Family Oral History – It's not always a pretty picture.

Blog Carnival – "The Ancestors Told; the Elders Listened; We Pass It On"

As stated on the LowCountry Africana website, In honor of StoryCorps' National Day of Listening, the Preservinators (Angela Walton-Raji, George Geder and LowCountry Africana) have reunited to bring you "The Ancestors Told; the Elders Listened; We Pass It On," a blog carnival that's all about oral history. I am extremely excited to participate in this event.

Family Oral History – It's not always a pretty picture

Senomia Middlebrooks (1898-1994) was my great aunt. Her mother was Sudie Parks and her father was Alex Middlebrooks. Her grandmother was Malinda Guise who I wrote about in Finding Malinda – Part 1 (click here if you missed that post). I grew up knowing my aunt Nomie, as we called her, and visited her many times. As a cousin said "She was the matriarch of our family." Never once did I think to ask her about our family history and what it was like growing up in Meriwether County. It would be years after her death before the genealogy bug would bite me and I would crave for knowledge of my family history.  A missed opportunity for sure, and I can only imagine the stories she had to tell. Little did I know Nomie had already added a chapter to our Middlebrooks family oral history.

Last summer, a cousin shared with me notes from an interview her brother had conducted with Nomie. The conversation took place on Friday, 29 June 1990. I don't know what questions he asked or what he expected to learn. Maybe he wasn't looking for answers to any specific questions and was just picking her brain for memories of what the old folk had told her. Some of what my aunt shared sent chills down my spine and brought tears to my eyes. It is only a page of notes – no long narratives, just simple statements of "reality" as she knew it or as it had been told to her. It is family oral history in its rawest form and it's not always a pretty picture.

Original Research Notes (scanned copy)

Transcription:

          Cousin Senomie Martin:                      Friday

                                                                    6-29-90

1-       MeLinda said "she ain't none of

            mine, you take her."  Laura raised

            by Eliza Hixon.

2-         The old marster was the Father

            of Laura , and the master would

            whip her Melinda until the blood ran.

3-         Alexander Middlebrook was

            slave on Powell platn plantation  ?

            Large man.  Middlebrooks lived

            on land formerly a part of Dan Long

            plantation

4-         People had very Little access to

            doctors;  only alternative [?] was

            to use herbs

            Fess's father

            Eddie Lee Stinson killed

            Jim "Sandy" Dixon  over gambling

            after Grover was whipped.

            Grover Stinson killed J. C. Wright

            John killed a man in Greenville

            Bill

  
No, it's not always a pretty picture. It is what it is.