The Jeter Place: Briefly

The Jeter Plantation.

Among the antebellum white settlers in the Shreveport region were the Jeter brothers from Virginia, William and James. They came as part of that southeast migratory pattern that opened up millions of acres of land to the cultivation of cotton in Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and, finally, Texas; they came to help establish the Cotton Kingdom. The Jeters were from an affluent family; they brought money and possessions, including some slaves, and bought land in northwestern Louisiana. Their slaves cleared the land, planted cotton, built a large house for the owners and small houses for themselves.

William Nathaniel Jeter, born in 1824, first purchased property in Caddo Parish in 1849. This was a tract of three hundred and twenty acres of wooded land northeast of Caddo Lake; the seller was Richard T. Noel.

During the next three years, William got himself situated and then returned to Virginia in 1852 to marry Lucinda Ford. Later that year, William came back to Louisiana with his new bride and his younger brother, James Addison Jeter, who had just turned twenty-one. For the sum of $1,500, James bought four hundred and eighty acres from one Randolph Martin. This land was to the west of the village of Blanchard, which is halfway between Shreveport and Mooringsport. James Jeter was a surveyor and many maps of this area are based on "Jeter's Country Plat." 

In May, 1860, William bought 160 acres to the south of Caddo Lake. This appears to be the beginning of what was to become the Jeter Plantation, or the Jeter Place. A near neighbor of the Jeters, at the time, was seventy-five year old John Lowe, also a native Virginian. Lowe possessed fifty slaves and eleven slave dwellings; his real estate was valued at $50,000. By this time, a mere twenty-five years since the clearing of the Red River, Caddo parish was shipping record quantities of cotton to the international market in New Orleans.

When the Civil War began, both Jeter brothers went off to defend the Confederacy. James was Captain of an outfit known as the Caddo Lake Boys, who marched a hundred miles east to Monroe, Louisiana, in 1861. Both brothers were captured and then later sent back home in a prisoner exchange.

The Jeters were farmers and businessmen, and they were among the white leaders in their isolated part of the country. They may have been members of the White Camellias. After the defeat in 1865, they returned to raising cotton and dealing land. William and Lucinda Jeter gave birth to nine children, though only four survived to maturity. The eldest was Alice, who was born in 1853; one of her sons, Sam Caldwell, was to serve twelve years as mayor of Shreveport. Virgil Jeter would become a physician and move to Atlanta, Texas, and the second son, Frank, was to take over and operate the Plantation. The youngest of the four Jeter children was Hulda who married locally and stayed in the area all her life.


Like most planters in the region, the Jeter's livliehood had been barely affected by the war. Their slaves were "freed," but most of them "knew their place" and continued to live on the land and work for the Jeter family. Those freedmen who preferred to leave the plantation but couldn't afford to buy land "farmed for halves." Landowners supplied land, seed, and perhaps mules, housing and tools; in return they took half of the crop in lieu of rent. The Jeter holdings grew considerably during the twenty-five years which followed the Civil War. The number of workers increased until the area occupied by blacks on their plantation became known as "the quarter." In the 1880's, the residents of the quarter included Wes and Annie Ledbetter and at least two of their married sons, Wes, Jr., and Bob.

A Choyce Interview.

A Choyce Interview March, 1991. Working on the Plantation.

Liz (L) and Leonard (C) Choyce: M is interviewer, Monty or Marsha.

Leonard Choyce was born on May 22nd, 1911. In a couple of months he would be 80 years old.

Our first question to Leonard Choyce was, "where were you born?" and the answer was immediately controversial. He said, "Jonesville," and Liz contradicted him. "Wascom," she said.

"Well, it was Jonesville then," he said. Jonesville, Wascom — it's a community on the Texas side of the line, east of Shreveport.
Since we're trying to dig out some information about Leadbelly's early life, we asked if and when Leonard's parents moved the family on to the Jeter Plantation? (The Jeter Plantation was Huddie Ledbetter's birthplace, and his home until the age of five when he moved with his parents to East Texas.)

