SLAVE NARRATIVES

A Folk History of Slavery in the United States
From Interviews with Former Slaves

TYPEWRITTEN RECORDS PREPARED BY
THE FEDERAL WRITERS’ PROJECT
1936-1938
ASSEMBLED BY
THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS PROJECT
WORK PROJECTS ADMINISTRATION
FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
SPONSORED BY THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

Illustrated with Photographs

WASHINGTON 1941

VOLUME XIV
SOUTH CAROLINA NARRATIVES
PART 4

Prepared by
the Federal Writers’ Project of
the Works Progress Administration
for the State of South Carolina

INFORMANTS

MARY RAINES

EX-SLAVE 99 YEARS OLD.

Mary Raines is the oldest living person, white or black, in Fairfield[1]
County. If she survives until next December, she will have attained
her century of years. She lives with her widowed daughter, Fannie McCollough,
fifty-seven years old, and a son, Joe Raines, aged 76 years. They rent a
two-room frame house, on lands of Mrs. Sallie Wylie, Chester County, S.C.
Joe, the son, is a day laborer on nearby farms. Fannie cooks for Mrs. W.T.
Raines. Old Mother Mary has been receiving a county pension of $5.00 per
month for several years.

“How old would Marse William Woodward be if he hadn’t died befo’
I gwine to die? A hundred and twenty, you say? Well, dat’s ’bout de way
I figured my age. Him was a nephew of Marse Ed, de fust Marse Ed P. Mobley.
Him say dat when him ‘come twenty-one, old marster give him a birthday dinner
and ‘vite folks to it. Marse Riley McMaster, from Winnsboro, S.C., was dere
a flyin’ ’round my young mistress, Miss Harriett. Marse Riley was a young
doctor, ridin’ ’round wid saddlebags. While they was all settin’ down to
dinner, de young doctor have to git up in a hurry to go see my mammy. Left
his plate piled up wid turkey, nice dressin’, rice and gravy, candy ‘tatoes,
and apple marmalade and cake. De wine ‘canter was a settin’ on de ‘hogany
sideboard. All dis him leave to go see mammy, who was a squallin’ lak a
passle of patarollers (patrollers) was a layin’ de lash on her. When de
young doctor go and come back, him say as how my mammy done got all right
and her have a gal baby. Then him say dat Marse Ed, his uncle, took him to
de quarter where mammy was, look me all over and say: ‘Ain’t her a good one?
Must weigh ten pounds. I’s gwine to name dis baby for your mama, William.[2]
Tell her I name her, Mary, for her, but I ‘spects some folks’ll call her
‘Polly’, just lak they call your mama, ‘Polly’.

“I was a strong gal, went to de field when I’s twelve years old,
hoe my acre of cotton, ‘long wid de grown ones, and pick my 150 pounds of
cotton. As I wasn’t scared of de cows, they set me to milkin’ and churnin’.
Bless God! Dat took me out of de field. House servants ‘bove de field servants,
them days. If you didn’t git better rations and things to eat in de
house, it was your own fault, I tells you! You just have to help de chillun
to take things and while you doin’ dat for them, you take things for yourself.
I never call it stealin’. I just call it takin’ de jams, de jellies, de biscuits,
de butter and de ‘lasses dat I have to reach up and steal for them chillun
to hide ‘way in deir little stomaches, and me, in my big belly.

“When Joe drive de young doctor, Marse Riley, out to see Mass Harriett,
while Marse Riley doin’ his courtin’ in de parlor, Joe was doin’ his courtin’
in de kitchen. Joe was as smart as de nex’ one. Us made faster time than them
in de parlor; us beat them to de marriage. Marse Riley call it de altar, but
Joe always laugh and say it was de halter. Many is de time I have been home
wid them sixteen chillun, when him was a gallavantin’ ’round, and I wished I
had a got a real halter on dat husband of mine.

“I b’longs to de Gladden’s Grove African Methodist ‘Piscopal Church.
Too old to shout but de great day is comin’, when I’ll shout and sing to de
music of dat harp of 10,000 strings up yonder. Oh! Won’t dat be a joyful day,
when dese old ailin’ bones gonna rise again.” (Then the old darkey became suffused
in tears, lapsed into a silence and apathy, from which she couldn’t be
aroused. Finally she slumbered and snored. It would have been unkind to question
her further.)

FRANK RANGE

CIVIL WAR SERVANT and HERO

At the age of one hundred and three, Frank Range is a[3]
familiar figure on the streets of Greenville, talking freely of
pre-Civil and Civil War days, and the part he played in the war.

Frank, the oldest of nine children, was born of slave
parents, Lenard and Elizabeth Herbert, on the plantation of Mr.
Jim Boler, Newberry, South Carolina. He was sold several times,
and is known by the name of one of his owners, John Range.

During the Civil War his master, Mr. Jim Herbert, carried
him to the war as a cook, and when necessary, he was pressed into
service, throwing up breast-works; and while he was engaged in this
work, at Richmond Va. a terrific bombardment of their lines was made,
and a part of their breast-works was crushed in, and his master buried
beneath it. Frantic with fear for the safety of his master, Frank began
to move the dirt away; finally he was able to drag him to safety.
Though shot and shell were falling all around him, he came out unscathed.

Frank Range returned to Newberry at the close of the war,
after which he moved to Greenville County in 1901, and into the city
in 1935. He is never happier than when, in the center of a group of
willing hearers, he is reciting in a sing-song tone the different
periods of his life.

He attributes his longevity to the fact that he has never
tasted whiskey, never chewed tobacco; never had a fight; toothache[4]
and headache are unknown to him; the service of a physician has
never been needed; he does not know one playing card from another.
He can walk five or more miles with seeming ease; is jovial and
humorous.

He receives a state pension of twenty five dollars annually.
His place of residence is 101 Hudson St. Greenville, S.C.

References;

Mr. Guy A. Gullick,
Probate Judge, Greenville County.

Frank Range (information given concerning himself)
101 Hudson St. Greenville S.C.

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“I was born in 1835 in Lexington County, S.C. I know I[5]
was 12 years old de last year of de war. I belonged to John
Hiller in Lexington County, near Columbia, S.C. Old Marse Hiller
was strict to his slaves, wasn’t mean, but often whipped ’em.
I thought it was all right then. When de Yankees come through
burning, killing and stealing stock, I was in marse’s yard. Dey
come up whar de boss was standing, told him dere was going to be
a battle, grabbed him and hit him. Dey burned his house, stole de
stock, and one Yankee stuck his sword to my breast and said fer me
to come wid him or he would kill me. O’ course I went along. Dey
took me as fer as Broad River, on t’other side o’ Chapin; then
turned me loose and told me to run fast or they would shoot me.
I went fast and found my way back home by watching de sun. Dey
told me to not go back to dat old man.

“De slaves never learnt to read and write. If any o’ dem
was caught trying to learn to read or write, dey was whipped bad.
I kotched on to what de white chilluns said, and learnt by myself
to say de alphabet.

“We went to de white churches atter de war, and set in de
gallery. Den de niggers set up a ‘brush harbor’ church fer demselves.
We went to school at de church, and atter school was out
in de atternoon, we had preaching.

“Befo’ freedom come, de patrollers was strong dere, and
whipped any niggers dey kotched out without a pass; wouldn’t let
dem go to church without a pass.

“Lots of hunting round dere, dey hunted rabbits, squirrels, foxes[6]
and ‘possums. Dey fished like dey do now.

“De white folks had old brick ovens away from de house, and
wide fireplaces in de kitchens. Dey cooked many things on Saturdays,
to last several days. Saturday afternoons, we had off to
catch up on washing and other things we wanted to do.

“I ‘member de Ku Klux and de Red Shirts, but don’t ‘member
anything dey did dere.

“We had corn-shuckings and cotton pickings, when de white
people would have everybody to come and help. Us niggers would
help. Dey had big suppers afterwards.

“We had plenty to eat from de garden of de boss, a big garden
dat furnished all de slaves. Den de boss killed hogs and had
other things to eat. Most o’ de things raised in de garden, was
potatoes, turnips, collards and peas.

“Some of us had witches. One old woman was a witch, and she
rode me one night. I couldn’t get up one night, had a ketching of
my breath and couldn’t rise up. She held me down. In dem days, was
lots o’ fevers with de folks. Dey cured ’em and other sickness
wid teas from root herbs and barks.

“Abraham Lincoln was a good man. He said you folks ought to
let dem niggers loose and let dem go to work. He come wid his two
men, Grant and Sherman, and captured de slave bosses. Jeff Davis
was one o’ de forerunners of de war. Don’t know much about him.
Booker T. Washington is a good man. Think he is in office fer a
good purpose. I been married four times, Was young man when I married
first time. Gussie Gallman, my last wife, is living wid me.”

Source: Sam Rawls (84), Newberry, S.C.
Interviewer: G.L. Summer, Newberry, S.C. (6/9/37)

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“I live wid my fourth wife and she is much younger dan me.[7]
I am unable to work and have to stay in bed lots of de time. My wife
works at odd jobs, like washing, ironing and cooking. We rent a two-room
house from Miss Ann Ruff.

“I belonged to John Hiller. He was a good master but he
worked his slaves hard. Dat was in Lexington County.

“I heard dat Gen. Grant said de slaves ought to get 40
acres of land and a mule so dey could go to work; but dey never got
any dat I knows of. Atter Freedom dey worked as wage earners and share-croppers.
Some went to other farms to get jobs. Dat’s about what dey
do now, but some of dem saved a little money and bought farms and
some started little businesses of deir own.

“De Ku Klux didn’t have much influence wid de slaves or ex-slaves.
As soon as de war broke, dey went riding up and down de public
roads to catch and beat niggers. My brother run off when dey got
atter him. He went to Orangeburg County and stayed down dere.

“I voted twice den, once at Prosperity and again at Newberry.
I was a Republican, of course. Some of de Niggers of dis
state was elected to office, but dey was not my kinfolks nor special
friends. I think niggers ought to vote so dey could vote fer good
white folks; and dey ought to run fer office if dey could be elected
by good white folks.

“I was sixteen years old when de Yankees come through dis
country. Dey caught me in de road and made me go wid dem to Broad[8]
River where dey camped one night. Den dey turned me loose and told
me to git. I run as fast as I could. I followed de setting sun, de
road running towards de sun all de time, and got home about night.

“Since freedom is come de niggers have worked mostly on
farms as share-croppers; some as renters wid deir own crops to raise.

“De present generation of niggers ain’t got much sense.
Dey work when dey want to, and have deir own way about it. De old
niggers was learned to work when dey was little.

“I don’t know nothing about de Nat Turner Rebellion. I
never know’d but one old nigger dat come from Virginia, old Ellen
Abner. She lived below Prosperity fer a long time, in de Stoney Hills.

“Yes sir, I tries to live right and git along wid everybody.”

Source: Sam Rawls (80), Newberry, S.C.
Interviewer: G.L. Summer, Newberry, S.C. 8/23/37.

FOLK-LORE: EX-SLAVES

“I was born on Capt. John P. Kinard’s[9]
place. My mammy and pa was Lucy and Eph Kinard who belonged
to Marse Kinard. Marse Kinard was good to his slaves—didn’t
whip them much. He whipped me a little. When I was a little
girl I slept in the big house in the room with my mistress and
her husband, and waited on them. I worked when I got old
enough, in the field, and anywhere around. When I wouldn’t
work good, my mammy whipped me most.

“I ‘member the folks cooked in skillets
over an old fireplace.

“After the war was over and freedom come
we stayed on with Capt. Kinard, ’till I married and then went
over to Dock Renwick’s place where my husband worked. I married
Tom Renwick. We went to the church of the colored folks after
the war, and had preachings in mornings and evenings and at night,
too. We didn’t have no nigger schools, and we didn’t learn to
read and write.

“The white folks had corn-shuckings, cotton
pickings at night, when the mistress would fix a big dinner for
all working.”

SOURCE: Ellen Renwick (79), RFD, Newberry, S.C.
Interviewer: Mr. G. Leland Summer, 1707 Lindsey St.,
Newberry, S.C.

FOLK-LORE: EX-SLAVES

“I was born in Spartanburg County, S.C., near[10]
Glenn Springs. I can’t ‘member slavery or de war, but my ma
and pa who was Green Foster and his wife, Mary Posey Foster, always
said I was a big gal when the war stopped, when freedom come.

“We belonged to Seth Posey who had a big farm
there. He was a good man, but sure made us work. I worked in
the fields when I was small, hoed and picked cotton, hoed corn.
They didn’t give us no money for it. All we got was a place to
sleep and a little to eat. The big man had a good garden and give
us something from it. He raised loads of hogs, to eat and to sell.
He sold lots of them. The young fellows hunted rabbits, possums,
squirrels, wild turkeys, partridges, doves, and went fishing.
The Master’s wife, Miss Nancy, was good to us. She had one son,
William.

“Yes, I ‘member my ma telling us ’bout the padder-rollers.
They would ride around, whipping niggers.

“My ma said her step-mother sold her. Sometimes
they would take crowds of slaves to Mississippi, taking away
mothers from their infant babies, leaving the babies on the floor.

“We always shuck corn and shell it at night, on
moon-light nights we pick cotton. On Saturday afternoons we had
frolics, sometimes frolics ’till Sunday daylight, then sleep all
day Sunday.[11]

“When we got sick all the medicine we took was
turpentine—dat would cure almost any ailment. Some of the
niggers used Sampson snake weed or peach leaves boiled and tea
drunk.

“I joined the church when I was 12 years old
’cause the other girls joined. I think everybody ought to join
a church to get their souls right for heaven:

“I married Charley Rice in Spartanburg County,
at a colored man’s house, named Henry Fox, by a colored preacher
named ‘Big Eye’ Bill Rice. I had four children, and have five
grand-children. I have been living in Newberry about 35 years
or more. I worked as a wash-woman many years.

“When freedom come, my folks stayed on with Capt.
Posey, and I washed and ironed with them later when I was big
enough. I done some cooking, too. I could card and spin and
make homespun dresses. My ma learned me.

“I don’t know much about Abraham Lincoln and Jeff
Davis but reckon dey was good men. I never learned to read and
write. Booker Washington, I reckon, is a good man.”

SOURCE: Anne Rice (75), Newberry, S.C.
Interviewer: G. Leland Summer, 1707 Lindsey St.,
Newberry, S.C.

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“My people tells me a lot about when I was a lil’ wee[12]
boy. I has a clear mind and I allus has had one. My folks did not talk
up people’s age like folks do dese days. Every place dat I be now,
‘specially round dese government folks, first thing dat dey wants to
know is your name. Well, dat is quite natu’al, but de very next question
is how old you is. I don’t know, why it is, but dey sho do dat.
As my folks never talked age, it never worried me till jes’ here of
late. So dey says to me dat last week I give one age to de man, and
now I gives another. Soon I see’d dat and I had to rest my mind on
dat as well as de mind of de government folks. So I settled it at
80 years old. Dat gives me respect from everybody dat I sees. Den
it is de truth, too, kaise I come along wid everybody dat is done
gone and died now. De few white folks what I was contemperment (contemporary)
wid, ‘lows dat I is 80 and dey is dat, too.

“You know dat I does ‘member when dat Sherman man went
through here wid dem awful mens he had. Dey ‘lowed dat dey was gwine
to Charlotte to git back to Columbia. I never is heard of sech befo’
or since. We lived at old man Jerry Moss’s in Yorkville, way back
den. Yes sir, everyone said Yorkville, den, but dey ain’t never
called Gaffney like dat. Stories goes round ’bout Sherman shooting
folks. Some say dat he shot a big rock off’n de State House in Columbia.
My Ma and my Pa, Henry and Charity Rice, hid me wid dem when
Sherman come along. Us never see’d him, Lawd God no, us never wanted
to see him.[13]

“Folks allus crying hard times dese days, ain’t no hard
times now like it was atter Sherman went through Yorkville. My ma and
pa give me ash cake and ‘simmon beer to eat for days atter dat. White
folks never had no mo’, not till a new crop was grow’d. Dat year de
seasons was good and gardens done well. Till den us nearly starved
and we never had no easy time gitting garden seed to plant, neither.

“Yes sir, if I’s handy to locust I makes locust beer; den
if I’s handy to ‘simmons, why den I makes ‘simmon beer. Now it’s jes’
for to pass de time dat us does dat. But gwine back to de war; den it
was for necessity. Dese young’uns now don’t know what hard times is.
Dey all has bread and meat and coffee, no matter how poor dey is. If
dey had to live for days and weeks on ash cake and ‘simmon beer, as
us did den, and work and wait on a crop wid nothing but dat in deir
bellies; den dey could grumble hard times. I allus tells ’em to shut
up when dey starts anything like dat around me.

“When dat crop come along, we sho did fall in and save
all us could for de next year. Every kind of seed and pod dat grow’d
we saved and dried for next spring or fall planting. Atter folks is
once had deir belly aching and growling for victuals, dey ain’t never
gwine to throw no rations and things away no mo’. Young folks is
powerful wasteful, but if something come along to break up deir good
time like it did to us when dat man Sherman held everything up, dey
sho will take heed, and dey won’t grumble ’bout it neither, cause dey
won’t have no time to grumble.

“Things passes over quicker sometimes dan we figures out
dat dey will. Everything, no matter how good it be or how hard, passes
over. Dey jes’ does like dat. So dem Yankees went on somewhars, I
never know’d whar, and everything round Yorkville was powerful relieved.[14]
Den de Confederate soldiers started coming across Broad River. Befo’
dey got home, word had done got round dat our folks had surrendered;
but dem Yankees never fit (fought) us out—dey starved us out. If
things had been equal us would a-been fighting dem till dis day, dat
us sho would. I can still see dem soldiers of ours coming across
Broad River, all dirty, filthy, and lousy. Dey was most starved, and
so poor and lanky. And deir hosses was in de same fix. Men and hosses
had know’d plenty till dat Sherman come along, but most of dem never
know’d plenty no more. De men got over it better dan de hosses.
Women folks cared for de men. Dey brewed tea from sage leaves, sassafras
root and other herb teas. Nobody never had no money to fetch
no medicine from de towns wid, so dey made liniments and salves from
de things dat grow’d around about in de woods and gardens.

“I told you ’bout how small I was, but my brother, Jim
Rice, went to Charleston and helped to make dem breastworks down dar.
I has never see’d dem, but dem dat has says dat dey is still standing
in good conditions. Cose de Yankees tore up all dat dey could when
dey got dar.

“Lots of rail fences was made back in dem days. Folks had a
‘no fence’ law, dat meant dat everybody fenced in deir fields and let
de stock run free. Hogs got wild and turkeys was already wild. Sometimes
bulls had to be shot to keep dem from tearing up everything.
But folks never fenced in no pasture den. Dey put a rail fence all
around de fields, and in dem days de fields was never bigger dan ten
or fifteen acres. Logs was plentiful, and some niggers, called ‘rail
splitters’, never done nothing else but split rails to make fences.

“If I recollects right, Wade Hampton broke down fence
laws in dis country. I sho heard him talk in Yorkville. Dey writ[15]
about him in de Yorkville Inquirer and dey still has dat paper over
dar till now. De Red Shirts come along and got Wade Hampton in. He
scared de Yankees and Carpetbaggers and all sech folks as dem away
from our country. Dey went back whar dey come from, I reckon.

“De Ku Klux was de terriblest folks dat ever crossed my
path. Who dey was I ain’t never know’d, but dey took Alex Leech to
Black’s Ford on Bullet Creek and killed him for being a radical. It
was three weeks befo’ his folks got hold of his body.

“Dr. Bell’s calves got out and did not come back for a
long time. Mrs. Bell fear’d dat dey was gitting wild, so she sent de
milk girl down on de creek to git dem calves. Dat girl had a time,
but she found ’em and drove ’em back to de lot. De calves give her a
big chase and jumped de creek near a big raft of logs dat had done
washed up from freshets. All over dem logs she saw possums, musrats
and buzzards a-setting around. She took her stick and drove dem all
away, wid dem buzzards puking at her. When dey had left, she see’d
uncle Alex laying up dar half e’t up by all dem varmints.

“She know’d dat it must be him. When she left, dem buzzards
went back to deir perch. First thing dey done was to lap up
deir own puke befo’ dey started on uncle Alex again. Yes sir, dat’s
de way turkey buzzards does. Dey pukes on folks to keep dem away,
and you can’t go near kaise it be’s so nasty; but dem buzzards don’t
waste nothing. Little young buzzards looks like down till dey gits
over three days old. You can go to a buzzard roost and see for yourself,
but you sho better stay out’n de way of de old buzzard’s puke.
Dey sets around de little ones and keeps everything off by puking.

“Pacolet used to be called Buzzard Roost, kaise in de old
days dey had a rail outside de bar-room dat de drunks used to hang[16]
over and puke in a gully. De buzzards would stay in dat gully and lap
up dem drunkards’ puke. One night a old man went in a drunkard’s
sleep in de bar-room. De bar tender shoved him out when he got ready
to close, and he rolled up against dis here rail dat I am telling
you about. He ‘lowed dat next morning when he woke up, two buzzards
was setting on his shirt front eating up his puke. He said, ‘You is
too soon’, and grabbed one by de leg and wrung his head off. But befo’
he could git its head wrung off it had done puked his own puke back
on him. He said dat was de nastiest thing he ever got into, and dat
he never drunk no more liquor. Dem days is done past and gone, and it
ain’t nobody hardly knows Pacolet used to be called Buzzard Roost.

“Lawd have mercy, white folks! Here I is done drapped
plumb off’n my subject; but a old man’s mind will jes’ run waa’ry at
times. Me and Joe, Alex’s son, went to see de officer ’bout gitting
Joe’s pa buried. He ‘lowed dat Alex’s body was riddled wid bullets;
so we took him and put his bones and a little rotten flesh dat dem
buzzards had left, in de box we made, and fetched it to de site and
buried him. Nobody ever seed Alex but me, Joe, and dat gal dat went
atter dem calves. Us took shovels and throw’d his bones in de box.
When we got de top nailed on, we was both sick. Now, things like dat
don’t come to pass. I still thinks of de awful days and creeps runs
all over me yet.

“All my brothers, sisters, mother and father is done gone.
And I is looking to leave befo’ a great while. I is trying every day
to git ready, Lawd. I been making ready for years. Smart mens tries
to make you live on, but dey can’t git above death. Tain’t no use.”

Source: Jesse Rice (80), Littlejohn St., Gaffney, S.C.
Interviewer: Caldwell Sims, Union, S.C. 1/8/38

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“I’m living on Mr. Russel Emmitt’s place. I never did[17]
nothing but drive cows when I was a little boy growing up. Miss
Cum and Miss Lizzie Rice was Marse Alex’s sisters. Marse Alex
done died, and dey was my mistress. Dey tuck and sold de plantation
afo dey died, here ’bout twenty years ago. Dat whar my
ma found me and den she died.

“My grandparents, Jane and Peter Stevens, brung me up. I
was a little farm boy and driv cows fer de overseer, Jim Blalock.
Miss Cum was really Miss Ann. Miss Ann had a hundred niggers,
herself, and Miss Lizzie had might nigh dat many, asides dem
what Marse Alex done left ’em. De overseer try to act rough out
o’ Miss Ann’s sight, and she find it out and set him down a peg.

“Miss Jane have our shirts made on de looms. She let us
wear long shirts and go in our shirt tails, and us had to keep
’em clean, too, ’cause Miss Jane never like no dirt around her.
Miss Jane have charge of de whole house and everything along
wid it.

“Us had three hundred hogs to tend to, two hundred
yellings and heifers, and Lawdy knows how many sheep and goats.
Us fed dem things and kept ’em fat. When butchering time come,
us stewed out the mostest lard and we had enough side-meat to
supply the plantation the year round. Our wheat land was fertilized
wid load after load of cotton seed. De wheat us raised
was de talk of de country side. ‘Sides dat, dare was rye, oats[18]
and barley, and I ain’t said nothing ’bout de bottom corn dat
laid in de cribs from year to year.

“Our smokehouse was allus full o’ things to eat, not only
fer de white folks but fer de darkies as well. And our barns
carried feed fer de cattle from harvest to harvest.

“De fattest of all de hosses, was Miss Ann’s black saddle
hoss called, ‘Beauty’. Miss Ann wo’ de longest side-saddle dress
dat hung way down below her feets. Somebody allus had to help
her on and off Beauty, but n’ary one of her brothers could out-ride
Miss Ann.”

Source: Phillip Rice (75), Kelton, S.C. RFD
Interviewed by: Caldwell Sims, Union, S.C. (5/7/37)

THE POT OF GOLD.

Martha Richardson, who tells this story, lives at 924 Senate Street,[19]
Columbia, S.C. Her father was an Indian and her mother a mulatto. She was
born in Columbia in 1860 and was five years old, when General W.T. Sherman’s
Federal troops captured and burned the city in 1865.

“When I gits big ‘nough to pick up chips for de cook stove, we was livin’
in de rear of Daniel Gardner’s home, on Main Street, and my mammy was workin’
as one of de cooks at de Columbia Hotel. De hotel was run by Master Lowrance,
where de Lorick & Lowrance store is now.

“My daddy, like de general run of Indians, love to hunt but de game not
bring much cash in. My mammy often give him some change (money) and he not
work much but he always good to mammy and she love him and not fuss at him,
much. I soon learn dat if it had not been for mammy, we wouldn’t a had much
to eat and wear. We go ‘long lak dat for a good while and my mammy have friends
‘nough dat she seldom had to ask for a job.

“De game was so scarce dat my daddy sometimes make a little money a showin’
people how to make Indian medicine, dat was good for many complaints, how
to cover deir houses, and how to kill deir hogs, ‘cordin’ to de moon. He tell
us many times ’bout de great Catawba Indians, who make all deir own medicines
and kill bears and dress in deir skins, after feastin’ on deir flesh. He was
a good talker.

“You know, I sees so much ‘skimpin’, to make ends meet at home, as we go
‘long dis way, dat I has never married. My mammy tell me: ‘Honey, you a pretty
child. You grow up and marry a fine, lovin’ man lak your daddy, and be happy.’
I kinda smile but I thinks a lot. If my daddy had worked and saved lak my mammy,[20]
we would be ‘way head of what we is, and my brudders say so, too. But we fond
of our daddy, he so good lookin’ and all.

“What de most ‘citin’ thing I ever see? Well, I think de Red Shirt campaign
was. You never see so much talkin’, fightin’, and fussin’ as dat. You
know de Yankees was still here and they not ‘fraid, and de Hampton folks was not
‘fraid, so it was a case of knock down and drag out most of de time, it seem to
me. Long at de end, dere was two governors; one was in de Wallace House and one
in de Capitol. Men went ’bout town wid deir guns.

“Mammy keep busy cookin’, nussin’, and washin’, and us chillun help. You
know I had two brudders older than me and a little baby brudder ’bout a year old,
when my mammy rent a small farm from Master Greenfield, down at de end of Calhoun
Street, near de Broad River. We plant cotton. I was then eleven years old and
my brudder was twelve and thirteen. My mammy help us plant it befo’ she go to
work at de hotel.

“She was home washin’, one day, when my brudders and me was choppin’ cotton.
We chop ’til ’bout eleven o’clock dat mornin’ and we say: ‘When we gits out de
rows to de big oak tree we’ll sit down and rest.’ We chillun lak each other and
we joke and work fast ’til we comes to de end of de rows and in de shade of de
big oak. Then we sets down, dat is, my oldest brudder and me, ’cause my young
brudder was a little behind us in his choppin’. As he near de finish, his hoe
hit somethin’ hard and it ring. Ha rake de dirt ‘way and keep diggin’, light
lak.

“What you doin’, brudder?’ I say. He say: ‘Tryin’ to find out what
dis is. It seem to be a pot lid.’ Then we jump up and go to him and all of
us grabble dirt ‘way and sho’ ‘nough it was a pot lid and it was on a pot. We
digs it out, thinkin’ it would be a good thing to take home. It was so heavy,
it take us all to lift it out.[21]

“It was no sooner out than we takes off de lid and we is sho’ s’prised
at what we see. Big silver dollars lay all over de top. We takes two of them
and drops them together and they ring just lak we hear them ring on de counters.
Then we grabble in de pot for more. De silver went down ’bout two inches deep.
Twenty dollar gold pieces run down ’bout four inches or so and de whole bottom
was full of big bundles of twenty dollar greenbacks.

“We walks up to de house feelin’ pretty big and my oldest brudder was singin’:

“Mammy say widout lookin’ at us: ‘What you all comin’ to dinner so soon
for?’ Then she looked up and see de pot and say: ‘Land sakes, what you all
got?’ Then we puts de big pot down in de middle of de floor and takes off de
lid, and mammy say: ‘Oh! Let’s see what we has!’ She begin to empty de pot
and to count de money. She tell us to watch de door and see dat nobody got
in, ’cause she not at home!

“She say de money ‘mount to $5,700, and she swear us not to say nothin’
’bout findin’ it. She would see what she could find out ’bout it. Weeks after
dat, she tell us a big white friend tell her he hear a friend of his buried
some money and went to war widout tellin’ anybody where it was. Maybe he was
killed and dat all we ever hear.

“My mammy kept it and we all work on just de same and she buy these two
lots on Senate Street. She build de two-story house here at 924, where you
sittin’ now, and de cottage nex’ door. She always had rent money comin’ in
ever since. By and by she die, after my Indian pappy go ‘way and never come
back. Then all de chillun die, ‘ceptin’ me.

“I am so happy dat I is able to spend my old days in a sort of ease,[22]
after strugglin’ most of my young life and gittin’ no learnin’ at school, dat
I sometimes sing my mammy’s old song, runnin’ somethin’ lak dis:

MAMIE RILEY

Ex-Slave

“Aunt Mamie’s” hair is entirely white. She lives in a neat[23]
duplex brick house with one of her husband’s relatives, a
younger woman who is a cook for a well established family in
Estill, S.C. When questioned about the times before the war,
she replied:

“Yes’m, I kin tell you ’bout slav’ry time, ’cause I is one
myself. I don’ remember how old I is. But I remember when de
Yankees come through I bin ’bout so high. (She put her hand
out about 3½ feet from the floor.) We lived on Mr. Henry Solomons’
place—a big place. Mr. Henry Solomons had a plenty
of people—three rows of house, or four.

“When de Yankees come through Mr. Solomons’ place I wuz
right dere. We wuz at our house in de street. I see it all.
My ma tell me to run; but I ain’t think they’d hurt me. I see
’em come down de street—all of ’em on horses. Oo—h, dey
wuz a heap of ’em! I couldn’t count ’em. My daddy run to de
woods—he an’ de other men. Dey ran right to de graveyard.
Too mucha bush been dere. You couldn’t see ’em. Stay in de
woods three days.

“Dey went to my daddy’s house an’ take all. My daddy ran.
My mother an’ my older sister wuz dere. My ma grab a quilt
off de bed an’ cover herself all over wid it—head an’ all.
And set in a chair dere by de fire. She tell us to git in de
bed—but I ain’t git in. And she yell out when she hear ’em[24]
comin’: ‘Dere’s de fever in heah!’ Six of ’em come to de
door; but dey say dey ain’t goin’ in—dey’ll catch de
fever. Den some more come along. Dey say dey gwine in.
Dey ain’t gwine to take no fever. Fill two sack of ‘tatoes.
White man ask to search all trunk. Dey take two of me Ma’s
good dresses out. Say to wrap ‘tatoes in. I start to
cryin’ den, an’ dey say, ‘Well, git us some sacks den.’ I
knowed where some sacks wuz. I git ’em de sacks. Dey do
’em right. Dey bid ’em goodbye, an’ ax ’em where de man
wuz. Dey give me ‘leven or twelve dollars. I wuz little
an’ ain’t know. My mother never give it to me.

“I stay right on dere after freedom, until after I
married.”

Source: Mamie Riley, Negro about 80 years old, Estill, S.C.

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“I was born near Broad River in de Dutch Fork of Newberry[25]
County. I was a slave of Cage Suber. He was a fair master, but
nothing to brag about. I was small at slavery time and had to
work in de white folks’ house or around the house until I was
big enough to go to de field and work.

“Old Marse Cage always made me fan flies off of him when
he lay down to take a nap. The fan was made out of brushes.

“De white folks had cotton-pickings, corn-shuckings and
quiltings. Dey allus had something to eat at the frolics and
I had to help wid ’em.

“I married John Riser. I moved to town several years ago.”

Source: Susie Riser (80), Newberry, S.C.
Interviewer: G.L. Summer, Newberry, S.C., May 17, 1937.

ISOM ROBERTS

EX-SLAVE 80 YEARS OLD

Isom Roberts rents one room at 1226 Waverly Street, Columbia, S.C.,[26]
and lives alone. However frail he appears, he is able to support himself
by working in the yards about the city.

“Well, sir, white folks, I is eighty years old, or leastwise I is so
close to it, dat it don’t make much difference. But even if I is dat old,
it don’t seem so long since I was a little boy. Years flies by mighty fas’
to old folks, ’cause deir ‘memberance is shorter, while young folks ‘members
everything, and in dat way months and years drags ‘long slower to them.

“I was a very small boy when de Civil War was gwine on. It seems like
I knows all ’bout Sherman’s army comin’ through dis State, a burnin’ Columbia
and destroyin’ and takin’ away everything what folks had. I has heard
so much ’bout slavery and all them times, from my mammy and daddy, dat it
‘pears to me dat I ‘sperienced it all. I ‘spects knowin’ ’bout things is
just ’bout as good and true as seein’ them. Don’t you?

“My daddy and mammy b’long to Marster Sam Louie, who had a big plantation
over in Calhoun County. He had ’bout fifty or more grown slaves,
‘sides many chillun of de slaves. Old marster was a good farmer; raised
big crops and saved what he made. He sho’ was a fine business man but he
was mighty hard on everybody he had anything to do wid. He told his slaves
to work hard and make him a heap of money and that he would keep it, in
case of hard times. Times was all de time hard wid old marster but de niggers
never got no money. When news spread ’round dat de Yankees was comin’
to free de niggers, he called all de slaves up in de yard and showed them[27]
a big sack of money, what they had made for him, and told them dat he was
gwine to kill all of them befo’ de Yankees set them free and that they
wouldn’t need no money after they was done dead. All de slaves was mighty
sad and troubled, all dat day, when old marster made dat speech to them. But
somethin’ happened. It most makes me tremble to talk to you ’bout it now.
Providence, or some kind of mercy spirit, was sho’ walkin’ ’round dat plantation
dat night. Sometime in de night it was whispered ’round amongst de slaves
dat old marster done took de smallpoxes and was mighty sick. Mammy said he
must have been terrible sick, ’cause they buried him two days after dat.

“After old marster flew away, everything was different on de plantation.
Miss Nancy, dat was old marster’s wife, told de slaves dat when de Yankees
freed them, they could stay right there and work on shares or by the day, which
ever way they wanted. Many stayed on de plantation after freedom while others
went away. Me and my folks stayed on wid Miss Nancy until she die. Then us
moved on another plantation in de lower side of de county. I stayed dere until
my wife died, seventeen years ago.

“Does I ‘member anything ’bout how de slaves was treated in slavery
time? Well, I ‘members a little myself and a heap of what others told me. Wid
dis I has done told you, I believes I want to stop right dere. A low fence is
easier to git over than a high one. Say little and you ain’t gwine to have a
heap to ‘splain hereafter. Dere is a plenty of persons dat has lost deir heads
by not lettin’ deir tongues rest. Marster Sam Louie is dead now. He can’t disturb
nobody in his grave. He had his faults and done many things wrong but
show me dat person what don’t mis-step sometimes. All of us, both white and
black, is prone to step aside now and then. To tell de truth, old marster never
knowed what Sunday was. Everybody on de plantation worked on dat day as[28]
same as any other day.

“But Boss, if my old marster was rough and hard and break de Sabbath
and all dat, he was no worser than what young white folks and niggers is
dese days. You can see them any time, floppin’ ’bout in dese automobiles,
a drinkin’ and a carryin’ on. Sich stuff is abomination in de sight of a
decent person, much less dat One up yonder. (He pointed upward).

“I’s gwine to tell you boss, dat slavery time was better for de average
nigger than what they is gittin’ now. Folks say dat slavery was wrong
and I ‘spose it was, but to be poor like a heap of niggers is now, is de
worse thing dat has ever come upon them, I thinks. Dis gittin’ something
wrong, ain’t right. De North had no business sellin’ niggers to de South
and de South had no business buyin’ them from de North and makin’ slaves
of them. Everything went on pretty nice for awhile, then de North got jealous
of de South and de South got ‘spicious of de North. I believes dat if
you can’t go over and you can’t go under, then you should try to go ’round.
If de big men up North and here in de South had been good ‘nough and smart
‘nough, they might could a gone ’round dat terrible Civil War. I believes
dat.

“I marry Lucy Nelson when I was ’bout thirty years old. She was a
bright skin nigger, much brighter than I is. She was high tempered and high
spirited, too. She was sho’ smart, and de best cook I has ever seen. Just
plain corn bread, dat she cooked in de hot ashes of de fireplace, taste
sweeter and better than de cake you buy now. But de least thing would git
her temper ‘roused. I has knowed her to complain wid de old hound dog us had,
’cause he didn’t run some rabbits out de woods for me to shoot. Fuss wid de
cats, ’cause they didn’t ketch de mouses in de house. Quarrel wid de hens,[29]
’cause they eat, cackled, scratched and wallowed holes in de yard and wouldn’t
lay. Told de old rooster many times dat she was gwine to chop his head off
if he didn’t crow sooner and louder of mornin’s and wake me up so I could
go to work. All dis sounds foolish I knows but you see how bent my back is.
Well, I ‘spects it was bent from totin’ so many buckets of water from de
spring for her to wash wid soon of mornin’s, so I could then do a day’s
work.

“My wife thought she was doin’ right by workin’ like she did. She
thought dat she was helpin’ me make a livin’ for our big family of eight
chillun. Yes sir, I knows now she was right, but hard work broke her health
and brought her to her bed where she lingered ’bout one year and then she
went away from me. All dis took place seventeen years ago and, from then to
dis, I ain’t seen no woman I would have for a wife, ’cause I ain’t gwine to
find no woman Lucy’s equal. All my chillun are dead, ‘cept two, and I don’t
know where they is.

“Does poor folks have any blessings and pleasure? Well, yes sir, in a
way. You see they don’t have no worriments over what they has, like rich
folks. They can sleep as hot as they want to in de summer time and raise as
big families as anybody. Sho’, poor folks, and especially niggers, has a
good time on hog-killin’ days. In early summer come them juicy brierberries
dat they enjoy so much. They last until watermelon season. Then they has
‘possum and ‘tators in de fall. Most all livin’ beings has deir own way of
doin’ things and deir way of existin’. De hog roots for his, de squirrel
climbs for his, de chickens scratches for deirs, and de nigger, well, if
dere ain’t nobody lookin’, I reckon they could slip deirs right handy.

“I sho’ has enjoyed talkin’ to you dis evening and now, if you will
‘scuse me, I’s gwine home and cook me a pot of turnips. I can almost taste[30]
them now, I is so hungry.”

ALEXANDER ROBERTSON

EX-SLAVE 84 YEARS OLD.

Alexander Robertson lives as a member of the household of his son,[31]
Charley, on the General Bratton plantation, four miles southeast of White
Oak, S.C. It is a box-like house, chimney in the center, four rooms, a
porch in front and morning glory vines, in bloom at this season, climbing
around the sides and supports. Does Alexander sit here in the autumn sunshine
and while the hours away? Nay, in fact he is still one of the active,
working members of the family, ever in the fields with his grandchildren, poke
around his neck, extracting fleecy cotton from the bolls and putting it deftly
into the poke. He can carry his row equally as well as any of the six grandchildren.
He has a good appetite at meal time, digestive organs good, sleeps
well, and is the early riser in the mornings. He says the Negro half of his
nature objects to working on Saturday afternoon, and at such times his tall
figure, with a green patch cloth over the left eye, which is sightless, may
be seen strolling to and fro on the streets of Winnsboro.

“Well, well! If it ain’t de youngun dat use to sell me sugar, coffee,
fat back and meal, when he clerk for Calvin Brice & Company, at Woodward, in
’84 and ‘long dere.

“I hopes you is well dis mornin’. I’s told to come to Winnsboro and
gits blanks for a pension. Andy Foster, man I knows, d’rect me up dese steps
and bless God I finds you. You wanna ask me some questions? Well, here I is,
more than glad to answer, if I can. Where I born? Strange as it seems, I born
right here in Winnsboro. My name set down in a book: ‘Alexander-boy-mother,
Hannah, wench of James Stewart’. Dat de way it was read to me by Dr. Beaty, dat
marry a Miss Cherry and live in Rock Hill. If slavery had never been done ‘way[32]
wid, dat would be my master today, ’cause him lak hound dogs and I lak a
hound dog. Dat kind of breed got a good nose and make good ‘possum dog.
Marster Jim tell me one time, dat de first dog sprung from a wolf, and dat
fust dog was a hound dog. Dat out dat fust dog, (must to a been a bitch,
don’t you reckon?) come all dogs. I follow his talk wid belief, ’bout de
setters, pointers, and blood hounds, even to de fices, but it strain dat
belief when it git to de little useless hairy pup de ladies lead ’round
wid a silver collar and a shiney chain. Well, you don’t care to hear anymore
’bout dat? What is de question?

