Doc Daniel Dowdy
Age 81 yrs.
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
I was born June 6, 1856 in Madison County, Georgia. Father was named Joe
Dowdy and mother was named Mary Dowdy. There was 9 of us boys, George, Smith, Lewis, Henry, William,
Myself, Newt, James and Jeff. There was one girl and she was my twin, and her name was Sarah. My
mother and father come from Richmond, Va., to Georgia. Father lived on one side of the river and my
mother on the other side. My father would come over ever week to visit us. Noah Meadows brought my
father, and Elizabeth Davis, daughter of the old master, took my mother. They married in Noah
Meadows house.
My mother was the cook in the Big House. They’d give us pot likker with
bread crumbs in it. Sometimes meat, jest sometimes, very seldom. I liked black-eyed peas and still
do till now. We lived in weatherboard house. Our parents had corded-up beds with ropes and us
chillun slept on the floor for most part or in a hole bored in a log. Our house had one window jest
big enough to stick your head out of, and one door, and this one door faced the Big House which was
your master’s house. This was so that you couldn’t git out ‘less somebody seen you.
My job was picking up chips and keeping the claves separate so that the
calves wouldn’t suck the cows dry. Mostly, we had Saturday afternoons off to wash. I was show boy
doing the war, me and my sister, ‘cause we was twins. My mother couldn’t be bought ‘cause she
done had 9 boys for one farm and neither my father, ‘cause he was the father of ‘em. I was
religious and didn’t play much, but I sho’ did like to listen to preachings. I did used to play
marbles sometimes.
We jest wore shirts and nothing else both winter and summer. They was a
little heavier in winter and that’s all. No shoes ever. I had none till after I was set free. I
guess I was almost 12 years old then.
The overseer on our place was a large, tall black man. We had plenty poor
white neighbors. They was one of our biggest troubles. They’d allus look in our window and door
all the time.
I saw slaves sold. I can see that old block now. My cousin Eliza was a
pretty girl, really good looking. Her master was her father. When the girls in the big house had
beauz coming to see ‘em, they’d ask, “Who is that pretty gal?” So they decided to git rid of
her right away. The day they sold her, will allus be remembered. They stripped her to be bid off and
looked at. I wasn’t allowed to stand in the crowed, I was laying down under a fig brush. The man
that bought Eliza was from New York. The Negroes had made up nuff money to buy her off theyself, but
they wouldn’t let that happen. There was a man bidding for her who was a Swedeland. He allus bid
for a good looking cullud gals and bought ‘em for his own use. He asked the man from New York,
“Whut you gonna do with her when you hit ‘er?” The man from New York said, “Non of your damn
business, but you ain’t got money nuff to buy ‘er.” When the man from New York had bought her,
he said, “Eliza, you are free from now on.” She left and went to New York with him. Mama and
Eliza both cried when she was being showed off, and master told ‘em to shut up before he knocked
they brains out.
Iffen you didn’t do nothing wrong, they whipped you now and then
anyhow. I called a boy Johnny once and he took me ‘hind the garden and poured it on me and made me
call him master. It was from then on I started to fear the white man. I come to think of him as a
bear. Sometimes fellows would be a little late making it in and they got whipped with a cow-hide.
The same man whut whipped me to make me call him master, well, he whipped my mamma. He tried her to
a tree and beat her unmerciful and cut her tender parts. I don’t know why he tied her to that
tree.
The first time you was caught trying to read or write, you was whipped
with a cow-hide, the next time with a cat-o-nine tails and the third time they cut the first jint
offen you forefinger. They was very severe. You most allus got 30 and 9 lashes.
They carried news from one plantation by whut they call relay. Iffen you
was caught, they whipped you till you said, “Oh, pray Master!”
One day a man gitting whipped was saying “Oh pray master, Lord have
mercy!” They’d say “Keep whipping that nigger Godddamn him.” He was whipped till he said,
“Oh pray Master, I gotta nuff.” Then they said, “Let him up now, ‘cause he’s praying to
the right man.”
