in Darlington County, South Carolina, the 14th of June
1869. My mother was named Rilla McCullough and my father was named
Marion McCullough. I remember them very well and many things they told
me that happened during the Civil War. They belonged to a slave owner
named Billy Cannon who owned a large plantation near Marion, South
Carolina. The number of slaves on the plantation from what they told me
was about fifty. Slaves were quartered in small houses built of logs.
They had plenty of rough food and clothing. They were looked after very
well in regard to their health, because the success of the master
depended on the health of his slaves. A man can't work a sick horse or
mule. A slave occupied the same place on the plantation as a mule or
horse did, that is a male slave. Some of the slave women were looked
upon by the slave owners as a stock raiser looks upon his brood sows,
that is from the standpoint of production. If a slave woman had
children fast she was considered very valuable because slaves were
valuable property.

"There was classes of slavery. Some of the half-white and beautiful
young women who were used by the marster and his men friends or who was
the sweetheart of the marster only, were given special privileges. Some
of 'em worked very little. They had private quarters well fixed up and
had a great influence over the marster. Some of these slave girls broke
up families by getting the marster so enmeshed in their net that his
wife, perhaps an older woman, was greatly neglected. Mother and
grandmother tole me that they were not allowed to pick their husbands.

"Mother tole me that when she became a woman at the age of sixteen
years her marster went to a slave owner near by and got a six-foot
nigger man, almost an entire stranger to her, and told her she must
marry him. Her marster read a paper to them, told them they were man
and wife and told this negro he could take her to a certain cabin and
go to bed. This was done without getting her consent or even asking her
about it. Grandmother said that several different men were put to her
just about the same as if she had been a cow or sow. The slave owners
treated them as if they had been common animals in this respect.

"Mother said she loved my father before the surrender and just as soon
as they were free they married. Grandmother was named Luna Williams.
She belonged to a planter who owned a large plantation and forty
slaves adjoining Mr. Cannon's planta