Talitha Lewis
From:
Arkansas
Interviewer: Mrs. Bernice Bowden
Person interviewed: Talitha Lewis
300 E. 21st Avenue, Pine Bluff, Arkansas
Age: 86
[Date Stamp: MAY 31 1938]
"I should say I was born in slavery times! Now if you ask me something
I don't know, I couldn't tell you, honey, 'cause I believe in people
tellin' the truth.
"In a way I know how old I is. I give what my white folks give me.
They told me I was born in 1852. Yes ma'am, my young missis used to
set down and work on me. She'd say, 'Get it in your head' 'cause I
ain't got no education.
"I 'member my old missis. Know her name as good as I do mine. Name was
Maria Whitley. After old master died, his property was divided and Jim
Whitley drawed me and my mother and my sister. Yes ma'am, it was my
sister.
"Goldsboro, North Carolina is where I was born, in Johnston County.
"Do I 'member anything 'bout peace declared? I should say I
do--'member long time 'fore it come.
"I seed so many different regiments of people I didn't know which was
which. I know the Yankees called ever'body Dinah. They'd say to me,
'Dinah, hold my horse,' and my hands would be full of bridles. And
they'd say, 'You got anything buried?' The white folks had done buried
the meat under my mother's house. And say, 'Is they good to you?' If
they hadn't a been we wouldn't a known any better than to tell it.
"I 'member they found where the meat was buried and they ripped up my
mother's feather bed and filled it full of hams and shoulders, and
there wasn't a middlin' in the lot. And kill chickens and geese! They
got ever'thing and anything they wanted.
"There was a battle-field about four miles from us where they fit at.
"Honey, I can't tell it like I know it, but I know it.
"Old master was a good man. You had plenty to eat and plenty to wear.
And on Monday morning all his colored folks had clean clothes. I wish
I could tell it like I know. He was a good man but he had as mean a
wife as I ever saw. She used to be Nettie Sherrod and she did not
like a black face. Yes ma'am, Jim Whitley was a good man but his
father was a devil.
"If Massa Jim had a hand he couldn't control, he sold him. He said he
wasn't goin' to beat 'em or have 'em run off and stay in the woods.
Yes'm, that was my master, Jim Whitley.
"His overseer was Zack Hill when peace declared.
"How long I been in Arkansas? Me? We landed at Marianna, Arkansas in
1889. They emigranted us here. They sure said they had fritter trees
and a molasses pond. They said to just shake the tree and the fritters
would fall in the pond. You know anybody that had any sense wouldn't
believe that. Yes ma'am, they sure told that lie. 'Course there was
times when you could make good money here.
"I know I is a slave time chile. I fared well but I sure did see some
that didn't.
"Our white folks had hands that didn't do nothin' but make clothes and
sheets and kivers.
"Baby, them Ku Klux was a pain. The paddyrollers was bad enough but
them Ku Klux done lots of devilment. Yes ma'am, they done some
devilment.
"I worked for a white man once was a Ku Klux, but I didn't know it for
a long time. One time he said, 'Now when you're foolin' around in my
closet cleanin' up, I want you to be pertickler.' I seed them rubber
pants what they filled with water. I reckon he had enough things for a
hundred men. His wife say, 'Now, Talitha, don't let on you know what
them things is.'
"Now my father belonged to the Adkins. He and my mother was married
with a stiffcate 'fore peace declared and after peace declared they
got a license and was married just like they marry now.
"My master used to ask us chillun, 'Do your folks pray at night?' We
said 'no' 'cause our folks had told us what to say. But the Lawd have
mercy, there was plenty of that goin' on. They'd pray, 'Lawd, deliver
us from under bondage.'
"Colored folks used to go to the white folks' church. I was raised up
under the old Primitive Baptist feet washin' church. Oh, that's a
time, baby!
"What I think of the younger generation? I don't know what to think of
'em. I don't think--I know they is goin' too fast.
"I learned how to read the Bible after I 'fessed religion. Yes ma'am,
I can read the Bible, praise the Lawd!"
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Abbie Lindsay
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Mary Lee
