W S Debnam
From:
North Carolina
N. C. District: No. 2 [320240]
Worker: T. Pat Matthews
No. Words: 1025
Subject: A Slave Story
Story Teller: W. S. Debnam
Editor: Daisy Bailey Waitt
[TR: Date Stamp "JUN 30 1937"]
W. SOLOMON DEBNAM.
701 Smith Street.
Yes, I remember the Yankees coming to Raleigh. I don't know very much
about those times, I was so young, but I remember the Yankees all right
in their blue clothes; their horses, and so on. I'll be 78 years old the
8th of this comin' September an' I've heard mother an' father talk about
slavery time a whole lot. We belonged to T. R. Debnam at Eagle Rock, Wake
County. His wife was named Priscilla Debnam. My father was named Daniel
Debnam an' my mother was named Liza Debnam. My master had several
plantations an' a lot of slaves. I don't know how many, but I know he
had 'em. He fed us well; we had a good place to sleep. We had wove
clothes, enough to keep us warm. He treated me just like he had been my
father. I didn't know the difference. Marster an' missus never hit me a
lick in their lives. My mother was the house girl. Father tended
business around the house an' worked in the field sometimes. Our houses
were in marster's yard. The slave quarters were in the yard of the great
house. I don't remember going to church until after the surrender.
I remember the corn shuckin's, but not the Christmas and the fourth of
July holidays. They had a lot of whiskey at corn shuckin's and good
things to eat.
I heard pappy talk of patterollers, but I do not know what they were.
Pappy said he had to have a pass to visit on, or they would whip him if
they could ketch him. Sometimes they could not ketch a nigger they were
after. Yes, they taught us to say pappy an' mammy in them days.
I remember the coon and possum hunts an' the rabbits we caught in gums.
I remember killin' birds at night with thorn brush. When bird blindin'
we hunt 'em at night with lights from big splinters. We went to grass
patches, briars, and vines along the creeks an' low groun's where they
roosted, an' blinded 'em an' killed 'em when they come out. We cooked
'em on coals, and I remember making a stew and having dumplings cooked
with 'em. We'd flustrate the birds in their roostin' place an' when they
come out blinded by the light we hit 'em an' killed 'em with thorn brush
we carried in our han's.
Marster had a gran'son, the son of Alonza Hodge an' Arabella Hodge,
'bout my age an' I stayed with him most of the time. When Alonza Hodge
bought his son anything he bought for me too. He treated us alike. He
bought each of us a pony. We could ride good, when we were small. He let
us follow him. He let us go huntin' squirrels with him. When he shot an'
killed a squirrel he let us race to see which could get him first, while
he laughed at us.
I didn't sleep in the great house. I stayed with this white boy till
bed time then my mammy come an' got me an' carried me home. When marster
wanted us boys to go with him he would say, 'Let's go boys,' an' we
would follow him. We were like brothers. I ate with him at the table.
What they et, I et. He made the house girl wait on me just like he an'
his son was waited on.
My father stayed with marster till he died, when he was 63 an' I was
21; we both stayed right there. My white playmate's name was Richard
Hodge. I stayed there till I was married. When I got 25 years old I
married Ida Rawlson. Richard Hodge became a medical doctor, but he died
young, just before I was married.
They taught me to read an' write. After the surrender I went to free
school. When I didn't know a word I went to old marster an' he told me.
During my entire life no man can touch my morals, I was brought up by
my white folks not to lie, steal or do things immoral. I have lived a
pure life. There is nothing against me.
I remember the Yankees, yes sir, an' somethings they done. Well, I
remember the big yeller gobler they couldn't ketch. He riz an' flew an'
they shot him an' killed him. They went down to marster's store an'
busted the head outen a barrel o' molasses an' after they busted the
head out I got a tin bucket an' got it full o' molasses an' started to
the house. Then they shoved me down in the molasses. I set the bucket
down an' hit a Yankee on the leg with a dogwood stick. He tried to hit
me. The Yankees ganged around him, an' made him leave me alone, give me
my bucket o' molasses, an' I carried it on to the house. They went down
to the lot, turned out all the horses an' tuck two o' the big mules,
Kentucky mules, an' carried 'em off. One of the mules would gnaw every
line in two you tied him with, an' the other could not be rode. So next
morning after the Yankees carried 'em off they both come back home with
pieces o' lines on 'em. The mules was named, one was named Bill, an' the
other Charles. You could ride old Charles, but you couldn't ride old
Bill. He would throw you off as fast as you got on 'im.
After I was married when I was 25 years old I lived there ten years,
right there; but old marster had died an' missus had died. I stayed with
his son Nathaniel; his wife was named Drusilla.
I had five brothers, Richard, Daniel, Rogene, Lorenzo, Lumus and
myself. There wont places there for us all, an' then I left. When I left
down there I moved to Raleigh. The first man I worked fer here was
George Marsh Company, then W. A. Myatt Company an' no one else. I worked
with the Myatt Company twenty-six years; 'till I got shot.
It was about half past twelve o'clock. I was on my way home to dinner
on the 20th of December, 1935. When I was passing Patterson's Alley
entering Lenoir Street near the colored park in the 500 block something
hit me. I looked around an' heard a shot. The bullet hit me before I
heard the report of the pistol. When hit, I looked back an' heard it.
Capt. Bruce Pool, o' the Raleigh Police force, had shot at some thief
that had broken into a A&P Store an' the bullet hit me. It hit me in my
left thigh above the knee. It went through my thigh, a 38 caliber
bullet, an' lodged under the skin on the other side. I did not fall but
stood on one foot while the blood ran from the wound. A car came by in
about a half hour an' they stopped an' carried me to St. Agnes Hospital.
It was not a police car. I stayed there a week. They removed the bullet,
an' then I had to go to the hospital every day for a month. I have not
been able to work a day since. I was working with W. A. Myatt Company
when I got shot. My leg pains me now and swells up. I cannot stand on it
much. I am unable to do a day's work. Can't stand up to do a day's work.
The city paid me $200.00, an' paid my hospital bill.
Abraham Lincoln was all right. I think slavery was wrong because birds
an' things are free an' man ought to have the same privilege.
Franklin Roosevelt is a wonderful man. Men would have starved if he
hadn't helped 'em.
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Sarah Debro
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