Adding to My Mother-in-Law Ellis’ DNA Map

I learned something interesting recently. My wife’s mother’s DNA seems more endogamous than my wife’s father’s. Endogamous means that your ancestors tended to intermarry with each other’s cousins. One way to check this is through AncestryDNA. Here are some numbers for Joan:

Divide Joan’s close matches by all her matches and multiply by 100 to get a percentage. I get 9.6%. For Joan’s sister Elaine, I get 10.5%. My wife’s father is not at Ancestry, but his two sisters are. For Lorraine, I get 7.3% and for Suzy, I get 7.6%. That means that there was more intermarriage on the Ellis side than the Butler side. The higher the percentage, the higher the intermarriage rate. I had assumed, that as half of Butler was French Canadian, that there would be more intermarriage there, but the PEI and Newfoundland ancestry of the Ellis family trumps the Butlers.

Updating Joan’s DNAPainter Map

This is what I have:

The higher percentage Joan has explains why I had trouble finding consistant common ancestors for some of Joan’s DNA matches. Many matches had more than one possible set of common ancestors. Joan is 36% painted overall now. I would like to bring that number up a bit in this Blog.

Ivan at MyHeritage

MyHeritage has DNA and Trees, so is a good place to start:

Based on Joan’s ThruLines at Ancestry, George seems to be a likely son of Peter Upshall:

Ivan overlaps with two people who have Dicks genealogy:

That means that Ivan could have Dicks genealogy or that Edna and Cheryl could have Upshall genealogy. There are even other possibilities!

Glenys at MyHeritage

Glenys matches on the Upshall Line:

She shows as a 2nd cousin once removed. I can check on the tree quickly. Glenys has her mom as Gladys Upshall from Newfoundland. She has her grandfather as Theordore Malcolm Upshall from Harbour Buffett. That is where my wife’s ancestors came from, so that makes sense.

This record at Ancestry is helpful:

I painted Glenys in, but she did not add any new DNA.

Irma at MyHeritage (MacArthur)

The MacArthurs had a large family, so Joan will have a lot of 4th cousins from that line:

Here are the ThruLines from Ancestry:

Joan has 175 matches, with 55 matches on her Marion MacArthur Line. The Effie MacArthur at MyHeritage is probably the Euphemia at Ancestry. Let’s add in Irma:

On Chromosomes 4 and 9, the MacArthur DNA is bumping into the Ellis DNA, so something could be off in the genealogy on one or both sides.

Unfortunately, I’m not up to sorting it our right now. My guess is that Irma could have Ellis ancestry.

Mervyn on the Upshall Side

Mervyn is also on Ancestry:

Based on Joan’s 7 matches to descendants of Susan Upshall, I’d say it is time to add Susan to my wife’s ancestry tree.

The match on Chromosome 2 is interesting:

Mervyn is matching the Dicks. However, if Chris Dicks married a Collette for example, this would make sense as Mervyn is also a Collette.

Richard on the MacArthur Line

It is not clear to me why the top person was deleted. It seems clear that it would be MacArthur/MacDougall. I’ll just assume the genealogy is right.

Richard filled in some paternal DNA for Joan on Chromosomes 1 and 17, but her overall painted percentage is still 36%.

Rebecca: Another MacArthur Descendant

Rebecca comes down by way of Hugh MacArthur:

Rebecaa matches Joan on Chromosome 11:

Rebecca’s match overlaps a bit on the Rayner side. My colors are a bit off. I need more contrast between MacArthur and William Ellis. Also between Ed and John Rayner.

Rebecca brings Joan up to 37% painted overall and 29% paternal.

David at MyHeritage: A New Line?

David matches on the Gorrill/Newcombe line.

David’s match is on Chromosome 14 and gets Joan up to 31% painted (from 29%) on her paternal side.

Rhonda on the Ellis Side

I feel like I have a long way to go here:

Rhonda shows as a third cousin twice removed to Joan.

The match on Chromosome 17 should indicate that the match with Debbie should be on the Ellis side and not the Gorrill side.

Wendy on the Newcombe/Pring Line

This would be a new set of ancestors to map:

Joan and Wendy have a different possibility at the 5th cousin level, but I will stick with this option. First, I’ll check on William, son of William Newcombe. I see this in the 1851 Census for Devon, England:

That means that that William and Mary had a pretty big family.

This results in a bit of a mess as Chromosome 2 shows overlap with other families. Something to work out at a later time! Also, I see that other trees have names other than Pring for Mary.

Wayne on the MacArthur Line

The tree looks legit. We have come across Euphemia or Effie before.

Wayne fills in a bit of a gap at the end of Chromosome 4 for Joan:

Wayne also matches Joan on Chromosome 18 but only in areas already covered by other matches.

Devin on the Dicks Line

Bonnie on the MacArthur Line

I have had good luck painting in the MacArthur line:

Bonnie gets the paternal side up to 32% painted:

She fills in some missing area on the paternal side of Joan’s Chromosome 12.

Richard on Joan’s Daly Line

Joan doesn’t have many matches on her Daly side:

Richard is a good find. That brings Joan up to 44% painted on her maternal side and 38% overall. For some reason, the Theory above shows ‘deleted profile’. Here is Richard’s tree on his maternal side:

Richard would be a good candidate for an X Chromosome match to Joan based on their genealogy. However, MyHeritage does not show X Chromosome matches.

Loretta with a Single Ellis Common Ancestor

 

According to MyHeritage, Joan and Loretta are 1/2 third cousins once removed. That means that they only have one common ancestor who is James Henry Ellis born in 1801. That also means that the DNA that these two share comes from James Ellis.

Loretta’s matches with Joan are on Chromosomes 9 and 11. On Chromosome 9, Loretta fills in some blank space. On Chromosome 11, Loretta’s matches indicates that Marianne’s and Melissa’s DNA are from the Ellis and not the Gorrill side.

Janet on the Dicks Line

Janet fills in a small blank in the maternal copy of Chromosome 15:

Shantall and Hopgood/Watson Common Ancestors

Shantall provides the first painted in segment for Joan on her Chromosome 22:

Sharon on the Rayner/Simmons Line

Sharon is Joan’s first paternal side match on Chromosome 10:

This match tips the scales and gets Joan up one percent to 33% painted paternally and 39% overall.

Clarice on the Rheihold/Hurst Line

Clarice is the first maternal side identified match for Joan on Chromosome 16:

A Small Rayner/Hopgood Match with Brian

This small match was the first for Rayner/Hopgood and shows at the very beginning of Chromosome 9:

Josh on the Hopgood Line

Josh is the last Theory of Relativity at MyHeritage that Joan has right now:

The Theory has a few deleted profiles, but the genealogy seems alright:

Josh is the first painted Hopgood/Yeo segment:

Summary and Conclusions

Here is the new map for Joan:

  • I was pleased overall with looking at the Theories at MyHeritage. They added many new segments
  • I didn’t add some segments as there were multiple close common ancestors
  • There were some theories especially on the MacArthur line where the genealogy was messed up, so I didn’t try to fix the genealogy.
  • I was hoping to get Joan up to 40% painted. I think I can do that by working out the MacArthur genealogy or looking at Gedmatch for DNA matches. This can be handled in a subsequent Blog.
  • The interrelatedness of some of Joan’s ancestors presents some challenges when looking at the DNA.
  • I enjoy making these maps, but it can be a time-consuming exercise.

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