Who are the Melungeon?

Everywhere you look on the internet for information on Melungeon people will lead down a rabbit hole of mystery and confusion. Where did we come from? When did we get here? What race or ethnicity are we? However, what you will not find, is any article or publication or quote from us, Melungeon people. It is all speculation and assumption by people trying to figure us out or distant descendants who are trying to figure themselves out after generations of disconnect. Why is this? We still exist. We are still here. We have been passed our oral history and have tried telling others, yet still people choose to assign labels and origins to us based on what they want to believe, from mystical origins like the lost tribe of Israel to wicked, godless witches. I want to shed some light on what those of us who were born and raised with our oral history and traditions, have been taught of our origins, which are not isolated to a single location. You see, Melungeon is a mix of origins, we weren’t Melungeon before mixing. Melungeon means “Mate” or “Friend”. We were Shepardic Jews who migrated to Portuguese trading posts in Angola, where interracial mixing between Portuguese Traders, Shepardi Jews and Angolans began, creating the first of the Melungeon people. Eventually we migrated from Angola and to colonial America, and into the Appalachian mountains. We are Portugeuse, Angolan, and Shepardi. After migrating to the Americas some families mixed further with Scots-Irish indentured servants, Indigenous tribes, and other free people of color, but Melungeon communities became pretty strictly endogamous for many generations after migrating to the States. Not being “white enough”, we faced a lot of discrimination and displacement. People like Walter Plecker wanted us dead, followed us, pushing us out of our settlements, furthing displacing us from each other, and trying to genetically eliminate us. Many Melungeon families today have made decent lives for themselves hiding in small Midwest communities or on the outskirts of Appalachia, with smaller Melungeon settlements migrating west out of the mountains. We as a people were exisiting here for hundreds of years along side smaller Indigenous tribes, developing our own unique traditions, beliefs, language, and even foods. We have been in hiding and considered a mystery for so long, I feel it’s time we finally wear our culture proudly and show our faces. I am Melungeon, I am still here, and I am PROUD.