“My father’s mother was a squaw.  I don’t know her name.  She was sold from grandpa and he went to Master Snow.  He never seen her any more.  He took another wife and jumped over the broom on the Snow place.  He thought some of his owners was terrible.  He had been whooped till he couldn’t wear clothes.  He said they stuck so bad.

“My own father whipped me once till my clothes stuck to my back.  I told you I had seen a pretty hard time in my own life.  I was born in Starkville, Mississippi.

“Since I was a girl there has been many changes.  I was married by Rev. Bell December 14, 1902.  My husband is living and still my husband.  I can see big changes taking place all the time.  I was married at De Valls Bluff.”

Interviewer’s Comment

This woman could give me some comparative views on the present generation but she didn’t.  It is one of the Saturday gathering halls.  She depends on it somewhat for a living and didn’t say a word either pro or con for the present generation.

Interviewer:  Samuel S. Taylor
Person interviewed:  Ellen Briggs Thompson
                    3704 W. Twelfth Street, Little Rock, Arkansas
Age:  83

Birth and Relatives

“I was born in October 1844, in Nashville, Arkansas.  I don’t remember the exact day.  I have went through thick and thin.  I was a small girl when my mother died.  I got the rheumatism so bad I can’t hardly walk.  It hurts me now.  My oldest brother, Henry Briggs, was five years older than me, and my youngest brother, Isaac Briggs, was five years younger than me.  I was born October, but he was born at Christmas Eve just after surrender.  My oldest brother died last year.  My youngest brother is in Galveston, Texas.  If he is living, he is there.  My name was Briggs before I married.  I was just studying about my sister-in-law when you come up.  If I could get the money, I would go to see her.  She was my oldest brother’s wife.  Her name was Frances Briggs after she married.  She lives in Emmet, Arkansas, where he married her.  I just had two brothers, no sisters.

“My husband’s name was Henry Thompson.  He has been dead about twelve or thirteen years.  I have had so much sickness I can’t remember exactly.  I married him a long time ago.  I got it put down in the Bible.  I married yonder in Emmet, Arkansas.  I ain’t got the Bible nor nothing.  My brother had it and he is dead.

“My father’s name was Daniel Briggs.  He died in Hot Springs.  We were small children when he and my mother was separated.  He was in one place and we were in another.  He tried to get us children when he died, but we was little and couldn’t get to him.  My mother was dead then.

“My mother’s name was Susanna Briggs.  Her father’s name was Isaac Metz.  The children left him in South Carolina.  The white folks sold them away from him.  My mother just had three children:  me, and my two brothers.  I don’t know how many my grandfather had.  There were four sisters that I know besides my mother and two boys:  Aunt Melissa, and Aunt Jane, and Aunt Annie, and Aunt Sarah, and Uncle Albert Mitchell, and Uncle Ben.  My grandmother’s name was Betsy.  I never got to see her but they told me about her.