“One of de cabins was allus ha’nted atter some of de slaves got kilt in it whilst dey was fightin’.  Nobody never could live in dat cabin no more atter dat widout ha’nts gittin’ atter ’em.  De wust of ’em was a ’oman ha’nt what you could hear sweepin’ up leaves in de yard and all dat time you might be lookin’ hard and not see a leaf move.  In dat cabin you could all time hear ha’nts movin’ cheers and knockin’ on de wall.  Some of dem ha’nts would p’int a gun in your face if you met ’em in de dark.  Dem ha’nts was too much for me.

“Our white folks was good as dey knowed how to be when us got sick.  I don’t ’member dat dey ever had a doctor for de slaves, but dey give us all kinds of home-brewed teas.  Pinetops, mullein and fat light’ood splinters was biled together and de tea was our cure for diff’unt ailments.  Scurvy grass tea mixed wid honey was good for stomach troubles, but you sho’ couldn’t take much of it at a time.  It was de movin’est medicine!  Round our necks us wore asafetida sacks tied on strings soaked in turpentine.  Dat was to keep diseases off of us.

“What does I ’member ’bout de war?  Well, it was fit to fetch our freedom.  Marse Billy had a fine stallion.  When de sojers was comin’, he sont Pappy to de woods wid dat stallion and some gold and told him not to let dem yankees find ’em.  Dat stallion kept squealin’ ’til de yankees found him, and dey tuk him and de gold too.  Grandma was a churnin’ away out on de back porch and she had a ten dollar gold piece what she didn’t want dem sojers to steal, so she drapped it in de churn.  Dem yankees poured dat buttermilk out right dar on de porch floor and got grandma’s money.  Marse Billy hid hisself in a den wid some more money and other things and dey didn’t find him.  Dey tuk what dey wanted of what dey found and give de rest to de slaves.  Atter de sojers left, de Niggers give it all back to Marster ’cause he had allus been so good to ’em.

“Us stayed on wid Marse Billy for sev’ral years atter de war.  He paid us $10 a month and he ’lowanced out de rations to us evvy week; most allus on Monday ’cause Sundays us had ’nough company to eat it all at one time.  He give us three pounds of fat meat, a peck of meal, a peck of flour, 25c worth of sugar, and a pound of coffee.  Dat had to last a whole week.

“I didn’t take in nothin’ ’bout Abraham Lincoln, Jefferson Davis and dat dar Booker T. Washin’ton man, but I heared folks say dey was all right.

“What is you talkin’ ‘bout Miss?  I didn’t need to have no big weddin’ when I married Lige Elder.  It was a big ’nough thing to git a man lak what I got.  What did I want to have a big weddin’ for when all I was atter was my man?  Us had done been married 25 years ’fore us had no chillun.  Dis here Cornelia what I lives wid was our first chile.  She ain’t got no chillun.  Isaac, my boy, has got four chillun.  My old man died ’bout two years ago.

“I j’ined de church ’cause I was happy and wanted de world to know I had done got ’ligion.  I think evvybody ought to git ’ligion.  God says if us do right he will give us all a home in His Heaven.