TX BIOS:  J. F. Smith
   Selected and converted.American Memory, Library of Congress.
   
   Washington, 1994.
   
   Preceding element provides place and date of transcription only.
   
   This transcription intended to be 99.95% accurate.
   
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   collection, refer to accompanying matter.
   
   U.S. Work Projects Administration, Federal Writers' Project (Folklore
   Project, Life Histories, 1936-39); Manuscript Division, Library of
   Congress.Copyright status not determined.
   
   00011
   
   [?]
   
   William E. Smith
   
   Corsicana City Guide
   
   Pioneer Resident.
   
   Writers' Project
   
   District #8
   
   Palestine, Texas [?]
   
   Page 1 LIFE STORY OF J. F. SMITE, CORSICANA, TEXAS
   
   To begin with my name is John Franklin Smith, known to old settlers as
   Frank Smith. I was born September 19, 1852, in Bates county, Missouri,
   in the town of Pleasant Gap. My father was Joe Smith, he moved from
   Kentucky to northeastern Missouri, along with his father and other
   relatives, but did not like this part of the country so after years of
   residence here he moved to southwestern Missouri where I was born.
   There was thirteen children in our family, seven boys and six girls.
   There was three younger than I, and the youngest two were twin boys.
   
   The first I can remember of my Missouri home, was the hauling of
   lumber and brick from Sedalia, Missouri to build our house and barn.
   At that time we lived in a four room log house with stick and dirt
   chimney and board shingles. The two front rooms had a large hallway
   between them with a dirt chimneys at each and of the rooms. My father
   wa like all other southers farmers, having a number of slaves,
   including children and all, they numbered over a hundred, some of them
   cost him $1500, he never sold a mother from her children, nor sold any
   children from their parents. He once bought a family for $3000. He
   sent some of the negro men to Sedalia with wagons and teams of mules
   to haul the finish lumber and brick back to Pleasant Gap to build our
   houseand barn. The chimneys and foundation of the barn and house were
   of brick, the frame work of the house and barn was of native lumber
   coming from my father's sawmill located on his plantation on the
   [Merrizene?] River. My father built a large twelve room house,
   southern colonial style home, about a quarter of a mile from the town
   of Pleasant Gap, facing the town at the end of Main street. The front
   yard was large, covering about two or three acres with large post oak
   trees scattered about for shade. He also had a plank fence in front
   with a platform next to the road and steps on the side to the house.
   Hitch posts were on the side to the road. Platform at one side was low
   enough for visitors to drive up in coach or buggy and stop out an
   platform, still at another place ladies could ride up horseback to
   this part and step off and come down the steps into the yard. All
   ladies in those days 00022rode in side saddles when riding a horse,
   and they could ride as fast and as far as the men.
   
   The house which we lived in until the war, was a two-story house with
   a large front porch, with large round columns that reached to the roof
   of the second story. There were two bedrooms downstairs, the other
   being upstairs. Our livingroom was a large room covering about
   one-fourth of the first floor. At one end of it was a large brick
   fireplace large enough to burn cord wood. It would take two slaves to
   put an a back log, and it sure did threw out the heat. The dining room
   and kitchen was back of this. We had a large long table in the dining
   room, and I have seen as many an thirty people eating at this table at
   one time. My father never turned any traveler away from his home, he
   would always give them lodging and feed for their stock without
   charge.
   
