SKETCH OF LIFE IN BOLIVAR COUNTY IN 1872

 

By MRS. L. A. LITTLE, (formerly MRS. DAN SESSONS)

 

      Colonel Dan Sessions and I and our little baby came up on the Belle Lee from Linwood, Chicot County, Arkansas, our former home, to Australia Landing, Bolivar County, Mississippi. We arrived just about sundown, hitched the horse to the buggy-both of which we had brought with us-and drove up to the plantation. The lower half of the place had grown up in saplings, cane, and briers, with just a bridle path leading to the house. The briers were so close they became entangled in the fringe of my much prized shawl when the horse was trotting at rapid gait. My husband just cut the fringe and left it decorating the briers.

 

            How my heart fell when we reached the house. It was a two room log house with an open hall between the rooms, the holes chinked with mud, and it had never been whitewashed. This contrasted with the handsome home from which we came, gave me a feeling of having dropped from high aspirations to dire reality. Inside the room there was a mantel of one board, too high for me to reach, on which was a tallow candle in a brass candle-stick. The old gentleman who lived there had done his best to prepare for my coming by putting his large bear-skin rug by my bed. I was invited in to supper in the next room. The cook was a plantation hand, and such a supper it was - bacon floating in grease, biscuit the size of an orange with hard blue centers, a small bit of brown sugar in a broken tumbler, and a small cake of butter in a large vegetable dish, with a very much worn piece of oilcloth serving as a tablecloth. My appetite failed me, and but for consideration of my husband, I should have indulged in a good cry. The next morning my husband told me I must choose which of the rooms I wished for ours, as the old man who owned the place would sell but half of it now. We took the room in which we had our supper, as it was nearest to the kitchen, cistern, and lock-up. There was a little lean-to that served as a pantry and storeroom. The old man from whom we bought the place could not get labor and he proposed that we form a partnership, he to furnish the land and Mr. Sessions to furnish the labor and control the crops. My husband's old slaves had never left him. He had taken them to Texas during the war, and when they were freed, they followed him back to Arkansas and then to Bolivar County and remained with him until they died. Mr. Sessions had raised many of them from childhood and was uniformly kind and just to them; in fact, too lenient, as he found it hard to deny them anything they asked for. There was a great deal of clearing, timber cutting and cutting of canebrakes, repairing houses, building new ones, and rebuilding fences to be done, but he managed very well. The wolves would come up in packs to our gin and howl until the Negroes' dogs would sally forth and scare them away. The bears were numerous. They came into the corn fields and stole the corn, until Mr. Sessions had a frame made on which a watchman could stand, protected from their sight, to shoot them. The Negroes said that the bears would pull down the fences just as a man would, step over, and go up and down the corn rows, select the heavy ears, hold them in their arms, and walk out with their loads as though they had human intelligence. A few effective shots soon broke them from coming in.

 

            It was not long before we got home affairs going nicely. With plenty of chickens, ducks, turkeys, and hogs, we could furnish our table well. We brought our own cook and we had palatable food, and home itself was very comfortable, but I craved the companionship of cultivated ladies. There was no church nearer than Concordia, eight miles distant, no physician, except for one in Concordia; the roads were almost impassable, and the law prohibited driving on the levee, except during low water. There had never been any public drainage; consequently, the lagoons were good breeding places for mosquitoes, which gave great discomfort. We had to make smudges and use newspapers for puttees if we were not under good bars, for none of the houses was screened; neither had we telephones nor electricity. Think of the crudeness of our lives. There was a lake just above the house that had many alligators in it. They would come up into the quarter lot for pigs and would not have declined a little pickaninny; but the mothers had such a horror of them that they did not allow the children to play on the bank of the lake alone.

 

            There was great sport for the men hunting bear, with good hounds for the work. Bear were trapped, also. One way was to hang up a bottle of honey on a low bough of a tree and place the trap under it; the bear would step in the trap while trying to get the honey. Good hunters killed alligators and sold their hides for good prices. I never heard of alligator meat being eaten, but bear meat was salted and dried, as was venison. It was told of one of the bear hunters that while under the influence of whiskey, forgetting where he had placed one of his traps, he walked into it himself and found it impossible to release himself and had to stand prisoner until some men, hearing his cries for help, came to his assistance. Of course, he had to stand much fun at his expense.

 

