More Hirschenhof Latvia Revision Lists: Furhmann and Biedermann

I have been working on a series of my Hirschenhof, Latvia ancestors using the Revision Lists. So far, I have looked at Rathfelder, Lutke and Schwechheimer. In this Blog, I will look at my Furhmann and Biedermann ancestors.

Note that Furhmann pops up in two branches. Also, as my last Blog was on the Schwechheimer family, I want to find Anna E Schwechheimer at the bottom of the tree above.

The 1782 Audit of Souls

The Revision LIst is also called the Audit of Souls. I will peruse through that list to see if I can find where the Furhmanns lived then. Here is the listing I want at the Raduraksti web site:

Confusingly, the listings for this Audit were under the Estate name. I see a Furhmann on Farm 40 (or possibly Family 40, but I think it is the Farm number):

Jacob is 45, so he was born about 1737. This could perhaps be the Heinrich Jacob in my Tree:

Ancestry has him as my 5th great-grandfather. If I have it right, I should have places for 128 5th great-grandparents. Here is the next page:

Whoever wrote this had a flair for handwriting. Here I also see that Anna Catharena Muller must be a second wife. That makes sense as I have Anna Magdalena Meng as my ancestor. The death of the first wife apparently happened betwee 12 and 5 years from 1782 based on the gap between children.

Here is my transcription:

Interestingly, Jacob’s new wife was 8 years older that Jacob’s daughter. Also there seems to be a discrepancy from the first daughter in my tree and Elisabeth Margare… in the Audit above. It is possible that the Maria Magdalena in my tree is wrong.

The 1811 Revision List (No Women Allowed)

This List is interesting, though only males are listed:

Now it is 29 years later. The elder Jacob has passed away in 1797. His son Jacob also passed in 1806. Anna Margaretha has married Johann Adam Biedermann and moved from Farm 42 to 43. However, Johann Adam has moved to Farm 33.

One confusing thing is that there is 16 years between the old and new ages. That means that this must refer to a Revision that was performed in 1795 rather than 1782.

Biedermann in 1782

That leads me to look for Biedermann in 1782. Here they are on Farm 41 next to the Furhmanns:

This leads me to believe that the Farm numbering changed a little between 1782 and 1811:

It is unclear why Sannewald took over Farm 41/43 by 1811, but there were still Biedermanns living there.

To fill out the picture, we need to look at Farm 30 in 1811:

Farm 30 is run by Philip Jacob Gangnus another one of my ancestors. Makes sense. Anna Biedermann who is Adam’s daughter will marry Johann Jacob Gangnus, but not until after 1811. I will likely do a Blog on the Gangnus family in the Revision Lists at some point.

Looks like Johann Jacob is about 35 years older than Anna. In 1811, he is listed as moving to Farm 33. The 1816 Listing for Farm 33 has him moving to Farm 43:

 

This was back where the Biedermann Family was before. The Farm is run by Siemon (Simon?)

1816

Let’s try to figure out what is going on for Adam Biedermann:

Adam is living on the Sannewald Farm again. We can now see his wife as women are listed in the 1816 Revision.

the good news is that this couple had a relatively long marriage for their time. The association between Biedermann and Farm 33 is still not totally clear.

The 1834 Revision Lists

My first inclination is to look at Farm #43:

My question is whether Adam was a subtenant meaning that he lived below the average income level of the Colony or whether there was some other reason for him living under Sannewald.

I need to write this out on my Excel spreadsheet to make sense of it all:

Now, another 18 years have gone by. Johann Adam Biedmann passes away in 1832. There is no mention of his wife who likely also passed away.

We think that Elisabeth Juliana has married old man Gangnus. Hopefully, I will find her when I do my Gangnus Blog.

Eva Fuhrmann

I had found Eva previously on my Blog on the Lutke family. Here she is in 1858 on the Female side of the Revision List:

She was on Farm #2 at the time.

I think that the best strategy would be to look for Eva’s father in the 1811 Revision List. It looks like Friedrich Simon Fuhrmann was born in 1782, so probably missed the 1782 Audit. Friedrich Simon should be 29 at the 1811 Audit. The 1811 Revision List referred to an earlier Revision which was 16 years earlier, so that age should be about 13 years old.

This could possibly be Friedrich Simon in 1811:

The birth seems to be two years off, but this seems to be the right name. He is said to be associated with Farm 11. I was able to find a Simon Fuhrmann on Farm 11 in 1811 with the help of Ancestry:

Simon is listed with son Gustav Woldemar who was 3 in 1811 so born in 1808. Now, I have two issues. One is that I did not have a father for Simon Furhmann and I do not have parents for his wife who is Anna Elisabeth Schwechheimer. My theory is that Anna Elisabeth was perhaps the sister of Johann Schwechheimer and that Simon Furhman who was Anna’s husband was the son of Jacob Fuhrmamm. Here is the hint that got me to the above image:

This is either a typo or poor transcription or perhaps be a hint that Simon was married to the sister of the head of the farm.

I then found more Furhmanns in the 1816 Revision Lists:

Simon Furhmann is at Farm 42. Here is my attempt at a transcription:

I added Jacob as Simon’s father:

However, my conclusion is that Jacob is the same as Heinrich Jacob, the father of Anna Maria M Fuhrmann above. However, when I add in Simon:

I see that Friedrich Simon was born after the death of Anna Magdalena Meng. The answer is in the 1782 Audit of Souls:

Jacob married Catharina Muller and had Anna Charlotta, Eva Christina and Friedrich Simon.

There, I think that is right now.

I added these children in for the family of Simon Furhmann and Anna Elisabeth Schwechheimer:

 

I think that Woldemar died young as I did not see him in the 1816 Revision List.

I think this shows that Johann Gangnus and Anna Jacobine Lutke were half second cousins to each other.

Summary and Conclusions

  • It was perhaps ambitious to look at the Biedermann and Fuhrmann Families together in the Revision Lists, but it was helpful to do it that way due to the interrelationships between the two families
  • The Revision Lists are a wealth of information when it comes to the structure of family units. It would be extremely difficult to put thes families together without these family lists.
  • I was able to add additional family members to my ancestors families.
  • I was able to see how my two Fuhrmann branches were related to each other and added Anna Catharina Muller as an ancestor.
  • I will likely try to wrap up some loose ends in an upcoming Blog before I delve into my Gangnus ancestors families in the Revision Lists.

 

More Hirschenhof Latvia Revision Lists: Schwechheimer

In my last Blog, I looked at my Lutke ancestors through the eyes of the Revision Lists. The 1850 and 1858 Lists have been posted on Ancestry for easy access and earlier lists can be found at the Raduraksti web site.

Schwechheimer Genealogy

I avoided looking at Schwechheimer in my previous Blog as I have two different Schweccheimer Lines in my genealogy:

One goes back from 1823 and another is two generations earlier. Schwechheimer is a name that goes back to the early days of the Hirschenhof Colony in Latvia. Before that, the Schwechheimer family lived in Germany in a town named Altlußheim on the Rhine River:

By the way, I was wondering what Schwechheimer meant. I was having trouble finding an answer, but then found a blogger who supposed it meant ‘one from Schwechheim as that is apparently a Town in Germany. Unfortunately, I have not found a town with that name and spelling.