My father was the preacher and an educated man. You know the sermon they
give him to preach? –Servan, Obey Your Master. Our favorite baptizing hymn was On Jordan’s
Stormy Bank I Stand. My favorite song is Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen.
Oh, them patrollers! They had a chief and he git e’m together and iffen
they caught you without a pass and sometimes with a pass, they’d beat you. But iffen you had a
pass, they had to answer to the law. One old master had two slaves, brothers, on his place. They was
both preachers. Mitchell was a hardshell Baptist and Andrew was a Missionary Baptis. One day the
patroller chief was rambling thoo’ the place and found some letters writ to Mitchell and Andrew.
He went to the master and said, “did you know you had some niggers that could read and writ?”
master said, “No, but I might have, who did you ‘spect?” The patroller answered, “Mitchell
and Andrew.” The old master said, “I never knowed Andrew to tell me a lie ‘bout nothing!”
Mitchell was called first and asked could he read and write. He was
scared still. He said, “Naw-sir.” Andrew was called and asked. He said, “Yes-sir.” He was
asked iffen Mitchell could. He said, “Sho’ better’n me.” The master told John Arnold, the
patroller chief, not to bother ‘em. He gloried in they spunk. When the old master died, he left
all of his niggers a home apiece. We had Ku Klux Klans till the government sent Federal officers out
and put a stop to their ravaging and sent ‘em to Sing Sing.
Doing the war my father was a carpenter. His young master come to him
‘cause he was a preacher and asked him must he go to the front and my father told him not to go
‘cause he wouldn’t make it. He went on jest the same and when he come back my father had to tote
him in the house ‘cause he had one leg tore off. The Yankees come thoo’, ramshackled housed and
take fat ones and turn the poor ones in the corn they left. They took everything they could. They
cussed niggers who dodged ‘em for being fools and make ‘em show ‘em everything they
knowned whar was.
Our old master was mighty old and him and the women folks cried when we
was freed. He told us we was free as he was.
I come to Oklahoma in 1906. I come out of that (Atlanta, Georgia) riot in
1906. Some fellow knocked up a colored woman or something and we waded right in and believed me we
made Atlanta a fit place to live in. It is one of the best cities in America.
I married Miss Emmaline Witt. I Carried her to the preacher one of the
coldest nights I ever rid. I have three chillun and don’t know how many grandchillen. My chillun
is one a nurse, one in Arizona for his health and the other doing first one thing and another.
I think Abraham Lincoln was the greatest human being ever been on earth
‘cepting the Apostle Paul. Who any better’n a man who liberated 4,000,000 Negroes? Some said he
wasn’t a Christian, but he told some friends once, “I’m going to leave you and may never see
you again (and he didn’t) so I’m going to take the Divine Spirit with me and leave it with
you.”
Jeff Davis was a bloody as he could be. I don’t lak him a’tall. But
you know good things come from enemies. I don’t even admire George Washington. White men from the
south that will help the Negro is far and few between. Booker T. Washington was a great man. He made
some blunders and mistakes, but he was a great man. He is the father of industrial education and you
know that sho’ is a great thing.
The white folks was ignorant. You know the better you prepare yourself
the better you act. Iffen they has put some sense in our heads ‘stead of stricks on our heads,
we’ud been better off and more benefit to ‘em.
I had something from within that made me fear God and taught me how to
pray. People say God don’t hear sinners pray, but he do. Everybody ought to be Christians so not
to be lost.
I work in real estate and can do a lot of work. I don’t use no
crutches and no cane and walk all the time, never hardly ride. I come in at 1 and 2 o’clock a. m.
and get up between 8 and 9 a.m. ‘cept Sundays, I get up at 7 or 8 a.m. so I can be ready to go to
Sunday School. I cook for my own self all the time too. I am a Baptist and a member of Tabernacle
Baptist Church. I am a trustee in my church too.
