Gibsons and Goins

 Gibsons & Goins

         

 

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November 1741 the court presented George Gibson and George Gibson, Jr., for not going to church.  In July 1745 Phillis Goeing (Gowen) petitioned him concerning her children, but he failed to answer the petition so the court ordered the churchwardens to bind them out. (It is likely this George Gibson Sr., is the son of Gibby Gibson who left the 1727 will in Charles City County and brother of Gilbert Gibson in Louisa County, George Jr., is likely the father of Phillis Goeing's children. George Gibson appears in Louisa Co., with Thomas about this time.)

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Merchant's Account Book: Hanover County, Virginia 1743-44

Magazine of Virginia History

Michael Gowing Jr.
David Gowing
Edward Gowing
Michael Gowing Sr.
Thomas Gibson
Gilbert Gibson

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Granville—Willm Eaton Esqr Coll: of Granville county His Regimt consists of 8 companys 734 besides officers 2 Captns Simms & Jones are moved away the others Resigned He thinks the fines on delinquents should be fixed by a Court Martial. No arms or ammunition in the Stores There are about 12 or 14 Sapona men and as many women & children in the county ( Report concerning the militia in each county of North Carolina 1754  Volume 05, Pages 161-163)

Muster Roll of the Regiment in Granville County under the Comand of Col. William Eaton as taken at a General Muster of the said Regiment 8th October 1754 William Person, Lieut. Col. James Paine, Major 

 

78. Thomas Gowen, Malatto

79. Michael Gowen, Malatto

80. Edward Gowen, Malatto

81. Robert Davis, Malatto

82. William Burnel, Malatto

20. William Chavers Junior, Negro

21. William Chavers, Mul. ( William Chavers/Chavis is wife is the daughter of Gibby Gibson, sister of Gilbert Gibson in Louisa County, Va., and widow of George Smith)

22. Gilbert Chavers, Mulatto

It seems if there were 12-14 Saponi men on the lands of William Eaton that those above identified as 'Malatto' listed in his Muster Roll are very likely the Saponi men.

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''After remaining a short time in North Carolina Captain Baxter marched back to South Carolina and joined Colonel Culp who joined General Francis Marion. After a few months service under Colonel Culp, he Colonel Culp returned home and was killed by the Tories said to be commanded by Mike Gowen and Thomas Gibson. Captain Baxter  immediately went in pursuit of them, we found Mike Gowen at Cade's Mill in Robeson County in this State & he was shot.''

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''At the Rockdale mills, there lived some free mulattoes by the name of Turner, who were Tories and very wicked. The troops engaged in this expedition, having been disbanded, and Captain Culp having gone home, some of these mulattoes followed him to his own house, called him out at night, and accused him of whipping one of their brothers. He refused at first to come out, and they threatened to burn the house; but still he refused, until they began to apply the fire; then he came out between two young men, one on each side, holding them by the arms, and begging for his life; but the Turners told the young men that, If they did not wish to share the same fate with Culp, they must leave him. They did so; and he was Immediately shot down in his own yard. It is said that they not only murdered him, but his family also, and then burned his house, which stood about a mile below Hunt's Bluff. Old Major Pouncey's wife was Culp's daughter...."

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''Deponent was on his way to join General Gate's army (under Command of Capt Hathorn) and was within hearing of the Cannon at the battle at Camden South Carolina but before they reached the field of battle his Capt heard of General Gate's defeat and retreated towards North Carolina and In their way fell in with a party of Tories with whom they had a hot skirmish; this he says was on Big Pedee near Mares Bluff [sic, Mars Bluff] that there were a good many of the tories killed on that occasion; he says he had a brother Nathan White who was a regular soldier in General Gate's army; the deponent was with Gates' army a few days before his defeat and General Gates was pointed our to him by his brother; he cannot state why they were not in the battle of Camden. On the retreat of Capt Hathorn's company on the south side of Big Pedee they encountered a small body of tories under command of Capt Thomas Gibson and defeated them. That from great length of time and very imperfect memory deponent cannot recollect all the incidents of the war. He was with his company under Command of Capt Hathorn and another Company under command of Capt Clayton in a severe skirmish with the tories at Kelly's cowpens in South Carolina; that he removed to South Carolina Saint Bartholomews Parish in Colleton District about the eleventh or twelfth of March one thousand seven hundred and ninety and has resided in the said Parish and District from that time to this.''

http://www.southerncampaign.org/pen/r11401.pdf

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Marion County, South Carolina

William Middleton Sr. left a sizeable estate (worth about 4,000
pounds not counting land), inventoried and appraised by William
Middleton, Jr., Gideon Gibson, Sr., and Gideon Gibson, Jr. on April 24,
1773. An interesting list of debtors to the estate includes:
Wm Alston due the Estate for Pork......55"--"-
Gideon Gibson Sr Note to the Estate...157"--"-<-----------------------------
George Gibson due to the Estate........26"--"-<-----------------------------
John Berry by Acct due the Estate.......5"--"-
Jordan Gibson Sr. Acct.................17"--"- <----------------------------
Benj. Blackmans acct.......96/3
Peter Keighleys acct.......25/
Isaac Nevils acct..........L 5
Thomas Brewintons acct.....60/
Frederick Jones acct...... L 10
Jacob Goings acct dues said Estate......7"10"- <----------------------------

