At first, I thought I wouldn't write this interview up; but afterwards
I thought: Maybe this interview will be of interest to those who want
the work done. It represents the attitude of a very small, but
definite, minority. About five persons out of a hundred and fifty
contacted and more than eighty written up have taken this attitude.
Johnson is reputed to have been born in slavery, but he says not. He
had a high school education. He is a good man, wholesome in all his
contacts, despite the apparent intolerance of his private remarks to
the interviewer.
Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor
Person interviewed: Willie Johnson (female)
1007 Izard, Little Rock, Arkansas
Age: 71
"My father said he had a real good master. When he got up large enough
to work, his master learned him a trade. He learned the mechanic's
trade, such as blacksmithing and working in shops. He learned him all
of that. And then he learned him to be a shoemaker. You see, he
learned him iron work and woodworking too. And he never whipped him
during slavery time. Positively didn't allow that.
"My father's name was Jordan Kirkpatrick. His master was named
Kirkpatrick also. My father was born in Tennessee in Sumner County.
"My father married in slave time. You know, they married in slave
time. I have heard people talking about it. I have heard some people
say they married over 'gain when freedom came. My father had a
marriage certificate, and I didn't hear him say anything about being
married after freedom. I have seen the certificate lots of times. I
don't know the date of it. The certificate was issued in Sumner
County, Tennessee.
"My father and mother belonged to different masters. My mother's
master was a Murray. She had a good many people. Her name before she
married was Mary Murray. I don't know just how my mother and father
met. The two places weren't far apart. They lived a good distance from
each other though, and I remember hearing him tell how he had to go
across the fields to get to her house after he was through with the
day's work. The pateroles got after him once. They didn't catch him,
so they didn't do anything to him. He skipped them some way or
another.
"I have heard them say that before the slaves were set free the
soldiers were going 'round doing away with everything that they could
get their hands on. Just a while before they were set free, my father
took my mother and the children one night and slipped off. He went to
Nashville. That was during the War. It wasn't long after that till
everybody was set free. They never did capture him and get him back.
"During the War they went around pressing men into service. Finally
once, they caught him but they let him go. I don't know how he got
away.
"I can remember he said once they got after him and there was a white
man and his family living in the house. He rented a room from the
white man. That was in Nashville. These pateroles or whatever they was
got after him and claimed they were coming to get him, and the old man
and the old woman he stayed with took him upstairs and said they would
protect him if the pateroles came back. I don't know whether they came
back or not, but they never got him.
"My father supported himself and his family in Nashville by following
his trade. He seems to have gotten along all right. He never seemed to
have any trouble that I heard him speak of.
"I was born in 1867 in Nashville, Tennessee, about half a block from
the old Central Tennessee College[G]. I think it became Walden
University later on, and I think that it's out now. That's an old
school. My oldest sister was graduated from it. I could have been if I
hadn't taken up the married notion.
"I got part of my schooling in Nashville and part here. When I left
Nashville, I was only a child nine years old. I only went to school
four sessions after we came out here. I didn't like out here. I wanted
to stay back home. My father came out here because he had heard that
he could make more money with his trade here than he could in
Nashville, which he did. He was shoeing horses and building wagons and
so on. Just in this blacksmithing and carpenter work.
"I wanted to learn that. I would stay 'round the shop and help him
shoe horses. But they wouldn't let me take it up. I got so I could do
carpenter work pretty good. First I learned how to make a box
square--that is a hard job when a person doesn't know much.
"I never heard my father say anything about the food the slaves ate. I
have heard him talk about the good times they had around hog killing.
His master raised sweet potatoes and corn and wheat and things like
that. I guess they ate just about what they raised.
"My father never was a sharecropper. He knew nothing of rural work
except the mechanical side of it. He could make or do anything that
was needed in fixing up something to do farm work with. I have seen
him make and sharpen plows. The first cotton stalk cutter that was
made within ten miles of here was made by my father. The people 'round
here were knocking off cotton stalks with sticks until my father began
making the cutter. Then everybody began using his cutter. That is, the
different farmers and sharecroppers around here began using them. I
was scared of the first one he made. He made six saws or knives and
sharpened them and put them on a section of a log so that it could be
hitched to a mule and pulled through the fields and cut the cotton
stalks down.
