“The paddyrollers run ’em in a heap but Master John Rook never let them whoop his colored folks.

“We lived six miles from Holly Springs on the big road to Memphis.  Seem like every regiment of Yankee and rebel soldiers stopped at our house.  They made a rake-off every time.  They cleaned us out of something to eat.  They took the watches and silverware.  The Yankees rode up on our porch and one time one rode in the hall and in a room.  Miss Patsy done run an’ hid.  I stood about.  I had no sense.  They done a lot every time they come.  I watched see what all they would do.  They burnt a lot of houses.

“A little white boy said, ’I tell you something if you give me a watermelon.’  The black man give the boy a big watermelon.  He had a big patch.  The boy said, ’My papa coming take all your money away from you some night.’  He fixed and sure ’nough he come dressed like a Ku Klux.  He had some money but they didn’t find it.  One of the Ku Kluxes run off and left his spurs.  The colored folks killed some and they run off and leave their horses.  They come around and say they could drink three hundred fifteen buckets of water.  They throw turpentine balls in the houses to make a light.  They took a ball of cotton and dip it in turpentine, light it, throw it in a house to make a light so they could see who in there.  A lot of black folks was killed and whooped.  Their money was took from them.

“The third year after the War ma and pa come and got me.  They made a crop for a third.  That was our first year off of Rook’s place.  I love them Rook’s girls so good right now.  Wish I could see them or knowd where to write.  I had to learn my folks.  I played with my sisters all my life but I never had lived with them.  When pa come for me they had my basket full of dresses and warm underclothes, clean and ironed.  They sent ma some sweet potatoes and two big cakes.  One of them was mine.  Miss Patsy said, ‘Let Fannie come back to see my girls.’  I went back and visited.  Granny lived in her house and cooked till she died.  I had a place with granny at her house.  We went back often and we helped them after freedom.  They was good white folks as ever breathed.  There was good folks and bad folks then and still is.

“Times is hard.  I was raised in the field.  I made seven crops here—­near Brinkley—­with my son.  I had two girls.  One teaches in Brinkley, fourth or fifth grade; one girl works for a family in New York.  My son fell off a tall building he was working on and bursted his head.  He was in Detroit.  Times is hard now.  The young folks is going at too fast a gait.  They are faster than the old generation.  No time to sit and talk.  On the go all the time.  Hurrying and worrying through time.  Hard to make a living.”

Interviewer:  Zillah Cross Peel
Information given by:  “Gate-eye” Fisher
Residence:  Washington County, Arkansas