Browse:MORE DOCTORS DESCRIBED BY LAYMEN (Volume 1, entries 3064–3109)
MORE DOCTORS DESCRIBED BY LAYMEN
Volume 1, entries 3064–3109. Source context: THE DOCTORS AT WORK: REPORTS FROM LAYMEN. Entries listed under this heading in the source volume.
Entries
Entry 3064
Now, if yo' wanta draw de attention of anyone dat chew cares fo', yo git nine teaspoonsfula sugah an' draw a glass of watah an' yo' put it in there. Put de sugah in de watah an' yo' offer it up to de Sacred Heart of Jesus. Yo' offer dat glass of sweeten watah tuh de Sacred Heart of Jesus an' ah'll guarantee yo' it'll bring dere mind to yo' an' dey'll come to yo'. No names. Jes' offer it tuh de Sacred Heart of Jesus.
(How do you offer it? Where do you put this glass?)
Under there - undah de picture, see. Den yo' offer it to it, an' yo' set that glass there, ah guarantee yo'.
Entry 3065
(The Sacred Heart you say?)
De Sacred Heart of Jesus, yo' prays tuh him if yo' wants. Lak yo' got con- fusion in yore house an' yo' wants peace. Yo' gives de Sacred Heart of Jesus a red candle on Monday, Wednesdays an' Fridays, or yo' give him a red light. Yo kin buy these cups whut chew burns these lights in an' yo' gives him a red light, but it must be Monday, Wednesdays an' Fridays. Dat's de Sacred Heart days.
Entry 3066
(You do what?)
Use the Sacred Heart. You use a purple light to that saint and that's to get your wishes right away, too. [New Orleans, La., (857), 1364:10.] [Before I begin MY CONVERSATIONS WITH DOCTORS, I must find a place: for the fabulous Doctor Buzzard, old-timers like George Jackson and Zippy Tull, and the woman who got sanctified.]
Entry 3067
[This remarkable man we have already met, along with his friend who was equally adept at sudden disappearance. Perhaps you remember him by his more familiar name, Daddy Snakelegs, "cause he could run so fast and he could disappear." A precious pair! Sorry, I should also include the third member of the group, Ole Sal, the disappearing mule. See 845, p.293.] I've done hear [what you want]. I kin tell you most everything you ask me.
[I turn off machine and we talk until something of possible interest appears.]
(Burying you alive? How do they do that? Do you know?)
Burying you alive and you bound to follow the dirt.
(I see. Well, how do they say they do that?)
Well, I heard ole man Alexander tell that. He say he makes a coffin.
(Do what? Makes a coffin?)
Makes a coffin and puts this dirt in it.
(What kind of dirt?)
Graveyard dirt. Puts a needle catercorner there and puts another one cater- corner here.
(Like making an X in the coffin?)
No, just.
(Here - that's the coffin there.)
[I probably use my small oblong Nuonbers Book, used for altar, p.886.]
There's the coffin. Well, dey lay de two needles straight, right along here. And right between here they put a piece of cayenne pepper, table salt, and a piece of new salt [sulphur?] right there. Then they lay a piece of devil's root, dey call it - drive that down in there, you see, and they say that draws you up. (I see. Now, they put these needles like this [cross them], sort of making an X in the corners like that, and up here at this top part - up here at the top of the coffin.in that sort of a V there [one of the 4 angles of the crossed needles] they - what do they put up there?) They put a pinch of cayenne pepper.
(Cayenne pepper. What do they put down here in the left-hand corner?)
A pinch of sulphur.
(And what do they put in this corner - the right-hand corner of the coffin?)
New salt.
(And up here - where do they put the root?)
Up here - they put the root chere.
(Up in the.right-hand corner they put this root.)
And there's your head. (That's your head. And they put - what was the name of that stuff they put there?) Ah - ah devil's root. I suppose they want the devil to get that coffin.
(I see. And what [else] will they do for the devil to get that coffin?)
Carry it out and bury it - bury it in the dirt.
(What will that do?)
That's all - just carry that out and bury that down in the dirt. [See Coffin, PP.536-542.]
Entry 3068
[He was my son] and he got into difficulty by way of being in some bad company. Well, you see he didn't have any brothers, he was the only boy I had. He didn't have any brothers or nuthin, nobody to help him - didn't care nuthin for him, but they put it all on him. An' there was a man here they called Doctor Armour from Berkley. He's dead too, now. He'd gone to New York and he died up there a few years ago. But a lady told me, she says, "Miz Jenkins, '' she says, "ah tell you how you kin get that boy out and it won't cost you so much money." I say, "But my Lord, I 'ready paid $85." She says, "Well, you won't have much more to pay." She says, "A man here from Berkley they call Doctor Armour," she says, "and you go to see him and he will help great. And I say, "Well, I'm going." I say, "You go with me." She say, "Well, you come to my house tonight and I go there with you." Well, he was in a house in 16th street in the 5OO block. Well, I'd gone with her. She'd taken me there and he was there talking and telling folks different things. [The doctor had a private church to keep his work within'the law.] But ah told him I wanted to see him private. Well, he taken me after: de crowd left and I'd gone in the room with him and told him my troubles. He says, "Uh-huh." He say, "Well, you come back here tomorrow." Say, "Go to the Five-And-Ten [Cent Store] and buy me a five-cent handkerchief, big white handkerchief, and a bottle of Hearts Cologne." And he says, "I'm goin' fix [dress] this handkerchief, and when you come back, you go over there and give it to him. And when they have his trial you tell him how to use it," and he say, "and you goin' bring him back home." I say, "Is that true?" He say, "Yes. And I was so worried I kept right on from there and gone and got the Hearts Cologne. I got it at the drug store. And I come by a store - I couldn't wait till the next day till the Five-And-Ten opened, and I went to the drug store and got the Hearts Cologne, and went by a Jew store and got a handkerchief. Well, the next morning early I'd taken it up there to him before he'd even gotten up. He say, "You are in a hurry, ain't you?" I told him yes, I was so worried about my boy - first trouble he had began to get into. And so I'd taken it there and he'd dressed this handkerchief and he say, "You tell the boy when he get in the court," he say, "he just kind of shake it around and blow his nose. Tell him don't wash it - don't care how dirty it gets, cain't wash it." And I say, "All right, I'll tell him." And I say, "That's all you goin' do?" He say, "That's all I need to do." And I say, "Well, what is that?" He say, "You go on," he say, "that's charged high with lodestone and High John de Conker - it's in that handkerchief." And he say, "And you just go and tell him to do what I say." Well, you see, I couldn't go in the jail. And I'd carry meals but they'd take 'em in. And I would give him - I'd write on a little piece of paper and tell him what to do with the handkerchief, and told him, "Don't wet it - didn't care how dirty it gets." And he did just like I told him - well, which he did just about the same. And when his trial came up I went there and he was using the handker- chief like I had told him on de note, and I'm here to tell you when his trial was closed he went on back home with me - carried him right on home.
(How did you get this note to him?)
In his meals.
(Did you hide it in something?)
No, I didn't hide it in something. I just put it - Mr. Roy was jailer and the boy was in there and I go there so much he really knowed me. I carried him every meal he ate. And I just felt that way, first trouble he had been in, and it worried me very much, and I carried him every meal and I just put it there in his handkerchief. I had it in his handkerchief and told him to use the handkerchief, and I say, "Don't wash it no matter how dirty it get and use it just as I said." (Well when you took these meals there, did they let you take this handkerchief where he was?) No, no, Mr. Robert would take them hisself.
(Then you gave Mr. Robert this note to give to your son?)
It was in the handkerchief in the basket. I had a little basket you know and the food. Course he would go through the basket to see was they anything in there, but he didn't see anything, you know, that would harm. Well, I just had on the note for him not to wash it no matter how dirty it gets. Well, I guess he seed that too but he didn't see nothing in there - just a white handkerchief - cause he just had one you know for him to use. Well, which he did, but told it on that little note - because the handkerchief was dressed, you see. And so afterward, I brought him and I carried by there to let Doctor Armour see him. And he laughed, he said, "What did I tell you." I say, "You sure did tell me the truth." And I say, "What you charge me?" He say, "I charge you $2.02." He said, "I always charge a penny to the dollar - that's all I charges. I said, "Doctor, here's five dollars." He said, "No, I just want $2.02, and then I want that in silver - want the dollar. He wouldn't never take any Paper money.
(Well, how did your son know that handkerchief was dressed?)
Well, he didn't know, but he just only did what I told him to do.
(Just to carry it with him?)
I told him to keep this handkerchief and don't wet it whatever you do. Don't wet it no matter how dirty it gets - don't you wash it. And that's what he did.
(Then when your son came out, did you tell him about the handkerchief?)
I told him after he came out.
(What did he say when you told him?)
Well, he say he thought something funny. He'd been always a peculiar child anyhow and seemed like he's easy to ketch on things. And it seems that some people is borned with something in 'em, see, and that's the way he is. Since he'd gone to Philadelphia and all, he knowed so many tricks and turns you see, more than I does because I'm old enough to have a whole lot of experience you see. But he said he felt something when ah told him not to wet it and said he wouldn't wet it. And I told him to - ah say, "When you get in court, you always wipe your mouth and nose with it." And he says he understood - seemed like he felt like that's what it was and so I brought him on back as Doctor Armour says. And I asked him, I says," 'What in the world did you put in that handkerchief?" He says that handkerchief was charged highly with lodestone and High John de Conker. He say that will bring anybody out of trouble - it will overcome any- thing. That's what he says. [For Berkley, see Introduction.][ Newport News, Va., (482), 506:8.]
Entry 3069
[We have already met Doctor Bayhan, a white man on the Eastern Shore, who was also known in Baltimore (62, p.28).] [Here is an original statement in my original penciled transcription. "Temporary annotation - for footnote reference only - to get wife back - Doctor Bayhan. He charges from $20 to $25...you bring him the picture...he'll guarantee you and he'll give you a Bible and you'll wear this Bible in your pocket. If she don't come back in a space of time that he gives yeh, he'll refund your money back to you regardless of where you at. This note was orig- inally made to be used for fees by doctors.]
Entry 3070
[Fortunately I am able to introduce to you the fabulous Doctor Buzzard of Beaufort (Bu'fert) in the words of another gifted doctor - a man I call CoURT- ROOM SPECIALIST in INTERVIEWS section. Beaufort, yo' know. See, Doctor Buzzard at Beaufort. OF Dat's a fairy tale. Yo' know, once dey had a story down at Beaufort dere an' dey [story] has de fishermen go down to de sea. All right, de boat'll capsize wit de mens an' some of de men goin' drown. Dey had de boats [one boat] full of fishes. Well, about three or fo' days whut de [they] find - de boat, when dey see de boat, de boat come drifting up to de dock wit fish in dat boat, an' dey [the story says a buzzard] come steering it on up an' de buzzard eatin' de fish when de boat comin' up to de dock. When de boat come up.to de dock, de buzzard done eatin' de fish. Ever since dat, dey say [a] buzzard done rowed de boat - he rowed de boat to Beaufort.
(Well, about that man, the root doctor down there?)
He done - listen, de mens was drown-ded, de fishermens. Dey had a boat fulla fish, and right down - when de fishermen out to sea dere, an' dey rotten on de boat, de buzzard settin' on de boat eatin' de fish, an' de blood drippin' on de watah. Dey see buzzard, an' de buzzard rowin' de boat.
(So the buzzard rows the boat?)
No, de buzzard wasn't rowin' de boat, but dat is a tale, yo' know. (What was that tale about old man Buzzard rowing the boat though, didn't they tell something to you about that?) That's the same tale.
(Tell me that story, so that I can get it straight.)
Anyone go to his house.
(This old man Buzzard?)
Yeah, to his house. He stay on one side of de water and yo' be on de nex' side. Well, yo' come down to de boat to go cross to him, he'll send a buzzard ovah to row yo' in de boat. An' aftah yo' git in de boat, de buzzard row 'cross to de othah side. Now, if yo' come down an' git in de boat and de buzzard start rowin' yo' off an' come back, dey say yo' bettah git off, 'cause yo' de wrong man - de buzzard gotta tuh drown yo'. He row off a piece an' come back, yo' bettah git off. But aftah, yo' see - aftah yo' git on de boat, de buzzard he row yo' on 'cross to de ole man. Yo' git to de house an' git to de do', de buzzard he'll invite chew in de house. Den he'll go fust to give yo' a seat. Den Doctor Buzzard he goin' talk with yo' den.
(The old man Buzzard, did you see him - the old man?)
Yessuh, ah done see him. Ah saw him heah.
(How long has be been dead?)
He been daid 'bout 'leven yeahs.
(There really was a man named Doctor Buzzard?)
Name Buzzard. Dere wus a man name Buzzard. Stayed in a hut-house cross heah to Lady's Islan' - in a hut-house to Lady's Islan'.
(He was a colored man, wasn't he?) [Leading questionl]
Yessuh.
(What did he look like?)
Was a ole man, gray haired man wit a long beard - a ole man. (Do you know any other stories that they tell about Buzzard? Are there any other stories that you know about him? They used to tell a lot of stories about him.) Dere one story 'bout he make a snake walk in de co'thouse yo' know, where a case is goin' on an' de judge dismiss de case. [See snake sent to courthouse, 248, p.70.] An' he make a lil bird fly right in de co'thouse an' dey dismiss de case.
[See magic BIRDS, Pp.56-59.]
An' he make a buzzard fly roun' in de co'thouse an' dey dismiss de case. [For trained buzzards, see 203-204, p.57f.] Yo' wouldn't have tuh go dere [to him], yo' jes' [write] to 'im an' pay him yore money an' go on 'bout chure business an' still he'd be dere. Dat day yo' go dere an' see a snake crawlin' round de co' thouse - or a buzzard flyin' round de co'thouse - [or] a lil white bird would come an' fly roun' de judge an' sit on de judge shoulder - an' de judge would dismiss the case. (Did you ever hear of another fellow down there on the Islands named Jones? Was there another fellow named Jones - an old man?) [Leading question but with a special purpose.] Yeah, I heard about him, too. An' ah heard about Jones an' ah heard about Robinson - Robinson down dere now.
[For Robinson, also called Robertson, see later in this margin-title.]
(Is he the undertaker - is he the man that has a store down there?) [For my visit to Beaufort, see later.] No, Willie Wright got de store near de schoolhouse.
(Wright?)
Yeah, Willie Wright, near de fillin' station.
(Did you ever hear of Kid Wade?)
Kid Wade? He's daid. Yes, he died long heah in - his daughter run his place now.
(Well, he's only been dead in the last year or so hasn't he?)
He ain't dead a yeah yet. (Well, two years ago I went down there and stopped off and saw him, but he had had a stroke or something. So he's dead now?) Dat's correct.
(His daughter is carrying on his business?)
Yeah. (Could I get much of this stuff down at Beaufort - things along this line? They tell me that it is dying out down around Beaufort.) They're still gittin' the stuff down dere - dey still do dat stuff down dere.
(What was Doctor Buzzard's real name? Have you any idea?)
Dat's all ah really know - Doctor Buzzard.
[I must have asked about men elsewhere.]
Dere Doctor Harrison. [See margin-title later in this subsection.]
(Where is that?)
Dat in Florence [S. Car.]. Well see, he died about ten yeahs ago. He was ovah there. Ah know him from 1908.
[We talk while my machine was stopped, and then.]
(And he was the real Doctor Buzzard?) [I repeat him.]
De - he de real Doctor Buzzard. [Most people went to.]
(At Florence?)
Yessuh. (I talked with one of the men that worked for Harrison.) [Where this is I do not know at the moment.] Yeah, he was de real Doctor Buzzard, in Florence, yo' know.
(He was a white man?) [Again I repeat what he said while machine stopped.]
A white man - a white man lived three mile outa Florence. (Have you talked with many white people who do this kind of work - round in this part of the country - doing this sort of thing, rootworking and things of that sort?) A good many - a good many. A good many won't tell it, yo' know. [While I was in Waycross, Ga., a white doctor wanted to see me. This occured elsewhere.]
Entry 3071
We have a great man heah by de name of Doctor Buzzard. He did all dat kinda stuff an' he could see yo' befo' yo' came. He's right cross dis rivah.
(His name is Doctor Buzzard. Where does he live?)
He lives right ovah at Beaufort, S'uth Ca'lina - right cross in de - lak on a little island dere. It's a little island planted dere by itself.
(Is he still alive?)
He's still alive, he is. See, yo' git in de cane [canebrake], cross country dere. He has two large cane buzzards dat is large as eagles. Ah don't know how dey know how to row de boat - maybe it's a motor in it, but dey say ole buzzards rows it, one sittin' in de bow an' one in de stern. Say, when yo' gits dere, yo' go up dere an' go in de boat. Well, dey rows yo' right cross de rivah wit dey wings.
