Virginia Archives – Page 3 of 38

Descendants of Veranus Filoon of North Bridgewater, MA

For several generation the family bearing the name of Filoon has live in Abington and North Bridgewater (now Brockton), where evidence of their thrift, solidity and respectability are manifest, and there also have lived the Bretty and Fullerton families, with which the more recent generations of the Filoons have been allied through marriage, the Brett family being one of the ancient families of the Old Colony and its progenitor an original proprietor of Bridgewater. This article is to particularly treat of the branch of the Filoon family to which belonged the late Veranus Filoon, who was long and prominently identified with the business and social circles of North Bridgewater and Brockton, and his son, the present Fred W. Filoon, who as his father’s successor is continuing the business with marked success, as well as the former’s brother, the present Henry H. Filoon, who has long been a leading and successful practicing dentist.

A Record of the Agee Family

James W. Agee wrote this pamphlet as a way to publish the vital records of every known Agee. Unfortunately, at the time of publication, he estimates to have received only a quarter of responses to the cards he sent out. Since he only asked for vital records, that’s all he presents in this manuscript. He claims all living Agee’s, except one, could claim descent from “the 24” who were the 24 children of James and Anthony Agee: Noah, James, Jacob, John, Hercules, Joseph, Rhoda, Ruth, Celia, Mary, Chloe, and Nancy, all children of James Agee; and Joshua, James, Daniel, Matthew, Jacob, John, Isaac, Joseph, Reuben, Anthony, Noah, and an unnamed daughter who married a ? Christian, all children of Andrew Agee.

Hart Family of Orange County NC

This is a self published manuscript of the Hart Family from Orange County, North Carolina.

The great ancestor of the Hart family in the United States emigrated from London about 1690 and settled in Hanover County, Virginia, where he died leaving an only son, Thomas Hart, who was about eleven years of age when his father arrived in Virginia. Of the elder Thomas little is known except that he was a merchant and probably late in life, a blind man. This manuscript begins with the son, Thomas Hart, Jr. who married Susanna Rice. After the death of Thomas Jr., Susanna and all of her children: Thomas, John, Benjamin, David, Nathaniel, and Ann, moved to Orange County, North Carolina.

Appalachian Colonists from the Mediterranean Basin

Throughout the Southeastern United States can be found “old families” in rural areas whose appearance is not quite the same as the European or African peoples who colonized the region, but also not what a person with substantial indigenous ancestry looks like either. In earlier times they might have called themselves Cajun, Black Irish, Redbone, Black Dutch, Portughee, Old Spanish, Melungeon or Part Injun. In more recent years they are likely to say that their great-grandmother was a full blooded Choctaw, Cherokee, Creek, Chickasaw, Catawba, Shawnee or Blackfoot. She may have been, but that is not always the case. Many … Read more

Cindy Henderson’s DNA Results

Split View of Cindy Henderson's Ancestry

My mother is of Irish/German and Italian ancestry. Her father is a 1st generation Italian, the family is from Abruzzo Italy. The colonial line, her mother who is partially Irish/German was from Roane, TN. Her (grandmother) father’s family is from Old Fort McDowell NC. They moved to the Tennessee area. My father’s maternal line, his mother was Black American and born NJ. Her father (my great grandfather), I don’t know his origins other than he was Black. Her mother (my great grandmother) was born in Washington DC and moved to NJ. My grandmother’s birth was the result of an extramarital … Read more

Captivity and Escape of Mary Inglis (Ingles) – Indian Captivities

The captivity of Mary Draper Inglis (Ingles) is a third person account of her captivity and eventual escape. Mary was captured by Shawnee Indians along with her two sons, and sister-in-law from Draper’s Meadow in 1755. She eventually made her escape, along with another dutch woman, a few months later. This is her story.

Genealogy of the Yeargan Family 1730-1890

“The Origin and Genealogy of the Yeargan Family: As Far As Heard From Up to This Date, 1890” is an early genealogy by Leonidas Hilary Yeargan and Hilary H. L. Yeargan. Published in Nashville, Tennessee, by the Publishing House of the M. E. Church, South, in 1891, this manuscript offers an account of the Yeargan family lineage as best the authors could research at the time. The primary aim of this manuscript was to document and connect the descendants of Rev. Andrew’s ten sons, grouping them into family units as they dispersed. Although some descendants remained unknown at the time of publication, the manuscript remains a valuable resource for understanding the Yeargan family’s roots and legacy.

North America Indian Names of Places in Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, and Louisiana

The Indians all over this continent had names, traditions, religions, ceremonies, feasts, prayers, songs, dances all, more or less, with symbolism and allegory, adapted to circumstances, just as all other races of mankind. But the world has become so familiar with the continued and ridiculous publications in regard to everything touching upon that race of people that a universal doubt has long since been created and established as to the possibility of refinement of thought and nobleness of action ever having existed among the North American Indian race, ancient or modern; and so little of truth has also been learned … Read more

Memoirs of the LeFlore Family

The Old Farm House: The Pioneer Home of a Choctaw Chief, Leflore, and of the Oak Hill School

