Gates: I'm Henry Louis Gates Jr., welcome to Finding Your Roots.

In this episode we'll meet actors Michael K. Williams and Felicity Huffman.

Two people bound by a common thread... Both grew up knowing little about their biological fathers... Williams: Who knows, he's gone now, but in hindsight I wonder how things would have been if he had been in our lives, all of our lives a little bit more.

Gates: Felicity, this is the door that has never been opened.

Huffman: Yes!

It rocks the, the ground upon which I stand.

Gates: To uncover their roots, we've used every tool available.

Genealogists combed through the paper trail their ancestors left behind, while DNA experts utilized the latest advances in genetic analysis to reveal secrets hundreds of years old... And we've compiled everything into a book of life, a record of all our discoveries... Huffman: Oh, my God!

How did you guys find this?

Williams: Wow.

It's humbling.

Gates: Felicity and Michael have spent their lives wondering about the fathers they barely knew... Men from whom they descended, but who didn't raise them, leaving them with questions about entire branches of their family trees.

Those questions are about to be answered.

In this episode, they're going to explore their paternal roots for the first time... And see themselves more completely than even before.

(Theme music plays) ♪♪ ♪♪ Gates: How many of your siblings are still living?

Williams: There are now eight of us.

There were six boys and four girls.

Gates: Michael K. Williams isn't a household name... But he should be.

He's among the most talented actors of his generation, and he brought to life one of my all-time favorite characters... The Wire's doomed Robin Hood, Omar Little... A performance so ferociously intense, that I was a bit apprehensive about meeting him... Man: Omar's comin, get out of here!

I said, Omar's coming!

Somebody in trouble now, let's go.

Williams: Hey-yo!

Gates: Michael knows Omar's world.

He grew up in the Vanderveer housing projects in Brooklyn... And he's seen his share of violence: the scars on his face are razor slashes from a fight outside a nightclub.

But, at base, Michael is nothing like Omar... He's shy and sweet, and has fond memories of his upbringing... Williams: I was a key latch kid, 'Cause Mom was always working, so I had a lot of, you know, time to be alone.

Gates: Yeah.

Williams: And long as I got home to get that phone call to give the illusion that I was home after school, you know... Gates: Then you could split.

Williams: I had some wiggle room.

And I... So I played a little bit.

And it was a vibrant childhood.

I loved music, loved to dance, I was always that kid.

Lotta sports, um... I was very mischievous, you know?

I loved growing up in Vanderveer.

Yeah.

Gates: The one aspect of Michael's childhood that brings him pain is his parents' marriage, which ended in divorce after many years of conflict.

It's even difficult for him to share the story of how their relationship began... Williams: My mother was living in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn and my dad, at the time, was in a marriage.

He had six kids in Lafayette Gardens projects.

And he met my mom and, you know, he never really officially looked back.

Gates: I understand.

He fell in love with your mom.

Williams: Yeah.

You know... But, uh, there's an old saying: "How you meet them is how you lose them."

Gates: I never heard that before.

Williams: Oh, yeah.

Gates: "How you meet them is how you lose them."

Williams: "...is how you lose them."

Gates: Right.

Williams: It was good for a little bit and then he was who he was... Gates: Yeah.

Williams: And so that wasn't going to really fly... Gates: Right.

Williams: With my mom.

And so the turbulence started very early on.

You know, she... She fought to save the marriage but that was a losing battle.

I always tell her the best thing he ever did was give her me and bounce.

Gates: Michael's father passed away in 2010, but he had been largely absent since the divorce.

From then on, Michael's family life centered around his mother and his many half-siblings... Who helped raise him, providing guidance and support as he built his career... And creating bonds that have kept Michael's father In his heart, if not in his daily life... Williams: There's something in the blood that keeps me connected to the siblings that I share with my father.

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Williams: I don't know, it's something I can't explain.

I feel very close to them.

You know, we fight, we argue just like the rest of families do.

But nonetheless we... We'd never not acknowledge that we are a family... Gates: Right.

Williams: And one family.

Gates: We are family.

Williams: Yes, sir.

Gates: But Papa was a rolling stone.

Williams: Yes, sir.

Yes, he... Yes, he was.

But, um, in hindsight, who knows, he's gone now, but in hindsight, I wonder.

All those families that he alienated, all those children that he alienated, in the end we were all by his side.

And I wondered how things would have been if he had been in our lives, all of our lives, a little bit more and not have been so selfish.

Gates: It would have been better for him too.

Williams: I think so.

Gates: Yeah, for you and for... Williams: 'Cause we loved him.

Gates: Yeah.

But you loved him.

Williams: Yeah.

I'm wearing his jacket today.

Gates: That's fabulous.

You're stylin', man.

My second guest is Felicity Huffman... Renowned for her Emmy Award winning role on Desperate Housewives, and for over two decades of indelible work on stage and screen... Like Michael K. Williams, Felicity grew up with an absent father.