            The fishing in Lake Charles was fine, and the woods abounded in game of all kinds, including wild turkeys. In the winter the lakes were good hunting grounds for ducks and wild geese. The trees afforded logs for building houses, the pecans and walnut trees, nuts; and the muscadines, our wine, of which I made a barrel every year. I sold a cow with a young calf, bought fruit trees with the money, and set out an orchard with one Negro to help me do the work. There were no insects to bother us in those days, and we had an abundance of fruit. My husband bought me a cider mill, and I made cider, also using the mill in making wines. We killed eighteen hogs every winter, and I saved the cracklins and made all the soap used on the place. The men would assemble at the landing every Sunday and play cards and drink whiskey, while their wives stayed home nursing the babies. I was determined that my husband should give me his attention that special day, and we would either make a visit to one of our neighbors or have some of them visit us; and he was quite willing to gratify me. On one of these visits seven miles east of our home, we visited the home of a lovely family. After dinner, they asked us to go with them to see their young orchard and flower garden. Inside the gate, the wife slipped her arm around my waist and drew me to a little bed of flowers. I could tell that she was greatly distressed, and looking among the flowers, I saw a little mound and realized the cause of her grief. At last she said, "I laid my baby here without a prayer, without a song," and then her heart overflowed with grief. I led her out of the garden and under a tree on the grounds. I soothed her the best I could. I told her the women of the community were to blame for not having a church and a minister in their midst. She replied she would second me in any move that I would make. We agreed to call a meeting of all the ladies within seven miles of the landing and see what could be done. We made a list of all the women either of us knew, and on my way back home I got my husband to stop at the store of Mr. Lyman, a one-armed Confederate engaged in the mercantile business there. I asked this gentleman to let me have the use of one of his rooms the following Sunday. He willingly consented. I then wrote to all the ladies, stating that I had been requested to inform them that there was to be a meeting of all the ladies in the neighborhood the next Sunday at the store of Mr. Lyman, and that I hoped they would be there. I knew the men would be sure to go to the landing, and I hoped they would bring their wives with them.

 

      When my husband took me there at the appointed time, there were only three ladies present, a personal friend of mine, Mrs. Butler, a Mrs. Brown, and a Mrs. Smith - rather discouraging. But Christ has promised that "Where two or three are gathered together in my name there will I be also," and it proved true then, as always. We had a note from one of the ladies saying that she did not think Sunday was the proper day to discuss business. We wrote her just to name any day that suited her, and we would gladly join her. I felt sure that if we could only have one service, it would become interesting. I therefore asked a lady at the landing if she would permit services to be held in one of the rooms of her house the following Sunday, and she willingly agreed. I then wrote to Mr. Hughes at Concordia asking him to preach for us the next Sunday afternoon; upon his replying that he would, I placed notices in every public place.

 

      When I reached the house designated, on Sunday afternoon, I found the house full, the yard full, and great enthusiasm. I got my husband to take up a collection for the minister, who agreed to give us every Sunday afternoon and two sermons on every fifth Sunday. I felt sure we would have a church now; and finding an abandoned store, I bought it, employed a carpenter, and had it ready for services by the next Sunday evening. The Kate Adams, our weekly packet, not only contributed but sent us a handsome Bible and hymn book. Two sisters in the neighborhood had their melodeon brought up and led the music, and those fifth Sundays were a joy to the' neighborhood. Each lady would bring a basket; we would spread our tablecloths on top of the levee, and spread the contents of our baskets all together. People from quite a distance would attend and always find a welcome. A terrible snow storm caused the roof of the church to break at a time when I was sick. An old lady came to me and said she thought the men should build a church, and the ladies let it alone; I replied that I was perfectly willing for the men to build it, if they would, but I was determined that it should be built, and if the measures had not been effected by the time I was well, I would take the matter in hand. Circumstances proved that I had it to do, and we worked with such energy that we soon had a new church.

 

            We now began to realize trouble. First, small pox on the plantation carried off so many of the negroes that we were short of labor. Fortunately, we had three white men from Illinois who proposed making a corn crop. They were about to leave the place on account of small pox, but I took them into my own house, cooked, and washed for them, and they made the crop, which netted us $1000 from surplus corn. We could not get a physician for the small pox patients, and as my husband had to be away most of the time, it devolved on me to do all I could for them. I found one old man who was immune, so I hired him to wait upon the sick and report to me the condition of each one. I read doctors' books and would tell him what to do every morning. I made two gallons of tea, sweetened it to my taste, also made a peck of thin biscuit, and had him give a pint of tea and two biscuits to each convalescent. At dinner, I would give them beef soup and crackers, and in this -way I soon had the epidemic checked and the dismal tolling of the bell stopped.

 

        I saved the lives of many, and they were soon coming out again, showing by their pocked faces the ordeal they had undergone. I had to be both doctor and surgeon in many instances. I had to put the left breast back on a Negro. I used adhesive straps, as I could not make a needle go through the skin. We could not get a doctor, so I waited on this Negro one month and cured him. I also had to doctor two severe ginsaw cuts, one bullet wound, a stabbing wound, and numerous malarial cases. But I never refused to answer a call, day or night. I had, also, cases of congestion.

 

       The only amusing experience during my life as a plantation doctor was when I was asked to see a monkey. The owner was in great distress. He said that his monkey and his organ were all he had with which to make a living for himself and his family. I told him I would certainly do all I could for the suffering little monkey. I felt its pulse, looked at its tongue, measured out the medicine, and gave the man instructions about nursing it and giving it the medicine, but told him that he must let me feed it until it was well, which it soon was, to the unbounded delight of its owner, who called down every blessing he could upon me.

 

       The overflow of 1882 proved very disastrous to us, making the crops late and causing much sickness to both man and beast. The buffalo gnat gave charbon to the stock and cows. I had such a hard time during the overflow with sick children that I took my two little ones to Jacksonville, Illinois, to which place my husband soon followed. We returned in September much refreshed and able to work again.

 

 

 

 

       Editor's note: The above was taken from two articles written by Senator W. B. Roberts. Senator Roberts came to Bolivar County in 1882; seventeen years after negro rule had been established in the county and eight years before it was abolished.

 

 

 

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