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Subject:
From:
Anne Pemberton <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Wed, 29 Oct 2008 12:16:06 -0400
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Steve,

Herb is merely grabbing at straws. We don't know if any red-headed slave, if 
one existed, was descented from Peter Jefferson, and we have no idea if he 
had a relationship with Sally Hemings, or even if they knew each other. 
Furthermore, if they had had children together, the resultant children would 
have been muli-hued rather than all almost white. The testimony of visitors 
at Monticello is that these children were very white looking and some of 
them passed for white after the left the plantation. That does not 
consistently happen when both parents are of mixed parantage.

Jon Kukla wrote about the possibilities, actually the probabilities, as did 
Fawn Brodie and Annette Gordon Reed. Herb labeled them all liars. Let him 
now wear the same badge.

Anne

Anne Pemberton
[log in to unmask]
http://www.erols.com/apembert
http://www.educationalsynthesis.org
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Lyle E. Browning" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, October 29, 2008 12:08 PM
Subject: Re: New Presidential Descendant Claimant


> Herbert is correct in his remarks about the possibility. And Sandy is 
> certainly a red-head nickname. And his final point about the DNA  testing 
> is the one that all should take away from this discussion.  Without 
> additional testing, all the analysis of existing and known  documents will 
> not settle the issue.
>
> Science rules, OK.
>
> Lyle Browning, RPA
>
>
> On Oct 29, 2008, at 11:57 AM, Anne Pemberton wrote:
>
>> Herb,
>>
>> You are committing the sin that you accuse others of ... lots of  maybes 
>> in your remark, none of which you can prove. You can't even  prove that 
>> there was a red-headed slave on the property. A name  doesn't establish 
>> any fact whatsoever. You seem anxious to jump on  almost anything that 
>> could be made into an excuse for Jefferson's  paternity.
>>
>> Anne
>>
>> Anne Pemberton
>> [log in to unmask]
>> http://www.erols.com/apembert
>> http://www.educationalsynthesis.org
>> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Herbert Barger" <[log in to unmask]
>> >
>> To: <[log in to unmask]>
>> Sent: Wednesday, October 29, 2008 11:15 AM
>> Subject: Re: New Presidential Descendant Claimant
>>
>>
>> Mr Corneliussen is absolutely correct that it is "possible" that a  slave
>> inherited from Peter Jefferson (Thomas Jefferson's father) could have
>> carried the Jefferson DNA from past Jefferson males. This slave's  name 
>> was
>> "SANDY", a name that denotes reddish hair, and this man could have 
>> fathered
>> a male heir who "may" have been a father to some of Sally's  children. 
>> Please
>> remember that only ONE Hemings family member was DNA tested.
>>
>> Herb Barger
>> Jefferson Family Historian
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Discussion of research and writing about Virginia history
>> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Steven T. Corneliussen
>> Sent: Tuesday, October 21, 2008 7:32 AM
>> To: [log in to unmask]
>> Subject: Re: [VA-HIST] New Presidential Descendant Claimant
>>
>> And please forgive me if I'm misinterpreting something related from 
>> Kevin
>> Hardwick's Oct. 12 revised list of the things that we can "say about 
>> Sally
>> Hemings that no one is likely to dispute." Item 5 on that revised list
>> says that the "father of one of [SH's] children -- Eston Hemings --  was
>> descended from Thomas Jefferson's paternal grandfather; that is to  say, 
>> we
>> can narrow the list of possible fathers for this child to Thomas
>> Jefferson, TJ's brother, his paternal uncles, and his paternal  cousins."
>>
>> It seems to me that, at a minimum, this phrasing fails to make 
>> completely
>> clear what is known about the radius of the circle of paternity
>> candidates. That complete clarity is important because many  participants
>> in Hemings-TJ discussions, and almost all participants in the media,
>> presume that the circle includes only Jeffersons who were routinely
>> acknowledged at the time as members of the extended Jefferson  family. In
>> my view it's important to stipulate specifically the possibility of
>> paternity by some unknown carrier of the Jefferson DNA marker within  the
>> enslaved population. We know that the DNA marker crossed the race  line. 
>> We
>> do not know whether it crossed the race line in a generation earlier 
>> than
>> the one that produced Eston Hemings. Now, this may well be an  outlandish
>> possibility in terms of the historical evidence. But because the DNA
>> evidence says nothing whatsoever about it, as a matter of DNA  science 
>> the
>> circle of paternity candidates must actually be defined as wider  than 
>> the
>> circle of males in the known, acknowledged, extended Jefferson  family. 
>> As
>> a matter of DNA science, we simply do not know the radius of the  circle 
>> of
>> paternity candidates. (And yes, here I have repeated myself nearly
>> verbatim, but in this case it seemed necessary.)
>>
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