I am the administrator for my wife’s Aunt Elaine’s DNA at Ancestry. Recently, I got notifications that she had close matches, so I thought that I would take a look. I am not sure who the close matches are, but I can look at her ThruLines.
The Genealogy
Here is Aunt Elaine’s Tree:
The major lines are:
- Ellis – Prince Edward Island roots
- Rayner – also PEI
- Uphsall – Newfoundland
- Daley – Nova Scotia
She has Canadian Maritime ancestry.
Elaine’s ThruLines
from Elaine’s grandfather siblings’ descendants, Elaine has 27 DNA matches. That is a lot. Actually, I missed some matches off the right:
Here are 14 more matches for a total of 41 matches.
Here is what I have for an Ellis DNA tree:
This tree is from 2022, so it must be outdated. Here is the part that corresponds with the ThruLines above:
Note that in this tree, I have George’s siblings: Richard, Eva and Bertha. In the ThruLines, I see Richard, of course, with 20 matches, but then Marianne, John and Ellen. Then there are Sarah, Reubin, Bertha, Eva and Serena. It appears that we have some low hanging fruit to update this chart.
Now I need more genealogy. Here are the children of James Henry Ellis and Clarinda Gorrill:
I would like to at least add Marianne, John William and Ellen.
Marianne Ellis born 1875
Ancestry wants me to evaluate Evelyn and Erma Ruby Williams. They do not appear to be in my tree right now:
Also Marianne’s children are shown in grey, which means that I have not assign male or female to them. I can at least do that based on their names. For Evelyn, I need to look at the 1911 Census:
Marianne is Mary E. here. E. is for Ellis.
Let’s look at the 1921 Census:
Marianne’s mother was living with them. Ancestry transcribes Erma as Emma, so I chose Erma as per the ThruLines. Marianne had a lot of daughters!
Unfortunately, I ended up with two sons which I believe should be one. I can merge these two back together where they belong. I do not see much information on the trees of Karla or Kelton, but I assume due to the close 2nd cousin match that they are related. I do see this for Evelyn Williams:
One way to make sure that these two are right is to see if they match each other:
Yes they do by 34 cM.
So I didn’t add these two to my Ellis DNA Tree due to lack of availability on their Ancestry Trees, but I did go one generation down from Marianne Ellis in my tree.
The John William Line
I would be surprised if these four matches were not in my wife’s Ellis Tree. Here is EE’s paternal side tree at Ancestry:
In 1931, I see John William as a grocery store merchant, but where is his wife?
Here is the family in 1921:
Enid is transcribed at Mannie Ernst, but I think it should be more like Minnie Enid. I missed Enid in the 1931 Census:
Enid apparently marries young, but where is her husband? The Ellises are listed as Church of England and Enid is Presbyterian. Enid’s obituary fills in some details of her life:
Finally, I check EE’s shared matches and I find Shane as expected:
I have to have a separate Ellis DNA Tree for James Henry Ellis:
Here I have Shane who also has MacArthur in his line – a likely additional relationship to Elaine.
This tree will likely grow quite a bit.
Ellen Mary (Ella May) Ellis
Here is my current tree:
Kent has a small DNA match with Elaine:
Kent’s Ancestry Tree is a bit different:
He has Ellen Gillis instead of Ellen Ellis. I will leave Kent off my tree right now, even though it seems he should be there.
Reubin Ellis 1890
ThruLines has changed it’s look – perhaps to fit more people in. I’ll try to add TM to my tree in the conventional way adding him as a floating tree. T.M. has an Ancestry Tree:
However, it is difficult without T’s father’s or grandfather’s name to go backwards in time.
Here is Reubin in my tree:
Here is the family in 1931:
Reubin was a farmer in 1931. Here is some basic information on Jean:
I would say that and the large DNA match are enough to put these two into my Ellis DNA tree. I’ll just check the shared matches. These are shared matches between T4 and Elaine sorted by closeness to T4:
I see that T4’s father is listed. I wonder why he does not show up on Elaine’s ThruLines? I also see T4’s brother Kirby on the list. From shared matches, genealogy and DNA matches, this is what I get:
Sarah Ellis 1886
I will look at Sarah and then take a bread from the extensive Ellis family.
Elaine shows two matches on this line. I already have two children of Sarah in my Ancestry tree. Here is Shelley’s Ancestry Tree:
Ancestry conveniently outlines the common ancestors of Shelley and Elaine. I assume that Shelley knew who her grandfather was, but I can put Shelley in as a floating tree and then connect her.
It is clear from much information at Ancestry on Sidney that she connects, so I will add her in to my tree.
Sadie fits in between Richard and Reuben Ellis.
Next, Rebecca has her maternal grandmother as an Enman:
We find out quite a bit about Wilma in the Portland, Maine, newspaper;
I will add in Rebecca to my tree. I do note that Wilma’s mother was a MacArthur which likely adds to the DNA matching.
Summary and Conclusions
- DNA matching at the 2nd cousin level is pretty much a sure thing
- Some people had insufficient genealogy at Ancestry or private trees. This kept me from adding a few people. However, it it likely the connection is correct
- The only thing that confuses the DNA matching is that many people from PEI are related on different lines. This could cause a higher match than expected.
- Due to the large Ellis families and many Ellis descendants taking DNA tests, it would take a long time to review all the matches and add them to my Ellis DNA Tree.