   Behind the house was the cook and servant house, and the smokehouse
   where we kept all the meat. This meat and lard was issued to the
   slaves once a week. I have seen the slaves kill as many as fifty hogs
   at one time, all the killing, cleaning and dressing was done in one
   day- the next day lard was made and the meat packed. The meat box was
   built in the meat house, which was large enough for a man to got in
   and walk around. Behind this the barn was off quite a distance. It was
   large enough to hold over a thousand bushels of corn and plenty of hay
   to feed over two hundred head of stock, with stalls for twenty-two
   teams of mules and sheds for the balance and plenty of sheds for the
   milk cows. Behind the barn was a plank lot too where the hogs were
   called up and fed. We always fed then a little to keep them coming up
   so we could mark the young pigs, as the hogs ran out the year round.
   My father had his entire twenty-seven acres fenced off with plank
   which came from the sawmill. All of the posts were sawed square at
   both ends and the same length, and were put in the ground at the same
   depth. All the boards were spaced alike around the fields and pasture.
   About a hundred yards to the west were the slave quarters, with two
   rows of houses [facing?] each other with a wide street between them.
   All of these houses were built from native lumber, with stock and dirt
   chimney. A wood pile was behind each house for them. Our wood was
   stacked in the northeast corner of 00033our back yard. A pile was kept
   there in the winter time larger than an ordinary house for our use.
   Our wood pile lay north, east and west from our house, with most of
   the farming land to the north and east, running back down in the
   bottom. This land was planted in corn, cotton, hay, watermelons,
   garden vegetables and a large field of beans, peas and potatoes. The
   corn was check rowed and planted by hand, by doing this it could be
   plowed in each direction, this would keep down hoeing. Cotton was
   planted like it always is, to be chopped and hoed and hoed again. The
   garden was very large and worked by the slaves, also for the use of us
   all but not to be wasted. Any slave caught wasting any thing had to do
   without his next issue of the particular thing he was caught wasting.
   
   All slaves were allowed to carry watermelons from the patch to the
   house any time but were not allowed to burst one in the patch as the
   birds would take to them and ruin the patch. I have seen the little
   negroes with melon juice all over their face and the front of their
   clothes many times and still eating melons.
   
   The peas and beans were planted in large patches or in a sufficient
   amount so as to be picked when ripe and piled in a large room in the
   barn on a plank floor and then thrashed out of the hulls with a brushy
   limb from a small tree or let the slaves tramp them out. Then they
   were taken outside and poured from a tub or bucket to another, holding
   the basket high while pouring, letting the wind blow the chaff the
   broken hulls out of the beans and peas, then they were ready to be
   cooked. This was done each month or week as they were needed. However
   the entire field was picked and stored away, peas and beans being
   separated. The potatoes, cabbage, and turnips were harvested and put
   in long ricks or piles and logs split and laid against a ridge poll at
   the top like a house top and corn stalks placed over the cracks and
   than dirt piled over this fairly deep, just deep enough to shed water
   and to keep the vegetables from freezing in the winter, this dirt had
   to be built up after each rain so the vegetables would not got wet,
   this would keep them all winter. We had to raise what we eat and eat
   what we raised, as we could not get fresh vegetables from south Texas
   and other places the year around like we can now, especially when one
   man had to look out for over one hundred people. 00044We always had
   fresh meat of some kind, wild turkeys were plentiful. We had lots of
   deer meat and plenty of small game. Fish was plentiful, we didn't eat
   small fish like we do now and call them nice fish.
   
   We raised lots of cotton that was planted, plowed, picked and ginned
   on the same plantation. The cotton was picked in small baskets and
   emptied into larger baskets and weighed. The slaves could pick as much
   cotton in those baskets as they can in sacks now.
   
   We had an old negro named Remus that always led the slaves to work.
   His job was to ring the bell every morning at four o'clock for all the
   slaves to get up, the men to feed, while the women got breakfast. We
   all got up at the same time, the men would go on to work after
   breakfast and the women that did not have nursing babies were to come
   as soon as their house was cleaned and dinner cooked. The slave women
   that had nursing babies were to spin, weave and make the cloth for
   their clothes and were to make most of their clothes, or if they had
   plenty of clothes or cloth made, they would go to the field still
   later than the other women, but my father mostly found plenty of work
   at the house or close by for them so they could be near their babies.
   My father always had plenty of food for his slaves as a well fed negro
   could do plenty of work and one [that?] could do lots of work would
   always bring a good price when sold. It was also Remus's job to issue
   rations each Saturday evening, to every family, enough to run them a
   week, this was done according to the size of the family, and size of
   children in the family. Father wanted then to have plenty to eat but
   nothing to waste.
   
