SLAVE NARRATIVES - Library of Congress

"Men come long the road peddlin 1 from out the cities, men come
long with droves of horses and mules. They was called horse traders*
Then once in a while they come long tradin* and selling slaves* Nother
way they sell em was at public auction* If fen a slave steal from
another master, like go in his smoke house or crib and stealf the
sheriff have to whip him* They would have public whippin 1 *
n How f d they know was freedom? How»d they not know it was
freedom? Everybody went wild* They was jes f crazy cause they was
free* Way I knowd for certain it was freedom Mr* John Griffin had
all the slaves that hadn't done went off come to the house and he
told them they was all free* Some of em just started walking the
roads till they nearly starved* The government didn't start feeding
the slaves till so many nearly starved* My mother cooked on nearly
a year* Then she went to work for Vaughn in Edge field County*
"They didn f t give them no land* The white folks was land pore*
"They didn f t have no money* When the masters had money they give
the slaves a little spending money* Nearly all the slaves had a little
money long* They get a pass to split rails for a neighbor and make
money. That was befo freedom* After freedom nobody had money but the
Yankee soldiers* They keep it closer than the folks you been livin 1
with*
"Mr. Griffin, he isas called General by all the young men* He
was too old to fight so he trained soldiers* He didn f t wear a
uniform but they did* They met certain days every weeko They wore
gray uniforms*
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