*Interview with Uncle Andrew Means, age 80*
*Route #4; Spartanburg, S.C.*
--_F.S. DuPre, Spartanburg, S.C._
Andrew Means, when approached, held a baby in his arms and moved very
slowly around in his front yard. He was asked if the babe was his
grandchild or his great-grandchild, as the old darky had previously
stated his age as eighty. He replied that it was his own and he pointed
out another child playing in the yard whom he said was his also. He
stated, "I'se been married twice. I had fifteen children by my first
wife, and these two are by my second wife. She is a young woman. But
I'se sick now, 'cause I had two strokes of paralysis and I can't do
much".
He remembered some things during slavery times. His mother belonged to
Dock Murph's father. "I don't recollect his name", he said: "but I was
born on a plantation down about White Stone on Mr. Murph's place". He
stated his mother lived in a two-room log house with board floors. "My
mother and my father separated, and he got killed in Florida. One day my
father came there to take me with him, but I wouldn't go. I stayed with
my mammy. She was a hoshand, and used to do washing around the house;
she did some cooking, too. She used to pick cotton. We raised plenty of
cotton; made good crops."
He said "I wonder what has become of the wild duck and the wild geese we
used to have? I used to see them coming over de house, stretched out one
right behind the other. There was plenty of duck and geese, but you
don't see 'em now."
When questioned further about slavery times, he said, "I was so little,
too little to work. I was playing marbles and pitching horse shoes. One
day I looked up and I seed soldiers running their horses down the road
in my direction and I got scared. They had on blue hats, or caps, but I
don't recollect what kind of clothes they had on, but I remember the
blue caps with a stiff front to it. No, Sir, they didn't do nothing at
the house. Some of dem asked for something to eat, but when we didn't
have anything to eat they couldn't get it, so rode on. I was so scared
and my heart was beating so when I seed 'em coming I just lit out on a
run." (At this point he laughed heartily to himself.) "I ran so hard and
was so scared I run over and knocked down two railings on de fence, den
I crawled under de bed."
When asked how the darkies got married in those days, he said: "They had
to do the best they could. People didn't get married at that time like
they do now."
He said he had heard of some of the slaves getting whippings, but he had
a good master; he never saw a nigger get a whipping. "But I heard of it
on some places".
He never went to white folks' church when he got big enough to go to
church, but the first church he went to was a colored church.
"No, Sir, I never seed a ghost, but one night when me and another fellow
was going 'possum hunting, I saw something, but I don't know what it
was. De dogs treed a 'possum and laid down at de foot of the tree and
just barked. Torectly something flew down out of the top of de tree and
fought de dogs. It just tore them into shoe-strings--their ears and
sides was all torn to shoe-strings. Some of de dogs didn't get back 'til
next morning and they was all cut up. When dat thing came out de tree I
left there. We didn't stay. It looked bigger than a bear. Maybe it was a
ghost.
"The 'paterollers' didn't give us much trouble as long as we had a
pass."
He stated he had never heard of Abe Lincoln or Jeff Davis but he
recollected when Garfield was President.
When he was passed a little change, he said, "Thank you, Sir; come
again, come to see me again."