The Breeding of American Slaves True Stories of American Slave Breeding and Slave Babies By Various Recollections of American ex-slaves and their memories of Breeding and Babies Taken from the American Slave Narratives "If a woman didn\'t breed well, she was put in a gang and sold.
Ellen Cragin, Ex-Slave, 815-1/2 Arch Street, Little Rock, Arkansas Age: Around 80 or more at time of interview*.
My oldest sister told me to take it and set it by the door, and I did it.
I said to myself, \'If you whip my mother today, I am goin\' to shoot you.\' I didn\'t know where the gun belonged.
I don\'t know whose gun it was. "I went out one day and got a gun.
He would have children by a nigger woman and then have them by her daughter.
That wasn\'t nothin\'.
He made her breed and then made her work at the loom. "It wasn\'t her work to be in the field.
I didn\'t have no use for neither one of \'em, and ain\'t yet. "I have heard women scream and holler, \'Do pray, massa, do pray.\' And I was sure glad when she beat up young Tom and got away.
I\'m an old woman, but Tom Polk better not come \'round me now even.
I never did get over that.
She was stout, and they had dug a hole in the ground to put her belly in.
And they had her down.
I heard some one say, \'They got Clarisay Down, down there \' I went to see.
I was small.
I don\'t know how many times he hit her.
I forget how much cotton they had to pick.
When there was nothin\' to do at the loom, mother had to go in the field, you know.
He hit her because she didn\'t pick the required amount of cotton.
That was before she ran away.
One day, Tom Polk hit my mother.
While she did that weaving, she had children fast. "Mother was a breeder.
When the slaves didn\'t pick enough cotton for them, they would take them down the field, and turn up their clothes, till they was naked, and beat them nearly to death.
Polk and his son, the one my mother beat up and left lying on the ground, were two mean men.
Henry Banner, Ex-Slave, County Hospital, Little Rock, Arkansas Age: Unknown but born around 1849 "Dr.
They married just like they do now, only they didn\'t have no license.
Some people say that they done this and that thing but it\'s no such a thing.
They married just like they do now but they didn\'t have no license.
The Breeding of American Slaves True Stories of American Slave Breeding and Slave Babies By Various Recollections of American ex-slaves and their memories of Breeding and Babies Taken from the American Slave Narratives "If a woman didn\'t breed well, she was put in a gang and sold
