ed to death.

She lived down in Kentucky after the War until she was quite a young
woman and then came to Indiana where she has lived ever since. She lives
now with her daughter in New Albany.

Special Assignment
Emily Hobson
Dist. #3
Parke County

INTERVIEW WITH ANDERSON WHITTED,
COLORED EX-SLAVE, OF ROCKVILLE, INDIANA

[Illustration: Anderson Whitted]

Mr. Whitted will be 89 years old next month October 1937. He was born in
Orange County, North Carolina. His mother took care of the white
children so her nine children were very well treated. The master was a
Doctor. The family were Hickory Quakers and did not believe in
mistreating their slaves, always providing them with plenty to eat, and
clothing to wear to church on Sunday. Despite a law that prohibited
books to Negroes, his family had a Bible, and an elementary spelling
book. Mr. Whitted's father belonged to his master's half-brother and
lived fourteen miles away. He was allowed a horse to go see them every
two weeks. The father could read, and spell very well so would teach
them on his visits. Mr. Whitted learned to read the Bible first, then in
later years has learned to read other things. It was the custom for the
master to search the negro huts, but Mr. Whitted's master never did.

The Doctor often took Mr. Whitted's grandmother with him to help care
for the sick. When the war broke out the Master's son joined the
southern forces. The son was wounded. The Doctor and Mr. Whitted's
grandmother went for the boy. On the way home the Doctor died but the
grandmother got the boy home and nursed him back to health. Life for the
Negroes was different after the son began running the place, he was not
good to them. Mr. Whitted was then 16 years old, and the older brother
was the overseer. The negroes had been allowed a share of the crop but
the new master refused them anything to live on. In that region the
wheat was harvested the middle of June. There was a big crop that year
but the entire family was turned out before the harvest, with nothing.
Mr. Whitted left his older brother with his mother and the children
sitting by the road, while he ran the 14 miles for his father to find
out what to do. The father borrowed two teams and wagons, rented a house
in the edge of town, and moved the family in.

The slaves were freed about that time, and for the first time in their
lives they were free, and the entire family together. The father went to
the governo