A boys' life of Booker T. Washington

by Walter Clinton Jackson

On just such a plantation down in Franklin County, Virginia, Booker T. Washington was born. His mother was the cook on the plantation of a Mr. Burroughs who lived near a little crossroads post office, southwest of Lynchburg, called Hales’ Ford. There, in a little one-room cabin, Booker was born on April 5, 1856. The cabin had no glass windows. It had only one door, and it had a dirt floor. There were large cracks that let in the cold. In the middle of the floor there was a large opening in the ground in which sweet potatoes were stored. Sometimes as they put the potatoes in or took them out, Booker got one or two and roasted them. All of the cooking was done over the open fire in this cabin, for they had no stove. It was a very uncomfortable place in which to live.

The boy lived a hard life. He says: “I cannot remember a single instance during my childhood or early boyhood when our entire family sat down to the table together, and God’s blessing was asked, and the family ate a meal in a civilized manner. It was a piece of bread here, and a scrap of meat there. It was a cup of milk at one time and some potatoes at another.”[^[1]]

One day, when he was about five years old, he saw his young mistress and some visitors out in the yard eating ginger cakes. He said he never saw anything in his life that looked so good to him as those cakes did; and he thought that, if he ever got free, the height of his ambition would be to buy all the ginger cakes he wanted, just like those the young ladies were eating.

He had to sleep on a pallet. He never slept in a bed until after he was set free. The first pair of shoes he ever had was made of leather, but the soles were of wood, and they were very uncomfortable and made a great noise when he walked. He never thought of wearing anything on his head. But the worst thing about his dress in those early days was having to wear a flax shirt. These shirts were made of the roughest and coarsest part of the flax, and they were very uncomfortable. When new, they scratched severely. After they were worn awhile and “broken in,” they were fairly comfortable. His brother John often “broke in” Booker’s shirts for him, a very kind and generous thing to do.

He had no time to play when he was a boy. When he was a grown man, he was asked what games he played when he was a boy, and he answered that he had never played at all. He had to work so hard that no time was left for play. Even when he was a very small boy, he had to sweep the yards, carry water to the hands in the fields, help around the “big house,” and carry in wood. Going to mill was the worst job he had. A farm hand would put a sack of corn on a horse, put him on top of the sack, and send him off. It was a long way to the mill. Almost every time he was sent, the sack of corn would work to one side and then fall off. It was too heavy for him to put back; so he would have to wait until some one came along to help him. He sat and cried until some one came. It was often dark when he got home. He was terribly frightened when he was alone at night, for he was told that there were deserting soldiers in the woods, and that when they found little negro boys the first thing they would do would be to cut off their ears. Of course this was not true, but he thought it was.

Do you suppose this little boy had any chance to go to school? This is what he says: “I had no schooling whatever while I was a slave, though I remember on several occasions I went as far as the schoolhouse door with one of my young mistresses to carry her books. The picture of several boys and girls in a schoolroom engaged in study made a deep impression upon me, and I had the feeling that to get into a schoolhouse and study in this way would be about the same as getting into paradise.”[^[2]] This is the same boy who came to be the greatest educator of his race; the head of the greatest negro school in the world.

Founder’s Day Drill at Tuskegee

It must be remembered that the conditions under which Booker lived in these early years of his life were not restricted entirely to the negroes. Many of the white people were poor also, and many white boys wore flax shirts and shoes with wooden soles. Just after the Civil War, especially, all the white people of the South had a very hard time. White boys as well as negro boys had no time for play. Nor did they have an opportunity to go to school. In those days many white boys who were eager for an education had such difficulties to face as those which loomed up before Booker Washington.

By and by, when Booker was about nine years of age, there came a thrilling day. For four long years the great war had been going on. Often he had heard his mother singing freedom songs. He remembered being awakened one morning and saw his mother by his bed and heard her praying that Lincoln might be successful, and that her little boy might some day be free. He had seen some of the soldiers in their uniforms, home on furlough. He remembered when they brought home the body of “Marse Billy” and buried him amidst the bitter weeping of the slaves, who loved him as their friend, for he had often begged for them when they were about to be punished. While they vaguely knew and felt that the success of Lincoln meant freedom, and the success of the others meant slavery, they were still loyal and true to their masters. By means of the “grape vine telegraph,” that is, by passing news along quickly from one plantation to another, the slaves had kept pretty well informed of the progress of the war, and when Lee surrendered at Appomattox, the slaves knew it very soon.