Willhite Family – Digging Up Your Family

What’s Going On

In the past month or so I have had a lot going on, and I hope that it will start to calm down after the holidays. I took 2 months off from school because a) I needed a short break, and b) so I would have time for research. And research I have been doing, though I have been jumping back and forth between trees. Anyway, what I have been up to:

1) I had a mishap a couple of months ago with photographs to post at The Georgia Anna Project. My son got his hands on some photographs and mixed them up. So I will need to go back through and separate them all out (currently some of the Pennsylvania photos are mixed in with the Vermont photos, but luckily I remember which group most go in). Last month I did post new photographs that I purchased from a little shop down the road here and at least one of them is from Brooklyn, New York. The name of that gentleman is Edward Shields. Go check it out!

2. I got started on a new genealogy blog, Beyond the Indian Rolls, dedicated specifically to American Indian heritage and genealogy. This is a special project that came up due to my Granddaddy’s friend William Hendrix Yernipcut. I have started researching his family and I have to say it is really interesting! The information takes a while to compile, but I am really excited about it.

3. When I get frustrated with my own family tree I find that it is nice to have a different family to work on. SO, I currently have several trees I started for a few friends. Some of the surnames include:

– Gorman, Carroll, Morton, Flynn

– Kelly (includes adoption)

– Moreno, Martinez, Escalante

– Rucker, Harris, Windom, Walden, Stonestreet, Head, Cole

– Strange, Henderson, Orr, Bailey

– Nichols, Powell, Salmon, Rickman, Armes, Sullivant

4. In addition, I am still working on my tree and still trying to solve some mysteries:

– The exact date of death for John Spencer DeMumbrie. If you remember, I decided that he died sometime between May 1, 1875 and September 4, 1876 (that post is here). I am still looking to narrow it down!

– Who did Peter McQueen kill? I had found a newspaper article that listed the murdered man’s last name (that post here) and I set out to figure out who it could possibly be. Here, you can see an example of my in depth, extremely technical research:

I had come to the conclusion that it must have been John Flowers, b. abt 1814. Unfortunately, though, it isn’t. I was able to get in touch with one of his descendants and she confirmed that he didn’t die until 1869, four years after Peter killed the man. So who was it? Both her and I have gone through the Flowers families in the area (Choctaw County, Mississippi) and every single male can be accounted for, either through death in other years or appearing on the 1870 census. Sigh.

– Where is the death certificate for Eppie Nettie Willhite Craft? I know from her daughter Cofie’s letters that she was born in August of 1860 and died on January 29, 1938. I am unsure where she died, though I am VERY confident it was in the state of Tennessee. Great-aunt Kat remembers that after Eppie’s husband John died (December 3, 1936) Eppie came to live with them for just a little bit. She doesn’t remember how long, but if we are to believe Henry Corbit Craft on the 1940 census record then it means they were in Houston County, Tennessee at the time. Kat doesn’t remember where Eppie went when she left their home, though I imagine she would have moved in with one of her children (possibly Cofie?). Eppie is buried at Double Springs Presbyterian Church Cemetery in Gibson County, Tennessee (again, I know this because of the letters Cofie wrote), the same cemetery that John C Craft, Henry Corbit Craft, Katie Clady Cathey, Louise Craft, Jesse Porter Craft, Wretha Jane Harris, Maggie Nell Craft, and Woodrow Wilson Phillips are buried.

– And speaking of Craft, I have been working on a few Craft cousins’ trees. Well, I can’t be certain that they are blood Craft cousins, but I can always keep my fingers crossed! I got some interesting information for Frederick Owen Craft that makes all of the previous research done on him (concerning his parents) suspect. I need to figure out where the current information about his parents came from, though, before I can determine which path to take during research.

If anyone has any information about any of this, let me know! I would love to hear what you have!

New Information For Eppy Willhite Craft

My mom was talking to a Craft cousin, Polly, and we finally have the death date for Eppy Willhite Craft!

