My great-great grandmother Ellen (Dodson) Gilmer was said to be a "Black Dutch" or "Black Irish" Cherokee. I am not sure what that means but I know people in Ireland have no idea what it could mean. I think it was the way some Cherokees used to avoid the move west on the Trail of Tears by claiming they were Irish or Dutch ancestry and then intermarried with Anglo-Americans. Exactly as my g.g.grandmother did.

Besides my g.g.grandmother, all my Anglo-American ancestors were Protestant Ulstermen from Ulster in Northern Ireland who arrived in America at Newport Virginia in the early 1800s and later moved south along the Shenandoah Valley and settled in central Virginia, eastern Tennessee and northern Georgia. Peter Coffee, spent two years in Liverpool England on the prison galley "H.M.S. Forward" while waiting until the vessel had a full load of prisoners and passengers. Peter Coffee (1700-1771), was a Scots-Irish Ulsterman. The surname Coffee was derived from Gaelic O'Cobhthaigh (victorious) and was pronounced O'Coffey. Peter Coffee arrived in America in 1730 and spent the following 5 years in Potomac Prison and 9 years as an endentured overseer on a Virginia tobacco plantation. When he was released from ententured service in 1744, he became the manager and finally the owner of the tobacco plantation in Prince Edward County Virginia. He raised fine tobacco and eleven children and died in 1771. His son, and my g.g.g.g grandfather, William Coffee (1744-1799) , was in the War in the Revolution. In 1777, William saw action at the battles of Princeton, Saratoga, Fort Mifflin and Trenton. In 1776, William enlisted in Capt. Samuel Jordan Cabell's 7th Rifle Company, Lt. Col.James Hendricks' 6th Virginia Reg't of Foot, Congressional Forces. In July 1777, the 6th Virginia Regiment was reassigned to Col. Daniel Morgan's Rifle Regiment at Saratoga New York.

Peter Coffee's land later became part of the Prince Edward Tobacco Company.