Texas Slave Narratives

Texas Slave Narrative

  Richard Carruthers

Richard Carruthers , 100 year old ex-slave. was born in Memphis, Tennessee. Mr. Billy Coats bought him and his mother and brought them to Bastrop Co., Texas. He came to Houston 20 years ago and lives in a negro settlement known as Acres Home, about 8 miles northeast of Houston. It is a wooded section, with a clearing here and there for a Negro shack and plots of ground for growing victuals and co'n.

I wants to tell the Gospel truf. My mammy's name was Melia Carruthers and my papa's name was Max . My papa's papa's name was Carruthers , too. My brothers names was Charlie and Frank and Willie and John and Tom and Adam .  When I was still little Mr. Billy Coats bought my mama and us and with about 500 of his slaves we set out to come to Texas. We goes to Bastrop County and starts to work. My old missy  her name was Missy Myra   was 99 year old and her head was bald as a egg and had wens on it as big as eggs, too. In them days the boss men had good houses but the niggers had log cabins and they burned down oftentimes. The chimney would cotch fire, 'cause it was made out of sticks and clay and moss. Many the time we have to git up at midnight and push the chimney 'way from the house to keep the house from burnin' up. The chairs was mostly chunks of cordwood put on end, or slabs, just rough, and the beds was built like scaffoldin'. We made a sort of mattress out of corn shucks or moss. My missy, she was good, but the overseer, he rough. His temper born of the debbil, himse'f. His name was Tom Hill , but us called him 'Debbil Hill.' Old Debbil Hill, he used to whup me and the other niggers if we don't jump quick enough when he holler and he stake us out like you stake out a hide and whup till we bleed. Many the tine I set down and made a eight plait whup, so he could whup from the heels to the back of the head 'til he figger he get the proper ret'ibution. Sometime he take salt and rub on the nigger so he smart and burn proper and suffer mis'ry. They was a calaboose right on the plantation, what look like a ice-house, and it was sho' bad to git locked up in it. Us got provisions 'lowanced to us every Saturday night. If you had two in the family, they 'lowanced you one-half gallon 'lasses and 12 to 15 pounds bacon and a peck of meal. We have to take the seal and parch it and make coffee out of it. We had our flours. One of them we called biscuit flour and we called it 'shorts.' We had rye and wheat end buck grain. If they didn't provision you 'nough, you jus' had to slip 'round and git a chicken. That easy 'nough, but grabbin' a pig a sho' 'nough problem. You have to cotch him by the snoot so he won't squeal, and clomp him tight while you knife him. That ain't stealin', is it? You has to keep right on workin' in the field, if you ain't 'lowanced 'nough, and no nigger like to work with his belly groanin'. When the white preacher come he preach and pick up his Bible and claim he gittin the text right out from the good Book and he preach: 'The Lord say, don't you niggers steal chickens from your missus. Don't you steal your Master's hawgs.' That would be all he preach. Us niggers used to have a prayin' ground down in the hollow and sometime we come out of the field, between 11 and 12 at night, scorchin' and burnin' up with nothin' to eat, and we wants to ask the good Lawd to have mercy. We puts grease in a snuff pan or bottle and make a lamp. We takes a pine torch, too, and goes down in the hollow to pray. Some gits so joyous they starts to holler loud and we has to stop up they mouth. I see niggers git so full of the Lawd and so happy they draps unconscious. I kep' a eye on the niggers down in the cotton patch. Sometime they lazy 'round and if I see the overseer comin' from the big house I sings a song to warn 'em, so they not git whupped, and it go like this: Hold up, hold up, American Spirit! Hold up, hold up, H-O-O-O We used to go huntin' and they was lots of game, bears and panthers and coons. We have bear dawgs, fox dawg and rabbit dawg that mostly jus' go by the name of houn' dawg. Then they have a dawg to run niggers. I never tried the conjure, but they would take hair and brass nails and thimbles and needles and mix them up in a conjure bag. But I knows one thing. They was a old gin between Wilbarger and Colorado and it was hanted with spirits of kilt niggers. Us used to hear that old mill hummin' when dark come and we slip up easy, but it stop, then when you slip away it start up. I 'member when the stars fell. We runs and prays, 'cause we thinks it jedgment day. It sure dumb old Debbil Hill, them stars was over his power. On Sundays we put shoes on our feet and they was brass toed. They was so hard and stiff they go 'tump, tump tump,' Then we walk. That's the only day we got 