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Black Dutch is a term with several different meanings in United States dialect and slang. It generally refers to racial, ethnic or cultural roots. Its meaning varies and such differences are contingent upon time and place. Several varied groups of multiracial people have sometimes been referred to as or identified as Black Dutch, most often as a reference to their ancestors. [1] [2] [3] [4]
The term Black Dutch appears to have become widely adopted in the Southern Highlands and as far west as Texas in the early 1800s by certain Southeastern families of mixed race ancestry, especially those of Native American descent. [5] When used in the South, it usually did not imply African admixture, although some families who used the term were of tri-racial descent.
In addition, some mixed-race persons of European and African descent identified as Portuguese or Native American, as a way to explain their variations in physical appearance from Europeans and to be more easily accepted by European-American neighbors. [6] By the late 18th century, numerous free mixed-race families were migrating west, along with white Americans, to the frontiers of Virginia and North Carolina, where racial castes were less strict than in plantation country of the Tidewater. [6]
Many tribes, specifically Chocktaw and Chickasaw tribes, fought for The Confederacy to keep their slaves. After The Civil War, those slaves who had moved onto reservations with their Native American owners were released from enslavement and labeled Freedmen. Tribes have separate lists in the Dawes Rolls, (1898-1914) where some of these Freedmen are named. A large population settled in The Choctaw Territory at Oak Hill to pursue education, specifically literacy to vote and industrial training for employment. Oak Hill Academy is one such place.[ citation needed ]
Late 20th-century research by Paul Heinegg found that 80 percent of people listed as free people of color in North Carolina censuses from 1790–1810 could be traced back to free blacks in Virginia in colonial times. Based on his research, he found that most such free black families before the American Revolution were descended from unions in the working class – between white women (whose status made their children free by the principle of partus sequitur ventrem ) and African men: free, indentured servants and slaves. [6] Since the late 20th century, DNA tests of people from core Melungeon families, as documented in the Melungeon DNA Project coordinated by Jack Goins, have shown most individuals are of European and African descent, and having little Native American ancestry. This is a confirmation of Heinegg's genealogical research, summarized in his Free African Americans in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware (1995–2005). [6] Many triracial isolate ethnic groups in Eastern North America including the Melungeons, [Lumbee]], Louisiana Redbones, Qarsherskiyans, Great Dismal Swamp maroons, and Brass Ankles of South Carolina have similar stories.
As early as the 18th century, ethnic Germans and Irish/Scots-Irish migrated from Pennsylvania into Virginia through the Shenandoah Valley and settled in the backcountry of the Appalachian Mountains, areas considered the frontier compared to Tidewater Virginia and the Low Country of the coast. They likely continued to use their term of "Black Dutch" to refer to swarthy-skinned people or, more generally, political opponents. Historically, mixed-race European-Native American and sometimes full blood Native American families of the South adopted the term "Black Dutch" for their own use, and to a lesser extent, "Black Irish," first in Virginia, North Carolina, and Tennessee. As the researcher Paul Heinegg noted, the frontier was also the area of settlement of mixed-race families of African and European ancestry, who also used the terms. [6]
They may have attempted to "pass" and avoid being removed to Indian Territory or stigmatized by what became a majority Anglo-American society. [5] Some Native Americans, mainly from the Five Civilized Tribes of the Southeast, claimed "Black Dutch" or "Black Irish" heritage in order to purchase land in areas which United States treaties and other laws had reserved for people of European descent. Once they owned the land, such families who had escaped forced removal would not admit to their Native American heritage, for fear of losing their property. [5]
As an example, an exhibit at the state-run Oakville Indian Mounds Park and Museum in Lawrence County, Alabama gives the history of the term among Cherokee in the local area after Indian Removal:
Before the Indian Removal Act in 1830, many of Lawrence County's Cherokee people were already mixed with white settlers and stayed in the country of the Warrior Mountains. They denied their ancestry and basically lived much of their lives in fear of being sent West. Full bloods claimed to be Black Irish or Black Dutch, thus denying their rightful Native American blood. After being fully assimilated into the general population years later, these Irish Cherokee mixed-blood descendants, began reclaiming their Native American heritage in the land of the Warrior Mountains, Lawrence County, Alabama. During the 1900 U.S. Census only 78 people claimed their Native American heritage. In 1990, more than 2000 individuals claimed Native American descent. Today more than 4000 citizens are proud to claim their Native American heritage and are members of the Echota Cherokee tribe.
