By Rickey Robertson

Editor’s note: Rickey Robertson retired from Louisiana State Police and upon his retirement became a historical researcher/writer for Stephen F. Austin State University.  Rickey is a proud Peason Ridge Heritage Family member and currently is Pastor of Cold Springs Baptist Church in Anacoco, Louisiana. Rickey has written many articles on the Louisiana Maneuvers of 1941 and speaks to groups on this great historical event that affected our state and nation. He and his wife reside in Peason, Louisiana.

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Throughout the state of Louisiana, in every community and every parish, there are legends that have been left to us. In the little Cold Springs Community in northern Vernon Parish there is the old legend of Sambo Sanks. But just who was Sambo Sanks?

Sambo Sanks first came to Rapides Parish as a very young boy as a slave. Sambo then came to Vernon Parish where he would live most of his life.  As I looked back at the story of Sambo he would have come into Alexandria, Louisiana, by way of the Red River. This was how he was transported to another world that he did not know about. When Sambo got to Vernon Parish, he could not speak correct English, for when he was captured and sold as a slave, his tongue was split and cut, and he could not pronounce words correctly. And when he came to the McInnis Family home, he got a good washing in the nearest creek with good lye soap. And guess what.  He had been dyed with potion made up of boiled walnut shells and was dyed deep brown. But that lye soap took the dye off him and he was not black! When asked what his name might be, all he could say was, “Sambo all me know”. When asked where he came from, he would say, “Me don’t know, ma’am. All me know cross big water. Little boy, men, stole me, clip under tongue, black me, sell me slave, master see black coming off, take me to creek, help me wash, set me free.” So, Sambo had been captured in some faraway land, had his skin dyed, and came across the ocean to be sold as a slave as a very young boy. Looking back into Sambo’s history and what little we know, he would have possibly been born around 1830 far from Louisiana. But Louisiana and Vernon Parish were to be the only home he would ever know.

Sambo was set free but he did not have a home or a family. He could not read or write and when he talked, he was hard to understand. Sambo was known throughout the area for coming and working in the fields, gathering crops, plowing the crops, cutting stove wood, and riving out wooden shingles. All Sambo would ask for was bed and board and some food for his work. And talking with some of the older folks and family members around Peason, it is noted that Sambo also came into the Sawmill Town of Peason and would work for those folks needing a handy man for a day or so, and he even worked on the farms around Peason. One lady told me that her mother would make Sambo his favorite, an apple pie, when he would work for them at Peason. He was known to always be smiling and happy no matter what the circumstances, and he was a friend to everyone he came in contact with.  He would play with the children and about dark he would go possum hunting with the boys and their dogs.

Sambo was known for getting up very early in the morning. He would say, “Bray right ma’am! Bray right! Brit up!” (Day light ma’am; day light, get up). Sambo was known far and wide for his wood splitting. In his day everyone’s cook stove was a “wood stove” fired by split wood. Sambo would cut and split the finest stove wood, and he could also rive out the finest and best wood shingles to go on the roof of people’s houses. While cutting stove wood for J.M. (Jim) McInnis, he told Jim, “If you don’t rike it I pit.” (If you don’t like it I quit). From around 1919 until his death on January 2, 1930, Sambo lived with Jim and Lydia McInnis.

Christmas time in 1929 was a very harsh and cold winter. Many of us have been told by our fathers, mothers, and grandparents of the terrible pneumonia epidemics throughout the 1920’s and 30’s and of the children and adults who died of this disease due to no antibiotics such as we have in today’s world. While at the McInnis Home in the Cold Springs Community, Sambo became sick with possible double pneumonia. While sick and laying near the fireplace to stay warm, Sambo told Aunt Lydia to read to him out of the Good Book. As she finished, he pointed to one of the large sycamore trees in the McInnis homeplace yard and said, “When me die plant one (he pointed to the sycamore tree) on my grave.” Sadly, on January 2, 1930, Sambo passed away. He was carried just the short distance to the McInnis Cemetery where he was buried. But the legend of Sambo still lives on. Each year at the McInnis Cemetery and Bonnet Chapel there is a Memorial Service held in the old Chapel built in 1914 during the time Sambo lived in this community. This service is held to remember our ancestors and all those buried in the McInnis Cemetery and is held the second Saturday of each October. Everyone goes and pays their respects to their family members buried in the cemetery and a prayer is uplifted to the Lord while we stand at their gravesites. And yes, everyone has to go and pay their respects to Sambo Sanks, the little, small, smiling, hardworking man who impacted Vernon Parish and surrounding communities.

Retired Major General Erbon W. Wise has written many fine historical books, and in one set of books he wrote information about Sambo Sanks.  In ’30 Was a Good Year in Vernon Parish Louisiana, under the deaths, the following is listed in the Leesville Leader dated February 13, 1930: Sambo Sanks, died in Anacoco. He was called a “most unique character: and was thought to have been brought to this country from Africa as a slave, His true age was not known but it was about 100.

Sambo has been gone for 93 years but his name is still mentioned. Talking with Lane Belsha, near his home are two areas where Sambo helped to clear the forest land by “girdling” the timber. These areas are known as the “Sam Deadening”. The method Sambo used was by cutting around the bark of the tree and letting it die in that manner. Once the tree died, it could be cut for wood and the land cleared for farming.

So, as you read this story of the little vagabond who was brought to Louisiana from a far country as a slave, be thankful in this season for everything you and your family have to hold onto. Sambo had nothing but was happy wherever he was, and he had friends who watched out for him everywhere. Don’t you think we all need to have a little of Sambo’s good cheer and hard-working ethic in us every day and to be as thankful as he was for what little he had? We remember you, Sambo!