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Allen Parker's Worcester
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BY ALLEN PARKER (Worcester, Mass.: Chas. W. Burbank & Co., 1895, 96 pp) CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER VII.THE following year after I left Cofell I went to work for Darias White who was a step son of my old master, and I continued to work for him three years. His business was to get out oak and hard pine lumber most of which was used in ship-building. All the time I worked for White I drove team, and had charge of the mules and one horse. The horse was kept by my master for his own use. The mules were used entirely for teaming. Besides these he had a large number of oxen that were used for hawling the great logs out of the woods. These logs were of the largest kind and were often one hundred feet or more in length. The but end of the log was fastened to the axletree of an enormous pair of wheels, from the axletree projected a long tongue, to which was attached a single yoke of oxen. In front of this yoke of oxen there was sometimes as many as fifteen yoke of oxen one ahead of the other and all fastened by a chain to the end of the tongue. A team of this kind required about eight drivers. Each driver was seated on the yoke of one pair of oxen, and would drive that yoke and the yoke in front. Instead of a whip such as is used in the north, the drivers would have a long slender birch rod, which when green would be almost as durable as a raw-hide. The small end of the log was also hung between a large pair of wheels. To the tongue of which was fastened a rope from twelve to fifteen feet long with a a knot in the end. The end of this rope was given into the hands of a strong active negro, whose business it was to steer the logs. When everything was ready the word to start would be given and away the logs went, the oxen pulling with all their might and the log drivers shouting at the top of their voices. The man with the guiding ropes of the rear wheels sometimes on the logs sometimes on the ground at one side, and sometimes at the other side working with all his strength to keep the log in its place, and so the procession proceeded from the woods to the river bank, where the log would be left till enough were got together to ship to market. Very often I had to drive oxen myself, though my business generally was to drive the mules, drawing grain and fodder for the oxen. Sometimes the mules would be hitched in front of the ox team. I liked this sort of work very well as it was not often hard, and there was a good deal of excitement about it. Mr. White was a good master and took good care of his slaves, and was never known to whip one. He generally had about forty hands in all. Often at the end of the year a slave who had done well, would receive a present of five or ten dollars from him. He liked to see his slaves look well and they soon learned to keep clean and to look as respectable as possible. Their clothes were of heavy white cotton cloth, which would be carefully washed each week, so that as they went to the woods on Monday morning, they would present quite a smart appearance. Had all masters been like Darias White there would been far less trouble with the slaves, as under such masters they were generally happy and contented. Many of the slaves camped in the woods through the entire lumber season. A camp would be made of logs, bark and pieces of board, which would enclose the camp on three sides, on the fourth a large fire would be built at night, at which we did our cooking. Every evening after supper had been disposed of the slaves would spend the time till bed time in singing and telling stories. After I got through with Mr. White I went to live with Elisha Buck with whom I lived one year. Buck was a mean poor white who had a large farm, and owned some slaves, and I made the eighth hand on the farm. He did not treat us at all well, and it was not often that we had all we wanted to eat. One day while I lived on his place I went in company with another slave into the woods and caught a pig, which we knocked in the head with a large pine knot, which we called a lighted knot, but it so happened that the owner of the pig was in the woods, and hearing the pig squeel came to see what the matter was We did not get away before he saw us so he went directly to Buck and told him that two of his niggers had been stealing a pig. We were immediatly> called out of the field by Buck, and he told the owner of the pig that he could give us a whipping, but that he could not strike us on the back, so we got about thirty-nine lashes each, and then were let go. It did not do much good to either of us for on the following Sunday I went into the woods again and got another pig which I dressed in the night. As I did not have every atvantage of a first-class slaughter house I was obliged to manage as best I could. Accordingly I built a fire and gave the pig a good singeing and while he was warm from the effects of the fire. I put him into water, and then scraped him with a case-knife and finally got him clean. When he was properly dressed I carried him on my shoulder about three miles, and turned him over to a "poor white" who took him to a neighboring town the next day, and sold him for me. I got back to quarters before the hands were called in the morning so that no one knew where I had been. In due time the "poor white" gave me my share of the money he got for the pig. With this money I bought some cloth, which a white woman made into a coat and a pair of pants for me. A few days afterwards I wore my new clothes to a "big meeting," that is a meeting in the woods something like a camp meeting. Put the fact that they were paid for with stolen goods did not trouble me at all. The negroes at the south seemed to think that everything that they could get hold of belonged to them. In New England this code of morals would appear rather out of place. But if you consider that a strong able bodied slave was required to work a full year for his board and clothes. And not only this, but that he was expected to cook his own food after doing his day's work, and it will be remembered that the entire cost o food furnished him was in most cases less than thirty dollars per year, and that the entire outfit in the shape of clothes cost less than twelve dollars per year, making a grand total of less than forty two dollars per year or three dollars and fifty cents per month. The slave could hardly be expected to feel the same regards for his master's rights as he would have done had he been a free man, properly treated and justly paid. While I was living with this man my mother's health began to fail, and I frequently went to see her. As her friends gathered around her she would tell them that while she did not expect to live to see it she hoped that the time would soon come when all the slaves would be free. The war of the rebellion had at this time been in progress some months, and although our masters tried to keep all matters relating to the war from their slaves, the slaves managed to get hold of a good deal of news, and the idea was fast gaining ground, that in some way they were soon to be free. As the time went on my mother became weak and I obtained leave to be with her nights, and my father got leave to be with her three nights in a week and all day Sunday. At this time he lived about eight miles from my mother's cabin, and of course had to walk both ways every time he came to see her. Both my father and I were with mother when she died which took place about nine o'clock one August night. She was buried in the same manner that most of the slaves were. A negro carpenter made a rough pine box, without lining, trimming, or paint. Her only shrowd was a white night-dress, yet the tender hands of her loved ones smoothed this out as carefully as if it had been of the finest satin. A few of the nearest friends and neighbors gathered round the rough coffin to take a last look at the dear face, then the cover was nailed on, the coffin placed in a cart and carried to a little sandy knoll, and beneath the shade of a few stunted pines a shallow grave was dug, in which without ceremony the coffin was placed and the sandy earth heaped above it. Not a prayer was said nor a hymn sung for the white folks seemed to feel that the sooner the matter was over the more time the slaves would have for work, and the slaves --well they were not supposed to feel at all, they were only cattle. Nevertheless the form that now lies in that unmarked grave, far in the sunny south, was that of my mother, and my mother was just as dear to me, kind reader, as your mother is to you; and though she died a slave, and lies buried where I may never visit her grave, I hope by the grace of Him who died that that we might live, to meet her in that land where all shall be free, and where there shall be no night nor any sorrow, and where there shall be none to oppress. RETURN TO TOP
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