There was a man sent from Oklahoma to North
Carolina where a few of us still remained. The man's name was Mr. PUNCH, I
don't remember his given name.
He came to North Carolina for the purpose of
telling us about the new country, Oklahoma. He made speeches and told us all
about Oklahoma. Of course, we had to come and see! Oh, it was awful to give
our place up and take a chance on getting another one like it. We had to give
up our friends and relatives. Some women left husbands and husbands left
wives.
It was best that we came where we could own our
land again. The day before we left, we had a farewell stomp dance. The next
day we started walking. We walked for many miles before we came to a railroad
station.
We landed in Oklahoma, near Stilwell, the same
year. We never did work, we got a small payment from the Government after we
got here. We would have to go to Tahlequah to get the money. The way we would
bring the money back was six or seven families would go in a bunch, only one
wagon. Just the driver would ride in the wagon, the rest would ride horses and
carry guns to protect the wagon. We had a big trunk in the wagon with all our
money in it.
Not many years after we came to the Territory we
headed south to pick cotton. We landed here at Short and have been here ever
since.
We accepted our allotment and set to work to build
homes and improve our land.