MISSOURI
HERCt3LANEUM
EX-SL~.VE STORIES
	ROU~RTBHYÄNT	Page 3.	~	83



	“But I wouldn‘t g,o with her. I wouldn‘t leave dat other woman. ~bout 2 o‘clock dat night d‘e ~ia11 began to hit de house

and we had to ~it out. So I went with de other woman andy it was about two or three days before I would go with my mother. Two or three days later we all metagain and my mother said: ‘Don‘t you knöw your mother.‘ I knowed it was my mother ‘cause my brother what was deaf~ and dumb was with her. Den I went on with her. I would talk to my brother with signs.

	“Den we went to a little place away, away from Pilot Knob. Den my mother was free and she said,‘Robert, we is all free.‘ I was too young to know anything ‘bout it. ~fter we was free we put in a little stuff in de ground. We had to go to de woods to get some brush and make a brush fence around de garden to keep de cat-P tie out. Vie got permission from a man dat owned a farm to build our own log house. It took two or three days to build a one room house. We made up some mud with water and made it stiff enough to stick to de chinckin‘ . Den we cut a big hole in one end of de buildIng and got some flat rocks and made a fireplace. ~îe put mudon de inside and outside of de chimney. Sor~ietimes de chimney would catch on fire and we had to run to de branch to • get water and put it out. Sometimes it would catch‘on fire twic.e or three times in one night.