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1785. Will of Moses Bass of Prince Georges Parish, George Town Dist, Province of SC, being indisposed in Body.... to MOURNING GOING, dau of JACOB GOING, one cow marked with a cross & over bit & undr bit in one ear and cross & whole under nick in the other ear; to SARAH GOING, dau of JACOB GOING, one cow marked in the above mentioned mark; to ELIZABETH GOING, dau of JACOB GOING, one cow marked with a cross & undr bit & over bit in each ear and branded ME; to ANNE GOING, dau of JACOB GOING, one heifer marked with a cross and under bit & over bit in each ear branded ME; to CYNTHA GOING, dau of JACOB GOING, one heifer yearling marked with a cross & over bit & under bit in each ear & branded ME; to my beloved cousin Jeremiah Bass, tract of 100 ac granted to John Smith, and one negro named Peter, one negro woman named Fann, one negro boy named Jack with their increase; my wife Elizabeth Bass to have the use of said plantation & tract of land granted to John Smith her lifetime and the use of negroes Peter, Fann & Jack & their increase her life time; to my beloved cousin Wright Bass, the plantation, mill, & tract of land containing 444 ac that I now live on, one negro woman Jane, my wife Elizabeth Bass to have the use of the plantation, mill & tract of land and negro woman her lifetime; to Henry Harison, son of James Harison, one negro woman Cate & increase, my wife to have the use of the negro woman her lifetime; to JOSEPH GOING, JUNR, one negro girl named Judah & increase, my wife to have the use her life time; to my beloved wife Elizabeth Bass, one negro man named Jack, one woman named Florah, one woman named Nan, one boy named Isum, one boy named Roger, and my cattle, about 110 head, branded ME, all my stock of horses & mares, all my household furniture & plantation tools, 26 head of sheep, and my hogs, also negro girl Violet; to JACOB GOING, a plantation of 50 ac granted to John Crawford; I appoint my wife Elizabeth Bass and my friend Luke Whitefield and James Harison, executors, dated 28 Feb 1777. Moses Bass (M) (LS), Wit: Malachi Murfee, Jeremiah Bass (x), Right Bass. A true copy taken from the original and examined by Hugh Horry, Ordinary G Town Dist. Whereas I, the within named Right Bass, am the eldest son of Edward Bass deceased, who was eldest brother of the within named Testator Moses Bass, which said Moses Bass departed this life without issue, whereby I, said Right Bass became his heir at law, and I am willing that all the several devises & bequests in the said will should have full effect, for the memory of my deceased uncle Moses Bass and for the several devisees in the within will, and five shillings, I confirm all the devises, legacies and bequests, 9 Nov 1785. Right Bass (LS), Wit: Chas Cotesworth Pinckney, Wm Smith. Proved in Charleston Dist by the oath of Charles Cotesworth Pinckney 28 Jun 1786 before Dl. Mazyck, JP. Rec 28 Jun 1786. S-5, 283-284. (Holcomb, SC Deed Abstracts, 1783-1788, Bks I-5 thru Z-5, 1996. SML 975.7 Hol)

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August 1788. On motion of W. Avery, Esqr. atto. for Thomas Going for obtaining letter of administration on the Estate of Elizabeth Bass, decd. ordered that the same be laid over until next term, for proof of sanguinity [kinship, blood relationship] & that a dedimus potestatem [a commission to take testimony] issue in favour of said Thomas Going to Anson & Richmond Counties & to the State of South Carolina by giving fifteen days notice to Jeremiah Bass of the time & place where such testimony will be taken, ditto for Levi Bass to South Carolina giving Thos. Going fifteen days notice at least."

Bulletin of the Watauga Association," Volume 10:

 

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 Greene County had been formed in 1783 with land taken from Washington County. In 1788, "Thomas Goin" applied to the County Court of Greene County for the administration of the estate of Elizabeth Bass, according to "Bulletin of the Watauga Association," Volume 10: 

 [ In 1788, Thomas Goin sold his land in Greene County and moved westward to newly created Hawkins County, Tennessee from which Claiborne would be created in 1801. Thomas Goin didn't come to Claiborne County; the county came to him. He appeared there as a taxpayer, along with his sons, Levi Goin and Uriah Goin on Big Barren Creek in 1799.]   http://freepages.rootsweb.com/~famtrees/genealogy/GOIN/thomas_1.htm

October 14, 1788. Know all men by these presents that I Edward Gowen of the County of Granville for divers good causes and considerations thereunto [me] moving more especially for the sum of £25 to me in hand paid, the receipt of which I do hereby acknowledge, hath bargained, sold & made over, and by these presents, do bargain, sell and make over to my nephew, Thomas Gowen all the estate, right and interest I have or hereafter may have to the estate of Elizabeth Bass, deceased, or any part thereof, and do hereby make over the same to the said Thomas Gowin, his heirs and assigns from the claim of me, the said Edward Gowen or any other person whatever claiming under me. In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand & seal the 15th day of October, 1786.

Edward Going

Witnesses:

Henry Meghe

Allin Hudson

Jhn. [X] Simmons"

John Simmons later appeared in Granville County Court to prove the deed of "Edward Gowing" to "Thomas Gowing," according to "Court Minutes of Granville County, North Carolina, 1746-1820," page 28 by Zoe Hargett Gwynn.

Granville County Will Book 2, page 79.

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"Thomas Going" was mentioned in "Brunswick County, Virginia Court Order Books, 1737 & 1749." An index listed him in volume I, page 254. Other individuals who appeared in the index include : "Anne Going, Volume 1,pages 321, 353 and 379; Drury Going, Volume 1, page 302; Edward Going, Volume 3, page 388; Elsoner Going, Volume 1, page 302; John Going, Volume1, page 254; Michael Going, Volume 2, pages 37 and 78; William Going, Volume 3, page 102 and 202, William Going, Planter, Volume 3, page 204[2] and Mary Gowing, Volume 1, page 302."

