This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Surnames: Aldridge Newkirk Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/5R.2ADI/967 Message Board Post: I wondered if you might have run across might have run across (supposedly Creek or half Creek) Sallie Mae Aldridge b. SC or her son Robert Aldridge born SC ca. 1890 who came to Ga between 1890 and 1910 who may be the one who suddenly appeared in Al after 1920. He told his daughter he had many sisters and brothers, including a Frank (Aldridge?). Or he may really be of a family from Muskogee Co, near Columbus, GA.which I cannot find.. I am doing a family tree for my children and have come across the possibility that they have black cousins, or even black heritage. Definitely Indian heritage. Below is my info. I have 2 births for Robert Lee Aldridge Oct 5 , 1890 from his daughter and SSN- and Nov. 12 1892 on his gravestone in Bessemer, AL. It is coincidental that last week I had published a partial list of slaves from the wills of the SC and AL Hardys on Gen Forum in case black SC and AL Hardys were looking for their relatives. Now I myself am looking for answers on another branch of the family who may have been slaves. I thought it would be so easy to connect with the right line of Aldridges and from there so much research has been done that it would be a piece of cake. Not so. I have just come across a 1910 census in GA -Camden Co. Thompkins Dist. (on the GA coast) Robert Aldridge supposedly came from Columbus, GA on the AL border to AL around or before 1920. I say supposedly because he kept his life a secret I think, so whatever he said is unreliable. Anyway here is the story and any help would be appreciated. Some grandchildren heard he shot somebody in the middle of the night and left. Some grandchildren say he deserted 13 children when he left. No one knows the truth. Some grandchildren say he changed the spelling of Aldridge from another spelling. My deceased husband heard the Aldridges ran to the NC mountains in the Civil War to escape the fighting. Lorene his daughter claims to know part of the story which I will incorporate below. I would like to say that I am not an Aldridge by birth, but my children are. I will also say that although the Aldridges were desperately poor and beset by tragedy, they were the handsomest, tallest group of people I have ever seen and all musically talented and tops in sports. My mother thinks they must, somewhere in their genes, have a very distinguished family. I have a lot of difficulty with the Aldridges - in finding documentation -except a few AL ssn s. These Aldridges seem to have threatened to shoot every census-taker in GA and AL and ILL where they worked in the mines. After interviewing one of his last surviving children and getting a possible birth date for him, I still had nothing, despite hours of searching in data banks----till today. Lorene Aldridge had told me her father Robert Aldridge looked Indian in that he was darker skinned and black hair, but blue eyes. He told her he had a half Indian or Indian mother called Sallie Mae (no record of marriage). He never said anything about his father-no name, no description. Lorene also told me that he told Lorene that he left 2 children behind in the care of a relative after a wife Phoebe had supposedly died. Lorene Aldridge Freeman also said he came from Columbus,Ga. which is Muskogee Co.- but I find nothing. But it could be that I was only looking for "white" families, because today I hit the jackpot when I changed my tactics---- and have finally found a Robert with the correct birth year which Lorene swears by for Robert in Ga. -1890. Only the Co. is wrong. In the 1910 GA census, Robert Aldridge is 20 years old living with his brother in Camden Co., Thompkins district-Militia 32. Robert is listed as head of house and his older "brother" is delegated to 2nd place, even though the brother is older. Robert's brother has another name -Henry Newkirk - and is "married " (although there is no woman listed) and is listed as "black." The whole page of the census is black people. Robert Aldridge is listed mixed race and is one of only two of a hundred people in front and behind who is anything but "B" for black. Well to be living away from his father makes sense because Robert claimed he hated his father for allegedly beating him bloody all his life, so if it is true ,he must have left home as soon as possible, and to the other side of the state at that. Have you ever heard of the term "crossing over?" Mulattos or mixed race people used it when they look white enough to change their identities and start over somewhere else where no one knows them. I ask myself this question for 4 reasons. 1) Lorene said her father never took them to visit his relations. 