She is a firm believer in the Bible. It is apparent she strives to lead a religious life according to her understanding. She is a member of the Second Baptist Church since its organization in 1892.
Having passed her three score and ten years she is "ready to go when the Lord calls her."
WPA in Ohio
Federal Writers' Project
Bishop & Isleman
Reporter: Bishop
(Revision)
July 8, 1937
Topic: Ex-Slaves
Jefferson County, District #5
JOHN WILLIAMS MATHEUS
Ex-Slave, 77 years
"My mothers name was Martha. She died when I was eleven months old. My mother was owned by Racer Blue and his wife Scotty. When I was bout eleven or twelve they put me out with Michael Blue and his wife Mary. Michael Blue was a brother to Racer Blue. Racer Blue died when I was three or four. I have a faint rememberance of him dying suddenly one night and see him laying out. He was the first dead person I saw and it seemed funny to me to see him laying there so stiff and still."
"I remember the Yankee Soldier, a string of them on horses, coming through Springfield, W. Va. It was like a circus parade. What made me remember that, was a colored man standing near me who had a new hat on his head. A soldier came by and saw the hat and he took it off the colored man's head, and put his old dirty one on the colored man's head and put the nice new one on his own head."
"I think Abraham Lincoln the greatest man that ever lived. He belonged to no church; but he sure was Christian. I think he was born for the time and if he lived longer he would have done lots of good for the colored people."
"I wore jeans and they got so stiff when they were wet that they would stand up. I wore boots in the winter, but none in the summer."
"When slavery was going on there was the 'underground railway' in Ohio. But after the surrender some of the people in Ohio were not so good to the colored people. The old folks told me they were stoned when they came across the river to Ohio after the surrender and that the colored people were treated like cats and dogs."