Buddy Holly ancestry help

Erica Howton C

9/12/2022 at 1:45 PM

Managers of Buddy Holly,

Buddy was or is my cousin his moms identical twin sister Allie was my great grandma. My grandpa Sam and buddy were first cousins, but dna wise they would have shown has half brothers because of their moms being twins. So though we have always know him and called him our cousin dna wise he would have been my great uncle. I recently moved from SE New Mexico about 2 hours from Lubbock tx. To TN. I have met and spent time with both of Buddys brothers and sister.

My dads god father was the drummer of the crickets. Peggy Sue put on my grandmas baby showers from my dad and his brothers when she was each pregnant with them.

Moving to NE Tenn. I recently discovered through geni. About the Cherokee blood on this side of the family. They always said we had some but I was never really sure. I would like to find out more about it!! My grandpa Sam and buddy would have been Cherokee descendants of meli ward… I recently spoke with the Cherokee nationas and eastern band Cherokee and neither have or can find record or any kind that says Nancy took in meli ward. I also could not find enrolled family members of the Cherokee on Dawes rolls or baker rolls is there anyway to find that information out??

I am contacting you about this profile: Buddy Holly

Erica Howton C

9/12/2022 at 1:55 PM

This is the Meli Ward referred to.

Private User

9/12/2022 at 1:55 PM

I have Native DNA Gedmatch says and I match cousins that have Cherokee. I have not had the Cherokee test done. I am yet to find my Cherokee ancestors. . It is said my 5th grathgrand father Rowland Judd married a Cherokee but I have no proof. T961860 on Gedmatch.

Erica Howton C

9/12/2022 at 2:09 PM

There are notes that point to records in this profile:

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Taylor-24238 corresponds to Mary 'Polly' Ray

From Find a Grave:

Mary "Polly" Taylor was the daughter of William S. Taylor (1/4 Cherokee) and Meli Ward (Full Blood Cherokee). She married John Ray in Fayette Co, Alabama in 1825. Her children submitted applications to the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Muskogee Area Office, Relating to the Enrollment of the Five Civilized Tribes under the Act of 1896. They listed Cherokee as the tribe on the application.

She was also the GG grandmother of Charles Hardin Holley, known in the entertainment world as Buddy Holly.

Quoting from the research notes of B.R. Conolly, page 10 of 15:

The Rays Look Back, by Marvin Basil McCarley; pg. 70:”... John Ray of Georgia, born 1 Jan. 1800 Ga.; d. 16 July 1884, Wise Co., Tex.; m. ca. 1825 Cherokee Indian Territory, Ala. to Mary Taylor... John was in Fayette Co., Ala. prior to 1840...when they moved to Itawamba Co., Miss. Mary was part Indian. They had twelve children, five boys and seven girls. When the war began in 1861, the four oldest boys, Lee, William Green, Thomas and Charles disappeared, and were never heard from again....At the close of the war in 1865 the family moved to Johnson County, Texas, and settled near Blum...They returned briefly to Alabama, and later returned to Texas and settled in Wise County..."

Although no sources were given, it was proven by the pension application of Solomon Ray that Green Berry and John were his brothers. It has also been proven by descendants of John’s family.

- - -

From census records we learn they had the following children:

William Green Ray (1830–)
Thomas Ray (1832–)
Charles Ray (1834–)
Andrew Jackson Ray (1836–1896)
Rebecca Ray (1838–) Mrs Gentry
Sidney Reden Ray (1838–1906) Mrs Drake
Levi Ray (1842–)
M Charlotte "Lottie" Ray (1845–1929) Mrs Gentry
Nancy Jane Ray (1847–1911) Mrs King
Solomon Tanza Ray (1848–1930)
George Washington Ray (1854–1930)

Erica Howton C

9/12/2022 at 2:12 PM

This record should be findable:

Charlotte Gentry

Application for Enrollment in the Cherokee Nation - Affidavit15 Aug 1896 , Wise County, Texas, USA

R C Carney Affidavit

State of Texas

County of Wise

Before me the undersigned authority personally appeared R. C. Carney who being by me duly Sworn Says I knew John Ray and his Wife Mary Ray both now deceased and I know that they raised a daugther name Sharlottie who is a sister to Sidney Reden Jamison and that she ... Sharlottie Ray marrie Sam Gentry and now lives near Decatur in Wise County Texas. This August the 15 1896.

R. C. Carney His Mark X

Sworn and suscribed to before me this August the 15th 1896. PT, Notary Public Wise County, Texas

G W Ray Affidavit

Before me the undersigned authority personally appeared G W Ray who being by me duly Sworn Says I knw John Ray and his wife, Mary Ray, boath now deceased and I know that they the said John & Mary Ray raised a daughter name Sharlottie who is a sister to Sidny Redden Jamison and I know that the said Sharlottie Ry married Sam Gentry and now living near Decatur in Wise County Texas. This August the 15th 1896.

