The Madison County Yellowbones, also called the London Ohio Yellowbones, are a group of multigenerationally mixed race extended families descended from escaped and freed slaves, Free People Of Color, early Black arrivals to Ohio, Amish settlers of Ohio, Appalachian Scots-Irish frontiersmen coming into Ohio when Ohio was part of the northwest territory, and in some families likely distant Native American ancestors from various tribes of the Southeast, Mid-Atlantic, Appalachian, and Midwestern regions of the USA, depending on the family.

If you are a Madison County Yellowbone descendant, your relatives likely had one of a short list of last names by the 1990s, which includes Napper, Whitelow, Whitehead, Whited, Whiteside, McCoy, Miller, and other surnames recorded in these families in 1991. You may have ancestors who fought as Black Union Army soldiers during the American Civil War and likely have relatives who identify as Black but has blue eyes or has red or blonde natural highlights despite having an afro hair type. Many Madison County Yellowbone descendants have been adopting the term Qarsherskiyan as a self identification or endonym, and it was their community that coined the term for them, Darke County Yellowbones, and Tidewater Creole communities back in 1991, beginning to use the term online as the term began catching on by late 2019.

Madison County Yellowbone by Jamal Omar Whiteside January 27, 2026

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