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"Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves Arkansas Narratives, Part 7"

This old couple are the
parents of four children, the eldest of whom is now sixty-three. They
live alone in a small white-washed cabin only a mile or so from Marvell
being supported only by a small pension they receive each month from the
Social Security Board. They have a garden and a few chickens and a hog
or two and are happy and content as they dip their snuff and recall
those days long past during which they both contend that life was at its
best, "Aunt Becky" is religious and a staunch believer, a long-time
member of Mount Moriah Baptist Church while "Uncle Dock" who has never
been affiliated with any religious organization is yet as he terms
himself "a sinner man" and laughingly remarks that he is going to ride
into Heaven on "Aunt Becky's" ticket to which comment she promptly
replies that her ticket is good for only one passage and that if he
hopes to get there he must arrange for one of his own.


Interviewer: Miss Irene Robertson
Person interviewed: Bell Wilks, Holly Grove, Arkansas
Age: 80

"I was raised in Pulaski, Tennessee, Giles County. The post office was
at one end of the town, bout half mile was the church down at the other
end. Yes'm, that way Pulaski looked when I lived there. My father's
master was Peter or Jerry Garn--I don't know which.


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