Category: DNA General

Posted on

Nicholson Enhanced Shared Matches

I have been looking at Enhanced Shared Matches in several recent Blogs. I have used different methods in doing those. In this Blog, I will take a look at my Nicholson Enhanced Matches. The goal is to identify some new matches. These are matches without trees or trees that are unhelpful.

My Nicholson DNA/Genealogy Chart

This chart is already large:

Perhaps because of all the connections, it would be fairly easy to make some more connections. Now my grandmother was a Lentz, but her mother was a Nicholson. I have found many Nicholson connections but not many Lentz connections. I plan to look at Lentz in a subsequent Blog.

Going Down My Mother’s Maternal Matches

The first match is my older sister. After that, Eric shows a common ancestor. After that, the people are not easily identified. In addition, there are two matches over 200 cM that I have not looked at – at least on my mother’s match list.

Jessica

Here is Jessica’s tree:

She is a bit of a mystery as I have not figured out how she connects to my mother’s genealogy. That leads me to believe that Jessica’s genealogy could be wrong. Jessica is Angela’s sister, but Angela has a private tree:

If Angela and Jessica are sisters, then they could descend from William Lentz:

Doris

Doris has no tree. However, she shows as a possible 1st cousin once removed to Barry:

Here is Barry’s paternal side tree:

I added Barry onto my chart here:

Barry is my mother’s second cousin once removed. He descends from Martha Baxter Nicholson. Martha stayed in the UK when the rest of the family moved to Philadelphia.  If Doris is a 1st cousin once removed, she could be from a sibling of Martha Jane Dockrill.

Marian

Marian’s closest match is to Matthew:

Unfortunately, Matthew does not have a tree.

Paige

I already added Barry, so Paige is next on my mother’s list of matches. Judy shows as Paige’s mother:

Here under Grandmother Judy, I have replaced mother with Paige. I had a question with Judy as I was a liitle shaky on the genealogy. Further down the list, I see that Justin is Paige’s son, so Haiven’s brother. I will add him in also. That means we have three generations of a tested family. Of course, to be complete, I should get around to adding these people to my Lentz chart also.

Karen

I already have Haiven and Robert on my chart, so I’ll look at Karen. Karen should be easy to figure out:

Karen shows as Joshua’s mother. Somehow, I lost my NIcholson chart, so I added her on my Lentz Chart:

Other, than losing a chart, this is going pretty well. Fortunatey, I have a copy on my other computer. Karen is my mom’s 2nd cousin twice removed.

Colleen

I have Robert and Heidi on my chart, so I’ll look at Colleen. She has an unlinked tree, but there is only one person in the tree. Eric is Colleen’s father, so there is another easy add.

This is starting to fill in the William Lentz Line.

Rachel

I don’t think I need Shared Matches to fill in Rachel:

Rachel’s paternal side tree has this:

Albert Pote Allen is already on my chart:

I’ve added her in. She is my mother’s 2nd cousin once removed.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I started out looking for my mother’s Nicholson Shared Matches, but ended up just looking at her maternal matches which was easier.
  • These matches included Nicholson and Lentz Matches
  • Many of these matches had a high cM value and were easy to place due to other close identified relatives showing up in the Shared Match List
  • Due to the success of this exercise, I would like to continue this in a subsequent Blog

 

 

 

 

Posted on

Fun with My Frazer Enhanced Shared DNA Matches at Ancestry

I recently signed up for Pro Tools at Ancestry. The only Pro Tool I have used so far is the enhanced Shared Matches. One Quarter of my ancestry is Frazer. Then that goes back to Clarke and McMaster, so I’d like to take a look at what I have.

Here is my grandmother’s tree so far:

I’m stuck more on the Clark side.

Frazer Enhanced Matches

I’ll start here as it should be simpler than the Clarke side:

Many of these matches are from FTDNA, MyHeritage and 23andMe. Enhanced matches are just from Ancestry. It appears that my Ancestry DNA Frazer matches are at the third cousin level. However, that should include McMaster also technically as the common ancestors for this group are George William Frazer and Margaret McMaster.

One way to see my maches are through ThruLines:

I do have one match at the 2nd cousin level. That is Mabel. Interestingly, I match Faye, my third cousin with more DNA. Here is Mabel and my shared match list:

These are the first five after my niece:

  1. Matthew – on my chart
  2. Rebecca – on my chart
  3. Stephen – need to add
  4. Faye – on my chart
  5. B.V. – older match

Actually, I need to add Mabel. She is the sister of Raymond and Emily:

After adding Mabel, I realized that she and Emily are the same person!

