The Bond-Speller families, like many families that can trace their lineage in eastern North
Carolina and southern Virginia, are either bi-racial or tri-racial through their interactions
between Africans, native Indians, and Europeans during the last 400 years. The African
American Bonds and Spellers, along with the racial groups from Indian Woods in Bertie
County, can trace their lineage to the Africans, the Europeans, and what is now known as the
Southern Band of Tuscaroras from about 1640.
Shown
on the left, Dempsey Bond, is the father of Alden, Lincoln, Sydney and
Burkley Bond.
Their mother was Jane Bond.
Also
shown on the left is Cullen Capehart Speller. He is the father
of Eva, Willie, Mary, Celia, Minnie,
Thomas, and Cullen Speller. Their mother was Hannah Etheridge (a
black slave).
Dempsey's
son, Lincoln, and Cullen's daughter, Eva, were married and together they
had 9 children: Dempsey,
Nellie, Lela, Cullen, Booker, Lewis, Lincoln, Eva, and Styron
Click
on Family Tree to see the children of Lincoln and Eva and their family
breakdown.
Dempsey's
mother Fanny had one more child by James Bond (her white plantation
owner).
Her name was
Melvenia Bond.
Melvenia
married Noah Cooper and together they 3 had children: Thomas, Lambert, and Henry.
Thomas married Roberta Overton and had 2 children, Henry and
Russell
Cooper. Henry
married Symera Newsome and together they had Glenn and Iris Cooper.
Fanny
also had children by a black man named Harry Bond, whom she married
after the Civil War. Together they
had 6 children:
Fortune,
West, Phoebe, Henry, Willie, and Lewis Bond.
Mamie Bond is
the daughter of Willie. She married Benjamin F. Speller Sr.
This union produced Dr. Benjamin F. Speller Jr. and Leslie Clifton Speller.