“My master at de fust, was Marster Jim Stewart and my mistress was
his wife, Mistress Clara. They have two chillun. I ‘member Marster Jim and
Miss Lizzie; they live in a fine house befo’ de war, ’round yonder close to
Mt. Zion College. My mother was de cook and I was de house boy. They had a
big plantation ’bout two miles out, sorta southwest of Boro, I mean Winnsboro,
of course, but de country people still call it Boro.

“On dat plantation was many two-room houses, brick chimneys in de
middle, for de plantation slaves. In de growin’ season I go wid marster
every day, not to drive, too small for dat, just to hold de hoss, when him
git out and then I run errands for him, ’round de house and in de fields.

“My mother had another child, Willie Finch. A colored man name of
Finch is his father but her and de white folks never tell me who my father
was. I have to find out dat for myself, after freedom, when I was lookin’
’round for a name. From all I hear and ‘pear in de lookin’ glass, I see I
was half white for sure, and from de things I hear, I conclude I was a Robertson
which have never been denied. Maybe it best just to give no front
names. Though half a nigger, I have tried to live up to dat name, never took[33]
it in dat court house over yonder, never took it in dat jail or dat calaboose.
I’s paid my debts dollar for dollar and owe no man nothin’ but good
will.

“What de Yankees do when they come? Let other people tell dat, but
seem lak they lay de whole town in ashes, ‘cept de college and our house close
to it, dat they use for de officers while they was in Boro. Why they hear
sumpin’ bout de Davis name techin’ de St. John ‘Piscopal Church and they march
’round dere, one cold February Sunday mornin’, set it afire, and burn it up.
Mother and me went to de plantation and stayed dere ’til they left.

“When freedom come, I was twelve years old. Mother marry a Finch;
Bill was de name of him. Our nex’ move was to Dr. Madden’s place, just north
of Boro. Us farm up dere and I do de hoein’. I live dere thirteen years. I
got to feelin’ my oats and tired of workin’ for a plum black nigger, I did.
Maybe I ought to been more humble but I wasn’t.

“I ask myself one night: ‘What you gonna do, stay here forever
for your vittles and clothes?’ Then come over my mind I old ‘nough for to
marry. Who I gwine to marry? It pop right in dis head, Sarah was de gal for
me. I rode old Beck down dere de nex’ Sunday; dat was in December. I come
right to de point wid her and de old folks. They ‘low they have no objections
if I could take care of her. I say I try to. They say: ‘Dat ain’t ‘nough,
‘range yourself for another year and then come and git her’.

“De Lord directs me. I’s down here payin’ my poll, too. Marster Tom
Shanty Brice come in as us come out. I ask him if he need a hand for nex’ year.
He look me up from top to bottom and say: ‘What’s your name?’ I show him my
tax receipt. He hire me than and dere. I go right straight to Sarah and us
tell de old folks. Rev. Gordon marry us de 29th of January, 1879. Us has[34]
seven chillun. Alex, dat’s de one name for me, is in Tampa, Florida.
Carrie marry a Coleman and is in Charlotte, N.C. Jimmie is dead. Thomas
is in Charleston, S.C. Emma marry a Belton and lives wid her husband in
Ridgeway, S.C. I stay wid my son, Charley, up de country.

“I voted one time in 1876, for Gov. Chamberlain, but when I moved
to Marster Tom Brice’s I thought so much of him, I just quit voting. I
would lak to vote one more time to say: ‘I have vote one time wid de black
part of my nature, dis time I votes wid de white side of my nature.’ What
you laughin’ ’bout? If it was de call of dark blood de fust time, maybe it’s
de call of de white blood dis time. You have no idea de worry and de pain a
mulatto have to carry all his eighty-four years. Forced to ‘sociate wid one
side, proud to be related to de other side. Neither side lak de color of
your skin. I jine de Methodist church here in Boro and ‘tend often as I can
and as I hear my preacher Owens preach, dat dere will be no sex in hebben, I
hopes and prays dat dere’ll be no sich thing as a color line in hebben.

“Who de best white men I ever know? Mr. Tom Brice, Mr. W.L. Rosborough,
Mr. Watt Sinonton, and Mr. August Nicholson. Master Bill Beaty, dat
marry my young mistress, Elizabeth, was a fine man.

“What I think of Abe Lincoln? What I think of Mr. Roosevelt? Dere
de color come up again. De black say Mr. Lincoln de best President us ever
have; de white say us never have had and never will have a President equal of
Mr. Roosevelt.”

CHARLIE ROBINSON

EX-SLAVE 87 YEARS OLD.

Charlie Robinson lives nine miles northwest of Winnsboro, S.C., on[35]
lands of Mr. R.W. Lemmon. There is one other occupant in the four-room
house, John Giles, a share cropper. The house has two fireplaces, the
brick chimney being constructed in the center of the two main rooms. The
other two rooms are shed rooms. Charlie ekes out a living as a day laborer
on the farm.

“They been tellin’ me to come to de social circle and see ’bout my pension
but I never is got dere. It been so hot, I hate to hotfoot it nine miles
to Winnsboro and huff dat same distance back on a hot summer day.

“Glad you come out here but sorry of de day, ’cause it is a Friday and
all de jay-birds go to see de devil dat day of de week. It’s a bad day to begin
a garment, or quilt or start de lye hopper or ‘simmon beer keg or just anything
important to yourself on dat day. Dere is just one good Friday in de
year and de others is given over to de devil, his imps, and de jay-birds. Does
I believe all dat? I believes it ‘nough not to patch dese old breeches ’til
tomorrow and not start my ‘simmon beer, when de frost fall on them dis fall,
on a Friday.

“You wants me to set down so you can ask me sumpin’? I’ll do dat! Of
course I will! (He proceeded to do so—wiping his nose on his sleeve and
sprawling down on the doorsill). My pappy name George, black George they call
him in slavery time, ’cause dere was a small yallow slave on de place, named
George. My mammy name Ca’line. My pappy b’long to de McNeals and my mammy
b’long to Marse Joe Beard. His wife was my mistress. Her name Miss Gracie.[36]
‘Nitials? Dat sumpin’ not in my lingo, Boss. You want to know what my pappy’s
old marster name? Seem to me they call him Marse Gene, though it been so long
I done forgot. When my marster went to de war him got a ball through his leg.
Bad treatment of dat leg give him a limp for de balance of his days. White
folks call him ‘Hoppin’ Joe Beard’ and sometime ‘Lopin’ Joe’.

“Marster and mistress have two chillun. I play marbles wid them and make
mud pies. Deir names was Marse Willie and Miss Rhoda.

“My brudders and sisters was Jeff, Roland, Jane and Fannie. All dead
‘cept Fannie. Her marry a big, long nigger name Saul Griffin. Last I heard of
them, they was livin’ in Columbia, S.C.

“I start workin’ in de field de second year of de war, 1862. It sho’ made
me hungry. I ‘members now, how I’d git a big tin cupful of pot liquor from de
greens, crumble corn bread in it at dinner time and ‘joy it as de bestest part
of de dinner. Us no suffer for sumpin’ to eat. I go all summer in my shirt-tail
and in de winter I have to do de best I can, widout any shoes. Ever since then,
I just lak to go barefooted as you sees me now.

“My pappy git a pass and come to see mammy every Saturday night. My marster
had just four slave houses on de place. ‘Spect him have ’bout eight women,
dat men come from other places to see and marry them and have chillun. I doesn’t
‘member nary one of de women havin’ a husband livin’ wid her every night.

“Who do de plowin’? Women and boys do de plowin’. Had good ‘nough houses,
though they was made of logs, ‘cup and saddled’ at both ends, and covered wid
white oak board shingles. Had stick and mud chimneys.

“De Yankees made a clean sweep of everything, hosses, mules, cows, hogs,
meat and ‘lasses. Got so mad when they couldn’t find any salt, they burn up
everything. Pull Marse Joe’s beard, just ’cause him name Beard. De one dat do[37]
dat was just a smart aleck and de cap’n of de crowd shame him and make him
slink ‘way, out de house.

“When freedom come, Marse Joe stay one year, then leave. Sell out and
move to Walhalla and us move to pappy on de McNeal place. Dat year us all
jined de church, Union Church. I now b’longs to New Hope Methodist Church.
Us nex’ move to Mr. Bill Crawford’s place. Mr. Crawford got to be school
commissioner on de ‘publican ticket and white folks call him scalawag. Him
have pappy and all de colored folks go to de ‘lection box and vote. Ku Klux
come dere one night and whip every nigger man they could lay deir hands on.
Things quiet down then but us no more go to de ‘lection box and vote.

“‘Bout dis time thoughts of de gals got in my head and feets at de same
time. I was buyin’ a biled shirt and celluloid collar, in Mr. Sailing Wolf’s
store, one Saturday, and in walked Ceily Johnson. I commence to court her right
then and dere, befo’ I ever git inside dat shirt and collar. Her have dark skin
and was good to look at, I tell you. I de-sash-shay ’bout dat gal, lak a chicken
rooster spread his wing ’round a pretty black pullet, ’til I wear out her indifference
and her make me happy by marryin’ me. Her was too good lookin’ and
too bad doin’, though, for me. She left by de light of de moon when us was livin’
on de Cummings place, ‘bove town. Excuse me now, dat’s still a fresh subject of
torment to me. Let’s talk ’bout chances of gittin’ dat pension, when I can git
another clean white shirt, lay ’round de white folks again, and git dis belly
full of pot liquor.”

AL ROSBORO

EX-SLAVE 90 YEARS OLD.

Al Rosboro, with his second wife, Julia, a daughter, and six small[38]
grandchildren, lives in a three-room frame house, three hundred yards east of
the Southern Railway track and US #21, about two miles south of Woodward, S.C.,
in Fairfield County. Mr. Brice gives the plot of ground, four acres with the
house, to Al, rent free. A white man, Mr. W.L. Harvey does the ploughing of
the patches for him. Al has cataracts on his eyes and can do no work. Since
this story was written he has received his first old age pension check of
eight dollars from the Social Welfare Board in Columbia, S.C.

“Does I know what a nonagenarian is? No seh, what dat? Old folks?
Well, dats a mighty long name and I been here a mighty long time. Glad you
say it’s a honor and a privilege by de mercy of de Lord. I’s thankful! You
wants to know where I was born and who my white folks then?

“I was born just one and a half mile b’low White Oak, S.C., on de
old Marse Billie Brice place. My pappy b’long to old Miss Jennie Rosboro, but
mammy b’long to Marse William Brice. Her name Ann. My old mistress name Mary,
daughter of de Simontons, on Dumpers Creek.

“You wants de fust thing I ‘members, then travel ‘long de years ’til
I come to settin’ right here in dis chair. Well, reckon us git through today?
Take a powerful sight of dat pencil to put it all down.

“Let me see. Fust thing I ‘members well, was a big crowd wid picks
and shovels, a buildin’ de railroad track right out de other side of de big
road in front of old marster’s house. De same railroad dat is dere today. When
de fust engine come through, puffin’ and tootin’, lak to scare ‘most everybody to[39]
death. People got use to it but de mules and bosses of old marster seem
lak they never did. A train of cars a movin’ ‘long is still de grandest
sight to my eyes in de world. Excite me more now than greyhound busses,
or airplanes in de sky ever do.

“I nex’ ‘members my young misses and young marsters. Dere was
Marse John; he was kilt in de war. Marse Jim, dat went to de war, come back,
marry, and live right here in Winnsboro. Marse Jim got a grandson dat am in
de army a sailin’ air-ships. Then dere was Marse William; he moved off. One
of de gals marry a Robertson, I can’t ‘member her name, tho’ I help her to
make mud pies many a day and put them on de chicken coop, in de sun, to dry.
Her had two dolls; deir names was Dorcas and Priscilla. When de pies got
dry, she’d take them under de big oak tree, fetch out de dolls and talk a
whole lot of child mother talk ’bout de pies, to de Dorcas and Priscilla rag
dolls. It was big fun for her tho’ and I can hear her laugh right now lak
she did when she mince ’round over them dolls and pies. Dere was some poor
folks livin’ close by and she’d send me over to ‘vite deir chillun over to
play wid her. They was name Marshall. Say they come from Virginny and was
kin to de highest judge in de land. They was poor but they was proud. Mistress
felt sorry for them but they wouldn’t ‘cept any help from her.

“Well, when I git twelve years old, marster give me to his son,
Marse Calvin, and give Marse Calvin a plantation dat his son, Homer, live on
now. I ‘member now old marster’s overseer comin’ to de field; his name was
McElduff. Him say: ‘Al, Marse William say come to de house’. I goes dere
on de run. When I git dere, him ‘low: ‘Calvin, I wants you to take Al, I
give him to you. Al, you take good care of your young marster’. I always
did and if Marse Calvin was livin’ he’d tell you de same.[40]

“I forgit to tell you one thing dat happen down dere befo’ I
left. Dere was a powerful rich family down dere name Cockrell; I forgits
de fust name. Him brudder tho’, was sheriff and live in Winnsboro. Dere
was a rich Mobley family dat live jinin’ him, two miles sunrise side of
him. One day de Cockrell cows got out and played thunder wid Mr. Mobley’s
corn. Mr. Mobley kilt two of de cows. Dat made de Cockrells mad. They
too proud to go to law ’bout it; they just bide deir time. One day Marse
Ed Mobley’s mules got out, come gallopin’ ’round and stop in de Cockrell
wheat field. Him take his rifle and kill two of them mules. Dat made Mr.
Mobley mad but him too proud to go to law ’bout it. De Mobley’s just bide
deir time. ‘Lection come ’round for sheriff nex’ summer. No Cockrell was
‘lected sheriff dat time. You ask Mr. Hugh Wylie ’bout dat nex’ time him
come to de Boro. Him tell you all ’bout it.

“Dat call to my mind another big man, dat live ‘bove White Oak then,
Marse Gregg Cameron. He was powerful rich, wid many slaves. Him lak to bar-room
and drink. Him come by marster’s house one day, fell off his hoss and de
hoss gallop on up de road. Dat was de fust drunk man I ever see. Marster
didn’t know what to do; him come into de house and ask Mistress Mary. Him tell
her him didn’t want to scandal de chillun. She say: ‘What would de good Samaritan
do?’ Old marster go back, fetch dat groanin’, cussin’, old man and put
him to bed, bathe his head, make Sam, de driver, hitch up de buggy, make West
go wid him, and take Marse Gregg home. I never see or hear tell of dat white
man anymore, ’til one day after freedom when I come down here to Robinson’s
Circus. Him drop dead dat day at de parade, when de steam piano come ‘long
a tootin’. ‘Spect de ‘citement, steam, and tootin’, was too much for him.

“Niggers never learn to read and write. It was ‘ginst de law. White
folks fear they would write deir passes and git ‘way to de free states.[41]

“Us slaves ‘tend Concord Church, tho’ Marse Calvin jine de Seceders
and ‘tend New Hope. Why us go to Concord? ‘Cause it too far to walk to New
Hope and not too far to walk to Concord. Us have not ‘nough mules for all to
ride, and then de mules need a rest. I now b’longs to Bethany Presbyterian
Church at White Oak. Yes sah, I thinks everybody ought to jine de church for
it’s de railroad train to git to hebben on.

“Marse Calvin went to de war. Him got shot thru de hand. Yankees
come and burn up everything him have. Wheeler’s men just as bad.

“After freedom I got mannish. Wid not a drop of blood in me but de
pure African, I sets out to find a mate of de pure breed. ‘Bout de onliest
place I could find one of dis hatchin’, was de Gaillard quarter. I marry
Gabrielle. Live fust years at de Walt Brice McCullough place, then move to
de Vinson place, then to de preacher Erwin place. Dat was a fine preacher,
him pastor for Concord. Him lak to swap hosses. When him come down out de
pulpit him looks ’round, see a hoss him lak, soon as not him go home to dinner
wid de owner of dat hoss. After dinner him say: ‘If it wasn’t de Sabbath,
how would you trade dat hoss for my hoss?’ More words pass between them, just
supposin’ all de time it was Monday. Then Mr. Erwin ride back dere nex’ day
and come back wid de hoss him took a fancy for.

“Mr. Erwin move when he git a call to Texas. I moves to de Bob
Sinonton place. From dere I goes to de Jim Brice place, now owned by young
Marse James Brice. I been dere 32 years. Gabrielle and me generate thirteen
chillun, full blooded natural born Africans, seven boys and six gals. Then
Gabrielle die and I marry Julia Jenkins. Us have five chillun, one boy and
four gals. I’s done a heap for my country. I wants Mr. Roosevelt to hear
’bout dat; then maybe him make de country do sumpin’ for me.”

TOM ROSBORO

EX-SLAVE 79 YEARS OLD.

Tom Rosboro lives with his daughter, Estelle Perry, in a three-room frame[42]
house, on Cemetery Street, Winnsboro, S.C. The house stands on a half-acre
plot that is used for garden truck. Estelle owns the fee in the house and lot.
Tom peddles the truck, eggs, and chickens, in the town and the suburban Winnsboro
mill village.

“My pappy was name Tom, just lak I is name Tom. My mammy was name Sarah
but they didn’t b’long to de same marster. Pappy b’long to old Marse Eugene
McNaul. Mammy b’long to old Marse John Propst. De ownership of de child followed
de mammy in them days. Dat throwed me to be a slave of old Marse John
Propst.

“My young marsters was name Marse Johnnie, Marse Clark, Marse Floyd, and
Marse Wyatt. I had two young misses. Miss Elizabeth marry a McElroy and Miss
Mamie marry a Landecker. You know Marse Ernest Propst dat run dat ladies’ garment
store and is a member of de Winnsboro Town Council? Yes? Well, dat is one
of Marse Floyd Propst chillun.

“I hear mammy say dat daddy’s mistress was name Miss Emma but her mistress
and my mistress was name Miss Margaret. My daddy have to have a pass every time
he come to see mammy. Sometime they give him a general pass for de year. Sometime
him lose de pass and then such a gwine on you never did see de lak. Make
more miration (hullabaloo) over it than if they had lost one of de chillun. They
was scared de patarollers (patrollers) would come ketch him, and lay de leather
whip on his naked back. He wouldn’t dare stay long. Him would go back soon, not
on de big road but through de woods and fields, so as not to meet de patarollers.[43]

“Who was my brothers and sisters and where is they? Brother Ben and Sister
Mamie is dead and in glory. Dat’s all de chillun mammy had a chance to have,
’cause she was a good woman and would never pay any ‘tention to de men slaves on
de Propst place. Her was faithful to pappy through thick and thin, whichever it
be.

“I doesn’t ‘member much ’bout de Yankees, though I does ‘members de Ku
Klux. They visit pappy’s house after freedom, shake him, and threaten dat, if
him didn’t quit listenin’ to them low-down white trash scalawags and carpetbaggers,
they would come back and whale de devil out of him, and dat de Klan would
take notice of him on ‘lection day.

“When I was ’bout seventeen years old, I come to de Boro (Winnsboro) one
Saturday evenin’ and seen a tall willowy gal, black she was but shiny, puttin’
them foots of her’n down on de pavement in a pretty gamecock pullet kind of way,
as if to say: ‘Roosters look at me.’ I goes over to Mr. Landecker’s store, de
Mr. Landecker dat marry Miss Mamie Propst, and I begs him to give me a cigar. I
lights dat cigar and puts out after her. I ketches up wid her just as she was
comin’ out of Mr. Sailing Wolfe’s Jew store. I brush up ‘ginst her and say:
‘Excuse me lady.’ Her say: ‘I grants your pardon, Mister. I ‘spects smoke got
in your eyes and you didn’t see me.’ I say: ‘Well, de smoke is out of my eyes
now and they will never have sight for any other gal but you as long as I live.’
Black as she was, her got red in de face and say: ‘Who is you?’ I say: ‘Tom
Rosboro. What might be your name, lovely gal?’ Her say: ‘My name is Mattie
Nelson.’ I say: ‘Please to meet you, Sugar Plum.’ Her say: ‘I live down at
Simpson’s Turnout. Glad to have you come down to see me sometime.’ After dat
us kep’ a meetin’ in Winnsboro, every Saturday, ’til one day us went ’round to
Judge Jno. J. Neils’ law office and him married us. Me and Mat have our trials[44]
and tribulations and has went up and down de hills in all kind of weather.
Us never ceased to bless dat day dat I run into her at Mr. Sailing Wolfe’s
store.

“How come I name Rosboro? I just picked it up as a mighty pretty name.
Sound better than Propst or McNaul and de Rosboro white folks was big buckra
in dat time.

“Us had lots of chillun; raise some and lost some. I have a son, Charlie,
dat’s a barber in Washington, D.C. Lucy, a daughter, marry Tank Hill. Nan
marry Banks Smith. Estelle marry Jim Perry but her is a widow now. Her bought
a house and lot wid de insurance money from Dr. McCants. She has a nice house
on Cemetery Street, wid water and ‘lectric lights. Her got four chillun. When
my wife die, two years ago, I move in wid Estelle and her four chillun. Her
make money by washin’ and ironin’ for de white folks. Me and de chillun picks
cotton and ‘tends to de makin’ and de peddlin’ of garden truck and sich lak.
Ah, us is a happy family but I ain’t ‘bove usin’ some of dat old age pension
money, if I can git it.”

INTERVIEW WITH
REUBEN ROSBOROUGH, RIDGEWAY, S.C.,
EX-SLAVE—82 YEARS, 3 MONTHS OLD

“No sir, I can ‘member nothin’ ’bout de State of Verginny, where pappy[45]
said us was born. He told me, when I was ’bout two years old he and mammy
Kitty was took from somewhar in dat state to Richmond, wid de understandin’
to sell us as a family, and to give a man name Johnson, de preference. He
say de trader couldn’t find de man Johnson, and sold us to my marster, John
Rosborough. My pappy name William, my brothers, Tom and Willie and my sisters,
Mary and Alice.

“My marster was a kind and tender man to slaves. You see a man love
hosses and animals? Well, dat’s de way he love us, though maybe in bigger
portion, I ‘low. Marster John never marry. Set down dere dat he was good
enough to buy my old gran’ mammy Mary, though she never could do much work.

“Us knowed dat our gran’pappy was a white man back in Verginny, but
dat was her secret, dat she kept locked in her breast and carried it wid her
to de grave. You say I’s very light color myself? So I is, so was she, so
was pappy. Ease your mind, us had none of de white Rosborough in us. Us come
on one side from de F.F.V’s. I’s proud of dat, and you can put down dere dat
deres no poor white trash blood in dese old veins, too.

“De last part of de war I worked some in de field, but not enough to
hurt. My Marster was a Presbyterian, b’longed to Aimwell Church. Two or three
acres in cemetery dere now, but they done move de church into de town of
Ridgeway.

“Money was not worshipped then like it is now. Not much use of it.[46]
Marster raised all we eat and made all we wear right dere on de place, ’bout
five miles north of Ridgeway.

“I guess Marster John had forty slaves. Us live in two-story log house
wid plank floor. Marster John die, us ‘scend to his brother Robert and his
wife Mistress Mary. I played wid her chillun. Logan was one and Janie the
other. My marster and mistress was good to me. I use to drive de mules to de
cotton gin. All I had to do was to set on de long beam and crack my whip every
now and then, and de mules would go ’round and ’round. Dere was three hundred
and seventy-six acres in dat place. I own part of it today. I b’longs to Good
Hope Church. I sure believes in de Lord, and dat His mercies is from everlastin’
to everlastin’ to them dat fears Him.

“‘Member but little ’bout de war for freedom, ‘cept dat some of de slaves
of marster was sent to de front to use pick and shovel to throw up breast works,
and things of dat nature. My pappy was de foreman and stayed at home, carry on
whilst Marster Robert go.

“‘Deed I recollects ’bout de Yankees. They come and ask my pappy, de foreman,
where was de mules and hosses hid out? Pappy say he don’t know, he didn’t
carry them off. They find out a boy dat knowed; make him tell, and they went
and got de mules and hosses. They took everything and left.

“Doctor Scott was our doctor. Dere was in them days lots of rattlesnakes;
had to be keerful of them. Then us hear lots and had lots of chills and fever.
They found de remedy, but they was way off ’bout what make them come on you.
Some ‘low it was de miasma dat de devil bring ’round you from de swamp and
settle ’round your face whilst you sleep, and soon as he git you to snore you
sniffed it to your liver, lights and gall, then dat make bile, and then you
was wid de chills a comin’ every other day and de fever all de day. Marster
Doctor Hayne done find out dat de skeeter bring de fever and de chills, and[47]
funny, he ‘low dat it is de female skeeter bite dat does de business. You
believe dat? I didn’t at first, ’til old Doctor Lindor tell me dat it was
no harder to believe than dat all disease come into de world when a female
bite a apple in de garden of Eden.

“I think Mr. Lincoln was raised up by de Lord, just like Moses, to
free a ‘culiar people. I think Mr. Roosevelt is de Joshua dat come after
him. No president has done as much for de poor of both races as de one now
president. God bless him and ‘stain him in his visions and work to bring de
kingdom of heaven into and upon de earth.”

GOING DOWN TO DIE

(FOLKLORE)

STORY TOLD BY EX-SLAVE

Boss Man, you talk about de brave soldier[48]
who been in de last big war and
how dey look death in de eye and spit on him. I ain’t see dat
war. It been ‘cross de water. But I know sump’en ’bout de
Civil War. I been young lad when de big gun shoot and de Yankee
pile down from de north.

Talk ’bout being brave. De bravest
thing I ever see was one day at Ashepoo junction. Dat was near
de end of de war. Grant was standing up before Richmond; Sherman
was marching tump-tump through Georgia. I was a stripling
lad den and boy-like I got to see and hear everything. One day
more than all, de overseer sent my pappy to Ashepoo junction to
get de mail. I gone ‘long wid him. Seem like I jest had to go
dat day.

I member dat morning well. When I
get to de junction de train start to come in. What a lot of
train! De air fair smoke up wid dem. They come shouting in
from Charleston, bound up-country.

I stand wid my pappy near de long
trestle, and see de train rock by. One enjine in front pulling
one in de back pushing, pushing, pushing. De train load down
wid soldier. They thick as peas. Been so many a whole ton
been riding on de car roof. They shout and holler. I make big[49]
amaze to see such a lot of soldier—all going down to die.

And they start to sing as they cross de trestle.
One pick a banjo, one play de fiddle. They sing and whoop,
they laugh; they holler to de people on de ground, and sing
out, “Good-bye.” All going down to die.

And it seem to me dat is de most wonderful sight I
ever see. All them soldier, laughing light, singing and
shouting dat way, and all riding fast to battle.

One soldier man say in a loud voice: “Well, boys we
going to cut de Yankee throat. We on our way to meet him and
he better tremble. Our gun greeze up, and our bayonet sharp.
Boys we going to eat our dinner in hell today.”

I turn to my pappy and ax him how can man act like
dat when they going down to die. He answer me: “Dat ain’t
nutting. They n’use to dat. Ain’t you know soldier different?”

But I say: “Pappy, you hear dem talk ’bout eat dinner
in hell?”

He answer me back: “They been in de army ‘long time.
They don’t study hell anymore.”

De train still rumble by. One gang of soldier on de
top been playing card. I see um hold up de card as plain as
day, when de luck fall right. They going to face bullet, but
yet they play card, and sing and laugh like they in their own
house … All going down to die.[50]

De train pull ‘cross de trestle. I stand up and watch
um till he go out of sight ’round de bend. De last thing I
hear is de soldier laugh and sing … All going down to die.

SOURCE: Interview with William Rose, 80, ex-slave of Edisto
Island, S.C., in 1936.

BENJAMIN RUSSELL

EX-SLAVE 88 YEARS.

“I was born fourteen miles north of Chester, S.C. the property[51]
of Mrs. Rebecca Nance. After eighty-eight years, I have a vivid recollection
of her sympathy and the ideal relations she maintained with her
slaves.

“My father was just Baker, my mother just Mary. My father was
bought out of a drove of slaves from Virginia. I have been told my mother
was born on the Youngblood place. (Youngblood name of my mistress’
people in York County.) My father was a slave of a Mr. Russell and lived
two or three miles from the Nance place, where mother lived. He could only
visit her on a written pass. As he was religiously inclined, dutiful and
faithful as a slave, my mother encouraged the relation that included a
slave marriage between my father and mother. My mother in time, had a
log house for herself and children. We had beds made by the plantation’s
carpenter. As a boy I remember plowing from sun to sun, with an hour’s
intermission for dinner, and feeding the horses.

“Money? Yes, sometimes white folks and visitors would give me
coppers, 3-cent pieces, and once or twice dimes. Used them to buy extra
clothing for Sundays and fire crackers and candy, at Christmas. We had
good food. In the busy seasons on the farm the mistress saw to it that the
slaves were properly fed, the food cooked right and served from the big kitchen.
We were given plenty of milk and sometimes butter. We were permitted to
have a fowl-house for chickens, separate from the white folks. We wore warm
clothes and stout brogan shoes in winter; went barefooted from April until
November and wore cotton clothes in summer. The master and some of the[52]
women slaves spun the thread, wove the cloth and made the clothes. My
mother lived in a two-story farm house. Her children were: William, Mattie
and Thomas. We never had an overseer on the place. Sometimes she’d whip
the colored children, but only when it was needed for correction.

“Yes, sir, I went with my young master, William, to Chester
Court House, and saw slaves put on a block and auctioned off to the
highest bidder, just like land or mules and cattle. Did we learn to read
and write? We were taught to read, but it was against the law to teach
a slave to write. The Legislature passed an act to that effect. A number
of cases in which slaves could write, the slave would forge a pass and
thereby get away to free territory. They had a time getting them back.
On one occasion I run in on my young master, William, teaching my Uncle
Reuben how to write. They showed their confusion.

“All slaves were compelled to attend church on Sunday. A
gallery around the interior of the church, contained the blacks. They
were permitted to join in the singing. Favorite preacher? Well, I guess
my favorite preacher was Robert Russell. He was allowed sometimes to use
the white folks school, which wasn’t much in those days, just a little
log house to hold forth in winter. In summer he got permission to
have a brush arbor of pine tops, where large numbers came. Here they sang
Negro spirituals. I remember one was called: ‘Steal away to Jesus.’

“Runaway slaves? Yes, we had one woman who was contrary
enough to run away: Addie, she run off in the woods. My mistress hired her
out to the McDonald family. She came back and we had to pelt and drive her
away.

“How did we get news? Many plantations were strict about this,
but the greater the precaution the alerter became the slaves, the wider[53]
they opened their ears and the more eager they became for outside information.
The sources were: Girls that waited on the tables, the ladies’
maids and the drivers; they would pick up everything they heard and pass
it on to the other slaves.

“Saturday afternoons? These were given to women to do the family
washing, ironing, etc., and the men cut fire wood, or worked in the garden,
and special truck crops. Christmas? Christmas was a holiday, but
the fourth of July meant very little to the slave people. Dances? There
was lots of dancing. It was the pastime of the slave race. The children
played shimmy and other games, imitating the white children, sometimes
with the white folks.

“The master and mistress were very particular about the slave
girls. For instance, they would be driving along and pass a girl walking
with a boy. When she came to the house she would be sent for and questioned
something like this: ‘Who was that young man? How come you with
him? Don’t you ever let me see you with that ape again. If you cannot
pick a mate better than that I’ll do the picking for you.’ The explanation:
The girl must breed good strong serviceable children.

“No, I never saw a ghost, but there was a general belief among
the race in ghosts, spirits, haunts and conjuration. Many believe in
them yet. I can never forget the fright of the time my young master, William
was going off to the war. The evening before he went, a whippoorwill
lighted on the window sill and uttered the plaintive ‘whip-poor-will.’
All the slaves on the place were frightened and awed and predicted bad
luck to Master Will. He took sick in war and died, just wasted away. He
was brought back in rags toward the end of the struggle.[54]

“Mistress always gave the slaves a big dinner on New Year’s Day
and talked to us out of the catechism. She impressed on us after dinner
that time, that we were free. Some were sorry, some hurt, but a few were
silent and glad. I and many of the others had been well treated. When we
were sick she visited us and summoned a doctor the first thing, but the
remedies those days were castor oil, quinine, turpentine, mustard plaster
and bleeding.”

FOLK-LORE: EX-SLAVE

“I was born about 1846, ’cause I was in[55]
de war and was 19 years old when de war was over. I went to
Charleston with my master, Ros Atwood, my mistress’s brother.
My mistress was Mrs. Laura Rutherford and my master at home
was Dr. Thomas Rutherford. We was on Morris Island.

“My father was Allen Rutherford and my
mother Barbara Rutherford. My daddy had come from Chili to
this country, was a harness maker, and belonged awhile to
Nichols. We had a good house or hut to live in, and my work
was to drive cows till I was old ‘nough to work in de fields,
when I was 13. Then I plowed, hoed cotton, and hoed corn ’till
last year of war and den went to Charleston.

“Master paid us no money for work. We
could hunt and fish, and got lots of game around there. We
had dogs but our master didn’t like hounds.

“Col. Daryton Rutherford, doct’s son, had
me for a ‘pet’ on the place. They had overseers who was sometimes
bossy but they wouldn’t allow dem to whip me. One old nigger
named ‘Isom’, who come from Africa, was whipped mighty bad one
day. The padderollers whip me one night when I went off to git
a pair of shoes for an old lady and didn’t git a pass. I was
16 years old then.

“Doctor Rutherford had several farms—I
reckon around 2,000 acres of land. We didn’t have church nor[56]
school but sometimes we had to go to de white folks church and
set in the gallery. We didn’t learn to read and write. The
mistress learnt some of de nigger chaps to read and write a
little.

“We had Saturday afternoons off to wash up
and clean up. When Christmas come the doctor would give us good
things to eat. When we was sick he give us medicine, but some
of de old folks would make hot teas from root herbs.

“We had old time corn-shuckings before and
after freedom. We made sure enough corn den and lots of it—had
four cribs full. When freedom come, the old man had fallen
off a block and was hurt, so one of de overseers told us we was
free and could go if we wanted to. Some of dem stayed on and some
got in the big road and never stopped walking. Then we worked
for ⅓ share of the crops; had our little patch to work, too.

“I was 31 years old when I married first
time. Was living in Mollohon. Her name was Leana and she belonged
to Madison Brooks’s family, as waiting girl. I was married twice,
but had 13 children all by my first wife. I have 14 grandchildren,
and so many great-grandchildren I can’t count them.

“When de Ku Klux was in dat country I lived
wid a man who was one of them. The first I knew about it was when
I went down to de mill, de mule throwed me and de meal, and down
de road I went to running and met a Ku Klux. It was him.

“I think Abe Lincoln and Jeff Davis good men,
but don’t know much about dem.

“I join de church when I was 68 years old
’cause God sent me to do it. I believe all ought to join church.”

SOURCE: Joe Rutherford (92), Newberry, S.C.; Interviewer: G. Leland
Summer, Newberry, S.C.

FOLK-LORE: EX-SLAVE

“I was born about 1849 in the Dutch Fork section[57]
of Newberry County, S.C. I was slave of Ivey Suber and his good
wife. My daddy was Bill Suber and my mammy was Mary Suber. I
was hired by Marse Suber as a nurse in the big house, and I waited
on my mistress when she was sick, and was at her bed when she died.
I had two sisters and a brother and when we was sold they went to
Mr. Suber’s sister and I stayed with him.

“My master was good to his slaves. He give them
plenty to eat, good place to sleep and plenty of clothes. The
young men would hunt lots, rabbits, possums, and birds. My white
folks had a big garden and we had eats from it. They was good
cooks, too, and lived good. We card and spin and weave our own
clothes on mistress’s spinning wheels.

“Marse Suber had one overseer who was good to us.
We went to work at sun-up and worked ’till sun-down, none of us
worked at night. We sometimes got a whipping when we wouldn’t
work or do wrong, but it wasn’t bad.

“We never learned to read and write. We had no
church and no school on the plantation, but we could go to the
white folk’s church and sit in the gallery. Some of us was made
to go, and had to walk 10 miles. Of course, we never thought
much about walking that far. I joined the church because I was
converted; I think everybody ought to join the church.[58]

“The patrollers rode ’round and ketched slaves
who ran away without passes. They never bothered us. When our
work was over at night, we stayed home, talked and went to sleep.
On Saturday afternoons white folks sometimes give us patches of
ground to work, and we could wash up then, too. We raised corn
on the patches and some vegetables. On Sunday we just rested
and went to neighbor’s house or to church. On Christmas we
had big eats.

“Corn-shuckings and cotton-pickings always had
suppers when work was done. Master made whiskey up at his
sister’s place, and at these suppers he had whiskey to give us.

“When we was sick we had a doctor—didn’t believe
much in root teas.

“I married when I was 15 years old at a white
man’s place, Mr. Sam Cannon’s. A negro man named Jake Cannon
married us. Supper was give us by Mr. Sam Cannon after it was
over.

“When freedom came, my mother moved away, but
I stayed on.

“I think Abraham Lincoln was a good man, and
Jeff Davis was a good man. I don’t know anything about Booker
Washington.”

SOURCE: Lila Rutherford (86), Newberry, S.C., RFD
Interviewer: G. Leland Summer, 1707 Lindsey St.,
Newberry, S.C.

Uncle Sabe Rutledge
(Testimony given by old man born 1861, The Ark Plantation.
Horry County—owned by Mr. John Tillman)

“Fust thing I realize to remember, I nuster cry to[59]
go to the old boss—old Massa—for sugar. Massa
say:

“‘Martha, what Newman (he call me that) crying for?’
Ma say, ‘Wanter come to you for sugar!’

“‘Bring the boy here, Martha!’

“He gi’e me sugar.

“Boil salt? Pump! Pump! Pump it! Had a tank.
Run from hill to sea. Had a platform similar to wharf.
And pump on platform. Fetch good high. Go out there on
platform. Force pump. My Grandmother boil salt way
after Freedom. We tote water. Tote in pidgin and keeler—make
out of cedar and cypress. No ‘ting to
crove ’em (groove ’em) compass. Dog-wood and oak rim.
Give it a lap. (This was his description, with pantomime,
of the way pidgin and keelers were made by plantation
carpenters)

“My Grandmother had two pots going. Boil all day
and all night. Biling. Boil till he ticken (thicken)
Cedar paddles stir with. Chillun eat with wooden spoons.
Clay pot? Just broken piece. Indian had big camping
ground on beach near the Ark. After big blow you can
find big piece of pot there. I see Indian. Didn’t see[60]
wild one; see tame one.

“Indigo? Old man Lashie Tillman nuster plant indigo.
Seed lak a flax. Put myrtle seed in with indigo to boil.
Gather and boil for the traffic. All the big folkses
plant that fore the rice. Rice come in circulation, do
way with indigo. Nuster (used to) farm indigo just like
we work our corn. Didn’t have nothing but ox. And the
colored folks—they came next to the ox—Hill keep
advancing out. Reckon you wouldn’t blieve it, but I ken
cummember (Uncle Sabe stutters a bit) when all that beach
been cultivate field. Must be nature for sand hill to
move. Time most got too fast now for the people to live.

“Storm? Oh my Lord! Flagg Storm? Sea naturally
climb right over that hill like it wasn’t nothing. Water
come to King Road. Reckon it would a come further if the
wind didn’t shift.

“Calls this ‘The Ridge.’ Why? I first man settle
here. Oak Ridge. (It is the highest land between the
Waccamaw river and the ocean.) Just name it so.

“Member the shipwreck. Two men and lady come to the
Ark. Stormy time. Massa take them to town. Old anchor
there now. Come a blow you kin see it. Water rise over
it high tide.

“Ma tell me bout they had the to-do. Blockade at
Inlet. Had ’em out to drill (The Yankees came to shore[61]
to drill.) Old man John Tillman lose all he China-a-way!
(chinaware.) Every bit of his china and paints (panes of
glass) out the window. Yankee gun boat sojer (soldier)
to Magnolia to drill. They tack ’em (attacked ’em) to
cut ’em off. When Rebs tack ’em, small boats gone back.
She had to brace ’em. Shoot dem shell to brace. (Gun
boat fired to frighten Rebs who were cutting Yankees off
from escape) I hear old man Frank Norris—lived right
beyond Vettrill Deas—I hear him (nuster come home to
the Ark and trap)—I hear him say lot of ’em bog.
(Ella, Agnes and Johnnie Johnson fadder been there) Bomb
shell hit the hill and bury them in the sand. Had to dig
out.

“Old man John Tillman my boss. Sho treat his people
good. Don’t see why his folks (slaves) went to blockade
(tried to escape and join Yankee gun-boats). Sho treat
his colored folks good. My Grandfather, Rodrick Rutledge,
driver from a boy. Time he big nuff to handle it till
Freedom.

