"My mother was Harriet Davis and she was born in Virginia. I don’t know who my father was. My grandmother was captured in Africa when she was a little girl. A big boat was down at the edge of a bay an’ the people was all excited about it an’ some of the bravest went up purty close to look at it. The men on the boat told them to come on board and they could have the pretty red handkerchiefs, red and blue beads and big rings. A lot of them went on board and the ship sailed away with them. My grandmother never saw any of her folks again."
—
MARTHA KING, 85 years old, McAlester, Oklahoma, ca. 1937
WPA Slave Narrative Project, Oklahoma Narratives, Volume 13
Federal Writer’s Project, United States Work Projects Administration; Library of Congress
NationalHumanitiesCenter.org
