Black Indians: A Hidden Heritage

Written by William Loren Katz

Narrated by Bill Andrew Quinn

The compelling account of how two heritages united in their struggle to gain freedom and equality in America.



The first paths to freedom taken by runaway slaves led to Native American villages. There, black men and women found acceptance and friendship among our country's original inhabitants. Though they seldom appear in textbooks and movies, the children of Native- and African-American marriages helped shape the early days of the fur trade, added a new dimension to frontier diplomacy, and made a daring contribution to the fight for American liberty.



Since its original publication, William Loren Katz's Black Indians has remained the definitive work on a long, arduous quest for freedom and equality. This new edition includes updated information about a neglected chapter in American history.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tantor Media, Inc
• Release date: May 14, 2019
• ISBN: 9781977347930

Reviews for Black Indians

[Malcum Lawrence · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Great listen, lots of hidden gems, concerning the history of these two, races of people. But if you looked a bit further you'd find these two are the Northern and Southern kingdoms of Israel, the two sticks

[setnahkt · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

My guess is that this was originally intended to about blacks and Seminoles, but that there wasn’t enough material for a full book so author William Loren Katz expanded it to include black Indians in general (“Indians” is his term). The result is uneven; the information about blacks and their relations with the Seminoles is interesting and scholarly, but the rest of the book is a farrago of anecdotes about anything Katz can find that’s even peripherally related to blacks and Indians. Europeans are always capitalist exploiters and blacks and Indians are always mutually supportive peaceful protosocialists except when they’re not, of course, and Katz gets around that by calling Indians that fight other Indians “mercenaries” and claiming that whites forced tribes to keep black slaves.

There’s very little – a few pages – about the Civil War era; it’s claimed that the Five Nations (Cherokee, Creek, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Seminole) treated their black slaves kindlier than whites did. There’s no mention of Stand Waties’ Confederate Cherokee massacre of black Union soldiers at the Second Battle of Cabin Creek and no mention of the ongoing Cherokee and Chickasaw Freedmen controversy.

Although there’s a short bibliography, there are no footnotes, which makes it difficult to check out things that Katz claims. There are numerous photographs that Katz claims depict “black Indians”, but none of them have source attributions, again making it difficult to check; an Amazon reviewer claims that one of the photographs actually depicts Filipinos.

Interesting for the accounts of black Seminoles – but I’m taking those suspiciously until I can do more research.

[kharding_21 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This book is listed as grade 6 and up, but seems to be most appropriate for high school. It is organized by topics relating to the history of black Indians over a range of time, and does not stick to a chronological order. Sometimes these topics are very specific and examine a particular group or individual, while other times they are a broad discussion of a historical issue, with specific examples included.
The writing of this book is sometimes strong, but too often weak. I found the sensationalized tone in the introduction and first few chapters very distracting. Katz finds numerous ways to make the same claim that blacks and Indians were actively seeking freedom, while Europeans were professing it yet squelching it. As the book goes on this tone weakens and the author allows the history to speak for itself instead of always defending a point.
I learned a lot from this book and will use this knowledge to support future lessons that I teach. However, I don't think I would teach this entire book. For one, I think it is too dense. Further, I think the author's writing is often sensational and the language is unjustified. The author does not make efforts to explain the words that he chooses when referring to race, and fluctuates often. Katz is very heavy on the term "dark people" to refer to people who were black, Native American or mixed. If he is to use this term in order to explain that it is how the colonizers viewed both races than he needs to explain that as part of his intentions for the use of the term.
There is one chapter in this book that I found exceptional. Chapter 8 is titled "Their Mixing is to be Prevented" and goes into concise but well supported explanation of the history of slavery and the use of racism within that system. While this chapter does not sum up the material of the whole book, it is so well written and informative that I would use it as a main source for students to read, while providing supplemental details as part of a lesson.