Story about the Davis Chapel Area (part 3)

One year later, in the fall of 1888, I landed my first job in working for wages away from home.  I worked for Mr. Eugene Dorr who with Capt. T. L. Needham had put up a new cotton gin about a mile west from home near the old Dorr place.  My wages were 75 cents a day.  I ran the ginstand and attended to the seed.  Clarence Hay was the engineer.  I will never forget how proud I was of my job and how I liked my work.  I worked for them 2 seasons, the fall of 1888 and 1889.

In the fall of 1890, I worked for Mr. Keating a prosperous farmer whose place was 6 miles west of us for $15 per month and board and such board it was!  His table was always filled with everything good to eat, and his daughter, Miss Dosia was an excellent cook.

He had an office in the corner of the yard where we boys stayed at night.  There were 6 of us in that office, his 3 sons Dawson, Peter and Tony besides 3 hired hands, Will Bailey, Edd DeLong and myself.  You can imagine what a racket we kept up in there at night as we were all nearly the same age - full of life, vigor, and fun.  When we would get too demonstrative, the "Old Boss" (as we called him) would come to the edge of his porce and say, "Tony, you boys keep less noise down thar".  That would calm us down for awhile.

Miss Dosia and Tony were twins.  Dawson died since we came out here and Will Bailey died at Pleasant Grove several years ago.  Tony and Pete are still very much alive.

I remember soon after I started to work for him, he had a yoke of oxen hitched to a road scraper and we were in the field one day cleaning out ditches.  He asked me if I could handle the scraper.  I told him I never had, but there was nothing I wouldn't try once.  He said, "Get hold thar and see what you can do".  I took hold of the thing, but raised the handles too high so that it entered the ground too deep and of course the oxen kept pulling so that I went right on over to the oxen's heels.  He laughed about as loud as the boys at my predicament.

Mr. Keating was a prosperous, successful farmer and I learned a great deal about the practical side of farming while working for him.  I couldn't have been better treated had I been his own son. We attended services at Peach Creek Baptist Church on Sundays.

He had a small sawmill and cotton gin on the place and at times, I worked at both of them.  I remember one time I was offbearing slabs behind the saw and his eldest son, Mr. John Keating, was the sawyer.  I let a slab strike the side of the saw and he yelled at me.  I didn't know what he meant, but he stopped the saw and beckoned me to him.  He took me to a hickory  tree in line with the saw and about 30 to 40 feet distant where there was a piece of bark about 8 iinches square knocked off.  He said, "Charley, do you see that?  Some time ago a fellow let a slab strike the saw, the teeth caught and it flew by my head and struck that tree endwise.  I leave you to imagine what it would have done if it had struck me.  Be careful boy."  It was an object lesson that I never forgot. Afterward I worked for Mr. Tom Keating until Christmas that year and I'll say I was certainly well treated by everyone.

That was the year I cast my first vote in a Presidential Election. Dad had given me a horse, Dave, when I was 21 which I sold back to him for $80.  That and what I had saved from work enabled me to go to Mississippi College at Clinton, Mississippi for the next 6 months.

About the time I was 20 and Henry 17, he ran away from home as a lot of young boys will.  Just for the love of adventure.  I know he had no reason for leaving as he was not mistreated at home.  We didn't hear where he was for a week until a letter came from Will Baker, a friend of mine about my age, who had married and lived at Horn Lake, about 40 miles north, saying that Henry was at his house hoeing cotton.  Mother was almost crazy with anxiety by this time and nothing would do but I must go after him immediately, but Dad was not in favor of it.  He said,"Fannie, if we send after him now, it will not belong until he will leave again.  Let him alone until he wants to come back and then he will stay".  But nothing would do but I must go after him at once.

Dad gave me the money and sent me after him.  I found him in the field at work and the first thing he said was, "Cap (nearly all the boys called me Cap in those days) what did you come after?"  I told him I came after him and he said, "Well, you won't get me, you can just go back the way you came."  I told him he ought to be ashamed of himself, that I didn't think he would talk that way when I told him how mother was crying all the time about his absence.  He said, "Well, I can't help that.  I'm not going back with you".  I don't believe he would have either if Will had not said he had to go down to Sardis that evening on business.  Of course, he wouldn't stay with both of us gone.

I got him back home, but Dad was right.  He didn't stay a week until he left the field one day and was gone again.  This time mother said, "Let him stay this time until he comes back of his own accord."  But who can probe the depth of mother love?  She would go around the house day after day in tears and it hurt me.  We heard from him occasionally and that helped, but she still held out that she would not send for him.  Dad, seeing her grief, offered to send again, but, "No, let him stay this time till he gets ready to come home."