But her's was absent for a very different reason... Huffman: I found out when I was about 13 or 14 that the guy who was my dad was not my biological dad.

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Huffman: And, um, that had been sort of a, a somewhat well-kept secret.

Gates: So, your mother sat you down to tell you?

Huffman: My mother was in the bathtub, smoking a cigarette.

I remember it very well, and she had her washcloth, and she was doing this with the washcloth, and I was, I went from a 4.0 to a 2.6 in high school.

Gates: Wow.

Huffman: And, um, she said, uh, "You know, Flicka, I... I think there's a lie that might be... That might be, uh, interfering in your life."

And I said, "What is it?"

And she said, "Roger Maher is your father."

And I sort of didn't know what to say.

I just sat there and took it in.

Gates: Felicity knew Roger Maher because he was a close family friend, with a wife and children of his own... But she had no inkling that he was her biological father.

As far as Felicity knew, her father was the man she called "Dad", the man who was married to her mother for almost 25 years: Moore Huffman.

Felicity and Moore shared much more than a surname, they shared a wealth of common experiences.

And though Moore and her mother divorced when Felicity was young, Moore remained very much a part of her life... The revelation that he was not her biological father came completely out of the blue... That would've freaked me out.

I mean, did you, like, have a nervous breakdown?

Did you get angry?

Huffman: It was sort of a... A shock, but to tell you the truth, you know, I was the youngest of eight kids, and I always felt, uh, a little different.

Maybe everybody feels different in a family, so there was a part of me that was relieved.

I was like, "Oh, that, that's why I'm different."

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Huffman: "That's why I'm a little different."

But I still don't know exactly what to do with it.

I don't know where to put it.

I mean, my father is... Is Moore Huffman, and... And he raised me, and, um... But I don't really know where to put this other guy.

Gates: Yeah.

Huffman: Do I like him?

Am I mad at him?

I don't know.

Gates: Right.

Huffman: It's so complicated.

I think I'm conflicted.

Gates: Felicity and Michael came to me missing half of their family trees... Knowing their father's names, but almost nothing about their fathers ancestry... It was time to reveal what had been hidden for so long.

I started with Michael... After his father, Booker T. Williams, split up with his mother, he moved from Brooklyn to the tiny town of Greeleyville in South Carolina... Greeleyville was Booker's home town, and it was here that he would live out the remainder of his life, largely cut off from his children... Booker's reasons for leaving, like many of his actions, remain a mystery to his son... Did your father ever talk about this?

Williams: He didn't really talk that much.

He was pretty guarded with things that may or may not have bothered him.

Gates: Oh, yeah?

Williams: He wasn't a big talker.

Gates: Do you know much about the roots he left behind in the south in Greeleyville?

Williams: Uh, a little bit.

I know his brothers and sisters, which were my, my aunts and uncles.

Uh, you know, the land that they... That they grew up on, we would go there as kids.

Gates: Yeah.

In the summertime?

Williams: Mm-hmm, yeah, yeah.

Gates: Your parents get rid of the kids, send 'em south.

Williams: Yeah, down south for summer.

Gates: For seasoning.

Williams: Yeah.

Gates: Well, let's explore that a little bit.

Could you please turn the page?

Williams: Yes, sir.

Gates: Michael, you're looking at a page of the United States federal census from the year 1930.

Would you please read the names that we've transcribed for you there?

Williams: "Primus Williams, 40, farmer.

Anna, wife, 36.

Jay H., 18.

Eva M., 13, Booker T., 8."

Gates: That's your father as an eight-year-old boy living with his parents.

That Booker T., that's your daddy when he's eight years old.

Williams: Wow.

Eva, Aunt Eva, that's his sister.

Jay H. stands for Hugh.

That was Uncle Jay Hugh.

Gates: Right.

Williams: And Boot is Ida.

We call her Aunt Boot because she always wore boots in the field.

Gates: Oh, really?

Williams: Yeah.

She never wore anything else but, like, with a dress and construction boots.

It was the craziest... And we called her Aunt Boot.

Gates: That's great.

Williams: Yeah.

Gates: "Aunt Boot" is a symbol of sorts for Michael's entire paternal line.

Our research revealed that his father's family included multiple generations of farmers... All living in Greeleyville and the surrounding area known as Hoke Township.

In fact, using census records, we were able to follow his roots all the way back to 1870... When Michael's great-great-grandparents Elizabeth and Billy Murrell were living with their children on a Greeleyville farm... Based on their ages, both were likely born into slavery... So this is among the first records of Michael's family in freedom, and it shows the beginning of a long line of people who tended farms... Williams: "Billy Murrell, 36.

Occupation: farm labor.

Elizabeth, 28.

Pinkney, 11.

Longstreet, 9.

Billy, 5."

Gates: Now, this is the first time your family appeared with legal names.

Williams: Names... Gates: In a federal document.

And those are your great-great-grandparents.

What's it like to see that?

William 'Billy' Murrell and Elizabeth, his wife, on a farm.

