Barack Obama's Ancestors Owned Slaves

Wire services carried an article a few days ago describing the relationship of the families of segregationist Senator Strom Thurmond and the Reverend Al Sharpton. Now another politician has been linked to slavery in a manner that may surprise all. It seems that Barack Obama's ancestors owned slaves.

Mr. Obama's immediate ancestry is well known. His father is a black man from Kenya, and his mother is a white woman from Kansas. William Addams Reitwiesner, who works at the Library of Congress and practices genealogy in his spare time, spent time researching Obama's ancestry and found that his mother's family owned slaves, according to census records.

According to the research, one of Obama's great-great-great-great grandfathers, George Washington Overall, owned two slaves who were recorded in the 1850 Census in Nelson County, Kentucky. The same records show that one of Obama's great-great-great-great-great-grandmothers, Mary Duvall, also owned two slaves.

You can read more in the Chicago Tribune at http://tinyurl.com/3d7rbb.

While this is an interesting story because of the other recent news articles, I suspect this is not a rare occurrence. If every American traced his or her ancestry, many of us would find similar stories in our family trees.

It reminds me of a quote from Helen Keller: "There is no king who has not had a slave among his ancestors and no slave who has not had a king among his."

Comments

[Alice Paige]

So, who cares? The anti-Obama people are trying to make a big deal out of something that is not of his doing and is beyond his control. This is viciousness creeping out.

[Laurie Kender]

Viciousness is in the eye of the reader - perhaps the article was written with a political motive, hoping to find the readers who would 'make hay' of it, perhaps not....but I hope we're looking at it from a genealogy perspective here.

I find it interesting and somewhat ironic, in a philosophical sense. I agree that if you shake anyone's tree, you may well come up with a slave-owner or two - I have, from New England in the 1600s (yes, I was surprised). But I like to muse on what those generations-back Southern Civil War era ancestors would have thought...about their ?X-great-grandaughter marrying a black man from Kenya...and about the son of that marriage being in contention for the presidency of the most powerful nation in the world. I'd have to think they'd be mind-boggled, at the least....

[B. Kirka]

What a great country we all share. The facts of his family history and the advancements of our history is why he is able to run for President with a chanch to win. That is exactly what we , as a country, are all about !!!!

[Pat]

and???? so what??? Let's trace all the candidates' ancestries to see what is there. Can anyone help what their ancestors may or may not have done? I have ancestors that were in the Rev. War....and at the same time, some members of my same family were Tories. (sided with the British, in case someone doesn't know what that means). It doesn't affect who I am. Let's get on to some real news now.

[A. Calkins]

Similar situation came up when Kerry was in contention last election. In his it case was his Jewish heritage.

[C. Henry]

I love the quote from Helen Keller. What a wonderful, diverse nation we live in! If we were all judged on our ancestry, would we even be able to be in this great land?

I, too, have not only wonderful Rev. War hero's in my ancestry, but one of those hero's had a daughter who married the son of a Loyalist who actually fought under the command of Cornwallis! That son became an indentured servant when the father died prematurely and the mother could not take care of her children. He was only 12 years old at the time!

During the Civil War, I have a great-grandfather who fought for the South, but later changed his allegiance, and fought for the North. His position there? Guarding the very men he fought side by side with in a Northern Prisoner of War camp. His allegiance switch tore his family apart.

I have slave holders in my history. I also have slaves. It is a sad point of history. Something that we, as a people, have hopefully learned and evolved from. And I think Obama is a beautiful example of that. A blended history. Black and white. Cultural diversity from different nations.

What more beautiful example of this great country could we ever hope for?

[Barbara]

Every time you see a light skinned African American you are probably looking at someone whose ancestors had slaves. It was very common for white slave owners to relieve themselves with slave women. If you go back further to Africa you will find more slave owners. When they warred with each other the winners got to keep the losers as slaves. Africa wasn't the only continent to engage in slavery, of course. I'm afraid that slavery has always been, and still is, part of human behavior. Telling us about one person's slave owning past is like telling us about one grain of sand on the beach.

