Top 20 Darkest Family Reveals on Finding Your Roots

Canadian rock artist Alanis Morissette didn’t learn about her Jewish ancestry until she was in her late 20s. On “Finding Your Roots,” she uncovered even more details about that side of her family, particularly the fate of her great uncles Gyorgy and Sandor Feuerstein. Both men disappeared during the Holocaust, leaving their family with no answers. However, using records at Yad Vashem, the World Holocaust Remembrance Center, the show’s team dug up those answers. They discovered that the brothers had been sent to work camps in Russia, where they tragically lost their lives. Morissette found this especially heartbreaking, as her grandfather, who escaped the same fate as his brothers and moved to Canada, passed away without ever knowing what happened to them.

One often overlooked consequence of the slave trade was the separation of families—fathers never seeing their kids again; young children forced to grow up on their own. That unfortunate fate befell filmmaker Jordan Peele’s great-great-grandmother, Alvania. In 1860, when she was just 12 years old, Alvania was taken away from her parents and brother, and sold into slavery for $1,250. While reflecting on what effects such an experience could have had on the psyche of Alvania and her family, Peele felt a mix of pain and pride. He recognized the psychological trauma they must have endured as a result, and how that may have been passed down through generations.

In December 1941, during WWII, Japan invaded Hong Kong, beginning a nearly four-year military occupation that led to widespread starvation and countless deaths. To escape the famine and brutality of Japanese rule, many residents fled on foot to China. One of them was journalist Lisa Ling’s grandmother, who wrote a book about her harrowing experience making that journey. Ling had actually read the book years earlier, but seeing it again on the show, she was able to reexamine it with a more mature perspective. She was clearly struck by the immense resilience and strength her grandmother showed in embarking on that journey while carrying her family on her back… literally.

The freedoms enjoyed by queer people in some parts of the world today are the result of long, hard-fought battles. Few things highlight the significance of these struggles as clearly as cases like this. On Season 6 of “Finding Your Roots,” actress Justina Machado discovered a surprising part of her grandfather’s past. In his youth, he was sent to the Río Piedras State Penitentiary, one of the most notorious Caribbean prisons, for having sexual relations with another man. At the time, this was considered a crime in the eyes of the law, one that attracted even more prison time for her grandfather while he was already incarcerated.

Between 1830 and 1850, the U.S. government forcibly displaced around 60,000 Indigenous Americans from their ancestral homelands in what became known as the Trail of Tears. This ethnic cleansing left scars that have impacted generations of Native Americans, including actor Wes Studi. When he appeared on “Finding Your Roots” in 2024, Studi learned of his maternal third great-grandmother, Big Nancy, who was among those forced to leave their home in Georgia and suffer a grueling journey to Oklahoma. Years after the harrowing ordeal, Nancy filed a claim for compensation, seeking $187 for the properties white settlers had taken from her. Studi reflected on the deep pain this history carries, acknowledging the lasting effects it has had on his people.

During the Salem witch trials of 1692, one of the few men convicted of witchcraft and executed was Samuel Wardwell. Wardwell was a self-professed fortune teller, whose practices apparently drew suspicions of the occult among the locals and led to his conviction. One of the people who testified against him was Captain Thomas Chandler, the eighth great-grandfather of actor Jeff Daniels. Daniels learned this unsettling fact on “Finding Your Roots,” where he also discovered that Chandler testified against another accused witch, Mary Parker. Unlike Wardwell, Parker was Chandler’s neighbor and peer, yet he believed she was using sorcery on his daughter and granddaughter, which prompted his testimony.

Although she had always been aware of her Jewish heritage, comedian Iliza Shlesinger never knew she had a direct link to the Holocaust, until she appeared on “Finding Your Roots” in 2024. In the episode, Shlesinger learned that while her great-grandmother immigrated to the U.S. from Poland before the Holocaust, she left behind at least two brothers. One of them, Lipa, was a textile dealer who was forced into a ghetto in Mława after the Nazis invaded. He was later sent to Auschwitz, where he tragically lost his life. The revelation brought Shlesinger to tears, as she confronted both the atrocities that her ancestor endured, as well as her newfound connection to the Holocaust.

