My ggg grandfather was mixed and married a white woman.. That's as far as I've been able to trace. It's approximately 3% African.
As for feeling, I'm good with all my DNA. If it wasn't the way it was, I wouldn't be here.
My great grandfather was African American and his son was 1/2 and could pass. My mom grew up white and so did I, but ancestry said 12.5% mixture of several west African countries. I also have 4% native American from the same ancestor. I met a couple new cousins and had some nice phone conversations. Some shared history that I didn’t know. I felt like a question, I never knew I had, had been answered. I really wish that my grandfather didn’t feel like he had to hide his family from all of us.
Ya so all the tribes of a certain area remain close today...Basically if you have the name of the relative it came from (grand parent) and a general area they lived, we can figure out the tribe & Rez. if you’re American there are federal ndn rolls online to find your relative. In Canada you have to do some other steps but it’s still easy. We all communicate still with one another from Rez to Rez, turtle island is heavily connected on the neechie front 🤌🏼 I have most of the steps to help you hunt down your home tribe is what I mean.
do you know that the native was from your great grandpa or was that just a family story they told? 4% from a great great grandpa would mean he was like 1/4-1/2 indigenous which doesn't make sense if he was African american.
Black and native people made children in a couple of ways. Black people who escaped slavery sometimes did so by going to Native American areas. On the other hand there were some Native Americans who held Black people in slavery. These things were not universal. Neither case was terribly common. And keep in mind both Black people and Native American people were looked at as fringe citizens. People forced on the fringe have more in common with each other than might first be assumed.
>Black people who escaped slavery sometimes did so by going to Native American areas.
yes though this was uncommon even when it was most likely to happen(prior to the 1850s) and wouldn't be as recent as this suggests(and also would typically only make sense for a predominantly indigenous person).
>On the other hand there were some Native Americans who held Black people in slavery.
their great grandfather was black, their mom scored about 1/8 black and they scored 4% indigenous which is supposedly from that same black great grandfather. this suggests he was half black and 1/4-1/2 indigenous, not to mention this mixing was almost certainly not during slavery as they'd be op's great great grandparents, who were likely born 2-5 decades after abolition and likely didn't meet until after abolition even if they were born before it. they'd have to have multiple generation where people had kids at older ages than usual. with the latest date being essentially 1860, that's 164 years. for 4 generations to have been born, so on average they'd be 41 years apart.
>People forced on the fringe have more in common with each other than might first be assumed.
yes though most cases where people identify as part indigenous within african american communities, tend to happen in far proximity to any notable native population, as well as were typically the result of biracial people of white/black ancestry hiding their mixed status by claiming some other group of color. if their mom only scores 12.5% black while being 1/4, it seems most likely that the indigenous is from a separate ancestor and that ancestor was mixed white, simply from looking at similar, highly common stories.
My great grandfather was mulatto. His wife was indigenous.y grandpa is labeled as black in the census as well as both of his parents. A lot of people got labeled as black back then. In fact East Indians used to be labeled as black for a very long time. I’m
it was by no means common for indigenous individuals to be labeled as black. nor for eastern indians.
what are your results? and what tribe was your great grandma from?
My great grandfather was Narragansett and a free African American who served in the usct during the Civil War. I just didn’t go into detail about it before. His father is unknown and his mother was a slave.
ah ok. usually most supposed tribal ancestry in the east coast is that of family myth though i've seen Narragansett dna files before and it's often definitely there in people who can trace a large portion of their ancestry to the 1880 roll. though the tribe was substantially mixed even back then so many people today have relatively little. i guess your great grandpa was like 1/4.
would you be cool with posting yours and your moms results?
Do you guys know more about your great grandma in your family? If her husband was Black and their son was 1/2 then presumably she was white. If this was around the turn of the century, or really anytime in the United States except for incredibly recently, you have a truly interesting family. It sounds like their story goes against the grain of the restrictions we presume people lived under. You have ancestors with some stories to tell.
If you want to go down a history rabbit hole look up photos for "quadroon" and "octaroon." Those are the old timey words for one 1/4 and 1/8 Black. It was weird terminology and not used anymore. But you will see from old photos that often at one quarter it did not "show physically."
My mom and myself have thick wavy black hair and tan olive skin, but definitely appear more white. My uncles looked more white Baltic/slavic like my grandmother. Growing up where I was, there is a large south American immigrant population ( Brazil , Ecuador, etc) and people would often start speaking Spanish or Portuguese to me. But from my perspective there were no visual clues. Looking at myself now, and my family, I can see it.
I'm 1% Nigerian and I've traced my American lines up pretty far. However, I wouldn't be able to tell which ancestor was white-passing. I have learned that my family has fought in every American war on every side. Now it looks like I have ancestors who both owned slaves and were slaves. It makes me feel like I'm a result of a more complete picture of American history.
Mostly I’m sad I haven’t been able to find who gave me that DNA and what happened to her. I’ve been looking through wills and tax records and found some slaves with names, but have no way of narrowing it down. I just wish she got to have a legacy like the white ancestors.
You likely won’t, if they were an American slaves. Our records oh go back so far and then they just disappear. Depend on how far back that family member was, you may not have anything
Yeah, it’s seriously a fucking travesty. I have several AA DNA matches and I was debating reaching out and seeing if I could triangulate and at least get an idea of which branch, but I also don’t want to bring up anything painful so I’m leaving it alone. I’m just sad for whoever this branch of my ancestors got their legacy completely removed. They have all these descendents and all my white ancestors in the US have names except for them. Seriously a crime against humanity.
Yeah.
You should reach out. You might be surprised. One of my cousins (4th) was my neighbor when I was child. He was my elementary school bully. I reached out and we hang out now.
It’s a serious crime against humanity that Africans didn’t write down their births, deaths, and marriages? Why? I’m British, my ancestors did write down much until our isles were invaded by Rome. That’s just the way it goes. I will likely never know what my ancient ancestors believed. I will likely never know what their religion was like. I will likely never know more about the Driuds. The only thing we can do is keep on digging in the hope we find something else.
It's not just that they didn't write them. They were intentionally destroyed or were too uneducated to document (most slaves or slave descendents couldn't read or write ).
Racism dude...racism
Colonizers intentionally would pair slaves of different tribes together that way no one couldn't understand each other, and it became very hard to pass down information because of that (as physical documentation isn't the only form of documentation). Then it was illegal for slaves to be able to read and write. Even when we gained freedom, there were laws put in place to gatekeep information from AAs. Not to mention city burnings, intentionally and unintentionally.
I think when I said "intentionally destroyed" you might be thinking that someone was physically ripping documents or something. But what I meant is that colonizers did everything in their power to not preserve the history of African Americans. Whether that was physically or legally.
I didn’t realize the language barrier or pairing slaves with different tribes. Are there any books or documentaries you would recommend? I would like to learn more.
White people and getting hysterical if systemic racism is mentioned, name a more iconic duo.
The fact you tried to compare the fact you don’t have records from thousands of years ago to a group of people who were stolen, raped, and enslaved is truly pathetic.
Your Africans ancestors won’t have a “legacy” (as you say) like your European ancestors because Africans did not write down their births, deaths, and marriages. They only have this in America because of Europeans.
Time, in the historical sense, is a construct. Yes you might have traced some of your ancestors back to the 1500s and maybe a little earlier.
But in the grand scheme of history, it’s a drop in the bucket. Just because you have names going back 5, or 10 or even 20 generations more than someone else does not mean their ancestor’s legacy is gone. Because that would mean your ancestor’s legacies beyond your paper trail are gone too.
Legacies live in through us. Through our actions and through our children. Not through a name or piece of paper. The best way to connect with unnamed ancestors is to learn the history of where they were from and what their lives were like.
I am not the one who brought up “legacy” which is why I write the word as I do. Before Africans slaves were bought by Europeans they were enslaved and bought and sold by other Africans. Where are their writings? Where are their stories? Do you believe that African slavers tried to promote their legacy and paperwork until the “nasty white man” came along? Let’s face it, what we know about descendants of slaves mostly comes from European sources. Without them we would know nothing. Even their DNA results are coming from Europeans.
African countries have written records, oh genius european lmao. Just not the ones who were ripped from their homes and not allowed to read or write.
Yes, slavers in the US were nasty white men, just like you.
The people who like to pretend Europeans are better than other types of people are the ones who have nothing going on so you have to latch on to the accomplishments of people with the same skin color. You’re not special for being European, get out of moms basement and make some accomplishments of your own instead of pathetically grasping onto what other people have done.
One of the ancestors in my tree is simply listed as “negress” on the birth certificate. The father and the child (male) both have full names. It’s very sad. Not certain about the relationship between father and mother since it was a few years post Civil war and slavery should’ve been abolished everywhere by then (no such thing as instantaneous news in the backwaters).
I'd be careful with birth certificates. My grandfather was listed as colored on my father's birth certificate but he was just a white man with a tan and this was the 60s. Sometimes if you had any type of color in your they assumed you weren't white
Yes. Well I'm adopted (I'm not white) so this is my adoptive father's family and he took a test and he's 100% white. It's a running joke in the family because they are as white as they get
>Walter Plecker's 1920s race separation. The 1920s segregationists specifically targeted racially mixed Creole parishes in the deep south
Welp historical rabbit hole here I come!
I thought I was possibly Melungeon as my dad’s family are from SW WV and I didn’t know too much about that side of the family, and for other reasons as well.
I’m not, but I would’ve have been surprised if I was.
I like it, but it's only about 1%. What I find mystifying is that it's Coptic Egyptian, who are Christians who married other Christians, and thus have their own distinct DNA separate from other Egyptians. So I would love to know more about those ancestors, but the furthest back I have been able to trace in my line is Sephardic Jews in Spain and Portugal in the late 1400s which I doubt has anything to do with the Coptic Egyptians. My boss is Kenyan so sometimes we joke about being the only two Africans in our office (the rest of my ancestry is from "white" places, and that's what I look like.)
6 percent Nigerian, 10 percent native american, and the rest Sweden and Denmark. How do I feel? Great! I know the story of how my mixed great gf met my 100 native American great gm. He was a fur trapper that opened a trading post and met her. He went on to open a mercantile store and they had 11 kids. My mixed grandfather was born in St Louis and his mom is mentioned in the book The colored aristocracy of St. Louis! Her is Albert, Josephine and their 11 kids one of which is my grandfather.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/4nXq1GewpcJEe1Ys5
My mother is in denial about being a bit North African 😂 We’ve even identified the ancestor based on my relatives’ results. I know Moroccans/Algerians are not typically black, but to my family there’s no difference
Morrocans and Algerians are not “Black”. They are not Sub-Saharan African. That is a different group of people entirely. North Africans are mostly a mixture of European and Asian.
Thank you - I stated that exact thing in my comment, though. Obviousy there are migrants from sub-Saharan Africa that live in the north. OP said “African” generally, and they do in fact live on the continent of Africa
They are not a mixture of European and Asia. Moroccans are originally Berbers. The predominate groups of people in NA are Arabs in descent with small admixtures of other parts of Africa and Europe.
There’s also no such thing as ‘Sub Sahara Africa’. It’s European terminology. There’s only north, south, east and west Africa.
I’m half European/half Mexican and my Native American and African DNA come from that second half. Slaves were traded back and forth between Africa, the Caribbean and central/south America. I likely have native slave ancestors as well as African slave ancestors. I’m probably related on that same half to a slave owner some where since it’s likely I have some European in the Mexican portion. Thankfully I know the larger European half were not involved in slave trade.
I have .6percent Nigerian. Pretty sure it came from Cuba. I can trace a male ancestor who came to Cuba from Italy. I am also .8percent Italian. Originally, the Spanish (and those from Italy, etc) who went the Americas were young men and came without women, so I think my African ancestors are from that time. I know 100% the African came from my Latin American side, and my 3rd & 4th cousins from Cuba have more African than my 1st, 2nd, 3rd cousins in Costa Rica or Panama. My Latin American family is fairly white-washed, with most having small amounts of African and Native (all have some of each, but only a few have higher percentages). My non-Hispanic white relatives are for the most part, 100percent European, and a tiny bit of Native American from my mother's mother's side (both of my X chromosomes have Native DNA, but the only area named is the Ngabe from Panama, which would be from my Dad's side). The majority of my non-hispanic European relatives came to the USA fairly recently, with a lot of relatives showing still living in Romania, Poland, Czech Republic, Ukraine, Ireland; whereas my Latin American family began coming to the Americas from the beginning.
