Who was Rebecca
- Flash
- Jan 31, 2019
- 3 min read
Most everyone has heard stories about the Native American Indian heritage that lies somewhere in the family. I know I have, on and off, throughout the years. I have relatives in Texas and Kansas that typically participate in native ceremonies and pow wows. If you were to come to my house, all the paintings on the walls have Native American themes by artists such as Bev Doolittle, JD Challenger and Cindy Jo. Whenever we go visit family in Albuquerque, we always pick up some native art work. People have come in our house and asked if there is American Indian blood in the family. I have never been able to answer that question, so I am hoping in my search for the diversity in me I will be able to come to some definite conclusion.
The closest that I have come, and I have hit a hard block, is my 7th grandmother, Rebecca Stewart born about 1717. I suspect she was born in North Carolina and ended up moving back and forth across the border from North Carolina to Virginia. Most of the information that I can fine on her is on a web site which talks about a community in southern Virginia and refers to the Lost Creek Stewart Families. I also found information in the book by Paul Heinegg titled “Free African Americans of North Carolina, Virginia and South Carolina from the colonial Period to about 1820 Volume 1” and the web site FreeAfricanamericans.com. Most of the history on Rebecca is in the Dinwiddie County area in southern Virginia. Unfortunately, this is what is known as a burned-record county. Meaning, when the Union soldiers came through the area, they burned all the official records they could find. I don’t understand why this happened, but I am sure it made some sense in that time of war. Some of the neighboring counties do have some records and that search continues.
None of these references list who the parents of Rebecca are, only that she had possibly 8 children. Her son James Stewart born in 1750 is the linage I am from. There is a story in all three about Rebecca:
"Rebecca Stewart, born say 1717, sued Charles Hix in Brunswick County, Virginia court in September 1738 for her freedom and a certificate for the same, but the court dismissed the case in February 1738/9 when she failed to appear."
I am uncertain and unable to find how she was bound to Charles Hix. There are 3 different theories on the who Rebecca was. The first is, at the time when she is thought to have been born, 1717, the first ships carrying indentured Jacobite Scottish men landed in Virginia in 1616. I did manage to find the manifest of the ships and there were listed several indentured Stewarts, but I can find no record of who they were all bound to for their indenture time. It was common practice to have the indentured Scottish and Irish men and women mate with the African American and native American slaves to produce a continued line of slaves.
“The colonists began to breed Scottish and Irish women and girls with African men to produce slaves with a distinct complexion. These new mulatto slaves brought a higher price than Scottish and Irish livestock and likewise, enabled the settlers to save money rather than purchase new African slaves."
The theory is that Rebecca was a child of this type of mating. The second theory is that Rebecca is part of a long line of Stewarts that were mixed race African American and Native American that resided in the Dinwiddie area. There is quite a bit of history concerning the Stewarts that were mixed race and descended from the Saponi or Nansemond tribes. The third and probably most true theory is that Rebecca had children with an African, Indian or mixed person(s), and this started the Lost Creek Stewart Line. The reason is that Rebecca is listed in the colonial Virginia records as “Free white female.” This would bolster the theory that she was born of one of the bonded indentured Jacobite families and was bonded to Charles Hix. Since census records on her sons as born in Virginia and race as mulatto, this would indicate a mixed-race marriage.
In Virginia In October 1705, the Acts of Assembly in Virginia defined “mulatto”, “as the child of an Indian, the child, grandchild or great-grandchild of a Negro”.
Therefore, the term “mulatto” encompassed many varieties of ethnic mixtures.
So, the question is still out there. Is there native American blood running in me. I believe so, I just must keep looking. My Ancestory.com results say 1% Native American and my 23andme.com results also say 1%. So that heritage may be way down the line, but the journey continues.
Comments