- This topic has 8 voices and 21 replies.
-
Posts
-
Hi all…I finally made it back after a year. I am J. Jones Jackson-Hutton. My family I am told holds many of the Saponi Names. After a few years of turning over the dust and mud that can be the Eastern Shore of Maryland. I went to visit one of the older members of my families church. After a 30 minute conversation with him – I decided to come back over here and talk to ya’ll.
After going through the message boards and discovering that Cherokee lived among us. It validated what I heard from Mr. Holden. He is 86 years old and showed me a drawing of his father. He told me that his father was part Indian. Though from the drawing – part was one step away from full. He explained to me how our families were situated during the 1920’s and 30’s in Marumsco and Shelltown. He was the first outside the family source that talked to me about Jackson Town. I asked him what was Jackson Town – he told me it was an area in Marumsco where all the Jackson’s lived. I asked how long they had lived there, he laughed and said: “Forever”. He then explained to me about the area of Holden Creek. A place where the Holden and Stewart Families could be found. He told me that his father use to take him as a young boy in a row boat – up into the gut on Holden Creek. His father explained that this is where all their Holdens came from. I was literally mesmerized by this old man. He started reciting names: Jackson, Lane, Stewarts, Holdens, Boyers, McCreadys, Williams.
Our family is documented for 176 years. The names that we have available to us that come from Marumsco/Shelltown, Quindocqua, and Liberia have not been lost. This area is near the Pocomoke River, that flows and makes up Marumsco and Holden Creek. The names that can be found among us are: Jackson, Stewart, Green, McCready, Gale, Teagle, Holden, Milbourne, Collins, Williams, Johnson, Lane, Holden, Lloyd, Drummond, Benson, Bell, Waters, Handy, Hutt (Harmon), Smith (out of Moore County, North Carolina), Chambers (out of North Carolina), Hughes, Jones, Harris, Brittingham and Selby (out of Virginia).
Though all family members are noted as African American today all are aware of their American Indian bloodlines.
howdy —
I’ve heard Harris is Catawba and seen it is also Chickasaw. Could be Catawba who moved into Chickasaw lands and were adapted by them, I am not sure though. I have 2 ancestors named “Hoten”. I think Hughes is also Chickasaw or Choctaw one Hughes County, Ok is in land those 2 tribes occupied I think). Some Stewarts (or Stuarts?) seem to have married into our family. I have heard people here lookin’ at both Green and Collins.
But the Harris name, altho we aren’t Harrises, that name went with our ancestors from NC/SC/Va to Ok over a hundred 150 year span, and some Harrises attended the same Church my ancestors did in the Chickasaw Naiton (near present day Duncan, Ok) in 1900.
Again, these are common surnames so it might be a coincidence. It’s hard to know. I might just be leadin’ ya down a wild goose chase, I don’t know.
vance
Thanks for posting, Jae. She and I have been correponding about all this and I was hoping we could get this info talked about here, and get some help looking at all this.
Jae is one of the people who was involved in that striking coincidence a year ago, when I heard from three people in one week, two of them on the same day, who were involved with Maryland Blackfoot. Jae has the Blackfoot ID in her family, she’s been on the “Other Blackfoot” yahoogroup for awhile, and had posted about what she’d learned about a Blackfoot Town. I heard from a long lost cousin who helped me pinpoint where in Maryland my family was — not far from Jae’s family, then another lady from Arizona wrote me clear out of the blue, right after my cousin wrote, talking about her Blackfoot family in the same area as me and Jae. Her family carries the story that they’d escaped from Virginia. Jae’s source mentioned something about an escape as well.
Since that time, Bess supplied us with the historical texts concerning an aborted uprising planned by the Seneca and Tutelo in 1742, which was thwarted about July, in this region. There’s also the documentation that Dagborough, DE was known as Blackfoot Town, MD from 1740s to 1780s. That’s further to the coast than our families were, though I don’t know if anything in Maryland is very far from any other place in MD, plus our families turn up several generations later.
Now Jae has supplied all these names. I count nine names in her family that are intriguing with what’s either known or speculated about Saponi/Tutelo families! Who wants to help dig and see what can be found? This knocks my socks off.
I think if we could connect some of her family with other families either known or felt to be Saponi/Tutelo, we’d have something pretty hard to dismiss.
