"On Sadday nights us would frolic an' dance all night long iffen you wanted to, buck-dance, sixteen-hand reel and cake walk. Dey would blow reed quills an' have all the licker dey wanted. Mistiss, dey ain't jes' now drinkin' licker. Oh, dem cornshuckings! Shuk corn, drink an' holler all night long. Sometimes dey'd sing:
Dark cloud arising like gwine to rain,
Nothing but a black gal coming down the lane,
Nigger stole a pumkin an' started outer town;
Nigger heered it thunder, Lord, an' throwed dat pumkin down.
"Mistiss, I don't wanter tell you no mo' of dat.
"When us niggers ma'ied, dey didn't have no preacher. We jes' jumped over de broom, an' went on an' lived together. Iffen a gal went wrong, dey beat her nearly to death. Iffen you moved de place when you ma'ied, de other marsa had to buy you.
"De li'l niggers had big times. Us used to play, 'Green grow the willow tree, you swing my gal an' I swing yourn. Green grow de willow tree.' Dey used to sceer up us niggers 'bout "Raw Head an' Bloody Bones," gwine to ketch us dat was so sceer bad iffen us didn't mind 'em, but I ain't never seed nor believed in ghostes. Us didn't get sick much 'caze us didn't have no trash to eat an' Mistiss giv' us ebony of yarbs an' us wore sacks of yarbs 'roun' our necks too.
"The Yankees did plenty of harm. Marsa shot at some of dem; an' dey took off our cabin wagons. When us was freed dey singed, 'I'se gwine back to Dixie, no more my heart to wander, never see my master no mo'.'
"Marsa called us all up an' told us we was jes' free as him. He give us all a suit of clo'es, some money, a mule, a cow, wagon, hog and a li'l corn to start off on. Us moved to Dr. Lawrence Smiths near La-Fayette, Alabama.
"Later years I ma'ied Jane Drake at the cafe in Opelika, Alabama, and by de jedge at twelve o'clock. She died, den I ma'ied Phoebe Ethen Drake. Some says de church can't save you, but I sho' feels safer in hit, an' I jined 'caze I wants to be better dan I was an' try to be saved."
[Isaam Morgan]
Interview with Isaam Morgan
—Mary A. Poole, Mobile, Alabama