[V. Souers]

Name one person who can change the past!

[Teresa Elliott]

Just makes me wish one of my cousins on my brick wall line would run for President. :0)

[Barnegat Blummis]

I had several tzitzit-knotters in my family tree, as well as people well-known for running around screaming "gournisht tzu hilfen!" That notwithstanding, I believe that this story represents a kind of 'guerilla genealogizing' and is quite similar to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth (aka, "Lying Ideologues From the South") and ought to be condemned by the entire genealogical community as unworthy behavior and an invasion of privacy.

[Otwane Omuleppu]

Shall we note that George W. Bush's Grandfather was CEO of a company that sold US technology to the Nazis and helped them to do the Holocaust much more efficiently? And he was investigated by congressional committees for aiding the enemy in 1942 and 1943? Is that the fault of Vietnam-service-avoiding-AWOL-good-old George W?

[Blair]

Many African Americas who researched their family trees would be shocked to discover some of their black ancestors were slave owners. In the United States, free blacks as well as whites owned slaves (one of the South's biggest slave owners was a free black man.) The precentage of blacks who owned slaves was small, of course, but so was the perecentage of whites who owned slaves.

African Americans who traced their ancestory back to Africa would discover their virtually all their African ancestors were involved in the slave trade. African tribes ran the slave markets.

[Steve Franklin]

I hope that Barnegat Blummis's genealogy work is more factual than his diatribe against the Swift Boat Veterans For Truth, who were much more truthful than the wonderful Mr. Kerry. Genealogy is about the truth, whatever it reveals.

[MSwoager]

I'm terribly surprised by the reactions of Obama supporters - one's genealogy is something that not one of us can change. I can no sooner change having both Union & Confederate ancestors or Revolutionary ancestors than I can change my DNA.

Lighten up, people! This is hardly meant as an attack on "your" candidate!

[MSwoager]

I'm terribly surprised by the reactions of Obama supporters - one's genealogy is something that not one of us can change. I can no sooner change having both Union & Confederate ancestors or Revolutionary ancestors than I can change my DNA.

Lighten up, people! This is hardly meant as an attack on "your" candidate!

[Elaine O'Neill]

One difference to be noted is that Al Sharpton was asked first and gave his permission to the people from Ancesty to research his family tree. Was Mr. Obama asked, and did he give his permission for his family tree to be researched? If not, then this research and even more, the publicizing of it certainly seems to be an invasion of privacy, regardless of the type of information discovered.
It certainly comes across as trying to discredit him in some way for something neither he, nor his mother, had any control over. I really don't like to see genealogy used as a weapon. It's just not right.

[Janis]

While I find it interesting to know about the ancestors of our Presidents and Presidential hopefuls, they had no control over what their ancestors did or didn't do. I base my vote on who they are today and what their viewpoints (not their ancestors) are on running our country. Likewise, I hold no grudges against my ancesotors (or anyone else's) who owned slaves, aided Nazi's or had done anything else that I would not have done. Since I did not live in their times and walk in their shoes, I don't know what influenced the choices they made. I have found no record of my great-grandfather's parents owning slaves, but he joined the Confederate Army shortly before the war ended, at about age 16. Did he join for the adventure or maybe to protect his mother and younger siblings from the Yankee soldiers? (Supposedly he built embankments) I will probably never know!

[Sandi Lee Craig]

I, too, have Rev. Soldiers, and men on both sides of the Civil War - all as a part of my interesting ancestry, their stories filled in by many years of research. I am able to tell the tale, proven with back-up paperwork, of how one of my ancesters was sold into slavery on the Boston docks for 10 pounds. Several comments have ranged from "you don't look Black" to people insisting that then it was called "indentured". I chose the word "slave" because any Scot who was a POW of Cromwell, lived through battle and the Tower of London, much less a Winter crossing of the Atlantic - and here in the New World totally against his will - SOLD in to service, certainly didn't come here of his own intentions! People, NOT all slaves were from Africa! How the genealogy would prove harmful to any candidate is beyond me. Most any one whose family has been in this New World for over 450 years has to have a similiar story to be unraveled with deep research. Genealogy isn't just about what was, but who we are and the responsibility we have to our ancestors to change this world for the better.

