Alabama

Jefferson, Mixed Bloods and Frontier Defense

[102]By the beginning of the nineteenth century at least two major changes had altered the political environment affecting the Choctaw Indians. Within the Choctaw tribe several countrymen were beginning to exert influence in tribal decisions. Although not yet accepted as equals to the chiefs, white men such as Nathaniel Folsom and John Pitchlynn were respected […]

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Sample of Mixed Blood Ubiquity: Representative Family Histories

The extant records concerning the traders and other countrymen are uneven in their coverage of mixed-blood families. Although only the better-known families were chronicled in the works of early regional historians and authors commenting on the Indian tribes, the existence of scores of surnames within these records indicates that mixed-blood families were widespread in the

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Choctaw Trade and Coexistence in the Nation

After the discovery of the new world, trade quickly became the most important interaction between the American natives and the colonists. For the Indians it was an extension and continuation of their inter-tribal practices. Reuben Gold Thwaites, an early nineteenth-century student of the American frontier, stated that “the love of trade was strong among the

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An Affinity For Trade

Despite their early encounters with Hernando DeSoto, whose ruthless exploitation of the Native Americans was unabashedly cruel, the Southeastern Indians greeted white men with peaceful cooperation. Later European arrivals found that their success in the Gulf wilderness depended largely upon peace with the native inhabitants, or at least peace with one of the larger tribes.

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Introduction, Choctaw Mixed Blood

One of the most controversial areas of American history is that of Indian/white relations and the federal policies, which led to Indian Removal. In the early and middle nineteenth century the United States government embarked upon a program of wholesale government-sponsored emigration of tribes residing within the various states and territories. Later called the “Trail

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Alabama Vital Records

Vital records, as their name suggests, are connected with central life events: birth, marriage, and death. Maintained by civil authorities, they are prime sources of genealogical information; but, unfortunately, official vital records are available only for relatively recent periods. These records, despite their recent creation in the United States, are critically important in genealogical research,

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Biographical Sketch of Col. John Smith

Col. John Smith, of the revolutionary war, lived in Franklin County, Virginia, here he married Frances Burk by whom he had William, Stephen, John, Wyatt, Henry, Susan, Mary, and Frances William married Elizabeth Ferguson, of Virginia, by whom he had Samuel, Thomas, Stephen, William H., Mary, Frances, Susan, Martha, Elizabeth, Sarah P., and Julia. Mary

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Biographical Sketch of Alexander Harding

Alexander Harding, of Halifax Co., Va., married Mary Hightower, and they had Archibald, Anna, Benjamin, Elizabeth, Mary, and Sally. Mr. Harding died in 1816, and his widow married Josiah Rodgers, and moved to Alabama. Archibald married in Virginia, and settled in Missouri in 1833. Anna married James Anderson, and settled in Montgomery County in 1833.

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The MOWA Choctaws

Extinction by Reclassification: The MOWA Choctaws of South Alabama and Their Struggle for Federal Recognition – In the 1930s, Carl Carmer, a professor at the University of Alabama and author of Stars Fell on Alabama, traveled around Alabama collecting unusual stories. He said that he chose “to write of Alabama not as a state which is part of a nation, but as a strange country in which I once lived.” One of his stories describes his efforts to determine the ancestry of the so-called Cajuns who lived around Citronelle in southwest Alabama. Carmer’s story provoked a flurry of interest in the “Cajans,” when in reality they were not Cajun at all. Instead, they were descendants of the indigenous Choctaw Indians of southwest Alabama. Originally appearing in The Alabama Review, Volume 59, July 2006, pages 163-204.

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Alabama Archives

The Alabama Archives center or better known as ADAH has a treasure trove of information available for genealogists and historians of Alabama ancestry. Many of the larger communities have also built archive centers open to the public for research. We provide specific links below, to all of the Alabama archives that we’re aware of.

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