Adella Hunt Logan is our fifth cousin, three times removed. The common ancestors we share are William Stone (1665-1703) and Margaret Dix (1673-?) who were Adella’s fourth great grandparents and our seventh great grandparents.
I wound up finding this line while trying to find the parents for William Stone and Margaret Dix. I did not find them, but found this interesting line of descent to Adella Hunt Logan. Our direct line from William Stone and Margaret Dix Stone goes through their daughter Mary who married Abraham Tappan. Adella’s descent from William and Margaret Stone goes through their son William.
The whole way down that line of descent is interesting with some scandals, but especially Adella’s grandfather Nathan Coombs Sayre who was a free thinking, free loving man. He had traveled from New Jersey to Sparta, Georgia, became very wealthy, and had a houseful of slaves with whom he lived. He fathered children with a couple of his slaves, but then took as his consort a woman named Susan Hunt. Susan was a mixture of Cherokee, African, and white. Susan and Nathan had at least three children, one of them named Cherokee Mariah Lilly Sayre. You can read more about Nathan and Susan in this PBS Frontline article: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/jefferson/mixed/nash.html
Adella Hunt’s parents were Cherokee Mariah Lilly Sayre and a white farmer Henry Alexander Hunt. Adella married Warren Logan who was born into slavery in 1857 in Virginia. Nathan Coombs Sayre (in addition to fathering children with slaves) had started a women’s college in Georgia along with one of his brothers. So, his family was well educated. This was also true of Adella and she attended Atlanta College. Adella and her husband Warren Logan were both on the faculty at Turkegee Institute. Adella was active in the women’s suffrage movement and the NAACP. Warren and Adella had nine children, six of whom lived to adulthood. They were all well educated and had very successful families. For example, a granddaughter of Adella’s is Adele Logan Alexander professor of history at George Washington University.
Adella suffered from depression throughout her life. She sadly died by suicide when she jumped from a building at Tuskegee Institute.