Eliza King (1850)

Born 1850 in South Carolina, United States

Biography

Eliza King is a part of US Black heritage.

Eliza was born in 1850. She is the daughter of Griffin King.

Eliza's brother George G. King was interviewed in Tulsa, Oklahoma about 1937 about his life and his time as an enslaved person. Most of the story is in the interviewer's words.

He'll tell you that he was born on two-hundred acres of Hell, but the white folks call it Sam Roll's plantation (six miles N.E. of Lexington, South Carolina).

"The Master he says we are all free, but it don't mean we is white. And it don't mean we is equal. Just equal for to work and earn our own living and not depend on him for no more meats and clother."

"Wasn't nothing to eat after he [General Sherman] march by. Darkies search 'round the barns, maybe finds some grains of corn in the manure, and they'd parch the grains - nothing else to eat, except sometimes at night Mammy would skit out and steal scraps from the Master's house for the children. She had lots of hungry mouths, too. They was seven of us then, six boys and a girl, Eliza. The boys was Wesley, Simon, Moses, Peter, William, and me, George. This pappy's name was Griffin. But they was other pappys (Mammy told him) when Eva was born long before any of us, and Laura come next, but from a white daddy. Mammy lost them when she was sold around on the markets."

Interview: George G. King was interviewed in Tulsa, Oklahoma by an unknown interviewer as part of the Federal Writer's Project of the Works Progress Administration (WPA). The results are made available by the Library of Congress. ^[1]

Sources

1. ↑ [1] Library of Congress - WPA - Slave Narrative - George G. King - Vol. 13, Oklahoma; pages 165-168, images 170-173 of 369.