'cept-Christmas and we jus got somethin extry to eat. All them women sho' knowed how to cook! I often tell my wife how glad I was one mornin' when my mammy give me a hot, butter biscuit.I goes down and shows it to all the other boys. We didn't git them hot. butter biscuits in them days. I used to dance the pigeon wing and swing my partners 'round. Was them womenfolks knock-kneed? You she' couldn't tell, even when you swing 'em 'round, 'cause they dresses was so long. I's been all 'round the mountain and up on top of it in my day. Durin' slave time I been so cold I mos' turn white and they set me 'fore the fire and poultice me with sliced turnips. Come a norther and it blow with snow and sleet and I didn't have 'nough clothes to keep me warn. When a nigger marry, he slick up his lovers and put on his brass-toed shoes, then the preacher marry him out of the Bible. My pappy have a pass to visit my mammy and if he don't have one, the paddle roller cook him on the head. My Grandma and grandpa come here in a steamboat. The man come to Africa and say, 'Man and woman, does you want a job?' So they gits on the boat and than he has the 'vantage. When I was 21 and some more, I don't know jus' how old, I was a free man. That the day I shouted. We niggers scattered like partridges. I had a fiddle and I'd play for the white folks wherever I went, when they has the balls. I marries after 'while, but I don't know what year, 'cause we never done paid no 'tention to years. My first wife died after a long time, I think 'bout 34 year and I married another and she died this very year. Jus' three months later I marries my housekeeper, named Luvene Dixon , cause I allus lived a upright life and I knowed the Lawd wouldn't like it if I went on livin' in the same house with Luvena without we was married. She is 52 year old, and we is happy.


"Uncle" Richard Carruthers , 100-year-old slave negro, was born in Memphis, Tennessee.  Mr. Billy Coats bought him and his mother and brought them to Bastrop, County, Texas when he was quite small. Cleb Harris , who lived in Bastrop, too, bought his father and after Emancipation, Uncle Richard went to work for the Harrises . He was 21 years old at the time. Uncle Richard has spent 70 of his 100 years married, 36 to his first wife and 34 to his second, who died in 1937. Three months later, he married his housekeeper, Luvena Dixon , who is 52 years old. Said Uncle Richard : "You see, I'se allus lived a upright life and I knowed the Lawd wouldn't like it if I went on livin' in the same house with Luvena without we was married." Uncle Richard came to Houston twenty years ago. The couple live in a negro settlement known as Acres Home, about 8 miles N. E. of Houston. It is a wooded section, with a clearing here and there to accomodate a negro shack and a plot of ground for growing "vittles and cawn." Uncle's old age pension of $12 a month, added to Luvena's income from an occasional wash, keep the couple in staples. Their home is little more than an unpainted lean-to, but the place bears evidence of much conscientious scrubbing by his bride. I wants to tell the gospel truth so folks will know about us po' old niggers that born to slavery. My mamma's name was 'Melia Carruthers and my papa's name was Max Carruthers . I don't know where my parents was bawn. My papa's papa's name was Carruthers , too, and my papa name me after him. My pap belong to a man by the name of Harris . My brothers' name was Charlie , Frank , Willie , John , Tom , Adam . When Mr. Billy Coats bought my mamma and me, us and about 500 of his slaves set out to come to Texas. When we git out on the road we herded along like cattle. They was no autymobiles and street cars in them days. When we goes down to Bastrop County, we starts to work on the plantation. My old Missy, old Miss Coats her name was Myra was 199 (one hundred and ninety-nine) year old and her head as bald as a egg and wens on it as big as a egg. She have two daughters Leenie and Sary . She reared a 'dopted child and when he growed up to be 52 she marry him but he die when he turn 88. In them days the bossmen has good houses, but the niggers has log cabins. They burn down often times. They would cotch on fire in the chimney. You see the chimney was made out of sticks and clay and moss and sometime we have to push over the chimney to keep fo'm burnin' the house up. Many the time we have to git up at midnight and push the chimney away fo'm the house when it done cotch on fire to keep fo'm burnin' the house up. We have jus' the roughes' kind of furniture in the cabins. The chairs mostly was just chunks of cordwood put on end, or slabs just slab-wood benches like the tables was made of. Just slabs, rough slabs of wood, either sawed or hewn. The beds was built jus' like a scaffoldin'. We jus' bore a couple of holes in the