Margret Hulm
From:
Arkansas
Interviewer: Mrs. Annie L. LaCotts
Person interviewed: Margret Hulm, Humphrey, Arkansas
Age: 97
(Story of Abraham Lincoln as a spy)
In the west edge of Humphrey in a small house beneath huge old trees
lives an aged Negro woman with her boy (61 years old) and his wife. This
woman is Margret Hulm who says she was born March 5, 1840 in Hardeman
County, Tennessee. When asked if she remembered anything about the war
and slavery days she said:
"Oh yes mam. I was 24 years old when the slaves were set free. My folks
belonged to Master Jimmie Pruitt, who owned lots of other slaves. When
they told him his niggers were free, he let them go or let them stay on
with him and he'd give them a place to live and some of the crops. I
guess that's what folks call a share crop now. I was what folks called a
house girl. I didn't work in the field like some of the other slaves. I
waited on my mistress and her chillun, answered the door, waited on de
table and done things like that. I remember Mr. Lincoln. He came one day
to our house (I mean my white folks' house). They told me to answer the
door and when I opened it there stood a big man with a gray blanket
around him for a cape. He had a string tied around his neck to hold it
on. A part of it was turned down over the string like a ghost cape. How
was he dressed beneath the blanket? Well, he had on jeans pants and big
mud boots and a big black hat kinda like men wear now. He stayed all
night. We treated him nice like we did everybody when they come to our
house. We heard after he was gone that he was Abraham Lincoln and he was
a spy. That was before the war. Oh, yes, I remember lots about the war.
I remember dark days what we called the black days. It would be so dark
you couldn't see the sun even. That was from the smoke from the
fighting. You could just hear the big guns going b-o-o-m, boom, all day.
Yes, I do remember seeing the Yankees. I saw 'em running fast one day
past our house going back away from the fighting place. And once they
hung our master. They told him they wanted his money. He said he didn't
have but one dollar. They said 'we know better than that.' Then they
took a big rope off of one de Yankee's saddle and took de master down in
de horse lot and hung him to a big tree. The rope must a been old, for
it broke. Our master was a big man though. Then they hung him again. He
told 'em he didn't have but one dollar and they let him down and said
'Well, old man, maybe you haven't got any more money.' So they let him
go when the mistress and her little chillun come down there. He didn't
have but one dollar in his pockets but had lots buried about the place
in two or three places."
While Margret was giving this information she was busily sewing together
what looked like little square pads. When examined they proved to be
tobacco sacks stuffed with cotton and then sewed together which would
make a quilt already quilted when she got enough of them sewed together
to cover a bed.
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John Hunter
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Anna Huggins