Adding Stephen

I had a note already that Stephen was related to Whitney. When I choose Stephen’s Shared matches with me, I see this:

Whitney is Stephen’s Niece:

Here I have added him to my Frazer DNA/Genealogy Chart. Stephen must be Lisa’s brother and my third cousin. I made a note at Ancestry to that effect.

Here is how BV is related:

The relationship is on the McMaster side. However, William McMaster married a Frazer. This Frazer is quite distantly related to me.

The next 5 on Mabel and my match list could be more difficult:

I know how I am related to Gladys:

Our common ancestors were James Frazer and Violet Frazer. i believe that they were first cousins. I don’t think I have the other four on the list. However, I have noted previously that they all match Gladys.

Where is Lisa on My Chart?

Next I choose Lisa on my shared match list. I look on the right to see her highest shared match:

Fortunately, that match is with Linda and I have a shared ancestor with her. Ancestry guesses that Lisa is a 1st cousin once removed to Linda.

I don’t know exactly where Lisa fits in, but my guess is around here:

Lisa probably descends from James Clarence Frazer.

When I look at Spen, she is likely from the same branch as Lisa.

I get two hints for Kathryn:

Kathryn is either first cousin or haf niece to SM and Linda. I see that SM is not on my chart, so I will add her as a daughter of Clarence Frazer:

Finally, I have John on my list. John is most closely related to Brad:

However, the blue dot by Brad means that I haven’t even looked at his results.

John’s second largest match is with Matthew:

Matthew is my 3rd cousin:

John has no family tree, but his results are managed by Dawn. Dawn has this tree with her husband in it. This is her husbands part of the tree:

John’s maternal grandfather was my great-grandfather’s brother. That means that I can at least add John to my tree:

John would be my 2nd cousin once removed. I need to write to Dawn to find out if the John who took the test was her husband. It looks like from my notes that I did write two years ago, but didn’t hear back. It is helpful to have John on the Chart above as it reminds me who he is when the Ancestry match comes up.

Continuing with Mabel

Now I have only three because this is the end of page one of three of shared matches between myself and Mabel. As I side note, I could do this with my four other siblings who have tested at Ancestry and I would get different results and in different order. I don’t know about Alannah, but Matthew and Jan are on my chart.

Here is Alannah’s tree:

The Johnston name comes up a lot in my research, so that could be the link. Alannah’s highest shared match is with BV mentioned above. That match is only 47 cM. My guess is that the connection is quite old – as in the 1700’s.

Here are the first two matches on Page 2 of Mabel and my shared matches. I know where keith fits in on my McMaster side. I am not familiar with Lila. Lila’s tree shows some ancestors that came from Ireland and went to Ontario. I found a first and a second cousin to Lila, but their trees were not useful.

Five More on Page 2

I’m still interested in the list, so will keep going:

All these shared matches have some sort of tree. There is one match that I have not looked at named KS.

Morgan is and estimated 1st cousin once removed with Keith. I see that he is already on my chart.

Morgan should show up on my ThruLines, but perhaps I haven’t kept up at Ancestry with my McMaster side. Also Morgan does not have a linked tree, so we would not show on ThruLines because of that.

Mary

Mary is the sister of Lila. Mary and Lila are still a bit of a mystery.

K.S.

Here is KS’ tree:

A lot of these names have come up in my DNA matches, but they have stumped me so far. KS’ largest DNA match is with Mabel.

John

His match seems to go back to the 1700’s in Ireland on my Mcmaster or Frazer side or both.

n.f.

n.f. is most closely related to Matthew.

That means that he must descend from Hubert Frazer.

Looking at the Clarkes

Here is my closest Clarke descendant match at Ancestry:

Ronald is also related to me on my McMaster side, but more distantly, so that creates some potential difficulties.

Above are the top six shared matches I have with Ron.

Cheryl

Cheryl has no tree. However, she shows as a first cousin once removed to Kyle who has this tree:

There is the Lougheed name again. They are from County Sligo where my McMaster and Clarke ancestors lived. Frazers lived there also, but earlier, they were in North Roscommon. My guess is that Cheryl also has Lougheed ancestry.

Another unusual thing about Cheryl is that I have 13 pages of shared matches with her. I didn’t check every match but every match she had with a good tree had a Lougheed in it. One theory, based on the number of Lougheed matches is that Lougheed is the mother of Jane Spratt:

However, this match is still a mystery until I can work out the genealogy.

Nina – A Spratt Connection?

L.R. is Shani’s child, so I will move on to Nina. Here is Nina’s tree:

I think that Spratt is a relatively uncommon name. The connection must be on the Spratt side. Nina has a large match with Ed:

Deb also has a good match with a better tree:

Deb’s paternal side:

Here it is clear that Deb is in fact a half niece as Wray Lionel must have had two marriages.