I found Rosine already when I looked at my Rathfelder ancestors in the Revision Lists:

In 1850, Rosine was living in Hirschenhof on Farm 3 with her husband and young children.

Johann Gottfried Schwechheimer in 1834

This looks like Gottfried:

I was a little surprised to find this record at Ancestry, as I did not know that they covered the 1834 Revision Lists. Here, Gottfried was living at farm XI:

This is my attempt at transcribing the 1834 Revision List for the Schweccheimer family:

Green is meant to indicate my direct ancestor. I count that Johann’s wife had 16 children. That is a lot:

I must have this information from a Gangnus book that I bought.

Schwechheimer in the 1818 Revision Lists

It looks like the farm number is where the family number used to be.

It looks like some extended family was living on the farm. Probably explained in German notes that I didn’t look up. I have that Johann’s mother lived until 1822, but I do not see her in this Revision:

She should have been about 66 years old in 1816.

1811 Male Revision List

We will not see Anna Maria in the 1811 List as it contained women only:

I am getting lazy, so I will not transcribe this Revision. I assume that Johann and Johann George were brothers. It looks like the sons of Johann George made their way to other Farms within Hirschenhof if I am reading it correctly.

1782 Audit of Souls

Here we see the family is on Farm 8. However, I wonder if the numbering was different in 1782 from what it was to be in 1811 as there always seems to be a change.

This is an interesting snapshot as it adds another generation to my Schwechheimer ancestry. Also I finally found Anna Maria Schmidt.

My Ancestry Tree reveals some discrepancies:

  • I am missing Johan George born about 1770
  • I am not sure if Silvester is the same as Georg Michal Schwechheimer
  • I am missing Maria Magaretha born 1767

Some Genealogy for Johann Markus Schwechheimer

I found this Ancestry Tree interesting:

However, why is Anna Maria now Conrad instead of Schmidt? The reference for this tree has different surnames:

Here we have Schmidt which I have and Krieger. The Geneanet page makes more sense:

Here he marries Anna Maria Krieger who dies and then he marries Anna Maria Schmidt who was 25 years younger than his first wife and she has the other children.

It turns out that I found Anna Margaretha in the 1782 Audit on Farm 26 in Hirschenhof:

She is 27, so born in 1755. It all seems to check out. Here is more from the Geneanet Tree:

This follows the Hauk Line.

Schwechheimer DNA

In an 2018 Blog, I had this connection:

Wolf has other connections. However, Wolf never got added to this Schwechheimer DNA/Genealogy Chart:

George Michael was noted in the 1811 Revision List above as going to Farm #28. Here is Wolf’s Line added:

Wolf’s tree carries the Schweccheimer Line back to the 1500’s:

Wolf has the family in Atussheim, Germany the whole time. However, there is some confusion in his tree:

Wolf has Anna Maria Schmidt married to Johann MarkusSchwechheimer. She dies and then has all her children which cannot be right. The mistake must be due to what Geneanet shows – that Markus married two women with the same name: Anna Maria. Based on the 1782 Audit above, it is clear that Anna Maria Schmidt was alive at the time and born about 1746.

At Ancestry, Markus is in 18 trees. None of them look quite right, but the combination of these two trees looks good to me:

Anna Elisabeth Schwechheimer Born about 1784

Anna is from my Gangnus to Lutke to Furhmann side of my tree:

This appears to be one record of their marriage:

I will look more for Anna Elisabeth when I look at the Furhmann Family in the Revision Lists in a subsequent Blog.

Summary and Conclusions

  • Looking at my Schwechheimer ancestors in the Revision Lists helps me to focus on that family
  • These lists show relationships to other families and where famiily members moved to
  • By following a MyHeritage Tree I could see where the Schwechheimers lived in Altusheim, Germany going back as far as the 1500’s.
  • I was able to clear up a complicated issue where one early Schweccheimer (Johann Markus born 1727) appeared to have two wives both with the same first and second names. He was an important ancestor as he was the one who made the jump from Germany to Hirschenhof, Latvia.

 

More Hirschenhof Latvia Revision Lists: Lütke

In my previous Blog, I went over many of my Rathfelder ancestors who were listed in Hirchenhof, Latvia in documents called revision lists. It occurred to me that many of my other Latvian ancestors should be listed there. Here is the Latvian part of my family tree:

My choices are Schweccheimer, Gangnus, or Lutke as my grandfather’s grandparents other than Rathfelder. I have a book on Gangnus and there are two lines there, but I would like to try Lutke as I do not know much about that Line.

I see that I have very few DNA matches on the Lutke Line:

Lutke in the Revision Lists

Anna Jacobine was my 2nd great-grandmother born on Wirt 2 according to my records. It would be perhaps easier to track her down by her husband first.

Jacobine in 1858

Here is Jacobine with her husband in 1858:

As a bonus, I see my great grandmother Maria Elisabeth Gangnus:

Of course, she was just a baby in 1858.

Here I just wrote down the bare minimum as I was interested in Jacobine. My interpretation is that this family went from #10 to #8, but I am not sure.

Friederick in 1858

Here, I think I would do better in finding her father.

This is interesting as Friederick lived on Farm 2 and was family 3. From my last Blog, I had that my Rathfelder side was from Farm 3 and Family 4. I guess there was a next-door marriage.

This is the picture I see for 1858:

  • Jacobine Lutke moves from Farm 30 to marry Philip Gangnus some time before 1858 and has Maria Elisabeth.
  • Friedrick Lutke lives at Farm 2 in Hirschenhof which is presumably where Jacobine was born.
  • Other children of Friedrick need to be added to my family tree.

This is what I have now for Friedrich. He has more children than Jacobine:

Next, I will look at the Raduraksti Revision Lists. Here is the Link:

I mention this because it is not obvioius when looking for Hirschenhof. I found what I was looking for on page 318 of 620:

Interestingly, the surname shows as Lutchen rather than Lutke. This is either a variation or the name has changed in 8 years.

Next, I can start to add family members to these two Lutke families. This is a little complicated for Carl Heinrich Lutchen as Anna Charlotte Maertz appears to be a second wife. Here is a marriage record for Johann Heinrich:

Going back another Revision may clear this up. I also found this tree at Ancestry which clears things up:

It appears that the 1850 Revision mixed up Jacobine and Friedricke and that this tree is correct above.

Lutkes in 1834

This is on page 88 at the Raduraksti Web Site:

Right side of Page:

This is what I need to check as I have that Carl Heinrich Lutke was married to Maria Eva Buchenroth. Here Jacobine is back as the elder sister to Friederike. Here is my transcription showing three generations of my Lutke ancestors:

The 1816 Revision

Here is where my Buchenroth ancestor  comes in.

I assume that Maria Eva Buchenroth passed away between 1818 and 1834 and Carl Heinrich Lutke married Anna Charlotte Merz.

Lutke in 1811

I like the title page:

This was the ‘not women allowed’ Revision:

This is easy to write down:

This yields an extra generation of Lutke: my ancestor Friedrich born around 1756.

The 1782 Audit of Souls

Here the Lutken family is at Farm 13, or they are family 13.

If I read this right, Anna Elisabeth had Adam Johann when she was 47?

