Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States - From Interviews with Former Slaves - Georgia Narratives, Part 4

Work Projects Administration

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• Publié par: uddo
• Publié le: 08 décembre 2010
• Nombre de lectures: 43
• Langue: English

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The Project Gutenberg EBook of Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves, by Work Projects Administration This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org Title: Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves Georgia Narratives, Part 4 Author: Work Projects Administration Release Date: July 3, 2006 [EBook #18485] Language: English Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SLAVE NARRATIVES: A FOLK *** Produced by Robert Fry and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by the Library of Congress, Manuscript Division) HTML version produced by Jeannie Howse. [TR: ***] = Transcriber Note [HW: ***] = Handwritten Note 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 IV GEORGIA NARRATIVES PART 4 Prepared by the Federal Writers' Project of the Works Progress Administration for the State of Georgia INFORMANTS Telfair, Georgia Thomas, Cordelia Thomas, Ike Toombs, Jane Mickens Town, Phil [TR: In the interview, he's named Phil Towns.] Upson, Neal Van Hook, John F. Vinson, Addie Virgel, Emma Walton, Rhodus Ward, William Washington, Lula Willbanks, Green Williamson, Eliza Willingham, Frances Willis, Adeline Willis, Uncle [TR: Willis Bennefield in combined interview.] Winfield, Cornelia Womble, George [TR: Also called Wombly in the interview.] Wright, Henry Young, Dink Walton 1 11 25 29 37 48 71 97 115 123 128, 132 134 136 148 151 161 168 176 179 194 205 COMBINED INTERVIEWS [Excerpts from Slave Interviews] Adeline Eugene Mary Rachel Laura Matilda Easter Carrie Malinda 212 213 215 216 216 217 218 219 219 Amelia [Four Slaves Interviewed by Maude Barragan, Edith Bell Love, Ruby Lorraine Radford] Ellen Campbell Rachel Sullivan Eugene Wesley Smith Willis Bennefield [TR: Uncle Willis in individual interview.] [Folklore] Emmaline Heard Rosa and Jasper Millegan Camilla Jackson Anna Grant Emmaline Heard COMPILATIONS [Richmond County] Folklore Conjuration Folk Remedies and Superstitions Mistreatment of Slaves Slavery Work, Play, Food, Clothing, Marriage, etc. 220 221 226 230 235 245 251 254 255 256 261 269 282 290 308 355 Transcriber's Notes: [TR: The interview headers presented here contain all information included in the original, but may have been rearranged for readability. Also, some ages and addresses have been drawn from blocks of information on subsequent interview pages. Names in brackets were drawn from text of interviews.] [TR: Some interviews were date-stamped; these dates have been added to interview headers in brackets. Where part of date could not be determined — has been substituted. These dates do not appear to represent actual interview dates, rather dates completed interviews were received or perhaps transcription dates.] [TR: In general, typographical errors have been left in place to match the original images. In the case where later editors have hand-written corrections, simple typographical errors have been silently corrected.] PLANTATION LIFE AS VIEWED BY AN EX-SLAVE GEORGIA TELFAIR, Age 74 Box 131, R.F.D. #2 Athens, Ga. Written by: Miss Grace McCune Athens, Ga. Edited by: Mrs. Sarah H. Hall Athens, Ga. and Mrs. Leila Harris Augusta, Ga. [Date Stamp: APR 29 1938] "Yes chile, I'll be glad to tell you de story of my life, I can't tell you much 'bout slav'ry 'cause I wuz jus' six months old when freedom come, but I has heared quite a lot, and I will tell you all I kin 'member 'bout everythin." Said old "Aunt" Georgia Telfair, who lives with her son to whom her devotion is quite evident. Both "Aunt" Georgia and the little home show the excellent care that is given them. "My pa," she said, "wuz Pleasant Jones, an' he b'longed to Marse Young L.G. Harris. Dey lived at de Harris place out on Dearing Street. Hit wuz all woods out dar den, an' not a bit lak Dearing Street looks now. "Rachel wuz my ma's name. Us don' know what her las' name wuz 'cause she wuz sold off when she wuz too little to 'member. Dr. Riddin' (Redding) bought her an' his fambly always jus' called her Rachel Riddin'. De Riddin' place wuz whar Hancock Avenue is now, but it wuz all in woods 'roun' dar, jus' lak de place whar my pa wuz. Atter dey wuz married ma had to stay on wid de Riddin' fambly an' her chilluns b'longed to de Riddin's 'cause dey owned her. Miss Maxey Riddin' wuz my brudder's young Missus, an' I wuz give to her sister, Miss Lula Riddin', for to be her own maid, but us didn't git to wuk for 'em none 'cause it wuz jus' at dis time all de slaves got sot free. Atter dat my pa tuk us all wid him an' went to farm on de old Widderspoon (Witherspoon) place. "It wuz 'way off in de woods. Pa cut down trees an' built us a log cabin. He made de chimbly out of sticks an' red mud, an' put iron bars crost de fireplace to hang pots on for to bile our vittuls an' made ovens for de bakin'. De bes' way to cook 'tatoes wuz to roas' 'em in de ashes wid de jackets on. Dey ain' nothin' better tastin' dan ash-roasted 'tatoes wid good home-made butter to eat wid 'em. An 'us had de butter, 'cause us kep' two good cows. Ma had her chickens an' tukkeys an' us raised plenty of hogs, so we nebber wuz widout meat. Our reg'lar Sunday breakfas' wuz fish what pa cotch out of de crick. I used to git tired out of fish den, but a mess of fresh crick fish would sho' be jus' right now. "Us always kep' a good gyardan full of beans, corn, onions, peas an' 'taters, an' dey warn't nobody could beat us at raisin' lots of greens, 'specially turnips an' colla'd greens. Us saved heaps of dry peas an' beans, an' dried lots of peaches an' apples to cook in winter. When de wind wuz a howlin an' de groun' all kivvered wid snow, ma would make dried fruit puffs for us, dat sho' did hit de spot. "When I wuz 'bout eight years old, dey sont me to school. I had to walk from Epps Bridge Road to Knox School. Dey calls it Knox Institute now. I toted my