You
leave the baby with Sallie Ann.' It was the courthouse. They questioned
her and him both. Seemed like he couldn't understand how freedom was to
be and mama didn't neither. Then papa took mama on Johnny Williams'
place. He come out to Arkansas and picked cotton after freedom and then
he moved his children all out here.
"Uncle Albert and grandpa take nights about going out. Uncle Albert was
courting.
"They put potatoes on fire to cook when next morning they would be warm
ready to eat. The fire popped out on mama. She was in a light blaze. Not
a bit of water in the house. Her sisters and brothers peed (urinated) on
her to put out the fire. Her stomach was burned and scarred. They was
all disappointed because they thought she would be a good breeder. Miss
Sallie Ann took her and cured her and when Miss Sallie Ann was going to
marry, her folks didn't want to give her Minerva. She tended (contended)
out and got her and Agnes both. Agnes died at about emancipation.
"I'm named for my mother. I'm her youngest child.
"I recollect my grandmother and what she told, and papa's mind went back
to olden times the older he got to be. When folks would run down slavery
he would say it wasn't so bad with them--him and mama.
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