Award-winning actress Sigourney Weaver came to “Finding Your Roots” hoping to uncover a juicy scandal in her ancestral line. What she found, however, was far darker than she expected. Using census records from 1871, the show’s researchers discovered that Weaver’s great-great-grandparents, Josiah and Barbara Hunt, were living apart, despite having a child together. Barbara had moved in with another man, whom Josiah accused her of having an affair with. She became pregnant by this man, but suffered a miscarriage, after which she was institutionalized in a psychiatric facility, where she remained for the rest of her life. Perhaps inspired by this ordeal, Barbara’s son, Weaver’s great-grandfather, later became a doctor in another psychiatric facility, where patients were treated much more humanely.

It’s one thing to hear about your ancestors suffering a tragic fate, but it’s an entirely different experience to see the details of their deaths written down. That can bring tears to even the driest eyes. Such was the case for actress Scarlett Johansson who, in this 2017 episode, discovered the fate of her great-uncle, Moishe and his family, who lived in Grojec, Poland when WWII began. Moishe and his family were rounded up and taken to the infamous Warsaw Ghetto. There, he and at least two of his 10 children were killed. Johansson couldn’t help but fight back tears, though she was grateful to learn more about her family history, as it deepened her connection to her roots.

Some genetic discoveries are so sensitive that they need to be shared privately first before being revealed on camera. This was the case with LL Cool J. For most of his childhood, the rapper was raised by the people he believed to be his maternal grandparents. Even his mother, Ondrea Griffith, thought they were her biological parents. However, a DNA test on “Finding Your Roots” revealed otherwise. In reality, Griffith was adopted as an infant, and her adoptive parents, Eugene Griffith and Ellen Hightower, never made that information know to her throughout their lives. Regardless, the revelation didn’t change LL Cool J’s perception of his adoptive grandparents. If anything, it deepened his love and respect for them.

In 2021, Rosanne Cash, the daughter of country music icon Johnny Cash, appeared on “Finding Your Roots,” where she made a particularly interesting discovery. Back in 1965, Cash’s mother, Vivian, was targeted by the KKK in a racist campaign. The white supremacist group believed Vivian was black, thus alleging her marriage to Johnny was illegal. The controversy only died down after the country singer issued a public statement insisting his wife was white. However, on “Finding Your Roots,” Cash discovered that her mother indeed had African American heritage. Vivian’s maternal great-great-grandmother was a mixed-race woman named Sarah Shields, who was born into slavery in Alabama. Shields later married a white man and recorded all her children as white in official documents.

Actor Joe Manganiello owes his existence today to the remarkable tenacity of his maternal great-grandmother, Terviz “Rose” Darakjian. Darakjian was an Armenian woman who was married with eight children. In 1915, during the Armenian genocide, her husband and seven of her children were murdered before her eyes. Darakjian managed to escape and swam across the Euphrates River with her last surviving child strapped to her back, but tragically, the infant died during the journey. She was then thrown into an internment camp, where she encountered a German soldier named Karl Wilhelm Beutinger, who impregnated her. On his paternal side, Manganiello also discovered that the man he believed to be his grandfather, Emilio Manganiello, was not biologically related to him.

Even before “Finding Your Roots,” comedian Tig Notaro always knew she was the descendant of a politician. Her great-great-grandfather was John Fitzpatrick, who served as the mayor of New Orleans from 1892 to 1896. But it was on the show that Notaro first learned about her ancestor’s upbringing. At the age of seven, Fitzpatrick lost his father and was placed in an orphan asylum alongside two of his brothers. Surprisingly, this wasn’t due to their mother’s demise, but rather the limited public welfare system, which apparently left her with no choice but to entrust some of her children to an orphanage. Fitzpatrick was later reunited with his mother and worked his way up from a newspaper boy to the mayor’s office.

While Edward Norton is widely recognized for his roles in several popular Hollywood films, it turns out he may not be the most famous individual in his family tree. In the season 9 premiere of “Finding Your Roots,” the actor learned that Pocahontas was his 12th great-grandmother, confirming a long-held family lore. But perhaps the most uncomfortable detail uncovered during the episode was the revelation that Norton’s third great-grandfather, John Winstead, was a slave owner in North Carolina. While he wouldn’t be the first celebrity to make such a discovery, Norton reflected on its disturbing nature, describing it as an “uncomfortable” truth that “needs to be acknowledged” and “contended with.”

