Moore, Patsy

The following data is extracted from Arkansas Slave Narratives.

Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson Person interviewed: Patsy Moore, Madison, Arkansas Age: 74


"My mother was sold in Jamestown, Virginia to Daphney Hull. Her white folks got in debt. My papa was born in Georgia. Folks named Williams owned him. Ma never seen her ma no more but William Hull went to Virginia and bought her two sisters.

"I was named Patsy after grandma in Virginia. She had twenty-one children to ma's knowing. Ma was a light color. Pa was a Molly Glaspy man. That means he was Indian and African. Molly Glaspy folks was nearly always free folks. Ma was named Mattie. If they would have no children they got trafficked about.

"Daphney Hull was good but William Hull and his wife was both mean. They lived on the main road to Holly Springs. Daphney Hull was a Methodist man, kind-hearted and good. He was a bachelor I think. He kept a woman to cook and keep his house. Auntie said the Yankees was mean to Mr. William Hull's wife. They took all their money and meat. They had their money hid and some of the black folks let the Yankees find out where it was. They got it.

"Papa was a soldier. He sent for us. We come to Memphis, Tennessee in a wagon. We lived there five or six years. Pa got a pension till he died. Both my parents was field hands in slavery. Ma took in washing and ironing in Memphis.

"I was born in De Sota County, Mississippi. I remember Forrest's battle in Memphis. I didn't have sense to be scared. I seen black and white dead in the streets and alleys. We went to the magazine house for protection, and we played and stayed there. They tried to open the magazine house but couldn't.

"When freedom come, folks left home, out in the streets, crying, praying, singing, shouting, yelling, and knocking down everything. Some shot off big guns. Den come the calm. It was sad then. So many folks done dead, things tore up and nowheres to go and nothing to eat, nothing to do. It got squally. Folks got sick, so hungry. Some folks starved nearly to death. Times got hard. We went to the washtub onliest way we all could live. Ma was a cripple woman. Pa couldn't find work for so long when he mustered out.

"I do recollect the Civil War well.

"I live with my daughter. I have a cough since I had flu and now I have chills and fever. My daughter helps me all I get. She lives with me.

"Some of the young folks is mighty good. I reckon some is too loose acting. Times is hard. Harder in the winter than in summer time. We has our garden and chickens to help us out in summer."

Source: Arkansas Slave Narratives

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