See: Thomas Goins of Claiborne County, Tennessee

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John Gowen appeared as the head of a household in the 1790 census of Georgetown District, Prince George Parish:

==O==

Lucy Gowen appeared as the head of a household in the 1790 census of Georgetown District, near John Gowen's location in Prince George parish. Her family was composed of five females. She may have been the widow of Jacob Gowen and the mother of his many daughters.

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1804 Sumter County Deed... S.C. Marion Dist. Levi Gibson appeared, saith that he was personally acquainted with a certain elderly woman by the name of Franky Going or Taylor. That from her appearances he had cause to believe that she was not of Ethiopian extraction. She was generally reputed to have proceeded from the Indian. He was also acquainted with a certain Gowen Taylor who was said to be the son of aforesaid Franky Taylor and he never was considered in any other way than to have derived from the Indian extraction. Hardy Crawford attested to oath.

Hardy Crawford was married to Rhoda Gibson who is either dau of Jordan or Gibson --

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John Gowen Sr. of SC to Solomon Page of Marion Dist.. 3 parties of land containing 250ac on Ashpole Swamp one tract 150 ac being granted to Ignatious Flowers 14 Ap 1774, one other tract 50ac granted to Archable Odom 6 June 1785--Line runs up *Ashpole Swamp to ....... the three tracts near of adj each other and include where John Gowen SR. lives. John Gowen Sr. [His mark] Wit; John Ford, Benj Rawls, proved before Robert Moody Qu 9 Jan 1808 Nancy Gowing [her mark] rdr 12 Oct 1804 before Jesse Bethea JQ .. Rec 7 June 1810

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See also   Rockingham County Indians - Goinstown             

Molungeons 1883

 Weekly Public Ledger [Memphis, Tennessee

October 2, 1883

"MOLUNGEONS"

An Interesting Question Relative to Persons of Mixed Extraction

Nashville American, 25

One of the State officers yesterday received the following letter from the County Superintendent of Schools of Polk County:

Benton, Tenn., Sept 22

Dear Sir:

Please inform me relative to persons of mixed or negro blood. What amount or degree of negro blood by law prohibits them from entering and being taught in the common free schools of the county, when they have been enrolled by the common school directors as colored scholars?  Please write me by mail and you will very much oblige, yours truly 

F. P Kanester

The question asked in this letter seems a rather strange one, but in the light of some information furnished an American reporter by an East Tennesseean its pertinency is apparent.  This gentleman said that there are in the counties of East Tennessee and western North Carolina a class of persons called by the common people of the country "Molungeons."  They are of dark complexion, and evidently of mixed blood.  They claim that they are of Portuguese descent and not of negro extraction.  In one of two instances writs of mandamus have been issued against county superintendents of schools to enforce the admission of these persons to white schools. 

The same question entered into an important suit where the heirship of an estate was at issue.  One side tried to invalidate a certain marriage by proving that the husband was of negro blood, and hence could not legally marry a white woman  Witnesses were brought from North Carolina, where the man formerly resided, to prove that he had always been regarded there as a "Molungeon" or a person of Portuguese extraction.  The attempt to prove negro blood was ineffectual and the suit was decided on this point.  [This is the case against the daughter of Solomon Bolton, granddaughter of Spencer Bolton born 1735 on the Pee Dee River] See Below

CELEBRATED MELUNGEON CASE http://www.historical-melungeons.com/case1.html

THE TRIAL http://www.historical-melungeons.com/trial.html

Dothan

Malunjin Indians living in Albama, early 1800s

Dothan Eagle (Dothan, Alabama)
27 Oct 1953

Mystery Of Malunjin Indians Baffles All Making Efforts Toward Solution

The Malunjin Indians - they walked the earth as late as 1865 - were quite a problem for those who have been helping put together the Houston County story.

Where they came from and where they went, nobody seems to know. The Malungjins carried their knowledge to the grave where most of it is preserved.

Oscar L. Tompkins, author of Wiregrass Sagas, gives the reader a fleeting glimpse of this tribe - but no more.

He points out that the Malunjins were a "mixed breed community, residing some three to six miles northeast of Dothan."

"Where they dispersed to is the limbo of forgotten men," Tompkins declares.
Tompkins got his trace of the Indians from the late B. P. Poyner, born near the Malunjins' community.  Some of them used to bring milk to Mr. Poyner's mother while he was quite young.  He could remember them.

The Poyners lived in the rural area of Houston County between Webb and Kinsey.
B.P. Poyner, Jr., Dothan businessman could shed little light on the Malunjuns- although baffling - were more truth than fiction, Eagle chroniclers fanned out their search.
It even led to the Alabama Bureau of Archives and History. But the letter from there was as blank as the stares most people gave when you asked the stock question:
"Did you ever hear of the Malunjin Indians who used to live in Houston County?"

An Eagle reporter even interviewed a 104-year old man who spent most of his adult life in Kinsey.  His memory failed him on the Malunjin subject and the search continued.

Did you ever eat any Malunjin bread? Or did you call it "syrup cake?"

The Malunjins were noted for this mixture of flour, egg, milk, seasoning and syrup-instead of sugar.  This suggests that they made a meager existence.  Syrup being more plentiful than sugar and less expensive, was an ingredient that found its way into much of the Malunjin squaw's cooking.