The Choyce family, when they left Jonesville, moved to the Jeter place, and that's where Leonard lived, basically, until he moved down to his current location in Mooringsport.

M:  Did you farm on the Jeter place?

Choyce:  Farmed all my life while I was there. 

M: You moved on to the Jeter plantation about 1920, then?

Choyce: Somewhere like that, yes. About 1920.

M: And your parents farmed there?

Choyce: Yes, my mother did. She wasn't married when she move there. She married afterwards. Married a Lacey. She didn't marry my dad. They wasn't together.

M:  How many brothers and sisters do you have?

Choyce: I had two then. But those are dead.

M: What sort of crops did you raise?

Choyce:  Cotton and corn.

M: Tell me about the raising of cotton . . . how do you start the year?

Choyce: We would start in January when the weather was favorable. We'd start breaking up the crop. We'd get the whole thing planted somewhere in May. Corn and cotton.

Liz:  Old people like to plant that corn and cotton in March.

M:  Where did you get the seed?

Liz: The man you were working for bought the seed.

Choyce: That's where we got feed for the mule. Furnished us food, too. Furnished the whole plantation food. Frank Jeter.  F.F. Jeter.

M: Frank Jeter furnished you the food and the seed, and in return for that,  

you raised the cotton? 

Liz: We worked for him for half. You'd raise the cotton — you'd get half of the cotton and he'd get half. And the corn, too.

Choyce: That was what you call "working for half." When you pull the corn, you carry a load to his barn, carry a load to your barn. Then when the cotton crop come off, he got half of it, and you got half of it.

M: Did he have a gin there?

Choyce: No, we hauled it to the gin in Leigh, Texas.

M:  Who owned the gin over there?

Choyce:  Taylor and Howe. [T.J. Taylor, Lady Bird Johnson’s father]   

M: T.J. Taylor owned a whole lot of Texas, didn't he?

Choyce: He sure did. (smiles) Most of it. (laughs) So that's the way it was . . . but we got along alright.

M: You've got the cotton planted. What do you do next?

Choyce: Like when we ain't planting? Worked around there on the farm. Clean up the farm, clean up the ditches; kept the water draining . . . you know, drained the water off the farm. Kept something to do all the time.

M: Did you have animals?

Choyce: I had cows.Two milk cows.

Liz: Mr. Jeter had horses and cows. Mules and horses.

M: So you got up in the morning and milked the cows?

Choyce: Sometimes my wife milked.

Liz: He didn't get up milking cows. He got up going to the field. See, he'd get up early going to the field, then I'd be getting up doing everything, you see. Cause I'd even fix breakfast and take him his breakfast in the field after I got at the house. I was the one did the milking.

M: Did you use the milk for other things; like cheese?

Liz: No. Didn't use it for no cheese. Just used it for drinking and cooking with. Then butter and stuff, never did make any cheese. When the milk turned, you'd churn it and made plenty of butter. Good old home made butter. That's the best kind.

M: You had your own churn for butter making?

Liz: That's right. Sure did. Had my own churn and had all my milk stuff. Like when you milk you strain the milk up and put it up til it turns, get ready for churning.

M: Okay. Back to the cotton: when the cotton starts to grow, you have to chop?

Choyce: Chop cotton. Plow it. Pick it, too.

Liz: Had to hoe it;  had to do all that. Chop it, hoe it. I'd be hoeing and chopping while he plowed and he had some hands that'd help. Mr. Jeter did. But, you had to do all that before the picking come around. Then you laid by. You're through with it til you go back to pick it.

M: Different people had different parts of Jeter's land?

Choyce: Yes. Different people had different parts. So many acres, each one worked. It was a big-sized place. Was a lot of people on the place. I can't tell you exactly how many, but it was a big place. Plantation. That's what it was.

Liz: He was already on there before we got married (in 1929.) He practically finished growing up there. He was there a long time before I went over there. I can tell what happened while I was there.

M: Where did you come from?