Williams: Wow.

That's crazy.

So, I'm only three generations removed from being a slave.

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Williams: And it broke with my grandparents.

My grandparents were the first completely born free.

Gates: Right.

Williams: This is, um, it's, it's humbling.

Gates: Many African Americans can't trace their roots back any further than this.

Slavery is the barrier that genealogists can rarely cross, because so few documents listed slaves by name.

But Michael's family proved an exception... We found an estate record from the year 1846 for a plantation owner named William Cantey... It contains an inventory of his property, including of course his slaves.

And some of the names were painfully familiar... Now, Michael, do you see these names there with those black arrows next to them?

You recognize those names?

Your great-great-grandmother, Elizabeth.

What's her value?

Williams: $175.

Gates: Her father Rolla, or Raleigh?

Williams: Raleigh, $450.

Gates: And Elizabeth's mother, Lucy?

Williams: $350.

Gates: Did you ever think that you would, as... as... As it were, meet your enslaved ancestors and see the value that was placed on them, not as human beings but as property?

Williams: No.

Not at all.

Gates: And do you see the three people listed below Elizabeth?

Williams: Mm-hmm.

Gates: We believe they were her brothers and sisters, so you just read the names of your great-great-grand-aunts and grand-uncles, too.

That's your whole family.

It's like this estate record is like your family tree.

What's that feel like?

Williams: Yeah.

The numbers are really... I'm still trying to wrap my mind around... Around... Around that.

How do you... How do you come to those amounts?

Um... Gates: They were just... Swapping people for money like we would go to a market.

Williams: Yeah, we weren't human, right?

Gates: Right.

Williams: We weren't human.

Gates: As difficult as it is to see your family members valued like animals or property, records like this one offer African Americans our only real chance to glimpse our ancestors' lives in slavery... And for Michael, the discovery contained within it a uniquely powerful insight... William Cantey, the man who owned his family, ran a rice and cotton plantation that was located in a very familiar place... Your father was born seven miles from where his enslaved ancestors were living on this man's plantation.

Williams: His enslaved great-great-grandparents... Gates: Yes.

Williams: Were living.

Gates: It's amazing.. Williams: You know, hearing this... You know, I've always had a... A, um... You know, it's... I don't know if love/hate is the right words that I'm using with my relationship with Greeleyville.

Gates: Well, that's where your family... That's your family tradition.

Two centuries, man, your family has lived there.

And it was a hard life.

Your ancestors did not have, not like any slave did, but it was hard work in that heat working either rice or working... Williams: Cotton.

Gates: Cotton.

And they survived, which is why you are here.

Williams: I'm... I'm having all these like... Like memories of when, you know... Of me going down south... Gates: Mm-hmm.

Williams: And going to Greeleyville.

And now I'm having all these memories.

I'm looking at my father's siblings and I'm looking at them with a fresh pair of eyes right now.

When I look back and I think about them, how they were, always with that land, always with that farm life.

It was like to the next level with my family down south.

Now it's starting to make sense.

For instance, you know, Aunt Boot always had a farm.

There was always chickens, uh... Uh, pigs, there was a barn.

And now seeing where it came from.

That's what they did.

That was part of their herit... Their culture.

Gates: Right.

Right.

Records suggest that Michael's family has likely been in the same part of South Carolina since the early 19th century, if not earlier... First in slavery, then in freedom.

This is unusual.

Roughly 48% of all the slaves who came into the United States arrived in this country through port of Charleston, South Carolina.

But most were then shipped elsewhere.

Michael's ancestors, however, appear to have stayed very close to where they likely landed.

So they entered through Charleston.

And then usually they were dispersed.

Your family stayed in South Carolina that whole time.

Williams: I was expecting to hear this journey: "They went over here, they went over there, they moved, da-da-da-da-da..." Gates: No, they went to Greeleyville.

Williams: They went to Greeleyville.

Gates: They didn't go down to Mississippi... Williams: No.

Gates: Alabama... Williams: Yeah.

Gates: I mean, maybe extended family... Williams: Yeah, yeah.

But not the core.

Gates: Yeah.

Williams: The core stayed.

Gates: When your father left New York to find home, it was like a magnet drawing him back, man, because your family has lived there forever.

In your family tree, there was Africa, and then there was South Carolina.

Williams: It's like, wow.

My blood line has been here... Been here in America for a long time.

Gates: A long time, man.

Much like Michael, Felicity Huffman has fundamental questions about her paternal roots.

Her biological father was a family friend who'd had an affair with her mother, a fact that was kept from Felicity until she was a teenager.

As a result, she grew up believing that her father was Moore Huffman, the man who had helped raise her... And the man to whom she is deeply attached... Huffman: He was the one that would get me up in the morning, and he would always make me scrambled eggs and make my breakfast every morning, and I'd go and sit in his little annex.

And then, when I would come home, he would make me these snacks which I guess were snacks when he was growing up, but he would take white bread and thick butter, and then sugar... Gates: Oh, really?

