Frazer-Johnston DNA and Genealogy: Part Two

In my previous Blog on the Frazer-Johnston connection, I looked at John’s DNA results. Recently John told me he had uploaded his sister Jamie’s DNA results to Gedmatch.

The Frazer-Johnston Connection on the Frazer/Stinson Line

John and Jamie are in the light blue. This is a good Frazer line as there are some on the line that are in other Frazer lines such as Jane, Michael and the yellow group. John and Jamie as well as the purplish line, Cathy and the bright green line are represent people that are believed to be in the Archibald/Stinson Line only. That gives some surety in what the DNA matches might mean. However, it could result in smaller DNA matches. There is a tradeoff.

The Johnston-Frazer connection is quite old. At the top of the blue line is a Mary Frazer born at the end of the 1700’s. She married William Johnston born about 1790. Having any information from Irish records before 1800 is considered great. I have more detailed genealogical information in my previous Blog.

Let’s Jump Into Jamie’s DNA

Well, not literally. The results are a little surprising:

Jamie is on the row below the top of the solid box in the bottom right. That box represents those that are only in the Archibald Frazer/Stinson Line. This shows that Jamie does not match anyone that is just in that line other than her brother John.  Jamie’s largest match is with Richard who I believe to be the only one that is only in the Philip Line.

We can look at the Jamie/Richard match when I look at the specific matches later. However, there are a few explanations for the match as I see it now:

• Jamie and Richard would be 5th cousins, once removed through the Frazer side. That is pretty far out. The further out the relationship is, the more random the match is. That is likely why Richard and Jamie have a 31.6 cM match as 5th cousin once removed and why Jamie wouldn’t have a match with some of her 4th cousins that are in the Archibald Frazer/Stinson Line.
• A second reason would be that Jamie could be matching on a line we don’t know about. We don’t know who the wife of Philip was. Also Jamie doesn’t know the name of the mother of the William Johnston that married Jane Frazer in 1815. I noted in a previous blog that a later Philip Frazer, married a Jane Johnston also in 1815.

Moving across, we see that Jamie matches Emily and Paul who would not be in the Frazer/Stinson Line. However the same reasons apply for them as applied to Richard. Note also that Emily and Paul are of the same generation as Richard, so more likely to match. Here is the whole Archibald Line:

Paul is at the bottom of the third blue column. Emily is shown to the left of Paul in the above image.

Dancing with DNA

Here are Jamie’s specific matches with those in the Archibald Line of the Frazer DNA Project:

 

I tried to put the matches into the appropriate Frazer Lines. Jamie has more matches with those in the Stinson Line. However, Jamie has higher matches with those that are not in the Stinson Line. Anywhere Jamie matches more than one person on a segment, there is a possibility of triangulation. Ir looks like Jamie could triangulate on every chromosome above except for Chromosome 12 with Paul.

Frazer Triangulation

Triangulation should mean common ancestors. This trouble is figuring out who those common ancestors are. As this is a Frazer project, and we all have Frazer ancestry, the assumption is that the common ancestor is a Frazer. However, there are other possibilities.

TG03

This TG can be shown like this:

The theory is that this TG points to either Archibald Frazer or Ann Stinson. Not both. However, we don’t know which unless there is a match to a Frazer that is not related to a Stinson or a Stinson that is not related to a Frazer. I have a spreadsheet that has a compilation of TGs and the triangualtion above I have previously named TG03C. So I added Jamie to that group.

TG17

This is a TG I had found when I looked at Richard’s results. Unless there is some other connection, this TG appears to go all the way back to Archibald born about 1743 or his wife Mary Lilley.

Note that my sister Lori and I are in the Philip Line as well as the Richard LIne. I didn’t put us in the Richard Line to save space. The same with Michael. Only his first ancestor in the Stinson Line is showing in peach color. It is tempting to think that I am matching Richard on the Philip Line and Michael is matching Jamie on the Stinson Line, but that is only one possibility.

More About Chromosome 17

Here is my TG Spreadsheet for Chromosome 17.

I’ve squished it together a bit so it would show better. Note that Doug is in a purple TG with Bonnie and Beverly. Bonnie and Beverly are on the more distant James Line. I also note that Richard matches Doug from 70-74M on Chromosome 17. So something is going on here between the Frazer Lines.

Let’s look at this from Richard’s viewpoint. Here are his matches on Chromosome 17:

This shows that Richard has a large match with Michael. Interesting, but confusing.

A New TG Chromosome 18

This is a little like the previous TG. Is the DNA trying to tell us something? It seems to be saying that there may be a connection the Philip and Archibald/Stinson Lines that we don’t know about. Or, it is just a good match up to the Archibald born in the 1740’s and his wife Mary Lilley.

TG20

Here Jamie is added to an existing TG.

Triangulation Group Summary for Jamie

 

This spreadsheet accentuates what I have been trying to explain in this Blog. It seems like John and Emily have an affinity for the left side of the spreadsheet and not so much for the Stinson side. This could be by chance. However, there could be other explanations. What if Philip who we think may have been born in 1776 married a Johnston? That would tie these families together – I think.

 

Here I tried out my theory. I had a feeling that Michael would not fit in to this cinfiguration. However, his match with Jamie was small at 7.6 cM and could be the one that goes up to the Archibald born in the 1740’s. The tree above seems to fit the DNA. However, I’m sure there could be another explanation.

Here is another, simpler explanation. Under this scenario, Philip did not have to marry a Johnston. This would have Mary as Philip’s daughter instead of Archibald’s. This would require some rejiggering of the genealogy.

The above seems to fit the DNA better, but remember that DNA can be fickle.

My Two Laws of Genetic Genealogy

After looking at genetic genealogy for several years, I have come up with two laws:

1. The DNA is trying to outsmart you. The matches you have are generally not on the ancestors that you were expecting.
2. Your ancestors are messing with you. They married relatives and did other things to intentionally confuse us to keep us from figuring out their genealogy.

Summary and Conclusions

• Jamie’s results gave some different results from her brother John. This is normal and is one reason why we test siblings.
• Jamie’s DNA results showed no clear affinity for the Archibald/Stinson Line. This could be due to chance DNA inheritance or other reasons
• I gave two guesses as to the other reasons. One was that Philip born about 1776 may have married a Johnston. The other reason is that the Mary Frazer that married William Johnston could have been a daughter of Philip Frazer rather than Archibald Frazer. I like this option as it seems to explain the DNA matches.
• There may be other explanations. As always, more DNA testing could bring in more answers.