42()~49 *
	EX~..SLAV~ STORIES	~ Page One	•..
	( Texas)	~	*	p


FRANCIS BLACK was born at
	.	Grand Bluff, Mississippi ‚ ab~it
		1850, on the Jim Canton plan-‘
		tation. When five years old,
		she was stolen and taken to the
		sl~zve market in 1~Tew Orleans.
		Failing to sell her there, the
		slave traders took her to Jef—
		ferson, Texas, arid sold her to
		Bi1l~Tumlin. ?rancis stayed
		with him five years after she
		was freed, then iriartied and	*
		moved to Cass County, Texas.
		She became blind a year ago,	  *
		and now 1 ives at the Bagland Old.
	~	Folks Home ‚ 31 8 Elm St . ‚ Texarkana ‚ .
		Texas~



	“My name ~arri Prancis Black, e~d I don‘ t know jes ~ how old I is, but tmembers lots ‘b~t them slave days. I was a big gal, washint and ironint, when they sot the d.arkies free. ~‘rom that, I c~)late I‘m in my eighties.

	s, ~ was boi‘n in Grand Bluff, in Mississ ipp I ‚ on Old ManOarit ont ~ plantation, and I was stole from my folks when I was a 11,1 gal and

*	never seed th~za no more. Us kids played in thebig road there In Mis— siesippi, and one day ras and tnother gal is playin‘ up and down the road and three whlt e men come ~ I ong in a wagon. They grabs us up and. puts us~ in the wagon and covers us with quilts. I hollers and. yells and one the men say, ‘S~Iet up, you nigger, or Ill kill you.‘ I told him, ‘Kill me if you want s t o — you st oie me from my folks • t

“Th~ men t ook us t o New Orleans t o the • big slave market . I had

lông hair arid they cut lt off like a boy and tried to sell me, but I told •theini men what loo~cs at me, the men ~ut my hair off and stole me.

~ . ; . ~ mc man ~h&t cmt n~ hair off c~irsed me and said if I &Idn t~ bush he ~ d ~ ~ ~: ~ ki1lms~ bu:t he co9:tdn‘t séll us at New Orleans and tookus to Jefferson.