Gowen Research Foundation

Electronic Newsletter

November 2000

Volume 3 No. 11

ORIGIN OF THE MELUNGEONS

By Tim Hashaw

Editorial Boardmember

1937 Huge Oaks Houston, Texas, 77065

E-mail: wildwestgifts4u@aol.com

Part II:

Captives of War

The Melungeon chapter of American history opens with the

onset of Portuguese colonial conquest of interior Angola

in the year 1618. Mendes de Vasconcelos combined his

army with Imbangala mercenary warriors and pierced into

the heart of the Ndongo kingdom between the Lukala and

Kwanza rivers of the Malange highlands of north-central

Angola on the southern border of Congo. The captured

Ndongo were sold and put aboard New World-bound Spanish

ships, some of which lost their Malange Angola slaves to

English and Dutch pirates.

These Ndongo, originally of the Malange plateau region of

west central Africa, were brought to the English colony

of Virginia in 1619. They, and later Malange arrivals to

Jamestown and other colonies in the 17th century, became

the ancestors of the North American tri-racial people

known as Melungeons. "Malange" remains the name of the

province in modern Angola today. That word, with various

deriviations, is commonly attached to several localities

in one general area of northern Angola and southern Congo.

In the aftermath of the brutal 1618-1619 Portuguese inva-

sion, historian Manuel Bautista Soares recorded, that by

September 1619, the bodies of thousands of butchered

Ndongo were polluting the rivers and a "great multitude

of innocent people had been captured without cause."

John Thornton, professor of history at Millersville Uni-

versity of Pennsylvania, wrote in an article for "William

and Mary Quarterly," July, 1998:

"The demographic impact of this war was starkly obvi-

ous when the [Portuguese] campaign was resumed the

ext year [1619]; the army met no resistance in any

part of the back-country [Sertao], these provinces

having become destitute of inhabitants."

Deaf to the pleas of Catholic priests and Portuguese set-

tlers whose lands were ravaged, Vasconcelos let the kill-

ing and enslavement continue for months unabated. Vogado

Sotomaior, the 'ouvidor geral de Angola', wrote of the

royal Ndongo city of Kabasa, that it was "sacked in such

a way that many thousands of souls were captured, killed

and eaten" as the Imbangala rampaged through the defeated

kingdom unchallenged.

Vasconcellos cannot be excused for patriotic motives for

he was stripping the Malange province, contrary to the

orders of his king, with the sole personal ambition of

slave profiteering in the markets of the New World.

Soares wrote of Vasconcellos, that as he had Imbangala

mercenaries, "the wars were without any danger, but with

discredit to the Portuguese."

So devastating was the slavery campaign waged against the

Ndongo of the Malange, that captives, numbering in the

many thousands, choked the capabilities of the Portuguese

to hold them. Marched to the port of Luanda, the Ndongo

prisoners who had not been slaughtered and eaten by the

Imbangala, were placed in flimsy, hastily built pens

which could not nearly contain them all. Hundreds of the

Ndongo simply walked away in all the commotion, fading

into the forests. In addition, only 36 merchant-slave

ships arrived at Luanda Angola in the fiscal year 1618-

1619. Each ship was capable of carrying an average of

350-400 captives, not nearly enough for Vasconcelos to

efficiently dispose of slaves who must be fed.

The Malange-Ndongo captives remained penned up while the

slow but steady trickle of slavers arrived to load them

for the terrible Atlantic voyage to Spanish colonies in

the New World. Rarely in the history of African slavery

from 1400-1800 had such a large group of slaves sharing a

common identity, been assembled as those captives of the

Portuguese taken from the Malange highlands in 1619.

Fifty thousand would be shipped in three years, all from

the same Angolan province. Those first Africans landing

in Virginia in 1619, and the largest percentage of those

arriving on into the late 1640s, had a common regional

language and ethnicity. These were the founding fathers

of black America, and the ancestors of the people called

Melungeon.

The Common Identity of the Malange-Ndongo Angolans

To understand the origin of the Melungeon people, it can-

not be repeated enough that the greater part of Portu-

guese, and then Dutch, Angola slaves from 1618-1650,

came from a relatively small concentrated area; from the

Ndongo tribal land of the Malange plateau between the Lu-

kala and Lutete rivers. Thornton makes the point that

these thousands of captured prisoners of the Vasconcelos

campaigns, shared a closer common identity than was usu-

ally the case with single shiploads containing mere hun-

dreds. These Angolan Africans retained that common Ma-

lange identity after they were transported to the Ameri-

cas. Thorton writes:

"In America, when Kimbundu-speaking people were able

to communicate and visit each other, a sense of an

"Angolan Nation" emerged. It was certainly observable

in Spanish America, if not yet at the very beginnings

of English-speaking Virginia's reception of Africans."

