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330 W. Sixth Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age 83
"Yes ma'am, I was born in slavery days. They never did tell me when I was born but I was ten the seventh day of
August the same year we was freed.
"No ma'am, I wasn't born in Arkansas. I was born in Georgia. I sent there and got my license to show my age. I was
twenty years old when I married.
"George Jones was my old master. But, Lawd, them folks is all dead now. Old master and old missis, yes ma'am, all
of 'em dead.
"Fight 'round us? No, they didn't fight there but they come through there. Yes ma'am, they come through there. Oh,
chile, they got horses and mules.
"Used to give us the Confederate money. Wasn't no good though. They got the silver and gold. Confederate money
was white on one side and green on the other. Yes'm, they was Yankees.
"Oh, yes'am, old master was good to us. He didn't never marry. My grandmother was the cook.
"My mother was born in Virginia. I heerd her talk of the Nat Turner Rebellion but I never did see him.
"Our folks stayed right on after freedom and hired by the month. And hired us children for our victuals and clothes.
"I stayed there till I was married. Then I come to Vicksburg. Mississippi. Had nine children and all dead but two.
"He? Oh, I done washin' and ironin' mostly, cooked and most anything I could get to do. I'm all worked down now
though.
"We emigrated from Georgia to Mississippi. All my children born there.
"I 'member the soldiers had guns and we was scared of 'em. We looked for 'em to come up the road but they come
out of the woods and was around us right now. They didn't mind creeks or nothin', ridin' horseback or walkin'. I
know they said, 'We ain't gwine hurt you.'
"Old master's mother and father was named Sally and Billy. 'Member 'em? Co'se I do---many times as I waited on
that table. But they all dead 'fore I even thought about bein' grown.
"Oh, yes ma'am, we had a planty to eat. That's the reason I misses it now.
"I went to school one year but I had to work so hard I done forgot nearly everything I learned. I can read a little but
my eyes ain't no good.
"Dem Ku Klux---you dassent be out after dark. You better not be out on the street after dark. But Sunday night they
didn't bother you when you went to church.
"I was raised up with two white girls and their mother didn't 'low us to get out of the yard.
"I used to pick peas and cotton. Yes ma'am, that was when we was with the same old man, George Jones. I used to
huddle (herd) cows for miles and miles. My mother was the milk woman. I don't know how many she milked but
she milked a heap of 'em.
"Used to climb up in trees and tear our clothes. Then they'd whip us. Old master say, 'Don't you tell me no lie.' Then
old Miss Sally would get a stick and make out she gwine kill us, but she wouldn't touch us a lick.
"Younger generation? Now you done asked me too soon. I set here and look at 'em. Sometimes I don't know what
gwine come of 'em. When we was young we didn't do nothin' like they doin' now. Why we dassent raise our
dresses. If we see a man comin' we pull down our skirts. Yes, Lawd."
Name of interviewer Watt McKinney
Subject Ex-Slave and Confederate Soldiers
I'm gettin' old and feeble now and cannot walk no more And I've laid the rusty-bladed hoe to rest.
Ole marster and ole missus are sleeping side by side And their spirits are a-roamin' with the blest.
The above lines, had they been composed today, might well have been written with reference to "Uncle" Henry
Turner, ninety-three years of age, of Turner, Arkansas, in Phillips County, and among the very few remaining
ex-slaves, especially of those who were old enough at the time of their emancipation to have now a clear
recollection of conditions, customs, events, and life during those days long past immediately preceding and
following the Civil War. "Uncle" Henry's eyes have now grown dim and he totters slightly as, supported by his
cane, he slowly shuffles along the path over a short distance between the clean, white-washed cabin where he lives
with a daughter and the small, combination store and post office, on the porch of which he is accustomed to sit in an
old cane-bottomed chair for a few hours each day and the white folks in passing stop to speak a few words and to
buy for him candy, cold drinks, and tobacco.
Though "Uncle" Henry is approaching the century mark in age, his mind is remarkably clear and his recollection is
unusually keen.
This information given by "Uncle" Henry Turner (C)
Place of residence Turner, Phillips County, Arkansas
Occupation Plantation hand Age 93
He was born a slave in northern Mississippi near the small towns of Red Banks and Byhalia, was the property of his
owner, Edmond Turner, and was brought to Phillips County by "his white folks" some months before the war.
Turner, whe owned some fifty other slaves besides Henry, settled with his family on a large acreage of land that he
had purchased about fifteen miles west of Helena near Trenton. Both Turner and his wife died soon after taking up
residence in Arkansas leaving their estate to their two sons, Bart and Mat, who were by that time grown young men,
and being very capable and industrious soon developed their property into one of the most valuable plantations in
the County.
As "Uncle" Henry recalls, the Turner place was, it might be said, a world within itself, in the confines of which was
produced practically everything essential in the life of its inhabitants and the proper and successful conduct of its
operations. Large herds of cattle, hogs, sheep, and goats provided a bountiful supply of both fresh and salt meats
and fats. Cotton and wool was carded, spun and woven into cloth for clothes, fast colored dyes were made by
boiling different kinds of roots and barks, various colored berries were also used for this purpose. Medicine was
prepared from roots, herbs, flowers, and leaves. Stake and rider fences enclosed the fields and pastures and while
most of the houses, barns and cribs were constructed of logs, some lumber was manufactured in crude sawmills in
which was used what was known as a "slash saw". This was something like the crosscut saws of today and was
operated by a crank that gave the saw an alternating up and down motion. Wheat was ground into flour and corn
into meal in mills with stone burrs similar to those used in the rural districts today, and power for this operation was
obtained through the use of a treadmill that was given its motion by horses or mules walking on an inclined, endless
belt constructed of heavy wooden slats.