One of the more amusing aspects of trying to find a death date for Eppy has to do with the spelling of her first name. We still aren’t sure exactly how it is spelled, or exactly what she went by. Here are examples, though:

1870 Census: Eppenetus

1880 Census: Epsie/Effie/Effers (the last is what it looks like to me)

No census for 1890.

1900 Census: Epanetes

1910 Census: Epsy/Epsey/Ephy

I haven’t found her in 1920 yet.

1930 Census: Effie P/Eppy P

Her Marriage Record: Eppy

Her Son’s Death Certificate: Ep

Her Husband’s Death Certificate: Elphnetus

Her Youngest Son’s Delayed Birth Record: Eppy Nedica

Her Oldest Daughter’s Delayed Birth Record: Ellie

First Letter Written By Her Daughter Cofie: Epie Neties (that’s what Polly said it looked like, but the handwriting is kind of hard to read)

Second Letter Written By Her Daughter Cofie: Eppie

So, from the letter written by Cofie we now know that Eppy died on January 29, 1938 at the age of 77 years, which puts her birth later in the year of 1860 or early in the year of 1861. According to the census records she was born:

1870 Census: about 1861

1880 Census: about 1861

1900 Census: August 1869 (she shaved a few years off)

1910 Census: about 1864 (she added a few years back on)

1930 Census: about 1862 (added a couple of more years)

My guess is August 1860.

The letter also confirmed that Eppy is buried at Double Springs Cumberland Presbyterian Church Cemetery in Gibson County, Tennessee. So, it looks as though I will be able to make two more headstones to lay out there for Eppy (after I find her birth date and the spelling of her name) and her husband John C Craft.

Something else I just noticed: on the 1900 census she says she had 9 children and 8 were still living. The children I have for her are:

Sarah Ellen Craft 1883-1962

Ivy A Craft 1884-1973

James Lankford Craft 1886-1916

Cofie Lee Craft 1888-1980

Alley I Craft 1891-haven’t found a death date yet, but sometime after the 1920 census was enumerated

Kitty Pearl Craft 1893-1934

Henry Corbit Craft 1895-1971

William Craft 1897-1987

Robert Milton Craft 1900-1992

All of them are accounted for on the 1900 census record. Sarah Ellen had already married Andrew Armstrong, Alley I is listed and Robert Milton hadn’t been born yet (even though he was born in April of 1900, the enumerator most likely started enumerating the district prior to the June date noted at the top). If we go by this notation it means that Eppy had a total of 10 children. I wonder who the other child is?

So, I need to find the missing death date of Alley I Craft and where Eppy was in 1920.

What I Have Been Doing Lately

1. I had purchased several hundred photos on eBay that all turned out to be a family collection. After hunting around for a while I finally found the family to which they belong. I scanned roughly 70 of the photographs and mailed those off to the family on Tuesday. In the coming weeks I will scan the rest of them so I can get those mailed off, too. I am extremely happy that I found the family, and I am extremely happy that they are getting their precious heirlooms back. I had started a blog regarding the photos just in case I wasn’t able to find family. I will be keeping it going so you can check it out here.

2. My mom and I went up to Tennessee to visit with family again. After picking up Great-Aunt Kat we drove up to Clarksville to visit Grandmother and Granddaddy’s graves. Then we drove down to Hurricane Mills (our usual spot) and visited with Donny and Bobbie. We didn’t stay long because Bobbie wasn’t feeling well (luckily she is feeling much better now). While there we had decided that instead of buying Nan Nan’s fried pies from Cissie Lynn’s store, we would go to Nan Nan’s store and buy them directly from her. After driving out of our way (you can tell from the start of this that it ended badly) we got to the location only to find out that the location was moved. The sign (of which I wish I had taken a photo) gave the address of the new location and said to stop in and visit. So we drove even further out of the way. Come to find out the new location was the original location: the owner’s home. She (I assume Nan Nan, but it might just be named Nan Nan by using her grandmother’s recipe or something) was not pleased to see us. She seemed to be miffed that we pulled into her driveway. After telling us she didn’t really have many pies to sell I asked her if she took credit cards. No, she said, she didn’t even take them at the other location. By now I was angry. Their website (which is just their Facebook page from what I can tell) didn’t have the new address listed which caused the looooong drive. They also didn’t have payment options on the page, so I didn’t know I should have stopped for cash. But in the end, you know what? Her attitude ruined the entire thing anyway. Had she been more pleasant I may have considered driving out to an ATM and getting cash just to buy a fried pie. Will I ever purchase another Nan Nan’s Homemade Fried Pie again? Nope. (I just checked out the Facebook page, and they now have that they don’t accept credit cards and failed to use spell check…ok, that’s just me being bitter and mean)