Because of this common identity, we can see how the an-

cestors of the Melungeons could succeed as a distinctive

group, almost immediately after arriving in the English-

American colonies in the 17th century. The Ndongo home-

land was densely populated in the narrow strip of land

between its two rivers. One Malange city with its sub-

urbs of the late 16th century, was said to have held

nearly 100,000 residents; an exaggerated number no doubt,

but indicative of the European perception of the populous

region.

Several tightly packed towns were separated at intervals

by sections of farmland. The Ndongo were urbanized, yet

they grew crops and kept domesticated animals. They

were certainly better equipped to face the North American

wilderness than were many of their white colonial count-

erparts; European indentured servants who had been

plucked from the prisons, alleys, brothels, and taverns

of London and Bristol. These Ndongo grew sorghum and

millet and kept large herds of cattle as well as goats

and chickens before the Portuguese invasion.

Scholars marvel at the comparitive ease with which the

early Africans entered into English-American colonial

life. Lerone Bennett Jr. in his book "Before the May-

flower," says,

"There were skilled farmers and artisans among the

first group of African-Americans, and there are in-

dications in the record that they were responsible

for various innovations later credited to English

immigrants. An early example of this was reported

in Virginia, where the governor ordered rice to be

planted in 1648 'on the advice of our Negroes.'"

And, Washington Irving observed of the early Virginia Af-

ricans:

"These Negroes, like the monks of the Dark Ages, en-

gross all the Knowledge of the place, and being in-

finitely more adventurous and more knowing than their

masters, carry on all the foreign trade; making fre-

quent voyages in canoes loaded with oysters, butter-

milk and cabbages. They are great astrologers pre-

dicting the different changes of weather almost as

accurately as an almanac."

It is not then amazing that often in the space of less

than a few years after arriving from African, a Malange-

Angolan could climb from the bottom of the Virginia soc-

ial class of the 17th century, to ownership of a prosper-

ous plantation with servants of his own. By 1651, the

Ndongo transplant, Anthony Johnson, owned land and im-

ported servants, some of them white, in the original Vir-

ginia colony. The abstract of his deed reads:

"Anthony Johnson, 250 acs. Northampton Co., 24 July

1651. . . at great Naswattock Creek, by two small

branches issuing out of the mayne Creek." "Trans-

fer of persons: Tho.Bemrose, Peter Bughby, Antho.

Cripps, Jno Gesorroro, Richard Johnson."

In the next year his son John Johnson, owned 550 acres

with 11 slaves, male and female, black and white. Their

names were listed as; John Edward, Wm. Routh, Tho. Yowell,

Fra. Maland, William Price, John Owen, Dorothy Rily,

Richard Hemstead, Law, Barnes, Row, Rith, Mary Johnson.

Therefore, less than thirty years after capture in Ma-

lange Angola, and arriving as a slave in Virginia, An-

thony Johnson and his family possessed nearly 1,000 acres

and at least 16 slaves in the Virginia colony.

Lerone Bennett writes about early African achievements:

"Not only did pioneer blacks vote, but they also held

public office. There was a black surety in York

County, Virginia in the first decades of the 17th

century, and a black beadle [court crier or bailiff]

in Lancaster County, Virginia."

As long as the rules to success were evenly observed by

all sides, the Melungeon forefathers matched the European

whites in social and economic advances. After 1660, when

discriminatory laws began to shackle their dreams, the

children of the original Malange-Angolans would be forced

to push out to the frontiers of the American wilderness,

blazing new trails to cherished freedom. Many 18th cen-

tury white pioneers, believing they were intruding into

virgin forests, were often surprised to find the multi-

racial children of the original 17th century African-

Americans ahead of them. Whenever new territory opened

in the later United States, the Melungeons were often the

first to dare to settle there. The Ndongo life-style of

their fathers was well suited to pioneer life in America.

Portuguese Influences

The Europeans and their customs were not entirely new to

the people from the Malange highlands. As early as the

16th century, the Portuguese had made contact with Congo

people to the immediate north of Angola. At that time,

the Ndongo kingdom was a vassal state, subject to Congo

rulers. King Alphonso, [1509-42] of Congo opened his na-

tion to Portuguese missionaires and commerce. The Ndon-

go of Malange had, for decades prior to their captivity

in 1618-1619, bartered with the whites while speaking a

common trade language. African exposure to the Virginia

colony was not as alien to the Malange as might be as-

sumed.

