s owned by Master Rucker. It seems I was about ten years old when
the Civil War started. It seems like a dream to me now. Mother was a
weaver. They said she was a fine weaver. She wove for all on the place
and some special pieces of cloth for outsiders. She wove woolen cloth
too. I don't know whether they paid for the extra weaving or not. People
didn't look on money like they do now. They was free with one another
about eating and visiting and work too when a man got behind with the
work. The fields get gone in the grass. Sometimes they would be sick or
it rained too much. The neighbor would send all his slaves to work till
they caught up and never charge a cent. I don't hear about people doing
that way now.

"My parents was named Clinton and Billy Bell. There was nine of us
children.

"I never seen nobody sold. Mother was darker. Papa was light--half
white. They didn't talk in front of children about things and I never
did know. I've wondered.

"After freedom my folks stayed on at Master Rucker's. I got to be a
midwife. I nursed and was a house girl after the war. Then the doctors
got to sending for me to nurse and I got to be a midwife.

"My father was a good Bible scholar. He preached all around
Murfreesboro, Tennessee. He was a Methodist. He died when he was
seventy-seven years old. He had read the Bible through seventy-seven
times--one time for every year old he was."

Mrs. Mildred Thompson
Mrs. Carol Graham
El Dorado District
Federal Writers Project
Union County, Arkansas

Charley Williams, Ex-slave. "Mawnin' Missy. Yo say wha Aint Fanny Whoolah
live? She live right down de road dar in dat fust house. Yas'm. Dat wha
she live. Yo say whut mah name? Mah name is Charley. Yas'm, Charley
Williams. Did ah live in slavery time? Yas'm sho' did. Mah marster wuz
Dr. Reed Williams and he live at Kew London (SE part of Union County) or
ah speck ah bettuh say near New London caise he live on de Mere-Saline
Road, de way de soldiers went and come. Marster died befo' de Civil Wah.
Does ah membah hit? Yas'm ah say ah does. Ah wuz bo'n in 1856. Mah ole
mutha died befo' de wah too. Huh name wuz Charity. Mah young marster
went tuh de wah an come back. He fit at Vicksburg an his name wuz Bennie
Williams. But he daid now tho. Dere was a hep uv dem white William
Chillun. Dere wuz Miss Narcissi an she am a livin now at Stong. Den
dere's Mr. Charley. Ah wuz named fuh him. He am a livin now too. Den
dere is Mr. Race Will