3. A couple of weeks ago my mom and I got to meet new cousins who live here in Georgia: Valerie Craft and her mom Ruby! Valerie has the genealogy blog Begin With Craft, which is chock-full of great information and research tips. Due to the shared Craft surname we think that may be how we are related. Through DNA Valerie’s father matches up to Great-Aunt Kat an estimated 4th cousin. That means to find out how they are related we would need to go back to, at the very least, Prestly Ezekiel Craft’s father. I think it has been figured out that his name was John Craft (don’t hold me to that because I am not positive). Kat’s Craft family goes back:

Henry Corbit Craft (1895 TN-1971 TN)

John Craft (1859 TN-1936 TN)

Thomas Craft (abt 1810 NC-aft 1880 TN)

Prestly Ezekiel Craft (abt 1786 NC-btwn 1850 and 1860 TN)

Several people have that Prestly married his wife Mary Thaxton in Surry County, North Carolina. I guess I will have to look into that more.

4. My mom and I are getting ready for the Bondurant Family Association Annual Meeting next week. I’m pretty excited about it!

5. I recently applied to go back to school. I have thought about it for a while, and now with the imminent closing of the Georgia Archives to the public I decided to just do it! I applied to American Public University online school for history. Who knows, maybe I will eventually become an archivist!

6. In my genealogy research I am currently working on (ready for this? It’s like it is never-ending!):

-Who are Peter McQueen’s parents? It really is driving me crazy not knowing. The earliest I can find him is on an 1818 bill of sale for a slave named Daniel. Peter doesn’t appear on any census record (by name at least) until 1840, though.

-What happened to Spencer DeMumbrie? When and where did he die? Where is he buried? Why is he being difficult?

-Why am I unable to locate James Franklin Stalls’s grave in Oak Grove Cemetery in Paducah, McCracken County, Kentucky? His obituary says he is there, but there is no record of him as being buried there.

-Is the research I did on Brett’s Murphy family correct? It seems perfectly logical to me, but I was presented with something extremely different that is completely illogical to me.

-The Craft line (as mentioned above).

-The search for Eppy Willhite Craft’s death record. I will have to write a whole post for this fun headache. Let’s just say that no one is actually sure of her first name anymore, and her death cannot be found (and she had to have died unless she’s still alive at the ripe old age of about 150 years-old…which you never know, I guess).

-William Glenn Cathey: where are you buried exactly?

-Amanda Summers: when, where and how did you die and where are you buried? Oh, and who exactly is Lizzie’s father? Or do you not even know?

-And let’s just say many other research subjects, such as who are the parents of John B Smith? Where exactly was Elizabeth Brownlee from? Where is t
he Stalls family from? And many, many more questions.

I’m going to go watch movies now!

Beech Hill School, Hurricane Mills, TN 1938

A cousin sent this photo to me in the mail and I love it!