Jackson, Stewart, Green, McCready, Gale, Teagle, Holden, Milbourne, Collins, Williams, Johnson, Lane, Holden, Lloyd, Drummond, Benson, Bell, Waters, Handy, Hutt (Harmon), Smith (out of Moore County, North Carolina), Chambers (out of North Carolina), Hughes, Jones, Harris, Brittingham and Selby (out of Virginia).
Out of these surnames I have connections to Collins-Williams ( 2 separate lines)-Bell- Jones and possibly Harmon, all comming out of the Virginia/NC area durning the RW or shortly after.All of my lines found their way up into the mountains of West Virginia. I have never searched Moore Co. NC so I will be looking into this county. I would be wonderful to find that is where my Meredith Collins has been hiding but I won’t get my hopes up.
Brenda
Can you give us some details on where your Collins, Williams, Bell and Jones families were in VA/NC?
Hugh believed to be son of Jerimiah Williams
1. HUGH2 WILLIAMS was born 1767 in Va., and died Aft. 1850 in Nicholas Co. WVa.. He married JANE BELL 1781 in Rockingham,Va.. She was born 1769 in Greenbrier Co. Va., and died Aft. 1850 in Nicholas Co. WVa..
1. WILLIAM3 WILLIAMS was born 1794 in Greenbrier Co. Va.., and died 1869 in Nicholas Co. WV. He married (1) REBECCA HEATERS. He married (2) ELIZABETH JONES 1818 in Kanawha Co. WV, daughter of THOMAS JONES and LAVINAH THOMAS. She was born 1796 in Greenbrier Co. WV, and died 1882 in Nicholas Co. WV.
Earliest record on Meredith Collins was from old Fincastle County, Virginia 1776 entry into Fincastle militia at age 16. Fincastle County took in part of what is today Virginia,Kentucky, Tennessee, and the southern part of West Virginia. He enlisted the same day and same district as did George Collins, Lewis Collins, David Collins. When Fincastle was disbanded and it was divided these same men was found to be in the new Montgomery County Virginia militia (1777) with a John Collins Jr. Elisha Collins,
a son of Moses Riddle ( Indian from Pennsylvania County, Virginia) and a couple Sexton’s . These men stayed close together into the 1780’s.
I have no proof BUT: I believe that these Collins were somehow related to Old Thomas Collins who sold land on the Pumunkey River in Louisa Co. Va. as early as 1747 and moved across the border into what was Granville Co. /later Orange County NC. According to Jack Goins, Old Thomas’ daughter married Moses Riddle, the Indian. Old Thomas Collins and his sons were listed as Mullatoes living on the Flatt River in 1755. My Meredith wasn’t born until 1760 . Sure wish I could find the connection cause I know it is there.
Brenda
Is this web site of use? http://www.heite.org/index.html Has anyone posted this web site yet? I skimmed stuff on it. Might be relevant. I noticed that there was a record of someone from Dagsborough who looked Indian and a couple of familiar names mentioned along with a description of the almost-uprising that Bess alerted us to. Useful?
Cindy
From above article:
New Jersey legally recognizes Lenape organizations in Burlington and Cumberland counties. (Kraft 1986:241-243). A group known as Nanticoke-Lenape Indians of New Jersey, incorporated in 1978, includes many families from Kent County, Delaware. (Leni-Lenape Council 1996). The organization includes about 1,500 families today.
This is the area my TAYLOR line comes from. Crystal and I have discussed this many times. The Taylor line goes back to William Taylor and his wife “Senor”, who we believe is of Indian blood. The Taylors left that area and moved into Virginia around Winchester. Does anybody know anything about the Winchester, Virginia area?
Year age state remarks
1748 0 NJ Daniel was b. 18 Sept. 1748, near Newark, NJ.
s/o William and Senor Taylor
1749 1 NJ
1750 2 NJ
1751 3 NJ
1752 4 NJ
1753 5 NJ
1754 6 VA Daniel’s parents moved to Clearbrook, Fredrick
Co.,VA (mid 1750’s)
1755 7 VA
1755-1783 Winchester, Virginia
1783 35 VA Daniel returned to Fredrick Co. VA ( it is
thought that Daniel’s father may have died and
he went back to settle his estate.) 1784 36 VA Daniel is in
Frederick Co.VA
1785 37 VA Daniel is in Frederick Co.VA
1786 38 VA Daniel is in Frederick Co.VA
The names in my family are very interesting. More interesting are the photos that go along with the surnames. The Lane Family for many generations was unmistakably Native. The Jackson Family for the most part many members could be clearly marked as Tri-Racial. I called my cousin who remains in the area of Marumsco, she told me that two of her mothers brothers had different eye color. One brother had noticably hazel/green eyes and the other had gray eyes. Her mother, my grandfather’s younger sister had long black hair. Most people thought that Aunt Helen looked like an old indian. She had very distinquishing facial features, and she was small in stature. Aunt Helen died 5 days shy of her 100th birthday in 1999.
