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Elsie Ross (Muir - Editing Henry District #2 Montgomery County Stories from Ex-Slaves)
It isn't age that bothers Elsie Ross, former slave of 300 Sprague St. She doesn't know exactly how old she is, and she expects to live anyhow until she dies. Her particular "worriment", as she expresses it, is the callouses on the bottoms of her feet which painfully remind her of every step she is taking. She is also subject to occasional attacks of rheumatism.
Elsie was very doubtful how old she was until the interviewer figured out from certain facts she did know, that she was probably 86 years old. The knowledge that she was three years younger than she thought she was seemed to please her.
"Maybe I'll live to be hundred", she speculated. I suttinly comes from a family of long livers on my mammy's side of de house. When she died in dis very city seven years ago she was 121 years old. She warn't sick until a year befoh dat. When she took sick she jes laid on de bed and nevah got up again. But she kept her sight and hearin' right up to de end, and she didn't have many more wrinkles dan I has."
Elsie, like her mother before her, has good eyes and keen ears. Her mind is as clear as a bell. She gives no indication of senility. Moreover, she is so much more interested in the present than in the past that the interviewer had to ask her numerous questions to bring out her recollections of slavery days. If only she could find some remedy to relieve her feet, she remarked, she wouldn't mind living as long as her mother.
So she aired her opinions and made her complaints until she was finally shifted to the subject of her childhood while in servitude.
"Near as I members", she began, "I was 14 years old when I was sot free. Dat was on de Green Chairs plantashun way down in Florida. De farm was somewhere near de town of Tallahassee. Dat's 'bout as near's I can place it. One reason I can't locate it is dat I didn't live dere very long. I was born in Florida on de farm of my master, Jim Allman, but I was very little when Marse Jim and Mis' Lizzie took me to Atlanta, Ga. I didn't live on no plantashun den, but in de slave quarters on my master's estate. My daddy, James Ross worked in de warehouse, and my mammy, Louisa Ross was de cook and laundress on de Allman estate. As for me I jes did chores when I was a little girl such as runnin' errands and washin' dishes. When I got older I worked in my Marse Jim's peach orchard, which was 'bout a mile from Atlanta.
"My master was a busy man, but he was suttinly kinder'n his wife, Mis' Lizzie. Dat woman had an awful temper. I members one day when she took up a chair and knocked my mammy ovah de head with it. She jes laid dere like one dead. I was too 'fraid to say a word. I jes looked on and wondered why my mammy didn't make no stir. Den who should open de door while my mammy was lyin' dere but Marse Jim hisself. He didn't ask no questions. He knew what had happened.
"'how come you done knocked dat nigger out with a chair', he asked my missis! 'Was you tryin' to brain her. You oughter be ashamed of yourself.'
"'I knows dat', said Mis' Lizzie, and I think she meant what she said. 'I hope God will forgive me.'
"'You can ask him to', Marse Jim answered right back, 'but I don't think he will. How can you expect to control niggers if you can't control your temper?'
"Durin' de war Marse Jim sent my mammy, pappy and us nine chillun to de plantashun of his brother-in-law, Green Chairs in Florida. Dere was 'leven head of us on dat trip. I 'spects why he done dis was because dere was talkin' goin' 'round among de slaves dat dey had been freed by President Lincoln. He wanted to get us into de country away from such talk, I reckon.
"I was a pretty big girl and strong for my age. So when I got to Florida I worked in de fields. Was I happy? Well, I was young den and I guess I didn't know no better dan to be happy. I jes did my work and took things as dey came.
"Green Chairs was worse dan his sister. He was jes as mean as de devil. He worked his one hundred or more slaves to death, and he got his overseers to beat dem to get more work out of dem. But he didn't darst to have us beat 'cause we was de property of his brother-in-law, who didn't hold to beatin' niggers to make dem work harder.
"All de time dere was talk among de hands dat we had been freed. But we didn't believe it 'til one day Green Chairs called to my daddy and de rest of de hands together and told dem dey was slaves no longer. He said dat if dey wanted to stay and work for him on de plantashun, he'd pay dem wages. But dey could go 'way if dey wanted to.
"My pappy was a teamster and knew dat he could get work if he went to some town. So he told Green Chairs he wuzn't minded to stay. So he loaded de 'leven head of us in a cart he borrowed and two mules drove us to Newport, Fla., where he was born. Dere, in Newport, my pappy didn't have no trouble findin' work. But de pore man didn't live very long to enjoy his freedom. He was a corpse two years after he was sot free. He died April 1, 1867, a year after he went back to Newport. Mammy told me de year. Like me, she nevah went to school a day in her life. But she was smart and picked up a lot of learmin' dat I ain't got. She suttinly had time after she done buried her husband and raised her chillun. When she died in Dayton seven years ago de grandchillun figgured out dat she was 121 years old.
"It was on account of her being here and her sister, Mrs. Jane Kimbrough, dat I come to Dayton 12 years ago. My sister only lived a little while after my mother died. When she followed her to de grave it left me all alone in dis world, 'cept for my daughter, Lula Chairs, who lives in Philadelphia and ain't very well."
Elsie was touchy on the subject of her marriage, which occured about four years after her release from servitude, although she discussed other matters at length, she was short and curt on the subject of her husband.
"I married a low, no 'count nigger and I don't want to talk about him", she replied sharply, when she was asked about her marriage. "I dunno why I evah picked him. I was crazy at de time, I guess, and thought dat I was in love. His name was Jesse Jones. Before freedom, he belonged to Marse George Ward, who owned a plantashun near Tallahassee. We went to Tallahassee one Saturday and was married. I lived with him 'bout a year. Didn't take me long to get shet of him when he up and beat me one day. I left him on de spot, takin' my little girl to my mother to be brung up, and found me a job. I never stayed with him again nor with any other man."
Elsie's life from that time on, and until the time when age and infirmities incapacitated her from doing hard work, was largely devoted to serving families living in various Florida cities. She was also in the employ of several resort hotels, including the Ponce de Leon and the Alcazar in St. Augustine, and the Sunnyside in Jacksonville. Although hired for scrubbing and cleaning and other hard menial tasks, she seldom received more than $12.00 a month and her board and room.
It is doubtless because of the laborious life she was forced to live, and because she is a woman, that her general knowledge is, to say the least, somewhat limited. She is uninformed about many matters that some former slaves can discuss intelligently. The words reconstruction period, restricted suffrage, racial hatred, slave uprisings, Ku Klux Klan and patrollers mean nothing to her. She has heard of Negroes in the south being cheated out of their vote; but she has never voted, even since she came up north, and has no interest in exercizing her rights as an American citizen. She thinks this is a man's world anyhow. As for the younger generation of Negroes, she refused to express any opinion on them since she had had little opportunity to observe them.
Her chief concerns are her ailments, the occasional letters she receives from her daughter in Philadelphia, and the Old Age Pension which is so long in coming. If it ever does arrive she knows she can purchase a few creature comforts denied her now, and that she can engage a chiropodist to care for her agonizing feet. At present, she is now supported by the Department of Public Welfare, Division of Public Assistance of the City of Dayton. She makes her home with another old colored woman, Mrs. Bertha Phoenix at 330 Sprague St.
Mrs. Anna Smith 19/3/270 (District #5 Summit County Racial Groups File Copied 3-25-41 J.O.)