(Anybody else in the boat?)
Nobody else but those two buzzards - jes' dese two buzzards an' dey gits yo' to de landin'. When yo' git to de landin' he be standing at his house dere, an' he say, "Ah knew yo' wus comin'. Ah know de time yo' left home dis mawnin'." Say, "Ah know whut chew came after. Yo' came tuh git roots to kill so-an'-so Yo' came to git roots to run someone - sech-an'-sech a one away." Say, "Well, ah have 'em already fixed fo' yo." He had 'em already wrapped, an' yo' moden apt to carry it [away when you left]. An' he say, "Mah money, yo' jes' put it on yore mantelpiece tonight an' it will be brought to me." An'yocould put it anywhere in yore house an' tell him where yo' would put it befo' yo' leave. But if yo' tell him a story - that chew goin' put it sech-an'-sech a place an' don't put it nowhere an' den he don't git it - he goin' give yo' a stroke fo' life or - dere's many men been messed up tryin' tuh cheat him yo' see.
Entry 3072
(What courthouse is this? Where is this courthouse?)
Down on Main Street by Broad.
(And what do you see? What's in there?)
While de court's goin' on, you kin see buzzards - you know what you call buz- zards, and sparrows and things, flying in and out de courthouse. Dat's de roots working. And anybody tell you dat's de truth. Dat's de way de' do dere work, see - dem things flying. Dat's why de' call dat fellah I was telling you about Doctor Buzzard. Dey tell me he kin fix buzzards so he make them row a boat. Dat's de kind of fellah - he's smart enough to do dat. [For snake flying through air, see 248, p.70.]
Entry 3073
(Whom did you learn from down in Beaufort?)
Who? Doctor Cunningham.
(Doctor Cunningham. Is he still down there?)
Yes, sir.
(He is a good man?)
Fine - de only thing dey got in de country today, only thing they got there. White and colored go there.
(But years ago there used to be a lot of them down there?)
Oh, yes.
(Do you know anybody down there by the name of Doctor Buzzard?)
Yeah, he's there yet. He signs his name Buzzard Rowboat. Yeah, him and Cunningham is together.
(This is the son of the old man, you say?)
Yeah - no, the old man is dead. Yeah, but the office marked Buzzard Rowboat. Yeah, and Cunningham does that work.
(I see. How long has Buzzard been dead?)
About two years. (And you say this man's name was - how do you spell that name? [As so often, a useless question.] Hunnyham. Hunnyhaham.
Entry 3074
(Where did this happen now?)
He wus goin' 'long de street an' he takes some apples. Yo' know how de Jew store stands wit apples an' things all 'long de front [of the store]. An' he'd taken some an' de fellah demanded payment fo' dem. But he jest went on wit 'em. Dere was police standin' not very far, so he called him an' had him to take him up. An' dis boy was put in de box an' de next day was de trial. Dey goes ovah into Beaufort, S. Car., jest 'cross de sound. Dere was a man named Doctor Buzzard. His sister did - he was in jail locked up. Dis Doctor Buzzard says, "Wal, ah know whut chew coming fo', ah know whut chew comin' fo'. Yore brother's in jail." He says, "Yo' kin go on back. Ah'll 'tend to it," he says. An' dey went on back an' dat evening dey had de trial. Why this white gentle- man [fruit man] wouldn't say anything an' co'se no person to ask him. But whut dis Doctor Buzzard had done, ah don't know.
(This Doctor Buzzard up there, did he have quite a reputation?)
Yes, sir, he was all right.
(How long has he been dead?)
Well, he's been dead about three years.
(You say his sister is carrying on his work?)
His daughter.
Entry 3075
It was a school teacher I was talking to and this ole woman came from Beaufort and she asked her fer a drink of water. And while she was in de house the woman told her she was a doctor and she was a sister of Doctor Buzzard in Beaufort, [S. Car.]. And she said she was so sorry that she talked with this woman, because this woman had taken her spirit for de day. She said, "Ah don't feel like doing anything else today. I am so sorry I gave her that water." Say, "She has taken my whole spirit." And this was a teacher.
(This was a school teacher.)
A school teacher in [name of Charleston school].
(How old a woman was she?)
She was about 39 years old - not older than that. She was a mathmatician in the high school. And she say, "Ah can't do a thing else today because that woman has taken my spirit." (Did she say how she had taken her spirit? Did she know how this old woman could take her spirit away from her?) No, she didn't know. But she said jes' seein' that ole woman - and de ole woman told her that she was a root doctor. Right off she just got in her mind and she couldn't do a thing else fer dat day.
(How long ago did this happen?)
It was Tuesday.
(Tuesday, here in town?)
Right here in Charleston. ["Charleston, S. C., Friday, June 25, 1937 - 495 Mrs. Clayborne - sister and brother in Augusta, James Ramsey & Sofie Lee - No. 4 Percy St. [[Charleston]] working here - Carter [[my contact man from Fredericksburg, Va.]] staying here. Numbers Book 442-621. So this is the place where I interviewed in Charleston.]
Entry 3076
[This is a note I made from the cylinder: "Doctor Buzzard's son came to informant, said he would give informant all the churches he wanted. Skepti- cism on part of informant - said his [[Buzzard's]] father died a pauper. Well recorded. May use for recordings [{selection of recordings I was going to make]], though no great point to story." Informant, a clergyman from near Columbia, S. Car., knew nothing about hoodoo. Presumably he had heard that a Doctor Buzzard had died a pauper. Here is one of several men claiming sonship from Doctor Buzzard.]
Entry 3077
(Up in South Carolina, I found that the people up there called most of this sort of stuff witchcraft. Is that true, they called it witchcraft?)
[My informant is from South Carolina.]
Yes - witchcraft, an' cunjuration, rootworking.
(I never heard the word hoodoo up there. They don't seem to use it do they?)
They hardly ever use it.
(That seems to be over in New Orleans mostly.)
A hoodoo man is not - ah don't call him a actual cunjure.
(What would you say? What is a hoodoo man?)
A hoodoo man kin overcome dese things. He kin give yo' somepin to correct yo'self. Well, if yo' find out yore poisoned, anything, we always git a hoodoo man to look out fo' us, see.
[This is not true for most people, though it may be true for informant.]
(I see. The cunjure is the fellow that puts the stuff on you, starts the trouble.) He's de cunjure, but de man dat cure yo' dat de hoodoo. He kin overcome dese things. (Did you ever hear of old Doctor Buzzard. He was down at Beaufort, wasn't he?) Yes, sir.
(Well, did he die or something some years ago?)
Yes, he died but he left one son an' two daughters. He stayed tuh Orangeburg, South Carolina.
(He went up to Orangeburg. Well, did they carry on his work?)
Some one of dem is. They say his son is jest 'bout as good as he was.
(Is he still in Orangeburg, do you think?)
Ah think he's round dere now. (Some people say he was a white man, some said he was an Indian, some said he Was colored. What was he?) He was a natural white man. But he was wonderful - he was a good one. Now ah'm goin' tell whut ah seen when ah was a boy - nuthin but a boy. Ah seen de train [coming] an' run up to de station [to catch the train]. It was coming [going] to Columbia. Ah was down dere hunting twelve mile from Columbia - Hawkins, S. Car. An' he [Doctor Buzzard] was there [on business]. Some fellows Was goin' to town to Columbia, too. [He probably heard about Doctor Buzzard from them.] An' he tole me to go up on dat trip. [He merely told him to get on the train.] He tole me he goin' back home but he didn't go up dere [get on train.] An' when de train - shore 'nuff he nevah got on de train. [To return to Orange- burg, Doctor Buzzard had to pass through Columbia.] Nobody ever see him. Dey searched de train fo' him. When dey run up to Columbia in de shed, he was standing in de shed. He was a actual good man.
(How long has he been dead?)
Ah couldn't really know. Course ah leaved Columbia about 40 years ago, an' ah guess he was living den. But ah lived about lOO miles from him. But ah heard since that he's dead an' his daughter an' his son is jest as good as he was, but ah don't know. Right den he was in Orangeburg, S. Car., jest four miles outa town.
(Forty years ago he was at Orangeburg, S. Car., about four miles out.)
Yes, sir. Ah was born in 1865 an' that made me 63 years old or 73 years old the sixth of July gone. De rootwork dat be done now we gits it from New Orleans. Anybody git it. Dere's so many people gwine round now pretendin'. (Lot of things - lot of it has gone into spiritualism, something of that sort. There doesn't seem to be much of it.) [This sort of thing is merely to keep the conversation rolling along.] Yes, sir.
Entry 3078
(Doctor Buzzard down at Beaufort is dead isn't he?)
He's not daid. No sir, he ain't.
(Isn't he dead?)
No sir. Ah mean he ain't down dere tuh Beaufort - he ain't dead. Dere's one dere dat dey calls Doctor Buzzard but he ain't Doctor Buzzard. He's a man - dat Doctor Robertson. Yo' kin call him Doctor Buzzard but if yo' do he won't even recognize yo'. Doctor Robertson. (The old doctor in Beaufort is dead though, isn't he? That old Doctor Buzzard, he's dead?) Ah heard that he's dead. He's daid evah since 'long 'bout six or seven yeahs ago ah believe.
Entry 3079
Josephus Smalls.
(And they called him Buzzard?)
Called him Buzzard. He's daid now.
(Was he the fellow from Beaufort?)
Naw sir, not frum Beaufort. He was bawn an' raised right in this vicinity. But dere's several of Doctor Buzzards - goin' undah Doctor Buzzard name so dey make money. But de real Doctor Buzzard still be's down tuh Beaufort but ah nevah have seen 'im. [See later margin-title DOCTOR SMALL.]
The informant says the person called Buzzard is dead. The entry distinguishes the Beaufort figure; these source references authenticate neither identities nor a death.
Entry 3080
(How long has old Doctor Harris [Harrison] been dead?)
He been dead about eight or nine yeahs, I believe.
(Was he a white man or a colored man?)
He was a white man.
(That's what I thought. And old Doctor Buzzard?)
He was a colored man. No, he [Buzzard or Small] died heah last yeah.
(Doctor Smallins or Smalls?)
Smalls - Willie Smalls. Harrison got some boys dat tryin' tuh do business fo' him.
(Do they know anything?)
Ah don't think dey do know much. Dey drinks too bad.
The first reply gives a belief-qualified death report and approximate interval. The later editorial Buzzard-or-Small ambiguity remains unresolved.
Entry 3081
(You knew Doctor Buzzard? You knew him when he was alive?)
[I am evidently repeating his words while machine stopped.]
Yeah, ah met him 24 yeahs ago. Ah met him in Hamlet, North Carolina - he was on his Way to Tampa [Florida] do [though] we have [had] anothah Buzzard at de same time. He [the latter] live then lO miles from heah. Ah saw [met - inform- ant blind] him yesterday.
(There is another one? Lives around here now?)
He don't live here - he lives in de next city. [This eliminates Sumter. The man on his way to Tampa was one of the many traveling Doctor Buzzards. I met one of them - See margin-title DOCTOR BUZZARD: NORFOLK, VIRGINIA, in INTERVIEWS.] [Extract from BLIND DOCTOR in INTERVIEWS, Florence, S. Car., (1315), cylinders 2340-2347.1
Entry 3082
I came here to find out. (Will you sit a little bit closer so I can hear you?) [To bring him nearer the microphone.] [The following paragraph will introduce you to the problem I faced every day while collecting the material of this investigation - see also Introduction.] I came here to find out what your work may be, if there is any help I kin git in connection - if there is any of your help or whatnot in connection with what has happened to me in my business. [He is a bootlegger.] That's what I wan'a know. If it's anything 'at I've to tell or go through. I wan'a know that an' I'll begin my story jis' like I started off before [before I turned on machine]. There's so much of dis recently, I thought I jes' couldn't understand it you see. Lots of people come here an' say you's someone who tryin' to trap someone, an' this is tryin' to git someone in trouble. Well, I say, "Well, I don't know what in the world it's all about, but if he, that is to say, [does] things to help me, why I don't mind goin' over an' explain myself." ['Here I explain my work." These words are my penciled comment made at the time I did the original transcription in pencil. Here I also made one of my many mistakes. I failed to transcribe my explanation. My failure however Was excus- able - hand transcription being such a tedious and impossible task I had to call in an expert transcriber for the post-Wilmington cylinders. Yet one explaining sentence does remain, "I don't heal anyone, I don't sell anything." As you will now learn, this man Was in serious trouble. My lost explanation at least set him more or less at ease.] You mind if I light my cigarette?
(No, go right ahead.)
[I was smoking a cigar, why should I mind him smoking a cigarette. A woman later over in Memphis "came in...smoking a big cigar" - see MAMMY: THE CIGAR SMOKER in INTERVIEWS.] Now first, I'm a married man. I've got a wife an' three children - jes' as well say five because I've two to take care of that's my wife's sister's, dead, an' they stayed with me from the first, each one of them, so that makes me have five [children] to take care of. Now my wife, she's sick an' has been for a long period of time. Her first [sickness] was believed by medical experience was pelegra, an' after that, why I found out something else; an' I went on an' kep' - go see her an' I kep' finding out something else. I went to work at Wrightsville Beach six years ago [1931], right down here ll miles from the city, where I was workin' for Doctor W. there. An' one day, after knowin' that my wife had been sick so long - I kep' tryin' to, wonderin' what in the world's the matter - finally I found out from Doctor H., that it was pelegra. [Here informant is returning to something already said.] Thereon he subscribed that I take her to the country for her health. No doubt it would be a little beneficial to her, an' where it was quiet an' didn't hear the runnin' of the cars, the streetcars an' so on, an' jis' git out of all that stuff, an' it would make her no doubt so she recover. An' so I carried [her] on over to Atkinson, North Car'lina, an' she stayed there for a long long time - in fact the whole summer through an' partly of the fall. An' one day I got a telephone call - it come at ten o'clock jes' before I carried [her] to Atkinson. [Informant again returns to something already men- tioned. For the difficulty in following this type of thinking, see confusing story, No. 2750, Pp.758-767.] An' that was while I livin' away from home in the country right out here. In fact she was jis' like her mother, my daughter's god- mother [grandmother?] as fer as that concern [whatever this means]. Tom T., it was his wife [who. telephoned]. She say, "Come to town at once. Eliza is crazy."
[This may be why "she was jis' like her mother."]
An' I didn't believe it. When I got in town she didn't know me from [some- thing, not Adam] or nobody else. So after havin' consulted with Doctor H., as I foresaid, I carried her on up de country. She lived up there fer a while an' I'd go there. She jis' got in such a wreck, kickin' up so, an' jis' nobody could go around 'er. She didn't want to hear what they had to say. She jis' git to the place she dispised 'er father, you know. An' even to 'er sister or to herself or anybody. She didn't wan'a see nobody. Well we goes there to Clinton, North Car'lina. There's ole man up there, they call 'im Mr. Wickins[?]. He read the cards. He also give me a dose of medicine to take.
(What did he give it to you for?)
He told me when I took that dose of medicine - after readin' my palm - he said, "This dose is goin' work for you an' not her [it is not MEDICINE BY PROXY, p.365]; and besides, you goin' get it in house when you get back home. [This is preventive medicine - see PREVENTIVE MEDICINE CARRIED TO EXTREMES, p.328.] Well, I wonderin' what he meant by that. He told me, he said, "There's someone has thrown for you," he said, ''but they're not tryin' to kill your wife in connection with you, but they're durin' [doin'] somethin' to keep her puny, ailin' along." He said, "They'll give it to you, if they're havin' a whole lot of trouble with her." He said, "Now, it's a black-skin woman an' a dark-skin woman that's doin' this." [A doctor is always vague when identifying culprit - see MADAM JACKSON ACROSS DE CREEK, p.757.] An' besides, de black-skin woman is the woman that want joo, an' de dark-skin woman don't visit chore house very often but she's helpin' fo' this people." He said, "Now, the way they did this - goin' to git it goin' their way - they went there an' sprinkled somepin in de baid while you were away [in the country].
(Did he tell you what they sprinkled there?)
He said some kin'a powder. He couldn't - he don't - he set some kin'a thing in front of him. It was a little thing that looked to me like a little horses settin' up there, an' a little somepin looked like a crab, another thing looked like a little fish, another little thing looked like a little serpent. He could touch them little things, you could see them shiver all around in - looked like to me they was settin' in a little basin or a little [over shape? = over size?] bowl of water.
(Was it a bowl of water?)
