Melungeons in the 1890 Census

Report on Indians Taxed and Indians Not Taxed in the United States
(Except. Alaska) at the Eleventh Census: 1890.
Washington, DC: US Census Printing Office

Page 594
TENNESSEE
the civilized [self-supporting] Indians of Tennessee, counted in the general census, number 146 [71 males and 75 female] and are distributed as follows.
Hawkins county, 31; Monroe county, 12' Polk county 10; other counties [8 or less n each]. 93

In a number of states small groups of people, preferring the freedom of the woods or the seashore to the confinement of regular labor in civilization, have become in some degree distinct from their neighbors, perpetuating their qualities and absorbing into their number those of like disposition, without preserving very clear racial lines. Such are the remnants called Indians in some states where a pure-blooded Indian can hardly longer be found. In Tennessee such a group, popularly known as Melungeans, in addition to those still known as Cherokee.

The names seems to have been given them by early French settlers, who recognized their mixed origin and applied to them the name Melangeans or Melungeans, a corruption of the French word "melange" which means mixed. [See letter of Hamilton McMillan, under North Carolina.]

The Melungeans or Malungeans, in Hawkins county, claim to be Cherokees of mixed blood {white, Indian, and negro], their white blood being derived, as they assert, from English and Portuguese stock. They trace their descent primarily to 2 Indians [Cherokees] known, one of them as COLLINS, the other as GIBSON, who settled in the mountains of Tennessee, where their descendants are now to be found, about the time of the admission of that state into the Union [1796]. One of the sources of their white blood is said to have been an Indian trader names Mullins [Jim Mullins], the other was a Portuguese named Denham, who is supposed to have been put ashore o the coast of North Carolina from a pirate vessel for being troublesome to his captain, or insubordinate. Their negro blood they trace to a negro named Goins, perhaps a runaway slave, who joined Collins and Gibson soon after they accomplished their purpose of settlement. The descent of the Melungeans from such ancestors is readily observable, even those of supposed Portuguese mixture being distinguishable from those of negro mixture, thought it is not impossible that Denham was himself of mixed blood, as the Portuguese pirates sometimes recruited their crews from the ‘maroons’, or negroes, who had taken to the mountains of the West India island as slave n rebellion against their masters. Some of these were mixed Carib, or white blood [English, Spanish or Portuguese], the former being the natives [Indians] of these islands.

In the general census these Melungeans were enumerated as of the races which they most resembled.

Note: The above excerpt is taken from Joanne Pezzullo's excellent "Our Melungeons" web site, which can be found in the MHS Blog's "Links of Interest" section, the portal to which is located on the sidebar to the right.