Beech Hill School

Hurricane Mills, Humphreys County, Tennessee

September 28, 1938

top row (l-r): Gladys Willhite, Unknown Meadows, Geneva Mai "Polly" Willhite, Myra Mai Vaughn, Estelle Meadows (teacher), Annie Lee Miller, Dick Meadows, Blackie Baker, Grady Hodge; 2nd row (l-r): Sarah Mai Thorne, Betty Willhite, Martha Miller, Hettie Marie Miller, Mary Elizabeth Miller, Thelma Ragsdale, Agnes Inmon, Mary Olene Pogue, Joy Meadows, (here it says another Meadows, but I think she means both on the end are Meadows girls); 3rd row (l-r): Grady Stanfield, Howard Willhite, JD Poland, EC Pullen, James Pullen, Arthur Lee Thorne, Harris Wallace

Geneva Mai "Polly" Willhite, Mary Olene Willhite and Billy Willhite are all siblings, the children of John William Willhite and Pearl Mae Baker, grandchildren of William Harrison Willhite and Mary Elizabeth Jones

Mary McGibboney

note: photo of Mary McGibboney used with permission from Ann Woodson. photo of headstone used with permission from Virginia Albrecht.

My relationship to Mary McGibboney:

Virginia Marie Stalls (my mom)

Ruth May Craft (grandmother)

Henry Corbit Craft (g-grandfather)

Epanetes “Eppy” Willhite (gg-grandmother)-not exactly sure how her first name is spelled!

Mary McGibboney (ggg-grandmother)

Mary McGibonney was born May 1, 1822 in Guilford County, North Carolina to parents David McGibboney and Elizabeth Allison (note: the marriage record of David and Elizabeth have Elizabeth listed as “Ellison”). Though Mary doesn’t appear on a census record by name until 1850, her father is shown in 1820 and 1830 as living in Guilford County, North Carolina.

By 1840 Mary had moved with her parents to Warren County, Tennessee.

On September 11, 1849 Mary McGibboney married William M Willhite in White County, Tennessee. She gained a (step)son, James E Willhite, from William’s first marriage to Jane Bennett.

In 1850 the little family is found living in District 8, White County, Tennessee. Mary is listed as 28 years of age, born in North Carolina. She is listed as a person over the age of 20 years that cannot read and write. William is listed as 28 years of age, born in Tennessee and a farmer (who could read and write). James E is listed as 5 years of age and born in Tennessee.

In 1860 the family was still living in District 8, White County, Tennessee, Post Office New Ark. The family had grown considerably by then. Both Mary and William are listed as 38 years of age. The children living in the household are: James E (age 15 years), Elizabeth J (age 9 years), Barcelona (age 8 years), Martha C (age 7 years), John D (age 5 years) and William D (age 2 years). Something interesting to note is that according to the census William had no real estate and $200 personal estate. The household listed just before his family had Daniel England who owned $8,000 in real estate and $12,000 in personal estate. Just below William and Mary’s family is John Willhite who owned $600 in real estate and $400 (if I am reading that correctly) in personal estate. My first guess is that William Willhite probably worked for Daniel England, but then again he could have lived on John Willhite’s land and worked for him.

By 1870 the family had moved across to West Tennessee. They are found living in Civil District 8, Humphreys County, Tennessee, Post Office Waverly. James E had already left home at the time. Mary and William are both listed as 48 years of age. William’s occupation is farm laborer and Mary is “keeping house”. The children living in the household are: Elizabeth J (age 18 years), Bossey L (Barcelona, age 17 years), Martha C (age 16 years), John D (farm laborer, age 15 years), William D (farm laborer, age 12 years), Eppenetus (“Eppy”, age 9 years) and Travis P (age 5 years). Something I found curious about this census record is that Mary is marked as “deaf and dumb, blind, insane or idiotic”.

I am unable to find Mary on the US Federal Mortality Schedule, but from her headstone in Shannon Cemetery/Pleasant Valley Cemetery in Humphreys County, Tennessee I know that she died on March 7, 1879 when her youngest, Travis, was only 16 years of age. W.M

WILLHITE

HIS WIFE

MARY WILLHITE

BORN MAY 1 1822

DIED MAR 7 1879

I wish I knew more about Mary McGibboney. I know she was loved dearly by her family and is buried alongside most of them.

