John Punch (slave)

John Punch ( 1630s, living 1640) was an enslaved West African who lived in the colony of Virginia. Thought to have been an indentured servant, Punch attempted to escape to Maryland. In July 1640, the Virginia Governor's Council sentenced him to serve as a slave for the rest of his life. Two European men who ran away with him received a lighter sentence of extended indentured servitude. For this reason, some historians consider John Punch the "first official slave in the English colonies," and his case as the "first legal sanctioning of lifelong slavery in the Chesapeake." Some historians also consider this to be one of the first legal distinctions between Europeans and Africans made in the colony, and a key milestone in the development of the institution of slavery in the United States.Paul Finkelman (1985). Slavery in the Courtroom: An Annotated Bibliography of American Cases (Library of Congress). p. 3

In July 2012, Ancestry.com published a paper suggesting that John Punch was a twelfth-generation grandfather of President Barack Obama on his mother's side, on the basis of historic and genealogical research and Y-DNA analysis."Ancestry.com Discovers Ph Suggests" , The New York Times. July 30, 2012.Plante, Bill Obama Related to First Documented Slave in America", Ancestry.com. July 30, 2012.Stolberg, Sheryl Gay "Obama Has Ties to Slavery Not by His Father but His Mother, Research-in-obamas-family-tree/ "Surprising link found in Obama's family tree", CBS News. July 30, 2012. Punch's descendants were known by the Bunch or Bunche surname. Punch is also believed to be one of the paternal ancestors of the 20th-century American diplomat Ralph Bunche, the first African American to win the Nobel Peace Prize.Paul Heinegg, "Bunch Family", Free African Americans in Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland and Delaware, 1995-2000. Note: Heinegg believes that Bunche was descended from Bunch ancestors established as free blacks in Virginia before the American Revolution. There were men of the Bunch surname in South Carolina by the end of the 18th century. Quote: "Others [of Bunch Family] in South Carolina i. Lovet, head of a South Orangeburg District household of 8 "other free" in 1790 [SC:99]. He lived for a while in Robeson County, North Carolina, since "Lovec Bunches old field" was mentioned in the March 1, 1811, will of John Hammons [WB 1:125]. ii. Gib., a taxable "free negro" in the District between Broad and Catawba River, South Carolina, in 1784 [South Carolina Tax List 1783-1800, frame 37]. iii. Paul2, head of a Union District, South Carolina household of 6 "other free" in 1800 [SC:241]. iv. Henry4, head of a Newberry District, South Carolina household of 2 "other free" in 1800 [SC:66]. v. Ralph J., Nobel Peace Prize winner in 1950, probably descended from the South Carolina branch of the family, but this has not been proved. He was born in Detroit, Michigan, on August 7, 1904, son of Fred and Olive Bunche. The 1900 and 1910 census for Detroit lists several members of the Bunch family who were born in South Carolina, but Fred Bunch was not among them."

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Category:African-American people
Category:Slaves