wall and stick the bottom rails through, sideways, and the rest was built up jus' like a scaffoldin'. We make a sorter mattress outer corn shucks or moss. Some of the slaves would go out and git leaves to sleep on. That's right. That the gospel truth. None of the marsters I know of had brick houses. My marster had a big fine weatherbo'd house. My white people ' can say they treated me very well. I does give them praise for one thing. They taught me not to steal or lie or kill and it have done me good, and I do thank them for that to the day I die. My missy, she was good. The overseer, he rough. He a hard worker and make money for my missy, but I tell you the truth, his temper born of the devil hisself. His name was Tom Hill , but us niggers call him "Devil Hill." At first when my missy find out the overseers mean, she fire them out and turn them off, but when she git a new one, he jus' as mean. Old Devil use to whup me and the other niggers if we don't jump quick enough when he holler and if we run away and if we don't work fast as he have a mind to it. He stake us out like you stake out a hide and whup till we bleed and that the truth. Many the time I set down and make a eight-plait whup so he could whup from the heel to the back of the head until he figger he get the proper ret'ibution. He never make me plait my own whup, but many's the whupping I persecuted with. I hear tell and see sometime when a overseer take salt and rub on the nigger, so he smart and burn proper and suffer misery according to how the overseer think he ought. They was a caliboose right on the plantation. It look like a ice-house, 'bout that size, and it were sure bad to git locked up. He soon as leave you there until you die. "When slaves die or git whupped to death, 'bout night they would send somebody out to dig the grave, and then they would go out and bury him when it come dark. Harris he was a nigger on the plantation would make the coffin jus' straight box-like jus' like a hoss trough. They would jus' dig a hole and put the nigger in there and throw dirt on him. They wasn't any preacher or sorrowin' when a slave die. Us niggers got provisions 'lowanced out to us every Saturday night. Things was provishun out like this: If you had two in the family, they allow you one-half gallon of molasses, twelve to fifteen pounds of bacon and a peck of meal. We have to take that meal and parch it and make coffee outen it. I would put it in the oven and parch it, and you couldn't tell it from the coffee right now. We had our flours. We call one of them biscuit flour and we call it sometimes 'shorts'. We had rye and wheat and buck grain. They would grind all that up, and cawn too for cawn meal. You-all know that buckwheat flour is funny stuff and you have to have grease to git it off fo'm your hands. "If they didn't provishun you right on Saturday night, you jus' had to slip around and git you a chicken. That was easy enough, but grabbin' a pig was a sure-'nuff problem. You have to cotch him by his snoot so he won't squeal and clomp down tight while you take a knife and stick him till he die. Then you take the hide and insides and put them in a sack and throw them in the crick. Some folks mought call that stealin', but it ain't stealin', is it? When you don't git 'lowanced right, you has to keep right on workin' in the field and no nigger like to work with his belly groanin'. No ma'am, the good Lord won't call that stealin', now will he? "When the white preacher come to the plantation to preach to us niggers, he pick up his Bible and claim he gitting the text right out fo'm the good book, and he preach: "The good Lord say: 'Don't you niggers steal chickens fo'm your missus. Don't you niggers steal your marster's hogs'. And that would be all he preach

Us niggers use' to have a praying ground down in the hollow. Sometime when we come out of the field, say between 11 and 12, scorchin' and burnin' up with nothin' to eat, we want to ask the good Lord to have mercy. Come dark, we put grease in a snuff pan or bottle and make a lamp to see by. Then we take a pine torch too, and we go down into the hollow to pray, so the white folks won' hear. Some get so joyous they start to holler loud, and we have to stop up they mouth. I see niggers git so full of the Lord and so happy, they drop unconscious. Sometime the overseer hear and he come stompin' down into the hollow and yell: 'What you niggers doin'?' We say, 'We prayin' to the Lord to have mercy on us.' When he see a nigger dropped out with the joy of the Lord, he grab him and whup him and say, 'Git up you nigger you. You jus' puttin' on.' He would always whup that individual that happy. Sometime he git scared when a nigger won' wake up and he leave him alone. We had a hard time, I tells you the gospel truth. I sure misfortuned to git a hard