Craig also has an interesting match to Nina:

That means that Ancsetry is right is saying that Craig is Nina’s 2nd cousin once removed:

Notice that there are no Lougheed ancestors. Ancestry thinks that Nina and I could be third cousins once removed. Assuming that is right, our common ancestors could be:

1775 seems a long time ago, but third cousin once removed does not seem like that distant of a relationship. However, I would not be surprised if the connection is at least a generation back. I have three out of found sibllings at Ancestry that showed shared matches with Nina and all their matches are at a lower level than mine.

Helena

Helena matches Nina and me with modest amounts of DNA:

Helena’s maternal genealogy goes back to William Spratt:

It appears that Christopher was older than average when he had Rachel and George. It is also possible that the Jane Spratt in my tree born in or around 1830 is a daughter of Christopher Spratt or a daughter of one of his brothers.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I started out looking at my somewhat easier Frazer shared matches
  • By looking at shared matches, I added some names to my Frazer DNA/Genealogy Charts. Other names I could figure out where they should be approximately on those Charts
  • I then looked at the more difficult Clarke side
  • The name Lougheed comes up quite often. My guess is that name is associated with Jane Spratt’s (b. 1830) maternal side
  • Another separate group of shared matches went back to earlier Spratts of Enniskiilen, Ireland (Fermanagh County). This line is likely the line of Jane Spratt.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Posted on

Butler Enhanced Shared Matches

Shared enhanced matches is a new feature at Ancestry under their Pro Tools. They are helpful in ferreting out matches or identifying matches with no trees by associating them close matches that do have trees.

In my previous Blog, I looked at the Butler ThruLines for two of my wife’s late aunts. It turns out that recent revisions to the Butler tree have made a lot of my older Blogs obsolete. Here is one of my wife’s Aunt Lorraine’s matches:

Lorraine’s match with Will is interesting as it brings us back an additional generation from what we had. Here are Lorraine and Will’s shared matches:

 

These are shared matches where will also matches Lorraines match by at least 20 cM. There are more matches going down. Virginia is Lorraine’s sister. Barbara descends from Edward Butler and his son George. Brian descends from Edward’s brother George of Cincinnati as does Patty. The blue dots for Charles and Jennifer mean that I have not looked at these matches. There are additional matches not shown above.

This is one way that it could work. Charles is a shared match with Lorraine and Will, but he has no tree posted. I choose Charles to get his shared matches:

 

Charles is in the the second cousin range compared to Bobbi. I know that Bobbi descends from Mary Ann. She was the son of George Butler of Cincinnati. She moved to St. John, New Brunswick and had a family. That means that Charles must be related to the New Brunswick side of the Butler family. In fact, Charles is from Halifax, Nova Scotia:

Here is the relationship between the two places:

Bobbi is on the bottom left of the image above. She is with two other DNA matches from the New Brunswick Branch started by Mary Ann Butler. Mary Ann’s sister Rebecca remained in the Cincinnati area.

Lorraine and Will’s Shared Match Jennifer

Jennifer also has no tree, but I shared match between her and Lorraine does:

Based on other matches, the link is probably on the Kirwin side:

Maureen and Lorraine are related to Michael, but Michael is much more closely related to Maureen:

Michael’s 2nd great-grandfather was from Waterford:

This may be the connection. I believe that Maureen and family are from New Jersey.

Lorraine and Patty’s Shared Match List

Patty is one of Lorraine’s biggest matches from the Cincinnati Branch:

Jeremiah is the first on page 2 of Lorraine and Patty’s Shared Match List, but he is already on my Butler DNA/Genealogy Chart. James is someone new. Here is James’ Family Tree on his maternal side:

I see three Butlers. Richard Butler was from Wexford and Adam Butler is a name that comes up in the new Butler genealogy. This is worth tracking, so I’ll create my own tree for James focusing in on the Butler connection. Even better, I contacted a Butler relative in England and he assures me that his tree is right for the Butler part.

Here is James added to the Butler DNA/Genealogy Chart:

Here are the shared connections by DNA:

 

A Peek at MyHeritage

Lorraine has a match with Marie at MyHeritage:

Marie’s tree has some familiar names:

I’ve added Marie to my Butler Chart:

I didn’t check Marie’s tree, but I’m guessing that it is right. One good thing about MyHeritage is that they show where the match is between Lorraine and Marie:

Here I added that information to Lorraine’s profile:

This is the first Butler DNA I’ve added for Lorraine and it goes back to the 1700’s. I even have an unknown category. Hopefully that will be identified at some point.