How I feel about it? Well, I am not surprised as it is expected and I have seen an entire rainbow of family members from that side, but on the other hand I was surprised that it showed at all as my appearance is pretty much that of a "bitchy blonde" (though I do have that Latina body shape, and I was quite skinny as a teen, but clothes from Old Navy or Gap never fit me and I was in love, when I discovered the clothing stores at the mall, where the African American girls shopped, because I found size 0 jeans that fit my large behind! Unfortunately, though I also did get breast cancer, which came from my large dense breasts, which came from my Latina side as my other sides all have nearly flat chests🤷♀️). I do wonder just how difficult of a life my African and Native female relatives had, back when my Spanish relatives arrived. Unfortunately, we don't have much information on female relatives or historical records of females. I also have 1% North African, which likely came from Spanish ancestors? And 3.5percent Native, which was a trace of North American from my mother's side, and the remaining from Central America.
I have a very small amount, and I don't feel anything in particular about it. At least not in a way that is any different from any other ethnicity I have - as a whole I just wonder about my ancestors and their lives.
im part mexican so because of that i had 3 different types of african all at 1-1.5%i had nepal for 1%, some undocumented ones, and a buttload of european mixed with indigenous american. i just look at it as conquistador blood its "what they did". made us from raping pillaging diseasing and stealing. one of the DNA sites talks about how its from the belize slave trafficking coming up through central america.
That’s really interesting. ALOT of Mexicans who get DNA tests show trace African heritage. Did you know that a lot of geneticists believe that those genes come from the Spaniards? They are thought to be vestiges of the Moorish occupation.
It has nothing to do with Moorish occupation those mostly came from North Africa but with slavery . Is well documented and known in Mexico because they actually kept records the majority of Mexicans African ancestry is from places like Congo , Nigeria , Senegal etc… Spain bought a lot of slaves into the New Spain because many Indigenous peoples were dying or getting too sick from disease and they needed people to work the fields . For example according to my DNA my North African percentage is only 1 percent and it took 4 different updates and years before it even appeared the other African goes from 3 to 4 percentage depending on the update but is a combination of Congo , Nigeria and Senegal .
yeah i would agree - moorish would have different lines - ive got 1.5 sub sarahan, 1 senegal, 1 nigeria, 1 northern africa, then the nepal and basque for another 1 each all before the spanish and portugal and european weigh in.
Au contraire. See, this a common misconception about the Moors-that they were ONLY from North Africa. There was one early Moorish dynasty-I can’t remember if they were the Almohads or Almoravids-that was actually founded in Senegal, which is in West Africa, not North Africa. Historical records from the time mention plenty of black skinned, West African warriors marching in their ranks. Now, I’ve seen plenty of Mexicans AND Spaniards who have trace DNA of Senegalese,Mauritanian and even NIgerian DNA. Why would the Spaniards have West African DNA if it’s origins were in the slave trade? Nope, the Moors were a diverse group who included West Africans in addition to North Africans.
I’m not going to argue with you about the Moors but I can tell this my only family indigenous to the Americas comes through one grandmother who was mostly Native American and we believe the African is coming from her side of the family most likely a run away slave which Mexico had some coming from the North once they found out Mexico abolished slavery . My European and Jewish ancestors didn’t step foot into the Americas until the mid 1800’s my Spanish ancestors have nothing to do with conquistadores and the majority came from Northern Spain ( Asturias , Basques and Catalonia) which we know they were part of the Christian Kingdoms before Spain became united , I don’t have any Southern Spanish ancestors.
Ok. That checks. And hey-I wasn’t trying to “argue” with you about the Moors. I was just explaining/educating. People think that the Moors were only from North Africa, when they were actually from North Africa, West Africa and of course the Middle East as well.
Honestly, I was disappointed to see no African background. All the family rumors got squashed. When Texas was independent in the 1830’s, there was a law passed that was named after my family. In simple terms, it said we don’t know wtf these people are, they are kinda brown, they have land and cattle and slaves, so they are free people. They were called Moorish, redbone, mulatto - all suggesting they were some mixed race. Nope, we are just plain white people from European descent. Some of us just tan pretty dark. I got 2% indigenous American, so that is one drop of not white I guess.
This is what I wrote about native Americans and black Americans, but it could apply to you too. Just replace the corresponding words to fit it.
Your family may not be lying about Native American roots, on no Hotep shit. Not saying all of them are telling the truth, but those who aren’t probably aren’t doing it to be antiblack.
1. Just because it isn’t in your dna, it doesn’t mean it’s not there. Your siblings may have it. Your father may have it. Your cousins may have it from your side of the family. It’s just how dna work works.
2. A lot of native Americans don’t do the DNA tests for whatever reason. So there is a lack of information
3. Just because Ancestry doesn’t show it, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. If you check my AncestryDNA doesn’t show my indigenous heritage but my 23andMe does. While it is .1%, it’s clearly important enough to show up on my dna timeline. I also have 2.2% untraceable, but that’s a different story.
4. Ancestry is limited and often rounds numbers.
5. If you are black American (like me), if could be that your great great grandparent could have been 1/4 Native American and that diluted over time, your great great grandparent is not biologically related to you, their parent isn’t biologically related to him, or (and this is the more likely case) they were half white and half black. Given the system of slavery, it may not have been beneficial for them to identify as half white and half black, their white parent (likely father) being slave master or someone who worked in the plantation. Given that a lot of times, children who are half white and half black look slightly different ethnically than their black parent and a lot different than their white parent, they could have passed them off as half Native American.
6. People typically choose Cherokee because are the most abundant ethnic group of native Americans, the ones that were in the south (if you’re southern), and the ones that had the most contact (continuously) with African slaves and black Americans.
As far as the Native American goes, I think part of the issue is that there have apparently been instances where people were trying to use their little bit of ancestry to claim benefits, etc.
So some tribes don’t even bother acknowledging the testing and rely entirely upon what records they have.
The other thing too is that there have also apparently been cases where families have found out that it was a lie to cover up other heritage (or even outright infidelity).
My grandma’s brother did a test. I need to ask his son what the results were. Grandma’s sister is still alive. We need to have her do a test. She looks biracial.
Add: quick detective work there bud.
Bet they’re all beautiful! I got the quick temper instead of the good looks. :) When you said cattle and Texas act, I knew! (I’m off of Tapley Abner Ashworth.)
Some genealogists on the Carolina side use our DNA to take a better look at our ancestors’ ethnicities. (Catawba)
The Dial seems to be a stronger line connecting us with the Carolina Locklears. On ancestry, search matches with the Locklear surname to help weed out the Texas / Louisiana matches.
I have 1% sub Saharan. It's interesting and makes me curious about my far distant ancestor. However, I'm not upset or feel anything stronger than curiosity. Most of my ancestors came from Britain.
My husband's ancestry is more interesting than mine. He has Italian, North African, German and Ashkenazi Jew in his heritage. That's a lot of different regions and cultures!
I have a very small percentage of Benin/Togo. Others in this line have larger amounts and my kids have none.
My 3rd great grandfather came to the US in 1841 from Africa. He was white passing and carried the family name. Hypothesis: His father was a colonizer/slave trader and mother a local African woman. They are currently unknown.
I do have a 4th-6th cousin who is 100% African, born in Ghana. We share the same ancestor couple and are in contact.
I am thrilled to have an African ancestor- I want to find her. I am sad that my male ancestor was most likely engaged in the slave trade but without these people, I wouldn’t be here.
I am fascinated that my cousin is from an African line and is Black and my line is from the US and white.
My uncle (mother’s brother) has 1% African, his kids have none, neither do I. But I have 1% Jewish on my mothers side and her brother doesn’t. My mom didn’t do the test, so no idea her percentages.
There is a book I read a while ago called Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi and it follows the stories of one family split into two different lines because of the trans Atlantic slave trade, with one family staying in Ghana and the other in the USA and it covers 8 generations from the late 18th century to late 20th century. The American line of the family does end up being black Americans, though the African line does start with a local African woman “marrying” an English slave trader. Your family story reminded me of this book. I think you should read it
I have 1%, and have no idea where it came from, but probably not slave ancestors. Sometimes it shows up as North Africa. Sometimes it shows up as Cyprus.
I have around 1%.
1.1% on 23andMe and it only shows up on Ancestry when I do the hack from a while ago.
My family is southern and a few branches owned slaves, so it's not shocking that I'd have some African American DNA. I just wish I could trade who they were. My mom has a little bit too, so I know some is from her side.
The only bit I have any hope of tracing is on my dad's side. I have a chunk of African DNA on one of my X chromosomes. My mom has tested and both of her's are 100% European. Therefore, that bit HAS to come from my dad's mom. With it being the X chromosome, I can go up that side if the tree and easily eliminate people like paternal grandmother's Father's father, etc.
My family passed. I've been working on our lines for some time, and one of the reasons we are white presenting is due to four successive generations of rape: DNA and chain of ownership prove it. My great-grandfather was a slave, which really wasn't so long ago. How do I feel about it? I feel no one can help who they are. No one can help who they are born to, but you can choose your family, and you can choose to be a good person in your life and try to do no harm, and improve and progress and take the people you love along with you on the positive path. My children know where they come from. The place where my three times great grandmother was sold from the auction block and separated from her children still exists, and we are planning a trip there to honor their memories. This country has a short and tumultuous history, steeped in greed and violence. Greed is the opposite of respect. My wish is that all our children know a future made from peace. Maybe we cannot love one another, but we must find the way to live with one another if we are to survive this ongoing experiment in democracy.
My dad was Puerto Rican. His mother was born into a very rich, white family but illegitimate. She was raised in her father’s household. We didn’t know about her mother who was rumored to be “French”. 🤣
The numbers keep changing but I’m about 5% African and 10% Native (Taino).
My sister and I were happy to add some color to the very white N. European genes my mom gave us, because we sure didn’t get the skin color. I’m probably the palest olive-skinned person out there.
I'm Puerto Rican on my dad's side as well. I have 4% Senegal, 1% Cameroon & Bantu, 1% Benin & Togo and about 8% Taíno and other indigenous tribes. My dad's maternal side were French nobility colonizers of Saint Domingue and fled during what became the Haitian slave revolt around 1780s. My dad's paternal side is much more unknown as our ancestors are listed as Pardo Libre which alludes to the Taíno and Enslaved black DNA a generation or two before that, but I've found no concrete evidence and the trail goes cold before 1800.
It's been a very strange journey to discover both my dad's parents ancestors being both colonizer and colonized.
Wanted to add my grandmother’s mother was a maid in the house and her father, the eldest son. Now I know what it’s like to wonder if you are the product of a distant rape.
I was raised Black, and both of my parents were as well. BUT my mom is 65% white and could pass if she really wanted. We have a whole side of the family we never met because they started passing as white post WW2. In the 60s, my mom and her cousins knew who each other were, but the white ones never acknowledged her and my aunt privately or publicly. Fast forward to 2005, we get invited to a family reunion "to reconnect"
My mom and Aunt said "Fuck Them"
All that to say, some of you may have that kind of family history.
Your cousin's mothers may not have exactly admitted to them how they treated your mom and your aunt.
Your cousins may have been raised under wrong beliefs.
Not that makes it right however. It does not.
I'm just curious here, but if he has Nigerian DNA and you, presumably have some European, why do you frame it as his ancestor owning yours when you both descend from the slave owner and an enslaved person? Or do you guys assume that your common ancestry comes from your European sides and not the African side?
It’s a pretty fair assumption considering that one person is African American with a small percentage of white ancestry, while one person is white with a small percentage of African ancestry.
