Finding Your Roots

I stayed up too late last night watching back-to-back episodes of “Finding Your Roots With Dr. Henry Louis Gates“.

I admit that the first time I’d ever heard of Gates was a couple years back when he unwisely got into a bit of a kerfluffle with a Cambridge police officer, and was surprised to note that some of my African-American friends definitely knew who he was and had the highest degree of respect for him.

So hearing he was making a show about famous people tracing their family’s history certainly sounded intriguing to me. I just had no idea how well produced it would be or how much I would learn about the history of this country in one short episode.

Many of the individuals featured on the show are African-Americans, and the history of their race in this country is obviously very complex and one that I really did not pay that much attention to. For example, one one of the shows I watched last night they featurued Congressman John Robert Lewis from Georgia.

I was aware of who he was based upon the fact that I’d seen him multiple times on the news apparently associating with race-hucksters like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson. I also had an awareness that he’d been beaten by law enforcement during the 1965 march from Selma to Montgomery, AL. However, I’d had no idea regarding his association with MLK, nor the fact of how a poor farmer’s son from Troy became such an articulate young proponent of equal voting rights for all Americans.

He was giving speeches at 25 that would put more accomplished speakers to shame.

The other interesting thing about the show was how most African-Americans living today:

1. Generally have a relatively high percentage of European blood in them due to miscegination between slaves and their white masters.

2. Have a belief that they have less European blood in them than they do “Cherokee” or other Native American blood.

3. Cannot in general trace their family history much further back than the 1870 census because of the lack of existence of records regarding slaves.

I have come to realize through the course of my research associated with this blog that I am VERY fortunate. In a very short period of time, I’ve been able to learn so much about where I came from. Things that I had previously never thought about and things that I believed would be impossible to know.

For example, I know that my Great Great Great Great Great Great Grandfather on my father’s father’s side, George Lowrey, was a Scotsman who married a Cherokee woman in Tennessee in 1767. None of the African-Americans featured on last night’s show could trace their ancestry any farther back than 1850, and that in itself was a small miracle.

Last night I learned for the first time with clarity, that there is an entire race of people whose history is unknown and will remain unknowable, short of mass DNA testing.

I consider myself very lucky to know a bit of where I came from. To paraphrase what John Lewis said on the show last night when he joyously found out that one of his African-American ancestors was able to vote for the first time in 1867, a right that he had to fight for 100 years later, “Imagine if everyone else in the world would have this opportunity to find out how interconnected we all are and where we came from.”

Waipahu Joe

My Dad was born in the 1930s. From what I’ve been able to determine, his grandfather on his father’s side was full-blooded Cherokee, and he also had about 1/32nd of Cherokee blood from his Great Great Grandmother on his mother’s side, whom I believe was half Cherokee.

Back in the day (in a less politically correct time) he was playfully known amongst his peers in Oklahoma as “Lopey” (short for “Lopez”) and another pejorative that I won’t repeat here, all because of his dark skin.

He served on Oahu at Naval Air Station Barbers Point and Ford Island during the 1950s, and his squid buddies used to call him “Local Boy” and “Waipahu Joe“.

He said he was also called, “…’Peanuts’ for a while for a baseball pitcher, Peanuts Lowrey. But, like Lopey, those were in good nature and all were long ago.”

John Prebble

“You are hereby ordered to fall upon the rebels, the MacDonalds of Glencoe, and to put all to the sword under seventy.”

O.K., so after watching “The Battle of Culloden”, I did a bit more research. It turns out that the mockumentary was based upon the work of John Prebble, who also wrote the screenplay for one of my favorite movies of all time, “Zulu“.

Interestingly, the screenplay itself was based upon a magazine article Prebble wrote called “Slaughter In The Sun”, which can be found in this acclaimed book (which I intend to buy at the earliest possible moment).

Prebble wrote several books which sound extremely interesting, including “The Fire and Sword Trilogy”, which consists of the books “Culloden” (1962), “The Highland Clearances” (1963), and “Glencoe” (1966).

Glencoe refers to the 1692 massacre of members of Clan MacDonald by their guests, the Campbells, while the “Highland Clearances” refer to the fact that most of the land in Scotland at the time was held by absentee landlords who allowed poor Scots families to live and farm on their property for rent. The landlords, who mainly lived in London, decided to improve their income by getting rid of the troublesome Scots families and replacing them with sheep, who were more profitable. According to the research, “The effects of the clearances are to be seen everywheee in Scotland, with the numerous deserted crofts and abandoned settlements still visible in the landscape.”