taskmaster. "I was a sort of lot man. They about 200 oxen, mule, goat, sheep and cow to slop and feed. I keep a eye on the niggers down in the cotton patch. Sometime they lazy around and if I see the overseer comin' from the big house I had a song' sing to warn them, so they git to work and not be whupped. The song go like this'Hold up, hold up, American Spirit! Hold up, hold up, Hooooo!' When the niggers hear that they sure grab that old hoe. "They uster take right good care of the babies when the mother folks was in the field. Most of the time they take some of the babies what could crawl and they make a basin of planks. The basin was bo'ded up so no snakes could git in. The mothers could know that the little uns was safe enough all right in that basin. "They ain't nothin' to this stuff about plantin' accordin' to the moon, in my mind. When we-uns had our plantin' to do, and when we had our season, we just go ahead. I allus say that I jus' plant in the ground, and not in the dark of the moon and stuff like that. Back on the plantation, sometime raise two bales to the acre and I've seen the time when they would gather four or five bushel of peanuts outen one hill. When the bloom come in the peanut you-all know they's like vines? jus' keeping coverin' but always leavin' the flower out and hillin' up 'round the vine and when they is all come up and jus' go and git four or five bushel outen one hill.We uster go huntin' lots on off-days. Yes, they allow us to go huntin' and they had lots of game in them days: bear, panther, couger, pole cat, 'coon, and all sorts of game. We have bear dawg, fox dawg and rabbit dawg that mos'ly go by the name of jus' hound dawg. Then they had the dawg to run niggers. When a nigger try to run away, he sure have to up and fly to keep away from them dawgs. Do one of them dawg git on the track of a nigger, he run him for a 1000 miles jus' as long as he stay on this earth. You could hear them hounds in the woods jus' a-bayin' mos' any night a-chasin' some nigger. "One time one of the niggers tell us how to conjure 'Devil' Hill, if we run off and don't want to get whupped. He say: 'Now I tell you what you do. Get you a whole bunch of rattan. Walk up to your boss and shake the rattan right in his face, and that will conjure him and you won' get whupped.' One day one of the niggers tried it and he git fooled. Old 'Devil' grab him by his hands and about beat him to death. What I done was to run to the back side of the field and set there and about shake myself to death. "I never had no faith in it anyway, but some would bury stuff under the front stoop and try to conjure that way. They would take hair and brass nails and thimbles and needles and mix them all up in a conjure bag. "No, I never fooled with no such doin's, but I do know one thing. They was a old gin between Wilbarger and Colorado and it were haunted with all the spirits of the poor old niggers that got killed. I don' doubt you can go there at midnight right now and hear that old gin hummin'. I use to work there many a day packin' cotton. Us niggers use to hear that old mill hummin' when dark come and we slip up right easy, but when you git there it jus' stop and no sound come a-tall. And when you slip away easy it start up ag'in, and that the truth. The place so wicked, so many dead people come there. God sent them there to make a noise, and that was the way God had to show people it was a wicked way "They was other signs too. I remembers well when the stars fall. Them stars pepper down jus' like hail. They come close to the ground and bust open with a big noise. God jus' didn' mean for them stars to hit the earth, for do they hit the earth they sure set in on fire. Us niggers so scared we run and hide and pray. We thought it was the judgement day, that the end right thar. It sure dumb old Devil Hill them stars was over his jurisdiction. He jus' stand there plumb scared. We use to play by moonshine, but not in daytime. That was week-days. The paddle rollers use to come around to our cabins to hear if us niggers make any noise or talk after bedtime, and would whup us did he hear any. On Sundays we put shoes on our feet. They was brass-toed shoes made out of pure leather. They set all week and come Sunday when we goes to church to hear the nigger preacher outen the woods, they so hard an stiff they go 'tump, tump, tump, tump' when we walk. You could hear them a hundred yard away. I wore many a garment made out of 'lowers. They about all I ever had. "They'd give us Christmas Day to fiddle and play. We all git a little round of toddy from the old missy. We don't git no presents, jus' somethin' to eat. All those slaves, them women, sure knowed how to cook. Some of the cakes would last for two or three months. I often tell my wife how glad I was one mornin' when my missy give