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Photo of Mrs. Alberta Pugh Bumpers-Law-Murphy-Foster-Collins-Williams. Her father was Robert Bud/Budd/Bob Beckham Pugh. Her mother was Martha Todd Lindsey Williams-Bumpers. Robert and Martha were very young when slavery ended. Their parents were all slaves, in Clarke County Alabama, coming from Virginia, Northa Carolina and other parts of Alabama. Alberta was bron in September 1889, in the area of Coffeeville, Alabama, Clarke County. She passed away in September of 1979, in Prichard, Alabama. She was my great grandmother. This photo was taken in about 1960, in Oakland, California, and has been through a lot. I tried to restore it, and add a little color to it, and this is the out come. She was more like the Indian Chief, to our whole family. Her passing left a big dent in the family.
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Alberta had a great knowledge of her family members in Clarke County, only telling us some of it. We had no idea of the things we could have learned from her. As a young child, she lived between her mother and father, being her mother's oldest child. Her parents never married one another, but both were married after her birth.
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Alberta's father, Robert Pugh, was a music teacher, playing all kinds of string instruments and the piano. He taught her a song on every instrument he taught. She could play the bango, guitar, fiddle and that little guitar, I can't spell (yuka lalli?). She was part Cherokee, Creole and African American. I can not say where this all came from, because her grandparents were slaves. Her father, it is said, did speak with a dialect, and had straight black hair. His parents were Judy and Charles Beckham Pugh.
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Notice all of the last names that are mentioned? These names are names that were on the census, of 1870 and 1880. On the 1870 census, Charles, Judy and Robert were listed twice. Once as Beckham, and then as Pugh. On the 1880 census, Judy and Robert Pugh, lived with John Beckham, Charles and Judy's older son. Also, on the 1880 census, Martha, Alberta's mother, lived with her grandmother, Celia/Sylia Todd, and was listed as Martha Lindsey. Martha never lived with her mother, because, when slavery ended, the white Lindsey family, wanted her to stay with them. This is where the Lindsey name came from. Later in life, Martha only used Williams or Bumpers as he last name. Her mother was Hannah Williams, and her father was John Todd. Martha married Robert Bumpers, who treated Alberta like his own child.
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