[bhenderson25]

Hey just wanted to share a less lengthy version of my story since my previous one didn’t receive any feedback. My name is Broderick Henderson. My family oral history states that my great great grandmother Hester Kirby was a Blackfoot indian. She was born in Sampson County NC and according to census records her parents were born in NC as well but we don’t know who they were. My great grandfather Johnnie Edward Pugh-Kirby a.k.a Edward Kirby stated on his social security application he didn’t know his mother Hester’s maiden name and his father was a James Kirby. It was my great grandfather himself passing down to my aunt that his mother was Blackfoot and that he was also Cherokee but coming out of Sampson County, Cherokee could refer to Lumbee/Croatan or Coharie as result of the state assembly. Hester was listed as a Kirby in the Cohabitation Records when her marriage to a Carey Pugh was recognized. Looking to connect with any Kirbys.

[tl842]

Hello.  I can see your original post by going to the “replies created” section of your profile page but the website wouldn’t let me respond to it.

Your reasoning that your family’s oral history of Cherokee ancestry could come from either Cherokee or other tribal lineages makes sense.  It has seemed to me at times while researching that the Cherokee term occasionally became a “catch-all” way of describing Native ancestry even if a person’s tribal lineage may be from other tribes.

I also remember seeing references to groups of Cherokee that dispersed in many different directions from western North Carolina in the early to mid-1800s, such as a comment made on this forum by the Four Cats user in this thread mentioning Cherokee descendants being “in every part of North Carolina at times.”

https://saponitown.com/forums/topic/hickman-rickman-goins/

I see in your original post that you said that the parents of your specific ancestor who communicated Cherokee ancestry were enslaved in Sampson County on the plantation of Francis Pugh.  However, it’s possible that there is Cherokee ancestry in your family from one of these groups that moved to various parts of North Carolina, one of these places possibly being where your ancestors were in Sampson County.

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