Interview with Lindy Patton—Alice S. Barton, Eutaw, Alabama
FIFTY YEARS IN DE PO' HOUSE
"White folks," said Lindy Patton, from a chair in the Greene County Poor House. "I was born in 1841 an' it taken me fifty years to git to de po' house. Now I is got jus' fo' mo' years to make it an' even fifty dat I been dere. I hopes I makes de grade, caze dat would be some sorta rec'd wouldn't it? Fifty years in de po' house.
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"I wukked in de fiel's an' I worked hard all day long. De white folks useta gimme de clothes of de lil' white chilluns. I was born in Knoxville, Alabama, in Greene County, an' I belonged to Massa Bill Patton. I remembers a slave on our plantation dat was always arunnin' away. De Massa try beatin' him but dat didn't do no good. Dat nigger would run away in spite of nothin' they could do. One day de massa decided he was goin' to take de nigger to Mobile an' swap him for anudder one. De Misstis tol' him to leave de ole fool alone, said it warn't worth the trouble. Well, de massa started out to Mobile wid de nigger, an' when de got dere an' de train stop, de nigger, he lit out an' de massa runned right behine him. Dey musta runned a mile or mo' till finally de Massa he gib out an' let de nigger go. Two days later de massa he died f'm a-chasin' dat low down burr head.
"Nawsuh, de white folks didn't teach us to read or write. White folks, I can't hardly count none at all. We didn't have no church on dat place neither. We jus' went along wid de massa an' sot in de back. I ain't never ma'ied, an' I ain't never goin' to."