SLAVE NARRATIVES - Library of Congress

Wife
"My wife didn f t have many people* She knows her mother, her mother f s
mistress, and all* Her ma was named Martha Henson# That was her married
name. Her mistress 9 last name was Strlbling« Martha Hanson was a well-
treated slave* The Striblings lived in Bockport, Arkansas, but their
native home was Georgia. I don Y t know where the Striblings are now* The
old man died before the Civil War broke oat* I guess they are all dead and
in torment* My wife f s grandmother and grandfather on her mother*s side
were gone so far back that neither she nor I know anything about them*
Whippings
"My great-grandmother on my mother 1 s aide was in Union County when I
knew anything of her—close to SI Dorado* I was about twenty-two years old
when she died* She was tall and spare built, dark ginger cake color*
N Coarse straight black hair that had begun to mingle with gray* She never
did get real gray, and her hair was never white* Even when she died, at a
hundred and thirteen years, her hair was mostly black mingled with gray*
\ "The overseer knocked her in the head in slavery times, and they had
to put a silver half-dollar in her head to hold her brains in* I have seen
the place myself* When I was a little fellow she used to let me feel the
place and she would say, f That's where the overseer knocked granny in the
head, son* I got a half-dollar in there•' I would put her hair aside—my
but she had beautiful hair I—and look at the plaee* \
"My wife could tell you what my mother told her* She has seen the
marks on my mother's back and has asked, 'llama, what's all these marks on
your back?' And mama would say, 'That's where I was whipped in slavery
times, daughter* 9 She nearer did like to tell the details* But the scars
were awful* •
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