Over time, the term "Black Dutch" migrated with certain families of mixed ancestry from North Carolina, Kentucky, and Tennessee to Missouri and Arkansas, as well as to Mississippi, Alabama, Texas, and Oklahoma, where its original meaning became lost. Many people born in the 20th century have claimed Black Dutch heritage, sometimes in addition to Native heritage. [5] Unlike families in Pennsylvania or Virginia, most of the mixed-race Black Dutch families of the Deep South have English, Scots, or Irish surnames, and have no German ancestry in their families. [5]
Sneedville is the only city in and the county seat of Hancock County, Tennessee, United States. The population was 1,282 per the 2020 census.
Mulatto is a racial classification that refers to people of mixed African and European ancestry only. When speaking or writing about a singular woman in English, the word is mulatta. The use of this term began in the United States of America shortly after the Atlantic Slave Trade began and its use was widespread, derogatory and disrespectful. After the post Civil Rights Era, the term is now considered to be both outdated and offensive in America. In other Anglophone countries such as the British Isles, and English and Dutch-speaking West Indian countries, the word mulatto is still used. The use of this word does not have the same negative associations found among English speakers. Among Latinos in both the US and Latin America, the word is used in every day speech and its meaning is a source of racial and ethnic pride. In four of the Latin-based languages, the default, masculine word ends with the letter "o" and is written as follows: Spanish and Portuguese – mulato; Italian – mulatto. The French equivalent is mulâtre. In English, the masculine plural is written as mulattoes while in Spanish and Portuguese it is mulatos. The masculine plural in Italian is mulatti and in French it is mulâtres. The feminine plurals are: English – mulattas; Spanish and Portuguese – mulatas; Italian – mulatte; French – mulâtresses.
Melungeon was a slur historically applied to individuals and families of mixed-race ancestry with roots in colonial Virginia, Tennessee, and North Carolina primarily descended from free people of color and white settlers. In modern times, the term has been reclaimed by descendants of these families, especially in southern Appalachia. Despite this mixed heritage, many modern Melungeons pass as White, as did many of their ancestors.
The terms multiracial people refer to people who are of multiple races, and the terms multi-ethnic people refer to people who are of more than one ethnicities. A variety of terms have been used both historically and presently for multiracial people in a variety of contexts, including multiethnic, polyethnic, occasionally bi-ethnic, Métis, Muwallad, Melezi, Coloured, Dougla, half-caste, ʻafakasi, mestizo, mutt, Melungeon, quadroon, octoroon, griffe, sacatra, sambo/zambo, Eurasian, hapa, hāfu, Garifuna, pardo, and Gurans. A number of these once-acceptable terms are now considered offensive, in addition to those that were initially coined for pejorative use.
Chief Buffalo Child Long Lance was a mixed race African-American journalist, writer and film actor, believed today to be of Lumbee descent, who, for a time, became internationally prominent as a spokesman for Native American causes. He published an autobiography, purportedly based on his experience as the son of a Blackfoot chief. He was the first presumed Native American admitted to the Explorers Club in New York City.
The one-drop rule was a legal principle of racial classification that was prominent in the 20th-century United States. It asserted that any person with even one ancestor of African ancestry is considered black. It is an example of hypodescent, the automatic assignment of children of a mixed union between different socioeconomic or ethnic groups to the group with the lower status, regardless of proportion of ancestry in different groups.
