We're Related?: Johnny Depp

8th Cousin 2x Removed?

Today's Edition of We're Related? features my possible 8th Cousin 2x Removed, Johnny Depp. Johnny was born on June 9, 1963 in Owensboro, Kentucky.

Here's the ancestral path that Ancestry.com's We're Related app took determine our relation:

Red Flag: Agatagwi Captured Cherokee Woman.

"Agatagwi Captured Cherokee Woman" is a woman who can be found on many unrelated family trees. When I say, "unrelated", I mean many people who are probably unrelated to each other have "Agatagwi Captured Cherokee Woman" somewhere on their tree. I think many people are overzealous to find Native American ancestry on their tree and once it's found it's never cited and sourced properly.

I have been looking and I can't find a record of Jacob Kimmerling, the man who would be the husband of "Agatagwi Captured Cherokee Woman" and father of Agatha Agnas Kimmerling Sonifrank, having married a Cherokee woman, but that doesn't mean he didn't, I just can't prove it. I'm not sure how other researchers have determined his wife was Cherokee, but it is an exciting find if he did. As genealogists quickly learn, many children were named after their parents, even daughters back then may be named after their mother, not just men's names were passed down as they are nowadays. I can see where Agatagwi may have turned into Agatha, so there is that small clue.

Jacob Kimmerling was born in Wuertenberg, Germany on February 23, 1733, when he came to America is unknown to me, but after he did he possibly lived in Pennsylvania at first, later moving to Virginia.

I do have all of the ancestors on We're Related's path on my tree up to the Agatagwi, as you can see Johnny Depp would be related to me through my father's side of the family. While doing research for this installment of We're Related, a mystery was actually solved. Josiah Franklin "Frank Tarheel" Nesselrodt has been trouble for me in the past. I wasn't exactly sure who his parents were, but I thought I did. I found through doing this research and researching who We're Related has listed as Josiah's mother, Margaret Smith, that she is his correct mother. His father I found is Elijah Nesselrodt, born on October 7, 1833 in Rockingham Couny, Virginia. Elijah died on June 20, 1908 in Dry Run, West Virginia.

With the addition of Frank Tarheel's mother, I now have three Margaret Smiths on my family tree, Frank Tarheel's Margaret Smith, was born in 1840 and lived until 1910. I also found this picture of her with her sisters on Ancestry.com. The caption to this photo, which appears to be from a book, also references possible Indian heritage. Margaret is sitting on the bottom right, the other three women are my 5th great-aunts, the woman in the very back, Kiziah Cleaver Nazelrod, is also related to me, but I haven't placed her accurately on the tree yet.