In a message dated 7/3/07 2:55:40 PM, [log in to unmask] writes:


> VERY WELL stated Linda. I am quite sure that many others on this list will
> find their ancestry is as mixed as yours.
> 
> I am retired from Colonial Williamsburg. as an interpreter of African
> American History I was often asked how did I feel telling the story of how
> African-Virginians were treated, "Doesn't it make you angry...hate white
> people...etc...?"  My response was "My African ancestors were brought here
> to work uncompensated for my English ancestors who stole the land from my
> American ancestors, how am I suppose to feel?"
> 
> Harriott
> 
> 
Dear Harriott:

I agree with you whole heartedly.   I too have 3 different gene pools in my 
ancestry:   West African, European (English, possibly Scots-Irish and Jewish), 
Native American (Cherokee and Seminole).   I have been fortunate to have made 
contact and meet my white   Eggleston cousins on my maternal side.   I really 
hit the jackpot as they were both CW and geneaology buffs like me, in fact  
one of them   Bryan Baine contacted me first on the internet!   Both Bryan and 
my other cousin, Dr. Robert Eggleston have been very open and gracious in 
sharing their documents, photos and history with me.   Several years back Bryan and 
I gave several joint lectures at Petersburg NBP and at the   national AAGHS 
(Afro-American Geneaological and Historical Society) conference about our 
connected history.   Bryan and Bob are first cousins, third removed from me and our 
common ancestor was William Eggleston (1794-1847) son of Major Joseph 
Eggleston (1754-1811) who was second in command to Light Horse Harry Lee during the 
Rev. War.   William Eggleston had two descendant lines;   his white family in 
the big house and a liason with an unknown black female slave who delivered my 
GGgrandfather Robert Eggleston (1822-1910)---yeah I know, southerners like to 
use the same names over and over, it drives me batty!!    In the midst of our 
joint research and conversation, Bryan asked me if I was mad at him for being 
a descendant of a slave owner.   I replied to him that I was not angry at him 
personally   as he himself was not directly responsible.   I told him I could 
not forget what happened to my ancestors either but hoped by my geneaological 
investigations to understand the contex in which both parts of the family 
lived in.   I think we need to look at history/geneaology within the historical 
context in which it happened and try and not interpret it from a 21st century 
viewpoint...which is a hard nut to crack, I admit.   As an amateur living 
historian with the Atlantic Guard Soldiers' Aid Society, an authentic, civilian 
living history group, I and the rest of AGSAS believe in interpreting history as 
it happened and not putting a modern spin on it.   Sometimes this makes people 
uncomfortable but we prefer not to sugar coat the historical truth just to 
make it more palatable.   We only learn accurately from history if we examine it 
from all sides and not alter it in our historical interpretation.   I think 
this forces the spectator to think more completely about what historical 
event/people we are interpreting and thus gain a more complex understanding of the 
issues of the day.


Anita L. Henderson
Atlantic Guard Soldiers' Aid Society
Atlantic Guard Soldiers Aid Society

PS:   if you look at your website, I am all over it in the photos ;-)!   I am 
in about 3-4 photos on the revolving photo cartoon on the main page.



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