I remember when I
began researching the ancestry of my grandmother,
Alma Ingram,
daughter of Richard Ingram and
Nancy Jane Hanks, my genealogist
mentor offered this suggestion. "You
might be related to Abraham Lincoln, his mother
was a Hanks"
As a result of this potential well-known
connection, my research of Alma's ancestry
proceeded quickly. Adin Baber has written several
well researched and documented books on the Hanks
that serve as the source of my Hanks ancestry.
Alma's grandfather was Fielding Hanks,
son of William and Louisa (Hall) Hanks
and grandson of Fielding and Lydia
(Harper) Hanks. See the family gedcom for descendents and
ancestors.
Fielding Hanks (Alma's
grandfather) was born about 1832 in Kentucky. He married Sarah
Francis Gilmore on May 20, 1858, in
Montgomery County, Kentucky. They had 8 children.
The children were: John W., Andrew
Jackson, U. S. Grant, Nancy
"Nannie" Jane, Elizabeth,
Fielding, Olivia Leah,
Francis Marion.
On both, the 1870 and 1880 federal census
records, the family lived in Bath County, Kentucky. Fielding
made his living as a farmer. Sarah
died between 1878 and 1903. This particular
branch of the Hanks family had lived in eastern Kentucky since the
1790's. However, by 1911, Fielding and several of
his children had moved to the Indian Territory in
Oklahoma.
What enticed this family to move from their
homeland of 200 years to Indian lands? In 1893
the Dawes Commission was established to eliminate
tribal ownership of land and distribute or allot
the land to the individual members of each tribe.
Therefore, a critical function of the Commission
was the identification (enrollment) of all
persons claiming to be members of the Five
Civilized Tribes.
In the Hanks family, it was a tradition that Lydia
Harper, wife of the elder Fielding, was
a full blooded Choctaw Indian. Her parents were John
and Mary Ann Harper. According to the
tradition, John and Mary Ann
were Choctaws and had been born in Mississippi. John
and Mary Ann moved to eastern Kentucky sometime in the
1780's to Clark County and finally resided in
Montgomery County. In 1830, the government
reached an agreement (Treaty of Dancing Rabbit)
with the Choctaw tribe in Mississippi providing
for their removal to Oklahoma. If any of the
Choctaws wished to stay in Mississippi, the
federal government would grant them 160 acres of
land and US citizenship.
Again, according to family tradition, John
Harper went to Mississippi and attempted
to register under the articles of the treaty to
claim land, but was denied. He returned to Kentucky where he died in
1838 without ever registering as a Mississippi
Choctaw Indian.
Due to the special provisions of the Treaty of
Dancing Rabbit, the Commission extended the
enrollment process to people claiming to be
descendants of Mississippi Choctaws.
Over 300 families who could trace their
descent from John and Mary Harper
applied for Choctaw citizenship between 1903 and
1905. Fielding and several of
his children traveled to Muskogee, Indian
Territory in 1903 to apply. They basically had no
proof to offer that John Harper and Mary
Ann were Choctaw other than the family
traditions.
The commission denied their applications, but
the family contested the rulings. Ultimately,
Representative Langley, of Kentucky,
proposed a bill in the House of Representatives
in 1908, providing for the identification of the
Hanks as Choctaw Tribal members. The House did
not pass the bill.
Even though their dream of free land was never
realized, Fielding and at least
three of their children moved to Oklahoma,
including Alma's parents, Richard and
Nancy Jane (Hanks) Ingram.
Fielding died June 23, 1911
and is buried in Stringtown, Atoka County,
Oklahoma.
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