“Couldn’t marry widout consent of boss.” (Remark
from Uncle Sabe’s sister, Mom Jane, who is quite acid.
All her information inherited—she Freedom child)
Mom Jane: “Been to devil and come back now!”

Uncle Sabe—continuing:[62]

“Have sick house; have chillun house.” (All in this
section tell great tales of the ‘chillun house.’ Sounds
a lot like the nurse houses in Russia today. All the
babies were in this day nursery in care of the older
women, too old for field work.) “Corn. Meat—pig,
beef, fish—plenty milk.” (Some cow ‘coffee cow’—that
is give just enough milk for the coffee.)

“Any rice?”

Aunt Jane: (interrupting) “Pick you teet (teeth) to find
the rice! Great God! Now I can buy my rice!”

Uncle Sabe: “Could plant up-land rice to Ark. (This on
coast away from fresh water)

“Ash cake? Meal, salt, water. Not a grease! Not a
grease! See Mudder cook it many a hundred day!”

Mom Jane: “Put it in the stove today,—nothing!
Rather have it any day!”

Sabe: “Wrap it in brown paper, mostly. Cows free in
woods. Alligator tail good. Snail built up just like a
conch (whelk). They eat good. Worms like a conch.
Bile conch. Git it out shell. Grind it sausage grinder.
Little onion. Black pepper. Rather eat conch than any
kind of nourishment out of salt water.”

Mom Jane: “Conjur? Wouldn’t turn a hucks bread for ’em.”
(Give a crust.)[63]

Sabe: “What God got lot out for a man he’ll get it.”

“Flat boat full up (with slaves trying to escape)
gone down Waccamaw. Uncle Andrew Aunt the one got he eye
shoot out (by patrollers) took ’em to camp on North
Island. Never see so much a button and pin in my life!
Small-pox in camp. Had to leave ’em.

“Captain Ben and Captain Tom fadder—look how
he die! Looker the blood! Looker the people! Looker
the blood! His boat call ‘The Bull River.’ Up and down
Pee Dee river. Meet flat! Bore hole in flat and women
and chillun go down! Take men off. He COME TO THIS
COUNTRY. (Came down from North before Civil War) Them
darnish Yankee very percruel. (Peculiar?)

“My Great-grandmother Veenia, pirate captured and
took all they money in English war. (Revolution) Dem
day Ladies wear bodkin fastened to long gold chain on
shoulder—needle in ’em and thimble and ting. Coming
down from New York to get away from English. My great
grandmother little chillun. Pirate come to her Missus.
Take all they money—come cut bodkin off her shoulder.
Grandmother ma gone on the boat and twiss herself in
Missus’ skirt. Pirate put ’em off to Wilmington. Come
on down settle to Pitch Landing near Socastee. Keep on
till they get to Ark.

“My Great-Grandma Veenia didn’t have a teet in[64]
her head—one hundred ten years old and could eat hard
a bread as any we.”

Uncle Sabe Rutledge
Burgess, S.C.—P.O.
Horry County
Age 76 (Born 1861)
Ark Plantation.

UNCLE SABE RUTLEDGE

(EX-SLAVE STORY)

“They call him Rogerick Rutledge for shortness. My Grandpa REAL[65]
name Jim. First time I big enough to realect (recollect) him he have on
no pants but something built kinder like overall and have a apron. Apron
button up here where my overall buckle and can be let down. All been dye
with indigo. Have weave shirt—dye with blue indigo boil with myrtle
seed. Myrtle seed must-a-did put the color in. Old brogan shoe on he
foot. Old beaver hat on he head. Top of crown wear out and I member he
have paste-board cover over with cloth and sew in he hat crown. My Grandmother
wear these here gingham cloth call gingham twill.

“Now the chillun! I member I was a big boy grown when I get my first
pants. All boy chillun wear a shirt——long down to knee and lower. Have
belt round the middle—just like you belt to hold ’em. Chillun have not
a shoe! Not a shoe for chillun on us plantation to the Old Ark. First
shoe I have, Pa get a cow hide and tan it. And a man name Stalvey make my
first pair of shoes. I was way near bout grown. Make the sole out the
thickness of the cow hide. Short quarter. No eye—just make the hole.
Last! Yes man! Yes man! Yes man! Keep ’em grease! Them shoe never wear
out!

“We raise all we get to eat. Hominy, cornbread, peas, potatoes, rice.
Morest we plant this here yellow corn. I cry many a day bout that yellow corn![66]
We say, ‘Pa, this here yellow corn make hominy look like he got egg cook
in ’em; red corn look like hominy cook in red molasses!’

“But yellow corn stronger feed! Stronger feed! And Pa know ’em.

“Sunday come go to church in that same blue shirt! Little old
pole church—(gone now)—call ‘Dick Green Bay Church’. (Named for
a local character.) When we go to church before freedom, Mudder and them
have to have the ticket.

“Old man John Tilghman at the Ark Plantation have no overseer—have
‘Driver’. Most folks on Waccamaw have overseer and ‘Driver’. My Pa
been the Ark ‘Driver.’

“Old man Zachariah Duncan been the preacher. That the same man build
the first ‘Heaven Gate’ church after freedom. He got drift lumber on the
river and on the beach. Flat ’em—make a raft and float ’em over to the
hill and the man haul ’em to ‘Heaven Gate’ with ox. Yes. ‘Heaven Gate’
built outer pick up lumber.

“Before freedom Parson Glennie—he was ‘Piscopal—he would come
give us a service once a month on the plantation—so mother said.

“Patches of indigo all through the woods. You know cow eat indigo.
Us have too much ox! Have to haul rail all the time keep up the old fence.[67]
Woods full up with cow. Cattle loose—free. When you want beef have
to hunt for ’em like we hunts deer now. I member some ox I helped broke.
Pete, Bill, Jim, David. Faby was a brown. David kinder mouse color. We
always have the old ox in the lead going to haul rail. Hitch the young
steer on behind. Sometimes they ‘give up’ and the old ox pull ’em by the
neck! Break ox all the time. Fun for us boys—breaking ox. So much
of rail to haul!

“(You can’t tell me bout this pension? Look like to me somebody trying
to smother something. Letters come. Cards come. My name on outside alright.
Tell me to put my name on cards and hand ’em out to my friends. Say send
twenty-five cents. Next time say ‘Send thirty-five cents’. He cool off
then and another man—Mr. Pope come in. Got two letter from him and he
tell me be still till I hear from him again. J.E. Pope. Last blank I
got from Mr. Pope he say not to look for more than thirty or thirty-two
dollars a month. Say there ain’t going to be no two hundred a month.)

“How come I know all these Buh Rabbit story, Mudder spin you know.
Have the great oak log, iron fire dog. Have we chillun to sit by the fireplace
put the light-wood under—blaze up. We four chillun have to pick
seed out the cotton. Work till ten o’clock at night and rise early! Mudder[68]
and Father tell you story to keep you eye open! Pick out cotton seed be
we job every night in winter time—’cept Sunday! When we grow bigger,
Mudder make one card. One would spin and then Mudder go to knitting.
Night time picking these cotton seed out; day time in winter getting wood!

“Fall——harvest peanut, peas, ‘tater!

“I member all them Buh Rabbit story! Mudder tell ’em and we laugh
and wake up! They was one bout Buh Rabbit and Buh Patridge. You know Buh
Patridge the onliest one get the best of Buh Rabbit!

“Buh Rabbit bet Buh Patridge (Buh Rabbit think he so sharp you
know!) He bet Buh Patridge if he fly off down the road a piece and lit
Buh Rabbit can find ’em.—Buh Patridge bet him he can’t! So Buh
Patridge take off and fly down the road a piece and lit—like a Patridge
will do—lit and turn up on he back and rake the leaves over him and
kiver (cover) his body all ‘cept he two foots sticking up like stick!

“Now Buh Rabbit come! He hunt and he hunt and he hunt! Couldn’t
find ’em and he get so hot he take off he coat and hang it on Buh Patridge
foots!

“He go on hunting and after while he call out,

“‘Well I can’t find Buh Patridge! Can’t find Buh Patridge!’

“And Buh Patridge sing out,[69]

“‘Well, Buh Rabbit, here I is! You hang you coat on my feet!’

“Buh Rabbit have to pay the bet! (I don’t member what the bet
was). So Buh Patridge was the onliest one I ever hear bout could get
the best of Buh Rabbit!

“When Father and Mudder tell them story we chillun noddin’! Some
cackle out and all jump up and go back to picking out cotton seed!

“There is another one bout Buh Bear. They goes out my head. I’ll
think them Buh Rabbit up fore you come back Missus!”

And Uncle Sabe, who was sitting on the ‘LOOK OUT’ at the Floral
Beach Fishery, continued to let his eyes play all over the sea like
searchlights, ready to wave the black flag and march down toward the
fishery holding it aloft keeping himself in a line with the fish if fish
were sighted. Since way before what he called ‘the big war’ he and his
people have eaten mullet and rice for the three fall months. His home
was visited before Uncle Sabe was located and children and grand-children,
wife, sister and neighbors were found seated and standing all over the
kitchen floor and piazza floor and steps——each one with a generous tin
plate of rice and fresh, brown, hot ‘spot’——a fish not so valuable in
summer but choice in fall and winter. Two hounds and a large cat worked
around among the feasters for their well chewed bones.[70]

SOURCE: Uncle Sabe Rutledge, The Ridge, Burgess, S.C., (Horry County)
Born first year of the Civil War.

(He owns his house and land,——some twenty-five acres under
cultivation. This is located on what appears to be a ‘height of land’ lying
between the Waccamaw and the Atlantic. Locally it is known as ‘The Sand
Ridge’.)

FOLK-LORE: EX-SLAVES

“I was born in Edgefield county, S.C., about[71]
1854. I was the son of Larkin and Cheny Ryan who was the slaves
of Judge Pickens Butler who lived at Edgefield Courthouse. I has
some brothers and sisters, but don’t remember them all. We lived
in a log house with but one room. We had good beds to sleep in,
and always had plenty to eat. Old Judge Butler was a good man.
I was 10 years old when he died. Before then I worked in and
around the house, and freedom come I stayed with the Butler family
two years, then went to Dr. Maxwell’s.

“In slavery time we had extra patches of
ground to work for ourselves which we sometimes worked on Saturday
afternoons as we had dat time off. Judge Butler used to give us
a little money, too, before freedom come, for our work. We bought
clothes and things we had to have. We had a big plantation garden
dat the overseers planted for all on de place to eat out of.

“We used to hunt ‘possums, rabbits, squirrels,
wild turkeys, doves, partridges, and set traps for partridges and
set box gums for rabbits. We had good food then, plenty peas,
cornbread, and wild game. When winter time come we put on wool
clothes and heavy shoes.

“Old Marse Butler and his mistress was good,
de best folks in de country. They lived in a big house, had a
girl and a boy, and over 1000 or maybe 2,000 acres of land, on
several farms. One was on Saluda River. His overseers some was
no good, but master wouldn’t let them treat slaves cruel, just
light whipping.[72]

“We used to have to wake up at sun-up and
work till sundown. We didn’t learn to read and write; but we had
a prayer house on de plantation where we could go to sometimes,
until freedom come, then we went on to it just the same. Old man
Bennefield, a nigger preacher, talked to us there. I can ‘member
one of de favorite songs we sung:

“None of Major Pickens Butler’s slaves ever
went away from him, but some in de neighborhood did run away, and
day never heard of dem again.

“The paderrollers would catch a nigger if
he didn’t have a pass. Some would pass and re-pass in the road,
and maybe get catched and such scuffling would go on!

“We worked on Saturday afternoons unless
boss give time off to work our own little patches or do some
other work we had to do. But some would frolic then and wash
up for Sunday, or set around. On Sunday we went to church and
talked to neighbors. On Christmas we celebrated by having a
big dinner which the master give us. We had three days holiday
or sometimes a week. We had New Year’s Day as a special day for
working, ’cause it was a sign if we worked good dat day, we would
work good all de year. The white folks had corn-shuckings and
cotton pickings in slavery and after freedom, too. Den would have
big supper. Some neighbors walk ten miles, like walking to church
or to school. Didn’t think anything of walking dat far.[73]

“Some of de games played by children were
marbles, jump-rope.

“Once an old man had his dog trained to say
his prayers. The dog was fed but wouldn’t be allowed to eat until
he put his paws in front and bow his head on dem; de old man say to
him, ‘No, no, you die and go to hell if you don’t say your prayers.’

“Once another fellow, a nigger, said he was
going to his wife’s house to see her; but he had to pass his old
partner’s place on de way, who was dead. When he got opposite
the partner’s place something, maybe a ghost, came to him and
wrestled with him and wouldn’t let him go on to see his wife, so
he come back to his master’s house and stayed.

“When the slaves got sick they had doctors,
and used old herbs. ‘Jerusalem Ore’ was a kind of herb for
children, to build them up, and there was field grass roots and
herb roots which was boiled and tea drunk for fevers. And ‘Primer-rhine’
tea which was drunk, too. Sometimes they would hang garlic
around small boys and girls necks to keep away any kind of sickness.

“We didn’t have schools; started them the second
year after freedom. Old General Butler give us old slaves a home
each and a small patch to work.

“I married when I was 21 years old, the first
time in Edgefield County, now called Saluda County. I have six
children, nine grand-children, and four great-grand-children.

“I think Abe Lincoln was good man and he was
Providential arrangement. I think Jeff Davis was good man, same.
Booker T. Washington is good man, done lots for young niggers. I
rather like it now, and not slavery time. I joined church when I
was 18 to turn from evil ways and to live a better life.”

SOURCE: Henry Ryan (83), Newberry, S.C.; by G. Leland Summer, Newberry, S.C.

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“I live in a rented three-room house with my daughter. I[74]
am too old to do much work, but I work where I can get little jobs
that I can do.

“The slaves did not expect anything after Freedom, for the
South was in such a bad fix. They just got jobs where they could
find them. Most of them worked as share-croppers or wage hands on the
farms, and have worked like this since that time. Some few have rented
farms. When any moved to town they got jobs where they could.

“I never thought much about Reconstruction. Some slaves
voted at first, but when Wade Hampton was elected they didn’t get to
vote much.

“I think the younger generation has too much freedom and
doesn’t stay home enough. They want to have their own way.

“Over in old Edgefield where I was raised we had plenty to
eat; plenty peas, corn bread, turnips and other things. We hunted
wild game, too. I was a slave of Major Pickens Butler. He was a good
man and sometimes gave us a little money for our work. Our master
gave us a small patch of land to work for ourselves and plant anything
we wanted.

“No, I never think anything about voting. I am satisfied
just to get along.”

Source: Henry Ryan (N—83), Newberry, S.C.
Interviewer: G.L. Summer, Newberry, S.C. 8/18/37.

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“I am bad-sick woman, in bed and can’t hardly talk and[75]
can’t ‘member much. I was born near Broad River in de Blair
section. I belonged in slavery to de Blair family. My mudder
and papa was Grace and Samuel Blair, and dey belonged to
Capt. Blair. When dey was sold, I was put in de house wid a
good free nigger woman to raise me and to stay ’till de war
was over. Den I come to de Blair house, and helped around de
house. My sisters could card, spin and weave, and I helped dem
wid it. I didn’t have but one dress. When it got dirty, I went
down to de creek and washed it and put it against de lims to
dry, but I had to put it back on before it got good dry.

“When I got old enough, I worked in de field, hoeing
and picking cotton.”

Source: Emoline Satterwhite (82), Newberry, S.C.
Interviewer: G.L. Summer, Newberry, S.C. May 19, 1937

STORIES OF EX-SLAVES

“Marster Charner Scaife a-laying on his bed of death is[76]
’bout de first thing dat stuck in my mind. I felt sorry fer everybody
den. Miss Mary Rice Scaife, his wife, was mean. She died a year
atter. Never felt sad nor glad den; never felt no ways out of de
regular way, den.

“Overseers I recollects was, Mr. Sam Hughes, Mr. Tom Baldwin,
and Mr. Whitfield Davis. Mr. Baldwin was de best to me. He had a
still-house out in a field whar liquor was made. I tote it fer him.
We made good corn liquor. Once a week I brung a gallon to de big
house to Marster. Once I got happy off’n it, and when I got dar lots
of it was gone. He had me whipped. Dat de last time I ever got happy
off’n Marster’s jug.

“When I was a shaver I carried water to de rooms and polished
shoes fer all de white folks in de house. Sot de freshly polished
shoes at de door of de bed-room. Get a nickle fer dat and dance fer
joy over it. Two big gals cleaned de rooms up and I helped carry out
things and take up ashes and fetch wood and build fires early every
day. Marster’s house had five bedrooms and a setting room. De kitchen
and dining-room was in de back yard. A covered passage kept dem from
getting wet when dey went to de dining-room. Marster said he had
rather get cold going to eat dan to have de food get cold while it
was being fetched to him. So he had de kitchen and dining-room jined,
but most folks had de dining-room in de big house.[77]

“It took a week to take de cotton boat from Chester to
Columbia. Six slaves handled de flat-boat. Dere was six, as I said,
de boatman, two oarsmen, two steermen and an extra man. De steermen
was just behind de boatman. Dey steered wid long poles on de
way up de river and paddled down de river. De two oarsmen was behind
dem. Dey used to pole, too, going up, and paddling going down.
Seventy-five or eighty bales was carried at a time. Dey weighed
around three hundred pounds apiece. In Columbia, de wharfs was on
de Congree banks. Fer de cotton, we got all kinds of supplies to
carry home. De boat was loaded wid sugar and coffee coming back. On
Broad River we passed by Woods Ferry, Fish Dam Ferry, Hendersons
Ferry and Hendersons Island and some others, but dat is all I recollect.
We unloaded at our own ferry, called Scaife Ferry.

“I split rails fer fences. On Christmas we had coffee,
sugar and biscuit fer breakfast.”

Source: Alexander Scaife (82), Box 104, Pacolet, S.C.
Interviewer: Caldwell Sims, Union, S.C.

ELIZA SCANTLING EX-SLAVE

87 Years

“If you wants to know about de slavery times,” said old Aunt[78]
Eliza, “you’se sure come to de right person; ’cause I wuz right
dere.” The statement was easy to believe; for old Aunt Eliza’s
wrinkled face and stiff, bent form bore testimony to the fact
that she had been here for many a year. As she sat one cold
afternoon in December before her fire of fat lightwood knots,
in her one-room cabin, she quickly went back to her childhood
days. Her cabin walls and floor were filled with large cracks
through which the wind came blowing in.

“I gits along pretty good. My chillun lives all around here,
and my granddaughter that’s a-standin’ at the window dere, takes
care of me. Den de government helps me out. It sure is a
blessing, too—to have sech a good government! And ‘Miss
Maggie’ good to me. She brought me dis wood. Brought it in
her truck herself. Had a colored man along to handle it for
her. But I so stiff I sometimes kin hardly move from me waist
down. And sometimes in de morning when I wake, it is all I kin
do to get up an’ wash me face. But I got to do it. My granddaughter
bring me my meals.

“I is 87 years old. I know ’cause I wuz so high when de war
broke out. An’ I plowed my January to July de year ‘fore peace
declare. I remember dat. I wuz a good big girl; but jes’ a
child—not married yet. Yes’m I plowed a mule an’ a wild un
at dat. Sometimes me hands get so cold I jes’ cry. But dey[79]
all say I ‘wuz a nigger what wuz a nigger!’

“In May peace declare. De first president of de country wuz
Lincoln. He took his seat in March. But I work for de white
people ‘fore dat. On a Friday mornin’ our Massa, Mr. Richard
Davant come an’ told us peace declare. He come an’ told us hisself.
I wuz in de cornhouse a-shuckin’ corn to go to de mill
on Saturday. After freedom all de niggers left ‘cept my Mamma.
My father brought us back here to Col. Alex Lawton’s place at
Robertville. He used to belong to Col. Lawton. Many years
atter dat Col. Lawton moved to Savannah; but when he died dey
brought him back here an’ buried him at Robertville.

“My young Missus was de daughter of Mr. Sam Maner, my old
Massa; so when she marry Mr. Davant I went wid her. Dey had
bought a place in Screven, Georgia. Seven year ‘fore peace declare
we went to Georgia. On a Monday mornin’ a colored man
come along an’ tell Miss Anna de Yankees had took Waynesboro.
We all went to see it. De fire had left de place clean. Could
pick up a pin behind it. Other than dat I see nothin’. I
never see no house burn down. I never hear no gun fire. I jes’
see de uniform, an’ see ’em kill de hog an’ sling ’em ‘cross de
saddle. Den when we come back to Robertville, we see de destruction
left behind.

“After I git of size I mind de birds off de corn an’ rice an’
sech like. Den I’d take care of de turkeys. An’ we’d sweep de
yards. Carry de leaves off to de stable in a wheelbarrow.[80]

“Both my missus wuz good to me. De last missus I own treat
me jes’ de same as her own child. I stayed right dere in de
house wid her, an’ if I wuz sick or anything she’d take care
of me same as her own chillun. I nurse one of her chillun.
An’ dat child would rather be wid me than wid her own mother!”

Source: Elisa Scantling, Scotia, S.C. age 87 years.

Mary Scott

Gourdin, S.C.

Ex-Slave, About 90 years old

“Where and when were you born?”[81]

“On Gaston Gamble place, between here and Greeleville. In da Gamble’s
Bible is my age. Don’t know my age. Pretty much know how old, I bout
90. I wuz little girl when freedom come.”

“Give the names of your father and mother.”

“Father, John Davis. Mother, Tina Davis. Belonged to last mausa. Darby
Fulton. Gamble sold mama and three children to Fulton. Belonged to Davis
after freedom. Father belonged to Davis. Take first mausa’s name. Sold
to Arnold Mouzon. Didn’t take Mouzon name.”

“Where did your father and mother come from?”

“Right where Grandma go, Gamble place.”

“Did you have any brothers and sisters?”

“James and Benjamin. All ded.”

“Describe the beds and where you slept.”

“Had plenty slaves. I don’t know exactly how many. In dem times you know,
we had to get ticket to go to see dere family.”

“What kind of house did you have to live in?”

“Better dan dis. Better dan dis. Good house. Sleep on wooden bed. Straw
and feather mattress.”

“Do you remember anything about your grandparents or any stories told
you about them?”[82]

“I ain’t know my grandmother, grandfather either.”

“What work did you do in slavery times.”

“Didn’t do no kind of work. Mother milked, tended to de butter.”

“Did you ever earn any money?”

“No money.”

“What did you eat and how was it cooked?”

“Boil meat and put peas or greens, rice cooked dry, take up in plate and eat.
One girl get done and wash dishes and put dem up.”

“Did you ever eat any possums?”

“Yes, my brother catch possum and raccoon.”

“Fish?”

“Fishing in de branch.”

“Did the slaves have their own gardens?”

“Yes, sir, plant big garden, no use plant, go to dere garden and get it.”

“What clothes did you wear in cold weather?”

“Thick. I could weave it with stripes and put one check one way and nother
strip nother way.”

“Hot weather?”

“In winter warm clothes and shoes. Had Sunday clothes. I had a green worsted
dress.”

“Did the slaves have a church on your plantation?”

“Go to white people church and sit out of doors and wait till dey come out
and den we go in and have preaching.”

“White or colored preacher?”

“White preacher.”

“Was your master a good man?”

“Mr. Gamble like to drink liquor but still good people. All who I talking
about good people.”[83]

“What was Mr. Gamble’s name?”

“Mr. Gamble name Gatron Gamble. Son living in dat big house and grandson living
down dere.”

“How many children did Mr. Davis have?”

“He had some not many. Mr. Gamble had some too.”

“What kind of house did Mr. Gamble live in?”

“Medium size house. All had just common house, two-story.”

“What about the overseer?”

“Overseer he see dat you work soon. Driver go in de field and stay ’til
12 o’clock.”

“How many acres in the plantation?”

“Don’t know how many acres.”

“What time did the overseer wake the slaves up?”

“Wake dem up soon. Blow horn.”

“Did you have to work hard?”

“Work ’til sundown.”

“Did you see any slaves punished?”

“Some punished, but I ain’t never see none whip. I heard stick strike de
ground and tie hands and feet. Paddle on dis side and den paddle on de other
side ’til sore.”

“Did you ever see any slaves sold or auctioned off?”

“My mother and us sold. Mrs. Gamble died left my mama for a daily gift.
She wouldn’t allow dem to whip me. I ain’t know when we be sell, I wuz a baby.”

“Did you see slaves in chains?”

“No chains.”

“Did the slaves have a church on your plantation?”

“Yes, de Gambles make us to go to Sunday school and learn us the Sunday
school lessons. I could plow. We went to white church and set down till
white people go out and de old man dat tend to de church and open up de church
and say come in, can’t stay outside.”[84]

“Who preached for you all?”

“My uncle, Jefferie Pendergrass, mother’s brother. If colored people want
preacher preach, he go in dere and made de children be quiet and preach a nice
sermon and have watch night but not in de church.”

“Do you know any spirituals?”

“I forgets dem things. I use to be good singer but I ain’t got no teeth.
I ain’t been looking fer dis. If you hadn’t come, I’d been gone.”

“Where would you have gone?”

“Just to walk about. All gone to de field and de children so bad.”

“Tell about baptizing.”

“Baptized by de white people.”

“Did the slaves run away to the North?”

“I ain’t know ’bout dat.”

“What about patrollers?”

“No patarollers. Have to get ticket, whip dem if dey didn’t get it. Colored
people do more than white people allow. Caused dem to whip dem. My sister,
my sister-in-law and girl went and tell dem dey gwine have play in white kitchen.
Mr. Sam Fulton boss wouldn’t go to war. My sister, sister-in-law run up in de
loft and tell dem come down and dey come down and jump off de window and land
in de mud hole wid dere best dress on. Mr. Fulton let dem have it in de quarters.”

“Did you hear of any trouble between the master and the slaves?”

“My grandmother went off and wouldn’t come back. She write that she get
everyday what she could get fer Sunday.”

“Did you work on Saturday evenings?”

“Some of de white people made dem work on Saturday evening. I had a uncle
when white people come by going to church he hoeing his rice. Dey didn’t
want him work on Sunday. Miss Elizabeth Gamble tell dem he gwine to chop his
rice on Sunday.”[85]

“What did you do on Sunday?”

“Go to church.”

“Christmas day?”

“I don’t remember what dey give on Christmas day. My family got clothes.”

“What did you do at a wedding or funeral among the slaves?”

“Just say got a wife, ain’t married. If anybody ded everything stop.”

“What games did you play as a child?”

“I don’t know what all I played.”

“Do you know any funny stories?”

“No, sir, I used to tell my grands things.”

“Did you ever see any ghosts?”

“I ain’t believe in it, but I see dem. Jest pass by and dey want bother you.
Don’t know where dey come from. Dey look like people.”

“You don’t believe in them?”

“No, sir, but I know one thing, dey say fox gwine mad. Say cat gwine mad
but dat ain’t so. I ain’t scared of nothing.”

“You are not scared at night?”

“When de moon shining. Moon ain’t shine might fall and cripple. When we
holler voice way back dere.”

“When the slaves became sick, who tended to them?”

“White people tended to dem. Use medicine.”

“Do you make medicine out of herbs?”

“No, sir, don’t make it.”

“Did you ever see anybody wear a ten-cent piece around the ankle?”

“I see dem wear it, but I ain’t know what fer.”

“What do you remember about the war that brought you freedom?”

“I know just as good when peace declared. Gun rolled in dat direction.
Must be guns. Cook say roll thunder roll and I say de sun shine it ain’t
gwine rain. I wuz too little to know but my sister say every man and every
woman got to work for demselves.”[86]

“What did your master say?”

“I ain’t know what master say, he single man and didn’t talk much.”

“Did you stay with him the year after freedom?”

“No, he didn’t treat my mother right.”

“Any schools for Negroes?”

“Pretty good time before schools.”

“Did the slaves buy any land?”

“No land bought.”

“Do you remember your wedding?”

“I member jest as good ’bout my wedding. I married on Thursday night. Some
white people from Kingstree and different ones come and pile it up and when I
get all dem presents some one stick fire and burn it all down.”

“Whom did you marry?”

“John Scott.”

“Do you have any children?”

“One gone in de field and dis one.”

“What are they doing?”

“Working on farms. Jane got killed in de wreck.”

“Who is Jane?”

“My daughter. She wuz coming to see me. Train wreck and kill her coming from
Norfolk.”

“How long ago was that?”

“‘Bout two years ago.”

“What do you think of Abraham Lincoln?”

“I see picture of dem. Picture in dere of Lincoln.”

“Now that slavery time is ended, what do you think of it?”

“I believe colored people do better in de slavery than now.”

“Do you belong to the church?”

“Yes, Promise Land Baptist church.”

“Why do you think people ought to go to church?”[87]

“To have some protection and when you go in a church dat is a place
for you to be taken care of. Dey ain’t got no religion.”

“Was the overseer ‘poor white trash?'”

“I could hear de people talk ’bout him. Some like him and some don’t. If
I got a wife over yonder, I got to get ticket before I could go to see her.
Had to work hard too.”

“Let us see the picture of Lincoln.”

“Dis is it.” (Granddaughter shows us Aunt Mary’s picture)

“Is that the one?”

“Yea, I think so.”

“Let me see, dat ain’t de one. Here is.” (Aunt Mary showed us a picture
which looked to be taken from some New York newspaper. It was probably a screen
star).

“Who told you that was Lincoln?”

“Some preacher or somebody come here and tell me.”

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“Aunt” Nina Scot sat on her front porch. She was drinking[88]
some liquid from a bottle which she said would help her trouble.
Being short of breath, she was not able to talk very much. She
said that she was very small at the time she was set free. “My
Marster and his folks did not treat me like a nigger,” she said,
“they treated me like they did other white folks.” She said that
she and her mother had belonged to Dr. Shipp, who taught at Wofford
College, that they had come here from Chapel Hill, N.C. and that
she was a tarheel negro. She said that white people in slavery days
had two nurses, one for the small children and one for the older
ones. “Yes sir, those were certainly fine people that lived on the
Campus during those days. (Wofford Col. Campus) When the ‘raid’
came on, people were hiding things all about their places.” She referred
to the Yankee soldiers who came to Spartanburg after the
close of the Civil War. “My mother hid the turkeys and told me
where she had hidden them.” Dr. Shipp came up to Nina one day and
asked her where the turkeys were hidden. She told him they were
hidden behind a clump of small trees, and pointed them out to him.
“Well,” he said, “tell your mother to go and hide them somewhere
else and not to tell you about it. You would tell the Yankees just
where those turkeys were hidden.” Aunt Nina recalls that Mr. and
Mrs. Dr. Duncan (formerly of Wofford College) had a habit of getting
a slice of bread and butter for all the neighboring children
(black or white) whenever their nurses brought them to their home.

SOURCE: “Aunt” Nina Scott, 260 N. Converse St., Spartanburg, S.C.
Interviewer: F.S. DuPre, Spartanburg Office, Dist. 4
(May 17, 1937)

STORIES OF EX-SLAVES

“I was born in Newberry County, near the Laurens County line,[89]
above Chappells Depot. My father and mother were Tom and Francis
Scurry and belonged as slaves to the Drury Scurry family. Dr. Drury
Scurry bought them from Col. Cooper of Laurens County. He was a fine
man and mighty good to his slaves. I worked around the house as a
boy, and in the fields when I got old enough. Some of the nigger
boys hunted ‘possums, rabbits and squirrels. Dr. Scurry had 100
acres in woods. They were just full of squirrels and we killed more
squirrels than you can count.

“The slaves didn’t have a garden, but after the war, we stayed
on wid Marse Scurry. When freedom come, he come to us in the yard
where we had congregated and told us we was free and could go anywhere
we wanted, but if any wanted to stay on wid him, he would pay
wages. All of us stayed on wid him. He give us a one-acre patch of
ground to raise anything we wanted to raise. He had white overseers
during slavery, but none ever whipped us ’cause the master wouldn’t
let them. He had a plantation of about 300 acres and 40 or 50 slaves.
They got up at sun-up and worked ’till sun-down each day, but had
Saturday afternoons off when dey could do anything dey wanted to.

“There wasn’t much time for learning to read and write. The
white folks sometimes had niggers to go to their church and set in
the back of gallery. In our neighborhood, niggers had their own
church dat they made of poles and brush, and called it, ‘Brush Harbor’.
They made seats from small logs sawed off of rough plank.

“On Christmas day, the master would have a big dinner for his
slaves and spread it out in the yard. Corn shuckings were popular
and so were cotton pickings, where big eats were prepared for those[90]
who helped. They had big feasts at marriages, and even the slaves
had feasts at their marriages, the master and his family taking
part in the ceremonies. I was married in 1887, and at that time I
was living with Mr. Renwick, and my girl with Dr. Tom Brown. Dr.
Brown had us to marry in his yard in the grove, and over 200 persons
was there to see it. The next day, he give us a big ‘infair’ with
all kinds of good things to eat, presents and dances. We never had
any children. After we moved to town, my wife was a nurse or midwife
among some of the white families for a long time.

“In Ku Klux times, I met five or ten of them in the road one
night. They never bothered me. They had long white sheets over them
and the horses. Slits were cut for the head, eyes, nose and mouth.

“The niggers had an old field song: ‘Give me dat good ole time
religion’ which they sang most of the time. There was another song
they sang: ‘Dark midnight is my cry—Give me Jesus, You may have
all this world, but give me Jesus.’

“Some old-time cures for the sick was—barks of cherry tree,
dogwood, and olive bush, made into tea and drunk.

“I thought Abe Lincoln was a fine man, done mighty good and
saved the country. Jeff Davis was a good man. Booker Washington
was a great man. I think slavery was bad; yet our white folks was
good to us, but some white masters was mean. I think everybody
should belong to the church and be a Christian.”

SOURCE: Morgan Scurry (78), Newberry, S.C.; interviewed by:
G.L. Summer. Newberry, S.C. May 19, 1937.

Uncle Ransom Simmons

Richland County, South Carolina.

Uncle Ransom is one of the few remaining slaves who still lives[91]
and whose mind is still clear and active. He has just passed his one-hundred
and fourth birthday, was born in Mississippi, and brought to
South Carolina by his master Wade Hampton, the father of the illustrious
General Wade Hampton, before the Civil War.

When the war broke out and General Wade Hampton went to war Uncle
Ransom cried to be allowed to follow his young master. He went and
served as a body guard. Uncle Ransom learned to read the Bible while
attending a night school held for slaves before freedom, and it was
only in recent years that he was taught to write his name.

This old man lives alone in a shack at Taylor, a little village
on the outskirts of Columbia. He is furnished with all the milk and
ice cream he can eat by the Columbia Dairy. He purchases a little
food with the state pension of twenty-five dollars a year paid to Negroes
who served the Confederacy in some military capacity.

Uncle Ransom says his master was the kindest man in the world,
and that as far as he is concerned, he has never had a worry in his
life, and as he said this, his face radiated with a broad and satisfied
smile.

Reference:

Personal interview with Ransom Simmons age 104.

ALFRED SLIGH

EX-SLAVE 100 YEARS OLD.

Alfred Sligh, who lives in a rented house at 1317 Gregg Street,[92]
says he was born in Newberry County, South Carolina, in 1837. His
hair is white and he is feeble. He goes about the city, on fair days,
collecting small sums of money from his white friends and sometimes
from his own race. In this way he earns most of his income.

“My folks was slaves of the Sligh family for many years, befo’ I
was born. My mammy and daddy and me b’long to Butler Sligh, at de time
I begin to do chores and take notice of things. I be nearly half grown
when my young master, Butler Sligh, am just four years old. He die,
four or five years ago. I guess you ‘member, ’cause he was a powerful
well-known white man. He was seventy-five years old when he die.

“De young master, he name for my old master. De old master and
‘most all de white men of de neighborhood, ’round ’bout us, march off
to de war in 1861. One day I see them ridin’ down de big road on many
hosses and they wavin’ deir hats and singin’: ‘We gwine to hang Abe
Lincoln on a sour apple tree!’ and they in fine spirits. My young master,
Butler, who they call Junior at de time, he am too young to go with
them so we stay home and farm. I go with him to de fields and he tell
de slaves what to do. Durin’ de war I see much of de soldiers who say
they not quit fightin’ ’til all de damn-Yankees am dead. Dis was so,
durin’ de first two years. After dat I see more and more of de damn-Yankees,
as they pass through ‘flictin’ punishment on ‘most everybody.

“Sho’ we hear dat all Negroes am free in 1863, but dat rumor not
affect us. We work on, ’til Sherman come and burn and slash his way
through de state in de spring of 1865. I just reckon I ‘member dat[93]
freedom to de end of my life.

“We gang up at my grandmother’s cabin and she tell us it am so.
We look scared, lak mules in de midst of a hornet nest, as we stood
dere. We didn’t wait long, for old Mistress Sligh she come ‘long and
say: ‘Sho’ it am so, you am free.’ Many of de slaves, ‘cludin’ me,
tell her we love to stay on and work as usual ’til de big white folks
come. She smile and say: ‘All right, maybe we be able to feed and
clothe you, and when your old master git back from Virginia, maybe he
will hire you!’

“When I first marry, which was at de start of de war, I marry
Sarah, a slave gal on de Sligh plantation. We has several chillun,
befo’ she die, which was soon after we move to Columbia. De chillun,
at least two boys and two gals, all git grown, but they go North a long
time ago, and I never hears from them.

“When I come to Columbia in 1866, I find work on houses, and building
was plentiful then. I git ‘long pretty well, then, ’cause if I did
not land a job, I could go to de Freedman’s Aid Office at Assembly and
Gervais streets and git rations and a little cash for my family. After
de Freedman’s Aid left town I had no trouble findin’ work. And soon I
was pretty prosperous. I kept that way, so long as I was able to do my
share of de work.

“It was in 1913, as I was walkin’ ‘long Hampton Street, dat I see
my present wife, Sadie. She pass by me, and smile and look and I smile
and look, and she slow up a little and say: ‘What’s happen, big boy?’
I am so tickled, I say: ‘I just have to tell you:[94]

“She say; ‘Pretty good, big boy, pretty good! Come ’round and
see me sometime.’ I answer: ‘I sho’ will, Peaches and Cream’. And
dat am just what I did. We got married dat same year, and we have been
happy, ’til I git too old and feeble to work much. She work now to de
best of her ability and we somtimes has a big squeeze to pay de rent.
Dat is why I’m hopin’ to get de old age pension, made possible by de
greatest President of them all.

“Does I recall de ‘sassination of de first President dat died
dat way? Yes sir, I sho’ do. De first one was Abraham Lincoln, a little
after de close of de war. He was shot while sittin’ in a seat in de
theater at Washington. James A. Garfield, was de nex’ one. He was shot
in de depot, at Washington. De nex’ one was McKinley. He was shot while
at a show place, in Buffalo.”

DAN SMITH
EX-SLAVE 75 YEARS.

Dan Smith lives in one room, rent free, of a three-room frame house,[95]
the property of his son-in-law, Jim Cason. It is situated on the southeast
corner of Garden and Palmer streets in the town of Winnsboro, S.C. He is
tall, thin and toothless, with watery eyes and a pained expression of
weariness on his face. He is slow and deliberate in movements. He still
works, and has just finished a day’s work mixing mortar in the construction
of a brick store building for Mr. Lauderdale. His boss says: ‘The
spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.’ There is nothing organically
wrong with Dan but he appears, in human anatomy, as Doctor Holmes’s One
Horse Shay must have looked the day before its final collapse.

“You been here once befo’ and now here you is again. You say you
wanna git additions? Well, I’s told you dat I was born in Richland
County, a slave of Marse John Lever and on his plantation, January de
11th day, 1862, when de war was gwine on. How I know? ‘Cause my mammy and
pappy told me so. They call my pappy Bob and my mammy Mary. Strange as it
seem, my mistress name Mary, just de same as my mammy, tho’ marster wasn’t
name Bob, lak pappy. Him name Marster John and de young marster, an only
child, was name Marse Jim. You better stop right dere ’til I tell you pappy
no b’long to de Levers. Him b’long to de Smiths. Him name Bob Smith, after
freedom. Dat’s how come I be dis day, Dan Smith. You ketch de p’int? Well
dats de way it was.

“Befo’ pappy take a shine to mammy in slavery time, her got mixed[96]
up wid one of old Marse Burrell Cook’s niggers and had a boy baby. He
was as black as long-leaf pine tar. Her name him George Washington Cook
but all him git called by, was Wash Cook. My full brudders was Jim, Wesley,
and Joe. All of them dead and gone long ago.

“Us chillun slept on de floor. Mammy had some kind of ‘traption or
other, ‘ginst de wall of de log house us live in, for her and de baby
child to git in at night. Us have plenty to eat, sich as: peas, ‘tatoes,
corn bread, ‘lasses, buttermilk, turnips, collards and fat meat.

“De only thing I ‘member ’bout my mistress is: One day her come down
to de house and see my brudder Joe sucking his thumb. Mammy tell her, her
can’t make him quit it. Mistress go back to de big house and come runnin’
back with quinine. Her rub Joe’s thumbs wid dat quinine and tell mammy to
do dat once or twice a day. You ought to see dat baby’s face de first time
and heard him squall! It sho’ stopped him sucking his thumbs!