Summary and Conclusions

  • It was helpful looking at enhanced shared matches. I don’t always find out who the match is if they don’t have a tree, but I get a much better idea of what branch of the family they are from.
  • I was able to enlarge my Butler DNA/Genealogy Tree. This is a tree of DNA matches that also show an ancestral connection.
  • I looked at one match at MyHeritage and was able to map it to Lorraine’s profile using DNAPainter.
  • This is still more searching to be done for matches at Ancestry, MyHeritage, FTDNA, and Gedmatch.

 

 

 

 

 

Posted on

Enhanced Shared Matches at AncestryDNA Part 3

In part 2 of my Blog series on enhanced shared matches, I looked at four matches. For three out of four, I figured out how they fit in and added them to my DNA/Genealogy Trees. I’ll continue the exercise in this Blog. This was one of four methods suggested by Jim Bartlett in a recent Blog that he wrote on the subject.

Doris on My Maternal Side

 

Ancestry thinks that we could be 2nd or third cousins. That should be easy to figure out. However, Doris has no trees. It looks like I have never tried to contact Doris. Doris and I share a match with Barry:

Pro Tools tells me that Barry could be Doris’ first cousin once removed. Here is how I am related to Barry:

This is interesting becuase Barry descends from a NIcholson ancestor named Maria who stayed in the UK when most of the family moved to Philadelphia. That means that Doris is likely from the UK. I believe that Barry and I should be full, not half third cousins.

I see that Sue is Doris’ daughter:

Sue shows that she has a tree but there is nothing in it. I have written to Doris to see if she would like to share information.

Mystery Match Kathy

I know that Kathy matches on my mother’s side – perhaps on the Nicholson or Lentz side or both:

Kathy’s closest shared match is with my late mother:

This makes sense as my mother is obviously an earlier generation than me. That would mean that Kathy likely descends from Lentz and Nicholson and is from a generation later than me. This also means that no close relatives to Kathy have tested at Ancestry.

Mystery Match #3: emach

Even the name of this paternal side match is mysterious. Joyce is emch’s grandmother:

I’m glad I got a DNA sample from Joyce at a family reunion.

I also see that emach’s mother is Jill:

Here I’ve added emach into my Hartley DNA/Genealogy Tree:

emach is my second cousin once removed. The tree is a little out of date as I’m not at my primary computer writing this. David should be in the same box with emach.

Mystery Match #4: Matthew

I think that four matches are enough for a Blog. Matthew is on my mother’s side:

I am now down to below 100 cM for a match.

Matthew’s best match is with Marian:

However, she has a line through her tree next to her name. That means she has no tree.

One More: Howard

Howard and I have a fairly large match:

Even though the match is quite large, I think that the relationship is quite distant. Based on Howard’s last name, I would suspect connection to the Pilling side, but I don’t see obvious Pilling matches that we share.

Howard and I share a match with John:

John shows this:

However, I have questioned some of these Hartley trees. I have two Robinson Trees that I have looked at, but I have not looked at this one. This gives me an idea for a subsequent Blog. I can look at all my Hartley Common Ancestor Trees at Ancestry to see if they have anything in common or shared matches.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I looked at four more enhanced shared matches
  • I found out where one of them fit in my Hartley DNA/Genealogy tree.
  • For three of them, I have a pretty good idea where they fit in my maternal tree, but not exactly
  • the fifth match is in a category of Hartley matches that I am unsure of, because I am so unsure of the Hartley genealogy before the early 1800’s. However, it gives me impetus to take a fresh look at my possible early Hartley ancestry to try to prove or disprove the Ancestry theories.

 

 

Posted on

Enhanced Shared Matches at AncestryDNA Part 2

In my previous Blog, I took a shot at looking at my enhanced shared matches. This is a new feature that AncestryDNA has under it’s Pro Tools. As the name suggests, there is a charge associated with the Pro Tools. In my previous Blog, I looked at a few matches on my Hartley side that I was curious about.

In this Blog, I would like to look at a suggestion from Jim Bartlett in his Blog:

1. Work down our Match list. Start at the top, and methodically work on each Match that we haven’t placed in our Tree. The advantage here is that the top Matches (most shared cM) are usually the easiest to figure out. With Pro Tools we can see their top Matches, potentially ones with good Trees, and often tease out their place in our Tree. At the least, even if we cannot find the exact relationship, we can figure out which sub-branch of our Tree they are on (which is all we really need to know for them to be helpful forming a tight group).

This is his Plan of Attack #1 out of 4.

