his mother lived with me.
Now I lives with this niece here some and my daughter in Jackson. I
had fourteen children. I just got one left and grandchildren I go to
see. I make the rounds. Some of 'em good and some of them ain't no
account at tall.

"I used to take advice. They get up and leave the place. They don't
want old folks to advise 'em. If they can't get their price they sit
around and go hungry. They won't work for what I used to be glad to
get. I keep my girl on the right path and that is all I can do. My
niece don't work out but her husband works on the farm all the time.
She helps him. They go out and live till the work is done. He is off
now ploughing. Times is fast sure as you born, girl. Faster 'an ever I
seen."

Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: Henry Lee
R.F.D., two and one-half miles, Palestine, Arkansas
Age: 87

"I was born close to Huntsville, Alabama during slavery. My master was
Tom Laughinghouse and Miss Fannie, his wife. They had two children,
Jarman and Mattie. He was Dr. George Laughinghouse's brother. Dr.
George lived at Forrest City.

"He brung us to the old Pope place close to Forrest City after
'mancipation. We didn't know we was free. Finally we kept hearing
folks talk, then Master Tom told us we was free. We cleared land right
on after freedom like we was slaves.

"General Lee, a white man, owned a boat on the Mississippi River. He
owned my father. We took on his name way after freedom. Mother was
Becky Laughinghouse and father was Willis Lee. They had six children.

"After I come to Arkansas I went to school three days to a white man.
He was sont here from the North somewhere.

"My folks was all black pure stock niggers and field folks same as I
is.

"Mother's owners was good to her. They give them all day Saturday to
wash and iron and cook for her folks. They got a whooping if they went
to the field Monday morning dirty. They was very good to us. I can
recollect that. They was a reasonable set of white folks. They weighed
out everything. They whooped their hands. They had a white overseer
but he wasn't hired to whoop Laughinghouse's slaves.

"They 'lowed mother to weave at her home at night. He had seven or
eight families on his farm.

"The well was a curiosity to me then and would sure be one now. We had
a walled and curbed well. A long forked pole, a short chain and a long
rope. We pulled up the water by the long forked po