Slave Narrative of Jack Simms

G. Monroe Dist. 4 Jefferson County

Interviewer: G. Monroe
Person Interviewed: Jack Simms
Location: Madison, Indiana
Place of Birth: Kentucky

SLAVE STORY MR. JACK SIMMS’ STORY

Personal Interview

Mr. Simms was born and raised on Mill Creek Kentucky, and now lives in Madison Indiana on Poplar Street diagonally North West of the hospital.

He was so young he did no remember very much about how the slaves were treated, but seemed to regret very much that he had been denied the privilege of an education. Mr. Simms remembers seeing the lines of soldiers on the Campbellsburg road, but referred to the war as the “Revolution War”.

This was a very interesting old man, when we first called, his daughter invited us into the house, but her father wanted to talk outside where he “spit better”. When his daughter conveyed this information Mr. Simms’ immediately decided that we could come in as we “wouldn’t be there long anyhow”.

After we gained entrance, the daughter remarked that her father was very young at the time of the war, whereupon he answered very testily “If you are going to tell it, go ahead. Or am I going to tell it?”


Surnames:
Simms,

Collection:
Federal Writers' Project. WPA Slave Narratives. Web. 2007-2024. The WPA Slave Narratives must be used with care. There is, of course, the problem of confusion in memory resulting from (73+ years) of the participants. In addition, inexperienced interviewers sometimes pursued question lines related to their own interests and perspectives and attempted to capture the colloquialism of the informant's speech. The interviews provide fascinating insight and surprisingly candid information, however.

1 thought on “Slave Narrative of Jack Simms”

  1. norma Foree
    was reading the story on Mr Jack Simms, was looking at mr simms story it could have been one or something like that, Can someone contact me if possible thanks,my Great Grand father was jack simms he was a mulatto lived in louisiana and kentucky, his name was ack simms , wife was edith simms and two girls viola and sally simms. can someone contact me please thanks norma .

    Reply

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