Huffman: And that was my after-school snack.

Gates: Wow, sounds pretty good to me.

Huffman: It was actually pretty fantastic.

As I was eating, I was like, "I don't think this is right, but I'm not gonna tell him."

Gates: Do you think he had any idea about your paternity?

Huffman: I think maybe.

I think maybe.

But I think, speaking to his noble, sort of, character, I think he made the decision of, "This is my daughter, and I don't want to hear anything different, and I'm going to treat her..." And indeed he did, he treated us all the same.

There were no favorites.

Gates: Oh, that's great.

Huffman: Yeah.

He showed up.

Gates: He showed up.

He not only showed up, he stayed... Huffman: Yeah.

Gates: And, you know, if your suspicion is right, a lot of men wouldn't have done that.

Huffman: Yeah.

Yeah, he really showed up.

Gates: Felicity's feelings about Moore have remained constant throughout her life.

She loves him, and is grateful for all that he did to nurture her.

By contrast, her feelings about her biological father, Roger Maher, have been shifting since she first learned the truth... Huffman: I wrote him a letter, saying, "I know."

And um, he wrote back and said, "I'm so glad you know.

Can we meet?"

And um, I drove and I met him for lunch.

And um, we had a nice lunch, and i, I guess I felt less conflicted than I feel right now.

I felt, uh, happy to see him, and I wanted to connect, and I think I even said, "You know, I'm so glad you're my father."

I don't even know if I knew what that meant.

Um... Gates: It's a lot to comprehend.

Huffman: Yeah, it is.

Gates: It's a lot for me to comprehend.

Huffman: You know, I, I actually now, from my, from my perch at being 54, I, I think I just kind of, like, went, I just took it in stride, and I think I squashed a little bit, and went, "Yes," and um, and I think there is a relief when a lie is out.

Gates: Mm.

Huffman: And I think I went with that.

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Huffman: But as the years have gone by, I don't know if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

Gates: Right.

Roger passed away in 1998.

By that time, Felicity had known that he was her biological father for roughly two decades.

Even so, their relationship was often awkward, and there was so much that she didn't know.

We showed Felicity a letter that Roger wrote to her mother describing Roger's experience of meeting Felicity and acknowledging their relationship... This is a letter to your mom, dated July 22, 1985.

Would you please read the transcribed section?

Huffman: "We let all the curtains down: my feelings toward you, and toward her, the so difficult position we are in, but well worth it... I showed her where I used to live and pointed out the house where she was conceived, no holds barred!

Please try to understand this feeble attempt to tell you how much this day meant to me."

Hmm.

Wow.

Gates: What's it like to read that?

Huffman: Well...to be perfectly honest, it makes me a little mad, um, because... Because this letter is easy to write.

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Huffman: Um, I think, what do I know?

I think it's easy to write.

Your 22-year-old daughter comes in and is going, "Yes," and you get to go, "Oh, how wonderful that you exist, and indeed, how wonderful that, and I'm very lucky that I exist, and at the same time, this is easy.

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Huffman: To sort of go, "She's great."

Gates: Yeah.

Instead of being more involved, you mean?

Huffman: Yes.

Instead of being more involved.

I mean, there was a secret that had to be kept.

Gates: Right.

Huffman: You know, there's a secret from his wife that had to be kept.

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Huffman: Um, but it feels a little like a thin celebration, an easy celebration.

Gates: Do you consider Roger and Moore both your fathers?

Huffman: No.

I consider Moore my father... Gates: Okay.

Huffman: And Roger my biological dad.

Gates: I wanted to help Felicity understand where her biological father came from, and how his roots connect to hers.

I knew it would be a difficult task.

What do we inherit from an absent parent?

Someone who shares half of our genome but none of our family experiences?

This is a complicated question... So we began our journey in the simplest way possible... Would you please turn the page?

Huffman: Sure.

Gates: Felicity, that's your father's birth certificate.

Huffman: Oh, wow.

That's crazy.

"Name of child: Roger Tallman Maher."

That's right.

"Date of birth: September 29th, 1912.

Place of birth: 222 South Clinton Street, East Orange.

Name of father: Frank H.

Maher."

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Huffman: "Maiden name of mother: Grace Brown."

Gates: What's it like to see that?

I mean, you just met your biological grandparents.

Huffman: You know, I think I closed the door, like, on, like, Roger.

It ends with Roger.

Gates: Right.

Huffman: And this sort of feels like pulling back the curtain from The Wizard of Oz.

You kind of go, "What's behind there?"

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Huffman: Wow.

Gates: Roger's parents Frank Maher and Grace Brown were both born in western Connecticut in the 1880s.

Records suggest that they were an ordinary middle class family.

But Felicity was hardly able to begin to process the details of her ancestors lives when she was confronted by a tragedy... Huffman: "Frank Herbert Maher, who in two years weathered the ordeal of 16 operations died at the home of his father, John Maher.