"My mother's old master was her father. I think my father's father was
a Negro and his mother was an Indian. My mother's mother was an
American woman, that is, a slavery woman. My mother and father were
lucky in having good people. My mother was treated just like one of
her master's other children. My father's master had an overseer but
he never was allowed to touch my father. Of course my mother never was
under an overseer."
[Footnote G: [HW: Central Tennessee College estab. about 1866-7.]]
Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: Angeline Jones
Near Biscoe and Brinkley, Arkansas
Age: 79
[Date Stamp: May 31 1938]
"I was born in Memphis, Tennessee. Mother was cooking. Her name was
Marilla Harris and she took my pa's name, Brown. He was Francis Brown.
I was three years old when the surrender come on. Then grandma, my
mama and pa and me and my brother come with a family to Biscoe. There
wasn't no Biscoe but that's where we come to anyhow. Mama and grandma
cooked for a woman. They bought a big farm and started clearing. Some
of it was cleared. Mama's been dead forty years. I farmed all my whole
life. I don't know nothing else.
"Grandma had a right smart to say during slavery times. She was
cooking for her mistress and had a family. She'd hide good things to
take to her children. The mistress kept a polly parrot about in the
kitchen. Polly would tell on grandma. Caused grandma to get whoopings.
She talked like a good many of 'em. She got sick. The woman what
married grandma's brother was to take her place. She wasn't going to
be getting no whoopings. She sewed the parrot up. He got to dwindling.
They doctored him. She clipped his tongue at the same time so he never
could do no good talking. He died. They never found out his trouble.
Grandma said they worried about the parrot but she never did; she
knowed what been done. Grandma come from Paris, Tennessee but I think
the same folks fetched 'er. I don't think she said she was sold. She
said slavery times was hard. Mama didn't see as hard times as grandma
had. Grandma shielded her in the work part a whole heap to get to
live where she did. They loved to be together. She's been dead and
left me forty odd years. I works and support myself, and my kin folks
help all they can."
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Charlie Jones
1303 Ohio Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 76
"I was borned in '61 in the State of Mississippi August the 15th.
"I member just a little bout the War. Yes'm, I member seein' the
soldiers. They was walkin'--just a long row of em. Had guns across
their shoulders and had them canteens. I member we chilluns run out to
the road and got upon the bars and watched em go by. I think it was
after they had fought in Vicksburg and was comin' back towards
Memphis.
"My mother belonged to the Harrises and we stayed with her and my
father belonged to the Joneses.
"I member how they used to feed us chillun. They had a big cook
kitchen at the big house and we chillun would be out in the yard
playin'. Cook had a big wooden tray and she'd come out and say
'Whoopee!' and set the tray on the ground. Sometimes it was milk and
sometimes it would be potlicker. We'd fall down and start eatin'. Get
out [TR: our?] heads in and crowd just like a lot of pigs.
"After freedom we went to old Colonel Jones and worked on the shares.
I wasn't big enough to work but I member when we left the Harris
place. I know they wasn't so cruel to em. Didn't have no overseer.
Some of the people had cruel overseers.
"I went to school after the War a right smart. I got as far as the
third grade. Studied McGuffy's Reader and the old Blue Back Speller.
Yes'm, sure did.
"I come here to Arkansas wid my parents in '78. Come right here to
Jefferson County, down at Fairfield on the Lambert place.
"All my life I've farmed. I worked on the shares and rented too. Could
make the most money rentin'. I got everywhere from 4c to 50c a pound
for cotton. I had cows and hogs and chickens and raised some corn.
"I made a garden and made a little cotton and corn last year on
government land on the old river bank.
"I heered of the Klu Klux but they never did bother me.
