foods was plentiful. One time the Yankee soldiers

visit the place. The white folks gone and I talks with them. Asks me

lots of questions--got any meats--got any potatoes--got any this--some

of that--but I just shake my head and they don't look around.

The old cook fixes them up though. She fry all the eggs on the place,

skillet the ham and pan the biscuits! Them soldiers fill up and leave

the house friendly as anybody I ever see!

The Browns wasn't bothered with the Ku Klux Klan either. The Negroes

minded their own business just like before they was free.

I stayed on the plantation 'til the last Brown die. Then I come to

Oklahoma and works on the railroad 'til I was too old to hustle the

grips and packages. Now I just sits thinking how much better off would

I be on the old plantation.

Homesick! Just homesick for that Alabama farm like it was in them good

old times!

Oklahoma Writers' Project

Ex-Slaves

SALLIE CARDER

Age 83 yrs.

Burwin, Okla.

I was born in Jackson, Tennessee, and I'm going on 83 years. My mother

was Harriett Neel and father Jeff Bills, both of them named after

their masters. I has one brother, J. B. Bills, but all de rest of my

brothers and sisters is dead.

No sir, we never had no money while I was a slave. We jest didn't have

nothing a-tall! We ate greens, corn bread, and ash cake. De only time

I ever got a biscuit would be when a misdemeanor was did, and my

Mistress would give a buttered biscuit to de one who could tell her

who done it.

In hot weather and cold weather dere was no difference as to what we

wore. We wore dresses my mother wove for us and no shoes a-tall. I

never wore any shoes till I was grown and den dey was old brogans wid

only two holes to lace, one on each side. During my wedding I wore a

blue calico dress, a man's shirt tail as a head rag, and a pair of

brogan shoes.

My Master lived in a three-story frame house painted white. My

Mistress was very mean. Sometimes she would make de overseer whip

negroes for looking too hard at her when she was talking to dem. Dey

had four children, three girls and one boy.

I was a servant to my Master, and as he had de palsy I had to care for

him, feed him and push him around. I don't know how many slaves, but

he had a good deal of 'em.

About four o' clock mornings de overseer or negro carriage driver who

stayed at the Big House would ring de bell to git up and git to work.

De slaves would pick a heap of cotton and work till late on

moonshining nights.

Dere was a white post in front of my door with ropes to tie the slaves

to whip dem. Dey used a plain strap, another one with holes in it, and

one dey call de cat wid nine tails which was a number of straps plated

and de ends unplated. Dey would whip de slaves wid a wide strap wid

holes in it and de holes would make blisters. Den dey would take de

cat wid nine tails and burst de blisters and den rub de sores wid

turpentine and red pepper.

I never saw any slaves auctioned off but I seen dem pass our house

chained together on de way to be sold, including both men and women

wid babies all chained to each other. Dere was no churches for slaves,

but at nights dey would slip off and git in ditches and sing and pray,

and when dey would sometimes be caught at it dey would be whipped.

Some of de slaves would turn down big pots and put dere heads in dem

and pray. My Mistress would tell me to be a good obedient slave and I

would go to heaven. When slaves would attempt to run off dey would

catch dem and chain dem and fetch 'em back and whip dem before dey was

turned loose again.

De patrollers would go about in de quarters at nights to see if any of

de slaves was out or slipped off. As we sleep on de dirt floors on

pallets, de patrollers would walk all over and on us and if we even

grunt dey would whip us. De only trouble between de whites and blacks

on our plantation was when de overseer tied my mother to whip her and

my father untied her and de overseer shot and killed him.

Negroes never was allowed to git sick, and when dey would look

somewhat sick, de overseer would give dem some blue-mass pills and oil

of some sort and make dem continue to work.

During de War de Yankees would pass through and kill up de chickens,

and hogs, and cattle, and eat up all dey could find. De day of freedom

de overseer went into de field and told de slaves dat dey was free,

and de slaves replied, "free how?" and he told dem: "free to work and

live for demselves." And dey said dey didn't know what to do, and so

some of dem stayed on. I married Josh Forch. I am mother of four

children and 35 grand children.

I like Abraham Lincoln. I think he was a good man and president. I

didn't know much who Jeff Davis was. What I heard 'bout Booker T.

Washington, he was a good man.

Now dat slavery is over, I don't want to be in nary 'nother slavery,

and if ever nary 'nothern come up I wouldn't stay here.

Oklahoma Writers' Project

Ex-Slaves

BETTY FOREMAN CHESSIER

Age 94 years

Oklahoma City, Okla.

I was born July 11, 1843 in Raleigh, N. C. My mother was named Melinda

Manley, the slave of Governor Manley of North Carolina, and my father

was named Arnold Foreman, slave of Bob and John Foreman, two young

masters. They come over from Arkansas to visit my master and my pappy

and mammy met and got married, 'though my pappy only seen my mammy in

the summer when his masters come to visit our master and dey took him

right back. I had three sisters and two brothers and none of dem was

my whole brothers and sisters. I stayed in the Big House all the time,

but my sisters and brothers was gived to the master's sons and

daughters whey dey got married and dey was told to send back for some

more when dem died. I didn't never stay with my mammy doing of

slavery. I stayed in the Big House. I slept under the dining room

table with three other darkies. The flo' was well carpeted. Don't

remembah my grandmammy and grandpappy, but my master was they master.

