Mandy Hadnot

Mandy Hadnot did not know her age. She was born on the Slade farm near Coldspring, Texas. Her father died when she was a baby, and she and her mother, Emily Budle, were the only enslaved people on the place. Her mother cooked and cleaned the log house.

The enslaver and his wife had no children, and Mandy said he treated her almost like his own daughter. Every two weeks he drove the ox wagon into town for supplies, and she would wait at the gate to wave and see what he had brought: a whistle, candy, a doll, or once an Easter hat. At Christmas he cut a tree from the woods and trimmed it with popcorn for her. He gave her a gentle horse named Julie. Mandy had no other children to play with except visiting white children. The mistress held prayers every morning for the three of them and tried to teach her to read.

After freedom, she and her mother stayed. Her mother died soon after, and Mandy took over her work. Once her dress caught fire at a bonfire and her leg was badly burned; the mistress nursed her for a long time. The mistress paid her wages after freedom, and helped her assemble a hope chest and sew a white lawn dress when she married Bob Thomas in the parlor. In the late 1930s she lived in Woodville, Texas, with her husband Josh Hadnot.