John Franklin
From:
South Carolina
Project #1655
Stiles M. Scruggs
Columbia, S.C.
JOHN FRANKLIN
EX-SLAVE 84 YEARS OLD.
"I is the son of John Franklin and Susan Bobo Franklin. I was born
August 10th, 1853 in Spartanburg County. My daddy was a slave on the
plantation of Marster Henry Franklin, sometimes called Hill and my mammy
was a slave on the plantation of Marster Benjamin Bobo. They was
brother-in-law's and lived on a plantation joining each other.
"My white marsters and their mistresses was good to us and to all their
slaves. We have plenty to eat and wear, on the Bobo plantation, from the
time I can remember up to the time I was 'bout eleven years old. In
1861, my marsters go away with their neighbors, to fight the damn
Yankees and the plantation was left in charge of the mistresses and
worked by the slaves. The slaves all raised 'bundance of rations, but
pretty soon there was a scarcity 'cause they was no coffee at the store
and stragglin' Yankees or what they call 'Rebel soldiers' come 'long
every few days and take all they can carry.
"That shortage begun in 1862, and it kept on gettin' worse all the time,
and when Lincoln set all niggers free, there was such a shortage of food
and clothes at our white folks houses, that we decided to move to a
Dutch Fork plantation. My daddy go 'long with other niggers to fight for
'Uncle Abe' and we never see him no more. Soon after that me and mammy
told our mistress goodbye, and move down to her daddy's place, 'bout ten
miles from Chapin. I was ten years old that year and we raise corn,
beans, 'taters and chickens for ourselves and to sell, when we could go
to Columbia and sell it and buy coffee and other things that we could
not raise at home. So we do pretty well for a year or two and we keep
up our tradin' trips to Columbia, which 'counts for me and Ben Lyles, my
cousin 'bout my age, comin' to Columbia on February 16, 1868. We sold
out and stayed all night at the home of Ben's uncle. He had us do some
tasks 'bout his home on Lincoln Street the next day and it was way in
the day befo' we start home. We walk north on what was known then as the
Winnsboro road 'til we come to Broad River road, and we take it. There
was one or two farm houses north of Elmwood Street on the Winnsboro road
at that time and only one house on Broad River road, the farm house of
Mr. Coogler, which is still standin'. There was a big woodsland at the
forks of the Winnsboro road and Broad River road.
"After we walk 'long the Broad River road, what seem to us for a quarter
of a mile, we see four or five old men standin' on the left side of the
road wavin' a white flag. We walks out in the woods on the right side
opposite and watches. Soon we see what seem lak a thousand men on hosses
comin' briskly 'long. The men keep wavin' the white flag. After many had
passed, one big bearded man rein up his hoss and speak with the men
wavin' the white flag. They tell the soldier there am no 'Rebel soldier'
in Columbia and the blue-clad army am welcome; beggin' them to treat the
old folks, women and children, well. The Yankee soldier set straight and
solemn on his hoss, and when the old men finish and hand him a paper, he
salute and tell them, 'Your message will be laid befo' General Sherman'.
"All this time the ground am shakin' from the roar of big guns 'cross
the river. Ben and me run thru the woods to our footlog and see
thousands still comin' into Columbia, all 'long. We get 'fraid and
stayed in the woods 'til we get out of sight of the soldiers. But we
ain't got far over the top of the hill 'til we come face to face with
more men on hosses. One of the men, who seem to be the leader, stop his
hoss and ask us boys some questions. We answer as best we can, when he
grin at us and pull out some money and give us a nickel a piece.
"We travel on toward Chapin and meet our mammies and many other people,
some them white. They all seem scared and my mammy and Ben's mammy and
us, turns up the river and camps on the hill, for the night, in the
woods. We never sleep much, for it was 'most as light as day, and the
smell of smoke was terrible. We could see people runnin' in certain
parts of Columbia, sometimes. Next mornin' we look over the city from
the bluff and only a few houses was standin' and hundreds of tumble-down
chimneys and the whole town was still smokin'.
"I dreams yet 'bout that awful time, but I thank God that he has
permitted me to live 'long enough to see the city rebuilt and it
stretching far over the area where we hid in the trees."
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Emma Fraser
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Charlotte Foster
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