year for Massa Claude Wakefield, right near Milford, too. De old man
ain't due to live nowhere long and I's gittin' 'bout ready to cross de
river. I's seed a heap of dis here earth and de people in it, but I
tells you it am sho' hard time now. Us is old and cripple' and iffen de
white folks don't holp us I don't know what us gwine do.
"Some dese young niggers gone plumb wild with dere cigars and cars and
truckin' and jazzin' and sech. Some go to school and larn like white
folks and teach and be real helpful. But talk 'bout workin' in slave
time--'twarn't so hard as now. Den you fuss 'cause dere's work, now you
fuss 'cause dere ain't no work. But den us have somethin' to eat and
wear and a place to sleep, and now us don't know one day what gwine fill
us tomorrow, or nothin'.
"I'd sho' like to shake Massa Boyd's hand again and hear him come
singin' down de lane. Us hear him sing or whistle long 'fore he git dere
and it mighty good to see him. De slaves allus say, 'I's gwine 'way
tomorrow,' and I guess I's gwine 'way pretty soon tomorrow.
420195
JERRY BOYKINS, spry and jolly at the age of 92, lived with his aged
wife in their own cabin at 1015 Plum St., Abilene, Texas. He was
born a slave to John Thomas Boykin, Troupe Co., Georgia, 80 miles
from Lagrange, Ga. His master was a very wealthy plantation owner,
working 1,000 slaves.
"I been well taken care of durin' my life. When I was young I lived
right in de big house with my marster. I was houseboy. My mother's name
was Betsy Ann Boykin and she was cook for Old Missus. My grandpa was
blacksmith. I slept on a pallet in de kitchen and in winter time on cold
nights I 'members how cold I would get. I'd wake up and slip in by
marsters bed and den I'd say, 'Marster John, I's about to freeze.' He'd
say, 'You ought to freeze, you little black devil. What you standin'
dere for?' I'd say, 'Please, marster John, jes' let me crawl in by your
feet.' He'd say, 'Well, I will dis one time,' and dat's de way I'd do
every cold night.
"I was full of mischief and I'd tu'n de mules out of de lot, jus' to see
de stableboy git a lickin'. One time I wanted a fiddle a white man named
Cocoanut Harper kep' tryin' to sell me for $7.50. I didn' never have any
money, 'cept a little the missie give me, so I kep' teasin' her to buy
de fiddle for me. She was allus on my side, so she tol' me to take some
co'n from de crib and trade in for de fiddle. In de night I slips out
and hitch up de mules and fetched de co'n to old Harper's house and
traded for dat fiddle. Den I hides out and play it, so's marster wouldn'
fin' out, but he did and he whip all de daylight outta me. When de
missie try to whip me, I jes' wrop up in her big skirts and she never
could hurt me much.
"I allus ate my meals in de house at de white folks table, after dey
done et. Iffen I couldn' sit in de marster's chair, I'd swell up like a
toad.
"De marster done all de whippin', 'cause dey had been two overseers
killed on de plantation for whippin' slaves till de blood run out dey
body.
"Was I bovered with haints and spooks? I been meetin' up with 'em all my
life. When I was younger I was such an old scratch I'd meet 'em right in
de road, some without heads. I'd take to my heels and then I'd stop and
look 'round and they'd be gone.
"I wore home-weaved shirts till I was grown, then I had some pants and
dey was homemade, too. The women gathered womack leaves to dye de goods
black.
"I well rec'lects when my marster went to war. He called all us in de
kitchen and telled us he had to go over dere and whip those
sons-of-bitches and would be back 'fore breakfast. He didn' return for
two years. I says, 'Marster, we sho' would have waited breakfast on you
a long time.' He said, 'Yes; deys de hardes' sons-of-bitches to whip I
ever had dealins' with.'
"When war was over, he called us together and tol' us we were free. He
said, 'Now, I'm goin' to give you a big day and after that you can stay
and work for pay or you can go.' So he rolled out two barrels of whiskey
and killed hogs and spread a big day.
"I wants to tell you 'bout how we killed hogs in my day. We digged a
deep pit in de groun' and heated big rocks red hot and filled up de pit
with water and dropped dem hot rocks in and got de water hot; den we
stuck de hogs and rolled 'em in dat pit.
"Soon after I's free a man come for me from Louisville to hire me as
foreman in his cotton mule barn. So I went there and I worked in
Kentucky for 18 year. Fifty-one years ago I married my ol' woman, Rachel
Taylor, at Corsicana, Texas, and I think she's jes' as fine as the day I
married her. We has six chillen and all works hard for a livin' and we
got one lil' grandbaby 10 years ol'. She lives here at our house and
we're educatin' her.
