“In June of 1865 Old Nick returned to Ellicott City dressed in a uniform of blue, showing that he had joined the Federal Army.  Mr. Rueben Rogers upon seeing him had him arrested, charging him with being a fugitive slave.  He was confined in the jail there and held until the U.S.  Marshal of Baltimore released him, arresting Rogers and bringing him to Baltimore City where he was reprimanded by the Federal Judge.  This story is well known by the older people of Howard County and traditionally known by the younger generation of Ellicott City, and is called ’Old Nick:  Rogers’ lemon.’”

Maryland
Sept. 28, 1937
Stansbury

Dennis Simms, Ex-slave. 
Reference:  Personal interview with Dennis Simms, ex-slave,
           September 19, 1937, at his home, 629 Mosher St., Baltimore.

Born on a tobacco plantation at Contee, Prince Georges County, Maryland, June 17, 1841, Dennis Simms, Negro ex-slave, 628 Mosher Street, Baltimore, Maryland, is still working and expects to live to be a hundred years old.

He has one brother living, George Simms, of South River, Maryland, who was born July 18, 1849.  Both of them were born on the Contee tobacco plantation, owned by Richard and Charles Contee, whose forbears were early settlers in the State.

Simms always carries a rabbit’s foot, to which he attributes his good health and long life.  He has been married four times since he gained his freedom.  His fourth wife, Eliza Simms, 67 years old, is now in the Providence Hospital, suffering from a broken hip she received in a fall.  The aged Negro recalls many interesting and exciting incidents of slavery days.  More than a hundred slaves worked on the plantation, some continuing to work for the Contee brothers when they were set free.  It was a pretty hard and cruel life for the darkeys, declares the Negro.

Describing the general conditions of Maryland slaves, he said:  “We would work from sunrise to sunset every day except Sundays and on New Year’s Day.  Christmas made little difference at Contee, except that we were given extra rations of food then.  We had to toe the mark or be flogged with a rawhide whip, and almost every day there was from two to ten thrashings given on the plantations to disobedient Negro slaves.

“When we behaved we were not whipped, but the overseer kept a pretty close eye on us.  We all hated what they called the ‘nine ninety-nine’, usually a flogging until fell over unconscious or begged for mercy.  We stuck pretty close to the cabins after dark, for if we were caught roaming about we would be unmercifully whipped.  If a slave was caught beyond the limits of the plantation where he was employed, without the company of a white person or without written permit of his master, any person who apprehended him was permitted to give him 20 lashes across the bare back.

“If a slave went on another plantation without a written permit from his master, on lawful business, the owner of the plantation would usually give the offender 10 lashes.  We were never allowed to congregate after work, never went to church, and could not read or write for we were kept in ignorance.  We were very unhappy.