Surname Saturday

Surnames I am researching, along with geographic areas of interest, are the following:
Baldridge - Ireland>PA>NC>SC>TN>MS
Branch - VA>NC>TN>MS
Coggins - NC>SC>GA>AL>MC
Fenner - RI>NC>GA>AL>MS
Gibson - VA>NC>SC>TN>MS
Merriwether (Meriwether/Merriweather) - VA>KY>SC>GA>AL>TN>MS
Motte - Dublin, Ireland>West Indies>SC>AL>MS Territory
Netherland (Neatherlin/Netherlin/Neatherland) - VA>KY>TN>GA>AL>MS
Pettus - VA>KY>TN>GA>AL>MS
Porter - PA>VA>NC>SC>AL>MS
If your ancestors share these surnames, I would love to hear from you.  Who knows...we may be cousins!

Natchez on the Mississippi, by Harnett T. Kane

During the past week, I continued researching the surnames Porter and Middleton, South Carolina ancestors who settled in the early Southwest Mississippi Territory. Part of that research included reading through several books that include details about early Mississippi settlers, as I searched for references to either of the two families.  One such book was Natchez on the Mississippi by Harnett T. Kane.  Published by William Morrow & Company in 1947, Kane's book includes over three hundred pages of eloquent details about the history of the Natchez area. Although I did not find references to either the Porter or Middleton names, I immensely enjoyed reading Kane's vivid descriptions of over twenty antebellum mansions, the personal stories of the families that built them, and the individuals who called them home. Of interest to anyone who enjoys history is the fact that many of the individuals named in the book were among those who helped shape the state's history, and in some cases, the history of our nation.  Also included in the interesting and entertaining stories in Kane's book about Natchez are two that garnered national interest in years past, the famous steamboat race between The Natchez and The Robert E. Lee, and the infamous story of Natchez's "Goat Castle."  The index of Natchez on the Mississippi is a special bonus for family history researchers everywhere, since it contains an alphabetical listing of hundreds of family names mentioned in Kane's book.

Surname Saturday - Are We Related?

It's Saturday again, and it's been a while since I last posted a list of the surnames I am researching. If you are also searching any of these names and in any of these locations, I would love to hear from you.  Maybe we can exchange some information or offer each other some new research ideas.  So here goes:


Baldridge -  Ireland >PA>NC?>SC>TN>MS(Carroll County) 
Branch -  England >Virginia>NC>TN>MS (Hinds, Madison, and Attala Counties) 
Coggins - Wales>Nash County)>SC>GA>AL>MS (Holmes County) 
Fenner - Ireland >Rhode Island>NC>GA>AL>MS (MS Territory, Wilkinson County)
Gibson - Scotland>VA>NC>SC>MS (Adams, Monroe, Calhoun and Carroll Counties)
Merriwether - England>VA>KY>SC>GA>TN>MS (Calhoun and Carroll Counties)
Middleton - England>SC>MS Territory (Franklin County)
Netherland - VA>KY>TN>GA>AL>MS Territory (Amite County)>MS (Holmes and Yazoo Counties)
Pettus - Norwich, England>VA>KY>TN>AL>MS (Holmes County)
Porter - Ireland>PA>NC>SC>GA>AL>MS Territory (Franklin County)>Madison & Attala Co (MS)
Ragland - Wales>Ireland>VA>NC>SC>GA>AL>MS (Franklin, Wilkinson, Hinds, Attala Counties)
Trigleth - England>VA>NC>SC>GA>AL>MS (Holmes and Yazoo Counties)

Alabama Pioneers - A Member's Story

For some time, I have subscribed to an e-newsletter published by Alabama Pioneers, a website geared toward genealogy research in Alabama. Although my initial intent was to use the website to research some of my own ancestors who lived, at least for a time, in parts of that state, those with the surnames of Coggins, Garrard, Pettus, Porter, and Ragland, I have also enjoyed reading about unrelated families. The person behind this fantastic genealogy website is Donna Causey, and her informative blog can be accessed here. One of the sections of the Alabama Pioneers website is entitled "Alabama Memories," a place where a number of members' stories are posted, and the site's e-newsletter often contains a link to one of these stories.  Today's newsletter includes such a link. I invite you to read "The Home Place," an interesting family story written by Annice Graham and submitted by Dorothy Gast, her granddaughter.  Graham's story of her own family's experiences during the depression years is one that will interest anyone who had ancestors who also endured those difficult times.

The Depression Years in Attala County, Mississippi

Lelia Porter Branch and Clark C. Branch
Newport Community, Attala County, Mississippi, circa 1922

The picture here is the earliest picture I have of my paternal grandparents, Lelia Porter Branch and Clark Commander Branch. Lelia and Clark were married on December 9, 1922 in rural Attala County, and they began their life together in the Newport community located in Attala County, Mississippi near both families. Her family, the Porter family, lived near Sallis, and the rest of my grandfather's Branch relatives also lived near them in Newport or around McAdams. Their only child, my father, was born the next December, and his life, like the lives of my grandparents, was to change because of this Great Depression.

