cSwain vaccinated us
for small pox. My sister died with it. When the slaves died marster
buried them. They dug a grave with a tomb in it. I do not see any of
them now. The slaves were buried in a plain box.

The marsters married the slaves without any papers. All they did was to
say perhaps to Jane and Frank, 'Frank, I pronounce you and Jane man and
wife.' But the woman did not take the name of her husband, she kept the
name of the family who owned her.

I remember seeing the Yankees near Fayetteville. They shot a bomb shell
at Wheeler's Calvary, and it hit near me and buried in the ground.
Wheeler's Calvary came first and ramsaked the place. They got all the
valuables they could, and burned the bridge, the covered bridge over
Cape Fear river, but when the Yankees got there they had a pontoon
bridge to cross on,--all those provision wagons and such. When they
passed our place it was in the morning. They nearly scared me to death.
They passed right by our door, Sherman's army. They began passing, so
the white folks said, at 9 o'clock in the mornin'. At 9 o'clock at night
they were passin' our door on foot. They said there were two hundred and
fifty thousan' o' them passed. Some camped in my marster's old fiel'. A
Yankee caught one of my marster's shoats and cut off one of the hind
quarters, gave it to me, and told me to carry and give it to my mother.
I was so small I could not tote it, so I drug it to her. I called her
when I got in hollering distance of the house and she came and got it.
The Yankees called us Johnnie, Dinah, Bill and other funny names. They
beat their drums and sang songs. One of the Yankees sang 'Rock a Bye
Baby'. At that time Jeff Davis money was plentiful. My mother had about
$1000. It was so plentiful it was called Jeff Davis shucks. My mother
had bought a pair of shoes, and had put them in a chest. A Yankee came
and took the shoes and wore them off, leaving his in their place. They
tol' us we were free. Sometimes the marster would get cruel to the
slaves if they acted like they were free.

Mat Holmes, a slave, was wearing a ball and chain as a punishment for
running away. Marster Ezekial King put it on him. He has slept in the
bed with me, wearing that ball and chain. The cuff had embedded in his
leg, it was swollen so. This was right after the Yankees came through.
It was March, the 9th of March, when the Yankees came through. Mat
Holmes had run away with the ball and chain on him and was in th