' He said he was
goin' to give her ten and that I was her first little nigger. When we
was both grown Mary Lou used to write to me once a year and say 'I claim
you yet, Mary.'
"I 'member when Garfield was shot. That was the first time I ever heard
of gangrene.
"Yes'm I have worked hard all my life. When I was in Mississippi I used
to make as much as ten dollars a week washin' and ironin'. But I'm not
able to work now. The Welfare helps me some."
[HW: (COPY)]
El Dorado Division
FOLKLORE SUBJECTS (Ex-Slave)
Mrs. Mildred Thompson
Federal Writers' Project
Union County, Arkansas
[TR: hand dated Nov. 6, 1936]
[TR: Ellen Crowley]
Ellen Crowley an old Negress of Jefferson county, known as "old Aunt
Ellen" to both white and colored people. She was quite a character; a
slave during Civil War and lived in Mississippi. She later married and
moved to Arkansas.
Aunt Ellen was much feared and also respected by the colored race owing
to the fact that she could foretell the future and cast a spell on those
she didn't like. This unusual talent "come about" while on a white
plantation as a nurse. She foretold of a great sorrow that would fall on
her white folks and in the year two children passed away.
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