2) Lorene said a man across the hallway in a hospital where her brother Seaborn was recovering in Birmingham sent a note thru the nurse saying - "What ever happened to Robert Aldridge from Georgia?" and she was told not to talk to him and they did not reply to the note. 3) There were some Aldridges who working in the same Bakery in Birmingham as Robert's daughter Lorene- and she was told not to associate with them and Lorene could not understand why. 4) when Robert Aldridge supposedly went back to GA ONE time ( years later ) to try to find out what ever happened to his own flesh and blood he had left behind in GA. , he said he came no more than 20 miles from the parents place and would go no further. He asked an old acquaintance Seabourn Callatt about them but no one knew anything and he went back to AL without seeing his parents which he had never seen since leaving all those years before, and Robert never saw again in his lifetime. What do you folks think? Maybe in order to "cross over" and disassociate from his black relatives, he wanted to cut all ties and make a better life for himself, which is every man's right, or was he just afraid of the police? A possible scenario as follows which I have constructed from the information in the 1910 census. Robert Aldridge's father is born in NC around the time of the Civil War. His father has a son by a black or black/Indian woman called Newkirk in NC in 1888. He is called Henry Newkirk and looks black enough to be listed as lack in the 1910 census Robert's father moves across the order to SC where his mate Newkirk dies. He takes up with an Indian woman called Sallie Mae and has Robert Lee Aldridge by Sallie Mae in Oct. 1890 in SC, and this SC birth is what was told to the census taker. Robert Lee Aldridge looks mixed race, blue eyes. The family supposed then moves to GA. (Maybe it was only Henry newkirk and Robert. who moved to GA.) Between 1900 and 1910 Robert Aldridge moves out of his family house in GA. and moves in with brother Henry who meantime married. They find work in Camden Co. Henry in a store. Robert -odd jobs. In 1910 they are living together in the Camden Co. Ga. census in a black neighborhood. Phoebe part Creek Indian or Creek Indian marries somebody and has a daughter before 1910. Between 1910 and 1920 Phoebe Creek Indian "marries" again to Robert Aldridge . Since Robert's own mother is Indian, this is natural for him. They have Jessie and Aline before 1920. Phoebe Creek Indian Aldridge supposedly dies -before 1920. Robert Aldridge gets a girl pregnant in Muskogee Co. The police in Columbus GA tell him to cross the river to Alabama and don't come back. Robert Aldridge leaves the 2 children in care of his step daughter part Indian (or his black brother's kin?), "meandering" (Lorene Aldridge) to Ragland, AL (where , by the way, there are also Arledges- he does not mention them ) never to see them again. Robert Aldridge marries Cora Mewbourn in Ragland, AL in 1921 (at the home of her uncle John Layton who is a preacher). He talks about a Frank and other forgotten names to his daughter Lorene. He never sees his family ( who ever they are) again. Is it possible that he has crossed out of the Indian (and black) community in Ga. into white Alabama? Do you know who this Robert Aldridge in 1910 could have been? I have to find out who Robert Aldridge's father of is. Is he Mulatto who has a blue eyed parent? Is he white and the Robert's blue eyes come from him? Is he black and the blue eyes come thru Sallie Mae his half Indian mother who had a blue eyed father? Was his name Aldridge? Or was Sallie Mae an Aldridge? That is the latest in my search....anybody have any advise on researching this? susan aldridge

I can't help you with the specifics, but I've been puzzling at some of the same kinds of questions for awhile now... In following one of my lines, I am pretty sure that there was Creek... a Mackey marrying some female relation of Hopoie Micco... one of the resulting branches from female children were ETHridges in Wilkinson County, and they passed down the Hopoie Micco name in their line of the family. Another branch were Ridleys. Some of them are also accounted as Creek descendants, but which ones is unclear and disputed... apparently, in my opinion, according to whether or not particular descendants want to consider themselves Creek. There are facts in dispute, and I don't think anyone has rock-solid answers. My 2-great grandmother was a Ridley so far as I can determine (I have found no absolute proof of that yet... just a marriage record that appears to be her and my 2-great grandfather... but there would seem to be some possibility that there were other folks out there then who we don't know about now, who had the same names). It seems that less is known about her Mackey/Ridley ancestry than some of the rest, as there were marriages of multiple siblings