In First Lady’s Roots, a Complex Path From Slavery

[XemaSab]

In 1850, the elderly master of a South Carolina estate took pen in hand and painstakingly divided up his possessions. Among the spinning wheels, scythes, tablecloths and cattle that he bequeathed to his far-flung heirs was a 6-year-old slave girl valued soon afterward at $475.

In his will, she is described simply as the “negro girl Melvinia.” After his death, she was torn away from the people and places she knew and shipped to Georgia. While she was still a teenager, a white man would father her first-born son under circumstances lost in the passage of nearly two centuries.

In the annals of American slavery, this painful story would be utterly unremarkable, save for one reason: This union, consummated some two years before the Civil War, marked the origins of a family line that would extend from rural Georgia, to Birmingham, Ala., to Chicago and, finally, to the White House.

Melvinia Shields, the enslaved and illiterate young girl, and the unknown white man who impregnated her are the great-great-great-grandparents of Michelle Obama, the first lady.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/08/us/politics/08genealogy.html?ref=us

[bluestateguy]

1. I'm so glad she is the First Lady

We are really lucky to have her.

[GreenPartyVoter]

2. I love genealogy. It makes history so much more real to me when I think of

my ancestors who lived through it.

[HamdenRice]

3. Even though we're about the same age, it's my great grandparents that were slaves

I guess Michelle's people married young or something. Five of my 8 great grandparents were slaves about the same age or a little older than Melvinia -- as opposed to great-great-great-grandparents of Michelle -- and I'm about the same age as Michelle.

[SPedigrees]

9. It's frightening and distressing to think that this was your personal history.

But Michelle's, and your own, circumstances today are testimony that even the most disgraceful chapters of mankind can be reversed.

[NOLALady]

13. I'm older than both of you.

Half (8) of my GGGParents who were born about the time of Melvina were enslaved. Maybe your ancestors were a little older at the time of the birth of your direct line.

[HamdenRice]

14. My parents had me late, and my grand parents had my father late

I think the norm back then was having kids around 20, but my parents had me closer to 40, as did my grandmother viz my father.

My father was born in 1920, my paternal grandmother and grandfather in the 1890s, and four of my great grandparents were teens or preteens at emancipation, putting their births in the early to mid 1850s.

So it's interesting that several generations of late births put me closer by two generations to slavery than most people my age.

On my mother's side only one great grandparent was a slave here (the rest were from the West Indies or elsewhere), and the story is that he ran away from slavery to Brooklyn.

On edit: You mean GGGparents (great great) or GGparents (Great grandparents)? You mention 8, which would be your great grandparents, not great, great grandparents.

[NOLALady]

17. Sorry, I wasn't clear.

I meant 16, but half (8) were enslaved about the time of Melvina Shields. The other 8 were a gumbo of Natives, FPCs and Europeans.

I didn't know anyone who was enslaved. But I have talked to relatives who were children while some of the former enslaved were still alive. She told me great stories about their escape from the plantation. The escape was documented in Freedman Bureaus records, but she gave me details that weren't included in the narrative. She also described the scars on his back.

[Matariki]

19. My Great Grandma was alive until I was in my 30s

Puts it in very sad perspective for me.

[XemaSab]

16. Amazing

I'm reminded of the woman who passed a few weeks ago. Her father was born a slave, and she lived to vote for Obama.

[eleny]

4. k&r

[FiveGoodMen]

5. And in her husband's actions, a complex path back toward it

This time based on economics rather than skin color.

[TomCADem]

6. Well, At Least You Did Not Embed A Picture Of Obama With A Hitler Mustache

[FiveGoodMen]

7. I wasn't even thinking of Hitler

[HamdenRice]

11. Dag, teh stoopid be painful at times

Spoken like someone who obviously has no stories passed down in the family about what slavery was like.

Why not give us your best holocaust joke while you're at it.

Fucking moron.

And, btw, that's not an insult, so there's no reason to alert. That was a perfectly accurate and objective description of any jackass who would compare slavery to anything likely to occur under the Obama administration.

[AuntPatsy]

12. Forgive my ignorance but I have no idea how your words have anything to do with the op?

[FiveGoodMen]

15. I don't care about the first lady (this or any other one)

I don't care about the first kids or the first dog.

I don't care how the President looks or what he likes to eat any other such human interest bullshit.

Obama is selling out America and particularly those who put him in office.

If that changes, it's news.

The rest isn't fit to print.

[Hekate]

18. Well, I guess that's all there is to be said about that. Bye. nt

[FiveGoodMen]

20. So long.

[NYC Liberal]

22. We should close our eyes and put our fingers in our ears

and forget that slavery ever happened.

Let's not think about the significance of it.

You can go back to ranting on an internet message board now.

[AuntPatsy]

23. then why click on this thread?

[Another Bill C.]

8. We have 32

great-great-great-grandparents. I'll bet there are some more interesting stories in Michelle's background (as in most of our backgrounds).

[AuntPatsy]

10. your right...utterly remarkable .....proof that justice can sometimes be achieved

even if it takes a couple of centuries for it to occur.

[Pirate Smile]

21. K & R. Great article. People should go read the entire thing.