He married four years ago."

Oh, crikey, he died young!

"He married four years ago Miss Grace Brown, who with one son survives."

Oh, Roger was their only kid?

Gates: Yeah.

And Roger, your biological father, was just three years old when he lost his father to cancer.

Huffman: Wow.

And he was only married for four years.

Gates: Yep.

Huffman: She had a little three-year-old.

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Huffman: Can you imagine how stressful that was for all of them?

I mean, for Frank, but also for his wife, Grace, taking care of a young son, and taking care of your husband who's dying.

Gates: And it had to be traumatic for your biological father.

Huffman: Yeah, absolutely.

Fascinating.

Gates: Felicity's grandmother was just 27 years old when her husband died.

Her options must have been extremely limited, and she soon decided to take her young son back to her hometown: Torrington, Connecticut... Huffman: Wow, that's tough.

I can imagine that travel back to her family, and the little three-year-old son, just watching your mother fall apart, and... Gates: Oh, yeah.

Huffman: Weep all the way home.

Gates: And where's daddy?

Huffman: Yeah.

Gates: It's sad.

It's a sad story.

Huffman: Yeah, yeah, hmm.

Gates: Unfortunately, Grace's story was about to become even sadder... The 1920 census revealed that after returning to Torrington, she moved into a household containing multiple generations of what appeared to be her family... It included her father, Frederick Brown, and a woman named Emma Brown, whom, we assumed was Grace's mother... That assumption, however, was soon thrown into doubt... Would you please turn the page?

Huffman: Sure.

Gates: Okay, Felicity, this is the birth register for the town of Torrington... Huffman: Okay.

Gates: From the year 1888.

Huffman: Wow.

Gates: Would you please read the transcribed section?

Huffman: "June 25.

Name of child: Grace E.

Brown."

Hmm.

"Name and birthplace of father: Fred Brown, Litchfield.

Name and birthplace of mother: Effie Wooster, Torrington."

Gates: Mm-hmm.

You know what that is?

Huffman: No.

Gates: That's your grandmother's birth record.

Huffman: My grandmother's birth record.

My gosh.

Gates: Do you notice something strange from this document?

Huffman: No.

Gates: Look at that again.

This lists Grace's father as Fred Brown, whom we just saw in the census.

Huffman: Right.

Gates: But here Grace's mother is a woman named Effie.

Huffman: Oh, my goodness.

Gates: So we weren't sure what to make of it.

Emma and Effie are similar names, but not that similar.

Huffman: Wow.

Gates: We were now facing a mystery... We knew that Grace's birth mother was named "Effie."

And we knew that when Grace returned to her hometown, her father Fred was living with a woman named "Emma."

But were Emma and Effie the same person?

And if not: what had happened to Effie?

The answer lay in a death record from Ansonia, Connecticut from the year 1896... Huffman: "November 13, Effie G. Wooster Brown" age: 29, cause of death: Pulmonary... Phthisis"?

Gates: It's tuberculosis.

Huffman: Oh, wow.

So, Effie died, and then he married Emma?

Gates: Yeah, you guessed it.

Grace's mother, Effie, died, leaving behind your eight-year-old grandmother Grace, her two younger siblings, and their father, Fred.

Three years later, when your grandmother was 11, Fred married his second wife, Emma, whom we saw in the census earlier.

Huffman: Wow.

Gates: Fred and his family then moved in with her family.

Huffman: It's so interesting that Roger's father died... Gates: Yes.

Huffman: And Grace's mother died... Gates: Yeah.

Huffman: Wow.

Gates: Causing a whole lot of trauma, and... Huffman: A whole lot of trauma, yeah.

Gates: Yeah.

So, what do you think this would've been like for your grandmother?

Huffman: Oh, gosh.

She lost her mother when she was eight years old, then he remarried, and she went to live with her family.

Gates: Yeah.

Huffman: Boy, I hope she was nice to her.

Gates: Oh, yeah.

Huffman: I hope Emma was a good step-mother.

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Huffman: We just have to hope for the best.

Gates: Did Roger, I mean, did he, in the times you were together, did he ever say, "Do you want to know about my family, or can I tell you about family story, or..." I'm sure it was tense enough.

Huffman: Yeah.

Yeah.

I don't remember him doing that.

You know, maybe he did, and in my, in my immaturity I sort of, you know, as one does, you don't really listen, you know?

But I don't remember him talking about this.

Gates: This is the door that has never been opened.

Huffman: Yes.

It rocks the... The ground upon which I stand.

Gates: Yeah.

Huffman: And I feel really, um, emotional.

I just, I don't, don't know where to put... Put it.

That's how I'm feeling.

Gates: We had already taken Michael K. Williams back to the early 1800s on one line of his father's family tree, drawing, in part, on the estate records of a slave-owner named William Cantey.

