Coastal Brooks of North Carolina
Joseph Brooks
John Brooks
Research of the Brooks families living in
Currituck, Hyde, Craven, Beaufort
& Pitt Counties
North Carolina
&
Their possible relationship to the Lost
Colony of Roanoke, 1587
& Pirates of the Coast of Carolina
The proposals that I make in these
webpages may not necessarily connect the various Brooks ancestors
mentioned. Indeed, Stephen and John
Brooks are beginning to take on the characteristics of separate migrations to
Eastern North Carolina. This is a
hypothetical work “in progress” and should always be regarded as such. Lines will change as new data is recovered.
Never in my
wildest imagination did I expect to come across Croatan Indians or
pirates! When I started this task of
analyzing the facts associated with James
Brooks of Pitt Co, NC, I approached it as I would any genealogical
task. Yes, this area was somewhat
unfamiliar to me in a genealogical sense.
My Brooks
come from the Anson Co, NC area, more a sub-mountainous territory than
anything else. The off chance (from DNA
data related to Abraham Brooks of Anson Co, NC) that my Brooks may be related
to the James Brooks family of Pitt Co, NC started me on this trek. One thing that came of that effort was a
possible answer to how Ephraim Brooks of Anson Co, NC fits into my Brooks
family… basically, that he probably doesn’t.
It may very well be that he came from Pitt Co, NC. As it turns out, my relation to the Brooks
family in Pitt Co, NC is not very likely, but I kept going because, as a
historian-in-the-making at East
Carolina University,
I was fascinated by the possibilities and loved the abundance of good records from
Hyde & Currituck counties. Besides,
this was the birthplace of America
itself! I could learn something
here. Still, the pirates and Indians had
a little something to do with it… J
I didn’t really
expect to go beyond James, b.c1738. I
thought that this was about the “brick wall” date. It has been for my Brooks… 1736 for us. But,
there are numerous good records for this area and it was rather an easy task to
follow a person’s life with a reasonable margin of error. Laughing, I called this genealogical
undertaking an “easy” task. After 26
years of doing something, it doesn’t necessarily become easy… just fun to do. So,
explore I did.
Past research into
the fate of the Roanoke
colony has uncovered possible descendants of these colonists among the local
Croatan or Hatteras Indians. That much,
we pretty well knew thanks to some amateur colonial wood sculpturing talents
expressed on a tree as “Croatoan”. But,
the details of their subsequent fate, we didn’t know and will probably never
know completely. Although, some
excellent research and absolutely brilliant (in my opinion) reasoning has been
displayed by Lee Miller in her book, ROANOKE: Solving the Mystery of the Lost Colony. I got this book real cheap from www.amazon.com. If you want a real murder mystery involving
scientific accuracy, you’ll love it. An
historical CSI! Beware, though, she has
critics. Whether or not she is right
doesn’t alter the fact that her book is an excellent and interesting introduction
to the available data on the subject.
Ms. Miller was
simply following the facts (guided by her interpretation of events). Recently, through new satellite imaging
techniques and archaeological digs, more of these facts are surfacing as well
as hints at their subsequent re-infiltration back into the white man’s
society. These possible descendants are
presumably concentrated in Chocowinity,
NC… not far from where James
Brooks lived most of his adult life there on Swift Creek. There are also populations in Free Union
(now, Plymouth
in Washington Co, NC).
So, how do the Brooks fit in? The premise is that settlers to this region
of Carolina
would have needed wives (the settlers were almost always single males… 7 out of
8, actually) and they took those wives from the local population. Imagine love starved men finding natives with
lighter skin, blonde hair and blue eyes!
Hello, “East Coast California!” The re-infiltration of the Lost Colonists
back into American society would be relatively simple… more importantly,
without much notice from the casual passersby.
Yes…
re-infiltration. It has been proposed
that members of the Lost Colony are still among us today… at least, their
descendants are. This has been the work
and theory of the Lost Colony Research Group, headed by Roberta Estes. Her website at Lost Colony Research Group
contains mounds of data and research involving an unprecedented
multi-disciplinary approach to this subject… the proverbial “fine-toothed
comb.” They are affiliated in a
multi-national, multidiscipline research effort to locate any remaining
descendants of the Lost Colony. Over
2,000 records are available for research on their free site.
The Brooks of this
region are undoubtedly involved in the Indian population of the Mattamuskeets
of Hyde county, possible descendants of the Hatteras (formerly “Croatan”)
Indians of Lost Colony fame. On the
original site of the Croatan near present-day Buxton, there is a bay on the
sound side of the Outer Banks called “Brooks Bay,” and is likely the very spot
that Stephen Brooks would one day ferry supplies to the mainland of Hyde County
for the Revolution. This island was once
located in Currituck county and likely the site of John Brooks’ settlement and
subsequent death in 1708. It is at least
possible that John Brooks I was a brother of the infamous Joseph Brooks I who
served with the ignoble “Blackbeard.”
