I ain't never been back home
since. I wish I was. I wouldn't be in this condition if I was back home.
"Mississippi was my home. I come up here with the Yankees and I ain't
never been back since. Laconia, Mississippi was the place I used to be
down there. I been wanting to go home, but I couldn't git off. I want to
git you to write there for me. I belong to the Baptist church. Write to
the elders of the church. I belong to the Mission Baptist Church on the
other side of Rock Creek here.
"They just lived in log houses in slave time.
"I want to go back home. They made me leave Laconia.
"Pateroles!! Oh, my God!!! I know 'nough 'bout them. Child, I've heard
'em holler, 'Run, nigger, run! The pateroles will catch you.'
"The jayhawkers would catch people and whip them.
"I would be back home yet if they hadn't made me come away.
"They didn't have no church in slavery time. They jus' had to hide
around and worship God any way they could.
"I used to live in Laconia. I ain't been back there since the war. I
want to go back to my folks."
Interviewer's Comment
Frank Williams is like a man suffering from amnesia. He is the first old
man that I have interviewed whose memory is so far gone. He remembers
practically nothing. He can't tell you where he was born.
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