"De mistress had a long table out in de front yard under de smokehouse shed and here all us children had our food. It was good food. Mrs. Baker had a fig nursery in de front yard and we would go and pick washtubs of figs. Some were dried and others were put up. Mrs. Baker had a plantation of 1,800 acres. On week ends we would dance and they would always be getting married. We had a colored man on de place who could read and he did de marrying. De only school I ever went to was to a night school here fer a short time. Dey would tell me a story ’bout ’de bear an de Grand-ma’ an ’bout ’little Riden’ Hood’. Dey use to tell us some awful yarns. Dey would kill over 100 head of hogs every year and cure it, and I can’t get used to buyed meat today. Mrs. Baker would take anyone in de wagon to church dat wanted to go. My aunt went to church but would not be baptized.
"I ’member when de Ku Klux Klan started out when dey would dress up in white and dey had a noise like ’O-O’ ’O-O’. But we were not ’fraid of dem ’cause we knew dey would be killed if dey come on de place. I think a lot of Abe Lincoln. I have often thought how hard it was to give up his life, fer de United States. But Christ died for to save de world and Lincoln died to save de United States. And Lincoln died more Christ like den any other man dat ever lived.
"Dere was an old colored man on de place and he would drive Jeff Davis 'round and would keep Davis in his house and feed him. This was when Jeff Davis was a boy, and a orphan. Jeff Davis gave dis colored man, Montgomery, a lot of land. It’s a good thing dat slavery is over. Anything wants a privilege outside and not in a coop. Slaves could not be natural when they was dis way. Everybody wants to do somethin’ with demselves.
"I staid in Louisiana till 1875 and got mad and left and went to Madison Parish, Louisiana. It was not de white people dat made me leave here but it was my father. Den I went to Vicksburg for seven months, den to St. Louis on a mail boat. It cost me $8.50 to come from Vicksburg to St. Louis. I found work in St. Louis in a little while. Never did have to worry ’bout where I was going to sleep. I left Madison Parish ’cause we had a flood when de levee broke.