Here is a baptism for Carl Heinrich:

It looks like he was born on 25 January 1770. This is a bit confusing as I have that he was born in 1772 and that his mother was a Stolts. This mother appears to be a Dannewald. Or perhaps Dannewald was a sponsor or Godparent.

Here is an entry for 1773:

I wonder if this child died young. This Ancestry tree confirms that:

This 1771 record seems to contradict the 1773 record – though there could have been two children with the same name.

One goal from this exercise is to fill in the Lutke families on my Ancestry Tree:

 

Here are the three Trees at Ancestry give to me as hints for Ernst Friedrick Lutke:

From the 1782 Audit, I have 4 of the possible 6 children. We know that Johann Friedrick Wilhelm died young, so that accounts for 5 of the possibel 6 children from Ancestry trees. That leaves Magdalena Dorothea (without dates) as being unaccounted for. I would be satisfied to add the children as per the last Tree.

I now have this vertical fuller view of the Lutke family in Hirschenhof:

The families got larger in each generation. So this is three generations of the Lutke family with the fourth generation being Jacobine Lutke who married a Gangnus.

Here is a photo from Hirschenhof of one of the farm dwellings:

Summary and Conclusions

  • The Audit of Souls and Revision Lists give a peek into the family makeup of many of my Lutke ancestors
  • They also give an idea of where these famlilies lived and who they lived near.
  • These Census substitutes were quite advanced for their time giving a lot of information not normally found elsewhere.
  • I was able to add a lot of sibling information, fiilling out my Lutke familiy trees.
  • I was also able to confirm the following Lutke wives’ surnames of Furhmann, Buchenroth and Stoltz.

Rathfelders and Latvian Revision LIsts

I just saw on Facebook that Ancestry has the Latvian Census and Resident Registers, 1854-1897. Let’s take a look. I did a search for Johann Rathfelder and came up with this entry:

This should be under the category of audit or revision lists and gives names of residents. The headings are in Russian, but the entries are in German. I’m not sure I had this before. Unfortunately, I am not sure how to read it. This appears to be a snapshot of some of my ancestors in 1850. We see Johann Rathfelder who was 31 in 1850. That makes sense as I have that he was born in 1819. This is what I have in my Ancestry Tree:

The audit list also has Heinrich Rathfelder who was my great-grandfather. The question is: where are the rest of the children? The answer would be that they were not born yet. Ancestry further has this information in part:

Here is the information to the right of what I had above:

Here we see Rosine Schwechheimer who was 27 in 1850. She was the wife of Johann and my 2nd great-grandmother. My interpretation is that Johann and Rosine had two daughters at the time: Wilhemine and Charlotte. I see that I had mentioned Wilhemine in a 2016 Blog. I found her birth record in 1844:

I think she was born in July?

How to Read Revision Lists

I have found many online sources on how to read these lists. Here is some information from Luse Genealogical Research:

It appears that I have the 9th Revision from Ancestry. Here is an 1858 example from the same site:

It is interesting that there were so many of these Revision Lists. Also I take note that it is important to follow the family and household numbers. As I zoom in, I see some fascinatiing information which can be applied to my ancestors:

As I suspected, the large roman numerals refer to the number of the farm. Here is the previous page to the Johann/Heinrich Rathfelder page:

My Rathfelder family was living on Farm #3 in 1850. I don’t know if the Farm numbers translate to this map or not:

I only see one family number for this family which is #4. Would it be safe to say that all these Rathfelders were siblings?

Here is my interpretation of the 1850 Revision List for Farm #3:

Some parts were difficult to understand. I did notice numbers 2-5 for Peter, Ludwig, Johann and Gustav. I don’t know if that means that these were four brothers with the possible addition of Georg Rathfelder. Here is what I have at Ancestry:

It does not seem likely that Johann Georg Rathfelder and Anna Charlotte Mertz would only have had one child.

Hirschenhof in 1858

While searching around in Ancestry, I came upon the 1858 Revision Lists for Farm #3:

 

Ludwig and Johann are still part of Family 4. This still suggests to me that Johann could be siblings with Ludwig and the others. Here is the previous page:

Raduraksti Website

I would like to back in time from 1850 as suggested by many ‘how to’ web sites:

It appears that 1834 woule be the next logical step. However, I could not find anything that looked like Rathfelder in those records. Either that, or I was in the wrong section of the site.

Find the Estate

One tip I read said these records are listed by estate name.

That appears to be Helsreischof. Who knew?

Eureka!

Here we are in 1834. This is page 89 of 620 at the Raduraksti Site. The writing is quite scrolly. This Revision refers back to one that was 18 years earlier (1816).

Rathfelders in 1816

I can go back further. This is page 44 of 620:

It seems that the Rathfelders are now family #3. Notice there are fewer Rathfelders in 1816. However, the picture seems to clear up:

I have what I believe to be my ancestors highlighted in green. If I am reading the 1816 Revision List correctly, it appears to say that George Rathfelder had Johann who then had three sons. Comparing that to the 1834 Revision List implies taht after Ludwig, Johann had Johann (my 2nd great-grandfather) and then Gustav.

Here is what I have on my Ancestry Tree:

Where the Revision list has George, I have Hans Jerg. Where the Revision List has Johann born about 1779, I have Johann Georg born 1778. This appears to be the birth record for Gustav:

My guess is that Gustav was born on 23 December 1821 and baptized on the 26th of December.

Thanks to the Revision Lists, I have added six siblings to my 2nd great-grandfather’s family:

Rathfelders in Hirschenhof 1811

This Revision did not include women. The transcription is in the next section.

 

The 1782 Audit of Souls

This Audit is more difficult to read. However, I suspect that I should find many of my ancestors in this audit. Here are some:

They are either family 65 or at Farm 65.

Here is my transcription:

 

 

Green is meant to indicate one of my ancestors. I am impressed with how good these revision lists are. The Census for the US up to 1850 was not as good as these. A few notes:

  • I added birth year to make it easier to track people between Lists
  • For 1782, I added a Gagnus family as they were ancestors of mine also.

400 Years of Rathfelders

Years ago, a German Rathfelder researcher sent me an article about Rathfelders. Here is Blasius:

Something seems off. If Blasius was 46 in 1782, then he would have been born in 1736. That means he would have been 11 when his first son was born. I’m guessing that he was born closer to 1726. The above article gives his third wife as Maria Ursula Sannwald. I was having trouble reading her surname in the 1782 Audit of Souls.

Confusingly, Hans Herg is also Johann Georg (my ancestor):

Hans Jerg (or Johann Georg) Rathfelder had two Johann Georgs and one Gerog Adam. I guess he liked the name Georg. My ancestor Johann Georg was the first, born in 1778 and listed as Johann (as underlined above) in the Revision Lists.

Adding DNA to the Mix

Here are two matches to my mother:

These are large DNA matches for 4th cousins. There may be other points of connection. However, the thing that is interesting to note is that these two lines are from two brothers bother named Johann Georg Rathfelder. However, my ancestor went by Johann and the ancestor of the two sisters above went by Georg.

