Bedsole - NCGenWeb

Not being a member of the church meant that person would not be able to trade their goods for things they
and their family desperately needed. In addition, they could not count on the help and support of church
members, and that fact alone was usually so devastating, it was enough to get the wayward member to
mend his ways. Church members enjoyed many important benefits such as; When anyone got sick, or
injured, everyone gathered there and did whatever they could to help care for the party in need, including
caring for babies and children, the family, cooking, milking cows and doing all the farming, cultivating,
planting, harvesting and other chores normally done by that family. Knowing that tomorrow, the person in
need could very well be any one of them, this practice was looked on as a very valuable thing to have in
ones life, together with the ability to trade among themselves. Caring for each other meant survival, living or
dying, in many cases.
When a member in good standing, moved to another location, they could request a letter of transfer from
their local church to the church at their new location and stay in good graces with the church. However, they
were only allowed 30 days to be accepted into the new church. Preachers and pastors were key people in
everyone’s lives and were always treated with the utmost respect and courtesy and were especially cared for
by all the families in the area. It was common practice to invite the Preacher and his family to ones house for
Sunday dinner where the host family always prepared the best food they had for the meal and the guest(s).
Velvet Beans
Picking Velvet Beans was pure torture. They were planted among the corn, so the vines would have
something to grow and run up on and multiply. They were used primarily for cattle feed. Picking velvet beans
was one of the most despicable jobs, next to cotton. The beans are all covered with a thick coating of small
velvety hairs which all have reversed barbs all along the hair, so if the hair sticks in your skin which it will, the
thing could not be pulled out and would break off instead, resulting in skin itching and infections.
The itching and stinging of the skin were horrendous and impossible to describe. The settlers all wore heavy,
thick, guano sack shirts and the thickest pants they had, which were usually made of leather or hides. The
legs were tied around the ankles really tight. The shirt collars were buttoned all the way up. The shirt sleeves
were rolled all the way down and tied tight around the wrists. Still, the velvet got inside the shirts, up the
sleeves, up the pants legs, and inside the clothes. With the weather around one hundred degrees in the
summer and the humidity at about ninety-five percent and these beans being down among the corn where no
breeze could get to the workers, picking them dressed as they were, was pure torture for days on end. The
weaker workers frequently fainted from aggravation and heat exhaustion.
Gathering Corn
The ears of corn had to be pulled from the stalks and put in a sack with a strap which was worn around the
neck. The leaves on corn stalks are also lined on each side of the leaf with reversed needle-like stingers and
a leaf will cut ones skin like a knife. Then the sweat would get in the cuts and burn like fire. By the time they
had been carrying that fifty pound bag of corn around their necks and dumping it in the wagon for twelve
hours, their shoulders and backs would be throbbing and hurting so badly, they could hardly keep from
crying. Working among the stalks of corn meant no breeze could get to them and the heat was torture. Every
time their sacks were full, it was carried and emptied into the mule-drawn wagon. When the wagon was full,
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the corn was hauled to the barn and unloaded and stored inside. With one hundred or more, acres of corn,
this was no small job. Corn was used primarily for animal feed and for meal and human consumption in the
form of cornbread. If the family had children age five or higher, they did much of this work. Its hard to imagine