!~ISSOURI
~	LOUIS EX~S~V~ STORIES
	J~~L	Page 3[	22



	“I got what little education I got, tending night school here in St. Louis. I ~~ot ‘nough to git ordained in da Chamber Street Bap~ tist Church for a preacher. Den I corne in höliness in Elder 3ones, Church of God in Christ on Kennerly Avenue. I ~astored~the Macedonia S‘~iritual Church eight years in East St. Louis, Ill. I been narried twice and a~de father of three children, all dead, and both wifes dead. I don‘t know how long none of ‘em been dead. My mother died while I was 1~r~ de army and my father ~~ot drowned before I was born. I only had two sisters and three brothers, and dey is all dead. My • brother, 3~im Bryant, died in de army. He enlisted one year before I did, but in a different regiment. I has voted many times in my life/. time, and always voted Republican till dis last election, I decided I better vote de Democrat ticket and I did, and I don‘t regret it either.

	“I gits my washing done by de neighbors dat do washing and I eat at de restaurant on de corner. De Ku Klux never bothered me none ‘causel st4yed~ north out of dere reach.

	“I ‘member de old slaves used to sing: ‘Amazing Grace HOW

Sweet De Sound‘; ‘I want to be a Soldier, Since de Lord has set me .

Free‘ ; ‘Fighting for Liberty‘ ; ‘Why Shoùld We Start, and Fear to Die‘;

	‘Death is the Gate to Endless Joy and Yet We Dread to Enter Th~re‘ ~ ‘The Pain, the groan, the dying strife, rights our approaching souls

	away‘; ‘Jesus can make a dying bed, soft as downy pillows are, whilst