As you can see in the picture, my grandparents lived in a very simple house in a rural area of Attala County, on land they farmed. Their life must have been very hard, with no conveniences. They used kerosene or "coal oil" lamps, they had well water, and they heated their home with wood burned in an iron stove. There was no refrigeration, no electricity, and cooking was done on a wood stove. Living conditions such as this are almost impossible for most people my age to even imagine.

I thought it seemed "right" to write about the depression years at this particular time, since for several weeks now, our world has been filled with information about the troubled economic conditions that prevail now in our country. There is talk about a probable economic recession, and even talk that another Depression may be around the corner. My plan is to write a series of posts dealing with rural life in Mississippi, as it was experienced by my ancestors during the depression. Today is the first article in that series.

The post today is actually about something good that came out of that other period of dire financial circumstances, one that left genealogists like me with a wealth of information about how their relatives lived during those years. One of the parts of the New Deal program was a project designed to put unemployed individuals to work during the Depression. The name of this program was the U. S. Work Progress Administration or "WPA." Within the program was a project developed to put unemployed intellectuals to work, and it was known as the Federal Writer's Project. Materials written by those who worked in the Federal Writers' Project are housed in the Library of Congress Manuscript Division, and it is part of a larger collection titled The U.S. Work Progress Administration Federal Writers' Project and Historical Records Survey.

This collection covers the years 1889-1942 and includes many topics about varied subjects. Approximately 300,000 items are contained in the collection, including correspondence, reports, essays, and oral histories. Included are life histories of men and women describing their feelings while coping with life during the Depression; studies of the social customs of ethnic groups living in the United States; records of interviews with ex-slaves describing life during the period of slavery; and drafts of publications produced.

The unemployed writer who may have participated in this project could have been a lawyer, a teacher, a librarian, or someone else who had experience writing when they were employed. Many felt during this time that the Roosevelt Administration could find more jobs for those who had an academic background than for those who worked in "blue collar" jobs. The project was not popular within the U. S. Congress and was referred to as the federal government's attempt to "democratize American culture," especially after it was approved for federal monies in June 1935.

The project continued into the late 1930's, but Congress remained critical and some opponents were intent on shutting down the project. Funding for the project ceased in late 1939, primarily because the Roosevelt Administration needed funding for an increased defense budget. After that, the project continued in a less active roll, funded on money given to the states, and it closed about a year after the U. S. entered World War II.

The result of this collection is that it contains genealogy records that allow us to have a snapshot of life as it actually was during these troubled years, told by real people who lived it.

The Ghosts of our Ancestors

A few years ago, after I became aware that I had a Gibson great-great-great grandfather, I began searching for Gibson ancestors. Little did I know how much information I would find about this family.

Much of what has been written about the Gibson family in America concerns this family's biracial roots, beginning in Virginia and continuing in its migration through North and South Carolina and on into Georgia, Tennessee, Mississippi, and Louisiana. My Gibson ancestor was born in South Carolina about 1799. His name was John P. Gibson, and I still have not found the names of his parents. But along the research road, I found many interesting books and published articles about biracial and multiracial heritage in the early years of this country. One such article included "The Free State of Jones", written by Victoria E. Bynum and published by the University of North Carolina Press. Chapter 1 of the publication begins with an interesting quote of Sam Dabney, from James Street's "Tap Roots," published in 1943.

"We can't boast of our ancestors because when we get started talking about our families, out jumps the ghost of a pirate or a cousin of color."

A reference to America's rich racial heritage, contained in Victoria Bynum's book mentioned earlier in this post, states that racial sentiments in the South "evolved over a period of three centuries." She states that "by the 1840's, claims of Indian, Iberian (Spanish), or Mediterranean (Moorish) ancestry, defended one's whiteness against race-based laws and social harassment." Gideon Gibson, a "light-skinned slaveholder of partially African ancestry" and a member of South Carolina's Regulator Movement, is mentioned in this publication as a person who exemplified how racial identity was often "fluid" and "even negotiable in some cases." Bynum goes on to say that "many of Gideon Gibson's descendants, migrated west in search of whiteness as well as lands." We know this is true, since many of the descendants of Gideon Gibson, Jacob Gibson, and Jordan Gibson who ended up in the state of Mississippi prior to the Civil War have been well-documented in the state histories of Mississippi, Kentucky, Louisiana, and even the history of Methodism in Mississippi. We know, too, that regardless of whether a person was labeled as a Mulatto, Mestizo, Mustee, Melungeon, Creole, Cajun, Redbone, or similar names denoting something other than an "all white" ancestry, racial "mixing" has occurred throughout American history, and not only in the South Carolina backcountry and other states commonly known as "The South." Class-consciousness was very real in the society of the 1800's, and it became common for those who lived in the colonies, including North and South Carolina prior to migrating farther west and south, to portray their ancestors as aristocratic patriots and slaveholders. The fact was that many of their "aristocratic" ancestors were Regulators, itinerant preachers, and even Tories.

