So what is in a name?
My family name is Adkins. It is an English name that derives from something else. It is also sometimes spelt Atkins, which used to infuriate my father becuase there were people with the name Atkins he did not care for. He was real proud of his name, given to him by his father, who had gotten it from his father, who had gotten it from his.
And there it stops.
My great great grandfather, one Samuel Adkins, was born "a woods child" my uncle told me several years ago. It was also said Samuel had "been born on the wrong side of the sheets". These quaint saying reflected the fact his parents were not married, and the name came from his mother, Hanah. Perhaps she picked the name form the old testament story of Hanah and her son Samuel. Perhaps someone else got confused and remembered her name wrong. In either case, if Samuel ever knew who his father was, he never told.
For years relatives have asked me where the Adkins's were from. I would tell them the name was English, but that we were from Salt House Branch. That was as far as the written records could take it. Or so I thought. It turns out I had the answer written inside of me and didn't know it.
My broker gave me as a birthday present this year a National Geohraphic DNA testing kit. I was stunned. This is not a cheap test. She and her husband had their DNA tested and I had expressed an interest in it. So I took it home and read the instructions, saw that I could have either my fathers side or my mothers side done with this one test. I decided to do my fathers side hoping it would give me some sort of information regarding his Native American ancestry.
It took about a month for the results to be posted, and they are so technical I cannot understand. Most of the markers appear in the British Isles, and some places in Germany and Spain. There was another set of markers that occued in Siberia, so I figured they were the Indians.
Then there was this message that my halotype froup was associated with the following email groups. There was one for the British Isles, One for Appalachia, one for the Adkins surname and then one for the Mullins surname. WTF?
So I contacted the moderator for this email list and apparently my halotype matches male decendants of one Matthew Mullins who lived in King and Queen County, Virginia in 1699. Without even trying I found out what my name was supposed to be, apparently. The Mullins family are numerous in the area. And apparently there is supposed to be more of them, me included. This I had never expected.
So I do not know who it was that impregnated Hanah Adkins sometime just after the War of 1812, perhaps with some research, a list of suspects could be drawn up.
I told a cousin of mine this the other day when I ran into him and he was like "How can this be?" and I explained it to him again, we had compared notes on our research before. The more I talked to him it became apparent he just was not getting it, there was a mental block going on. I had to be blount with him: Samuel had his Mamma's name because she was not married to his Daddy, or may not have known who he was. The lightbulb of recognition made him appear kindley pale.
So what is in a name? Well, if I were a Mullins people around here would want me to work on their car. I don't even change my own oil. Aside from that, in a small town, a bunch of assumption on how you'll turn out. I think I will just stay an Adkins and see what happens next.
Topic: Shakesthegrounds Rumblings (Read 2652463 times)