Exactly whether the Malunjins gave the Wiregrass cook this syrup cake delicacy can't be substantiated by records. But many believe they were the first to make syrup cake.   
And Malunjin bread still graces many a table, not always because the family can't afford sugar but because a good slice of syrup cake has no substitute.

When the white man moved into this territory to settle-the Indians notwithstanding-he left only two tribes unmolested, according to Tompkins' Sagas.

One was the Uchees or Emasees, kinsmen of the Creeks or Seminoles who lived at the mouth of the Emmassee (O'Mussee or Mercer) Creek near Columbia.

Part Indian

The other was the Malunjins of the 1860s. 

The Emassees were friendly to the whites throughout Alabama's territorial days which might explain why whites spared them.

The Malunjins were part Indian and part white which apparently explains why the whites spared them.

But where they came from-where they went, nobody seems to know.
Did you ever hear of the Malunjin Indians who used to live in Houston County?"

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The families living in Dothan Alabama in early 1800 were the GIBSONS, BUNCH CUMBO LOWERY etc...  They were from South Carolina, not East Tennessee

Will Allen 1890

What Do You Know About The Melungeons?
Nashville Banner - August 3 1924
By Douglas Anderson

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In the summer of 1890 "Will Allen" visited a settlement of "Malungeons" on Newman's Ridge, in Hancock County, and printed two articles in the American descriptive of the inhabitants and the way they lived.

Many of the Malungeons claimed Portugese and Cherokee descent. One man claimed to be the grandson of a Cherokee chief. The inhabitants were of all colors, and there was a black man who had a white wife, but escaped punishment by insisting upon his Portugese blood.

They all lived in rude huts; many were immoral and all were filthy. They grew tobacco, had orchards, and were much given to distilling. They had their herb doctors and charmers, and blood beads that would cure any disease of the blood. Collins, Mullins, and Garvin were the three family names represented in the settlement. During the Civil War, it was stated, this settlement was a terror to the women in "the valley", by reason of plundering and thieving expeditions.

CONTROVERSY STARTS

"Will Allen's" first article was printed in the American of Aug. 31. It was followed by quite a discussion, which revealed the existence of other settlements of Malungeons in different sections of Tennessee, and afforded several correspondents an opportunity to express their opinion of the origin of the name and tribe, but added nothing of a positive nature to the knowledge of either subject.

Hon. J. A. Cartwright, later circuit judge, wrote of a settlement in the Twenty-fourth district of Davidson County, as follows; "These people have black hair, dark brown complexion, are readily distinguishable from the mulatto, being evidently of different origin, and have distinct features, quite similar to those described by Will Allen. They are illiterate, live in cabins and subsist by their labor, mainly by cultivating the soil in a small way.

"There is no social connection between them and their neighbors, either white or black, but they remain seperate, distinct and isolated. The citizens of that vicinity called them Portugese. "Some years ago when the county schools were organized and put into operation these people were sufficiently numerous to require of the school commisioners a seperate, distinct school for their children, and furnished as many as thirty pupils exclusively of their own race. This school was distinct from the schools of the district and was attended by the children of no other people. Is this strange unknown remnant of a tribe or race a part of the Malungeons?"

SAID THEY WERE MULATTOES

In the American of Sept.7, "Twenty-fourth district" insisted that the Malungeons were an admixture of the white, Indian, and Negro races. He protested against "coining a new name for these amalgamationists." (If the Malungeons had heard of this last word they would have thought a new word had been coined for them.) "Will Allen" need not have gone to East Tennessee to find these people, observed this correspondent. "They are here under the very dome of the capitol. We recognize them as mulattoes on account of the fusion of Negro blood in their veins. When the fusion is slight they set up a claim of superiority and call themselves Portege, but, as Will Allen says, it is a mystery where the Portugese comes in. This will remain a mystery until better ethnologists enter the lists than have yet appeared. The Negro blood can easily be traced, as also sometimes the Cherokee." The correspondent stated that "we have just a few of these mulattoes among us", and denied Cartwright's statement that they had demanded and obtained a seperate school.

CARTWRIGHT COMES BACK

In the American of Sept. 10, Cartwright answered "Twenty-fourth District", taking the position that "if there were no Portugese blood in them, as your correspondent denies, but Negro blood instead, then they are a mixture of Indian and Negro alone, and consequently we cannot 'recognize them as mulattoes'. So that any mixture which is not between the white and the Negro alone may well be called Malungeon, this word being apparently derived from the French Melanger, to mix, mingle.

Consequently the criticism on the coinage of a new word to represent a mixture otherwise than between white and Negro is not well taken." "I am reliably informed," Cartwright continued, "that there is or was a family of these people in the Twenty-fourth district whose name is Collins, and it is a significant fact that both the East Tennessee and Davidson County people repudiate the mulatto idea, and according to my information, keep themselves seperate and distinct from the Negro in their social relations."

As to the statement that a seperate school was at one time maintained for Malungeons in the Twenty-fourth district, Cartwright stated that he got the information from the man who was county superintendent of education in 1870-71. He adds that the seperate school had thirty pupils and was taught by a white man named "Oldham or Oldman".

SLAVES AND MALUNGEONS

In the American of Sept. 14, "C.H." wrote that he had heard of the Malungeons from his father's Negro slaves long "before the war", and he anxious to know if such people really existed or not; have thought perhaps it was only a myth hatched in (?) adds: "Since childhood I have been (?) the very fertile brain of our imaginative Negro nurse, who used to entertain us with stories of the Malungeons, ghosts, hobgoblins, Br'er Rabbit, Br'er Fox, etc.

