Now 14 Known Slaveholding Ancestors Of Ben Affleck Throughout The South Affleck identified the relative as benjamin cole on social media. here’s how the associated press, using census records and other documents, connected affleck and cole — men born more than 150 years apart. —1857: benjamin l. cole of savannah, georgia, marries georgia a. speissegger. they are affleck’s great great great grandparents. After a “wow” and a “whoa,” the cnn anchor told host henry louis “skip” gates on a recent episode of the pbs genealogy show finding your roots, “oh, my god. that’s amazing. this is.
Ben Affleck Breaks Silence On Pbs Controversy Slave Owning Ancestors An "embarrassed" ben affleck admitted tuesday that he asked producers of the pbs documentary show "finding your roots" to edit out the discovery that one of his distant ancestors owned slaves. the. In 1850, they would list the owner of slaves in a separate census. affleck: there’s benjamin cole, owned 25 slaves. gates: your third great grandfather owned 25 slaves. he was a slave owner. — ben affleck admitted earlier this week that he was embarrassed to learn that one of his ancestors owned slaves. now, he's revealing the name of that person. "lots of people have been. When the segment aired on october 14, gates focused on the occultist, a us revolutionary war relative and affleck's mother, who was a "freedom rider" in 1964 during the civil rights movement.