ide the wall and a trundle bed. That was the cabin
they lived in in slavery time.

Soldiers

"My father said once that when the men were gone, the soldiers came
in and asked the women to cook for them. They wouldn't do it; so the
soldiers made them bring them a chunk of fire. They throwed the fire on
the bed and when it got to burning good, the officer wouldn't let them
put it out. But he told them that they could get some of the boys to
help them carry out their things if the boys were willing to do it. It
was the officers who wanted the women to cook for them. It wasn't the
slaves they asked; it was the white folks.

Sold His Master

"I heard my stepmother--I call her my mother--say some thing once. She
belonged to a white family named Bell. They had a lot of slaves. My
stepmother was the house girl; so she could get on to a lot of things
the others couldn't. She stayed in the house. That was in slavery times.
The speculators who were buying colored folks would put up at that
place. Looked like a town but it all belonged to one person. The name of
the place was Cloverdale, Tennessee. My stepmother said that a gang of
these folks put up at Cloverdale once and then went on to Nashville,
Tennessee. On the next day a nigger sold the speculator. He was educated
and a mulatto, and he sold his master in with a bunch of other niggers.
He was just fixin' to take the money, when his master got aware of it,
and come on up just in time. I don't know what happened to the nigger.
It was just an accident he got caught. My stepmother said it was true.

Good Masters

"My mother had a good master. At least, she said he was good. Slaves
from other plantations would run away and come to her master's place to
stay. They would stay a good while.

"My father said his master was good to him too. My father's young master
has come to see us since the War. He got down low and used to come
'round. My father would give him turns of corn. You know when you used
to go to the mill, you would carry about two bushels of corn and call it
a milling or a turn. My father would let his young master shell a bushel
or two of corn and carry it to the mill. He got poor and sure 'nough you
see. We had moved away from them then, and he got in real hard luck. He
used to come and sit a half day at a time at our house. And father would
give him the corn for his family. We were living in Dickson County,
Tennessee then. Seems like we was on Frank Hudson