Reviewing the Lagniappe Article

Writer's note: This article was first published in the Redbone Research Group on Sep. 29, 2007.

The copy of the Sep. 20 edition of the Lagniappe Magazine sent by Jim Serra arrived at my house Friday afternoon. This is a weekly mag published in Lake Charles, LA. The article of interest therein is entitled "The Mystery People" and appears on pages 44-47. Its sub-title is "While keeping to themselves, Redbones make a mark on area history"; the author is Brad Goins.

Mr. Goins is from Tennessee, so he apparently doesn't know much about Louisiana Redbones. Which leaves him dependent on his local sources, which appear to have been Gary Gabehart and Don Marler in the main, though Sammy Tippit and Cyndie Goins Hoelscher are cited as sources. All of these individuals are Redbone Heritage Foundation (RHF) board members; all of them except Marler are Goins descendants. Marler is not a Redbone, though he has been known to write essays telling real Redbones what it feels like to be a Redbone [gag, barf, puke!]. Talk about your over-inflated egos!

This article is very much a Goins affair. Other Redbone families get scant mention, and the three people photographs all depict Goins-related persons. The frontispiece is Charlie Thomas, who is captioned as "a 19th-century Redbone". This fellow is actually the maternal grandfather of Gabehart, though that fact doesn't seem to be mentioned in the article, but whether or not he was a Redbone, I cannot say; he did marry Nancy Goins, who was one. It's nice that the Goins clique which runs the RHF (7 of their 10 officers are Goins descendants, 2 are not Redbones, the 10th has quit in disgust; all except one live outside Louisiana) is appreciative of their acclaimed ancestors, but if they want to have a Goins Heritage Foundation, then why don't they go off to Two Feathers, TX and organize one and leave us Louisiana Redbones alone?

The rest of the article is filled with some historical facts and a whole lot more of the same type of disinformation Marler (mainly) and Gabehart loaded Jim Serra's wagon with when he was using them as sources for his Sep. 9 article on the KPLC-TV blog site. None of the palaver about the "one drop rule" is applicable, for example. Some of the historical facts are a little tawdry. Isaac Ryan and Reuben Calvin Goins were 1st cousins twice removed (same as 3rd cousins), not first cousins as Brad states based on Gabehart's info. Instead of citing any other examples, I'll leave it to y'all to read the article and see for yourself.

If you don't have access to it, I hope to be able to scan a copy and upload it to the group archives in the near future (when that will be, I don't know, because my work schedule is already overloaded to the max; fighting the evil of the RHF is a full-time job). It's not Brad Goinses fault that he got stuck with the same con artists that pulled the wool over Serra's eyes, and "The Mystery People" is worth a read, even if just to observe the strategy and tactics of deception and disinformation used by the RHFers.[Writer's note: I was never able to scan the article, apparently because some kind of technology was used to block scanning]

I've been hoping to write a piece on this type of exposition and argumentation, but have not gotten to it. Basically, it goes like this: The RHFers as well as certain others, such as Larry Keels, owner of the Yahoo discussion group called Melungeons or Redbones or Renegades, dredge up some factoid from anywhere having to do with something that might possibly have something to do with the Louisiana Redbones. For example, the Redbones were called "free colored" on the 1820-40 Louisiana censuses; therefore, anything in the world having to do with "free colored" people is regarded by these wannabe scholars to be relevant to Redbones. They copy that information and then slap it down triumphantly somewhere, usually in one of the several Redbone discussion groups on Yahoo, as if they had just proved something about Louisiana Redbones. If the information is indeed pertinent, then maybe they have, but more often the relevance resides only in their hyperactive imaginations. It also appears that they rarely, if ever, spend any time on analysis and verification.

Larry is the most industrious follower of this strategy, and he does occasionally come up with a gem of new information, but Marler's book _Redbones of Louisiana_ is full of examples, and that's where I would direct the student. Marler has seven whole appendices of surnames, for example, including one titled Redbone Surnames. The idea of presenting all of this mostly useless information is, I suppose, to identify where Redbone families could have come from, but mere possession of identical names is no sure guarantee of any sort of genetic or other relationship. A specifically causal connection must be demonstrated, and no such connection is known with Seminoles or Cherokees or whatever. The Lumbees have a Dial family? We've known that practically for ever, but no gen relationship has ever been demonstrated between that Dial family and the Dial family that became the Louisiana Redbone Dial family. We're still looking for the link.

And so it goes. Even on his Redbone list, Marler has so many surnames which aren't demonstrably Redbone that the list is largely useless or at least misleading. Well, the door is always open for Marler (and the others) to demonstrate the truth and pertinence of his (their) "evidence". I'd especially like to see his proof for any Redbone, much less a "white" one, ever being a slave anywhere at any time. The Redbones were never slaves, Don, and we won't be slaves now for you or the self-promoting egomaniacs of the RHF who have hijacked our foundation.

LV Hayes
Just another Redbone Elder