All of this history took place right here… the historical “hotbed” of the
Outer Banks.
Currituck county
in 1708 covered a lot of territory. It
may very well be that John Brooks I lived further south in Currituck Co, NC
(than its present location) which ran a long way down the barrier islands of the
outer banks, past Roanoke Island to directly east of Hyde Co, NC. In fact, Hyde Co, NC took over a portion of
Currituck Co, NC in 1745… the part of the mainland region (eastern side of Lake Mattamuskeet
to the water) directly to the east of its previous territory. This may well explain why the Brooks
“apparently moved” when the county simply changed name.
When the
Tuscarora War broke out in 1713 the Indians from this swampy area joined with
the belligerent hostile Indians laying waste to hundreds of European settlers.
The main bodies of the Tuscarora were defeated about 1714. The
Croatan/Mattamuskeet contingents escaped and were able to hide in the Alligator River interior (Beechland) and waged
very effective guerrilla warfare for four or five years. Forays into Manteo,
the Pamlico basin and a small outpost on the Alligator River
(this location has not been found) resulted in nearly one hundred colonists
killed (Shepard/Willard 2002). The North
Carolina authorities initiated “a peace settlement
with John Padgett and his men” (Padgett’s Indian name was Inuquner
[Shepard/Willard 2002]. Another important Indian was named John Barbour, whose
Indian name was Correuiert [Shepard/Willard 2002]). This peace treaty was
supposedly held on the Outer Banks and eventually resulted in a peace
settlement (this new emerging research may have found two more original Croatan
Indian names). The settlement included a very valuable Indian reservation in Hyde County.
A large group of Indians maintained their original lands in Beechland including
all the land from the shores of Lake
Mattamuskeet to the Pamlico Sound (Garrow: The Mattamuskeet Documents). This
was a huge concession by the state authorities resulting in a very large Indian
reservation and encampment including almost one million acres of land from the Mattamuskeet Lake, including the entire Alligator River flood plain to Roanoke
Island and the Outer Banks of North Carolina (Garrow,
Shepard/Willard, Long 2000). This peace treaty anchored the land, which
ultimately led the Croatan/Mattamuskeet Indians towards their final destination
in two small villages now called Chocowinity (on the Pamlico River)
and Free Union (near present-day Plymouth
[Shepard/Willard 2002]).
Interestingly
enough, John Brooks II, shows a deed in 1709
Currituck Co, NC on the mainland right in this area where the reservation would
later be in now Hyde Co, NC. From then,
until 1716, there is no sign of him. Was
he hiding out with the Croatan/Mattamuskeet at this point? Of course, the lack of records for this very
early period is not necessarily a “smoking gun”. Regardless of John Brooks II’s political
affiliations, he is somehow a part of this Indian Reservation where we find our
Brooks descendants. The hypothesis here,
and I think it a good one, is that John & Stephen both had married in with
the Indian population, indeed their mothers may both be natives of these Carolina tribes from the
Beechland “hideout” and, therefore extant members of the “Lost Colony”.
As I got further
along in my genealogical studies, I became aware of this unusual quality about
these Brooks. For all intents and
purposes, the records seemed like those you might find anywhere and, for awhile
it seemed that way. Reading or learning always has a way of
altering your perception. As I went
further into this subject, I became aware of a sea-faring community a lot like
that of the early Algonquian tribes along these shores… like the Croatan or the
Pamptico, etc. But, that was just what
you might expect from a seaside community.
Peaceful, relaxing lifestyle… Jimmy Buffet style! It appears today, through modern scientific
evidence as well as good, old-fashioned genealogy that these folks may have
more than lifestyle in common with these natives.
“There
are presently 250-300 people living seventeen miles due east of Greenville,
North Carolina in a small town with the Indian name of Chocowinity. This group
of people all live within a three-mile radius of a "targeted" Indian
village named Panawicky (there are seven variant spellings of this name). The
Panawicky village is on the 1588/1618 Theodore deBry maps. Its location, as of
this date, has not been confirmed. This contact period Indian village appears
on about twenty or more maps dated up to about 1700. This group of people,
living in Chocowinity, have recently been informed that they and their
ancestors may be a finite part in the famous mystery of the ‘Lost Colony of
1587’.”
As it turns out,
there is a lot of “new” data aside from DNA on the web now that wasn’t readily
available to researchers in past years and this info clearly outlines the paths
of the Pitt Co, NC Brooks back through Beaufort, Craven, Hyde & Currituck
Counties, NC.
