The broad ax., 1916-09-09

Hannah Louise Gale and George Gale,
and the names and births of their if
teen children. 1t also contains the
record of all the children born to her
except two. She well remembers the
time when her mother and all her
sisters and brothers except one brother
and her father, who belonged to Andrew
Bird, were sold down South, and the
very day she bade her mother farewell
forever, who died with broken heart
on her way to the land of sugareane
and cotton, she gave her black and
green colored silk shawl which she has
kept unto this day, and she has prom
ised this priceless relic of bygone days
to US if she should be the first to pass
on into the next world. Her father,
George Gale, was not sold South, but
remained with his master until near the
close of the war. Then he started out
in an unsuccessful attempt to locate his
children, but he was compelled to give
up in despair, and he returned to Vir-
ginia, where he died, and was buried
near the place of his birth. He was
So years old.
With much interest she related to
US how careful she had to be with
her Sunday clothes when she was a
young girl. She wore one bright red
calico dress each Sunday for three
years, and three tucks were put in at
the time it was made, and each year
one tuck would be let out in order to
make it come down to the tops of her
Sunday go-to-meeting shoes, and when
ever she would start for church she
had to wrap up her shoes and stockings
in cloth and carry them under her
arm until near the church. Then she
would sit down on the roadside, wipe
the dust from her feet, put on her shoes
and stockings and enter church, and at
the time our father was sparkling her
she had to 60 through the same process.
In her girlhood days and even after
she was married she had to work in
the fields right along with the men,
and do a mans work in the day, and
then cook and work around her mas
ter's house in the evenings.
On one occasion her mistress, Mrs.
Sally Seibert, flew into towering rage
over some trifing matter, and attempt
ed to whip her, and she did succeed in
striking her twice over her back with
a hickory stick. Then, as quick as
fash of lightning, she sprang at her mis-
tress like a maddened tigress. She
wrenched the stick from her grasp, and
struck her two severe blows across her
back with it, and after Mrs. Seibert
had related her side of the affair to her
husband that evening he wendell his
way into mothers two-roomed cabin,
which stood right across the yard in
front of the big old-fashioned white
house which we can still see in our
mind g eye, and after seating himself
in an old splint- bottomed wooden chair,
he requested her to tell him why she
had struck her mistress. She, in q
straightforward manner, told her side
of the story, and at the same time
told him "that she was willing to
work in the fields, in the house, and
to do everything Mrs. Seibert asked
her to do, but if she ever attempted to
whip her again she would end her life, "
and to the everlasting credit of Will
lam Seibert he was a very considerate
man, and he informed her "that it
would be wrong for her to kill his wife,
and if she did she would be hung up
BY the neck until she was Dead" and
she declared "that she did not care
what became of her; that no one could
whip her as long as she had the
strength to fight back" and she and
Mrs. Seibert, who possessed very
naughty and contemplate ways, con-
tinued to fight and spat until at last
Mr.. Seibert was compelled to hire her
away from her so-called home and chill
dren for three years, and while absent
from home she cooked for Noah Higgs,
who ran the leading tavern in New
Market, Va.
The great struggle was on between
freedom and slavery shortly after
mother returned to her masters home
from New Market, and when General
"Phil" Sheridan made his famous raid
through the Shenandoah Valley, and
our father, who had been sold to Robert
and Samuel Bowman by Louis Circle
because he was unable to whip him,
and mothers only brother, Hiram Gale,
whom she had not lost track Of, fol-
lowed Sheridan's army on North, and
eventually our father settled in Colum-
bus, Ohio, and when he passed away
March l9, 1899, he was in his list year,