"De rebels held Springfield from 1861 till 1862, when General Freemont come in and took it. Marmaduke and Price had de biggest armies of de southerners, Freemont come sneaking in, wrapped his wagon wheels with old blankets so dey wouldn't hear him coming, and he had a body guard of three hundred. Marmaduke and Price was den in Springfield. Freemont come 'bout daybreak, and started shooting de town up. He got de town and held it.
"Marmaduke and Price drifted 'round to de Southeast part of de State and went into Arkansas. Later dey had a three hour scrummage at Pea Ridge, Arkansas. Either 62 or 63, I kaint 'member much, I was too little and scairt to know. Being only ten or eleven years old. Dey was a man named Finis McCrae, a rebel in de Marmaduke and Price Army, in de infantry. He took sick some place in Arkansas. Dey brung him to us, we being rebels, and keep him two weeks in our up-stairs, not letting any one know he was dere. We kept him till he got better and he went back into de army and fit some more.
"I seen Marmaduke in person, when he was making his campaign for governor, down in Cuba, Missouri. All de Union sojers stopped at our house to get water. We had a runnin' stream that never did go dry. They filled their canteens there. All us chillun fussed 'bout 'em takin' our milk and butter outen de spring-house. Old missus keep all her milk and butter and cheese in dere to keep it cool. When de Union sojers come by our house to Rolla dey took so much of de water to fill dere canteens it nearly took our spring dry. Took every thing we had in de spring-house—milk, butter—everything.
"I don't 'member how dey was dressed, but dey all had on sumpin' blue. Uniforms I guess. Me and four more little darkies was one-half mile offen de big road when dey passed, and got scared and run back to old missus house and hid in de old barn loft all dat night. Old missus asked us what we did for sumpin' to eat. We told her we bent de rye down in de field and rubbed de grain out wid our hands and eat dat. She took us to de house and give us sompin' to eat. De sojers was still passing de house den.
"In time of de Civil War we wouldn't come down to Rolla, we went south to do our trading. We wasn't Union and Rolla was Union Headquarters. Old Master was getting old den, he had been a colonel in some army or other way 'fore de Civil War.
"Lincoln issued 'green backs' 'long 'bout '61 or '62, after Stephen A. Douglas goes up to Washington and tell Lincoln, after he got de 'nomination dat if he didn't get Jeff Davis and some of de leaders and prosecute 'em, he was going to have war on his hands. Lincoln tells Douglas to go back and tell Jeff Davis to lay dem guns down, dat in 90 days he would 'low dem so much a head for dere niggers. Dat if dey would free dem dey could be paid for so much a head, by taxation. But Lincoln told dem dey would all have to come back together again same as before like dey was. You see dese folks in de south had done got $8,000,000, all dat ammunition and guns and things from England. Jeff Davis and dem leaders wouldn't give it up.
"De first issue of greenbacks was $175,000,000 and de next issue was $250,000,000. We had been told all dis and I ask old missus if she reckon we could whip dem 'blue bellied yankees'. I says: 'Dey ain't got no money'.
"We called de Union sojers—'Yankees' and our side was called de Gray or de Rebels. It's 75 years, the 10th day of August, 1937, that General Lyon was killed.
"My boss—Hancock was de biggest slave holder in Missouri when de war first come up. He settled four miles east of Springfield, Missouri. He owned close to 1200 or 1500 acres of ground. From Springfield to Strafford—east. We had 375 acres in cultivation—corn, oats, wheat, rye, and clover was our main crops.
"My daddy belonged to a man named Lou Langston. There is a railroad station named for this same Langston. What was known as the 'Gulf Road.' I took my mammy's white folk's name. They were as fine and good as anybody. The first child old missus had was a boy, Bill Hancock. The first child my old granny had (on my mammy's side) was a boy, named Joe. Old missus gave granny's boy Joe, to her boy Bill, as a slave. You see my old missus and my old granny was born a year apart demselves.