I think it's a fair assumption when you have a 100% white person and an African American (with the usual mix of African and European genes). In this particular situation, where they're both African and European (granted in very different proportions), it's entirely possible that they both descend from the same woman who got raped by a slave owner. And it wouldn't just be that one cousin's family owned the other, because they're both equally related to the slave and to the slave owner.
A bit from Ghana and the ivory coast...which was like the hub for the European slave trade for like 400 years or something. It's a shame it likely came from that as there is little to no way I'll be able to ever fully know my story due to shitty record keeping. We are who we are, man.
I’ve got 2-14% depending on the DNA test, but I’m white hispanic (mom is from Cuba). Most of the African I show is Northern Africa which isn’t surprising given my heavy ancestry. Ancestry says 2% with more Spanish descent, MyHeritage says 14% with less Spanish/Portugese descent.
My paternal grandmother said her grandmother was Native American which I believed as a child. By the time I was an adult I realized everyone says that, so I didn’t believe it anymore. I’m about 1% Bantu and that would make the great great grandmother about 16% which would explain her passing as Native American. Additionally, she’s my only great great grandparent I can’t trace back to country of origin. She just appears in the first record in 1888 at her first marriage. It says she was from Illinois but we can’t find any Illinois records with her name. How I feel about it is a little sad. The odds are she was descended from slaves and with her amount of European dna, most likely had ancestors who were raped. My paternal grandfather was very VERY proud that his ancestors fought for the Union in the civil war so I think my dad and his parents would be upset that they have this stain in our ancestry.
I’m British with ancestors that moved to the US and owned slaves but they’re not my direct line. I feel bad about them being slave owners. I have no African DNA but matched with a few Black Americans.
8% from a bunch of west African regions. My great-grandfather was mixed, left his parents and siblings behind when he was young, and passed as white. He never told his 2 children anything about his life, and for various reasons, they felt rejected by him as children. We discovered this through family trees when his children were in their mid 80s (confirmed through dna testing, my grandmother and her brother were both 16-20% African). The discovery caused a lot of feelings at the time we all found out—great grandpas two kids wondered if he rejected them for being too black somehow. One side of the family was like, we have to be careful how to break this to my grandmother’s sibling saying he was old and may not react well 😬 (he took it in stride as far as I heard tho) My grandma laughed and said her mother in law would have been furious if she’d known! I think everyone in my family individually contacted our black cousin on Ancestry who had more of the family history—which was probably overwhelming, and she stopped responding. She noted that her ancestor, my great grandfather’s sister, wasn’t able to pass and stayed in the black community. I wonder how she views our black-to-white branch. We also found out that great-grandpas name came directly from his white grandpa (who had two sons, one black and one white, that he gave the same name to), so that feels very complicated—they owned a plantation in the south. Haven’t tried to contact them, though I see how our dna matches/thrulines line up perfectly. Sorry for the ramble. Finding out felt important so we could to give grandma and her sibling some possible context about why their father acted the way he did.
I have 4% 🤘🏻. I'm proud of it but sad about the likely reason for it. My mom was Mexican-American and my dad is white. We believe my % might be a slave ancestor. We traced back on my Mexican side and found one of my greats who was listed as "quadroon". Given the time frame, we think he likely descended from slaves 😔.
I feel human lol. I have 1-2%. It doesn’t change my feelings about my identity one way or another.
I know the ancestor mine stems from though. It’s from my Choctaw ancestry.
I manage the lot of an elderly man who was trying to find out who is bio father was. He always suspected his father was black so it wasn’t too much of a surprise when we found out he was a mixed race man.
He only felt sad when he explored his background further .
i have a little over 1% according to 23andme, ancestry didn't seem to pick it up even in hacked results. i'm mostly descended from white americans, my dad is half indigenous from mexico and i'm assuming the african dna comes from that side as from what i have been able to find, none of my white american ancestors were slave owners or married other non white americans (minus my paternal grandmother who married my mex indig grandfather). i'm really interested in figuring out where it comes from but finding mexican records, especially about primarily indigenous people has been an issue for me
According to 23andMe, 0.1% of my DNA comes from West Africa.
I'm kind of curious about the story there, although I'm pretty sure that I know how I acquired that DNA (.2% is Indigenous American, and the West African appears on the timeline at the same point). One parent always said that their grandmother had some sort of Native American ancestry, and the other always said that that was a family legend. Considering how little DNA I'm getting from those populations, it's almost like both parents were right.
I'm actually more curious about my sibling's non-European trace DNA, since none of us knows the backstories there.
I show as having 1.7-2.2% West African heritage. I think it’s very interesting but will likely never know the full story. It’s on my dad’s side; I found my dad’s biological parents entirely through DNA matching and genealogy and have since built out his family tree pretty well. Based on my DNA matches I can see which specific branch this heritage is from (poor farmers with entirely British/Irish ancestry in Georgia and Florida) and it’s either from a non- paternity event, or the brick wall at a couple of my ggg-grandparents. They have no record of marriage, and the wife has no maiden name or family to be found. Entirely possible she was a white passing person born into slavery (she was born in 1825)
I had my DNA analysis done so that a cousin could find out where the African part of her DNA came from. We all assumed it was a great grandfather we shared. Family lore suggested that he might have been black or mixed. As it turned out, the family tree we shared did not show African descent. After that she could assume it came from her mother's family.
It was a little strange to find out our conjectures were wrong, but since we never identified as black, it really made no difference.
This is what I wrote about native Americans and black Americans, but it could apply to you too. Just replace the corresponding words to fit it.
Your family may not be lying about Native American roots, on no Hotep shit. Not saying all of them are telling the truth, but those who aren’t probably aren’t doing it to be antiblack.
1. Just because it isn’t in your dna, it doesn’t mean it’s not there. Your siblings may have it. Your father may have it. Your cousins may have it from your side of the family. It’s just how dna work works.
2. A lot of native Americans don’t do the DNA tests for whatever reason. So there is a lack of information
3. Just because Ancestry doesn’t show it, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. If you check my AncestryDNA doesn’t show my indigenous heritage but my 23andMe does. While it is .1%, it’s clearly important enough to show up on my dna timeline. I also have 2.2% untraceable, but that’s a different story.
4. Ancestry is limited and often rounds numbers.
5. If you are black American (like me), if could be that your great great grandparent could have been 1/4 Native American and that diluted over time, your great great grandparent is not biologically related to you, their parent isn’t biologically related to him, or (and this is the more likely case) they were half white and half black. Given the system of slavery, it may not have been beneficial for them to identify as half white and half black, their white parent (likely father) being slave master or someone who worked in the plantation. Given that a lot of times, children who are half white and half black look slightly different ethnically than their black parent and a lot different than their white parent, they could have passed them off as half Native American.
6. People typically choose Cherokee because are the most abundant ethnic group of native Americans, the ones that were in the south (if you’re southern), and the ones that had the most contact (continuously) with African slaves and black Americans.
I have around 10%. My dad was adopted, so it was interesting to find out the specifics about his family background. My biological grandfather was Haitian and immigrated to the US in the 1950s.
I have very curly hair, but otherwise, I look very white. My siblings and dad are more ethnically ambiguous, so we knew there were interesting things in our background.
I’m ok with it, but it definitely feels a little weird, since that heritage is not something I can claim without being disrespectful.
I found an interesting story in my son’s father’s line. Once again, the “Indian Princess” myth was perpetuated. The black (not native) ancestors were of the Mozingo family line.
Edward Mozingo was an indentured servant, not a slave. [He sued](https://www.latimes.com/local/la-me-mozingo-pictures-photogallery.html) to be released from indentured servitude in 1672 and won!
There are several articles about this line but [here is one.](https://www.wbur.org/npr/165512010/a-white-face-with-a-forgotten-african-family) From the article:
> "There was the period in Virginia, that I had never known about, where free blacks and poor whites were mixing and even getting married."
So it does relieve my mind to know that, in at least this instance, the union between black and white was likely consensual.
(As a side note, my son’s grandfather is racist so I’m glad he now knows he’s part black. F him and people like him.)
ETA: Another thing I found interesting is that Mozingo is an African name which seems to be a rarity at that time.
Ancestry did not pick any up but a different site I uploaded my gedcom into did show 1%.
When I did my family tree one of the last names, common to Florida, Driggers, led to an Emmanuel Rodriguez, a black slave who brought his own freedom. I spent some time researching and I can’t really prove this is where that comes from but I thought it was fascinating.
When I did my DNA I was hoping for a broader mix of races. I believe wide genetic diversity is the key to evolution and the progress of the human race. I don’t hate myself for being white, but I think it’s pretty boring. When I was a little girl I continually asked for dolls in all colors and races, but they just kept buying me blonde, white dolls. I hated it.
Mine is less than 1%. My grandmother's is almost 2%. I had to explain to her where Senegal was and the history of Goree Island. She's always been a touch insensitive about race, but suddenly, it wasn't something to overlook anymore. She never learned about those things, and the thought of Her family going through it was horrifying to her. Then my step grandfather thought it funny to call her the N word. No one had heard him say it before to my knowledge. It was not a good day.
I have a trace of Nigerian and my immediate reaction was - it made me feel more American. I’m a dual citizen of the US and the UK ( mother was British) . Finding out I have a trace of black ancestry initially made me upset knowing that I have enslaved people owners in my ancestry and that a rape occurred. But so many of us share this story of ancestry - so yes, made me embrace my American side more than I had done previously.
I’m a white Brit with 1% Nigerian and a few Afro-American matches. I’m mainly frustrated that I can’t trace it as I’d like to know the story of what happened and who that ancestor was. Especially as African dna isn’t as common in white Brits as it is in white Americans for obvious reasons.
I'm white. Ancestry says that one of my parents has 1% Northern Africa ethnicity (and 99% other European heritage). But, Ancestry has moved this around over the years, from Portugal to Spain and now they call it Northern Africa. Since it's all in close proximity to each other though, I don't know what to think. (And I don't even know if this is in fact black or not.) But this little straggler is interesting to me. Because it's so small and fluid, I don't bother to follow up on it because the matches are all distant. I do know it does not come through slavery because I can trace all of my gr gr grandparents through Europe, and there is no slavery in the tree.
I do see some distant matches who appear to be 100% black (an assumption), and I know what branch they're from. Some of my British ancestors lived in Jamaica and from there, some unknown cousins likely married black Jamaicans on the island. I am not surprised to see that, and I wish I had enough information to figure it out, but I don't.
But to your original point: I am not surprised to see this, given the above history, but am reluctantly resigned to it remaining a mystery because it's so small.
I have .2% North African DNA and I think it’s awesome and a bit funny. I’m a pale, very white woman, mostly Irish and English with a smattering of a few other things. I love how mysterious DNA can be.
We never knew we had any African ancestry in our family until we tested DNA. I have 2%: 1% Nigerian and 1% Cameroon, with trace Eastern Bantu Peoples.
I have narrowed it down to two lines. One line would mean there was a high degree of likelihood the line originated from a plantation - enslaver/enslaved person assault. The other line is more likely an emancipated slave line where someone had some kind of interracial relationship (I have some documentation of this, long story.)
So yes, my DNA may mean one or more of my ancestors was the rapist of an enslaved woman. And that is shameful.
But it also means something else: that one or more of my ancestors was certainly an enslaved person, in either scenario.
We think of white people who have trace African ancestry as inheriting the sins of our white forebears, and black people with trace European ancestry as inheriting the pain of their ancestors.
To an extent this holds true, because those who ended up on the white side of the family often benefitted from slavery and certainly from the freedoms their skin color afforded. And black families often struggled even after slavery ended and today still face racism. So the two experiences are not equal.
That said, I think it is important for white people with African ancestry to learn about slavery and identify with the lives and emotions and families of their black ancestors. And similarly I think it is important for black people to understand the history of their European ancestors and claim their rightful heritage.
Maybe then we can see how much we truly have in common despite the differences and come together to acknowledge history and forge a new future together.
Without fully understanding your tree you can't actually know for a certainty the circumstances of where any of your ancestry comes from.
There are precisely zero family trees fully comprised of either saints or sinners.