Finishing the Picture – Adding 1858

I did not include three Bittenbinders who moved to Farm #3:

This shows the connection between Revisions:

 

Summary and Conclusions

  • It was helpful for Ancestry to get me started on the 1850 and 1858 Revision Lists for Hirschenhof
  • From there, a web page unlocked the Russian headings for the 1858 Revision Lists.
  • Next, I used the Radaraksti Web Site to get the earlier revision lists. I needed to know the Estate name which was different than the Colony name. I found this a bit confusing.
  • These revision lists give a good picture of who was living near each other – or on the same farm in each period.
  • These revisions also gave me names for the six siblings of my second great-grandfather Johann Rathfelder born in 1819
  • It may be interesting to trace some of my other Hirschenhof surnames in these Revision Lists.

 

More ThruLines through Abraham McMaster born about 1764

In my previous Blog, I had some success in documenting some descendants of Abraham McMaster born about 1764 in Kilmactranny Parish, County Sligo, Ireland. Here is my descent from Abraham:

The relationships are a bit confusing as James McMaster married Fanny McMaster. Also, in one of my trees, I have another Abraham between Abraham and James McMaster. However, I have that they were both married to Margery, so they may be the same people.

My Sister Lori and Daniel

My sister Lori has some good McMaster matches:

Daniel matches Lori on the Robert McMaster Line. Unfortunately, it looks like Daniel’s tree is private and he is not taking messages. Here is how Ancestry shows the connection between Lori and Daniel:

I’ll assume that Ancestry got Daniel’s grandfather right and go from there. First, I’ll create a floating tree for Daniel. That is a tree that is not connected to my Hartley Tree, but one that I hope will connect.

This appears to be Joseph and family in 1940 in Hopkinton, Massachusetts:

It looks like Gertrude had previously been divorced:

Gertrude’s mother matches what Ancestry has so far:

Next, I would like to look for Annie Stafford’s mother:

Here is Annie or Mary Ann’s birth record:

Here is the family in 1880:

Catherine’s death record gives her father as Robert McMasters and her mother as unknown.

My McMaster Web Page has a Catherine born in 1851:

That is interesting, but no proof for the ThruLines.

The couple was married in Boyle Registration District:

That was followed by a trip to the US in 1872:

Catherine should have been about 20 at this time. Interestingly enough, I have their marriage record in my records:

The marriage was at the Kilmactranny Parish Church. I feel that this information puts Daniel’s McMaster ancestors back at Kilmactranny Parish in Sligo.

Updating the McMaster DNA/Genealogy Chart

Here is the connection:

This is an interesting part of the family. Ron in green is related to me also, but more closely on my Clarke side. The chart also brings up the question as to why I don’t have Edward on my web page under Robert. It is clear that Edward was not born in 1851. There was a period in the Kilmactranny records where there were no entries. This was roughly between 1830 and 1841. My guess is that Edward was born at the later end of that period.

I notice this record at Ancestry:

This 1924 record has Edward almost 78 years old which puts his birth back to about 1846. I am guessing that he was born 1841 or before. The 1851 birth date was from Edward’s Naturalization Papers.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I was able to make a connection between my sister Lori and Daniel. They are 5th cousins once removed
  • I would be interested in finding other McMaster relatives who have had their DNA tested where the results are shown in a chromosome browser
  • Daniel’s match has enhanced the information of the Robert McMaster family of Kilmactranny Parish, County Sligo.

 

 

My Cousin Paul’s Theories of Relativity

MyHeritage does Theories of Relativity. They are like Ancestry’s ThruLines. MyHeritage compares ancestral trees and matches them with DNA matches. This can be very helpful. I have looked at Paul’s Theories in the past, but they need updating.

Here are Paul’s Theories:

These Theories will be from the Frazer and McMaster families as that is where Paul and I match. Here is an update of my chart:

This is my attempt to be more comprehensive in my look at Paul’s Theories. For example, I don’t have Melanie on Paul’s DNA Painter profile, but I don’t need her there as her mother is already there. I have one of the John’s on my McMaster DNA/Genealogy Chart, but I forgot to put him on Paul’s DNA Painter profile. The blanks are ones that I appear to not have looked at yet.

John on the Robert Line and DNA Painter

Here is John on the Robert Line:

Paul and John should be 4th cousins and MyHeritage’s Theory of Relativity agrees. Here is where Paul and John match:

The Chromosome 8 match looks large, but it is only 6 cM which is below the standard amount that DNA Painter will add.

On Chromosome 14, John adds some new mappimg area. On Chromosome 18, John shows that matches with Emily, Raymond, and Faye are actually on the McMaster side and not on the Frazer side. Further, it explains on which McMaster line this DNA comes from:

My second great-grandmother Margaret McMaster had two McMaster parents. This DNA was from the James McMaster side.

Painting John to My Sister Heidi

Heidi and John match on the first two chromosomes:

Heidi’s match on Chromosome 1 was too small to paint. Here is Chromosome 2;

The blue matches are on my Hartley side. Here, John’s DNA identifies the match with Susan as being on the McMaster and not the Frazer side. I didn’t have other DNA painted from Abraham McMaster and his wife, so I added that for Heidi.

Painting John to my Sister Sharon’s DNA Painter Profile

Sharon and John:

Sharon’s Chromosome match with John is large enough to paint.

Again John paints a new area for Sharon on Chromosome 1 and identifies other Frazer/McMaster matches on Chromosome 2.

Paul and Brian

MyHeritage shows:

I will create a floating tree for Brian. Here is an obituary for Ethel:

In 1900, James McMaster was a farm laborer in Hinsdale, Massachusetts:

Here is Hinsdale:

Here is the tree I have so far:

This tree is following the Theory.

Here is some more information on James McMaster (which my tree shows as McMasters):

According to the 1880 Census, Charles McMaster must have been born in Ireland:

Unfortunately, Charles had apparently died as Rachel shows as a widow. I notice that Brian has this interesting note on his family tree at Ancestry:

I would tend to agree with Brian. The William I descend from had children who were etiher in Ontario or stayed in Ireland.

I see that this is likely the same family in 1870 in Berlin, New York:

Ancestry has the surname as McMartus, though I can also see where this could be McMasters. The transcriber has Mary Blowers which makes sense as Brian has Rachel as Rachel Blowers.

I also see that Berlin is not far from Massachusetts and Vermont:

Here is where Brian matches my cousin Paul:

Here I have put Brian under Abraham McMaster, on Paul’s DNA Painter profile though there were some doubts as expressed above:

That tells me that Paul matches his Frazer relatives on the McMaster side on Chromosome 2 where those matches over lap with Brian.

Paul and Berenice

Paul and Berenice show as 4th cousins at MyHeritage. I’m going to shortcut and not evaluate Berenice. Besides, she shows as a 1st cousin to the John I already have on this line.

Paul and Brad

I don’t recall this match:

Unfortunately, Brad’s tree is missing some information:

It appears that Brad would have his mother a Long rather than a McMaster. Brad does show his paternal grandmother as a McMaster:

It looks like I can fill in some blanks. John had Andrew who married Evelyn:

That should be enough to go on for now. This stone is from the West Bothwell Cemetery in Ontario:

However, something still does not add up. MyHeritage has that Brad is in his 70’s. That means that he was born in the late 1940’s or early 1950’s. If Evelyn was mother this would make more sense as she would be in her 20’s at that time. The person who manages Brad’s DNA is clearly the daughter of Evelyn McMaster. I will assume that Bev is Brad’s sister.