For most of his life, “Saturday Night Live” alum Fred Armisen believed he was one-quarter Japanese, attributing this to his grandfather, the late Masami Kuni, who hailed from Japan. He would later discover this was all false. Kuni was actually South Korean, originally named Park Yeong-in, and only assumed a Japanese identity after the 1923 massacre of Koreans in Japan. But that was just the tip of the iceberg. Armisen also learned that while Kuni lived in Germany in the 1930s and ‘40s, he engaged in propaganda efforts for the Nazis, by entertaining German troops. Additionally, during this period, Kuni apparently also worked as a spy for Japan, gathering intelligence on Southern European and Turkish affairs.

The 2024 film “Treasure” stars Lena Dunham as a young woman who visits Poland with her aging father, and is forced to confront her family’s Holocaust past. When Dunham appeared on “Finding Your Roots,” she discovered unexpected parallels between her own ancestry and that of her character in the movie. It turns out that Dunham’s great-great-grandmother Regina migrated to America as a teenager, leaving behind nearly a dozen siblings in Europe. Tragically, during World War II, one of Regina’s nieces, Ilona, was separated from the rest of her family and sent to the Nazi-occupied city of Kamianets-Podilskyi in Ukraine. Ilona is believed to be one of roughly 24,000 Jews who lost their lives there.

Celebrities who appear on “Finding Your Roots” step into the unknown, unsure of what family secrets might be revealed. While many learn unsettling details about distant ancestors, veteran radio host Joe Madison was confronted with a startling truth about his own father. In the season 5 episode, Madison found out that Felix Madison, whom he had always believed to be his biological father, actually wasn’t. Sensing the sensitivity of the information, host Henry Louis Gates Jr. first called Madison privately to share it with him, away from all the cameras. Madison’s appearance on the show also led him to the discovery that his biological grandfather was one of the subjects of the controversial Tuskegee Institute Syphilis Study.

For many African-Americans, having the chance to read first-hand stories of their ancestors’ lives, especially those who were enslaved, is rare. Acclaimed music producer Pharrell Williams got this opportunity when he appeared on “Finding Your Roots” in 2021. During the show, Williams was presented with an interview given by his great-great-great-aunt Jane Arrington, who participated in the Slave Narrative Project in the 1930s. In her interview, Arrington shared detailed accounts of her harrowing experience as an enslaved person. As he read the notes on the program, Williams was deeply moved by the hardships his ancestor was forced to endure. He also uncovered the unsettling fact that his great-great-great-grandfather, Fenner Williams, spent the first decade of his life enslaved.

Throughout his career, actor Michael Douglas has starred in multiple crime thrillers, yet few of those fictional narratives can match the gripping real-life tales of his own ancestors. In a 2024 episode of the show, Douglas learned about his grandfather Harry Danielovitch, and his great-uncle, Moshe, both of whom migrated to the U.S. from Chausy, in present-day Belarus. Before they left for America, both Harry and Moshe were caught up in a life of crime. Harry had been arrested and sent to prison for robbery, while Moshe was implicated in an armed robbery case in 1906, and declared a wanted man in Chausy. However, it is unclear if he was ever apprehended before he left the country.

Like many other celebrities who have appeared on “Finding Your Roots,” Maya Rudolph aimed to uncover her identity. The “SNL” alum was curious about her maternal African-American heritage and was given a glimpse into her ancestry. Through the show, Rudolph discovered her maternal great-great-great-grandfather, James Grigsby, who was born into slavery in Lincoln County, Kentucky. A census document from 1860 showed Grigsby listed without a name, but solely by his sex and age–5. This discovery was deeply unsettling to Rudolph, causing her to break down in tears. She also learned of another maternal ancestor whose owner’s grandson denied him the financial compensation and freedom promised in his owner’s will. Fortunately, he took the grandson to court and won.

What unexpected discoveries have you made in your own ancestry? Let us know in the comments below.