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By Niamh Adlen

Name of interviewee: Betty Farrow

Age at emancipation: (approx.) 18

Year of interview: 1937

Place of interview: Betty Farrow’s son-in-law’s farm on a black american settlement in Moiser Valley, Texas.

State of interview: Texas.

Place of enslavement:  Patrick County (VA), Sherman (TX), and Fort Worth (TX).

Address of interviewee: Moiser Valley, Texas.

‘Occupation’ under slavery: Domestic.

‘Occupation’ of mother: Unknown.

‘Occupation’ of father: She does not remember her father.

Size of slaveholding unit: Large (Alex Clark enslaved 20 people)

Name of enslaver : Alex Clark (Snr) and Alex Clark (Jnr)

Name of plantation/farm: unknown

Crop produced on slaveholding unit: unknown

Name of interviewer: Rheba Beehler and Fred Dibble

Race of interviewer: Both white

Is this included in Rawick’s supplement series? No

Is there evidence of editing? Yes

Betty Farrow was born on the 28th June 1847 on Alex Clark’s plantation in Patrick county, Virginia. Farrow worked domestically for the Clark family from the age of ten, and served as a playmate for Alex Clark Snr’s children. Farrow describes there being about twenty enslaved people who worked around the ‘big place’. Although it has not been possible to find an exact address of the plantations that Farrow was enslaved at, it can be inferred that by having a large slaveholding unit of twenty people the Clark’s were living on a large estate and were wealthy.

The Clark family moved plantations three times whilst Farrow was enslaved: twice under the watch of Alex Clark Snr, and once under Alex Clark Jnr. This change in hands was due to the murder of Alex Clark Snr who had a problem with their neighbour known as ‘Shields’ and was shot by him. This resulted in her final move to Fort Worth, Texas where she stayed after abolition. Although, she did not remember being told she was free, she stayed because it was the only home her and her family knew, and they had no reason to go.

1880 Census

1880 Census

 

Using genealogy tools, it was possible to find out what life was like for Farrow away from slavery. The first census found is from 1880 which shows her marriage to Bill Farrow 1873.

1900 Census

1900 Census

 

Once she moved away from the Clark’s planation, she began to create her own life outside of slavery. From the 1880 census we see that she stayed in Texas after she left the Clark plantation and continued to work domestically in housekeeping. Some of her children are also on the 1880 census: Daniel Farrow, Tena A. Farrow and Easter Jane Farrow. However, in the 1900 census the Farrow family had grown and after twenty-seven years of marriage Bill and Betty Farrow were parents to ten children and had one grandchild.

1910 Census

1910 Census

 

The 1910 census gave further insight into what environment the Farrow family were living in. By 1910 Betty was not working, but Bill was self-employed on a farm that the family rented. The census states that Bill Farrow is ‘mixed race’, but it is unknown where either of his parents were born, unlike Betty whose parents were both born in the United States. During slavery there were often non-consensual relationships between enslaved people and their white slave owners, this could possibly have been the case for Bill Farrow’s mother or father. In 1920 Betty’s husband of forty-seven years passed away at the age of seventy-five.

St. John Baptist Church, Mosier Valley, Texas

St. John Baptist Church, Mosier Valley, Texas

 
1940 Census

1940 Census

The final census that Betty Farrow appears on is the one in 1940 which showed she had moved in with her daughter Mollie Coffie and son-in-law Henry Coffie in Moiser Valley, Texas. Mosier Valley was originally a settlement created by formally enslaved people in the 1870s. The land was sold to them by Moiser and Lee plantation owners. With this land formally enslaved people created a close farming community and throughout the 1930’s the population of Moiser Valley grew. Which led to the congregation at St. John Baptist Church began putting many community events on for the residents of Moiser Valley including a church revival and public festivals.

Moiser Valley is where the interview of Betty Farrow took place, it was also where she spent the last years of her life living on her son-in-law’s farm helping raise her grandchildren and great grandchildren. Mollie Coffie, one of Betty’s ten children, had ten children of her own: five sons and five daughters who were born between 1907 and 1929, and one grandson who was born in 1923. Henry Coffie, like his father-in-law, worked in the agriculture industry with his grandson Emery King who helped him as a labourer.

On the 1st May 1941, just four years after her interview with Beehler and Dibble, Betty Farrow passed away at the age of ninety-three in Euless, Texas. Even though Farrow started her life as an enslaved person in Virginia she left an important and interesting legacy about family and happiness. In her interview she described her family fondly and seemed to enjoy living with her daughter in later life. Although she does not reveal much about life as an enslaved person, we get an insight into what plantation life was like, especially from the perspective of someone who was forced to frequently move, but was still enslaved by the same family.

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