"You know, I'm not tellin' you things what have been told me, but I'm tellin' you things I knows.
"I remember when the Zoabbes company came from Georgia here to Wilmin'ton an' they had all ladies as officers.[1]
"I remember when the Confederates captured part of the Union Army at Fort Sumter, S.C., and they brought them here to Wilmin'ton and put them out under Fourth Street bridge, and the white ladies of Wilmin'ton, N.C. cooked food and carried it by baskets full to them. We all had plenty of food. A warehouse full of everything down there by the river nigh Red Cross Street, an' none of us ever went hungry 'till the war was over.
"I remember when Gen'ral Grant's Army came to the river. They mounted guns to boombar the city. Mr. John Dawson an' Mr. Silas Martin, they went on the corner of Second an' Nun Streets on the top of Ben Berry's house an' run up a white sheet for a flag, an' the Yankees did'n' boombar us. An' Mr. Martin gave his house up to the Progro Marshells, and my mother cleaned up the house an' washed for them. Her name was Caroline West.
"I remember when that Provo Marshell told the colored people that any house in Wilmin'ton they liked, that was empty, they could go take it, an' the first one they took was the fine Bellamy Mansion on Market an' Fifth Street."
"Uncle Jackson", asked the interviewer, "don't you remember that house was headquarters of the Federal Army? How could colored people occupy it?"
Uncle Jackson: "I don't remember nothin' about Federal soldiers bein' in that house, but I'm tellin' you I knows a lot of common colored folks was in it because I seen 'em sittin' on the piazza an' all up an' down those big front steps. I seen 'em. Nice colored people wouldn't 'a gone there. They had respec' for theirselves an' their white folks. But Dr. Bellamy came home soon with his fam'ly an' those colored people got out. They wan't there long.
"Endurin' of slavery I toted water for the fam'ly to drink. I remember when there was springs under where the new Court House is now, and all the white folks livin' 'round there drank water from those springs. They called it Jacob Spring. There was also a spring on Market Street between Second and Third Streets, that was called McCrayer (McCrary) spring. They didn't 'low nobody but rich folks to get water from that spring. Of co'se I got mine there whenever I chose to tote it that far. We did'n' work so hard in those days. I don't know nothin' about field han's an' workmen on the river, but so far as I knows the carpenters an' people like that started work at 8 o'clock A.M. and stopped at 5 o'clock P.M. Of course 'round the house it was different. Our folks done pretty much what the white folks did because we was all pretty much one an' other.
"Did I ever know of any slaves bein' whipped? I seen plenty of 'em whipped over at the jail, but them was bad niggers, (this with a grimace of disgust, and shaking of the head), they needed whippin'. But (with a chuckle) I sho' would have hated to see anybody put they han's on one of my owner's people. We was all 'spectable an' did'n know nothin' about whippen. Our mammy's spanked us aplenty, yes mam they did.
"I remember when they didn't have no trussels 'cross either river, an' they had a passages boat by the name of Walker Moore, an' the warf was up there by the Charlotte railroad (S.A.L.) The Boat would take you from there to the bluff an' then you would have to catch the train to go to Greensboro, and other places in No'th Carolina.