"I voted the Publican ticket and never had no trouble.
"I been right around this town fifteen years and I own this home. I
worked about six months at the shops but the rest of the time I
farmed.
"Heap of things I'd do when I was young the young folks won't do
now."
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Cyntha Jones
3006 W. Tenth Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 88
"Well, here's one of em. Born down in Drew County.
"Simpson Dabney was old master and his wife named Miss Adeline.
"I reckon I do remember bout the War. Yes ma'am, the Yankees come and
they had me scared. I wouldn't know when they got in the yard till
they was all around me. Had me holdin' the bridles.
"My young missis' husband was in the War and when they fought the last
battle at Princeton, she had me drive the carriage. When I heard them
guns I said we better go back, so I turned round and made them horses
step so fast my dress tail stood out straight. I thought they was
goin' to kill us all. And when we got home all the windows was broke.
Miss Nancy say, 'Cyntha, somebody come and broke all my windows,' but
it was them guns broke em.
"Old master was a doctor but my young missis' husband wasn't nothin'
but a hunter till they carried him to war. He was so skeered they had
to most drag him.
"I seen two wars and heered tell of another.
"I member when the Yankees come and took things I just fussed at em. I
thought what was my white folks' things was mine too. But when they
got my old master's horse my daddy went amongst em and got it back
cause he had charge of the stock. I don't know whether he got em at
night or not but I know he went in the daytime and come back in the
daytime.
"Old master's children and my father's children worked in the field
just alike. He wouldn't low a overseer on the place, or a patroller
either.
"Dr. Dabney and his sister raised my mother. They brought her from
some furrin' country to Arkansas. And when he married, my mother
suckled every one of his children.
"I just worked in the house and nussed. Never worked in the field till
I was grown and married. I was nineteen when I married the fust time.
I stayed right there in that settlement till the second year of
surrender.
"When I was twenty-one they had me fixed up for a midwife. Old Dr.
Clark was the one started me. I never went to school a minute in my
life but the doctors would read to me out of their doctor books till I
could get a license. I got so I could read print till my eyes got so
bad. Old Dr. Clark was the one learned me most and since he died I
ain't never had a doctor mess with me.
"In fifteen years I had 299 babies on record right there in Rison.
That's where I was fixed up at--under five doctors. And anybody don't
believe it, they can go down there and look up the record.
"We had plenty to eat in slave times. Didn't have to go to the store
and buy it by the dribble like they does now. Just go to the
smokehouse and get it.
"I got such a big mind and will I wants to get about and raise
something to eat now so we wouldn't have to buy everything, but I
ain't able now. I've had twenty-one children but if I had em now
they'd starve to death.
"I been married four times but they all dead--every one of em.
"When freedom come my old master give my mother $500 cause she saved
his money for him when the Yankees come. She put it in the bed and
slept on it. He had four farms and he told her she could have ary one
of em and any of the stock, but my father had done spoke for a place
in Cleveland County--he had done bought him a place.
"And old master on his dying bed, he asked my mother to take his two
youngest children and raise em cause their mother was sickly, but she
didn't do it.
"I don't know hardly what to think of this younger generation. Used to
be they'd go to Sunday school barefooted but now'days, time they is
born they got shoes and stockin's on em.
"I used to spin, knit and weave. I even spun thread to make these
ropes they use to plow. I could spin a thread you could sew with, and
weave cloth with stripes and flowers. Have to know how to dye the
thread. That's all done in the warp. Call the other the filler.
"Now let me tell you, when that was goin' on and you raised your meat
and corn and potatoes, that was livin'!"
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Edmond Jones
1824 W. Second, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 75
"I growed up in the war. I remember seein' the soldiers--hundreds and
thousands of em. Oh, yes'm, I growed up in the war. I was born under
Abraham Lincoln's administration and then Grant.
"I remember when that old drum beat everbody had to be in bed at nine
o'clock. That was when they had martial law. Hays knocked that out you
know. That was when they had the Civil Rights Bill. I growed up in
that.
