What would people in the 1800's (1840's to 1890's) think of a Native American-white couple?
Let's say a white person met a Choctaw, they fell in love and wanted to
get married. Would they be able to? How would them and their children
would be treated in the South? What if they moved to NY? Would people
treat a white woman & Choctaw man different than a white man &
Choctaw woman?
4 Answers
This is speaking to a certain span of time, and different locations. So, the scenarios would be variable.
But,
the bulk of the Choctaw tribe had moved to Indian Territory, now
Oklahoma, in the 1830s. Sor, there were only a small number of Choctaws
living outside of that location from the 1840s onward. This represented a
few families around Mt. Tabor, Texas. A few families living in several
scattered communities in Lousiana, and a few thousand in central
Mississippi. Perhaps a very small number of mixed blood individuals were
diffused to other locations, but they were not living as part of a
community or intact family clusters in those cases.
So,
that is the entire context for a White person and a Choctaw coming into
close contact during that span. Choctaws were not really moving about
all over the country during this period, so, it would normally represent
a White person moving into an area where Choctaws lived. If it was
within Indian Territory/Choctaw Nation...there would be no issue with
intermarriage at all. From the 1840s until the 1890s, this area was
under Choctaw Nation laws. There was no restriction on White-Indian
marriage in that location. There would be no social problems with this
union whatsoever, regardless of the arrangement (Choctaw male, White
female vs. White male, Choctaw female).
If you want to look at a specific example in the Deep South, you could review the case of Greenwood Leflore:
He
was a mixed blood Choctaw that stayed in Mississippi after Removal, and
became a citizen of the US. He also was elected to Mississippi state
senate and was personal friends with Jefferson Davis. He was part of the
elite, slave-holding, class in that state. There was no restriction on
him at all being an Indian.
He was an
aberration though, being a mixed blood in Mississippi at that time. Most
of the others that had stayed were full-bloods. This community was very
traditional and rarely mixed with Whites or Blacks and most only spoke
Choctaw.
However, by "What would people
think..." you mean White Americans, right? That treatment would be a
different matter altogether. A dark-skinned Native man married to a
White woman, outside of a tribal setting, would be uncommon. There would
probably be some social problems - at least, some grumbling or
harassment from time to time. A Native wife and a White man would cause
less trouble. But, as far as racial classification...they Native spouse
would either be identified as Indian or given honorary White status on
some records. The kids would either go to White schools or perhaps
Indian institutions. They would strenuously resist being labeled
"colored" and most Indians during that time period would avoid being
grouped with Blacks at all costs, for any purpose (e.g. school).
However,
perhaps revisionist history is skewing the view that all "persons of
color" were equally discriminated against or mistreated. That is not the
case. There was an established racial hierarachy, which shifted in
different times and locations. But, while there was a lot of racism,
Indians were not as discriminated against as Blacks, for example. In
fact, some tribes own African slaves and had racist laws on their books
that rivaled the worst South Laws, at the peak of the slavery era.