“Clothes? Didn’t need no clothes in de summer time but a shirt. In
de winter, us just stood ’bout de fire. I’m talkin’ ’bout us chillun, don’t
‘member ’bout old folks.

“Master and Mistress lived in a big white house, two stories high,
tall brick chimneys at de gable ends, and wide front and back piazzas de
full length of de dwelling. Us chillun had no shoes. Mammy had two pair
all de time but they had wooden bottoms. Dere was no white overseers ’round,
but patarollers (patrollers) ketched my pappy once, in de house, jerk him
out and whup him, while mammy and us chillun yell and cry and beg them to
stop.

“When de Yankees come, mammy hide us chillun under her bed ‘traption.
They act mighty nice to her, so she say.

“What kinda work mammy do? Her was one of de weavers. Heard her[97]
tell ’bout how they make de thread and de cloth. They had spinnin’ wheels.
Person turn de wheel wid de hand and walk back’ards and for’ards, drawing
out de thread. Dis kind of thread, her say, was rough. Later they got a
thing de spinners operate wid deir foots, settin’ by de wheel and workin’
it wid deir foots, sorta lak a sewing machine is run. Her ‘low de thread
dat come to her in de weave-room from dis kind of spinnin’ was smoother
and more finer than de other kind. After de yarn was spin, it was reeled
off de spools into hanks and then took to de warper. Then she woofed it,
warped it, and loomed it into cloth. Her make four yards in a day.

“After freedom, pappy come and take mammy and all us chillun to a
farm on Cedar Creek, in dis county, Fairfield. I works dere ’til 1872,
I thinks. I gits concerned ’bout dis time wid two things, jinin’ wid de
Lord, and jinin’ wid de woman. De fust was easy. All I had to do was go
to de Methodis’ revival, shout a little, and jine up befo’ de preacher.
I just had to be convicted and convinced, but mind you, I was de one to
be convinced, de other was not so easy. De Lord was easy to find and quick
to take me, but de gal was hard to find and was slow to take me, ’cause
she was de one to be convinced dis time, you see.

“I looks all ’round Cedar Creek. De ones I could git, I wouldn’t
have, and de ones I would have I couldn’t git. So dere it was. I mounts
old Betsy, dat was pappy’s mule, one Sunday and come to Winnsboro. I spied
a gal at church, ’bout de color of a ripe pumpkin after de big frosts done
fall on it, hair black as a crow and meshed up and crinkled as a cucker
burr. Just lookin’ at her made my mouth water. Me and old Betsy raise de
dust and keep de road hot from Cedar Creek to Winnsboro dat summer and
fall, and when us sell de last bale of cotton, I buys me a suit of clothes,[98]
a new hat, a pair of boots, a new shirt, bottle Hoyt’s cologne and rigs
myself out and goes ’round and ask her to marry me. Her name Ida Benjamin.
Did her fall for me right away? Did her take me on fust profession
and confession lak de Lord did? No sir-ree bob! Her say: ‘I got to go to
school some more, I’s too young. Got to see papa and mama ’bout it. Wait
’til you come nex’ time and I’ll tell you.’ I was confused then, I gits
up, gives her de cologne bottle, and mounts old Betsy, spurs her in de
side, gallops, and cusses all de way back to Cedar Creek. I confess to
mammy. Her laugh and say: ‘Dan, you knows nothin’ ’bout women and gals.
Why it’s mighty plain she gonna say yes, nex’ time.’ Just lak her say,
Ida did, and us got married de end of de nex’ school term, in May.

“Us had ten chillun. Dan, name for me, is at Concord, N.C. Oscar
is in Concord, N.C. Lucinda marry a Haltiwanger and is comfortable in
Baltimore, Md. Aurelia marry a Williams and is in Baltimore. Henrietta
marry a Sawney and is in Charlotte, N.C. Lilly marry Jim Cason and live
right in Winnsboro, in de house I have a room in.

“I got lots of gran’childs, too many to mention, They take after
dere grandma, lak to go to school and read de Bible and go to church and
Sunday School.

“Whut I have on my mind now is a pension. When a man git seventy-five
years old, (I hear folks talk ’round me) dat man should not be ‘lowed
to work on de Supreme Court, him should be give a pension of $15,000.00
and made to stop work. Him may have chillun dat can support him, all de
same, dat jedge gits his pension. Then in de name of goodness, why don’t
they make me quit mixing mortar when I is seventy-five years old and give
me $240.00 a year? Sauce for de fat goose Supreme Court Jedge, oughta be[99]
sauce for de mortar mixer poor gander, I ‘low. It look lak jestice for de
rich jedge and mix more mortar for poor Dan.”

HECTOR SMITH

Ex-Slave, 79 Years

“I born down here in Wahee Neck. Easter Avant, dat[100]
was my mammy en my father name Hector Smith. Coase I
ain’ never see him cause he die fore I was born, but dat
what dey tell me. Dat was a pretty rough time wid de
people den. I don’ recollect so much bout de times back
dere cause in dat day en time chillun didn’ have de heap
of knowledge dey have dis day en time, but I remembers
seein de Yankees en de people gwine to de war. Oh, dat
was a tough time cause dey use de whip in dem days. Oh,
yes’um, my Massa whip my gran’mammy wid a leather strap.
You see she had a knack of gwine off for some cause or
another en meetin de boat what run up en down dat big Pee
Dee river en bring fertilizer en all kind of goods to de
peoples. Massa Randall had told her not to go nowhe’ bout
dat boat, but some people is sorta high strung like en dey
go off anyhow no matter bout de whip. Oh, yes’um, he sho
whip her like he didn’ have no soul to save.”

“I couldn’ tell you nothin bout how many slaves Massa
Randall Davis had, but I know dat he had a right smart of
them. I know it cause he had so many field hands dey didn’
none of em never have to work every day in de field. Oh,
dey just knock bout our Massa house en see after de stock[101]
en such things as dat what time dey didn’ have to work in
de field.”

“You knows when a thing happen so long back dere, it
does vanish from a person’s remembrance some of de time
en den it’ll wander back to you when you ain’ thinkin bout
it. I does recollect dat dere wasn’ nothin much more for
de colored peoples in dat day en time den what dey got to
eat en de clothes dey had to wear. My Massa give everyone
of he colored family a peck of meal en a quart of syrup en
so much of meat every week en ‘low em all to have a garden
of dey own. Oh, dey work dey garden by de moonshine en
fore light good in de mornin cause dey had to turn dey hand
to dey Massa work when daylight come here. I tellin you
corn bread was sweet to me in dat day en time as pound cake
ever been. Wasn’ never noways pickin’ en choosin bout nothin.
Oh, I forget bout all dem possums en rabbits dat eat right
smart in dem days. Use to catch em when dey had swells of
de water en dey come out de woods to hunt dry land. It just
like dis, dey couldn’ conceal demselves in de open fields
en dat how-come we catch em so easy. Run em down wid de
dogs en make em take to de water. Dat how we catch em. Dat
sho was sweet eatin in dem days.”

“Den we had a log house to stay in what never had but
just one room en de furniture we had was worser den de house.[102]
Us beds was made wid four stumps for de corners dat had
boards lay cross em to put de mattress on. Some of de
colored peoples had bag mattress stuff wid hay en de
others had homespun mattress what was stuff wid dis here
gray moss you see in de woods. En I remembers all bout
when de peoples had to cook in de fireplace cause dere
wasn’ much stoves in circulation in dat day en time.”

“Well, I don’ know so much bout dem things peoples
call ghost, but I know dat I has seen things. I knows
once long time back I was gwine long de road late on a
evenin drivin me ox what I had hitch up to de cart en a
ghost or somethin or another cause dat cart wheel to go
right in de ditch. Well, de ox, he pull en he pull, but
wid all me help, he couldn’ never pull dat cart out. I
ax some of dem people bout dere what dey reckon dat was
en dey say all dey know to compare it to was a hant or a
ghost. No ‘mam, didn’ see it, just hear it cause it come
right to my back en knocked. It had been rainin en soon
as it quit, de moon shine out bright as ever was day en
dat when de hant turn de cart loose.”

“De next thing I see was one time when me en another
fellow was sleepin in de swamp. I couldn’ tell whe’ de
moon rise den en when I come to my senses, dere was one
of dem things just a danglin in de air like dese things[103]
show people have. Some people say dat was a ghost.”

“Oh, de peoples didn’ never worry bout no doctor den.
Dey doctor was in de field in dat day en time. I gwine tell
you just like I know it, all de older peoples use to get de
herbs out de old fields for dey remedies. My Massa en my
Missus was de ones what doctor mostly in dem times. Use to
get old field ringdom, what smell like dis here mint, en
boil dat en let it steep. Dat what was good to sweat a fever
en cold out you. Den dere was life everlastin tea dat was
good for a bad cold en cherry bark what would make de blood
so bitter no fever never couldn’ stand it. Dem what had de
rheumatism had to take dat lion’s tongue or what some peoples
calls wintergreen tea en some of de time, dey take pine top
en mix wid de herbs to make a complete cure. Oh, dey make
it bad as dey could so as to weaken de case. Another thing
dat been good for de rheumatism was dat red oak bark dat dey
use to bathe de limbs wid. Willow tea was somethin good for
chill en fever en catnip en sage tea was de thing for babies.”

“It like I tell you de colored peoples never get no learnin
but what little dey catch from de plantation men in dem night
schools. Oh, dey give everyone of us a slate en slate pencil
en we study dere in de quarter in de night time by de light
of de fire. Studied dem Blue Back Websters. Dat was de text
we know bout den.”[104]

“I tell you de truth I live so much in darkness den
dat I think dat time was bout good as dis time. Didn’
know no better sense den. I tell you just like I been know
it, de peoples was coward like in dem days. Couldn’ never
pluck up no ambition to do a heap of things de people do
dis day en time. Dat how-come I rather live in dis go round.”

Source: Hector Smith, ex-slave, age 79, Wahee section of
Marion Co., S.C.
Personal interview, July 1937.

HECTOR SMITH

Ex-Slave, 79 years

“I studied en studied what songs would suit, but dem[105]
old familiar hymns bout all I know dese days. You see dem
old familiar hymns what de spirit sings. It just like I
tell you, I put all dem other kind of songs away when I is
change to a better way of livin. I does remember first one
en den de other of dem frolicksome song dat my grandparents
learnt me.”

Source: Hector Smith, ex-slave, 79 years.,
Wahee section of Marion Co., S.C.
Personal interview, July 1937.

WAY DOWN IN DE LONESOME VALLEY

“Dat go way back dere. De peoples didn’ have
nothin more den a mouth organ to make music wid
in dem times.”

Source: Hector Smith, age 79, ex-slave., Wahee section
of Marion Co., S.C.
Personal interview, July 1937.

HOLD DE DEAL

Source: Hector Smith, age 79, ex-slave, Wahee section
of Marion Co., S.C.
Personal interview, July 1937.

Hector Smith
ex-Slave, 79 years.

“I use to holler a heap in late years but after I[109]
lay it down, all dat leave me.”

Source: Hector Smith, 79 years, ex-slave, Wahee section
of Marion Co., S.C.
Personal interview, July 1937.

STORIES OF EX-SLAVES

“Aunt” Jane Smith, 80 years old, says that she was only[110]
eight years old when the war ended, and that her recollections
are very meagre as to conditions during slavery.

Her mother belonged to John Snoddy, who owned a farm a
few miles west of Spartanburg. Her father was owned by Dr. Miller
of a nearby plantation. She stated that she was old enought to
rock the cradle for the white babies during slavery.

She stated that she could remember seeing some of the
slaves being whipped on their bare backs with a plaited hickory
stick, or thong. She never received any whippings. She said
that a man once cut at her with his thong, but that she escaped
the blow by dodging.

She said she remembered seeing a small child with a piece
of bread in its hand when a hog entered the house and in snatching
at the bread, caught the child’s hand near the thumb with its
tusks. When running off, the hog carried the child with it,
dragging it along into the field. All the other children and
some men ran after the hog and caught it. The other colored
children were whipped, but by staying in the house and watching
the babies, keeping them safe from other pigs which had also
entered the house, she was not whipped.

Aunt Jane said that when the Yankee soldiers came to the
house, they were just as thick as the “fingers on her hands.”
She held up her hands for inspection to illustrate how thick[111]
the soldiers stood in the ranks. She said they did not take
anything, but that they crawled under the house to get the
hen eggs. One soldier, she said, came to the house and asked
if there were any horses on the farm. A colored woman told him
that there were no horses on the place, but just at that time,
one of the horses in a nearby stable neighed, and the soldier
threatened the woman’s life for lying to him. She says she
doesn’t remember whether the soldier took the horses but thinks
that he did.

The soldiers told the colored people that they free, but
she said that didn’t signify much to her mind. Some time afterwards,
she said her father came and carried her and her mother to his
master’s place. Later, she came to Spartanburg and got a job as
a cook and washerwoman.

When asked if she knew anything about conjuring, she
stated that she had heard of it but didn’t know anything about
it. When asked if she had ever seen a ghost, she said, “No,
but I heard one once.” She said that one night after her master
had killed “hisself” in the barn with a pistol, she heard the doors
being shut, the windows being slammed, and the chairs rocking on
the front porch all by themselves. She declared that the wind was
not blowing and that a “ghost was doing all dem things.”

She stated that she had been married twice; had reared a
houseful of children; had adopted some and reared them, but that
she didn’t have anybody to work for her now but “him,” referring
to her husband who was sitting on a trunk.

“Thank the Lord for coming to see me,” she said, as the
writer left.

SOURCE: Jane Smith, Concord St., Spartanburg, S.C. Interviewer: F.S. DuPre

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“I liked to went crazy when my brother, Bob, went to Arkansas.[112]
Den Marse George Young wrote our names in a book and give it to
my ma. It was jes’ a small mem’randum book. We kept it till Miss Addie,
dat is Mrs. Billy, give ma de Bible storybook, and den she copied our
names in dat one. De little book was about wore out den; so it was
burned up when Miss Addie had done finished writing our names in de
storybook. Us gwine to keep dat book and hand it down atter we done
left dis earth. Ma been dead now over fifty years.

“I sho nu’sed Marse George’s chilluns fer him, when I was a
little gal. Jimmie, Willie, Conquest, Jack, Katie and Annie was Marse’s
chilluns. Conquest dead now. Marse George had a great big house. He
was a jes’tice of de peace or something or ‘nother den. I don’t know
what year my ma died, but Marse had her buried at New Chapel. Dat
same year we raised a big crop of corn, cotton and peanuts, and had
plenty hogs. Marse let us have all we wanted. He let us hang our
meat in his smokehouse dat year.

“Befo’ ma died and I was a little gal, a terrible thing
happened to us. Across de Enoree on another place, de Miller place,
Fannie Miller run away. Dey couldn’t find her fer a long time. Dey
told my marster to git her. One Sunday my ma got ready to dress me
fer Sunday school. She bathed me and when she looked in de drawer she
couldn’t find my clothes. All of her clothes was gone, too. I cried
’cause I couldn’t go to Sunday school. Maude, de woman what lived
next to us, went to church. She saw Fannie dar wid all ma’s clothes
on. She told Marse about it and he sont out and had Fannie caught.[113]
She had come to our house and got de clothes on Saturday evening.
She had dem hid in a old house on our place. Dey put her in jail,
and den her marster come and whupped her and sont de clothes back
to ma. She never tried to run off agin.

“Jack Gist, a slave of Gov. Gist, run away once and lived
in a cave fer five months befo’ de white folks found him. He went
down on ‘de forest’ and dug a cave near de road in sight of de Harris
Bridge which still spans de Fairforest Creek at dat p’int. De cave
wasn’t dug on Governor Gist’s land, but on a place know’d den as de
old Jackson place. In de mid hours of night Jack come to see his
friends and dey give him things to eat. When dey got him he had a
hog, two geese, some chickens and two middles of meat. Cose de hog
and de middles was stole.

“One night he was crossing de Fairforest Creek on a foot-log
and he met Anderson Gist, one of de Governor’s slaves. Dey talked
fer awhile. Next morning, Anderson come wid his marster to de cave
whar Jack was. Dey took all his things on to de big house, and he was
whupped and put back to work. Governor Gist and our marster was good
to deir slaves and dey didn’t punish ’em hard like some of ’em did.
We had lots more den dan we has had ever since.

“I never went to de field till atter freedom come. Dey
wasn’t hard on us in de fields and I liked to work. We worked mostly
from sun-up till it was too dark to work. Marster’s youngest girl,
Mary Jane Young, married Mr. Dave Lane. Dey didn’t have a wedding.

“My grandpa was a African and he talked real funny. He was
low, chunky, fat and real black. He went around a lot befo’ he died.
He was de father of my mother, Clora. Granny, his wife, was called
‘Fender’ and she died de first year of freedom. She was sold and
lived on a neighboring plantation. We went to see her every Saturday.[114]
Ma would always take us to see her, and if we didn’t git to go, she
come to see us. We liked to go, and Marse always give us a pass. De
patrollers watch us like a hawk, but we had our passes and we told
dem if dey bothered us our marster would handle ’em. He would, too,
’cause dat was ‘de law’. Granny Fender was good looking. She wore
purty beads, earrings and bracelets, and wrapped her head up in a
red cloth. Her eyes and teeth flashed and she was always jolly.
Sometimes we stay all night, but most de time we come back home.
When she come to see us she always stay all night. All de old folks
had real religion den, and it kept ’em happy. Folks now are too fancy
fer religion and it ain’t real. I has real religion and nothing don’t
worry me. I feels happy all de time over it.

“My marster give my mother de spot of ground and de lumber
fer our church which was named New Chapel. De second church is on de
same spot. De first preaching was had under a oak tree, or arbor.
Uncle Tony Murphy was de first preacher. He was my favorite of all
de preachers. Marse read de Bible to us, but sometimes others read
it to us, too. His son, Bud, dat was killed in de first battle, used
to come to de quarters and read de Bible to us.

“Alex Hall was de minister dat immersed us all. We was all
Methodists, but out dar dey baptized everybody in de Fairforest no
matter what church dey went to. Dar was fifty people baptized de day
dat I was. Milly Bethane made me a big white robe to be baptized in.
When I got out I had a white dress to put on. Dey had a tent fer us
to go in to change our clothes. We was baptized in de Fairforest jes’
above de Harris Bridge. Everybody sung while we was going under de
water. Some of ’em shouted, too. It took de earthquake to shake religion
in my husband. He was Emanuel Gist, de first one.[115]

“Dat night, de people was hollering and woke me up. My
husband called me. ‘What dat?’ he ‘low. ‘I don’t know,’ I says. He
got up and run out. Soon he come back home and he was shaking all
over. He fell on de bed. When de chimney started to fall, I told
him to git up. He said he was too scared to git up. I pulled him
up and he was so scared dat he shook all over. I opened de door. He
was too scared to stand up. Next day he couldn’t work; so he went
off. I looked fer him till way in de night. When he did come home,
he was rejoicing. He was wid religion and he never give it up. Dat
was on de night of de earthquake. You could hear people hollering
fer miles around.”

Source: Mary Smith (N, 84), Buffalo St., Union, S.C.
Interviewer: Caldwell Sims, Union, S.C. (9/14/37)

EXPERIENCES OF AN EX-SLAVE ON WARDMALAW ISLAND

Massa Wus Kind to Slaves

Prince Smith, a man who is said to be over a hundred years of age, has lived[116]
on Wardmalaw Island practically all of his life. His experiences during slavery are
very interesting and true to life. An interview with him revealed the following:

“I was bo’n an’ raise’ on dis island and was only frum here when de Civil
War had begun. W’en Fort Sumter wus fired on mossa carried seventy of us to Greenville,
South Ca’lina on account of its montanous sections, which was believed would have prevented
the Yankees invasion in regard to their hide-out.” We stayed een Greenville
nearly four years. Durin’ dat time mossa planted his fa’m an’ we wurk as if we wus right
here.

“The Yankees had gunboats,” he continued, “but dey didn’ help dem atoll fur dey
couldn’ make any a’tack dat dis place is so unsuited fur water battles. But forest’ battles
wus fight on Beaufort Island and Port Royale. We een Greenville didn’ know enyt’ing
’bout whut wus goin’ on except what wus brought to us collud people by dose who wus
sent to da town. Mossa didn’ tell us eny ting. Fur almos’ four ‘ears we stayed een Greenville
w’en suddenly one Chuesday mornin’ bright an’ early, Sheridan came into Greenville
on horse backs en’ order ebery body to sarrendar. Colonels an’ Gen’rals came een de city
widout de firin’ of a gun. We stayed dere ’til harvestin’ time by de orders of Master
Osland Bailey who saw to it dat we wus given money as a share fur our wurk.

“Mossa’s custom at de end of de week wus to give a dry peck o’ corn which you
had to grin’ on Sat’day ebenin’ w’en his wurk wus done. Only on Chris’mus he killed en
give a piece o’ meat. De driber did de distribution o’ de ration. All young men wus given[117]
four quarts o’ corn a week, while de grown men wus given six quarts. All of us could
plant as much lan’ as we wuld fur our own use. We could raise fowls. My master wus a
gentleman, he treat all his slaves good. My fadder an’ me wus his favorite.

“Some o’ de slaves had to wurk on Sunday to finish dere week’s wurk. If dey didn’
de dribber who wus a Negro would give a lashin’ varyin’ frum fifteen to twenty five
chops. Only high-class massas had Negro dribbters, de crackers had white overseers.

“Like odder slaves had to hide frum dere mastas to hab meetin’, us could hab ours
any night we want to even widout his consent. When masta went to town any o’ his slaves
could ax him to buy t’ings for dem een Cha’leston. When Jews en peddlers came with clothes
an’ gunger to sell, we as chillun would go to him an’ ax fur money to buy whut we want.

“He had about four hund’ed acres of land which he divided in two half by a fence. One
‘ear he would plant one an’ let de cattles pasture on de oder. We could also raise hogs
‘long wood his but had to change pasture w’en he did. De people on his plantation didn’
hab any need to steal from him fur he didn’ ‘low us to want fur any thing.

“Dere wus three kinds of days wurk on de plantation: One is de whole tas’,
meanin’ a whole han’ or a person een his prime. He wus given two tas’ fur dis day’s wurk.
A tas’ carried frum twenty four to twenty five rows which wus thirty-five feet long en
twenty five feet wide. De shree fourth han’ wus given one whole tas’ which consists of
twelve rows. All de young chillun wus included in dis group. De half han’ was de old
slaves who did a half tas’ for dere day’s work. When it was time to pick cotton, de
shree fourth han’ had to pick thirty pound’ an’ de half han’ twenty fur dere day’s wurk.
Dose who attended to the gin only include de three fourth han’.

“Massa had shree kinds o’ punishment fur dose who disobeyed him. One wus de sweatbox.
It wus made de height of de person an’ no larger. Jus’ large ‘nough so de person[118]
woodn’ hab to be squeezed in. De box is nailed an’ een summer is put een de hot sun; een
de winter it is put in de coldest, dampest place. De next is de Stock. Wood is nailed on
floor with de person lyin’ on his back wid hans an’ feet tied wood a heavy weight on
de chest. De shird is de Bilboa. You are place on a high scaffold fur so many hours an’
if you don’ try to keep a level head, you’ll fall an you will surely hurt yourself if
your neck isn’t broken. Most o’ de time dey were put dere so dey could break dere necks.”

SOURCE

Information from an interview with Mr. Prince Smith, who is supposed to be over
a hundred years of age, Wardmalaw Island, S.C.

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“Lawsey, honey chile, how does I know jes’ when I was born.[119]
All sech as dat don’t mean nothing to us old slave time darkies. De
mis’tus say, ‘Silas, you sho was thirteen years old when dat ‘Federate
War wound up! Dat’s all I knows and dat’s what I goes by. De white
folks is worrying ’bout my age being in sech and sech a year and all
de like of dat. No sech as dat don’t worry Silas, kaise he sho don’t
give it no mind, dat I doesn’t.

“Mis’tus call us all to set down on de side steps wid our
hats in our hands. She read dat paper. When she git through, us still
sets, kaise no writing never aggrevated us niggers way back dar. She
wait a few minutes; den she ‘low: ‘It means dat you all is free, jes’
as free as I is.’ ‘Dumpling Pie’ jumped up and started crying. We all
looked at him, kaise he was a fat lazy thing dat laid around like
dumplings a-laying over kraut, and we axed him what he was crying for.
He say, ‘I ain’t gwine to be no free nigger, kaise dat brings in de
Issue, and I wants to keep my ma and pa, and what is I’m gwine to do
widout Marse Dusey?’

“Dat woke us up. Didn’t narry nigger on dat entire plantation
know what to do widout his marster. It was de awfulest feeling
dat everything in dem quarters laid down wid dat night, de new feeling
dat day was free and never had no marster to tell dem what to do.
You felt jes’ like you had done strayed off a-fishing and got lost.
It sho won’t no fun to be free, kaise we never had nothing.

“Next morning Mis’tus low, ‘Silas, I wants you to keep on
being my house boy.’ Dat sound de best to me of any news dat I had
got. She hired me and I jes’ kept on den as I had been gwine befo’.[120]
De quarters broke up, kaise Marse Dusey couldn’t keep all dem niggers,
so Mis’tus low’d. Marse was at de war and Mis’tus took things on.

“Dat left only a few in de quarter. In de meantime, carpetbaggers
and scalawags had put devilment in some of dem ig’nant niggers
and dey thought dat if dey leave, de U.S. gwine to give dem a plantation
atter de war had ceased, and plenty mules to make dem rich, like
quality white folks. So by dat time dey was a-raring to git moved off.
But I stay on wid Miss Sallie, as I called her den.

“One dark, rainy cold day a stranger come riding up on a po’
hoss and fetched a note of sorrow. Marse Dusey had done died somewhars,
and Mis’tus was widowed to de ground. I stayed on, and in a
year she died. Mr. Thomas Smith of Hickory Grove is de onliest chile
living of my mis’tus, and he is 71 years old.

“Atter Mis’tus died, I went to live wid my pa on Mr. ‘Baby’
John Smith’s place. He had been my pa’s marster. Way back den it was
so many John Smiths. ‘Pears like it was mo’ den dan now. Dat why dey
call Mis’tus’ husband ‘John Dusey’. Each John had a frill to his name
so dat folks could keep dem straight in deir minds whenever dey would
speak of dem. Mis’tus sho was good to me. I ‘members her chilluns’
names well; Misses Aurita and Amenta. Miss Amenta married Mr. Sam
Jeffries. Miss Rachael, Mis’tus other daughter, married Mr. John Morrow.
Her ‘Baby’ John married a lady whose name I jes’ disremembers, anyway
dey had a son called ‘Jeff’. He lived between Hickory Grove and
Broad River. All dese Smiths which I gives you renumeration of is de
Hickory Grove Smiths. You jes’ has to keep dem straight yet.”

Source: Silas Smith (N, 85), Gaffney, S.C.
Interviewer: Caldwell Sims, Union, S.C. (11/27/37)

MOM JESSIE SPARROW

Ex-Slave, 83 years.

“Honey, my white folks been well-to-do peoples. Dey[121]
ain’ been no poor white trash. Dey hab ‘stonishing blood
in dey vein. I been b’long to Massa Sam Stevenson wha’ lib
right down dere ‘cross Ole Smith Swamp. Dey ain’ hab no
chillun dey own, but dey is raise uh poor white girl dere,
Betty. Dey gi’e (give) she eve’yt’ing she ha’e en dey school
she too.”

“De ole man, he mind ain’ been zactly right when he die.
Dey say he bury some o’ he money down dere on he place jes
‘fore he die. Coase I dunno nuthin ’bout it, but dats wha’
dey tell me. Dey say dey never is find dat money a’ter he
been dead. Reckon it dere yet, I dunno. Peoples use’er aw
de time be plough up kegs en box full o’ money en va’uables
wha’ de well-to-do folks been hide dere.”

“De white peoples use’er bury dey silver en dey money
en aw dey va’uables late on uh evenin’ er early on uh mornin’
when de Yankees come ’bout. De Yankees ‘stroy aw us white
peoples va’uables wha’ dey is see. Um——dem
Yankees sho’ was ‘structive whey dey is went.”

“My ole mammy been Sally Stevenson ‘fore she marry en
den she wuz Sally Bowens. My ole Missus take she ‘way from
her mammy when she wuz jes uh little small girl en never[122]
wouldn’t ‘low her go in de colored settlement no more. She
been raise up in de white folks house to be de house girl.
Never didn’t work none tall outside. She sleep on uh pallet
right down by de Missus bed. She sleep dere so she kin keep
de Missus kivver (cover) up aw t’rough de night. My mammy
ain’ never do nuthin but been de house girl. My Missus
larnt (learned) she how to cut en sew so she been good uh
seamstress is dere wuz anywhey. She help de Missus make aw
de plantation clothes en dere ain’ never been no better
washer en ironer no whey den my ole mammy wuz.”

“When I wuz uh little small girl, us lib right dere in
my ole Missus yard. Dey le’ us chillun play aw us wanna den.
Never did hadder do none hard work tall. My Massa is some uh
time send we chillun in de field to scare de crow offen de
corn. Ain’ never been no hoe hand in me life. When dey send
we to scare de crow ‘way, we is go in de field when fuss (first)
sun up en we is stay dere aw day. Coase we is come to de house
when 12 o’clock come en ge’ we sumptin uh eat. Dese white folks
’round here don’ hab no chillun to scare de crow offen dey corn
nowadays. Dey has aw kind o’ ole stick sot (set) ’bout in de
field wid ole pant en coat flying ’bout on dem to scare de crow
‘way. Dere be plenty crow ’bout nowadays too. I hears em
hollerin aw ’bout in dis sky ’round ’bout here.”[123]

“I ‘member when I use’er nu’se de white folks baby. I
al’ays did lub to nu’se de babies, but I didn’t never lub to
nu’se no ug’y baby. I lub to hab uh pretty baby to nu’se.
Didn’t lak no boy baby neither. Don’ lak boy baby nohow.
Lubbed little girl baby. Lubbed to take de little girls en
dress em up in dey pretty clothes en carry dem out under de
trees to ‘muse dem whey dere wuz plenty peoples ’bout to see
em. Mammy al’ays ‘ud fuss at me ’bout puttin’ on dey best
clothes, but I ain’ never do lak dese nu’se do nowadays. I
take care o’ my babies, didn’t never ‘low em wallow in de dirt
lak yunnah see dese nu’se do ’bout here dese day en time.”

“I ‘members one time I been nu’se little boy baby en I
is larnt he hair to curl jes uz pretty. I bresh he hair
eve’y morning en twist it ’round me finger en he is had pretty
curl uz dere wuz anywhey. Never lak de Missus to cut my baby
hair off neither when I had larnt it to curl.”

“I been lub to wash little baby clothes too. I is primp
em up so nice. Never did put no starch much in em. I do me
best on em en when I ge’ t’rough, dey been look too nice to
le’ de child muss up.”

“Honey, I can’ stand no chillun fuss ’round me no more
dese days. Don’ hab no chillun fuss ’round me peaceful little
place. I tell aw me chillun en grandchillun en great-grandchillun
dat I can’ stand no chillun fuss ’round me no more.[124]
My Sammie, he marry three times en I ax him why he wanna
marry so many time. I ain’ never see no man I is wan’
since my ole man die.”

“I ain’ wha’ I use’er to be, child. I ain’ able to
do nuthin more now but dem little bit o’ clothes wha’ Miss
Betty hab. Coase she clothes ain’ hard to wash. Miss Betty
mighty clean, honey, she mighty clean. She don’ strip she
bed but eve’y udder week en den de sheet ain’ dirty one speck.
She does wash she self eve’y day en de sheet don’ ge’ de
crease out dem from one time dey wash till de next. I say I
gwinna wash Miss Betty clothes jes uz long uz de Massa’ll le’
me em.”

Source: Personal interview with Mom Jessie Sparrow,
age 83, colored, Marion, S.C., May 1937.

MOM JESSIE SPARROW

Ex-Slave, 83 years.

“I dunno, child, I don’ ‘member nuthin more den I tell[125]
yuh de udder time. Is yuh been to see Maggie Black yet? I
dunno how old she, but I know she been here. No, child,
Maggie ain’ dead. She lib right down dere next Bethel Church.
She move ‘way from Miss Mullins house when Gus die. Coase I
ain’ ne’er been in she house a’ter she move dere, but dey say
she hab uh mighty restful place dere. Dat wha’ dey tell me.
Maggie oughta could tell yuh aw ’bout dem times. I ain’ know
nuthin more to tell yuh. Don’ tell yuh aw I know.”

“Who my mammy wuz? My mammy been Sallie Stevenson ‘fore
she marry en den a’ter she marry, she waz Sallie Bowens. Don’
know whey dey ge’ de Bowens from cause my pa been b’long to be
uh Evans. Dat how come Miss Betty know so much ’bout me. She
say we mighty nigh de same age. Coase I don’ never ‘spute
Miss Betty word, but I don’ t’ink so.”

“No, child, I dunno. Dunno how many chillun my mammy is
hab. Dey aw been die sech uh long time dat I don’ forgot.
Coase George, de carpenter, my brother. He been train up by
uh good carpenter man en Henry, wha’ paint aw dese house ’bout
here, b’long to be annuder one uv we. It jes lak ’bout my own
chillun, I ain’ ‘member how many dey wuz. I know dere ’bout
t’ree uv dem bigguns dead, but aw dem babies, Lawd, I ain’
‘member how many dere wuz. Can’ never recollect nuthin ’bout
how many dere been come here.”[126]

“My mammy been de house girl in my white folks house.
She marry when she ain’ but 13 year old. Dat wha’ she tell
me. She say she marry to ge’ outer de big house. Dat how
come she to marry so soon. Say de white folks take she way
from she mammy when she won’ but uh little small girl en
make she sleep right dere on uh pallet in de Missus room aw
de time ‘fore she marry. Coase a’ter she marry, she been
de house girl right on but she never stay in de Missus
house when night come. Us chillun ain’ been ‘low to stay
in de big house. Dey hab uh room put on de kitchen fa my
mammy en she family to lib in. We chillun stay right dere
in de yard whey my mammy could look a’ter us in en ’round.
My mammy hadder stay ’bout my ole Missus aw de day en help
she cut en sew de plantation clothes en wash en iron. Den
she hadder help make quilts outer aw de scrap dat been left
o’er a’ter de garment was cut out.”

“Us chillun been fed from de table right dere in de
Missus kitchen en some uv de time my mammy ‘ud bring us
sumptin to eat, wha’ wuz cook in de Missus kitchen, en le’
us eat it in she room. Dey’ud gi’e us hominy en milk en
meat fa us break’ast. My white folks hadder uh lot uv
cows en dey’ud gi’e us chillun plenty milk en clabber to
eat. We is hab milk en clabber eve’y day en dey is gi’e
us plenty meat to eat, so dey is dat. Child, I ain’ know
no slack eatin’ ’round my ole Missus. Some uv de time we[127]
hab hoecake en den annuder time dey’ud gi’e us obben
(oven) bread. Dey cook eve’yt’ing on de fireplace in
dem days, eve’t’ing. Jes hab rods put ‘cross de fireplace
in de kitchen wid pot hang on it. Dat whey dey
cook us ration. Dey’ud gi’e us t’ings lak peas en
collards en meat fa we dinner. Den dey’ud gi’e us uh
big bowl uv corn bread en clabber late in de evenin’
cause jes lak I is call to yuh jes now, dey is use milk
right smart in dem days. I lak eve’yt’ing wha’ dey is
hab to eat den. Dey never eat lak dese peoples eats
nowadays. I won’ larnt to lak aw kind uv t’ing. Dey
use’er cook poke salad wha’ been season wid meat. Don’
yuh know wha’ dat? Poke salad is come up jes lak dose
weed out dere en dey is cut de top offen dem en take aw
de hard part outer em en den dey is boil em uh long time
wid meat. Dey is eat right good too. Don’ lak spinach
en aw dat sumptin en don’ lak celery neither. Don’ lak
butter put in nuthin I eats. I laks me squash fried down
brown lak wid grease in de pan. I laks me beets wid uh
little vinegay on em en season wid some sugar sprinkle on
em. Don’ lak em jes wid nuthin but uh little salt en
butter smear aw o’er dem lak some uv dese peoples ’bout
here eat em nowadays.”[128]

“Yas’um, we use’er eat plenty uv em possum. Eve’y
one dey is ketch, us parent cook it. Us eat aw kinder
wild animal den sech uz coon, possum, rabbit, squirrel en
aw dat. Hab plenty uv fish in dem days too. Hab pond
right next de white folks house en is ketch aw de fish
dere dat we is wan’. Some uv de time dey’ud fry em en
den some uv de time dey’ud make uh stew. Dey’ud put uh
little salt en onion en grease in de stew en anyt’ing
dey been ge’ hold uv.”

“Massa Sam been hab uh heap uv colored peoples
‘sides we, but dey lib up on de hill in de quarters.
My Missus, she see to it she self dat dey hab good bed
wha’ to sleep on en plenty sumptin uh eat. She docker
(doctor) em when dey ge’ sick too en she be mighty
anxious ef dey sick mucha. Us hab good clothes en shoes
den too. Coase de peoples’ud wear more clothes den, en
dey’ud put on more undey shirt in de winter den dey wear
in de summer. My white folks’ud make de plantation
clothes outer gingham en jeanes cloth mostly. Dat jeanes
cloth be wha’ dey make little coat en pant outer. Dat
sumptin jes lak homespun.”

“No, child, dey ain’ ne’er gi’e us no money den.
Never need no money den. My Massa been provide eve’t’ing
us hab, honey, eve’yt’ing. We ain’ lak fa nuthin den.[129]
We chillun ain’ been big ‘nough to do nuthin but scare de
crow offen de corn en some uv de time my ole Missus’ud
hab we chillun sweepin’ outer in de yard when she be out
dere wid us.”

“Yas’um, honey, my white folks al’ays’ud see dat dey
colored peoples’ud go to chu’ch (church) eve’y Sunday.
We hadder walk dere to de white big Methodist Chu’ch up
de road en sot en de gallery. Yas’um de white folks is
stay down en we is go up. Ef we chillun never go, my ole
Missus’ud teach us de catechism right dere in de back
yard. Hadder wash us face en hand en come dere to she.
Yas’um, I ‘members dat aw right.”

“My white folks’ud ride to chu’ch in dey big ole
carriage en dey driver’ud hab dey big black hosses bresh
jes uz shiny. I forge’ de driver name. Dey hab uh pair
uv dem black hosses wha’ been match hosses en dey is look
jes lak. En den one day de ole Yankees is come t’rough
dere en dey is carry one uv dem ‘way. A’ter dat dey hadder
use one uv de plantation hoss in de place uv dis carriage
hoss. De Missus’ud al’ays take my mammy in de carriage wid
she too. Never left her home, so she tell me. Jes stuff
she down dere ‘tween de seats somewhey.”

Source: Mom Jessie Sparrow, age 83, colored, Marion, S.C.
Personal interview, May 1937.

MOM JESSIE SPARROW

Ex-Slave, 83 Years

Marion, S.C.

“No, honey, dere ain’ not a soul live here but me.[130]
Man stay in dat other room dere just to be a little bit
of company for me when night come. He ain’ not a speck
of kin to me, not a speck. Oh, he pay me a little somethin,
but it not much. Mostly, I does want him for protection like.
Ain’ got but just dis one room for myself cause dat part out
dere does be just like out in de yard. Dis Miss Mary Watson
house en she tell me stay on here dat de house ain’ worth no
fixin. Don’ know how long I be here. No, honey, I ain’ got
no property only just myself. Ain’ got not a bit. Ain’ got
nothin, child. I can’ do no work dese days but dat little
bit of washin dat Miss Betty have en dat ain’ nothin to depend
on. Just try to do a little somethin to help myself along.
Nothin worth to speak bout though.”

“Miss Betty say we bout one age. My daddy belonged to
Miss Betty father en dat how-come she know dere ain’ much
difference in us age. My mammy was de house ‘oman on old man
Sam Stevenson plantation en dat whe’ I was born. When we was
freed, I was a little small girl en my daddy moved us up here
in town right over dere on de Gibson place. Fore den, when
he have a mind to see us, he had to come cross de swamp dere
to old man Sam Stevenson place en dat de reason he move us.[131]
He say it take too much pains to keep dat gwine back en
forth. I remembers I finished growin right up here in dis
town over dere on de Gibson place. My mammy have task to
cook dere en my daddy been de butler man, but I was small
den. Can’ recollect much bout it. Reckon I wouldn’ hardly
know de place whe’ I was born if I go back dere now. De old
man Sam Stevenson had nice house, but it burn down long time
back. Dey tell me dat de first court de peoples in Marion
did ever know bout meet right dere on dat same spot. Coase
I don’ know nothin bout it, but dat what I hear dem say.”