They would frighten us by saying: 'If you don't behave the Malungeons will get you', and if angry with one another they would say: "You are as mean and low-lived as a Malungeon, and you are nothing but an Ish anyhow.' When we would ask who the Malungeons or Ishes were they said they were runaway Negroes who had married Indians and their children, and that the Negroes belonging to quality folks would not associate with them; that Negroes who belonged to poor white folks would sometimes visit them. Most of the Negroes, both blacks and mulattoes, held these Malungeons in great contempt. These things come back to me after forty years, when I heard the Negro slaves of my father tell stories of their meanness. They were always insulted if called a Malungeon".

"J.W.S." OF MURFREESBORO.

In the American of Sept. 14, "J.W.S." of Murfreesboro combated the idea that the Malungeons were merely mulattoes, saying in part that "a race of mulattoes cannot exist long like these Malungeons have. They go from mulattoes to quadroons and from these to octoroons. Then the race stops. Who ever heard of an octoroon woman bearing children? There is not a case on record, so that if these people are or were mulattoes, as these critics would have you believe, the race would have been extinct long ago, as no children have been born of women springing from mulattoes, beyond the quadroon mother, and it seems that some of these Malungeon women have as many as seventeen children, who, if they had come from mulatto parentage, would long ago have passed the octoroon stage.

This fact alone shows they do not descend from mulatto parents, and therefore they must be Malungeons or some other race besides mulattoes, "There are, no doubt, many citizens living in Tennessee now who remember that quadroon and octoroon women were not as ready sale, except for house servants (mostly on orders then), as the black women, and all on account of the fact that no children were ever born of an octoroon woman".

OTHER SETTLEMENTS

In the American of Sept. 15, Dan W. Baird wrote of the Malungeons, in part, as follows:

"Several families are still to be found in Smith, Wilson, Rutherford, and Davidson Counties. There is nothing in their family names to give the student of ethnology a clue to their origin. In a locality in Wilson County known forty years ago as 'Malungeon Town', the most common names were Richardson, Nickens, and Collins. In Rutherford County not far from Lavergne, the principal Malungeons were Archers, Lanterns, and Blackmans. One of the latter family has sold fish in the north end of the market house in this city (Nashville) for many years, and some of the same family reside a few miles out on the Nolensville Turnpike. "A pretty fair speciman of the Malungeon tribe is a young fellow named Bernice Richardson, now serving a life sentence in the state prison for self-confessed complicity in the murder of M.T. Bennet of Lebanon.

"We need not go outside this county to prove that the Malungeons are, or were, up to the close of the war, a people distinct from and not allied by blood to either the white, Negro, or Indian races of this state. "It is a subject of no practical importance at this time, but it will interest many who have the leisure and opportunity for such investigation to trace the history and origin of this people. All that they seem to know of themselves is that they are Malungeons and of the Portugese descent. These two points have been agreed upon for more than three-fourths of a century, and it appears that anyone who undertakes to investigate the matter will be forced to accept them as established facts... " It is not a violent conjecture to suppose that many of these 'Mountain Negroes' may have been put ashore on the coast of North Carolina by the Portugese pirates who are known to have frequented those waters, and that their natural instincts would lead them to the mountains...At any rate, these people were first noticed in the mountains of Tennessee and North Carolina and they called themselves 'Malungeons' and claimed to be Portugese."

BOLLING OF RABBIT HOLLOW.

In 1879, a man named Bolling, or Bowling, lived with his large family of small children in a rude hut on the Rabbit Hollow lane, near Saundersville, whence he came or whither he went desponent saith not.

Possibly he was a fisherman. He was reputed to be a Malungeon, and he may have admitted that he was. He was certainly something out of the ordinary in the way of breeding, as shown by his dark brown complexion and long, stringy, shiny Indian-like hair. Bolling's peculiar features attracted much attention and comment, and in explaining to the uninformed what a Malungeon was, the wise ones said that he was a Portugese, or had Portugese blood in him. Perhaps it may have been said also that Bolling and other so-called Malungeons had Indian blood in them. "My recollection of Bolling is very clear, and from that recollection I would say that he would have little trouble borrowing a peck of meal in either an Indian or a Portugese camp. Judging from his name, he would probably have claimed descent from Pocahontas if he had ever heard if her.

The Tennessean (Nashville, Tennessee)

September 9, 1890
A QUESTION OF PRIVILEGE

Will Allen Comes Back at Her Critics in Gallant Style

To the Editor of The American

Referring to the anonymous correspondence in Sunday's AMERICAN, I wish to say a word concerning the peculiar race of people occupying an isolated ridge in eastern Tennessee. The writer seems to think because he did not see the Malungeons they cannot exist.  I take it he has never seen Jesus Christ, yet we are reliably informed that he did and does exist.  As to the coinage of the name, it is not mine, and in an article sent to THE AMERICAN last Friday, and which has not yet appeared, I made mention of this fact. They do not exist, however "under the shadow of the capitol," in spite of the emphatic ignorance which (pardon slang) sits so crushingly down upon everybody else's opinion.

If the writer will take the cars to Chattanooga, Knoxville, Lone mountain, then get a horse to Mulberry Gap, then Sneedville and sit on the court-house step half an hour, he will soon discover whether or not the Malungeons are mulattos. In case he should decide affirmatively I should advise him not to make the announcement until he is well out of Hancock county.

If, as he says, the Malungeons are mulattos it is a blot upon the name of Tennessee; a disgrace so black that morality would hide her face, and, shrieking. leave the world forever, for these people have children of white mothers, fathers of white blood, and sons who would silence forever the tongue that dared to call them mulattos.

