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First phase of the Irish slaveholders in South Carolina database complete

1/1/2025

It is with great joy that I enter 2025 knowing that the International African American Museum Charleston has accepted this research identifying approximately 250 Irish slaveholders in South Carolina, into their digital archive.
It is now available at the following link iaamcfh.omeka.net/s/IAAM_CFH/page/south-carolina-slavery-related-records

It is my sincere hope that this incomplete work, begun a decade ago, will be of some assistance to those whose ancestors were deprived of their lives and liberty by our Irish ancestors. The research will continue but this website will be coming down later this year. I would like to invite anyone who takes this early research further to contact Brian Sheffey, the Director of the Family Research Centre at IAAMC, and contribute their research to the digital archive. We are all working on a puzzle with many different pieces and it is in working together that we will best assist all those descendants whose ancestors have been deleted from the historical archive.

As far as possible, I have included links to documents so that other researchers can check sources and analyse the information contained. In the course of the research already completed some information has proved to be inaccurate (even in historical documents!) Corrections have been made where proof can be found. It is expected that this will continue especially where researchers have access to local historical archives.

I would like to thank the families who have shared their oral histories with me. I know this will assist others in the future. On a personal note, your generosity has moved me deeply and I have valued your willingness to correspond with me. My only regret is that I have been unable to research each family of Irish enslavers in more depth.
I would also like to thank fellow researchers Brian Sheffey, Brian Fahy, Dr. Michael O'Connor, Margaret Seidler, Stacy Ashmore Cole, Cindy Hines, Steve Harper, John G M Sharp, James Fitzgerald, Angiela Tillman and the members of the Beyond Kin Project. Thank you for your contributions to the research and your encouragement, your skill as researchers and teachers and your ongoing commitment to our cousins.

This research began as a result of my own discovery of African American cousins. Advances in genetic genealogy means that I have now identified three main clusters;
DeMesme/Golden family in Donaldsonville, Louisiana
Chenault/Chambers family in Madison, Kentucky
McDaniel/Johnson family in Scotland Neck, North Carolina.
My connection to the old Ninety-Six, South Carolina remains elusive.
I continue to work to my goal of identifying my common ancestor/s with all my cousins.
Cousins are so important in our Irish culture and I am proud to include my African American cousins in my tree
www.ancestry.com/family-tree/person/tree/178917254/person/162325490625/facts
I have uploaded my DNA to ancestry, myheritage and gedmatch under my own name and please be assured that if you contact me I will welcome you and share whatever I have found.

The Google Map I created for this project which marks the county in South Carolina in which I found the Irish slaveholder will remain available but I will be changing the links to show that of the IAAMC over the coming months.
www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/edit?mid=14aev2DUleLRB3J9pE9PADARg925uYhGT&usp=sharing

As the first phase of this project comes to an end, I can only say that I feel honoured to have been one of many who are working on this kind of research. As time goes on I hope that others will create databases of Irish slaveholders for each State. I am also encouraged to see a number of researchers in local history & family history here in Ireland who have begun looking into the origin of some of the slaveholders.
Martine Brennan
Ireland

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Myles Dempsey 1778-1837 Wexford, Ireland & Charleston, South Carolina

4/25/2024

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