Thanks for the link Ill check it out. I have not traced the Cherokee records back to the 1700's however It took me 9 years of researching with others and looking at DNA results to figure out what may have happened. I have spoken to a few Cherokee on this issue and I hope they are digging on info I gave them. I was not looking for it so to speak and it slowly all came together and now at this point warrants further investigation. It started off with me researching the patriarchs of the Martin Smith Shell lines. They lived in Burke County and my Martin ancestor lived around the Patriarchs of the Martin Smith Shell line. I have spoken to people who's Y DNA is Gen Joseph Martin's Male line (he had brothers) who have a different surname than Martin that lived in Burke County. They married into court officials of Burke County. The Hildebrands connected to the Cherokee were court officials.Hildebrands have connections to a Judge in Lincoln County who was a Lightfoot (rare English surname that got in the Cherokee). Samuel Finley Patterson who was Indian commissioner to the Cherokee was a court official in Burke/Caldwell/Wilkes. He was in charge of the land sale in Macon County where William Holland Thomas bought up all the land. Samuel Finley Patterson was married to the Granddaughter of William Lenoir. Burke county Deeds were all taken and it just so happens the court officials who had access to the deeds happen to be related to the Cherokee. My ancestors loose their land around removal and at the moment no answer why but we have several DNA autosomal cousin matches to enrolled Cherokee both OK and Eastern Band and people who have documents of Cherokee in their lines. Some in Cali. I do believe its possible these court officials in Burke county knew William Holland Thomas and were probably in cahoots with each other. This is under investigation. Trail of tears or before most of my ancestors get their mothers surnames and unk fathers. To date no bastardy bonds found and even if found does not mean that bondsman was the father of the child. This is just scratching the surface. I have a lot more. I would be here all day. A lot of this info and more I have posted on genforum AI board. There seems to be a coverup by court officials in our area.

There are several Patriarchs in our area of how the Cherokee got their surnames. For example The Benges were in Albemarle VA and so was General J ( he had brothers too!!!). I call Albemarle a hot spot. Benges wind up in Surry NC. We have some of Genral J's descendants in Burke and they may have wound up in other counties. Hildebrand Lincoln/Burke, Cline and Rhine Lincoln/Catawba Counties. Abernathys Burke County ,Robinsons Lincoln/Burke. Littlejohn Burke/Wilkes. Ussery Burke/Wilkes. Fletcher Wilkes/Iredell and maybe Burke. Gilreaths (Eastern Band) Wilkes. I could go on with more and more patriarchs. Found a few Choctaw that can trace their patriarchs back to our area. One being the Fletchers. Cherokee and Choctaw have a lot of same surnames and probably a lot more inter tribal mixing there than some people know. I have Spoken to a few of our Cherokee cousin matches that can trace to Burke. Some of our matches if I know their families I will tell them to look in our area for their patriarchs. Our surnames don't match up and this is common. Makes it that much harder to research since the Cherokee were mother clan they may have given mothers surname rather than fathers. Many of the men in our area also had sweeties on the side. Legally those sweeties children had to get their mother's surname. Catawba told me they were not mother clan but they even told me they might have given children mother's surname instead of fathers.