Marriah (Pressman) Hines (1835 - aft. 1937)

Born 4 Jul 1835 in Southampton County, Virginia, United States

Descendants

Biography

Marriah (Pressman) Hines is a part of US Black heritage.

Marriah was born in 1835, and her parents died when she was young. She passed away after 1937.

Marriah was born a slave on James Pressman's plantation (In the absence of a LNAB, I assigned the name of her enslaver according to "US Black Heritage: Naming Conventions for Slaves") . James Pressman married her to Benjamin F. Hines. "I had five chullun by him, four girls and one boy, two of the girls and the boy are dead. Dey died 'bout 1932 or 33."

Mrs. Hines was interviewed at E. Avenue R.F.D. 1. Oakwood Norfolk, Virginia by David Hoggard on March 26, 1937. [At age 102!!!!]

Marriah remembered her enslaver as a good Christian, who treated his enslaved workers well. "I lived with good people, my white folks treated us good. There was plenty of 'em that didn't fare as we did. Some of the poor folks almost starved to death. Why the way their masters treated them was scandalous, treated them like cats and dogs. We always had plenty of food, never knowed what it was to want food bad enough to have to steal it like a whole lot of 'em. Master would always give us plenty when he give us our rations." "We didn't even have to work on Sundays not even in the house. The master and the preacher both said dat was the Lord's day and you won't spose to work on that day. So we didn't. We'd cook the white folks victuals on Saturday and lots o'times dey eat cold victuals on Sundays. . . Lots of times we slaves would take turns on helping 'em serve Sunday meals just 'cause we liked them so much. We hated to see Missie fumbling 'round in the kitchen all out 'a'her place."

Pressman's neighbours didn't like his tolerance, but the patrollers would leave the Pressman enslaved persons alone, but slander him. The slaves had 2 hours for dinner [lunch], so they could go home and eat before the end of the day, and no overseers. "We had plenty time to ourselves. Most of the time we spent singing and praying 'cause master was sich a good Christian and most of us had 'fessed religion. Evenings we would spin on the old spinning wheel, quilt make clothes, talk, tell jokes, and a few had learned to weave a little bit from Missus. We would have candy pulls, from cooked molasses, and sing in the moonlight by the tune of an old banjo picker. Chillen was mostly seen, not heard, different from youngens of today talking backward and foward cross their mammies and pappies. Chillen dat did dat den would git de breath slapped out on 'em. Your mammies didn't have to do it either; any old person would and send you home to git another lickin'."

James Pressman told his enslaved workers that they were free and that they could leave if they wanted, but "Most of us slaves stayed right there and raised our own crops. Master helped us much as he could. Some of us he gave a cow or a mule or anything he could spare to help us. Some of us worked on the same plantation and bought our own little farms and little log cabins, and lived right there till master dies (about 1866 or 1867) and the family moved away."

Marriah married Benjamin F. Hines, and they had 4 daughters and 1 son. Two daughters and the son had died in 1932 or 1933. Marriah would would stay with one daughter, then the other.

This may be the Mariah Hynes, Negro, widowed, age 94 [b. 1836] living with family of Guy B. and Gladys M. Diggs in Newport News, VA. in 1930. The census lists her as “mother” of the head of the house, but Gladys was actually Mariah's granddaughter -- the daughter of one of Mariah's daughter.^[1]

Sources

1. ↑ 1930 Census

• The Federal Writers' Project. Slave Narratives; A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves, Washington, District of Columbia : The Library of Congress, 1941 (https://www.loc.gov/collections/slave-narratives-from-the-federal-writers-project-1936-to-1938/?fa=original-format:manuscript/mixed+material). Virginia: Vol. 17, Berry - Wilson
• "United States Census, 1930," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:33S7-9R82-QJJ?cc=1810731&wc=QZF4-2XW%3A648805201%2C648983201%2C648983202%2C1589282329 : 8 December 2015), Virginia > Newport News (Independent City) > Newport News > ED 11 > image 21 of 60; citing NARA microfilm publication T626 (Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 2002).