I waited on the table, kept flies off'n my mistress and went for the

mail. Never made no money, but dey did give the slaves money at

Christmas time. I never had over two dresses. One was calico and one

gingham. I had such underclothes as dey wore then.

Master Manley and Mistress had six sons an' six darters. Dey raised

dem all till dey was grown too. Dey lived in a great big house 'cross

from the mansion, right in town before Master was 'lected Governor,

den dey all moved in dat mansion.

Plantation folks had barbecues and "lay crop feasts" and invited the

city darkies out. When I first come here I couldn't understand the

folks here, 'cause dey didn't quit work on Easter Monday. That is some

day in North Carolina even today. I doesn't remember any play songs,

'cause I was almost in prison. I couldn't play with any of the darkies

and I doesn't remember playing in my life when I was a little girl and

when I got grown I didn't want to. I wasn't hongry, I wasn't naked and

I got only five licks from the white folks in my life. Dey was for

being such a big forgitful girl. I saw 'em sell niggers once. The only

pusson I ever seen whipped at dat whipping post was a white man.

I never got no learning; dey kept us from dat, but you know some of

dem darkies learnt anyhow. We had church in the heart of town or in

the basement of some old building. I went to the 'piscopal church most

all the time, till I got to be a Baptist.

The slaves run away to the North 'cause dey wanted to be free. Some of

my family run away sometime and dey didn't catch 'em neither. The

patrollers sho' watched the streets. But when dey caught any of

master's niggers without passes, dey jest locked him up in the guard

house and master come down in the mawnin' and git 'em out, but dem

patrollers better not whip one.

I know when the War commenced and ended. Master Manley sent me from

the Big House to the office about a mile away. Jest as I got to the

office door, three men rid up in blue uniforms and said, "Dinah, do

you have any milk in there?" I was sent down to the office for some

beans for to cook dinner, but dem men most nigh scared me to death.

They never did go in dat office, but jest rid off on horseback about a

quarter a mile and seem lak right now, Yankees fell out of the very

sky, 'cause hundeds and hundeds was everywhere you could look to save

your life. Old Mistress sent one of her grandchillun to tell me to

come on, and one of the Yankees told dat child, "You tell your

grandmother she ain't coming now and never will come back there as a

slave." Master was setting on the mansion porch. Dem Yankees come up

on de porch, go down in cellar and didn't tech one blessed thing. Old

Mistress took heart trouble, 'cause dem Yankees whipped white folks

going and coming.

I laid in my bed a many night scared to death of Klu Klux Klan. Dey

would come to your house and ask for a drink and no more want a drink

than nothing.

After the War, I went to mammy and my step-pappy. She done married

again, so I left and went to Warrington and Halifax, North Carolina,

jest for a little while nursing some white chillun. I stayed in

Raleigh, where I was born till 7 years ago, when I come to Oklahoma to

live with my only living child. I am the mother of 4 chillun and 11

grandchillun.

When I got married I jumped a broomstick. To git unmarried, all you

had to do was to jump backwards over the same broomstick.

Lincoln and Booker T. Washington was two of the finest men ever lived.

Don't think nothing of Jeff Davis, 'cause he was a traitor. Freedom

for us was the best thing ever happened. Prayer is best thing in the

world. Everybody ought to pray, 'cause prayer got us out of slavery.

Oklahoma Writer's Project

Ex-Slaves

POLLY COLBERT

Age 83 yrs.

Colbert, Oklahoma

I am now living on de forty-acre farm dat de Government give me and it

is just about three miles from my old home on Master Holmes Colbert's

plantation where I lived when I was a slave.

Lawsy me, times sure has changed since slavery times! Maybe I notice

it more since I been living here all de time, but dere's farms 'round

here dat I've seen grown timber cleared off of twice during my

lifetime. Dis land was first cleared up and worked by niggers when dey

was slaves. After de War nobody worked it and it just naturally growed

up again wid all sorts of trees. Later, white folks cleared it up

again and took grown trees off'n it and now dey are still cultivating

it but it is most wore out now. Some of it won't even sprout peas. Dis

same land used to grow corn without hardly any work but it sure won't

do it now.

I reckon it was on account of de rich land dat us niggers dat was

owned by Indians didn't have to work so hard as dey did in de old

states, but I think dat Indian masters was just naturally kinder any

way, leastways mine was.

My mother, Liza, was owned by de Colbert family and my father, Tony,

was owned by de Love family. When Master Holmes and Miss Betty Love

was married dey fathers give my father and mother to dem for a wedding

gift. I was born at Tishomingo and we moved to de farm on Red River

soon after dat and I been here ever since. I had a sister and a

brother, but I ain't seen dem since den.