Regarding the removal of the Scots from their land and the lack of human population in the Highlands, the narrator of “Culloden” stated this:

“They’ve created a desert and have called it ‘peace’.”

According to Wikipedia and what was presented in the film, Prebble’s opinion was that there was a conscious effort on behalf of the English government to remove Highland Scots from Scotland after the Battle of Culloden because of the intransigence of the Scots, their border raiding, and the desire to create a united Britain.

Between the animosity of the English towards the Highland Scots, as well as the loss of their way of life and land, it’s no wonder many of them decided to pick up and leave for the proverbial greener pastures of North America and elsewhere.

Image credit.

The Battle Of Culloden

“Sir Thomas Sheridan, Jacobite military secretary. Suffering advanced debility and loss of memory. Former military engagement, 56 years ago. Sir John MacDonald, Jacobite captain of cavalry. Aged, frequently intoxicated, described as ‘a man of the most limited capacities.’ John William O’Sullivan, Jacobite quartermaster general. Described as ‘an Irishman whose vanity is superseded only by his lack of wisdom.’ Prince Charles Edward Stuart, Jacobite commander in chief. Former military experience: 10 days at a siege at the age of 13.”

I’d had this movie in my Netflix queue even before I started this little research, but knowning even a little bit about where I supposedly came from made watching this all the more intriguing.

Even if I had no familial relation to the events taking place on screen, this is still a very powerful, sobering, and well-done production.

Shot as if a television news crew was on the field of battle in 1746, this mockumentary clearly reflects the fact that it was made in 1964 and seems to take an almost perverse joy in breaking what must then have been societal taboos against showing the insanity of war, including depictions of rapes and executions.  Throughout the film, the spectre of Vietnam is never far from the mind.

According to teh Internets, Clan MacLaren fought on the losing side with the rest of the Highland Scots in the Appin regiment under Lord George Murray, who was described in the film as England’s finest general of the 18th century.

The Appin Regiment, or the “Stewarts of Appin” consisted of 250 men at the time of the battle and was led by Charles Stuart of Ardsheal.  According to Wikipedia, “The regiment suffered from desertion. During the campaign it suffered 90 killed, 65 wounded.”

The reprisals against the Highland clans after the battle were brutal, and appeared to have been a contributing cause in driving many Highland Scots out of Scotland and into strange locales like Canada, the current, U.S., and Australia.  After the battle, MacLaren Clan chief Donald MacLaren remained a fugitive until the amnesty of 1757.  (My first Lowrey ancestor appears to have arrived in the present U.S. by at least 1767.)

A film well worth watching. I’m going to have to go and find a good book on the subject now.

Wee Gillis

I found this one at the library even before I started this little research project. Up to that point, I wasn’t even aware there was such a thing as a Lowland Scot.

An absolutely charming book by Munro Leaf, the same genius who drew the inimitable 1936 classic “The Story of Ferdinand“.

Cows

Went to a private zoo this weekend and saw one of these. Reminded me that the flora and fauna of Scotland would have been somewhat different than what we have here in the U.S.

“The Everlasting Taylor File”

From this site:

“Andrew Taylor (until about 1853 when he apparantly [sic] absconded with $26,000) appears frequently in the correspondence of the Bureau of Indian Affairs. His brother David Taylor and David’s son James M. Taylor were even more prolific in the BIA correspondence…

…the Taylors appear so frequently in the records, that one BIA clerk annotated one letter as ‘The Everlasting Taylor File.’ The BIA agent to the North Carolina Cherokees described the Taylor family as ‘showing considerable persistency, some cunning, and a total disreguard for veracity.’

In 1911, James Taylor and his siblings were thrown off the tribal rolls, although later descendants were able to reestablish their North Carolina Cherokee citizenship. Other Taylors were able to become Oklahoma Cherokees.

The Taylors appear on most of the Cherokee census and other rolls, Cherokee citizenship court cases, the Dawes roll and the Eastern Cherokee (Guion Miller) roll.

My point is that the Taylor brothers and their progeny so pestered the BIA with various claims, complaints, and demands for compensation, that it requires a systematic search of the BIA records to locate all of these documents.

In addition, David Taylor was put in jail in Washington, D.C. in 1853 and his son James had a very messy divorce case in 1872; there are substantial court records in the District of Columbia Court files in the National Archives. James M.Taylor had several illigitimate children, as recorded in scattered BIA files.