I attend every year theNanticoke/Lenape Pow Wow in New Jersey and the Nanticoke Pow Wow in Millsboro, Delaware. One particular year in 1990 I almost made a mistake of walking up to one of the elderly women of the Nanticoke People, to call her “Old woman”. It was the way I joked with Aunt Helen. On closer examination I realized that this woman was not MY Aunt Helen at all. But, she became one of the keys in doing my families research. In 1995 I started attending Church Services in Cheswold – there I ran into a gentleman that could pass for my uncles twin brother. Other people there looked like other family members, once again making me call my JACKSON bloodline into question. We have always had the Delaware Indian (Lenape) and Blackfoot Indian ID in our Jackson Family. It wasn’t until I ran into members of the Nause Waiwash people that the Hughes and Green names came into being identified also as Indian. Because of the location of my Green/Hughes Family members-it became easy to accept that these people were also Native, White and Black.
Here in Delaware there are several names you will find among the Nanticoke, Cheswold and Nanticoke Lenape People. The groups all have some type of bloodline tie to each other. Heite has researched them for years. He seems to be an expert on the groups. Names found among them are: Jackson, Wright, Clark, Harmon, Norwood, Street, Ridgeway, Sockum/Sackum, Durham, Seeney, Games, Gould, Coker, Sammons, and Morris. You will also find other names that are not extremely common, but do trace back to the people of these three communities. It is hard to tie to either group if your family did not remain in Delaware. Though some of my family names, characteristics and traits are clearly Nanticoke/Nanticoke-Lenape because my great great grandfathers group broke away and hid on Maryland’s Eastern Shore we cannot tie in a direct line of descendency to the people of Delaware or New Jersey. Even though there are 3 Native American Associations or active bands of Indians on Marylands Eastern Shore we do not tie to either of them. Though some of our names can be found among the Nause Waiwash, our family bloodline does not in anyway that I see, tie to them.
Just curious. Do your Lanes carry the Blackfoot ID? Mine comes from a ggggrandmother who was in Western PA whose name was McLane. She was an orphan, so I doubt I will ever determine her background. I wonder, if Lane was a Blackfoot name, if they changed it to McLane to disguise the native. The obit of one of her children claimed that she was Scotch-Irish. We know she was not. She smoked a pipe and claimed to never enter the home of a white man (go figure-as far as we know, her husband was white). Do your Lanes call themselves Blackfoot?
Cindy
The Lanes in my family are said to have come from Virginia, and settled on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, in the Marumsco/Shelltown area. If anyone wants to break out a map to see what I’m talking about – it makes what I’m saying easier to understand. The area that we lived in is along the Pocomoke Sound. We lived in the place directly across from Saxis, Virginia.
Coming out of the Sound, moving up the Tangier Sound, out into the Chesapeake, Edward Lane went up to Kent Island/Stevensville area in St. Mary’s County and took a wife by the name of Lucinda Briscoe. If anyone knows the History of that area, it was originally settled as a Trading Post in 1644. There white traders married Indian women to gain possesion of the land. In this area you found the Choptank, Piscataway, Nanticoke and the Sussequehanock, among others. I believe Indians from the Western Shore use to venture over and steer up trouble every now and then. But this was way before the time of Ed Lane and Lucinda….but, it was evident that their bloodline was clearly NDN.
The same theory of traveling the water took place when Pete Jackson took a wife from Nanticoke, Maryland. He traveled out of the Sound up the Chesapeake along the Nanticoke or Wicomico River an found a wife. He must have found a wife for his brother Issac as well since he married my great grandmother’s sister Charlotte.
In a couple of weeks I have asked to meet with the Lane Family. Their family historian has graciously agreed to meet with me. I am hoping I will gather more information on them at that time.
