Matilda Miller
From:
Arkansas
Interviewer: Mrs. Annie L. LaCotts
Person interviewed: Matilda Miller
Humphrey, Ark.
Age: 79
The day of the interview Matilda, a nice clean-looking Negro woman, was
in bed, suffering from some kind of a pain in her head. She lives in a
little two-room unpainted boxed house beside the highway in Humphrey.
Her house is almost in the shadow of the big tank which was put up
recently when the town acquired its water system.
When told that the visitor wanted to talk with her about her early life,
Matilda said, "Well, honey, I'll tell you all I can, but you see, I was
just a little girl when the war was, but I've heard my mother tell lots
of things about then.
"I was born a slave; my mother and daddy both were owned by Judge
Richard Gamble at Crockett's Bluff. I was born at Boone Hill--about
twelve miles north of DeWitt--and how come it named Boone Hill, that
farm was my young mistress's. Her papa give it to her, just like he give
me to her when I was little, and after she married Mr. Oliver Boone and
lived there the farm always went by the name of 'Boone Hill.' The house
is right on top of a hill, you know, it shure was a pretty place when
Miss Georgia lived there, with great big Magnolia trees in the front
yard. I belonged to Miss Georgia, my young mistress, and when the
niggers were freed my mamma staid on with her. She was right there when
both of his chillun were born, Mr. John Boone and Miss Mary, too. I
nursed both of them chillun. You know who Miss Mary is now, don't you?
Yes'um, she's Mr. Lester Black's wife and he's good, too.
"I was de oney child my mother had till twelve years after the
surrender. You see, my papa went off with Yankees and didn't come back
till twelve years after we was free, and then I had some brothers and
sisters. Exactly nine months from the day my daddy come home, I had a
baby brother born. My mother said she knew my daddy had been married or
took up with some other woman, but she hadn't got a divorce and still
counted him her husband. They lived for a long time with our white
folks, for they were good to us, but you know after the boys and girls
got grown and began to marry and live in different places, my parents
wanted to be with them and left the white folks.
"No mam, I didn't see any fighting, but we could hear the big guns
booming away off in the distance. I was married when I was 21 to Henry
Miller and lived with him 51 years and ten months; he died from old age
and hard work. We had two chillun, both girls. One of them lives here
with me in that other room. Mamma said the Yankees told the Negroes when
they got em freed they'd give em a mule and a farm or maybe a part of
the plantation they'd been working on for their white folks. She thought
they just told em that to make them dissatisfied and to get more of them
'to join up with em' and they were dressed in pretty blue clothes and
had nice horses and that made lots of the Negro men go with them. None
of em ever got anything but what their white folks give em, and just
lots and lots of em never come back after the war cause the Yankees put
them in front where the shooting was and they was killed. My husband
Henry Miller died four years ago. He followed public work and made
plenty of money but he had lots of friends and his money went easy too.
I don't spect I'll live long for this hurtin' in my head is awful bad
sometime."
Next:
Nathan Miller
Previous:
Henry Kirk Miller
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