There has been some family controversy surrounding my maternal grandfather and great grandfather. There have been legends that sprang up to support ‘the story’. Exercising some genealogical muscle, I set out to do what I do. Prove or disprove using facts. The “Q” family records stopped with my great grandfather…and that is always interesting. Now I know that circa 1900, he changed his name (possibly a brush with the law).
That part of the family settled in Hatteras Island, North Carolina. They lived on the outer banks since some time in the early 1700’s and were alternately pirates, smugglers, fishermen and salvage operators who claimed ships driven ashore and shipwrecked. They owned slaves – not black ones – hapless seafarers who washed up on the Outer Banks. Great grandpa Q left all that for Washington DC, where he lived most of his life, dying in 1971. My mother described him as a mountebank, which may have been what drew him there. He was alternately a brick layer, a boxing promoter and an opportunistic crook.
His son, my grandfather was a scammer (not unlike his daddy) and for most of his life, he was a revival tent preacher, known as “Reverend Jack”. I only saw Reverend Jack a couple of times that I can recall. He was a handsome Elmer Gantry style guy without the scruples of the movie character. He had two children with my grandmother before she dumped him. I have no idea how many other likely lads are out there. He founded a church in Tennessee eventually and died there.
I didn’t spend much more time with my mother (an accomplished ballerina from the American Ballet Theater) who, at 84, still walks and moves like a ballerina. The harsh discipline that made her a great dancer also made her very difficult to love. The last thing that my brother asked me before he died (the next day) in auto accident was to be nice to her, so I put myself out to do that very thing.
My mother bought the story of the history of the Q family hook, line and sinker. She wasn’t all that happy to know that rather than descending from a group of farmers who were kind to the Indians, and my great grandfather married an Indian princess, they were a species of pirate who preyed on the unfortunate. The antebellum South took race very seriously (the records are clear) and the Q family didn’t have any known affiliation with the Hatteras Indians, all of whom had been killed off between 1520 when it was first settled and the early 1700’s. Mother had other stories from her maternal side as well. I don’t think that she made them up. She’s not like that. But she took things at face value and created a legend that she has shared with my daughters. Shining a light on family history (the roaches scuttle for the floorboards) is interesting.
I have a trip to the outer banks planned, to dig a little deeper. There is a lot of provable information on-line these days including family bibles that have been photographed and made available on the Internet. But walking old cemeteries in Frisco, Buxton and Hatteras might turn something up.
There are some dangling bits of history that may have wound around my DNA. For example, Blackbeard-the-Pirate (Edward Thatch – or Teach) operated in those waters. Did my ancestors sail with him on the Queen Anne’s Revenge or the Witch of Endor? They were in the right place at the right time, in the right line of work. Blackbeard accepted a royal pardon and settled in Bath, North Carolina, right across the Pamlico Sound from Hatteras, where the Q family was living at the time. Did they rub shoulders? I can’t say for sure (yet).
Mother (who is very proper) is disturbed by this history, which is much more fun to me…no wonder I always like the Pirate ride and eating at the Blue Bayou restaurant at Disneyland. Mother is not amused.
This is going to be interesting.
Recently sent off a DNA sample to Ancestry. Not sure I'm looking forward to the results.
One can find some interesting things if one looks. I have a family history that was written in the 1880s by a gentleman who also spent time in the Colorado gold fields around 1860. One of the more interesting characters was an early Mormon who was important in the church in the 1850s. In one incident, he discovered wife #1 had a boyfriend, so one Sunday morning after church, he walked up to the guy and shot him dead. Word of the incident reached Salt Lake City and Brigham Young himself declared it justified. That ended that right there and the #1 wife behaved herself very well after that.
I'm positive that the Q family knew Blackbeard. He lived 25 sea miles from Hatteras. At the time he settled in Bath, NC, he was famous and there were about 200 people living there. He settled there because he ran the Queen Anne's Revenge on a sand bar in the the Pamlico River, where the city is today. I'm not sure of the details of what happened to his ship after that and how seriously it was damaged.
These people were sailors and smugglers and knew the area and why not go and check out the most famous resident of the area?
At present there's no way to tell if some of my ancestors signed ship's articles with him. That's a stretch.
Share them if you dare!
Brigham Young was the territorial governor in the 1850's and his word was law. Interesting history.
'they were a species of pirate who preyed on the unfortunate' Oh, and Blackbeard. Please excuse me for not being surprised, Larry me hearty.
Har, sea wench, avast and fetch a flagon of grog! The Blackbeard associate ancestors was a surprise. They lived on Hatteras Island for a very long time and I started putting pieces together with the history of the area and with their predisposition to piracy and the puzzle snapped together.
The farther back in time you go, the more people are related and the more interesting the history.
The Lamberts crossed from France in 1066 with the Norman invasion. Some in Harold Godwinson's court considered that William-the-Bastard (The Conqueror) was a pirate and a pretender to the throne. That was settled with an arrow in King Harold's head. It seems that the genes have been passed down with little attenuation.
Have a safe trip when you go. See if you can find any.. overgrown or not so well cared for cemeteries as well. Could be they are uncared for, for a reason. 🙂
My dad was born a Shell, but his dad abandoned the family and his mom died when he was a year old, so he was raised by Aunt Jo and Uncle George Coffey. He just took up the Coffey name. But his 'brothers' were busy in the moon shine business and two lied in Chicago and was part of the Capone mob. They worked in off shore gambling in the boats off the cost in Lake Michigan. But I learned my daily item by having to look up mountebank. I have never heard the term used before.
Yes, the cemeteries are likely haunted.
It sounds as if your family tree has interesting branches.
My Italian ancesters are all accounted for and part of the Minnesota historical society. I'm sure all the bad bits have been edited out. Mom's side? Who knows. German, English, and a spot of French.
You're family sounds way more interesting.
My people are all domesticated now. However, if you go back a few generations they were a lot more interesting. Pirates, pioneers on the road west, gunslingers and soldiers of fortune. What happened to us? We were all tamed…not cool.
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