In a country obsessed with race, the ethnic diversity which existed among colonial era Persons of Color has gone largely unreported. An appreciation of these complex ethnic communities, communities which originated nearly 400 years ago, is essential to the accurate and full understanding of the history of Free Persons of Color in America. Varied and diverse ethnic communities which originated in colonial times persist unto this day.

Many Free Persons of Color, among them Native Americans, East Indians, Gypsy, Portuguese, etc., found permanent homes in the stable but dwindling Indian tribes. The surnames Silva and Rodreguez appear regularly in Pow Wow brochures from Hertford County, NC . Do these families relate to "the Portuguese servant Nicholas Silvedo", whose child was wet nursed by a woman of the Rodriguez/Driggers family as per seventeenth century Virginia court records ?

James Nickens