Morgan, Olivia

The following data is extracted from Arkansas Slave Narratives.

Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson Person Interviewed: Olivia Morgan Hazen, Ark. Age: 62


"I am 62 years old. I was born in Lafayette County close to New Lewisville. I heard mama say many a time she was named after her state-North Carolina. Her name was Carolina Alexandria. They brought her a slave girl to this new country. She and papa must of met up toreckly after freedom. She had some children and I'm one of my papa's oldest children.

"Papa come here long fore the war started. The old master in Atlanta, Georgia-Abe Smith-give his son three boys and one girl. He emigrated to Arkansas.

"Mama said her first husband and the young master went off and he never come back as she knowed of. Young master played with mama's second girl a whole heap. One day they was playing hiding round. Just as she come running to the base from round the house, young master hit her on the forehead with a rock. It killed her. Old master tried to school him but he worried so they sent him off-thought it would do his health good to travel. I don't think they ever come back.

"After freedom mama married and went over to papa's master's. Papa stayed round there a long time. They got news some way they was to get forty acres land and a mule to start out with but they said they never got nothing.

"My papa said he knowed it to be a fact, the Ku Klux cut a colored woman's breast off. I don't recollect why he said they got after her. The Jayhawkers was bad too. They all went wild; some of em left men hanging up in trees. They needed a good master to protect em worse after the war than they needed em before. They said they had a Yankee government then was reason of the Ku Klux. They run the Jayhawkers out and made the Yankees go on home. Everybody had a hard time. Bread was mighty scarce when I was a child. Times was hard. Men that had land had to let it lay out. They had nothin' to feed the hands on, no money to pay, no seed, no stock to work. The fences all went to rack and all the houses nearly down. When I was a child they was havin' hard times.

"I'm a country woman. I farmed all my life. I been married two times; I married Holmes, then Morgan. They dead. I washed, ironed, cooked, all at Mr. Jim Buchannan's sawmill close to Lewisville two years and eight months; then I went back to farmin' up at Pine Bluff. My oldest sister washed and ironed for Mrs. Buchannan till she moved from the sawmill to Texarkana. He lived right at the sawmill ground.

"My papa voted a Republican ticket. I don't vote. My husbands have voted along. If the women would let the men have the business I think times would be better. I don't believe in women voting. The men ought to make the livings for the families, but the women doing too much. They crowding the men out of work.

"Some folks is sorry in all colors. Seems like the young folks ain't got no use for quiet country life. They buying too much. They say they have to buy everything. I ain't had no depression yet. I been at work and we had crop failures but I made it through. Some folks good and some ain't. Times is bout to run away with some of the folks. They all say times is better than they been since 1928. I hope times is on the mend."

Source: Arkansas Slave Narratives

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