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times he come dat day, ‘specially in crop season. He never talked to us slaves much, just talked to de overseer ‘bout us all, I reckon. De overseer was a nigger and de meanest man, white or black1 I ever see. Dat nigger wouldstrut ‚ round wid a leather strap on his shoulder and would whip de other slaves unmerciful. He worked us hard from sunrise to sunset every day in de week, ‚ cept some Saturday evenin‘ s . ~ Most of de grown slave women knccked off from field work at dinn~r time on Saturdays and done de washi~‘ ~ for de rest of ‘dé slaves. -

ttyes sir, us had a plenty of rations to eat;no fancy vittles,

no •

just plain corn bread, meat and vegetables. Dere was/flour bread or any kind of sweet stuff for de slaves to eat. -Master say~sweet things ‘fected

.	de stomach and teeth in a bad way. 11e wanted us to stay well and healthy
	so us cQuld work lmrd.	~	~ -

-	- ~‘~ster Tom was good to Us, course he was, ‘cause he didntt see us

much no wayo But dat nigger overseer was de~ devil settin‘ cross-legged for de rest of us ~n de plantation all de time. I never has believed aXt master ‘tended for dat nigger to- treat us like he ~did. He took “vantage of his

bein‘ t~y an&talk soft talk when he come again. Yes sir, he sho‘ did.

I ~	“Not very long after de Yankees come, us was told dat de ni~gers

~	was free.~Youmigh~ thixik dat was & happy day for us s~laves, but I didn‘t

think lak dat. I was kinda lonesome and sad lak. Us slaves was lost,

~	didn‘t ~~what to do or where ~to ~o. D~~‘t ~x think dat was a~sad time? “How old was I when I done xo~j court~in‘ ? What‘ s dat? Dat courtin‘ ~

	stuff is what whitefolke does, no nigger kziows what dat fancy thing is. ~ - Us j~si~ natohally live.s together; men and. women mtes•~ lak~ de animals out
~ -‚	I	I	J	I	I	/