pared by Annie Ruth Davis
Place, Marion, S. C.
Date, January 27, 1938
No. Words ----
Reduced from ---- words
Rewritten by ----

JOSEPHINE BRISTOW
Ex-Slave, 73 Years

"Remembers de Confederate War, Miss. Yes, mam, I'm supposed to be, if I
can live to see February, bout 73 year old. What age Hester say she was?
Dat what I had thought from me en her conversation. Miss, I don'
remember a thing more bout de war den de soldiers comin through old
Massa's plantation en we chillun was 'fraid of dem en ran. Knew dey was
dressed in a different direction from us white folks. All was in blue,
you know, wid dem curious lookin hats en dem brass buttons on dey
bodies. No, mam, dey didn' stop nowhe' bout us. Dey was ridin on horses
en it seem like dey was in a hurry gwine somewhe'. En dey didn' stop to
old Massa's house neither. No, mam, not to my knowin, dey didn'. Well,
we was livin out to de plantation, we calls it, en Massa en Missus was
livin up here to Marion. Mr. Ferdinand Gibson, dat who been us Massa in
slavery time en Miss Connie, dat what we used to call her, was us
Missus. To my knowin, dey didn' have no chillun dey own, but dey sho had
plenty colored people. Yes, mam, seems like to my remembrance, my Massa
ran bout 30 plantations en 'sides dat, he had a lot of servants right up
here to de big house, men en women."

"I was real small in dem days en far as I can remember, we lived on de
quarter dere to old Massa's plantation in de country. Us little tots
would go every mornin to a place up on de hill, called de milk house, en
get our milk 'tween meals while de old folks was off workin. Oh, dey had
a old woman to see after we chillun en tend to us in de daytime. De old
lady dat looked after us, her name was Mary Novlin. Lord, Mr. Gibson, he
had big farms en my mother en father, dey worked on de farms. Yes'um, my
mother en father, I used to never wouldn' know when dey come home in de
evenin, it would be so late. De old lady, she looked after every blessed
thing for us all day long en cooked for us right along wid de mindin.
Well, she would boil us corn meal hominy en give us dat mostly wid milk
for breakfast. Den dey would have a big garden en she would boil peas en
give us a lot of soup like dat wid dis here oven bread. Oh, dem what
worked in de field, dey would catch dey meals when dey could. Would have
to cook way in de night or sometimes fore day. Cose dey would take dey
dinner rations wid dem to de fi