Evidence for Melungeons Having Had Indian Ancestry

As Recently Presented on the Rootsweb Melungeon Discussion List

By the Noted Melungeon Researcher Joanne Pezzullo

In 1913 John B. Brownlow, son of the Parson Brownlow, in an article titled “Remnant Indian Tribes” stated these people were, without a doubt, Portuguese Indians. He had rode horseback through the counties where these people lived and had known them intimately. He also wrote of the information he received from John Netherland, the attorney who defended the Melungeons, and it was the same as reported by Judge Lewis Shepherd.

Hamilton McMillan another eyewitness to history wrote in July of 1890: 'The Croatan tribe lives principaly in Robeson county, North Carolina, though there is quite a number of them settled in counties adjoining in North and South Carolina. In Sumter county, South Carolina, there is a branch of the tribe, and also in east Tennessee. In Macon county, North Carolina, there is another branch, settled there long ago. Those living in East Tennessee are called "Melungeons",

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Note: I have never seen a Melungeon origin theory, from the most plausible to the most outlandish, that did not posit some degree of Indian ancestry. Many Melungeon researchers, including Joanne Pezzullo, consider it to be the sine qua non of Melungeon ancestry.