Hello everyone, I am fresh back from GenTech 2001 where I was able to buy a book on the Melungeons - it is fascinating!!! Good old Richard Matlock/Medlock certainly lived in the right locality to be part of this ethnic group! I know that the folks on this list are open-minded enough to view this as an important area of our common genealogy to untangle just like everything else we have covered and worked on ... Obviously, the information will be relevant to some MATLOCK lines (like mine, mebbe) and not to others... In any case, there is definitely evidence of Melungeon Matlock family members. Here is what I have found so far: There is a Melungeon mailing list here if any of you want to subscribe: http://lists.rootsweb.com/index/other/Ethnic/Melungeon.html I just subscribed and it is a BUSY list... In searching the archives of the list, here is what I find regarding MATLOCKS so far: The Douglas Register" by Rev. William Douglas Genealogical Publishing Company, Inc. Baltimore, Maryland 1966 Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 66-30367: page 92: WASH, Lucy, & Zachariah Matlock, both in Louisa Dec 7 1780 PULHAM, James, & Agnes Matlock 5 March 1781. Jas PULHAM & Agnes Matlock - Lucy born Mar. 5 1781 Baptized Ap. 9 1781 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Phipps-TN Marriages Brides: Matlock, D. F. Phipps, Margaret Jun 1, 1842 Dickenson, TN Source FTM Archive CD# 229 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >From a post: Here is the info I have on Capt. Van SWEARINGEN. Van SWEARINGEN was born about 1743 in Edgecombe Co., NC. He later moved to Anson Co., NC and finally settled in Edgefield District, SC (these are the old counties, so they may not correspond to the modern counties by the same name). Van married Rachel (possibly CLOUD) in 1775. Van registered for military service in Edgefield and reached the rank of Captain. Van died in 1808, Rachel after 1810. They had the following children: 1) Joel SWEARINGEN +____ BETTIS 2nd Susanna COTTEN 2) William SWEARINGEN +Nancy SPURLOCK 3) Van SWEARINGEN (b abt 1777) 4) Moses SWEARINGEN (b 1786) 5) John SWEARINGEN 6) Eli SWEARINGEN (b abt 1789) 7) Zilpha SWEARINGEN +____ HARGROVE 8) Milley SWEARINGEN (b abt 1778) +Stephan MEDLOCK <------------- 9) Francis SWEARINGEN +Alfred HACTHER 10) Ancel SWEARINGEN +Hampton MIMS 11) Margaret Ann SWEARINGEN (b 1790) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Another post: I just recently found out that my aunt's Great Grand-Mother was Black Dutch. I really do not know what this means and am looking for enlightenment. My aunt's name was Cora Josephine MEDLOCK. She died July 13, 1980, TN. She was married to Raymond Douglas CROW in Tennessee. If anyone can inform me about this relationship and the Black Dutch, I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you, John W. Turner ([email protected]) RESPONSE: There is an article concerning Black Dutch at: http://www.ancestry.com/ It is under Ethnic Research, hope that helps you. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ David Sparks b: May 19, 1794 in NC d: November 10, 1862 in Delta, Clay, AL. married Permelia Medlock b: 1791 in 1876 m: December 15, 1811 in Morgan Co. GA ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Also, from my newly found Matlock cousin, Sue, here are some websites to look over: http://rosecity.net/cherokee/blackdutch.html http://archiver.rootsweb.com/th/read/Black_Dutch_America http://www.murrah.com/gen/redbones.htm ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ For more information on Melungeon Health Issues: http://www.melungeonhealth.org MELUNGEON CENTRAL..... a new GenConnect Board for Melungeon Research http://genconnect.rootsweb.com/genbbs.cgi/Special/Melungeon Battles in Red, Black and White Virginia Racial Integrity Law 1924 http://xroads.virginia.edu/~CAP/POCA/POC_law.html The Melungeon Registry http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Flats/5649/melunreg.htm The Silicon Holler: http://www.appalnet.org/ [[[[[[[Virginia Racial Law Timeline:]]]]]]]]] http://www.rootsweb.com/~kyjohnso/amh.txt [[[[[[[Jeff Weaver's New River Valley Notes;]] http://www.ls.net/~newriver/nrv.htm The Melungeon List Homepage by Martha Short: http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Pointe/3778/ For a list of Melungeon Links http://cresswells.com/alhn/melung/index.html I am beginning to formulate a theory that perhaps the 1st wife of Richard that everyone mentions but no one names may have been Melungeon and her info was simply skipped due to prejudices... It would certainly help us all to get this figured out! I intend to continue to research this and think it would be just delightful to learn who all those 13-14 children of Richard's were and which mother they went to. It has already been suggested to me that the reason his branch went to Indiana was that Indiana was a free state... I find this all just fascinating... hope you do as well! Jana Black Listowner, MATLOCK-L

Some more from the Melungeon list; seems to begin to explain why mention may have felt ominous to some & why research is tough. The link references are excellent - Jana ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ POLITICS, RACE AND DR. PLECKER: The proud, strong, courageous, people called Melungeons were discriminated against by their Scots-Irish and English neighbors as they moved into the areas where the Melungeons lived. They wanted the rich valley lands occupied by the Melungeons they found residing there. They practiced RACIAL discrimination against the Melungeons because they were darker skinned than their own anglo-saxon ancestors and because this helped them obtain the lands they coveted. In a society where slavery was an accepted way of life, where genocide against the American Indian was government policy, hiding was sometimes the only way to survive. This discrimination carried into the 1940's-50's and perhaps even longer, because of the work of a man named Walter A. Plecker, who was the state of Virginia's first Director of Vital Statistics and an avowed racist. Some Germans say that it was he, who first gave them the idea of eugenics, that was used during WWII to help exterminate 6 million Jews. Plecker labeled the Melungeons, calling them `mongrels' and other worse terms - some were labeled FPC - Free Person of Color in Virginia. This in turn led to their children being labeled as Mulatto (M) and both of those terms came to mean "BLACK." (There is information on Plecker and the letters he wrote to all the counties in VA and the surrounding states to marginalize and discriminate against the Melungeons on various websites noted below. Some Melungeon families married white, some black, some Indian, some a combination. But for all of them, the terms led to rulings in which they couldn't own property, they couldn't vote, and they couldn't school their children with local white children. Is it any wonder that they became ANYTHING else in order to do these things? They hid their backgrounds with the Indian myth, with the orphan myth (my family are all dead) , and the adopted myth, and they changed either the spelling of their surnames or they picked an entirely new name, moving many times, anything to distance themselves from their Melungeon heritage. They became `Black Dutch,' `Black Irish,' `Black Scot or Swede,' or some other combination to hide their "otherness." Is it any wonder they are so hard to find? They deliberately made it so, in order for their descendants to have a better life than they had had. http://www.geocities.com/bourbonstreet/inn/1024/plecker.html http://members.xoom.com/BJ_Dillon/plecker.html