I send with this a picture of one of them, Calloway Collins, who declares his father was a full-blood Cherokee. Calloway is an Indian if ever one lived on Tennessee soil. The picture was drawn by Mr. Thos. M. Sharpe of Nashville, and is exceedingly well done.  Calloway was a soldier belong to the First Tennessee under Brownlow and Johnson, and today draws a pension for three bullet wounds.  His daughter Dorcas [one of Mr. Sharpe's drawing speaks for herself.  The family group is from life.  We visited this family with Mr. John Tyler, the brother of Hon. H.S. Tyler of Sneedville.  I send the pictures along with this, and my anonymous critic can see them by calling at THE AMERICAN office.

The Malungeons need no defense from me  They can speak for themselves, and all Hancock county can speak for them  I first saw the name in the New York World, and many old gentlemen of Hancock county have corroborated the existence of the people and the correctness of the name. And the fact that one croaker rises to dispute their existence because he has not seen them does not in the least alter the fact of their existence.

I know nothing of the people referred to as living in the 'twenty fourth district.  I had intended visiting Mr. Cartright and asking him something of them, but work and business have prevented.  And now since an anonymous critic has entered his "protest," I presume I had best be quiet concerning them.  The people in East Tennessee, however, I shall insist upon their existence and for them deny the mulatto theory.  They live alone, mixing with none, and asking little.  If my critic will go and see, or will kindly sign his name, I will be very glad for any information he can give concerning them.

Will Allen. 

Will Allen's stay at the home of Calloway Collins, mentions Jordan Collins, they called him "Soft Soul"
THE LAST OF THE MALUNGEONS   


Articles and Newspaper Accounts
Will Allen's Articles

Mixed Families on Drowning Creek

50 Mixt Families

1754 Governor Dobbs requested reports from the militia commanders of North Carolina’s counties. The Bladen militia submitted the following: “Col. Rutherford’s Regimt. of Foot in Bladen County 441, a Troop of horse 36... Drowning Creek on the Head of Little Peedee, 50 families, a mixt Crew, a lawless People, filleth the Lands without patent or paying quit rents. Shot a surveyor for coming to view vacant lands being inclosed in great swamps. Quakers to attend musters or pay as in the Northern Counties. Fines not high enough to oblige the militia to attend musters. No arms stores or Indians in the county.” [Colonial Records of North Carolina, Vol. V, p161

These are some of the families reported by the Militia,  records show that these families who would later be called Lumbee, Melungeons, Redbones, etc., were, in fact, living on Drowning Creek - Pee Dee River area in 1754, many of them coming from Chippoakes Creek, Charles City County, Virginia.  

27 August 1753, John Johnson Jr. entered 100 acres in Bladen County, North Carolina on the north side of Pugh's marsh whereon John Oxendine was then living. (Bladen County Land Entries #805). In 1759 , he and two of his sons, John and Benjamin, lived in the Drowning Creek area of Bladen County, North Carolina which is the upper part of the Lumbee River area. [Oxendine later found on Newmans Ridge]

Moses Bass was living near "the drains of Drowning Creek" on 1 February 1754 when Robert Carver entered 100 acres there [Philbeck, Bladen County Land Entries, nos. 677, 934]

Thomas Ivey 300 acres on Drowning Creek where James Roberts formerly lived on 26 September 1755 [Philbeck, Bladen County Land Entries, nos. 974, 1048]. [Ivey found on Newmans Ridge]

Robert Sweat was granted 100 acres on Wilkerson Swamp near the Little Pee Dee River on 23 Dec 1754. This land adjoined the land of Joshua Perkins and was sold to Phillip Chavis.

Gilbert Sweat Case…21 Aug. 1829…St. Landry’s Parish LA… Testimony of Joshua Perkins – Gilbert Sweat was born about 1756 in what was then Marion Co. SC on the Pee Dee River. About the year 1777, Perkins helped Sweat run away with Frances Smith, the wife of J.B. Taylor. Sweat moved from SC to Tenn, to NC to Big Black River, Miss. And arrived in LA in 1804.

31 Mar 1753 Grant: To Daniel Willis, 300 acres in Bladen County on Saddletree Swamp adjacent Thomas Ivey [Colony of NC 1735-1764 Abstracts of Land Patents, Margaret M. Hofman, Vol. 1, p10, grant #111]

17 November 1753 Bladen County land which had been surveyed for Gideon Gibson in North Carolina on the north side of the Little Pee Dee River was mentioned in a Bladen County land entry [Philbeck, Land Entries: Bladen County, no. 904].

20 Feb 1754 Land Entry: Thomas Ivey enters 150 acres including his own improvements, on the 5 Mile Branch in Bladen County. [North Carolina Land Entries 1753-1756, A. B. Pruitt, Vol. 2, p127] (From BOB'S FILING CABINET)

Fayetteville, North Carolina --- Dec. 2, 1845 -- Extreme Old Age -- A writer in the Highland Messenger says he had just visited Spencer Bolton, a resident of Buncombe county, who is now almost one hundred and ten years of age! He was born (1735) on Big Pee Dee River, in South Carolina, and is still sound in mind and body. He was in several skirmishes under Marion in the Revolutionary war. Has been for 65 years a member of the Methodist Church. Health generally good. In early life, principal diet bread, rice, potatoes, and milk; slept on straw beds; generally up before day-light; and much accustomed to bathe in cold water. To the influence of these habits he ascribes his long life.

Spencer Bolton is father of Solomon Bolton who was identified as a Portuguese/Melungeon in 1874 court case.