Shannon Cemetery, Hurricane Mills, Tenn.-Willhite, Craft, Baker, Shannon and Pickard

Well, this is one of the more interesting posts I’ve done on a cemetery. When my mom and I were up in Hurricane Mills, Humphreys County, Tennessee with my great-aunt Kat a little over a month ago we were directed to the Shannon Cemetery (also known as the Pleasant Valley Cemetery) by my cousin Ann. We went there to find Crafts, and we ended up finding a lot of Willhites, too. I wasn’t able to take photos of all of the headstones in the cemetery, but I did get all of the Willhites, Crafts and a few others, including Pickards (which tie into my Cathey and Craft lines!).

The following are the photos I was able to get. I can’t wait to go back! I put as much information about the family relations as I could find. Also, if I was able to find a cause of death (from death certificates or records) I added that.

note: my relationship to the Willhite family is:

Virginia Marie Stalls (my mom)

Ruth May Craft (grandmother)

Henry Corbit Craft (great-grandfather)

Eppy (Epanetes) Willhite (gg-grandmother), daughter of William M. Willhite and Mary McGibboney.

Jennie Willhite 1892-1909, daughter of William Harrison Willhite and Mary Elizabeth Jones.

Cause of death was consumption.

Unknown Child Willhite, born 1896, son of William Harrison Willhite and Mary Elizabeth Jones.

James Calvin Willhite, Jr (Buddie) 1926-1931, son of James Calvin Willhite, Sr and Bessie Mae Page.

Cause of death was purulent pericarditis (secondary to pneumonia).

Willie Bryan Willhite 1914-1943, son of Christopher Columbus Willhite and Mary Stella Hodge.

Cause of death was lobar pneumonia.

Jimmie C. (James Calvin)Willhite (Sr) 1903-1967, son of Christopher Columbus Willhite and Mary Stella Hodge.

Bessie Mae Willhite 1910-1968, daughter of Jefferson Nathaniel Page and Adelia Bowman.

C.C. (Christopher Columbus) Willhite 1869-1937, son of James E. Willhite and Easter S. Baker.

Cause of death was carcinoma of lower lobe of right lung

(Mary) Stella Willhite 1882-1917 (death certificate lists parents as Calaway Hodge and Elline Hodge, but I have yet to find either of those names on a census with Stella, let alone Stella herself in 1900).

Cause of death was tuberculosis of the lungs.

Unknown Willhite, died October 1908.

Infant Willhite 1906-1906, daughter of Christopher Columbus Willhite and Mary Stella Hodge.

Dorris Willhite, born and died June 28, 1927, son of Bell Willhite and Ollie Page.

Easter Willhite 1847-1924, daughter of William Baker and Mary Ann Willhite.

Cause of death was scrofula of lungs and old age.

James E. Willhite 1839-1912 (there appears to be an issue with who his parents are-there are several James E. Willhites all born about the same time, but no one has actual birth dates for any of them. He was born in White County, according to his death record.)

note: my cousin Ann told me that James E. Willhite's parents are William M. Willhite and his first wife, possibly Jane Bennett (I think I have that right!).

Cause of death was old age.

Bell Willhite 1900-1974, son of William Harrison Willhite and Mary Elizabeth Jones.

Ollie (Adelia) Page Willhite 1901-1981, daughter of Jefferson Nathaniel Page and Adelia Bowman.

Mary E. (Elizabeth) Willhite 1869-1942, daughter of Jimmie Jones and Unknown.

Cause of death was pulmonary tuberculosis.

W.H. (William Harrison) Willhite 1866-1936, son of James E. Willhite and Easter Baker.

Cause of death was cancer of the liver.

Ella Willhite 1900-1917, daughter of William Harrison Willhite and Mary Elizabeth Jones.

Cause of death was cerebrospinal fever with typhoid complications.

J.J.(Jesse) Boss Willhite 1887-1913, son of William Harrison Willhite and Mary Elizabeth Jones.

(John) J.D. Willhite 1855-1894, son of William M. Willhite and Mary McGibboney.

Cynthia E. (Ellen) Willhite 1842-1934, daughter of William Harris and Margaret Shannon.

Cause of death was was not listed on her death certificate, but it was probably old age.

