This piece is from the newsletter of the Arkansas Folklore Society, Vol. VI, June 1, 1956, no. 2. The collector of the story is unknown.
Folktales from the Davis Family
After we had already collected nearly a hundred folksongs from Mr. and Mrs. T. M. Davis, now of Fayetteville, I discovered that their memories are equally well stuffed with folktales. Mrs. Davis heard most of her tales as a child in the Ozark Mountains. Mr. Davis spent his childhood and youth in Eastern Tennessee. Some of his stories he learned there, and some in Arkansas and Missouri.
Of the following tales, the first six are from Mrs. Davis. Some of them are transcribed from tape recordings, and some she wrote out for me. The “Bobby John Tales” are from both Mr. and Mrs. Davis. They learned these when they lived at Ozark, Arkansas. The remaining stories I took down from Mr. Davis’s dictation.
Mammy’s Skull and the Stolen Treasure
This is a story concerning some treasure, or jewels and money, that was lost during the Civil War. It happened somewhere just in between the North and the South. As you know, there were Bushwhackers who plundered the houses and took valuables and drove off the stock and everything. They were neither Rebels nor Federals, but just Bushwhackers who did this.
They supposedly got away with some money and jewels that belonged to a certain family. At least, the money was gone, and the housekeeper Mammy had disappeared. The family supposed that she was kidnapped.
After the War, there were two children, about twelve years old, that were playing in the yard. And one of them said, “I wish Dad could find that money that was lost during the Civil War.”
The little friend that was visiting her said, “I’ll tell you, let’s go on a treasure hunt, and let me play like I’m the Mammy that took the money to hide; and you play like that you’re your father and mother and children that had to run from the Bushwhackers.”
So the other little girl said, “All right, we’ll play like that. Now I’m the real Mammy and I’ve got this box of money, and I’ve got to run and hide it before the Bushwhackers come and steal it.”
So she took off up the hill and she felt as if she was really Mammy. And she was going to hide that money.
She looked quickly around and she thought, “Now, the Bushwhackers are coming; I’ve got to hurry.” So all at once she remembered that there was a big cave called the Black Cave. And no one had ever been back in it very far — she thought, just the mouth of it. The children played around it quite a bit. “That might be a good place, and it’s near to the house, and Mammy may have thought of that. So she might have run back in there to hide that money.”
She ran back in there with her little imitation box of money, and she got just out of the line of light that naturally came in at the front. Well, she was in darkness then, and she slipped on something and fell. Her box flew out of her hand, but there was enough light so she could see where her box went. It went in a little pool of water. She raised up; and as she got used to the semi-darkness, she saw a skull lying beside her. And it frightened her. At first she thought she was going to scream. But then she thought, “No, I’m Mammy. Maybe she came in here and did the very same thing I did, and slipped on this rock and fell. And her box must have gone where my box did.”
And it was in this pool of water. It wasn’t very deep. So she got to looking down there and, sure enough, she saw the outline of what could be a big box or a rock or something. It was so moss covered she could hardly tell. But she was so sure that it could be the money that she put her hand down in the water and got to feeling around it, and it did kind of feel like a box. A big iron strongbox.
She ran back and told the other little girl she was playing with, and the other little girl told her mother and her father. They went up to investigate and saw the skull and said, “That must be Mammy’s skull.”
Then they grappled the box out. They had to break it open, it was so rusted and everything. And there was all the money and the jewels and the valuables.