CHEROKEE COMMUNITIES OF THE SOUTH ROBERT K. THOMAS

In the early 1760’s Indians, as families, began to move out of the Granville County area. Many went south into the region of Cumberland County, North Carolina around Fayetteville and then into present day Robeson County. (These were simply the first Indian settlers in Robeson County. They were later joined by the Hatteras from the coast and Cheraw from South Carolina. Robeson County became a refuge for “loose” Indians and Indian families from all over that region congregated there over the years.) Theses Granville County families who went south into Robeson County were the Chavis’, Locklears, Gibsons, Collins’, Goings’, etc. These are families that we are sure came from the area of Granville County, North Carolina. Some of these families may have been composed of a black or white man with an Indian wife, although there is fairly good evidence that Collins is a Saponi family name. The Gibsons moved on further south from Robeson County so that name is no longer found in Robeson County among the Indians there who are officially now called the Lumbees.

All these above families not only settled in Robeson County but also scattered further south and west through central South Carolina. In fact, in central South Carolina some names show up from that original northern center in Granville County which one does not find in Cumberland and Robeson Counties in that period. I presume that they came directly from Granville County into South Carolina. These are families like Taylor, Hicks, Bunch, and Strickland. Many of these northern migrants married into the Cheraw and Peedee and almost absorbed these native South Carolina tribes. Later in South Carolina other family names show up - Willis, Ware, Dial - who appear to be Indians of this same “northern” stock. However, we cannot find these family names in the north. These family names may have originated with blacks, whites, or native Indians who married into these scattered Indian Families.

http://www.historical-melungeons.com/rk_thomas.html

Bolton
http://www.historical-melungeons.com/bolton2.html

Chippoakes Creek
http://the-melungeons.blogspot.com/2016/09/

Portuguse Melungeons & Pee Dee

 
The Real Untold Story of the Melungeons

The Melungeons of the Pee Dee River

No matter what you've read, no matter where you read it, 

no matter what you have heard, no matter who has said it.  

There is but one documented case of Melungeons 

Swan Burnett who had been working with Doctor Gurley of the Smithsonian, and Doctor Pierce of Hawkins County, Tennessee read a paper before the Anthropological Society of Washington D.C on February 5,1889 on the Melungeons of Newmans Ridge which was published in numerous newspapers around the country.

On March 11th Mr. Lawrence Johnson of Meridian, Mississippi wrote to the editor of the ATLANTA CONSTITUTION. He recognized these people called Melungeons from his time in South Carolina, he was born 1821 and raised in Chester County, his grandfather had fought in the Revolution. He wrote;  

"Near a month ago an article appeared in The CONSTITUTION named Melungeons. I laid it aside in order to correspond with the writer, but the paper got destroyed and the name and address had not been noticed with care, and are forgotten. Excuse me then for addressing him through the same medium.

His name Melungeons is a local designation for this small peculiar race. Their own claim to be Portuguese is more generally known. Their original site is on the Pedee river in South and North Carolina . They were once especially strong in Georgetown and Darlington districts of the latter. 

Johnson doesn't mention Newman's Ridge, doesn't mention Hamilton County or even Wilson County but he had heard of the Melungeons, back when he lived in South Carolina.  

Dromgoole had had not been to Newman's Ridge, she had not written any articles on the Melungeons yet.  There had been a journalist in 1848, stayed at Vardy's Inn and wrote the Legend of the Melungeons of Newmans Ridge, the Portuguese Indians. And then there was the Solomon Bolton Case.

Spencer Bolton was the father of Solomon, born on the PEE DEE RIVER in 1735

Fayette Observer Fayetteville, North CarolinaNovember 22, 1845

Extreme Old Age -- A writer in the Highland Messenger says he had justvisited Spencer Bolton, a resident of Buncombe county, who is now almost onehundred and ten years of age! He was born on Big Pee Dee River, in SouthCarolina, and is still sound in mind and body. He was in severalskirmishes under Marion in the Rebolutionary war. Has been for 65 years a member of the Methodist Church. Health generally good. In early life, principaldiet bread, rice, potatoes, and milk; slept on straw beds; generally upbefore day-light; and much accustomed to bathe in cold water. To the influenceof these habits he ascribes his long life.

Hamilton County Tennessee 1874

Judge Lewis Shepherd defended descendants of 
Solomon Bolton, son of Spencer Bolton.

William McGill (Justice of the Peace, Hamilton County TN)

 Q. Was this character that of a white person or negro, or of what race did he have the character of being?

A. He was a mixed blooded man in some way, that was his character. We generally called them Malungeons when we talked about the Goins and them—the Goins that were mixed blooded. 

Rev. D. D. Scruggs

 Q. State to what race of people Bolton belonged, and state fully all the facts in connection with your acquaintance with him and his family?

A. He belonged to the Spanish race of people I think. I am positive that it was either Spanish or Portugese. I was Tax Collector in the District at one time and amongst other things I was required to levy a per capita tax on all Negroes and I recollect distinctly that it was not levied by me upon him. He, Bolton was a dark skinned man with very straight hair and long nosed, thin visaged man-At the time referred to when I was tax collector, some parties reported to me that Bolton was of mixed blood. Thereupon I proceeded to investigate the matter by calling in three citizens living in his neighborhood, among whom were a Mr. Young, Mr. Miles, and other to assist me in deciding the question; the decision was in favor of Bolton, to the effect he had no Negro blood in him. About the same time my attention was also called in an official capacity to a Mr. Dempsy who claimed to be a Portugese, and the decision in his case was that he was of mixed blood, but I gave him the right of appeal but he left the country. Bolton and Dempsey were not in any way connected.

