My Family are Cherokee Freedmen Descendants

My late paternal grandparents, Cora "Mom" Brown Ross Ross, and her second husband, P. Fred(ric) "Gramps"Ross were both registered with the Dawes Roll of Cherokee Freedmen of the Five Civilized Tribes. Mom's first husband, William Foster Ross, was duly registered on the Dawes Roll (letter above) to my great aunt Christine Foster Ross Cody about her father's claim and payment as a Cherokee Freedmen descendant.

Mom, born in 1897, was enrolled as Cora Brown, along with her mother, Rebecca "Becky" Ann Musgrove Brown Sanders, and daughter, Ada Brown (Little), as well as Grandma Becky's first husband, Anderson Brown.

Gramps was born in 1895, and was a World War veteran. His family were slaves of the first Cherokee Nation Chief John Ross, and walked the Trail of Tears from Georgia to Indian Territory, to Park Hill, Snow Creek, Nowata and Lenapah, now Oklahoma. They lived in Black Towns like Colored Canadian, and Boley. All Black Town links, http://digital.library.okstate.edu/encyclopedia/entries/A/AL009.html, http://allblacktowns.blogspot.com/, and http://www.african-nativeamerican.com/6-towns.htm (to name a few of the many online references and resources).

They are all listed on the Refused, Rejected and Doubtful Freedmen lists, except for Great-great-great grandfather Moses Ross and his third wife, Rebecca Banks Ross. Unfortunately Grandpa Moses died shortly after he received his citizenship certificate in 1904.

Great aunt Cynthia Ross Morgan and her husband John Morgan were taken out of Indian Territory at the start of the Civil War by Chief John Ross and were given their freedom to work as house servants in his Philadelphia home. My great grandfather George Ross and second wife, great grandmother Rose(ann) (Rosa) Gibson Ross along with Gramps and his sister great aunt Stella Ross Little and step brother great uncle Thomas Anderson Ross were all taken out of Indian Territory as well. To find work as maids, laborers and farmers, Grandpa George took his family to Coffeyville, Kansas, and as a result was always listed on the Dawes Roll and rejected for Cherokee Freedmen enrollment though the family was authenticated on the Kerns-Clifton and Wallace Rolls.

Day 7

It's Black History Month! Some great resources are found on NARA's Ancestry.com, where all month you have free access to its African-American portals.
So a BIG part of Black History Month is my family and our genealogy. The photo at the left are my late grandmothers, Evelyn "Granny" Elizabeth Shelton Carmichael, and Cora "Mom" Brown Ross Ross.
Interestingly my maternal grandmother, Granny Evelyn, was born in 1917 in Waco, Texas, to sharecroppers Annie Johnson and Sherman Shelton, at 22 Canal Street, near the Brazzos River. Always made high marks in school, Granny was selected to be a school teacher, but had to drop out of school in the 6th grade in order to work when her father died. But Granny was my best teacher, who was a lifelong learner, taking my college books and reading them to "enlighten" herself. Her grandmother, Ann Rowell, was a free African, and one of pioneer photographer W.D. Jackson's many frontier women subjects.

ANN ROWELL, My Great-great grandmother (below)
Grandma Ann traveled from the South to the West (California) along with her sisters. They were educated, wealthy and proper ladies, Granny used to say, and that was all.