had stayed on at de Lemmon's place. De
white folks of both plantations 'courage us to have a big weddin'. Her
white folks give her a trousseau and mine give me a bedstead, cotton
mattress, and two feather pillows. Dat was a mighty happy day and a
mighty happy night for de 'Rose of Sharon'. Her tells young niggers
'bout it to dis day, and I just sets and smokes my pipe and thinks of
all de days dat am passed and gone and wonder if de nex' world gwine to
bring us back to youth and strength to 'joy it, as us did when Rose and
me was young.

"Does I 'members anything 'bout patrollers? 'Deed, I do! Marster didn't
'ject to his slaves gwine to see women off de place. I hear him say so,
and I hear him tell more than once dat if he ever hear de patrollers a
comin' wid blood hounds, to run to de lot and stick his foots in de mud
and de dogs wouldn't follow him. Lots of run'ways tried it, I heard, and
it proved a success and I don't blame them dogs neither."

Project #1655
W. W. Dixon
Winnsboro, S. C.

JESSE DAVIS
EX-SLAVE 85 YEARS OLD.

Jesse Davis, one of the fast disappearing landmarks of slavery times,
lives with his wife and son, in one of the ordinary two-room frame
houses that dot, with painful monotony, the country farms of white
landowners. The three attempt to carry on a one-horse farm of forty
acres, about thirty acres in cotton and the remainder in corn. The
standard of living is low. Jesse is cheerful, his wife optimistic with
the expression that the Lord will provide, and their son dutiful and
hopeful of the harvest. Their home is about ten miles southwest of
Winnsboro, in the Horeb section of Fairfield County.

"Dere is some difficulty 'bout my age. Nigh as I can place it, I was
born befo' de Civil War. I 'members 'tendin' to and milkin' de cows, and
keepin' de calf off, drawin' water out de well, and bringin' in wood to
make fires. I 'spects I's eighty-five, mountin' up in years.

"I lives on Mr. Eber Mason's place wid one of my chillun, a son name
Mingo. Us all work on de place; run a farm on shares. I can't do much
work and can't support myself. It's mighty hard to be 'pendent on others
for your daily rations, even if them others is your own bone and flesh.
I'd 'preciate sumpin' to help my son and wife carry on. Dats why I wants
a pension. Do you 'spect God in His mercy will hear de prayer of dis
feeble old believer? I don't beg people but de Bible give me a right to
beg God for my dai