1. State your full name and present post office address:
Answer: W. L. Hays, Bells, Tenn. R. 2
2. State your age now:
Answer: I am 806 (86?) years – in 6 month(?) I was borned
3. In what State and county were you born?
Answer: in Case (Cass) county, Georgia
4. Were you a Confederate or Federal soldier?
Answer: I was a Confederate Co. H. 19 lb (Ala.)
5. Name of your Company?
Answer: Alabama Regt. Co. H, 19 Ala
6. What was the occupation of your father?
Answer: he was a farmer
7. Give full name of your father: Edward L. Hays; born at dont no; in the County of ___; State of Georgia; He lived at ____.
Give also any particulars concerning him, as official position, war services, etc.; books written by him, etc.:
Answer:
8. Maiden name in full of your mother: dont no any thing about no mother; she was the daughter of: (full name) ____ and his wife: (full name) ____; who lived at: ____.
9. Remarks on ancestry. Give here any and all facts possible in reference to your parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, etc., not included in the foregoing as where they lived, offices held, Revolutionary or other war service; what country they came from to America; first settled-county and State; always giving full names (if possible), and never referring to an ancestor simply as such without giving the name. It is desirable to include every fact possible, and to that end the full and exact record from old Bibles should be appended on separate sheets of this size, thus preserving the facts from loss.
Answer: ___________________
10. If you owned land or other property at the opening of the war, state what kind of property you owned, and state the value of your property as near as you can:
Answer: never owned any during my stay with ______during my ______
(Original transcribers remarks: This spelling is beyond reading, so what little we have been able to figure will be very brief from here on)
11. Did you or your parents own slaves? If so, how many?
Answer: nown ____
12. If your parents owned land, state about how many acres:
Answer: non at tall
13. State as near as you can the value of all the property owned by your parents, including land, when the war opened:
Answer: ________
14. What kind of house did your parents occupy? State whether it was a log house or frame house or built of other material, and state the number of rooms it had:
Answer: the houss…. log hous….4 roomes with….
15. As a boy and young man, state what kind of work you did. If you worked on a farm, state to what extent you plowed, worked with a hoe and did other kinds of similar work. (Certain historians claim that white men would not do work of this sort before the war.)
Answer: …. when i was a young man the most I ever did was of on___ a farm… from 6 year old… I did other kind of…. work
16. State clearly what kind of work your father did, and what the duties of your mother were. State all the kinds of work done in the house as well as you can remember – that is, cooking, spinning, weaving, etc.:
Answer: My father was a s____ and wee boys had to work lik thunder. I was the fin____ one of the boys. Boys tha went in the war a _____ (Original transcribers remarks: The best I can tell, this should read; “I was the first one of the boys that went in the war Richard then Hardy? he came next Marion? L., L. M.? Hays Wm.? my youngest brother. This writing is worse than the spelling)
17. Did your parents keep any servants? If so, how many?
Answer: non at tall
18. How was honest toil – as plowing, hauling, and other sorts of honest work of this class – regarded in your community? Was such work considered respectable and honorable?
Answer: yes sir respecble
19. Did the white men in your community generally engage in such work?
Answer: yes ser
20. To what extent were there white men in your community leading lives of idleness and having others do their work for them?
Answer: _________
21. Did the men who owned slaves mingle freely with those who did not own slaves, or did slaveholders in any way show by their actions that they felt themselves better than respectable, honorable men who did now own slaves?
Answer: the(y) gelt better of corse
22. At the churches, at the school, at public gatherings in general, did slaveholders and non-slaveholders mingle on a footing of equality?
Answer: at the church and chools the slaveholder and non lave (slave) holders did not gr____ weal ____ hover? the slave holder was not
23. Was there a friendly feeling between slaveholders and non-slaveholders in your community, or were they antagonistic to each other?
Answer: no
24. In a political contest, in which one candidate owned slaves and the other did not, did the fact that one candidate owned slaves help him any in winning the contest?
Answer: that the slaveholder the poor man had no chanc _____
25. Were the opportunities good in your community for a poor young man, honest and industrious, to save up enough to buy a small farm or go in business for himself?
Answer: some tim now? not often the _____ ? _____
26. Were poor, honest, industrious young men, who were ambitious to make something of themselves, encouraged or discouraged by slaveholders?
Answer: (cannot read this)
27. What kind of school or schools did you attend?
Answer: I went to a little log cabben
28. About how long did you go to school altogether?
Answer: walk…. (unreadable)
29. How far was it to the nearest school?
Answer: 4 miles
30. What school or schools were in operation in your neighborhood?
Answer: ….. house in our naberhood the nearest
31. Was the school in your community private or public?
Answer: Public chool
32. About how many months in the year did it run?
Answer: it joust run 3 – 4 months… now it runes about nine… attended five from 4 to 9 months
33. Did the boys and girls in your community attend school pretty regularly?
Answer: man
34. Was the teacher of the school you attended a man or woman?
Answer: …. I inlisted __ttsed? center Cherokee county Alabama went from Huntsville muster in service at Huntsville where about the 10 of May
35. In what year and month and at what place did you enlist in the service of the Confederacy or of the Federal Government?
Answer: sent Huntsville… few days…