Liz: I come from over Mr. Tilly Kerr's place (?) Not too far from off the Jeter place. Over across the road. Tilly Kerr. He had a big plantation. I was living with my grandparents — Sarah Thomas and Joe Thomas. That's where I got married. My mother was named Willie — Willie Thomas.

M: They came from a plantation, too, then? Were they farming for halves as well?

Liz: Yes. Sure were. Back in them days, that's the way everybody worked.

Working for half. He had a lot of people on his plantation, too.

M: What's the difference between that and "sharecropping?"

Liz:  I don't know about the sharecropping. A lot of people owned it. They had their own land. They're not working for half, you see, that's their own. See, they do what they want and like they want with it. That's the difference. But if you're on somebody else's and working for them, well, they get the half and you get the half. 

M: What did you think about it at the time? Did you like it alright?

Liz: I didn't have no other choice. I didn't like it, but I went on like I liked it. Matter of fact, they started me out at eight years old. And I used to cut bushes, replant cotton, corn...they'd plant it and it'd be cold, wasn't coming up to suit 'em, they'd have us with them pockets on, replanting cotton, corn; if not that, cutting bushes out of the field. And then we had to cut wood, pack it up, us children, us grandchildren. It was rough. We didn't have no easy time. So, no sir, I didn't like it, but I didn't have no other choice.

M: Did you get much time to go to school?

Liz: No sir, not in them times. They robbed us out. They didn't go to school longer than three months. Some of them could go three months, if they were children with their mother and father, they'd send them to school, but you with your grandparents . . . they'd keep you out. Most of the time. It wasn't but three months. I come up the hard way. Ain't seen no easy time,  but I didn't have no other choice.

M: You (to Leonard) didn't go to school much either, then? 

Choyce: No. I didn't. It was just like she said. You had three months. Schooling. And I went to school, had 30 days, and all them wasn't school days out of the month. So I guess I made it to school a little better than half of the time. Had to get out there and cut sprouts. Clean up sprouts out of the way. . . I guess you know what that is?

M: No, you'll have to tell me that. 

Choyce: (Laughs) That's the same thing. Sprouts grow up over the field, instead of me going to school, I had to stop and cut sprouts out of the way. 

Liz: You had to do that to get the land ready, get those bushes out. Then the next thing, they started me out plowing. I wasn't no higher . . . at eight years old I had to hold up on the handle like that (gestures) and that  (?) cross that handle of that plow would touch me and I had to push up on the handle like that. And they had me dragging off and the planter behind be planting. 

M: And the plow was pulled by mules?

Liz:  Yes sir. Horses and mules. It's the way it was.

Liz moved to the Jeter plantation at seventeen years of age. That's when she got married to the seventeen-year-old Leonard. They were married on the 22nd of January, 1929.

It was almost their anniversary.

Liz: Yes. Be 62 years, been married that long.

Choyce: 63, won't it?

Liz: No. You counted too fast.

M: That's right, it's 62. 1929 to '91.

Liz: 62 years.

Choyce: Yes.

M: You're jumping ahead.

Liz: He counted too fast. (Laughter)

Choyce: I know it's been a long time.

Liz: But I keep up with it, you see, it was 61 last past one. It'd be 62. That's after the third Sunday. He's got a doctor's appointment that day. Anniversary Day. (Laughs)

Leadbelly's Nieces

Leadbelly's Nieces: an Interview
Several years ago (circa 1990) I went to visit Irene Campbell in Marshall, Texas. She was a retired schoolteacher well into her 80's; she'd attended Bishop College in Marshall and taught at the local schools, starting in the 1930's, before integration, and retiring in the 1970's; which would have been about the time that segregation was ending in Texas.
Irene had caused a bit of a storm with the Louisiana relatives of Leadbelly when she'd requested that his grave site be moved over the line to Texas, because she felt that was really his home. So I went to talk to her about her Uncle Huddie. She was related through Huddie's half-brother Alonzo Batts, Irene's father. She surprised me at the interview by introducing me to her elder sister, Viola. So this is a bit of a interview with the Batts sisters, Irene Campbell and Viola Daniels circa 1990.

