My mother was a very handsome woman.  My father was what you might call good looking.  I was very anxious to look like him; used to try to wear off my teeth on the right side, because his were worn off.  About two years before he died, he came to Texas to visit me.  I was then in the hotel business.  During the first meal he ate at the hotel, he looked up and seeing me waiting on the table, he got up and began waiting on the table himself.  I had to work very hard then and it was a grief to him to have no means to give me.  One morning he came into my room while I was dressing and said:  “Daughter, I have not slept all night for thinking of you.  The last thing last night was you in the kitchen and the first thing this morning.  I have always hoped to have something to leave you, and it is such a grief to me that I can not help you.  Carry, it seems the Lord has been so hard on you.”  I said:  “No, Pa; I thank God for all my sorrows.  They have been the best for me, and don’t you worry about not leaving me money, for you have left me something far better.”  He looked up surprised and said:  “What is it?” I answered:  “The memory of a father who never did a dishonorable act.”  My father’s eyes filled with tears, and after that he seemed to be happier than I had ever seen him; everything seemed to go right.

My father was a very indulgent master to his colored servants, who loved him like a father.  They always called him “Mars George.”  The negro women would threaten to get “Mars George” to whip their bad children, and when he whipped them, I have heard them say:  “Served you right.  Did not give you a lick amiss.”  This was proving their great confidence, they being willing for some one else to whip their children.  They were very sensitive in this matter and were not willing for my mother to do this.  My father would lay in a supply, while in Cincinnati, of boxes of boots and shoes, arid get combs, head handkerchiefs, and Sunday dresses, which would greatly delight his colored people.  Happy, indeed, would the negroes have been if all their masters had been as my father was.

When we moved to Mercer County from Garrard, we had a sale.  It was customary then at such a time to have a barbecue and a great dinner.  The tables were set in the yard.  I remember Mr. Jones Adams, a neighbor and great friend of my father, brought over a two bushel sack of turnip greens and a ham.  I remember seeing him shake them out of the bag.  At this sale for the first, and only time, I saw a negro put on a block and sold to the highest bidder.  I can’t understand how my father could have allowed this.  His name was “Big Bill,” to distinguish him from another “Bill”.  He was a widower or a batchelor and had no family.  There was one colored man my father valued highly, and wanted to take with him, but this man, Tom, had a wife, who belonged to a near neighbor.  After we got in the carriage to go to our new home, Tom followed us crying:  “Oh, Mars George, don’t take me from my wife.”  My father said:  “Go and get some one to buy you.”  This Tom did, the buyer being a Mr. Dunn.  Oh!  What a sad sight!  It makes the tears fill my eyes to write it.