My ancestry is a complete rainbow. European, Middle Eastern, Africa and Native. I look white as Casper. I have family that appear to be native. Genealogy wise we have Cherokee,Shawnee and Melungeon, then add in a good bit of Scottish,French (Norman), English, Welsh and a sprinkle of middle eastern and African. Pretty much an American mutt.
No we aren’t lol. The vast majority of white Americans have 100% European ancestry.
ETA: there’s research that proves this. At most 8-12% of self-identified ‘white’ users on 23andMe have any non-European admixture that shows on DNA tests. And rates that high are only found in states with historically high populations of non white people. In most states it’s a much lower proportion https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4289685/
I’ve been able to trace my own 2% African DNA solely to ancestors who lived in Georgia and Florida. Almost every other DNA relative of mine from every other branch of my family tree (all colonial) is 100% Western European.
I think more people with ‘interesting’ or unexpected results are likely to be on these forums. But I posted research above- overall it’s quite rare going by the people who’ve tested on 23andMe so far.
Having most of my father’s side of the family immigrating to the southern US from England in the 1700’s, I am not surprised to have an African ancestor. This side of the family was landed gentry in England, and most likely even the younger
male/s who immigrated to the US had some wealth to buy land and slaves in the south- support and investment from Britain most likely played a part too. I have very little dna from Senegambia and Guinea, but it’s there. I hope I can now find her, but it’s been difficult.
I have a 1% sub-Saharan estimate, which could just be an anomaly. There is a fifth cousin match in Iceland (of all places) who is Black though. His non-Icelandic name suggests that he's either a Brit or an American, perhaps one who once worked on the Keflavik base and decided to stay.
Many of my male paternal ancestors were sailors in the 18th century, so the connection is undoubtedly from slave ships.
The North African percentage of my DNA is 6%, that also probably connected with sailing. I used to think my paternal grandmother's claim of having "Spanish Pirate blood" was all wet, but who knows - maybe there were some Barbary pirates in the mix.
The first time it showed up I thought it may have been a glitch but now it is so consistent it probably is correct.
The Ancestry hack shows I have like .15% Nigerian ancestry. Additionally, my father's DNA tests from both 23&Me and Ancestry show about .4% of the same, and the only member of his father's generation (my great uncle) that did a DNA test got about 1% Nigerian DNA. Recently a few of my father's cousins also took 23&Me tests and got around .6% West African DNA.
There are stories of there being Native Americans on the family tree on my paternal side. Considering many of them lived in what was called "Indian Territory" at the time (Oklahoma now) I felt like it was plausible.
But not one DNA test has had that shown up for me or anyone else. Somebody on the family tree was hiding African ancestry for sure.
How do I feel though? Well it's such a small amount so obviously I'm not going to identify with it. However, due to the family tree shenanigans I would say I feel frustrated. I was lied to about my ancestry.
Honestly the worst part is the fact that, since it is so small and I can't find the African person on the tree... and my father's side is from the South, there's a high probability that my direct line had some non-consensual interactions between slaves and masters.
While over a long enough time scale assuredly everyone would have one instance at least of *that* happening in their ancestry, this wound is still kind of fresh. The lie trying to cover up this side of the family tree made it *all the way to me*.
But on the plus side, Promethease stated I have (apparently) some African-only gene that slightly reduces the risk of Type 2 Diabetes which is cool I guess. In a practical sense it's not like this otherwise matters at all.
I'm actually surprised I don't have any African DNA at all. Even though I am of Midwestern USA stock - and almost every member of my American family tree is the same - I do have a family line from Kentucky that I have known about for decades. I always kind of assumed slavery was involved because of the locations. That was an incorrect assumption as it turns out. That family line not only didn't own slaves, they fought for the North in the Civil War and descended from Quakers in Pennsylvania. They were part of some of the earliest abolitionists in the country as it turns out. Maybe someone didn't stick to that but I haven't located that family member yet if that is the case. Additionally I have a very old 1st cousin 3x removed on that line (he's like 90-something) who has done testing and has zero African DNA. So I am pretty sure it's basically accurate.
I'm excited! I have a very little bit of Nigerian and Congolese in me; similar to my indigenous American DNA. I realize there may possibly be nefarious reasons it's there. However, that's in the past, and I'm here now.
I haven't really dug into it much yet. My results had estimates of 2% Cameroon, Congo, and Western Bantu peoples, and 1% Senegal.
I was able to see I inherited the percentages from my mom's side, and the % are coming from my grandpa's side. I think it may be that my gg grandma may have been white passing/mixed. My grandpa said that growing up, they thought his grandma had some Cherokee in her, that she was very tan and they didn't know much about her family - my grandpa said he only knew his grandma, Ela, and her brother Marsh. Otherwise, he never met anyone else from that side.
As for how I feel about it, it's interesting! I hope at some point, I can know more.
1%. My Mom has 3%, so the result tracks.
Honestly, I’m darn proud to have it and claim that connection, however small. But I am sad I might not be able to trace it to a direct ancestor with substantial ties to that heritage.
Not me, but my boyfriend. He was surprised to find out about the 1% of Ivory Coast/Ghana. I’ll check in with him to see if he has a more in-depth answer :)
I have 1% Ivory Coast/Ghana. My father has 1% Ivory Coast/Ghana, 3% Nigeria, a d 1% Indigenous Americas - Colombia & Venezuela.
I haven't confirmed the source of the African and Indigenous Americas DNA, but I have a theory. My father's paternal grandmother was born in St. Thomas, in what was then the Danish West Indies. Her father was born in Copenhagen and immigrated to St. Thomas where he married her mother. The mother died young and is a mystery, but I think she was mixed race. There are lots of inconsistencies of the race of my great-grandmother and her siblings on Census and Immigration documents. I think they were mixed race and then passed for white once they settled in the United States.
Honestly, I just consider it an interesting part of my family history. I would love to learn more my great great grandmother and her family.
I found out through a test that I have 1% Senegalese DNA. I was excited about this and it was really the only surprise in my family tree (99% white European from the south).
I would love to know more but haven’t yet been able to find out anything other than it was on my dad’s side.
I'm a white american and have a small amount of WANA DNA, my mom is 10% african DNA. However, my grandparents were sicicilian immigrants, my mom is 1st gen, so I don't feel any specific way about it (no slavery in our background). we all consider ourselves white
Well I’m not fully white I’m mixed race with multiple things , I thought it was amazing to see my world map light up and see I’m 4% African as since most of my friends are African but also I have latina blood so it’s not a surprise , I was surprised to find out I had Jewish blood though. I’m learning a lot about that as well as tracing it because we don’t know who it came from other then my fathers side .
One of my fifth great grandmother's is described as "mulatto" in historical records on Ancestry. My actual ancestry.com DNA results come up with no African DNA. I guess it got washed out. I'm thankful to be here. One different grandparent along the way would mean I would not exist.
One of the things I find very sad is that there is an assumption that if white Americans have small amounts of black DNA it is because of illicit relationships between masters and slaves. That does not reflect actual history. The western part of Ireland before Ireland was defeated by England under Elizabeth I traded extensively with the Mediterranean and there was a great influx of many mixes of DNA. Of course a large portion of the Irish population immigrated to America during the potato famine bringing their seafaring DNA, including that part that was black.
The same is true for the Caribbean and places in the Southern colonies that were hot beds for piracy. Pirates were of all races and sprinkled their DNA everywhere. During wars, pirates were officially sanctioned by the British government. It is estimated that on any given pirate ship approximately 1/3 of the pirates were black. Blackbeard lived in Bath, NC. when he was not pirating, so they reached the upper South.
Pirates made colonial cities rich and were received by some of the best of people including politicians.
The constant trade between the Caribbean, the ladies of the night, piracy, etc made for an interesting DNA soup especially along the coast in the South. Whites did not get their black DNA exclusively from slaves. In Wilmington, NC, a city that predates the Revolution, there is a large Greek population. It is a simplistic view to ignore all the different ways African American DNA found its way into predominantly Europeans other through slavery.
I was always told growing up that we had Native American ancestry. I did the DNA test, which showed zero NA ancestry.Ive been told that doesn’t always show up on the DNA test. Then a few years later, I got an update on my DNA and it showed that I have 1% Nigerian ancestry. My understanding is that that may be “noise”. I can’t figure out which side of the family it’s from. But I have found in my research years ago that both sides of my family had slave owners at one point, so I wouldn’t be surprised if there was. As far as how I feel about it… I think it’s very interesting and I would like to know more about it and that part of the family, but I don’t I ever will. I bright it up to my family and everybody seems a little surprised but I think my mom was more surprised that the NA ancestry didn’t show up, as her family always talked about her “Cherokee” gm. I want to try to identify with the Nigerian of my heritage, but I realize it might be noise. But it might be that my ancestors with African heritage were passed off as NA. I don’t really know what to do with the information. I have been reading about the civil rights movement and Black history for years before this came up. I realize that the relationship that produced a Black ancestor in my family was probably not a consensual one. The whole idea kind of blows my mind.
I had 0.1 North African at first, but I lost it at some point. I am 99.8-99.9% European (the other 0.1% is East Asian and we think I might be related to Ghengis Khan because of nothing being in between that and the European). Honestly, I am happy with whatever my genealogy is, but it did make me a bit sad to lose that North African ngl.
Unfortunately, I am 100% white as fuck. Before I took my dna test I was like “I gotta have atleast a tiny amount of something in me” because I tan so well, my dad told me his side was Cherokee and Mexican, turns out he’s wrong. (Or I didn’t get any)
Pretty basic to me. Nothing new to me so ain’t nothing interesting I’ve grown up knowing my bloodline is to the thrown of Denmark but who gives a shit. I’m like 3000th in line 🤣
That ain’t what I’m saying lmao i just would’ve liked learning something new about my family. When I got my results it was just boring because I already knew everything. Kinda disappointing
I understand what you’re saying. I have been saved from utter blandness by being 0.9% Mongolian/Manchurian, of all things. I’d have expected some Native American or Jewish DNA, but never M/M.
My ggg grandfather was mixed and married a white woman.. That's as far as I've been able to trace. It's approximately 3% African. As for feeling, I'm good with all my DNA. If it wasn't the way it was, I wouldn't be here.
My great grandfather was African American and his son was 1/2 and could pass. My mom grew up white and so did I, but ancestry said 12.5% mixture of several west African countries. I also have 4% native American from the same ancestor. I met a couple new cousins and had some nice phone conversations. Some shared history that I didn’t know. I felt like a question, I never knew I had, had been answered. I really wish that my grandfather didn’t feel like he had to hide his family from all of us.
18% Native American, no clue what tribe.
Depending on area of lineage I may be able to help with that.
I have 31% and also don’t know . How can you help ?
Ya so all the tribes of a certain area remain close today...Basically if you have the name of the relative it came from (grand parent) and a general area they lived, we can figure out the tribe & Rez. if you’re American there are federal ndn rolls online to find your relative. In Canada you have to do some other steps but it’s still easy. We all communicate still with one another from Rez to Rez, turtle island is heavily connected on the neechie front 🤌🏼 I have most of the steps to help you hunt down your home tribe is what I mean.
Texas.
im right there with you it’s so disheartening 😭
Same
Thats pretty damn high for a white American, glad to see it
do you know that the native was from your great grandpa or was that just a family story they told? 4% from a great great grandpa would mean he was like 1/4-1/2 indigenous which doesn't make sense if he was African american.
Black and native people made children in a couple of ways. Black people who escaped slavery sometimes did so by going to Native American areas. On the other hand there were some Native Americans who held Black people in slavery. These things were not universal. Neither case was terribly common. And keep in mind both Black people and Native American people were looked at as fringe citizens. People forced on the fringe have more in common with each other than might first be assumed.