It looks like Evelyn would have been about 32 when Bev was born. Here is Evelyn in 1931:

Below is Evelyn potential great-grandfather William at age 98. I think that it will be difficult to place this family with certainty.

Here is where Brad matches Paul by DNA:

The 1891 Census appears to show an extended McMaster family group:

William J is living with siblings and parents: William and Sarah McMaster. An elder Eliza McMaster is also living with them. She is perhaps the grandmother bron about 1810.

William’s parents names are given on his death certificate:

This says that William’s parents were Abraham McMaster and Bessie Johnston. I have this already on my McMaster DNA/Genealogy Tree:

I had added in the past to the Abraham McMaster/Bessie Johnston Line but did not save it. I’ll add Brad now.

We think that Eliza made it to Ontario and perhaps her husband. Also I see that brothers William and Mark McMaster both married Crundwells.

Next, I add Brad to Paul’s DNA Painter Profile:

These are new sections painted to Paul’s chromosomes and the first from the Abraham McMaster/Bessie Johnston Line. This raised Paul’s overall painted DNA from 12 to 13%. That doesn’t seem like much, but I am only looking at Paul’s paternal side, so he is painted 26% on his paternal side.

While I’m at it, I’ll add Christina’s match to Paul on his profile:

I also mention Christina in my previous Blog.

Paul and Justin

Here is a progress update. Hopefully it is accurate:

Se that there are twice as many identified McMaster Theories compared to Frazer Theories. Justin shows in the Frazer camp:

I am initially skeptical of this connection. Here is the full Theory:

Many on the connections have low probabilities of being correct. I’ll move on to the next Theory.

Pamela and Paul on the McMaster Side

For some reason, two generations show as ‘Deleted profile’. First, I will try to recreate Pamela’s tree but putting Pamela in my tree as a floating tree. It appears that Elsie’s father should be Archibald:

Here is Steiglitz, near Melbourne:

I borrowed from an Ancestry tree to see that Archibald is actually Archibald McPherson III.

In my own tree, I have this information:

This is from an email I received in 2009.

So my tree for Pamela should have a McMaster by now, but has a Tait:

Here we have possibilities:

  1. Archibald had two different wives
  2. One tree is right and one is wrong.
  3. There was more than one Archibald born around 1860

Here is a gravestone from Meredith, AUS:

Meredith appears to be in the right part of the World:

I am not sure where the confusion is, but I am going with the Archibald from the gravestone above. My tree has an Archibald born 1860 and another Ancestry tree has this Archibald McPherson born 1867. I am not sure if this is the discrepancy:

So between the DNA match, my old email and other Ancestry Trees, I will add this Line in to my tree. This appears to be the other McPherson, buried in Gisorne:

I’ll add Pamela to my McMaster DNA/Genealogy Chart:

Here is Pamela on Paul’s DNA Painter profile:

This is confusing as this shows overlapping DNA from the McMaster and Frazer side on Chromosome 12. This suggests that Suzzanne could be related on the McMaster side.

Finally, Paul and Josephine

Josephine is Paul’s last Theory at this time:

 

Based on other Archibald McMaster/Elizabeth Meehan descendants, this connection seems likely. Paul and Josephine match on Chromosome 14 in this area:

This is the John that I mention earlier in the Blog who descends from Robert McMaster.

Based on the share matches between Paul and Josephine, the connection seems pretty certain. Here is Lalbert where Elizabeth McMaster Meehan was buried:

Here is a birth record for Margaret Mary Meehan borrowed from an Ancestry Tree:

This record is helpful:

Again, I will borrow this record from another Ancestry Tree:

That seems to close the circle. I will now add Josephine to my McMaster DNA/Genealogy Tree:

All that is left to do is to add the DNA match to Paul’s DNA Painter Profile:

Here is a summary:

Summary and Conclusions

  • It was helpful to look at Paul’s Theories at MyHeritage as Paul is one generation closer to common ancestors than me or my siblings.
  • The McMaster tree is quite large. This is just the tree I go back on on my James McMaster side. I have another tree for Fanny McMaster who married James McMaster.
  • The McMaster families that I tracked were in the US, Canada and Australia.
  • There was some confusion on some of the Frazer Theories. The connection for Justin was unclear. I already know the connection for Joanna, but MyHeritage did not show the right connection. This is understandable as the connection is a bit convoluted. I already had the connection to Suzzanne, but when mapped on Paul’s DNA Painter Profile, it appears that Suzzanne’s connection could be on the McMaster side.
  • I agreed with Brian that his McMaster connection was through Archiabald McMaster, but based on naming conventions, I could also see the possibility that he could be connected on the William McMaster side.

 

Updating My McMaster DNA Matches

I recently noticed a new McMaster match at MyHeritage. This match came up the strongest for my second cousin Paul as he is a generation closer to the common ancestors. Here is how the match shows:

I cannot see how Geoffrey and Paul match specifically on each chromosome as that information appears to be blocked. Geoffrey’s tree was also private but he shared it with me. Here is a DNA/Generalogy Chart I already have for part of the McMaster family:

I circled my family and the Meehan Line where Geoffrey is. I’ll add in Geoffrey:

Paul and Geoffrey are 4th cousins. My family and I are 4th cousins once removed to Geoffrey.

McMaster ThruLines

Here is what I have for Abraham McMaster ThruLines:

This points out an error on my Chart:

The two Abrahams I have pointed to above should be the same person. As the third Abraham was born 1809, that line should be mnoved to the right. The Chris at the bottom of that line corresponds with the Chris on my ThruLines:

Checking Tamara’s McMaster Connection

I would like to build out a tree for Tamara. This is one of those human vs. computer challenge, to see if I can verify what the Ancestry Computers came up with. Tamara’s tree is small, but seems to be workable. I’ve never done a floating tree before and the consensus seems to be that is the way to do these. I just watched a video on how to do this. I have to connect a person to my tree and then disconnect that person.

I’ll add Tamara as a daughter to my grandmother and then disconnect her. I did this, and then I removed her fake parents (who were my grandparents). Now she is floating. I put Tamara in under her maiden name, so I want to add a married name, so she will be easier to find if I need to.

Now Tamara has the first ‘floating tree’ in my AJoelHartley Tree. I had to rename my tree AJoelHartley previously because I had so many non-floating trees. So far, Tamara’s tree matches up with the ThruLines Tree. However, that is as far as Tamara went on her paternal side.

My best guess is that this is Warren Stirling in the 1931 Ontario Census:

This shows that the family lived in Enniskillen, Ontario at the time. Also, Stirling’s father was born in Ontario and named Herbert Tims. According to this record, Herbert’s parents were both born in Ireland.

This obiturary ties the father and son together also – especially as Tamara has her father buried in Wyoming, Ontario. If I have the right place, Enniskillen is close to the US:

Here is a portion of the marriage record for Herbert George Tims:

This gives his mother’s name as Mary Ann McMaster. Mary Ann’s death record gives helpful information:

I expect Eliza Johnson is meant to be Eliza Johnston. The reference to Roscommon is interesting. Most McMasters were from Sligo. However, I believe that the Johnston family was from Roscommon. Both families lived near the border between Roscommon and Sligo. I feel that this is enough evidence for me to add Tamara to my McMaster DNA/Genealogy Tree:

The relationship appears to check out. Tamara is my 4th cousin once removed. This information needs to be reconciled with my McMaster Website:

One possible explanation is that Abraham remarried Eliza Johnston and had more children. On another of my McMaster Web Pages, I mention 3 Abraham McMasters as referred to in a lease for William McMaster from 1812. Or, on a current reading, there could only be two Abrahams mentioned in the Lease. That means that it could be that the Abraham McMaster who married Margery was different from the Abraham McMaster who married Eliza or Elizabeth Johnston. One interesting possibility is that the William McMaster who is the subject of the lease is my ancestor born around 1790 who married Margaret Frazer.

