Nansemond early notes

Originally published in When I Was 69 Aug 11, 2013, No Blue Blood 

Genealogists get fired up about...people who published documents which invented relationships. If you can't trust genealogy, who can you trust?

I of course have not read the last 12 years of the conversation which started in 1999 about the Bass families.  There were some emails published under one of these person's listings, and I found it very interesting.

Apparently a Mr. Bell was paid to connect a family with some blue bloods.  Others have said to question the book "Bass Families of the South", by Albert Bell.

"I think that all this controversy in the Bass Genforum is healthy and will help more people to understand that Bell's book is flawed." Mike Crandall, Aug 11, 1999

 From: FredBright

 To: Mike and Ruthie Crandall

Date: Friday, August 20, 1999 

Subject: Bell's Book

Mike-      I enjoyed your email which was forwarded to me by War Chief, Earl Bass. You are correct. There are many incorrect entries in Dr. Bell's book. People can say what they want, but the truth is, he was trying very hard to establish a Huguenot connection for a particular group of people, with Bass surnames.

The interesting thing is that this led to writing to the Native American Tribe of Virginia of which I'd never heard, the Nansemond Nation, which may be my ancestors.

What a headache.  These people have dates and source data attached to them, so there are families there, which are true relationships.  I need to slowly go through and justify the ones that belong to the Bass family which was my grandfather's mother's family.

Earlier information triggered another person to make a newsletter, which unfortunately doesn't have much published. http://www.tbass.com/basse.htm

It was a good idea however and there's a link to http://www.tbass.com/photopage/

The Nansemond Tribe holds its POW-WOW each Fall in the Chesapeake/Suffolk VA area near where they lived when the Europeans came in the late 1500's. They are a part of the Powhatan Chiefdom which included 32 Algonkian-speaking tribes in the tide water area of Virginia. The European part of my family, John Bass/Basse married into the tribe in 1638. His was one of two Christianized marriages between European and American Indians according to Helen C. Rountree in The Powhatan Indians of Virginia through Four Centuries. Their culture is recorded in The Powhatan Indians of Virginia: their traditional culture by the Ms. Helen C. Rountree. I have attended the POW-WOW each Fall for the past three years. I met former Chief Earl "Running Deer" Bass, and present Chief Barry "Big Buck" Bass at their homes at the northern end of Dismal Swamp in the summer of 1993. Chief Barry Bass, his wife Betty, and The Nansemond Association are most gracious host for the POW-WOW each year. I have been to a lot of POW-WOWs over the years, but I must admit that I get much more pleasure out of attending the POW-WOW of my peoples. AHO MITAKA OYSIN, Grandfather I give thanks for the winds which have come an blown the fog away so that I could know who I am. AHO...  {Updated 01/01/13} 

 

 

This sign announces the gathering of people for the Nansemond Tribal Pow-Wow which is held north of Suffolk VA each year in Late Summer or Early Fall. Chief Barry "Big Buck" Bass greets all attendees graciously.

Though it was updated 2013 in January, tbass hasn't posted any pictures since the 2000 pow wow.  But the good thing is, I don't live very far from Virginia.