My grandmother Helen told me that her great grandmother (I believe it was) came over on a boat with her husband who was Indian (from India). She did not speak English so the children used to tease her. She had long black hair down her back. She didn't tell me that her great grandmother was Hispanic, but my first cousin, her grandson, told me that Grandma Helen told him she was. The illustration of my ancestral origins from Ancestry.com seems to bear out that heritage.
I was told by my grand uncle John (GHelen's middle brother) that my birthmother's (her daughter) father was tall and looked like a White man. I tried to find out more about him when we visited relatives in South Carolina. It's like I willed her to me...a cousin from my grandfather's side of the family showed up at my cousin Ruth's house and said she had never visited her before. She stopped because she saw Ruth's brother's truck outside. Unfortunately, her mother who was my 2nd cousin had passed and she couldn't tell me anything about my grandfather.
One of our family historians told us at a family reunion that the first relatives they traced us back to were a German slave trader and an African American minister who had 14 children. We also have Cherokee Indian blood. I really should pull out the DVD about our family's heritage that another of our historians produced. Truthfully, it started out kind of boring, so I stopped watching. But I think at this time, my son would be very interested in watching it with me. I don't know much about the ancestry on my paternal side (long story). I was given to GHelen's oldest brother and his wife as a baby and they raised me.
