Good Morning POU!
Ok, center, peace…..breathe…in, out……in, out…alright, ready to read today’s entries.
Mary Armstrong, Texas – on her childhood, witnessing sister’s death
“You see, my mamma belong to old William Cleveland and old Polly Cleveland, and they was the meanest two white folks what ever lived, ’cause they was allus beatin’ on their slaves. I know, ’cause mamma told me, and I hears about it other places, and besides, old Polly, she was a Polly devil if there ever was one, and she whipped my little sister what was only nine months old and jes’ a baby to death. She come and took the diaper offen my little sister and whipped till the blood jes’ ran—jes’ ’cause she cry like all babies do, and it kilt my sister. I never forgot that, but I sot some even with that old Polly devil and it’s this-a-way:
“You see, I’s ’bout 10 year old and I belongs to Miss Olivia, what was that old Polly’s daughter, and one day old Polly devil comes to where Miss Olivia lives after she marries, and trys to give me a lick out in the yard, and I picks up a rock ’bout as big as half your fist and hits her right in the eye and busted the eyeball, and tells her that’s for whippin’ my baby sister to death. You could hear her holler for five miles, but Miss Olivia, when I tells her, says, ‘Well, I guess mamma has larnt her lesson at last.’ But that old Polly was mean like her husban’, old Cleveland, till she die, and I hopes they is burnin’ in torment now.
Hattie Rogers, North Carolina – Slave “breeding”
“If a woman was a good breeder she brought a good price on the auction block,” said Hattie Rogers, a North Carolina resident, when she was interviewed in 1937. “The slave buyers would come around and jab them in the stomach and look them over and if they thought they would have children fast they brought a good price.”
Richard Toler, Virginia – Life on the plantation
“Befo’ the wah we never had no good times. They took good care of us, though. As pa’taculah with slave as with the stock – that was their money, you know. And if we claimed bein’ sick, they’d give us a dose of castah oil and tu’pentine. That was the principal medicine cullud folks had to take, and sometimes salts. But nevah no whiskey – that was not allowed. And if we was real sick, they had the Doctah fo’ us.
“We had very bad eatin’. Bread, meat, water. And they fed it to us in a trough, jes’ like the hogs. And ah went in may [sic] shirt till I was 16, nevah had no clothes. And the flo’ in ouah cabin was dirt, and at night we’d jes’ take a blanket and lay down on the flo’. The dog was supe’ior to us; they would take him in the house.
“Some of the people I belonged to was in the Klu Klux Klan. Tolah had fo’ girls and fo’ boys. Some of those boys belonged. And I used to see them turn out. They went ’round whippin’ niggahs. They get young girls and strip’em sta’k naked, and put ’em across barrels, and whip ’em till the blood run out of ’em, and then they would put salt in the raw pahts. And ah seen it, and it was as bloody aroun’ em as if they’d stuck hogs.
“I sho’ is glad I ain’t no slave no moah. Ah thank God that ah lived to pas the yeahs until the day of 1937. Ah’m happy and satisfied now, and ah hopes ah see a million yeahs to come.”
Andy Anderson, Texas – on finding out about Emancipation
“W’en surrendah am ‘nounced, Marster right away tells his niggers dat dey am free. He calls allus together an’ tells weuns dat it am jus’ a sho’t time ’til de o’dah fo’ to free de niggers will be given. He says, “Now, dem who stays will be paid wages, or weuns shall ‘range fo’ wo’kin’ de land on shares”. Whar he am a talkin’ am in de field undah a big tree. I’s standim’ neah him an dere’s whar my big mouth gits me all fustup.
“De Marster finished his statement a sayin’, “All yous niggers can stay wid me”. I’s says to myse’f, not loud ‘nough fo’ anyone to heah, I’s thinks, but de Marster heahs me w’en I’s says, “Lak hell I’s will”.
Jerry Moore, Texas – On elections and voting during Reconstruction
“I rec’lect the time the cullud folks registered here after the war. They outnumbered the whites a long way. Davis was governor and all the white folks had to take the Iron Clad oath to vote. Carpetbaggers and Negroes run the government. In the early days they held the election four days. They didn’t vote to precincts but at the court house. The Democratic Party had no chance to ‘timidate the darkies. The ‘publican party had a ‘Loyal League’ for to protect the cullud folks. First the Negroes went to the league house to get ‘structions and ballots and then marched to the court house, double file, to vote. My father was a member of the 11th and 12th legislature from this county. He was ‘lected just after the Constitutional Convention, when Davis was elected governor. Two darkies, Mitch Kennel and Wiley Johnson, was ‘lected from this county to be members of that Convention.