Mary Craft Smith 1901-1982, daughter of James Monroe Craft and Mary Alice Green.

Evie Craft Beecham 1910-2008, daughter of James Monroe Craft and Mary Alice Green.

Frances Baker 1885-1915, daughter of Unknown, wife of Perry Baker.

Dr. James J. (Joseph) Shannon (Jr) 1862-1929, son of James Joseph Shannon, Sr and Nancy Young.

Cause of death was chronic interstitial nephritis.

Josie B. Shannon 1880-1969, daughter of John D. Willhite and Cynthia Ellen Page.

(Henry) Franklin Pickard 1899-1904, son of James David Pickard and Dicey Elizabeth Dunn.

Obie Pickard 1899-1901, son of John Franklin Pickard and Elvie Miranda Dunn.

Henry Corbett Craft

Henry Corbett (or Corbit) Craft was the son of John Craft and Epanetes Willhite. He was born on May 4, 1895 in Hickman County, Tennessee. Most everyone called him CC throughout his life, but his second wife, Maudie, called him Corb.

In 1900 CC was living in Hickman County, Tennessee with his parents and siblings. The family’s last name was misspelled as Croft. An odd thing about the 1900 census is that it has his father, John, as “in school” and “farm laborer”. It also says that his mother, Epanetes, is “in school”. I think that the enumerator may have been mistaken (I mean, surely they weren’t in their 30s and in school, right?). His siblings listed (and I can’t say that these names are correct) are: Ivey A (age 16 years), James (age 14 years), Caha L (age 11 years), Alley (age 8 years), Katey P (age 6 years) and William (age 3 years). CC is listed as Henry C (age 4 years).

In 1910 the family was still living in Hickman County, Tennessee. His father is listed as John and his mother is listed as Epsey. This time the family’s last name is correct as Craft. The siblings he lived with at the time were (again, I don’t know which names are correct): Santford (age 23 years), Pearl (age 16 years), Willie (age 12 years) and Robert (age 9 years). The census does list his name as Henry, but the transcriber entered in as Hemroy (which makes me giggle very unprofessionally).

Henry Corbett Craft married Katie Clady Cathey on July 18, 1915 in Humphreys County, Tennessee.

In 1920 the family is living in Gibson County, Tennessee. The family’s last name, once again, is misspelled as Croft. On this census record Henry is listed quite clearly as Aubrey, though I cannot figure out why. Katie’s name is misspelled as Katty. They have two children: Nettie Sue (age 2 years 10 months) and Louise (age 1 month). CC was, at this time, a laborer in a cotton mill. Though the census record just has Katie as “at home” I think that she worked the cotton fields.

Over the course of the next 10 years CC and Katie had four more children, one, a daughter, which was stillborn.

On the 1930 census the family is living in Gibson County, Tennessee. The census transcriber had put Eraft as their last name, and I will admit it is kind of difficult to make it out. The children listed on this census are : Nettie S (age 13 years), Louise (age 10 years), Maggie N (age 8 years), Ruthie May (misspelled as Reathi, Rarthi-depending on whether you look at Family Search or Ancestry, age 4 years 7 months) and Jessie P (age 1 year and 1 month).

After 1930 CC and Katie had three more children: Mary Katherine (born 1931) and twins, John and Unnamed (born 1935). The Unnamed was a stillborn that had apparently quit developing long before John was born since it was small enough to have been buried in a kitchen matchbox. Katie passed away within a couple days of the twins’ birth in 1935.

In 1936 CC married Maudie Berkley. They did not have children together (that are known), but CC did get a stepson from Maudie’s previous marriage.

Henry Corbett Craft died on December 27, 1971 at Butler Nursing Home in Milan, Gibson County, Tennessee where he had been under care for about 3 months. He is buried in Double Springs Cemetery near Milan, Gibson County, Tennessee.

It was understood that he had been a sharecropper in his earlier years. Later in life CC owned a shop where he repaired shoes and made brooms and mops to sell. My mother said “he’d have a mouthful of tacks that he spit out onto the shoe (quite accurately, I might add) and then tap, tap, tap it into the shoe sole”.