   We never worked on Saturday evenings, or Thanksgiving, Christmas,
   Fourth of July, but always done a good days work of New Years Day, and
   I have followed my father's ruling to the present time, do something
   on New Years Day and you will be busy all the year. For all this extra
   work father give Remus shoes from the store and factory made tobacco,
   a hat for dress wear, and pants and shirts from the store. The others
   wore clothes made on the plantation, except servants that waited on us
   and special visitors. Then they wore clothes that came from the store
   or made from cloth that came from the store, The store was in town
   00055on the main street and my father hired three clerks besides
   himself and the older boys who worked in there with him. He handled
   groceries, clothes, medicines, and what farm tools that was bought in
   those days, also buggies, surries and wagons. He bought us a fine
   stage while he was in business there. We had a span of fine mares he
   brought from Kentucky with him that we worked to it when he first
   bought it and he finally hocked a span of young mares from these old
   mares to it, and they sure could carry you down the road holding their
   heads high like they had plenty of pride, and they did for they were
   thorough bred. We had a young negro slave named Charley that cared for
   the stable stock and he knew his business about training these
   thorough [DEL: bred :DEL] breds. We had about thirty head of those
   Kentucky thorough breds when the war broke out.
   
   About 2:30 o'clock, one [evening?] in 1861, ny father saw the
   Jayhawkers coming down the road on horses and he could tell by the
   number and the way they were riding that they were the Yankees, so he
   told the three clerks to hurry out and go home and he also told my
   older brothers to go home and tell my mother that he would come on, so
   he locked the store and [DEL: bought :DEL] brought all his money home
   in a little sack, there was a little over three thousand dollars in
   that sack that he kept hid around in the store, and about the time he
   got home the Jayhawkers rode in on Main street and went to stealing
   and plundering at [ease?]. They robbed all the stores and loaded up
   what they wanted in those big Government wagons and then sat fire to
   the buildings. Then they started to plundering into every thing. About
   this time two of my cousins Ben and Tommie Dyer who were twins and
   about 16 years old had heard about the Jayhawkers coming in and had
   started home, both were horseback and had been to see one of their
   cousins and when they [DEL: go :DEL] got to where they could see them,
   they split up and made a run for home as their mother was a widow. Ben
   run his horse in the back way, put the horse in a stall and run in the
   back door of the house, but Tommie tried to go around our burning
   store and in from the other side, but some of the Jayhawkers started
   chasing him on horses and when he got behind our store his horse
   stumbled and fell, falling on one of his legs, he got his leg from
   under the horse and got up and was bending ever when they rode up and
   shot 14 balls into his body. 00066His mother saw his running from the
   Jayhawkers, but she never had seen Ben and she though the Jayhawkers
   had already killed Ben and was chasing Tommie to kill him, she ran out
   of the house screaming but she was too late, they would have killed
   him anyway if she had gotten there [first?], they were just that
   dirty. When she got to where he lay she fell down ever him crying and
   telling them that they had killed her boys and they laughed in her
   face. The Captain came up and she asked him to have some of the men
   carry her boy about one block to her house, and he told them to carry
   him home, so two of then grabbed hold of his pants legs and started to
   dragging him off like a hog, and Aunt Mellie begged the Captain to
   make them stop dragging him, so he made more men get around him and
   pick his up and carry him home. So four of them got hold of him and
   when they got to the house they dumped him in the front door on the
   floor, and if that house still stands, that boy's blood is on the
   floor, it couldn't be washed up. After the Jayhawkers left the house,
   Ben ran to the gunrack to get his father's gun, intending to shoot
   into the Jayhawkers, when Aunt Mellie heard Ben cross the room she
   looked up expecting to see some of them sneak up on her back to kill
   her, and she said she was so overjoyed to see him alive and run to him
   and persuaded him not to shoot any of them. He later joined the
   Southern Army and went through the war without a scratch. He said
   before he went into the army that he was going to kill a dozen Yankees
   for every ball shot into his brother's body. When the war was ever he
   said he got part of them.
   
