They would buy them and put them with
good healthy men to raise young slaves. I heard that. I was very small
when I seen that young woman sold and years later I heard that was what
was done.
"I don't know when freedom came on. I never did know. We was five or six
years breaking up. Master Stone never forced any of us to leave. He give
some of them a horse when they left. I cried a year to go back. It was a
dear place to me and the memories linger with me every day.
"There was no secret society or order of Ku Klux in reach of us as I
ever heard.
"I voted Republican ticket. We would go to Jackson to vote. There would
be a crowd. The last I voted was for Theodore Roosevelt. I voted here in
Helena for years. I was on the petit jury for several years here in
Helena.
"I farmed in your state some (Arkansas). I farmed all my young life. I
been in Arkansas sixty years. I come here February 1879 with distant
relatives. They come south. When I come to Helena there was but one set
of mechanics. I started to work. I learned to paint and hang wall paper.
I've worked in nearly every house in Helena.
"The present times are gloomy. I tried to prepare for old age. I had a
apartment house and lost it. I owned a home and lost it. They foreclosed
me out.
"The present generation is not doing as well as I have.
"My health knocked me out. My limbs swell, they are stiff.
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