And there was still more to reveal... Much of Cantey's property came into the possession of his son-in-law, a planter named Robert Keels... And Keels' estate records revealed that he owned not one, but three generations of Michael's family... Bringing his paternal roots together in a single place... That's a headstone on a family plot in Greeleyville.

Would you mind reading the inscription.

Williams: "Robert F. Keels who was born August 6, 1831 and departed this life the 23 of October 1857."

Gates: That's the grave of the man who owned three generations of your ancestors.

Williams: Wow.

This is in Greeleyville right now?

Gates: Yep.

He's buried in the Keels' family cemetery in your ancestral home of Greeleyville.

Williams: Wow.

Gates: So you know in all that we think, "Who owned our ancestors?"

In your case he was just down the road in the family cemetery when you were there playing as a kid.

Williams: The slave master.

Gates: What's it like to see that?

I mean, you know the name of the plantation.

You know the name of the man who owned not just one of your ancestors but three generations of your ancestors.

It's incredible.

What's it make you feel like?

Williams: A little angry.

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Williams: A little angry.

That definitely was an emotion there.

Gates: Yeah.

Williams: But then you know it's... It's... It's like there's a peace, you know, just knowing this.

I can't really explain it.

It's, you know... Gates: Yeah.

Williams: It's very powerful.

Gates: It is impossible to determine exactly how many of Michael's ancestors were owned by Robert Keels.

The records simply don't contain enough information.

But we do know that more than 15 of his paternal relatives were enslaved on Keels' plantation at one time or another... And we also know that at least one of Michael's enslaved ancestors, his great-great-grandfather William Murrell, emerged from the ordeal unbowed... This is the voter registration list from the year 1868, three years after the end of the Civil War.

Would you please read the transcribed section?

Williams: "William Murrell, colored."

He voted?

Gates: He registered to vote as soon as he could after he was free.

Williams: Wow.

He knew better.

Gates: Yeah.

It's incredible, man.

As soon as this brother could, he said "I'm a citizen."

Williams: Yes.

Gates: That's bad.

Williams: I've got a lot of family members that are going to love to hear this story.

A lot.

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Williams: It meant empowerment.

It meant he had a voice.

Gates: Yeah.

Williams: It meant he was a man.

Gates: Of course, a Black man who stood up for himself in post-Civil War South Carolina was taking an enormous risk.

Though reconstruction offered a brief glimmer of hope, its promise was not fulfilled.

By 1876, white paramilitary groups across the state were using violence to suppress the African American vote.

The following year, reconstruction ended when so-called "Home rule" returned, and Black people in South Carolina were consigned, by and large, to decades of poverty and powerlessness.

They often found themselves working as sharecroppers in the same the fields that they had worked as slaves... Owning little and passing on almost nothing.

But Michael's ancestors, somehow, avoided that fate... Now, Michael, the page on your right is part of the 1880 census.

Would you please read the transcribed section?

Williams: "Name of the person who conducts the farm: Billy Murrell."

Gates: What's that last word?

Williams: Owner.

Gates: Owner.

Owner.

After over 30 years spent in slavery, your great-great-grandparents, Billy and Elizabeth, had a piece of land to call their own, and they worked it.

And guess what?

It wasn't a small piece of land, man.

You think it was a little patch where they grew corn and potatoes and green beans?

They owned 100 acres of land.

Williams: Wow.

Gates: Look there.

Outlined in red is some of the land Billy owned.

That portion still remains in the possession of your family.

Williams: Crazy.

Gates: That is an amazing success story, man.

Williams: This is awesome.

This is really awesome.

Gates: How would your father have felt knowing all this?

He had no idea of all this history, right?

Williams: No, but he, you know... I don't think he knew all of this by far.

If he was here right now he would definitely... He... He... His chest would probably burst open.

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Williams: You know, um, he was a lot of things, granted, but, you know, he was...he... In a weird way, he did love family.

He loved that land.

I'm starting to understand now why he was so obsessed with going back.

You know, um, he got sick of the city life.

He wanted to go back to what he knew.

Gates: Sure.

I mean what could you own in... Brooklyn?

Williams: Brooklyn.

Gates: Yeah, you know?

Williams: Yeah.

Gates: How does Michael feel, knowing this, learning this?

Williams: I feel like I come from, I don't know, like, greatness.

You know, my ancestors endured hell, and in the process, still had a mind to blossom, you know, to... To think like an entrepreneur.

I feel, you know, I didn't know what I was gonna hear when I came today; I was so nervous, like, but to hear these stories... I feel very powerful.

I feel like I come from a long line of strong, intelligent Black people.

Gates: They had the capacity to reinvent themselves, didn't they?

Williams: Yes, they did.

Yes, they did.

I'm starting to see a little bit of that in myself too and I see where I get, where I get it from.

