Beyond our Elusive William Daniel

Family Stories told to Janis Chartier by her mother Ruby O. Daniel Chartier.
"My father, Wm. Marion was a natural born trader. He was forever trading mules cows, etc. That's how we got our Christmas fruit. He would trade his pecans and cane syrup for a crate of oranges, apples and hard peppermint candy. Nina Lee sold her butter & eggs to buy hair ribbons or hankerchiefs for presents. That was the whole of their Christmas. Aunt Jessie recalled how each older child would be given a hot toddy of sugar, bourbon & hot water.

Hog Killing: late in fall, at the first real cold, really cold, Papa would kill a hog. He and the hands would work all night, kill, hang, dress & cut
that hog. Their wives would bring their children and a great feast of chitlin's cooked right then, (after being cleaned & scrapped of course).
Plus Papa also gave them some meat, sausage & lard for helping out.

The children all went to Liberty School right at Beulah. The old pump handle is all you can see today. One fall we were all scared because a convict camp was across the road above the cemetery. It was hot, and they were living in a small wooden building, no fan or electricity and one convict is said to be buried in Beulah.

Jessie & Addie & me always hated Tuesday's because winter or summer, it meant ironing. We heated abt 6 heavy (2lb) irons on the stove, used one, got another and on and on till we finished. I mean we ironed EVERYTHING, clothes, sheets, tablecloths, linen, everything.

Nina Lee, made her own sausage, she liked it very hot with red & black pepper & salt. She also made her own lye soap. First Papa would take oak ashes & put in a small keg. Let the rain fall in, and slowly drain into containers as real homemade lye. Next, Nina would get out the huge old black kettle. They put in beef tallow (not pork) and melted it and added the lye, cooked it & poured it into pans and when cool, cut it into bars. Pork tallow will make your soap yellow, not white.

Nina was older than her husband, and his folks didn't like her & vice versa. She said her mother-in-law was curious, anyhow. It galled Nina that Louisa bragged about taking her babies into a cold room to feed or change them so she wouldn't shame her husband. Nina said she would put HER children first, to heck with a man's feelings on the subject.

They would go to dances with Papa, and if they didn't dance, they couldn't go to the next. Nina stayed home. They used dance cards for awhile.

Nina Lee was known for her healing powers. She would go down into the woods and get herbs, roots, leaves, etc to use on folks. This was to have been passed on, but she died before she could teach me. Aunt Jessie recalled how when she was only 5, Papa took her to the ear doctor over in Montgomery, AL. They stayed with relatives overnight in Columbus, GA.

William Marion was strange, he refused to change to government time. He always went by sun time. He also hated the idea of government crop support, said it took control away from the farmer. He wouldn't sign up.

On Saturday's the children had to use brush brooms and sweep the yards before getting company or going to town. Everyone lined up to take a bath in a washtub once a week. They had one set of work clothes, school and a Sunday "Go to Meeting" outfit. Work clothes were patched or faded too much, school were not new, except at the beginning of the year, and most of those were hand-me-downs. Sunday best was for Sunday only or a funeral or an important school function.

Mama said the pond had some fish in it. They would all go down and fish, clean & cook them on an open fire, in a big flat, round iron skillet with just enough grease in it to cook the fish. Papa made biscuits cooked in a spider pan, a Dutch oven like with lid that has high sides. Coals under it and on the lid and the bread would brown on both sides. Watermelon cooled all day in the pond. What a meal!

Luke, Fred & Roy loved to hunt and fish. After Luke married Edna Wishard, he would get up very early and catch fish or kill some birds & get Nina Lee to cook them for his breakfast along with eggs, grits, biscuits, bacon and pear preserves & coffee.

They had an old wood cooking stove with a warming shelf on top. Nina kept biscuits and cornbread there. They had a screened safe for keeping food in after a meal. You know they kept peas, butterbeans even chicken and it never ruined. They ate food at room temp for supper in summer, no fire was lit as it would heat up the house. In the winter when days were short they ate fried sweet potato and cornbread in buttermilk for supper.

The children would walk from home to Beulah for school. For lunch they took cold sweet potato and cornbread or hoecake and sausage if they could. Each child had a tin drinking cup that would fold up. I still have mine.

Nina Lee had a smoke house and this was her downfall. She loved smoked ham and was known to cut & eat it right there in the smoke house without further cooking. She got those little parasites and didn't know what was wrong for years. To this day I won't eat pork unless it's cooked to pieces.

Papa loved fried fish. But as he grew older he developed asthma and had to take adrenalin shots for it. Everytime he ate fried fish he nearly died and finally it did kill him. I never have eaten any fish.

He was a Mason and he could never be a member of Beulah as they refused to accept Masons and he refused to give up being one. He was also a Justice of the Peace and married many young couples. They would come up on the porch and he would open the window and look at the couple and their papers and if all was in order he would marry them. This was usually at night, couples eloping.

Ruby said that as a child she could hear Grandpa Francis Marion sneeze all the way up the hill, a 1/2 mile or more away. Grandpa Snellgrove was mean. He would put camphor on the dogs noses if they tried to get near the fireplace. She hated the smell of camphor till the day she died.

Jim & Joe Lane lived with their parents. When a cloud would come up (storm) and Joe was home alone he would come up to W M's house, come in (door's weren't locked) and climb in bed with "Doc". They wouldn't know it till next day.. in the winter it would be very cold. Bedrooms weren't heated. You had to use quilts. The girls all had pet cats that they trained to sleep on their feet for warmth. In would come Roy or Fred from a date and take one of their cats. Boy, did that make the girls mad.

Ruby said W. M. didn't whip them, he only had to look at them. He only whipped Fred or Roy on one occasion, one of them pulled a chair out from under Addie and she hurt her back and the boy got the buggy whip. To really punish them, Mama would make them "kiss and hug" to make up. It nearly killed them.

During the depression, Roy worked for CCC and was in South Carolina. He would buy sugar on black market and give it to the family. The family had a Model T. "Doc", who was crippled and couldn't talk loved to ride. He wanted to go everywhere WM went. Of course he couldn't always go, so one day he tried to get back at Papa, He put sugar in the gas. Boy was Papa mad. Doc could not read or write but you know he could count money! He could look at a letter and tell you by gesture who it was from. He was always right. Today he could have been helped and trained.

Louisa never put any salt in her cornbread which cooked on top of the stove in thin cakes. Nina Lee cooked hers with salt in the oven.