1p9

M.3 .Ross
	jcr-1/25/37	Talk with ex-slave
	.4 ~	SA1UE GRAY
	IULi17Ř	~ ~-~--
	Ssrah G~i~ay is an aged. ex~s1~we, whose years hive riot only bent b~er body bu.t seem to have oloudied. her memoi‘y. Only a few faets relating to 8lSvery coald, therefore, be learned from her. The events she related, however, seemed to give her as much
pleasure a~ a child playing with a favorite toy.
Sarah
The only recofl~1on ~• has of her mother is seeing ber

	lay in her coffin, as she was very young when her mother

	She remembers asking her sisterS why they didn‘t give: b~r

	any breakfast.

	Sarah‘s master was Mr. Jim Nesbit, who wa~ the owner ot a small plantation In Gwinnett County. The exact nu.mber of slaves on the plantation were not known, but there were enough to carry on the work of plowing, hoeing and. chopping the cotton and. other crops. Women as well as men were eipeoted. to turn out the required. an~u~nt of work, whether it was picking cotton, ou~tting logs, splitting rails for fences or working in the house.

	Sarah was a house slave, performing the duties of a ~id. She Wa s of ten taken o n tri pa wi th ~~1e mi stres s, a nd. trea ted mor e a~ one of the Nesbit family than as a slave. She remarked,“I even ate the same kind. of food as the master‘s family.“

	The Nesbits, according to Sarah, •ollowed the cas tomary practice of the other slave o~ers in the matter of the punish— nient of slaves. She says, however, that while there were stories
slave o~ers
of s cane very oi‘aOl mas ters ‚ in her opinion the ~s•*~bi•;of those

d.ays were not as cruel as some people today. She said. occasionally slave owners appointed some of the slaves 88 overseers, and. very Often these slave—overseers were very cruel.
as she died.

mother