When I started my genealogical journey it never occurred to me that one day I may come across a situation like this. There were two things that I knew for sure....my mom's family originated from Texas and my dad's family originated from Mississippi and the families did not mix until my parents married. There is nothing like a little genealogy research to turn your world around. Let's start with the basics.
My father is descended from the Duckworth, Keys, Peyton, and Windham family of Mississippi. The first mystery I encountered was the fact that my paternal grandmother, Vera Windham and her husband and my father's stepfather, John Keys were cousins, Once I took a DNA test, I noticed that I had numerous Duckworth matches and I could not understand why. As far as I knew at the time, the only Duckworth in my tree was John and we weren't related. Once the 1940's census was released the mystery was solved. it listed Vera, her mother Mamie and sisters living with her future husband BUT they were listed as cousins, While that answered some questions it did not answer how they were related and I could not find any more info on John's parents. One of my most, recent discoveries revealed that Mamie was a Duckworth through her mother Anna. So now I know that Duckworth family was on both sides of my father's family. Within the last month I received information regarding the Duckworth family slave holder, Benjamin Case Duckworth.
My mother is descended from the Thompson, Kerr, Evans and Lang family from Texas. My research into her family has been relatively easy because I grew up around her siblings, parents, aunts, uncles and grandparents. I spent every summer at her grandmother's farm as a child and I heard many stories about the Langs, my great grandmother's family. Elizabeth Lang was the center of my mother's world and I believe my great grandmother doted on my mother. The Lang line was very well known to me but my mother did not know a lot about her father's paternal line, The Thompsons. We knew they had been in Texas for a long time. Her father's paternal line was something of a mystery to me because we did not know anything past her grandfather, Otha. Ater some research through Otha's obituary and census records, I found the name of Otha's parents and siblings but that was where the trail went cold. After my mother's DNA test this year, I came across a few matches with Thompson links that created more questions than answers but still left me confused about the Thompson family origins. I know Otha's paternal grandfather was born in either Alabama or Mississippi but that is the extent of my current knowledge.
Seven months ago, I came across a surprise while looking up a match of mine. I had assumed that she was related to my dad through the Duckworth family. We have the same people on our tree. But once I received my mother's Gedmatch results back and check her matches I realized that this same cousin was on her list. My first thought was that my parents shared a cousin. But after having a more thorough look I realized that this cousin did not share any DNA with my dad...only with my mother. My first intention was to reach out to this cousin. Unfortunately she had passed away a week before. She was a warm, goodhearted person and I was very sad to hear of her passing. I remembered that she made me a contributor to her tree and I decided to take a more comprehensive look at her tree and realized that while we had the same people in our tree, she was not directly descended from those people. She was descended from a Nancy Duckworth, who appeared to be Native American. Not too long after that, my mother received another match who confused me even more. This new match was European and after looking through her family tree realized that she descended from Duckworth's as well...all Caucasian, To say that I was surprised is a gross understatement. My mother had two DNA matches who both connected to the Duckworth surname, one from the African- American side and one from the Caucasian side. Since the Caucasian Duckworths lived in New York and the African-American Duckworth lived in Mississippi, I did not want to assume that they were connected. I felt that I had assumed enough and I should just sit on that for a while.
A month ago, one of my Duckworth cousins shared the family tree of the Duckworth Family slave holder. I thoroughly searched the tree and found a connection to New York. I then compared the trees from my mother's Caucasian Duckworth cousin to the slave holder's tree and realized that the families were definitely related. Also in the slave holder's tree I found a connection to a Thompson family in Alabama. So it appears that my mother is possibly descended from the slave holding Duckworths and my father is descended from the Duckworth slaves. That is a lot to take in and I will admit that it seems unreal. Since many of the Duckworth connections are on Ancestry, I have decided to have both of my parents take a test to see if we can compare chromosomes and really pinpoint the connection. I just mailed out my mother's test this morning and will be testing my dad soon. I pray the results will give me more answers than questions.
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