Candles for lighting purposes were made of animal fats combined with beeswax. Plows, harrows and cultivating
implements were made on the plantation by those Negroes who had been trained in carpentry and blacksmithing.
Plows for breaking the land were sometimes constructed with a metal point and a wooden moldboard and harrows
made of heavy timbers with large, sharpened wooden pegs for teeth. Hats of straw and corn shucks were woven by
hand.
Small, crude cotton gins were powered by horses or mules hitched to a bean fastened to an upright shaft around
which they traveled in a circle and to which was attached large cogwheels that multiplied the animal's power
enormously and transmitted it by means of a belt to the separating machinery where the lint was torn from the seed.
No metal ties were available during this period and ropes of cotton were used to bind the bales of lint. About three
bales was the daily capacity of a horse-powered plantation gin.
It was often difficult to obtain the services of a competent doctor and except in cases of serious illness home
remedies were administered.
Churches were established in different communities throughout the County and the Negro slaves were allowed the
privilege of attending the services, certain pews being set apart for them, and the same minister that attended the
spiritual needs of the master and his family rendered like assistance to his slaves.
No undertaking establishments existed here at this time and on the death of a person burial was made in crude
caskets built of rough cypress planks unless the deceased was a member of a family financially able to afford the
expensive metal caskets that were available no nearer than Memphis. "Uncle" Henry Turner recalls the death of Dan
Wilborn's little six-year-old boy, Abby, who was accidentally killed when crushed by a heavy gate on which he was
playing, and his burial in what "Uncle" Henry described as a casket
made of the same material as an old-fashioned door knob; and while I have no other authority than this on the
subject, it is possible that in that day caskets were made of some vitrified substance, perhaps clay, and resembling
the present day tile.
The planters and slaveowners of this period obtained the greater share of their recreation in attendance at political
rallies, horse races, and cock fights. Jobe Dean and Gus Abington who came to Trenton from their home near La
Grange, Tennessee were responsible for the popularity of these sports in Phillips County and it was they who
promoted the most spectacular of these sporting events and in which large sums of money were wagered on the
horses and the game cocks. It is said that Marve Carruth once owned an Irish Grey Cock on which he bet and won
more than five thousand dollars one afternoon at Trenton.
No Negro slave was allowed to go beyond the confines of his owner's plantation without written permission. This
was described by "Uncle" Henry Turner as a "pass"; and on this "pass" was written the name of the Negro, the place
he was permitted to visit, and the time beyond which he must not fail to return. It seems that numbers of men were
employed by the County or perhaps by the slaveowners themselves whose duty it was to patrol the community and
be on constant watch for such Negroes who attempted to escape their bondage or overstayed the time limit noted on
their "pass". Such men were known then as Paddy Rolls" by the Negroes and in the Southern states are still referred
to by this name. Punishment was often administered by them, and the very mention if the name was sufficient to
cause stark terror and fear in the hearts of fugitive slaves.
At some time during that period when slavery was a legal institution in his country, the following verse was
composed by some unknown author and set to a tune that some of the older darkies can yet sing:
Run nigger run, the Paddy Boll will get you
Run nigger run, it's almost day.
That nigger run, that nigger flew
That nigger tore his shirt into.
Run nigger run, the Paddy Roll will get you
Run nigger run, it's almost day.
Both Bart Turner and his brother Nat enlisted in the services of the Confederacy. Nat Turner was a member of the
First Arkansas Volunteers, a regiment organized at Helena and of which Patrick R. Cleburne was colonel. Dick
Berry and Milt Wiseman, friends and neighbors of the Turners, also volunteered and enlisted in Cleburne's
command. These three stalwart young men from Phillips County followed Cleburne and fought under his battle flag
on those bloody fields at Shilch, Murfreesboro, Ringgold gap, and Atlanta; and they were with him that day in
November in front of the old gin house at Franklin as the regiment formed for another and what was to be their last
charge. The dead lay in heaps in front of them and almost filled the ditch around the breastworks, but the command
though terribly out to pieces was forming as cooly as if on dress parade. Above them floated a peculiar flag. a field
of deep blue on which was a crescent moon and stars. It was Cleburne's battle flag and well the enemy knew it; they
had seen it so often before. "I tip my hat to that flag" said the Federal General Sherman years after the war.
"Whenever my men saw it they knew it meant fight." As the regiment rushed on the Federal breastworks a gray clad
figure on a chestnut horse rode across the front of the moving column and toward the enemy's guns. The horse went
down within fifty yards of the breastworks. The rider arose, waved his sword, and led his men on foot to the very
ramparts. Then he staggered and fell, pierced with a dozen balls. It was Cleburne, the fearless field-marshal of
Confederate brigade commanders. The Southern cause suffered a crushing defeat at Franklin and the casualty list
recorded the names
of Nat Turner, Dick Berry, and Milt Wiseman, who like their beloved commander had given their life for their
country. There is an inscription on the stone base of the magnificent bronze statue of General N. B. Forrest astride
his war horse in Forrest Park in Memphis that could well be placed above the graves of Cleburne, Turner, Berry,
and Wiseman, those brave, heroic soldiers from Phillips County. The inscription in verse is as follows:
Those hoof beats die not on fame's crimson sod
But will live on in song and in story.
He fought like a Trojan and struck like a god
His dust is our ashes of glory.
Interviewer Zillah Cross Peel
Information given by Seabe Tuttle
Residence Washington County, seven miles east of Fayetteville."