My mother died when I was real small, and about a year after dat my

father died. Master Holmes told us children not to cry, dat he and

Miss Betsy would take good care of us. Dey did, too. Dey took us in de

house wid dem and look after us jest as good as dey could colored

children. We slept in a little room close to them and she allus seen

dat we was covered up good before she went to bed. I guess she got a

sight of satisfaction from taking care of us 'cause she didn't have no

babies to care for.

Master Holmes and Miss Betsy was real young folks but dey was purty

well fixed. He owned about 100 acres of land dat was cleared and ready

for de plow and a lot dat was not in cultivation. He had de woods full

of hogs and cows and he owned seven or eight grown slaves and several

children. I remember Uncle Shed, Uncle Lige, Aunt Chaney, Aunt Lizzie,

and Aunt Susy just as well as if it was yesterday. Master Holmes and

Miss Betsy was both half-breed Choctaw Indians. Dey had both been away

to school somewhere in de states and was well educated. Dey had two

children but dey died when dey was little. Another little girl was

born to dem after de War and she lived to be a grown woman.

Dey sure was fine young folks and provided well for us. He allus had a

smokehouse full of meat, lard, sausage, dried beans, peas, corn,

potatoes, turnips and collards banked up for winter. He had plenty of

milk and butter for all of us, too.

Master Holmes allus say, "A hungry man caint work." And he allus saw

to it that we had lots to eat.

We cooked all sorts of Indian dishes: Tom-fuller, pashofa, hickory-nut

grot, Tom-budha, ash-cakes, and pound cakes besides vegetables and

meat dishes. Corn or corn meal was used in all de Indian dishes. We

made hominy out'n de whole grains. Tom-fuller was made from beaten

corn and tasted sort of like hominy.

We would take corn and beat it like in a wooden mortar wid a wooden

pestle. We would husk it by fanning it and we would den put it on to

cook in a big pot. While it was cooking we'd pick out a lot of

hickory-nuts, tie 'em up in a cloth and beat 'em a little and drop 'em

in and cook for a long time. We called dis dish hickory-nut grot. When

we made pashofa we beat de corn and cook for a little while and den we

add fresh pork and cook until de meat was done. Tom-budha was green

corn and fresh meat cooked together and seasoned wid tongue or

pepper-grass.

We cooked on de fire place wid de pots hanging over de fire on racks

and den we baked bread and cakes in a oven-skillet. We didn't use soda

and baking powder. We'd put salt in de meal and scald it wid boiling

water and make it into pones and bake it. We'd roll de ash cakes in

wet cabbage leaves and put 'em in de hot ashes and bake 'em. We cooked

potatoes, and roasting ears dat way also. We sweetened our cakes wid

molasses, and dey was plenty sweet too.

Dey was lots of possums and coons and squirrels and we nearly always

had some one of these to eat. We'd parboil de possum or coon and put

it in a pan and bake him wid potatoes 'round him. We used de broth to

baste him and for gravy. Hit sure was fine eating dem days.

I never had much work to do. I helped 'round de house when I wanted to

and I run errands for Miss Betsy. I liked to do things for her. When I

got a little bigger my brother and I toted cool water to de field for

de hands.

Didn't none of Master Holmes' niggers work when dey was sick. He allus

saw dat dey had medicine and a doctor iffen dey needed one. 'Bout de

only sickness we had was chills and fever. In de old days we made lots

of our own medicine and I still does it yet. We used polecat grease

for croup and rheumatism. Dog-fennel, butterfly-root, and

life-everlasting boiled and mixed and made into a syrup will cure

pneumonia and pleurisy. Pursley-weed, called squirrel physic, boiled

into a syrup will cure chills and fever. Snake-root steeped for a long

time and mixed with whiskey will cure chills and fever also.

Our clothes was all made of homespun. De women done all de spinning

and de weaving but Miss Betsy cut out all de clothes and helped wid de

sewing. She learned to sew when she was away to school and she learnt

all her women to sew. She done all the sewing for de children. Master

Holmes bought our shoes and we all had 'em to wear in de winter. We

all went barefoot in de summer.

He kept mighty good teams and he had two fine saddle horses. He and

Miss Betsy rode 'em all de time. She would ride wid him all over de

farm and dey would go hunting a lot, too. She could shoot a gun as

good as any man.

Master Holmes sure did love his wife and children and he was so proud

of her. It nearly killed 'em both to give up de little boy and girl. I

never did hear of him taking a drink and he was kind to everybody,

both black and white, and everybody liked him. Dey had lots of company

and dey never turned anybody away. We lived about four miles from de

ferry on Red River on de Texas Road and lots of travelers stopped at

our house.

We was 'lowed to visit de colored folks on de Eastman and Carter

plantations dat joined our farm. Eastman and Carter was both white men

dat married Indian wives. Dey was good to dey slaves, too, and let 'em

visit us.

Old Uncle Kellup (Caleb) Colbert, Uncle Billy Hogan, Rev. John Carr,

Rev. Baker, Rev. Hogue, and old Father Murrow preached for de white

folks all de time and us colored folks went to church wid dem. Dey had

church under brush arbors and we set off to ourselves but we could

take part in de singing and sometimes a colored person would get happy

and pray and shout but nobody didn't think nothing 'bout dat.