Gates: We had already taken Felicity Huffman back three generations on the family tree of her biological father, Roger Maher... Our journey had ended in Ansonia, Connecticut, where Felicity's great-great grandmother, Effie Wooster, died of tuberculosis in 1896... Felicity now expected that we'd be going to Ireland, since she believed that Roger had deep roots there... But she was in for a surprise... Roger's ancestry stretched back much further, right here in America... We were soon introducing Felicity to her fourth great-grandfather, a man named Walter Wooster... Who was born in Connecticut when Connecticut was still a British colony... Huffman: Wow.

Oh my goodness.

Born in 1745.

Gates: Yeah.

Your fourth great-grandfather was born more than three decades before the Declaration of Independence.

Huffman: Wow.

That's amazing.

Okay, so, this is not exactly Irish.

This is, this is, uh, this is American.

Gates: It's American.

You have deep American roots... Huffman: This is amazing.

Back when it was just a colony.

They all spoke with English accents.

Gates: Because they were English.

Huffman: Yes.

Gates: Until the Declaration of Independence, they were subjects of the King.

Huffman: Absolutely, and considered themselves as such.

Gates: Yeah.

How's that make you feel, to see these roots?

I mean, this is your family.

Huffman: I know!

I... I so expected us to be like, "Okay, there's Roger, and then we're gonna go to Ireland."

Gates: Yeah.

Huffman: Um, I never thought that I was such an American, such, that lineage of the American colonies on a sort of DNA level, on a bred-in-the-bone kind of level... Gates: Yeah.

Huffman: Which is a great feeling.

Gates: Of course, Felicity's ancestors were not only in the colonies, they were witnessing the transformation of those colonies into an independent nation... Which raised a question: when the revolution came, would her fourth great-grandfather, Walter Wooster, side with the British?

Or with the Patriots?

Now, Felicity, this is so cool.

This is a military record from the Connecticut state archives.

Huffman: Oh, my goodness.

"A muster roll of the field and staff officers and captain Eli Leavenworth's company... Sergeants: Walter Wooster, appointed March 2, 1777."

Wow.

Gates: Your fourth great-grandfather Walter was a sergeant in the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War.

Huffman: Oh my gosh.

Gates: You have a patriot ancestor.

You are the fourth great-granddaughter of a Patriot.

Huffman: Wow.

I'm so glad he was on the right side.

Gates: As it turns out, Walter did more than choose the winning side... He served in one of the most colorful battles of the war... On the night of July 15th, 1779, Walters Regiment marched for eight hours to launch a night attack on a British fort above the Hudson River at a place known as "stony point."

Despite being out-gunned and ill-positioned, the Americans triumphed... A victory that is little known today, but was quite famous in its time... Giving an enormous boost to the morale of the Patriot cause... This is a letter that Washington's wounded General Wayne sent him at 2 a.m.

After the battle was over.

Huffman: "Dear General" oh!

"The fort and garrison are ours.

Your officers and men behaved like men who are determined to be free."

Wow.

That's really moving.

Gates: And your ancestor was in the regiment that played a prominent role in that attack.

Huffman: Amazing.

Oh my goodness, Walter.

"Dear General."

Did he survive?

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Walter served with his regiment for three years, and then was discharged.

Huffman: Amazing!

I think this is one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen.

Just beautiful.

I'm gonna frame this.

Walter Wooster.

They probably called him Woost.

Gates: We had now taken Felicity back six generations on her biological father's line, and we had much further still to go.

Walter Wooster's wife was a woman named Ursula Beebe.

Ursula is Felicity's fourth-great grandmother... And by following her line back, we came to a man who was born when North America was still a wilderness... Now, get ready for this.

Find William Hickok.

Huffman: William Hickok.

Gates: Read when he was born.

Huffman: Good gracious.

"Born about 1608."

Gates: He is your ninth-great-grandfather.

Huffman: Wow.

Gates: Great-great-great- great-great- great-great- great-great... Your ninth-great-grandfather.

Huffman: Wow.

Gates: Shakespeare is alive!

Huffman: No!

Gates: Shakespeare's writing plays and still being performed.

Shakespeare lives another eight years.

Do you know how few people can identify their ninth-great-grandfather in a continuous line from themselves?

Huffman: Wow.

This is amazing.

I can't believe we were... I love it.

"We."

Do you like how I've just adopted them?

Gates: No, but they're your family.

Huffman: We're back in 1608.

That's just so shocking.

Gates: Well, let's see what we found out about the Hickoks.

Huffman: Okay.

Gates: Would you please turn the page?

All right, this is a compiled history of Farmington, Connecticut, written in the year 1841.

Would you please read the transcribed section?

Huffman: "Original proprietors and settlers of Farmington, William Hickok."

Oh, he's one of the original settlers?

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Your ninth-great-grandfather William was one of the 84 original founders of Farmington, Connecticut.

Huffman: Wow.

Oh my god.

Gates: They are historical figures.

Huffman: That's crazy.

Gates: William's settlement paved the way for the subsequent nine generations of your family in Connecticut.

Huffman: Wow.

This guy, the next nine generations.

Gates: Yep, the last of whom was your grandmother, Grace Brown.

Huffman: Was Grace Brown.