Me: Do you remember the songs that Huddie sang?
Irene: Some of them.
Me: When you were kids.
Irene: "Goodnight Irene," I know that.
Me: (With a laugh) Sounds like he wrote that for you.
Irene: Yes he did, he did. Really, this Mr. Myers, we called him Miles - Sterling Miles, but later I found out his name was Myers, said he was there when Uncle Huddie wrote the song. They came through, they'd been out, and passed by my mother - he called her "Big Sister". "Big Sister, I'm drunk, and I'm hungry, fix me something to eat." She told him, "Well, you keep the baby while I fix something to eat." He was keeping the baby and wrote this song. "Goodnight Irene." Now that's what Mr. Myers said.
Me: Who's Mr. Myers?
Irene: He was his friend. Sterling Mi - well, we said Miles, but his name was Myers. He hasn't been dead so long either.
Me: Is there anybody else who's still living who was there?
Irene: There's a man, I think his name is Russell, but I don't know him. He says he knows Uncle Huddie. And he can play something, but he doesn't play it with the same tune that Uncle Huddie had. He can't even play "Goodnight Irene" with the same tune. (Irene turns to her sister, Viola.) Do you know anybody living now that knew Uncle Huddie?
Viola: The one I know would be already dead I guess - Roscoe Jamieson ?
Irene: He's dead.
Viola: He would be the one that would come into the house, regularly. See, all these people would meet him 'down yonder' didn't come to the house, you know. Cause what they had going down there, those songs, he didn't play at the house. So we had a wonderful time with our hymns and songs that we sang. . .
Irene: Games - what you call (sings)

I measure my love to show you
I measure my love to show you
We have a game to do. . .

Songs that you can act out. What is this you go in and out the window?

In and out the window, for we have a game today.

Viola: I forgot that one.
Irene: And what were some other play songs that we used to have?
Viola: "Little Sally Walker, sitting in a saucer" - that sort of thing. "Skip to My Lou, my darling." We'd do the skipping.
Irene: "I measure my love to show you" you know, those were the sort of things he would play for us and we would do them out on the lawn, out in the yard. And we'd have, uh, "Goodbye Mary, I hate to leave you,"
Viola: And then I notice in this children's book they've started this "Wild Goose." . . .

Irene: (takes up the recollection) . . . the bird would come from heaven a certain time of the year. He was so large that his wings would cover the sky. It would get dark. And he would say "QUA, QUA" (laughter) and when you see this bird coming over, you tell him what you want him to tell your loved ones in heaven when he gets back, and you give him what you want him to tell, and he'd say "QUA-K-QUA" and he just pass on over and then it get light again. Cause it was black as night while he was passing over. And I can't sing - can you remember some more songs we would sing when this bird was coming over? But the tale is that the group of them went hunting and the big eagle - big bird - came over and they shot him and it took - how long did it take him to fall? -
Viola: I don't remember that.
Irene: So many years, I think it was eight years to fall, and then he fell, and then - eight hours! it took him a long time to fall. And then they decided they would cook him and they put him on to cook and it took that same length of time for him to cook, and they cooked him and they got him boiled, done, and then when they got him ready to eat, he flew away (laughter). That was a tall tale!
Viola: That's what the children -
Irene: That's what Huddie would tell us and we were there spellbound, listening.
Viola: You were listening, I don't know where I was, I didn't hear that one. I'd get part of it, I didn't get the other part of it.
Irene: Boiled him and boiled him and he finally flew away. Now he has that in music. That record would get it straight, because I have it all twisted. I know it was a ridiculously long time. Falling and cooking and finally flew away. That was just a tale to make the kids laugh. He loved children. I think, cause he took so much time with us.

It's always been said that Huddie Ledbetter was a great children's entertainer and these two ancient ladies gave a glimpse into that aspect of Huddie's life.
POSTED BY MONTY AND MARSHA BROWN AT 2:28 PM 3 COMMENTS LABELS: LEADBELLY, LEADBELLY, LEADBELLY'S KIDS SONGS, LEADBELLY'S NIECES LINKS TO THIS POST