[Kathy Birch]

Personally, I am glad to see this story. In my opinion, the whole to-do-ta-da about the Sharpton/Thurmond story was ridiculous--and CERTAINLY nothing to get all hot under the collar about. Stories about tragedies our ancestors experienced or caused should always serve as lessons to us, but as we have no control over them at this point, why be angry or traumatized? This Obama story supports the argument that there could be horse thieves (or the equivalent) in everyone's history!
Conflict doesn't even have to be all that far back. My father was born in Germany in 1939. My grandfather, his father, was enlisted in the German army during WWII, and was assigned to an anti-aircraft weapons unit. My maternal grandfather built military planes in So. California, which my paternal grandfather then shot down. Meanwhile, my father-in-law was a soldier in the US Army and spent horrific months as a POW in Germany before being liberated by the Allies after the end of the war. Remember: we're talking here about people who actually LIVED through these things... and there are no hard feelings at family reunions! My daughter is a living embodiment of the sum total of all of their experiences.
Just because someone has decided to play in the very visible political arena doesn't mean we have to turn their lives--especially their ancestors' lives!--into soap opera drama! They are certainly NOT the only ones who experienced tragedy!

[Kathy Birch]

Like I teach all my students: "There is no judgment in Genealogy."

[Gordon Banks]

Everybody's ancestors OWNED slaves. Everybody's ancestors WERE slaves. Humans just aren't very nice animals much of the time. We do bad things to each other.

[Candy-Lea Chickite]

Anyone involved in politics knows that the best and cheapest way to have your family tree traced is to, well, be involved in politics!

It's inevitable that someone's going to do it, and nobody should be shocked at what is discovered.

[Dora Smith]

Well, guess what? My 3X great grandmother was the great grand-daughter of a Mulatto slave on her father's side, and the infamous DeWolf family on her mother's.

The only problem I've got with this is where my family has always lied about both parts of this.

Yours,
Dora Smith

[Irma Saldana]

If anyone wants to hold (Obama)or anyone of us accountable for our ancestors, trace your DNA and you will realize that everybody in the world came originally from Africa. DNA can determine our ancestors migration pattern over the last tens of thousands of years. We all share a common ancestor who lived in Africa some 120,000 years ago. At what point do we condemn our ancestors for their actions--50,000 years ago, 100 years ago, or 50 years ago? Your family story can be told through the science of genetics. I challenge anyone placing judgement to test their DNA.There is evidence in our genes that we have inherited to prove who you are and where you came from? Read the Journey of Man by Dr. Spencer Wells just to begin your journey of who you are. Don't worry about what you find out. It is possible that your ancestors owned slaves, were slaves, fought in wars, killed to survive, were warriors, kings, queens, farmers, etc. So, what are we going to do about it? Let's continue our journey in improving ourselves as human beings and we can start by not being so judgemental on what our ancestors did or didn't do. We are now the most intellectural group of people that ever existed. Let's act like it.

[Blair]

Reply to Janis: The early American colonies did have some white slaves whose offspring also became slaves, but they should not be confused with indentured servants. Most indentured servants freely contracted to become indentured for specified number of years in exchange for passage over the Atlantic. For most, it was a good deal. The cost of the voyage to America was equal to three or four years wages. At the end of their period of servitude, indentured servants were due a lump sum payment. Most used the payments to buy land. By that time, they knew where the best land was and which crops grew best. As a result, many quickly became more proporous than their fomer masters. Some indentured servants were cheated and mistreated, but most masters lived up to their end of the bargain. Indentured servants could, and did, sue masters who failed to live up to their end of the bargain.

Slaves from Africa quickly replaced the white slaves in the American colonies because they were cheaper and had some immunity to diseases such as malaria.