"When my folks first come to Arkansas we lived in a cabin that just had a balin' sack hangin' in the door and one night a bear come in and my brother and I broke a board off the side and fell right out in the cane. We all hollered so some folks come down and shot the bear. I ain't never seed a bear before and I didn't know what it was.
"I 'member when the Yankees come to my boss man's place. They wanted to shake hands but he was scared to death and wouldn't do it. Another time the Yankees captured him and kept him three months. They took his horse and he finally come home on a mule that didn't have but three legs. I guess the Yankees give him the mule. He turned the old mule loose and said he never wanted to see another Yankee. If he saw any kind of a white man comin' down the road he run in the house and hid between the feather bed and the mattress.
"One time the Yankees come and drunk the sweet milk and took all the butter, turkeys and hogs and then broke the powder horn against the maple tree.
"The cook say 'I'm gwine tell Marse Joe you drink all this milk.' The Yankees say, 'Let the damn fool alone—here we are tryin' to free her and she ain't got no sense.' They said there wouldn't be any more hard times after the war.
"But I sure have seen some hard times. I have washed and cooked and done 'bout everything.
"When I get up in the morning I got the limburger (lumbago) in my back so I ain't able to do much. Sometimes I have something to eat and sometimes I don't."
Mrs. Carol Graham
Mrs. Mildred Thompson
El Dorado District
Fannie Sims.
Customs.
"How ole is ah? Ise about 78. Yes'm ah wuz live durin de wah. Mah ole moster wuz Mistuh Jake Dumas we lived near de Ouachita rivuh bout five miles fum El Dorado landin. Ah membush dat we washed at de spring way, way fum de house. What dat yo say? Does ah know Ca'line. Ca'line, lawsy, me yes. Ca'line Washington we use tuh call huh, she wuz one uv Mr. Dumas niggers. We washed fuh de soldiers. Had tuh carry day clo'es tuh dem aftuh dark. Me an Ca'line had tuh carry dem. We had tuh hide de horse tuh keep de soldiers fum gittin him. When we would take de horse tuh de plum orchard we would stay dah all day to dark wid "Blackie". Dat wuz de horse's name. Mah job mostly wuz tuh watch de chillun an feed mah mistress chickens.