Hello,
Jae
I looked over your current and previous posts to see if I had anything in my files that might help. What follows is all that I have come up with at the moment.
I was wondering if you had tried to trace some of your family surnames back to local records covering the lower section of Sussex County near Dagsboro? If not, you may want to give it a try. In the past when I did some research in this part of the county, on “Blackfoot town”, I came across some of the surnames you mentioned: COLLINS, SELBY, GUMBY, JACKSON, BELL, GREEN.
Do you know what route the father of Edward Jackson (your gggfather) took when he returned to Delaware (1830s)? A correct answer to this question would greatly increase the possibility of finding him in Delaware records. You may have already considered this, but let me state it anyway: if he took the most logical route from Shelltown, he probably would have gone straight up the Pokomoke River. This would have taken him past the town of Snowhill (12 miles upstream) and past the border (DE/MD) to Pokamoke Swamp (ca. 25 miles up river). Here, in the middle of Pokamoke swamp, your gggfather would have entered the portage between the headwaters of the Nanticoke River and the headwaters of Pepper Creek, a tributary of Indian River. Today, this region would be centered along the 20-mile stretch between the towns of Broad Creek, Laurel, and Dagsboro, Delaware. However, in 1760s, Pokamoke swamp was an extremely remote area, and it was the property of John Dagworthy. He was granted this land after 1759 by the MD legislature for his service in the so-called “French and Indian war”(1755-63). Also, consider this, had you gggf returned to Pokamoke swamp (and not another region of Delaware further north) he would have come within a few miles of “Blackfoot town” which was about five miles east of the Swamp. Further, if he remained in the middle of Pokamoke swamp, he would have been standing on the of historic site of Winnasoccum, the location of the planned Indian uprising in 1742 where Tutelo, Seneca, Shawnee and Canoy met with Nanticike and “Indian River Indians” to plot against the British. If your gggfather Jackson‘s people actually grew up in this area, before locating in Shelltown, then there is a good possibility he was of Tutelo/Blackfoot and Lenni Lenape ancestry.
Of course, much of this is speculation. Yet there are some facts that suggest a possible connection that would warrant further research. When John Dagsworthy died in 1784, his LWT mentions a niece named Abigail BELL (1). In 1782 John Dagworthy sold to Levi Collings? (COLLINS) a parcel of land in Pokamoke Swamp. When Adrew Collins of the same area wrote his LWT in May, 1784 it mentions a daughter named Polly JACKSON (2), Other of your surnames such as SELBY, GREEN AND GUMBY were carried by families labeled as “white” and “colored” who occupied property in the 19th century that was formerly owned by Dagworthy or adjacent to his property. The property of William Green (European settler) was adjacent to Dagsworhty on the western front and was purchased by the state of MD to create the Broad Creek Reservation for the Nanticoke tribe in 1717. (3). Consequently, I think it would be prudent to look into the private and public papers of John Dagworthy’s family (and those connected to him) on file in Sussex County, DE and Worcester County, MD. You may not find Edward Jackson’s father, but you may get a lead in that direction.
Do you have any idea as to how the Cherokee ended up in your area in south Delaware? It may be that John Dagsworthy may have had a hand in their migration.
Notes:
(1) Sussex County, Arch vol. A68:1-3; Reg of Wills, Lib er D, folios 52-54
(2) Sussex County, Arch vol A65:129
(3) Thomas J Scharf , The History of Delaware. L.J. Richards Co.,(1888) Vol. 2:1285-1292
Good luck,
Bess Veney
Hi Bess…I have no idea where the Cherokee came from, but Mr. Holden is not the only one that told me of the Cherokee in the area of Shelltown and Marumsco. I am told that the Williams/Mumford Family also have a Cherokee Bloodline. It’s interesting that you shared all this information. I think it would still be too early for Edward’s father – since Edward was born around 1830. Though I’ve never been certain I have always believe that this is the route (as you mentioned) that Edward’s father tookto go back to Delaware. Our family through generations have never been to far away from the Pocomoke River. I never knew that the Selby’s were in Delaware. I suppose that’s where the name Selbyville came from. [talk about a Duh moment]. Selbyville is the neighboring town to Dagsboro. This information will be valuable when looking closer at my father’s family. Especially his grandparents: Ella Ellen Selby and Charles Harris.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