Looked to me like it was water. An' he talked to me. Den directly he go startin' talk to these little things in there, an' they kin'a quiver. [See photograph, supposedly in crystal ball, "trembled like a leaf," p.173, line 5.] An' then he start to tell somepin else. ["I suggest that these figures were magnetic, shaped in forms of the zodiac, and that they quivered whenever the root doctor holding a concealed magnet passed his hand over them. There was no water in the bowl." This comment is a part of original transcription in pencil. The evidence or experience for it I no longer remember. These quivering figures may be a diagnostic device (pp.165-217) like the trembling photograph in the crystal ball just mentioned. It is certainly one of the many tricks to impress the patient - like invisible writing (p.265).] So he told me, he said, "You weren't all right, don't sleep well at night, an' neither one of you don't sleep good at night." I said, "Well, you're right." He said, "Well, don't answer me." He said, "I know what I'm talkin' about." I have given many examples of a doctor knowing or foreseeing everything - see YOU DON'T HAVE TO TELL ME, p.316.] I says, "Well, I must tell you, she don't sleep at all at night." He said, "Well, that's why that was sprinkled in your baid for. An' the way this black-skin woman had the dark-skin woman to do, to give it to you, were to sprinkle some of the same stuff under your door, an' that's why it got choo an' it fix you. Then I told him exactly [all that had happened.] He give me some kin' of little roots - he called one [of] them John de Conker. Then he also give me some kin' of little stuff called wood mold. It grows in the little pine [something - could be thickets?] like tha' choo go to rake it up an' you use it for makin' fertilizer - like the farmers use. [In Maryland this "little stuff is called shadders (= shatters), "fallen pine leaves or needles," used for animal bedding, which turns into manure or fertiZizer - 723, p.240.] An' he told me to take that [wood mold] an' red oak bark [frequently used for medicine, p.462 and elsewhere] - take that stuff an' boil it, make a tea out of it, an' feed her off of it. Give her all salts that I could get her to take - physic salts. An' so I did it until she got to the place that she wouldn't even take that. An' I went back to him again an' he said get Vita-Food east [brand of yeast] that come in a big tall can about that tall - somepin tha' choo sprinkle over de food when she gits ready to eat. Not de Fleshman [Fleischmann] east, something in comparsion, but it was yellowish lak sulphur maybe an' had a very strong odor. An' he had somepin called Eastborn [yeast-born or Eastbourne] tablets. Well, she had then fallin' from a hunderd an' seventy-six pounds down to a hunderd an' twenty. Well, I was feedin' [her] on that stuff an' she went back to a hunderd and fifty. An' I come on back to town. An' afterwards I brought her back from de country here an' we lived together fer a good while. My house be the second doah to my brother-in-law - from her brother house, my brother-in-law. I was at 905, where he was 909. An' rather than stay home, she'd stay over there; but when she goin' eat she'd come home, an' jes' as soon as she eat she'd be right out an' gone. Well I got worried over the gait[?]. So I told my father-in-law about it an' he says, "Well, any steps you wan'a make, why go on an' make it." So then I got into another [acquainted with] boy that was workin' there with me. We called him Skeet. Skeet told me of a woman down South - Madam Rachel - Dillon, South Car'lina. [Note that a man in North Carolina calls South Carolina down South. This was frequently done - see Introduction.] An' he also made men- tion of a old man called Doctor Buzzard.
(Where was he?)
Florence, South Car'lina. First, before I got to this Madam Rachel, this Doctor Buzzard came to my house [in Wilmington].
(He came to see you?)
He came here ordinary passin' by. An' another person he goes by [visits pro- fessionally]. An' someone told him that I'd care to see somebody of that kind. So he came in. He had a little hand bag, not a big case. [Was he referring to my 3 large cases - recorder, transcriber, and cylinder carrier?] It was a hand bag [in imitation of a M.D.'s medical kit then in use]. He had a whole lot of little snakes in that bag. [See SNAKE, Pp.66-73, and elsewhere.]
(Alive or dead?)
Alive. That snakes scared her. She's frighten anything that kind. My wife was there. She was lyin' right in de baid an' he told her, he said, "Now, I'll put choo to walkin' by tomorrow for four dollers and one cent.' I ast him what was he goin' do with de one cents. He says, "Well, the four dollars is for me; the one cent is the cure." "I says, "If you put my wife to walkin' by tomorrow, I'll give you four dollers an' one cent." [For this type of payment, see DOCTOR ARMOUR, p.891, line 2.] He say, "Well git me a pint of liquor." I say, "That'll cost you a dollar." I got a pint of liquor. He took a needle an' two straight pins an' crossed them. He crossed all three of 'em an' tied 'em together with a red piece of string an' put em into a little bag. Then he took out some little seed that appearently looked like flaxseeds. An' he told me take these seeds; if it's any time you want to go, be with some Woman. He say you drop one of these seeds in the liquor or somepin that she's drinkin' an' make her do anything you want her to do. I said, "I didn't ask you to come here to cunjure me an' wife. I ask you to come here to aid." He said, "I don't mean that." Well, I went on an' give him de four dollers an' one cent, an' [he] took all this stuff an' sewed it up in that bag [thus making a hand]. Then he took the snake out of it [iar], which [snake] he had already wrapped one around my wife's leg an' throwed [throwing] some liquor over it he wrapped it around the right leg jes' above the knee. Besides, when I got that second pint of liquor for him, he poured some down the table an' poured those snakes out of a little jar he had 'em in, an' begin to talkin' to those snake, an' they stood right straight up an' go over to him. There's where I vacate out of de room fer a few minutes. [I repeat preceding reference, SNAKE, Pp.66-73, and elsewhere. Besides after one drink of raw moonshine whiskey a person could see a few things; after two pints of it, anything.] So I came back. In a few seconds later an' he told me, "All right. Now, by tomorrow, as I told you [she will be out of bed]." Well, he went home an' she seemed to be recoverin' a little. But then this Madam Rachel, about two weeks later, she came there. This was the third party [root doctor] now. [She had been called from Dillon, S. Car., to wait on a case in Wilmington, and had heard about my informant.] An' she told me to go to the drug store to Doctor Mason [druggist], the Ideal Pharmacy. I was livin' aroun' there at that time. [This is a normal drug store, not a hoodoo store.] She tole me to git a dime worth of bluestone an' red pepper. An' she put out some dirt, some kin'a lookin' - I called it sand. She poured out a little bottle, but she tole me it was graveyard dirt. So she mixed it all together. Then she ask me before she give me that stuff, she said, "Do you know any officers in this town?
(Officers?)
Officers. Policeses. I said, "Yeah, I know jist about every one of 'em." I told her the name of them. An' [she said], "Write them down on this piece of paper I'll give you. De's somepin I wan' choo to do with it." I said, "All right." So I wrote down every one that I could think of. She said, "Now, on this set of names, how many is it that you think would do you harm, an' he goes out an' make it his business an' come arres' chew jes' out of ordinary [for no purpose at all?]?" I said, "I don't know. I hate to go through that part of it; but still, since it's personal, why I guess I'll have to tell you." So I named the one or two that I thought wasn't very good friends of mine an' knew the whole family an' my wife and her [people] before I even knew her my own self. So I named 'em down fer her. She told me, she said, "Now, you take these names on this piece of paper, go to the northeast of this house an' bury it down there, then come back to me. Then she took that dirt, that mixture she had there, an' circle all the way aroun' my house entirely. [To circle the house with salt or other substances is a fairly common protective device.] An' told me then - she says, "There somepin under your front doorstep tha' joo an' your wife are walkin' over ev'ry day is what cause you not to be gittin' along any better, an' I'm gon'a stop it. An' besides, the officers been runnin' in here on you all the time an' claim that choo have a lot of liquor an' you doin' this an' that an' de other thing you' re not doin'." She said, "I'm gon'a stop that. Besides, Im gon'a fix it so when they come to the front door they can't come in." I said, "How much is that gon'a cost me?" She said, "Give me three dollers an' you pay for the goods an' a doller on my gas bill back home." Well, she had a big Buick car out in front. I did that. Well, I found out I was gittin' along very very good then an' really my wife did come out of bed, stayed up fer a long time, gittin' along gran'. So after she'd gone, I decided then I'd move an' change houses. I thought the house was bad luck to me. I didn't know if there any other stuff [sprinkled or buried] along there. So I moved. No sooner than I moved, I got in other house, [it Wasn't] three months before I in [jail] agin. That [this] time I cooked 60 days in the county jail up here in town. I cooked up there when the cook got sick.
[At least this tells us something about the informant - he was a fair cook.]
An' when I came back, to be sure whether I was right or wrong, I moved right back in that same house. [Which house?] Then [I] started to fallin back [into the same bad luck] right away. I had a ole - sister's dead an' gone now. She came to me one day an' tole me, she said, "Let me tell you somepin. She always did call me brother. [She Was not his sister.] She say, "Let me tell you somepin, brother." She say, "There's somepin aroun' this house that it interfering with chor life an' you can' be happy. You can't live with your family like you want to," she says. "I'm goin' find it," she say. She went up under my front doorstep an' got a pair of scis- sors out from under there with one of the points broke off of it, an' ole rusty nails au' needles all tied together. An' she brought them in the house with her, "Here it is, I've got it at last." [He did not see her find the articles.] I said, "Now, Mama Annie, do you reckon that's true?" She say, "Well, here it is."
(What was her name?)
Mama Annie, we called her. Her name was Annie P. We called her Mama Annie.
[She was a root doctor.]
So she tole me then to take that, break it up, burn it up, do anything I knew to do an' I would stop that stuff goin' on then. So I ask her what it was an' she tole me it was [some]thing that somebody still tryin' to git between me an' my family. I took that pair of scissors - I had a good hot fire in the stove - needles and nails, an' I thought that stove would melt. It turnt red-hot. An' I let it there fer two or three days till I was sure it was gone. I got rid of that. Well now, a little later on comes the nex' part of it. I got in some more trouble. A man 'cused me then of sellin' 'im whiskey. This happen recently, too. This party - he's dead, the one that said it; but this party lives right here in the city now. [I am unable to straighten this out - the man will appear again.]
(How long ago was all this happening - these stories?)
It happened to an' fro within the last five or six years - right along, all up an' down the sides, right up an' down. It's right now so. Jis' like I told Mr. Gavin out here [in my waiting or reception room in the Gavin home] jis' a while ago. [Mr. Gavin, my contact man in Wilmington, N. Car., Was the husband of the sister of Julia, page one. I interviewed in the Gavin home and had lunch there each day.] I said, "I've a tendency maybe today I want my wife any second an' I'll go to her. We are sweet and loving together. An' directly another feelin' jump right [up in] me an' I'm out and gone. Maybe she'll be talkin' nice an' lovin' to me. Directly she jump right up, "Oh! So-an'-So." An' I'm out an' gone. Well, I go around to her brother's house an' go to bed an' sleep or some- where, anywhere, at some friend, an' go on to sleep. So I told her one day, I said, "Let me take you down South. I had a party aroun' there in Walnut Street by the name of J. He told me a place up [down] here between Southport an' here, that I could go to a man that he was - well, that he could clear all that stuff where I lived at. [Southport - being south of Wilmington - equals informant's "down South."] Somebody agin! [Another root doctor!] An' that [meeting with the doctor down toward Southport] was suppose to have happened this last Thursday, but I was sick - had no more than come out of the hospital. I had a rectal abscess. I'd jes' been operated on. Come out last Monday an' I wasn't able to go. I didn't have any money to go with - the first part of it. I had to pay little bills you know. An' about this last party, to git back to de same trouble'as I started to say. This man claimed that I sold him some whiskey on the 21st day of November, an' I Wasn't even in the house that day or that night. An' so dis same [Walnut Street] Mammie J., he told me that, "I know a party that you ought to see right here in town. Maybe he kin help you a little." I said, "Who is it?" [No answer.] They [the rootworker between Wilmington and Southport] were supposed to be here in town this last past Thursday, but didn't come an' I didn't have any way to get to 'em. But I did see the party here in Wilmfngton. An' they told me also that it was things down aroun' my house; that's why I couldn't live happy an' peaceful at home.
(What do you think about it?)
Well, I do think there [is something] in it. An' I'll be frank with you. There had been a time way back, when I was much younger, I didn't believe any doze kin'a things; but I still now, since I found things buried - there is so much. An' that when I'd go as I foresaid, an' try to make love to my wife, seem like ev'rything is all right, right at first an' directly things occurred in an- other different way. An' then I would come an' try to humor her along, "Honey, what's de matter? What's de occasion? Sittin' in de dining room, huggin' wit 'er as sweethearts do. We'll talk things over an' directly she'll say, "Well, let's do so-an'-so, let's be sweethearts again." She'll forgit it an' I'll do anything fer you. You kin bet chor life right on the same schedule agin. So I went to this party [in Wilmington] an' he read the cards out fer me, an' told me that there was somepin down at my house to cause to bein' this way, an' I couldn't help myself, an' give me a root, an' got it with me now as fer as that's concern. He told me to keep it wit me anywhere I went. An' I got another thing, I got two other articles at de house that I keep. An' whenever I go roun' my wife, he told me to always wipe my face down with that powder. It's a little sweet perfume powder. An' then there's a little ball somepin like you got it sewed up in a little bag. You can't tell what's in it. I didn't cut it open to see. [This is a ball-shaped hand.] I leave it at home unless I'm goin' round to her house.
(What's the name of that root?)
I don't [know] what de name of the thing. I got it here in my pocket. An' she told me to chew a piece off of it an' spit around the door before I walked in, to kill my enemies before I got dere. That's what she give it to me fer. She said that would kill my enemies before I got dere; an' if it's anyone to do any harm, it'll change their mind. That I would also find a little dark-brown-skin man there. I didn't intend to tell you about that. That's de trouble over me an' my wife. An' [she said] I would certainly find that man there. An' she also told me she did it [whatever this means]. An' my wife sometime would mention this man ["rootworker is my transcription notation] to me. She said she liked me but she never [was untrue tol me an' didn't live no man in the world but me. Well, I know that of it's true [truth]. An' the thing that - so far [the marriage?] would last three or four years jis' about perfectly right up to the minute [trouble began]. This little bag I pinned that on the inside of my clothes nex' to my flesh. Then sometime it would smell like a onion an' agin it would smell like perfume - change odors all kin' of ways, like turpentine an' agin you don't know what you smellin'. Jes' the way that thing smell. Well, as I tell you, I didn't open it up to see what was in it, because it was sewed down there. Then she give me a prayer. It was written on a piece of paper down onto the 24th Psalm, called Ezekiel, I believe it is. An' I'd read that an' memorize as much of it as possible when I'm goin' aroun' my wife - like I'm away there now an' I should happen to think [trouble Was brewing]. That [is] to quite fusses down or anything in case you may start anything. Read that as I start towards my house, an' when I git to my yard I finish it an' then go in. An' they told me when I paid her a dollar and a half more, that she would go in there an' git this thing up an' show it to me. An' I told this weekend I'd let her complete her part of the job. An' [I] found that ev'rything she told me has worked out right. Even now in this case that I have now, she told me that this case was gon'a be put off three times. An' she said, "Let's put it off some more."
(That case in court now against you?)
Yes sir, that this man J. accused me of sellin' him some whiskey, bottle of liquor on the 23rd day of November of last year, which I wasn't even in my house, as I aforesaid a while ago, dat day or night. An' she told me and said, "Well, I'm gon'a show that I'm right before I clear you completely. I'm gon'a put off your case some more." An' she has put it off eight times successfully. Now this comin' Friday will make the ninth time that I'm goin' to be tried.
Entry 3083
A fellah tole me oncest - he said he was fixed in his haid. Something Was in his stomach. He said when it come to de bottom of his stomach, said some- thing would start to roarin'. An' he said when it got up here along about de breast-like, he said he couldn't hardly talk. And I asked him myself, I said, "Well, what was it?" He said it was a snake. "How do you know it was a snake?" He said, "My wife could even git a snake to grow like a [something]." Ah said, "Then what did you do?" He said, "Well, ah searched for a fellah in Hickory, S. Car., who was called Doctor Buzzard." And he told me that that Doctor Buzzard called to him, to that man, and he ["that man"] said he [Buzzard] scraped both feet, after having him put his feet in hot water, warm water, and git his feet hot. Doctor Buzzard came to see him and he had him to put both feet into a hot pan of water - all right, and let it got hot. And by taking his feet out de water, instead of washing dem, he jest take dem out de water and scrape 'em, both feet and - what he scrape from de water, de guy said, it looked like scales had come off his feet and practically other dirt. See, now. Den he said de ones dat dey got off his right foot, he said dey didn't use dat; but de one dat dey got off his left foot, he said he remembering him folding it into a pocket hand'chief good - fold it into a pocket hand'chief good. They ask fer a wet towel. Then taking de wet towel and dampen it and place it [left-foot scrapings] into de wet towel and place it [remainder of towel] across de stuff and let it lay [hidden] dere, he says, two hours. He says he [Buzzard] didn't leave. He say he stopped dere [in patient's house] and read [prayers or from the Bible]. And [after] de two hours, he said the snake come from de man's body. [This is a rare method for removing a live snake from the human body. Unfor- tunately informant did not remember or was not told how "the snake come from de man's body." But we can reconstruct this foot-skin operation. Live things like most hoodoo disease can be moved down through the body and out through the feet. Sometimes the live thing will go out through the big toe, leaving a small hole to prove they exist. Since the present patient evidently picked up his live snake by Walking over a snake preparation - dust or dried blood - the logical procedure was to scrape the bottoms of the patient's feet, using only the left or evil-side skin. Our operator could easily have pulled the live snake out through the left foot; instead he unfolds the towel and there is the small crawling snake he had taken from his pocket and had palmed into the towel. This trick is not so simple as it sounds. It demands a master of preparation and execution. Whoever this Doctor Buzzard was, he was also an original thinker. For this type of work, see LIVE THINGS IN YOU, Pp.227-239; and especially, "...lak a snake. Den he'll make lak dat'll come out of her haid," p.268, line 22; and then the snakes in preced- ing story.]