Is it
possible?
I believe it
is. John Lawson visited the Coastal
Carolina Indians in 1701 and, knowing the story of the Roanoke Colony of 1587,
had this to say in 1709:
"A
farther Confirmation of this [Roanoke Island
settlement] we have from the Hatteras Indians, who either then lived on
Roanoak-Island, or much frequented it. These tell us that several of their
Ancestors were white People, and could talk in a Book [read], as we do. The
Truth of which is confirmed by gray Eyes being found frequently amongst these
Indians, and no others. They value themselves extremely for their Affinity to
the English, and are ready to do them all friendly offices. It is probable,
that this Settlement miscarry’d for want of timely Supplies from England; or
thro’ the Treachery of the Natives, for we may reasonably suppose that the
English were forced to cohabit with them, for Relief and Conversation; and that
in process of Time, they conform’d themselves to the Manners of their Indian
Relations. And thus we see, how apt Humne Nature is to degenerate.”
The Hatteras
History website ( http://www.hatterasguide.com/history.htm
) contains:
John White and
116 colonists landed on “Hattorask” on June 22, 1587, and they encountered the friendly natives
prior to moving on to Roanoke Island, where
they set up a colony. When John White came back to his Roanoke Island colony in
1590 after three years of being away in England, the 116 colonists were gone,
the only connection to their whereabouts were the letters “CRO” and “CROATAN”
carved into a tree. White assumed this meant the missing colonists had gone to
Hatteras to live with the Croatan tribe, but he was never able to go there to
find out for himself. We may never know what happened to the “Lost Colonists,”
but there are some who believe that they did indeed go to Hatteras
Island to seek help from the kind natives. Legends of blue-eyed,
light-skinned Indians living on the island suggest a mingling of Native
American and European genes. And in the 1990s, an archaeologist found a
16th-century English signet ring during a dig in Buxton.
The following
gives sound reasoning for how the Brooks and many families became part of the
local Indian tribe and thus, gave us matrilineal descendants of the ill-fated
colonists:
When the first
European migrations moved south from the Jamestown
settlement they were predominantly young and male; very few of them were women
until late in the nineteenth century. The eminent historian Thomas Parramore's
conjecture (Department of History, Meredith
College, Raleigh, North
Carolina) is that there was only one woman for each
eight men that migrated to the Albemarle
region during this time frame (1650/1750). There must have been serious
contentions between the Native male population and the European males seeking
female affection.
This theory is
convincing. The female descendants of
John White and his colony may very well have married back into English families
who came down from the Jamestown
settlement in need of wives.
But, that’s not
all…
Another twist in
the family research include some possible Brooks connection to pirates of the
early 18th century, namely one Edward Drummond, Teach or Thatch, or
whatever his real name might be. We know
him simply as “Blackbeard.” And it has
long been known that a father and son joined his crew by the name of Joseph Brooks Sr. & Jr. Both of these men fought Lt. Maynard at
Okracoke Inlet when Blackbeard was captured.
Joseph, Sr. died in the battle in 1718 and his son was hanged in Williamsburg in 1719,
after being delivered to the authorities by Maynard. There are some Joseph’s in following
generations of this Brooks family and the Joseph Brooks Sr. would have been of
the same generation as the John Brooks who died in
1708 Currituck Co, NC, the first one we know of. And descendants of Stephen
Brooks, now in Tennessee,
have passed down the tradition that Stephen Brooks (b.1703 who was a mariner of
some questionable reputation himself on Hatteras Island)
was a son of this Joseph Brooks, Sr. Stephen Brooks Jr. lived on Lake Mattamuskeet
(site of the Indian Reservation from 1714) and married a Farrow. Mary Farrow is the daughter of Jacob Farrow,
Jr. and is probably descended from Francis Farrow in Currituck Co, NC. As it turns out, Brooks & Farrow are two
of the eighteen primary surnames being researched as “Lost Colony” Indian descendants
by Willard and his team.
Then, looking at a
map, we find Chocowinity near Washington,
NC at a point where the Tar River flows into the sound. Swift Creek branches from just south of this
point, crosses the Beaufort Co. line after three miles or so, flowing northwest
through Pitt Co, NC. In 1782, James
Brooks had land on Swift Creek, living just a few miles from Chocowinity. And, when Pitt Co, NC formed from Beaufort
Co, NC in 1761, John & son James Brooks were on the Pitt side of that
division while John’s older son, William Brooks was left in Beaufort… later,
the Craven County area.
Don’t listen so
much to me, but read the data on Lost Colony Research Group
and colleagues of Roberta Estes. This is
absolutely fascinating. I just wish it
was my family! J
Links for further study:
Blackbeard
at
