The Graysville Melungeons

Tennessee Anthropologist
Vol. IV, Number 1 (1979)

The Graysville Melungeons
(A Tri-Racial People in Lower East Tennessee)

By Raymond Evans

Abstract

Located approximately 30 miles north of Chattanooga, the community of Graysville, Tennessee contains one of the most stable Melungeon settlements in the state. Field work in the community conducted in conjunction with archival research demonstrates that the Melungeons, who now compose more than half of the local population, came from Hamilton County durning the latter half of the nineteenth century. Census records and other archival sources indicate that prior to comming to Hamilton County they had lived in Virginia and North Carolina. In Graysville, the Melungeons strongly deny their Black heritage and explain their genetic differences by claiming to have Cherokee grandmothers. Many of the local Whites also claim Cherokee ancestry and appear to accept the Melungeon claim.The racist discrimination common in Hancock County and in other Melungeon communities is absent in Graysville. Here, the Melungeons interact in all phases of community life,and exogamy with local Whites is common practice.- Goins- and the term "Melungeon" is not used by the people or by their neighbors. Recent field observations of the Graysville Melungeons differ in no way from that of any other small southern Appalachian community.

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Note: While the term Melungeon has been applied to these people by various authors, including the author of this paper, and this paper is often cited in a Melungeon context, it was not used by them or by their neighbors. Their connection, if any, to the people in and around Hancock County, Tennessee who were historically known as Melungeons is problematical.