Adeline White
"I 'member going through the woods one time and seein' somethin' black come up 'fore me. It must a been a ghost. I got a boy call' Henry what live in Welch and he kin see ghosties all the time. He jus' look back over he lef' shoulder and see plenty of 'em. He say they has a warm heat what make him sweat.
"Old massa didn't go to the war and his boys was too little. We jus' heared about the war and that it was goin' to free us. In the night us would creep out way in the woods and have the prayer meetin', prayin' for freedom to come quick. We has to be careful for if massa find out he whip all of us, sho'. We stays nearly all night and sleeps and prays and sleeps and prays. At las' we hears freedom is on us and massa say we are all free to go, but if we stay he pay us some. Most of us goes, for that massa am sho' mean and if we doesn't have to stay we wouldn't, not with that massa.
"We scatters and I been marry twice. The first man was Eli Evans in Jennings, in Louisiana and us have six chillen. The second man he James White but I has no more chillen. Now I lives with my gal what called Lorena and she make me happy. She sho' good to her old mammy, what ain't much good no more."
[Sylvester Sostan Wickliffe]
Sylvester Sostan Wickliffe, of Ames, Texas, was born in St. Mary's Parish, Louisiana, in 1854. A free-born Negro, Wickliffe tells an interesting story about his life and that of his uncle, Romaine Vidrine, who was a slave-holder. Wickliffe has a nicely furnished home in Beaumont, and two of his children have been to college.
"I's what dey call a free-born nigger. Its a long story how dat come about, but I can tell you.
"Three Frenchmen come to Louisiana from France. In three generations dey mix with Indians and Negroes. Dey high-born Frenchmen and 'cumulate plenty property. Before dey die dey make 'greement 'mongst demselves. When one die de property go to de other two; de last one livin' git all three plantations and all dat's on dem. It so happen dat old man Vidrine's daddy live longes', so he git it all. But he so good he divide up and my daddy gits forty acres good land. My daddy's greatgrandpapa was one dem first three Frenchmen.
"My daddy was Michael and mama was Lucy and dey a whole passel chillen, Frances, Mary, Clotilde, Astasia and Tom, Samuel, Gilbert and Edward. My daddy was part Indian and I had some half-brothers and sisters what wore blanket and talk Indian talk. Dey used to come see daddy and set round and talk half de night and I never understan' a word dey sayin'.
"Mama didn't have no Indian blood in her, but she born in Louisiana and a right purty, brown-skin woman, probably some French or Spanish in her.