between the two families involved. Her husband, also, was an unknown as to ancestry. Some folks with his surname were part Indian, usually Cherokee, but I can make no definite tie from him to anyone, much less them. I just know that he was born at an odd time in an odd place... Florida in 1821 or slightly before: Spanish Florida. My great grandmother who was the Ridley woman's daughter first married a man of a family well known to be mixed, but apparently the mixture went in every possible way and what all was included in specific cases is not necessarily clear at all. It is considered that the line in question began with a slave in Virginia about 1690... but in 1690 many slaves were INDIANS!!! It wasn't till after the Yamassee Indians almost destroyed the Colony of South Carolina during their uprising in 1715-1716, that the South Carolina government finally clamped down on the predatory enslavement of Indians that had been organized and operated out of Charles Towne for quite some time. This man's ancestors had been Colonial officials, including an Indian Agent and a marshall... so it would seem more likely that his mixture was only Indian, but I can't really say for sure and don't think anyone could. Various things are involved so far as I can see... One is that under the law there was little to no distinction between a person who was part African and a person who was part Indian, though the practical application of the law might not have been the same towards each... especially between about 1820 and 1880 or thereabouts where there was a constantly increasing polarization in things racial going on. But while on one hand a strong appearance of mixture might result in a person appearing in records as a "mulatto", a plainly observable but lesser mixture seems to have generally been overlooked... or at least that's the way I understand it. That first husband of my great grandmother died in NY in 1864 as a Confederate prisoner in a Union POW camp. But in looking at the records of one of his brothers and several of my great grandmothers' brothers in the Confederate Army it appears to me that they held a sort of anomalous position, not quite exactly either fish nor fowl. All were private soldiers in volunteer units... but they tended to be given secondary roles not common to all soldiers... that is to say, one of my great grandmother's brothers was detailed for independent duty as a wagoner. One of her husband's brothers was an artificer in an artillery unit. An artificer was a highly skilled blacksmith... not just a farrrior... that is a blacksmith who primarily shoed horses. Artificers had broader and more general skills... so in his case there was a set of skills involved, but still... there were those entries in his enlistment record: complexion - dark, eyes - black (or often gray, for guys who I think were mixed Indian... but in this case, black), hair - black. As to the wagoner... It is a famous thing about the Confederate Army that most of its wagoners were Black. But they weren't all. I had an uncle who was a driver in Patton's Red Ball Express in W.W.II. Most of the Red Ball Express drivers were Blacks in segregated units... but not all were, and my uncle was one of those exceptions. I never *saw* my great grandmother's brother and I have no idea what he *looked* like... so I can't say for sure. But I have seen a tintype of my great grandmother's daughter by her first marriage and to me she looks both part Indian and part Black. BUT she had at least one blonde headed grandchild... because I've seen his photo, too... and my grandfather, a child of my great grandmother's third marriage... so far as I know his father was White and when I was a kid I had no idea that my grandfather looked a bit peculiar... or that my dad looked a lot like him. It took finding this trail of inuendoes for it all to click as to why my dad had a big hawk's nose, a grayish skin tone, and very little body hair. A fact that he hid from the whole world including me, till, literally, the day he died... was that on about half of his face in spots where beard should have grown... he had no beard. He always told me that it was too "scrufty" to let his beard grow out. He never admitted to anyone that it just plain about half wasn't there. So... my suggestion to you is that you may already know more than a lot of folks in your shoes. Knowing more would be nice, but it may not be possible. The "system" by which matters of mixed race were recorded in those times just doesn't offer much substance for us to extract clear understanding today. Also, the whole subject of White/Indian and Black/Indian mixtures was apparently largely suppressed by virtually all concerned. I think that mixed-race folks were pretty common, but most folks tried to hide it if they had it... and not to see it very