was goin' and Miss Susan say, 'Virginia, if you think he
ain't goin' come back you ought to kiss him goodbye.' I said, 'I ain't
goin' to kiss no white man.'

"Miss Fanny went up the ladder and sot rite on the roof and watched the
soldiers goin' by. Yes'm. Old master whipped me with a little peach
stick cause I let Frankie--we called her Frankie--go up the ladder. I
said I couldn't stop her cause she said if I told her papa, she and
Becky goin' to whip me. He whipped Miss Fanny. Old miss come in and say,
'Ain't you goin' whip this nigger?' She was mean as the devil. Oh, God,
yes. She so mean she didn't know what to do. But old master kep her
down. You know some of these redheaded women, they just as devilish as
they can be. We had some neighbors, Mrs. Davis and Mrs. Daniels and old
miss would be out there on the lawn quarrelin' till it was just like a
fog. Us niggers would be out there listenin'.

"But I was always treated good. You know if I had been beat over the
head I couldn't recollect things now. My head ain't been cracked up.
Nother thing. I always been easy controlled.

"I never went to school a day. After we was freed we stayed right on
the Murphy place. They paid us and we worked on the shares. That's the
reason I say I done better when I was a slave."

Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Senya Singfield
1613 W. Second Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 74

"I was born in Washington, Virginia right at the foot of the Blue Ridge
Mountains. My mother was sold when I was a babe in her arms. She was
sold three times. I know one time when she had four children she was
sold and one of my brothers was sold away unbeknownst to her. Her old
master sold her away from her mistress. She was a cook and never was
mistreated.

"I ain't never been to school. When I got big enough, my mother was a
widow and I had to start out and make a living. I've always been a cook.
Used to keep a boarding house, up until late years. I've washed and
ironed, sewed a right smart and quilted quilts. I've done anything I
could to turn an honest living. Oh I've been through it but I'm still
here. I've been a widow over forty years.

"I think the folks nowdays are about run out. They are goin' too fast.
When I was comin' up, I had to have some manners. My mother didn't low
me to 'spute nobody."

Interviewer: Samuel S. Taylor
Person interviewed: Peggy Sloan
2450 Howa