430 
may be expected that still more 
groups of this sort will appear in the 
literature. 
Some of the mixed-blood Indian 
groups have attracted the attention of 
fiction writers. In Shelby and Ston- 
ey’s “Po’ Buckra” (1930), the central 
figure is a Brass Ankle who attempts 
to adapt himself to the life of a south- 
ern (white) planter but in the end 
finally returns to the hunting and 
fishing life, the carefree existence of 
his forefathers. In their romantic 
novel, “The King of Scuffletoun” 
(1940), Lucas and Groome tell a 
melodramatic story woven about the 
life and adventures of the famous 
Croatan outlaw of Civil War times, 
James Lowrie. Albert Payson Ter- 
hune, in a boy’s book entitled ‘“Treas- 
ure” (1926), describes the Jackson 
Whites with considerable vividness. 
A somewhat different approach to 
mixed-blood Indians is taken by 
James Aswell and E. E. Miller in their 
series of fantastic tales about ‘Ten- 
nessee Melungeons, which form a sec- 
tion of the volume entitled “‘God Bless 
the Devil’ (1940). In this work the 
local dialect is used with remarkable 
effect to tell about the Melungeons 
the impossible and exaggerated oc- 
currences so frequently recounted at 
country courthouses by local story- 
tellers. In a somewhat similar vein 
but of far more serious intent is 
Mildred Haun’s ““The Hawk’s Done 
Gone’”’ (1940), a series of local dialect 
biographies of the whites and Melung- 
geons of a section in eastern Tennessee. 
Roy Flannagan, in his novel, “Am- 
ber Satyr’’ (1932), describes the recent 
struggle for Indian status on the part 
of members of the mixed-blood groups 
in coastal Virginia, while Lyle Saxon’s 
“Children of Strangers” (1937) por- 
trays a similar situation in Louisiana. 
Aside from the literary notices of 
these mixed Indian groups there are 
evidences of a considerably longer 
historical background than one might 
at first expect. In most of the Atlan- 
tic-coast groups (Brass Ankles, Croa- 
ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1948 
tans, Wesorts, Moors, and Nanticokes) 
for example, it is evident from the 
early censuses that as far back as 
1790 the ancestors of these groups were 
living in the same locations as we find 
them today and were classified as 
mixed-bloods then also. The family 
names of the groups in 1790 were prac- 
tically the same as they are today. 
How much earlier than 1790 these 
families were in the same locality 
has not been ascertained. 
For the groups farther away from 
the east roast, Melungeons, Guineas, 
Cajans, and Jackson Whites, the 
family names appear in the census 
records at various times from 1830 
through 1870. The census records 
can therefore be used to demonstrate 
a rather early appearance of the 
mixed-blood Indian communities in 
the eastern States in most cases long 
before any literary notice of these 
groups. 
The names or nicknames, however, 
by which these groups are known 
today may be of comparatively recent 
origin. The term ‘‘Croatan’? came 
into use about 1885 owing to the 
promulgation of the theory that this 
group was descended from Sir Walter 
Raleigh’s lost colonists on Roanoke 
Island. The name ‘“‘Wesort”’ first ap- 
peared in local parish records about 
1896. 
At the present time the Indian 
mixed groups of the eastern States 
are in a process of transition. Up 
until about 20 years ago, for example, 
the Brass Ankles of South Carolina 
lived in the isolation of river swamps 
and pine barrens, in small clearly 
marked-off racial “‘islands.”” Since then 
improvement in the means of com- 
munication and programs of the 
W....P.. A. and. EF... S. A.»duning he 
thirties have broken down this iso- 
lation. The members of mixed- 
blood communities are now tending 
to disperse and many of these groups 
have decreased in size, a few almost 
becoming extinct. This process re- 
sults in two sections, (1) a group of 