Top Unknown Match

This would have to be Keith:

I recognize the last name. My grandmother had a sister Agnes Lentz whose married name was the same as Keith’s. I have that Agnes had a son named Robert Lester in 1925, but I have no further information on him. Keith’s tree is private. I messaged Keith at Ancestry, but got no response.

This is probably a pretty easy example. The first shared match between Keith and myself is my late mother. She shows as likely 1st cousin twice removed. Now the Robert Lester I mentioned would be my mother’s first cousin. That means that Keith at twice removed could be Robert’s grandson.

As I scroll down my shared match list, I see Mia:

Mia is Keith’s daughter and has an unlinked tree:

Mia has Robert as her paternal great-grandfather. This seems to confirm what I had guessed. I wrote to Mia in the past. She got back to me once but did not follow up apparently. Without the Pro Tools, I would not know that Mia was Robert’s daughter which is helpful.

Keith and Mia are related on my Lentz and Nicholson side. I am having more trouble with the Lentz side, so I will add them to that tree:

Here is the add:

Keith is my 2nd cousin once removed and Mia is my second cousin twice removed. Keith may be helpful in checking out other Lentz matches.

My Second Top Unknown Match: Bird

I have a high match with bird. I don’t think I ever heard back from her. She is on my Hartley side. I go down the Shared Match Pro list and look for large matches:

Turns out that Bird is an Aunt or half sister to S.W. S.W. is my second cousin:

Ancestry thinks that S.W. is bird’s aunt or half sister. That means that we are related through my great Aunt Mary. Mary Alice (also known as Molly) had several children. So it may be possible to reason out a more exact relationship. However, I believe that bird must descend from Mary Alice aka Molly.

Upon further review of my tree, I see a person who would fit the remaining name of bird that I have blurred out. Here is my Hartley DNA/Genealogy Tree so far:

This is a big family, so this is the tip of the iceburg. My great Aunt Mary is in the second row about the middle. I am missing Mary Alice or Molly:

Here I have filled in Mary Alice and her children. Susan, Lady and Bird have all tested at AncestryDNA. So Bird was actually a niece to Susan and Lady and not a half sister.  I may have been able to figure this out without the Pro Shared Matches, but the new utility got me to figure it out. Another mystery solved. So far, I am two for two.

Mystery Match #3: David

My match to David has some similarities to Bird:

I match David at 148 cM vs 150 for Bird. Here is a shared match between David and me:

I am the administrator for Joyce’s DNA, so that is convenient. A second shared match makes it even more clear:

Here I have separated out Jim and Joyce and added Jill and David to my Hartley DNA/Genealogy Tree. Again, I probably could have figured this out before, but I didn’t without the Pro Tools. The Pro Tools give a certainty to this line that I could have assumed before.

Mystery Match #4: Jessica

If I ever figured out how Jessica fits in, I didn’t make a note to that effect. Jessica shows up on my maternal side.

Jessica has a sister named Angela who matches me at a lower rate (64 cM). However, she has a private tree.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I tried going down my list of matches as suggested by Jim Bartlett in his Blog
  • I fairly easily identified my first 3 uncertain matches.
  • I could not identify the fourth match. However, she likely descends from Nicholson and Lentz. I aslo could not trace her ancestry easily.
  • This was a pretty fun excercise and I will likely continue in a subsequent Blog

Jessica’s Genealogy

I will have to make a tree for Jessica and see where that takes me. This is what she has:

Here is my tree so far:

So far, I’m in the US with this tree, so  I’m tempted to accept all the green hints to see if any familiar names show up.

Still nothing rings a bell.

Here is the next level:

Still no luck. It seems like I should see a famililar name by now. I can tell by the shared matches that I am related to Jessica probably on the Lentz or Nicholson side or both.

 

 

 

 

 

Posted on

Enhanced Shared Matches at AncestryDNA

The big news at Ancestry is that they have Enhanced Shared Matches. My understanding is that means that tells you of your shared matches with another person, you can now tell how those shared matches match each other.

In order to access this utility, you have to sign up for Pro Tools:

I suppose the other tools are helpful, but all the talk is about the enhanced shared matches. I am interested in a match on my Hartley side where I can’t find a connection.

Hartley Enhanced Shared Matches

I’ll start with a match I do know about:

Kristen and I have a pretty good match of 42 cM at Ancestry. We are third cousins once removed. Our common ancestors are Greenwood Hartley and Ann Emmet. That means that our shared matches should be along the Hartley or Emmet Lines.

