tracing 1800 West African ancestor

[Anonymous]

According to 23 & me, we have a 100% West African ancestor who was born some time between 1710-1800. I assume this ancestor was a slave in the U.S. How would I go about starting to attempt to trace this history? Totally clueless here!

[Anonymous]

Work back from more recent generations. Marriage, birth and death records.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Work back from more recent generations. Marriage, birth and death records.

If this person was a slave, which seems likely, then records aren't likely to be of much use, are they? I guess I need to research how African American families do geneology.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Work back from more recent generations. Marriage, birth and death records.

If this person was a slave, which seems likely, then records aren't likely to be of much use, are they? I guess I need to research how African American families do geneology.

Well, the records will get you somewhere because photographic evidence could get you to the first generation that "passed." Also, Ancestry.com has been working hard to beef up their records around African American descendants of slaves.

You might also be able to use those 23 and Me findings to locate distant relatives. If those folks "remained" Black, they might have a better sense of the common ancestor.

[Anonymous]

how do you know it's one 100% individual and not two 50% individuals, or a mixture of individuals?

(I am not being snarky--I want to know how you figured it out)

On 23andMe, enable your "DNA Relatives." It takes a few days to a week for it to compile. Then start emailing your top matches. Someone might share that ancestor and have more info.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:how do you know it's one 100% individual and not two 50% individuals, or a mixture of individuals?

(I am not being snarky--I want to know how you figured it out)

On 23andMe, enable your "DNA Relatives." It takes a few days to a week for it to compile. Then start emailing your top matches. Someone might share that ancestor and have more info.

I don't know! That's just what the results said. (Actually my brother's; I need to do my own.)

[Anonymous]

ok then you need access to your brother's account (name and password) so you can go look at this instead of relying on him giving you drips of info, or get your own done.

[Anonymous]

You need the mormons, that's on ancestry.com. They have better records on specific genealogy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:According to 23 & me, we have a 100% West African ancestor who was born some time between 1710-1800. I assume this ancestor was a slave in the U.S. How would I go about starting to attempt to trace this history? Totally clueless here!

Are there any Indians in your tree? That's often how African blood emerged in a "white" person. The African would have to be a freeman if he married a white woman. Then again it could have been out of wedlock. Things could be murky in the frontier areas in the 18th century.

[Anonymous]

PP here.

Google Benjamin Banneker and look him up on wiki. He was supposed to have had a white grandmother who was an indentured servant herself, who had a relationship with a black slave. This would have been early in the 18th century because as the century progressed, such black and white relationships became much rarer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:PP here.

Google Benjamin Banneker and look him up on wiki. He was supposed to have had a white grandmother who was an indentured servant herself, who had a relationship with a black slave. This would have been early in the 18th century because as the century progressed, such black and white relationships became much rarer.

Oh interesting - so voluntary interracial relationships were more common in 18th century?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP here.

Google Benjamin Banneker and look him up on wiki. He was supposed to have had a white grandmother who was an indentured servant herself, who had a relationship with a black slave. This would have been early in the 18th century because as the century progressed, such black and white relationships became much rarer.

Oh interesting - so voluntary interracial relationships were more common in 18th century?

NP, yes, they were more common, until they were outlawed. You should visit Colonial Williamsburg to learn more. They've got some fascinating programs on the lives of the indentured, the enslaved and how Virginia's slave laws changed over time.

[Anonymous]

The likeliest situation is that a female slave was impregnated by a white male owner, then her mixed race daughter faced the same fate, until eventually it produced a child white enough to "pass." I doubt there are any happy stories of interracial romance here. If you trace your ancestors far enough back to get to where the information stops, you may have reached the original "passing" person. Slave births won't be recorded.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP here.

Google Benjamin Banneker and look him up on wiki. He was supposed to have had a white grandmother who was an indentured servant herself, who had a relationship with a black slave. This would have been early in the 18th century because as the century progressed, such black and white relationships became much rarer.

Oh interesting - so voluntary interracial relationships were more common in 18th century?

Yes! Banneker' grandmother Molly not only had a relationship with an African man --she purchased his freedom and married him. Her half-black daughter later married a black man who she also freed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PP here.

Google Benjamin Banneker and look him up on wiki. He was supposed to have had a white grandmother who was an indentured servant herself, who had a relationship with a black slave. This would have been early in the 18th century because as the century progressed, such black and white relationships became much rarer.

Oh interesting - so voluntary interracial relationships were more common in 18th century?

Common is a word one should be careful using. But it did happen between black and white more often than later in the 18th century, when both laws and racial attitudes hardened.