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. Maybe Melungeon
Jack Goins
This story deals with some unanswered questions on the Historical
Melungeons. When and where did this name begin and who was the most
likely source? The answer to these questions is based on opinions from
my research. Some of my direct line ancestors were entwined in this
history and some in my Goins family were among the first settlers in the
Clinch area. Authors listed them as Melungeon because of various tax,
court and census records. To set this story in its correct perspective
the Melungeons were designated by census and tax enumerators, courts,
and some of their white neighbors as free persons of color, or mulatto.
The First Melungeons
Who were the first Melungeons in the Newman Ridge/Blackwater area? Was
it the following?
“Micajer Bunch, Isreal Bunch, Solomon Bunch, Claiborn Bunch, Jessee
Bowlin, Zachariah Goins (note: son of John and Elizabeth of Henry
County, Virginia). (1797 Lee County Virginia Tax Records VA. state
library)
The above were all listed “white” in 1797. In an 1800 tax list all the
Bunches except Sol were gone, also included in this tax list are: Jesee
Boling, Zach Goins (free man of color), two John Collins, Jacob and
Daniel Collins. (1800 Lee Co., Va. Tax list)
At this time Virginia claimed most of the land on the North side of
Clinch River for tax purposes. Some whose land was on the north side of
Clinch River in Hawkins County actually signed the petition to form Lee
County, Virginia.
Did this unknown term ‘Melungeon’ inspire people to research them, and
if there is still a mystery, is it---why this name Melungeon?
Basically I find Melungeon research the same as family research if ones
goal is to determine if you are a Melungeon descendant, or in some way
related to the historical Melungeons, also if the researcher wants to
know who the historical Melungeons were and why they were designated
Melungeon. First we need to know the history of our families and also
the history of the Melungeon.
Several researchers, authors etc., who were interested in solving this
mystery have started with a theory, but could not tie it to known
Melungeons. This problem is why Melungeon family genealogy may
eventually solve many of these unanswered questions.
Melungeon families can be traced back in history by written records
because of the mulatto, free man of color designation. Head Melungeon
families are listed on tax and land records by this method, but the
researcher must be able to properly identify them because only a small
percentage of the ones so labeled were Melungeon.
If a researcher discovers some of their progenitors were labeled fpc/mulatto
this may become a real challenge to tie them into the historical known
Melungeons. The researcher may have to decide on “Maybe Melungeon.”
The mulatto identification was first established in colonial Virginia,
which is also the first hint of discrimination against people of mixed
ancestry.
“Be it enacted and declared, and it is hereby enacted and declared, that
the child of an Indian and the child, grand child, or great grand child,
of a Negro shall be deemed, accounted, held and taken to be a mulatto.
Source: Henning’s Statutes at large, vol 3, pp 250-251, 252.”
Their Names
My first unanswered question is, why the name Melungeon? Or was it
Melungin, or malengin? Theories range from the French word mélange
meaning mixture to a host of others too numerous to name.
Who were the Melungeons not remembered? Sneedville Attorney Lewis
Jarvis names several Melungeons: Vardy Collins, Shepard Gibson,
Benjamin Collins, Solomon Collins, Paul Bunch and the Goodman chiefs.
Jarvis later names James Collins, John Bolin and Mike Bolin and some
others not remembered. Obviously there are more not remembered than
named, so the best we can do is search the census, tax and court records
for this FPC label. Jarvis also stated they were given this name
Melungeon by their white neighbors who lived here among them because of
the color of their skin.
Click link to read article. (Attorney Lewis Jarvis, Sneedville Times
4/17/1903 Hancock County, TN and it’s people Volumes 1 and 2.)
Lewis Jarvis was a captain in the Union Army Co E 8th Tennessee
Volunteer Cavalry during the Civil War and was intimately acquainted
with several in my immediate family including Sizemore’s, Goins, Minor
and Lawson. Capt. Jarvis was the commanding officer who gave Stokley
Lawson his fatal three-day leave to return home. Stokely along with 5
other men were captured by Rebel Soldiers led by a Captain Surgenor,
and as the stories go either hung in Rebel Hollow, or shot near Fort
Blackmore.