Now, instead of a Shared matches selection I have this:

Here is the first page of what I get:

Heather is my daughter. Lori and Jonathan are my sibglings. The next two people are my father’s first cousins. I note that Joyce has a good match with Kristen, so that is interesting. I have access to the the results for these people, so it isn’t telling me anthing new, but it is helpful to have this in this format to compare in one place.

Some Unknown Hartley/Emmet Relatives

I have to go to page two of my shared matches with Kristen for this:

Jennifer has been a question mark in my mind as she has no tree. Notice a tree icon with a line through it. Emily is a known relative. She is my 3rd cousin twice removed. She shows as a 1st cousin to Kristen, but this is estimated by DNA. She would have to be a 1st cousin once removed to Emily in real life.

I haven’t yet figured out what the plus button is for.

saudet

I haven’t figured out how I am related to saudet. saudet shows as having a 63 cM match to Kristen and possibly a half 2nd cousin once removed or 2nd cousin twice removed. Here is her tree:

saudet’s mother was born in 1928. Kristen’s father was also born in 1928. That means that a second removed relationship is not likely. Looking at the tree, it is my assumption that I am related to saudet on her maternal side. Her paternal side is French Canadian. In addition Gonsalves and Rogers come from Portugal – though Rogers does not strike me as a Portuguese name. Further, Xavier and Saulles are from Portugal. That leaves the lines of John and Alice Shadlock.

Here is a photo of Elizabeth Shadlock:

 

Let’s go back and look at Kristen’s tree:

If Kristen and saudet are third cousins and they are both related to me, then the connection would have to be at the level of Able Burrows or Mary Ann Hartley. Actually, it would have to be at the level of Mary Ann Hartley, as I am not related to Abel Burrows.

An Audet/Pilling Connection?

Jack shows up on my shared matches with saudet:

Jack has Pilling in his tree:

Jack has that the John Pilling in his tree born 1824 was from Trawden.

My Father’s Cousin Joyce

I can go back a generation to my father’s cousin Joyce. Joyce and saudet have a shared match named Ruth:

Joyce and Ruth have a common ancestor:

Here again, we see the Pilling family. That means that my best guess is that saudet is related to the Hartleys on the Pilling side. Mary Pilling had a child before marrying Robert Hartley. That means that Ruth has no known Hartley ancestor. However, the exact connection between Pilling and Audet is somewhat of a mystery.

Here is another shared match between Jocye and saudet:

Richard also has Pilling ancestry on the Wilkinson side. Mary Pilling married a Wilkinson after Robert Hartley died.

This depiction is incorrect at Ancestry as Mary Pilling should be at the top of the tree. However, again, the common denominator is Pilling. This ensures that the connection is on the Pilling side. I must say that Elizabeth Shadlock’s baptism record is somewhat irregular.

My understanding is that Elizabeth’s mother was Mary Shadlock and the father was shown as William Walker. However, if William was the father, then why didn’t Elizabeth take his name? In addition, the baptism appears to be four years after the birth which is unusual. Also John Pilling was a sketchy character. He lived in the New Bedford but abandoned his family and returned to England with money that he had from a food cooperative.

Mystery Match Lee

Lee is another person of interest. Lee matches my at 22 cM at Ancestry. He has Hartley ancestors in the Colne area. Lee also matches my father’s cousin Joyce at 23 cM. Here is Lee’s tree:

Lee has:

  • Margaret Hartley from Colne
  • Robert Horsfield from Colne
  • Samuel Thornton from Colne
  • Alice Irving from Colne
  • William Wilson from Colne
  • John Clark from Colne
  • Margaret Simpson from Marsden

That would be a lot to check into.

I have that Joyce and lee have a shared match with Rebecca:

I also have a note that Rebecca has a Shackleton in her tree. However, Rebecca’s tree only covers her maternal side:

Also Thomas Shackleton was from Heptonstall:

Perhaps not too far from the Colne area, but not too close either. His father was from Wadsworth which is interesting as it looks not too far from Trawden:

Here is my Shackleton web page:

There is a slim chance that Rebecca’s John and my ancestor John could be the same person. Interesting possibility. I also notice that Rebecca has a Betty Greenwood in her tree and Nancy Shackleton in my tree married a Greenwood Pilling.

Another interesting shared match between Lee and Joyce is Kevin:

Kevin has a small match to Joyce, but a large tree:

Kevin does not show any Shackleton ancestors. In fact, his ancestors are not from Lancashire but mostly from Yorkshire. This suggests that the connection between my family and Lee’s could be in Yorkshire rather than in the Colne area.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I looked at two mystery matches on my Hartley side using Enhanced Shared Matches
  • I gained my certainty on where these matches should occur.
  • One match is certainly on my Pilling side
  • The other match is most likely in Yorkshire and possibly on my Shackleton side
  • I would like to try some of the three other methods suggested by Jim Bartlett in a recent post he wrote. He calls the method I used in this post as Focus on Specific Problems.

