Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: Maria Sutton Clemments, DeValls Bluff, Ark.
Age: Between 85 and 90 years
[TR: Also reported as Maria Sutton Clements]
I don't know jes how old I is. Yes mum I show do member the war jes lack
as if it was yesterday. I was born in Lincoln County, Georgia. My old
mistress was named Frances Sutton. She was a real old lady. Her husband
was dead. She had two sons Abraham and George. One of them tried to get
old missus to sell my ma jes before the war broke out. He wanter sell
her cause she too old to bear children. Sell her and buy young woman
raise mo children to sell. Put em in the nigger drove and speculate on
em. Young nigger, not stunted, strong made, they look at their wristes
and ankles and chestes, bout grown bring the owner fifteen hundred
dollars. Yea mam every cent of it. Two weeks after baby born see the
mother carrin it cross the field fur de old woman what kept all the
children and she be going right on wid de hoe all day. When de sun come
up the niggers all in the field and workin when de ridin boss come wid
de dogs playin long after him. If they didn't chop dat cotton jes right
he have em tied up to a stake or a big saplin and beat him till de blood
run out the gashes. They come right back and take up whar they lef off
work. Two chaps make a hand soon as dey get big nuf to chop out a row.
Had plenty to eat; meat, corncake and molasses, peas and garden stuff.
They didn't set out no variety fo the niggers. They had pewter bowls to
eat outer and spoons. Eat out in the yard, at the cabins, in the
kitchen. Eat different places owin to what you be workin at when the
bell rung. Big bell on a high post.
My ma's name was Sina Sutton. She come from Virginia in a nigger traders
drove when she was sixteen years old and Miss Frances husband bought er.
She had nine childen whut lived. I am de youngest. She died jes before
de war broke out. Till that time I had been trained a house girl. My ma
was a field hand. Then when the men all went to the army I plowed. I
plowed four years I recken, till de surrender. Howd I know it was
freedom? A strange woman--I never seed fore, came runnin down where we
was all at work. She say loud as she could "Hay freedom. You is free."
Everything toe out fer de house and soldiers was lined up. Dats whut
they come by fer. Course dey was Yankee soldiers settin the colored
folks all free. Everybody was gettin up his clothes and leaving. They
didn't know whar des goin. Jes scatterin round. I say give 'em somethin.
They was so mad cause they was free and leavin and nobody to work the
land. The hogs and stock was mostly all done gone then. White folks sho
had been rich but all they had was the land. The smoke houses had been
stripped and stripped. The cows all been took off cept the scrubs. Folks
plowed ox and glad to plow one.
Sometime we had a good time. I danced till I joined the church. We
didn't have no nigger churches that I knowed till after freedom. Go to
the white folks church. We danced square dance jess like the white folks
long time ago. The niggers baptized after the white folks down at the
pond. They joined the white folks church sometimes. The same woman on
the place sewed for de niggers, made some things for Miss Frances. I
recollects that. She knitted and seed about things. She showed the
nigger women how to sew. All the women on the place could card and spin.
They sat around and do that when too bad weather to be on the ground.
They show didn't teach them to read. They whoop you if they see you have
a book. If they see you gang round talkin, they say they talkin bout
freedom or equalization. They scatter you bout.
When they sell you, they take you off. See drove pass the house. Men be
ridin wid long whips of cow hide wove together and the dogs. The slaves
be walkin, some cryin cause they left their folks. They make em stand in
a row sometimes and sometimes they put em up on a high place and auction
em.
The pore white folks whut not able to buy hands had to work their own
land. There shore was a heap of white folks what had no slaves. Some ob
dem say theys glad the niggers got turned loose, maybe they could get
them to work for them sometimes and pay em.
When you go to be sold you have to say what they tell you to say. When a
man be unruly they sell him to get rid of him heap of times. They call
it sellin nigger meat. No use tryin run off they catch you an bring you
back.
I don't know that there was ever a thought made bout freedom till they
was fightin. Said that was what it was about. That was a white mans war
cept they stuck a few niggers in front ob the Yankee lines. And some ob
the men carried off some man or boy to wait on him. He so used to bein
waited on. I ain't takin sides wid neither one of dem I tell you.
If der was anything to be knowed the white folks knowed it. The niggers
get passes and visit round on Saturday evening or on Sunday jes mongst
theirselves and mongst folks they knowed at the other farms round.
When dat war was done Georgia was jes like being at the bad place. You
couldn't stay in the houses fear some Ku Klux come shoot under yo door
and bust in wid hatchets. Folks hide out in de woods mostly. If dey hear
you talkin they say you talkin bout equalization. They whoop you. You
couldn't be settin or standing talkin. They come and ask you what he
been tell you. That Ku Klux killed white men too. They say they put em
up to hold offices over them. It was heap worse in Georgia after freedom
than it was fore. I think the poor nigger have to suffer fo what de
white man put on him. We's had a hard time. Some of em down there in
Georgia what didn't get into the cities where they could get victuals
and a few rags fo cold weather got so pore out in the woods they nearly
starved and died out. I heard em talk bout how they died in piles.
Niggers have to have meat to eat or he get weak. White folks didn't have
no meat, no flour.