Entry 3084
I use to didn't believe in these things, see now, but I have come [to believe] since I seen that. It must of been some supernatch'al power of some kind. See. Now this fellow and myself in Newport News [Virginia], we worked ev'ry day together on the coal docks. See. I use to be a deck-walker and he use to be a stevadore. He drew his money on a Sat'days, come home, give his wife his envelope, take a bath, set around for awhile, he'd go out. She'd take this other fellah, divide de money with him and he'd go where he want to. Now, he [husband] come in and slept in the back room - I slept upstairs in the back room and he slept downstairs in the back room. This fellah when he come in he slept with his [husband's] wife. Now mind, de husband now, he's sleepin' in de back room. See. This fellah - when he go out and stay out late at night, de husband - this fellah git up out de bed, open de door for him to let him in to go back in de back room. Well, I knew this fellah had some people in Philadelphia and he [husband] had some here in New Kent County [Va.]. See. So I said to him, 'Louis," I says, "there's somepin wrong with you, boy." "Ah man, you wouldn't mean any harm?" That what he said, you know. I said, "Boy, you're telling me." I said, "I know there's somepin wrong about this." So we went to his brother in New Kent County and he brought us here to Hope- well. It was an ole woman by the name of Aunt Cora. She professed that she could take care of de situation. I don't know what she did, but whatever she did broke it up anyway. So, I never will forgit as long as I live, we goes to this Aunt Cora. She lived back over on towards the James River Water front you see, in back of some white people's house you know. She was a real ole peculiar- looking woman. And she told us, say, "Boy, '' she says, "listen to me." She said 'That woman has got chew sewed up in little red flannel - just about de size of this swinging wire here Ithe electric wire from my Telediphone to floor plug - he didn't touch the wire]. She says, "It's up higher in de ceiling than you kin reach if you stand on your feet." See. He says, "Well, do you reckon so," he says. "Yes sir." He says, "What else she got in there?" She told him. She says, "There's somepin in there looks like [corn] meal, it some threads of your winter underwear, some needles, and some other threads" - look like fiber silk, you know, before it's woven. She says, "Well, go." So I says, "Well, we go home, we find it." He still didn't believe it. See. And I bet chew we cut out all dat plastering in that wall. Finally we found it all right. We found it all right - that was the most peculiar-looking thing [the discovery]. So he got scared. He said, "Well," he says, "now if my wife find it [out]," he says, "she'll kill me." Well, de woman told him, she said, "Now, if you find it," she said, "don't give it to your wife." She said, "She'll have anything done to you, she want. She wants to run you crazy, if she wants you blind, she'll do it. If she wants you run out of town, she'll do it." So I says, "Well," I says, "tell you what we do. We'll go back to Hopewell, take it back to Aunt Cora. We'll find out what she's gon'a do." So we spent de night over there. Aunt Cora says, "Well, boys, you all meet me tonight here at twelve o'clock." I'll never forgit as long as the day I live. At twelve o'clock that night we met her on that bridge that comes over, that connects de highway between Hopewell and Richmond - see, on de Richmond-Hopewell road. It's de James River - runs all de way down to City Point. Well, she turns her back, she throwed that thing over her left shoulder downstream. Now, what supernatch'al power that had I don't know. I've often wanted to learn. But anyhow, after that - Oh! there come a big fight dere dat night. He put dis guy out - and come near being a shooting scrape. But after dat, him and dat woman got along fine. And this other fellah was out de way. Well, soon after that, in course of time, I reckon about four months, this fellah died.
Entry 3085
This man I married - oh, it was forty some years, forty-five or near fifty years ago now [happened about 1887]. He was taken sick and his mother said somebody had poisoned him. And this old woman [ole Leana Davis, called Mammy Doctor, well-known in Richmond years ago], whut waited [doctored] on him, come to see him, cut off getting de [medical] doctor's medicine. [This was standard practice to "cut off" the M.D.'s medicine, which was considered useless and harmful in witchcraft and hoodoo.] She went and got a he bullfrog and said she was goin' bury him at the center of the door and whoever did it was goin' come back and ask her what was de matter. Well, she got dis he bullfrog and put him in dis cup [top from a], baking-powder box [can], and made an oath and filled it full of five cents worth of new cayenne pepper. And he [bullfrog] bellowed like a bull. This ole cunjure woman put it under the sill of the door, right down in de corner here - and the house there today and that cup is down there now, I reckon - the door where he was livin' at, under the steps. And ev'ry mornin' for nine days his mother had to go there and stomp on de steps and say she hoped to God she'd get 'em. But this boy died. He died. And the frog still there - calculate it still there now, I reckon.
Entry 3086
[Madam DeLong is a hand-maker and of the dime-a-dozen variety. She must be included here because my informant visited both women. Besides, her name interests me for a reason given later. Aunt Sally is a master of her craft - original, brilliant.] At Savannah, Ga. (What were their names?) Aunt Sally - Savannah, Ga. Ah first went to Madam DeLong - she was white. Ah went to Madam DeLong.
(In Savannah.)
Dat's right - on Jerome Street in 1914. But ah went to her fer gambling hand.
(What did she do for you?)
Jest a minute, now. Ah don't recall [everything] - a piece of root and some black peppah; yes, it was, and if ah understand well, three grains [seeds] out of a green pepper, cayenne pepper. She had three grains. She took dat root dey call John de Conker and she [didn't] cut it up and [but] she cut another root which is called blacksnake root and a little gypsum [ginseng]. [Three roots.] [And she did them] jest like she did de seeds, like de three seeds dat she took out of de pepper, and she grates it into a flannel. But she had another rag in dere befo' she put it into de flannel. And she sewed dat up and she give it to me for luck in gambling.
[John de Conker was not cut up but worn in one piece.]
(This was the white woman, Madam DeLong: How do you spell that?)
Madam DeLong, dey call it. She's dead now.
(How do you spell that name?)
Ah jest don't know. [I heard this so'often!] [If I remember rightly, there was a curio mail-order firm in Chicago by that name. This woman - a possible agent of theirs or buying some of her hoodoo sup- lies from them - may have used DeLong as her professional name. We have a good example of name-adoption from a firm in G. H. Smith & Company (2740, p.746).] Ah went to Aunt Sally, dat was one of mah race after dat. Le'me see, 'twas about a year after dat, ah reckon. I did [it]. [It] worked very well in dat year cause I was runnin' pract'ly a kitchen gambling house - dey gamble in de kitchen - an' nobody didn't bother me. Well den, after she died, I went to Aunt Sally. Well, I went to Aunt Sally and she give me a fishing hook and she made me step three steps right out in front of her do'. Den she sont a little boy out after that and she told him to pick up her some sand out of each one of those [three] tracks. She told me when I got to de last track, "Don't make no other step." She said, "Jis' swing around." I swung around. And ah noticed dat dat last track - de little boy brought in de sand. She put de other two sand to- gether out of de other two tracks, but dis sand heah, dis last track, she didn't put dat sand in dere. She put it into something look like a sifter and she sift- ed it into a white piece of cloth. After sifting it into a white piece of cloth, she laid it up on de sheft [shelf] and she said, "Now, you sit down fer five minutes." Ah sat down five minutes and when she rech up dere and got it agin, instead of it being sand, it was ants. It was ants! Ah looked at it myself. It was dem little antses. Den she tuk it and put it into de same package. Ah don't know whether de dirt turned to ants or not, but when she did lay it up dere five minutes and den when she looked at it, and I looked at it too, and it was ants instead of de sand. Den she fold it into de other package and fold it up. And she hand it to me like dat [demonstrates].
(With her fist down.)
Yeah, jes' dat way, with her fist down. Ah never will forget it. And den she tuk it back. Dat's how it was done. And she said, "Now," she say, "I won't give yo' dis." Ah said, "Well, why?" She said, "Yo' ain't able to pay fo'it." An' ah asked her, ah said, "What do you want fer it?" She said, "Fifty dollars." Ah say, "Ah'll pay fer it twice." And she wouldn't take de $50. She tuk $5 but she never did give me de package. She say, "Yo' go on you'll be all right.
(What was that for?)
That was for running business, a place of business - help yo' business.
(Or in ganbling.)
Yes, actually that was my business - running a gambling [business]. ["Go on you'll be all right is a common trick (see 885-886, p.319), but to change footstep-dirt into live ants and refuse a large price for them displays the hand of a master. I need not explain that some doctors work upon the theory: if you give nothing, there can be no evidence. The ants? Simple - two packages
(see bottle substitution,792, p.265).]
Entry 3087
It started from drinkin' water. I drinked water behind a lady and went out [the room]. And all at onest I got blind, jis' as blind as a - I couldn't see nuthin. So I called de landlady of de house. She said, "What's de matter?" I said, "I'm blind, I can't see." She said, "Why, you Was seein' a few minutes ago." I says, "Well, I don't know what's de cause of it." She carried [took] me in de room and lied me on de bed and sent for a ol' woman named Aunt Eliza. She came and prayed with me, rubbed some kind of salve over my face for nine mornings, and my eyes begin to crack open agin. They were closed. She would never tell me de name of de medicine she give me. She give me nine drops every morning for nine mornings. And she said de Lord's Prayer every morning before she give me dat medicine. And de last morning she give me dat medicine, she says, "What de Name of de Father and de Son and de Holy Ghost have I did." [Wilmington, N. Car., (241), 164: l+85; this happened in Fayetteville, N. Car.]
Entry 3088
[We are again in the presence of a celebrity - not fabulous like Doctor Buzzard, but so widely known that his name and color were confused. He was surely a white man named Harris - (see 3089, p.909; also the very end of the interview A DOCTOR AT EASE, and elsewhere). This man, claim- ing to be a faith doctor (3089) would not have sanctioned the evil said to have been perpetrated in the following story.] He went to him you know.
(Who was this man?)
His name was Buzzard, or somepin like that choo called him.
(Where did he live?)
No, it was George Harrison, who lived at Florence, South Carolina. Ever'body used to go to him from fer an' near cause he's a wonderful man. He's dead I think, but his brother or his son or somepin carried it on, so I heard. So this man had a wife once an' she was a bad woman. An' the man was kin'a 'flicted - choo know, rheumatism. An' she's young, right nice-lookin' - purty hair. An' a course he would - you know, he would put her aside he say, but he suppose to git children by 'er. An' this woman still runnin' aroun'. [Everyone] tell that [to] her husband, but her husband didn't care cuz he said he would give up. He couldn't make a livin' fer her like he ought to be, an' she would do the thing, you know, that was helpin' him. An' so he didn't care. So he was livin' an' po' [poor]-like. An' this other man was livin' next to the farm - it was ajinin' farm. He had a fine black horse you know. A big tall black man. An' she was a nice-lookin' brown-skin woman. So he was lovin' this woman. He did! He would come there an' bring 'er in de yard - well, he [husband] wouldn't say nuthin - right in his yard out there, an' drive aroun' in de buggy. She was a good-lookin' woman. So finally this woman must of thought she was gon'a die. She decided she'd make a change. She went an' got sanctified. See. An' this man a - after she got sanctified, she tell him she didn't go that way any more. Well, he didn't want her to quit, choo see. He said, "Well, you kin go that way an' keep it a secret an' - come on let's go." She said, "No, I livin' now fer de Lord." An' she lived that way two years. Well, after she got sanctified - they always say these sanctified people goes with one another. An' dey say, "Well, how you gon'a help it?" You see, he would believe that she's goin' with one de sanctified men. She told him, she said, "Well, if I do - I don't do it - but if I do - if I is goin' with him, two clean sheet can't dirty one another." That means she was sanctified, the man was sanc- tified - they couldn't move in no sin. An' he said, yes it was. Well, he didn't like it. An' so he leaved his farm one day an' ever'body missed him, didn't know where he had gone - he was livin' down on de Santee River. He come to Florence an' got this man [George Harrison], you know, to fix some [something] fer him. An' I believe he had a pitchure of her. He come up dere [to the husband's farm] one day. An' he come in [came near] the house one day an' call 'er out an' talkin' with 'er. She went an' talk with 'im. An' she never was afraid of him, you know, but she wouldn't agree to go with 'im then. An' she he said, "All right." An' he kin'a play with 'er, you know, an' throwed somepin like a dus' on 'er. Well, she said, "That's a smell. I'm curious - that bottle." But she didn't pay it no mind. But in October - well, he went on back home [down on de Santee River]. An' [before he left] she heard 'im say, "I got choo now." So he went on back home. She was sanctified. She had a fiah made in de fiahplace - it was no grate, it was a fiahplace. She fold a quilt. She fold it an' lay down acrost de fiah- place like they do in de country; an' took a Bible an' lay down there an' went to readin' it. She had a little girl about three years old, de baby, aroun', playin' aroun' de fiah. An' this baby went in de kitchen an' it stood up there an' said, "Mama." She would call 'er mama. She was 'sleep. She'd lay down there an' read de Bible an' she fell asleep. An' while she was asleep, well de fiah popped on her. This stuff that he put on 'er drawed de fiah. An' as she wake up she was on fiah. An' she jump up. She went to jumpin' up like that an' try to outen herself like that, an' de fiah jis' went on up, jis' Went on up over 'er haid, an' jis' - an' she jumped aroun'. And when they caught 'er, why she had done burnt. She was eight months gone [pregnant]. A man who caught 'er - he was from de nex' doah, neighbor - saw 'er, he ran 'er down an' ketched 'er. She done burnt to death. An' he [the dust-thrower] tell 'er, she didn't go with 'im, she wasn't with nobodys else. An' so this woman died. [This fair copy by pencil made more than 30 years ago from my original scrib- bled transcription has a penciled note of the same date, "[[Happened]] about 12 years ago [1925]] - informant married the dead woman's husband."] [Wilmington, N. C., (320), 253:1+85.] ["Thur., Feb. 18, 1937 - 320 - Grace Harvin - [[from]] Sumter, S. C. - fair to good" - Numbers Book 318-338. Not a very complimentary evaluation for a woman who gave a rare story like this!]
Entry 3089
(Doctor what?)
Doctah Harris - he's daid too.
(He was a white man?)
[I am merely having him repeat what he had said before I turned on machine.]
Yes suh, he's wus a white man. He didn't claim tuh be a root doctah. He used tuh said he wus a faith doctah.
(Doctor Harris.)
[This man has also been called Harrison.]
(All these root doctors that lived here - why do they die out? Were they moved to a different place? Or anything? Or what?) No sir, ain't no one take dey place so far.