 

 

Posted on

An Arthur YDNA Test with Possible Links to Hartley

A while ago (last April), a new YDNA match appeared on some peoples’ radar. I thought that I would hear back more from his family, who were interested in his results, but I have not yet heard back, so I thought that I would write a Blog on some of the possibilities concerning that match.

Arthur took the 111 STR YDNA test. Here is how I match him compared to others:

Arthur is my 4th match at 8 steps. As his match is inbetween others with known Hartley ancestry, it is possible that Mr. Arthur has some Hartley ancestry – perhaps going back many years. Another interesting thing about this list is that many have taken the BigY700 test. That would be everyone except for Arthur, Ross and Wolka.

FTDNA has a time predictor:

It comes out that our common ancestor is perhaps around the year 1450. However, the range is between 1100 and 1700. Further, I am one step away from my brother James. That means that James and Mr. Arthur are a GD of 7. That puts the date for a common ancestor aroudn around 1500 (or between 1200 and 1750).

Mr. Arthur to Hartley YDNA Project People .

I can put these STR comparisons into a spreadsheet. Here is the start:

This is just my brother and I so far. Here is the match list sorted by GD:

The closest match is with Channon. STRs are not as accurate as SNPs which the BigY test looks at, but they should give some information.

Here are Channon’s closest matches at the 111 STR level:

Of Channon’s matches, everyone who has information on Paternal Earliest Known Ancestor has that ancestor as a Hartley.

Here is Channon’s Block Tree. These are all people who have taken the BigY test:

The “Your Branch” refers to Channon. He is in A11134 with three other Hartleys. A11134 branches off of A11132. It is thought that Mawdsley is an early relative of the Hartleys, but he probably branched off before the age of surnames. Arthur does not match Mawdsley at the 111 level but he does at the 67 STR level. That means that Arthur and Mawdsley are more distant matches compared to those in my Excel spreadsheet above.

There are two other branches under the main Hartley Branch of A11134. Those are Ft225247 which my brother and I are in and A16717. That is an early branch of Quaker Hartleys who moved to Pennsylvania – probably to avoid persecution.

Summary and Conclusions

  • A person with the surname Arthur has taken the 111 STR level YDNA test.
  • Arthur has relatively close matches to Hartleys indicating at least a fairly early common ancestor with Hartleys.
  • Arthur’s closest STR match of the ones in the Hartley YDNA Surname Project is with someone with the surname Channon. However, Channon appears to also have early matches with Hartleys.
  • My theory is that Arthur has Hartleys in his ancestry – possibly going back to the year 1600 or before. The Hartley name in the area where my Hartleys came from go back to around the year 1422.

 

 

 

Posted on

A New Hartley BigY

Every so often a new Hartley BigY comes out. One just came out which is in my Tribe of Hartleys. What I mean by that is that in the YDNA tree of man there is more than one branch of Hartleys. These YDNA branches are distantly related.

A11134

My Branch of Hartley YDNA is called A11134. It is shown on the FTDNA Block Tree here:

This tree is from my perspective. I am in an offshoot of A11134 called FT225247. John R., Michael, and Lawrence are in another off-shoot called A16717. This was a branch of Hartley Quakers from the 1600’s that emigrated to Pennsylvania. Ethan is curently in the main Branch of Hartleys under A11134 along with Channon, John N., and Steve. I believe that Channon may have Hartley in his ancestry going back. Mawdsley is related to the Hartleys, but the branches probably split prior to the common use of surnames and his surname would have developed independently. So we don’t think that Mawdsley ever had Hartley in their ancestry. Smith is a separate branch that is very old.

Some other observations:

  • My branch has the most SNPs for some reason – 7
  • A11134 is actually a block of three different SNPs
  • As there are 7 SNPs in my Branch and an average of three Private Variants under A16717 and A11134 and other branches, there is more room for further branching.

FTDNA Time Tree

This time tree shows that Smith has been alone in his Branch of A11138 since about the year 500 AD (or CE). Mawdsley’s Line split off around the year 1200. The rest of the Hartleys are quite old – going back to the 1500’s or possibly even earlier.

