Plantation

“The slave quarter was a row of houses.  The plantation was high land.  The houses were little log houses with one room.  They had fire arches.  They would hang pots over the fire.  They would have spiders that you call ovens.  You would put coals on top of the spider and you would put them under it and you could smell that stuff cooking!  The door was in the top of the spider and the coals would be on top of the door.

“You couldn’t cook nothin’ then without somebody knowin’ it.  Couldn’t cook and eat in the back while folk sit in the front without them knowin’ it.  They used to steal from the old master and cook it and they would be burning rags or something to keep the white folks from smelling it.

The riding boss would come round about nine o’clock to see if you had gone to bed or not.  If they could steal a chicken or pig and kill and cut it up, this one would take a piece and that one would take a piece and they would burn the cotton to keep down the scent.  The rider would come round in June and July too when they thought the people would be hunting the watermelons.

“When the soldiers came, the niggers run and hid under the beds and the soldiers came and poked their bayonets under the bed and shouted, ’Come on out from under there.  You’re free!’

Destructiveness of Soldiers

“The soldiers would tear down the beehives and break up the smoke houses.  They wasn’t tryin’ to git nothin’ to eat.  They was just destroying things for devilment.  They pulled all the stoppers out of the molasses.  They cut the smoked meat down and let it fall in the molasses.

Rations

“Every Saturday, they would give my father and his wife half a gallon of molasses, so much side meat.  And then they would give half a bushel of meal I reckon.  Whatever they would give they would give ’em right out of the smoke house.  Sweet potatoes they would give.  Sugar and coffee they’d make.  There wasn’t nothing ’bout buying no sugar then.

How the Day Went

“The riding boss would come round before the day broke and wake you up.  You had to be in the field before sun-up—­that is the man would.  The woman who had a little child had a little more play than the man, because she had to care for the child before she left.  She had to carry the child over to the old lady that took care of the babies.  The cook that cooked up to the big house, she cooked bread and milk and sent it to the larger children for their dinner.  They didn’t feed the little children because their mothers had to nurse them.  The mother went to the field as soon as she cared for her child.  She would come back and nurse the child around about twice.  She would come once in the morning about ten o’clock and once again at twelve o’clock before she ate her own lunch.  She and her husband ate their dinner in the field.  She would come back again about three p.m.  Then you wouldn’t see her any more till dark that night.  Long as you could see you had to stay in the field.  They didn’t come home till sundown.