big house stayed in the big house.
All the slave men ate in one place and all the slave women ate in one
place. They weren't supposed to have any food in their homes unless they
would go out foraging. Sometimes they would get it that way. They'd go
out and steal ol' master's sweet potatoes and roast them in the fire.
They'd go out and steal a hog and kill it. All of it was theirn; they
raised it. They wasn't to say stealin' it; they just went out and got
it. If old master caught them, he'd give 'em a little brushin' if he
thought they wouldn't run off. Lots of times they would run off, and if
he thought they'd run off because they got a whippin', he was kinda slow
to catch 'em. If one run off, he'd tell the res', 'If you see so and so,
tell 'im to come on back. I ain't goin' to whip 'im.' If he couldn't do
nothin' with 'em, he'd sell 'em. I guess he would say to hisself, 'I
can't do nothin' with this nigger. If I can't do nothing with 'im, I'll
sell him and git my money outa him.'

"I have heard my mother say that some of the slaves that ran away would
get destroyed by the wild animals and some of them would even be glad to
come back home. Right smart of them got clean away and went to free
states.

"After the War was over, they all was brought back here and the owners
let them know they was free. They had to let them know they were free. I
never heard my mother tell the details. I never heard her say just who
brought her word or how it was told to her when they was freed.

"I never heard her say much about the church because she was a sinner.
After they was freed, I would go many a night and set down in a corner
where they was having a big dance.

"The pateroles and jayhawkers were bad. Many of them got hurt too. They
tried to hurt the niggers and sometimes the niggers hurt them.

"Right after the War, my folks farmed for a living. They farmed on
shares. They didn't have nothing of their own. They never did get
nothing out of their work. I know they didn't get a thing. They farmed
at first about seven miles out from Little Rock, below Fourche Dam on
the Fletcher place. There ain't but one of the Fletchers living now, and
that is Molly Daniels. She is old Louis Fletcher's daughter. All their
brothers is dead. She's owning all the land now we used to till. It's
over a thousand acres. She [HW: mother] stayed down there for about
twenty or thirty years. Then she moved here to town. Here she cooked for
white folks. My