project ;~1655			253
~ ~. Dixon	390311
~dnnsboro, 3. C.



ALECK WOODVü~RD,
EX..SLA\TE ~ 83 YEMtS.



n Yo ~ knows de Sirnont on plac e ‚ Mr ~ ~‘o od? We 11 ‚ dat ~ just

where I was born back yonder befo ‚ de war ‚ a slave of old Marster Johnnie Si~oriton. Five miles sorter south sunset side of ~ioodward Station where you was born, ain‘t it so? ~iy pappy was Ike ~oodward,

•ut~ 1).im just call ‘Ike ‚ t im.e of slavery ‚ and i~r maniny was name Dinaho My brother Charlie up north, if he ain‘t dead, The lives in ksheville, North Carolina. Two sisters: OIlle, her n~rry an Aiken, last counts, ~‘nd she and her family in Charlotto, iiorth Carolina; sister Mattie marry a V~ilson nigger, but I don‘t know where they is.

‚I Us lived in a four‘..room log house, ‘bout sixteen all told.

Dere was pappy end rnamray (now you count them) gran‘pappy, Henry Davis, Gran‘marany Kisana, Aunt anna, and her seven chillun, and me~ ~nd niy two brothers and two sisters. How m~iy make dat? Seventeen? Wèll, dat‘s de number piled in dore at night in de beds and on de floors. They was scendlous beda; my god, just think of ~ grands, old as I is now, tryin‘ to sleep on them hard beds and other folks piled ‘scriminately all over de lo~ floorsi My ~ran‘pappy Henry was de o~rpenter, and old rnarster tell him ‘if you make your beds hard, Henry, ‘member you folks got to sleep on them.‘

	s, ~ was just a little black feller, running ‘round most of de time in my shirt tail, btr~ I recollect pickin‘ cotton, and piddling ‘round

de woodpile, fetchizi‘ in wood for white house and chips and kindling to

fresh up de fires. 15e had plerrty to eat ‚ ‘cause us killed thfrty~five hogs