MAY 11 1938
Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: Phillis Hicks
Edmondson, Arkansas
Age: 71
“My mother’s owner was Master Priest Gates. He had a son in Memphis. I seen him not long ago. He is an insurance agent. They was rosy rich looking folks. Mama was a yellow woman. She had fourteen living children. Her name was Harriett Gates. Papa named Shade Huggins. They belong to different folks. They was announced married before the War and they didn’t have to remarry.
“She said the overseers was cruel to them. They had white men overseers. She was a field hand. I heard her say she was so tired when she come to the house she would take her baby in her arms to nurse and go to sleep on the steps or under a tree and never woke till they would be going to the field. She would get up and go on back. They et breakfast in the field many and many a time. Old people cooked and took care of the children. She never was sold. I don’t know if my father was. They come from Alabama to Mississippi and my mother had been brought from Georgia to Alabama.
“She picked geese till her fingers would bleed to make feather beds for old master I reckon. They picked geese jus’ so often. The Gates had several big quarters and lots of land. They come to be poor people after the War—land poor. Mother left Gates after the War. They didn’t get nothing but good freedom as I ever heard of. My father was a shoemaker at old age. He said he learned his trade in slavery times. He share cropped and rented after freedom.
“I heard ’em say the Ku Klux kept ’em run in home at night. So much stealing going on and it would be laid at the hands of the colored folks if they didn’t stay in place. Ku Klux made them work, said they would starve and starve white folks too if they didn’t work. They was share cropping then, yes ma’am, all of them. I know that they said they had no stock, no land, no rations, no houses to live in, their clothes was thin. They said it was squally times in slavery and worse after freedom. They wore the new clothes in winter. By summer they was wore thin and by next winter they had made some more cloth to make more new clothes. They wove one winter for the next winter. When they got to share croppin’ they had to keep a fire in the fireplace all night to warm by. The clothes and beds was rags. Corn bread and meat was all they had to eat. Maybe they had pumpkins, corn, and potatoes. They said it was squally times.
“I got a place. I rented it out to save it. My brother rents it. I can’t hardly pay taxes. I’d like to get some help. I could sew if they would let me on. I can see good. I’m going to chop cotton but it so long till then.
“I washed and ironed in Memphis till washing went out of style. Prices are so high now and cotton cheap. I’m counting on better times.
“Times is close. Young folks is like young folks always been. Some are smart and some lazy. None don’t look ahead. They don’t think about saving. Guess they don’t know how to save. Right smart spends it foolish. I’m a widow and done worked down.”