There she is.

Boy, they didn't move far, huh?

Gates: No.

Huffman: They were not a peripatetic people.

Gates: They go, "Nothing wrong with here."

Huffman: "We're gonna stay here."

That's astounding.

Gates: We've gone back nearly 400 years on a line that, two hours ago, you didn't know anything about.

Huffman: No.

Gates: And these are your ancestors.

Huffman: It's, uh, you sort of go, "I do kind of belong here."

Gates: Yeah, Roger gave you a great legacy.

Huffman: Yeah.

Gates: I mean, of ancestry.

Huffman: Yeah, he did.

Gates: He might've been kinda short on the other, on the birthday gifts... First 22 years.

Huffman: Wow.

I just... You, of course, you know with history, you know, yes, these people actually existed, and yes, they actually did this, and yes, they were under the same sun that we're under, and the same moon.

But to actually have this lineage go up nine generations is, uh, what is it?

It makes you feel somewhat legitimate.

Gates: Yeah.

Oh, yeah, that's a great way to put it.

Huffman: As someone who's illegitimate.

Gates: Yeah, that's an ironic way to put it.

Huffman: That's right.

Fascinating.

Gates: Does seeing this, walking through these records, having these records attached to, you know, members of your family tree, change the way that you think of yourself?

Are you Roger's daughter yet?

Huffman: Am I Roger's daughter yet?

No.

I don't think I'll ever be Roger's daughter.

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Huffman: But there's a connection.

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Huffman: There's a... A deep connection.

It's a, it's an interesting dance... Gates: It is.

Huffman: Of where I live with it all.

Gates: We were now nearing the end of our journey... The paper trail for Felicity and Michael had run out.

We'd taken their families back as far as we could go.

This is your entire family tree... It was time to compile everything we'd discovered in one place... Huffman: Oh.

Oh lord.

Gates: These are all the biological ancestors that we found.

Huffman: Oh...my people.

Gates: These are your people.

Huffman: These are my people.

That's crazy.

Gates: So if you start with yourself down at the bottom... Huffman: Yeah.

Gates: And up to the left, your biological father, and all of his ancestors... Huffman: This is... I contain multitudes.

Gates: You do.

And they produced you.

Huffman: And they produced me.

I hope I do you guys proud.

Gates: You've done already.

Williams: I've never seen this.

My history laid out like this so perfectly.

I can trace my family now to the... To the 1800s?!

Gates: Yeah, that's right.

Williams: And not be that far removed.

To think... I don't know, 'cause I'm not the best in math, but, you know, so, if I say, "Oh, that's just my great-grandparents" or "My great-great-grandparents", when I say it like that, it seems like that's just right there like that just happened, like, yesterday, right?

Gates: Right, right.

Williams: But then when you look at it on... Like this, the math... You realize that was not just right... Gates: No... Williams: That was... This is many, many, many years ago.

Gates: Big time.

Williams: I feel whole right now.

There's a void that's been filled with this information.

I know who people are.

I can put times and names and dates with things.

Gates: Yeah.

Williams: It's a feeling... It's a feeling of wholeness.

Gates: As I said goodbye to Michael and Felicity, I was struck by the enormity of what we'd experienced together... Each had seen their family trees utterly transformed.

Each had learned about the fathers they never really knew... It had been a privilege for me and I wondered what it meant to them.

You wanted us to give you answers about questions that you've long pondered.

Did we?

Huffman: More than I could have anticipated.

Yeah, you gave me not only information, you gave me context, and you gave me another journey to go on.

I think I'm gonna go on another journey now.

You know, that door was shut, and I was like, "This is me."

But now I want to open it again.

Williams: This journey has changed a lot of things about the way I look at myself.

I feel very proud of the legacy of my family on my father's side, particularly, especially with, you know, with my great-great-grandfather understanding the power of the vote, understanding that was his voice.

Gates: Right.

Williams: And then, you know, my family were landowners.

I mean they are.

I know... I know about the property in South Carolina, in Greeleyville, but I didn't know it was in my family for that many years.

Gates: Mm-hmm.

Williams: And I'm proud of that.

Gates: You should be.

Williams: I came here feeling a little... Frightened, I guess.

A little, little nervous of the unknown, like what... Exactly what was going to be revealed today, right?

And, uh, I was pleasantly surprised... And I'm really grateful.

This is a beautiful thing and it's healing.

It's healing that you really can't see when my family goes home and watches this.

The healing that that does you'll never understand.

So um, I'm going to leave here a changed person today.

Information is key, I believe in knowing things about ourselves, about myself.

It gives me power, it gives me insight.

You know?

I'm grateful for that.

I feel, I feel... I feel very powerful.

Gates: That's a beautiful way to put it.

Williams: Thank you.

Gates: That's the end of our journey into the family trees of Michael K. Williams and Felicity Huffman.

Please join me next time, when we unlock the secrets of the past for new guests on another episode of Finding Your Roots.