This is the tree I proposed in a previoius Blog:

Adding Mary Ann McMaster to My Tree

This was fairly easy. I just chose Abraham McMaster in my tree and added a daughter. I picked choose from tree and chose Mary Ann McMaster:

Now I see why the floating tree method is preferable. By the way, ThruLines is showing these relationships to be half relationships. My assumption is that they are full relationships. The confusion is perhaps about who the wife of elder Abraham McMaster was.

A Floating Tree for Eliot

My assumption is that Elliot belongs in the tree. In fact, it looks like the family married back into the Johnston Line. This is the only information that Elliot has on his paternal grandfather:

The ThruLines could be right, but I do not have enough information to go on.

My Sister Lori’s ThruLines

My sister Lori has more than the average amount of McMaster ThruLines compared to her siblings.

Lori has 7 potential matches under Abraham, son of Abraham McMaster. When I open up Lori’s Mark McMaster matches, I see Chris who is already on my McMaster DNA/Genealogy Tree:

A Floating Tree for Jean

Jean and Lori have Chris as a shared match as well as two McMasters, So that is a good sign. Jean has a small tree including her father who was born in Ontario:

Otto’s death record is helpful:

This gives both his parents’ names. The 1921 Census has Otto’s grandfather born in Ireland which is a good sign:

Here is George and his father Mark (transcribed as Mary by Anncestry) in 1891:

Here is Mark in 1861 with his family living in a log home which was the usual residence for the area and timea:

This is helpful as it gives the children of Abraham and Eliza McMaster. On my McMaster DNA/Genealogy tree, I already have Mary Ann and Mark:

I’ll add Otto under Mark:

My Sister Lori and HH

Adding HH would add antoher child of Abraham. The ThruLines has William H McMaster born in 1831. However, the 1861 Census above has William at 23 in 1861 which would mean William was born closer to 1838 or 1839.

First, I have to create a floating tree for HH:

It looks like HH’s mother Annie needed a birth cerificate and got a delayed one in 1970. Here is the family in 1921:

The family is listed as Methodist and father Thomas works on a farm.

Here are a few McMaster families living next to each other in 1891:

My guess is that the Eliza is Eliza Johnston McMaster. Next, I just need to associate this William with the William in the 1861 Census. Here is Bothwell, where William lived in 1891:

I see that in 1871, William was also in Zone, Bothwell:

He appears to be still single, but head of household with his (assumed) parents, Abram and Eliza. Next door, is assumed brother George and more family. I feel like this is enough evindence to add HH to my McMaster/DNA tree and to my Ancestry Tree. When I added William McMaster to my tree, I had a duplicate Elizabeth Johnston, so I had to merge the two into one at Ancestry.

What I notice is that all these matches are at Ancestry, so I don’t have the specific area where on my family’s chromosomes where this line matches.

Lori and Christina

I looked on MyHeritage for Lori and saw this match:

Christina must be the sister of Jean from Ancestry. I’ll add Christina to Lori’s DNAPainter Profile:

The red indicates DNA from Abraham McMaster at the top of my chart or his wife. This just further confirms that these matches go back to Abraham McMaster in the 1700’s (or his wife):

This also confirms the relationship of the three brothers: Robert, James and Abraham McMaster.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I looked at a match Geoffrey on the Meehan Line of McMasters and added him to my McMaster DNA/Genealogy Chart
  • I looked at some McMaster ThruLines at Ancestry
  • These ThruLines that I looked at descended from Abraham McMaster born 1809. He is probably the one who is mentioned in an 1812 Lease by William McMaster
  • Abraham moved to Ontario as did my other William Branch of McMasters
  • I employed the floating tree method for those who I added to my Ancestry Tree while verifying the ThruLines.
  • I found a match at MyHeritage on the Abraham line. I was able to add this match to my sister Lori’s DNA Painter Profile. This further solidified the connections between the elder Abraham McMaster family (born perhaps in 1764.

 

 

 

A New Clarke DNA Match at Ancestry

I have very few DNA matches at Ancestry on the Clarke side. For that reason, I was glad to see that I have a match with Melissa. Ancestry also shows that Melissa and I have the likely common ancestor of Thomas Clarke:

One interesting thing that I see is that Melissa’s great-grandmother died 57 years after my great-grandmother. Melissa has a very nice tree at Ancestry:

This shows her paternal line going back to Thomas Clarke and Jane Henderson. Whereas, I am descended from Thomas’ first wife who was Jane Spratt.

Clarke DNA

According to Ancestry, Melissa and I are likely half 3rd cousins. That can be a good thing as that means that I am related to Melissa on her Clarke side only and not the Henderson side or Spratt side (assuming Thomas’s two wives were not related). My match of 22 cM fits in well with the expected relationship:

Shared DNA Matches with Melissa

I notice that two of the matches I have with Melissa have Lougheed in their ancestry. That name has come up a lot in my matches in the past. Here I started to look at shared DNA matches and put them into a spreadsheet:

At first I tried to look at whether the shared matches were shared with my siblings that tested at Ancestry (Heidi, Jon, Lori and Sharon). Then I looked at shared matches with DE who was the largest shared DNA match between myself and Melissa. I only looked at my own shared matches . with DE. This would take a long time to go through all the permutations, but I did come up with a lot of Lougheed or Loughead ancestors. This suggests to me that Thomas Clarke has a Loughead ancestor. This is actually helpful as that makes me think that my Spratt ancestor Jane who married Thomas Clarke may not have Loughead ancestors.

Mapping Clarke DNA

It has been difficult to map the Clarke DNA. That is because until now, my Clarke DNA matches have aslo been McMaster matches in earlier generations. This is what I have for myself at DNAPainter:

It would be helpful to map my match with Melissa also, but her match is at AncestryDNA and AncestryDNA does not show where the matches are o the Chromosome. If Melissa were to upload her results to Gedmatch, FTDNA or MyHeritage, I would be able to see where we match on the specific chromosomes.