CC was a religious man later in life. As a young man he had been a heavy drinker. One night after drinking quite a bit an angel appeared to him on his way home and grabbed the reigns of the horse (or mule, perhaps). This apparently changed his life. He had prophetic dreams throughout his life, including one concerning the death of his son John’s twin.

He said very long prayers at meals and would end the prayers with a long, drawn out “Aaaaameeeeeen” and look up with tears in his eyes.

At one point he was a member of a Church of God congregation that was further into the country and in an old house with creaking wood floors. Because the members of the church would dance around speaking in tongues, the state of the floors really concerned my mother (I guess she imagined the floors just giving way one day!).

The Craft Family and the Melungeons

Several years ago a descendant of the the Craft family presented to my mother in an email the theory that the Craft line extended back to the Melungeons that originated in the Southeastern part of the United States: North Carolina and South Carolina into Tennessee and parts of Virginia, Kentucky and so on. If you don’t know about the Melungeons there is a website with a ton of information that I found through the Lost Colony/Melungeon Lore DNA Project, Melungeon Heritage Association.

There are several theories on the origin of the Melungeons, one being that the members of the Lost Colony of Roanoke may have travelled to Croatan Island and blended with the Native inhabitants. Another theory, of course, is that the colonists were attacked and murdered by the Natives.

In general it is thought that the Melungeons are a grab-bag mix of Native Americans, freed black slaves, Portuguese and white European settlers. DNA tests show that the genomes of known Melungeon descendants correlate with all of these groups.

Census records show us that these families all had appearances that did not allow them to be categorized into mainstream society. They were usually listed as black, Indian or mulatto. In general they may have had European features, but with darker skin. Or some of their features may have been more African than European. There are photos that can be found online of known Melungeons. Some I see and I think that I never would have noticed a difference. Some I see and, though the features are clearly European, their skin is very dark. I have even seen photos of people with blonde hair and very dark skin. As time went on and the Melungeons mingled and married those with predominately European ancestry their successors slowly became accepted as “white”.

So when my mother introduced me with this family theory, I decided to check it out. Because my autosomal DNA matches so many different world populations I am comparing it to different people of known Melungeon origins. This, of course, takes more research, but it’s pretty intriguing. This may explain why members of my direct Craft family get so dark in the sun so quickly. And though we know there is Native American blood, there may also be Melungeon.

A woman in the Lost Colony/Melungeon Lore DNA Project also has Crafts in her family. If I can find if and how her Crafts are from the same line I may be able to say unquestionably that, yes, our Crafts are descended from Melungeons.

I am still researching them, but here’s what I have so far (that I am certain of), following my direct line (this in no way represents all of the offspring from each couple, only my direct line):

Thomas Craft (abt 1810-?)

Dicey Unknown (abt 1822-?)

According to census records Thomas was born in North Carolina. Both his mother and father were born in South Carolina. Dicey was born in Tennessee and both her mother and father were born in South Carolina.

John Craft (1867-1931)

Epanetes (Eppy) Willhite (1869-?)

John Craft was born in Tennessee. Census records state that his father was born in Tennessee, so either the census taker or John himself made a mistake.

Henry Corbett Craft (1895-1971)

Katie Clady Cathey

Corb was born in Hickman County, Tennessee. Katie was born in Indian Bayou, Lonoke, Arkansas.

Ruthie May Craft (1925-2007)

James Paul Stalls, Jr (1917-1987)

Both Ruth and Paul were born in Tennessee.

I have read on websites many different surnames for Dicey. I have also seen many different fathers listed for Thomas, with the most promising being a Charles Craft from South Carolina. Until I have confirmation on these names, however, I cannot actually add them.

On an interesting side note, I read on Wikipedia that an anti-illegal immigration group is using Virginia Dare, the child of , more or less, illegal immigrants (the Native Americans sure didn’t want them on their land) as the namesake and symbol of their group.

Category: Willhite Family