me a hot butter biscuit. I was sure proud then and I go down in front of the other boys and let 'em smell of my biscuit that the old missy give me. I'd let 'em smell a bit and then give 'em a little bite. After they all bit, they wasn't much left. We don' git no hot butter biscuit in them days. "I was sure one of the best dancers in my day. We'd dance the 'pidjun wing' and swing our partners 'roun'. I've seen lots of changes in my comin' up from the past hundred years. In my day, a party had to be 21 year old befo' he could keep company, and a gal had to be growin' on 19 to 21 befo' she could go courtin'. That was fo' nigger folks, too, right on the plantation. not like it is in these days. And the womenfolks now was they knock-kneed or nothin'? No ma'am, you sho' couldn't tell cause they wo' their dresses right down where you couldn't hardly see the ankles slaves folk, too. "I'se been all 'round the mountain an' up on top of it in my day. My skin an' my ears have turn as white as you-uns. During slave time I has been so cold that I just plumb froze up, and mos' turn white. Did they see I was froze they sot me befo' the fire and poultice me wif sliced turnips. And why do I git so cold in them days? Well, I'll tell you. Come a norther and it blow with snow and sleet, a po' ole nigger don't have enough clothes to keep him warm and no way to git any mo'. I can't stand cold weather to this day. When I was sick they would use calomel and castor oil. The old boss man which was so deaf you have to yell into one of them trumpet things he hold to his ear, would give us that. Our old missy knew all about family affairs and she would use the kind of medicine she wanted to use on us. She would use shucks tea. Go and take the shuck off from the cawn and bile it into tea. "When a nigger marry, he slick up his lowers and put on his brass-toed shoes, then the preacher marry him outen the Bible. Sometime nigger folks git so mixed up about who kin to who, they marry their own sister or brother. When they buy slaves, they take the mamma and leave the little folks, then when the chillen growed up, they take a sister and leave a brother, like that. Sometime when a nigger marry his sister, they find out this way. One night they gits to talking. She say, 'One time my brother had a fight and he git a awful scar over his left ear. It long and slick and no hair grow there.' He say, 'See this scar over my left ear? It long and slick and no sign of a hair.' Then she say, 'Lawd God help us po' niggers. You is my brother!' It happen like that. Many a time I see it, and that the gospel truth. My pappy had to have a pass to visit my mamma. When he come to see us, or we goes to see him, the watchman say, 'Fetch yo' pass, nigger.' And if we don't have one, the paddle roller conk you on the head. When my pappy come to see my mamma we talk and talk. I remembers well my mamma's mamma and my pappy's pappy. They come over here to America in a steamboat. The steamboat come up to where they stand by the shore, and the steamboat man say, 'Ole man, ole woman, do you want a job? Well, come on this steamer and I give you a job.' When they get on, the ship just sail away, and that man on the boat he knowed he had the advantage. I recollec' a story about a black feller called Old Pete . He come fresh from Africa and he din' know no talk hardly but that African talk. He heared somethin' a-screechin' outen the woods and he say 'What dat? What dat? to heself. Then he say, 'Whittaka-plum-pick' for the name we-all call screech owl.

  When I was 21 year old I was a free boy. I remembers well when the great day come. That the day I shouted. The boss, he tell me to go down in the field and tell all the niggers to come to the big house as he could tell them some news. When they come, he say: 'All you niggers air freed.' We so glad we scatter jus' like pattridges. God knows where I went. I was a fiddler. Ever where we have a ball, I set there all night and play for the folks to dance. I remembers well when the big war over. The soldiers come home and a great thing come off at the plantation. The soldiers come in and eat. I was a awful boy for honey. I ate so much I was sick for a month, and to this day I still turned against honey I remembers a song the Yanks sung when they go marchin' back to the north. They say:  'Oh rebels ain't you sorry, Oh rebels ain't you sorry, Oh rebels ain't you sorry, When we go marchin' home.' I was a free nigger when I gits married. My chillun's names what is dead and alive by my first wife, and all I ever did have, was David , Pearl , Billie , Lottie , Zola , Samson , Allen , Sammie and they is seven dead. I don't know where my chillen are, or what they is doin' or where they lives. I ain't heard fo'm any of them for over a year.


BACK TO TEXAS "C" SLAVE NARRATIVE INDEX