Q. State whether or not you know of any of Bolton's family-- his father or other in the state of North Carolina or other place

A. I was in South Carolina once and saw his father. I knew most of his family. I was on business in South Carolina. His father, or a man claiming to be his father came to me to inquire after his son Solomon Bolton whom he said was living in this County

Q. State whether or not the father of Solomon Bolton was regarded and treated as a citizen of South Carolina, or as a colored man? You will also state his church relations-to what church he belonged and how he was received by society, so far as you were able to determine.

A. They told me there that he was a very respectable citizen there. I asked if he was not a colored man and they told me he was not, but was a Portagese. They told me that he was a member of Baptist Church there in good standing and was received in good society. I saw nothing to the contrary.

Q. How many different families in this County or adjoining Counties did you know of the same race or character of people -name them?

A. I don't now how many- several - but the Perkins- the Goins, Mornings, Shumakes, Menleys &other

Q. State whether or not you know a preacher named Dyke?  If so, where did he live, how was he related to Solomon Bolton, and what race of people did he belong to?  How was he treated and recognized in this and Hamilton County?

A. I knew the preacher Dyke, have heard him preach.  He lived some where about Kelly's Ferry Marion County.  I do not know the relation he sustained to Solomon Bolton.  I have heard he was a cousin, but don't know of my own knowledge how that is.  He claimed to be of the same race of people that Solomon Bolton claimed to be - Portuguese and Spaniard perhpas, I do not remember positively.

Arch Brown

Q. Describe the size, build, complexion and general appearance of Solomon Bolton?

A. He was a common sized man-rather chunky. He was dark complexioned, some said he was part negro, and some said one thing and some another, but he said he was a Portugese.

Q. Describe the complexion and general appearance of Bolton, the color of his hair, eyes and skin, and then state what race of people he belonged to, to the best of your opinion?

A. Bolton had dark hair-He was common sized man. He had dark skin. I cannot say I have an opinion as to his race. It was talked in the neighborhood that he was part negro, but he claimed he was Portugese.

Judge Lewis Shepherd won this case and it was upheld on appeal. Shepherd, when telling the story 'of his clients' he wrote;

• In truth, these people belonged to a peculiar race which settled in East Tennessee at an early day and in the vernacular of that country, they were known as “Melungeons, 

• South Carolina had a law taxing free Negroes so much per capita, and a determined effort was made to collect this of them.  But it was shown in evidence on the trial of this case that they always successfully resisted the payment of this tax, as they proved that they were not Negroes.  Because of their treatment, they left South Carolina at an early day and wandered across the mountains to Hancock county, East Tennessee; in fact, the majority of the people of that country are “Melungeons,:” or allied to them in some way. 

Many of these families living on the Pee Dee River in 1754 when they were identified as '50 mixt families' by the Militia had removed from Chippoakes Creek in Charles City/Surry County, Virginia. The Ivey, Collins, Gibson, Goins, Sweat, Chavis etc., are all found on Chippoakes Creek, Indian traders, trappers, packmen etc. The Core family of Gibsons, Melungeons of Newman's Ridge are kin to the Gibsons of the Pee Dee, proven by DNA. 

Tobias Gibson 

Tobias was born in 1771 to Jordan Gibson and Mary Middleton who lived on the Pee Dee River, brother of Gideon Gibson of the Pee Dee, removed to Natchez in 1781. These two have been confused with the older set of Jordan and Gideon brothers, the Regulator. 

 “His circuit embraced all the settlements on Watauga, Nollichucky, and Holston Rivers, including those in what is now Greene, Washington, Carter, Johnson, Sullivan, and Hawkins Counties, Tenn., and Washington, Smyth, Russell, and perhaps Scott and Lee Counties, Va., with one or two appointments on the head waters of New River, in Grayson County, Va., and Ashe County, N. C.” (Holston Methodism from 1783 to 1788, p. 94.

These families came over the mountains from South Carolina to East Tennessee, probably the same route the families had taken almost 30 years before on their way to Natchez .

Rev. John G. Jones-1867

...from memory and a few scraps of memoranda, what little I know of these three leading Gibson families. First; the parents of Rev. Randall Gibson came to the Natchez county (as it was then called), about 1781. In order to avoid the hostile Indians in what is now Western Georgia and Eastern Alabama, immigrants from the Carolinas traveled over land to the Holston River in East Tennessee, where they built family boats and descended the Holston and Tennessee Rivers, etc. Randall Gibson was then about fifteen years old, and I have heard him relate this fact in connection with an attack made on their boat by hostile Cherokee Indians.

These Gibsons were in East Tennessee on the Holston before their kinfolk were in Wilkes County. Note Tobias circuit the Watagua, Nolichucky,  and Ashe County, formed 1799 from Wilkes.  Tobias' cousin John Gibson, Indian trader, son in law of the Chickasaw trader and author of  The History of the American Indians was in Wilkes County in 1774 on the tax list of Benjamin Cleveland. 


NEXT - The Families of the Pee Dee


Celebrated Melungeon Case - The Petition  The Trial  The Story & Solomon Bolton

http://www.historical-melungeons.com/bolton2.html

The Legend

http://www.historical-melungeons.com/littels.html

Swan Burnett - Note on the Melungeons

http://www.historical-melungeons.com/swan.html

Tobias Gibson

https://tinyurl.com/y8uaxj6n

http://www.historical-melungeons.com/tobias.html

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