ey come to Virginia and brought
me here to Arkansas. I was here four years before the Old War ceasted
and I was twelve when I come here.

"I was right there standin' behind my mistis' chair when Abe Lincoln
said, 'I 'clare there shall be war!' I was right here in
Arkansas--eighteen miles from Pine Bluff when war ceasted. The Lord
would have it. I had a good master and mistis. Old master said, 'Fore
old Lincoln shall free my niggers, I'll free em myself.' They might as
well a been free, they had a garden and if they raised cotton in that
garden they could sell it. The Lord bless His Holy Name! We didn't know
the difference when we got free. I stayed with my mistis till she went
back to Virginia.

"Yes, honey, I was here in all the war. I was standin' right by my
mistis' chair. I never heard old master make a oaf in his life, but when
they brought the paper freein' the slaves, he said, 'Dad burn it.'

"I member a man called Jeff Davis. I know they sung and said, 'We'll
hand old Jeff Davis to the sour apple tree.'

"I been here a long time. Yes, honey, I been in Arkansas so long I say I
ain't goin' out--they got to bury me here. Arkansas dirt good enough for
me. I say I been here so long I got Arkansas 'stemper (distemper).

"My old master in Virginia was Joe Hudson. My father used to ketch
oysters and fish. We could look up the Patomac river and see the ships
comin' in. In Virginia I lived next to a free state and the runaways was
tryin' to get away. At Harper's Ferry--that's where old John Brown was
carryin' em across. My old mistis used to take the runaway folks when
the dogs had bit their legs, and keep em for a week and cure em up. This
time o' year you could hear the bull whip. But I was lucky, they was
good to me in Virginia and good to me in Arkansas.

"Yes, chile, I was in Alexandria, Virginia in Kinsale County when they
come after me by night. I was hired out to Captain Jim Allen. I had been
nursin' for Captain Allen. He sailed on the sea. He was a good man. He
was a Christian man. He never whipped me but once and that was for
tellin' a story, and I thank him for it. He landed his boat right at the
landin' on Saturday. Next day he asked me bout somethin' and I told him
a story. He said, 'I'm gwine whip you Monday morning!' He wouldn't whip
me on Sunday. He whipped me and I thank him for it. And to this day the
Lindsey's could trust me with anything they had.

"I was in Virginia a play-chile when the ships