Portugal was unlike other colonial powers in that it re-

garded its colonies as "states" and, according to "Brit-

tanica," Angola was the largest state of Portugal with

its inhabitants accorded citizenship during its colonial

era. Portuguese law also required all African captives

to be baptized and converted to Christianity before pas-

sage to the New World. By 1619, Kimbundu-speaking

Christians were already worshipping in Angola. Jesuit

priests who came with the first Portuguese army in 1575

had produced catechismal literature in the language

spoken by the Malange Ndongo.

Thornton writes concerning that literature:

"Such a rudimentary instruction was probably orient-

ed to the syncretic practice of the Angolan church,

which followed patterns, already a century old, from

the Kongo church that had originally fertilized it.

Thus, early 17th century Spanish Jesuits, conducting

an investigation of the state of knowledge of the

Christian religion among newly arrived slaves, found

that, for all the problems they noted, the Angolan

slaves seem to have adequate understanding of the

faith by the time they arrived."

It is therefore likely that the Malange slaves bound for

the mines of Mexico before English pirates diverted them

to Virginia, had, at the very least, a basic education in

Christianity before arriving. In the colonies and later

in the states, a number of Melungeon descendants insisted

they were Portuguese Christians who should be exempt from

chattel slavery. Sometimes they even produced documents

to support these claims. A number of court cases are on

record into the 19th century detailing Melungeons arguing

Portuguese citizenship.

American scholars often have misinterpreted these claims

of Portuguese nationality, as attempts by the children of

mixed race to escape slavery by denying their African

heritage. A better explanation is that these children of

the Malange Angolans were rightfully insisting on the

Christian heritage of their fathers in Africa before

slave ships brought them to America in the 17th century.

North American white slave-owners were inclined to hide

these baptisms of African-born Catholic chattel slaves

because of the "shame" of one Christian kidnapping and

owning another.

Sometimes the Melungeons won their suits, sometimes they

lost their freedoms. This people stubbornly maintained

their memory of Portuguese nationality for more than two

centuries, passing it down by word-of-mouth as they did

the name "Melungeon", when they were forbidden to read or

write. To them, "Portuguese" did not mean they were not

African. It meant rather that they had been baptised in-

to Christianity while still in Africa and therefore they

should not be made slaves by other Christians.

Early Malange-Angolan Status in North American Colonies

In early 1619, Spanish merchant-slave ships began arriv-

ing at the Portuguese slave markets in the port of Luanda

to take delivery of the Malange-Ndongo captives for the

difficult trans-Atlantic voyage. Over the next two years,

50,000 Kimbundu-speaking Angolans would be dragged on-

board for destination to Spanish plantations and mines.

But, for a small handful of the Malange-Ndongo packed in-

to tight, dark and filthy compartments, there was deter-

mined another destination and another fate when two cor-

sairs, an English and a Dutch privateer, captured one

Spanish ship and stole its human cargo.

The first Malange-Angolans, the famous "20 and odd Ne-

groes" from the Dutch man-o-war anchoring at Jamestown in

August 1619 were not the earliest slaves in Virginia.

The first slaves of Virginia were white Englishmen, and

this is an important observation to make about the first

decades of the American colony.

There was very little practical distinction in the words

"servant" and "slave" in the 17th century though much has

been made of the use of the former title in regards to

the status of the first Africans to America. Whites of-

ten entered the colony, like Africans, with very little

choice. The premature mortality rate in Virginia before

1620, due to hunger, disease and Indian wars, was an in-

credibly high fifty-percent of all settlers. For the

period 1620-22, some have argued credibly that the death

rate was even higher.

European whites, providing colonial labor, had been com-

pelled to cross the Atlantic because they were poor, or

felons, or religious dissenters, or prostitutes or the

ne'er-do-well sons of gentlemen. Frequently, lower

class English citizens were kidnapped from English

streets like the Africans who came later. They were

crammed aboard ships usually already overloaded with

moldy food supplies and swarming with disease-carrying

vermin.

To study the passenger lists of some ships is to witness

a European Middle Passage sometimes as perilous as the

African passage. The European survivors, upon arrival in

Virginia, were sold to the highest bidder, often by the

ship's captain. Whether white or black, indentured ser-

vants were at the mercy of masters who could injure and

even kill them without legal repercussion. Colonial ser-

vitude was so harsh and certain masters so hated, that

many indentured whites joined indentured blacks in small

groups to flee into the wilderness or to attempt to reach

another colony. But those "servants" who remained and

survived in the early years could attain freedom regard-

less of their skin color.

In his book, "Before the Mayflower," Lerone Bennett Jr.

writes about the founders of African-America to the ear-

liest settlements:

"In Virginia, then, as in other colonies, the first

black settlers fell into a well-established socio-

economic groove which carried with it no impli-

cations of racial inferiority. That came later.