Entry 3090
My husband was hurt. Of course he's dead now. And my husband was hurt. But his first wife - he was married the second time, I'm his second wife. And his first wife, after the death of her, why his people you know how people are. You know when some people - that after the death of [in] the family, they want people to dis- tribute and jis' give everything they got away. And so his first wife, after the death of his first wife, his first wife people - he had three children and he decided that he would give their girl to the grandmother and he keep the two boys and still keep house and his things together. Well, they didn't want him to do that. They wanted him to give them all the children and the household furniture and everything and jis' break up housekeeping, and he wouldn't do it. Well after he wouldn't agree to do it, then his sister-in-law come to stay with him and keep house for him, and gonna call herself helpin' him. So he was out workin' one day and she cooked some molasses bread. And he came in that evenin' and was out takin' out his team, takin' 'em out to feed 'em, and one of the little - the oldest boy came out to the stable and he says, "Papa, he says, "Aunt Dinah got some molasses bread, cook some molasses bread today, and he said, "Aunt Dinah put somepin funny in that bread." As God should have it, He let that child told him - "Aunt Dinah put somepin funny in that bread." Still he didn't make de child any answer. He goes on in de house, he went on in and wash up and dress in the house. When he got through, Dinah call him. She says, "Come on to supper, Andrew, '' she says. He said, "No, I don't think I want any supper tonight." He says, "Dinah, I'm feelin' bad, I don't think I want any supper." So he dressed and went on out to a restaurant and got his meal. [He lived on the edge of Wilmington.] And he stop eatin' at home. And next evenin' he came and the molasses bread was up in [the] safe. The next night she says, "Andrew, don't choo want a bit [of] some molasses bread?" She says, "I cook it for yah." Still it wasn't cut. [The fact that she had not taken a slice of it was suspicious - to Andrew.] He said, "No, I don't think I want anything to eat." He says, "I don't feel good tonight." And he stop eatin at home all together. Well, that molasses bread stayed up in safe, he said, roun' 'bout three or four days. And one evenin' he came home and the molasses bread was out in the horse stable - nobody didn't eat any of it. Well, they couldn't get him like that. Well, they [went] on [trying to fix him]. After a while he got down. He begin to linger. He couldn't sleep at night. He couldn't go for to work. He began to be helpless as a newborn baby. When he'd get off his bed in the mornin' he was jis' like - when he put his feet on de floor it was jis' like stickin'-pins and needles was stickin' in de bottom [of his feet] and he was achin' like dat all ovah. And so a friend of hissen, a woman friend of hissen [by the name of Harriet] came to him and says, "Andrew, she say, "there's somepin wrong. [She] came to see him. She says, "Andrew, there's somepin wrong wid joo." Says, "I got a uncle on de Sound [Wrightsville Sound]" - between here [Wilmington] and Wrightsville Beach - "and he's name [by the name of] ole man Church Hines." But he's dead now. "And," she say, "zhoo come on and go with me." she says, "I know Uncle Hines kin do you some good, I believe." and so he says, "Well, I'll go anywhere to get somepin cure me." So when he goes down there next mornin', [after] Harriet came to see him, it all he could do to hitch his horse to his buggy. And he goes on down to the Sound. And when he got out at ole man Hines, he says, "My boy, did zhoo come to see me? You's in a bad fix, ain't choo?" [See THIS WUS BAD FIX, p.316, and MAN YOU'RE RUINED, p.314.] He says, "I's certainly is." He says, "I don't know what's ailin' me," he say. And he [Hines] say, "And I mean you's in BAD FIX!" So he says, "I tell you wha' choo do." He says, "Got any money?" He said, "Yes, I got a little." [Hines says], "How much choo got?" He says, "I got $15.00 now with me." He says, "Well, I'm gon'a char' joo $30.00." He said, "I'll pay you any price zhoo charge me, if you do me any good." He says, "I'll give you the $15.00 now, and then I'll bring you de rest when I come back agin." He say, "No, I don't want any now," he said, "but I tell you what choo do. You go on back home this evenin', and [when] you get back home, you take a little stick and look right down to left side of your front doorsteps. And jis' take dis - don't put cheh han' on it - you don't have to dig fer, jis' got to pull de dirt off it. And when you dig a little bit, jis' de least bit, you'll find a little bag." And he say, "Don't choo put yer han' on that bag. You take a stick, take it between two sticks." And he said he was so anxious to git back home he trotted de horse ev'ry step of the way from the Sound. When he got back home he dragged [himself] out de buggy. He had de stick befo' he got home. And as he said, he jis' went and pulled de dirt, and time he'd pulled de dirt, it was a little bag. And he said it was nine pins and nine needles, and somepin looked like a whole lot of little dust and stuff. He didn't know what it was. He says ole man Church Hines tole 'im to take dat bag between two sticks and carry it down to the river, and throw it cross his left shoulder and cuss it when he throw it overboard. And he said he did it. Now, he said to him to go back down to him nex' mornin'. Nex' mornin' he goes back. He say, "Did joo fin' whut I tole yah?" He says, "Yes." He says, "I know you fin' it." Well, he said he went [felt] better that night than he did fer six mon' - aftah he got dat bag. And dat de way he was. When he put his feet on de flo', it was jis' like needles and pins was stickin' in de bottom of it [because he has been walking over the needles and pins buried at the left side, the evil side of his front doorstep]. And so he said he went on back down there, and he say, "Did you fin' de bag?" And he say, "Yes, sir." [Hines says] "I know you fin' it." And he said, "Now, you come on in here." And he take 'im in de room. He says, "oh!" he says, "it's a man and a woman got choo fixed like dis" - which he didn't tell 'im none of dat de day befo'. You see, he jis' tole 'im what to do. And he said, "A man and a woman got choo fixed like dis." Says, "It's a sister and a brother. They wanted joo to do, and you wouldn't do jis' like they wanted joo to do, and they were pretend [intended] to kill yah." And he says, "Now," he says, "I got to kill one." He says, "One dem gon'a die, if I take it offa you." And he said he didn't care which one die, jis' since he get offa him. And so he said, "Now, well I charge you $30.00." And he tole 'im to go on back home now.
(What did that root doctor do to kill them?)
Well, it jest a mystery now. He never did know. He'd never did tell, don't choo see. He jis' do de work and you never knows what he did. [I evidently ask while machine stopped, "Who were the sister and brother that fixed Andrew?"] That was the sister and de brother - his mother-in-law and his mother-in-law brother. You see, the sister-in-law [Dinah] tried to get him first, but after she couldn't git him, den de mother-in-law and de brothah stepped in. And dey was intend to get him. He says, "The one got to die and the othern'll be in a bad condition, a critical condition - but she won't die right away." And so he come on back home. And it wasn't long before the ole man died bellin' [bellowing] like a bull and howlin' like a dog (see 775-776. p.256). And de mother-in-law walked on crutch[es] fer six mont's and she died.
Entry 3091
If yo' got a spell of sickness an' yo' jis' don't feel right atall - if somebody have did somethin' to yo' an' yo' cain't be satisfied - yo's on a worry, yo' jis' worryin' an' yo' jis kinnot be satisfied. Well, now, if yo' don't - understan' ah have been lak dat. Some- one have had me worried and ah jis' couldn't be satisfied an' didn't know mah trouble an' ah wus drowsy an' ah didn't know anythin' tuh do. Well, ah went tuh Mistah Durbena Hone ovah heah in Patterson, Arkansas, an' he tole me whut de mattah, an' got it offa me an' ah been all right evah since.
(Was he a colored man or white?)
Yes, he's: a colored man.
(What did he tell you to do?)
He didn't tell me tuh do anythin'. He jis' had me tuh [demonstrates] put mah han's on his han's, an' den he had me lay mah han' on some papah lak dat, an' he jis' rubbed it lak that - wrote on it lak dat.
(He outlined your fingers with a pencil.)
Wit a pencil. An' so he tole me, "Go, heah on an' ever'thin' be all right." An' ah did, an' ever'thin' was all right.
(Did he do anything to that hand after that?)
He didn't do nuthin to it, jis' had me lay it dere. [For another outlining of hand, see HAND - HANDSHAPED, p.583.]
Entry 3092
[I heard about George Jackson and Zippy Tull of the Eastern Shore at the same time and from some of the same persons - for her, see later in this sub- section. The first two stories describing Uncle George, as he was called, are by Mrs. Elijah Williams - widow of George's nephew - whom I interviewed while collecting in Baltimore. She Was also mother of Jerry Williams, my contact man on the Eastern Shore and in Baltimore, who tells the third story. The fourth story, statement rather, comes from Joshua Wilson, who as a young man drove an occasional client out to George Jackson or to Zippy Tull.] Pitt's Creek wharh [where] he wus born at. That's in Worcester County [Maryland]. Well then, after he growed up to be a man - of course that wus years and years before I wus born - why then he moved to the place they called Fairmount. It's in Somerset County. And he stayed there his life - he died in Fairmount.
(How long ago did he die?)
Well, he's been dead about 35 years [before 1936].
(How old was he when he died?)
I don't know his age but I'm sure he wus around about 70. I'm sure he wus.
(He had quite a reputation?)
Yes indeed.
(How did he learn this work?)
Well, I suppose it must have been gifted 'cause he couldn't read - he could not read or write, so he must have been gifted. But he could read the Bible. He didn't have no one to learn him anything.
(Was he born in slavery?) [I wanted to double-check his age.]
Born in slavery? Oh, yes indeed! Real old slaveryl Now, he might have been older than that when he died, but he, you know, he kept youngified. You wouldn't know he was old - you knew he was old, that's all.
(Did anyone ever try to carry on his work? Did he have a son or anyone?)
He never had no children.
(Has anyone a photograph of him?)
No, I have no photograph of him.
(Was a photograph ever taken of him?)
Not as I know of. You know, in them times they didn't take much photographs. He never was married, and he had a housekeeper. Now, whether she tried to do anything or not I do not know.
(Where is he buried?)
He was buried in Fairmount but I don't know the graveyard because I didn't go, neither did his nephew [informant's husband] becus we didn't know he was dead until the day he was buried. That was the first time they sent him word that his uncle was dead. [His name was] George Jackson, but you know in olden times de folks who wus born children then, they named George Jackson and Nathan Williams and Josiah and all that, and they give 'em that name. But his re'lly name would have been George Dennis, George Jackson Dennis. Old John Hugh Dennis they called him, a white man, you know he was his owner, he was his master.
(John Hugh Dennis?)
Yes sir. Well, do you know - no, you don't know becus joo don't belong here [in Baltimore]. Why Samuel Dennis used to be de chief jurdge here in Baltimore, it was his father.
(Where did he have the farm?)
They had the farm on - they called it the Cedar Hall. That wus near Pocomoke City [Maryland].
Entry 3093
My mother - well, she was about 40 I guess or maybe 40 odd. She wus 42 - my brother wus two years old. She taken sick. She went outdoors - I wus livin' in Pocomoke [City, Maryland] then - an' she went out de door. Well, these ole houses, country places, the chimleys, zhoo know, aside yeh house - an' she went out there an' stopped de side de chimley [for chimney-corner toilet, see 203, p.56] an' she taken a pain in her right [big] toe an' it went on up in her knee. An' when she got in the house she said, "Mama, I can't walk." That wus my grandmother an' my grandma lived to be 85. She said, "Mama, I can't walk," she said, "my knee - I got a pain in my toe an' it's went up in my knee. I can't walk." So my grandmother - she wus a mighty one fer rubbin', you know, an' she rub 'er. An' she went an' got some ole horehoun' an [or] yard marvel - de grass, dey call it yard marvel grass - an' she stews this stuff up an' she rubs zer in it. An' it didn't do 'er any good. She couldn't walk. So she put her in the baid. An' when she got in the baid she couldn't get out any more - taken para- lize all the way from 'er shoulder clear down. She couldn't move dat foot, dat right foot. She couldn't move her right foot no way - had to take 'er 'bout de baid an' put 'er in. She jes' gotta wha' choo call a perilous [paralysis] stroke, we thought. So we sent - my grandmother doh [though], she sent fuh de doctor. An' de Doctor Quinn come, why he said 'twas a col' [cold] rheumatis. So she got worser an' worser. All he did to 'er - everything he give 'er would make 'er worse. So my husband an' I - that wus his uncle, Uncle George Jackson wus - I said, "I very mind to go to Uncle George an' see if they is anything ailin' mah mother. I believe dey's somepin wrong about her - she can't walk an' de doctor can't do 'er no good, she can't use her side." Well, I thought then in that time that de people didn't take wit perilous strokes, zhoo know, offten, like they do now. So I says, "I don't believe it's any perilous stroke." He says, "All right, then, let's us go." So we walked. We got out about nine a'clock at night, one night, an' walked down to Fairmount [Maryland], down whare I told joo Uncle George wus. When we got there 'twas daybreak - he wus settin' up then, he had his clothes on - I guess about five a'clock in the morning [eight hours walk]. It wus in June when we went. I suppose it wus about five a'clock in de morning 'cus it wus light. An' we rahpped [rapped] on de door an' he opened de door. You know, mah husband didn't go to see 'im as offten as he wanted it to see 'im, to go see him. An' he said, "Uh huh!" He said, "I knowed somepin happen," he said, "iss [else] you wouldn't of been here." So we laffed an' tole 'im, "No, not much happened." He said, "Yes it did," he said - to me, he said. He said, "Ya, your mother's layin' pint [point] of death, she can't walk." I said to 'im - I wus always kin'a jokin' - I said, "How did joo know that?" "Uh huhI" he said - he wus a great big fellah, he'd filled this chair up - he said, "Uh huhI your mother's down an' can't walk." I said, "Yes." "An' why didn't choo come fer 'er before?" He said, "She's been down now ever since Apurl an' you jis' come here in June." I said, "Yes, she did." He said, "She started to a show." Well, she did. She started to git ready to go to a show an' she taken dat pain in de foot. De show wus at Pocomoke City, an' she wus down in kin'a about two mile from de show, from de city, out in de country part. An' he said, "Well, why didn't zhah come here before?" An' he said, "She wus gettin' ready to go to a show an' dat's de show she got to!" I said, "Well, that's true." "Uh huh!" he said. So he jis' set back in de chair - he always set in a chair, somepin like this. "Uh huh!" he said. "Well, a lady dat she thought dat wouldn't nevah do 'er no harm, a woman," he said, "an' she's a little short woman," he said, "she's jist about so high" - an' sure enough she wus - "an' she's light [in color]," he said. "An' she put dat [image there because] she an' her husband got mad with 'er, 'cus she wanted her to go to her house an' she wouldn't go," he said. "An' she come down there an' laffed an' talked with 'er, an' went out side de chimley at night an' put a piece of a tin," he said. "So when you go back, '' he said, "they'll be a piece of tin put right inside [in the corner] of de chimley," he said, "an' it's in de shape of her." He said, "It's in de shape of your mother," he said, "an' it's got one foot off" - had been cut out a piece of tin. "An," he said, "it wus put down," he said, "an' the foot's cut off." He said, "You go back, Elijay" - he called mah husband - of course he wus his nephew. He said, "Elijay, you go back, you go an' look, feel down, take a trowel, '' he said, "don't take anything else, don't take no spade, no shovel, '' he said, "an' take a trowel, an' you dig down an' you dig your mother-in-law up, he said, "an' I'll do the balance." He said, "You bring dat piece of tin to me," he said, "an' I'll do de balance. Zhoo [the informant] walk with him." He laffed. An' we stayed there all day. We stayed an' visited. We stayed there about fo' a'clock. He wus gon'a stay till five but he told us not to. He said, "Now, don't choo stay here no longer." He set an' talked with us, first one thing an' then another. He said, "Now listen, an' git yerself ready an' go on back so you kin take that up," he said, "befo' morning." He said, "I want choo to git up out of here, I want choo to git back in time enough befo' fo' or five a'clock tonight [that is, before sunrise] an' take that up." He said, "You'll find it." An' sure enough we did git it. We went back home, an' Elijah went an' took his trowel like he told him an' lifted that up. An' there wus that piece of tin. It had legs an' all, an' this piece [a foot] wus cut off. An' he took it back there. Now, I don't know whut he [George Jackson] did, but he took it back to him. Mah mother got well. She lived about ten years after that. Baltimore, Md.,
(139, Mrs. Williams), 40:1; happened about 1896.]
Entry 3094
My grandmother - well, I'm speaking of my aunt - just as well say grandmother, she was born a slave. She [aunt] said that one night she dreamt that this friend of hers was mixing up something that was green, yet it was sup- posed to be milk. And she said to her husband next day, "Purnell, don't you take dinner with Bettie on Sunday." But sure enough he would go and take dinner with this woman on Sunday - they were friends - and sure enough this woman did poison her [aunt's] husband in milk. So he called on a man by the name of George Jackson who lived out here near Girdletree [Maryland] at that time - he's dead now. [George Jackson never lived at Girdletree.] And he went to call on this old man George Jackson. And he went to get some roots out of the woods and boiled it up. And while he was boiling these up he was singing a song. And the more he'd sing, the more this stuff would boil. I suppose that was just [uncle's] imagination. But when he got it boiled as much as he wanted it, he gave my uncle this to drink. And there had been things crawling up and down - running up and down - inside of him. You could hear them. She [aunt] said this had happened about two weeks after he took this dinner. You could hear these things squealing as if though they were mice and rats. And finally, when he drank this up, an hour or so afterwards, why these things came from him - he discharged these things. And they were wood- bitches - ground puppies.
[For another example of singing while something boils, see 918, p.337.]
This happened down here at St. James [a Negro community in which I was to work a few days later]. St. James is five miles on the other side of Pocomoke [City, Maryland] right on the border of Virginia. [The speaker is Jerry Williams, George Jackson's grandnephew and my contact man. I had interviewed him that summer at Ocean City, Md. We are about to start my second collecting trip in Maryland - Friday, Dec. 14, 1936 - as well as to use the Telediphone for the first time. This unusual story of George Jackson singing to his brew, the first recording for the Telediphone, signifies bubbling luck - also work - for the 3000 cylinders to follow.]