De Patrollers was de law, kind of like de policeman now. Dey sure

never did whip one of Master Holmes' niggers for he didn't allow it.

He didn't whip 'em hisself and he sure didn't allow anybody else to

either. I was afraid of de Ku Kluxers too, and I 'spects dat Master

Holmes was one of de leaders iffen de truth was known. Dey sure was

scary looking.

I was scared of de Yankee soldiers. Dey come by and killed some of our

cattle for beef and took our meat and lard out'n de smokehouse and dey

took some corn, too. Us niggers was awful mad. We didn't know anything

'bout dem fighting to free us. We didn't specially want to be free dat

I knows of.

Right after de War I went over to Bloomfield Academy to take care of a

little girl, but I went back to Master Holmes and Miss Betsy at de end

of two years to take care of de little girl dat was born to dem and I

stayed with her until I was about fifteen. Master Holmes went to

Washington as a delegate, for something for de Indians, and he took

sick and died and dey buried him dere. Poor Miss Betsy nearly grieved

herself to death. She stayed on at de farm till her little girl was

grown and married. Her nigger men stayed on with her and rented land

from her and dey sure raised a sight of truck. Didn't none of her old

slaves ever move very far from her and most of them worked for her

till dey was too old to work.

I left Miss Betsy purty soon after Master Holmes died and went back

to de Academy and stayed three years. I married a man dat belonged to

Master Holmes' cousin. His name was Colbert, too. I had a big wedding.

Miss Betsy and a lot of white folks come and stayed for dinner. We

danced all evening and after supper we started again and danced all

night and de next day and de next night. We'd eat awhile and den we'd

dance awhile.

My husband and I had nine children and now I've got seven

grandchildren. My husband has been dead a long time.

My sister, Chaney, lives here close to me but her mind has got feeble

and she can't recollect as much as I can. I live with my son and he is

mighty good to me. I know I ain't long for dis world but I don't mind

for I has lived a long time and I'll have a lot of friends in de other

world and I won't be lonesome.

Oklahoma Writers' Project

Ex-Slaves

[Date stamp: NOV 5 1937]

GEORGE CONRAD, JR.,

Age 77 yrs.

Oklahoma City, Okla.

I was born February 23, 1860 at Connersville, Harrison County,

Kentucky. I was born and lived just 13 miles from Parish. My mother's

name is Rachel Conrad, born at Bourbon County, Kentucky. My father,

George Conrad, was born at Bourbon County Kentucky. My grandmother's

name is Sallie Amos, and grandfather's name is Peter Amos. My

grandfather, his old Master freed him and he bought my grandmother,

Aunt Liza and Uncle Cy. He made the money by freighting groceries from

Ohio to Maysville, Kentucky.

Our Master was named Master Joe Conrad. We sometimes called him "Mos"

Joe Conrad. Master Joe Conrad stayed in a big log house with weather

boarding on the outside.

I was born in a log cabin. We slept in wooden beds with rope cords for

slats, and the beds had curtains around them. You see my mother was

the cook for the Master, and she cooked everything--chicken, roasting

ears. She cooked mostly everything we have now. They didn't have

stoves; they cooked in big ovens. The skillets had three legs. I can

remember the first stove that we had. I guess I was about six years

old.

My old Master had 900 acres of land. My father was a stiller. He made

three barrels of whisky a day. Before the War whisky sold for 12-1/2c

and 13c a gallon. After the War it went up to $3 and $4 per gallon.

When War broke out he had 300 barrels hid under old Master's barn.

There was 14 colored men working for old Master Joe and 7 women. I

think it was on the 13th of May, all 14 of these colored men, and my

father, went to the Army. When old Master Joe come to wake 'em up the

next morning--I remember he called real loud, Miles, Esau, George,

Frank, Arch, on down the line, and my mother told him they'd all gone

to the army. Old Master went to Cynthia, Kentucky, where they had

gone to enlist and begged the officer in charge to let him see all of

his boys, but the officer said "No." Some way or 'nother he got a

chance to see Arch, and Arch came back with him to help raise the

crops.

My mother cooked and took care of the house. Aunt Sarah took care of

the children. I had two little baby brothers, Charlie and John. The

old Mistress would let my mother put them in her cradle and Aunt Sarah

got jealous, and killed both of the babies. When they cut one of the

babies open they took out two frogs. Some say she conjured the babies.

Them niggers could conjure each other but they couldn't do nothing to

the whitefolks, but I don't believe in it. There's an old woman living

back there now (pointing around the corner of the house where he was

sitting) they said her husband put a spell on her. They call 'em

two-headed Negroes.

Old Master never whipped any of his slaves, except two of my

uncles--Pete Conrad and Richard Sherman, now living at Falsmouth,

Kentucky.