But in the interim, a period of forty years or more,

the first black settlers accumulated land, voted,

testified in court and mingled with whites on a ba-

sis of equality. They owned other black servants

and certain blacks imported and paid for white

servants whom they apparently held in servitude."

About 1670, the European settlers began passing laws for-

bidding black freedmen from owning white servants. Both

white and black were also forbidden to intermarry, even

though such laws were generally ignored on the colonial

frontier as late as the 19th century. But before then in

North America, when social distinction was not of race,

but of class, the Malange-Angolan ancestors of the Melun-

geon were able to achieve frequent successes.

Not Just Black or White

The Malange-Angolans who began arriving in Virginia in

1619 were not even the first African slaves in the colon-

ial era of North America. About 100 years earlier, 500

Spaniards with 100 African slaves built a settlement

thought to be in present day South Carolina on the Peedee

River. In October or November of 1526, the slaves re-

belled against their Spanish masters and fled to nearby

Indian villages. The Spaniards returned to Haiti, de-

serting the settlement and leaving the Africans with the

Indians. The descendants of these Africans who intermar-

ried with Indians, survived to see the arrival of the

first English settlers some 80 years laer, and indeed

they survive presently.

There are other stories of similar situations in which

Africans were stranded along the Atlantic coast of North

America. In addition, there are also legends of isola-

ted, forgotten colonies of whites living among the In-

dians prior to the English settlers. John Haywood, a

Tennessee judge, circa 1820, described early whites liv-

ing among the Cherokee; whites who possessed a cross,

iron tools, and a bell which summoned them to meetings,

and which indicated perhaps a Catholic past.

But it is the later-arriving Malange-Angolans who hold

the important keys of discovering more about multi-racial

groups which predated even them. For it was those James-

town, Virginia Africans whose lives were first documented

in detail in existing records of passenger lists, census,

property deeds, marriage licenses, obituaries, probates,

lawsuits, and military records. These Angolan ancestors

of the Melungeons are the earliest, continually-surviv-

ing, individually recorded African-Americans. We can

reliably trace them as they moved in and among other mul-

ti-racial groups, and we can bring those other groups in-

to better focus through their contact with Melungeons.

As long as those Melungeon ancestors were treated fairly

in the American colonies, they remained and prospered.

But by the 1670s, when restrictive laws began popping up

on the books, many once-free African-Americans clung to

their cherished liberty by trail-blazing into the unset-

tled frontier where they forged new alliances. Once we

have correctly noted the complex layers of early mixed-

race history in America, we will then by able to distin-

guish the specific identities of African-Indians, Afri-

can-Europeans, European-Indians, and European-African-

Indian communities; the Witkop, Lumbee, Brass Ankles,

Redbones, Cajun, Haliwa Indians, Guineas, Wesorts, Sabine

or Houmas, Carmel Indians, Nanticokes and Moores, the

Brown People of Virginia and Turks. These Melungeons,

Lumbees and other early multi-racial groups have distinc-

tively different origins, even as members of one group

sometimes intermarried with another non-white group.

This series of articles chiefly concerns the Malange-An-

golan origin of the Melungeon people; an origin pre-dat-

ing the arrival of the Pilgrims of Plymouth Rock by a

year.

The English surname "Gowen", [with its many variations of

Goins, Givens, Going, Guines, Goyne, Guynes etc.] origi-

nated in the American colonies among these first Angolans.

The Gaelic meaning of "Gowen" is "smith" and was just as

common as our "Smith." As such a common surname it was

often adopted by newly arriving blacks lacking a surname.

Today, "Gowen" and its derivitives are found in nearly

all multi-racial groups in North America. But the adop-

tion of "Gowen" is first documented among Malange-Ango-

lans in the Virginia colony of the early 17th century.

They were the earliest, best documented Africans inte-

grated into the society of what would become the United

States of America; they were the founding fathers not

only of the Melungeons, but of all of African America.

[To Be Continued]

This is the second article in a series written exclusive-

ly for Gowen Research Foundation. It may not be reprint-

ed or sold without the permission of the author.

November 8, 2000.

Biography of the Author:

Tim Hashaw is an investigative reporter living in Hous

ton, Texas. He has filed stories for CBS, ABC, and NBC

from local network affiliates and he has been a journal-

ist in radio, television and print. Tim has received

numerous national awards for excellence in journalism

from: The Radio and Television News Director's Associa-

tion, Associated Press, United Press International, the

National Headliners Club and others. Tim is a seventh-

generation Texan and a descendant of James Goyne, born

May 30, 1755 in Mecklenburg County, Virginia.