The Cravat families of Choctaws are the descendants of John Cravat, a Frenchman, who came among the Choctaws at an early day, and was adopted among them by marriage. He had two daughters by his Choctaw wife, Nancy and Rebecca, both of whom became the wives of Louis LeFlore. His Choctaw wife dying he married a Chickasaw woman, by whom he had four sons, Thomas, Jefferson, William and Charles, and one daughter, Elsie, who married- a white man by the name of Daniel Harris, and who became the parents of Col. J. D. Harris, whose first wife was Catharine Nail, the … Read more

Prominent White Men among the Chickasaws

At an early day a few white men of culture and of good morals, fascinated with the wild and romantic freedom and simplicity of the Chickasaw life, cast their lot among that brave and patriotic nation of people. I read an article published in Mississippi a few years ago, which stated that a man by the name of McIntosh, commissioned by British authorities to visit the Chickasaw Nation and endeavor to keep up its ancient hostility to the French, was so delighted with the customs and manners of that brave, free and hospitable people that, after the accomplishment of his mission, he … Read more

Lord Dunmore’s War

The war in 1774 with the Indians, known as “Dunmore’s War” had its origin from the murders committed upon Indians by the Virginians in the region of the upper Ohio.

Early Exploration and Native Americans

De Soto and his band gave to the Choctaws at Moma Binah and the Chickasaws at Chikasahha their first lesson in the white man’s modus operandi to civilize and Christianize North American Indians; so has the same lesson been continued to be given to that unfortunate people by his white successors from that day to this, all over this continent, but which to them, was as the tones of an alarm-bell at midnight. And one hundred and twenty-three years have passed since our forefathers declared all men of every nationality to be free and equal on the soil of the North … Read more

Narrative of Mrs. Clendenin – Indian Captivities

Narrative of the Destruction of the Settlement of Green-Brier, Virginia, together with the capture and surprising conduct of Mrs. Clendenin, who was among those Who Escaped the Tomahawk of the Indians at that Massacre. After peace was confirmed between England and France in the year 1761, the Indians commenced hostilities in 1763, when all the inhabitants in Greenbrier were totally cut off by a party of Indians, headed by the chief warrior Cornstalk. The principal settlements were on Muddy Creek. These Indians, in number about sixty, introduced themselves into the people’s houses under the mask of friendship, where every civility … Read more

Narrative of the Captivity of of Mrs. Francis Scott – Indian Captivities

A True and Wonderful Narrative of the Surprising Captivity and remarkable deliverance of Mrs. Francis Scott, an inhabitant of Washington County, Virginia, who was taken by the Indians on the evening of the 29th of June, 1785. On Wednesday, the 29th day of June, 1785, late in the evening, a large company of armed men passed the house on their way to Kentucky, some part of whom encamped within two miles. Mr. Scott’s living on a frontier part generally made the family watchful; but on this calamitous day, after so large a body of men had passed; he lay down … Read more

Ethnology of the Powhatan Tribes of Virginia

Group of Pamunkey of a generation ago in dance costume.

In the Ethnology of the Powhatan Tribes Frank Speck completed the third of a series of monographs dealing with the modern cultural life of communities of descendants tracing their origin from the tribes inhabiting the Chesapeake tidewater area. The future student of American folk-communities of Indian descent will find here new tribes with new trait-complexes to analyze and interpret. These contributions represent some culture aspects of the humble groups who were at the time of writing of this paper, at a climax and turning point in their history. Replete with over 100 photographs and maps, and at least that many surnames, this paper proves its value to both the historic researcher and the genealogist.

Powhatan Featherwork

We now come to what is perhaps the most interesting topic in the material life of the southern tribes, the woven feather technique. An art so ancient and so elaborate can hardly be expected to have persisted from colonial times down to the present day where the process of deculturation among the conquered tribes has gone so far. But surprising as it is, the Virginia Indians have not entirely forgotten, nor even lost, the art of weaving feathers into the foundation of textile fabrics. The antiquity of the woven-feather technique is attested by virtually all the authors of the old … Read more

Powhatan Pottery

First let us look over the material from the Virginia tidewater area. Everywhere here from the southern boundary of Virginia by actual observation, north-ward even through the Delaware valley, the pot-sherds are almost identical in material, decoration and color. Holmes has appropriately called the ceramics of the tidewater “the Algonquian type.” On the Pamunkey, Mattaponi, Rappahannock, James, and Chickahominy rivers it is all the same, the rims, decorations, and ingredients being practically uniform within a certain range of variation.

Powhatan Agriculture

Chickahominy children cracking walnuts with stone mortar and pounder

A review of some agricultural practices of the Powhatan shows but a few traces of aboriginal Indian survival by the 1920’s.

Powhatan Canoes

Dugout canoe of the Pamunkey in course of construction.

The means provided by the Powhatan tribes for transporting themselves about in their marshy wastes was the dugout canoe. This article describes these canoes, their method of manufacture, and provides pictures of them and their paddles.

Powhatan Fishing Customs

Pamunkey fishermen returning from their nets.

The Powhatan tribes still adhere to some fishing practices worth mentioning. Until not long ago fish fences were employed. These were chiefly for sturgeon, but now this splendid fish is so scarce that whereas thirty years ago from three to six a day during July and August would be taken, now the record is three a season by six boats fishing the same period. Captain John Smith mentions 52 and 68 being taken ”at a draught.” The Virginia explorers noted the great abundance of sturgeon, and we may imagine that the fish contributed largely to the abundance of food of … Read more