Alvin Eugene Collins's Page

Hi Alvin - I actually have 2 Collins lines but both from the north. One is my dad's mother's sister Cecelia Byrne or Burns married John Collins and lived in Cazenovia NY. My dad's father's sister Roxy married George Collins and lived in Gillett PA. Have you met Erin Bradford yet? She is a member here. Her specialty is free African Americans in North Carolina. She is doing a chat about North Carolina beginning soon. Stop in the chatroom and talk genealogy with us and make some new friends!

Hello - I logged on to your page to see if your Collins were related to mine. But I guess not. I started looking at your photographs - That is an amazing collection! and what makes it so amazing is the amount of info you know about everyone. Thanks for sharing them! Jim Avery, Dover PA

That is really interesting Alvin. I'll bet he wasn't a bachelor in spirit. Probably they loved each other and because they were not allowed to marry, he just remained faithful to her by being a "bachelor" in the public view and her his "mistress"...but they considered themselves as man & wife. How romantic. Lesser men would have married to keep the public from guessing the truth and thereby have a white wife in her face everyday, in order to "save" his reputation. I am sure folks at the time understood exactly what was going on..He was a brave man for the times. I hope you are proud of him. Most people today would wilt under public pressure.

My own great-great-grandmother would never talk of her Native American blood (her mother was full blood) because she grew-up being made ashamed of it....all the lost heritage and family stories!

I have looked on the census for slaves in connection to my TN ancestors. I didn't find any but they were very poor people. The Kentucky ancestors were Hardin, Perrin, Ratliff...they came down through VA and so it is possible they did have slaves.

I see your comment about your slave ancestors in "Missouri, Virginia, Tennessee and Kentucky." I have ancestors in KY, TN and VA. I believe my TN ancestors were dirt poor and would not have had any slaves. I think my KY ancestors could possibly of had slaves because they were not poor but I don't think they had an operation larger than their own farms...none were plantation owners, so...would that have left them out? 

How much we can learn from one another!

Thank you for the great comment you left on my page! I really do not understand leaving a tree private. When I initially joined Ancestry.com, I had my tree private to give me a chance to load the info from my website into a tree. Once I got a baseline up, I opened the tree. I want people to further their info and I also want them to contact me it they see a mistake.

So happy to "meet" you Alvin!

Greetings Cousin,

Enjoying your photos and home page.  Say hello to your family from me.

Cecile