Now that you’ve read the title, here’s what I mean. Many of our ancestors have been trapped in a prison for the forgotten. Genealogy is the key that released them. Their names are unearthed and called. Their stories are being told to whoever wants to listen. Genealogy has not only freed our souls held back …
Category: History
20 People in One House
During the 1940s and 1950s, most of my maternal grandmother’s siblings joined the exodus of African Americans from Mississippi who were migrating north to Chicago, Detroit, Gary, Indianapolis, and other places. They were looking for better opportunities in the industrialized northern cities where decent-paying, factory jobs were available. They were also escaping from the tumultuous …
Juneteenth: Hard Decisions Had to be Made
This picture above represents the decision many of our enslaved ancestors had to make after they heard, “We free now!” Let me explain. Many of our enslaved ancestors asked, “What do we do now?” Options were VERY few. Many remained in the area where they had been enslaved, and some packed up and left eventually …
Chromosome Data Matters: Exploring Ewe Connections from Ghana
Picture Source Everyone has 23 pairs of chromosomes. One chromosome in each pair was inherited from the mother and the other chromosome was inherited from the father. Below is a snapshot of my mother’s paternal chromosome 2 in DNAPainter.com, a web-based tool for chromosome mapping – the process of labeling/assigning your chromosome segments to specific …
Continue reading Chromosome Data Matters: Exploring Ewe Connections from Ghana
Heinegg Releases New 6th Edition of “Free African Americans of North Carolina, Virginia, and South Carolina”
Genealogist Paul Heinegg and I at the 2019 Afro-American Historical and Genealogical Society (AAHGS) Conference, Univ. of Maryland When I started actively researching my family history in 1993, I quickly learned of genealogist Paul Heinegg’s wonderful publication, “Free African Americans of North Carolina, Virginia, and South Carolina from the Colonial Period to about 1820,” which …
Deeds and DNA Took Me Back to ‘Old Virginny’
https://youtu.be/YOqWIS-QS-0 Short clip: Visiting the area in Lunenburg County, Virginia where my great-great-grandmother, Jane Parrott Ealy, was taken away from c. 1839 and brought to Leake County, Mississippi. DNA revealed that family still lives there! In the early 1990s, when I first found Robert & Jane Ealy, my great-great-grandparents, in the 1870 and 1880 censuses, …
Continue reading Deeds and DNA Took Me Back to ‘Old Virginny’
More Than Just Names: Incorporating Social and Community History Into Your Research
Click image to register or see Zoom link below. I am very excited about this opportunity to co-teach on this upcoming webinar with genealogist and author, Robyn Smith. We both have busy federal careers, but we have maintained an active passion for genealogical and historical research for over two decades. Like many researchers, we get …
Continue reading More Than Just Names: Incorporating Social and Community History Into Your Research
Free, Alone with Young Children to Raise
My grandfather's baby sister, Martha Reed Deberry (1891-1971), who passed down history about her maternal grandmother, Polly Partee, who was an enslaved cook. Juneteenth commemorates the announcement of the abolition of slavery in Galveston, Texas on 19 June 1865. The Emancipation Proclamation, that had an effective date of 1 January 1863, did not immediately emancipate …
Slavery, the Church, and their Record-keeping
Padgett's Creek Baptist Church, Union County, South Carolina (photo source) In America, the carefully orchestrated process of converting Africans to Christianity began in earnest during the Great Awakening of the 1730s, intensifying in the late eighteenth century. In their minds, white preachers and slave-owners aimed to “save” enslaved African Americans by showing them their perceived …
Continue reading Slavery, the Church, and their Record-keeping
I Ain’t Taking Massa’s Name
Stephen, Eliza, and their children were inventoried in the estate of John Hebron, 1862, Warren County, Mississippi. They selected the surname HUNT. Disclaimer: Most of this post was taken from my 2012 article entitled, “Ain’t Gonna Take Massa’s Name.” Because of the popularity of the topic and misunderstandings about the surnames of African Americans, I …
Roots Revealed 