   These Jayhawkers called themselves Home Guards, but they didn't know
   what home guards were, we called them Jayhawkers. They came an down to
   the house, rode up in [DEL: fron :DEL] front and called. My father
   went out, my mother following him, then all of us children followed
   her and crowded around them. I can remember as well as if it happened
   yesterday, one of the men spread his arms out and said stand back men
   I'll kill the rascal and raised his gun to shoot when we heard a shout
   and looked up the road to see what it was and saw Judge Myers coming
   as fast an his horse could run, shouting as loud as he could. The man
   dropped his gun to his side, when Judge Myers rode up be was shaking
   his head and his eyes were blazing fire. He turned around in his
   saddle and pointed back toward town and said you men get out from here
   00077and do it damn quick. (Judge Myers was a nothern man but he was
   one of my fathers best friends) All the Jayhawkers turned around and
   sulked off like/ a whipped dog.
   
   When the man all left Judge Myers came up to my father an put his hand
   on his shoulder and said "Joe you have got to get out of here before
   you are killed. Now I will escort you to Clinton and you and your
   family can take the train there and go farther south where you will be
   safe." My father told him he was a slave owner and that he had already
   sent all but a very few of his slaves south so they could be taken
   care of, [that?] he could not desert the people who had confidence in
   him at a time like that, he would have to shoulder his gun and do his
   bit to win the war. That it was lawful to buy slaves and to sue them
   when he first began business and in fact he had bought some of his
   from Northers speculators, that the Government tolerated that, and now
   since the southers farmers had their money invested in slaves they
   wanted them freed. He also thanked Judge Myers for saving his life but
   under the existing circumstances he would be forced to stay and fight
   [for?] his rights. Judge Myers begged him still farther to leave but
   he still refused. My father's parting words to the Judge was that he
   was glad to have such a man as he for a friend and although they were
   separated in opinion and would probably fight in battle against each
   other if the war went that far, but he would always consider him as
   his friend and have a friendly feeling for him.
   
   After this my father, brother Will, Clem and Joe, two cousins and
   three brother-in-laws and three Uncles went to war, [leaving?] us
   there with the few slaves to take care of the plantation. That was the
   last time I ever saw my father, brother Will, one of my cousins and
   one of ny brother-in-laws and one uncle. My brother Will,
   brother-in-law and cousin was killed in the battle at Lone Jack,
   Missouri. They were buried some time before me knew they were killed.
   My father, brother Joe and Clem, one brother-in-law and Uncle got
   separated from the others and did not know of the tragedy for some
   time. Later that year my father was wounded and an uncle killed at
   Mansfield, Missouri. That was the last raid General Price made through
   there. A lady living there by the name of Lindsay that knew our family
   had him taken to [?] house. (Her husband was also fighting for the
   South and was is another part of the state at that time.) 00088She
   left father with her grown daughters and a good doctor and rode 68
   miles horseback to Pleasant Gap to notify us of father being wounded.
   Mother left us smaller children to the care of the older children and
   what few slaves was left and she and Mrs. Lindsay took the train back
   to Mansfield, leaving her horse with us. A few days after mother got
   there two of father's sisters and nephews came and stayed until after
   he died. My father got better after mother came and the doctor told
   her he thought he was out of danger, so father sent her back home to
   get us children and return to Mansfield to stay until he got well
   enough to travel then he would go to Texas until the war was over, but
   he died and was buried [before?] mother could come back and get us
   children and get back to him, some complication set up that the doctor
   could not control after mother left. All of us children were very
   eager to get to our father to see him again but when we got there and
   was greeted with the sad news there wasn't anything there for us so we
   returned to Pleasant Gap.
   
   The town of Pleasant Gap, Missouri, lay in a small neck of timber or a
   gap between two large strips of timber and was named so.
   
   After we returned home, mother searched for all the valuable papers
   and several thousand dollars that my father had buried soon after the
   store was burned. She thought she knew about where she buried them but
   we never found them. She intended to ask him when she went to him
   while he was wounded but he got better and was getting so much better
   she thought she better let him get them himself, if she began digging
   around and never found them and was seen, some one also might get them
   before we returned. One of my older sisters also buried $500, that was
   never found.
   