Later John Madison Taylor and James Lafayette Taylor (sons of James M. Taylor) produced voluminous Justice Department and BIA records in the 20th century. This dosn’t exhaust the BIA records which mention the various Taylors.”

David Taylor was my Great Great Great Grandfather on my Dad’s mother’s side. James Madison Taylor would have been my Great Great Great Uncle.

“showing considerable persistency, some cunning, and a total disreguard for veracity.”

Sounds like white trash to me. I think it’s hilarious.

The inscription on David Taylor’s tombstone reads as follows:

“David Taylor, Sr. Born
Orange Co., VA 1791
Died 1877, Citizen Of
Cherokee Nation
Before Removal.
Congress In 1852
Paid Him For Land
He Lost By Treaty
New Echota Dec.
29, 1835. His Sons
James-Campbell H.
Were Captains In
Thomas Confederate
Legion.”

I’m 9/64ths Cherokee. 1/8th of that comes from the Lowrey side. The other 1/64th apparently comes from one of the Taylors marrying a Cherokee lady. (My Mom’s side is all German.)

Here’s part of an e-mail from my Dad regarding my Great Great Great Grandfather, David Taylor:

David (Taylor) and Andrew married Bigby sisters and were threrfore able to sign for Cherokee reservations. And somehow they were able to hound the U.S. government for reimbursement for loss of land when the Cherokees were forced to move to Indian Territory.

It took years, but both brothers were in Washington, DC and finally they were both awarded around $26,000.

Neither returned to their families after the award.”

We’re also apparently somehow kin to “Old Rough and Ready“. More on that later.

Holy Shit, Man…

I just found my Great Great Great Great Great Great Grandfather.

I’d known he was from Scotland, but I’ve just found some more fascinating information as a result of trying to trace the Lowrey name to Clan MacLaren.  I still don’t know if there’s a definitive connection there, but according to this site and everything else I’ve been able to corroborate, George Lowrey (Sr.) was born in Scotland around 1740, though it doesn’t say where.

Here’s what else it says:

“George Lowrey was born in Scotland about 1740 and married Nannie Watts, daughter of Ghi-go-neli (father: Oconostota) and Rising Fawn (Agiligina Kenoteta). He was a trader, miller and man of many far-ranging activities who made his home in Battle Creek valley in the Sequatchie Country, which housed the fleet of war canoes of the Chickamauga Nation. Their daughter Aky Lowrey married Chief Arthur Burns. Another daughter, Jenny, was the wife of Chief Tah-lon-tee-skee. Yet another daughter married a Sevier. In fact, it can be said that none of the marriages in the Lowrey clan were taken lightly. Col. John Lowrey married Elizabeth Shorey, and Maj. George Lowrey married Lucy Benge. As in the case of the Browns and Keyses, some Lowreys remained in the Valley Head area without being forced west. They were known for maintaining a “free loan association” to aid poor farmers, widows and other needy individuals.”

According to this site, George Lowrey’s first son was named John Lowrey, who was born in 1768 in Tennessee. That would mean that he was approximately 28 years old when he was first a father, and would mean that our line of Lowrey’s has been in the present U.S. of A. since at least 1768.

(I also found information that there was a “Levi Lowrey” who was born in North Carolina in 1764, though I’m not sure if he’s related.)

Regardless, my Great x 5 Grandfather, Major George Lowrey, was born in Tennessee in 1770.  (As I’ve stated previously, we’ll talk more about him later.)

Regarding Major George Lowrey’s father, (George Lowrey, Sr.), he was apparently a Scottish-Irish trader who died in 1790 in Cherokee Nation, East Tennessee.

According to my research, George Lowrey, Sr. was married to a Cherokee woman named “Nannie Ol Loo Tsa Ne Li (Watts)“.  Her father was a Cherokee chief named Ghi-Go-Ne-Li.  Nannie was born around 1748 in the Cherokee Nation of Tennessee as well, and she would be my Great (x6) Grandmother.

According to this website, George Lowrey and Nannie had seven children. They are as follows:

– John Lowrey, b. 1768, Tennessee, d. 1817.
– George Lowrey, b. 1770, Tahskeegee on the Tennessee River, Alabama, d. October 20, 1852 – age 82.
– Elizabeth Lowrey, b. 1776, Tennessee, d. May 18, 1839, Calhoun, Tennessee.
– Sallie Lowrey, b. 1776, Tennessee
– Jennie Lowrey, b. 1778, Tennessee
– Aky Lowrey, b. 1782
– Nellie Lowrey, b. 1786

Like I said, holy shit, man…

UPDATE: George Lowrey and Nannie married in 1767, meaning the Lowreys have been in the present U.S. since at least that time.

