SLAVE NARRATIVES - Library of Congress

Soldiers
"My father said once that when the men were gone, the soldiers came in
and asked the women to cook for them* They wouldn f t do it; so the soldiers
made them bring them a chunk of fire* They thro wed the fire on the bed and
when it got to burning good, the officer wouldn f t let them put it out* But
he told them that they could get some of the boys to help them carry out
their things if the boys were willing to do it# It was the officers who
wanted the women to cook for them* It wasn f t the slaves they asked; it. was
the white folks*
Sold His Master
*I heard my stepmother—I call her my mother—say something once* She
belonged to a white family named Bell* They had a lot of slaves* My step-
mother was the house girl; so she could get on to a lot of things the others
couldn't* She stayed in the house* That was in slavery times* The
speculators who were buying colored folks would put up at that place*
Looked like a town but it all belonged to one person* The name of the place
was Cloverdale, Tennessee* My stepmother said that a gang of these folks
put up at Clover dale once and then went on to Nashville, Tennessee* On the
next day a nigger sold the speculator* He was educated and a mulatto , and
he sold his master in with a bunch of other niggers* He was just fixin* to
take the money, when his master got aware of it, and cane on up just in
time* I don't know what happened to the nigger* It was just an accident
he got caught* My stepmother said it was true*
Good Masters
"My mother had a good master* At least, she said he was good* Slaves
from other plantations would run away and come to her master's place to stay*
Ihey would stay a good while*
3.
248