Re: Genealogy vs. Genetics - Cherokee Heritege?
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In reply to:
Re: Genealogy vs. Genetics - Cherokee Heritege?
Otis Fuller 7/29/04
Otis:
Most of my "Abernathy" kin lives in North Carolina, but there are distant relatives who migrated (circa: 1800-1850) to Jacksonville, Benton (now Calhoun) Co., Alabama, and Cassville, Bartow Co., Georgia.
I have not been able to find proof of Cherokee heritege; but my father was orginally from Asheville, NC.There is a connection to the Abernathys in Alabama, they probably are descendants of Miles Washington Abernathy. Miles mirgrated to Alabama, along with the metal/steel industry.
My mother's family (Justice, Clinkscales, Spruiell, Meadows) lived in Alabama as far back as the early 1800s (or sooner).
My great-grandfather Isaac Clay Justice was born in "Coosa" (long before there was a county by that name.
I have been able to uncover the migration route of many of the family names -- starting in PA or VA, then MD, on to the Carolinas, then GA and Alabama.
The earliest immigrants on my family tree seemed to have arrive here in the mid- to late 1700s. So, it is a challenge trying to find some of the family tree.
On the Justice line, the trail ends with Dempsey Justice, in the 1760s, in Georgia. I have a theory that his ancestors were from Germany or Switzerland, and "Americanized" the name to Justice once they settled in the Carolinas.
Alas, it is like the Cherokee heritege, family tradition says there are Cherokee ancestors; but no solid proof has turned up in my search(s).
- Cathy A.