(Map credit.)

St. Lawrence

Since I’m a bit of a completist, I figured I’d close the loop on this one:

Now, as we’ve discussed, the research shows that the name “Lowrey” is the diminutive English version of the name “Lawrie”, which itself comes from “Lawrence”, and that “MacLaren” is the Gaelic version of “Son of Lawrence”. Further, the research shows that the Highland Scot Clan MacLaren take their name from Abbot Lawrence or Abbot Laurence, who established a Celtic church of Achtow in Balquhidder, which itself is in Perthshire, Scotland during the 1300s. The members of Clan MacLaren are thought to take their name from this individual. (According to one source I read, the persons who later owned the land around Balquhidder was traditionally referred to as “Abbot”, even though they did not apparently have any religious vocation.)

Now, “Lawrence” comes from “Laurentus”, which means someone who comes from the ancient Latin city of “Laurentum”, an inner sanctum of ancient Rome. Another interesting thing I’ve discovered is that all of the family coats of arms of the various permutations of the name “Lowrey” (“Lowery”, “Lowry”, “Lawrie”, “Laurie”, “Lawson”, etc.) all carry the same theme of the laurel wreath (Laurentum being the “City of Laurels”) and the motto of “Repullulat”.

Considering all of this, some might say that those bearing the “Lowrey” name derive their ancestry from ancient Rome.  That might be so. However, it’s also possible that the “Lawrences” from which the Lowrey name derives came from an admiration for St. Lawrence, whose popularity in the early Christian church may have caused the name to spread across Europe and up into England, Scotland, and Ireland, where it became “Lawrie”, “Lowry”, “Lowrey”, “MacClory”, “O’Lowry”, and “MacLaren”.

Here’s what teh Internets says about St. Lawrence:

“St Lawrence, a deacon of the Church of Rome, who was born in Spain, died a martyr in Rome in AD 258. St. Lawrence is one of the most venerated saints in the church’s glorious history. Pope Sixtus II ordained Lawrence (a.k.a. Lorenzo) a deacon. Lawrence was martyred shortly after Sixtus, his bishop. When the pope was arrested Tradition has it that he told Lawrence to give the Church’s treasures, for which he was responsible, away to the poor. When he was noticed by the Roman authorities for doing this, the Roman prefect ordered Lawrence to turn over the Church’s treasures to him. So, Lawrence, pointing to the poor and sick around him, said, “Here are the treasures of the Church.” As a result, he was condemned to death by being burnt on a gridiron. He endured this torture in good spirits, allegedly saying at one point, ‘See, I am done enough on one side, now turn me over and cook the other.’“

Thus, we have three working theories regarding where the name “Lowrey” comes from:

– From former denizens of the city of Laurentum in ancient Rome, who possibly later traveled throughout Europe and settled in Scotland as Roman soldiers.

– From Abbot Lawrence, who was possibly named after St. Lawrence, whose name would have derived from denizens of the city of Laurentum.

– Or from the French.

As one website succinctly put it,“…surnames can derive from a variety of equally interesting sources, rather than all be ultimately related.”

Oh, Lookee!

It appears as though my independent Internets research was pretty spot on:

“The Lowry name and its numerous alternate spellings is likely more Scottish than Irish. If you search the online records of PRONI (the Public Records of Northern Ireland), you will see that the Lowry name is concentrated in County Down, particularly in the Kilmore, Killinchy and Killyleagh areas south of Belfast. If you look at a timeline, you will see few Lowry’s before 1650 which makes sense because the great Ulster Plantation experiment didn’t begin until the early 1600s when James I empowered two men named Montgomery and Hamilton to repopulate parts of Northern Ireland ravaged by war. County Down and County Antrim (directly north of Down) were to receive wave after wave of Lowland Scots who emigrated to Northern Ireland in search of a better life. Being Lowland, as opposed to Highland, they were almost uniformly Presbyterian and hardly Celtic. The Celtic people were largely Highland Scots as well as the Irish who populated the republic of Ireland, as well as Wales.

There is even some speculation that the Lowry name is French, being a corrupted version of Loire, the river valley in France where many French Protestants (Hugenotss) lived until moving elsewhere because of religious persecution…

As the name suggests, most of the emigrants from Northern Ireland to America were Scots who moved first to Northern Ireland. They are not Irish.”