[1] She was described as a 'Guinea Negro', "meaning she was racially mixed but did not look white nor was she light-skinned, but with 'nice hair' not kinky and shoulder length" similar to Australian aborigines.
[citation needed] The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints began proselytizing in the South, Jones county in particular in the early 1880s.
[5] Many of Rachel's children were encouraged by Newton to marry someone who was as close to white as possible, wanting to "erase that one drop of Negro blood in their veins.
"[4] The Knight family mothered by Rachel grew to have a reputation as the "white Negroes" of Mississippi due to their light skin color and straight hair.
[6] As most of Rachel's later descendants were white passing, they fled to other states to start new lives in the 1920s and 1930s, enjoying opportunities that were unavailable to African Americans at the time .
"[8] Initially the court proclaimed that because his great-grandmother, Rachel, was considered "a negro" that implicated Davis at least one-eighth Black and therefore was in violation of the law.