|
|
The remoteness of slavery and Civil War days as we studied it in United States history as children is removed like
magic when we come in contact with a darky who served as a slave in those days. Very few persons still live who
are old enough to remember when Negroes were bought and sold just like any other property. Most ex-slaves still
living were mere children at the time of the Civil War. Considering the scarcity of ex-slaves, I was fortunate in
finding three or four in Medina County whose memories are still good and whose health is fair. They are genial
darkies, always eager, obliging. There is no impudence in their make-up and they respond instantly to kindness,
showing their gratitude with wide smiles.
On my arrival at the humble cottage of Bill and Ellen Thomas (which is the Old Slave Settlement, three miles north
of Hondo, sec 810), the old darkies came to meet me and offered their best chair. The chair is old, like the porch,
and the rock step is worn by the footsteps of nearly a century. Likewise, the Negroes themselves are old and worn,
but their age has not reduced their charm, if one can judge by the many little laugh wrinkles around their eyes. Bill
is eighty-eight and Ellen is eighty-one. The simplicity of their lives has not brought the harsh lines of worry and
discontent, but rather has brought contentment and peace to these gentle old folk.
Their fields are tilled and waiting for a rain, hens cluck to broods of baby chicks about the yard, a horse or two and
a cow graze in the little pasture, a few peach trees have blossomed and are putting on fruit, and a kitchen garden is
under way, for these old darkies are used to wresting a living from their farm of sixty acres.
Dressed in simple, everyday clothes, both were clean. They do not wear glasses, though a string of nutmegs grace,
Aunt Ellen's neck to "make yer eyes strong."
Uncle Bill seemed anxious to talk and I soon launched him out on a narrative of his early life, being careful to touch
on subjects that were of special pride to him. He was childishly pleased to interpret the interview as "the gov'ment
wantin' all this." And he was delighted to have his picture with Aunt Ellen and hoped it would be "a good 'un if it
was liable to git to Washin'ton."
To use Uncle Bill's own words: "Does you want me to start right at the beginnin'? Well, I'll tell you jes' how I went
to this country. I left Falls County (Texas) at Alton Springs, well not right at Alton Springs, I guess it was closer to
Marlin. The man what was living there that kept the post office -- le's see, what was his name mama? He was named
Chamlin, I remember now; and I belonged to him. He had lots of land, I reckin about fifty acres. They kep' us in a
little house right in the same yard. Reckin how old I was when he bought me? Jus' five years old! He give $500 for
me, but he bought my mother and my sisters all together. He had to buy me cause my mother she wouldn't go
without me. No, suh, she tol' 'em she wouldn't go if they didn' buy me too. An' the man he bought us f'um, he
wanted to keep me and raise me and he wouldn't take less than $500 for me. Well, his wife she had the consumption
-- Mrs. Chamlin did, so he bought the whole family except my father. They sold my father and we never laid eyes
on him again.
"My mother cooked. The dinin' room and kitchen was off f'um the main part of the house. Mus' Chamlin, he always
fed us plenty, an' whatever they had, we had. If he cooked sausage, you had it too; if he cooked ham, you got it too;
if he cooked lye hominy, you got it too; if he had puddin', you got it too.
"When I was six or seven years old I chopped cotton, and I plowed too, and after I got big I already knowed how to
do ever'thing, I could lay as straight rows with oxen as any you ever saw.
"He whipped me with a dogwood switch, but he never did bring no blood. He thought a heap of us, but I guess I
thought I was a man and my mother said, 'He needed to whip you, you talk so sassy.' But it taken seven men to whip
my father. When one couldn't whip you they would go and get two or three to whip you, but he never did do that to
me. He was pretty good to me after all. One time when he whipped me I told him if I ever lived to be a man he
never could whip me again. He said, 'You mustn't talk to your master like that.' He was pretty good to me, after all.
But some of them was awful good.
"I'll tell you how I got away f'um there. He bought the cotton and carried it to Mexico. His wife had already died
and he taken his two boys over with him. We had three wagons and I drove one. I had four oxen to my wagon and I
had three bales of cotton on my wagon. He had six oxen to the second wagon and six bales of cotton on it, and the
next wagon, he had ten bales on it and six oxen. I don't remember how much duty he had to pay; seems like he had
to pay a bit a bale (probably he means 12 and 1/2 cents a pound), but I ain't right sure. He had to ship it across the
river, the Rio Grande, to the 'Jew Man.' If a Meskin bought it, he come across and took it over hisself. Reckin how
much he got fo' that cotton? He got sixty cents a pound! Yes'm he sho' did. Cotton was bringin' that then.