plainly even if they didn't. There were some well known cases of public figures... but for the rest, the average folks... they had a kind of anonymnity that included not having to write these things down on pieces of paper. In fact, so long as it happened in Indian Country, until Benjamin Hawkins and a few others started writing down a few scattered bits about it, most of this kind of thing went on in a situation where there were virtually no records of any kind. We cannot manufacture records of these events 200 or more years later. RW susanaldridge2000@yahoo.de wrote: >This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. > >Surnames: Aldridge Newkirk >Classification: Query > >Message Board URL: > >http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/5R.2ADI/967 > >Message Board Post: > >I wondered if you might have run across might have run across (supposedly Creek or half Creek) Sallie Mae Aldridge b. SC or her son Robert Aldridge born SC ca. 1890 who came to Ga between 1890 and 1910 who may be the one who suddenly appeared in Al after 1920. He told his daughter he had many sisters and brothers, including a Frank (Aldridge?). Or he may really be of a family from Muskogee Co, near Columbus, GA.which I cannot find.. > >I am doing a family tree for my children and have come across the possibility that they have black cousins, or even black heritage. Definitely Indian heritage. > >Below is my info. I have 2 births for Robert Lee Aldridge Oct 5 , 1890 from his daughter and SSN- and Nov. 12 1892 on his gravestone in Bessemer, AL. It is coincidental that last week I had published a partial list of slaves from the wills of the SC and AL Hardys on Gen Forum in case black SC and AL Hardys were looking for their relatives. Now I myself am looking for answers on another branch of the family who may have been slaves. > >I thought it would be so easy to connect with the right line of Aldridges and from there so much research has been done that it would be a piece of cake. > >Not so. I have just come across a 1910 census in GA -Camden Co. Thompkins Dist. (on the GA coast) Robert Aldridge supposedly came from Columbus, GA on the AL border to AL around or before 1920. I say supposedly because he kept his life a secret I think, so whatever he said is unreliable. Anyway here is the story and any help would be appreciated. Some grandchildren heard he shot somebody in the middle of the night and left. Some grandchildren say he deserted 13 children when he left. No one knows the truth. Some grandchildren say he changed the spelling of Aldridge from another spelling. My deceased husband heard the Aldridges ran to the NC mountains in the Civil War to escape the fighting. > >Lorene his daughter claims to know part of the story which I will incorporate below. > >I would like to say that I am not an Aldridge by birth, but my children are. I will also say that although the Aldridges were desperately poor and beset by tragedy, they were the handsomest, tallest group of people I have ever seen and all musically talented and tops in sports. My mother thinks they must, somewhere in their genes, have a very distinguished family. > >I have a lot of difficulty with the Aldridges - in finding documentation -except a few AL ssn s. These Aldridges seem to have threatened to shoot every census-taker in GA and AL and ILL where they worked in the mines. After interviewing one of his last surviving children and getting a possible birth date for him, I still had nothing, despite hours of searching in data banks----till today. Lorene Aldridge had told me her father Robert Aldridge looked Indian in that he was darker skinned and black hair, but blue eyes. He told her he had a half Indian or Indian mother called Sallie Mae (no record of marriage). He never said anything about his father-no name, no description. > >Lorene also told me that he told Lorene that he left 2 children behind in the care of a relative after a wife Phoebe had supposedly died. Lorene Aldridge Freeman also said he came from Columbus,Ga. which is Muskogee Co.- but I find nothing. > >But it could be that I was only looking for "white" families, because today I hit the jackpot when I changed my tactics---- and have finally found a Robert with the correct birth year which Lorene swears by for Robert in Ga. -1890. Only the Co. is wrong. > >In the 1910 GA census, Robert Aldridge is 20 years old living with his brother in Camden Co., Thompkins district-Militia 32. Robert is listed as head of house and his older "brother" is delegated to 2nd place, even though the brother is older. Robert's brother has another name -Henry Newkirk - and is "married " (although there is no woman listed) and is listed as "black." The whole page of the census is black people. Robert Aldridge is listed mixed race and is one of only two of a hundred