co country slave was that of being sold
"down south to the cotton country."

So after the war, Porter Scales came back to the Dan river in
Rockingham county, and bought his 130 acres farm from Mr. Alex
Llewellyn. He liked to recount his matrimonial matters except those of
his second wife who married him for a rich nigger widower, and spent
his hard won dollars freely for lace curtains and such to adorn the
town house in "Pocomo" and finally forced him out of the "town" house
into the woodhouse in the yard where he lived some years, dying there.
His church friends took charge of his body and kept it until put away
by the side of his first wife.

She, Martha Foy, he said in 1932 to me, was bought by Dr. Ben Foy of
Madison from Wheeler Hancock of Wentroth. Six of their children are
living near Madison and in West Virginia, Stephen and Lindsay Scales at
the old place down at Deep Springs. He told of "going tuh see" the
attractive Betsy Ann, house girl slave of Mrs. Nancy Watkins Webster
but was "cut out" by Noah Black. Aunt Betsy Ann Black is remembered as
being the superlative obstetrical nurse in homes of the rich about
Madison, and was designated by them as being a "lady" if ever there was
a negro lady. She was never dressed except in "cotton checks". "Being
cut out" thus, Porter cited as evidence of his aristocratic
association: for one of Aunt Betsy's son became a Methodist preacher,
and two of her grandaughters teachers in the public schools of North
Carolina.

Porter told of the white school teacher, Professor Seeker who taught in
the Doll academy, Madison's old "female academy" which still stands
(remodeled since 1900 into a dwelling) on Murphy Street at the 60 foot
deep well in the street, by the old Dr. Robert Gallway house (standing
still in 1937) just south of John H. Moore's five acre homeplace.
Professor Seeker, he said left Madison and went up on Baughn's Mountain
to teach among the Baughns, Lewises and Higgies and Bibsons, pioneer
families of that area. On that May 2, 1932 in his Kemoca yard, Uncle
Porter recited the poem which little Bettie Carter forgot in stage
fright at Professor Seeker's "exhibition" before Professor Jacob Doll
ever started his "female school". All these pupils were pay "scholars".

The free school for Madison, the "old field schoolhouse" was way down
the hill from the old Dr. Smith house near Beaver Island Creek. Only
white folks intimate with itch, head lice and long standing pove