An interesting bit of history that I also discovered during my research was the story of Dr. Walter Ashby Plecker, a small-town doctor who became the registrar of Virginia's Bureau of Vital Statistics in 1912. Dr. Plecker became known as the impetus for the passage of the Racial Integrity Law in 1924, commonly referred to as "Plecker's Law." The law became Virginia's infamous "one drop" statute, and its language created two racial categories, "pure" white and everybody else. Dr. Plecker had allied with John Powell of the Anglo-Saxon Clubs of America and had begun to wage an all-out war against the mixing of the races, one of which was a push for "ancestral registration."

According to J. David Smith in "The Eugenic Assault on America: Scenes in Red, White, and Black," Virginians were reluctant to comply with the idea of "ancestral registration," even though the state had passed the first anti-miscegenation law in 1662, when "passing" as white may have been rather commonplace and proof of racial purity was difficult to obtain.

Plecker's method of identifying racial impurity was to compile a list of family surnames that were "known" to be "mixed." The list was by Virginia county and the names of the "racially mixed" families who lived in these counties, and is shown below:

Amherst: Pumphrey (Migrants to Allegheney and Campbell) Adcock (Adcox), Beverly (this family is now trying to evade the situation by adopting the name of Burch or Birch, which was the name of the white mother of the present adult generation), Branham, Duff, Floyd, Hamilton, Hartless, Hicks, Johns, Lawless, Nukles (Knuckles), Painter, Ramsey, Redcross, Roberts, Southwards (Suthards, Southerds, Southers). Sorrells, Terry, Tyree, Willis, Clark, Wood

Bedford: McVey, Maxey, Branham, Burley (see Amherst)

Rockbridge: (migrants to Augusta), Cash, Clark, Coleman, Duff, Floyd, Hartless, Hicks, Mason, Mayse(Mays), Painters, Pults, Ramsey, Southerds (see Amherst), Sorrell, Terry, Tyree, Wood, Johns

Charles City: Collins, Dennis, Bradby, Howell, Langston, Stewart, Wynn, Custalow(Custaloo), Dungoe, Holmes, Miles, Page, Allmond, Adams, Hawkes, Spurlock, Doggett

King William: Collins, Dennis, Bradby, Howell, Lanston, Stewart, Wynn, Custalow(Custaloo), Dungoe, Bolnus, Miles, Page, Allmond, Adams, Hawkes, Spurlock, Doggett

New Kent: Collins, Bradby, Stewart, Wynn Adkins, Langston

Henrico and Richond City: (see Charles City, New Kent, and King William)

Caroline: Byrd, Fortune, Nelson (see Essex)

Essen and King and Queen: Nelson, Fortune, Byrd, Cooper, Tate, Hammond, Brooks, Boughton, Prince, Mitchell, Robinson

Elizabeth City and Newport News: Stewart (descendants of Charles City families)

Halifax: Epps (Eppes), Stewart (Stuart), Coleman, Johnson, Martin, Talley, Sheppard (Shepard), Young

Norfolk County and Portsmouth: Sawyer, Bass, Weaver, Locklear (Locklair), King, Bright, Porter

Westmoreland: Sorrells, Worlds (Worrell), Atwells, Butridge, Okiff

Greene: Shifflett, Shiflet

Prince William: Tyson, Segar (see Fauquier)

Fauquier: Hoffman (Huffman), Riley, Colvin, Phillips, (see Prince William)

Lancaster: Dorsey (Dawson)

Washington: Beverly, Barlow, Thomas, Hughes, Lethcoe, Worley

Roanoke County: Beverly (see Washington)

Lee and Smyth: Collins, Gibson (Gipson), Moore, Boins, Ramsey, Delph, Bunch, Freeman, Mise, Bolden (Bolin), Mullins, Hawkins - Chiefly Tennessee "Melungeons"

Scott: Dingus (see Lee)

Russell: Keith, Castell, Stillwell, Meade, Proffitt (see Lee and Tazewell)

Wise: (see Lee, Scott, Smyth, and Russell Counties)

As the Registrar, Dr. Plecker had the authority to change various forms of registration required in Virginia, including birth certificates and marriage records. Since he exercised this authority and changed or added to the documents as he saw fit regarding racial makeup, the process of alteration became known as "pleckerizing."

The impact of this finding on my research was that two of my family lines were included on the list, Gibson and Porter. What it really meant was that I had much more research to do.