Contact:

If you have comments or questions concerning the Malange-

Angolan ancestry of the Melungeons, you may contact Tim

Hashaw directly.

Amasa Vernon Going Killed

In the Battle of Atlanta

By Fredrick M. Tucker

Editorial Boardmember

Box 214, Duncan, South Carolina, 29334

Amasa Vernon "Mace" Going, son of Isaac Going and Rebecca

Palmer Going and namesake of his uncle Amasa Palmer, was

born at Kelton, South Carolina in Union District. His

birth occurred "Tuesday, 30th day of January 1827, 45

minutes past 6 o'clock in the evening," according to the

family bible. He was a grandson of Drury Going, a Revo-

lutionary soldier, and his wife, Sarah "Sally" Baxter

Going.

Amasa Vernon "Mace" Going fled to Louisiana about 1858 to

avoid being implicated in the theft of a slave. "A. M.

Goins" appeared in the 1860 census of Union Parish, Lou-

isiana.

In July 1861 Amasa Vernon "Mace" Going enlisted as a pri-

vate in Company E of the "Independent Rangers" at Camp

Moore, Louisiana, according to the research of J. Dale

West, a Civil War historian of Longview, Texas. At that

time Camp Moore was located just north of New Orleans

near the site of the New Orleans Fairgrounds.

Shortly after his enlistment, the soldier had his picture

taken in his new uniform while holding his musket. The

photograph, a sixth plate ambrotype, was made by a woman

photographer, E. Beachabard in New Orleans August 18,

1861.

This rare and valuable artifact is now owned by West who

maintains a collection of Civil War photographs. Close

examination shows that the waist beltbuckle bears the

Louisiana state seal. The weapon was an 1816 converted

percussion musket, general issue for that period, accord-

ing to West.

The photograph appeared in "Guide to Louisiana Confeder-

ate Military Units, 1861-1865" by Arthur W. Bergeron, Jr.

and in "Confederate Calendar Works" by Larry Jones of

Austin, Texas. More recently the portrait was published

in "Portraits of Conflict, a Photographic History of Lou-

isiana in the Civil War" compiled by Dr Carl H. Moneyhon,

professor of history at University of Arkansas at Little

Rock in collaboration with Bobby Roberts.

West researched the military career of Amasa Vernon

"Mace" Going and the "Independent Rangers." The regiment

was incorporated into Confederate service as the Twelfth

Louisiana Infantry Regiment. The 12th Louisiana partici-

pated in the Confederate victory in the Battle of Belmont

on the Mississippi River November 7, 1861. They had to

retreat in April 1862, giving up Island No. 10 after a

bitter battle.

Amasa Vernon "Mace" Going wrote a letter September 12,

1862 to his older brother, William George Washington Go-

ing who was serving with the South Carolina 7th Cavalry

Regiment in Virginia.

"Mississippi,

Marshall County

Near Holly Springs

Sept. 12, 1862

Dear Brother,

I am well, and I hope this will find you and family with

all the connection is in the same good blessing. We have

just got back from a tiresome trip. We traveled over 700

miles, got but little to eat and done very hard marching.

We did not get into any fights.

"Our regiment stood it much better than I thought. I saw

John Bailey and old Jim Sams at Jackson, Miss. He was

well. I also saw John Foster yesterday. He heard of me

and came by to see me. He belongs to the 6th Miss. Regt.

He is 12 miles above here.

We have just received orders to cook up five days rations

and be ready for marching in the morning at 4 o'clock.

We will go up North I think. We will fight at Bolivar,

Tenn. before this time next week, if the yankeys don't

leave there before we can get there. They are 12,000

strong at that place. We have and can get about 20,000 I

think. The general notion is to push on a fight at that

place.

We are camped on cold water [Creek], five miles from Hol-

ly Springs, just where the yankeys were camped 6 weeks

ago. They did a great deal of mischief in this settle-

ment.

I found some yankey letters today they lost when they

left here. One young lady writing to her sweetheart said

"Oh how she would like to see the Rebels tortured a while

and then killed" and others praying for him to come home

for she and her children were living on bread and other

one was grieving because her husband was not buried in a

coffin. I see from the letters we found about here that

they have hard living as well as we do in the South.

I suppose you have heard of the glorious victorys in Virg,

Tenn and Ky. long before this can reach you. I have to

write in a hurry. You can tell brothers that I am up

here and direct there letters to Holly Springs and I will

get them though they are fixing to start to Tenn. and

will be there tomorrow.

I want you to keep everything strait between you and I

about the Land. You do what you think is rite and that

will suit me. I will wright again before long, soon as

we stop or our fight is over. Tell Keran [his sister]

I will wright to her before long. Tell them all that

I am well. I must go to cooking.

