*Interview with Gus Askew*
--_Gertha Couric_
"Dat was one time when de ban' was playin' and flags was flyin' dat us
lil' niggers didn't get no joy outen it." Gus Askew smiled at the
thought of the occasion as he sat on the sunny steps of his comfortable
house in Eufaula. Gus was telling about the investment of Eufaula during
the War between the States.
"Gen'l Grierson and his men marched right through town," Gus went on
with his story of his boyhood. "Mr. Lincoln done said we was free, but
us lil' niggers was too skeered to lissen to any ban' music, even iffen
the so'jers had come to set us free. 'Pears like us was allus gittin' in
somebody's way in dem days and gittin' skeered of somepin'. But we went
on away from the so'jers and had a good time 'mongst ourselves like we
always done when there wasn't any cotton pickin'. Cotton pickin' time
was when we didn't have any chance to do any playin'.
"After the surrender I didn't have to do any more cotton pickin' and I
went blacksmithin' for Joe Sturgis. He was the first blacksmith in dis
here town. I was the second. Now my son done took on de work. They ain't
so much sence all dese here automobiles done got so plentiful and might
'nigh ruint de business. But for seventy years I riz wid de sun and went
to dat blacksmith shop. I's enjoying a little misery now; so I's takin'
my rest."
[Illustration: _Gus Askew, Eufaula, Alabama_]
Gus Askew was born a slave of the Edwards family in Henry County in
1853. He was brought to Eufaula just before the close of the war and
stayed on as a blacksmith after he was freed. In his seventy years of
hard work he saved enough to buy his home and some property which
maintains him and his wife since age and infirmity forced him to turn
over the work to his son. He has been married 54 years, numbers his
white friends by the hundreds and is held in great respect by his own
race.