him.

And always after every sentence he utters, there rises the old refrain:
"I want to go back home. I wouldn't be in this condition if I was back
home. I live in Laconia. They made me come away." And that is the
substance of the story he remembers.

Interviewer: Thomas Elmore Lucy
Person interviewed: Gus Williams, Russellville, Arkansas
Age: 80

"Was you lookin' for me t'oder day? Sure, my name's Williams--Gus
Williams--not Wilson. Dey gits me mixed up wid dat young guy, Wilson.

"Yes, I remembers you--sure--talks to yo' brother sometimes.

"I was born in Chatham County, Georgia--Savannah is de county seat. My
marster's name was Jim Williams. Never seen my daddy cause de Yankees
carried him away durin' de War, took him away to de North. Old marster
was good to his slaves, I was told, but don't ricollect anything about
em. Of course I was too young. Was born on Christmas day, 1857--but I
don't see anything specially interestin' in bein' a Christmas present;
never got me nothin', and never will.

"Was workin' on WPA--this big Tech. buildin'--but got laid off t'other
day.

"My mamma brought us to Arkansas in 1885, but we stopped and lived for
several years in Tennessee. Worked for twelve years out of Memphis on
the old Anchor Line steamboats on de Mississippi, runnin' from St. Louis
to N'Orleans. Plenty work in dem days.

"No, I ain't voted in a long time; can't afford to vote because I never
have the dollar. No dollar--no vote. Depression done fixed my votin'.

"Jest me and my wife, but it takes pluggin' away to get along. We
belongs to the C.M.E. Church since 1915. I was janitor at the West Ward
School for seven years, and sure liked dat job.

"Don't ask me anything about dese boys and gals livin' today. Much
difference in dem and de young folks livin' in my time as between me and
you. No dependence to be put in em. My _estimony_ is dat de black
servants today workin' for de whites learns things from dem white girls
dat dey never knowed before, and den goes home and does things dey never
done before.

"Don't ricollect many of de old-time songs, but one was somep'n
like--"Am I Born to Die?" And--oh, yes,--lots of times we sung 'Amazin'
Grace, how sweet de soun' dat saves a _race_ like me.'

"No suh, I ain't got no education--never had a chance to git one."

NOTE: The underscored words are actual quotations. "Estimony" for
"opinion" was a characteristic in Gus' vocabulary; "race" for the
orig