Rosaline Rogers, 110 years old when interviewed, lived at 910 North Capitol Avenue in Indianapolis with her granddaughters, of whom she was very fond. The interviewer described her as a “very pleasant” woman.
Rosaline was born in South Carolina in 1827, a slave of Dr. Rice Rogers. She said that Rogers, the youngest son of a family of eleven children, was very mean. When she was eleven, Rosaline was sold for $900 to a man named Carter and taken to Tennessee. Soon after arriving on the Carter plantation, she was sold again to Belby Moore, with whom she lived until the beginning of the Civil War.
The Moore slaves, both men and women, were herded into a single cabin, no matter how many there were. She remembered a time when there were twenty slaves in a small cabin. There were holes between the logs large enough for dogs and cats to crawl through. The only means of heat was a wood-burning fireplace, which also was used for cooking food. They ate corn cakes, side pork, and beans. Seldom did they have any sweets except molasses.
Slaves generally were given a pair of shoes at Christmastime, and if they wore the shoes out before summer, they had to go barefoot. Her second owner, though, would not buy shoes for his slaves. When they plowed, their feet cracked and bled from walking on hard clods. If they complained, they were whipped, so very few complained.
Slaves were allowed to go to their owner’s church, but they had to sit on one of seven benches at the rear of the church. If those benches were full, they were not allowed to sit on any of the others. Her wealthy owner would not even allow his slaves to mix with poor whites, because he said the whites had been free all their lives and should be slaveholders themselves. Poor whites were hired by those who did not believe in slavery or could not afford slaves. Here is Rosaline’s account:
At the beginning of the Civil war, I had a family of fourteen children. At the close of the war, I was given my choice of staying on the same plantation, working on shares, or taking my family away, letting them out for their food and clothes. I decided to stay on; that way, I could have my children with me. They were not allowed to go to school; they were taught only to work.
Slave mothers were allowed to stay in bed only two or three days after childbirth; they were forced to go into the fields to work, as if nothing had happened.
The saddest moment of my life was when I was sold away from my family. I often wonder what happened to them; I haven’t seen or heard from them since. I only hope God was as good to them as He has been to me.
I am 110 years old; my birth is recorded in the slave book. I have good health, fairly good eyesight, and a good memory, all of which I say is because of my love for God.