"Abraham Lincoln issued the Proclamation of Freedom in January and I
was born in May so you might say I was born right into freedom.
"I always say I was born so close to slavery I could smell it, just
like you cookin' somethin' for dinner and I smelled it.
"I tell these young people I can look back to my boy days quick as
they can.
"Yes'm, I don't know anything bout slavery. My people say they come
from North Carolina, but I been right here on this spot of ground for
forty-four years. I come here when they was movin' the cemetery.
"My mother was a cook here for Mrs. Reynolds. After I growed up here I
went out to my father where he was workin' on the shares and stayed
there a year. I married quite young and bought a place out there. I
said I was twenty-one when I got the license but I wasn't but twenty.
"In old times everbody thought of the future and had all kinds of
things to eat. First prayer I was taught was the Lord's Prayer--'Give
us this day our daily bread.' I said sure was a long time bein'
answered cause now we're gettin' it--just our daily bread.
"I never had no luck farmin'--ever' time I farmed river overflowed. I
raised everthing I needed or I didn't have it. Had as high as thirty
head of cows at one time.
"I went to work as janitor at Merril School to take the regular
janitor's place for just two months and how long you reckon I stayed
there? Twenty years. Then I come here and sit down and haven't done
anything since.
"The first school I went to was in the First Baptist Church on Pullen
Street. They had it there till they could put up a building.
"I went to nine different teachers and all of em was white. They was
sent here from the North. We studied McGuffy's reader and you stayed
with it till you learned it. I got it till today--in my head you
understand.
"Sure, Lord, I used to vote and hold ever' kind of office. Used to be
justice of the peace six years. I said I been in everthing but a bull
fight.
"I've traveled ever' place--Niagara Falls, Toronto, Canada. I been in
two World's Fairs and in several inaugurations. Professor Cheney says
I know more history than any the teachers at the college."
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Eliza Jones
610 E. Eighteenth, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 89
"Yes ma'am, this is Eliza. I was born in slave times and I knowed how
to work good.
"You know I was grown in time of the War 'cause I married the first
year of freedom.
"Belonged to a widow named Edna Mitchell. That was in Tennessee near
Jackson. Oh Lawd, my missis was good to all her niggers--if you should
call 'em that.
"She had two men and three women. My mother was the cook. Let's
see--Sarah was one, Jane was two, and Eliza was three. (I was Eliza.)
Then there was Doc and Uncle Alf. I reckon he was our uncle. Anyway we
all called him Uncle Alf. He managed the business--he was the head man
and Doc was next. And Miss Edna raised us all to grown.
"Now I'm tellin' you right straight along. I try to tell the truth. I
forgits and I can't remember ever'thing like it ought to be but I hit
at it.
"Things is hard this year and I don't know how come. I guess it's
'cause folks is so wicked. They is livin' fast--black and white.
"How many chillun? Now, you'd be s'prised. I hardly ever tell folks
how many. I had fifteen; I was a good breeder. But they is all dead
but one, and they ain't doin' me no good. Never raised but two. Most
of 'em just died when they was born.
"I'd a been better off if I had stayed single a while longer and went
to school and learned how to read and write and figger. But I went to
another kind of a school.
"But I sure has been blest. I been here a long time, got a chile to
cook me a little bread--don't have to worry 'bout dat.
"I had to send clean back to where I j'ined the Metropolitan to get my
age. That was in Cairo, Illinois 'cause I'd lived there fifteen years.
But when my daughter and her husband come here and got settled, why I
come to finish it out.
"Yes ma'am, I sure have worked hard. I've plowed, split wood, and done
a little bit of ever'thing. But it was all done since freedom. In
slavery times I was a house girl. I tell you I was a heap better off a
slave than I was free.
"After freedom we had to go and get what we could get to do and work
hard.
"They used to talk 'bout ha'nts and squinch owls. Say it was a sign of
somebody dead. But I don't believe in that. 'Course what I don't
believe in somebody else does."
Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor
Person interviewed: Evelyn Jones
815 Arch Street, Little Rock, Arkansas
Age: Between 68 and 78?
"I was born in Lonoke County right here in Arkansas. My father's
name--I don't know it. I don't know nothin' 'bout my father. My
mother's name was Mary Davis.
"My daddy died when I was five weeks old. I don't know nothin' 'bout
'im. Just did manage to git here before he left. I don't know the date
of my birth. I don't know nothin' 'bout it and I ain't goin' to tell
no lie.
"I have nineteen children. My youngest living child is twenty-eight
years old. My oldest living is fifty-three. I have four dead. I don't
know how old the oldest one is. That one's dead.
"I have a cousin named Harry Jordan. He lives 'round here somewheres.
You'll find him. I don't know where he lives. He says he knows just
how old I am, and he says that I'm sixty-eight. My daughter here says
I'm seventy. And my son thinks I'm older. Don't nobody know. My daddy
never told me. My mama was near dead when I was born; what could she
tell me? So how am I to know?
"My mother was born in slavery. She was a slave. I don't know nothin'
'bout it. My mother came from Tennessee. That's what she told me. I
was born in a log cabin right here in Arkansas. I was born in a log
cabin right in front of the white folks' big house. It was not far
from the white folks' graveyard. You know they had a graveyard of
their own. Old Bill Pemberton, that was the name of the man owned the
place I was born on. But he wasn't my mother's owner.
"I don't know where my father come from. My mother said she had a good
time in slavery. She spoke of lots of things but I don't remember
them.
"My grandma told me about when she went to church she used to carry
her good clothes in a bundle. When she got near there, she would put
them on, and hide her old clothes under a rock. When she come out from
the meeting, she would have to put on her old clothes again to go home
in. She didn't dare let the white folks see her in good clothes.
"I think my mother's white people were named Jordans. My mother and
them all belonged to the young mistress. I think her name was Jordan.
Yes, that's what it was--Jordan.
"Grandmammy had so many children. She had nineteen children--just like
me. My grandmammy was a great big old red woman. She had red hair too.
I never heard her say nothin' 'bout nobody whippin' her and my
granddaddy. They whipped all them children though. My mama just had
six children.
"Mama said her master tried to keep her in slavery after freedom. My
mama worked at the spinning-wheel. When she heard the folks say they
was through with the War, she was at the spinning-wheel. The white
folks ought a tol' them they was free but they didn't. Old Jordan
carried them down in De Valla Bluff. He carried them down
there--called hisself gittin' away from the Yankees. But the Yankees
told mama to quit workin'. They tol' her that she was free. My mama
said she was in there at the wheel spinning and the house was full of
white men settin' there lookin' at her. You don't see that sort of
thing now.
"They had a man--I don't know what his name was. He stalled them
steers, stalled 'em twice a day. They used to pick cotton. I dreamed
about cotton the other night.
"My father farmed after slavery. I never heard them say they were
cheated out of nothin'. I don't know whether they was or not. I'll
tell you the truth. I didn't pay them no 'tention. Mighty little I can
remember."
Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: John Jones,
Brinkley, Arkansas
Age: 71
"I was raised an orph'_ant_ but I was born in Tennessee. I lived over
there and farmed till 'bout fifty year ago. I come out here wid Mr.
Woodson to pick cotton. He dead now and I still tryin' to work all I
can.
"I haben voted in thirty-five year. Because I couldn't vote in the
Primary, then I say I wouldn't vote 'tall. I don't care if the women
want to vote. Don't do no good nohow.
"I farmed all my life 'ceptin' 'bout ten years I worked on the
section. I got so I couldn't stand up to it every day and had to farm
again.
"I never considered times hard till I got disabled to work. It mighty
bad when you can't get no jobs to do. My hardest time is in the
winter. I has a garden and chickens but I ain't able to buy a cow. Man
give me a little pig the other day. He won't be big enough to eat till
late next spring. Every winter times is hard for me. It's been thater
wa's ever since I begin not to be able to get about. Helped by the
PWA."
