Edwin Johnson

Family, friend, or fan, this family history biography is for you to remember Cora Hulcher.

Family, friend, or fan, this family history biography is for you to remember James Hulcher.

I am faced with an enigma. My Grandmother was born in 1888 as Cora Hulcher. in Richmond VA. Her birth name was unknown to my family until about 6 years ago when I discovered her marriage record from 1907 to Peele R Brown, wherein she lists her name as Cora Hulcher and her parents as James and Cora Hulcher. She shows the same parents and surname on the birth record for her daughter Goldie Brown in 1909. Fact is, my Grandmother has lived her entire life as a Black woman, although, she has been mistaken often as a White woman. I do know that she often visited a Doctor Hulcher at his office on Main Street in Richmond. I don't think this was a coincidence (they were likely related in some way). I can find no birth record or any other connection with any Hulcher family. Any clues? I believe that her parents either died while she was very young or was abandoned and was adopted by a Black family named Houchins (she had a half brother named Joseph R Houchins, who was a member of President Franklin Roosevelt's "Black Cabinet"). Her mother was likely a light skinned Black woman, which would explain why she lived as a Black woman. Her social security card shows her name as Cora Hulcher Brown. She was enumerated in every census except the 1900 census when she would have been 12 years of age.