I am your loving brother

A. V. Going

To William Going"

The Confederate forces enjoyed temporary successes and

moved from Mississippi into Tennessee. The 12th Louisi-

ana was ordered to defend Ft. Pillow, Tennessee on the

Mississippi River. They were driven out of Ft. Pillow

in May 1863 by the superior firepower of the Union gun-

boats descending the river.

They were then transferred to Port Hudson, Louisiana to

resist the Union gunboats advancing up the Mississippi

from New Orleans. When Port Hudson fell in May 1863,

the regiment fell back toward Vicksburg, Mississippi

where it was defeated in the Battle of Baker's Creek.

The regiment was then transported to Dalton, Georgia to

attempt to halt the advance of Gen. W. T. Sherman on At-

lanta. Under Confederate Gen. J. E. Johnston the regi-

ment joined in the delaying action.

William George Washington Going wrote June 15, 1863 to

his wife, "William Fowler's letter said you had heard

from A. V. Going, but I can't make no since out of it."

Fighting continually, Johnston wisely withdrew his

forces toward Atlanta and inflicted 17,000 casualties on

the Union forces. Pres. Jefferson Davis, tired of Johns-

ton's Fabian tactics, replaced him with a "fighting man"

Gen. J. B. Hood. Hood hurled his troops against Sher-

man's superior forces thrice and was soundly defeated

in each battle.

The last battles for Atlanta were bloody hand-to-hand

combat, and it was here that Amasa Vernon "Mace" Going

must have died. No entries were made in his service

record after the Battle of Atlanta in July 1864.

Like Amasa, captain of the host of Judah who was treach-

erously slain by Joab in II Samuel, he was a dedicated

soldier serving a cause.

"Amasa wallowed in blood in the midst of the highway . .

and everyone that came by him stood still."

Martha Angeline Gowan at Age 13 Assisted

Her Confederate Uncle with Amputation

Martha Angeline "Angie" Gowan, daughter of Pleasant An-

drew Gowan and Mary A. Elizabeth Harris Gowan, was born

near Jackson, Tennessee August 28, 1851. She had a

first-hand experience with the Civil War, according to

Connie LaDelle Ball Chandler, a granddaughter of McCrory,

Arkansas and author of "The H. L. Ball Family."

"When she was 13, one of her uncles was shot in the leg

during the Battle of Shiloh. He crawled into the woods

and hid. He started for home [90 to 100 miles away]

crawling through the woods at night and hiding in the

daytime, living on berries and roots. The family thought

that he had been killed in the battle, but one morning,

Martha Angeline Gowan went out to milk the cows and found

him in the barn, deathly ill with gangrene in his wound.

He cautioned her not to let anyone know of his presence

because Union soldiers were still in the area.

He requested her to bring a sharp butcher knife, some wa-

ter and rags for bandages. They built a fire to steril-

ize the knife and to boil some water.

They placed a tourniquet above the wound, and she was in-

structed to complete the amputation in the event that he

passed out. They disjointed the leg at the knee, cauter-

ized it to stop the bleeding and pulled the skin down

over the stump. She bandaged the stump and stood vigil

while he slept. The war was over by the time his wound

had healed, and he could then let all know that he had

survived the Battle of Shiloh.

I have in my possession a quilt that she made when she

was a little girl. She picked the cotton, carded it, spun

the thread, wove the material, dyed it using leaves for

the green and bark for the brown dye. Then she cut the

pieces and pieced them together, carded cotton bats for

the filling, and then quilted it."

Martha Angeline "Angie" Gowan was married January 6, 1874

to George Falcon Wood, according to Carroll County marri-

age records. He was born February 14, 1854 near Jackson,

according to Gerald F. Scott, Jr, Gowan descendant and

Foundation Member of Paragould, Arkansas.

Connie LaDelle Ball Chandler wrote, "She served as a mid-

wife to ladies in the community, riding horseback or in a

buggy to attend to the women. Once she went on a call in

the buggy, driving a mare with her young colt following.

The baby was slow in arriving, so she returned home to

fix supper for her family. When she returned for the

birthing, she tied up the colt and rode the mare. The

baby finally arrived, about daylight she was ready to re-

turn home. When she mounted the mare, the horse took the

bit between her teeth and raced all the way home. She

was so anxious to return to her colt, that she was uncon-

trolable. The rider had great difficulty staying on the

horse. She ran so fast and recklessly that Grandmother

was bleeding from the nose and ears when they got home."

