The Melungeon People Who are They and where did they come from America s Lost Appalachian People

The Appalachian mountain chain of North America, such a beautiful place, but so vast and so rugged. It runs from Maine all the way down into Alabama and they started settling in this country in the late 1600s, 1700s, started coming into the area. Most of them were Scots, Irish, German, Dutch, and etc. from the European countries and they got into these rugged mountains. They just started setting up their little communities and homes and farms. Now this area in the southern Appalachians, circled in yellow, is mostly where they come across the Melungeons at and the red is the highest concentration of where they really originated from. There's still a mystery to this day. Now these people, settlers, come into this old country they're just trying to make them a way in here, clear them some land, set up them a home, and start farming. And you can see the houses that they set up in when they first come in the area in this rugged country, wild, full of Indians. And they found it. Some people were already here, didn't know where they come from. They wasn't English, Scotch, Irish, they didn't know. They've been here a long time, raising families, farming. The term Melungeon was given to a group of people in the southeast United States for being a mixed people of European, African, and Native American Indian descent. And the biggest area they come from, they found, was around Lee County, Virginia, Hancock County, Tennessee, Hawkins County, Tennessee, all the way into Claiborne County, Tennessee, and around the Gap. But this is the highest concentration of where the Melungeon from. And you can see the diverse different people in this Melungeon culture, a diverse style of people from Indians, Spanish, Portuguese, African Americans, all different bloodlines. And they kind of stayed to their self in these rugged southeastern Kentucky, east Tennessee hills. And they lived off the land just like anybody else, trying to make a living, raising families, and their families, and their families. And to this day, they're still trying to determine where they came from. Now here are some of the states set up DNA testing programs to determine the bloodline and their ancestry. And that's still going on today. Now here's an example of some of the DNA testing done. Now this is not all the people, this is just a few. The others they test will show African American, Native American Indians, different cultures, different bloodlines. Now here's just an old theory of mine, and see what you think about it in these old rugged hills. Now back in 1540, there was a Spanish explorer called Hernando de Soto. He was a cruel explorer for Spain, looking for gold and land to claim. And they kept good documented records. And he come into this area, probably the first man to ever lay eyes on the Tennessee Valley, come across the mountains, went down the French Broad, until he hit an Indian village. And you could see the proximity here of the location of the Melangan people. Awful coincidental, don't you think? Well, he come down the river as he come through the mountains, claimed he had an 800-man expedition with 200 slaves carrying his supplies. And they run up on this Indian village, and they was kind of wore out. So they stayed at this island here with these Indians for three weeks, scouting the area and resting. And I say a lot of men were just fed up with this. They'd been through Indian wars, and they was wore out. So some may have deserted to the mountains and slaves into these rugged East Tennessee mountain hills, and they stayed there for generation after generation. So that's just a theory of mine. Now these old people, they're just like anybody else, just pioneer mountain people, raising family, living off the land, hard-working mountain people. And as generations went on, they evolved just like everybody else in these mountains. So you can find any more information you want to find on this. There's all kinds of books you can look on, too, about the ancestry and their theories and stuff on the Melangines. Now these old families, generation after generation, there's really no set where they came from. But they are a mountain people, and as strong and resilient as anybody else. So I thank you for watching, and I'll see you next time.