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Work Projects Administration

"Arkansas Narratives, Part 2"

My father
was but my mother wasn't. When Paul Barringer lost all of his niggers,
what he first had, his sister give him my mother and a whole lot more of
them. I don't know how many he had, but he had a great many. My father
went alone, but all my mother's people were taken--four sisters, and
three brothers. They were all grown when I first seen them. I never seen
my mother's father at all.
"There was a world of yellow people then. My mother said her sister had
two yellow children; they were her master's. I know of plenty of light
people who were living at that time.
"My mother had two light children that belonged to her sister. They were
taken from her after freedom, and were made to cook and work for their
sister and brother (white). All the orphans were taken and given back to
the people what owned them when freedom came. My mother's sister was
refugeed back to Charlottesville, North Carolina before the end of the
war so that she wouldn't get free. After the war they were set free out
there and never came back. The children were with my mother and they had
to stay with their master until they were twenty years old. Then they
would be free. They wouldn't give them any schooling at all.


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