Putting The Past Behind Them: Slave Descendant Unites With Plantation OwnerPosted in Articles, History, Media Archive, Passing, Slavery, United States on 2016-08-05 23:30Z by Steven |
Putting The Past Behind Them: Slave Descendant Unites With Plantation Owner
Growing Wisconsin
2016-07-13
The dinner was historic on many levels. On one side of the table sat Nkrumah Steward, 44, the ancestor of a slave. On the other side of the table sat Robert Adams, the ancestor of the man who owned that slave.
This was a meeting of two men who shared a complicated past, one that forever ties them together by blood and circumstance.
If it weren’t for Steward’s fascination with genealogy and his desire to complete a family tree, the two men might never have met.
Digging Into His Past
Over the last 20 years, Nkrumah Steward, of Canton, Michigan, an IT Technician for Coca-Cola, has questioned relatives, plowed through archival papers, and hunted down details through online genealogy sites to piece together his family tree.
He was fortunate to have known his great-grandfather, James Henry, who he knew was the first to be born a free man on his mother, Linda’s, side. Steward had always been curious as to why James Henry looked so “white.”
Through his research, Steward came to learn why. Not only was he descended from slaves, but the line began with a union between his 4th great grandmother, Sarah, a house slave, and, Joel Robert Adams, the slave owner of a South Carolina plantation known as Wavering Place.
Steward’s maternal family tree branched out like this: Sarah and her master, Joel Robert Adams, had Louisa in 1835; Louisa had Octavia. Octavia’s son, James Henry, was the first to be born free. James Henry later fathered Steward’s grandfather, J.D.; and J.D. fathered Steward’s mother, Linda.
Though he was born free, James Henry’s mixed blood made life complicated. He was allowed only to attend a black college; but when he moved from South Carolina to Detroit, Michigan, he “passed” for white and was able to get jobs he would never have had as a black man…
Read the entire article here.