reason for him being trusted with a gun was because he had been raised
by the poor white man who worked for the slaveholder. My Pappy did not
work in the fields but drove a team of horses."

"I remembers that when we left the plantation and come to Washington
County, Ohio that we traveled in a covered wagon that had big white
horse hitched to it. The man that owned the horse was Blake Randolls. He
crossed the river 12 miles below Parkersberg. W. Va. on a ferry and went
to Stafford, Ohio, in Monroe County where we lived until I was married
at the age of 15 to Mr. Burke, by the Justice of the Peace, Edward
Oakley. A year later we moved to Curtis Ridge which is seven miles from
Stafford and we lived their for say 20 year or more. We moved to Rainbow
for a spell and then in 1918 my husband died. The old man hard luck came
around cause three years my home burned to the ground and then I came
here to live with my boy Joe and his family."

"Mr. Burke and myself raised a family of 16 chilluns and at that time my
husband worked at farming for other people at $2.00 a month and a few
things they would give him."

"My Pappy got his education from the boy of the white man he lived with
because he wasn't allowed to go to school and the white boy was very
smart and taught him just as he learned. My Pappy, fought in the Civil
War too. On which side? Well, sho nuff on the site of the North, boy."




Hallie Miller, Reporter
Audrey Meighen, Author-Editor