“My Massa had a big plantation, honey, a big plantation
wid heap of colored people house. I remember dey call up dat
way from de house on de hill en all de servants house set up
dere. So I hear my mammy say she know bout some white folks
dat didn’ half feed dey colored people en didn’ half clothe
dem in de winter neither, but our white folks always treat
us mighty good. Put shoes on all us feet in de winter en
give us abundance of ration all de time.”

“Honey, I hear dem talkin bout dat war, but I can’ tell
you nothin bout dat. I recollects I see dem Yankees when dey
come through my Massa plantation en took his best carriage
horse. Had two of dem big black carriage horses dat was match
horses en dem Yankees carry one of dem away wid dem. I hear
dem say de white folks would bury dey silver en money in pots
en barrels to hide dem from de Yankees. Oh, dem fiddlin Yankees[132]
ax nobody nothin. Just go in de house en take dat what dey
wanted. Go right in de house en plunder round en take de
peoples best things. Wouldn’ take no common things. Wasn’
right, but dey done it. I hear talk dat a man plowed up a
chest or somethin another de other day full of money, so dey
tells me. I hear plenty peoples plow up all kind of things
dese days in old fields dat ain’ been broke up or throwed
out for years. I hear so, but I know I ain’ never found
none though.”

“I sho been here when dat shake come here, child. I
been married ever since I was a grown ‘oman en I was stayin
right over yonder in dat house dere. My son Henry was de
baby on me lap den en he tell me de other day dat he was
bout 50 now. It come like a wind right from dat way. Some
people tell me de ground was just a shakin en a mixin up, but
I don’ know how de ground was doin cause I never go on it. I
hear de lumberation comin or dat what I calls it en it come
long en hit de side of de house so hard dat all de dishes was
just a rattlin. Every time de earth commence shakin, dem dish
start jinglin. It come bout de early part of de night. I didn’
know what to think it was till somebody come dere en say it been
a earthquake. Say de ground was just a workin up. I tell you
I ain’ know what it was to be scared of, but dere been de old
Ark (boarding house) standin cross de street den en dem people
was scared most to death. Dey thought it was de Jedgment comin[133]
on. Reckon I would been scared worser den I was, but I didn’
get on de ground. No, honey, I reckon de house dat was standin
up in dat day en time was substantial like en it didn’ worry
none of dem.”

“Is you seen Maggie Black any more? She been right sick,
but she better now. Yes, she been right puny. Don’ know what
ail her.”

“Honey, what can you tell me bout dat white man dat been
shoot up bout Mullins de other day. I hear people talk bout
a man been shot by another man, but I ain’ know nothin more
den dat. Ain’ hear none of de details only as dey tell me
dey catch de man dat got away next Dillon tryin to get back
home. I tell you it a bad place up dere in Mullins durin dis
tobacco time. Dey tell me dere be such a stir up dat people
be rob en shoot all bout dere. Dat de reason I stay back here
whe’ ain’ nobody to worry me. Some of dem be seekin for you
when you sleep en den another time dey get you when you gwine
long de road. I don’ like so much fuss en rousin en mix up
round me. Dat de reason I does stay here by myself.”

“De people just livin too fast dis day en time, honey.
You know some of dese people, I mean my race, dey got a little
bit of education en ain’ got no manners. I tell dem if dey
ain’ got no manners, dey ain’ got nothin cause manners carries
people whe’ a dollar won’ carry you. Dis education don’ do
everybody no good. It get some of dem standin on de top of
dey heads. Dat what it done to dem. Coase dey say everybody[134]
chillun got to go to school dis year en dat a good thing
cause dere be so many runnin round makin mischief when dey
ain’ in school. I used to tell my chillun I buy dey book
en satchel en keep plenty meat en bread for dem to eat en
dey portion been to go dere en get dey learnin. If dey get
whippin at school, I tell dem go back en get more. Didn’
never entice dem to stay home.”

“All I know bout Abraham Lincoln was dat he Abraham
Lincoln en he de one cause freedom. I recollect dey used
to sing song bout him, but I done forget it now. Say dey
hung Abraham Lincoln on de sour apple tree or old Jeff Davis
or somethin like dat. Honey, dat all I know. Can’ recollect
nothin more den dat bout it.”

“Child, dis a pretty bad time de people got dese days,
I tell you. Coase I thankful don’ nobody worry me. All treats
me nice, both white en black, what knows me. I be gwine down
de street en folks come out de courthouse en say, ‘Ain dat
Mom Jessie? Mom Jessie, don’ you remember me?’ I say, ‘I
know your favor, but I can’ call your name.’ Dey tell me en
laugh en let me lone. It just like dis, child, I puts my trust
in de Lord en I lives mighty peaceful like. I ain’ got a enemy
in de world cause everybody speaks appreciatively of me. Dere
somebody bringin me somethin to eat all de time en I don’ be
studyin bout it neither. First one en den de other bring me
a plate en somethin another. Don’ want me to do no cookin.[135]
Say I might fall in de fire. Honey, de lady come by here
de other day en tell me I gwine get de old ‘oman money
pretty soon now dat dere been so much talk bout. I be
thankful when it get here too, child, cause I wants to
get first one thing en de other to do some fixin up bout
my house.”

“Well, honey, I tired now cause I ain’ much today
nohow. Can’ recollect nothin else dis mornin. Don’ know
what you want to hear bout all dem things for nohow.”

Source: Mom Jessie Sparrow, age 83, ex-slave, Bond Street,
Marion, S.C.—Third Report.

Personal interview by Annie Ruth Davis, Sept., 1937.

MOM JESSIE SPARROW

Ex-Slave, 83 Years

“No, I ain’ cold. I settin in de sun. Miss Ida,[136]
she went by here just now en call at me bout de door been
open en lettin dat cold wind blow in on my back wid all de
fire gone out. I tell her, it ain’ botherin me none, I been
settin out in de sun. Well, I don’ feel much to speak bout,
child, but I knockin round somehow. Miss Ida, she bring me
dis paper to study on. She does always be bringin me de Star
cause she know dat I love to see de news of Marion. It right
sad bout de Presbyterian preacher, but everybody got to die,
I say. Right sad though. We hear dat church bell here de
other evenin en we never know what it been tollin for. I
holler over dere to Maggie house en ax her how-come de church
bell tollin, but she couldn’ tell me nothin bout it. Reckon
some chillun had get hold of it, she say. I tell her, dat
bell never been pull by no chillun cause I been hear death
note in it. Yes, honey, de people sho gwine horne (grieve)
after Dr. Holladay.”

“I say, I doin very well myself en I thankful I ain’
down in de bed. Mighty thankful I ain’ down in de bed en
can set up en talk wid de people when dey comes to see me.
I ain’ been up dere on your street in a long time. Can’ do
much walkin dese days cause I ain’ got no strength to speak
bout. Ain’ been up town dere in bout two months. Mr. Jervey[137]
ax John Evans what de matter dat I ain’ been comin to de
store to get my rations en John Evans tell him I been under
de weather. Somehow another, dey all likes me up dere en
when dey don’ see me up town on Saturday, dey be axin bout
me. Mr. Jervey, he come here de other day en bring me some
tobacco en syrup en cheese en some of dem other things what
he know dat I used to buy dere. He tell me dey all was wantin
to see me back up dere again. I say, I can’ go up dere cause
I give way in my limbs en just comes right down whe’ I don’
have nothin to catch to. Got dis old stick here dat I balances
myself on when I goes out round bout de house here. Cose I
don’ venture to steady myself no far ways on it.”

“No, child, I ain’ been up your way in a long time. I
wash for Miss Betty all my best days, but I ain’ been up to
de house in many a mornin. Miss Betty like myself now, she
old. I tell dem up dere to de house, de last time I talk wid
dem, don’ mind Miss Betty cause her mind ain’ no good. I say,
just gwine on en do what you got to do en let Miss Betty rest.
You see, Miss Betty always would have her way en dis ain’ no
time to think bout breakin her neither. Cose I don’ know
nothin bout it, but Miss Betty say we bout one age.”

“I reckon Miss Betty got plenty pecans dis year cause
she does rake dem up by de tubfuls bout dis time of de year.
I got my share of dem last year, but I ain’ got no mind dat
I gwine get any dis year less I go up dere. Yes, mam, I got[138]
my share last year cause when I went to carry Miss Betty
washin home, I could pick up all I wanted while I come
through under de trees. My Lord, Miss Betty, she had a
quantity of dem last year, but I ain’ hear what de crop
doin dis year. I don’ care though cause I wouldn’ eat
dem nohow widout I beat dem up en I ain’ in no shape to
go to all dat trouble. I loves peanuts good as anybody,
but I couldn’ never chew dem widout dey was beat up.”

“Honey, my child en her daughter comin from de
northern states dis Christmas to see me. Her name Evelyn,
but dey call her Missie. She write here dat she want to
come en I tell my Sammie to send word dey is welcome. Cose
dey gwine stay wid my son, Sammie, cause dey got more room
den I is en dey got a cookin stove, too, but she gwine be in
en out here wid her old mammy off en on. Yes’um, I wants to
see her mighty bad since it be dat she been gone from here
so long. When she first went up dere, she worked for a white
family dere to Hartford, Connecticut, but it won’ long fore
she got in a fidget to marry en she moved dere to Philadelphia.
Dat whe’ she livin now, so my Sammie tell me.”

“Den dere another one of my chillun dat I say, I don’ never
‘spect to see no more on dis side of de world. Evelina, she
get married en go way out west to live. She de one what used
to nurse Lala up dere to Miss Owens’ house. My God, honey,
she been crazy bout Lala. Don’ care what she been buy on a[139]
Saturday evenin, she would save some of it till Monday to
carry to dat child. My Evelina, she always would eat en she
used to bring Lala here wid her a heap of times to get somethin
to eat. She would come in en fetch her dat tin plate up dere
full of corn bread en molasses en den she would go to puttin
dem ration way. Would put her own mouth full en den she would
cram some of it down Lala’s mouth in de child’s belly. You
see, I always would keep a nice kind of syrup in de safe cause
I don’ like none dese kind of syrup much, but dis here ribbon
cane syrup. My Lord, dat child would stand up dere en eat
just as long as Evelina poke it down her. Oh, Lala been just
a little thing plunderin bout en I tell Evelina dat she ought
not to feed dat child dem coarse ration, but she say, ‘Lala
want some en I gwine give it to her cause I loves her.’ No,
child, Miss Owens never didn’ worry her mind bout whe’ Evelina
been carry dat child. You see, she been put trust in Evelina.”

“I don’ know what to tell you, honey. I bout like Miss
Betty now. My ‘membrance short dese days. Oh, I hear talk
bout all kind of signs de people used to worry over en some
of dem still frets bout dem, too. Hear talk dat you mustn’t
wash none on de New Years’ Day. It bad luck, so a heap of dem
say. Den some folks say it a sign of death to hear a owl holler
at night. Some people can’ bear to hear dem, but don’ no owls
worry me, I say. Lord, Maggie, dis child ax me how a owl holler
when it a sign of death. Well, dey does holler a right good[140]
space apart. Don’ holler right regular. I ain’ hear one
holler now in a long time, but I used to hear dem be hollerin
plenty times out dere somewhe’ another in dem trees. Say,
when some people been hear dem holler on a night, dey would
stick a fire iron in de fire en dat would make de owl quit
off. I hear talk bout a lot of people would do dat. Den
dere another sign de people does have bout de New Years’ Day.
Reckon dat what dey call it, I don’ know. No, mam, I don’
understand nothin bout it, but I does hear people speak bout
dey craves to get a cup of peas en a hunk of hog jowl on de
first day of de year. Say, dem what put faith in dem kind of
victuals on de New Years’ Day, dey won’ suffer for nothin no
time all de next year. Cose I don’ know, but I say dat I eats
it cause I loves it.”

“Well, child, dat bout all I know to speak bout dis evenin.
It gettin so cold, I don’ know whe’ I can manage here much
longer or no. Cose my Sammie, he want me to go stay dere wid
him, but I can’ stand no chillun fuss round me no more. I tell
him dese people bout here be in en out to ax bout me right smart
en I think bout I better stay here whe’ dere ain’ nobody to mind
what I do. You see, honey, old people is troublesome en I don’
want to be noways burdensome to nobody. Yes, mam, I gwine be
right here waitin, if de Lord say so, de next time I see you
makin up dat path.”

Source: Mom Jessie Sparrow, age 83, colored, Marion, S.C.
Personal interview by Annie R. Davis, Dec., 1937.

MOM JESSIE SPARROW

Ex-Slave, 83 Years

“Good morning, honey, I ain’ much today. How you is?[141]
No, I can’ talk nothin bout dem times today. Ain’ know no
more den I done tell you. I doin very well considerin I can’
get bout like I wants to. Doin very well, honey. Peoples
mighty nice to me, white en black. Cose I don’ venture to
get far off de lot, I be so poorly dese days. Ain’ been bout
up town dere in a month since Saturday.”

“Well, my chillun say for me to go live wid dem, but I
don’ want to go down to dat other far end of de town. I tell
dem dey worry me so dat I think I rather be here in dis piece
of house. See, I has such good neighbors bout me here en dere
be so much a fightin en gwine on in dat other end of town. All
de peoples speaks well of me, both white en black, of dem dat
knows me. Yes, mam, Miss Ellen tell me fore she die for me to
stay right here in dis house long as I live en ain’ nobody is
gwine worry me neither. No, child, Miss Mary Watson don’ worry
me, not one speck bout dis house. Miss Mary de only child dat
Miss Ellen got left here. No, honey, I ain’ studyin bout gwine
nowhe’ yet. Cose de house may fall down on me cause dat dere
old kitchen over dere was good when I come here, but it rot down.
Dat how-come I ain’ got no stove. De kitchen rot down en de rain
come in on de stove en rust it out. No, dey don’ worry me none.
I tell dem I ain’ got nothin, but I settin here just as satisfied
like. Cose I may get a little pension soon, but don’ know when[142]
it gwine get here. I ain’ hear tell of nobody gettin it yet.
I tell lady dat come here if I get it, it be all right en if
I don’ get it, dat be all right too.”

“Big sale on today, ain’ dere, child? I hear talk bout
dey gwine sell all de Witcover property en all dat, but I don’
know. Dey sho got a pretty day for it. I had on my old thick
sweater, but it too hot. I had to pull it off en put on dis
here thin jacket. Can’ go bout too naked, honey.”

“Yes’um, I know it was you come here de other night. Cose
I can’ see so good, but I can hear de people voice en tell who
dere time I hear dem comin up dat path. You see, I don’ light
my lamp first night nohow, dere be so much grass round here de
mosquitoes comes in en worries me right smart.”

“Miss Foxworth en dem fixin to plant dey turnips over dere.
Miss Foxworth, I likes her very well to speak. She good-hearted,
kind en clever. She comes over en talks wid me often cause us
been friends ever since fore de old man been gone. Dey ain’ got
no kind of garden yet, but dey fixin to plant a fall garden out
dere.”

“No, child, I done put Miss Betty clothes down. Tell her
I ain’ able to wash no more en my Lord, Miss Betty sho hate to
hear me say dat. Won’ dat Miss Betty clothes was so hard, but
it was de totin dem back en forth en den dere be so little bit
of money in dem, didn’ pay to hire nobody to carry dem. Cose
she didn’ pay me nothin worth much cause she didn’ never have[143]
nothin much, but a little changin of underclothes en bout
one dress. Just had to starch bout one petticoat en one dress,
but I can’ hardly wash for myself dese days en I wouldn’ never
venture to do hers no more. No, honey, my conscience wouldn’
allow me to overpower Miss Betty for dem little bit of somethin
en dey ain’ dirty neither. You see, since Miss Emma been stayin
dere, she in charge de house en uses all her tablecloths en such
as dat. Miss Emma, she mighty nice to me. Every time I go up
dere en I ain’ been doin nothin for her neither, she see can
she find a cup of fresh milk or somethin another to hand me.”

“Reckon I gwine be lonesome right bout dis side next week
cause all de colored schools gwine be open up Monday. You see,
dere be so many school chillun en teacher livin on dis here
street. Dat child over dere say she gwine be home right sharp
after she be finish pickin cotton next week. I say I ain’ be
obliged to leave dis country cause my white folks wouldn’ never
venture to come dere to dat other end of town to see me. All
dese chillun bout here mighty good to me. Don’ never let me
suffer for nothin. Dey caution me not to risk to cook nothin
over dat fireplace cause dey say I might tumble over en can’
catch myself. No, dey tell me don’ do no cookin, I might fall
in en burn up. No, child, I ain’ chance to cook none on dat
fireplace since I been sick. Different ones brings me somethin
dis day en dat day. Don’ suspicion nothin bout it till I see
dem comin. Celeste over dere brings me breakfast en dinner[144]
every day en I don’ never bother wid no supper cause I lays
down too early. Den dey keeps me in plenty bread en rolls
en I keeps a little syrup on hand en eats dat if I gets hungry.
Dere Marguerite all de time bringin me somethin, if it ain’
nothin but a pitcher of ice. You see, dey makes dey ice en it
ain’ costin her nothin. When I see her turn out dat piazza, I
know she comin here. I ain’ see her today, but I lookin for
her. Used to wash for dem too. Honey, I done a lot of work
bout dis town en I don’ suffer for nothin. All de people bout
here be good to me.”

“No, mam, I ain’ gwine let you take no more pictures. Ain’
gwine take no more. If Miss Montgomery say she comin here to
take more pictures, tell her I ain’ gwine take no more. No,
child, I ain’ studyin bout no pictures. I don’ want no more.
I got one big one up dere on de wall dat show me en my mammy
en my son, Sammie, settin in a automobile. Dat my picture
settin up dere wid de white blouse on. I tell dem I look like
somethin den, but I too old en broke up now. My daughter, she
want a picture en she kept on after us till we went up dere to
whe’ de carnival was. Carnival man had a automobile dat he take
your picture in en we get in en set down en he snap de picture.
I tell dem dey got one now en dat ought to be sufficient. Dat
my mammy settin dere by me. She was sho a fine lookin woman.
Lord, Lord, honey, dem chillun love dem pictures, but I ain’
studyin bout wantin my picture scatter all bout de country.”[145]

“Yes, child, I sleeps all right. Go to bed early too
fore anybody else round here do. Yes, mam, I goes to bed
early en don’ never get up none till I see day shine in dem
cracks. I was figurin somebody else ax me dat de other day.
Believe it was Dr. Dibble. My Sammie, he a mammy child. He
never stop till he send de doctor here to see could he find
out de ailment dat seem like was eatin me way. Dr. Dibble
come here en set down in dat chair en ax me a heap of questions.
Den he test my blood en give me a tonic dat he say would hope
me. Yes, mam, dat my Sammie doctor en he goes to see him often,
he does have such a misery in his head. Dat de first time Dr.
Dibble ever been here, but I likes he manner mighty well. Dr.
Zack was a good doctor too. Cose dat what dey tell me, but I
ain’ know nothin bout it. No, child, I been healthy all my
days en I ain’ had to worry bout no doctor. I tells dem when
I falls down, I won’ last long cause I been hearty all my days.”

“Your sister still in Dr. Dibble store (office), ain’ she?
Is she got a cook yet? Dat it, I glad she got somebody to depend
on cause dese young people, can’ tell bout dem. Dey be
one place today en den dey apt to be another place de next day.
I used to cook dere to lady house cross de street, but I never
didn’ cook no Sunday dinner dere. Dat lady been take in sewin
en she would sew en press right on de big Sunday. I tell her
dat a sin en she say she had to get finish somehow dat de folks
was pushin her for dey clothes. I say, ‘Well, dat you, ain’ me.’
I go dere on Sunday mornin en cook breakfast en clean up en put[146]
wood in de kitchen. Den I would go to church en left dem to
cook what dinner dey get. Dat de reason I won’ cook for none
dese white folks dis day en time cause when dey pays you dat
little bit of money, dey wants every bit your time. I been
proud when dat lady move from here cause I was tired walkin
de road back en forth. People come here en beg me to cook
for dem, but I tell dem I gwine stay right here en do my bit
of washin. Gwine get along somehow wid it.”

“Bethel, down dere on de other side de jail, de only church
I ever been a member of. We got to fix us church twixt now en
next year. It need fixin bad. You see, it right on de Main
street gwine down en does be right public out to de people.
I was fixin to go to church Sunday gone, but my child never
come after me. My son, Sammie, never show up, but he come
Sunday evenin laughin. Say, ‘Ma, I know if I come by your
house, you would want to go wid me.’ No, I ain’ been so I
able to go in four Sundays.”

“Child, you ought to had brought your parasol wid you
cause you been settin here so long, you gwine be late gettin
whe’ you started. Dis here another hot day we got come here.”

“Well, good-day, child. Speak bout how you is find Maggie
Black to me when you pass back long dat street dere.”

Source: Mom Jessie Sparrow, ex-slave, 83 years, Marion, S.C.
Personal interview by Annie Ruth Davis, October, 1937.

ROSA STARKE

EX-SLAVE 83 YEARS OLD.

Rosa’s grandfather was a slave of Solicitor Starke. Although she has[147]
had two husbands since slavery, she has thrown their names into the discard
and goes by the name of Rosa Starke. She lives in a three-room frame house
with her son, John Harrison, two miles south of Winnsboro, S.C., on the plantation
of Mrs. Rebecca V. Woodward. She still does farm work, hoeing and picking
cotton.

“They say I was six years old when de war commence poppin’ in Charleston.
Mammy and pappy say dat I was born on de Graham place, one of de nineteen plantations
of my old marster, Nick Peay, in 1854. My pappy was name Bob and my
mammy name Salina. They had b’longed to old Marse Tom Starke befo’ old Marse
Nick bought them. My brudders was name Bob and John. I had a sister name Carrie.
They was all older than me.

“My marster, Nick Peay, had nineteen places, wid a overseer and slave quarters
on every place. Folks dat knows will tell you, dis day, dat them nineteen
plantations, in all, was twenty-seven thousand acres. He had a thousand slaves,
more or less, too many to take a census of. Befo’ de numerator git ’round, some
more would be born or bought, and de nominator had to be sent ’round by Marse
Nick, so old Miss Martha, our mistress, say. Her never could know just how many
’twas. Folks used to come to see her and ask how many they had and her say it
was one of them sums in de ‘rithmetic dat a body never could take a slate and
pencil and find out de correct answer to.

“Her was a Adamson befo’ her marry old marster, a grand big buckra. Had
a grand manner; no patience wid poor white folks. They couldn’t come in de front
yard; they knowed to pass on by to de lot, hitch up deir hoss, and come knock on[148]
de kitchen door and make deir wants and wishes knowed to de butler.

“You wants me to tell ’bout what kind of house us niggers live in then?
Well, it ‘pend on de nigger and what him was doin’. Dere was just two classes
to de white folks, buckra slave owners and poor white folks dat didn’t own no
slaves. Dere was more classes ‘mongst de slaves. De fust class was de house
servants. Dese was de butler, de maids, de nurses, chambermaids, and de cooks.
De nex’ class was de carriage drivers and de gardeners, de carpenters, de barber,
and de stable men. Then come de nex’ class de wheelwright, wagoners,
blacksmiths and slave foremen. De nex’ class I ‘members was de cow men and de
niggers dat have care of de dogs. All dese have good houses and never have to
work hard or git a beatin’. Then come de cradlers of de wheat, de threshers,
and de millers of de corn and de wheat, and de feeders of de cotton gin. De lowest
class was de common field niggers. A house nigger man might swoop down and
mate wid a field hand’s good lookin’ daughter, now and then, for pure love of
her, but you never see a house gal lower herself by marryin’ and matin’ wid a
common field-hand nigger. Dat offend de white folks, ‘specially de young misses,
who liked de business of match makin’ and matin’ of de young slaves.

“My young marsters was Marse Tom, Marse Nick, and Marse Austin. My young
misses was Miss Martha, Miss Mary, and Miss Anne Eliza. I knows Marse Nick, Jr.
marry a Cunningham of Liberty Hill. Marse Tom marry a Lyles and Marse Austin
marry and move to Abbeville, after de war. Old marster die de year befo’ de
war, I think, ’cause my mammy and pappy fell in de division to Marse Nick and us
leave de Graham place to go to de home place. It was called de Melrose place.
And what a place dat was! ‘Twas on a hill, overlookin’ de place where de Longtown
Presbyterian Church and cemetery is today. Dere was thirty rooms in it
and a fish pond on top of it. A flower yard stretchin’ clean down de hill to[149]
de big road, where de big gate, hangin’ on big granite pillars, swung open to
let de carriages, buggies, and wagons in and up to de house.

“Can I tell you some of de things dat was in dat house when de Yankees
come? Golly no! Dat I can’t, but I ‘members some things dat would ‘stonish you
as it ‘stonished them. They had Marseille carpets, linen table cloths, two silver
candlesticks in every room, four wine decanters, four nut crackers, and two coffee
pots, all of them silver. Silver castors for pepper, salt, and vinegar bottles.
All de plates was china. Ninety-eight silver forks, knives, teaspoons and table-spoons.
Four silver ladles, six silver sugar tongs, silver goblets, a silver mustard
pot and two silver fruit stands. All de fireplaces had brass firedogs and
marble mantelpieces. Dere was four oil paintin’s in de hall; each cost, so Marse
Nick say, one hundred dollars. One was his ma, one was his pa, one was his Uncle
Austin and de other was of Colonel Lamar.

“De smoke-house had four rooms and a cellar. One room, every year, was
filled wid brown sugar just shoveled in wid spades. In winter they would drive up
a drove of hogs from each plantation, kill them, scald de hair off them, and pack
de meat away in salt, and hang up de hams and shoulders ’round and ’bout de smokehouse.
Most of de rum and wine was kep’ in barrels, in de cellar, but dere was a
closet in de house where whiskey and brandy was kep’ for quick use. All back on
de east side of de mansion was de garden and terraces, acres of sweet ‘taters,
water millions (watermelons) and strawberries and two long rows of beehives.

“Old marster die. De ‘praisers of de State come and figure dat his mules,
niggers, cows, hogs, and things was worth $200,000.00. Land and houses I disremember
’bout. They, anyhow, say de property was over a million dollars. They put a price
of $1,600.00 on mammy and $1,800.00 on pappy. I ‘member they say I was worth
$400.00. Young Marse Nick tell us dat the personal property of de estate was[150]
‘praised at $288,168.78.[A]

“De Yankees come set all de cotton and de gin-house afire. Load up all
de meat; take some of de sugar and shovel some over de yard; take all de wine,
rum, and liquor; gut de house of all de silver and valuables, set it afire, and
leave one thousand niggers cold and hongry, and our white folks in a misery they
never has got over to de third generation of them. Some of them is de poorest
white folks in dis State today. I weeps when I sees them so poor, but they is
‘spectable yet, thank God.

“After de war I stuck to de Peay white folks, ’til I got married to Will
Harrison. I can’t say I love him, though he was de father of all my chillun. My
pappy, you know, was a half white man. Maybe dat explain it. Anyhow, when he
took de fever I sent for Dr. Gibson, ‘tend him faithful but he die and I felt more
like I was free, when I come back from de funeral, than I did when Marse Abe
Lincoln set us free. My brudder, Bob, had done gone to Florida.

“I nex’ marry, in a half-hearted way, John Pearson, to help take care of
me and my three chillun, John, Bob, and Carrie. Him take pneumonia and die, and
I never have a speck of heart to marry a colored man since. I just have a mind
to wait for de proper sort, till I git to heaven, but dese adult teachers ‘stroy
dat hope. They read me dat dere is no marryin’ in heaven. Well, well, dat’ll be
a great disappointment to some I knows, both white and black, and de ginger-cake
women lak me.

“Is I got any more to tell you? Just dis: Dere was 365 windows and doors
to Marse Nick Peay’s house at Melrose, one for every day in de year, my mistress
‘low. And dere was a peach tree in de orchard so grafted dat dat peach tree have
ripe peaches on it in May, June, July, August, September, and October.”

JOSEPHINE STEWART

EX-SLAVE 85 YEARS OLD.

Phinie Stewart, as she is known in the community where she lives,[151]
is a small, black negress, who shows her age in appearance and movements.
She lives with Robert Wood, a hundred yards back of the Presbyterian
Church manse at Blackstock, S.C. Robert Wood married Phinie’s niece,
who is now deceased. Phinie has no property, and depends entirely on
the charity of Robert Wood for her support.

“Does you know where de old Bell House is, about a mile de other
side of Blackstock, on de Chester road? Yes? Well, dere is where I was
borned, in May, 1853.

“I doesn’t know who my pappy was. You know in them times folks
wasn’t particular ’bout marriage licenses and de preacher tying de knot
and all dat kind of thing. But I does know mammy’s name. Her name was
Celie. Dese eyes of mine is dim but I can see her now, stooping over de
wash tub and washing de white folks’ clothes every Monday and Tuesday.

“Us belonged to Marster Charlie Bell and his lady, Miss Maggie Bell,
our mistress in them slavery days. Does I ‘member who Miss Maggie was befo’
her married Marster Charlie? Sure I does. Mistress was a daughter of Miss
Anne Jane Neil, who lived to be a hundred and five years old, and its writ
on her tombstone in Concord Cemetery. I ‘spect you has seen it, ain’t you?
Old Miss Anne Neil was a Irish lady, born in Ireland across de ocean. She
had a silver snuff box; I seen it. She’d take snuff out dat box, rub it up[152]
her nose and say: ‘De Prince of Whales (Wales) give me dis box befo’
I come to dis country, and I was presented to his ma, Queen Victoria, by
de Duke of Wellington on my sixteenth birthday.’ Old Miss Anne Neil
claims she was born over dere de very night of de battle of Waterloo.
And she would go on and ‘low dat when de duke took her by de hand and
led her up to de queen, him say: ‘Your Majesty, dis young lady was
born on de night of our great victory at Waterloo.’

“My young mistress was named Miss Margaret. She married Marse
Wade Brice. I was give to them when I was ’bout five years old and I
went along with them to Woodward, S.C. My mammy was give to them, too,
at de same time. Us lived in Marse Wade’s quarter, to de east of de
white folks’ house. Dere was a row of log houses, ’bout ten I think.
Mammy and me lived in one dat had two rooms. De chimney was made of
sticks and mud, but de floor was a good plank floor. De bed was a wood
bedstead wid a wheat straw tick. Dere was no windows to de house, so it
was warm in de winter time and blue blazing hot in de summer time.

“My white folks was mighty good to us; they fed us well. Us had
wooden shoes and no clothes a-tall in de summer, ‘cept a one-piece slip
on. My mistress die ’bout a year after her marry, and then Marster Wade
marry Miss Tilda Watson, a perfect angel, if dere ever was one on dis
red earth. She take a liking to me right at de jump, on first sight.
I nussed all her chillun. They was Walter, Ida, Dickey, Lunsford, Wade,
Mike, and Wilson. Then I nussed some of her grandchillun. Mr. Brice
Waters in Columbia is one of them grandchillun.

“Marse Wade went off to de war and got shot in de hip, but he
jined de calvary (cavalry) soon after and was away when de Yankees come[153]
through. De Yankees burned and stole everything on de place. They took
off all de sheep, mules, and cows; killed all de hogs; cotch all de chickens,
ducks and geese; and shot de turkeys and tied them to deir saddles as
they left. De gin-house made de biggest blaze I ever has seen. Dere was
short rations for all de white folks and niggers after dat day.

“In 1870 I was still dere wid Marse Wade and Miss Tilda, when de
devil come along in de shape, form, and fashion of a man. He was name Simon
Halleg. I was young then, and a fool, when I married dat no ‘count nigger.
Us had two chillun, a boy, Allen, and a girl, Louise. Louise sickened and
died befo’ she was grown. Allen married and had one child, but him and de
child are dead. My husband run away and left us.

“About de time of de great cyclone, Miss Tatt Nicholson, a cousin of
Miss Tilda, come down and took me to Chester, to be a maid at de Nicholson
Hotel. I liked de work, but I got many a scare while I was dere. In them
days every hotel had a bar where they would mix whiskey and lemons. Men
could just walk up, put deir foots on de brass rail of de bar counter and
order what they want, and pay fifteen cents a drink. Sometimes they would
play cards all night in de bar. One night an old gent stopped his wagon,
dat had four bales of cotton on it, befo’ de hotel. He come in to get a
drink, saw a game going on and took a hand. Befo’ bed time he had lost
all his money and de four bales of cotton outside.

“No, I didn’t work in slavery times. Chillun didn’t have to work.
De only thing I ‘members doing was minding de flies off de table wid a
brush made out of peacock tail-feathers.

“All de slaves had to go to church at Concord twice every month and
learn de Shorter Catechism. I has one of them books now, dat I used seventy-[154]five
years ago. Want to see it? (She exhibits catechism printed in 1840
for slaves.)

“I left de hotel and come back to Miss Tilda Brice. I married Jacob
Stewart then, and he was a good man. Us had no chillun. He been gone to
glory eight years, bless God.

“Yes, sir, I ‘members de earthquake. It set a heap of people to
praying dat night. Even de cows and chickens got excited. I thought de
end of de world had come. I jined de Red Hill Baptist Church then, but
my membership is now at de Cross Roads Baptist Church. Brother Wright, de
pastor, comes to see me, as I’m too feeble to gallivant so far to church.

“Dis house b’longs to Joe Rice. My nephew rents from him and is
good enough, though a poor man, to take care of me.

“Please do all you can to get de good President, de Governor, or
somebody to hasten up my old age pension dat I’m praying for.”

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“I was born near old Bush River Baptist Church in Newberry[155]
County, S.C. This was the white folks’ church, but the
colored folks have a Bush River church in that section now. I
was grown when the war started. I was a slave of Bonny Floyd.
He was a good man who owned several slaves and a big farm. I
was the house-girl then, and waited on the table and helped
around the house. I was always told to go to the white folks’
church and sit in the gallery.

“When the Patrollers was started there, they never did
bother Mr. Bonny’s slaves. He never had any trouble with them,
for his slaves never run away from him.

“The Ku Klux never come to our place, and I don’t remember
seeing them in that section.

“We took our wheat to Singley’s Mill on Bush River to be
ground. We made all our flour and grain. We plowed with horses
and mules.

“I am an old woman, sick in bed and can’t talk good; but
glad to tell you anything I can.”

Source: Bettie Suber (96), Newberry, S.C.
Interviewer: G.L. Summer, Newberry, S.C. (5/18/37).

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“I was born on the Enoree River in Newberry County. Tom Price[156]
was my master. I married Nathan Swindler when I was about grown. My
father and mother was Dave and Lucy Coleman. I had a brother and
several sisters. We children had to work around the home of our master
’till we was old enough to work in de fields, den we would hoe
and pick cotton, and do any kinds of field work. We didn’t have much
clothes, just one dress and a pair of shoes at a time, and maybe one
change. I married in a ole silk striped dress dat I got from my mistress,
Miss Sligh. We had no ‘big-to-do’ at our wedding, just married
at home. In cold weather, I had sometimes, heavy homespun or
outing dress. When Saturday afternoons come, we got off from work
and do what we want. Some of us washed for de week. We had no schools
and couldn’t read and write. Sometimes we could play in our yards
after work was over or on Saturday afternoons. On Christmas the master
give us something good to eat. We didn’t have doctors much, but
de ole folks had cures for sickness. Dey made cherry-bark tea for
chills and fever, and root-herb teas for fevers. Lots of chills and
fevers then. To cure a boil or wart, we would take a hair from the
tail of a horse and tie it tight around both sides of the sore place.
I think Abe Lincoln was a great man, and Jeff Davis was a good man
too. I think Booker Washington was a great man for de colored race.
I like it better now than de way it was in slavery time.”

Source: Ellen Swindler (78), Newberry. S.C. Interviewed by:
G.L. Summer, Newberry, S.C., May 20, 1937.

MACK TAYLOR

EX-SLAVE 97 YEARS.

Mack Taylor lives six miles southeast of Ridgeway, S.C., on his farm[157]
of ninety-seven acres. The house, in which he resides, is a frame house containing
six rooms, all on one floor. His son, Charley, lives with him. Charley
is married and has a small family.

“Howdy do sir! I sees you a good deal goin’ backwards and forwards to
Columbia. I has to set way back in de bus and you sets up to de front. I can’t
ketch you to speak to you, as you is out and gone befo’ I can lay hold of you.
But, as Brer Fox ‘lowed to Brer Rabbit, when he ketched him wid a tar baby at
a spring, ‘I is got you now.’

“I’s been wantin’ to ask you ’bout dis old age pension. I’s been to
Winnsboro to see ’bout it. Some nice white ladies took my name and ask me some
questions, but dat seem to be de last of it. Reckon I gwine to get anything?

“Well, I’s been here mighty nigh a hundred years, and just ’cause I
pinched and saved and didn’t throw my money away on liquor, or put it into
de palms of every Jezabel hussy dat slant her eye at me, ain’t no valuable
reason why them dat did dat way and ‘joyed deirselves can get de pension and
me can’t get de pension. ‘Tain’t fair! No, sir. If I had a knowed way back yonder,
fifty years ago, what I knows now, I might of gallavanted ’round a little
more wid de shemales than I did. What you think ’bout it?

“You say I’s forgittin’ dat religion must be thought about? Well, I can
read de Bible a little bit. Don’t it say: ‘What you sow you sure to reap?’
Yes, sir. Us niggers was fetched here ‘ginst our taste. Us fell de forests
for corn, wheat, oats, and cotton; drained de swamps for rice; built de dirt[158]
roads and de railroads; and us old ones is got a fair right to our part of
de pension.

“My marster, in slavery times, lived on de Wateree River. He had a
large plantation and, I heard them say, four hundred slaves. He was a hard
marster and had me whipped as many times as I got fingers and toes. I started
workin’ in de field when I was a boy fifteen years old. De work I done was
choppin’ de grass out of de cotton and pickin’ de cotton. What’s become of
them old army worms dat had horns, dat us chillun was so scared of while
pickin’ cotton? I never see them dese days but I’d rather have them than dis
boll weevil I’s pestered wid.

“My marster’s name was Tom Clark. My mistress was a gentle lady, but
field niggers never got to speak to her. All I can say is dat de house slaves
say she was mighty good to them. I saw de chillun of de white folks often and
was glad they would play wid us colored chillun. What deir names? Dere was
Marse Alley, Marse Ovid, Marse Hilliard, and Miss Lucy.

“Old marster got kilt in de last year of de war, and Miss Margaret,
dat was our Mistress, run de place wid overseers dat would thrash you for
all sorts of things. If they ketch you leanin’ on your hoe handle, they’d
beat you; step out of your task a minute or speak to a girl, they’d beat you.
Oh, it was hell when de overseers was around and de mistress nor none of de
young marsters was dere to protect you. Us was fed good, but not clothed so
good in de winter time.

“My pappy didn’t b’long to de Clarks at de commencement of de war. Old
marster done sold him, ‘way from us, to Col. Tom Taylor in Columbia. After de
war, he run a shoe repair shop in Columbia many years befo’ he died. His name
was Douglas Taylor and dat is de reason I took de name, Mack Taylor, when I
give in my name to de Freedman’s Bureau, and I’s stuck to it ever since.[159]

“I members de Yankees. Not many of them come to Miss Margaret’s place.
Them dat did, took pity on her and did nothing but eat, feed deir horses, and
gallop away.

“Us was never pestered by de Ku Klux, but I was given a warnin’ once,
to watch my step and vote right. I watched my step and didn’t vote a-tall, dat
year.

“Mr. Franklin J. Moses was runnin’ for governor. Colored preachers was
preachin’ dat he was de Moses to lead de Negroes out of de wilderness of corn
bread and fat grease into de land of white bread and New Orleans molasses. De
preachers sure got up de excitement ‘mongst de colored women folks. They ‘vised
them to have nothin’ to do wid deir husbands if they didn’t go to de ‘lection
box and vote for Moses. I didn’t go, and my wife wouldn’t sleep wid me for six
months. I had no chillun by her. She died in 1874. After Nancy die, I marry
Belle Dawkins. De chillun us had was George, Charley, Maggie and Tommy. Then
Belle died, and I married Hannah Cunningham. Us had no chillun. After she died,
I marry a widow, Fannie Goings, and us had no chillun.

“My son, George, is in Washington. My daughter, Maggie, is dead. Tommy
was in Ohio de last I heard from him. I is livin’ wid my son, Charley, on my
farm. My grandson, Mack, is a grown boy and de main staff I lean on as I climb
up to de hundred mile post of age.

“I b’longs to de Rehovah Baptist Church. I have laid away four wives in
deir graves. I have no notion of marryin’ any more. Goodness and mercy have
followed me all de days of my life, and I will soon take up dis old body and
dwell in de house of de Lord forevermore.”

DELIA THOMPSON

EX-SLAVE 88 YEARS OLD.

“I’s heard tell of you, and sent for you to come to see me.[160]
Look lak I can no more git ’bout on dese under pins lak I use to. Dere’s
de swing you can set in or chair right by me, now which you rather? I’s
glad you takes de chair, ’cause I can keep steady gaze more better on dat
face of your’n. Lord! I been here in dis world a long time, so I has. Was
born on de Kilgo place near Liberty Hill, don’t know what county ’tis, but
heard it am over twenty-five miles from dis town.