They removed to Tipp, Arkansas in 1887 and assisted in

organizing the Friendship Methodist Church in the follow-

ing year. They removed to McCrory, Arkansas in 1903

where George Falcon Wood operated a livery stable. Later

he and his son Edward Hermon Wood operated a general

store in McCrory.

He died April 29, 1912 at McCrory and was buried in the

Odd Fellows Cemetery there. She died August 2, 1947,

three weeks short of her 96th birthday, and was buried

beside her husband.

Children born to them include:

Margaret Eula Wood born December 25, 1879

Pleasant Andrew Wood born September 13, 1885

Edward Hermon Wood born February 15, 1888

Elizabeth Myrtle Wood born December 29, 1889

Martha Abi "Mattie" Wood born June 22, 1892

Woodruff County Historical Society of McCrory published

in its "Rivers and Roads" the family history research of

Connie LaDelle Ball Chandler who died there June 22,

1992. The Foundation is indebted to Roger Smith, presi-

dent of the Society who gave approval for the Foundation

to publish excerpts from the Chandler material.

==Dear Cousins==

I am interested in sharing information on the Goings sur-

name. Michael Goings/Goans was born c1740 in Shenandoah

County, Virginia of parents unknown. He was married in

the middle 1760s, wife's name Mary.

Children born to Michael Goings and Mary Goings are be-

lieved to include:

Henry Goings born about 1769

John Goings born about 1772

Mary Goings born about 1775

David Goings born about 1780

Henry Goings, regarded as the son of Michael Goings and

Mary Goings, was born about 1769 in Shenandoah County. He

was married there to Lucy Blackwell in 1792. Later they

removed across the Shenandoah Valley to adjoining Hardy

County, VA [later West Virginia] in the early 1800s.

Children born to Henry Goings and Mary Goings probably

include the following:

Michael Goings born about 1793

Thomas Goings born about 1794

Amelia Goings born about 1797

Emeline Goings born about 1800

Balderman Goings born about 1801

Caroline Goings born about 1810

Joseph Goings born about 1812

Michael Goings, regarded as the son of Henry Goings and

Mary Goings, was born about 1793. He was married to Mary

Elizabeth Honeyman in 1816 and removed to Madison County,

OH.

Amelia Goings, regarded as the daughter of Henry Goings

and Mary Goings, was born about 1797. She was married to

Harrison Baldwin in 1827. She died in Grant County, WV

in 1864.

Emiline Goings, regarded as the daughter of Henry Goings

and Mary Goings, was born about 1800. She was married to

Harrison Baldwin in 1827.

Balderman Goings, regarded as a son of Henry Goings and

Mary Goings, was born about 1801. He was married in 1822,

wife's name Lucretia. He died in Ohio.

John Goings, regarded as the son of Michael Goings and

Mary Goings, was born about 1772. He was married about -

1795, wife's name unknown. Children born to them are

believed to include:

Shadrach Goings born about 1796

Shadrach Goings, probable son of Michael Goings and Mary

Goings, was born about 1796 in Shenandoah County. He was

married about 1819 to Hester Sears. They also removed to

Hardy County where he operated a ferry crossing the south

branch of the Potomac River.

Thanks,

Annette Miner

4809 N. 4th Street

McAllen, TX, 78504-6503

956/687-6503 eminer@hiline.net

==Dear Cousins==

The Salt Lake Institute of Genealogy 2001 will be held

8-12 January 2001 at the Wyndham Hotel, Salt Lake City,

UT. The following courses will be held: 1) American Re-

cords and Research: Focusing on Localities; 2) Tracing

Immigrant Origins; 3) Scottish Research; 4) Scandinavian

Research; 5) Preparing a Family History in the New Mil-

lennium; 6) US Military records; 7) and 8) Research Meth-

odology: Problem Solving I and Advanced Methodology:

Problem Solving II; 9) Making the Most of Your Computer

as a Serious Genealogist; 10) The Internet: A Tool for

Genealogical Research. For more information, see:

http://www.infouga.org/institut.htm

==Dear Cousins==

I am having a problem finding anything on Nathan Gowin of

Jersey County, Illinois.

Here is what I have from cemeteries in Jersey county Ill-

inois:

Nathan Gowin

b: 8-12-1840

d: 6-9-1889

Married: Nancy Ann [last name unknown]

b: 12-13-1844

d: 10-13-1906

Child:

George Paris Gowin

b 1-6-1865

d 8-23-1935

married: Libby Elizabeth Schafer

b 3-4-1863

d 5-1933

Her parents are Andrew Schafer and Elizabeth White.

They in turn had my grandfather:

Minor Stephen Gowin

b 3-6-1903

d 1-11-1983

m 11-23-1927 to

Loretta Ann Evering

b 10-14-1907

d 10-11-1982

both were buried at Gunterman cemetery in Fieldon, IL in

Jersey County.

