The Discovery

It’s a beautiful thing to click on a link and see your family history displayed neatly right before your eyes. The sheer numbers are amazing! Over 1200 names and still growing! And, it’s nice to paint a picture of a family, no, a United Family, with a humble beginning in a small town in Alabama called Alexander City. If I close my eyes I can imagine our people in that small town. I see them working the fields, picking cotton and tending to the chickens that littered the yard. I see them sitting around the fireplace listening to their father. I see them smiling and I can almost hear them laughing. It is all too sad to realize that even this imaginary existence is marred by slavery.

Fact is that our people did not originate in Alexander City. No, our roots run much deeper. And, it is also a fact that our heritage is a mixed heritage. We all have heard talk about having Indian blood and we have all questioned if we were the product of slave and master. Unfortunately, there are limited resources available that cross the largest barrier to African American genealogy: Slavery. Would it ever be possible to really know where we came from? Yes.

In early September of 2003 I received a letter from Anna, the friend and cousin whom I met only briefly as a child. The letter contained an article by Leonard Pitts, a columnist for the Miami Herald. The article is called, “Discovering African Roots”. Leonard profiles a service founded by Dr. Rick Kittles, co-director of Molecular Genetics at the National Human Genome Center at Howard University. Dr. Kittles founded African Ancestry, a company that has a database of more than 10,000 African DNA sequences representing 82 African ethnic groups. This company will compare our DNA to this massive database. It is possible to know our true origins.

The company offers services that allow ancestry to be traced through the paternal line or the maternal line. The paternal line is called PatriClan Service. This is how it works as described on the African Ancestry website:

The Y-chromosome provides information on paternal lineage. It is found only in males and is passed UNCHANGED from father to son over hundreds of generations. As a result, each male’s Y-chromosome is the same as his father’s, his father’s father, and so on up the line.

The company sends a test kit consisting of instructions and two cotton swabs. Each swab is brushed along the inside of each cheek and return mailed according to instructions. The test costs $350.

Today is Tuesday, October 28, 2003. At approximately 5:00 P.M., I mailed the completed PatriClan test kit back to African Ancestry. I am a direct male descendant of William Walton. My father is Robert Carson, his father is Robert Lee, his father is Thomas (Walton) Hawkins, and his father is William Walton. In six weeks we will know where we came from.

Understandably, some of you are skeptical. I can hear you now, “I could have told you where we came from for free!” “If you had $350 to throw away you could have gave that to me, no shipping and handling!” But, in the words of Leonard Pitts:

Yes, our heritage is African. But, Africa is a continent of more than 11 million square miles, almost 50 nations and dozens of ethnic groups. So, the information is of limited value.

Join me in anticipation of the discovery of our ancestry. What tribe are we from and from what region? Will we be among the 30% who discover that their male line traces not to Africa, but to Europe? DNA doesn’t lie.

As for the maternal line, this is how African Ancestry describes how it works:

Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) are chromosomes that are inherited exclusively from the mother. This DNA provides a solid record of your maternal descent. Your mtDNA comes exclusively from your mother’s, mother’s, mother….for hundreds of generations.

Unfortunately, it is not possible to trace the maternal line to Julia Walton. The known female offspring of Julia are Annie Walton Stevenson and Sue Walton. Neither produced any female offspring that can be documented. However, we do have a direct female descendant of Mary Mattie Francis Napier, the wife of Thomas (Walton) Hawkins. Anna M. McCray Williams is the daughter of Bulah Hawkins McCray, her mother is Mary M.F. Napier Hawkins.

Pending results of the PatriClan testing we will pursue the maternal ancestry of the Napier line (if I can wait that long!). The Napier ancestry will prove to be equally if not more interesting than the Walton ancestry. I guarantee it!

Trey