"I come to Taylor's Bayou in '70 and rid stock long time for Mister Arceneaux and Mister Moise Broussard and farms some too. Then I comes to Beaumont when I's too old to work no more, and lives with one of my girls."
[Annie Osborne]
Annie Osborne, 81, was born in Atlanta, Georgia, a slave of Tom Bias. She was 'refugeed' to Louisiana by the Bias family, before the Civil War, and remained there with them for two years after she was freed. She has lived in Marshall, Texas, since 1869.
"Yes, suh, I's a Georgia nigger. I 'longed to Massa Tom Bias, and he lived in Atlanta. I couldn't state jus' how old I is, but I knows I was eleven years old when we come to Marshall, and that's in 1869.
"Mammy was Lizzie and born in Atlanta, and I's heared her say she was give to Tom Bias to settle a dept her owner owed. I don't know nothin' 'bout my daddy, 'cept he am named Tom Bias, and that am massa's name. So I guess he's my daddy. But I had two brothers, Frank and James, and I don't know if Massa Bias was they daddy or not.
"Massa Bias refugees me and my mammy to Mansfield, in Louisiana when I's jus' a baby. They come in wagons and was two months on the way, and the big boys and men rode hossback, but all the niggers big 'nough had to walk. Massa Bias opens a farm twelve mile from Mansfield. My mammy plowed and hoed and chopped and picked cotton and jus' as good as the menfolks. I allus worked in the house, nussin' the white chillen and spinnin' and housework. Me and my brother, Frank, slep' in Missy Bias house on a pallet. No matter how cold it was we slep on that pallet without no cover, in front the fireplace.
"Old man Tom never give us no money and half 'nough clothes. I had one dress the year round, two lengths of cloth sewed together, and I didn't know nothin' 'bout playin' neither. If I made too much fuss they put me under the bed. My white folks didn't teach us nothin' 'cept how they could put the whip on us. I had to put on a knittin' of stockin's in the mornin' and if I didn't git it out by night, Missy put the lash on me.
"My mammy was sceered of old Tom Bias as if he was a bear. She worked in the field all day and come in at night and help with the stock. After supper they made her spin cloth. Massa fed well 'nough, but made us wear our old lowel clothes till they most fell off us. We was treated jus' like animals, but some owners treated they stock better'n old Tom Bias handled my folks. I still got a scar over my right eye where he put me in the dark two months. We had a young cow and when she had her first calf they sent me to milk her, and she kicked me and run me round a li'l pine tree, fightin' and tryin' to hook me. Massa and missy standin' in the gate all the time, hollerin' to me to make the cow stand still. I got clost to her and she kicked me off the stool and I run to the gate, and massa grab me and hit me 'cross the eye with a leather strap and I couldn't see out my right eye for two months. He am dead now, but I's gwine tell the truth 'bout the way we was treated.
"I could hear the guns shootin' in the war. It sound like a thunder storm when them cannons boomin'. Didn't nary one our menfolks go to war. I know my brother say, 'Annie, when them cannons stops boomin' we's gwine be all freed from old Massa Tom's beatin's.
"But massa wouldn't let us go after surrender. My mammy pretends to go to town and takes Frank and goes to Mansfield and asks the Progoe Marshal what to do. He say we's free as old man Tom and didn't have to stay no more. Frank stays in town and mammy brings a paper from the progoe, but she's sceered to give it to Massa Tom. Me and James out in the yard makin' soap. I's totin' water from the spring and James fetchin' firewood to put round the pot. Mammy tells James to keep goin' next time he goes after wood and her and me come round 'nother way and meets him down the road. That how we got 'way from old man Bias. Me and mammy walks off and leaves a pot of soap bilin' in the backyard. We sot our pails down at the spring and cuts through the field and meets James down the big road. We left 'bout ten o'clock that mornin' and walks all day till it starts to git dark.