About 3 weeks afterward, I got a letter from him saying he had been sick and wanted to come home.  He said, "The poet never uttered a truer saying than when he said there is no place like home" and if they would let him come back, he would stay this time.  He came back and kept his word.  He went over in Arkansas the last time he left to the home of a cousin, Charlie Williams and went to work on the railroad, was taken sick and stayed in bed a week.  Charley said afterward that he called for mother all the time he was ill.

I left Sardis for Clinton soon after Christmas, 1890, arriving in Jackson about 8 pm, stayed all night at the Edwards House and left for Clinton, 9 miles west, about daybreak.  I went to Predsident Webb's house, according to directions, knocked and a white-haired old man opened the door and invited me in.  I told him my name and he said he had heard from my father about my coming, told me to have a seat, that breakfast would soon be ready, after which we would go up to the Campus and see about getting me a place to stay.  This was the President of Mississippi College, W. B. Webb and on the way to the Campus, I noticed the respect and veneration he commanded from the students.  On the way we met several boys who would tip their hats and say, "Good morning, President".  He would reply, "Howdy, boys, I have you a new student".

They were fine boys and tried in every way to make me feel at home with them - in fact, I'll say  that was the most democratic and friendly school I ever attended. He found me a place to stay on the Campus and board at the College Hall, told me the hours of recitation and left me.  On the College Campus was a row of 8 cottages of 4 rooms each.  At first, I shared one of those rooms with B. B. Smith, a nice studious young man, but afterward roomed with O. O. Hill with whom I stayed the rest of the session.  He was part Indian, one of the friendliest boys I ever saw and will always hold a warm place in my heart.  Wish I could see him again.

I entered the Senior Preparatory Class and finished it that Session .  I made many good friends at school and have met several of them since.  I recall 2 boys especially  that I considered good friends - R. P. and B. B. Newman.  They were brothers, sons of rich parents and dressed neatly in good clothes each day.  Some evenings after classes they would take me by the arms and walk down town as if I had on as good clothes as they.  Of course, I didn't as I was a poor boy and patched my own clothes while at school in order to make them last as long as possible.  I asked them one evening why they made a pal of me, when they could go with rich boys like themselves.  They replied that their mother taught them never to consider the clothes a boy wore as the mark of a man, but what he really was.  That they liked me from the first because I was always kind and friendly to everyone and had such a hard time trying to get an education - that  they had seen me  cutting wood on the Campus and doing other things to get along and they admired that spirit. 

My roommate, Oliver Hill, was also a poor boy and we would cut wood, milk cows, whitewash fences and do anything  else to help out with expenses.  I remember one time on the night of March 31st, President Webb asked us to watch the College Chapel to keep mischievous boys, who sometimes played April Fool jokes from doing any damage.  We watched all night, but nothing occured out of the ordinary, nevertheless, he paid us a dollar apiece for watching.

The College Campus was on a high hill south of town and was covered with large oak trees with gray Spanish moss hanging from their branches.  It made a dismal scene, especially on rainy days.  To the south was a low, stunted, cedar brake, with beds where cattle lay down at night for protection from the wind and so thick you were out of sight the instant you entered it.  Beyond this brake on a still higher hill was located the Abattoir where beef were butchered to supply the College Boarding Hall.  This belonged to Mr. Moss who had 2 charming daughters,  Misses Sallie and Nola, 19 and 17 years of age, respectively.  Hill and I spent many pleasant hours with those two girls on Sunday afternoons.

A girl's school was also located in Clinton called Hillman College and President Webb told we boys when we were homesick to go see the girls and they would bring us out of it.

On the 6th of June, 1891, the whole school attended the unveiling of the Confederate Monument at Jackson, Mississippi.  It was estimated there were 50,000 people in Jackson that day.  We heard many speeches by prominent men and that was the first time I saw a Gatlin gun fired.  The unveiling took place at 2:30 pm with imposing ceremonies. The weather was excessively warm and I remember when we were ready to return to Clinton after sundown, there were not enough passenger coaches to accomodate the crowd, so they hitched on an open coal car and about 50 of we boys rode home in it.  After a very warm day, you can imagine what a time we had riding in the open car with the cool breezes fanning us.

Well, it was near the end of Commencement - there only remained the presentation of the gold medals on the final night and you can imagine the pride I felt to be among the 8 boys on the stage that night.  I had taken my girl, Miss Nola Moss to the exercises that night and when I came off the stage, suddenly I found myself on the shoulders of a bunch of boys and being carried to the door.  I said, "Here, put me down boys, as much as I appreciate the honor, I have to find my girl and take her home".  Someone said, "Here comes your girl now".  she took my arm and said to the boys, "I feel honored in being escorted tonight by the winner of the gold medal and she wore my medal home.