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.
Interviewer: Mrs. Lucile Young & H. Grady Davis Person Interviewed: Mary Scott Location: Gourdin, South Carolina Age: 90 Ex-Slave, About 90 years old “Where and when were you born?” “On Gaston Gamble place, between here and Greeleville. In da Gamble’s Bible is my age. Don’t know my age. Pretty much know how old, I bout […]
Interviewer: W. W. Dixon Person Interviewed: Mary Raines Location: South Carolina Age: 99 Ex-Slave 99 Years Old. Mary Raines is the oldest living person, white or black, in Fairfield County. If she survives until next December, she will have attained her century of years. She lives with her widowed daughter, Fannie McCollough, fifty-seven years old,
Interviewer: Rogers Person Interviewed: Mary James Date of Interview: Sept. 23, 1937 Location: Baltimore, Maryland Place of Residence: 618 Haw St., Baltimore, MD Reference: Personal interview with Mary James, ex-slave, Sept. 23, 1937, at her home, 618 Haw St., Baltimore, Md. “My father’s name was Caleb Harris James, and my mother’s name was Mary Moriah.
Slave Narrative of Mary Moriah Anne Susanna James Read More »
Person Interviewed: Mary Minus Biddie Location: Eatonville, Florida Age: 100 Slave Customs Mary Minus Biddie, age one hundred five was born in Pensacola, Florida, 1833 and raised in Columbia County. She is married, and has several children. For her age she is exceptionally active, being able to wash and do her house work. With optimism
Person Interviewed: Mary Lindsay Location: Tulsa, Oklahoma Date of Birth: September 20, 1845 Age: 91 My slavery, days wasn’t like most people tell you about. ’cause I was two to my young Mistress and cont away to have when I was jest a little girl. and I didn’t live on a big plantation a very
Person Interviewed: Mary Grayson Location: Tulsa, Oklahoma Age: 83 I am what we colored people call a “native.” That means that I didn’t come into the Indian country from somewhere in the Old South, after the war, like so many Negroes did, but I was born here in the old Creek Nation, and my master
Location: McAlester, Oklahoma Age: 92 (deceased) Occupation: Field Hand Mary Frances Webb, grand daughter of Sarah Vest, aged 92, (deceased) McAlester, Okla. I’ve heard my grandmother tell a lot of her experiences during slavery. She remembered things well as she was a grown woman at the time of the war of the Rebellion. Her home
Person Interviewed: Mary Ferguson Location: 1928 Oak Avenue, Columbus, Georgia “Aunt” Mary Ferguson, née Mary Little, née Mary Shorter, was born somewhere in Maryland; the exact locality being designated by her simply as “the eastern shore” of that state. She was born the chattel of a planter named Shorter, so her first name, of course,
Interviewer: Emery Turner Person Interviewed: Mrs. Mary Crane Location: Mitchell, Indiana Place of Residence: Warren St., Mitchell, Ind. Date of Birth: 1855 Mrs. Mary Crane I was born on the farm of Wattie Williams, in 1855 and am eighty-two years old. I came to Mitchell, Indiana, about fifty years ago with my husband, who is
Interviewer: Sadie B. Hornsby Person Interviewed: Mary Colbert Location: Athens, Georgia (NOTE: This is the first story we have had in which the client did not use any dialect. Mary Colbert’s grammar was excellent. Her skin was almost white, and her hair was quite straight. None of us know what a “deep” slave was. It
Interviewer: Mary A. Hicks Person Interviewed: Mary Barbour Location: 801 S. Bloodworth Street, Raleigh, North Carolina Place of Birth: McDowell County NC Age: 81 Ex-Slave Story An interview with Mary Barbour 81 of 801 S. Bloodworth Street, Raleigh, N. C. I reckon dat I wuz borned in McDowell County, case dat’s whar my mammy, Edith,
Interviewer: Betty Lugabell Person Interviewed: Mary Belle Dempsey Location: Ohio Age: 87 Folklore: Ex-Slaves Paulding Co., District 10 MARY BELLE DEMPSEY Ex-Slave, 87 years “I was only two years old when my family moved here, from Wilford county, Kentucky. ‘Course I don’t remember anything of our slave days, but my mother told me all about
Interviewer: T. Pat Matthews Person Interviewed: Mary Anngady Location: 1110 Oakwood Avenue, Raleigh, North Carolina Age: 80 (Princess Quango Hennadonah Perceriah) 1110 Oakwood Avenue, Raleigh, North Carolina. I was eighteen years old in 1875 but I wanted to get married so I gave my age as nineteen. I wish I could recall some of the
Interviewer: T. Pat Matthews Person Interviewed: Mary Anderson Location: 17 Poole Road, R.F.D. #2, Raleigh, North Carolina Place of Birth: Wake County NC Date of Birth: May 10, 1851 Age: 86 My name is Mary Anderson. I was born on a plantation near Franklinton, Wake County, N. C. May 10, 1851. I was a slave
Interviewer: Stiles M. Scruggs Person Interviewed: Martha Richardson Location: Columbia, South Carolina Place of Residence: 924 Senate Street, Columbia, SC Date of Birth: 1860 Martha Richardson, who tells this story, lives at 924 Senate Street, Columbia, S.C. Her father was an Indian and her mother a mulatto. She was born in Columbia in 1860 and
Person Interviewed: Martha King Location: McAlester, Oklahoma Age: 85 They hung Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree! They hung Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree! They hung Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree! While we go marching on!” Dat was de song de Yankees sang when they marched by our house. They
Interviewer: Byers York Person Interviewed: Martha J. Jones Location: Louisville, Kentucky Place of Birth: Buckingham County, Virginia Date of Birth: 1847 Age: 90 In an interview with Mrs. Martha J. Jones, she reminisced of the old Civil War days as follows: “I was born in Buckingham County, Virginia, and later during the Civil War, I
Interviewer: Elizabeth Watson Person Interviewed: Martha Everette Location: Hawkinsville, Georgia Age: 88 Born in Pulaski County about 1848, the daughter of Isaac and Amanda Lathrop, Martha Everette has lived all her life near where she was born. Prior to freedom, her first job was “toting in wood”, from which she was soon “promoted” to waiting
Interviewer: Sarah H. Hall Person Interviewed: Martha Colquitt Location: Athens, Georgia The aged Negress leaned heavily on her cane as she shuffled about her tiny porch in the waning sunlight of a cold January day. An airplane writing an advertising slogan in letters of smoke high in the sky was receiving but indifferent attention from
Interviewer: Mary A. Hicks Person Interviewed: Martha Allen Location: 1318 South Person Street, Raleigh, North Carolina Place of Birth: Craven County NC Age: 78 Ex-Slave Story An interview with Martha Allen, 78, of 1318 South Person Street, Raleigh. I wuz borned in Craven County seventy eight years ago. My pappa wuz named Andrew Bryant an’