"Mus' Chamlin was about fifty years old when we went down into Mexico, and he took me across with 'im, and I
was freed over there. I was about fo'teen years old. Mus' Chamlin, he stayed over there til the country was free.
They was a fightin' jes' like ever'thing. He didn't believe in that fightin' and jes' stayed over there til the war was
over. One of his boys died over there. He had consumption. And one died over here when he come back home. Old
man Chamlin went below Eagle Pass about five miles where you cross the river and bought some sheep. He had
free land jes' like it was over here -- no fences er nothin'.
"I stayed at a hotel over there in Mexico and cooked. I could cook as good as anybody you ever saw. I stayed at that
hotel two years at a dollar a day. He was a big old Frenchman what owned it. He said I was the finest cook for a
young boy he ever saw. There was one year when I first went there I worked at a cotton yard. I sewed bales up and
jobs like that. I never thought of no girls while I was there, I loved my mother too good and wanted to see her. I
studied about my mother a heap 'cause when I went down to Mexico they was fightin', killin' and buryin' each other
like everthing. "Why, we heard a gun shootin' clear f'um Houston, or down that way some'ers. I dunno how fur they
was, but it was a long ways. But none of the soldiers ever got to our house. Of course we hear 'em talkin' about the
war, but we never knew much about it at the time. We knew that the North takin' the darkies as they come to 'em
and making soldiers out of 'em. Well, we hoped the North would win. We never had no church then, or no schools
or nothin'. But you see I was too little to fight in the war. They never was but one man come around there -- a
Northern soldier. He come there and they kep' him right in my old boss' house. He jes' drifted in there. He was a
kind of sickly feller. They give him plenty to eat -- plenty sausage, plenty ham, plenty eggs.
"Old man Chamlin had a smokehouse big as half this house and he had it crammed full of meat. I seen him sent a
wagonload of middlin's to Houston, but he kep' the shoulders and hams for hisself.
"He always give us good clothes. Our pants was made out of ducking like these wagon sheets, but my mother took
some kind of bark and dyed 'em. I think it was blackjack bark. He give us shoes, too, and when you wore 'em out in
the summer, he'd buy you another pair in the fall. They was half-tan leather brogans.
"When I come out of Mexico the war was over. The first stop I made was in Uvalde. I stayed there about a year and
after that I went down below Uvalde and worked on the old Adams ranch on the Frio. I done most any kind of work
they had. They was runnin' cattle mostly. F'um there I went to Castroville, and f'um there to the Noonan ranch, and
stayed there five years. I was hoss-breaking on the Noonan ranch. They never run nothin' but hosses. The old man,
he was Judge Noonan -- all I ever did learn, I learned f'um him. I worked all through this country, clear down below
D'Hanis. I knew about this settlement (the Negro settlement three miles north of Hondo where he now resides) when
I was working on the Noonan ranch.
We used to pen right here at the old Harper pens. (By this he means penning cattle or horses.) I was comin' through
here cow huntin' once when I met the madam here. She was Ellen Pierce, and was working for the Harpers. I met
her right down there on this creek.
"Old man Chamlin, he written me to come back down there where we used to live and he'd learn me how to be a
wheelwright. I knowed I could make a good livin' at it, but I was a cowboy then and I liked this country fine and I
didn't want to go back there to live. But I did go back and get my mother and half-sisters. My mother was married
again and had three girls, and she come out here and stayed til she died.
"When I come up through here horse huntin' or cow huntin' I knew old man White had come back f'um Mexico and
was sellin' this land to the colored folks for farms. I decided to buy this place, so, the first time, I bought twenty
acres, and I bought more land along til I had sixty acres, and I still got it. They wasn't nothin' on it. The Indians kep'
it burnt off clean. Wasn't no trees or nothin'. I planted that big mulberry tree out there in the yard, and that oak. That
mus-keet (mesquite), it has growed up since then. We never had all this bresh like you see around here now.
"Me and this lady here married when I was twenty-two. She was seventeen. We built a little house on this place, and
later on we built this bigger house. We had 'leven chillun, and they's still nine liyin'. They're all good to help us too.
When I need a little money I always ask some of 'em for a little and I get by til my crop's made.
"We worked hard farmin' and we raised the chillun to he'p us. We always had our horses and cows and chickens.
We had a wagon and in later years we had that old buggy out there. Law! It took me to town many a time. They's a
hen settin' in it now.