Entry 3095
Uncle George [Jackson] always called for wah choo calied a jack. This jack is a magnet, a magnet jack. Magnets dey called jacks them days. This mag- net, you know, [is] a piece of little steel in pickin' up pins. He'd tell you git him a magnet, an' he'd take this hair [which client brought from woman], an' this magnet, an' gits de - I'm sure he had other things put with it, you know. But anyhow, that was fixed up in a bag. An' when he'd give you that you wore that an' they'd always [be] success[ful] ever he'd fixed that for 'em. You couldn't fool with a woman. I don't care how many tried to beat it, they could not git her away from him. [Ten dollars was charged from this protective device. It is interesting to learn that formerly magnets were so commonly used as jacks that a magnet in some places was called a jack. But this device is not a jack, it is a hand; a type of CHASTITY HAND, p.534, which contains two other examples of Uncle George's love hands, Nos.1767-1768.]
Entry 3096
Wal, de story ah wanta tell - wheah ah live up in Mobile fer 17 years, an' ah [17 years old] left and went tuh Birmingham, an' ah lived in Birmingham 'bout six months in de no'th part of Birmingham, and after living in no'th Birmingham, went over in Westfield. It's about 7 miles from Birmingham and ah was working fer [some] company in Birmingham and ah lost a finger, see. Piece of a finger, see. An' ah drew about, I think it was 700 and some dollars fer dat finger - where ah was working from. An' ah went over tuh Birmingham and got aroun', having money you know - having a big time and met several girl friends. And where ah was living ah was goin' wit de girl stayed next door tuh me; an' ah was goin' wit de girl stayed at de third door from me. An' de girl that stay- ed at de third door from me, she was a.married woman, and de girl stayed at de first door from me, she was not married but she had a chile for dis married woman's husbands, yo' see, and so dey disliked one another. But how-de-ever, one day, she was goin' down to de commissary - dis store, yo' know, fer a camp, TCI camp. Dis TCI - ah guess you've heard about it. Down in dis camp dere a big store. All de trade is for de company - live by de company an' yo' deal wit de company. An' she ast me tuh go and ah tole her ah didn't wanta go. An' she tole me, "Yo' must go." Ah say, "Well, ah'm not goin'." Well she snatched mah hat and ah run, chased her to take mah hat from her and she out- run me and wore de hat on down dere. Well, when she came back - ah guess it was about six 'clock when she came back an' ah went over and ast her fer mah hat. So she gave it to me and so I wore that fer two or three days - worked with it, it was a work hat. So about several days after dat ah became - mah eyesight became sort of dim-like. What it was all about ah didn't know. Well, de TCI, you have to carry insurance dere. Dey takes out fer de rent and fer de doctor bill. Well, ah went over to de hospital - to de little hospital and me being in de hospital, de doctor test mah eyes and everything and tole me ah had sore eyes. He tole me to bath mah eye with some saltwater and it would come all right. Well, ah did and it didn't git any better and ah went back to him and so he sent me over to de Hillman Hospital - dat's in Birmingham - to a Specialist. Well, de specialist test mah eyes and ask me what happen. What hit me in de eye - did any steel or anything hit mah eye. Ah tole him no, it Wasn't any steel or anything ah got in mah eye. So ah tole him the only thing ah know of [I had been hoodooed]." 'Well, '' he say, "ah tell yo, son, you have to go to a two-headed doctor." [For telling a Doctor of Medicine that your ailment comes from hoodoo, see p.12, line 9f.]
(Was it a colored doctor who was waiting on you?)
It was a colored doctor.
(At this hospital?)
At de hospital. Oh! I beg yore pardon, it was a white doctor.
(And he advised you to go to a two-headed doctor?)
To a two-headed doctor. An' so ah goes on back to mah cousin and tole him he tole me to go to a two-headed doctor, and ast him did he mean that.
(Where did you say you went?)
From Birmingham - from de hospital? Well, ah went back home, yo' see.
(No. Didn't you go to see the two-headed doctor?)
He tole me go to a two-headed doctor an' ah went. Ah goes back home fer [first] an' ah tell mah cousin, who ah was livin' with, what de doctor tole me. So he advised me to go to a place dey call Tennysville, see. Yes, dat's a suburb of Birmingham, ah guess, 'bout seven miles. So ah goes ovah to the lady - it's a colored lady. Her name was Madam Jane. Ah goes tuh her and so she comes in to de room - de waitin' room and tole me everything. In de beginnin' she tole me, say, "Well, yo' lost yore eyesight - jist about." An' she tole me what it's all about and how come dis woman's mad with me and everything, but she wouldn't tell me who the girl was - she wouldn't call her name but she would describe her to me and give de girl initials [see 2748, p.757], yo' understand. An' so she tole me what charge - it cost me $25.00 to git mah eyes cured. Well, whut she said, ah don't know; but whut she tole me to do, ah know. So she advised me to bathe mah eyes in some fresh milk - whut ah mean by fresh milk, not dairy milk but from a cow, see. Dat whut she tole me to do - bathe mah eyes in fresh milk. An' she tole me dat mah eyes were blind from de girl takin' de bow off - de bow ah mean in de back of de hat, she had dressed de hat. An' say whut fer me tuh do was to take some salt - Epsom salts - take some Epsom salts and any kind of finest perfume and jest bathe dis - where dis bow was in mah hat. See. Co'se she gave me some treatments remember whut she gave me was to rub cross mah eyes but whut it was, ah don't know. An' so ah guess she worked on me 'bout two weeks and ah gained mah eyesight. In facts, in the third week ah was stone blind. But whut she did - ah know whut she tole me to do. Dat was to cure mah eyes. Dat's experience.
(What happened to the girl?)
Tuh de girl? Anything didn't happen to her. Quite natural me an' her was still friends but ah was sort of shy of her because she had did that trick, yo' see. In other Words, she was tryin' tuh gain love, yo' see. An' dis girl, she disliked her and she didn't want me to have dis girl. Of course, she's a married woman and ah couldn't be anything tuh her, but she liked me.
Entry 3097
I haven't had no dealing with that, but anyway, ah kin tell you some- thing about that lawyer.
(About what lawyer?)
My husband, he had kilt a man and I went to Mother Kate. (Mother Kate?) Yes, sir. (Where did she live?) She lives up on Jackson and Magnolia.
(Is she still living?)
Ah don't know if she's still living yet. I think she moved uptown.
(Oh, all right.)
But anyway I went there to her. I'd gived the lawyer $50, and so a lady told me to go up there to her. And I went up there to her, and I say, "Mother Kate, I come for you to help me - my husband is going to the penitent'ry. The next trial he get, he go to the penitent'ry. She say, "You know what you do," she say, "you go to the Ten Cent Store and get ten cents of brand-new needles and ten cents of pins and," she say, "you go to the market and you get you a beef tongue and," she say, "you put ten pins on each side and you put ten needles on each side." And she say, "you get you 50 pounds of ice and," she say, "let it stay 24 hours and," she say, "leave that tongue froze; and when he go to court he won't get no lifetime - he go to the penitent'ry, but he might get six months in the parish or either get three." And he got three months in the parish. And so after I got him out, he left me. And I went back there and I told her, ah said, "Don't you know he done left me - all that I did for him." She say, "Well, you got any money?" Ah say, "I got one quarter." She say, "You go to the corner and get a nickel worth of nutmeg and a nickels sugar and," she say, "you grate that nutmeg up, ' and she say, "you write his name nine times on a piece of paper, and you put some of that nutmeg [and sugar] in that paper and you put it in the lamp," she say, "you get a piece of red flannel and you burn your lamp."
(Wait a minute! What do you do with that red flannel, now?)
Get a piece of red flannel and drap it in the lamp - keep him from seeing it, you understand - and drap the paper in there [into red flannel to hide paper], and [but first] wrap it up with a piece of thread. And she say, "You write it nine times again and tie it up with a piece of thread and wear it in your shoe." And she say, "You get it nine times again and," she say, "you go to the barroom and gets you ten cents of gin and," she say, "you put it [third paper with 9 names] in a bottle and put it behind your bed and," she say, "you shake it up three times a day," she said, "and I'm betting he'll come back to you.'" And I'm got him till yet.
(Did he come back?)
Yes, I'm got him till yet.
(I see.)
And she say, "Three time a day you shake it up and say, "The Father, Son and Holy Ghost.
(I see. Mother Kate told you that.)
Yes, told me to get a nickel's worth of nutmeg and a nickels sugar.
(Yes?)
She told me to grate the nutmeg and mix it up in the sugar, and write it nine times.
(Wait a minute! Write what nine times?)
Write his name nine times on a piece of paper.
(All right.)
And put it in the lamp and get a piece of flannel and drap [or wrap] it in there. (Wait! You wrap this paper in a piece of flannel, and you put the flannel in the lamp?) Put the flannel in the lamp and wrap the nutmeg and the sugar up in the piece of paper and tie a piece of thread around it and drap that in the lamp.
(But the flannel is around the two then?)
Yes, sir, the flannel goes at the bottom - you know, the paper done sink and the flannel, you see, is all around it.
(Oh, all right. Then what?)
And then she told me, 'Write his name nine times again and put some of that nutmeg and sugar and wear it in your shoe.
(What do you wrap it up in?)
A piece of plain white piece of paper. Write it nine times and tie it up with a piece of white thread and wear it in my shoe.
(You don't put any flannel around that?)
No, don't put no flannel around it atall.
(Just the paper?)
Just the paper.
(All right.)
And she say, "Write his name nine times again on a piece of paper and wrap it up with a piece of thread." And she say, "You go to the barroom and get you ten cents of gin, and you put it in there and three time a day," she say, "you shake it up."
(Wait a minute! You put this paper in this gin?)
Put some of the sugar and the nutmeg and wrap it up with a piece of thread and drap it in the gin.
(I see.)
And then stop it up and put it behind the bed. "And three time a day," she say, ''you shake it up and say, "The Father, Son and Holy Ghost." (I see. You had to do all these three things, then - you burned the lamp, you had to wear it in your shoe, and.) And put it in ten cents of gin.
(And put it in gin. For how long do you have to burn that lamp?)
Burn it all day - but I don't burn it now.
(I see. You only burned it all day.)
Burned it all day and all night.
(I see.)
That's to get him back.
(And you wore this up in your shoe too?)
Wore that in my shoe - the nutmeg and.
(You only burned that lamp one day?)
Burn it all day. I burned it about three weeks.
(I see. OhI you burned it about three weeks.)
Yes, sir, I burned zactly three weeks.
(And he came back.)
And he come back - come back with his suitcase. (I see. You burned this lamp three weeks and you kept that thing in your shoe three weeks and you kept shaking that bottle up for three weeks.) I've got the bottle now, but I don't let him see it.
(I see. You did all those three things for three weeks.)
Three weeks.
(It was three weeks before he came back?)
It was three weeks before he came back. He come back that Monday.
(I see. All right.)
Entry 3098
[Molly Lee, a white doctor, had quite a reputation. I first heard about her while I was collecting in Richmond. Since I did not interview white doctors (see INTRODUCTION), I assumed she lived in or near Richmond - a false assumption. The following well-known and commonplace rite attributed to her does this doctor an injustice. Any woman who could receive her crystal ball from the spirits (561, p.178) must have been original and competent.] I knows once in my time, a woman had a man for her husband, and she lived over here in Suffolk. Maybe you heard something, too. There's a lady the other day, lady named Molly Lee, a white lady, she claims do it. She done something. She's a great woman for wrestlin' with young boys. She has a young boy down dere and she say, "Go ketch me a young frog - a toadfrog." And he get that frog and go put a board or something on him so that he can't get away - wouldn't kill him, fasten him down where he'd stay there and die, and the ants eat him up. Let de ants eat him up, you know, all to a skeleton. And in that frog's bones, find a little bone in 'em just exactly like fish scale. And there's another bone in 'em that is used, too, like a fishhook. You know, a little point to it - wasn't, see, all de way; but just more like a fishhook than any other bone. You kin take that bone - now, this has happened, this is not - but this is the bone that the boy had. She take that bone and hook it into a person's coat.
(Into what?)
Into somebody's clothes - just as you pass by, you know, just hook it into somebody's clothes and don't you pull it out, and he'll fall for you just as far as you'll let him. And at de same time this other little bone like a fish scale, see, when you get a chance to do it. Well, you see, if you can't get 'em to you, you can't drive them away. That's what they always says. And you come and just put dat bone just like a little fish scale, drop it on 'em, and just stay like you never seen 'em before. You'll never get dis bone out yourself. If you don't put dat fish scale on 'em, dat's finished - dey's gone and you'll never see 'em no more. He just gone from you just as free if he never been with you atall. (I see. If you want to keep them, you put this little hook; and if you want to drive them away, you put this fish scale on them.) Yes.
(And this is what that woman over in Suffolk did with these young boys?)
Well, she would have these boys ketch frogs for her.
(Oh! She had those boys catch frogs for her.)
Only little boys what is barefoot. Woman had children big as me. (I see. She did that though to get these other men, but she had that little boy catch the frogs for her. That was her way of getting a man and sending him away if she didn't want him - got tired of him.) Yes. And I mean, they ain't been back. That is what they used. I don't know whether there's anything else now that she did besides that, 'cause I've been there. I've gone over there in my automobile. That's what he carried on back. [Informant drove a client over to Molly and that is what she gave him to use for himself.]
(Is she supposed to be a root doctor or something?)
She is that.
(Molly Lee?)
Molly Lee.
(Is she still living?)
Yes sir, fur as I know. I have never heard of her being dead.
Entry 3099
[Pauline lived on an island 6 miles from Brunswick, Georgia, where I Was then working. What an opportunity to have explored that marvelous coastline as I had done at Beaufortl But I resisted the tempta- tion, refusing to break my rule - not to interview white doctors. I have two accounts of Pauline, both taken from broken interviews. In the first, we had been talking about Pauline - I am unable to find this - and then later I ask the following question.]
(Are there any white people that work here now?)
[Informant returns to Pauline.]
She lives on Bly's Island.
(Oh! She is still here. I don't want to talk to her but I just wondered.)
[Brunswick, Ga., (1201), C400:7 = 2017:7.]
iTne second account of Pauline comes from a man who has already given us in- formation about Doctor Buzzard - see 3071, p.893.] A white woman.
(What was her name?)
Miss Pauline.
(Where does she live?)
She lives heah at Bly's Island, a large island right cross tuh de rivah on de road to Jacksonville.
(Oh, just near Brunswick?)
Yes sir - six miles out chere [on the road] tuh Jacksonville. Well, mah mother done taken me out dere. Well, soon as ah got dere she set down an' talk tuh me. She asked me if ah evah worked any place an' ah tole her where ah worked. She asked me, "Did yo' have any enemies round dere?" Ah said, one woman wus a cook dere an' she wanted concernin' me tuh have somepin tuh do wit her - me an' her had tuh make beds in dis, yo' know, to dis home ever' mawnin' together. Ah wouldn't say nuthin to her. She said ah tried tuh play cute. She de one dat put down de stuff at de back gate of dis white tourist home where we were workin', an' ah step on it wit mah right fut gettin' ovah de fence. She done put it right whar ah got ovah de fence at ever' mawnin'. Me an' her wus de first ones dere. So after she seen me - see, ah tried to step on mah left fut, if it done kilt me. See, after two yeahs an' a half ah wus dried up to 135 pounds. She [Pauline] tole mama tuh let me come dere an' she would give me medicine. She taken sulphur, turpentine an' some kinda cocklespur weed - cocklebur weed - taken de cocklebur weed an' made a medicine out of it. [Three ingredients.] So she made a medicine an' ah started to taken dat cocklebur weeds an' sulphur an' turpentine. An' tole me tuh wear three pieces of Irish potatoes - white potatoes in each one of my shoes. So after dey figured - it came on to 'fect mah othah fut an' mah hips, yo' see, an' ah wus dead from heah down [demonstrates].
(From your hips down.)
Yeah, from de hips down. So after dat ah wore de Irish potato an' thing. an' ah begin tuh git bettah. So she tole me not tuh drink no whiskey. So ah stop off from drinkin' some whiskey an' got tuh walkin' an' ah put down de crutches. Yo' know, ah could walk wit de walkin' cane. Ah put down de crutches. So ah begin tuh drink whiskey at night wit de othah boys roun' heah. So dat throw me agin. Dey had tuh take me dere agin. She tole me ah had been drinkin'. Well, when ah got dere dat time, it had done came up into mah shoulders heah - see [demonstrates], it had me, ah'm daid in mah left ahrm - come up mah left side. So she had tuh work fast. Dey had tuh keep me out dere tuh her house fo' three days. So we had tuh pay her wit three pieces of silver money - ah had tuh find three silver dollahs somewhere. She charge only three dollahs - don't care how big de case wus - had tuh pay her wit three silver pieces of money. That concernin' de three links of chain also.
(Of Mary - that Mary wore around her neck?)
