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Route 2, Box 19-A, El Dorado, Arkansas
Age 82?
"I was born in Alabama. I don't know when though. I did not find out when I was born because old miss never told
me. My ma died when I was real small and my old miss raised me. I had a hard time of my life. I slept on the floor
just like a cat---anywhere I laid down I slept. In winter I slept on rags. If I got sick old miss would give me plenty of
medicine because she wanted me to stay well in order to work. My old master was name John Buffett and old
misses name was Eddie Buffett. She would fix my bread and licker in a tin lid and shove it to me on the floor. I
never ate at the table until I was twelve and that was after freedom.
"To whip me she put my head between the two fence rails and she taken the cow hide whip and beat me until I
couldn't sit down for a week. Sometimes she tied our hands around a tree and tie our neck to the tree with our face
to the tree and they would get behind us with that cow hide whip with a piece of lead tied to the end and Lord have
mercy! child, I shouted when I wasn't happy. All I could say was, 'Oh pray, mistress, pray.' That was our way to say
Lord have mercy. The last whipping old miss give me she tied me to a tree and oh my Lord! old miss whipped me
that day. That was the worse whipping I ever got in my life. I cried and bucked and hollered until I couldn't. I give
up for dead and she wouldn't stop. I stop crying and said to her. 'Old miss, if I were you and you were me I wouldn't
beat you this way.' That struck old miss's heart and she let me go and she did not have the heart to beat me any
more.
"I did every kind of work when I was a little slave; split rails, sprouted, ditched, plowed, chopped, and picked and
planted.
"I remember young master going to war and I remember hearing the first gun shoot but I did not see it. I saw the
smoke though.
"I never went to school a day in my life. The white folks said we did not need to learn, if we needed to learn
anything they could learn us with that cow hide whip.
"We went to the white folks' church, so we sit in the back on the floor. They allowed us to join their church
whenever one got ready to join or felt that the Lord had forgiven them of their sins. We told our determination; this
is what we said: 'I feel that the Lord have forgiven me for my sins. I have prayed and I feel that I am a better girl. I
belong to master so and so and I am so old.' The white preacher would then ask our miss and master what they
thought about it and if they could see any change. They would get up and say: 'I notice she don't steal and I notice
she don't lie as much and I notice she works better.' Than they let us join. We served our mistress and master in
slavery time and not God.
"I recollect miss died just after the War. Old miss was very strict on us and after she died we was so glad we had a
big dance in miss's kitchen and old miss came back and slapped one of the slaves and left the print of her hand on
her face. That white hand never did go away and that place was forever haunted after that.
"Now I don't know how to tell you to get after my age but I was twelve years old two years after surrender."
Interviewer Carol Craham
Subject Ex-slaves
Information given by Sarah Douglas, El Dorado, Arkansas
Mornin' honey. I thought you was comin' back tuh see me ergin las' summer an' I looked fuh you the longes' time.
I'se plum proud tuh see you ergin. Dis other lady ain't de one that was wid you las' summer is she?
Now jes lis'en tuh that will yuh, she wants Aunt Sarah tuh tell huh some more 'bout slave'y times. John Bufford was
mah marster's name. I was bo'n in Alabama an' brought to Louisiana by my marster's fambly. Aftuh de wah he freed
us an' some of 'em mixed up in politics an' the white folks from the North fooled 'em into makin speeches fuh 'em,
but dey soon learnt bettuh.
I ain't been well lately. The doctuh said I had slamatory rheumatis. I'm ol' now and don' have nobody tuh do nothin
fuh me. My mistress was mammy in de ol' days.
Aftuh I got up fum mah rheumatism I went down tuh that church you sees, I give de lan' fuh hit, me and Tom did
and I jes felt good and wanted tuh praise the Lord. I was so glad the sperit come once more. I got happy and I got up
and went down tuh de fron' and said: "I want to shake hand wid ever' body in dis house. I wanna stroke yo hand.
An' I stood down there at the front so hapoy an' duh yuh know one little chile and two women come down an' shook
hands wid me. I jes didn't know whut tuh think. Yoh know when I was young and a body got happy evuh body did
an' dey made a noise but not so now.
An' tuh think dey couldn't turn praises.
You say yo' wants tuh talk tuh Tom? Well he's out dar in de back yard but he aint well and I specks he won't talk
tuh but if you mus' come on. Tom here is a lady wants tuh talk tuh you. I'll go back an talk tuh de lady whuts waitin'
in de car.
(The above written just as Sarah Douglas expressed it).
(Taken down word for word.)
(August 11, 1937.)
Interviewer Pornella M. Anderson"
