"Christmas Day Marse Billy called us to de big house and give us a little fresh meat and sweet bread, dat was cake. Christmas warn't much diff'unt f'um other times. Jus' more t'eat. Us jus' had dat one day off, and New Year's Day was used as a holiday too.
"Oh, dem cornshuckin's! All day 'fore a cornshuckin' dey hauled corn and put it in great piles as high as dis here house. Us sung all de time us was shuckin' corn. Dere was a lot of dem old shuckin' songs. De one us sung most was: 'Whooper John and Calline all night.' Marse Billy, he give 'em coffee and whiskey all night and dat made 'em git rough and rowdy. Den de shucks did fly. Us had one more grand feast when de last ear of corn had done been shucked. Dere warn't nothin' lackin'.
"Cotton pickin's warn't planned for fun and frolic lak cornshuckin's. If Marse Billy got behind in his crops, he jus' sent us back to de fields at night when de moon was bright and sometimes us picked cotton all night long. Marster give de 'oman what picked de most cotton a day off, and de man what picked de most had de same privilege.
"Old Aunt Martha what nussed de chillun while deir Mammies wukked in de field was de quiltin' manager. It warn't nothin' for 'omans to quilt three quilts in one night. Dem quilts had to be finished 'fore dey stopped t'eat a bit of de quiltin' feast. Marse Billy 'vided dem quilts out 'mongst de Niggers what needed 'em most.
"Dem blue and white beads what de grown 'omans wore was jus' to look pretty. Dey never meant nothin' else. Mammy would skeer us down 'bout Rawhead and Bloody Bones. Us was all time a-lookin' for him, but he never got dar. What skeered us most was painters (panthers) a-howlin' close to our cabins at night. You could hear 'em most any night. When Mammy wanted to make us behave all she had to say was: 'I hears dem painters comin'!' Dat made us jus' shake all over and git mighty still and quiet. De mens tried to run dem painters down, but dey never did ketch one.
"One of de cabins was allus ha'nted atter some of de slaves got kilt in it whilst dey was fightin'. Nobody never could live in dat cabin no more atter dat widout ha'nts gittin' atter 'em. De wust of 'em was a 'oman ha'nt what you could hear sweepin' up leaves in de yard and all dat time you might be lookin' hard and not see a leaf move. In dat cabin you could all time hear ha'nts movin' cheers and knockin' on de wall. Some of dem ha'nts would p'int a gun in your face if you met 'em in de dark. Dem ha'nts was too much for me.
"Our white folks was good as dey knowed how to be when us got sick. I don't 'member dat dey ever had a doctor for de slaves, but dey give us all kinds of home-brewed teas. Pinetops, mullein and fat light'ood splinters was biled together and de tea was our cure for diff'unt ailments. Scurvy grass tea mixed wid honey was good for stomach troubles, but you sho' couldn't take much of it at a time. It was de movin'est medicine! Round our necks us wore asafetida sacks tied on strings soaked in turpentine. Dat was to keep diseases off of us.
"What does I 'member 'bout de war? Well, it was fit to fetch our freedom. Marse Billy had a fine stallion. When de sojers was comin', he sont Pappy to de woods wid dat stallion and some gold and told him not to let dem yankees find 'em. Dat stallion kept squealin' 'til de yankees found him, and dey tuk him and de gold too. Grandma was a churnin' away out on de back porch and she had a ten dollar gold piece what she didn't want dem sojers to steal, so she drapped it in de churn. Dem yankees poured dat buttermilk out right dar on de porch floor and got grandma's money. Marse Billy hid hisself in a den wid some more money and other things and dey didn't find him. Dey tuk what dey wanted of what dey found and give de rest to de slaves. Atter de sojers left, de Niggers give it all back to Marster 'cause he had allus been so good to 'em.
"Us stayed on wid Marse Billy for sev'ral years atter de war. He paid us $10 a month and he 'lowanced out de rations to us evvy week; most allus on Monday 'cause Sundays us had 'nough company to eat it all at one time. He give us three pounds of fat meat, a peck of meal, a peck of flour, 25¢ worth of sugar, and a pound of coffee. Dat had to last a whole week.
"I didn't take in nothin' 'bout Abraham Lincoln, Jefferson Davis and dat dar Booker T. Washin'ton man, but I heared folks say dey was all right.