SLAVE NARRATIVES - Library of Congress

theirselves. They didn't have "butter and they didn't have no sugar. Didn't
know much about what meat was yet. They would give the little hits of chil-
dren pot liquor. That's the most I ever seed them git. Of course I was treat-
ed differently. You couldn't judge them "by me. I was the only half-white
young un round there, and they said I was half-"brother to ol Marse's chillun.
Ajoi the white chillen would git me up to the house to dance for them and all
like, and they would give me biscuits or anything good they had. I never seed
the others eatin nothin hut pot liquor.
"Most of the slaves lived in log caWns. You know th^r never had hut one
door. In general where they had large families, they would have tio rooms with
a chimney in the middle of the house. The chimney was "buikt out of mud and
straw, I can remember them sawin the timher. Tm pulled a "big ol crosscut
saw. Didn't have no saw mills then. This world has come from a long ways.
They used to didn't have no plows. It was without form. You made it at home.
"They had ol homemade bedsteads to sleep in. They had a little rope that
run hack and forth instead of slats. That was called a corded bed. Cheers
were all made at home aid were split "bottoms.
"Th^r didn't many of Hie slaves have food in their homes. But when they
did, they would jus have a little wooden "box and they ^ould put their food in
it.
"It seems like the white people got to burying their money during the time
of the war. That never come out till after the war. Then they got to wantin
that money and started looking for it. There never was any talk of buried
treasure "before the war.
ff % folks didn't give me any schoolin hefore the surrender. I never got
any before the surrender and a mighty little afterwards• Ho nigger knowed
anything. I started to farming when I was thirteen years old. I used to be