Payne

I received an email today from someone who feels that (s)he might have made some advances in his/her research on Barsheba and Fanny Ellison. This would be wonderful b/c Barsheba Ellison Payne is the mother of the first Black WV legislator Christopher H. Payne. I believe that he was related to my greatgreatgrandmother Martha Payne but I haven't been able to establish a link, only that he founded a church in Summers County that my family members attended. I wish this researcher much luck and am so happy that people continue to give me a heads up when they find information about Black residents of the area. I know, eventually, all of the pieces will come together. In a very old post I wondered how my greatgrandmother Martha was a "Payne". I found out later that prior to emancipation she was "married" to Burton Payne but that he was sold off. Right after emancipation she married Solomon Haynes. All of her children (Socrates, Dudley, Elizabeth, and Charlotte) took on the name Haynes but her son Albert retained the name Payne. The family member indicated that this was because his father was Burton Payne. I later found two Burton Paynes living in Virginia. One of them seems to be the correct age and he married another woman named Martha. I will have to research him further.