One research team, the world’s largest online family history resource, has concluded that US president Barack Obama is the 11th great-grandson of John Punch, the first documented African enslaved for life in American history. The connection was made through Barack Obama’s Caucasian mother’s side of the family.
For genealogists, Barack Obama’s family tree is the gift that keeps on giving. The discovery is the result of years of research by Ancestry.com.au genealogists who, through early Virginia records and DNA analysis, linked US president Barack Obama to John Punch.
An indentured servant in Colonial Virginia, John Punch was punished for trying to escape his servitude in 1640 by being enslaved for life. This marked the first actual documented case of slavery for life in the colonies, occurring many years before initial slavery laws were enacted in Virginia.
Barack Obama’s mother was probably the descendant of a black African slave / America News
US president Barack Obama is traditionally viewed as an African-American because of his father’s heritage in Kenya. While researching Barack Obama’s Caucasian mother, Stanley Ann Dunham’s lineage, genealogists found her to have African heritage as well, which piqued the researchers’ interest and inspired further digging into Barack Obama’s African-American roots.
In tracing the family back from Barack Obama’s mother, genealogist team Ancestry.com.au used DNA analysis to learn that her ancestors, known as white landowners in Colonial Virginia, actually descended from an African man.
Existing records suggest that this man, John Punch, had children with a white woman who then passed her free status on to their offspring. John Punch’s descendants went on to be free, successful land owners in a Virginia entrenched in slavery.
Barack Obama’s family has connection to the first African slave / Barack Obama the descendant of John Punch
Joseph Shumway, a genealogist with Ancestry.com commented : ‘ Two of the most historically significant African Americans in the history of our country are amazingly directly related. John Punch was more than likely the genesis of legalized slavery in America. But after centuries of suffering, the Civil War and decades of civil rights efforts, his 11th great-grandson became the leader of the free world and the ultimate realization of the American dream. ‘
John Punch is sometimes described as the first African slave, a label that touches on an ongoing debate among historians who study the origins of the slave trade in the colonies.
The African John Punch lived before laws dictating slavery were codified in Virginia and during a period of sketchy historical documents. The genealogists said they felt this was an incredibly significant discovery.
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