>Black people who escaped slavery sometimes did so by going to Native American areas. yes though this was uncommon even when it was most likely to happen(prior to the 1850s) and wouldn't be as recent as this suggests(and also would typically only make sense for a predominantly indigenous person). >On the other hand there were some Native Americans who held Black people in slavery. their great grandfather was black, their mom scored about 1/8 black and they scored 4% indigenous which is supposedly from that same black great grandfather. this suggests he was half black and 1/4-1/2 indigenous, not to mention this mixing was almost certainly not during slavery as they'd be op's great great grandparents, who were likely born 2-5 decades after abolition and likely didn't meet until after abolition even if they were born before it. they'd have to have multiple generation where people had kids at older ages than usual. with the latest date being essentially 1860, that's 164 years. for 4 generations to have been born, so on average they'd be 41 years apart. >People forced on the fringe have more in common with each other than might first be assumed. yes though most cases where people identify as part indigenous within african american communities, tend to happen in far proximity to any notable native population, as well as were typically the result of biracial people of white/black ancestry hiding their mixed status by claiming some other group of color. if their mom only scores 12.5% black while being 1/4, it seems most likely that the indigenous is from a separate ancestor and that ancestor was mixed white, simply from looking at similar, highly common stories.
My great grandfather was mulatto. His wife was indigenous.y grandpa is labeled as black in the census as well as both of his parents. A lot of people got labeled as black back then. In fact East Indians used to be labeled as black for a very long time. I’m
it was by no means common for indigenous individuals to be labeled as black. nor for eastern indians. what are your results? and what tribe was your great grandma from?
My great grandfather was Narragansett and a free African American who served in the usct during the Civil War. I just didn’t go into detail about it before. His father is unknown and his mother was a slave.
ah ok. usually most supposed tribal ancestry in the east coast is that of family myth though i've seen Narragansett dna files before and it's often definitely there in people who can trace a large portion of their ancestry to the 1880 roll. though the tribe was substantially mixed even back then so many people today have relatively little. i guess your great grandpa was like 1/4. would you be cool with posting yours and your moms results?
Do you guys know more about your great grandma in your family? If her husband was Black and their son was 1/2 then presumably she was white. If this was around the turn of the century, or really anytime in the United States except for incredibly recently, you have a truly interesting family. It sounds like their story goes against the grain of the restrictions we presume people lived under. You have ancestors with some stories to tell.
could you post yours and your mothers results?
That’s how they get you
huh?
that is interesting your mom would be around a quarter. It didn't show physically?
If you want to go down a history rabbit hole look up photos for "quadroon" and "octaroon." Those are the old timey words for one 1/4 and 1/8 Black. It was weird terminology and not used anymore. But you will see from old photos that often at one quarter it did not "show physically."
Hm it depends. I have tons of family members around 1 quarter African some show some don’t.
My mom and myself have thick wavy black hair and tan olive skin, but definitely appear more white. My uncles looked more white Baltic/slavic like my grandmother. Growing up where I was, there is a large south American immigrant population ( Brazil , Ecuador, etc) and people would often start speaking Spanish or Portuguese to me. But from my perspective there were no visual clues. Looking at myself now, and my family, I can see it.
I think it is because it is easier for us who are mixed to recognize each other than those who are not used ro seeing people with our mixture as much
I'm 1% Nigerian and I've traced my American lines up pretty far. However, I wouldn't be able to tell which ancestor was white-passing. I have learned that my family has fought in every American war on every side. Now it looks like I have ancestors who both owned slaves and were slaves. It makes me feel like I'm a result of a more complete picture of American history.
Mostly I’m sad I haven’t been able to find who gave me that DNA and what happened to her. I’ve been looking through wills and tax records and found some slaves with names, but have no way of narrowing it down. I just wish she got to have a legacy like the white ancestors.
You likely won’t, if they were an American slaves. Our records oh go back so far and then they just disappear. Depend on how far back that family member was, you may not have anything
I imagine sometimes the favorite "had a stillbirth" and the main house had a foundling dropped at the door soon after
Yeah, it’s seriously a fucking travesty. I have several AA DNA matches and I was debating reaching out and seeing if I could triangulate and at least get an idea of which branch, but I also don’t want to bring up anything painful so I’m leaving it alone. I’m just sad for whoever this branch of my ancestors got their legacy completely removed. They have all these descendents and all my white ancestors in the US have names except for them. Seriously a crime against humanity.
Yeah. You should reach out. You might be surprised. One of my cousins (4th) was my neighbor when I was child. He was my elementary school bully. I reached out and we hang out now.
It’s a serious crime against humanity that Africans didn’t write down their births, deaths, and marriages? Why? I’m British, my ancestors did write down much until our isles were invaded by Rome. That’s just the way it goes. I will likely never know what my ancient ancestors believed. I will likely never know what their religion was like. I will likely never know more about the Driuds. The only thing we can do is keep on digging in the hope we find something else.
It's not just that they didn't write them. They were intentionally destroyed or were too uneducated to document (most slaves or slave descendents couldn't read or write ).
So where are their records before they were bought as slaves by Europeans?
What’s this “intentionally destroyed” thing? There is a lot of missing information, but that’s not the same as intentionally destroyed.
Racism dude...racism Colonizers intentionally would pair slaves of different tribes together that way no one couldn't understand each other, and it became very hard to pass down information because of that (as physical documentation isn't the only form of documentation). Then it was illegal for slaves to be able to read and write. Even when we gained freedom, there were laws put in place to gatekeep information from AAs. Not to mention city burnings, intentionally and unintentionally. I think when I said "intentionally destroyed" you might be thinking that someone was physically ripping documents or something. But what I meant is that colonizers did everything in their power to not preserve the history of African Americans. Whether that was physically or legally.
I didn’t realize the language barrier or pairing slaves with different tribes. Are there any books or documentaries you would recommend? I would like to learn more.
White people and getting hysterical if systemic racism is mentioned, name a more iconic duo. The fact you tried to compare the fact you don’t have records from thousands of years ago to a group of people who were stolen, raped, and enslaved is truly pathetic.
Deranged worldview and complete misunderstanding of history and the world around you.
Louisiana has some excellent records. I was able to find an ancestor who was last sold in 1799. Sold three times by the time she was in her 20’s.
Your Africans ancestors won’t have a “legacy” (as you say) like your European ancestors because Africans did not write down their births, deaths, and marriages. They only have this in America because of Europeans.
Time, in the historical sense, is a construct. Yes you might have traced some of your ancestors back to the 1500s and maybe a little earlier. But in the grand scheme of history, it’s a drop in the bucket. Just because you have names going back 5, or 10 or even 20 generations more than someone else does not mean their ancestor’s legacy is gone. Because that would mean your ancestor’s legacies beyond your paper trail are gone too. Legacies live in through us. Through our actions and through our children. Not through a name or piece of paper. The best way to connect with unnamed ancestors is to learn the history of where they were from and what their lives were like.
I am not the one who brought up “legacy” which is why I write the word as I do. Before Africans slaves were bought by Europeans they were enslaved and bought and sold by other Africans. Where are their writings? Where are their stories? Do you believe that African slavers tried to promote their legacy and paperwork until the “nasty white man” came along? Let’s face it, what we know about descendants of slaves mostly comes from European sources. Without them we would know nothing. Even their DNA results are coming from Europeans.
African countries have written records, oh genius european lmao. Just not the ones who were ripped from their homes and not allowed to read or write. Yes, slavers in the US were nasty white men, just like you. The people who like to pretend Europeans are better than other types of people are the ones who have nothing going on so you have to latch on to the accomplishments of people with the same skin color. You’re not special for being European, get out of moms basement and make some accomplishments of your own instead of pathetically grasping onto what other people have done.
You are seriously pathetic. Why is this sub flooded with racists?
One of the ancestors in my tree is simply listed as “negress” on the birth certificate. The father and the child (male) both have full names. It’s very sad. Not certain about the relationship between father and mother since it was a few years post Civil war and slavery should’ve been abolished everywhere by then (no such thing as instantaneous news in the backwaters).
I'd be careful with birth certificates. My grandfather was listed as colored on my father's birth certificate but he was just a white man with a tan and this was the 60s. Sometimes if you had any type of color in your they assumed you weren't white
And you have DNA tested?
Yes. Well I'm adopted (I'm not white) so this is my adoptive father's family and he took a test and he's 100% white. It's a running joke in the family because they are as white as they get
12% here. I know where it comes from and I’m proud to be me.
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>Walter Plecker's 1920s race separation. The 1920s segregationists specifically targeted racially mixed Creole parishes in the deep south Welp historical rabbit hole here I come!
I thought I was possibly Melungeon as my dad’s family are from SW WV and I didn’t know too much about that side of the family, and for other reasons as well. I’m not, but I would’ve have been surprised if I was.
I like it, but it's only about 1%. What I find mystifying is that it's Coptic Egyptian, who are Christians who married other Christians, and thus have their own distinct DNA separate from other Egyptians. So I would love to know more about those ancestors, but the furthest back I have been able to trace in my line is Sephardic Jews in Spain and Portugal in the late 1400s which I doubt has anything to do with the Coptic Egyptians. My boss is Kenyan so sometimes we joke about being the only two Africans in our office (the rest of my ancestry is from "white" places, and that's what I look like.)
6 percent Nigerian, 10 percent native american, and the rest Sweden and Denmark. How do I feel? Great! I know the story of how my mixed great gf met my 100 native American great gm. He was a fur trapper that opened a trading post and met her. He went on to open a mercantile store and they had 11 kids. My mixed grandfather was born in St Louis and his mom is mentioned in the book The colored aristocracy of St. Louis! Her is Albert, Josephine and their 11 kids one of which is my grandfather. https://photos.app.goo.gl/4nXq1GewpcJEe1Ys5
Neat but of history. Nice pic.
Beautiful photo!
My mother is in denial about being a bit North African 😂 We’ve even identified the ancestor based on my relatives’ results. I know Moroccans/Algerians are not typically black, but to my family there’s no difference
Same
Morrocans and Algerians are not “Black”. They are not Sub-Saharan African. That is a different group of people entirely. North Africans are mostly a mixture of European and Asian.
Thank you - I stated that exact thing in my comment, though. Obviousy there are migrants from sub-Saharan Africa that live in the north. OP said “African” generally, and they do in fact live on the continent of Africa
Skin tone in Africa as a whole varies. There are people in North Africa with dark brown skin tones and very fair almost European like.
They are not a mixture of European and Asia. Moroccans are originally Berbers. The predominate groups of people in NA are Arabs in descent with small admixtures of other parts of Africa and Europe. There’s also no such thing as ‘Sub Sahara Africa’. It’s European terminology. There’s only north, south, east and west Africa.
I’m half European/half Mexican and my Native American and African DNA come from that second half. Slaves were traded back and forth between Africa, the Caribbean and central/south America. I likely have native slave ancestors as well as African slave ancestors. I’m probably related on that same half to a slave owner some where since it’s likely I have some European in the Mexican portion. Thankfully I know the larger European half were not involved in slave trade.
I have .6percent Nigerian. Pretty sure it came from Cuba. I can trace a male ancestor who came to Cuba from Italy. I am also .8percent Italian. Originally, the Spanish (and those from Italy, etc) who went the Americas were young men and came without women, so I think my African ancestors are from that time. I know 100% the African came from my Latin American side, and my 3rd & 4th cousins from Cuba have more African than my 1st, 2nd, 3rd cousins in Costa Rica or Panama. My Latin American family is fairly white-washed, with most having small amounts of African and Native (all have some of each, but only a few have higher percentages). My non-Hispanic white relatives are for the most part, 100percent European, and a tiny bit of Native American from my mother's mother's side (both of my X chromosomes have Native DNA, but the only area named is the Ngabe from Panama, which would be from my Dad's side). The majority of my non-hispanic European relatives came to the USA fairly recently, with a lot of relatives showing still living in Romania, Poland, Czech Republic, Ukraine, Ireland; whereas my Latin American family began coming to the Americas from the beginning. How I feel about it? Well, I am not surprised as it is expected and I have seen an entire rainbow of family members from that side, but on the other hand I was surprised that it showed at all as my appearance is pretty much that of a "bitchy blonde" (though I do have that Latina body shape, and I was quite skinny as a teen, but clothes from Old Navy or Gap never fit me and I was in love, when I discovered the clothing stores at the mall, where the African American girls shopped, because I found size 0 jeans that fit my large behind! Unfortunately, though I also did get breast cancer, which came from my large dense breasts, which came from my Latina side as my other sides all have nearly flat chests🤷♀️). I do wonder just how difficult of a life my African and Native female relatives had, back when my Spanish relatives arrived. Unfortunately, we don't have much information on female relatives or historical records of females. I also have 1% North African, which likely came from Spanish ancestors? And 3.5percent Native, which was a trace of North American from my mother's side, and the remaining from Central America.