We raised corn, wheat, oats, rye and barley, in the spring. In

January, February and March we'd go up to the Sugar Camp where he had

a grove of maple trees. We'd make maple syrup and put up sugar in

cakes. Sugar sold for $2.5O and $3 a cake. He had a regular sugar

house. My old Master was rich I tell you.

Whenever a member of the white family die all the slaves would turn

out, and whenever a slave would die, whitefolks and all the slaves

would go. My Master had a big vault. My Mistress was buried in an iron

coffin that they called a potanic coffin. I went back to see her after

I was 21 years old and she look jest like she did when they buried

her. All of the family was buried in them vaults, and I expect if

you'd go there today they'd look the same. The slaves was buried in

good handmade coffins.

I heard a lot of talk 'bout the patrollers. In them days if you went

away from home and didn't have a pass they'd whip you. Sometimes

they'd whip you with a long black cow whip, and then sometime they'd

roast elm switches in the fire. This was called "cat-o-nine-tails",

and they'd whip you with dat. We never had no jails; only punishment

was just to whip you.

Now, the way the slaves travel. If a slave had been good sometimes old

Master would let him ride his hoss; then, sometime they'd steal a hoss

out and ride 'em and slip him back before old Master ever found it

out. There was a man in them days by the name of John Brown. We called

him an underground railroad man, 'cause he'd steal the slaves and

carry 'em across the river in a boat. When you got on the other side

you was free, 'cause you was in a free State, Ohio.

We used to sing, and I guess young folks today does too:

"John Brown's Body Lies A 'moulding In the Clay."

and

"They Hung John Brown On a Sour Apple Tree."

Our slaves all got very good attention when they got sick. They'd send

and get a doctor for 'em. You see old Mistress Mary bought my mother,

father and two children throwed in for $1,100 and she told Master Joe

to always keep her slaves, not to sell 'em and always take good care

of 'em.

When my father went to the army old Master told us he was gone to

fight for us niggers freedom. My daddy was the only one that come back

out of the 13 men that enlisted, and when my daddy come back old

Master give him a buggy and hoss.

When the Yanks come, I never will forget one of 'em was named John

Morgan. We carried old Master down to the barn and hid him in the hay.

I felt so sorry for old Master they took all his hams, some of his

whiskey, and all dey could find, hogs, chickens, and jest treated him

something terrible.

The whitefolks learned my father how to read and write, but I didn't

learn how to read and write 'til I enlisted in the U. S. Army in

1883.

They sent us here (Oklahoma Territory) to keep the immigrants from

settling up Oklahoma. I went to Fort Riley the 1st day of October

1883, and stayed there three weeks. Left Fort Riley and went to Ft.

Worth, Texas, and landed in Henryetta, Texas, on the 14th day of

October 1883. Then, we had 65 miles to walk to Ft. Sill. We walked

there in three days. I was assigned to my Company, Troop G. 9th

Calvary, and we stayed and drilled in Ft. Sill six months, when we was

assigned to duty. We got orders to come to Ft. Reno, Okla., on the 6th

day of January 1885 where we was ordered to Stillwater, Okla., to move

five hundred immigrants under Capt. Couch. We landed there on the 23rd

day of January, Saturday evening, and Sunday was the 24th. We had

general inspection Monday, January 25, 1885. We fell in line of

battle, sixteen companies of soldiers, to move 500 immigrants to the

Arkansas City, Kansas line.

We formed a line at 9:00 o'clock Monday morning and Captain Couch run

up his white flag, and Colonel Hatch he sent the orderly up to see

what he meant by putting up the flag, so Captain Couch sent word back,

"If you don't fire on me, I'll leave tomorrow." Colonel Hatch turned

around to the Major and told him to turn his troops back to the camp,

and detailed three camps of soldiers of the 8th Cavalry to carry

Captain Couch's troop of 500 immigrants to Arkansas City, Kansas.

Troop L., Troop D., and Troop B. taken them back with 43 wagons and

put them over the line of Kansas. Then we were ordered back to our

supply camp at Camp Alice, 9 miles north of Guthrie in the Cimarron

horseshoe bottom. We stayed there about three months, and Capt. Couch

and his colony came back into the territory at Caldwell, Kansas June

1885.

I laid there 'til August 8, then we changed regiments with the 5th

Calvary to go to Nebraska. There was a breakout with the Indians at

Ft. Reno the 1st of July 1885. The Indian Agency tried to make the

Indians wear citizens' clothes. They had to call General Sheridan

from Washington, D. C., to quiet the Indians down. Now, we had to make

a line in three divisions, fifteen miles a part, one non-commissioned

officer to each squad, and these men was to go to Caldwell, Kansas and

bring him to Ft. Reno that night. He came that night, so the next

morning Colonel Brisbane and General Hatch reported to General

Sheridan what the trouble was. General Sheridan called all the Indian

Chiefs together and asked them why they rebelled against the agency,

and they told them they weren't going to wear citizen's clothes.

