Interviews with former slaves
Manybooks.net has released several different formats of the Project Gutenberg edition of the WPA's Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery
by Work Projects Administration. It's a fascinating read.
Link"My father said that the patrollers would run you and ketch you and whip you if you didn't have a pass, when you was away from the pass.[HW: place?] But they didn't bother you if you had a pass. The patrollers were mean white people who called themselves making the niggers stay home. I think they were hired. They called their selves making the niggers stay home. They went all through the community looking for people, and whipping them when they'd leave home without a pass. They said you wasn't submissive when you left home without a pass. They hounded Lucy to death. She wouldn't let 'em get her, and she wouldn't let 'em get her quarter."

"My father said that the patrollers would run you and ketch you and whip you if you didn't have a pass, when you was away from the pass.[HW: place?] But they didn't bother you if you had a pass. The patrollers were mean white people who called themselves making the niggers stay home. I think they were hired. They called their selves making the niggers stay home. They went all through the community looking for people, and whipping them when they'd leave home without a pass. They said you wasn't submissive when you left home without a pass. They hounded Lucy to death. She wouldn't let 'em get her, and she wouldn't let 'em get her quarter."
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