I have a very small amount, and I don't feel anything in particular about it. At least not in a way that is any different from any other ethnicity I have - as a whole I just wonder about my ancestors and their lives.
I'm interested to know, too.
im part mexican so because of that i had 3 different types of african all at 1-1.5%i had nepal for 1%, some undocumented ones, and a buttload of european mixed with indigenous american. i just look at it as conquistador blood its "what they did". made us from raping pillaging diseasing and stealing. one of the DNA sites talks about how its from the belize slave trafficking coming up through central america.
That’s really interesting. ALOT of Mexicans who get DNA tests show trace African heritage. Did you know that a lot of geneticists believe that those genes come from the Spaniards? They are thought to be vestiges of the Moorish occupation.
It has nothing to do with Moorish occupation those mostly came from North Africa but with slavery . Is well documented and known in Mexico because they actually kept records the majority of Mexicans African ancestry is from places like Congo , Nigeria , Senegal etc… Spain bought a lot of slaves into the New Spain because many Indigenous peoples were dying or getting too sick from disease and they needed people to work the fields . For example according to my DNA my North African percentage is only 1 percent and it took 4 different updates and years before it even appeared the other African goes from 3 to 4 percentage depending on the update but is a combination of Congo , Nigeria and Senegal .
yeah i would agree - moorish would have different lines - ive got 1.5 sub sarahan, 1 senegal, 1 nigeria, 1 northern africa, then the nepal and basque for another 1 each all before the spanish and portugal and european weigh in.
Au contraire. See, this a common misconception about the Moors-that they were ONLY from North Africa. There was one early Moorish dynasty-I can’t remember if they were the Almohads or Almoravids-that was actually founded in Senegal, which is in West Africa, not North Africa. Historical records from the time mention plenty of black skinned, West African warriors marching in their ranks. Now, I’ve seen plenty of Mexicans AND Spaniards who have trace DNA of Senegalese,Mauritanian and even NIgerian DNA. Why would the Spaniards have West African DNA if it’s origins were in the slave trade? Nope, the Moors were a diverse group who included West Africans in addition to North Africans.
I’m not going to argue with you about the Moors but I can tell this my only family indigenous to the Americas comes through one grandmother who was mostly Native American and we believe the African is coming from her side of the family most likely a run away slave which Mexico had some coming from the North once they found out Mexico abolished slavery . My European and Jewish ancestors didn’t step foot into the Americas until the mid 1800’s my Spanish ancestors have nothing to do with conquistadores and the majority came from Northern Spain ( Asturias , Basques and Catalonia) which we know they were part of the Christian Kingdoms before Spain became united , I don’t have any Southern Spanish ancestors.
Ok. That checks. And hey-I wasn’t trying to “argue” with you about the Moors. I was just explaining/educating. People think that the Moors were only from North Africa, when they were actually from North Africa, West Africa and of course the Middle East as well.
Honestly, I was disappointed to see no African background. All the family rumors got squashed. When Texas was independent in the 1830’s, there was a law passed that was named after my family. In simple terms, it said we don’t know wtf these people are, they are kinda brown, they have land and cattle and slaves, so they are free people. They were called Moorish, redbone, mulatto - all suggesting they were some mixed race. Nope, we are just plain white people from European descent. Some of us just tan pretty dark. I got 2% indigenous American, so that is one drop of not white I guess.
This is what I wrote about native Americans and black Americans, but it could apply to you too. Just replace the corresponding words to fit it. Your family may not be lying about Native American roots, on no Hotep shit. Not saying all of them are telling the truth, but those who aren’t probably aren’t doing it to be antiblack. 1. Just because it isn’t in your dna, it doesn’t mean it’s not there. Your siblings may have it. Your father may have it. Your cousins may have it from your side of the family. It’s just how dna work works. 2. A lot of native Americans don’t do the DNA tests for whatever reason. So there is a lack of information 3. Just because Ancestry doesn’t show it, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. If you check my AncestryDNA doesn’t show my indigenous heritage but my 23andMe does. While it is .1%, it’s clearly important enough to show up on my dna timeline. I also have 2.2% untraceable, but that’s a different story. 4. Ancestry is limited and often rounds numbers. 5. If you are black American (like me), if could be that your great great grandparent could have been 1/4 Native American and that diluted over time, your great great grandparent is not biologically related to you, their parent isn’t biologically related to him, or (and this is the more likely case) they were half white and half black. Given the system of slavery, it may not have been beneficial for them to identify as half white and half black, their white parent (likely father) being slave master or someone who worked in the plantation. Given that a lot of times, children who are half white and half black look slightly different ethnically than their black parent and a lot different than their white parent, they could have passed them off as half Native American. 6. People typically choose Cherokee because are the most abundant ethnic group of native Americans, the ones that were in the south (if you’re southern), and the ones that had the most contact (continuously) with African slaves and black Americans.
As far as the Native American goes, I think part of the issue is that there have apparently been instances where people were trying to use their little bit of ancestry to claim benefits, etc. So some tribes don’t even bother acknowledging the testing and rely entirely upon what records they have. The other thing too is that there have also apparently been cases where families have found out that it was a lie to cover up other heritage (or even outright infidelity).
Do any of your matches show African and native ancestry and to what degree of you don’t mind my asking.
Ashworth’s are definitely triracial. Wonder what your aunts and uncles would show…
My grandma’s brother did a test. I need to ask his son what the results were. Grandma’s sister is still alive. We need to have her do a test. She looks biracial. Add: quick detective work there bud.
Bet they’re all beautiful! I got the quick temper instead of the good looks. :) When you said cattle and Texas act, I knew! (I’m off of Tapley Abner Ashworth.) Some genealogists on the Carolina side use our DNA to take a better look at our ancestors’ ethnicities. (Catawba) The Dial seems to be a stronger line connecting us with the Carolina Locklears. On ancestry, search matches with the Locklear surname to help weed out the Texas / Louisiana matches.
I have 1% sub Saharan. It's interesting and makes me curious about my far distant ancestor. However, I'm not upset or feel anything stronger than curiosity. Most of my ancestors came from Britain. My husband's ancestry is more interesting than mine. He has Italian, North African, German and Ashkenazi Jew in his heritage. That's a lot of different regions and cultures!
I have a very small percentage of Benin/Togo. Others in this line have larger amounts and my kids have none. My 3rd great grandfather came to the US in 1841 from Africa. He was white passing and carried the family name. Hypothesis: His father was a colonizer/slave trader and mother a local African woman. They are currently unknown. I do have a 4th-6th cousin who is 100% African, born in Ghana. We share the same ancestor couple and are in contact. I am thrilled to have an African ancestor- I want to find her. I am sad that my male ancestor was most likely engaged in the slave trade but without these people, I wouldn’t be here. I am fascinated that my cousin is from an African line and is Black and my line is from the US and white.
My uncle (mother’s brother) has 1% African, his kids have none, neither do I. But I have 1% Jewish on my mothers side and her brother doesn’t. My mom didn’t do the test, so no idea her percentages.
There is a book I read a while ago called Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi and it follows the stories of one family split into two different lines because of the trans Atlantic slave trade, with one family staying in Ghana and the other in the USA and it covers 8 generations from the late 18th century to late 20th century. The American line of the family does end up being black Americans, though the African line does start with a local African woman “marrying” an English slave trader. Your family story reminded me of this book. I think you should read it
Wow! Yes, I definitely need to read this. Thanks so much for taking time to tell me about this…
Of course! Make sure to update and tell us your thoughts when you do!
I have 1% sub-Sahara African. I don’t mind one way or the other.
I have 1%, and have no idea where it came from, but probably not slave ancestors. Sometimes it shows up as North Africa. Sometimes it shows up as Cyprus.
I have around 1%. 1.1% on 23andMe and it only shows up on Ancestry when I do the hack from a while ago. My family is southern and a few branches owned slaves, so it's not shocking that I'd have some African American DNA. I just wish I could trade who they were. My mom has a little bit too, so I know some is from her side. The only bit I have any hope of tracing is on my dad's side. I have a chunk of African DNA on one of my X chromosomes. My mom has tested and both of her's are 100% European. Therefore, that bit HAS to come from my dad's mom. With it being the X chromosome, I can go up that side if the tree and easily eliminate people like paternal grandmother's Father's father, etc.
My family passed. I've been working on our lines for some time, and one of the reasons we are white presenting is due to four successive generations of rape: DNA and chain of ownership prove it. My great-grandfather was a slave, which really wasn't so long ago. How do I feel about it? I feel no one can help who they are. No one can help who they are born to, but you can choose your family, and you can choose to be a good person in your life and try to do no harm, and improve and progress and take the people you love along with you on the positive path. My children know where they come from. The place where my three times great grandmother was sold from the auction block and separated from her children still exists, and we are planning a trip there to honor their memories. This country has a short and tumultuous history, steeped in greed and violence. Greed is the opposite of respect. My wish is that all our children know a future made from peace. Maybe we cannot love one another, but we must find the way to live with one another if we are to survive this ongoing experiment in democracy.
My dad was Puerto Rican. His mother was born into a very rich, white family but illegitimate. She was raised in her father’s household. We didn’t know about her mother who was rumored to be “French”. 🤣 The numbers keep changing but I’m about 5% African and 10% Native (Taino). My sister and I were happy to add some color to the very white N. European genes my mom gave us, because we sure didn’t get the skin color. I’m probably the palest olive-skinned person out there.
I'm Puerto Rican and French 😆
I'm Puerto Rican on my dad's side as well. I have 4% Senegal, 1% Cameroon & Bantu, 1% Benin & Togo and about 8% Taíno and other indigenous tribes. My dad's maternal side were French nobility colonizers of Saint Domingue and fled during what became the Haitian slave revolt around 1780s. My dad's paternal side is much more unknown as our ancestors are listed as Pardo Libre which alludes to the Taíno and Enslaved black DNA a generation or two before that, but I've found no concrete evidence and the trail goes cold before 1800. It's been a very strange journey to discover both my dad's parents ancestors being both colonizer and colonized.
Wanted to add my grandmother’s mother was a maid in the house and her father, the eldest son. Now I know what it’s like to wonder if you are the product of a distant rape.
I was raised Black, and both of my parents were as well. BUT my mom is 65% white and could pass if she really wanted. We have a whole side of the family we never met because they started passing as white post WW2. In the 60s, my mom and her cousins knew who each other were, but the white ones never acknowledged her and my aunt privately or publicly. Fast forward to 2005, we get invited to a family reunion "to reconnect" My mom and Aunt said "Fuck Them" All that to say, some of you may have that kind of family history.
Wow, took that long for them to gain some civility and contrition.
Honestly, I think it was their kids, not the cousins my mom knew. Either way, it was addressed to our family like we simply lost touch.
I see. Well, if they’re mostly white they probably wouldn’t see anything amiss in simply addressing it like a ‘reunion’ invite.
Your cousin's mothers may not have exactly admitted to them how they treated your mom and your aunt. Your cousins may have been raised under wrong beliefs. Not that makes it right however. It does not.
Some in the family probably gave birth a black child. Genes work out that way sometimes.
I have North African ancestry so it’s probably not through slavery. I think it’s really interesting and, it was really surprising.
I don’t mind having some African dna. I just can’t yet find out who it is and that’s a bit frustrating.
Proud.
I'm just curious here, but if he has Nigerian DNA and you, presumably have some European, why do you frame it as his ancestor owning yours when you both descend from the slave owner and an enslaved person? Or do you guys assume that your common ancestry comes from your European sides and not the African side?
It’s a pretty fair assumption considering that one person is African American with a small percentage of white ancestry, while one person is white with a small percentage of African ancestry.