More on the Genealogy

I feel no need to check on Melissa’s genealogy as we have a DNA match and the connection from her grandfather to our shared 2nd great grandfather seems clear. I have Melissa’s great-grandmother Susan as the eldest of the second wife of Thomas Clarke:

That means that my great-grandmother, Margaret Clarke would have been about 3 yeaers older than Susan Clarke. The 1911 Census turns out to be important for Susan Clarke:

This shows Melissa’s grandfather, Hubert bell with Hubert’s parents. Here are Susan and Henry’s memorial stone:

Here is where the Carrownanty Cemetery is outside of Ballymote:

Susan and the Clarke family was from near Collaney and my great-grandfather was from near Derry on the map be Lough Arrow. It is interesting that my great-grandparents apparently met in Boston. Here is Tonaponra where the Bell family was in 1911:

I find it interesting that Henry Bell has Tiraree on his memorial stone as that was not too far from Ballindoon where my Frazers were from:

I am guessing that these two places are about 4 miles apart.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I found what I believe to be my first DNA  match from the Clarke/Henderson Line
  • As Thomas Clarke married first Jane Spratt who died young and then Jane Henderson, any shared matches between Melissa and myself must be from the Clarke side only
  • Looking at the shared matches at Ancestry, makes it look like Thomas Clarke could have Lougheed or Loughead ancestry from County Sligo.
  • If Melissa uploads her AncestryDNA results to Gedmatch, MyHeritage or FTDNA, I will be able to see on which Chromosomes she matches with my siblings and myself and perhaps other DNA matches.
  • I have learned some more about another line of Clarkes which is always interesting.

 

 

Updating My Hartley Bradford DNA Connections at Ancestry

I had previously looked at Josiah Bradford in a Blog in 2019. At that time, my father’s cousin Joyce’s ThruLines for Josiah Bradford looked like this:

Now, in addition to the two matches on the Jesse Bradford Line, Joyce shows two additional matches:

I like to draw trees for the people that I believe are true DNA matches and match by genealogy, but my Bradford tree is quite out of date:

I had previously looked at this connection with Joyce in 2019:

My Bradford DNA/Genealogy Chart is starting to shape up.

My Match with Rollie

If I could confirm Rollie’s genealogy, that would firm up the Stephen Bradford connection. Rollie has a nice tree which I have no reason to doubt:

Rollie has Stephen, son of Stephen moving to Illinois at some point:

This 1870 Census seems to confirm that:

1850:

1860:

That means that Stephen went from Engraver in New Hampshire to a farmer in Illinois around the age of 50. I feel like the rest of the line should fall into place – I’m a bit lazy today.

Here is the connection I come up with:

Note that brothers Stepen and Alexander were born 1815 and 1838. They are first and last born in the family.

Back to Josiah

From the review of my 2019 Blog, I think that I thought that the Jesse Line would be OK. Here is the William to Jesse Bradford Line added:

New Matches on the William to Josiah Line

I had this image earlier in the Blog for my father’s cousin Joyce’s ThruLines:

This is interesting as I also match Joe. Unfortunately, Joe’s tree does not support this ThruLine:

The other match in pink shows a Bradford connection:

I’ll start with this Howard connection and build out a tree. Here is Glenn Deforest’s birth’s record from Waltham, MA:

It looks like Glenn’s father was a machinist. I get his parents names also from Social Security. Here is Everett’s aka Everard’s marriage record:

Looks like I need the second page:

 

 

The good news is that Evererett’s father had an unusual name. The bad news is that people messed up the name in the records. Here are two Maltiah’s in the 1860 Plymouth Census:

Unfortunately, the child I saw on the Census as Josiah, got transcribed as Jonah. I take him to be named for Josiah Bradford.

Here is the marriage record:

This is the tree so far:

According to North America, Family HIstories:

I note here that the name Josiah is correct. Josiah Bradford apparently married a Polly Robbins in 1803:

FindaGrave appears to confirm that Josiah’s father was William Bradford:

I take Polley to be the same as Mary Bradford, but I may be wrong. I see the trees at Ancestry have her as the same person. Molly is a derivative of Mary and Polly is a derivative of Molly.

This matches up with my own tree:

William’s wife was Ruth Dunham.

The ancestors with large families such as William Bradford’s above born in 1749 were more likely to pass down DNA to subsequent generations.

My Brother Jon and the Matilda Bradford Line

My brother Jon has these three matches:

None of these trees lead to Bradfords. I can make my own tree for Joe to try to see if his tree is wrong or if Ancestry is wrong.

Here is Joe and mother Doris in 1940:

Interestingly, Doris’ mother was the head of the household and not the husband. Here is Doris’ birth record:

Doris’ dad was an embalmer born in Plymouth. Based on this record, I accepted the Ancestry hints for Doris’ parents.

Arthur was born in Plymouth, though his parents were living in New Bedford at the time:

I think I see the problem. Joe’s tree does go back to our common ancestor who was Josiah Bradford:

However, Ancestry seems to be missing Weston Vaughan and Ella May Stephens in the tree. Based on the above birth record, I will accept Ancestry’s clue for Arthur’s parents and follow on Weston Vaughan:

Weston’s marriage record has his mother as Matilda. She is the one I’d like to follow:

Unfortunately, Arthur’s birth record does not give his mother’s maiden name either. Here is the family in 1870 in Plymouth:

We see Matilda’s maiden name on her marriage record:

I have set out to prove either Ancestry’s tree wrong or Joe’s tree wrong. It looks like Joe’s tree is right and Ancestry’s tree is partially wrong. The key is that Matilda married young and had her son Weston at a young age. Her marriage record says she was 18 when she married. The 1870 Census suggests she could have been 17 when Weston Jr. was born. That is what Ancestry did not have for some reason.

Here is Matilda’s death record:

Matilda’s father was a clergyman based on the 1850 Census in Plymouth:

Matilda is mentioned in FindAGrave:

This should bring me back to my own tree and close the loop:

Here is some more information from Ancestry:

The Ruth here would be Ruth Dunham from my tree.

I’ll add Joe into my Bradford DNA/Genealogy Tree:

Joseph is 5th cousin twice removed to Joyce and 6th cousin once removed to my family.

Bradford ThruLine to Barbara

Oddly, when I check my brother’s ThruLines now, they no longer have Joe. Perhaps the ThruLines were recalculated:

However, it doesn’t matter as I have what I believe to be right on my Bradford DNA/Genealogy Chart.

It shouldbe easy to check Barbara’s tree as I just need to get up to Matilda Bradford. Barbara has a small tree:

The other interesting thing is that this tree apparently goes through the Ransom side and not the Vaughan side. I found Etta’s birth record, so accepted the hint for her parents:

The hint for George Ransom’s mother is Rev Mary S Faunce. Here is the marriage record for George and Ida:

Here is George’s birth record:

I am skeptical that Mary was a Reverend. Here she is in Pembroke in 1880 keeping house:

I guess I was wrong. Here is her obituary:

This gets us back to Matilda Bradford born 1813. So I see the Ancestry ThruLine was correct this time.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I was able to show genealogical connections and probale DNA connections between my family and many other Bradford families going back to Josiah Bradford born 1724 and his wife Hannah Rider.
  • There was one generation missing on the ThruLines for Joe Vaughan, but I was able to find that and add it in.
  • These ThruLines change often. The one for Joe was changing as I was writing this Blog.
  • My Bradford DNA/Genealogy Tree was quite out of date and I was able to add two generations to it going back from Harvey Bradford on my family’s side.
  • The DNA matches appear to confirm the previous genealogy work that I have done.

 

 

 

 

 

Playing with Gedmatch Tier 1 2024 Finding Common Ancestors

I have one of my many colds this winter, so I’ll take some time and sign up for Tier 1 of Gedmatch.

MRCA Search Tool

I don’t remember using this tool before. Before I used it, I had to make sure my Kit# was associated with my family tree. My famiy tree was uploaded in 2014, so it is quite old. I suppose that I should update my tree at Ancestry. I’ll look at what I got, and then update my gedcom at Gedmatch.