General Sheridan called his corporals and sergeants together and told

them to go behind the guard house and dig a grave for this Indian

agent in order to fool the Indian Chiefs. Then, he sent a detachment

of soldiers to order the Indian Chiefs away from the guard house and

to put this Indian agent in the ambulance that brought him to Ft. Reno

and take him back to Washington, D. C., to remain there 'til he

returned. The next morning he called all the Indian Chiefs to the

guard house and pointed down to the grave and said that, "I have

killed the agent and buried him there." The Indians tore the feathers

out of their hats rejoicing that they killed the agent.

On the 12th of the same July, we had general inspection with General

Foresides from Washington, then we was ordered back to our supply camp

to stay there 'til we got orders of our change. On August 8, we got

orders to change to go to Nebraska, to Ft. Robinson, Ft. Nibrary, and

Ft. McKinney, and we left on the 8th of August.

This is my Oklahoma history. I gave this story to the Daily Oklahoman

and Times at one time and they are supposed to publish it but they

haven't.

Now you see that tree up there in front of my house? That tree is 50

years old. It is called the potopic tree. That was the only tree

around here in 1882. This was a bald prairie. I enlisted over there

where the City Market sets now. That was our starting camp under Capt.

Payne, but he died.

I joined the A. M. E. Methodist Church in 1874. I love this song

better than all the rest:

"Am I a Soldier of the Cross?"

Abraham Lincoln was a smart man, but he would have done more if he was

not killed. I don't think his work was finished. I'll tell you the

truth about Booker T. Washington. He argued our people to stay out of

town and stay in the country. He was a Democrat. He was a smart man,

but I think a man should live wherever he choose regardless. I never

stopped work whenever I'd hear he was coming to town to speak. You

know they wasn't fighting for freeing the slaves; they was fighting to

keep Kansas from being a slave State; so when they had the North

whipped, I mean the South had 'em whipped, they called for the Negroes

to go out and fight for his freedom. Don't know nothing 'bout Jeff

Davis. I've handled a lots of his money. It was counterfeited after

the War.

I've been married four times. I had one wife and three women. I mean

the three wasn't no good. My first wife's name: Amanda Nelson. 2nd:

Pocahuntas Jackson. 3rd: Nannie Shumpard. We lived together 9 years.

She tried to beat me out of my home.

Oklahoma Writers' Project

Ex-Slaves

MARTHA CUNNINGHAM

(white) Age 81 yrs.

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

My father's name was A. J. Brown, and my mother's name was Hattie

Brown. I was born in the East, in Saveer County, Tennessee. I had

twelve sisters and brothers, all are dead but two. W. S. Brown lives

at 327 W. California, and Maudie Reynolds, my sister lives at

Minrovie, California.

We lived in different kinds of houses just like we do now. Some was of

log, some frame and some rock. I remember when we didn't have stoves

to cook on, no lamps, and not even any candles until I was about six

years old. We would take a rag and sop it in lard to make lights.

All of our furniture was home made, but it was nice. We had just

plenty of every thing. It wasn't like it is in these days where you

have to pick and scrape for something to eat.

My grandfather and grandmother gave my mother and father two slaves,

an old woman and man, when they married. My grandfather owned a large

plantation, and had a large number of slaves, and my father and mother

owned several farms at different places. Our mother and father treated

our slaves good. They ate what we ate, and they stayed with us a long

time after the War. I remember though all of the slave owners weren't

good to their slaves. I have seen 'em take those young fine looking

negroes, put them in a pen when they got ready to whip them, strip

them and lay them face down, and beat them until white whelps arose on

their bodies. Yes, some of them was treated awful mean.

I saw mothers sold from their babies, and babies sold from their

mothers. They would strip them, put them on the auction block and sell

them--bid them off just like you would cattle. Some would sell for

lots of money.

They wouldn't take the slaves to church. I don't remember when the

negroes had their first schools, but it was a long time after the War.

Why, I remember when they'd have those big corn shuckings, flax

pullings, and quilting parties. They would sow acres after acres of

flax, then they would meet at some house or plantation and pull flax

until they had finished, then give a big party. There'd be the same

thing at the next plantation and so on until they'd all in that

neighborhood get their crops gathered. I remember they'd have all

kinds of good eats--pies, cakes, chicken, fish, fresh pork,

beef,--just plenty of good eats.

I went over the battlefield at Knoxville, Tennessee, two or three

hours after the Yankees and the Rebels had a battle. It was about a

mile from our house, and I walked over hundreds of dead men lying on

the ground. Some were fatally wounded, and we carried about six or

seven to our house. I saw the doctor pick the bullets out of their

flesh.

When the Yankees came they treated the slave owners awful mean. They

drew a gun on my mother, made her walk for several miles one real cold

night and take them up on the top of a mountain and show them where a

still was. They would make her cook for 'em. They took every thing we

had. I was about twelve years old at that time.

I stayed there with my mother until after my father died, then we

moved to Alabama. I was about 22 years old. I married a man named

Kelley. He and my brothers were railroad graders. We traveled all over

Texas.

I made the Run. Came here in '89 with my mother, husband and eight

children. My husband and brothers graded the streets for the townsite

of Oklahoma City and platted it off.

