Emmeline told of how they would stop for the night on the rough journey, and while the men fed the stock, the women and slaves would cook the evening meal of hoecake, fried venison, and coffee.  The women slept in the wagons and the men would sleep on the creek watching for wild life.  With other pioneers, they suffered all the hardships and dangers incident to the settling of the new country more than three-fourths of a century ago.

Emmeline always had good care.  She worked hard and faithfully and was amply rewarded.

[HW:  High]

Circumstances of Interview
state—­Arkansas
name of worker—­Blanche Edwards
address—­Lonoke, Arkansas
date—­October 20, 1938
subject—­An Old Slave [TR:  Emiline Waddell]
[TR:  Repetitive information deleted from subsequent pages.]

1.  Name and address of informant—­Mrs. John G. High, living nine miles north of Lonoke, Arkansas.

2.  Date and time of interview—­October 20, 1938

3.  Place of interview—­At the home of Mrs. John G. High, nine miles north of Lonoke.

4.  Name and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with informant—­

5.  Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you—­

6.  Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.

Text of Interview

Emiline Waddell, a former slave of the L.W.  Waddell family, lived to be 106 years old, and was active up to her death.

She was born a slave in 1826 at Haben county, Georgia, a slave of Claybourne Waddell, who emigrated to Brownsville, in 1851, in covered wagons, oxen drawn.

Her “white folks” were three weeks making the trip from the ferry across the Mississippi to old Brownsville; after traveling all day through the bad and boggy woods, at the end of their rough journey at eventide, the movers dismounted and began hasty preparations for the night.  While the men were feeding the stock and providing temporary quarters, the women assisted the slaves in preparing the evening meal, of hoe-cake, fried venison and coffee.  Then the women and children would sleep in the wagons while the men kept watch for wild life.

Mammy Emiline was a faithful old black mammy, true to life and traditions, and refused her freedom, at the close of the war, as wanted to stay and raise “Old Massa’s chilluns,” which she did, for she was nursing her sixth generation in the Waddell family at the time of her death.  Even to that generation there was a close tie between the southern child and his or her black mammy.  A strange almost unbelievable thing happened to Emiline; she was born a deaf mute, but her hearing and speech was restored many years before her death, when lightening struck a tree under which she was standing.