"I knows I's goin' to live to be over 100 years ol', 'cause my marster
done tol' me so."
420073
[Illustration: Monroe Brackins]
MONROE BRACKINS, born in Monroe Co., Mississippi, in 1853, was the
property of George Reedes. He was brought to Medina County, Texas,
when two years old. Monroe learned to snare and break mustangs and
became a cowpuncher. He lives in Hondo, Texas. He has an air of
pride and self-respect, and explained that he used little dialect
because he learned to talk from the "white folks" as he was growing
up.
"I was bo'n in Mississippi, Monroe County. I'm 84 years old. My master,
George Reedes, brought me, my father and mother and my two sisters to
Texas when I was two years old. My father was Nelson Brackins and my
mother was Rosanna.
"My master settled here at a place called Malone, on the Hondo River. He
went into the stock business. Our house there was a little, old picket
house with a grass roof over it out of the sage grass. The bed was made
with a tick of shucks and the children slept on the floor. The boss had
just a little lumber house. Later on he taken us about 20 miles fu'ther
down on the Hondo, the Old Adams Ranch, and he had a rock house.
"I was about six years old then. I had some shoes, to keep the thorns
outa my feet, and I had rawhide leggin's. We just had such clothes as we
could get, old patched-up clothes. They just had that jeans cloth,
homemade clothes.
"I was with George Reedes 10 or 12 years. It was my first trainin'
learnin' the stock business and horse breakin.' He was tol'able good to
us, to be slaves as we was. His brother had a hired man that whipped me
once, with a quirt. I've heard my father and mother tell how they
whipped 'em. They'd tie 'em down on a log or up to a post and whip 'em
till the blisters rose, then take a paddle and open 'em up and pour salt
in 'em. Yes'm, they whipped the women. The most I remember about that,
my father and sister was in the barn shuckin' co'n and the master come
in there and whipped my sister with a cowhide whip. My father caught a
lick in the face and he told the master to keep his whip offen him. So
the master started on my father and he run away. When he finally come in
he was so wild his master had to call him to get orders for work, and
finally the boss shot at him, but they didn't whip him any more. Of
course, some of 'em whipped with more mercy. They had a whippin' post
and when they strapped 'em down on a log they called it a 'stroppin'
log.'
"I remember they tasked the cotton pickers in Mississippi. They had to
bring in so many pounds in the evenin' and if they didn't they got a
whippin' for it. My sister there, she had to bring in 900 pounds a day.
Well, cotton was heavier there. Most any of 'em could pick 900 pounds.
It was heavier and fluffier. We left the cotton country in Mississippi,
but nobody knew anything about cotton out here that I knew of.
"I've heard my parents say too, them men that had plantations and a
great lot of slaves, they would speculate with 'em and would have a
chain that run from the front ones to the back ones. Sometimes they
would have 15 or 20 miles to make to get them to the sale place, but
they couldn't make a break. Where they expected to make a sale, they
kept 'em in corrals and they had a block there to put 'em up on and bid
'em off. The average price was about $500, but some that had good
practice, like a blacksmith, brought a good price, as high as $1,500.
"I heard my mother and father say they would go 15 or 20 miles to a
dance, walkin', and get back before daylight, before the 'padderollers'
got 'em. The slaves would go off when they had no permission and them
that would ketch 'em and whip 'em was the 'padderollers.' Sometimes they
would have an awful race.
"If they happened to be a slave on the plantation that could jes' read a
little print, they would get rid of him right now. He would ruin the
niggers, they would get too smart. The' was no such thing as school here
for culluds in early days. The white folks we was raised up with had
pretty good education. That's why I don't talk like most cullud folks. I
was about grown and the' was an English family settled close, about half
a mile, I guess. They had a little boy, his name was Arthur Ederle, and
he come over and learned me how to spell 'cat' and 'dog' and 'hen' and
such like. I was right around about 20 years old. I couldn't sign my
name when I was 18 years old.
"I can remember one time when I was young, I saw something I couldn't
'magine what it was, like a billygoat reared up on a tree. But I knew
the' wasn't a billygoat round there near, nor no other kinds of goats.
It was in the daytime and I was out in a horse pasture, I was jes'
walkin' along, huntin', when I saw that sight. I guess I got within 50
steps of it, then I turned around and got away. I never did think much
about a ghost, but I think it could be possible.
"I don't remember scarcely anything about the war because I was so
little and times was so different; the country wasn't settled up and
everything was wild, no people, hardly. Of course, my life was in the
woods, you might say, didn't hardly know when Sunday come.
