After their marriage my parents began farming in Bennettsville, Marlborough County, S. C., the place where I was born. I remember most vividly that two-roomed log cabin where my parents' ten children were born—
"Low and little, and black and old,
With children as many as it could hold."
However, my father soon began working for wages, and received $10 per month and the proverbial "rations"—three pounds of meat and a peck of meal per week. What a financier he must have been, for from that mean sum he managed to save $50 or $75 each year, and I still cherish the memory of how fondly I felt those crisp green-backs once a year. He brought them home every Christmas and allowed each member of the family to feel them—yes, even caress them.
When I was about nine years of age I entered the public school of the community, which was in session about four months in a year, opening late in the fall and going through the winter. My parents were so delighted and gratified at the progress I made that I was occasionally privileged to spend one month in the subscription school conducted near by during the summer.
When I was fourteen years of age a great sorrow visited our home. My mother died. I often wonder if any one can realize what it means to lose a mother without having suffered that bereavement. My father did not marry again.
About this time the authorities opened a school nearer us than the one I had been attending, but the teachers were usually very incompetent and my progress was seriously hindered.
The absorbing desire of my life had been to some day graduate from some institution of learning, but I found myself at eighteen years of age far from the goal of my ambition. I became alarmed. I realized what it would mean to grow to manhood in ignorance; I also knew that there were seven children younger than I to be cared for. I seriously thought the matter over. I finally broached it to my father, and he consented that I should try to make a way for myself.
I rented a small farm, trusting that by cultivating it I would be able to clear enough money to begin my education. I began wrong, for I had in advance mortgaged my crop. I began with $75, but when the year closed I had only $10. However, my aspirations were not to be daunted; I was resolved on going to school.
With this $10 I purchased the necessary books, paid my entrance fee, and entered the village graded school. I was poorly clad, and much of the time was without food, but I felt that I could not even ask my father for assistance because of his responsibility in caring for the younger children. I was constant, however, in my endeavor to find work, and finally a companion and I succeeded in getting an old farmhouse about three miles from the village in which to live. In a measure this suited me, for I loved the country.
The house was an old, dilapidated one, and I do not see now how we stood that first severe winter; but though I was in rags and my food was often roasted potatoes or peas with a little salt, I did not miss a single day's schooling that year, and great was my joy and satisfaction when, at the end of the year, I stood at the head of my class.