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: John Jones
3109 W. 10th Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 82
"I come here in 1856--you can figure it out for yourself. I was born
in Arkansas, fifty miles below here.
"I remember the soldiers. I know I was a little boy drivin' the gin.
Had to put me upon the lever. You see, all us little fellows had to
work.
"I remember seein' the Indians goin' by to fight at Arkansas Post.
They fought on the southern side. When I heard the cannons, I asked my
mama what it was and she said 'twas war.
"John Dye--that was my young master--went to the War but Ruben had a
kind of afflicted hand and he didn't go.
"Our plantation was on the river and I used to see the Yankee boats go
down the river.
"My papa belonged to the Douglases and mama belonged to the Dyes. I
was born on the Douglas place and I ain't been down there in over
fifty years. They said I was born in March but I don't know any more
bout it than a rabbit.
"Papa said he was raised up in the house. Said he didn't do much
work--just tended to the gin.
"I remember one night the Ku Klux come to our house. I was so scared I
run under the house and stayed till ma called me out. I was so scared
I didn't know what they had on.
"I remember when some of the folks come back from Texas and they said
peace was declared.
"I think my brother run off and jined the Yankees and come here when
they took Pine Bluff. War is a bad thing. I think they goin' keep on
till they hatch up another one.
"I didn't go to school much. I was the oldest boy at home and I had to
plow. I went seven days all told and since then I learned ketch as
ketch can. I can read and write pretty well. It's a consolation to be
able to read. If you can't get all of it, you can get some of it.
"Been here in Jefferson County ever since 1867. I come here from
Lincoln County.
"After freedom my papa moved my mama down on the Douglas place where
he was and stayed one year, then moved on the Simpson place in Lincoln
County, and then come up here in Jefferson County. I remember all the
moves.
"I remember down here where Kientz Bros, place is was the gallows
where they hung folks in slavery times. You know--when they had
committed some crime.
"Yes'm, I voted but I never held any office.
"I know I don't look my age but I can tell you a heap of things
happened before emancipation.
"I think the people are better off free--they got liberty."
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Lidia Jones
228 N. Oak Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 94
Occupation: None--blind
"I was born in Mississippi and emigrated to Arkansas. Born on the
Peacock place. Old John Patterson was my old master.
"My first goin' out was to the cow pen, then to the kitchen, and then
they moved me to Mrs. Patterson's dining-room.
"I helped weave cloth. Dyed it? I wish you'd hush! My missis went to
the woods and got it. All I know is, she said it was indigo. She had a
great big kittle and she put her thread in that. No Lord, she never
bought _her_ indigo--she _raised_ it.
"Oh, Miss Fannie could do most anything. Made the prettiest
counter-panes I ever saw. Yes ma'am, she could do it and _did_ do it.
"She had a loom half as big as this house. Lord a mercy, a many a time
I went dancin' from that old spinnin'-wheel.
"They made all the clothes for the colored folks. They'd be sewin' for
weeks and months.
"Miss Fannie and Miss Frances--that was her daughter--they wove such
pretty cloth for the colored. You know, they went and made themselves
dresses and the white and colored had the same kind of dresses.
"Yes Lord, they _had_ some folks.
"Miss Frances wore hoops but Miss Fannie didn't.
"During of the War them Yankees come down the river; but to tell the
truth, we run and hid and never seen 'em no more.
"They took Mars John's fine saddle horse named Silver Heels. Yes
ma'am, took saddle and bridle and the horse on top of 'em. And he had
a mare named Buchanan and they took her too. He had done moved out of
the big house down into the woods. Called hisself hidin' I reckon. And
he had his horses tied down by the river and the Yankees slipped up on
him and took the horses.
"Yankees burned his house and gin house too and set fire to the
cotton. Oh Lord, I don't like to talk about it. Them Yankees was
rough.
"Right after freedom our white folks left this country and went to
Missouri and the last account I heard of 'em they was all dead.
