The Melungeons: The Resurrection of a Proud People

As early as 1654, English and French explorers in the southern Appalachians reported seeing dark-skinned, brown- and blue-eyed, and European-featured people speaking broken Elizabethan English, living in cabins, tilling the land, smelting silver, practicing Christianity, and, most perplexing of all, claiming to be Portyghee. Declared free persons of color in the late 1700s by the English and Scottish-Irish immigrants, the Melungeons, as they were known, were driven off their lands and denied voting rights, education, and the right to judicial process. The law was enforced mercilessly and sometimes violently in the resoundingly successful effort to totally disenfranchise these earliest American settlers.

These Melungeons were a remarkable people caught up in a nightmare not of their own making. Perhaps history can finally amend itself and belatedly recognize the incredible achievement of these brave and lonely people, who were among the earliest American pioneers, and bring at long last an end to the Inquisition.

"This book is a beginning to understanding a part of our historical origins which has been bypassed by those writing the history of the Appalachian region." - West Virginia History

"Kennedy's well-written book reveals a fascinating panorama of a little-known group of people and is a mystery worth reading." - Jacksonville Daily Progress

N. Brent Kennedy, founder of the Melungeon Research Committee, is a native of Appalachia and a Melungeon. One day he began explaining to his parents their heritage and thus unraveled family mysteries that go back for generations. After years of wondering about the mysterious dark-skinned people he had often encountered while growing up, he realized he was indeed one of them, that his family was part of the proud, troubled heritage of the Melungeons. He earned degrees from Clinch Valley College of the University of Virginia and the University of Tennessee-Knoxville.