"Things was pretty high right after the war, but I believe We got 'em easier'n we get 'em now. I could get all the
clothes I want right after the war in Mexico. When I worked for Judge Noonan he would give me an order for
anything I wanted. After I bought this little farm here, we had chickens, eggs, milk, n'things like that. After the war
the white people was better, seems to me, than they are now. Why, we used to set down, we men, and play cards
and have lots of fun, and the old men was kind as could be, but I don't have no trouble with any of 'em. The men
folks ain't like the old ones. I don't never 'tend to nobody's business but my own, never have no cross words with
them. Out in cow camp we had all the fun we wanted. I 'member of nights after the war we used to play pranks and
jokes and sing. We done lots of hard work but we had lots of fun. Old man King here, he was always good to me. I
couldn't help but love that old man. Whenever I needed anything, he always give it to me. He would say, 'Well, Bill,
I ain't got that much money, but I can give you a check. And when he left this country to never come back no mo'
(died) I never owned him a nickel. He was sure good.
"I used to play the fiddle for dances when I was young, but not after I joined the church. I played for the white
people. Oh, yes'm the colored folks had dances. Yes, ma'm, they sho' did dance. I used to make four or five dollars a
night playin' the fiddle.
"After the war, it looked like we made a good crop every year. You could hardly ride your hoss across the prairie
without boggin'.
"When I went over to Mexico to stay til the war was over, they was Germans, Meskins (Mexicans), Indians and
ever'body was over, in Mexico. I had the smallpox down in Mexico, and measles too. But I had a good time while I
was there. Learned how to cook, learned how to haul water and sold it for a bit a barrel. We made good money. I
hauled water f'um the river -- right out of the Rio Grande.
"Yes'm I saw a ghost once. One night after I was livin' down here I was goin' to Sabinal, me and another man, and a
great long thing passed right in front of us. It was the blackest thing you ever saw. It passed right in front of us and
then disappeared. It was about six foot long. Yes ma'm, it sho' was a ghost or some'un; it disappeared and me lookin'
at it. The other fellow that was with me, he seen it too.
"Yes, they was lots of panthers and bears here after I come here. Why, right up here in the hills there was bears. The
hills was there and the bears was there. And if this ghost was a bear, he sho' was a big 'um. We had a ghost down
here on the creek we called the 'Ball Water Hole Ghost.' He was seen lots of times. He used to stay down there, but
he ain't been seen lately. My wife, she seen him."
Aunt Ellen smiled and replied:
"Yes'm, I saw him walkin' along in the trail ahead of us. He had on a black hat, like a tall stovepipe hat, and a long
black coat, and when we got up close he jes' disappeared. He was a big man, and tall. We didn't know which way he
went; he jes' seemed to disappear. My oldest daughter saw him too. Lots of folks did. He was always seen down at
that water hole somewhere.
"Then, again, I went to stay with Mrs. George Reedes after Mr. Reedes was killed, and all night long he would grind
coffee and sprinkle it all over us. I was so bad scared I nearly died. I kept my head covered up. Next morning there'd
be coffee all over the floor. We supposed it was Mr. Reedes' ghost -- they say if a person was wicked they come
back like that. Onct he pulled Mrs. Reedes out of bed and pitched her on the floor, and he would take the dishes out
of the shelves and throw 'em down. I couldn't stand it but a night or two, and I told her I was goin' home. I couldn't
sleep, and nobody else could. Yes, Ma'm, it was shore a ghost! He sho' did tear that house up ever' night. Why,
they'd be a light shine in that room jest as bright as daylight, nearly. Yes,
Ma'm, I saw that light! I don't know what that light was, but it was as bright as day. My goodness! I couldn't stay
there. I just told her I was going home, and I sho' did get away f'um there. I left befo' breakfast, too. They say ghosts
will run you, but I never did have any to run me. I've heerd of lots of things, my grandmother told me, that
happened back in Mississippi.
"I was born there. My mother died after we come to Texas, so my grandmother taken me and raised me. I guess I
was jes' a baby when I come to Texas. Mr. Harper owned my mother and grandmother. I remember when they had
that war, but it's been such a long time ago I can't remember very much. I remember when John Harper read the 'free
paper' to us. He had a big lot of slaves, but when he read the 'free paper' they jes' flew out like birds. But I didn't; I
was sticking to my grandmother. She didn't let me go. She was on crutches, and stayed on there at the Harper place.
