"Some of the masters treated us worse than dogs and others treated us
fine. Colonel Robert Willingham freed his slaves but his sisters and
brothers wouldn't stand for it. They went and stole us off and sold us.
My mother being a thrifty colored woman and a practical nurse,
everywhere she went, a case gave thirty dollars and her board and mine.
My father paid his master three hundred dollars a year. He built these
gin houses and presses. The old man would write him passes and
everything and see that he was paid for his work. Some years, he would
make as much as three or four thousand dollars. His master collected it
and held it for him and gave it to him when he wanted it. That was
during slavery times."