   In 1862, my brother-in-law who was a druggist at Pleasant Gap and also
   a Northern sympathizer but not a helper, persuaded my mother to let
   him take all her [yearlin?] mules to the county seat and sell them for
   her before there was another raid through there and they were taken.
   Well he took them up there and only brought back $400 to mother. Said
   he had put that in his shoes and the balance in his coat and pants
   pockets and when he was coming home was robbed by some bushwackers and
   all taken off of him except what he had in his shoes. But we never had
   any confidence in what he told us. 00099Some of our work stock was
   stole from time to time but in the winter of 1862 the Jayhawkers came
   through again looking for any thing they could steal and any thing
   dirty they could do. During this time an old man about sixty years old
   had [gottne?] sick and mother and us children had moved him to our
   home as his house was cold and they were afraid he might take
   pneumonia and his wife was old and could not got around very well to
   take care of him as it was lots of trouble for us to go back and forth
   so we moved him to our place.
   
   One day the Jayhawkers made another raid through there. About 60 came
   to our house and ordered dinner for them all and told us to be sure
   there was plenty of ham. Mother, the girls and the old slaves began
   getting their dinner. [While?] they were getting their dinner those
   men were plundering about the house stealing quilts and tieing them up
   behind their horses. They were called in for dinner and sat down and
   ate all they could hold, got up from the table and began plundering
   again and spitting all over the house and started to leave when my
   mother complained to the Captain that his men had stole all of her
   quilts. He asked her if she could identify any of then and she pointed
   out about thirty of them. He looked at her and then turned to an old
   negro slave woman and asked [her?] if my mother was telling the truth.
   She said, "Yas sah!" He then told her to identify all the quilts and
   she said, "I'so she can, I'se been here too long and has helped to
   make every one of dem, and she pointed out thirty-eight of them, so
   the captain made then take them all off their saddles and pile them an
   the front porch. This bunch drove off all of our cattle, horses and
   mules. One of our old Kentucky mares and some milkcows got away and
   came back home.
   
   Not long after this another raid was made, one of the men in this
   bunch was named Sissin and helped build our house. They came in and
   ordered a meal cooked for them, after they had eaten all they wanted
   they began plundering. One of them, a young man,walked to the head of
   the old sick man's bed and said "I believe I will kill the old devil,
   done lived too long now". He raised his gun and shot him in the head,
   his brains were scattered all over the head of the bed and wall. I
   witnessed this with my own eyes. When he walked away he reloaded his
   gun and made the remark, "I better load it, I might get to kill
   another dog before sun down". And when they got ready to leave this
   man was on a young horse, one I guess he had stole, and he had the
   stock of his gun on the toe of his shoe when his horse shied to
   001010one side, the gun slipped off his foot, discharged and blew his
   whole face away. I said I guess that is the other dog he is going to
   kill. A man yelled out at me that he would do me the same way if it
   didn't look so bad for a man to kill a brat. I didn't say any thing
   back to him.
   
   This band of robbers tore up every feather bed on the place and
   scattered the feathers ever the rooms, then poured several barrels of
   sorghum molasses over them and then set fire. They burned the house
   but did not burn the slave houses or the barn. Then they loaded up
   about fifty of those large government wagons with corn and hauled that
   away and took every chicken they could catch and all of the meat we
   had. They also burned the [chorthouse?] at the county seat.
   
   We lived for a few days in some of the slave houses, then we hooked
   the old Kentucky mare, old Julia, and two milk cows to two sleds, put
   our few belongings on them and left Southeast Missouri for Northeast
   Missouri to my grandfathers in Henry county. This was a long hard
   journey for a woman and children through territory where there was
   lots of buskwackers. There were plenty of them in this part of the
   country and it had been raided and raided. There wasn't much left to
   eat and we couldn't taje much with us. We traveled quite a bit by
   moonlight and grazed the stock in the daytime, and gathered what we
   could to eat for ourselves. We finally made the trip to my
   grandfathers, but we were scared all the time we would get our stock
   taken away from us. Mother took ever $3000 in money through with her
   in a little square tin box painted green. I never will forget what
   that little box looked like for we guarded it very closely.
   
   - continued -

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