After we was free, I worked for them a long time. I cooked, washed, ironed, milked the cows, and rode horses
astraddle. Sometimes I'd fall off if they run under a limb. We milked cows on the 'halvers'. He was pretty good to
us, old man Harper was. He was judge during the Civil War. I went along with John Harper and his wife when he
went to war, to nurse his chillun. When the war was over, I come back with them. He went off to fight somewhere
and she stayed. I took care of the chillun, and when they got sick I doctored 'em. For measles, I'd give 'em different
things, 'specially hot tea to break 'em out. And I used to give a young baby shuck tea to break him out with the
hives. She was always scared about her chillun when they had the hives. For chills and fever, they give you quinine
weed. It don't grow here. They give sage tea, too. But for colic I always gave a baby paregoric. It shore stopped the
colic. Now, I wear these nutmegs around my neck to make my eyes strong. Yes'm, it made my eyes strong.
"I stayed with Mr. John Harper and his wife a long time down there, and I shore was glad when they come up to
Hondo, because old grandma grabbed me and didn't let me go back. So I stayed there and worked. I was still a
young girl, but I plowed, grubbed and hauled water. I could make good cheese out of cow's milk. We always put the
clabber in a press, and it would be so nice and firm.
"I used to wear 'cotton stripes.' I 'member it well. It was a homespun cloth. I used to know how to spin and weave. I
could knit a pair of sox in two nights. The Harpers would give me a new dress sometimes twice a week, but the old
man always bought us whatever we needed. We had plenty of clothes.
"I was still workin' over here at Harpers when I married. I didn't never hear much about hard times or mean soljers. I
guess we was too fur away. I was treated pretty good, but I've got switched many a time. Oh, yes'm, I've been
whipped, but not like some of 'em was. They used to tie some of 'em down. Back in
Mississippi, I've heard 'em tell, they shore whipped 'em. They used to be a run-away now and then that got away
and went to Mexico, but if they caught him they shore whipped him awful.
"After we married we lived on this place here all the time. We ain't never left it. All my chillun was bawn here. We
got our youngest son back with us. He works the fawm and stays with us. I've got over forty little chickens now, and
if I w'n't crippled I could get around and do lots more."
From where I was sitting I glimpsed what I took to be a huge wooden piano leg in a little side room. I asked about it
and was told it was a piano their oldest daughter had bought many years ago. It is evidently very old, a long, square
piano of the make they used in the '60s probably. The varnish is off and part of the top has peeled, but it could be
sandpapered, refinished and polished and a beautiful thing made of it. They were proud to know that it might be
"worth a little somethin'."
(Holm, Stanley H.: PW, Angermiller, Mrs.: PW, Medina County, District #15, (Yes))
Bill And Ellen Thomas
Bill and Ellen Thomas were one of the first Negro couples to take up land in the Negro slave settlement north of
Hondo. Bill was born in Florida, Missouri, in 1849, a slave of Willis Samuel, who sold Bill, his mother and sisters
to a man named Chamlin and his father to another man. "Old Man" Chamlin then moved, taking them first to
Mississippi and from there to Texas. When the war broke out, Chamlin took his two sons and Bill to Mexico, giving
Bill, who was then fourteen, his freedom. Bill cooked at a hotel in Piedras Negras (then called Las Colonias). At the
close of the war, he returned to Texas and took up ranch work in Medina County. Ellen was born in Forrest,
Mississippi, in 1856. Her parents, Ike and Talitha Harper, belonged to Judge Harper, who brought them to Texas.
After freedom, Ellen stayed on at the Harper plantation and took the name of Pierce. Here she met and married Bill
Thomas about 1871 and they went to live on his farm in the old slave settlement north of Hondo, where they have
raised 11 children, nine of whom are still living. Uncle Bill Thomas is a darky of the old slave type. He does not
enunciate distinctly, and one finds it difficult to follow his jumbled drawl. In this second interview with Uncle Bill
and Aunt Ellen, they were pleased to recall other incidents of their lives, and they were proud to have their pictures
made again. Uncle Bill did most of the talking. He said:
"My mother, she was Ca'line Chamlin. My father was Tom. His old master was named Willis Samuel. I was bo'n in
Missouri and then moved to Miss'sippi, then to Texas. It was away yonder at Florida, Missouri, was the town I was
bo'n in.
"Ellen's (Bill's wife) father and mother was Ike and Talitha Harper. They belonged to old man Harper, as I done told
you. They come from Forrest, Miss'sippi.
"The beds we slep' in; they made these here beds; they bore holes and make legs, jes' like that, and make railin's and
put ropes aroun 'em for springs. The chillun had little, low trun'nel beds, is what the chilluns slep' on.
"When our boss hired a man to chop cotton, he put a man out there to lead us, and made his chillun work jes' like
we did. He was a wheelwright and was working all the time. My oldest sister could pick two hun'erd pounds of
cotton a day; the others could pick a hun'erd pounds, or fifty or sixty pounds, somewhere that way; and that foreman
boy, he could pick as much as my sister. He could pick two hun'erd pounds a day. He was the one that Old Man
Chamlin taken with me when he took us to Mesico. You see, he died (the boy) and he kep' the body down there
nearly three years. The Meskins put 'im away. They put 'im in a 'dobe vault and made a tin coffin and put 'im in that,
but he (Mr. Chamlin) went back there and got 'im and carried 'im back to Falls City.
