King George's Boys by Terry Germaine

Author:Terry Germaine [Germaine, Terry]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: ZZ, Historical, United States, Historical Fiction, African, African American, Genre Fiction, Literature & Fiction
Amazon: B00STVSAJU
Published: 2015-01-26T05:00:00+00:00

VIII.

Everybody Come

Most of the white men left for Charleston a few days later. Owen was to run the place with Driggus and Sullivan managing everything. The old man took a few of the strongest slaves with him despite my protest. I was too expensive to loan out to the war effort, so I kept plugging away. There may have been five or six whites left on the entire plantation, mostly Marie and the other wives. Whatever plans Mr. Alfonzo Rodrigues had, he was finally set up to put everything into action.

The backcountry was filled with Indians, poor whites and even a few blacks happy to catch slaves for a quick reward; those five or six whites who were left were well armed. Guns were stored inside the main house and everyone knew how to shoot. Most planters made sure their daughters could at least use a pistol.

No matter how much trust Driggus earned, he only had access to a rifle or musket under lock and key with all of the others – a key that Owen wore around his neck with his father gone. There was no way anyone was just going to walk off the plantation in broad daylight and get very far. That’s where Driggus’ Christian faith came in.

Life on a plantation is work for six days per week: Monday through Saturday. No work on Sunday made Saturday night a time to let loose. All the slaves would gather in the open space between the slave quarters and the master’s house. Everyone would sing songs and even dance a step or two. Sometimes whites or Indians would join in, but they were usually travelers. The gatherings happen every Saturday night, from Carolina low country up through the Virginia and Maryland tobacco fields. When I was a kid, the musicians included a banjo picker and a drummer. Fiddle players were becoming common wherever white debtors work the fields, too.

The drummer is the most important one in the bunch, usually sitting with two drums. One tuned to a high pitch (Bi) and the other to a lower pitch (Bo). They are used together to mimic the human voice – at least the voice of an African. When my mother spoke her native tongue, the pitch of the sound affected the meaning of the words and that was the basic language drummers use.

Jaco’s friend, Wuji, was the drummer. He called everyone together by playing bo-bi-bo-b’bo-bo. Bo-bi-bo-b’bo-bo, imitating one of the few phrases everybody knows: ‘Obia mommra,’ or ‘everybody come!’ Bo-bi-bo-b’bo-bo, or O-bee-ah, mu-oom-ra. ‘Everybody come!’ It’s the way you call folks together for a meal, meeting or church. Most of the other messages a drummer may play are for other folks. You could send a direct message like “go there” or “meet me here.” It’s tough to learn with the different languages spoken by folks, but a master drummer usually knew the most common languages spoken by the old timers. In the low country that includes Kikongo and my mother’s tongue, Akan.

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