My friend Ruth Johnson gave me a copy of a letter to her from William
“Bill” Groshe. In which he wrote: ”True Melungeons are descendants of
Vardy Collins, Solomon Collins, Benjamin Collins, Levi Collins, Jordin
Gibson, Shepard Gibson, William Goodman, Edmund Goodman, Jesse Goodman,
William Nichols, Zachariah Minor, John Minor and their families, also
include James and John Mullins.” Groshe may have written this from
memory and left out some. No Goins were named, but Maybe they were also
Melungeons? ( Letter from William Groshe to Ruth Johnson, who mailed
this author a copy of above information..)
The Term 'Melungeon"
Unanswered question #2- Where, when and by whom were they given this
name Melungeon? Lewis Shepard the attorney who won a case in 1872
Chattanooga, Hamilton County, Tennessee Chancery Court for a Melungeon
girl, ( her mother a Bolton) who was being denied her rightful
inheritance wrote:
“The term Melungeon is an East Tennessee provincialism; it was coined
by the people of that county to apply to these people.” (Memoirs of
Judge Lewis Shepard, 1915 page 88). (See A Romance of the Melungeons)
Studying Lewis Shepard Memoirs of that Chattanooga trial, his arguments
on behalf of his client resembled a tribe, rather than a nickname given
to them by their white neighbors, but more important this was 1872, 18
years before Dromgoole. Where did Shepard get this Ancient Carthage
argument? His story was they were ancient Phoenicians who, after
Carthage fell to the Romans, they immigrated across the straits to
Gibraltar and settled in Portugal. We are right back to the Portuguese,
did this Moors/Portuguese Melungeons story originate from a story told
to John Sevier, by a Gibson?
Much has been written concerning a John Sevier letter and encounter with
the Melungeons. The earliest known reference to the purported John
Sevier encounter was in a letter to the Nashville Daily American on
Monday, September 15, 1890. By Dan W. Baird:
"At the time when John Sevier attempted to organize the “State of
Franklin" there were living in the mountain section of East Tennessee a
colony of dark-skinned people, evidently of African or Moorish descent,
who did not affiliate either with the white, the Indian or the Negro
race. They called themselves "Malungeons" and claimed to be of
Portuguese descent."
Baird’s letter was in response to two articles written by Will Allen
Dromgoole. Dromgoole used this information in her Arena articles
without referencing where the information came from and Baird provided
no reference for his information. If you will read both the letter and
Dromgoole's articles, notice that neither writer claimed John Sevier
actually wrote a letter. Thus the possibility exists that this story
was handed down orally and eventually put in writing.
The problem I see with this encounter as written is when Sevier
attempted to organize the State of Franklin the Melungeons named by
Lewis Jarvis and William P. Groshe were not in East Tennessee.
According to documentation, Sevier’s encounter with the Melungeons must
have been when he undertook the survey of Hawkins County in 1802, which
included what is today Hancock County. Therefore not finding a letter
written by Sevier does not prove he did not see, or describe the
Melungeons, because in his survey of Hawkins County he stayed in the
heart of Melungeon country and spent the night with a Gibson who was
most likely a Melungeon Gibson considering Sevier’s location was in
Blackwater Valley.
Excerpts from the diary of John Sevier Mon. Nov. 1802: “Mr. Fish went
on to Hawkins C. H. Self and Genl. Rutledge crossed Clinch (?) Mountain
at Loonys Thur. 25 Rained Lay at Robers Fry. 26 Clear day. We all sit
out from Robert's crossed Newman's Ridge & lodged all night on black
water creek at Gibsons...”
In Lewis Shepards argument in the trial of the celebrated Melungeon
case, his Phoenicians escaped to Portugal, this may have been from part
of Shakespeare’s celebrated play Othello, The Moor of Venus. Shepard
took them back to Portugal and the Moors, and maybe a similar exotic
argument was used by John Netherland. Perhaps John Sevier in oral
conversations handed down his encounter with the Melungeons. In 1802
Sevier goes to Blackwater and stayed the night at Gibson’s. The Gibson
he spent the night with in 1802 on Blackwater was not Shepard, but maybe
Rubin. A Rubin and John Gibson did sign the petition to organize the
state of Franklin.
“Rubin, Fanny, Henry, Thomas Jr, Vina, Fanny and Mary Gibson all joined
Stony Creek Church 23 July 1802. “Sept 25, 1804 Ruben Gibson excluded
from membership of this church he lives down at Blackwater, and has our
letter of (dismission) and keeps it, and has joined another church”
(Stony Creek Church minutes)
This may be why the first time you find the word Melungin in writing
it’s in the Stony Creek Church minutes. The first minute’s show several
that were later enumerated in Hawkins County as FPC including Charles
Gibson and it also shows them returning from Blackwater to Stony Creek
to attend church meetings.