"I lived jes' like the other chillun did them days. If I didn't do anything, he whipped me jes' like he did the other
chillun. I bet I've seen a thousan' (slaves) in one field whar I come from in Miss'sippi. Old Man Chamlin's brother
had 'em. They worked over a thousan' grown men.
"We used to shuck c'on by hand and shell c'on. I was about eight or nine years old. But when we had c'on shuckin's
here, we was grown. In them days, not only me, but the white boys, would steal watermelons. They didn't care for
you eatin' a watermelon, jes' so you did't jes' go in there and bus' 'em open and leave 'em layin' there. You could go
pick you a good melon and eat all you want.
"My mother would go to dances when we was little. I recollect one night we went to a dance up to a fellow's called
Allen's, and the 'patterollers' would catch you if you didn't have a pass. I went with my sister that night and
somehow, I think, they (the patterollers) stopped the dance before they got through. The girl that lived there, she
said, 'You needn't expect no better of white people.' The mist'ess came, and they told her what the girl said, and the
mist'ess whipped her for sayin' what she did. They my sister run and jumped the fence with a hoop-skirt on and
caught her skirt on it and broke out three palin's. I was right behind her.
The patterollers, they would put out that notice that if any of the cullud people come to a dance without a pass, they
will whip 'em, and them with a pass, don't touch 'em. They worked for the Confederate Government.
"Back in Miss'sippi when they was movin' slaves, a lot of 'em walked and a lot of 'em rode. I've seen 'em right down
the road, like a herd of cattle. Some of 'em gets where they is goin' and some of 'em runs off. Then all them
bloodhoun's trail 'em up. Yes'm, I see 'em trailin' 'em. Jes' like trailin' a squirrel. Sometimes they had to go up in a
tree, and sometimes they had fifteen houn's after 'em. You would have to go to a tree, and when you come down,
they'd set still and not bother you. Yes, sir, I've heard bloodhoun's chasin' slaves, and he didn't bother you, he jes'
stayed right on that same trail. I 'member that!
"They had to carry my father to town to sell 'im. It taken seben men to carry 'im there. They had to come and get 'im
and chain 'im. The last time we heard of 'im, we was stopped on the Miss'sippi River, and we heard he went down
below on a boat.
"When Old Man Chamlin lef' for Misico, he lef' the girls with a frien' of his and lef' mama and my sister with a man.
H's named Moffett. Lives on the Blue Ridge. Next time mama married, she married a man on the same place. I
remeber the last words my mother said to me. She was sick and said, 'Billie, I won't be here very long.' And, sure
'nough, I didn't get back home before one of the little girls come down here after me. She was dead.
"I learned to write my name, but I got so I cain't write no mo'. Judge Noonan taught me how to read and write a
little. Oh! I couldn't read any hardly, but I could write my name.
"Somehow or other they always had a cullud man, and he would learn how to read some, and if that man, he got
into the church and joined the church, he would baptize the slaves. Some of the white preachers would teach the
cullud man how to preach.
"I had a big time at the baptizin'. Some of 'em would be happy and shout and cut up right along about like you do
now. A man can get so happy, he cain't hold it. I haven't seen many of 'em, I guess seven or eight baptizins's --
somethin' like that. They would sing some and pray some and have one lead 'im to the waterside and take 'im and
plunge 'im down into the water. What did they sing? Oh, I dunno, 'Hark-from-the-tomb-adoleful-soun', 'or somethin'
like that."
"They used to sing," put in Aunt Ellen,
'A charge to keep I have, It's God to glorify. . .'
"I remember that song well, 'cause I used to sing it myself."
"Well, then they couldn't say much of anything (at the baptizing), but when the preacher got up and say, 'Amen', he
went down with you and you had keep the other up (meaning you had to see to the rest of it, either hold your breath
or strangle). The only time I
was happy was when I joined the church. I shouted and I told 'em I was happy and wanted to lead a better life.
Mama didn't hardly know me when I come back -- I was a new feller. I ain't jokin', I was happy. I was an awful
wicked boy when I was growin' up. I thought it was best for me to change. I couldn't raise a family like I was. I get
happy ever'time I go to church. Man, I feel good in the church! Ain't feared of nothin' to tell nobody.
(Note: This story supplements one sent in previously.)
