Thomas Johns
From:
Texas
THOMAS JOHNS, 508 Knopp St., Cleburne, Texas, was born April 18,
1847, in Chambers Co., Alabama. He belonged to Col. Robert Johns,
who had come to Alabama from Virginia. After Johns was freed he
stayed with his old owner's family until 1874, when he moved to
Texas.
"My father's name was George and my mother's name was Nellie. My father
was born in Africa. Him and two of his brothers and one sister was stole
and brought to Savannah, Georgia, and sold. Dey was de chillen of a
chief of de Kiochi tribe. De way dey was stole, dey was asked to a dance
on a ship which some white man had, and my aunt said it was early in de
mornin' when dey foun' dey was away from de land, and all dey could see
was de water all 'round. She said they was members of de file-tooth
tribe of niggers. My father's teeth was so dat only de front ones met
together when he closed his mouth. De back ones didn' set together. W'en
his front teeth was together, de back ones was apart, sorta like a V on
its side.
"My mother was born a slave in Virginia. She married there and had a
little girl, and they was sold away from the husband and brought to
Alabama. She said her mother was part Indian and part nigger. Her father
was part white and part nigger, but he look about as white as a white
man.
"My brother's names was John, Jake and Dave. My sister's names was Ann,
Katie, Judie and Easter.
"I belonged to Col. Robert Johns. He owned 30 or 35 slaves. We was well
treated and had the same food the white folks did, and didn' none of us
go hongry. Col. Johns didn' have his niggers whipped, neither.
"Marster's place had 500 acres in it. We raised cotton, corn and rice,
vegetables and every sort of fruit that would grow there, a lot of it
growin' wild. We et mostly hog meat, but we had some beef and mutton,
too. When we'd kill a beef, we'd send some to all the neighbors.
"We done a good day's work, but didn' have to work after night 'less it
was necessary. We was allowed to stop at 12 o'clock and have time for
rest 'fore goin' back to work. Other slave owners roun' our place wasn't
as good to dere slaves, would work 'em hard and half starve 'em. And
some marsters or overseers would whip dere niggers pretty hard,
sometimes whip 'em to death. Marster Johns didn' have no overseer. He
seed to the work and my father was foreman. For awhile after old Marster
died, in 1862 or 1863, I forget which now, we had a overseer, John
Sewell. He was mean. He whipped the chillen and my mother told Miss
Lucy, old marster's oldest girl.
"We was allus well treated by old marster. We was called, 'John's free
niggers,' not dat we was free, but 'cause we was well treated. Jesse
Todd, his place joined ours, had 500 slaves, and he treated 'em mighty
bad. He whipped some of 'em to death. A man sold him two big niggers
which was brothers and they was so near white you couldn' hardly tell
'em from a white man. Some people thought the man what sold 'em was
their daddy. The two niggers worked good and dey hadn' never been
whipped and dey wouldn' stand for bein' whipped. One mornin' Todd come
up to 'em and told de oldest to take his shirt off. He say, 'Marster,
what you wan' me to take my shirt off for?' Todd say, 'I told you to
take your shirt off.' De nigger say, 'Marster, I ain' never took my
shirt off for no man.' Todd run in de house and got his gun and come
back and shot de nigger dead. His brother fell down by him where he lay
on de groun'. Todd run back to load his gun again, it bein' a single
shot. Todd's wife and son grabbed him and dey had all dey coul' do to
keep him from comin' out and killin' de other nigger.
"Marse Johns had 12 chillen. De house dey lived in was Colonyal style
and had 12 rooms. I was bo'n in dat house.
"De slaves had log cabins. We wore some cotton clothes in de summer but
in de winter we wore wool clothes. We allus had shoes. A shoemaker would
come 'round once a year and stay maybe 30 days, makin' shoes for
everybody on de place; den in about 6 months he would come back and
half-sole and make other repairs to de shoes. We made all our clothes on
de place. We wove light wool cloth for summer and heavy for winter.
"I could take raw cotton and card and spin it on a spinnin' wheel into
thread, fine enough to be sewed with a needle. We woun' de thread on a
broche, make like and 'bout de size of a ice pick. De thread was den
woun' on a reel 'bout de size of a forewheel of a wagon, and de reel
would turn 48 times and den 'cluck'. Dat was for dem to be able to tell
we was workin'.
"Dere was plenty wild game, possums, rabbits, turkey and so on. Dere was
fish, too, in de creek. I was de leader of de bunch. We would ketch
little fish in de creek. We'd cook a lot of fish and den we'd put a rag
rug in de yard under a big mulberry tree and pour de fish out on dat and
den eat 'em.
"Old marster never beat his slaves and he didn' sell 'em. But some of de
owners did. If a owner had a big woman slave and she had a little man
for her husban' and de owner had a big man slave, dey would make de
little husban' leave, and make de woman let de big man be her husban',
so's dere be big chillen, which dey could sell well. If de man and woman
refused, dey'd get whipped.
"Course whippin' made a slave hard to sell, maybe couldn' be sold,
'cause when a man went to buy a slave he would make him strip naked and
look him over for whip marks and other blemish, jus' like dey would a
horse. But even if it done damage to de sale to whip him, dey done it,
'cause dey figgered, kill a nigger, breed another--kill a mule, buy
another.
"I'll never forget de rice patch. It shore got me some whippin's, 'cause
my daddy tell me to watch de birds 'way from dat rice, and sometimes
dey'd get to it. It jus' seem like de blackbirds jus' set 'round and
watched for dat rice to grow up where dey could get it. We would cut a
block off a pine tree and build a fire on it and burn it out. Den we
would cut down into it and scrape out all de char, and den put de rice
in dere and beat and poun' it with a pestle till we had all de grain
beat out de heads. Den we'd pour de rice out on a cloth and de chaff and
trash would blow away.
"Our marster he drilled men for de army. De drill groun' was 'bout a
mile from our place. He was a dead shot with a rifle and had a rifle
with an extry long barrel.
"De Yankees told us niggers when dey freed us after de war dat dey would
give each one of us 40 acres of land and a mule. De nearest I'se ever
come to dat is de pension of 'leven dollars I gets now. But I'se jus' as
thankful for dat as I can be. In fac', I don't see how I could be any
more thankful it 'twas a hun'erd and 'leven dollars.
"A man told me a nigger woman told his wife she would ruther be slave
than free. Well, I think, but I might be wrong, anybody which says that
is tellin a lie. Dere is sumpin' 'bout bein' free and dat makes up for
all de hardships. I'se been both slave and free and I knows. Course,
while I was slave I didn' have no 'sponsibility, didn' have to worry
'bout where sumpin' to eat and wear and a place to sleep was comin'
from, but dat don't make up for bein' free.
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Auntie Thomas Johns
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John James
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