Blood quantum laws or Indian blood laws are laws in the United States that define Native American status by fractions of Native American ancestry. These laws were enacted by the federal government and state governments as a way to establish legally defined racial population groups. By contrast, many tribes do not include blood quantum as part of their own enrollment criteria. Blood quantum laws were first imposed by white settlers in the 18th century. Blood quantum (BQ) continues to be a controversial topic.
In societies that regard some races or ethnic groups of people as dominant or superior and others as subordinate or inferior, hypodescent refers to the automatic assignment of children of a mixed union to the subordinate group. The opposite practice is hyperdescent, in which children are assigned to the race that is considered dominant or superior.
The Carmel Indians are a group of Melungeons who lived in Magoffin County, Kentucky and moved to Highland County, Ohio. Dr. Edward Price observed that the most common surnames among the families were Gibson, Nichols and Perkins. His research found that the ancestors of the group were listed as free people of color on census records. Paternal line descendants of Bryson Gibson and Valentine Collins who participated in the Melungeon DNA Project belong to Haplogroup E-M2. The group were listed as free Black and Mulatto in Kentucky prior to the American Civil War.
Black Indians are Native American people – defined as Native American due to being affiliated with Native American communities and being culturally Native American – who also have significant African American heritage.
The United States has a racially and ethnically diverse population. At the federal level, race and ethnicity have been categorized separately. The most recent United States census recognized five racial categories, as well as people who belong to two or more of the racial categories. The United States also recognizes the broader notion of ethnicity. The 2000 census and 2010 American Community Survey inquired about the "ancestry" of residents, while the 2020 census allowed people to enter their "origins". The Census Bureau also classified respondents as either Hispanic or Latino, identifying as an ethnicity, which comprises the minority group in the nation.
The Chestnut Ridge people (CRP) are a mixed-race community concentrated in an area northeast of Philippi, Barbour County, in north-central West Virginia, with smaller related communities in the adjacent counties of Harrison and Taylor. They are often referred to as "Mayles", or "Guineas".
The Choctaw Freedmen are former enslaved Africans, Afro-Indigenous, and African Americans who were emancipated and granted citizenship in the Choctaw Nation after the Civil War, according to the tribe's new peace treaty of 1866 with the United States. The term also applies to their contemporary descendants.
Demographics of North Carolina covers the varieties of ethnic groups who reside in North Carolina and relevant trends.
Multiracial Americans, also known as Mixed Americans, are Americans who have mixed ancestry of two or more races. The term may also include Americans of mixed-race ancestry who self-identify with just one group culturally and socially. In the 2020 United States census, 33.8 million individuals or 10.2% of the population, self-identified as multiracial. There is evidence that an accounting by genetic ancestry would produce a higher number.
The Brass Ankles of South Carolina, also referred to as Croatan, lived in the swamp areas of Goose Creek, South Carolina and Holly Hill, South Carolina in order to escape the harshness of racism and the Indian Removal Act. African slaves and European indentured servants sought refuge amongst the Indians and collectively formed a successful community. Many of them are direct descendants of Robert Sweat and Margarate Cornish.
John Punch was an Angolan-born resident of the colony of Virginia who became its first legally enslaved person in British colonial America under criminal law. In contrast, John Casor became the first legally enslaved person of the colonies under civil law, having committed no crime.
The ownership of enslaved people by indigenous peoples of the Americas extended throughout the colonial period up to the abolition of slavery. Indigenous people enslaved Amerindians, Africans, and—occasionally—Europeans.
In the United States, the term "Black Irish" was initially used in the 19th and 20th centuries by Irish Americans to describe people of Irish descent who have black or dark-colored hair, blue or dark eyes, or otherwise dark coloring. This meaning is not frequently used in Ireland, where "Black Irish" more often refers to Irish people of African descent.
Melungeon Jews are a small group of American descendants of historically tri-racial isolate groups who have converted to Judaism.