When we made the Run, we just stood on the property until it was

surveyed, then we'd pay $1.00, and the lot was ours. I camped on the

corner of Robinson and Pottawatomie Streets and Robinson and

Chickasaw. I owned the Northwest corner. I later sold both lots.

I am a Christian, Baptist mostly, I guess, and I believe in the Great

Beyond. I don't think you have to go to church all the time to be

saved, but you have to be right with the Man up yonder before you can

be saved.

I am a Republican, and it makes my blood boil whenever I hear a negro

say he is a democrat. They should all be Republicans.

I have been married twice. I married William Cunningham here in 1922.

He is dead; in fact, both my husbands are dead, so I don't see much

need of talking about them.

Oklahoma Writers' Project

Ex-Slaves

[Date stamp: AUG 19 1937]

WILLIAM CURTIS

Age 93 yrs.

McAlester, Oklahoma

"Run Nigger, run,

De Patteroll git ye!

Run Nigger, run,

He's almost here!"

"Please Mr. Patteroll,

Don't ketch me!

Jest take dat nigger

What's behind dat tree."

Lawsy, I done heard dat song all my life and it warn't no joke

neither. De Patrol would git ye too if he caught ye off the plantation

without a pass from your Master, and he'd whup ye too. None of us

dassn't leave without a pass.

We chillun sung lots of songs and we played marbles, mumble peg, and

town ball. In de winter we would set around de fire and listen to our

Mammy and Pappy tell ghost tales and witch tales. I don't guess dey

was sho' nuff so, but we all thought dey was.

My Mammy was bought in Virginia by our Master, Hugh McKeown. He owned

a big plantation in Georgia. Soon after she come to Georgia she

married my pa. Old Master was good to us. We lived for a while in the

quarters behind the Big House, and my mammy was de house woman.

Somehow, in a trade, or maybe my pa was mortgaged, but anyway old

Master let a man in Virginia have him and we never see him no more

'till after the War. It nigh broke our hearts when he had to leave and

old Master sho' done everything he could to make it up to us.

There was four of us chillun. I didn't do no work 'till I was about

fifteen years old. Old Master bought a tavern and mammy worked as

house woman and I went to work at the stables. I drove the carriage

and took keer of the team and carriage. I kept 'em shining too. I'd

curry the horses 'till they was slick and shiny. I'd polish the

harness and the carriage. Old Master and Mistress was quality and I

wanted everybody to know it. They had three girls and three boys and

we boys played together and went swimming together. We loved each

other, I tell ye.

Old Master built us a little house jest back of de tavern and mammy

raised us jest like Old Mistress did her chillun. When I didn't have

to work de boys and me would go hunting. We'd kill possum, coon,

squirrels and wild hogs. Old Master killed a wild hog and he give

mammy her ten tiny pigs. She raised 'em and my, at the meat we had

when they was butchered.

They had lots of company at de Big House, and it was de only tavern

too, so they was lots of cooking to do. They would go to church on

Sunday and they would spread their dinners on the ground. My, but they

was feasts. We'd allus git to go as I drive the carriage and mammy

looked after the food. We had our own church too, with our own

preacher.

We had a spinning house where all the old women would card and spin

wool in de winter and cotton in de summer. Dey made all our clothes,

what few we wore. Us boys just wore long tailed shirts 'till we was 12

or 13 years old, sometimes older. I was 15 when I started driving the

fambly carriage and I got to put on pants then.

Our suits was made out of jeans. That cloth wore like buckskin. We'd

wear 'em for a year before they had to be patched.

We made our own brogan shoes too. We'd kill a beef and skin it and

spread the skin out and let it dry a while. We'd put the hide in lime

water to get the hair off, then we'd oil it and work it 'till it was

soft. Next we'd take it to the bench and scrape or 'plesh' it with

knives. It was then put in a tight cabinet and smoked with oak wood

for about 24 hours. Smoking loosened the skin. We'd then take it out

and rub it to soften it. It was blacked and oiled and it was ready to

be made into shoes. It took nearly a year to get a green hide made

into shoes. Twan't no wonder we had to go barefooted.

Sometimes I'd work in the wood shop, dressing wagon spokes. We made

spokes with a plane, by hand on a bench.

I didn't have much work to do before I was 15 except to run errands.

One of my jobs was to take corn to the mill to be ground into meal.

Some one would put my sack of corn on the mule's back and help me up

and I'd ride to the mill and have it ground and they'd load me back on

and I'd go back home.

I remember once my meal fell off and I waited and waited for somebody

to come by and help me. I got tired waiting so I toted the sack to a

big log and laid it acrost it. I led my mule up to the log and after

working hard for a long time I managed to get it on his back. I

climbed up and jest as we started off the mule jumped and I fell off

and pulled the sack off with me. I couldn't do nothing but wait and

finally old Master came after me. He knowed something was wrong.