Examining Records
Examining other historical documents, the Melungeon claimed their origin
was Portuguese who later mixed with other nationalities. Lewis Jarvis
was born 1828, at least 50 years after some named historical Melungeons
were born. The word Melungeon, Melungin is found in writing in 1813, so
his information was not first hand in regard to who, or when they were
given this name Melungeon. Although Jarvis stated he knew Vardy Collins
and some others.
Another problem question is, does this Melungeon label apply to all the
free colored families in Hawkins County, or only the ones who settled in
the part that became Hancock County in 1844? This old witness separates
them, but not by counties.
“In the last decade there has been a deep interest manifested by
educators, the church and the ethnologist, in what is known as the
“mountain people,” many thousands of whom are scattered over parts of
Kentucky, Tennessee, North Carolina, and Georgia.” But there is also
another people who have lived in the mountains, principally in the
Clinch mountains, of eastern Tennessee for more than a century; separate
and distinct from all others, whose ancestry is shrouded in mystery -
the mystery of obscurity. They have lived their simple pastoral life and
for more than a hundred years so quietly and obscurely that their name
is unknown to many.” They are the Melungeons -their very name is a
corruption of some foreign word unknown to them or to the few have given
them any study. They have had no poet or seer to preserve their
history.” (Statement by Eliza Haskell who’s father John Netherland won
their freedom for them.)
Unless an old record is located which contradicts these older documents
we can correctly say by research the correct identification as described
by witnesses in the days of the Melungeons:
“They were the families designated as free colored, free man (person) of
color and mulatto who moved into Hawkins/Hancock Tennessee and the lower
western part of Lee/Scott Counties, Virginia beginning 1790’s.”
The oldest documents on the Melungeons is also centered on these
interlocking families, such as the unnamed author in the 1848-49
Littell’s Living Age; a visit to Mineral Springs and Vardy Collins
hotel, and also describing the gorge where the Melungeons lived. Vardy
Collins was called the chief cook and bottle washer of the Melungeons.
Then 50 years later another writer came to the same location and
interviewed Vardy Collins grandchild and great grandchildren.
“On Friday forenoon, July 2, (1897) the writer (C.H, Humble) and Rev.
Joseph Hamilton, of Parkersburg, West Virginia, started in a hack from
Cumberland Gap, Tenn., for Beatty Collins’, chief of the Melungeons, in
Blackwater Valley, Hancock County, Tenn. (Womens Board Of Home
Missions. The Presbyterian Church U.S.A. Home Mission monthly).”
Some researchers have ignored both these old visitation accounts and
cast them aside as to be taken as a grain of salt cast into the wind, or
as color writers who should be ignored. My advice is to ignore any
researcher who tells you this because every document must be carefully
examined, because they are as scarce as hen’s teeth. If the researcher
rejects these two documents they are left with Dromgoole (1890) as the
only written source prior to 1900 who actually identified some of the
head Melungeon families. For an example we have:
#1-1813 Stony Creek Church record on one lady accusing the other of
housing the Melungins (not identified).
#2-1840 Brownlows Whig, “an impudent Malungeon from Washington Cty, a
scoundrel who is half Negro and half Indian,” (Not identified) and who
has actually been speaking in Sullivan, in reply to Combs.
#3-Edward Guerrant Diary: July 2,1863 "Came on to Mr Horton's for
dinner-found him in a tornado furious- against Virginians, who fed his
grass and & c, and in ecstatic panegyrics of all Kentuckians-"all of
whom were "interesting" gentlemen"- and no "malungens"(1/2 b & 1/2w).
Here is the message I get from these first three records.
1-A Melungeon was held in very low standing, one you should not keep in
your home.
2- A Melungeon was half Indian and Half Black and thus should be
ignored.
3-Melungeon was half black and half white. Also, Mr. Horton’s
conclusion that the Kentucky soldiers took care of his crops etc, was
because they had no Melungeons in their army?
Only three written documents to Dromgoole not counting the 1872 Shepard
trial because I have not found, nor have I seen any of those actual
court records in Shepard’s 1872 trial, only his S.L. Shepard Memoirs,
Chattanooga, 1915, or Bairds article, which was in response to Dromgoole.