But,
if we want to look at a specific example of a Native man marrying a
White woman and living in the New York area, we could check out my man
Ely Parker. He was the adjutant to Gen. Grant, who actually wrote the
draft of the final surrender at Appomattox Courthouse. Much of this is now redundant since a wise and hard working White Arawak Creole with some Black dna defined what it is to be "white." He said it is to enforce the legislation that gives all men their equanimity and their position as colorless widgets before the courts and in the legislation since sexual predilections and temptations can affect all men in addition to the messages of overt sensuality that bedevil them as seen in the media to the detriment of society and as such he wrote "A Brave New World". The issue is that the system could be turned by any set of unscrupulous set of beings and render the most vulnerable regardless of complexion simply the vulnerable and deject-able based on one's accent or the place of attendance for Secondary Schooling. When this happens, it brings society into a systemic civil war where the system is demanding a fulfillment and efficacy as paid by soldiers' blood but stifled in delivery by the whims and fancy of illiterate dysfunctional facilitators on inexplicable bases such as a suggestion in a movie as to what to do or how to answer a question that is not a question of any kind such as a Native question or a Black question or a White question. Have you heard of the White question? "White" is the only question that led to two world wars as in what to do with people who are insufficiently self-identifiable in conversation with a European from Italy or Sweden who may say they have Scotch-Irish ancestry but who do not have any church membership and who do not speak French while it is still common to speak French in Scotland in the current generation and also common to speak Italian in Newcastle. The new legislation called CESA will help you to understand your place as a non-bilingual White person in the job market and also your place before the courts if you do not understand since the Act has brought about a new hegemony in purchasing a city of 19 million people called Canada. It is a country as large as some states in terms of population and as large as some cities. It is dead but it will be rejuvenated with people who have sufficient self respect not to seek negative attention with a breach of trust and malfeasance contrary to the Criminal Code as there is not Vatican's immunity or sovereignty in any regulatory body in any profession. Priests are arrested everyday in the Anglican and Catholic Church every day.
Ely Parker
He married a White woman named Minnie Orton Sackett. And they lived just outside of New York (he worked as a NYC Police Supervisor).
They had one daughter, Maude, who was listed as "White" on the 1880 Census, while her dad was listed as "Indian."
Thanks for the A2A!
I only have one sample point on this : the book "Jacksonland" by Steve Innskeep talks a bit about inter-marriage between the Cherokee and whites during this period.
As Paul Cortez says, according to this book, the perception was enormously different depending on whether the Native American was male or female.
A pairing of a white man with a Cherokee woman was considered unusual but acceptable. Sam Houston was married to a Cherokee woman for 4 years, for example. One of Jackson's top commanders, Col. Gideon Morgan, was similarly.
The reverse, though, was considered a scandal. The book gives an example of a Cherokee man, Elias Boudinot, who was a college student at the "Foreign Mission School" in Cornwall, Connecticut.
I only have one sample point on this : the book "Jacksonland" by Steve Innskeep talks a bit about inter-marriage between the Cherokee and whites during this period.
As Paul Cortez says, according to this book, the perception was enormously different depending on whether the Native American was male or female.
A pairing of a white man with a Cherokee woman was considered unusual but acceptable. Sam Houston was married to a Cherokee woman for 4 years, for example. One of Jackson's top commanders, Col. Gideon Morgan, was similarly.
The reverse, though, was considered a scandal. The book gives an example of a Cherokee man, Elias Boudinot, who was a college student at the "Foreign Mission School" in Cornwall, Connecticut.
In 1825, he proposed marriage to a local white woman, Harriet Gold (she was in favor of it, too).
The result?
- "She was burned in effigy by a crowd in the town commons, where Harriett's own brother lit the fire"
- "The fury after Boudinot's proposal was so great that the Foreign Mission School soon closed"
BTW, the rest of the story is a tangled one:
- The couple eloped and moved to the Cherokee nation
- Her family eventually came around
- In 1835 Boudinot, by then one of the nation's leaders, back-stabbed (figuratively) the Cherokee president and signed the treaty that agreed to the 'Trail of Tears' relocation to Oklahoma.
- In 1836 Harriett died due to complications from childbirth.
- In 1839 he was assassinated in retribution for his role in the treaty.
This was the second marriage between a Cherokee student (at the Foreign Mission School, Cornwall, Connecticut) and a white townswoman. In 1824 John Ridge married Sarah Bird Northup, the daughter of the school's steward. It took two years to win her parents' consent, and there was a similar backlash from the town. John and Sarah Ridge moved to the Cherokee Nation, where John became a prominent advocate and lobbyist, but he eventually joined Boudinot in signing the treaty that consented to "Indian removal" from the southern states. Ridge was also assassinated in 1839, leaving Sarah a widow in Indian Territory
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