This is the first part of my list:

What I first noted was that the path to the primary kit (mine) was very long. I am seeing 6-13 genertaions. After watching a video on this utility, I see that the last column is important. It gives a score of how accurate it thinks the matching is out of 10. So the first on my list, Hannah Bartlett has a match of 2 out of 10 which is not good. John Spooner, further down, gets a 7 out of 10.

Our Path to John Spooner

Here is the path column:

I have not checked this Wilhelm Line, but it does not look unreasonable. I would like to see what the DNA match looks like, but I do not see a link to find this on this utility. I ran a one-to-one match between myself and my match with Spooner ancestry:

The match shows on Chromosome 11. To make sure this was a paternal match, I ran my paternal phased kit against this match and got the same results. Here is my Chromosome 5 mapped by DNA Painter:

I have an arrow where the possible Spooner DNA would be. I say possible because at 9 generations away, a lot could have happened. I think that SImone tested at 23andMe.  I am tempted to add this match just for fun. All the green matches are my second cousins. A few are first cousins once removed. Here is what I have for John Spooner on my tree:

Here I added in Spence on DNA Painter under SImone:

James Hartley was born in 1862, so the gap between him and John Spooner is over 200 years.

Updating My Tree at Gedmatch

First, I need to download my tree from Ancestry:

Before I got here, I had to choose Export Tree. When I chose download your Gedcom file, I ended up with two files as the Export already created one. First, I deleted my old Gedcom at Gedmatch. I’m not sure if this was the right way to do it.

When I uploaded the Gedcom, I got some errors based on not putting down the sex of the person:

There were other errors, but I just let the software do what it did.

Running a New MRCA Report from Gedmatch

This time I will use a minimum match score of 3 as recommended in a video I saw. This report is taking a while to run – perhaps because the gedcom I have now is larger. The report gave me 84 potential MRCA’s:

Here is a name on my list that catches my eye:

William Bradford gets a score of 8 which is very good.

However, I see an issue as there are two William Bradfords born 11 Mar 1654. I show to be 9th cousin once removed to this match. However, it appears that these two William Bradfords are the same which would move our connection closer by one generation. However, there is a disconnect. The death date of my William Bradford is very clear as he died in a carting accident in 1687. That means that he could not have had a daughter named Bethia born in 1692. Perhaps the Gedmatch scoring system is not the best.

Hiller MRCA?

Fifth on my list of 83 ancestors is a Hiller:

I recognize the match name (not shown here) from Ancestry. Here is the path:

I am a mere 7th cousin to this Hadaway on paper – and a DNA match. Here is where I match Hadaway:

My family seems to be related to other Hillers at Ancestry, so I think that this is a good match for me. I’ll add this person to DNA Painter:

My belief is that Hadaway (shown in purple) shares Hiller DNA on my Chromosome 2 with myself and my father’s first cousin Maury. This is likely shared with some of my other siblings.

Elizabeth Warren

The second match on my list is Elizabeth Warren:

This match is different as only the wife is mentioned in the match.

I assume that it came out this way as she descended from one of the Mayflower Pilgrims. To keep this consistent, I’ll enter this in DNA Painter under the husband who was Josiah Finney:

This is a fairly large match at Gedmatch:

Here as in other of my Hartley areas, this has connected my 1860’s common ancestor 2nd cousins, shown in green above, with my 1660’s cousin (seen in a bronze color).

So far, I have added to my colonial side on Chromosomes 2, 5 and 10:

The genealogy is fairly easy for these colonial matches. These matches are also helpful as it tell where my Hartley DNA from Lancashire, England is not.

Edward Richmond – Out 11 or 12 Generations

All this DNA has to come from somewhere. This is my first MRCA match:

I do show an Abigail Richmond in my tree. I also show that Edward Richmond married Abilgail Davis. I’m am liking Gedmatch’s MRCA utility as it is so easy to use. Next, I’ll map this match with Audrey:

However, this match with Audrey is showing a problem as there is an overlap with one of my Frazer relatives, Brenda. Further, when I have mapped my Chromosome 22, it has come out as being all Frazer, so this Hartley match cannot be right here. Let’s try to figure out what went wrong here.

When I look at Audrey’s tree, she has matches from County Sligo. My guess is that her match is on my Clarke side that I have not found many ancestors for. Or it could be on the Frazer side where I have some missing wives. Some of these names and places in Audrey’s tree have come up before, but I have not been able to place them within the genealogy:

 

In addition, some of my McMaster ancestors were from Dromore, County Sligo. That could be the best explanation for the connection. I have deleted Audrey from my Chromosome 22 as a Colonial American match, but she likely matches my McMaster ancestry. Interestingly, my fourth potential MRCA is with Dave. He matches on Chromosome 22 also. He must be related to Audrey.

An Almy Connection?

Matches 6 and 7 on my list have this connection:

 

I don’t have the inclination to check out the genealogy here. The DNA match is here:

I already have Debra in that spot. I had our conection on the Hatch side. From a Blog I wrote, I see that there was also a Palmer connection in Rhode Island. This connection is certainly on the Rhode Island side. Actually Debra is match #7, so is the same person. Match #6 must be her son.

I’ll just change the ancestors to Almy at DNA Painter. At 1601, that would likely be my oldest painted DNA and perhaps the most suspect for that reason!

Resolved White 1615

This match goes back to the Pilgrims.

First, I’ll check the DNA:

This is Chromosome 19 which is Frazer territory for me:

My Frazer ancestry is Irish, so clearly not Pilgrim material. It is possible that I have this Pilgrim connection, but not based on the shared DNA.

Benjamin Bartlett with a Score of 6

I’ll be sure to check the DNA match:

The match is out on the right side of the paternal copy of my Chromosome 7:

I have a lot of Frazer DNA on that Chromosome, but room for some Hartley on the right side.

I don’t show Ichabod Bartlett in my tree, but my tree may be incomplete. A book I have shows that Benjamin Bartlett had three wives and 6 children. The first three children were born from Sarah Brewster (including Rebecca Bartlett). The first wife apparently had no children. The last three children including Ichabod may have been from a third wife named Sisilla.

I’ll add Blair and Bartlett in pink to my DNA Painter profile:

It is not a large match and I could not put two ancestors down as I am only sure of the Bartlett ancestry.

One More? Joseph Sylvester

Joseph gets a rating of 5, but that is just on the genealogy match. I have checked the DNA to confirm that the match is on my Hartley side.

Joseph is on the Pilgrim side, born in Plymouth Colony. I do see an Amos on my genealogy tree, so that is good. I’ll add this match into DNA Painter.

Here i have added a small clump of DNA to my profile which I have said is either from Joseph Sylvester or Mary Barstow.

Summary and Conclusions

  • This is an easy tool to use
  • I needed to check my DNA matches to make sure that they were in the right area and right side – in this case paternal side.
  • I have a lot of colonial genealogy. Many others likely do too, so the bias is to match on those genealogies.
  • I did not go through the whole list, but I would guess that at least half of the matches would not pan out due to genealogy, DNA matches in the wrong area or other problems.
  • It is easier to disprove that a DNA match could not go with the shared genealogy than to prove that it does.