hes for herself and me. From then on, she worked and taken care of
me.

"From there she went to Pocahontas and worked and stayed there till I
was about fifteen years old. Meanwhile, she married in Pocahontas. Then
she moved to Newport. When I was fifteen, I married in Newport. My
mother supported herself by cooking and washing. Then she got a chance
to work on a small boat cooking and doing the boat washing, and there
would be weeks that some of the deck hands would have to help her
because they would have such a crowd of raftsmen. Sometimes there would
be twenty or thirty of them raftsmen--men who would cut the logs and
raft them to go and bring them down the river. Then the deck hands would
have to help her. I too would have to wash the dishes and help out.

"I went to school in Pocahontas and met my future husband (Travis). I
brought many a waiter to serve when they had a crowd. I took Travis to
the boat and he was hired to wait on the men. When they had just the
crew--Captain, Clerk, Pilot, Engineer, Mate, and it seems there was
another one--I waited on the table myself. I help peel the potatoes and
turn the meat. When we had that big run, then Mr. Travis and some of the
others would come down and help me. The boat carried freight, cotton,
and nearly anything might neer that was shipped down to town. Pocahontas
was a big shipping place.

"My mother said they used to jump over the broom stick and count that
married. The only amusement my mother had was work. I don't know if she
knowed there was such a thing as Christmas.

"Mother's little house was a log cabin like all the other slaves had.

"They didn't give her anything much to eat. They was farmers. They
raised their own cattle and hogs. The niggers did the same--that is, the
niggers raised everything and got a little to eat. They had one nigger
man that was around the house and others for the field. They didn't
allow the slaves to raise anything for themselves and they didn't give
them much.

"The slaves made their own clothes and their own cloth. They would not
let the slaves have anything much. To keep them from being stark naked,
they'd give them a piece to wear.

"Mama got to see her mother in 1885. When I married she left and went to
Missouri and found her sister and half-sister and her mother and brother
or cousin. She found her sister's oldest daughter. She was a baby laying
in the cradle when mama ran through the field to get away from a young
man