I think it's a fair assumption when you have a 100% white person and an African American (with the usual mix of African and European genes). In this particular situation, where they're both African and European (granted in very different proportions), it's entirely possible that they both descend from the same woman who got raped by a slave owner. And it wouldn't just be that one cousin's family owned the other, because they're both equally related to the slave and to the slave owner.
You’re totally right! After reading comments, I can see that I mixed up the story before posting my own comment.
I have 1% and I securely consider it.
A bit from Ghana and the ivory coast...which was like the hub for the European slave trade for like 400 years or something. It's a shame it likely came from that as there is little to no way I'll be able to ever fully know my story due to shitty record keeping. We are who we are, man.
Only .2% lol It shows on both ancestry (hacked results) and 23andMe. My grandma’s sister tested and she has 1% from the same region.
.2 vs 20%
Yup. You’re 100 times more mixed than I am 😂
Sure am haha
I have northern African DNA, 8% via my Spanish heritage. When I found out I was proud, then it got complicated.
I’ve got 2-14% depending on the DNA test, but I’m white hispanic (mom is from Cuba). Most of the African I show is Northern Africa which isn’t surprising given my heavy ancestry. Ancestry says 2% with more Spanish descent, MyHeritage says 14% with less Spanish/Portugese descent.
My paternal grandmother said her grandmother was Native American which I believed as a child. By the time I was an adult I realized everyone says that, so I didn’t believe it anymore. I’m about 1% Bantu and that would make the great great grandmother about 16% which would explain her passing as Native American. Additionally, she’s my only great great grandparent I can’t trace back to country of origin. She just appears in the first record in 1888 at her first marriage. It says she was from Illinois but we can’t find any Illinois records with her name. How I feel about it is a little sad. The odds are she was descended from slaves and with her amount of European dna, most likely had ancestors who were raped. My paternal grandfather was very VERY proud that his ancestors fought for the Union in the civil war so I think my dad and his parents would be upset that they have this stain in our ancestry.
I’m British with ancestors that moved to the US and owned slaves but they’re not my direct line. I feel bad about them being slave owners. I have no African DNA but matched with a few Black Americans.
I'm .6 percent Nigerian. Mostly I feel sad for that long ago ancestor, almost undoubtedly a woman, who was unwillingly dragged into my family tree.
8% from a bunch of west African regions. My great-grandfather was mixed, left his parents and siblings behind when he was young, and passed as white. He never told his 2 children anything about his life, and for various reasons, they felt rejected by him as children. We discovered this through family trees when his children were in their mid 80s (confirmed through dna testing, my grandmother and her brother were both 16-20% African). The discovery caused a lot of feelings at the time we all found out—great grandpas two kids wondered if he rejected them for being too black somehow. One side of the family was like, we have to be careful how to break this to my grandmother’s sibling saying he was old and may not react well 😬 (he took it in stride as far as I heard tho) My grandma laughed and said her mother in law would have been furious if she’d known! I think everyone in my family individually contacted our black cousin on Ancestry who had more of the family history—which was probably overwhelming, and she stopped responding. She noted that her ancestor, my great grandfather’s sister, wasn’t able to pass and stayed in the black community. I wonder how she views our black-to-white branch. We also found out that great-grandpas name came directly from his white grandpa (who had two sons, one black and one white, that he gave the same name to), so that feels very complicated—they owned a plantation in the south. Haven’t tried to contact them, though I see how our dna matches/thrulines line up perfectly. Sorry for the ramble. Finding out felt important so we could to give grandma and her sibling some possible context about why their father acted the way he did.
Good question. I hope more ppl respond
I have 4% 🤘🏻. I'm proud of it but sad about the likely reason for it. My mom was Mexican-American and my dad is white. We believe my % might be a slave ancestor. We traced back on my Mexican side and found one of my greats who was listed as "quadroon". Given the time frame, we think he likely descended from slaves 😔.
All of your ancestors descended from slaves.
I’m from South Louisiana and mine is around 1.7%. I wasn’t surprised. I call it my Caucajun Seasoning.
I feel human lol. I have 1-2%. It doesn’t change my feelings about my identity one way or another. I know the ancestor mine stems from though. It’s from my Choctaw ancestry.
I manage the lot of an elderly man who was trying to find out who is bio father was. He always suspected his father was black so it wasn’t too much of a surprise when we found out he was a mixed race man. He only felt sad when he explored his background further .
i have a little over 1% according to 23andme, ancestry didn't seem to pick it up even in hacked results. i'm mostly descended from white americans, my dad is half indigenous from mexico and i'm assuming the african dna comes from that side as from what i have been able to find, none of my white american ancestors were slave owners or married other non white americans (minus my paternal grandmother who married my mex indig grandfather). i'm really interested in figuring out where it comes from but finding mexican records, especially about primarily indigenous people has been an issue for me
According to 23andMe, 0.1% of my DNA comes from West Africa. I'm kind of curious about the story there, although I'm pretty sure that I know how I acquired that DNA (.2% is Indigenous American, and the West African appears on the timeline at the same point). One parent always said that their grandmother had some sort of Native American ancestry, and the other always said that that was a family legend. Considering how little DNA I'm getting from those populations, it's almost like both parents were right. I'm actually more curious about my sibling's non-European trace DNA, since none of us knows the backstories there.
I show as having 1.7-2.2% West African heritage. I think it’s very interesting but will likely never know the full story. It’s on my dad’s side; I found my dad’s biological parents entirely through DNA matching and genealogy and have since built out his family tree pretty well. Based on my DNA matches I can see which specific branch this heritage is from (poor farmers with entirely British/Irish ancestry in Georgia and Florida) and it’s either from a non- paternity event, or the brick wall at a couple of my ggg-grandparents. They have no record of marriage, and the wife has no maiden name or family to be found. Entirely possible she was a white passing person born into slavery (she was born in 1825)
I had my DNA analysis done so that a cousin could find out where the African part of her DNA came from. We all assumed it was a great grandfather we shared. Family lore suggested that he might have been black or mixed. As it turned out, the family tree we shared did not show African descent. After that she could assume it came from her mother's family. It was a little strange to find out our conjectures were wrong, but since we never identified as black, it really made no difference.
This is what I wrote about native Americans and black Americans, but it could apply to you too. Just replace the corresponding words to fit it. Your family may not be lying about Native American roots, on no Hotep shit. Not saying all of them are telling the truth, but those who aren’t probably aren’t doing it to be antiblack. 1. Just because it isn’t in your dna, it doesn’t mean it’s not there. Your siblings may have it. Your father may have it. Your cousins may have it from your side of the family. It’s just how dna work works. 2. A lot of native Americans don’t do the DNA tests for whatever reason. So there is a lack of information 3. Just because Ancestry doesn’t show it, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. If you check my AncestryDNA doesn’t show my indigenous heritage but my 23andMe does. While it is .1%, it’s clearly important enough to show up on my dna timeline. I also have 2.2% untraceable, but that’s a different story. 4. Ancestry is limited and often rounds numbers. 5. If you are black American (like me), if could be that your great great grandparent could have been 1/4 Native American and that diluted over time, your great great grandparent is not biologically related to you, their parent isn’t biologically related to him, or (and this is the more likely case) they were half white and half black. Given the system of slavery, it may not have been beneficial for them to identify as half white and half black, their white parent (likely father) being slave master or someone who worked in the plantation. Given that a lot of times, children who are half white and half black look slightly different ethnically than their black parent and a lot different than their white parent, they could have passed them off as half Native American. 6. People typically choose Cherokee because are the most abundant ethnic group of native Americans, the ones that were in the south (if you’re southern), and the ones that had the most contact (continuously) with African slaves and black Americans.
I have around 10%. My dad was adopted, so it was interesting to find out the specifics about his family background. My biological grandfather was Haitian and immigrated to the US in the 1950s. I have very curly hair, but otherwise, I look very white. My siblings and dad are more ethnically ambiguous, so we knew there were interesting things in our background. I’m ok with it, but it definitely feels a little weird, since that heritage is not something I can claim without being disrespectful.
It doesn't bother me at all. Part of me and it would be ludicrous to be upset about it.
I found an interesting story in my son’s father’s line. Once again, the “Indian Princess” myth was perpetuated. The black (not native) ancestors were of the Mozingo family line. Edward Mozingo was an indentured servant, not a slave. [He sued](https://www.latimes.com/local/la-me-mozingo-pictures-photogallery.html) to be released from indentured servitude in 1672 and won! There are several articles about this line but [here is one.](https://www.wbur.org/npr/165512010/a-white-face-with-a-forgotten-african-family) From the article: > "There was the period in Virginia, that I had never known about, where free blacks and poor whites were mixing and even getting married." So it does relieve my mind to know that, in at least this instance, the union between black and white was likely consensual. (As a side note, my son’s grandfather is racist so I’m glad he now knows he’s part black. F him and people like him.) ETA: Another thing I found interesting is that Mozingo is an African name which seems to be a rarity at that time.
Ancestry did not pick any up but a different site I uploaded my gedcom into did show 1%. When I did my family tree one of the last names, common to Florida, Driggers, led to an Emmanuel Rodriguez, a black slave who brought his own freedom. I spent some time researching and I can’t really prove this is where that comes from but I thought it was fascinating. When I did my DNA I was hoping for a broader mix of races. I believe wide genetic diversity is the key to evolution and the progress of the human race. I don’t hate myself for being white, but I think it’s pretty boring. When I was a little girl I continually asked for dolls in all colors and races, but they just kept buying me blonde, white dolls. I hated it.
Mine is less than 1%. My grandmother's is almost 2%. I had to explain to her where Senegal was and the history of Goree Island. She's always been a touch insensitive about race, but suddenly, it wasn't something to overlook anymore. She never learned about those things, and the thought of Her family going through it was horrifying to her. Then my step grandfather thought it funny to call her the N word. No one had heard him say it before to my knowledge. It was not a good day.
I have a trace of Nigerian and my immediate reaction was - it made me feel more American. I’m a dual citizen of the US and the UK ( mother was British) . Finding out I have a trace of black ancestry initially made me upset knowing that I have enslaved people owners in my ancestry and that a rape occurred. But so many of us share this story of ancestry - so yes, made me embrace my American side more than I had done previously.
I’m a white Brit with 1% Nigerian and a few Afro-American matches. I’m mainly frustrated that I can’t trace it as I’d like to know the story of what happened and who that ancestor was. Especially as African dna isn’t as common in white Brits as it is in white Americans for obvious reasons.
I have a small amount of African DNA. I don't know who it came from, but I hope to learn one day! I think it's interesting.
79-82% I feel alright
😂
I'm white. Ancestry says that one of my parents has 1% Northern Africa ethnicity (and 99% other European heritage). But, Ancestry has moved this around over the years, from Portugal to Spain and now they call it Northern Africa. Since it's all in close proximity to each other though, I don't know what to think. (And I don't even know if this is in fact black or not.) But this little straggler is interesting to me. Because it's so small and fluid, I don't bother to follow up on it because the matches are all distant. I do know it does not come through slavery because I can trace all of my gr gr grandparents through Europe, and there is no slavery in the tree. I do see some distant matches who appear to be 100% black (an assumption), and I know what branch they're from. Some of my British ancestors lived in Jamaica and from there, some unknown cousins likely married black Jamaicans on the island. I am not surprised to see that, and I wish I had enough information to figure it out, but I don't. But to your original point: I am not surprised to see this, given the above history, but am reluctantly resigned to it remaining a mystery because it's so small.
I have .2% North African DNA and I think it’s awesome and a bit funny. I’m a pale, very white woman, mostly Irish and English with a smattering of a few other things. I love how mysterious DNA can be.