This is all the written pre Dromgoole article I have, I’m sure there
must be more. How did the writer in the 1848 article know where to
come? And for that matter how did Dromgoole know where to come? Must
have been by oral conversations.
Other historians/authors later identified the same people as the 1848
and 1897 articles, or else they used Dromgoole to establish that the
Melungeons were free persons of color, but this begs another question,
which free persons of color were Melungeons? Eliza Haskell, William L.
Worden, Henry Price, Sandra Keys Ivey, and many, many others too
numerous to name, all had one thing in common-- they wrote about and
investigated the known historical Melungeons of the Blackwater/Newman
Ridge area. Jesse Stuart “Daughter of the Legend” was indirectly
pointing to these same interlocking families.
Were They Portuguese
I recommend you read Saundra Keyes Ivey Dissertation, she stayed in
Sneedville and interviewed many Melungeon descendants as well as taking
part in their outdoor drama, Walk Toward the Sunset. Her research was
outstanding. Here is her opinion on the correspondent in the 1848
Littel’s Living Age article. Quote: “There seems to be no reason for
this writer to have invented this detail, “The Melungeons carefully
preserved the “Legend of their history.” This “Legend” according to the
writer, included an original descent from Portuguese adventures and
later intermarriages with Indians, Negroes, and whites.” (Saundra Keys
Ivey PhD Dissertation, Indiana University.)
Most pre 1900 Melungeon records point to a Spanish/Portuguese heritage
that later married Indians.
” They deeply resent the name Melungeon given to them by the whites, but
proudly call themselves Portuguese.” (Dr. Swan Burnett: The Melungeons
Oct 1889 in American Anthropologist),
Notice in the 1848-9 visit to Mineral Springs and Vardy Collins, they
were first Portuguese, but in the 1897 visit to the same place and an
interview with Vardy Collins grandson they were not mixed, but pure. Why
this Indian heritage by Calloway Collins as recorded by Dromgool?
Last paragraph page 747 the Arena, this was after the move to Newman
Ridge, quoting Dromgoole: “there was no mixture of blood. They claimed
to be Indians and no man disputed it.”
Why did the Melungeons nationality change? One possibility was this
mixing with Indians and Europeans as described in the 1848-9 article
finally rooted out their original Portuguese ancestor after another
fifty years.
A good example of this change is evident in my own family whereas
Grandpa Goins talked about his Indian ancestors and never mentioned
Portuguese, but his sister talked about her Portuguese ancestors. No
doubt by the time the Melungeons arrived on Blackwater they were more
Indian than Portuguese. An old adage is if momma was Cherokee, baby was
Cherokee, if momma brought the Indian into the family, they identified
as their mother’s culture did.
“The Melungeons have a tradition of a Portuguese ship mutiny, with the
successful mutineer beaching the vessel on the North Carolina coast,
then their retreat towards the mountains.” (Eliza Haskell daughter of
John Netherland 1912 Arkansas Gazette.)
According to witnesses named in this article John Netherland was the
defense attorney in the illegal voting trials held in Rogersville
1846-48 this above statement by his daughter may have been a hint on the
argument presented by John Netherland in those trials, but Dr. Swan
Burnette had this to say about them in 1889:
“The matter was finally carried before a jury and the question decided
by an examination of the feet. One, I believe, was found to be
sufficiently flat-footed to deprive him of aright of suffrage. The
others, four or five in number, were considered as having sufficient
white blood to allow them a vote. Col. John Netherland, a lawyer of
considerable local prominence defended them.” (Dr.Swan Burnette 1889)
The 1834 revised Constitution of Tennessee specifically disfranchised
Indians, mustees, and mulattoes. The illegal voting charges and trials
of known Melungeon families in Rogersville proves they did not escape
this discrimination. After two separate juries ruled Wiatt Collins and
Zachariah Minor not guilty the state dropped the charges on Solomon,
Levi, Ezekial, and Andrew Collins and later dropped charges on Lewis
Minor. The answer to why the charges were dropped is simple, they were
brothers and cousins. Why try Lewis Minor after his brother Zachariah
was found not guilty by a Jury? Evidence points to a probable pre trial
deal between their lawyer and the state prosecutor on who was to be
tried.