"The northern soldiers never did get down in here that I know of. I know
once, when they was enlisting men to go to battle a whole lot of 'em
didn't want to fight and would run away and dodge out, and they would
follow 'em and try to make 'em fight. They had a battle up here on the
Nueces once and killed some of 'em. I know my boss was in the bunch that
followed 'em and he got scared for fear this old case would be brought
up after the war. The company that followed these men was called Old
Duff Company. I think somewhere around 40 was in the bunch that they
followed, but I don't know how many was killed. They was a big bluff and
a big water hole and they said they was throwed in that big water hole.
"We had possums and 'coons to eat sometimes. My father, he gen'rally
cooked the 'coons, he would dress 'em and stew 'em and then bake 'em. My
mother wouldn't eat them. There was plenty of rabbits, too. Sometimes
when they had potatoes they cooked 'em with 'em. I remember one time
they had just a little patch of blackhead sugar cane. After the freedom,
my mother had a kind of garden and she planted snap beans and
watermelons pretty much every year.
"The master fed us tol'bly well. Everything was wild, beef was free,
just had to bring one in and kill it. Once in awhile, of a Sunday
mornin', we'd get biscuit flour bread to eat. It was a treat to us. They
measured the flour out and it had to pan out just like they measured. He
give us a little somethin' ever' Christmas and somethin' good to eat. I
heard my people say coffee was high, at times, and I know we didn't get
no flour, only Sunday mornin'. We lived on co'nbread, mostly, and beef
and game outta the woods. That was durin' the war and after the war,
too.
"I was around about 6 or 7 years old when we was freed. We worked for
George Reedes awhile, then drifted on down to the Frio river and stayed
there about a year, then we come to Medina County and settled here close
to where I was raised. We didn't think it hard times at all right after
the war. The country was wild and unsettled, with ranches 15 or 20 miles
apart. You never did see anybody and we didn't know really what was
goin' on in the rest of the country. Sometimes something could happen in
5 miles of us and we didn't know it for a month.
"I was on the Adams Ranch on the Hondo when my master come out and told
us we were as free as he was. He said we could stay on and work or could
go if we wanted to. He gave my mother and father 50 cents apiece and 25
cents for the children. We stayed awhile and then went west to the Frio.
"I used to be along with old man Big-foot Wallace in my early days. He
was a mighty fine man. I worked for the people that was gathering stock
together there. Big Foot raised nice horses, old reg'lar Texas horses,
and they was better than the reg'lar old Spanish bronco. I used to go to
his camp down on the San Miguel. He lived in one part and his chickens
in the rest of his house. His friends liked to hear him talk about his
travels. He used to run stock horses and had a figger 7 on the left
shoulder for his brand and the tip of each ear split was his earmark.
"The last man I broke horses for was Wilson Bailey. I was there about 12
years. He raised just cavi-yard--we called it a cavi-yard of horses,
just the same thing as a _remuda_. We called 'em that later, but we got
that from the Spanish. We would get up in a tree with our loop till the
horse come under and drop it down on him. When they were so spoilt, we
got 'em in a sort of cavi-yard and drove 'em under trees and caught 'em
in a snare. We had lots of wild horses, just this side of Pearsall.
'Bout the only way I'd get throwed was to get careless. We'd ketch 'im
up, hackamore 'im up, saddle 'im up and get on 'im and let 'im go.
Sometimes he'd be too wild to pitch, he'd break and run and you had to
let 'im run himself down. I used to rather ketch up a wild horse and
break 'im than to eat breakfast.
"When I first started farmin' I taken up some state land, about 80
acres, down on Black Creek, in Medina County. I stayed there ten or
twelve years. Cotton hadn't got in this country and I raised some corn,
sugar cane and watermelons. I commenced with horses, but 'long 'way down
the line I used oxen some, too. I used one of those old walking plows.
"I sold that place and moved to a place on the Tywaukney Creek
(Tonkawa). I come up to church and met my wife then. Her name was Ida
Bradley and I was 38 years old. We lived down on the Tywaukney right
about 23 years and raised our children there. We jes' had a little home
weddin'. I wore a suit, dark suit. We got married about 8 o'clock in the
evenin' and we had barbecue, cake and ice cream. You see, in them times
I wasn't taught anything about years and dates, but I judge it was about
25 years after the war before I settled on the Tywaukney."
