While Laura Smalley obviously suffered during her childhood as a slave, those recollections seem to be more distant to her. What she really recalls is the preachers, who “preached better then… now they [preach] by scripts most of the time. But then… they just preach, preach by the spirit”, or how they would cut and dry grass to make good bedding. The larger sufferings still remain, but Mrs. Smalley couldn’t remember any abuse that she herself took. 1 Nor could she talk about slaves being sold like cattle, stating “us children never did know that, you know. We heard talk of it, but then I reckon that was after, after slavery I reckon.” It seems that slaves placed a high value on their children, on their community, and sought to shelter their children from its horrors. Of course, the horrors still shone through to her, such as when the plantation’s mistress beat a woman slave in the peach orchard and snuffed out a pipe on her skin; young Laura recalls having to grease her back afterward. 2
Laura was immune to monumental things like the end of Reconstruction, the labour reforms of Teddy Roosevelt, World War I, or the Great Depression’s onset, existing as mere gaps in memory. The tectonic shifts in America reached Laura and her community much slower than I would’ve expected; when the Civil War ended, her master didn’t even tell his slaves that they were free for six months (nor did any slave owner in Texas until Juneteenth). Even the race riots in the area passed by Laura; I was surprised that she was swift to recall “when colored folk [killed] one another for a while… Women killing other women about they husbands”, making me think the events are related. 3 4
No community is immune to every social or political change, so I quickly deduced that the omissions of major happenings were Mrs. Smalley’s error. Throughout the interview, she came off as addled, and I frequently sympathised with the interviewers who kept angling their questions for meaningful answers– only for Laura to confess she knew nothing about what they were asking. Though I found value in hearing just what daily life consisted of for those enslaved– the oral account allowed for inflections and repetitions of speech to tell the story, elements I appreciated– there is a big asterisk next to that value concerning Laura’s advanced age.
I was fascinated by the interviewers’ frequent interjections. The Faulks remained professional, but when Mrs. Smalley went into detail about the treatment of some slaves, they never failed to exclaim ‘Good God’ or an assenting grunt. They added a very human element to their part, making the interview a true conversation. It made a difference to Laura, too, as she eventually grew more comfortable in how she spoke. While a transcript would clarify much of Laura’s dense dialect, it would take away her progression of comfort as the interview continued, the dynamic between interviewer and interviewee. It speaks to the ethos of the FWP that the Faulks turned the interview into a conversation, that they and the best of their peers wanted their history to be a dialogue. 5
- Faulk, John Henry. “Interview with Laura Smalley, Hempstead, Texas, 1941 (Part 3 of 5) | Library of Congress.” Library of Congress, 1941. https://www.loc.gov/item/afc1941016_afs05497a/.
- Faulk, John Henry. “Interview with Laura Smalley, Hempstead, Texas, 1941 (Part 2 of 5) | Library of Congress.” Library of Congress, 1941. https://www.loc.gov/item/afc1941016_afs05496b.
- Faulk, John Henry. “Interview with Laura Smalley, Hempstead, Texas, 1941 (Part 5 of 5) | Library of Congress.” Library of Congress, 1941. https://www.loc.gov/item/afc1941016_afs05498b/.
- Faulk, John Henry. “Interview with Laura Smalley, Hempstead, Texas, 1941 (Part 1 of 5) | Library of Congress.” Library of Congress, 1941. https://www.loc.gov/item/afc1941016_afs05496a/.
- Faulk, John Henry. “Interview with Laura Smalley, Hempstead, Texas, 1941 (Part 2 of 5) | Library of Congress.” Library of Congress, 1941. https://www.loc.gov/item/afc1941016_afs05496b.