["Dat concerning de three linked chain dat Mary wore pertaining tuh de Bible" - from his interview in INTERVIEWS.] Yes sir, dat [represents] three silver dollahs dat ah had tuh pay her wit. De firs' time paid her wit a silver dollah, an' after ah went three times, had tuh pay her de three silver dollahs. So dat's de whole case of it, until ah taken up dis last bottle of medicine. Ah didn't drink any mo' an' dey said ah wus cured of it. Den ah had a fren'. He wus poison by a girl on a piece of cake. But he wus crowin' lak a rooster - jumpin' up an' down. An' ah tole him concernin' dis same lady - tole his mothah. An' she taken him out dere an' she pay her with three silver piece of money - carried him three times. See, each time it wus a dollah. When she carried him de last time, dat's when she gave him some kinda medicine an' out of his throat came a frog, little small wiggle-tail, little small snake. [Three things came out of his throat.]
Entry 3100
Yo' know when ah first gone [to him], he say ah wus poisoned. An' mah mother an' father befo' dey died, ah wus ovah 27 yeahs, dey had worked on me - dey had got a doctor yo' know tuh cure me. De first doctor dey got, dis doctor dey say wus de one. He didn't do me no good - yo' know, he worked on me. So dey let dat un go an' dey got another one. An' de doctor whut dey got fo' me, dey say dat's de one had fixed it - had deviled me inside. An' he seemed lak he wus goin' he'p me an' ah stayed up, yo' know, round de home - git so ah could be up an' down. An' after ah got sick, yo' see, dey had tuh go an' git another doctor. But ah saw dis doctor in de spirit on a Wednesday night. De Lawd show me where a man come tuh me an' he pull out some of mah hair heah [demonstrates], some heah, an' ah wus.
(From the top of the head and from side of the temples.)
Dat's whut in one of mah dreams - on a Wednesday night ah dreamed it. An' he come dat Sunday. Mah cousin brought him unbeknowst tuh papa dere - jes' lak ah dreamed it on a Wednesday night. So he [doctor] came an' he axt him [father]. He [father] say, "Yes," he had a very sick girl heah. An' he tole, say, "Yes." [Doctor] say, "Well, do yo' care fo' me tuh do anything fo' yo' daughter?" He say, "Yes. So he went on back tuh Jacksonville. He wus runnin' a bar - a barroom, but dis man is daid now but he help me. He come on back an' one Sunday he pull out some hair - yo' know, Jes' lak ah dream it, an' tole me tuh hole mahself right ovah de fire-hearth. He tole mah mother tuh give me some sulphur an' some gun- powder an' one mo' stuff [three ingredients], but ah forgot. An' jes' hol' mah haid ovah it like dat chew know, an' he say it wus a spell on me. Seemed lak somepin wus talkin' tuh me lak ah wus dyin', yo' know, all de time - be scarry an' hot, chew know. Well, ah wus bein' pregnant, see. Two weeks after dis baby born, den dat turn out on me. So dey thought ah had heart trouble, an' so de doctors all examine me. Dr. Kidd, he's buried an' gone, he tole me, says, "Yo' ain't got no heart trouble." He had look everywheres. It wus a spell on me. An' so it went an' went. An' sometimes ah couldn't raise dis arm. Sometime ah couldn't raise dis one. Sometime ah look at cha an' ah couldn't talk. Some- time mah feet chew know would turn in de back an' ah jes' drag: An' sometime ah couldn't eat, an' sometime ah could eat. Sometime nature couldn't hold me tuh save her life - ah'd eat so much yo' know. An' it jes' keep on like dat chew know for about a yeah, jes' right down till dis man, yo' know, worked on me an' got be bettah. So he went tuh de no'th an' he tole mah father dat he'd tried whut all tuh cure me. But, after he got me up he nevah did come back. He tole me he'll send de money but he's de one dat worked on me - Mr. Robinson. He's daid. So ah keep on an' ah come on tuh Brunswick, yo' see, an' ah stay ovah heah an' ah went in business an' ah got married den. So dis woman - ah wus ovah on Bay Street an' this woman come an' hit me on de shoulder. An' when she hit me - mah husband sent me after dat meat yo' see. An' when ah went back an' she hit me on de shoulder - when ah come back ah wus down in de shoulder like dat, an' ah went on an' ah tole him. So he tole mah mother an' dem were. An' so every place ah moved he [first doctor?] send dem wit dis poison. She always claimed it wus a spell agin. Dey had it where it could [come to life] every once in a while. An' every Place ah go, dis thing worries me but hit moves, see, in mah stomach an' wiggles an' come up all in mah throat sometime. Sometime in mah face yo' kin see it. An' it jes' make me feel sick. But on de young moon an' de full moon dat de time it worries me. An' den it goes into dis left foot. Yo' see, it will wiggle under dere sometime an' crawl. An' when it time fo' me tuh work, it'll stop me from workin'.
(That thing is still bothering you?)
Yassuh.
(You weren't cured then?)
Dat's whut dey say. Every once in awhile ah kin feel it.
(Didn't anybody cure you?)
De man say - he he'ped me up though.
Entry 3101
You know I wus bootleggin' an' de law come furce. Dis bad luck had been planted aroun' de house to ketch some bad luck fer me, you see, and I jis' had bad luck all de time. De law constan'ly come, constan'ly come. So I fixed salt an' t'ings down dey would tell me to, but dat didn't do no good. So den I goes to S'uth Car'lina - Doctor Small in S'uth Car'lina.
(What town does he live in?)
Florence, S'uth Car'lina. Doctor Small - I[J?]. H. Small.
[For Small, also see 3079-3080, p.897.]
He gits his cane an' he shake his cane up an' tells me all dese men's names. He tells me about Kid-eyed Reeves[?].
(Kid-eyed Reeves[?].) [The liquor man who supplied her?]
He tells me who sent 'em in dere. An' he gave me dis piece of luck - jis' somepin he [had].
(Did someone tell you about him being down there?)
Someone told me - someone sent me to him.
(How did he shake his cane?)
He had dis cane. He put somepin in dis cane. It was loaded - a loaded cane - and he shake zit up: An' he went on to tell me where dis cousin Ivry [Ivy] is, an' why mah husband an' I didn't agree [because] he liked dis cousin. Whut to do with his cousin. If he got a chance he'd kill 'er [wife] - dat he wus so jealous dat he wanted 'er so bad, he'd do anything to harm 'er [wife]. Den he went on to tell me dat he [husband] sent de law. An' he named all de officers names one by one - ev'ry one of 'em name, an' ev'ry time he shake de cane he give me another one name. An' he told me, he said. "You take dis [piece of luck = hand] an' t'row it over - he told me between North Car'lina, I mean S'uth Car'lina, an' Richmond [Va.] - to t'row it over in runnin' water. But I was afraid dat it might go up against de bank [of river] or somepin by not knowin' dat [where?] was travelin'. So I waited till I came home.
(You were traveling in an automobile?)
No, I was on a train. He told me to throw it in de runnin' water when de train pass but I didn't take a chance on it. I was afraid it might lodge some- where on a bank. So I brought it back here.
(Did you look at it? Did you know what it was that he gave you?)
I tell you. It was somepin on de order of - frankincense is one thing. You know he put four or five differen' little things. An' he'd shake up his bottles an' things an' mix dose things together. An' when I came back - an' he give me some lucky stars [see LUCKY STAR, p.607; 2541-2544.p.702f.1] So I came back an' he told me de next mornin' [after returning home], I get in mah car an' I goes to a bridge an' I named all dose men name an' threw it [the piece of luck] off. An' den, jes' after I threw it, I went to court. It was all through in de court [case was dismissed].
(You say there was something buried for you in the front yard?)
Yeah, it was buried.
(Who took this up?)
A spiritual taken it up. She dig it up: You're not suppose to handle 'em. He [Doctor Small] sent some spirit-man an' he found it. An' then, you don't suppose to handle [it] yourself. He didn't let me handle it - I couldn't put my hand on it.
(Who worked this for you?)
[Doctor Small may have sent a spirit-man to locate the buried article, but who dug it up?] It was a spiritual of Lakeside, whut lady went to see at Lakeside.
[Was she the person who had sent client to Small?]
(A spiritual?)
But she's a fortuneteller of Lakeside. She found it. She told me where it wus an' she come over dere an' found it.
(It was like a ball?)
[This shows I had turned off my machine somewhere, or informant had told part of the story before recording began.] Yeah, like a ball. I paid her to take care of it.
(Names of these officers, when did you call them?)
I called all four name, an' de last name I called, I t'rew it over mah left shoulder into de runnin' water on de bridge. An' dat case wus absolutely dis- missed.
Entry 3102
[My discovery of Zippy Tull and George Jackson - former celebrities of the high-man or witchcraft world along the Eastern Shore - I have described in the INTRODUCTION. One of the great stories about her has already been given - No. 8, page 5. For George Jackson, see page 912.] [Nicknames characterize the woman - "Zippy'" meaning '"lively'" and 'smart," and "Aunt Zippy'" revealing an affectionate regard by many people. She lived a large part of her life a mile or so from the Maryland line at a place once called Drummondtown, near New Church, Accomac County, Virginia. Approximate dates of birth and death would be the decade of 1830 and the year 1900. I have four stories about her, each told by a different informant; also three remedies given by a fifth person. Never again would I meet anyone who, I felt, had actually been so near old-time workers. All material, except the story by Mrs. Williams, I collected while working the region and stay- ing the last few days at the old Washington Hotel in Princess Anne, Maryland.] [Story No. 1 - recorded in my hotel dining room, Princess Anne, Maryland, was told by a former slave 89 years old.] That's been aboat [about] 70 years ago when I wus - 75 years ago [1861]. I know dat myself, I'm not talkin' about whut I hear somebody 'say. I wus a young man - guess I wusn't a young man neither. I called myself a young man an' I wus courtin' a girl. An' some people lived on a fahm [farm] that didn't like me so very well. I wus a very bright boy an' very swift at that time. So dey begin to wuk [work] on me, as I thought. We has an ol' woman named Zippy Tull, she's a fortuneteller. So I goes down to Miss Zippy an' I says to 'er, "I wan' chew to tell my fortune." She knew my father. She says, "All right, George," she says, "take a seat there." An' she goes over [the cards] an' I never said a word. I jis' sit down there an' listened at 'er. I hadn't tol' 'er nuthin atall yet. So she said, "George," she said, "there's a big dark woman," she said, "that don't like your mother an' don't like your father - an' she poisoned your dog." Well, that wus a fact. An' this dog died sort of tight anyhow. "Well, anyhow," she says, "it's workin' on you. Now, I ain't had no mind it seems to me for nuthin atall. "Well," I said, "I wan' chew to do somepin for me if you kin." She says, "I will, if you do whut I tell you to do," she says. "I will, an' farthermore," she says, "I'll make dem people come to you an' 'splain to you dey done it demselves." I tol' 'er that wus purtty good. Well, I goes to work an' done whut she told me to do. An' fo' or five days from that.
(What did she tell you to do?)
I ain't exposed [supposed] to do [tell] this.
[After all these years the old man was reluctant to tell!]
(Oh! I see. All right.)
In fo' or five days from that, I done jis' whut she told me, an' I done whut she tole me to do Saturday night. Aboat in two or three davs from then, mayhaps a week - that woman hadn't beer to my house in three years - she come there at twelve o'clock. She don't come in. She put both hands on the door an' says - my mother's name wus Liddy - she says, "Liddy," she said, "if ever I git over this, I shall never do any harm to nobody else while I live." "Well, Caroline," she said, "git over whut?" "Whut I've done." She says, "Whut have you done?" "Well," she said, "Liddy, I done a whole lot, I've done a whole lot in my time, but, '' she says, "I've done somepin now which I think that I've gone to my good scene [death] from outside [outside because her own spell had been turned against her by Zippy Tull]. She said, "I'll jes' say to you that I'll never will do nuthin else to nobody while I live, again." "Well, whut have you done?" "Well," she said, "I'll never do nuthin to nobody else while I live." Well, that woman went away, she went back to her home again - she went back aboat a quarter of a mile from me and she pined away. An' whut I done - as that stuff wasted away, she wasted away; when that stuff wus all gone, she went.
(What did she do? Can't you tell?)
Did I tell what I done?
(No. Did she [Zippy] tell what she [the bewitcher] did?)
No, she didn't tell me what she done to me.
(And what did you do, now? What did you get?)
Well, I [he still hesitates] - well, I done this. She [Zippy Tull] tole me to git some new needles, pins, an' some of my own water - an' I fergit now the other t'ings I take, been so long. I fergit the other odd t'ings that she tole me aboat, but some five or six diff'rent. But I know these new needles an' these new pins, an' I think some shot; put it all into a bottle, an' some of my own water into the bottle, an' dug a hole in de fahplace - taken up a brick an' dug a hole in de fahplace in my home. An' I buried this bottle, put it down - the stopper down. She says, "Now, when dat bottle leaks out - all dat stuff dat's in dat bottle, she'll die," she said, "but she'll waste away dat way same as dat bottle." She said, "Stop it up tight," she said, "turn it upside down, cover it up an' place this brick back on top of it." Well, I done that an' buried it, jest as she tole me, where I dug.
(Did she die?)
DIEI Why she smothered! [Princess Anne, Md., (127), 29:2.] 0. [Story No. 2 - came from Mr. J. Shrieve (Numbers Book 83-134), my hotel manager at Princess Anne, a man past fifty, the only white informant interviewed. The latter alone makes him memorable, but a favor he also did later made the day doubly a worthy memory (see INTRODUCTION). This story, No. 2, is numbered 0000. because it is already in the text - see No. 8, page 5.]
Entry 3103
[Story No. 3 - recorded in dining room of my hotel at Princess Anne - comes from Joe Dorman, No. 133, the man who told the remarkable storv. POWER FROM DEAD PREACHER'S BONE, p.285. Another story of his, about a whistling snake, has been lost.] I know of an old Indian, the old Indian's name was Marcellus Gates. His wife [a white Woman] left him, and he come to Miss Zippy [Tull] and wanted to find out all about this. She told him everything, she told him the man and all. He wanted to kill this man. "No," she says, "I won't do that." He wanted to kill this other old man whose name of - I can't think of his name now. Anyhow, he wanted to kill 'im. Old man Wainwrightl He was a Wainwright. So he wanted to kill old man Wainwright. "Well, no," she wouldn't do it. "No, I don't do that," she says. "But," she says, "I will fix it so tha' chew kin kill him if you want." "Oh yes," he'd kill 'im. So she told him what to do. He was to draw his phorto on a bran'-new shingle, just so he had his phorto. He goes to work and draws that thing. And she told him just exactly how much powder and shot must go in de gun. They used these old muscle [muzzle]-loaders, then. But de old man was so proud to git to kill 'im, he overloaded his gun. And she told him a certain distance to git off. And he was so proud to git to kill 'im, he went an' got closeter. Uncle Mack! That was his name. Old Mack Wainwright. So he got closeter. This is a real fact. He shot at Uncle Mack on that shingle. An' he ups with his gun, an' when he shot, he busted the shingle all to thunder. She told him if he busted it, he wouldn't die. "Now, you jis' got to mark dat shingle" - had to put one or two shot in it - "if you do, he'll die instantly." And he bust dat shingle all to 'plinters [splinters].
[How well Zippy provided against her own failure!]
But Uncle Mack fell. He was digging up his potatoes. Uncle Mack fell dead as a dead man - ker-boom - as soon as he shot. Here come de girl a-runnin'. Grandpap was killed - or somepin was de matter with him. She didn't know what was ailin' 'im. She knowed he fell. Somebody help her to git 'im to the house. They taken Uncle Mack to the house. And he aimed de gun right middle-way of this pixschure [picture]. And Uncle Mack wus peppered. Ev'ry shot wus in that gun wus on his stumick.
(All the shot that was in the shingle?)
Yes sir.
(They hit him?)
Dat was re'lly de fact. You could see them little bumps - looked like shot.
(On his skin?)
Yes sir - after he fell and was takened to de house and his clothes wus takened off. They didn't know what wus ailing him, you know - his clothes wus takened off and everything, and they wus tryin' to work him up, you know, and bring life to him. And he wus peppered!
(How long ago was that?)
Well, let me see. I'm about 60. That's been 45 or 50 year ago [before 1936]. They wus elderly along that time. Of course, the old Indian lived until I was a good [sized] boy. He lived a long time. I knowed him well. But I knew' d'ole man Mack. He died from it. He wus waitin' to hear, and when he hear' d'ole Uncle Mack fell, he thought he wus dead and he went over to see about it. So he told them what he done. He told he shot him. "By God," he says [on seeing Uncle Mack's stomach], 'that's wah [where] I shot him." He says, "I shot to kill him. Tha' chew see all over there, that's wah I shot 'im. He got so he never will be no better." So after he owned it all up, you know, it was no use to send for no doctor. He told 'em all what he'd done and ev'rything. Old man Mack lived about two or three months. I don't know if he lived that long before he died.