Old Master was good to all of his slaves but his overseers had orders

to make 'em work. He fed 'em good and took good keer of 'em and never

made 'em work iffen they was sick or even felt bad. They was two

things old Master jest wouldn't 'bide and dat was for a slave to be

sassy or lazy. Sometimes if dey wouldn't work or slipped off de farm

dey would whip 'em. He didn't whip often. Colored overseers was worse

to whip than white ones, but Master allus said, "Hadn't you all rather

have a nigger overseer than a white one? I don't want to white man

over my niggers." I've seen the overseer whip some but I never did

get no whipping. He would strip 'em to the waist and whip 'em with a

long leather strop, about as wide as two fingers and fastened to a

handle.

When de war broke out everthing was changed. My young Masters had to

go. T. H. McKeown, the oldest was a Lieutenant and was one of the

first to go. It nigh broke all of our hearts. Pretty soon he sent for

me to come and keep him company. Old Master let me go and I stayed in

his quarters. He was stationed at Atlanta and Griffin, Georgia. I'd

stay with him a week or two and I'd go home for a few days and I'd

take back food and fruit. I stayed with him and waited on him 'till he

got used to being in the army and they moved him out to fighting. I

wanted to go on with him but he wouldn't let me, he told me to go back

and take care of Old Master and Old Mistress. They was getting old by

then. Purty soon Young Master got wounded purty bad and they sent me

home. I never went back. I got a "pass" to go home. Course, after the

war nothing was right no more. Yes, we was free but we didn't know

what to do. We didn't want to leave our old Master and our old home.

We stayed on and after a while my pappy come home to us. Dat was de

best thing about de war setting us free, he could come back to us.

We all lived on at the old plantation. Old Master and old Mistress

died and young Master took charge of de farm. He couldn't a'done

nothing without us niggers. He didn't know how to work. He was good to

us and divided the crops with us.

I never went to school much but my white folks learned me to read and

write. I could always have any of their books to read, and they had

lots of 'em.

Times has changed a lot since that time. I don't know where the world

is much better now, that it has everthing or then when we didn't have

hardly nothing, but I believe there was more religion then. We always

went to church and I've seen 'em baptize from in the early morning

'till afternoon in the Chatahooche river. Folks don't hardly know

nowadays jest what to believe they's so many religions, but they's

only one God.

I was eighteen when I married. I had eight chillun. My wife is 86, and

she lives in St. Louis, Missouri.

[Illustration: Lucinda Davis]

Oklahoma Writers' Project

Ex-Slaves

[HW: (photo)]

[Date stamp: AUG 16 1937]

LUCINDA DAVIS

Age (about) 89 yrs.

Tulsa, Okla.

"What yo' gwine do when de meat give out?

What yo' gwine do when de meat give out?

Set in de corner wid my lips pooched out!

Lawsy!

What yo' gwine do when de meat come in?

What yo' gwine do when de meat come in?

Set in de corner wid a greasy chin!

Lawsy!"

Dat's about de only little nigger song I know, less'n it be de one

about:

"Great big nigger, laying 'hind de log--

Finger on de trigger and eye on the hawg!

Click go de trigger and bang go de gun!

Here come de owner and de buck nigger run!"

And I think I learn both of dem long after I been grown, 'cause I

belong to a full-blood Creek Indian and I didn't know nothing but

Creek talk long after de Civil War. My mistress was part white and

knowed English talk, but she never did talk it because none of de

people talked it. I heard it sometime, but it sound like whole lot of

wild shoat in de cedar brake scared at something when I do hear it.

Dat was when I was little girl in time of de War.

I don't know where I been born. Nobody never did tell me. But my mammy

and pappy git me after de War and I know den whose child I is. De men

at de Creek Agency help 'em git me, I reckon, maybe.

First thing I remember is when I was a little girl, and I belong to

old Tuskaya-hiniha. He was big man in de Upper Creek, and we have a

purty good size farm, jest a little bit to de north of de wagon depot

houses on de old road at Honey Springs. Dat place was about

twenty-five mile south of Fort Gibson, but I don't know nothing about

whar de fort is when I was a little girl at dat time. I know de Elk

River 'bout two mile north of whar we live, 'cause I been there many

de time.

I don't know if old Master have a white name. Lots de Upper Creek

didn't have no white name. Maybe he have another Indian name, too,

because Tuskaya-hiniha mean "head man warrior" in Creek, but dat what

everybody call him and dat what de family call him too.

My Mistress' name was Nancy, and she was a Lott before she marry old

man Tuskaya-hiniha. Her pappy name was Lott and he was purty near

white. Maybe so all white. Dey have two chillun, I think, but only one

stayed on de place. She was name Luwina, and her husband was dead. His

name was Walker, and Luwina bring Mr. Walker's little sister, Nancy,

to live at de place too.

Luwina had a little baby boy and dat de reason old Master buy me, to

look after de little baby boy. He didn't have no name cause he wasn't

big enough when I was with dem, but he git a name later on, I reckon.

We all call him "Istidji." Dat mean "little man."

When I first remember, before de War, old Master had 'bout as many

slave as I got fingers, I reckon. I can think dem off on my fingers

like dis, but I can't recollect de names.