This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Surnames: McQueen Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/XI0.2ACEB/693 Message Board Post: Jim McQueen is listed in the 1832 Creek Nation, Alabama census. I am not related to this family, just passing on this information, which comes from a webpage called "1832 Creek Nation, Alabama census." The link for the site is listed below. Joyce http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~texlance/1832census/j.htm

Just some observations on Creek naming practices in that time period... They were in a transitional flux. As I understand it in their original culture a Creek male had 4 different personal names in 4 different phases of his lifecycle. They certainly had no surnames and in their original culture only their mother and her family (clan), and to some extent their native ("home") town much mattered. Creeks were matrilineal. But in fact what we usually consider to have been their names was actually a title of an office they held, not a personal name at all. However, by 1832 Creek/Seminole society had been heavily impacted by 300 years of contact with Europeans and children of men of European descent could have almost a complete set of dual identities that were not necessarily in conflict, and at least in communications with the government if they were the son or male line grandson of a man of European descent they might well give a European-type name and be entitled to it by European naming customs. Peter McQueen had a lot of children and grandchildren in Creek Country by this time, and these may be descended from him or some other McQueen. But also by government requirement in some cases (particularly Creek children enrolled in the Indian school where they were NOT allowed to use either their Creek names or the Muskogean or Hichiti languages) and in other cases for what appeared to be no particular reason except that they just saw some advantage in it, Creeks "took" European-type names... usually (golly gee, I wonder why?) people they had heard of including sometimes the powerful or famous. So, in Creek Country use of a European surname by an Indian might indicate a conventionally acquired surname, or it might indicate a surname taken out of thin air. In the absence of specific information to either effect, I wouldn't assume anything. Richard White Tallahassee, Florida