420310
GUS BRADSHAW was born about 1845, at Keecheye, Alabama, a slave of
David Cavin. He recalls being brought to Texas in the 1850's, when
the Cavin family settled near old Port Caddo. Gus remained with his
master for ten years after emancipation. He now lives alone on a
fifty acre farm seven miles northeast of Marshall, which he bought
in 1877. Gus receives an $11.00 per month pension.
"I was born at Keecheye, Alabama, and belonged to old man David Cavin.
The only statement I can make 'bout my age is I knows I was 'bout twenty
years old when us slaves was freed. I never knowed my daddy, but my
mammy was Amelia Cavin. I's heard her say she's born in Alabama more
times than I got fingers and toes. Our old master brung us to Texas when
I's a good sized kid. I 'members like it am yesterday, how we camped
more'n a week in New Orleans. I seed 'em sell niggers off the block
there jus' like they was cattle. Then we came to old Port Caddo on Caddo
Lake and master settles a big farm close to where the boats run. Port
Caddo was a big shipping place then, and Dud and John Perry run the
first store there. The folks hauled cotton there from miles away.
"Mammy's folks was named Maria and Joe Gloster and they come to Texas
with the Cavins. My grandma say to me, 'Gus, don't run you mouth too
much and allus have manners to whites and blacks.' Chillen was raise
right then, but now they come up any way. I seed young niggers turn the
dipper up and drink 'fore old folks. I wouldn't dare do that when I's
comin' up.
"Maria say to me one day, 'Son, I's here when the stars fell.' She tell
me they fell like a sheet and spread over the ground. Ike Hood, the old
blacksmith on our place, he told me, too. I says, 'Ike, how old was you
when the stars fell?' He say, 'I's thirty-two.'
"Massa David had big quarters for us niggers, with chimneys and
fireplaces. They use to go round and pick up old hawg or cow bones to
bile with greens and cabbage. They was plenty of wild game, and deer and
wolves howlin' right through this country, but you can't even find the
track of one now.
"The first work I done was pickin' cotton. Every fellow was out at
daylight pickin' cotton or hoein' or plowin'. They was one overseer and
two nigger drivers. But at night you could hear us laughin' and talkin'
and singin' and prayin', and hear them fiddles and things playin'. It
look like darkies git 'long more better then than now. Some folks says
niggers oughtn't to be slaves, but I says they ought, 'cause they jus'
won't do right onless they is made to do it.
"Massa David allus give us eggnog and plenty good whiskey at Christmas.
We had all day to eat and drink and sing and dance. We didn't git no
presents, but we had a good time.
"I don't know much 'bout the war, only Massa Bob Perry come over one day
and say to Grandma Maria, 'They is surrender, Maria, you is free.' She
say to him, 'I don't care, I gwine stay with my white folks.'
"The Klu Klux done lots of cuttin' up round there. Two of 'em come to
Dr. Taylor's house. He had two niggers what run off from the Klux and
they want to whip 'em, but Dr. Taylor wouldn't 'low 'em. I knowed old
Col. Alford, one of the Klux leaders, and he was a sight. He told me
once, 'Gus, they done send me to the pen for Kluxing.' I say, 'Massa
Alford, didn't they make a gentleman of you?' He say, 'Hell, no!'
"I knowed old Col. Haggerdy, too. He marries a widow of a rich old
Indian chief, name McIntosh. He broke a treaty with his people and had
to hide out in a cave a long time, and his wife brung food to him. One
time when she went to the cave he was gone. She knowed then the Indians
done git him and kilt him for vi'latin' the treaty. So she marries old
Col. Haggerdy.
"The only time I votes was against whiskey. I voted for it. Some white
folks done say they'd whip me if I voted for it, but Mr. Joe Strickland
done told me they jus' tryin' scare me, so I voted for it. I don't think
niggers ought to vote. If some niggers had things in hand 'stead of
white folks, I couldn't stay here. These eddicated niggers am causin'
the devilment. The young niggers ain't got no 'spect for old age.
"I bought and paid for fifty acres land here in Harrison County and I
has lived on it sixty years. I lived with my wife fifty years 'fore she
died and done raise two chillen. These young niggers don't stay married
fifty days, sometimes. I don't mess with 'em, but if I needs help I goes
to the white folks. If you 'have youself, they allus help you if you
needs it.
420240
[Illustration: Wes Brady]
WES BRADY, 88, was born a slave of John Jeems, who had a farm five
miles north of Marshall. Wes has farmed in Harrison County all his
life. He now lives with friends on the Long's Camp Road, and draws
a $11.00 monthly pension.