“My old marster name Jesse Kilgo, so he was, and Mistress Letha
Kilgo, dats his wife, good to him, good to me, good to everybody. My young
mistress name Catherine, when her marry Marster Watt Wardlaw, I was give to
them for a housemaid, ’cause I was trim and light complected lak you see I
is dis very day a setting right here, and talking wid you. ‘Members how
’twas young missie say: ‘You come go in my room Delia, I wants to see if I
can put up wid you’. I goes in dat room, winter time mind you, and Miss
Charlotte set down befo’ de fire, cook one of them pretty foots on de dog,
don’t you ketch dat wrong, dat it was a lap dog which ’twasn’t but one of
de fire-dogs. Some persons calls them andy irons (andiron) but I sticks
to my raisin’ and say fire-dogs. Well, she allowed to me, ‘Delia, put
kettle water on de fire’. So I does in a jiffy. Her next command was:
‘Would you please be so kind as to sweep and tidy up de room’? All time
turnin’ dat lovely head of her’n lak a bird a buildin’ her nest, so it was.
I do all dat, then she say: ‘You is goin’ to make maid, a good one!’ She
give a silvery giggle and say: ‘I just had you put on dat water for to see
if you was goin’ to make any slop. No, No! You didn’t spill a drop, you[161]
ain’t goin’ to make no sloppy maid, you just fine.’ Then her call
her mother in. ‘See how pretty Delia’s made dis room, look at them
curtains, draw back just right, observe de pitcher, and de towels on
de rack of de washstand, my I’m proud of her!’ She give old mistress
a hug and a kiss, and thank her for de present, dat present was me. De
happiness of dat minute is on me to dis day.

“My pappy name Isom then, but when freedom come he adds on Hammond.
His pappy was a white man, and no poor white trash neither. My mammy
name Viny. Us live in a log house close up in de back yard, and most all
time I was in de big house waiting on de white folks.

“Did us git any ‘ligion told us? Well, it was dis way, mistress
talk heap to us ’bout de Lord, but marster talk a heap to us ’bout de
devil. ‘Twist and ‘tween them, ‘spect us heard most everything ’bout
heaven and all ’bout de devil.

“Yankees dat come to our house was gentleman, they never took a
thing, but left provisions for our women folks from their commissary.

“My first husband was Cupid Benjamin. My white folks give me a
white dress, and they got de white Baptist preacher, Mr. Collins to do
de grand act for us. Cupid turned out to be a preacher. Us had three
chillun and every night us had family worship at home. I’s been no common
nigger all my life; why, when a child I set up and rock my doll just lak
white chillun, and course it was a rag doll, but what of dat. Couldn’t I
name her for de Virgin Mary, and wouldn’t dat name cover and glorify de
rags? Sure it would! Then I ‘sociate wid white folks all slavery time,
marry a man of God and when he die, I marry another, Tom Thompson, a
colored Baptist preacher. You see dat house yonder? Dats where my daugh[162]ter
and grandchillun live. They is colored aristocracy of de town, but
they has a mighty plain name, its just Smith. I grieve over it off and
on, a kind of thorn in de flesh, my husband used to say. But both my
husbands dead and I sets here twice a widow, and I wonders how ’twill be
when I go home up yonder ‘bove them white thunder heads us can see right
now. Which one them men you reckon I’ll see first? Well, if it be dat
way, ‘spect I’ll just want to see Cupid first, ’cause he was de only one
I had chillun by, and them his grandchillun out yonder.”

ROBERT TOATLEY

EX-SLAVE 82 YEARS OLD.

Robert Toatley lives with his daughter, his son, his son’s wife,[163]
and their six children, near White Oak, seven miles north of Winnsboro, S.C.
Robert owns the four-room frame house and farm containing 235 acres. He has
been prosperous up from slavery, until the boll weevil made its appearance on
his farm and the depression came on the country at large, in 1929. He has
been compelled to mortgage his home but is now coming forward again, having
reduced the mortgage to a negligible balance, which he expects to liquidate
with the present 1937 crop of cotton.

Robert is one of the full blooded Negroes of pure African descent.
His face, in repose, possesses a kind of majesty that one would expect in beholding
a chief of an African tribe.

“I was born on de ‘Lizabeth Mobley place. Us always called it
‘Cedar Shades’. Dere was a half mile of cedars on both sides of de road leading
to de fine house dat our white folks lived in. My birthday was May 15,
1855. My mistress was a daughter of Dr. John Glover. My master married her
when her was twelve years old. Her first child, Sam, got to be a doctor, and
they sho’ did look lak brother and sister. When her oldest child, Sam, come
back from college, he fetched a classmate, Jim Carlisle, wid him. I played
marbles wid them. Dat boy, Jim, made his mark, got ‘ligion, and went to de top
of a college in Spartanburg. Marse Sam study to be a doctor. He start to practice
and then he marry Miss Lizzie Rice down in Barnwell. Mistress give me to
them and I went wid them and stayed ’til freedom.

“My childhood was a happy one, a playin’ and a rompin’ wid de white[164]
chillun. My master was rich. Slaves lived in quarters, 300 yards from de
big house. A street run through the quarters, homes on each side. Beds was
homemade. Mattresses made of wheat straw. Bed covers was quilts and counter-panes,
all made by slave women.

“My mammy’s pappy was a slave brick-mason, b’longin’ to a white
family named Partillo, from Warrington, Virginia. He couldn’t be bought ‘less
you bought his wife and three chillun wid him.

“Never had any money; didn’t know what it was. Mammy was a house
woman, and I got just what de white chillun got to eat, only a little bit later,
in de kitchen. Dere was fifty or sixty other little niggers on de place. Want
to know how they was fed? Well, it was lak dis: You’ve seen pig troughs, side
by side, in a big lot? After all de grown niggers eat and git out de way,
scraps and everything eatable was put in them troughs; sometimes buttermilk poured
on de mess and sometimes potlicker. Then de cook blowed a cow horn. Quick
as lightnin’ a passle of fifty or sixty little niggers run out de plum bushes,
from under de sheds and houses, and from everywhere. Each one take his place,
and souse his hands in de mixture and eat just lak you see pigs shovin’ ’round
slop troughs. I see dat sight many times in my dreams, old as I is, eighty-two
years last Saturday.

“‘Twas not ’til de year of ’66 dat we got ‘liable info’mation and felt
free to go where us pleased to go. Most of de niggers left but mammy stayed
on and cooked for Dr. Sam and de white folks.

“Bad white folks comed and got bad niggers started. Soon things got
wrong and de devil took a hand in de mess. Out of it come to de top, de carpet[165]bag,
de scalawags and then de Ku Klux. Night rider come by and drap something
at your door and say: ‘I’ll just leave you something for dinner’. Then ride
off in a gallop. When you open de sack, what you reckon in dere? Liable to
be one thing, liable to be another. One time it was six nigger heads dat was
left at de door. Was it at my house door? Oh, no! It was at de door of a
nigger too active in politics. Old Congressman Wallace sent Yankee troops,
three miles long, down here. Lot of white folks was put in jail.

“I married Emma Greer in 1879; she been dead two years. Us lived husband
and wife 56 years, bless God. Us raised ten chillun; all is doin’ well.
One is in Winnsboro, one in Chester, one in Rock Hill, one in Charlotte, one
in Chesterfield, one in New York and two wid me on de farm near White Oak,
which I own. I has 28 grandchillun. All us Presbyterians. Can read but
can’t write. Our slaves was told if ever they learned to write they’d lose
de hand or arm they wrote wid.

“What ’bout whuppin’s? Plenty of it. De biggest whuppin’ I ever heard
tell of was when they had a trial of several slave men for sellin’ liquor at
da spring, durin’ preachin’, on Sunday. De trial come off at de church ’bout
a month later. They was convicted, and de order of de court was: Edmund to
receive 100 lashes; Sam and Andy each 125 lashes and Frank and Abram 75 lashes.
All to be given on deir bare backs and rumps, well laid on wid strap. If de
courts would sentence like dat dese days dere’d be more ‘tention to de law.

“You ask me ’bout Mr. Lincoln. I knowed two men who split rails side
by side wid him. They was Mr. McBride Smith and Mr. David Pink. Poor white
people ’round in slavery time had a hard tine, and dese was two of them.

“My white folks, de Mobleys, made us work on Sunday sometime, wid de
fodder, and when de plowin’ git behind. They mighty neighborly to rich neighbors
but didn’t have much time for poor buckra. I tell you poor white men have[166]
poor chance to rise, make sump’n and be sump’n, befo’ de old war. Some of
dese same poor buckra done had a chance since then and they way up in ‘G’
now. They mighty nigh run de county and town of Winnsboro, plum mighty nigh
it, I tell you. It makes me sad, on de other side, to see quality folks befo’
de war, a wanderin’ ’round in rags and tatters and deir chillun beggin’ bread.

“Well, I mus’ be goin’, but befo’ I goes I want to tell you I ‘members
your ma, Miss Sallie Woodward. Your grandpa was de closest neighbor and fust
cousin to Dr. Sam. Deir chillun used to visit. Your ma come down and spen’
de day one time. She was ’bout ten dat day and she and de chillun make me
rig up some harness for de billy goat and hitch him to a toy wagon. I can
just see dat goat runnin’ away, them little chillun fallin’ out backside de
wagon and your ma laughin’ and a cryin’ ’bout de same time. I picks her up
out de weeds and briars.”

SLAVERY REMINISCENCES

“I was born in the town of Newberry, S.C. I do not remember[167]
slavery time, but I have heard my father and mother talk
about it. They were Washington and Polly Holloway, and belonged
to Judge J.B. O’Neall. They lived about 3 miles west of town,
near Bush River. An old colored man lived nearby. His name was
Harry O’Neall, and everybody said he was a miser and saved up
his money and buried it near the O’Neall spring. Somebody dug
around there but never found any money. There were two springs,
one was called ‘horse spring’, but the one where the money was
supposed to be buried had a big tree by it.

“I married Sam Veals, in ‘gravel town’ of Newberry. I had
a brother, Riley, and some sisters.

“We would eat fish, rabbits, ‘possums and squirrels which
folks caught or killed. We used to travel most by foot, going
sometimes ten miles to any place. We walked to school, three or
four miles, every day when I was teaching school after the war.
I was taught mostly at home, by Miss Sallie O’Neall, a daughter
of Judge J.B. O’Neall.

“My father and mother used to go to the white folks’
church, in slavery time. After the war colored churches started.
The first one in our section was Brush Harbor. Simon Miller
was a fine colored preacher who preached in Brush Harbor on
Vandalusah Spring Hill. Isaac Cook was a good preacher. We
used to sing, ‘Gimme dat good ole-time religion’; ‘I’m going
to serve God until I die’ and ‘I am glad salvation is free’.[168]

“Saturday afternoons we had ‘off’ and could work for
ourselves. At marriages, we had frolics and big dinners. Some
of the games were: rope jumping; hide and seek, and, ring around
the roses. Of course, there were more games.

“Some of the old folks used to see ghosts, but I never
did see any.

“Cures were made with herbs such as, peach tree leaves,
boiled as a tea and drunk for fevers. Rabbit tobacco (life everlasting)
was used for colds. Small boys would chew and smoke it,
as did some of the old folks.

“I have seven children, all grown; fourteen grand-children,
and several great-grand-children.

“Judge O’Neall was one of the best men and best masters
in the country that I knew of. I think Abraham Lincoln was a good
man, according to what I have heard about him. Jeff Davis was the
same. Booker Washington was a great man to his country and served
the colored race.

“I joined the church because I believe the bible is true,
and according to what it says, the righteous are the only people
God is pleased with. Without holiness no man shall see God.”

Source: Mary Veals (72), Newberry, S.C. Interviewed by:
G.L. Summer, Newberry, S.C. May 20, 1937.

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“I don’t own no house. I live in a rented house. Yes, I[169]
work fer my living. I don’t ‘member much ’bout slavery except what
I heard my daddy and mammy say. My pa was Washing Holloway and my ma
was Polly Holloway. Dey belonged to Judge O’Neall, and lived at his
place ’bout three miles from town, near Bush River.

“Judge O’Neall’s house was real old, and dey had a store near
it called Springfield, a kind of suburb at dat time.

“After de war, we didn’t have much clothes, ’cause everything
was so high. Judge O’Neall died befo’ de war was over, and his wife
went to Mississippi to live wid her married daughter. After de war,
Miss Sallie, who was Judge O’Neall’s daughter, learn’t me to read
and write, and other things in books.

“My father and mother went to de white folks’ church in
slavery time. After de war, de negroes built deir first church and
called it a ‘brush arbor’. A negro preacher named Simon Miller was
a good man and done lots of good when he preached in de brush arbor.
Dis was on de old Banduslian Springs hill, near de south fork of
Scotts Creek.”

Source: Mary Veals (73), Newberry, S.C.
Interviewer: G.L. Summer, Newberry, S.C. (9/30/37).

MANDA WALKER

EX-SLAVE 80 YEARS OLD.

Manda Walker lives with her son-in-law, Albert Cooper, in a three-room[170]
frame cottage in Winnsboro, S.C. Albert’s first wife was her daughter,
Sallie. Five of their children and Albert’s second wife, Sadie, occupy the
house with Albert and Manda.

“Does you know where Horse Crick (Creek) branch is, and where Wateree
Crick is? Ever been ‘long de public road ‘tween them water courses? Well, on
de sunrise side of dat road, up on a hill, was where my slavery time marster
live.

“I was born in de yard, back of de white folks’ house, in a little log
house wid a dirt floor and a stick and mud chimney to one end of de house. My
marster was name Marse Tom Rowe and my mistress name Missy Jane Rowe. They de
ones dat tell me, long time ago, dat I was born befo’ de war, in 1857. Deir
chillun was Miss Mary and Miss Miami.

“I no work much ’til de end of de war. Then I pick cotton and peas and
shell corn and peas. Most of de time I play and sometime be maid to my young
misses. Both growed into pretty buxom ladies. Miss Miami was a handsome buxom
woman; her marry Marse Tom Johnson and live, after de war, near Wateree Church.

“My pappy name Jeff and b’long to Marse Joe Woodward. He live on a plantation
‘cross de other side of Wateree Crick. My mammy name Phoebe. Pappy have
to git a pass to come to see mammy, befo’ de war. Sometime dat crick git up over
de bank and I, to dis day, ‘members one time pappy come in all wet and drenched
wid water. Him had made de mule swim de crick. Him stayed over his leave dat
was writ on de pass. Patarollers (patrollers) come ask for de pass. They say:[171]
‘De time done out, nigger.’ Pappy try to explain but they pay no ‘tention to
him. Tied him up, pulled down his breeches, and whupped him right befo’ mammy
and us chillun. I shudder, to dis day, to think of it. Marse Tom and Miss
Jane heard de hollerin’ of us all and come to de place they was whuppin’ him
and beg them, in de name of God, to stop, dat de crick was still up and dangerous
to cross, and dat they would make it all right wid pappy’s marster. They
say of pappy: ‘Jeff swim ‘cross, let him git de mule and swim back.’ They make
pappy git on de mule and follow him down to de crick and watch him swim dat swif’
muddly crick to de other side. I often think dat de system of patarollers and
bloodhounds did more to bring on de war and de wrath of de Lord than anything
else. Why de good white folks put up wid them poor white trash patarollers I
never can see or understand. You never see classy white buckra men a paterrollin’.
It was always some low-down white men, dat never owned a nigger in deir life,
doin’ de patarollin’ and a strippin’ de clothes off men, lak pappy, right befo’
de wives and chillun and beatin’ de blood out of him. No, sir, good white men
never dirty deir hands and souls in sich work of de devil as dat.

“Mammy had nine chillun. All dead ‘cept Oliver. Him still down dere
wid de Duke Power Company people, I think. When I come sixteen years old, lak
all gals dat age, I commence to think ’bout de boys, and de boys, I ‘spects,
commence to take notice of me. You look lak you is surprised I say dat. You
is just puttin’ on. Old and solemn as you is, a settin’ dere a writin’, I bets
a whole lot of de same foolishness have run through your head lak it run through
Jerry’s, when he took to goin’ wid me, back in 1873. Now ain’t it so?

“Us chillun felt de pivations (privations) of de war. Us went in rags
and was often hungry. Food got scarce wid de white folks, so much had to be
given up for de army. De white folks have to give up coffee and tea. De slaves[172]
just eat corn-bread, mush, ‘taters and buttermilk. Even de peas was commanded
for de army. Us git meat just once a week, and then a mighty little of dat.
I never got a whuppin’ and mammy never did git a whuppin’.

“Us all went to Wateree Presbyterian Church on Sunday to hear Mr.
Douglas preach. Had two sermons and a picnic dinner on de ground ‘tween de
sermons. Dat was a great day for de slaves. What de white folks lef’ on de
ground de slaves had a right to, and us sure enjoy de remains and bless de
Lord for it. Main things he preached and prayed for, was a success in de end
of de war, so mammy would explain to us when us ‘semble ’round de fireside befo’
us go to bed. Her sure was a Christian and make us all kneel down and say two
prayers befo’ us git in bed. De last one was:

“Wheeler’s men was just as hard and wolfish as de Yankees. They say de
Yankees was close behind them and they just as well take things as to leave all
for de Yankees. ‘Spect dat was true, for de Yankees come nex’ day and took de
rest of de hog meat, flour, and cows. Had us to run down and ketch de chickens
for them. They search de house for money, watches, rings, and silverware. Took
everything they found, but they didn’t set de house afire. Dere was just ’bout
five of them prowlin’ ’round ‘way from de main army, a foragin’, they say.

“When Miss Margaret marry, old marster sold out and leave de county.
Us move to Mr. Wade Rawls’ and work for him from 1876 to Jerry’s death. Is I[173]
told you dat I marry Jerry? Well, I picked out Jerry Walker from a baker’s
dozen of boys, hot footin’ it ’bout mammy’s door step, and us never had a
cross word all our lives. Us had nine chillun. Us moved ’round from pillar
to post, always needy but always happy. Seem lak us never could save anything
on his $7.06 a month and a peck of meal and three pounds of meat a week.

“When de chillun come on, us try rentin’ a farm and got our supplies
on a crop lien, twenty-five percent on de cash price of de supplies and paid in
cotton in de fall. After de last bale was sold, every year, him come home wid
de same sick smile and de same sad tale: ‘Well, Mandy, as usual, I settled up
and it was—’Naught is naught and figger is a figger, all for de white man and
none for de nigger.’

“De grave and de resurrection will put everything all right, but I have
a instinct dat God’ll make it all right over and up yonder and dat all our ‘flictions
will, in de long run, turn out to our ‘ternal welfare and happiness.”

NED WALKER

EX-SLAVE 83 YEARS OLD.

Ned Walker lives in the village of White Oak, near Winnsboro, S.C.,[174]
in a two-room frame house, the dwelling of his son-in-law, Leander Heath, who
married his daughter, Nora. Ned is too old to do any work of a remunerative
character but looks after the garden and chickens of his daughter and son-in-law.
He is a frequent visitor to Winnsboro, S.C. He brings chickens and
garden produce, to sell in the town and the Winnsboro Hill’s village. He is
tall, thin, and straight, with kind eyes. Being one of the old Gaillard Negroes,
transplanted from the Santee section of Berkeley County, in the Low Country, to
the red hills of Fairfield County, in the Up Country, he still retains words and
phrases characteristic of the Negro in the lower part of South Carolina.

“Yes sir, I’s tall and slim lak a saplin’; maybe dat a good reason
I live so long. Doctor say lean people lives longer than fat people.

“I hear daddy read one time from de Bible ’bout a man havin’ strength
of years in his right hand and honor and riches in his left hand, but whenever
I open dat left hand dere is nothin’ in it. ‘Spect dat promise is comin’ tho’,
when de old age pension money gits down here from Washington. When you ‘spect
it is comin’? De palm of my hand sho’ begin to itch for dat greenback money.
So you think it’s on de way? Well, thank God for dat but it seem ‘most too
good to be true. Now I’ll quit askin’ questions and just set here and smoke
and answer, whilst you do de puttin’ down on de paper.

“Yes sir, I was born right here in de southeast corner of Winnsboro,
on de Clifton place. De day I was born, it b’long to my master, David Gaillard.
Miss Louisa, dats Master David’s wife, ‘low to me one day, ‘Ned don’t you ever[175]
call de master, old master, and don’t you ever think of me as old miss’.
I promise her dat I keep dat always in mind, and I ain’t gonna change,
though she done gone on to heaven and is in de choir a singin’ and a singin’
them chants dat her could pipe so pretty at St. Johns, in Winnsboro.
You see they was ‘Piscopalians. Dere was no hard shell Baptist and no
soft shell Methodist in deir make up. It was all glory, big glory, glory
in de very highest rung of Jacob’s ladder, wid our white folks.

“Well, how I is ramblin’. You see dere was Master David and Mistress
Louisa, de king bee and de queen bee. They had a plantation down on
de Santee, in de Low Country, somewhere ’bout Moncks Corner. One day Master
David buy a 1,385 acres on Wateree Creek. He also buy de Clifton place, to
live in, in Winnsboro. I can’t git my mind back to tell you what I wants
for you to put on de paper. ‘Scuse me, forgit everything, ’til you git my
pedigree down.

“I done name Master David and Mistress Louisa. Now for de chillun.
Us was told to front de boys name wid Marse and de young ladies name wid Miss.
Now us can go and git somewhere.

“Well, dere was Miss Elizabeth; she marry Mr. Dwight. Miss Maria
marry another Mr. Dwight. Miss Kate marry Mr. Bob Ellison, a sheriff. Her
got two chillun in Columbia, Marse David and Marse DuBose Ellison. Then for
de boys; they all went to de war. Marse Alley got kilt. Marse Dick rise to
be a captain and after de war marry Congressman Boyce’s daughter, Miss Fannie.
Marse Ike marry and live in de Low Country; he die ’bout two years ago. Marse
Sam marry a Miss DuBose and went wid General Wade Hampton.

“Marse Sam’s son cut a canal that divide half and half de western
part of de whole world. Us niggers was powerful scared, ’til Marse David
Gailliard took a hold of de business. Why us scared? Why us fear dat de[176]
center of de backbone of de world down dere, when cut, would tipple over
lak de halfs of a watermelon and everybody would go under de water in de
ocean. How could Marse David prevent it? Us niggers of de Gaillard generation
have confidence in de Gaillard race and us willin’ to sink or swim
wid them in whatever they do. Young Marse David propped de sides of de
world up all right, down dere, and they name a big part of dat canal,
Gaillard Cut, so they did. (Gaillard Cut, Panama Canal)

“Well, I keep a ramblin’. Will I ever git to Marse Henry, de
one dat looked after and cared for slaves of de family most and best? Marse
Henry marry a Miss White in Charleston. He rise to be captain and adjutant
of de fightin’ 6th Regiment. After de war him fix it so de slaves stay altogether,
on dat 1,385 acres and buy de place, as common tenants, on de
‘stallment plan. He send word for de head of each family to come to Winnsboro;
us have to have names and register. Marse Henry command; us obey.
Dat was a great day. My daddy already had his name, Tom. He was de driver
of de buggy, de carriage, and one of de wagons, in slavery. Marse Henry
wrote him a name on a slip and say: ‘Tom as you have never walked much,
I name you Walker.’

“It wasn’t long befo’ daddy, who was de only one dat could read
and write, ride down to Columbia and come back wid a ‘mission in his pocket
from de ‘Publican Governor, to be Justice of de Peace.

“Marse Henry ladle out some ‘golliwhopshus’ names dat day. Such
as: Caesar Harrison, Edward Cades and Louis Brevard. He say, ‘Louis, I
give you de name of a judge. Dan, I give you a Roman name, Pompey.’ Pompey
turned out to be a preacher and I see your grandpa, Marse William Woodward,
in de graveyard when Uncle Pompey preached de funeral of old Uncle Wash Moore.
Tell you ’bout dat if I has time.[177]

“Well, he give Uncle Sam de name of Shadrock. When he reach
Uncle Aleck, he ‘low: ‘I adds to your name Aleck, two fine names, a
preacher’s and a scholar’s, Porter Ramsey.’ ‘Bout dat time a little runt
elbow and butt his way right up to de front and say: ‘Marse Henry, Marse
Henry! I wants a big bulldozin’ name.’ Marse Henry look at him and say:
‘You little shrimp, take dis then.’ And Marse Henry write on de slip of
paper: Mendoza J. Fernandez, and read it out loud. De little runt laugh
mighty pleased and some of them Fernandezes ’round here to dis day.

“My mammy name Bess, my granddaddy name June, grandmamny, Renah,
but all my brothers dead. My sisters Clerissie and Phibbie am still livin’.
Us was born in a two-story frame house, chimney in de middle, four rooms
down stairs and four up stairs. Dere was four families livin’ in it. Dese
was de town domestics of master. Him have another residence on de plantation
and a set of domestics, but my daddy was de coachman for both places.

“De Gaillard quarters was a little town laid out wid streets wide
‘nough for a wagon to pass thru. Houses was on each side of de street. A
well and church was in de center of de town. Dere was a gin-house, barns,
stables, cowpen and a big bell on top of a high pole at de barn gate. Dere
was a big trough at de well, kept full of water day and night, in case of
fire and to water de stock. Us had peg beds, wheat straw mattress and rag
pillows. Cotton was too valuable.

“Master didn’t ‘low de chillun to be worked. He feed slaves on
‘tatoes, rice, corn pone, hominy, fried meat, ‘lasses, shorts, turnips,
collards, and string beans. Us had pumpkin pie on Sunday. No butter, no
sweet milk but us got blabber and buttermilk.

“Oh, then, I ’bout to forgit. Dere was a big hall wid spinnin’[178]
wheels in it, where thread was spin. Dat thread was hauled to Winnsboro
and brought to de Clifton place in Winnsboro, to de weave house. Dat house
set ’bout where de Winnsboro Mill is now. Mammy was head of de weave house
force and see to de cloth. Dere was a dye-room down dere too. They use red
earth sometime and sometime walnut stain. My mammy learn all dis from a
white lady, Miss Spurrier, dat Master David put in charge dere at de first.
How long she stay? I disremembers dat. Us no want for clothes summer or
winter. Had wooden bottom shoes, two pair in a year.

“Mr. Sam Johnson was de overseer. Dere was ’bout 700 slaves in de
Gaillard quarter and twenty in town, countin’ de chillun. De young white
marsters break de law when they teach daddy to read and write. Marse Dick
say: ‘To hell wid de law, I got to have somebody dat can read and write
‘mong de servants.’ My daddy was his valet. He put de boys to bed, put on
deir shoes and brush them off, and all dat kind of ‘tention.

“De church was called Springvale. After freedom, by a vote, de members
jines up, out of respect to de family, wid de Afican Methodist ‘Piscopalian
Church, so as to have as much of de form, widout de substance of them chants,
of de master’s church.

“No sir, us had no mulattoes on de place. Everybody decent and happy.
They give us two days durin’ Christmas for celebratin’ and dancin’.

“I marry Sylvin Field, a gal on de General Bratton Canaan place. Us
have three chillun. Nora Heath, dat I’m now livin’ wid, at White Oak, Bessie
Lew, in Tennessee, and Susannah, who is dead.

“What I think of Abe Lincoln? Dat was a mighty man of de Lord. What
I think of Jeff Davis? He all right, ‘cordin’ to his education, just lak my white
folks. What I think of Mr. Roosevelt? Oh, Man! Dat’s our papa.

“Go off! I’s blabbed ‘nough. You ‘bliged to hear ’bout dat funeral?[179]
Will I pester you for ‘nother cigarette? No sir! I ain’t gonna smoke
it lak you smoke it. Supposin’ us was settin’ here smokin’ them de same?
A Gaillard come up them steps and see us. He say: ‘Shame on dat white
man’, turn his back and walk back down. A Woodward come up them steps
and see us. He say: ‘You d— nigger! What’s all dis?’ Take me by de
collar, boot me down them steps, and come back and have it out wid you.
Dat’s ’bout de difference of de up and low country buckra.

“Now ’bout Uncle Wash’s funeral. Uncle Wash was de blacksmith
in de forks of de road ‘cross de railroad from Concord Church. He was a
powerful man! Him use de hammer and tongs for all de people miles and
miles ’round. Him jine de Springvale Afican Methodist ‘Piscopalian Church,
but fell from grace. Him covet a hog of Marse Walt Brice and was sent to
de penitentiary for two years, ’bout dat hog. Him contacted consumption
down dere and come home. His chest was all sunk in and his ribs full of
rheumatism. Him soon went to bed and died. Him was buried on top of de
hill, in de pines just north of Woodward. Uncle Pompey preached de funeral.
White folks was dere. Marse William was dere, and his nephew, de Attorney
General of Arizona. Uncle Pompey took his text ’bout Paul and Silas layin’
in jail and dat it was not ‘ternally against a church member to go to jail.
Him dwell on de life of labor and bravery, in tacklin’ kickin’ hosses and
mules. How him sharpen de dull plow points and make de corn and cotton
grow, to feed and clothe de hungry and naked. He look up thru de pine tree
tops and say: ‘I see Jacob’s ladder. Brother Wash is climbin’ dat ladder.
Him is half way up. Ah! Brudders and sisters, pray, while I preach dat
he enter in them pearly gates. I see them gates open. Brother Wash done
reach de topmost rung in dat ladder. Let us sing wid a shout, dat blessed
hymn, ‘Dere is a Fountain Filled Wid Blood’.’ Wid de first verse de women[180]
got to hollerin’ and wid de second’, Uncle Pompey say: ‘De dyin’ thief
I see him dere to welcome Brother Wash in paradise. Thank God! Brother
Wash done washed as white as snow and landed safe forever more.’

“Dat Attorney General turn up his coat in de November wind and
say; ‘I’ll be damn! Marse William smile and ‘low: ‘Oh Tom! Don’t be
too hard on them. ‘Member He will have mercy on them, dat have mercy on
others’.”

DANIEL WARING

EX-SLAVE 88 YEARS OLD.

“I was born in Fairfield County, South Carolina, in 1849, and[181]
my parents, Tobias and Becky Waring was slaves of the Waring family, and
the Bookters and Warings was kin folks. When I was just a little shaver
I was told I b’longed to the family of the late Colonel Edward Bookter of
upper Fairfield County.

“The Bookter plantation was a big one, with pastures for cattle,
hogs and sheep; big field of cotton, corn and wheat, and ’bout a dozen
Negro families livin’ on it, mostly out of sight from the Bookter’s big
house. Two women and three or four Negro chillun work there, preparin’ the
food and carin’ for the stock. I was one of the chillun. Colonel Bookter’s
household had three boys; one bigger than me and two not quite as big as me.
We play together, drive up the cows together, and carry on in friendly fashion
all the time. The nigger chillun eat with the two black women in a place fixed
for them off from the kitchen, after the white folks finish. We generally
have same food and drink that the white folks have.

“When I was ’bout eleven years old my master took me to Columbia one
Saturday afternoon, and while Colonel Bookter was ’round at a livery stable
on Assembly Street, he give me some money and tell me I could stroll ’round
a while. I did, and soon find myself with ’bout a dozen of Master Hampton’s
boys. As we walk ‘long Gervais Street, we met a big fine lookin’ man with
a fishin’ tackle, goin’ towards the river, and several other white folks was
with him. As we turn the corner, the big man kinda grin and say to us: ‘Whose
niggers are you?’ The bigger boy with us say: ‘We all b’longs to Master Hampton.’
He laugh some more and then reach in his pocket and give each one of us[182]
a nickel, sayin’ to the white folks: ‘Blest if I know my own niggers,
anymore’.

“Yes sir, I was ’bout fourteen years old when President Lincoln
set us all free in 1863. The war was still goin’ on and I’m tellin’ you
right when I say that my folks and friends round me did not regard freedom
as a unmixed blessin’.

“We didn’t know where to go or what to do, and so we stayed right
where we was, and there wasn’t much difference to our livin’, ’cause we had
always had a plenty to eat and wear. I ‘member my mammy tellin’ me that
food was gittin’ scarce, and any black folks beginnin’ to scratch for themselves
would suffer, if they take their foot in their hand and ramble ’bout
the land lak a wolf.

“As a slave on the plantation of Colonel Edward Bookter, I had a
pretty good time. I knows I has work to do and I does it, and I always has
plenty to eat and wear in winter and summer. If I get sick I has a doctor,
so we set tight until 1865. After the war we come to Columbia, and mammy
made us a livin’ by washin’ for white folks and doin’ other jobs in the
kitchen, and I worked at odd jobs, too.

“We didn’t get much money from the Freedmen’s outfit, which was
‘stablished in Columbia. The white men who set it up and administered the
Freedmen’s funds and rations let some of their pets have much of it, while
others got little or nothin’. An’ existence become increasin’ harder as
nigger got more and more in the saddle.

“During the war, and it seem to me it would never end, we heard
much ’bout President Lincoln. Niggers seem to think he was foolish to get
into war, but they generally give him credit for directin’ it right as far
as he could. President Davis was powerful popular at the beginnin’ of the[183]
conflict, but his popularity was far less when the war is over and
he is in jail.

“I was ‘most grown at the end of the war, and I was at no
time popular with the black leaders and their white friends who rule
the roost in Columbia for ‘most thirteen years. I went back to my
white friends in Fairfield County and work for years for Mister T.S.
Brice, and others on the plantation.

“I has been married three times, and am now livin’ with my
third wife. She and me am makin’ a sort of livin’, and is yet able to
work. I can only do de lightest work and the sweetest thought I has these
days is the memory of my white friends when I was young and happy.”

NANCY WASHINGTON

Ex-Slave, 104 years.

“Come in child. Jes set right dere in dat chair whey I[184]
c’n be mindful uv yuh cause I ain’ hear but sorta hard lak
dese days. I jes come in outer de field whey I been chopping
’round uh little wid me hoe, but eve’t’ing is grow so black
‘fore me eye dat I t’ink I better rest meself uh little. I
tries to help Sam (her son) aw I c’n, but I ain’ mucha ‘count
no more. I 104 year old en I ain’ gwinna be heah much longer.
Me mark done strak (strike) me right dere dis a’ternoon. Dat
been jes de way my ole mammy waz call.”

“Does yah know whey dat place call Ash Pole? Dat whey I
wuz raise up when I b’long to Massa Giles Evanson. He wuz uh
good ole fellow. I ain’ know wha’ it wuz to ge’ no bad treatment
by my white people. Dey tell me some uv de colored peoples
lib mighty rough in dat day en time but I ne’er know nuthin ’bout
dat. I ‘member dey is spank we chillun wid shingle but dey ne’er
didn’t hit my mudder.”

“My Massa ne’er hab so mucha colored peoples lak some uv dem
udder white folks hab. Jes hab my mudder en eight head uv we
chillun. Hab ‘nough to gi’e eve’yone uv he daughter uh servant
apiece when dey ge’ marry. Ne’er hab nuthin but women colored
peoples. My Massa say he ain’ wan’ no man colored peoples.”[185]

“De preacher Ford, wha’ use’er lib right up dere in
town, papa hab uh big ole plantation wha’ been jes lak
uh little town. He hab hundred colored peoples en dey
is hab eve’t’ing dere. Hab dey preachin’ right dere on
de plantation en aw dat.”

“Coase my white folks hab uh nice plantation en dey
keep uh nice house aw de time. I wuz de house girl dere
en de one wha’ dey’ud hab to wait on de Missus. Dey’ud
carry me eve’ywhey dey go. Al’ays know how I wuz faring.
My Missus wuz big en independent lak. Talk lak she mad
aw de time, but she warnt. She ne’er wear no cotton ’bout
dere no time. Hab her silk on eve’y day en dem long yellow
ear bob dat’ud be tetchin right long side she shoulder. I
al’ays look a’ter de Missus en she chillun. Wash dey feet
en comb dey hair en put de chillun to bed. But child, some
white folks is queer ’bout t’ings. Dey watch yuh gwine ’bout
yuh work en den dey’ll wan’ yuh to do sumptin fa dem. De ole man
take me ‘way from helping de Missus en send me out to plow
corn en drap peas. I wuz shame too cause I ne’er lak fa he
to treat my Missus dat uh way.”

“De peoples ne’er didn’t cook in no stove den neither.
Dey hab big ole round dirt ubben (oven) to cook dey ration in.
Dey make dey ubben outer white clay en hadder build uh shelter[186]
over it cause dey’ud cook outer in de yard. Dey ne’er
cook but jes twice uh week. Cook on Wednesday en den
ne’er cook no more till Saturday. I ‘member de big ole
ham dat dey cook en de tatoes en so mucha bread. Jes hab
‘bundance aw de time. I got uh piece uv de ole slavery
time ubben heah now. I ge’ it outer en show it to yuh.
Dis is one uv de leads (lids) en dey’ud put uh chain en
hook on dere en hang it up in de fireplace. Dat de way
dey cook dey ration. O Lawd, ef I could ge’ back to my
ole home whey I could look in en see jes one more time,
jes one more time, child.”

“I wuz jes uh girl when de Yankees come t’rough dere.
Dey look jes lak uh big blue cloud comin’ down dat road
en we chillun wuz scared uv em. Dat land ’round ’bout dere
wuz full uv dem Yankees marchin’ en gwine on. Dey ne’er
bother my white folks but in some uv de places dey jes ruint
eve’t’ing. Burnt up en tore down aw ’bout dere.”

“Yuh ain’ ne’er see nobody weave no cloth nowadays. In
de winter dey use’er al’ays put woolen on de little chillun
to keep em from getting burnt up. Peoples wuz easy to cotch
uh fire in dat time. Dey hab plenty uv sheep den en dis jes
’bout de time uv de year dat dey shear de sheep. Al’ays’ud
shear de sheep in de month uv May. Dey is make aw kinder
nice cloth den. I c’n charge en spin en make any kinder
streak yuh wan’. Coase my mudder use’er weave de jeanes[187]
cloth en blanketing.”

“Dey use’er hab some uv dem corn-shucking ’bout dere
but I ne’er take no part in none uv dat. A’ter freedom
declare, us pull boxes en dip turpentine. Dat wha’ wuz
in de style den.”

“I won’ but ’bout 16 when I marry en I hab uh nice
wedding. Marry right dere in my Massa yard en hab white
swass dress to wear. I marry uh settled man offen uh rich man
plantation en dey ne’er wan’ me to marry, but dey ne’er
say nuthin ‘gainst it. Dey hab good manners den en
manners de t’ing dat carry peoples t’rough anyt’ing,
child.”

Source: Nancy Washington, age 104, colored, Dusty Hills,
Marion, S.C. (Personal interview, May 1937).

CHARLEY WATSON

EX-SLAVE 87 YEARS OLD.

“Dis is a mighty hot day I tells you, and after climbing them[188]
steps I just got to fan myself befo’ I give answer to your questions.
You got any ‘bacco I could chaw and a place to spit? Dis old darkie
maybe answer more better if he be allowed to be placed lak dat at de
beginnin’ of de ‘sperience.

“Where was I born? Why right dere on de Hog Fork Place, thought
everybody knowed dat! It was de home place of my old Marster Daniel Hall,
one of de Rockefellers of his day and generation, I tells you, he sho was.
My pappy had big name, my marster call him Denmore, my mammy went by de
name of Mariyer. She was bought out of a drove from Virginny long befo’
de war. They both b’long to old marster and bless God live on de same
place in a little log house. Let’s see; my brother Bill is one, he livin’
at de stone quarry at Salisbury, North Carolina. My sister Lugenie marry
a Boulware nigger and they tells me dat woman done take dat nigger and make
sumpin’ out of him. They owns their own automobile and livin’ in Cleveland,
Ohio.

“Us live in quarters, two string of houses a quarter mile long and
just de width of a wagon road betwixt them. How many slaves marster had?
Dere was four hundred in 1850, dat was de year I was born, so allowing for
de natural ‘crease, ‘spect dere was good many more when freedom come. Our
beds was made of poles and hay or straw. Was my marster rich? How come
he wasn’t? Didn’t he have a Florida plantation and a Georgia plantation?
Didn’t us niggers work hard for our vittles and clothes? It make me laugh
de way de niggers talk ’bout eight hours a day. Us worked by de ‘can and
de can’t system’. What way dat you ask me? Well, was dis way; in de mornin’[189]
when it git so you can see, you got to go to work and at night when it
git so dark you can’t see you ceasted to work. You see what I mean?
My marster’s white overseer ‘dopted de ‘can and can’t system’ of work
hours. My mammy had to plow same as a man, she did sir. Sometimes
they pulled fodder and fooled wid it on Sunday.

