Nobody Knows the Trouble Ive Seen

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Nobody Knows the Trouble Ive Seen

• A Lesson about Slavery by Slaves
• Margaret Gardner Taylor

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A Slave Family
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Nobody Knows

• Nobody knows de trouble I seeNobody knows but
  JesusNobody knows de trouble I seeGlory,
  hallelujah!

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Voices and Faces

• The narrative excerpts presented here are a small
  sample of the wealth of stories available. These
  narratives provide an invaluable first-person
  account of slavery and the individuals it
  affected. Although the African Americans who
  lived under slavery are no longer with us, their
  experiences remain due to these interviews
  recorded in the late 1930s by the Federal
  Writers' Project.

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Boston Blackwell

• Do you want to hear how I runned away and jined
  the Yankees?
• In October 63, I runned away and went to Pine
  Bluff to get to the Yankees.
• You know Abraham Lincoln claired freedom in 63,
  first day of January.

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Emmaline Heard

• Slaves were moved from place to place and from
  state to state.
• Emmaline Heards father was brought to Georgia
  and sold to the Harpers as a plow boy, at the age
  of eleven.
• Every woman had a certain amount of weaving and
  spinning to do at home after coming in from the
  field.

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Emmaline Heard continued

• Two dresses a year were allowed the women.
• Two cotton shirts and two pair of cotton pants
  were given the men.
• Every adult slave received one pair of shoes made
  from rough horse and mule hide.
• The white folks shoes were made from soft calf
  leather.

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Vilet Lester

• I wish to now what has Ever become of my Presus
  little girl.
• I left her in goldsborough with Mr. Walker and I
  have not herd from her Since and Walker Said that
  he was going to Carry her to Rockingham and gve
  her to his Sister and I want to now whether he
  will Sell her or now and the least that can buy
  her.

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James Cape, An Ex-slave

• Ft. Worth, Texas

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James Cape

• "When I's old 'nough to set on de hoss, dey
  learned me to ride, tendin' hosses. 'Cause I's
  good hoss rider, dey uses me all de time gwine
  after hosses. I goes with dem to Mexico. We
  crosses de river lots of times. I 'members once
  when we was a drivin' 'bout 200 hosses
  north'ards. Dey was a bad hail storm comes into
  de face of de herd and dat herd turns and starts
  de other way. Dere was five of us riders and we
  had to keep dem hosses from scatterment. I was de
  leader and do you know what happens to me if my
  hoss stumbles? Right dere's whar I'd still be!
  Marster give me a new saddle for savin' de hosses.

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Sarah Frances Shaw Graves
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Sarah Frances Shaw Graves

• "I was born March 23, 1850 in Kentucky, somewhere
  near Louisville. I am goin' on 88 years right
  now. (1937). I was brought to Missouri when I was
  six months old, along with my mama, who was a
  slave owned by a man named Shaw, who had allotted
  her to a man named Jimmie Graves, who came to
  Missouri to live with his daughter Emily Graves
  Crowdes. I always lived with Emily Crowdes."

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Sarah Frances Shaw Graves

• "Yes'm. Allotted? Yes'm. I'm goin' to explain
  that, " she replied. "You see there was slave
  traders in those days, jes' like you got horse
  and mule an' auto traders now. They bought and
  sold slaves and hired 'em out. Yes'm, rented 'em
  out. Allotted means somethin' like hired out. But
  the slave never got no wages. That all went to
  the master. The man they was allotted to paid the
  master."

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Sarah Frances Shaw Graves

• "Allotments made a lot of grief for the slaves,"
  Aunt Sally asserted. "We left my papa in
  Kentucky, 'cause he was allotted to another man.
  My papa never knew where my mama went, an' my
  mama never knew where papa went." Aunt Sally
  paused a moment, then went on bitterly. "They
  never wanted mama to know, 'cause they knowed she
  would never marry so long she knew where he was.
  Our master wanted her to marry again and raise
  more children to be slaves. They never wanted
  mama to know where papa was, an' she never did,"
  sighed Aunt Sally.

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John W. Fields
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John W. Fields

• "In most of us colored folks was the great desire
  to be able to read and write. We took advantage
  of every opportunity to educate ourselves. The
  greater part of the plantation owners were very
  harsh if we were caught trying to learn or write.
  It was the law that if a white man was caught
  trying to educate a negro slave, he was liable to
  prosecution entailing a fine of fifty dollars and
  a jail sentence. We were never allowed to go to
  town and it was not until after I ran away that I
  knew that they sold anything but slaves, tobacco,
  and wiskey. Our ignorance was the greatest hold
  the South had on us. We knew we could run away,
  but what then? An offender guilty of this crime
  was subjected to very harsh punishment."

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Temple Cummins
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Temple Cummins

• "The white chillun tries teach me to read and
  write but I didn' larn much, 'cause I allus
  workin'. Mother was workin' in the house, and she
  cooked too. She say she used to hide in the
  chimney corner and listen to what the white folks
  say. When freedom was 'clared, marster wouldn'
  tell 'em, but mother she hear him tellin' mistus
  that the slaves was free but they didn' know it
  and he's not gwineter tell 'em till he makes
  another crop or two. When mother hear that she
  say she slip out the chimney corner and crack her
  heels together four times and shouts, 'I's free,
  I's free.' Then she runs to the field, 'gainst
  marster's will and tol' all the other slaves and
  they quit work. Then she run away and in the
  night she slip into a big ravine near the house
  and have them bring me to her. Marster, he come
  out with his gun and shot at mother but she run
  down the ravine and gits away with me.

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Walter Rimes
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Walter Rimes

• "My pappy wasn't 'fraid of nothin'. He am light
  cullud from de white blood, and he runs away
  sev'ral times. Dere am big woods all round and we
  sees lots of run-awayers. One old fellow name
  John been a run-awayer for four years and de
  patterrollers tries all dey tricks, but dey
  can't cotch him. Dey wants him bad, 'cause it
  'spire other slaves to run away if he stays
  a-loose. Dey sots de trap for him. Dey knows he
  like good eats, so dey 'ranges for a quiltin' and
  gives chitlin's and lye hominey. John comes and
  am inside when de patterrollers rides up to de
  door. Everybody gits quiet and John stands near
  de door, and when dey starts to come in he grabs
  de shovel full of hot ashes and throws dem into
  de patterrollers faces. He gits through and runs
  off, hollerin', 'Bird in de air!'

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Walter Rimes

• "Patterrollers" (patrollers) were white men who
  served on local patrols organized throughout the
  South to control the movement of slaves outside
  their home plantations. Patrollers policed their
  neighborhoods by challenging any slave whom they
  suspected of being away from home to produce a
  written "pass," or authorization, from his or her
  master. Slaves found without a pass were subject
  to arrests, beatings, or other forms of violence,
  some of which led to death.

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Web Sites and Other Sources

• Morris Museum Paintings
• The Price of Blood, The Weighing of Cotton,
  and Black Angels
• Duke University Special Collection Library
• Blacks in Bondage Letters of American Slaves
• Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers
  Project 1936-1938
• Vilet Lester Letter