| Gaddis, Sallie
Field Worker: John F. Daugherty
Date: September 21, 1937
Interview # 8583
Address: Mill Creek, OK
Born: about 1876
Place of Birth: East of Mill Creek, in Johnson County
Father: Joe Benton, Hunter and trapper
Mother: Lizzie McGee
My parents were Joe Benton and Lizzie McGee Benton,
full blood Chickasaws. I was born east of Mill Creek
about 1876. I had one brother. Father was a great
hunter. This is the way he made a living. He sold
hides each winter. The trees around our cabin were always
full of hides in the curing process. Father made his own
tobacco. He gathered sumac leaves, dried them and smoked
them.
Mother had a few hens and ducks. She often found a wild
turkey's nest in the spring and would get the turkey's eggs and
set them under the chicken hens. Then we had our own
turkeys, but the wild turkeys usually would go back to the woods
in the fall. One fall I noticed that the turkeys went to roost
higher in the tree each night until one night they were in the
top. Father said the turkeys would leave us the next
morning. Sure enough when daylight came they flew far away
and we never saw them again.
One fall Mother had some ducks swimming on a pond near our
place. Some wild geese came down and swam with them.
These wild geese didn't leave, but stayed with Mother's ducks and
she raised some young geese in the spring from which she got
feathers for a bed.
In those days the young boys wore long shirts until they were
almost grown. Our beds were made of poles and fastened to
the corners of the house. We had straw mattresses, and
feather beds on top of these.
We had a dirt floor and swept it with a broom made of broom
weeds. Those were happy days for my brother and me but they
were not to last long, for Mother and Father both died when I was
about ten years old and we had to go to live with an aunt.
My little brother soon died.
My aunt was unkind to me and one summer I took the measles and
each morning my aunt made me take my quilt and go out back of the
house. I cried for water, but she wouldn't bring me any, so
I crawled over to the chicken trough and drank with the chickens.
When I was well I determined I would not stay with her any longer.
I was then about fourteen years old.
One evening I cooked supper earlier than usual and after I was
through with my work I sat down and planned a way of escape.
I was afraid to run off, for I knew if my aunt caught me, she
would whip me unmercifully. So after they were all in bed
and asleep I crept silently away and down to the creek. I
was frightened almost to death when I heard voices not far from
me. I discovered it was some Indians so I went to them.
They were strangers to me, but I told them of my plight and
they took me with them to Stonewall. There I found a
with a good old man and woman. I did the work for this old
couple and they were good to me. I remained with them until
they both died.
I married my first husband a short time after their deaths.
I have been married three times and have five children and fifteen
grandchildren.
Transcribed by Brenda Choate and Dennis
Muncrief, August 2001.
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