"'Motherless chilluns sees hard times; just ain't got no whar to go; goes from do' to do',' dat's de song dey got up. I doesn't know whar it come from. 'Nother one was: 'When de sun refuse to shine; Lord I wants to be in de number, when de sun refuse to shine. If I had a po' mother she gone on befo', Lord I promise her I would meet her when de saints go marching in.' Dat's what lots people is still trying to do.
"We sot mud baskets fer cat fish; tie grapevines on dem and put dem in de river. We cotch some wid hooks. I went seining many times and I set nets; bought seins and made de nets. Pull up sein after a rain and have seventy-five or eighty fish; sometimes have none. Peter Mills made our cat fish stew and cooked ash-cake bread fer us to eat it wid. Water come to our necks while we seining and we git de fish while we drifting down stream.
"We wear cotton clothes in hot weather, dyed wid red dirt or mulberries, or stained wid green wa'nuts—dat is de hulls. Never had much exchanging of clothes in cold weather. In dat day us haul wood eight or ten feet long. De log houses was daubed wid mud and dey was warm. Fire last all night from dat big wood and de house didn't git cold. We had heavy shoes wid wood soles; heavy cotton socks which was wore de whole year through de cold weather, but we allus go barefeeted in hot weather. Young boys thirteen to fifteen years old had de foots measured. When tracks be seed in de wa'melon patch, dey was called up, and if de measurements of dere tracks fitted de ones in de wa'melon patch, dat was de guilty nigger. I 'clar, you had to talk purty den. When I go in de wa'melon patch, I git de old missus to say fer me to go; den I could eat and nothing was said 'bout it.
"Sunday clothes was died red fer de gals; boys wore de same. We made de gals' hoops out'n grape vines. Dey give us a dime, if dey had one, fer a set of hoops.
"Twan't no dressing up fer marring in slavery times; just say, 'gwine to be a marriage tonight' and you see 'bout 40 or 50 folks dar to see it. If it be in wa'melon time, dey had a big feast atter de wedding. Old man preacher Tony would marry you fer nothing. De keep de wedding cake fer three weeks befo' it was eat."
Source: Gus Feaster (97), 20, Stutz Ave., Union, S.C.
Interviewer: Caldwell Sims, Union, S.C.
Project 1885-1
FOLKLORE
Spartanburg Dist. 4
July 7, 1937
Edited by:
Elmer Turnage
STORIES FROM EX-SLAVES
"I ain't never give you dis information. Miss Susie and Miss Tommie Carlisle, Marse Tom's onliest daughters, died befo' de surrender. Miss Susie slipped one day wid de scissors in her hand, and when she did dem scissors tuck and stuck in one her eyes and put it plum' smack out and she never did see out'n it no mo'. Dat made it so sad, and everybody cried wid her but it never done her narry bit of good.