Grand Ma's Story

CONGRESSIONAL RECORD
SENATE
Nov. 19, 2004

GRAND MA'S STORY

Mr. DeWINE. Mr. President, I recently received a letter from Iva D. Fesler Johnson. In it, she recalls what her grandmother, whom she called "Grand Ma," told her about slavery. I would like to thank her for sharing this with me. Grand Ma's story is one of strength and perseverance-a story that took place during one of the darkest points in our Nation's history. The following is the story contained in the letter:

On January 1, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation declaring "All Slaves Free."

I, Iva D. Jones, was born the daughter of Richard and Lottie Foster Jones. My father's mother was Cicly Belle Graham, the daughter of Henry and Fanny Graham. She was my grandmother. She was a slave.

"Grand Ma," as we called her, was brought to this country from Africa by ship. Grand Ma was sold three times by auction on the auction block at Washington, Kentucky. She was sold to the highest bidder. She was given the name of her slave master. So, she was Cicly Marshall at one time, another time, Cicly Smith.

Grand Ma plowed the fields with oxen. She was the mother of nine children. She birthed some of the children in the field that she was plowing. Her slave master did not allow her to return to the cabin in which she lived until the day's work was done. She worked from sun up to dark. She was not paid any money for this work.

She was married three times by jumping across a broomstick.

The slaves would sometimes try to escape from the "Life of Slavery" to Canada. Grand Ma tried to escape. She was caught by "Blood Hounds" and "Slave Catchers." She was punished by being whipped, and salt and pepper was put on the cuts made by the whip to help healing.

Grand Ma developed the gift of mid-wife. She delivered two sets of twins for her daughter, Margaret O'Banion, and her husband, Lucian O'Banion.

The slaves could not read or write. No one in the slave owner's family was allowed to teach the slaves because it was against the law. Some taught the slaves to read and write in secret. There were no schools for the slaves until after they were free.

Grand Ma said she saw President George Washington and President Abraham Lincoln.

Grand Ma lived through the Civil War. She said she prayed we would one day have a place to worship God under our own vine and fig tree and the slave master's whip would no longer be stained with African blood. God has answered her prayers. God has given us places to worship.

One writer states, slavery lasted 250 years in the United States. Millions of people were sold into bondage so that their owners could grow rich, selling sugar, tobacco, rice, and cotton grown by their slave laborers. The slaves loved to sing as they worked-such songs as "Steal Away to Jesus," "Go Down Moses," and "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot."

At dawn, the slaves would awake every morning except Sunday to the sound of the overseer's horn. Men, women, and children would scramble out of a pile of straw, piled high on the mud floor of their hut, with hoe in hand to the field. Mid-morning, they were told to fix their breakfast, which was cornmeal put in a pot of boiling water to make hoe-cakes. The hoe-cakes were cooked on the blade of their hoe over the fire. Once a week, they were given a little piece of salt pork and fish.

Sometimes the slaves would drop little pieces of grains in the boiling water.

The slaves did not have shoes to wear and their clothes were ragged.

The slave master would ride a horse to the slave auction. The slaves were chained together, barefoot and raggedy. They were taken to the auction block.

As they worked in the field, the overseer would ride a horse to watch the slaves work. If he thought the slaves were not working hard enough, he would flog them with a cowhide whip.

After slavery, Grand Ma worked for pay because she had to find a home. The master's wife told Grand Ma to leave Grand Ma's daughter, whose name was Ellen, with her while she looked for a home. Grad Ma said on Sunday morning a man riding a horse told Grand Ma, Ellen is dead and buried. Little Ellen was nine years of age. The man told Grand Ma that the missus said Ellen wasn't washing the hearth right. So the missus hit Ellen in the head with a sick of wood and Ellen died.

Other slaves were sold at auction, and members of a family were separated. Husbands and wives, brothers and sisters, and children did not know the whereabouts of others.

Grand Ma was finally able to get a home of three rooms on a one acre lot in Lewisburg, Kentucky. She lived there many years and died in her home on June 26, 1926. The House has been modernized. It stands there today. I was 15 years of age when Grand Ma died.

Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now I'm found. I was blind, but now I see.

Written by Mrs. Iva Johnson

These are things my grandmother told me about slavery.