"After freedom, folks scattered out just like sheep.
"I'm tryin' to study 'bout some songs but I can't think of nothin' but
Dixie."
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Lydia Jones
228 North Oak Street, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 93
"My name's Lydia--Lydia Jones. Oh my God I'se born in Mississippi. I
wish you'd hush--I know all about slavery.
"I never had but one master. That was old John Patterson. No he want
good to me. I wish you'd hush! I had two young masters--Marse John and
Marse Edward. Marse John go off to war and say he gwine whip them
Yankees with his pocket knife, but he didn't _do_ it. They said the
war was to keep the colored folks slaves. I tell you I've heard them
bull whips a ringin' from sun to sun.
"After the war when they told us we is free, they said to hire
ourselves out. They didn't give us a nickel when we left.
"I heered talk of the Ku Klux and they come close enough for us to be
skeered but I never seen none of 'em. We never had no slave uprisin's
on our plantation--old John Patterson would a shot 'em down. I tell
you he was a rabid man.
"I used to pick cotton and chop cotton and help weave the cloth. My
old mistress--Miss Fannie--used to go to the woods and get things to
dye the cloth. She would dye some blue and some red.
"Only song I 'member is Dixie. I heered talk of some others but God
knows I never fooled with 'em.
"Yes'm I believes in hants. Let me tell you something. My mama seen my
daddy after he been dead a long time. He come right up through the
crack by the fireplace and he said 'Don't you be afraid Emmaline' but
she was agoin'. They had to sing and pray in the house 'fore my mama
would go back but she never seen him again.
"I'se been blind now for three years and I lives with my granddaughter
but lady, I'll tell you the truth--I been around. Yes, madam, I is."
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Liza Jones (Cookie)
610 S. Eighteenth Street, Pine Bluff, Ark.
Age: 88
"Come in, this is Cookie. Well, I do know a heap about slavery, cause
I worked. I stayed in the house; I was house girl. They called me
Cookie cause I used to cook so much.
"That was in Madison County, near Jackson, Tennessee. My mistress was
good to me. Yes'm, I got along all right but a heap of others got
along all wrong.
"Mistress took care of us in the cold and all kinds of weather. She
sho did.
"She had four women and four men. We had plenty to eat. She had hogs
and sheep and geese and always cooked enough for all of us. Whatever
she had to eat we had.
"We clothed our darkies in slavery times. I was a weaver for four
years and never done nothin' else. Yes ma'm, I was a house woman and I
am now.
"Yes ma'm, I member seein' different kinds of soldiers. I member once
some Rebels come to old mistress to get somethin' to eat but before it
was ready the Yankees come and run em off. They didn't have time to
eat it all so us colored folks got the rest of it.
"Old mistress had a son Mac and he was in the war. The Yankees
captured him and carried him to Chicago and put him in a warehouse
over the water.
"Old mistress was a good old Christian woman. All the darkies had to
come to her room to prayermeetin' every night. She didn't skip no
nights. And her help didn't mind workin'. They'd go the length for
her, Miss.
"After I was grown I went most anywhere, but when I was little I sho
set on old mistress' dress tail. I used to go to church with her.
She'd say, "Open your mouf and sing" and I'd just holler and sing. I
can member now how loud I used to holler.
"Aint no use in talkin', I had a good mistress. I never was sold. Old
mistress wouldn't sell. There was a speculator come there and wanted
to buy us. When we was free, old mistress say, "Now I could a sold you
and had the money, and now you is goin' to leave." But they didn't,
they stayed. Some stayed with old mistress till she died, but I
didn't. I married the first year of freedom.
"My mistress and me spin a many a cut of cotton together. She couldn't
beat me neither. If that old soul was livin' today, I'd be right with
her. I was gettin' along. I didn't know nothin' but freedom.
"I had freedom then and I ain't been free since, didn't have no
sponsibility. But when they turned you loose, you had your doctor bill
and your grub bill--now wasn't you a slave then?