“You is a pushin’ me a little too fast. Let me gum dis ‘bacco
and spit and I can do and say more ‘zackly what you expect from me. My
marster had sheep, goats, mules, horses, stallion, jackass, cows and hogs,
and then he had a gin, tan yard, spinnin’ rooms, weave room, blacksmith
shop and shoe shop. Dere was wild turkeys on de place, deer in de cane brakes
and shad in de Catawba River. De Indians fetch their pots and jars to sell,
and peddlers come to big house wid their humps on their backs and bright yards
of calico and sich things de missus lak to feel and s’lect from. I see money
then, but I never see a nigger wid money in his paws in slavery time, never!

“Us was fed good on corn meal, hog meat, milk, butter, ‘lasses,
turnips, beans, peas and apples, never hungry. Boss whip me once for fightin’
and I never fought anymore, I tells you.

“My mistress name Miss Sarah. Her was a Hicklin befo’ she marry.
Their chillun was: Tom, Billie, Dan and Jason, all dead ‘cept Marster Jason.
De white overseer was Strother Ford. He give de slaves down the country maybe
sometimes, so heard them say, but I didn’t see him.

“Did us sing? Yes sir. What us sing? One was what I’s gwine hist
right dis minute and sing wid your lieve. (Here Charley sang, ‘Give me dat old
time religion’.)

“Us made ‘simmon beer sometime and lye soap just ’bout in de same way,[190]
hopper was ‘rected for dat. ‘Simmons was put wid locust; hickory ashes
was used to make soap. Every Christmas us got ginger cake and sassafras
tea.

“Doctor Scott was de doctor for de slaves. Us niggers was mighty
sad when his son Willie’s gun went off by accident and kill him in 1868.
De Doctor never smile again after dat cumbustion of dat gun. Does you
‘member de time Mr. Till Dixon was drowned? He your uncle? ‘Twas de
fourth of July, I ‘member dat day, and a boy Freddie Habbernick was
drowned in Catawba in 1903. Dat river take a many soul over dat other
shore, I tells you.”

EX-SLAVE 91 YEARS OLD, CONGAREE, SOUTH CAROLINA

THERE WAS NO GOD BUT MOSSA AN’ MISSUS

“My pa name was Nat White who tell me dat I was bo’n about[191]
1842. My ma was name Jane White. My pa use to carry all de votes
from McClellanville to Charleston. He come from Tibbin, South Carolina.
He also been all ’round de United States. My Ma’s Ma bin name
Kate. I had sense to know ’em all.

“I know a heap o’ sojus had on nice buttons an’ had plumes in
dere hats. Dey wus singin’ an’ playin’ on a flute dis song, ‘I wish
I wus in Dixie,’ an’ dey went in de big house an’ broke up ebery
thing. Dey say to me, ‘you are as free as a frog,’ an’ dey say to
my pa, ‘all your chillun are free.’ Dey say ‘little niggers is free
as a frog’ an’ we holler much.

“I aint nebber do no work, but I kin ‘member I use to wear a
pant you call chambery. Ma cook a pot o’ peas an’ weevils wus always
on de top. Ma would den turn mush an’ clean a place on de floor,
she make a paddle an’ we eat off de floor. She use to bake ash cake
too. I didn’ know ’bout no garden, all I know I eat. Dis what dey
put on me I wear em. I nebber know nothin’ ’bout shoes.

“My master been name Bill Cooper who had a gal an’ a son. De
gal been name Mary an’ de boy Bill like de daddy.

“Tarbin wus a big house, but I aint nebber know de number o’
slaves or ‘mount o’ lan’ dat went wid um.[192]

“De slaves had a church name Lazarus an’ some went to de
white church. Dey had us bar off frum de whites an’ we use to look
t’rough a glass door. I member when a preacher say, ‘honor your
missus an’ mossa dat your days may be long for dey is your only God.’
My Ma tell me when dey use to lick dem she use to sing dis song,
‘do pray for me’ en ma say w’en de lickin’ got too hot she say ‘oh
God’ en mossa say, ‘show me dat damn man’, den he say, ‘I am your
only God. My preacher name wus Sabie Mood.

“De slaves couldn’t git any news, but dey had to work on Sunday
if de week bin bad. W’en it rain dey use to shuck co’n.

“W’en Bill Cooper die he holler to me, ‘I’m burnin’ up’ an’
ma say missus say, ‘iron me too hot, she meat is red like fire.’

“We use to sing song like dese;

“I marry Sarah on December 18th. Him de only one I marry
an’ we had a big weddin’ an’ plenty o’ somethin’ to eat. We had fourteen
chillun.

“Pa say mossa use to take de fork an’ punch holes in
dere body w’en he got mad. People always die frum de pisin.

“Dis is all I know I ain’t go tell no lie, dat what
pa say, I moved here atter de yankees come.”[193]

Reference;

Uncle Dave White,
91 years old
Congaree, South Carolina.

UNCLE DAVE WHITE

An Old Time Negro

Uncle Dave White, one of the waning tribe lives in a simple homestead down a[194]
dusty and wind-swept curved country lane on the out skirt of McClenville, forty miles
North of Charleston rests the simple shanty of David White, aged Negro, affectionally
known to the Negro and white population for many miles around as “uncle Dave”.

His quiet unadulterated mode of living and his never changing grateful disposition
typifies the true Southern Negro of pre-Civil War days; a race that was commonplace
and plentiful at one time, but is now almost extinct, having dwindled in the face
of more adequate educational facilities.

His homestead, resembling a barn more than a place to live in. To protect the
house against the hazardous affects of imperilling winds, long poles are made to prop
the somewhat dilapidated shanty.

A visit to his home, one dark and dreary day in late December, found him as
usual in the best of spirits. He welcomed the visitors with a cordiality that would
rival the meeting of two long lost friends. The front has no main entrance; the main
door is around the back. There are conspicuous displays of many ancient burlap bags,
heavy laden, hanging from high rafters, which contained corn and peanuts.

“But why not keep them in your barn, Uncle Dave!” one would ask.

“Well, suh, I keep mah co’n and grain nuts in yuh so mak eye can sta’ on ’em,”
he replies.

A further inspection of the premises revealed other precautions he had taken
against the unwelcomed guests; a crude lock on each door and many other precautionary
measures convicted, that he was willing to take no unnecessary chances at having
his worldly goods stolen.

His age is truly a matter of conjecture. The more you look at him the more[195]
uncertain you become. His droopy carriage and shriveled feature betray you at first
sight. The first impression will lead one to believe that he is about one hundred
years of age, and later it will appear that he is not that old.

We had known “uncle Dave” for a long time; for years it had been a familiar
sight to see him trudging the streets of the town with burlap bags thrown across his
shoulders containing such household necessities as grits, salt, sugar, etc., and such
articles as the house wives would give him out of sheer sympathy. To every friendly
greeting he always had the humble response of “Tank Gawd, my eye is open.”

He is well known throughout the town. One Sunday night a short time ago,
while the services of a white church were in progress, distinguishable sounds of Amen
were heard at regular intervals coming from the outside. On investigating they discovered
that it was “uncle Dave” reverently enjoying the proceedings. Many times he has
been seen outside the same church listening to the services.

SOURCE

Interview with (Mrs.) Minnie Huges, age 43, 179 Spring Street, welfare worker.

INTERVIEW WITH EX-SLAVE

Everybody in the town of Mt. Pleasant, Christ Church Parish (across[196]
the Bay from Charleston) knows “Tena White, the washer,” “Tena, the cook,”
“Maum Tena” or “Da Tena, the nurse”—the same individual, accomplished in
each art, but best as a nurse.

The house where Tena lives is the second in a row of Negro houses. The
writer, calling from the gate, was answered by Tena, a middle-sized woman
of neat figure. As the writer ascended the steps a friendly cur wagged
itself forward and was promptly reproved by Tena, who placed a chair, the
seat of which she wiped carefully with her dress. The piazza was clean
and on the floor a black baby slept on a folded cloth, with a pillow under
its head. The writer was soon on friendly terms with Maum Tena, and was
told: “As soon as my eye set on you, I see you favor the people I know. My
people belonged to Mr. William Venning. The plantation was Remley Point.
I couldn’t zactly member my pa’s name. I member when de war come though.
Oh dem drum; I nebber hear such a drum in my life! De people like music;
dey didn’t care nothing bout de Yankees, but dem bands of music! My mother
name Molly Williams. My pa dead long before that. All my people dead. I
stayin’ here with my youngest sister chile—youngest son. He got seven
head ob chillun.”

“I can do anything—wash or cook—aint no more cook though. Oh yes”[197]
and her eyes sparkled, “I know how to cook de turkey, and de ham wid de
little brown spots all over de top. Nobody can collec’ my soup for me;
I first go choose my soup bone. One wid plenty richness. My chile say,
‘While my Tena live I wouldn’t want nobody else.’ But I couldn’t take
de sponsibility now.”

“Maum Tena, how many children did you have?”

“Maggie an Etta an Georgie an Annie, etc., etc.” so fast and so many
that one couldn’t keep up.

“Wait, Maum Tena. How many were there in all—your own children?”

“I nebber had a chile.”

“Oh, those were the children you nursed.”

“I marry twice. Caesar Robson an Aleck White.”

“Did you ever sing spirituals?”

“No, I nebber had time.”

“But you sang lullabies to the children.”

“Oh, I sing someting to keep de chile quiet.”

“Where is your church, Maum Tena?”

“De Methodist Church right here. I know I got for die some day. He
keep me distance,[B] but when I look an see my flesh, I tenk de Lord for ebbery
year what pass on my head. Taint my goodness, tis His goodness. Nothing
but the pureness of heart will see Him.”[198]

Tena was shocked and disgusted at the idea of the Lord being a “black
man.” She said with perfect certainty that he was “no such.”

“We all goin to de same Heaven, and there aint no black people there.”

The writer asked Tena her age; before she could answer, her great-niece
came to the door and said, “She eighty-eight.” Tena was indignant.
Her eyes flashed. “I aint goin to hab nobody come along puttin down my
age what dunno anyting about it. I ought to be as high as nine. Let um be
as high as nine.”[C]

“If I didn’t been round de house wid white people I wouldn’t hab dis
opportunity today, an dey good to me an gib me nuf to keep my soul an body
together. My mother raise me right. When de Yankee come through we been
at Remley Point. My Ma took care ob me. She shut me up and she gard me.
De Yankee been go in de colored people house, an dey mix all up, an dey do
jus what dey want. Dey been brutish.

“De beautiful tureen, stand so high and hab foot so long” lifting her
hands, “an all de beautiful ting smash up, an all de meat an ham in de smoke
house de stribute um all out to de people, an de dairy broke up, an de horse
an de cow kill. Nothin leave. Scatter ebberyting. Nothin leave.”

SOURCE: Tena White, Mt. Pleasant, Christ Church Parish, S.C.
Age: Approximately 90.

BILL WILLIAMS

EX-SLAVE 82 YEARS OLD.

Bill Williams lives on the Durham place, nine miles east of Winnsboro,[199]
S.C., on the warm charity of Mr. Arthur M. Owens, the present owner. He is
decrepit and unable to work.

“I was born a slave of old Marster John Durham, on a plantation ’bout
five miles east of Blackstock, S.C. My mistress name Margaret. Deir chillun
was Miss Cynthia, Marse Johnnie, Marse Willie and Marse Charnel. I forgits de
others. Then, when young Marse Johnnie marry Miss Minnie Mobley, my mammy, Kizzie,
my daddy, Eph, and me was give to them. Daddy and mammy had four other chillun.
They was Eph, Reuben, Winnie and Jordan. Us live in rows of log houses, a
path ‘twixt de two rows. Us was close to de spring, where us got water and mammy
did de white folks washin’ every week. I kep’ de fires burnin’ ’round de pots,
so de water would keep boilin’. Dat’s ’bout all de work I ‘members doin’ in slavery
time. Daddy was a field hand and ploughed a big red mule, name Esau. How
many slaves was dere? More than I could count. In them days I couldn’t count up
to a hundred. How, then, I gonna kno’ how many dere was? You have to ask somebody
else. I’ll just risk sayin’ dere was big and little ones, just a little drove of
them dat went to de field in cotton pickin’ time, a hollerin’ and a singin’ glory
hallelujah all day long, and pick two bales a day.

“Marse Johnnie and Miss Minnie mighty good marster and mistress to deir
slaves. We had good rock chimneys to our houses, plank floors, movable bedsteads,
wid good wheat straw ticks, and cotton pillows. Other folks’ slaves was complainin’
’bout dirt floors in de houses, boards to sleep on, no ticks, and rags for pillows.
Us got flour bread and ‘lasses on Sunday, too, I’m here to tell you.[200]

“They sho’ fetch dat catechism ’round on Sunday and telled you who made
you, what Him make you out of, and what Him make you for. And they say dat from
de crown of your head to de top of your big toe, de chief end of every finger and
every toe, even to de ends of your two thumbs, was made to glorify de Lord! Missus
more ‘ticular ’bout dat catechism than de marster. Her grandpa, old Marster John
Mobley was a great Baptist. After de crops was laid by, every August, him visit
his granddaughter. While dere, he take de slaves and dam up de branch, to make a
pond for to pool de water. Then he take to de hill just ‘bove, cut down pine tops,
and make a brush arbor to hold de prachin’ in. ‘Vite white preachers, Mr. Cartledge,
Mr. Mellichamp or Mr. Van, to come hold a ‘vival for all de slaves in and ’round and
’bout de country. I’s seen 27 go down and come up out dat pool, a splashin’ water
from deir faces, one Sunday evenin’. A terrible thing happen one time at de baptism.
It was while de war was gwine on. Marse Johnnie had come back from Virginia,
on a furlough for ten days. Old Marse John come to see him and fetch Rev. Mr. Cartledge
wid him. People was pow’ful consarned ’bout ‘ligion ‘long ’bout dat time.
Me and all de little slave boys jined dat time and dere was a little boy name Ike,
a slave of old Doctor John Douglas, dat jined. Him was just ’bout my age, seven
or eight years old. After him jined, him wanna back out of goin’ down into de water.
Dat evenin’, after dinner, us was all dressed in a kind of white slip-over gown for
de occasion. When it come Ike’s time to receive de baptism, him was led by his mammy,
by de hand, to de edge of de water and his hand given to de preacher in charge,
who received him. Then he commenced: ‘On de confession——’. ‘Bout dat time
little Ike broke loose, run up de bank, and his mammy and all de slaves holler:
‘Ketch him! Ketch him!’ Old Marse John holler: ‘Ketch him!’ They ketch little
Ike and fetch him back to old Marse John and his mammy. Marse John explain to him
dat it better to have water in de nose, now, than fire in de soul forever after.[201]
Little Ike say nothin’. His mammy take his hand and lead him to de preacher de
same way her did befo’. Little Ike went down into de water. Preacher take him
but when little Ike got down under dat water, de preacher lose de hold and bless
God, in some way little Ike got ‘twixt and ‘tween de preacher’s legs and comin’
out behind him, turnt him sommersets and climb out on de bank a runnin’. Little
Ike’s mammy cry out: ‘Ketch him! Ketch him!’ Old marster say: ‘No let him go
to de devil. Thank de Lord him none of our niggers anyhow. Him just one of Dr.
Douglas’ Presbyterians niggers dat’s destined to hell and be damned, I reckon.”

JESSE WILLIAMS

EX-SLAVE 83 YEARS OLD.

At the end of one of the silent streets of west Chester, S.C., that prolongs[202]
itself into a road leading to the Potter’s Field and on to the County Poorhouse,
sets a whitewashed frame cottage. It has two rooms, the chimney in the
center providing each with a fireplace. A porch, supported by red cedar posts,
fronts the road side. In this abode lives Jesse Williams with his daughter,
Edna, and her six children. Edna pays the rent, and is a grenadier in the warfare
of keeping the wolf from the door.

“You say I looks pretty old? Well, you’s right ’bout de old part but I’s
far ‘way from de pretty part. I got a hand glass in my house and when I shaves
on Sunday mornin’s, I often wonders who I is. I doesn’t look lak me. My best
friend couldn’t say I got much on looks, but my old dog rap his tail on de floor
lak he might say so, if him could speak.

“I’s been off and on dese streets of Chester for eighty-three years. I
was born a slave of Marse Adam C. Walker and my old miss was Mistress Eliza, dat’s
his wife.

“My pappy name Henry and mammy name Maria. I can see them plowin’ in de
field right now. Mammy plowin’ same as pappy and me runnin’ ‘long behind, takin’
de dirt off de cotton plants where de twister plow turnt de clods on de plants.
Then, when dat cotton field git white and red wid blooms in summer and white agin
in de fall, I have to shoulder my poke and go to de field and pick dat cotton. I
‘members de fust day dat I pick a hundred pounds. Marse Adam pull out a big flat
black pocket-book and gived me a shinplaster, and say: ‘Jesse, ever time your basket
h’ist de beam of de steelyards to 100, you gits a shinplaster.’ I make eighty[203]
cents dat year but I have to git up when de chickens crow for day and git in
de field when de dew was heavy on de cotton. Does I think dat was cheatin’?
Oh, no sir! I wasn’t ‘ceivin’ old marster. Him wink at dat, and take a pound
off for dew. I’d a made more money but they took me out de field in November,
to drive de mules to de hoss-gin. Dat was play work, just a settin’ up dere
and poppin’ de whip.

“Marster live in a big two-story, eight-room house. De kitchen was out
from de house. After Christmas, dat year, I was house boy and drive de buggy
for Miss Eliza when her want to go visitin’. I was fed well and spent my money
for a knife, candy, and firecrackers.

“My marster and missus have chillun. They was Peter, Jerry, Miss Elnora,
and Miss Sallie, dat I play wid in slavery time.

“De Yankees didn’t come as far up as Chester. They branched off down ’bout
Blackstock, took de sunrise side of dat place and march on ‘cross Catawba River,
at Rocky Mount. I stay on wid Marse Adam and Miss Eliza, after freedom. I marry
a handsome gal. Yes, sir, she dark but not too shady. I harks back to them days,
as I sets here in dis rocker a talkin’ to you. Did I tell you her name? Her name
just suit her. Not Jane, Polly, Mag, Sallie, and de lak of dat! Them was too
common for her. Her name Catherine, dat just fit her. Us have ten chillun and
her and all them ‘cept me and three chillun done gone over to Jordan. Dere was
just one thing ’bout Catherine dat I’s dubious ’bout. She lak to dance, and I
was too clumsy for to ever cut a double shuffle. I ‘spect I cut a poor figure
at de frolics us went to. Does you think burnin’ a candle for her would do any
good at dis late day? Why I ask you dat? Well, I has heard them say dat white
folks does dat sometimes for deir gone-on ones. My daughter, Edna say: ‘It
might do you good and it could do mama no harm.’ I b’longs to Mount Moriah Church
in dis very town of Chester. De preacher am Rev. Alexander. He ‘low it was superstition
to burn dat candle but if I live I’s gwine to light one nex’ Christmas.[204]

“Us had a good marster and mistress. They was big buckra, never ‘sociate
wid poor white trash. They wore de red shirt. De time come ’round when they
send me to Marse Will Harden and he pass me on to go see Marse Judge Mackey,
who live here then. Did I know Judge Mackey? Sho’ I did! While he was a settin’
up dere on de bench in de court house, he have all de people laughin’. One
time de father of Marse W.B. Lindsey beat up a Radical nigger and de case come
up befo’ him for trial. Great ‘citement ’bout it, over de whole county. Court
house packed dat day. Solicitor rise and say: ‘Please your honor, de ‘fendant,
Lindsey, put in a plea of guilty.’ You might have heard a breast feather of a
chicken fall, so very still was de people in dere, though de niggers and ‘publicans
was a grinning wid joy. Then Judge Mackey ‘low: ‘Let de ‘fendant stand
up.’ Wid a solemn face and a solemn talk, him wound up wid: ‘Derefore, de
court sentence you to de State Penitentiary at hard labor for a period of ten
years (Then him face light up, as he conclude), or pay a fine of one dollar!’
De white folks holler: ‘Three cheers for Judge Mackey!’ De judge git up and
bow, and say: ‘Order in de court.’ As dere was no quiet to be got, clerk
‘journed de court. De judge take his silk beaver hat and gold headed cane and
march out, while de baliffs holler: ‘Make way! Make way for de honorable judge!’
Everybody took up dat cry and keep it up long as de judge was on de streets. Oh,
how dat judge twirl his cane, smile, and strut.

“Did I ever see a spirit? ‘Spect I has and I sho’ have felt one more than
once. ‘Spect I was born wid a caul over my eyes. When de last quarter of de
moon come in de seventh month of a seventh year, is de most time you see spirits.
Lyin’ out in de moon, befo’ daybreak, I’s smelt, I’s heard, I’s seed and I’s felt
Catherine’s spirit in de moon shadows. I come nigh ketchin’ hold of her one night,
as I wake up a dreamin’ ’bout her but befo’ I could set up, I hear her pass ‘way,[205]
through de treetops dat I was layin’, dreamin’ under.

“Then another time, I was settin’ here ’bout four o’clock in de moonlight
a lookin’ ‘cross de street to de town hall. I see sumpin’ rise and jump upon
dat rock a lyin’ dere ‘ginst de town hall. It was de figger of a man. Who it
was I don’t know, though they de call de rock de ‘Aaron Burr Rock’, ’cause he
made a speech standin’ on dat rock, long befo’ I was born. De people in de
library can tell you ’bout dat speech. Maybe Dr. Lathan tell you ’bout it.
Him ninety-five years old dis last past twelfth day of May and knows all ’bout
de days dat are gone.

“I live wid my daughter, Edna, and I just can make it back dere from de
post office every day.”

FOLK-LORE: EX-SLAVES

Aunt Mary Williams stated she remembered[206]
slavery times, for she was a girl large enough to walk four
miles to go to work “while slavery was on”. She said Mr.
Alfred Brown used to own her mother, but she was raised by
Mrs. Margaret Taylor who used to live where the oil mill is
now, below Arkwright Mills. Her father was owned by Mr.
Simpson Bobo and drove his horse for him. She stated she
was a good hoe-hand, but didn’t pick cotton, as Mr. Brown
didn’t raise any cotton, just raised something to eat.

She said her master was a kind man,
didn’t allow any “paterollers” on his place, yet she had
seen other slaves on other plantations with bloody backs
and arms from the whippings they got. When asked why they
were whipped, she replied, “Just because their masters could
whip them; they owned them and could do what they wanted to
them”. Her master didn’t allow any whipping on his place.
One time he kept a slave from another plantation who was
fleeing the “paterollers” on his place and in his own house
until he was set free.

“I’se got the looking glasses and the thimble
my great-grandmother used to use when she worked. She was a
good weaver and a good sewer. She made a man an overcoat once,
but didn’t get but $1.25 for it; she made a pair of men’s
breeches and got fifty cents for making them. They didn’t
get nothing for making clothes in those days”.[207]

She remembered when the Yankee soldiers came
into Spartanburg. She said they took all they could get,
stole something to eat, just went into the stores and took
liquor and handed it out drink by drink to the other soldiers.
Aunt Mary stated she saw Abe Lincoln when he came through
Spartanburg; said he was armed himself and had soldiers all
around him. He told the colored folks who seemed scared of
him that he wasn’t going to hurt anybody, not to be scared
of him. (Here she must have confused Lincoln with some one
else, probably Colonel Palmer, who commanded a detachment
in pursuit of Jefferson Davis, which stopped over-night in
Spartanburg in April, 1865. FK.)

SOURCE: Aunt Mary Williams, 391 Cudd St., Spartanburg, S.C.
Interviewer: F.S. DuPre, Spartanburg, S.C.

EX-SLAVE STORY

UNCLE WILLIS WILLIAMS

“When wuz I born? Born in August. When I wuz born been August. I[208]
wuz a man grown pulling boxes, (turpentine boxes) when the shake wuz. I
know the very night the shake come——on a Wednesday night. I wuz on
door step loosing my shoe string. There wuz more religion then than they
is now. Praying and prayer meeting for a month. Everybody tend meeting.

“I been with the Yankee. I kin tell you bout the Yankee. They come
home there to Rock Creek when the war wuz breaking up and carried me to
Fayetteville. (N.C.) Kept me with ’em till Johnson surrendered in Raleigh,——then
they kept me in Goldsboro and took me on to Petersburg. After
everything over they give me free transportation back home. Free on train
back to Fayetteville. They had put all the Yankee clothes on me,——all
the blue shirt, blue coat and bumps on the shoulder,—and when they start
me home took all the Yankee clothes way from me. Put gray clothes on me and
sent me back. I member they took me up in a way-up-yonder building—to
Richmond. Couldn’t tell you the depth of it. Man on the ground looked like
boy.

“The man I belonged to been Mass John A. Williams. (Born on the Cape
Fear.) I goes by Mass John name—Williams. His sons been John, James,
Charlie, Wallis, William, James. James come home from army sick. Had the
mumps; thirty days furlough.[209]

“Member when the Yankees come. Been Sunday morning. Ride up to the
gate on horses. Old Boss happened to come out and walk to the lot. I
happened to be at gate. They took his watch out his pocket, his pistol—had
it girded to him—and took all he whiskey and catch chickens and
guinea and take them all. Then they gone in the lot and took two breeding
mares and hitch them in wagon and loaded wagon full o’ corn. Then they took
the two carriage horses and hitched to carriage, and gone to smoke-house,
and fill that carriage full of all Mass John sides of meat and ham and
shoulders. I been following and watching to see what all they going to take,
and a soldier looked at me and say,

“‘Come on little Nigger! Wanter go?’

“And I done like another fool! I rode off behind the two brood mares,
on the corn, and where they rested that night, I rested right there.

“It was mighty cold up there. I suffered a heap in the cold fore I
got back home. They give me a horse,—saddled and bridled,—and a
little bayonet gun. Put me on that horse to drive cattle. Tell me to take
all I see. Didn’t except nobody cattle. Night come put ’em in pasture—put
’em in anybody field—on the oats, rye, wheat.

“Sometimes rain sho fall.—Had to tend that bunch of cattle rain
or no rain. Didn’t kill one beef and stop! (Kill) FOUR beeves a day. Go
out git the hog and kill ’em. Skin ’em. Didn’t scald ’em and clean ’em like[210]
we do. Just eat the ham. Rest throw way. Gone to Wilmington, Fayetteville,
Rookfish and Beaver Creek.

“General Sherman? Has I hear bout him? I SEEN him! He had a big
name but he warn’t such a big man; he was a little spare made man. I
member now when I seed him the last time. He had two matched horses going
down to Petersburg. Six guards riding by the side of his turnout. Oh my
God, what clothes he had on! He was dressed down in finest uniform.

“When I leave the Yankee they give me $35.00 in money. I been so
fool had never seen no green back. Throwed it away eating crackers and
peanuts. And I bought some brogan shoes. If I’d a helt on to that, I’d a
been some body today.

“I members it was Sunday morning that General Johnson throwed up his
hand at Raleigh. Done with the war!

“Before Freedom I have a good enough time. Just lay round the house
and wait on my boss. When Freedom come and I did have to get out and work it
most kill me!

“After Freedom my mother wash for family to Beaver Creek. And after
Freedom my father went to working on shares. Old Maas John called ’em up
and tell ’em,

“‘You free, Asa. You free, Lewis. You free, Handy. You free, Wash.[211]
You can do as you please. You have to fadge for yourself now.’

“Mass John Williams had four hundred slaves. He was a man had the
colored people. He didn’t work all on his own plantation. He’d hire
out his people to work turpentine.——Put ’em out for so much a year.
He’d give ’em blanket, suit, coat, pants. First of the year come, Boss
would collect wages for all he hire out.

“That there my second wife. You know how a man is. How many wife
I had? Two or three. Lemme see! (Looking at present wife) You is one!
You the last one! Fust one been Jinny Lind. Next one been Mary Dickson.
And Caressa Pyatt been one! And there been another one! I forgot that
woman name! Got it in my mouth and can’t call it! I’ll call the name of
them others I take up with in a little while! One was Caline; one was Tissue;
(Tisha?) I take them a little while and if they didn’t do to suit me, I put
’em out! Some I didn’t stay with long nuff to find out they name! Jinny
Lind sister was Tissue. Jinny Lind gone, try her sister. Just a ‘make out’.
If they didn’t do to suit me, I’d give ’em the devil and put ’em out.

“Don’t know bout beating woman. Some say that bout,

“But some woman, the more you beat ’em the worse the devil gets in ’em.
Get so they won’t ‘GEE’ nor ‘HAW’.[212]

“When I was house boy for old Mass John, waiting on white people,
that was the best and easiest time I ever had. Ever Satdy drive Mass John
to Fayetteville. Ever Satdy they’d think that store belong to me! I’d eat
lumps of brown sugar out the barrel, candy, crackers. Did as I please then;
NOW do as I kin!

“‘Ways of woman and ways of snake deeper than the sea!’ I take that
to mean——mighty few can tell by the trail of a snake whether its coming
or going——

“I hear story bout the rabbit and the fox—all them old things—Some
times my mind franzy. Been break up too much! Break two ribs to the
lumber mill. Jump out a cart one day and run a ten penny nail through my
foot. That lay me up two months. Some mean people ketch me up by that tree
yonder with a car and that lay me up sixty-five days. They pick me up for
dead that time. All that make my mind get franzy sometimes. Come and go—Come
and go.”

SOURCE: Uncle Willis Williams. Age, 89 to 90 years old. Conway, S.C.
(Horry County).

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“I was a Garmany before I married Calvin Wilson. My[213]
father was Henry Garmany, and my mother Sidney Boozer. My
husband was in the Confederate army with his master. Dey was
near Charleston on de coast. I was slave of Lemuel Lane, of
de Dutch Fork. He was killed after de war, some say by some
of his young slaves, but we’uns did not know naything about
who killed him. We had a good house to live in on Marse Lane’s
plantation. I used to work around the house and in de fields.
My mother was a good seamstress and helped de white folks sew,
and she learn’t me to sew had help too. We didn’t get any
money for our work. One time after de war, dey paid me only
$5.00 and I quit ’em. My mother hired me out to work for her,
and I didn’t have any money, still; so I said I better get me
a man of my own. Marse Lane was mean to most of us, but good
to me. He whipped me once and I deserved it because I wouldn’t
answer him when he called me. He jes’ give me about two licks.
He was mean to my mother, but he wouldn’t let his white overseer
whip us, and wouldn’t let de padder-rollers come around.
He said he could look-out for his own slaves.

“We didn’t learn to read and write, but some of de white
folks had learned my mother, and she learned me some.

“Niggers had to go to church at New Hope, de white folks’
church, in slavery time and after de war too. We had Saturday
afternoons to do what we wanted, and we washed clothes then.[214]

“On Christmas, Marse would give de slaves some good
things to eat and send some to dere families. Niggers had
frolics at dere houses sometimes on Saturday nights. When I
married, I had a good hot supper.

“Children played all de ole games like, play-ball (throwing
over the house), marbles and base.

“Some saw ghosts, but I never saw any of dem.

“Old-time cures was peach tree leaves boiled and drunk
for fever; wild cherry bark was good for most anything if took
at night. I have used it for curing some things. The best cure
I know, is turpentine and a little oil mixed. Swallow it and it
will fix you up.

“The Yanks went through our place and took two of the
best horses we had. One had a tail that reached the ground. Dey
stole lots of victuals. I ‘member de Ku Klux wid dere long
white sheets, and den de Red Coats wid white breeches. Dey would
walk or ride, but dey never harmed us.

“I don’t know much about Abe Lincoln, but I reckon he
was a good man, and Jeff Davis, too. I don’t know Booker Washington
but heard he was a good man.

“I joined de church because de white folks did. Dey
wants to go to heaven and I do too. I think everybody ought to
try to do right. I used to think we could make heaven down here,
but if we jes’ do right, dats all we can do.”

Source: Emoline Wilson (90), Newberry, S.C.
Interviewer: G.L. Summer, Newberry, S.C. May 21, 1937.

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“I was born in Newberry County near Cannon’s Creek section[215]
in the Dutch Fork. I was a slave of Lemuel Lane. He was killed by
some slaves just after freedom. They killed him for his money but
didn’t find any, it was said. When freedom come, my mistress give
me some things to eat when we left.

“I can’t work much any more; I am old and I can’t get about.
I live with my son who works when he can find work. We rent a two-room
cottage in town.

“I never heard anything about slaves getting 40 acres of
land and a mule. None in that section got any. We had to go to
work for other people.

“The Ku Klux Klan never bothered us then, and we never had
nothing to do with them, nor with politics.

“There was no slaves living in our section who had come
from Virginia.”

Source: Emoline Wilson (90), Newberry, S.C.
Interviewer: G.L. Summer, Newberry, S.C. 8/10/37
(See ES IV, MS. #13).

STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES

“I am daughter of Billy Robertson and Louisa Robertson; was[216]
born about 77 years ago in Newberry, on Marse Job Johnstone’s
place. My father lived with Judge Job Johnstone as his extra man
or servant. He lived in the house with him, slept in his room and
waited on him when he became old; and, too, was the driver of his
carriage. He drove him to other courthouses to hold court. After
the war, my father was janitor at Newberry College, and he was
liked by professors, students, and everybody who knew him as
‘Uncle Billy’. At commencement, he always made a speech at night
on the campus, which the students enjoyed. He told about his
travels from Virginia to Newberry before the war. Judge Johnstone
never wanted anybody else to be with him when he traveled.

“I belonged to the Avelleigh Presbyterian Church in Newberry,
and was christened in the church by the preacher, the Rev. Buist.
Colored people were allowed to be members and set in the gallery
when they went to church.

“After the war, a colored man named Amos Baxter was killed
by the Ku Klux at the old courthouse. My father was on Judge
Johnstone’s farm a few miles away. He was sent for and came with
another colored man to town, and prayed and preached over the body
of Baxter. The Ku Klux came to kill my father for doing this, but
they never caught him.

“I had to stay home most of the time and help mama keep
house. I never worked in the field but once, and the job was so
poor they put me back in the house. That was the old Nance place.[217]

“Once I saw a man hung in Newberry. He was a negro named
Thompson and killed a white man named Reid. He killed him at a
store in Pomaria and burned it over his body. He was hung near the
railroad, and a big crowd was there to see it. That was my first
time to see a man hung, and I promised God it would be my last.
They asked the negro if he had anything to say, and give him five
minutes to talk. He was setting on a box smoking; then he got up
and said he reckoned his time was over, he was sorry for all the
bad things he had done; that he had killed a boy once for 25 cents,
and had killed a little girl for 20 cents. He was sorry for his
wife and three weeks old baby. His wife saw him hung.

“The Ku Klux wanted to kill any white people who was Republicans.
They killed some negroes. A white man named Murtishaw
killed Lee Nance, a store keeper. I was a little girl and saw it.
Some little children was standing out in front. Murtishaw came
up and said he wanted to buy something or pretended he wanted to;
then he went up to Nance, pulled his pistol quick and shot him
through the throat and head.

“Judge Johnstone’s kitchen was away from the house, a brick
building. They had large ovens and wide fireplaces in which they
cooked.

“My father’s favorite horses, when he drove the family, was
‘Knox’ and ‘Calvin’, which they kept for many years. When they
died the mistress cried awfully about it.

“My husband died at old Mr. Dan Ward’s place, on College
Hill, where he was living then.”

Source: Jane Wilson (77), Newberry, S.C.
Interviewer: G.L. Summer, Newberry, S.C. (6/9/37)

MOM GENIA WOODBERRY

Ex-Slave, 89 years

“Glad to see yunnah. Who dese udder wid yah? Who yuh?[218]
Lawd, I glad to see yunnah. I nu’se aw Miss Susan fust
chillun. Ne’er nu’se dem las’uns. Sicily been yo’ mamma
nu’se. Nu’se Massa Ben Gause child fust en den I nu’se
four head uv Miss Susan chillun a’ter she marry Massa Jim
Stevenson. Sleep right dere wid dem chillun aw de time.
Miss Susan ne’er didn’t suckle none uv dem chillun. I tell
yunnah dis much, Massa Jim Stevenson was good to aw uv his
colored people en Miss Susan wuz good to me. I sho’ born
right down yonner to Massa Ben Gause plantation. Gade Caesar
en Mary Gause wuz my parents. Yas’um, I is glad to see dese
chillun cause yuh know whey white folks hab feeling fa yah,
it sho’ make yuh hab feeling fa dey chillun. I ole now en
I can’ ‘member eve’yt’ing but I ain’ ne’er forge’ wha’ good
times dem wuz.”

“My Lawd! Yas, my Lawd, de peoples lib well dere to Massa
Jim Stevenson plantation. De white folks hab big house dere
wid eve’yt’ing ’bout it jes lak uh town. I couldn’t tell
yunnah how many colored peoples dey hab dere but I know dis,
I hear em say dere wuz more den two hundred uv em dat lib
in de quarter. Dey house wuz in uh field offen to itself
dere on de plantation en wuz strung aw up en down in two
long row lak. Dey wuz set up in good libin’ den.”[219]

“Coase I ain’ lib dere in de quarter wid de udder
colored peoples a’ter I ge’ big ‘nough to be nu’se girl,
but I know how dey fare dere. My Massa hab uh smoke
house full uv meat en uh barn full uv corn aw de time
en eve’y Friday a’ternoon aw de colored peoples hadder
do wuz to go dere to de big house en ge’ dey share uv
meat en ‘lasses en corn to las’ em de whole week. Ne’er
hadder worry nuthin ’bout it tall. Dey hab dey gristmill
right dere whey dey grind dat corn eve’y week. Yah ain’
ne’er see no sech barn en heap uv meat dese days uz dey
hab den. Dem hog killin’ days wuz big times fa dem
plantation peoples. It jes lak I tellin’ yunnah my Massa
gi’e he colored peoples mos’ eve’t’ing dey hab en den he
‘low eve’y family to hab uh acre uv land uv dey own to
plant. Hadder work dat crop in de night. Make light wid
fat light’ud stump wha’ to see by. Dat crop wha’ dey buy
dey Sunday clothes wid. Ne’er hadder hunt no clothes but
dey Sunday clothes cause dey hab seamstress right dere on
de plantation to make aw us udder clothes. Miss Susan
larnt Aun’ Cynthia en Starrah en Tenna to cut en sew dere
to de big house en a’ter dat dey ne’er do nuthin but make
de plantation clothes.”

“Aw de colored peoples dere to Miss Susan plantation
hab dey certain business to go ’bout eve’y day en dey ne’er[220]
didn’t shirk dat neither. Miss Susan ain’ ‘low fa no
slack way ’round whey she was. Dere been Yaneyki wha’
hadder jes wait on Miss Susan; Becky, de house girl;
Aun’ Hannah, de one wha’ cook in de big house; Aun’
Dicey, wha’ al’ays clean up de white folks kitchen; en
Sanco, de house boy. Den I wuz de nu’se dere fa dem
chillun. Ne’er lak it but I ha’e it to do. Hadder stay
right dere to de big house aw de time. Miss Susan ne’er
wouldn’t ‘low me take dem chillun ‘way offen no whey en
eve’ybody hadder be mindful uv wha’ dey say ‘fore dem
chillun too. I ‘member dat big ole joggling board dere
on de front piazza dat I use’er ge’ de chillun to sleep
on eve’y evenin’. I be dere singin’ one uv dem baby song
to de child en it make me hu’t lak in me bosom to be wid
my ole mammy back up dere in de quarter. Coase I ain’ le’
nobody know dat. Dere ain’ nobody ne’er been no better
den Miss Susan wuz to me. It jes lak dis, I wuz jes uh
child den en yah know it uh child happiness to be raise
up wid dey mammy.”

“Den de colored peoples lib mighty peaceful lak dere
in de quarter cause dey ne’er hadder worry ’bout how nuthin
come. My Massa see dat dey hab decent libin’ aw de time en
‘bundance uv eve’t’ing dey need. Hadder keep ’round ’bout
dey premises clean up eve’whey. I tellin’ yuh, child, my[221]
white folks wuz ‘ticular uv dey colored peoples when dey
wuz sick. Dey hab big ole me’icine book dat dey take down
when one uv dem ge’ sick en see could dey find wha’ wuz
good fa dey ailment. Den Miss Susan’ud send in de woods
en ge’ wha’ it say mix up fa de remedy en make de me’icine
right dere to de big house. Miss Susan’ud al’ays doctor
de plantation peoples en carry em nice basket uv t’ing
eve’y time dey wuz sick. Effen Miss Susan t’ink dey hab
mucha co’plaint, den dey’ud send fa de plantation doctor
’bout dere. Annuder t’ing dey ne’er didn’t ‘low de
colored girls to work none tall ‘fore dey wuz shape lak uh
‘oman cause dey ‘fraid dat might strain dey ne’ves.”

“Aw de colored peoples wha’ ne’er hab no work to do
’bout de big house wuz field hand en dey hadder ge’ up at
de fust crow uv de cock in de morning en go up to de big
house en see wha’ dey wan’ em to do dat day. Coase dey
eat dey break’ast ‘fore dey leab de quarter. Effen de sun
look lak it wuz gwinna shine, de o’erseer’ud send em in de
field to work en dey’ud stay in de field aw day till sun
up in de evenin’. Carry dey basket uv victual en pot ‘long
wid em en cook right dere in de field. Jes put dey peas en
bacon in de pot en build up big fire ’bout it close whey dey
wuz workin’ cause eve’y now en den dey hadder push de fire
to de pot. Den some uv de day dey’ud go in de tatoe patch[222]
en dig tatoe en roast em in de coals. Effen it wuz uh
rainy day, dey ne’er go in de field. Shuck corn dat day.
Dat wuz how dey done.”

