#666
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Neely Gray
818 E. Fifteenth, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 87
“I was born in Virginia. Dr. Jenkins bought my mother from a man named Norman. Brought us here on the boat. I know I was walkin’ and talkin’. I don’t remember about the trip, but I remember they said they had to keep me out from fallin’ in the river. I was too playified to remember anything about it.
“Durin’ the War I was a girl six or seven years old. Big enough to nuss my mother’s next chile, and she was walkin’ and talkin’ ’fore surrender.
“My mother was pushin’ a hundred when she died. I was her oldest chile. Sold with her.
“Dr. Jenkins had three women and all of ’em had girls. Raised up in the house. Dr. Jenkins said, ‘Doggone it, I want my darkies right back of my chair.’ He never did ’buse his colored folks. He was a ’cepted (exceptional) man—so different. I never saw the inside of the quarters.
“Dr. Jenkins’ house wasn’t far from the river. You could hear the boats goin’ up and down all night.
“I was scared of the Yankees ’cause they always p’inted a gun at me to see me run. They’d come in the yard and take anything they wanted, too.
“After surrender mama went and cooked for a man named Hardin.