Swan Burnette wrote, “one was found guilty.” Ambrose Hopkins was
charged at the same time as Vardy and the others, and found guilty by a
Jury on June 1, 1849. Court records now show three illegal voting cases
tried by juries in Hawkins County, Tennessee. The grand Jury charges
were identical for Vardy Collins and Ambrose Hopkins. If a pre trial
agreement based on kinship is correct, Hopkins was not related to the
Collins and Minors. (Credit: Dr. David Jones, Orlando Florida)
The above charges stemmed from an election held in 1845, looking at the
3rd District voters in 1843 the only one charged in 1846 for illegal
voting who voted in the 1843 election was Ambrose Hopkins.
Again we find the old witness correct. Burnette’s information was no
doubt second hand but finding this case proves he was correct by his
quote: “One was found Guilty and the others were sufficiently white
enough.” Was he correct in the flat foot method used to free or convict
those tried? Also, did John Netherland present the ship wrecked
Portuguese story as told by his daughter Eliza?
Zachariah Minor told his children he was Portuguese/Indian which leaves
little doubt the argument presented at the trial was Portuguese because
Indians were automatically eliminated from voting by the 1834
constitution. Looking at the possibility that the Sevier encounter was
known at this time (Sat.Jan 29,1848), “they appeared to be of African
or Moorish descent.” Perhaps their argument was Moors from Portugal,
what ever it was the following Jury ruled “Not Guilty”. Thomas Dodson,
John Isenberg, Mitchael Baugh, WM Rowan, James Miller, Meridith Lawson,
George Wright, William Long, Jos R Johnson, WM Lee, Jacob Arnott and
John Manis.
The 1880 census of Hancock County, Tennessee adds credence to this
defense because both my Goins and Minors were actually enumerated as
Portuguese written in the first column where race is designated by a
letter, thus Portuguese with the label W for white written over
Portuguese.
1880 federal census of district 4 Hancock County, Tennessee, enumerator
was James A. Doughty, June 1, 1880.
1880 Frame One
1880 Frame Two
Evidently both my Goins and Minor family told this census person they
were Portuguese and he wrote Portugee in race column, but later wrote
the initial W real dark over this Portuguese maybe because he noticed
the 1880 census did not list Portuguese.
On page 2 in my book “Melungeons And Other Pioneer families is a photo
of the log house I grew up in and grandpa Goins sitting on the front
porch. This house was built near the end of the Civil War. Dad
purchased the place in 1944 and grandpa died there in 1954. Ironically,
another Goins died there in 1895. “11 Dec 1895 Lewis Goans, an aged and
well known citizen of our county, died at the residence of Harris Bell
on Cave Ridge near town Tuesday night after an illness of about 6 weeks,
Aged 84 years. Until his last illness Mr. Goans had never been sick but
2 days in his life, and was an exceptionally well preserved man. He was
Very Dark complected and claimed to be of Portuguese stock. Buried at
Cedar Grove near the river.”
Lewis Goans moved to Hawkins County in 1855 from Rockingham County, NC
and the same area where my Rev. war grandfather Zephaniah Goins moved
from in 1811, but I have not been successful in connecting my Goins
family to Lewis. (Distant Crossroads Volume 19, number 3, 2002)
I’m not sure if the Portuguese came from my Goins or Minor family or
from both. Grandpa Goins always claimed to ¼ Indian and I have found
enough evidence to substantiate this ¼ Indian claim, it’s the other ¾
that’s in question. His sister Lizzie Goins Parsons always talked about
her Goins Portuguese ancestors. In a Tennessee Supreme Court case 1827
Abraham Vaughn vs Phoeba Tucker in a court case involving race, “Always
understood that Molly Moore had one of the family named Minor having
since obtained their freedom on the plea” [being of Indian Descent]. I
have not been able to find this Minor case in Virginia and since no
first name was given in the record I gave up on trying to locate it,
both my Minor and Goins family was originally from Virginia.
Maybe Melungeon
In my opinion the answer to who was a Melungeon lies with the family
researcher working within the scope of the historical records. Those of
us who search old records for the truth know proof of opinions come from
documented research. Hopefully locating and indexing the Hawkins County
records 1795-1850 will answer some of these questions and I can remove
this ‘maybe Melungeon’ label from my Goins family. Hawkins County
consisted of a very large area. Hancock County was formed from the lands
of Hawkins in 1844,but was not fully organized until 1846. Court cases
that occurred before Hancock was fully organized are in the Hawkins
County Court house. Like the above illegal voting cases, these charges
stem from a state election held in 1845.
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