“Aw dem wha’ work right dere to de big house al’ays
wuz fed from Miss Susan table to de kitchen. Dere wuz
Gran’mudder Phoebe who hadder look a’ter eve’t’ing ’bout
Miss Susan dairy. De plantation peoples’ud bring dey gourd
eve’y morning en leab it dere to de dairy fa Gran’mudder
Phoebe to hab fill wid clabber fa em to carry home in de
evenin’. Den when Gran’mudder Phoebe wuz finish wid aw de
churning, she use’er pour wha’ clabber wuz left o’er in uh
big ole wooden tray under uh tree dere close to de dairy en
call aw dem little plantation chillun dere whey she wuz.
She gi’e eve’yone uv em uh iron spoon en le’ em eat jes uz
mucha dat clabber uz dey c’n hold. A’ter dat she clean up
eve’yt’ing ’bout de dairy en den she go to de big house en
ge’ her dinner. Gran’mudder Phoebe say she could set down
en eat wid sati’faction den cause she know she wuz t’rough
wid wha’ been her portion uv work dat day.”

“Den dere wuz Patience wha’ work to de loom house. She
help do aw de weaving fa de plantation. Weave aw t’rough
de winter en aw t’rough de summer. She make aw kinder uv
pretty streak in de cloth outer de yarn dat dey dye right
dere on de plantation wid t’ing dat dey ge’ outer de woods
lak walnut wha’ make brown, en cedar en sweet gum wha’ make
purple. Den dey make de blue cloth outer dat t’ing dat dey[223]
raise right dere on de plantation call indigo. Dere some
uv dat indigo dat does grow up dere on de Sand Hills dis
day en time but ain’ nobody ne’er worry ’bout it no more.”

“Jes uh little way from de loom house wuz de shoe house
whey Uncle Lon’on hadder make shoe aw de day. I ‘member
dey is make aw de plantation shoe dere. Make em outer
cow hide wha’ dey hadder tan fust. Jes put de cow hide in
uh trough en kiver it aw o’er wid oak en water en le’ it
soak till de hair come offen it. Den dey take it outer dat
en beat it ‘cross uh log hard uz dey c’n till dey ge’ it
right soft lak. A’ter dat ley out de shoe lak dey wan’ it
en sew it up wid dem long hair wha’ dey ge’ outer de hosses
neck. Dat jes de way dey make aw we shoe den.”

“Minus en Chrissus Gause hab job dere to de gin house.
Dey’ud jes put de cotton in dat gin en de seed go one way
en de lent go de udder way. Minus hadder feed de gin en
dem udder helper hadder hand de cotton. Den Bacchus hadder
work de screw dat press de bale togedder. Yunnah chillun
ain’ ne’er see nuthin lak dat dese days. Dem hosses pull
dat t’ing round en round en dat screw ge’ tighter en tighter.
Turn out pretty uh bale uv cotton us yunnah e’er hear ’bout
in no time tall. My Lawd, I ‘member dey is hab bale uv cotton
pile up aw ’bout dat gin house.”

“En dey is hab dey own blacksmith shop dere on de place
down to de place call de big water. Aw dem peoples from
plantation aw ’bout come dere fa Fortune to mend dey plow en
t’ing lak dat.”[224]

“Yas’um, plantation peoples hadder go dere to de Ole
Neck Chu’ch eve’y Sunday. I hear em say dat wuz uh Methodist
Chu’ch. Aw dem well to do folks hab dey own pew up dere in
de front uv de chu’ch wha dey set on eve’y Sunday. Dey seat
wuz painted pretty lak uh bedstead en den de poor peoples
set in de middle uv de chu’ch in de yellow kind uv seat. Aw
de colored peoples hadder set in de blue seat in de back uv
de chu’ch. Peoples ne’er rank togedder den lak yah see de
peoples rank togedder dese days. Miss Susan Stevenson en
Miss Harriett Woodberry en Miss Maggie McWhite wuz de ones
wha’ pull togedder den. Know dey chillun time dey hit dat
chu’ch door. C’n tell em by dey skin. My blessed, chillun,
dere wuz sech uh diffe’ence.”

“Dat Ole Neck Chu’ch de same chu’ch wha’ yunnah see
stand two mile up dat road. Dem peoples oughtna hadder move
dat chu’ch neither cause it been dere long time ‘fore dey
come heah. Ain’ been right to do dat. Dem wha’ put dat
chu’ch dere bury right dere in dat cemetery right ’bout whey
dey chu’ch wuz en dem udder peoples ain’ hab no right to take
dey chu’ch ‘way a’ter dey been gone.”

“De peoples ne’er hab no cars lak dese peoples hab ’bout
heah now. My white folks hab carriage en two big ole white
hosses wha’ to ride to se’vice en whey dey wanna go den. Coase
dey ne’er go aw de time lak dese peoples does dis day en time.[225]
Lawd, dem hosses could pull dat carriage too. Dey wuz name
Selam en Prince. My Massa en Missus hab seat in de back uv
de carriage en I hadder set up dere ‘tween dem en de driver
en nu’se dem chillun. Isaac wuz Miss Susan driver en he hab
seat aw uv he own on de front whey he could mind de hosses.
My Lawd, I ‘member how I did use’er lub to set up dere in
Miss Susan carriage.”

“Dese peoples dese days don’ know nuthin ’bout dem times
den. I ‘member how dey use’er sell de colored peoples offen
to annuder plantation some uv de time. Man come dere to buy
my Gran’mudder a’ter Massa Ben Gause die en tell her to open
she mouth so he c’n ‘xamine her teeth. Say she say, ‘I won’
do it.’ Wanna know effen dey wuz sound ‘fore he buy her.
Dat de way dey do when dey sell hosses.”

“I ‘member when dem Yankees come ’bout dere too. Hear
Massa Jim Stevenson say dey mus’ herry en hide dey va’uables
cause de Yankees wuz comin’ t’rough dere en sweep em out.
Dey bury dey silver en dey gold watch in de graveyard up in
de Beech Field. (De Beech Field wuz de place whey de Indian
use’er camp long time ago cause de peoples use’er find aw
kinder bead en arrow head wha’ dey left dere.) Den Miss
Susan put trunk full uv her nice t’ing to de colored peoples
house. Ain’ been ‘fraid de Yankees bother em dere. Didn’t
no Yankees come no whey ’bout dere till a’ter freedom ‘clare
en den two uv em come dere en stay right dere to de big house.
Dey come to ‘vide outer de corn. Hab pile uv corn sot aw ’bout[226]
de born (barn) dere wid name uv de colored peoples stick
’bout in eve’y pile.”

“Yas’um, I ‘member dat aw right. Marry in March dere
to my pa house. Us ne’er left Massa Jim Stevenson plantation
a’ter freedom ‘clare. Ne’er wanna hunt no better libin’
den we hab dere. My Lawd, dere sho’ wuz big doing ’bout
dere when I go’ hitch up to Joe Woodberry. Pa kill uh
shoat en dey bake cake en hab aw kinder ration cook up.
I hab pretty dress make outer white swiss muslin wha’ I
marry in en aw dem peoples wuz dress up dat evenin’. Dat
wuz pretty uh sight uz dere e’er wuz when dey ge’ to blowing
dat cane en knockin’ dem stick en dey aw wuz uh jiggin’
’bout.”

“Chillun, seem lak aw de good time gone from heah now.
Peoples sho’ gotta scuffle fa wha’ dey hab dis day en time
en den effen dey ge’ it, dere ain’ no sati’faction no whey
’bout it. T’ing ain’ gwinna do nobody no good effen dey
gotta worry dey head so mucha ’bout whey de next comin’
from.”

“Good day, honey. Come back ‘g’in. Yunnah white en
I black, but I lub yuh.”

Source: MOM GENIA WOODBERRY (Eugenia Woodeberry), age
89, colored, Britton’s Neck, S.C. (Personal
interview, June 1937)

JULIA WOODBERRY

Ex-Slave, Age ____

“Come in, child. Dis ain’ nobody talkin to you from[227]
behind dat door, but Julia Woodberry. De door unlatch,
just turn de handle en come right in here whe’ you can
warm yourself by de stove. I tell my daughter for her
to take de sick child en walk over dere en make Aun’ Liney
a visit, while I wipe round bout dis stove a little speck.
Cose I ain’ able to scour none much, but seems like dis old
stove does keep everything so nasty up dat I can’ let things
bout it get too worser. No, child, I tell dese chillun I
done seen most all my scourin days, but I think bout I would
do this little job for Alexa dis mornin en let her put her
mind to dat child. I say, if I able, I loves to wipe up
cause it such a satisfaction. It just like dis, dere ain’
nothin gwine shine dat floor en make it smell like I want
it to, but soap en water. I don’ like dese old stoves nohow.
I ain’ been raise to dem cause when I come up, de olden people
didn’ think nothin bout puttin no stoves to dey fireplaces.
Oh, dey would have dese big old open fireplaces en would have
de grandest kind of fires. My Lord, child, dere wouldn’ never
be no nastiness bout dey fireplace cause de people never didn’
burn no coal in dem days. Slavery people been burn dese great[228]
big oak logs en dey would make de finest kind of fires, I
say. Yes, mam, I been raise up de slavery way en dat how-come
I don’ want to be noways departin from it.”

“Oh, dat was my granddaughter dat had de straw fever.
Yes, mam, look like she mendin right smart since she been
settin up. De straw fever, dat what I calls it, but I hear
people say it de hay fever. De doctor, he just say it de
fever, but from de way he give de pills, it point to de
straw fever. Cose dat what we termed it, but like I tell
you, some calls it de hay fever. I ain’ never hear talk
of dat kind of fever till dese late years. Yes, mam, she
had a little cold en cough some, but not much. You see,
when she first took down, she took wid a blindness en a
pain in de stomach at de school en couldn’ say nothin. De
doctor say de fever was bout broke on her den. You see,
she had de pain en, I say, dat a sign de misery broke on
her. But dat child, she lay dere on dat bed three weeks
en she been mighty weak, mighty weak from de fever. No, mam,
she ain’ have de fever all de time, but dere would come a
slow fever dat would rise on her every night en eat up what
strength she had caught durin de day. Cose she ain’ never
been hearty cause she been havin dis fever long bout two
years. No, mam, she been test for de T.B.’s in de school dis[229]
last year en dey say dat she never had none of dat. Alexa
say she gwine let her get dem shots in time next year. All
de school chillun took dem last year. Dey tell me dat be to
keep diseases down in school. Cose I don’ know nothin bout
it cause I been raise de slavery way en dat won’ de talk den.

“My mother, she was a freeborn woman. She come from off
de sea beach in our own country. Her people was dese Chee
Indians en she didn’ have no ways like dese other people bout
here. Now, I talkin out of her. Ain’ talkin out of nobody
else, but her. She told me she was born on de sea beach en
her parents was Chee Indians. Dat what she told us chillun.
Say, when dey stole her en her brother John, dey come dere
in dese big old covered wagons en dey stuffed dem way back
up in dere en carried dem off. Oh, she say, she was a big
girl when dey run her down en caught her. Like I tell you,
I talkin out of her. Her en her brother John was out playin
one day, near their sea beach home, en first thing dey know,
dere come one of dem big old covered wagons dere. Say, dey
never know what to think till dey see dis white man gettin
down off de wagon en start makin for dem en dey get scared
cause dey been learn white man won’ no friend. Say, dey broke en
run, but de man come right after dem en grabbed dem up wid
his hands en stuffed dem way back up in de covered wagon en
drove off. She say, she was runnin hard as she could from[230]
de man. I remember, I heard my mother speak bout dat she
didn’ reckon her mother ever knew whe’ dey went. She say,
dey cried en cried, but dat never do no good. No, mam, de
lawyer Phillips stole her. He didn’ buy her cause she told
me dey brought dem right on to his home en put dem out dere.
Her en her brother John were made house servants in de big
house en dey went from one to de other in de Phillips’
family till after freedom come here. Ma, she say dat she
fared good en dey didn’ ill treat her no time, but wouldn’
never allow dem to get out de family no more durin slavery
days. No, mam, she never didn’ have no hard time comin up.
Cose she had to put de white people chillun to bed at night
en den she could go to parties cross Catfish much as she
wanted to, but she would have to be back in time to cook dat
breakfast next mornin. You see, dey was house servants en
dey stayed right dere in de lawyer Phillips’ house all de
time. Been raise right down dere in dat grove of cedars
cross from de jail.”

“Well, she didn’ say bout dat. No, mam, she didn’ have
no word bout whe’ if she liked de white folks livin or no
when she first come dere. You know, when you in Rome, you
has to do as Rome do. Reckon dat de way de poor creature
took it. No, child, she didn’ tell us nothin bout her home
no more den dat she was born a Chee Indian. Yes, mam, my
blessed old mother told me dat a thousand times.”[231]

“My God, my God, child, I couldn’ never forget my old
mother’s face. She bore a round countenance all de time
wid dese high cheek bones en straight hair. I talkin out
of her now. Yes, mam, can see Ma face dere fore my eyes
right now. It de blessed truth, my old mother didn’ have
no common ways bout her nowhe’. I don’ know whe’ it true
or no, but de people used to say I took after my mother. I
recollects, when I would be workin round de white folks,
dey would ax me how-come I been have dem kind of way bout
me what was different from de other colored people. You
know, de Indians, dey got curious ways. My mother, she
wouldn’ never take a thing from nobody en she was sharp
to pick a fight. Yes, mam, she was quick as dat. (Slaps
her hands together.) Been fast gettin insulted. Anybody
make her mad, she would leave away from dem en dey wouldn’
see her no more in a month or two. Hear boss say dat she
was quick tempered.”

“Well, child, dat bout all I can know to speak bout
dis mornin. You see, some days I can get my ‘membrance
back better den I can on another day. I say, I gwine get
my mind fixed up wid a heap to tell you de next time you
come here en if you ain’ come back, I gwine try en get round
dere to your house. God bless you, honey.”

Source: Julia Woodberry, Ex-Slave, Age 70-80, Marion, S.C.
Personal interview by Annie R. Davis, Nov., 1937.

JULIA WOODBERRY

Ex-Slave, Age ____

“Oh, my God a mercy, child, dat been a time when dat[232]
shake come here. I tell you, dat been somethin. I sho
remember all bout dat cause I been a grown woman de year
dat earthquake come here. Yes, mam, I gwine tell it to
you just like I experience it. We had all just been get
over wid us supper en little things dat night en I had
washed Auntie en Mr. Rowell’s feet for dem to lie down
en dere come such a sketch of clouds from over in dat
direction dat I never know what to make of it. Auntie
en Mr. Rowell never know what to make of it neither. I
remember, I run out to help my sister dat been out to de
paddlin block en, honey, you ain’ never live to see no
black cloud like dat been. I washed a piece through en
den I left off en went back in de house en set down by
de fire to dry my feet. I set dere awhile en seems like
somethin just speak right out de fire, bout dat time, en
tell me to move my feet dat I was in bad shape. En, child,
it de truth of mercy, dere come a big clog of dirt out dat
chimney en drap (drop) right down in de spot whe’ my foot
was. I run to Auntie en Mr. Rowell to see could dey tell
what dat was, but dey been in just as much darkness as I
been. I look up en seems like de loft had lowered itself[233]
en could hear a roarin for miles en miles bout dere en
could hear de people hollerin every which a way. Yes,
mam, could hear dem hollerin miles en on top of miles
bout dere. My God, dem people was scared to lie down
dat night en such a prayin en a shoutin as everybody do
dat night, I ain’ never see de like fore den. Ain’ see
de like since den neither. Next mornin, I go to work
for de white folks en dey all go off dat mornin en I tell
you, I was scared bout to death in dat big house by myself.
I remember, I left out de house en been out in de ‘tatoe
patch grabblin ‘tatoes right along en when I raise up, dat
thing was comin down dat ‘tatoe row just a whirlin en a
makin right for me. Yes, mam, I been so scared. I ain’ see
whe’ I is grow a bit since de shake. I tell you, I thought
it was de Jedgment. Den we hear dere was gwine be another
earthquake, but de people get on dey knees en dey stay on
dey knees en it never come here dat time. Dat one was in
another state, so dey tell me. I hear talk dat all de earth
caved in en you could see de people down dere, but couldn’ nobody
get dem. Some people say dat been de devil do dat, but I tell
dem de devil ain’ had no such power. De Lord been de power dat
bring dat shake here, I say.”[234]

“Oh, Lord, de people sho fared better in dat day en time
den dey do dese days. Cose dey didn’ have a heap of different
kind of trashy things like dey have dese days, but dey had a
plenty to eat en a plenty to wear all de time en den everything
was better in dem times, too. Now, I speak bout what
I know bout. De rations eat better en de cloth wear better,
too, in dem days den dey do now. You see, mostly, de people
would make dey own provisions at home. White folks would
raise abundance of hogs en cows to run all dey big plantation
from one year to de other. Wouldn’ never clear out of meat
no time cause de stock been let loose to run at large in dem
days. De most dat dey bought was dey sugar en dey coffee,
but dem what was industrious en smart, dey made most dey
victuals at home. Made dey own rice en winnowed it right
dere home. Oh, dey had one of dese pestle en mortar to beat
it out. Yes, mam, de pestle been big at one end an little at
de other end. Den dey would raise turkeys en geese en chickens
en dere wasn’ no end to de birds en squirrels en rabbits en
fish in dat day en time. Dat is, dem what cared for demselves,
dey had all dem things. Cose dere was some den like dere be
now dat been too lazy to work en dey hand was empty all de
time. I remember, dem poorbuckras would just go bout from
one house to another en catch somethin here, dere en yonder.”[235]

“Den de people never wore none of dese kind of clothes
like de people wear dese days neither. When a person got
a dress den, dey made it demselves en dey made dey own underskirts
den, too. You see, all dese underskirts en bloomers
like de people does buy dese days, dey didn’ have nothin like
dat den. Used to put 10 yard in a dress en 10 yards in a
underskirt en would tuck dem clean up to dey waist. En, child,
when dey would iron dat dress, it would stand up in de floor
just like dere been somebody in it. When I say iron, I talkin
bout de people would iron den, too. Yes, mam, when I come along,
de people been take time to iron dey garments right. Oh, dey
clothes would be just as slick as glass. Won’ a wrinkle nowhe’
bout dem. Another thing, dey used to have dese dove colored
linen dusters dat dey would wear over dey dress when dey would
ride to church. Den when dey went in de church, dey would pull
dem off en put dem on again when dey started home. Dey was made
sort of like a coat suit, except dey was a little fuller en
would come clean down to de tail of de dress. You see, dey
was meant to protect de dress while dey was gwine along de road.”

“De world sho gwine worser dese days, honey. Oh, Lord,
de people worser. Yes, mam, dey worser, I say. Dey ain’ got
de mother wit. Dey weaker en dey wiser, I say, but dey ain’
got de mother wit. Can’ set down en talk to de people dese
days en dey take dat what you got to say in like dey used to.[236]
En de people don’ take de time to teach de chillun to know
good things like dey used to en dat how-come dey have more
time to get in so much of devilment dese days. Yes, mam, de
people used to have more chillun en dey raised dem, too.
Chillun know more den grown people do dese days, I say.
People used to know how to carry demselves en take care of
demselves more den dey do now. Seems like, de people more
rattlin en brazen den what dey used to be.”

Source: Julia Woodberry, colored, Marion, S.C.—Age, 70-80.
Personal interview by Annie Ruth Davis, Nov., 1937.

JULIA WOODBERRY

Ex-Slave, Age ____

“Well, I can speak bout what I used to hear my auntie[237]
en my mammy en my grandmammy talk bout what happen in dey
day, but I never didn’ live in slavery time. My mammy,
she been broke her leg long time fore freedom come here
en I remember she tell me often times, say, ‘Julia, you
didn’ lack much of comin here a slavery child.’ Honey,
I mean she been in de family way right sharp fore freedom
come here.

“My mammy, she was raise right down dere to de other
side de jail to de ‘Cedars’. You know dere whe’ all dem
cedars round dat house what bout to fall down. She belong
to de lawyer Phillips dere en he wouldn’ never allow her
to get out de family. She had been a free woman fore he
had stole her off de sea beach to be his house woman. Yes,
mam, stole my mammy en uncle John, too, off de sea beach, but
uncle John went back after freedom come here. My mammy, she
been raise from just a child to be de house woman dere to de
lawyer Phillips en she never didn’ know nothin bout choppin
cotton till her last baby been bout knee high.

“I remember how my mammy used to tell me bout dat de
colored people won’ allowed to go from one plantation to
another widout dey had a ‘mit (permit) from dey Massa. Yes,
mam, all de niggers had to have dat strip somewhat bout dem
to keep from gettin a beatin. Couldn’ leave dey home widout[238]
showin dat ‘mit from dey Massa. You see, de nigger men
would want to go to see dey wives en dey would have to get
a ‘mit from dey Massa to visit dem. Cose dey wouldn’ live
together cause dey wives would be here, dere en yonder. It
been like dis, sometimes de white folks would sell de wife
of one of dey niggers way from dey husband en den another
time, dey would sell de husband way from dey wife. Yes, mam,
white folks had dese guard, call patroller, all bout de country
to catch en whip dem niggers dat been prowl bout widout dat
strip from dey Massa. I remember I hear talk dey say, ‘Patroller,
Patroller, let nigger pass.’ Dey would say dat if de nigger had
de strip wid dem en if dey didn’ have it, dey say, ‘Patroller,
Patroller, cut nigger slash.'”

“Child, I tell you dat been a day to speak bout. When I
come along, de women never vote, white nor colored, en it been
years since I see a colored person vote, but I remember dey been gwine to
vote in dat day en time just like dey was gwine to a show.
Oh, honey, de road would be full of dem. Dey had to vote.
Remember, way back dere, everybody would be singin en a dancin
when dey had de election:

“White en black was all in a row dere dancin all night long.
Ain’ made no exception.”[239]

“I hear talk dat when freedom come here, de niggers was
just turn loose to make dey livin de best way dey could. Say
dat some of de white folks give dey niggers somethin to go on
en some of dem didn’ spare dem nothin. Dey tell me old Sherman
didn’ come through dis section of de country, but he sent somebody
to divide out de things like so much corn en so much meat
to de colored people. Now, I talkin bout dat what I hear de
old people say. Put everything in Ben Thompson hand to deal
out de colored people share to dem. Yes, mam, he was de one
had de chair. Talk bout Sherman give Ben Thompson de chair,
sayin what I hear de old people say. I don’ know exactly how
it was, it been so long since de old people talk wid me. Dat
it, it been so long till God knows, I forgot.”

“Well, I used to know a heap of dem songs dat I hear my
auntie en my grandmammy sing dere home when I was comin up.
Let me see, child, dey was natural born song too.

“Dat was my auntie’s grandmother Eve piece way back yonder in[240]
slavery time. Dat was her piece.”

“It just like I tellin you, dat been a day to speak bout.
I remember when dey used to spin en weave all de cloth right
dere home. Yes, mam, I wore many a wove dress to church. Dey
would get dis here indigo en all kind of old bark out de woods
en boil it in de pot wid de yarn en make de prettiest kind of
colors. Den dey would take dat colored yarn en weave all kind
of pretty streaks in de cloth. Dey would know just as good
how many yards of dat thread it would take to make so much of
cloth.”

“Yes, mam, I know dere been better livin long time ago
den dere be now. Know it cause I didn’ never have no worryations
no time when I was comin up. My God, child, I couldn’ make a[241]
support today if I know my neck had to be hung on de gallows.
No, mam, dis here a sin cussed world de people livin in dis day
en time.”

Source: Julia Woodberry, colored, Marion, S.C.
Personal interview by Annie Ruth Davis, October-November, 1937.

JULIA WOODBERRY

Ex-Slave, Age ____

“No, mam, I ain’ thought bout nothin no more to tell[242]
you. Death been in de family en seems like I just been so
worried up wid my daughter sick in de house dere wid de
straw fever. De doctor, he say it de fever en dat all we
know, but it acts like de straw fever all up en down. I
tell dem chillun dere de other night dat I would have to
go back en get my mind fixed up wid somethin to speak bout
fore you come here another time. Yes, mam, have to get my
mind together somewhe’ or another.”

“I been born down dere in Britton’s Neck, but most
my days was lived up to Mr. Jim Brown’s place to Centenary.
My father, he was name Friday Woodberry en my mother, she
come from off de sea beach in slavery time, so she told me.
Say dat her old Massa stole her en her brother John, too,
from off de sea beach. When freedom come here, her brother
John went back to de sea beach, but my mother say dat she
won’ in no shape to go back. She went from family to family
till after freedom was declared en her white folks wouldn’
never have her ill-treated neither en wouldn’ never let
nobody else have her no time. When she was let loose from
de white people, she went to Britton’s Neck wid a colored
woman. You see, she was a stranger to de country bout dere[243]
fore freedom come en she been know dat woman en dat how-come
she went wid her. I mean she didn’ know de people bout dere
cause de white folks didn’ allow dey colored people to go
bout much in slavery time. Couldn’ go nowhe’ widout dey had
a ticket wid dem. She stayed dere in Britton’s Neck till Pa
died en den she come back up here to Marion to live, but her
white people was scattered all bout den.”

“No, mam, I ain’ never marry cause you had to court on de
sly in dat day en time. I tell you, I come through de devil
day when I come along. I was learned to work by de old, old
slavery way en, honey, I say dat I just as soon been come
through slavery day as to come under a tight taskmassa dat
was colored. Yes, mam, if I never did a thing right, my dress
was over my head en I was whipped right dere. I was engaged
by letter, but dey kept me under dey foot so close till I
never didn’ slip de hay. I remember, I was stayin dere wid
Mary Jane Rowell en she kept me cowed down so worser, I never
couldn’ do nothin.”

“I tell you, I been a grown girl dere when I leave Mary
Jane Rowell’s house en go to cookin en a washin for Miss (Mrs.)
Louise Brown. Yes, child, I love Miss Louise Brown to dis very
day cause she been just like a mother to me. Yes, mam, Miss
Brown was just as good to me as she could be. Mr. Jim Brown,
he give me a house dere on his plantation to live in just to[244]
do de house work to de big house, but seems like de other
colored people on de plantation would be tryin to down me
most all de time cause I was workin ahead of dem. I know
I would go dere to work many a mornin cryin, from what dem
niggers been mouthin bout me, en Miss Brown would cry right
along wid me. I tell you, Miss Brown was a tender hearted
woman, so to speak bout. I tell Miss Brown, ‘Carolina say
I stole a towel off de line.’ En Miss Brown say, ‘Julia,
if dere a towel gone off dat line, I know whe’ it gone.’
No, child, I ain’ never think bout to lay no shame on dese
hands. White folks been used to leave money all bout whe’
I bresh (brush) en dust en I ain’ never had no mind to touch
it no time. Yes, mam, I been through a day since I come here.
Erelong I move out Mary Jane Rowell’s house, I been in white
people house. If it ain’ one class, it another. De very day
dat Dr. Dibble been pronounce me to de hospital, dey come after
me to wait on a woman. Yes, mam, Julia Woodberry ain’ beat de
state no time. Oh, I tell you, it de God truth, I has done
every kind of work in my life. Me en my three chillun dere
run a farm just like a man. Why, honey, you ain’ know I had
three girls? Yes, mam, dem chillun been born en bred right
dere in de country to Centenary.”

“I hear people talkin bout dat thing call conjurin, but
I don’ know what to say dat is. It somethin I don’ believe in.[245]
Don’ never take up no time wid dat cause it de devil’s
work. Dat de olden talk en I don’ think nothin bout dat.
Don’ want nobody round me dat believes in it neither. Don’
believe in it. Don’ believe in it cause dat en God spirit
don’ go together. I hear talk dat been belong to de devil,
but I was so small, I couldn’ realize much what to think
cause dat what you hear in dem days, you better been hear
passin. No, mam, dey knock chillun down in dat day en time
dat dey see standin up lookin in dey eyes to hear. I has
heard people say dat dey could see spirits, but I don’ put
no mind to dat no time. I believe dat just a imagination
cause when God get ready to take you out dis world, you is
gone en you gone forever, I say. Don’ believe in no hereafter
neither cause dey say I been born wid veil over my face
en if anybody could see spirits, I ought to could. I know I
has stayed in houses dat people say was hanted plenty times
en I got to see my first hant yet. Yes, mam, I do believe in
de Bible. If I hadn’ believed in de Bible, I wouldn’ been
saved. Dere obliged to be a hereafter accordin to de Bible.
Dere obliged to be a hereafter, I say. I can’ read, but I
talkin what I hear de people say. Dat a infidel what don’
believe dere a hereafter.”

“How-come I know all dat, I was raise up wid de old
people. Come along right behind de old race en I would be[246]
dere listenin widout no ears en seein widout no eyes.
Yes, mam, I took what I hear in, lady, en I ain’ been just
now come here. I been here a time. Dat de reason I done
wid de world. God knows I is done. I is done. I recollects,
way back yonder, Pa would sing:

“Dat was my father’s piece dat he used to sing in slavery
time. Dat right cause I can remember back more so den I
can forward.”

Source: Julia Woodberry, colored, age—about 70 to 75.,
Marion, S.C.
Personal interview by Annie Ruth Davis, Nov., 1937.

FOLK-LORE: EX-SLAVES

While looking for an ex-slave in a certain part[247]
of Spartanburg this morning, I was directed across the street to
“an old man who lives there”. I knocked at the door but received
no answer. Then I noticed an old man walking around by the side
of the house. He was tall and straight, standing about 6 feet
2 inches. He said that his name was George Wood and that he was
78 years of age.

He stated that he was born during slavery, and
lived on Peter Sepah’s place in York County. Peter Sepah’s farm,
where he was born, was near the North Carolina line; it consisted
of approximately 200 acres. His parents were named Dan and Sarah
Wood. His mother was given to old man Sepah by his father as a
wedding present, and his grandfather had been given to an older
Sepah by his parent as a wedding present. He said it was the
custom in slavery times that a slave be given to the son or
daughter by the white people when they got married.

He was too young to work, but about the time the
war was over, he was allowed to drive the horses that pulled the
thrasher of wheat. His master used to walk around and around while
the wheat was being thrashed, and see that everybody was doing
their work all right. His father lived on another plantation.
There was only one family of slaves on the whole plantation.
He, his mother, and five children lived in a one-room log cabin
about 30 or 40 feet from the “big house”. Their beds consisted[248]
of straw mattresses. They had plenty to eat, having the same
food that the white folks did. They ate ash cakes mostly for
bread, but once a week they had biscuits to eat. When the wheat
was thrashed, they had biscuits mostly for breakfast; but as the
wheat got scarcer they did not have much wheat to eat. He said that
Buffalo Creek flowed pretty close to their place and that the creek
emptied into Broad River. Shelby, N.C., their market, was about
ten miles distant. He thinks that it was easier then than now
to get something to eat.

The log cabin where he and his mother lived was
kept comfortably warm in the winter time. All they had to do,
was to go to the wood-pile and get all the wood they needed for
the fire. His mother worked on the farm, washed clothes and
helped with the cooking at his master’s house. The slaves stopped
work every Saturday afternoon about three o’clock; then his mistress
would have his mother to patch their clothes, as she did not like
to see their clothes needing patching. “We used to have lots of
fun,” he said, “more than the children do now. As children, we
used to play marbles around the house; but no other special game.”

Uncle George said that the patrollers saw that the
colored people were in their houses at 8 o’clock every night.
“They would come to the house and look in; of course, if a man
had a pass to another plantation or some place, that was all right;
or if he had some business somewhere. But everybody had to be in
the house by 8 o’clock.” He also stated that if a slave strayed
off the plantation and didn’t have a pass, if he could out-run
the “pateroller” and get back upon his own place, then he was all
right. The only slave he ever saw get a whipping, was one who[249]
had stayed out after hours; then a switch was used on him by a
“pateroller”. He said he never saw any slaves in chains or treated
badly, for his master was a good man, and so was his “Missus”.
One day his mother went to a church that was not her own church.
On coming back, she saw a “pateroller” coming behind her. She
began to run, and he did too; but as he caught up with her, she
stepped over a fence on her master’s place and dared the “pateroller”
to do anything to her. He didn’t do a thing and would not get
over the fence where she was, as he would have been on somebody’s
place besides his own.

He said that when the corn-shucking time came,
both whites and blacks would gather at a certain plantation.
Everybody shucked corn, and they all had a good time. When the
last ear of corn was shucked, the owner of the plantation would
begin to run from the place and all would run after him. When
they caught him, he was placed on the shoulders of two men and
carried around and around the house, all singing and laughing
and having a good time. Then they would carry the man into his
house, pull off his hat and throw it into the fire; place him in
a chair; comb his head; cross his knees for him and leave him
alone. They would not let him raise a second crop under his old
hat—he had to have a new hat for a new crop. Then they would
all, colored and white, gather to eat. The owner of the farm
would furnish plenty to eat; sometimes he would have some whiskey
to drink, but not often, “as that was a dangerous thing to have”.

He said that if a man who was chewing or smoking
met a woman, he would throw his tobacco away before talking with
the woman.[250]

There was plenty of fruit in those days, so brandy
was made and put into barrels in the smoke-house; and the same way
they had plenty of corn, and would put up a still and put the whiskey
they made into barrels.

People in those days, he said, had “manners”. The
white and colored folks would have their separate sections in the
church where they sat. “I’ve seen a white man make another white
man get up in church and give his place to a colored man when the
church was crowded.” He said his father was baptized by Rev.
Dixon, father of Tom Dixon, who was a Baptist preacher. His
mother was sprinkled by a Methodist white preacher, but he was
baptized by a colored preacher.

Asked about marriages among the slaves, he said
the ceremony was performed by some “jack-legged” colored preacher
who pronounced a few words and said they were man and wife.

He said the colored people did not know much
about Jeff Davis or Abraham Lincoln except what they heard
about them. All that he remembered was a song that his Missus
used to sing:

Another song was:

One day his “Missus” came to their house and
told his mother they were free and could go anywhere they wanted to,[251]
but she hoped they would stay on that year and help them make a
crop. He said his mother just folded her hands and put her head
down and “studied”. She decided to stay on that year. The next
year, they moved to another plantation, where they stayed for
twenty years.

“Before they were free, every colored man took
the name of his master, but afterwards, I took my father’s name.”

He said that the Yankee soldiers did not come to
their place, but they were ready for them if they had come. The
silver was buried out in the lot, and stable manure was piled and
thrown all about the spot. The two good horses were taken off and
hidden, but the old horse his master owned was left. He said that
sometimes a Confederate soldier would come by riding an old horse,
and would want to trade horses with his master. Sometimes his
master would trade, for he thought his horse would be taken anyway.
His master would never get anything “to boot”, as the soldier
didn’t have the “to boot” when the trade was made. So the soldier
would ride off the horse, leaving the poor, broken-down one behind.
Sometimes after the war, the Confederate soldiers would come by
the house, sick, wounded and almost starved; but his mistress
would fix something to eat for them; then they would go on.

“‘Possum and ‘taters were plentiful then. When
a slave wanted to go hunting, he could go; but we had to work
then—nobody works now.” He said that on rainy days, his mother
did not have to go to the field, but stayed at home and sewed or
carded. He said that after freedom came to the slaves, he worked
on a farm for $5.00 a month. After he had been on the farm for
many years, he heard that Spartanburg was on a boom, so he came[252]
here and worked at railroading for many more years. He has quit
work now; but still does a little gardening for some white folks.
He said that the white people in the South understand the colored
people.

When asked if he had ever seen a ghost, he replied
that he had never seen one and had never seen a person who
had. “I don’t believe in those things anyhow,” he said. He also
stated he had never heard of anybody being “conjured” either.
He said that all the niggers in his section were scared of the
niggers from way down in South Carolina, for their reputation
as conjurers was against them, so they always fought shy of
them and didn’t have anything to do with the “niggers from way
down in South Carolina”.

SOURCE: George Woods, 337 N. View St., Spartanburg, S.C.
Interviewer: F.S. DuPre, Spartanburg, S.C.

ALECK WOODWARD,

EX-SLAVE—83 YEARS.

“You knows de Simonton place, Mr. Wood? Well, dats just[253]
where I was born back yonder befo’ de war, a slave of old Marster
Johnnie Simonton. Five miles sorter south sunset side of Woodward
Station where you was born, ain’t it so? My pappy was Ike Woodward,
but him just call ‘Ike’ time of slavery, and my mammy was name Dinah.
My brother Charlie up north, if he ain’t dead, Ike lives in Asheville,
North Carolina. Two sisters: Ollie, her marry an Aiken, last counts,
and she and her family in Charlotte, North Carolina; sister Mattie marry
a Wilson nigger, but I don’t know where they is.

“Us lived in a four-room log house, ’bout sixteen all told.
Dere was pappy and mammy (now you count them) gran’pappy, Henry Davis,
Gran’mammy Kisana, Aunt Anna, and her seven chillun, and me, and my two
brothers and two sisters. How many make dat? Seventeen? Well, dat’s de
number piled in dere at night in de beds and on de floors. They was
scandlous beds; my God, just think of my grands, old as I is now, tryin’
to sleep on them hard beds and other folks piled ‘scriminately all over
de log floors! My Gran’pappy Henry was de carpenter, and old marster tell
him ‘if you make your beds hard, Henry, ‘member you folks got to sleep
on them.’

“I was just a little black feller, running ’round most of de
time in my shirt tail, but I recollect pickin’ cotton, and piddling ’round
de woodpile, fetchin’ in wood for white house and chips and kindling to
fresh up de fires. Us had plenty to eat, ’cause us killed thirty-five hogs[254]
at a time, and de sausages and lights us did was a sight. Then de lard
us made, and de cracklin’ bread, why, I hungers for de sight of them
things right now. Us niggers didn’t get white flour bread, but de cracklin’
bread was called on our place, ‘de sweet savor of life.’

“Money? Us had eyes to see and ears to hear, but us just hear
’bout it, never even seen money.

“My marster had a fish pond, signs of it dere yet.

“My white folks attended church at Concord Presbyterian Church.
Us went dere too, and us set up in de gallery. Yes, they asked us. De
preacher asked us to jine in some of de hymns, especially ‘De Dyin’ Thief’
and ‘De Fountain Filled Wid Blood,’ and dat one ’bout ‘Mazing Grace How
Sweet de Sound Dat Save a Wretch Like us.’

“Our young Marster Charlie went off to de war, got killed at
Second Bull Run. Marster Watt went and got a leg shot off somewheres.
Marster Jim went and got killed, Johnnie too, Marster Robert was not
old enough to carry a gun.

“De young mistresses was Mary and Martha. Marster John, old
mistress and all of them mighty good to us, especially when Christmas
come and then at times of sickness. They send for de doctor and set up
wid you, such tendin’ to make you love them. When de Yanks come us all
plead for Marster John and family, and de house not to be burnt. De
house big, had ten rooms, big plantation, run fifteen plows.

“You ask ’bout was dere any poor white folks ’round? Not many,
but I ‘members old Miss Sallie Carlisle weaved and teached de slaves how
it was done. Marster give her a house to live in, and a garden spot on de
place, good woman. She show me how to spin and make ball thread, little[255]
as I was. Marster John had over fifty slaves, and they worked hard, sun
up to sun down. It’s a wonder but I never got a whippin’.

“Did I ever see a ghost? Mr. Wood, I seen sumpin’ once mighty
strange, I was gwine to see a gal Nannie, on de widow Mobley place, and
had to pass ‘tween two graveyards, de white and de colored. She was de
daughter of Rev. Richard Cook. When I was just ’bout de end of de white
graveyard, I saw two spirits dressed in white. I run all de way to de
gal’s house and sob when I got dere. I laid my head in her lap and told
her ’bout de spirits and how they scared me. I still weepin’ wid fear,
and she console me, rub my forehead and soothed me. When I got quiet, I
asked her some day to be my wife, and dat’s de gal dat come to be years
after, my wife. Us walk to church hand and hand ever afterwards, and one
day Preacher Morris, white man, made us husband and wife. I ‘members de
song de white folks sung dat day. ‘Hark from de tomb a doleful sound’.
Don’t you think dat a wrong song to sing on a weddin’ day? ‘Joy to de
World,’ was in our heart and dat tune would have been more ‘propriate,
seems to me.

“Marster John give de slaves every other Saturday after dinner
in busy seasons, and every Saturday evening all other weeks. Us had two
doctors, Doctor Brice at first, and when he git old, us had Doctor Lurkin.

“Was glad when marster called us up and told us we was free.
De Yankees made a camp on de Doctor Brice place, and foraged de country
all ’round. They made me run after chickens and I had to give up my
onliest blue hen dat I had. My pappy was took off by them to Raleigh,
wid dat I ‘member, was de saddest day of slavery time.[256]