John Turner Project - Genetic Genealogy Project for Descendants of John and Patience Turner and Thomas Weathersbee

The research of John and Patience Turner has been a pet project of mine for many years, in large part because their story as a couple, as a slave and as a person of color in the South is so compelling but probably also because I have yet to figure out where they came from before their known stories and so there is an element of a puzzle or mystery there.

Some time ago, I started digging into their genetics via myself and their other descendants.  I found evidence of John Turner's Sub Saharan African ancestry and I'd love to find more.  I'd love to be able to continue their family trees.  Perhaps I could find evidence that John's father was or was not his slave holder, Thomas Weathersbee or maybe evidence of Patience's family.  Pie in the sky, we could maybe even create a pretty comprehensive Lazarus kit for John Turner or Patience Turner!

To further the effort, I created a 'data collective'.  That's a fancy way of saying a spreadsheet of all of the data related to the genetic matches of related descendants (of John Turner and Thomas Weathersbee), accessible by all project participants.    The project is in it's wee bitty stages still but it's already looking promising!  So far, 13 kits and a couple of months in, we have identified two segments from two ancestors that are most likely from John Turner. (update : 21 kits and family lines identified!)

We need more descendants' data to work with though.  If you are descended from John and Patience Turner or Thomas Weathersbee, I would love to include you in the project.  Participation is easy.  You only need a gedmatch kit (free and easily created from your 23andme, ftdna or ancestry.com DNA) and a family tree (even a suspected one is fine) between you and John and Patience Turner.  If you have sources for your research, that is all the better - otherwise, I will research your tree to the extent that I can find evidence in support of your tree.  You send me your information, I send you a link to the spreadsheet and from there, you can do as much or as little as you'd like!

To join the project or to read more about the project, visit the John Turner project website. 

John and Patience Turner

John Turner's mark

This is the story of my 5th great grandfather and grandmother, John and Patience Turner.  I first discovered them while researching my Hursey family.  There were smatterings here and there on the internet about it.  John was a slave and his freedom was purchased by his wife.  What?!  Surely, I would have heard about this from my grandmother, who was the family genealogist and our connection to the Hursey family.  But I hadn't.  So I assumed I must have made a mistake and I'd have to come back later to it to prove out my connection to this man - or disprove it.  I came back it early this year when a DNA test revealed Yoruban ancestry that would, in part, be explained by this connection.

Patience's father's name and date and place of birth are unknown.  Her mother was named Rachael Smith and was from Halifax Co., NC.  Rachael was of Irish descent and died while Patience was still a child.  [1][4]

By 1769, Patience's last name was Turner. [2]  Given the evidence I have regarding her maiden name, I believe that this is because she and John married before he was freed (see below) and she took his last name.

It's at this point that I should mention that although I did find some statements about Patience's racial identity being 'mulatto' while doing this research, I was not able to confirm that.  In fact, the evidence I've seen seems to indicate that she was not multiracial.  Although I can find one court record that said "Patience Turner passed and was received as a free white woman not having more than 1/4th negro blood" [6][13], and one could surmise that wouldn't need to be said if she was clearly white, 'less than 1/4th negro blood' could technically include no African heritage and the statement may have been made simply because she was married to a man of color so someone thought it needed to be on the record, so this statement is not evidence of African descent.