Entry 3104
[Story No. 4 - recorded in Baltimore, Maryland, was told by Mrs. Williams, mother of my contact man Jerry Williams. Her deceased husband was a nephew of George Jackson - see her material about him under GEORGE JACKSON, p.912f.] This old lady wus named Harriet Hen'erson. Why, she an' my grandma were good friends - supposed to be. An' then the' wus another woman named Emmer [Emma] Hen'erson. An' this woman Harriet Hen'erson, she didn't like this Emmer Hen'er- son, an' she told my grandma not to give her nuthin to eat. An' my grandma just shooed off, you know. She said, "Oh, I'm gon'a give 'er somepin to eat, if the woman come along an' want somepin to eat - sure I'm gon'a give 'er somepin to eat." An' this old woman Harriet Hen'erson said, "If you do, bad luck will take after you." [This is called a bad mouth - see BAD MOUTH, p.255f.] An' my grandma says, "Oh, I'm not 'fraid of no bad luck" - jis' like that [imitating her - as she says later, "She used to talk funny."]. So she goes on an' gives this Emmer Hen'erson somepin to eat. So the old woman Harriet she found out. She said, "Oh, yes," she said - my grandma wus named Liza - "Oh, yes," she said, "Liza, you give Emmer somepin to eat, did jeh?" My grandma said, "Yes, I did. She come to the house an' I give her somepin to eat." She said, "All rightl Then you see whut happens." So in a - I don't know just how long, I don't think it wus more than a month or So though before my grandmother taken sick. But at first, she had a close-piece - you know, her underwear - an' she hanged it out on the bushes. In those days that was the place where they hung clothes. An' this old woman Harriet, she's suppose - it must have been her. But anyhow, she [grandmother] found cut out of her close-piece [a piece] in the shape of a coffin. An' she takes it - not thinking, she takes a needle an' sews it [hole] up an' puts it on. [By sewing up the hole she closed the coffinl] So I think about a month - well, it wasn't more than a month, say a month, any way after that she taken sick. An' so this old woman Harriet goes - it must have been her - got the [sewed upl piece or sent someone to get it. Anyhow, she takes an' measures her foot- track - my grandma would use to go barefooted off ten [often] - she takes an' measures her track with a stick, an' takes this piece of garment an' wraps it around [stick] an' puts it into the latest grave, a new grave, puts that the foot at the grave. An' then my grandmother taken sick. They called it the Marle's graves, cemetery, then - a graveyard they called it then. That's near - well, it's about five miles of Pocomoke [City, Maryland] down near St. James [a small negro community where I had collected by hand one day and evening]. Well then, she stayed sick from Apurl until I guess August maybe. An' she crawled on her knees, she bark an' howl like a dog - my grandmother, my own grandmother [for barking, see 775-776, p.256]. She couldn't walk at all. An her husband, my grandfather, had to lift her up an' lift her down. An' every- thing she eat come right on up. You see, they didn't put anything [poison] in her, that wus whut wus so funny. An' so anyhow, they couldn't discover whut wus happen. She had doctors after doctors - old Dr. Quinn, he doctored on her - an' doctor, Hall wus his name - an' Dr. McMurray[?] but we used to call him Dr. Mack, an' he doctored on 'er an' he give 'er up. All those doctors give 'er up. So she said to my grandfather - she believe in cunjuration - an' she said to my grandfather, she said, "James, I'm hurt." An' he said, "Well, I 'spect you are." She said, "Yes," she said, "I wan' chew to go to old Miss" - she used to talk funny, my grandmother did - 'I wan' chew to go to ol' Miz-ez-ez-ez-Zippy Tull.' We used to laugh at her. She [Zippy] lived at Drummondtown. That was in Virginia a few miles away]. It's there yet. That's somewhere near New Church. [Zippy Tull lived at Drummondtown, near the north boundary of Accomac County, Virginia, on the Delmarva Peninsula - so called from Delaware, Maryland, Va.
(Virginia) - between Chesapeake and Delaware Bays.]
Then, anyhow, when he came in - 'twus that night when he drove up there. He got a horse from the lady he worked for named Miss Marle, Miss Liza Marle. An' when he got there an' he opened the door, she said, "uh huh," she said, "I see whu' chew come for," she said, "your wife if lying the pint of death." She say, "She hasn't but three more days to live." An' she says, "An' a woman told her not give another woman somepin to eat' - jis' settin' talkin' right to 'im like that - she says, "an' she did it, an' this woman told her bad luck would take after her." [The narrator in Story No. 2 says Zippy lived near Siloam, Wicomico County - north of and contiguous to Worcester County. New Church and Drummondtown are in Accomac County, Virginia, a few miles from the Maryland line and southern bound- ary of Worcester County; these 3 adjoining counties being on the Eastern Shore - east of Chesapeake Bay.] That's whut he [grandfather] said. He said she talkin' to 'im jes' like I'm talkin' to you. And she didn't look into any cards [to tell his fortune] or anything, but jis' told him right straight. She says, "An' she's took a piece out of her close garment" - but they called it then, shimmy, you know - "out of her close garment an' has wrapped it around - then took the measure of her foot, an' she's wrapped it around the measure of her foot an' put it at a graveyard, a new grave," she said, "right at the foot of a new grave," she says, "and you go there and take it up." She says, "Yes, your wife is barkin' an' howlin' like a dog." She said, "An' you go there an' take it up, an' then after you take it up," she says, "you wind it up, it's almost to dust." She says, "If that piece of goods do plainly rot, '' she says, "then your wife will die," she said, "but chew go right straight back now," she said, "it's almost rotten," she says, "an' you take it up an'" - I don't know whut she told him to do with it, but anyhow she told him that she would do the balance, for him to take it up. An' he went home he said. An' when he first got home he heard my grandma moanin' an' groanin' an' howlin' like she did, an' he goes to the house. Well, she told him to go to take it up before he got to the house, but he wus so 'fraid she'd die, she wus dead, he run to the house - he couldn't git it at first [on his first attempt in the graveyard], full of hurry, in such a hurry - he run to the house an' listened at her, an' run back in [the graveyard]. An' he triggered down there agin, dug down there agin, an' he got this thing up. It wus the mea- sure of her foot an' the piece of her garment. An' the garment wus almost rot. An' when he got it up, it come to pieces - that rotten. An' after that my grandmother begin to git better. After awhile she got well. That wus in Apurl [she took sick] - about August that he goes to Miss Zippy. She said in September she got so she could go out an' go to the orchard an' git a basket of apples.
Entry 3105
[The following remedies come from Joshua Wilson, who said he had acted as runner years ago for Zippy Tull and George Jackson - drove clients out to them. Even if what he says is true, I doubt him ever being in the confidence of either. What little information he could have gathered would have been given by talkative patients on the homeward journey.] Now, to take this spell off, she [Zippy Tull would] go to work you understand, she take a live chicken. She killed this live chicken and just speld [= split - from Scotland] de head back - no matters war's [where is] it at, she banished [bandaged] this live chicken right to the place, right war this poison cunjura- tion were, and let that chicken die she banished with. And she'd take that chicken away from it, the chicken got all that poison; chicken dcne turnt - sometimes she turnt black and some[times] green, depends what kind of stuff you [spellthrower] put on. So she takes this chicken - after she takes this chicken from this woman [victim], she carry it to the running stream, sent it wid de wind and tide, fer [far] as de wind and tide will carry it. And that woman [spell- thrower] has got to go away from that place, she must drift like de tide and wind, drift away like dat chicken. She can't stay no more. This woman [patient] will come all right, and this woman [spell-thrower] been driftin', galloppin' around, until she'd have to leave the whole neighborhood, jis' can't stay.
The account explicitly names a chicken, while the editor doubts the informant's access. The live/killed sequence, application wording and alleged effects remain unresolved or unverified.
Entry 3106
All she [Zippy Tull] wanted was the photograph. She could take this photograph, an' she had a regular little gun, she put it [photograph] up, she get huh quicksilver [either (l) tin foil, sometimes called silver paper, a sub- stitute for silver bullet, or (2) silver from the backing of a mirror], steel dus', an' she'd shoot this pitchure full of holes an' tell you to take this pitchure - you bring her firs' thing, this goes with a red brick, a right bran'- new brick never been used. She'd have you go to work an' write this party's name on this new brick. You take this pitchure, this new brick, go to the graveyard, you bury that crossways [the picture and brick crossing each other] on a man's breast, an' it wouldn't be many days before you commenced to lingah. If somepin wouldn't change, you never got better unless that wus moved. Now, she called that sZow death. An' it wus slow death, too!
Entry 3107
If she'd [some woman had] gone away from you, she'd [Zippy Tull would] tell you, "Bring me the right shoe an' the last track she made of goin' from home" - take the dirt from that track goin' from home, an' her right shoe, an' bring it to her. She'd take this shoe, she dressed this shoe an' had this shoe - you see, the toe wus goin' from the house, she'd have you to bury it, the toe goin' to de house; the shoe, you change it right around. She put that [track] in the shoe. An' in nine day's time she'd tell you she'd [be] there, she come very near bein' there.
Entry 3108
Mah experience [as a doctor] come from aole man which used tuh be mah mothah's cousin - called him Uncle Tom, a very good man. (Here in town?) No, he's [he was] up near - 'tween heah an' Macon, heah. He's a cunjure-man. An' so when ah wus a kid he don' like me. So, he always want me tuh go stay wit him. Well, yo' know, quite nat- urally, a boy in town don't wanta go stay in de country. Yo' cain't see no auto- mobile, nobody tuh play with, so on - ah didn't wanta go out dere. So, fust an' last, mah mothah carried me out dere. So he had a ole mule out dere an' de mule Wus pretty tame an' let me - lak a jockey lak. So he let me play wit de mule an' so ah got a-likin' de mule an' so quite naturally ah liked him. So he tuk us back home in de buggy an' let me drive de mule. Well now, when ah got home, well ah still wants tuh follow de mule back. An' so mah mothah wun't let me go dat time. So, afterward, well, she made up her mind to let me go out dere. So, ah reckon, ah wus 'bout de age den of about thirteen yeahs ole, but ah didn't know thet he could do these things, yo' know. Dey nevah have accessed me into it, see. So ah seed diff'rent peoples come dere an' see him, an' he'd take dem in de room. So ah wanta know whut dey wus doin' dere. Well, he take 'em in dere an' ah wus 'bout de age den ah reckon about thirteen yeahs ole. An' so as de peoples be in dere, yo' know, an' so ah say, "Well, ah'll axe him." He says, "Well, son, ah kin do most anythin'." Said, "Yo', ah lak, an' ah know someday ah gotta - ah'm gon'a die." Says, "When ah die ah wanta leave some- body could do de same things fo' peoples jes' lak ah do, because peoples need tuh know how tuh he'p peoples. (What did the people call him - a root doctor or what? What did they call him?) [He had already said cunjure-man.] Well, he wus a spiritual herb doctor, yeah. In othah words, if yo're sick wit anything yo' wants tuh know, he could tell yo'. An' when he come tuh see yo' - say, fo' instance, if mah mothah wus sick. After ah went out there wit him awhile mah mothah wus sick de same as ah wus tellin' jes' 'while ago.
[He repeats the story for me.]
Well, a wumman wus goin' wit mah dad - well, she liked mah dad. She laked mah daddy an' so mah mothah she got sick den, an' she made up her mind tuh go see Uncle Tom. Cause, see why, she had a mind of goin' tuh de rivah all de time. But she made up her mind - got enough sense, yo' know, mah dad did, tuh go.git Uncle Tom. See, he wus our cousin but everybody called him Uncle Tom. An' so he went dere an' got him. Uncle Tom come dere an' looked at her an' said, "Yes, dey got chew, Sally" - jes' lak dat, said, ''but if God says so, ah'll cure yo' An' so he gived her some medicine, see. Well, after he give her de medicine, he told her, well, says, "Now, tomorrow between nine an' twelve, dat woman will come in an' give yo' a cake an' goin' axe yo' tuh eat it, but don't chew eat it, don't chew eat dat cake." Says, "Yo' save it till ah come." Well, quite naturally, ah wus a kid an' ah wus lookin' right on 'cause ah loved mah mothah, an' ah wanta know whut goin' come up, see. Well, then after that - well, he left. Sure 'nuff de woman brought de cake. Well, ah wus so mad dat ah wants tuh kill her, see. So ah carried de cake den an' put it in de safe. Yo' know, we had somepin lak - not a safe, but somepin wit a screen to it lak screen wire an' it had a lock to it. Well, ah put it in dere an' locked it up. An' so when Uncle Tom come why he looked at de cake an' he took an' divided it lak dat [demonstrates] an' made a fiah an' held it ovah dere an' it burnt. An' as it burned it give out blue smoke, an' he says, "If Sally et [ate] dis, yore Uncle Tom couldn't do nuthin wit chew." He says, "God says so, ah have yo walkin'." An' so, quite natural, after dat he did have her walkin'. [Blue smoke or colored lights is a common trick when doctor burns any cunjure article.] An' so, evah since then ah sorta believed in him, an' ah went out dere an' from time tuh time he learnt [me] diff'rent things. But sometime he practice wit me ovah a week or maybe longah on one thing an' try tuh git it perfect. An' so dat's de way ah come tuh [be a root doctor].
(Is he dead now?)
No, he left there an' went tuh Jacksonville.
(What was his name?)
Tom Williams.
(Up near Macon?)
No, Jacksonville, Florida.
(No, I mean where did he live there?) [In Georgia.]
No, he lived at a place out from where ah lived - out from Wally [Lollie?]. (Out from Wally. The reason I ask about that Williams, there's a fellow named.) [Evidently I had heard of another Williams. I also stop the machine.]
Entry 3109
Well, mah fathah back in 1904 - dat's been a long time ago, yo' know, 1904. Fo' me d'rectly ah have nevah had a thing like dat workin' fo' me, but mah fathah hired a man like dat when ah was a boy - ah's 48 yeahs old now. An in dose days, along 1904, mah fathah was - we had bought a track [tract] of land but it wasn't zactly in cultivation, so he had to rent some land from a nearby neighbor. An' so de man dat he rent de land from didn't have sufficient fence around de land. Ah goin' tell yo' about dis hoodoo business. So dis man didn't have sufficient fence aroun' de lan' fo' tuh keep de stock outa de property, yo' know, which he had corn crop in dere. See, de cows an' all went in an' destroyed de crop. Well, after de crop was destroyed den he wanted mah fathah still tuh pay rent for de land, see. So he wanted him tuh pay rent on de land. Well, ah didn't know - ah was at dat time 'bout thirteen or fo'teen yeahs ole - ah didn't know anything, such a thing as a hoodoo man until den. Well, all right, mah fathah didn't pay it an so he offered tuh put him in lawsuit 'bout de land - 'bout de crop, paying de rent on de land. But dey couldn't win because dey wasn't no law on de land, on de stock eatin' up a man crop an' make him pay rent - in dem days it wasn't, see. Well, all right, den de ole man - we had our fence couple up to him like dis, see. An' dis ole man, then he divided de fence away from our fathah's, from mah fathah's crop and dat jes' put 'im in de same - he have [to] run de fence line in dere. In de meantime befo' all dis harmness [harm] was ovah, to keep de stock from eatin' up whut crops he had on his new land - we had jes' recently bought 80 acres of land, an' den ah found out dat mah fathah was dealin' with a hoodoo man. Ah was comin' from in de direction dis farm was an' ah met a man comin' crost over de hill wit a stick in his hand - see, a little stick in his hand. Had on a vest - it long about - an' ah guess it was a mocassin flowah on it. It was Octobah - guess it was - an' he asked me whah did dis man live. So ah tole 'im whar he lived. Well, ah didn't know who de man was.
(He asked where your father lived?)
No sir, he had been to mah fathah's house an' passin' on dere an' asked me whah did dis man live. An' so ah wasn't yery fur from whar he lived at an' ah tole 'im 'bout whar he lived. Dis ole man [not the hoodoo, but landlord] had a gray horse - but ah'm 'head of de story. So ah went on back home and ah tell 'em ah met a ole man on de hill that asked me whar mah fathah [father's landlord] lived, an' mah mothah tole me den, she said, "Well, dat's de ole man ole man [somebody], '' she say, "he's been workin' fo' yo' daddy a long time." She say, "He's gone tuh see 'bout all dis foolish- ness. He's been workin' fo' yore fathah fo' years - he got him hired by de yeah." An' he went up dere an' - ah must tell yo de truth - in 'bout three months from dat, dat ole man lost de horse an' dey leave. Dey jes' moved away from de place. An' his son move in on dis place. Den de son stayed awhile an he had to move away, an' no one evah lives on dat place. It absolutely was know it was done through Doctor Wilson, a hoodoo man. Well, any trouble or disaster mah fathah got in, he come tuh his rescue.