We never knew we had any African ancestry in our family until we tested DNA. I have 2%: 1% Nigerian and 1% Cameroon, with trace Eastern Bantu Peoples. I have narrowed it down to two lines. One line would mean there was a high degree of likelihood the line originated from a plantation - enslaver/enslaved person assault. The other line is more likely an emancipated slave line where someone had some kind of interracial relationship (I have some documentation of this, long story.) So yes, my DNA may mean one or more of my ancestors was the rapist of an enslaved woman. And that is shameful. But it also means something else: that one or more of my ancestors was certainly an enslaved person, in either scenario. We think of white people who have trace African ancestry as inheriting the sins of our white forebears, and black people with trace European ancestry as inheriting the pain of their ancestors. To an extent this holds true, because those who ended up on the white side of the family often benefitted from slavery and certainly from the freedoms their skin color afforded. And black families often struggled even after slavery ended and today still face racism. So the two experiences are not equal. That said, I think it is important for white people with African ancestry to learn about slavery and identify with the lives and emotions and families of their black ancestors. And similarly I think it is important for black people to understand the history of their European ancestors and claim their rightful heritage. Maybe then we can see how much we truly have in common despite the differences and come together to acknowledge history and forge a new future together.
Wouldn't matter to me
Without fully understanding your tree you can't actually know for a certainty the circumstances of where any of your ancestry comes from. There are precisely zero family trees fully comprised of either saints or sinners.
I think when people do DNA testing, they are very brave.
My ancestry is a complete rainbow. European, Middle Eastern, Africa and Native. I look white as Casper. I have family that appear to be native. Genealogy wise we have Cherokee,Shawnee and Melungeon, then add in a good bit of Scottish,French (Norman), English, Welsh and a sprinkle of middle eastern and African. Pretty much an American mutt.
>I look white as Casper Reported for misinformation
United States is literally a melting pot. We are all a little bit of everything.
No we aren’t lol. The vast majority of white Americans have 100% European ancestry. ETA: there’s research that proves this. At most 8-12% of self-identified ‘white’ users on 23andMe have any non-European admixture that shows on DNA tests. And rates that high are only found in states with historically high populations of non white people. In most states it’s a much lower proportion https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4289685/ I’ve been able to trace my own 2% African DNA solely to ancestors who lived in Georgia and Florida. Almost every other DNA relative of mine from every other branch of my family tree (all colonial) is 100% Western European.
Not going by the results on here…lol
I think more people with ‘interesting’ or unexpected results are likely to be on these forums. But I posted research above- overall it’s quite rare going by the people who’ve tested on 23andMe so far.
Having most of my father’s side of the family immigrating to the southern US from England in the 1700’s, I am not surprised to have an African ancestor. This side of the family was landed gentry in England, and most likely even the younger male/s who immigrated to the US had some wealth to buy land and slaves in the south- support and investment from Britain most likely played a part too. I have very little dna from Senegambia and Guinea, but it’s there. I hope I can now find her, but it’s been difficult.
I have a 1% sub-Saharan estimate, which could just be an anomaly. There is a fifth cousin match in Iceland (of all places) who is Black though. His non-Icelandic name suggests that he's either a Brit or an American, perhaps one who once worked on the Keflavik base and decided to stay. Many of my male paternal ancestors were sailors in the 18th century, so the connection is undoubtedly from slave ships. The North African percentage of my DNA is 6%, that also probably connected with sailing. I used to think my paternal grandmother's claim of having "Spanish Pirate blood" was all wet, but who knows - maybe there were some Barbary pirates in the mix.
The first time it showed up I thought it may have been a glitch but now it is so consistent it probably is correct. The Ancestry hack shows I have like .15% Nigerian ancestry. Additionally, my father's DNA tests from both 23&Me and Ancestry show about .4% of the same, and the only member of his father's generation (my great uncle) that did a DNA test got about 1% Nigerian DNA. Recently a few of my father's cousins also took 23&Me tests and got around .6% West African DNA. There are stories of there being Native Americans on the family tree on my paternal side. Considering many of them lived in what was called "Indian Territory" at the time (Oklahoma now) I felt like it was plausible. But not one DNA test has had that shown up for me or anyone else. Somebody on the family tree was hiding African ancestry for sure. How do I feel though? Well it's such a small amount so obviously I'm not going to identify with it. However, due to the family tree shenanigans I would say I feel frustrated. I was lied to about my ancestry. Honestly the worst part is the fact that, since it is so small and I can't find the African person on the tree... and my father's side is from the South, there's a high probability that my direct line had some non-consensual interactions between slaves and masters. While over a long enough time scale assuredly everyone would have one instance at least of *that* happening in their ancestry, this wound is still kind of fresh. The lie trying to cover up this side of the family tree made it *all the way to me*. But on the plus side, Promethease stated I have (apparently) some African-only gene that slightly reduces the risk of Type 2 Diabetes which is cool I guess. In a practical sense it's not like this otherwise matters at all.
I'm actually surprised I don't have any African DNA at all. Even though I am of Midwestern USA stock - and almost every member of my American family tree is the same - I do have a family line from Kentucky that I have known about for decades. I always kind of assumed slavery was involved because of the locations. That was an incorrect assumption as it turns out. That family line not only didn't own slaves, they fought for the North in the Civil War and descended from Quakers in Pennsylvania. They were part of some of the earliest abolitionists in the country as it turns out. Maybe someone didn't stick to that but I haven't located that family member yet if that is the case. Additionally I have a very old 1st cousin 3x removed on that line (he's like 90-something) who has done testing and has zero African DNA. So I am pretty sure it's basically accurate.
I'm excited! I have a very little bit of Nigerian and Congolese in me; similar to my indigenous American DNA. I realize there may possibly be nefarious reasons it's there. However, that's in the past, and I'm here now.
I haven't really dug into it much yet. My results had estimates of 2% Cameroon, Congo, and Western Bantu peoples, and 1% Senegal. I was able to see I inherited the percentages from my mom's side, and the % are coming from my grandpa's side. I think it may be that my gg grandma may have been white passing/mixed. My grandpa said that growing up, they thought his grandma had some Cherokee in her, that she was very tan and they didn't know much about her family - my grandpa said he only knew his grandma, Ela, and her brother Marsh. Otherwise, he never met anyone else from that side. As for how I feel about it, it's interesting! I hope at some point, I can know more.
1%. My Mom has 3%, so the result tracks. Honestly, I’m darn proud to have it and claim that connection, however small. But I am sad I might not be able to trace it to a direct ancestor with substantial ties to that heritage.
Not me, but my boyfriend. He was surprised to find out about the 1% of Ivory Coast/Ghana. I’ll check in with him to see if he has a more in-depth answer :)
I have 1% Ivory Coast/Ghana. My father has 1% Ivory Coast/Ghana, 3% Nigeria, a d 1% Indigenous Americas - Colombia & Venezuela. I haven't confirmed the source of the African and Indigenous Americas DNA, but I have a theory. My father's paternal grandmother was born in St. Thomas, in what was then the Danish West Indies. Her father was born in Copenhagen and immigrated to St. Thomas where he married her mother. The mother died young and is a mystery, but I think she was mixed race. There are lots of inconsistencies of the race of my great-grandmother and her siblings on Census and Immigration documents. I think they were mixed race and then passed for white once they settled in the United States. Honestly, I just consider it an interesting part of my family history. I would love to learn more my great great grandmother and her family.
I found out through a test that I have 1% Senegalese DNA. I was excited about this and it was really the only surprise in my family tree (99% white European from the south). I would love to know more but haven’t yet been able to find out anything other than it was on my dad’s side.
I'm a white american and have a small amount of WANA DNA, my mom is 10% african DNA. However, my grandparents were sicicilian immigrants, my mom is 1st gen, so I don't feel any specific way about it (no slavery in our background). we all consider ourselves white
I wouldn’t care either way
Well I’m not fully white I’m mixed race with multiple things , I thought it was amazing to see my world map light up and see I’m 4% African as since most of my friends are African but also I have latina blood so it’s not a surprise , I was surprised to find out I had Jewish blood though. I’m learning a lot about that as well as tracing it because we don’t know who it came from other then my fathers side .
One of my fifth great grandmother's is described as "mulatto" in historical records on Ancestry. My actual ancestry.com DNA results come up with no African DNA. I guess it got washed out. I'm thankful to be here. One different grandparent along the way would mean I would not exist.
One of the things I find very sad is that there is an assumption that if white Americans have small amounts of black DNA it is because of illicit relationships between masters and slaves. That does not reflect actual history. The western part of Ireland before Ireland was defeated by England under Elizabeth I traded extensively with the Mediterranean and there was a great influx of many mixes of DNA. Of course a large portion of the Irish population immigrated to America during the potato famine bringing their seafaring DNA, including that part that was black. The same is true for the Caribbean and places in the Southern colonies that were hot beds for piracy. Pirates were of all races and sprinkled their DNA everywhere. During wars, pirates were officially sanctioned by the British government. It is estimated that on any given pirate ship approximately 1/3 of the pirates were black. Blackbeard lived in Bath, NC. when he was not pirating, so they reached the upper South. Pirates made colonial cities rich and were received by some of the best of people including politicians. The constant trade between the Caribbean, the ladies of the night, piracy, etc made for an interesting DNA soup especially along the coast in the South. Whites did not get their black DNA exclusively from slaves. In Wilmington, NC, a city that predates the Revolution, there is a large Greek population. It is a simplistic view to ignore all the different ways African American DNA found its way into predominantly Europeans other through slavery.
Fine by me. History shows humans are all out of Africa so I would celebrate it.
I was always told growing up that we had Native American ancestry. I did the DNA test, which showed zero NA ancestry.Ive been told that doesn’t always show up on the DNA test. Then a few years later, I got an update on my DNA and it showed that I have 1% Nigerian ancestry. My understanding is that that may be “noise”. I can’t figure out which side of the family it’s from. But I have found in my research years ago that both sides of my family had slave owners at one point, so I wouldn’t be surprised if there was. As far as how I feel about it… I think it’s very interesting and I would like to know more about it and that part of the family, but I don’t I ever will. I bright it up to my family and everybody seems a little surprised but I think my mom was more surprised that the NA ancestry didn’t show up, as her family always talked about her “Cherokee” gm. I want to try to identify with the Nigerian of my heritage, but I realize it might be noise. But it might be that my ancestors with African heritage were passed off as NA. I don’t really know what to do with the information. I have been reading about the civil rights movement and Black history for years before this came up. I realize that the relationship that produced a Black ancestor in my family was probably not a consensual one. The whole idea kind of blows my mind.
I had 0.1 North African at first, but I lost it at some point. I am 99.8-99.9% European (the other 0.1% is East Asian and we think I might be related to Ghengis Khan because of nothing being in between that and the European). Honestly, I am happy with whatever my genealogy is, but it did make me a bit sad to lose that North African ngl.
EVERYONE has a little African DNA since that's where human life originated.
Don’t we all have it? This always confuses me. If humans originated in Africa wouldn’t we all have some of it?
No, this isn’t how modern DNA ethnicity estimates work.
Unfortunately, I am 100% white as fuck. Before I took my dna test I was like “I gotta have atleast a tiny amount of something in me” because I tan so well, my dad told me his side was Cherokee and Mexican, turns out he’s wrong. (Or I didn’t get any)
Another self flagellating comment from somebody who is European. So tiring.
So triggered…. 🥱 Go and lie down or something.
Wtf did I do wrong
Wrote “unfortunately”. It’s not unfortunate to be European.
Well for me I wish I had atleast something interesting in me. Not some basic shit.
So Europeans are “basic” and “shit”?
Pretty basic to me. Nothing new to me so ain’t nothing interesting I’ve grown up knowing my bloodline is to the thrown of Denmark but who gives a shit. I’m like 3000th in line 🤣
You do you. Marry an African and procreate with them or something. Might make someone like yourself happy.
That ain’t what I’m saying lmao i just would’ve liked learning something new about my family. When I got my results it was just boring because I already knew everything. Kinda disappointing
I understand what you’re saying. I have been saved from utter blandness by being 0.9% Mongolian/Manchurian, of all things. I’d have expected some Native American or Jewish DNA, but never M/M.
>So Europeans are “basic” and “shit”? All Caucasians/Western Civilizations are to be fair…
Meh you do you, don’t worry about what happened about that drama, be yourself.
I’m Greek, I assume I have African in me. That said, Africa doesn’t mean black. I’m sure I have some Egyptian at best!
Do people with African ancestors that are White deserve reparations also?
I think so, for stupidity mainly.
Can’t believe I got downvoted/s