The folks was after some people and I run off and kept goin till I
took up with some people. The white folks brought them to
Tennessee--Covington--I come too. They come in wagons. My father, he got
shot and I never seed him no mo. He lived on another farm fo de war. I
lived wid them white folks till bout nine years and I married. My old
man wanted to come to dis new country. Heard so much talk how fine it
was. Then I had run across my brother. He followed me. One brother was
killed in the war somehow. My brother liked Memphis an he stayed there.
We come on the train. I never did like no city.
We farmed bout, cleared land. Never got much fo the hard work we done.
The white man done learned how to figure the black folks out of what was
made cept a bare living.
I could read a little and write. He could too. We went to school a
little in Tennessee.
When we got so we not able to work hard he come to town and carpentered,
right here, and I cooked fo Mr. Hopkins seven years and fo Mr. Gus
Thweatt and fo Mr. Nick Thweatt. We got a little ahead then by the
hardest. I carried my money right here [bag on a string tied around her
waist]. We bought a house and five acres of land. No mum I don't own it
now. We got in hard luck and give a mortgage. They closed us out. Mr.
Sanders. They say I can live there long as I lives. But they owns it. My
garden fence is down and won't nobody fix it up fo me. They promises to
come put the posts in but they won't do it and I ain't able no mo. I had
a garden this year. Spoke fo a pig but the man said they all died wid
the kolerg [cholera]. So I ain't got no meat to eat dis year.
I ain't never had a chile. I ain't got nobody kin to me livin dat I
knows bout. When I gets sick a neighbor woman comes over and looks after
me.
I thinks if de present generation don't get killed they die cause they
too lazy to work. No mum dey don't know nuthin bout work. They ain't got
no religion. They so smart they don't pay no tention to what you advise
em. I never tries to find out what folks doin and the young generation
is killin time. I sho never did vote. I don't believe in it. The women
runnin the world now. The old folks ain't got no money an the young ones
wastes theirs. Theys able to make it. They don't give the old folks
nuthin. The times changes so much I don't know what goiner come next. I
jes stop and looks and listens to see if my eyes is foolin me. I can't
see, fo de cataracts gettin bad, nohow. Things is heap better now fo de
young folks now if they would help derselves. I'm too wo out. I can't do
much like I could when I was young. The white folks don't cheat the
niggers outen what they make now bad as they did when I farmed.
I never knowed about uprisings till the Ku Klux sprung up. I never heard
bout the Nat Turner rebellion. I tell you bout the onliest man I knowed
come from Virginia. A fellow come in the country bout everybody called
Solomon. Dis long fo the war. He was a free man he said. He would go
bout mong his color and teach em fo little what they could slip him
along. He teached some to read. When freedom he went to Augusta. My
brother seed him and said "Solomon, what you doin here?" and he said "I
am er teaching school to my own color." Then he said they run him out of
Virginia cause he was learnin his color and he kept going. Some white
folks up North learned him to read and cipher. He used a black slate and
he had a book he carried around to teach folks with. He was what they
called a ginger cake color. They would whoop you if they seed you with
books learnin. Mighty few books to get holt of fo the war. We mark on
the ground. The passes bout all the paper I ever seed fo I come to
Tennessee. Then I got to go to school a little.
Whah would the niggers get guns and shoot to start a uprisin? Never had
none cept if a white man give it to him. When you a slave you don't have
nothin cept a big fireplace and plenty land to work. They cook on the
fireplace. Niggers didn't have no guns fo the war an nuthin to shoot in
one if he had one whut he picked up somewhere after the war. The Ku Klux
done the uprisin. They say they won't let the nigger enjoy freedom. They
killed a lot of black folks in Georgia and a few white folks whut they
said was in wid em. We darkies had nuthin to do wid freedom. Two or
three set down on you, take leaves and build a fire and burn their feet
nearly off. That the way the white folks treat the darky.
I never knowed nobody to hold office. Them whut didn't want to starve
got someplace whut he could hold a plow handle. You don't know whut hard
times is. Dem was hard times. They used to hide in big cane brakes,
nearly wild and nearly starved. Scared to come out. I ain't wanted to go
back to Georgia.
The folks I lived wid fo I come to Tennessee, he tanned hides down at
the branch and made shoes and he made cloth hats, wool hats. He sold
them. We farmed but I watched them up at the house minu a time.
One thing I recollect mighty well. Fo de war a big bellied great monster
man come in an folks made a big to do over him. He eat round and laughed
round havin a big time. His name was Mr. Wimbeish (?). He wo white
britches wid red stripes down the sides and a white shad tail coat all
trimmed round de edges wid red and a tall beaver hat. He blowed a bugle
and marched all the men every Friday ebening. He come to Miss Frances.
They fed him on pies and cakes and me brushin the flies off im and my
mouth fairly waterin for a chunk ob de cake. When de first shot of war
went off no more could be heard ob old Mr. Wimbeish. He lef an never was
heard tell ob no mo. _He said never was a Yankee had a hart he didn't
understand_! I never did know whut he was. He jess said that right
smart.
I gets the Old Age Pension and meets the wagon and gets a little
commodities. I works my garden and raises a few chickens round my house.
I trusts in de Lord and try to do right, honey, dat way I lives.