"I was born and raised in Harrison County, and I was eighty-eight years
old this July past and has wore myself out here in this county. I was
born on Massa John Jeem's place, on the old Jefferson Road, and my
father was Peter Calloway, and he was born in Alabama and his whole
fam'ly brought to Texas by nigger traders. My mother was Harriet Ellis
and I had two brothers named George and Andrew, and four sisters, Lula
and Judy and Mary and Sallie. My old Grandpa Phil told me how he helped
run the Indians off the land.
"Grandpa Phil told me 'bout meetin' his massa. Massa Jeems had three or
four places and grandpa hadn't seed him and he went to one of the other
farms and meets a man goin' down the road. The man say, 'Who you belong
to?' Grandpa Phil say, 'Massa Jeems.' The man say, 'Is he a mean man?'
Grandpa say, 'I don't know him, but they say he's purty tight.' It was
Massa Jeems talkin' and he laughs and gives Grandpa Phil five dollars.
"We niggers lived in log houses and slep' on hay mattress with lowell
covers, and et fat pork and cornbread and 'lasses and all kinds garden
stuff. If we et flour bread, our women folks had to slip the flour
siftin's from missy's kitchen and darsn't let the white folks know it.
We wore one riggin' lowell clothes a year and I never had shoes on till
after surrender come. I run all over the place till I was a big chap in
jes' a long shirt with a string tied round the bottom for a belt. I went
with my young massa that way when he hunted in the woods, and toted
squirrels for him.
"Some white folks might want to put me back in slavery if I tells how we
was used in slavery time, but you asks me for the truth. The overseer
was 'straddle his big horse at three o'clock in the mornin', roustin'
the hands off to the field. He got them all lined up and then come back
to the house for breakfas'. The rows was a mile long and no matter how
much grass was in them, if you leaves one sprig on your row they beats
you nearly to death. Lots of times they weighed cotton by candlelight.
All the hands took dinner to the field in buckets and the overseer give
them fifteen minutes to git dinner. He'd start cuffin' some of them over
the head when it was time to stop eatin' and go back to work. He'd go to
the house and eat his dinner and then he'd come back and look in all the
buckets and if a piece of anything that was there when he left was et,
he'd say you was losin' time and had to be whipped. He'd drive four
stakes in the ground and tie a nigger down and beat him till he's raw.
Then he'd take a brick and grind it up in a powder and mix it with lard
and put it all over him and roll him in a sheet. It'd be two days or
more 'fore that nigger could work 'gain. I seed one nigger done that way
for stealin' a meat bone from the meathouse. That nigger got fifteen
hundred lashes. The li'l chaps would pick up egg shells and play with
them and if the overseer seed them he'd say you was stealin' eggs and
give you a beatin'. I seed long lines of slaves chained together driv by
a white man on a hoss, down the Jefferson road.
"The first work I done was drappin' corn, and then cow-pen boy and sheep
herder. All us house chaps had to shell a half bushel corn every night
for to feed the sheep. Many times I has walked through the quarters when
I was a little chap, cryin' for my mother. We mos'ly only saw her on
Sunday. Us chillen was in bed when the folks went to the field and come
back. I 'members wakin' up at night lots of times and seein' her make a
little mush on the coals in the fireplace, but she allus made sho' that
overseer was asleep 'fore she done that.
"One time the stock got in the field and the overseer 'cuses a old man
and jumps on him and breaks his neck. When he seed the old man dead, he
run off to the woods, but massa sent some nigger after him and say for
him to come back, the old man jus' got overhet and died.
"We went to church on the place and you ought to heared that preachin'.
Obey your massa and missy, don't steal chickens and eggs and meat, but
nary a word 'bout havin' a soul to save.
"We had parties Saturday nights and massa come out and showed us new
steps. He allus had a extra job for us on Sunday, but he gave us
Christmas Day and all the meat we wanted. But if you had money you'd
better hide it, 'cause he'd git it.
"The fightin' was did off from us. My father went to war to wait on Josh
Calloway. My father never come back. Massa Jeems cussed and 'bused us
niggers more'n ever, but he took sick and died and stepped off to Hell
'bout six months 'fore we got free. When we was free, they beat drums in
Marshall. I stayed on 'bout seven months and then my mother and me went
to farmin' for ourselves.
"I wore myself out right in this county and now I'm too old to work.
These folks I lives with takes good care of me and the gov'ment gives me
$11.00 a month what I is proud to git.
420165
JACOB BRANCH, about 86, was a slave of the Van Loos family, in
Louisiana, who sold him when a baby to Elisha Stevenson, of Double
Bayou, Texas. Jacob helps his son, Enrichs, farm, and is unusually
agile for his age. They live in the Double Bayou settlement, near
Beaumont, Texas.