"My mammy was a cook and her name was Katy.
"After I was married we went to live at Black Ankle. I learned to cook
and I sho did cook for the white folks twenty-one years. I used to go
back and see old mistress. If I stay away too long, she send for me.
"How many childen I had? You want the truth? Well, fifteen, but never
had but three to live any length of time.
"Well, I told you the best I know and the straightest I know. If I
can't tell you the truth, I'm not goin' to tell you nothin'.
"Yes, honey, I saw the Ku Klux."
Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: Lucy Jones,
Marianna, Arkansas
Age: Born 1866
[Date Stamp: MAY 11 1938]
"I was raised second year after the surrender. I don't know a father
or mother. They was dead when I was five years old. I had no sisters
nor brothers. Mrs. Cynthia Hall raised me. She raised my mother.
Master Hall was her husband. They was old people and they was so good
to me. They had no children and I lived in the house with them. I
never went to school a day in my life. I can't read. I can count
money.
"My mother was dark. I married when I was fifteen years old. I have
four children living. They are all dark. They are about the same color
but darker than I am.
"No ma'am, I don't believe one could be voodooed. I lived nearly all
my life with white folks and they don't heed no foolishness like that,
do they? I cooked, worked in the field, washed and ironed.
"I married three times. The first time at Raymond, Mississippi. I
never had no big weddings.
"Seems like some folks have lost their grip and ain't willing to start
over. I don't know much to say for the young people. They are not
smart. They got more schooling. They try to shirk all the work they
can. I never seen no Ku Klux in my life. People used to raise nearly
all their living at home and now they depend on buying nearly
everything. Well, I think it is bad."
Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor
Person interviewed: Mary Jones
1017 Dennison, Little Rock, Arkansas
Age: 72
"I was born on the twenty-second of March, 1866, in Van Buren,
Arkansas. I had six children. All of them were bred and born at the
same place.
"I was born in a frame house. My father used to live in the country,
but I was born in the town. He bought it just as soon as he come out
of the army and married right away and bought this home. I don't know
where he got his money from. I guess he saved it. He served in the
Union army; he wasn't a servant. He was a soldier, and drawed his pay.
He never run through his money like most people do. I don't know
whether he made any money in slavery or not but he was a carpenter
during slave times and they say he always had plenty of money. I guess
he had saved some of that too.
"My mother was married twice. Her name was Louisa Buchanan. My father
was named Abraham Riley. My stepfather was named Moses Buchanan. My
father was a soldier in the old original war (the Civil War)--the war
they ended in 1865.
"I disremember who my mother's master was but I think it was a man
named Johnson. I didn't know my father's people. She married him from
White County up here. Her and him, they corresponded mostly in letters
because he traveled lots. He looked like an Indian. He had straight
hair and was tall and rawboned and wore a Texas hat. I had his picture
but the pictures fade away. My father was a sergeant. He died sometime
after the war. I don't remember when because I wasn't old enough. I
can just remember looking at the corpse. I was too small to do any
grieving.
"My mother was a nurse in slavery times. She nursed the white folks
and their children. She did the housework and such like. She was a
good cook too. After freedom, when the old folks died out, she cooked
for Zeb Ward--you know him, head of the penitentiary. She used to cook
for the Jews and gentiles. That her kind of work. That was her
occupation--good cook. She could make all kinds of provisions. She
could make preserves and they had a big orchard everywhere she worked.
"I have heard my mother talk about pateroles, jayhawkers, and Ku Klux,
but I never knew of them myself. I have heard say they were awful
bad--the Ku Klux or somethin'.
"My mother's white folks sold her. I don't know who they sold her to
or from. They sold her from her mother. I don't know how she got free.
I think she got free after the war ceased. But she had a good time all
her life. She had a good time because she was a good cook, and a good
nurse, and she had good white folks. My grandma, she had good folks
too. They was free before they were free, my ma and grandma. They was
just as free before freedom as they were afterwards. My mother had
seven children and two sets of twins among them. But I am the only one
living.