people in front and behind who is anything but "B" for black. > >Well to be living away from his father makes sense because Robert claimed he hated his father for allegedly beating him bloody all his life, so if it is true ,he must have left home as soon as possible, and to the other side of the state at that. > >Have you ever heard of the term "crossing over?" Mulattos or mixed race people used it when they look white enough to change their identities and start over somewhere else where no one knows them. I ask myself this question for 4 reasons. > >1) Lorene said her father never took them to visit his relations. >2) Lorene said a man across the hallway in a hospital where her brother Seaborn was recovering in Birmingham sent a note thru the nurse saying - "What ever happened to Robert Aldridge from Georgia?" and she was told not to talk to him and they did not reply to the note. >3) There were some Aldridges who working in the same Bakery in Birmingham as Robert's daughter Lorene- and she was told not to associate with them and Lorene could not understand why. >4) when Robert Aldridge supposedly went back to GA ONE time ( years later ) to try to find out what ever happened to his own flesh and blood he had left behind in GA. , he said he came no more than 20 miles from the parents place and would go no further. He asked an old acquaintance Seabourn Callatt about them but no one knew anything and he went back to AL without seeing his parents which he had never seen since leaving all those years before, and Robert never saw again in his lifetime. > >What do you folks think? Maybe in order to "cross over" and disassociate from his black relatives, he wanted to cut all ties and make a better life for himself, which is every man's right, or was he just afraid of the police? > >A possible scenario as follows which I have constructed from the information in the 1910 census. > >Robert Aldridge's father is born in NC around the time of the Civil War. His father has a son by a black or black/Indian woman called Newkirk in NC in 1888. He is called Henry Newkirk and looks black enough to be listed as lack in the 1910 census > >Robert's father moves across the order to SC where his mate Newkirk dies. He takes up with an Indian woman called Sallie Mae and has Robert Lee Aldridge by Sallie Mae in Oct. 1890 in SC, and this SC birth is what was told to the census taker. Robert Lee Aldridge looks mixed race, blue eyes. > >The family supposed then moves to GA. (Maybe it was only Henry newkirk and Robert. who moved to GA.) Between 1900 and 1910 Robert Aldridge moves out of his family house in GA. and moves in with brother Henry who meantime married. They find work in Camden Co. Henry in a store. Robert -odd jobs. In 1910 they are living together in the Camden Co. Ga. census in a black neighborhood. > >Phoebe part Creek Indian or Creek Indian marries somebody and has a daughter before 1910. Between 1910 and 1920 Phoebe Creek Indian "marries" again to Robert Aldridge . Since Robert's own mother is Indian, this is natural for him. They have Jessie and Aline before 1920. Phoebe Creek Indian Aldridge supposedly dies -before 1920. >Robert Aldridge gets a girl pregnant in Muskogee Co. The police in Columbus GA tell him to cross the river to Alabama and don't come back. > >Robert Aldridge leaves the 2 children in care of his step daughter part Indian (or his black brother's kin?), "meandering" (Lorene Aldridge) to Ragland, AL (where , by the way, there are also Arledges- he does not mention them ) never to see them again. Robert Aldridge marries Cora Mewbourn in Ragland, AL in 1921 (at the home of her uncle John Layton who is a preacher). > > He talks about a Frank and other forgotten names to his daughter Lorene. He never sees his family ( who ever they are) again. Is it possible that he has crossed out of the Indian (and black) community in Ga. into white Alabama? Do you know who this Robert Aldridge in 1910 could have been? > > I have to find out who Robert Aldridge's father of is. Is he Mulatto who has a blue eyed parent? Is he white and the Robert's blue eyes come from him? Is he black and the blue eyes come thru Sallie Mae his half Indian mother who had a blue eyed father? Was his name Aldridge? Or was Sallie Mae an Aldridge? > >That is the latest in my search....anybody have any advise on researching this? >susan aldridge > > >==== CREEK-SOUTHEAST Mailing List ==== >To unsubscribe, send to CREEK-SOUTHEAST-L-request@rootsweb.com the one word, UNSUBSCRIBE, in the BODY of the message. If you are subscribed to the digest, send your unsubscrbe message to CREEK-SOUTHEAST-D-request@rootsweb.com > >============================== >To join Ancestry.com and access our 1.2 billion online genealogy records, go to: >http://www.ancestry.com/rd/redir.asp?targetid=571&sourceid=1237 > > > >