Does anyone have more information about George Paris Gow-

in and Nathan Gowin?

Thanks,

Angela Gowin

St. Louis, MO

gowina@optimist.org

==Dear Cousins==

Does anyone have knowledge of James Goins? My g-aunt Vir-

ginia Dunn was born in 1900 at Iuka, MS, and her first

husband was a Goins; I think he was Roy Goins. They had a

son James Goins, who would be about 75 today, but I think

he too has died. There was also a daughter, Lorraine

Goins. Can anyone help me get in touch with this family

or descendants?

Cynthia Chandler

East Peoria, Illinois

cynthia@davesworld.net

==Dear Cousins==

Has anyone heard of an Indian roll called the Hester

Roll? When I mentioned to someone else, who also was into

genealogy and history, that I was researching possible

Indian ancestors, they mentioned this roll. I went to the

National Archives, but didn't find it. Can anyone help?

Lynn Rockcastle

mymelmail@yahoo.com

All Year 2000 Foundation Memberships Expire

At the Stoke of Midnight December 31, 2000

Members are reminded that the end of the Year 2000 is

fast approaching, and NOW is a good time to get their

membership renewals in the mail.

New members and renewing members are offered memberships

which begin now and extend through December 2001.

A membership is required to access the Foundation Manu-

script and "Melungia." All other sections of the Elec-

tronic Library are open to the public without charge.

The membership fees are presently the only source of

income to meet the Foundation's operating expenses.

If you are financially able to "move up a notch" on

the Membership Schedule in the blank below, please do

so to keep the Foundation operating in its 12th year.

If you have family members on your Christmas List who

are interested in preserving our heritage, gift member-

ships in the Foundation would be very appropriate. The

Foundation will send gift cards acknowledging your

thoughtfulness, both to you and the recipients.

Nervously,

Arlee

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

To Subscribe and Unsubscribe to the Foundation Forum . .

You are currently subscribed to the Forum which means

that you will receive at no cost each message and each

Electronic Newsletter posted to the list as a separate

piece of E-mail.

You may unsubscribe at any time by sending the following

message:

Gowen-L-request@rootsweb.com

that contains in the body of the message the command

unsubscribe

[and no additional text]

Notice that all characters following the "@" symbol must

be in lower case.

If you are instructing your friends how to subscribe to

the Forum, tell them to send the following message:

Gowen-L-request@rootsweb.com

that contains in the body of the message the command:

subscribe

[and no additional text; turn off all signature files

and leave subject line blank]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Arlee Gowen, Editor

Gowen Research Foundation

A non-profit heritage society

5708 Gary Avenue

Lubbock, Texas, 79413-4822, 806/795-8758 or 806/795-9694

E-mail: gowen@llano.net

Website:

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~gowenrf

The Foundation Website offers:

Foundation Newsletters--All editions published since 1989

Foundation Electronic Newsletters

"Melungia" Home of the Melungeons-Articles published by

our Melungeon writers

"Dear Cousins" Letters from Foundation Researchers

Foundation Manuscript--10,000+ pages of research on the

following Families:

Gawan, Gawans, Gawen, Gawens, Gawin,

Gawins, Gawn, Gawne, Gawnes, Goain,

Goains, Goan, Goane, Goans, Goen,

Goene, Goens, Goin, Goines, Going,

Goings, Goins, Gorin Gouen, Gouens,

Gowain, Gowan, Gowane, Gowanes, Gowan,

Gowans, Gowen, Gowene, Gowens, Gowin,

Gowine, Gowing, Gowins, Gown, Gowne,

Gownes, Gowyn, Goyen, Goyens, Goyne,

Goynes, Goynne, McGowan, McGowen, McGowin,

O'Gowan, O'Gowen O'Gowin."

=========================================================

Membership Application

Gowen Research Foundation 806/795-8758 or 795-9694

5708 Gary Avenue E-mail: gowen@llano.net

Lubbock, Texas, 79413

Website: http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~gowenrf

I enclose payment as indicated below for

[ ] New Membership,

[ ] Renewal Membership

in Gowen Research Foundation.

$15 [ ] Member

$25 [ ] Contributing Member

$100 [ ] Sustaining Member

[ ] Please E-mail a sample copy of the Electronic

Newsletter to the family researcher(s)

listed on sheet attached.

[ ] Please send Gift Membership(s) as indicated above

to individual(s) listed on sheet attached.

Name(s)________________________________________________

Address______________________Phone_____________________

City________________State_____Zip________[+4]__________

E-mail Address_________________________________________

=========================================================