Signed G W Ray His Mark X

Sworn and suscribed to before me this August the 15th 1896 PWT, Notary Public Wise County, Texas

Erica Howton C

9/12/2022 at 2:16 PM

https://www.archives.gov/research/native-americans/dawes/dawes-1896... Suggests searching the collection, https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/1238/

Erica Howton C

9/12/2022 at 2:19 PM

Charlott Gentry in the U.S., Native American Applications for Enrollment in Five Civilized Tribes (overturned), 1896 https://www.ancestry.com/sharing/10058?token=ZhhjQnIw7KMn%2BwNKmKFU...

Kathryn Forbes

9/12/2022 at 2:52 PM

Complete myth. No Cherokee person named "Meli Ward." The 1896 Dawes applications were all rejected due to massive fraud. No one name Charlotte Gentry reapplied in 1900. There is no William Taylor or John Ray on the 1835 Cherokee census. There was a man named John Ray who was born in 1843, the son of a white man named Stephen Ray whose wife was a Cherokee, Elzira Hildebrand. No daughter Charlotte. There are no records that even suggest Nancy Ward adopted anyone. Her grand-daughter Jennie Walker was married to a man named Thomas Taylor. They did not have a son named William.

Kathryn Forbes

9/12/2022 at 3:43 PM

There is nothing to suggest that Mary/Polly Taylor had any Indian ancestors. In 1830 she and John Ray were living in Fayette County, Alabama next to her father. If any of them were Cherokee they would have been living in the Cherokee Nation.

Erica Howton C

9/12/2022 at 11:46 PM

re: The 1896 Dawes applications were all rejected due to massive fraud.

Are there more details about this scam?

Kathryn Forbes

9/13/2022 at 4:19 AM

There are books about it. The original Dawes Commission was all white people who were U.S. Citizens and they were just accepting the claims of hundreds of people who weren't Cherokee. Thousands of people who didn't live in Indian Territory sent in applications and even some of them were approved. The Cherokee Nation went to court to get oversight of the process and won the case so they had to start over. Nancy Sober's book The Intruders is a good one.

Kathryn Forbes

9/13/2022 at 6:30 AM

The problem was that the 1896 Dawes Commission was authorized to add people to the existing tribal rolls without input from the tribe and if one of those applicants was rejected, they could appeal to a United States court. The Cherokee had conducted a thorough census in 1896 and were confident that they had an accurate list of Cherokee citizens. There were more than 9,000 intruders (whites living without permission in the Cherokee Nation), whom the tribe had been trying to evict since the Civil War. Many of those 1896 applicants were those same Intruders, others like Charlotte Gentry, were people who didn't even live in Indian Territory and had no claim of any kind to Cherokee land or citizenship.

Private User

10/23/2022 at 6:07 PM

Hello cousin Samantha and Erica

The Dawes Documents are under the profile for William S Taylor here on Geni under his photo tab. I am sorry they are so small. I uploaded them in 2012 and I no longer have the computer they were on. I hope you can read them. I did just upload a couple of documents that are a letter from Charles Drake to the Dawes Commission. It is very eye opening on the history of the family. Charles Drake spent lots of time and money fighting the Dawes Commission on behalf of his mother Sydney Reden Ray (the daughter of Mary Taylor and granddaughter of Meli Ward and William S Taylor).

Your Cousin
Elizabeth aka Genstorygirl

Private User

10/23/2022 at 6:14 PM

Sorry I forgot to post links to the profiles here at Geni.

William S Taylor

Sidney Reden Ray

Charles Wesley Drake

Erica Howton C

10/23/2022 at 6:43 PM

If you click on “view full size”they are pretty legible.

www.geni.com/media/proxy?media_id=6000000188285944834&size=large

Private User

10/23/2022 at 6:51 PM

Hi Erica

The 4 documents I uploaded today are readable. For some reason the 70 pages of the Dawes Documents are super small and hard to read. Maybe it is because I uploaded them in 2012 as photos instead of documents. I no longer have the computer they were stored on.

Erica Howton C

10/23/2022 at 6:57 PM

Probably can get them again from Fold3.

Erica Howton C

10/23/2022 at 6:59 PM

Re: It is very eye opening on the history of the family.

And that’s a big point, isn’t it? The window into family history? It helps us all with the “Genstory,”. :)

Private User

10/23/2022 at 7:07 PM

Exactly! It is the stories behind those names on my family tree that really call out to me. It keeps me digging for more about the lives they led. But I don’t have to sell you on that. 😊

Buddy Holly ancestry help

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