"The Hickmans had my mother ever since she was four years old. My
grandfather was allowed to go a certain distance with her when she was
sold away from him. He walked and carried her in his arms. Mama said
that when he had gone as far as they would let him go, he put her in the
wagon and turned his head away. She said she wondered why he didn't look
at her; but later she understood that he hated so bad to 'part from her
and couldn't do nothing to prevent it that he couldn't bear to look at
her.

"Since I have been grown I have worked with some people at Newport. I
stayed with them there and married there, and had all my children there.

"I heard the woman I lived with, a woman named Diana Wagner, tell how
her mistress said, 'Come on, Diana, I want you to go with me down the
road a piece.' And she went with her and they got to a place where there
was a whole lot of people. They were putting them up on a block and
selling them just like cattle. She had a little nursing baby at home and
she broke away from her mistress and them and said, 'I can't go off and
leave my baby.' And they had to git some men and throw her down and hold
her to keep her from goin' back to the house. They sold her away from
her baby boy. They didn't let her go back to see him again. But she
heard from him after he became a young man. Some one of her friends that
knowed her and knowed she was sold away from her baby met up with this
boy and got to questioning him about his mother. The white folks had
told him his mother's name and all. He told them and they said, 'Boy, I
know your mother. She's down in Newport.' And he said, 'Gimme her
address and I'll write to her and see if I can hear from her.' And he
wrote. And the white people said they heard such a hollering and
shouting goin' on they said, 'What's the matter with Diana?' And they