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My father was adopted. We knew this. We were told our entire lives that grandpa was his father and a maid was his mother. We now know this is not true. And I found out that his sister was also adopted. The trail is a dead end as we only know his mother's name and she either gave the wrong name or was a ghost.
I have a nephew that lived in the same city I did that no one knew about. In fact, only my sister and myself know now. Not our place to surprise our two half brother nephews with yet another half brother(?) from a third unknown mother.
I'm not German. I'm Irish (over 40%) and Great Britain (over 30%). 5% western Europe. The weird thing is I found this out shortly before we spent 17 days driving around the southern half of Ireland.
Fascinating thread. I never come in here.
We had a family reunion about 5 yrs ago. Most of us were there from the paternal side. My mom is the youngest of 10 kids.
One of my cousins traveled to Mexico to inquire about our Mexican heritage.
We have a strong Catholic background of course.
Well, ggg grandfather crossed the Mexico border into Texas as a 10 yr old boy.
Took a bride later in life and had only 2 sons. He was buried next to an unknown man and no one knew where his wife was buried.
Big shocker to our Catholic Family, he was Jewish. The lighbulb went off in some of our heads as to why we preserved some of the rituals over the years, but no one ever talked about it.
His last name has roots from Spain and is a common name from the Spaniard/ conversion era.
So very sorry. I know how shocking it is to find out secrets like this later in life.
Where were your siblings growing up? Were they adopted out? My daughter was pregnant with my grandson almost 7 months before we found out and she didn't look pregnant unless she wore certain shirts. Same is true for her 2nd pregnancy, not many people knew she was pregnant. It sounds like your mother hid the pregnancy from you.
I was only six or seven so wouldnt have noticed anyway. back then children knew nothing about the birds and the bees, both were adopted out one in Dundee one in Glasgow. but cant find anything about the Glasgow one.
My mom's earliest patriarch on her maternal line and my father's earliest direct paternal ancestor were slaves belonging to the same extended family. Post-Civil War, the first went on to become an Exoduster in African American history. The other stayed in MS and purchased land in the 1890s where he was once a slave. The ancestor purchasing land could also read and write and all of his children were educated.
My mom's grandfather was murdered in MS in the 1920s.
I am distantly related to Silas Soule, at least on paper.
Another relative did some educational research with Booker T Washington.
Well, very little shocks me, but I do have a 3rd great uncle who came home from the Civil War only to be murdered by his father in law.
Apparently, his wife in his absence was overly friendly with a local gentleman and for whatever reason when he came home and his wife was living with her parents and her 3 kids, he agreed to meet her one night to discuss where they were moving into another house.
Instead, FIL, extramarital lover and hired hand showed up to first shoot and then club with a shovel my uncle to death and bury him in a shallow grave.
Next, uncles daughter made some remark if not for her grandfather, she would still have a father and apparently he poisoned her.
Then, the murder went undetected for about 10 years, until the hired hands conscience got the better of him and he spilled his guts.
Wow, very interesting... It's certainly possible we may be cousins I know the Chavis/Ivey/Busby proximity goes back to Virginia where all this mixed-race stuff seems to stem from for many of the related lines.
Specifically all these families that have mixed race people interacting (Chavis, Ivey, Busby, Gibson, etc) mostly tie back to Chipoakes Creek in Surry County, Virginia.
An interesting list of overlaps here (on top of the ones I've identified)
As it turns out my grandmother comes up with a small amount of high confidence Native American in lines unrelated to my African ancestry, though it leads back to an Andrew Russell born in the 1780s in South Carolina and a brother, cousin, or nephew Gibson Russell b. 1808 (a descendant of Gibson shares the same Russell DNA segment which includes Native DNA, also Gibson Russell is found living next to my Andrew in Alabama). They might lead back to Darlington Co., SC area where a lot of the mixed race and possibly tri-racial descendants of Gibsons and others ended up. Obviously with Gibson Russell's first name being what it is I wonder if I descend from the same the mixed race Gibsons on that line, my Native American segment would potentially then confirm they did have at least some Native DNA too.
It's a small world!
Not sure if this helps to know, but Chavis is very popular, old name in North Carolina. Chavis's are usually very light skinned; some claim Native American ancestry (Lumbee), and others African and white European. Here are a few links: https://www.ncsu.edu/ligon/about/history/chavis.htm this link has notes about VA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Chavis Leader of the Wilmington 10, (unfairly sentenced) Chavis this mentions their Cherokee heritage
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I know the Chavis/Ivey/Busby proximity goes back to Virginia where all this mixed-race stuff seems to stem from for many of the related lines.