YDNA SNP Theory

SNP Theory is simple:

  1. If you have a SNP that no one else has, it is a Private SNP or Variant
  2. If you match someone else with a SNP that puts you in a group with them
  3. If you do not have SNPs that others have in a lower branch, that puts you in a higher branch. For example, in the Hartley example above, Ethan, Channon, John N. and Steve do not have FT225247 or A16717, so they are currently in the higher or earlier Hartley Branch of A11134

In practice, interpreting these principles is difficult. All BigY tests are different. If the test has poor coverage for a SNP, or no coverage, it will be difficult to interpret the results.

Ethan’s Private Variants

FTDNA shows that Ethan has one private variant at position 17071491. However, I do not understand the results as the Reference is G and the Genotype is T. However, the test results give a ‘C’. Now if Ethan has only one private variant, that seems to indicate a relatively short time to common ancestors or that he has very few mutations compared to the average amount of mutations.

Here is Ethan’s Match List:

Ethan’s closest matches are John R and Channon. He has 5 non-matching variants with these two. Note that Private Variant 17071491 shows up in these list. That means that each of these testers could have tested negatvie for this Variant. However, we have to check to make sure.

This gets confusing as there are two John R’s. The one who took the BigY descends from the Quaker Hartleys:

John has a ton of reads, most of which are negative. That means that he is not positive for the Variant that Ethan has.

Channon’s results for Ethan’s Private Varinat position are similar:

Does Ethan Have Any New Matches with Existing Hartley Testers?

This seems to be the big question as that would put Ethan in a new group. Another corollary is: Does Ethan have non-matches which would put other Hartleys in a new group.

I see from a previous Blog I wrote, that I have this colorful spreadsheet:

I used an add-on called BAMsAway to look up variant results that FTDNA normally does not show. The colors give the various gradations that are possible with the results. This shows how one SNP was added to the Hartley Tree – namely MF 205420. I think that I used this chart to get FTDNA to put Michael, Lawrence and John into their own Branch.

Here I have added Ethan and his own Private Variant. All I have to do is to fill in the new row and column. Here is the column:

I had forgotten how I had the light green codes. For example B?4+ means that there were 4 positive reads. Usually 10 are needed. B?5- means that there were 5 negative reads. So the shortcoming of the designation is that a plus is a likely SNP and a minus is a likely ancestral value (no mutation).

I didn’t bother checkign each SNP in my own Hartley Branch as Ethan is likely not positive for those SNPs. I should also note that Michael has a lot of ‘no reads’. This is likely because he took th eolder BigY 500 which tested fewer locations on the YDNA.

The outcome of the exercise is that Ethan clearly does not share any of the Private Variants of the other testers. If Ethan had a no read for one of these positions, then perhaps we could say he matched one of the other Hartleys, but that was not the case.

Checking the Other BigY Tested Hartleys for Ethan’s Private Variant

As Ethan only shows one Private Variant, it is not likely that this Variant would be shared with anyone else, but I will check. Here is my result:

I see that there was a mutation in one read only, but the overall effect is that I am not positive for this mutation. It turns out that all the results were negative for Ethan’s SNP:

The bottom line is that my Hartley Branch has an unusually large number of SNPs since these Hartley Branches split and Ethan has an unusually small amount of Private Variants – one.

FGC SNPs

Earlier in the Blog, I looked at Ethan’s BigY Match List:

Here are a few non-matching variants in his list starting with FGC. I have looked at FGC6800 before. This is already a named SNP in the I branch of the YDNA and I am in the R branch. I have a feeling that FTDNA cannot handle two SNPs that are the same in different branches. I do not believe that I have looked at FGC7804 before. I’ll just add them to my spreadsheet:

I found that Nutter aka Channon has the SNP (or Private Variant) of FGC7804

According to YBrowse, the Branch for this SNP is unknown:

However, it was discovered in 2013 which is before Channon tested. I would tend to look at FGC7804 as a Private Variant for Channon.

Here, I didn’t check the Hartley Quaker descendants for the two FGC SNPs as they were in a different Branch.

Summary and Conclusions

  • My Hartley Branch has 7 SNPs, or 8 if FGC6800 is counted. That is a new SNP about ever 63 years or close to every other generation.ItSteve has 5 Private Variants (PVs), John has 4 PVs, Nutter has 3-5 PVs depending on the testing company, and Ethan has one PV
  • Ethan has only one PV in about the last 500 years. That seems very unusual.
  • The Quaker Line is about 200 years newer than the general Hartley Haplogroup. In that group, Michael has 2 PVs, but he took the older BigY 500 test. Lawrence has 5 PVs and John R has 4 PVs.
  • It does not appear that a manual review will be required by FTDNA
  • I don’t know if Ethan’s results will change the dating of the FTDNA Time Tree.
  • It appears that there were many Hartleys around the year 1500 or before. We have now 5 lines descending from that time – My branch with my brother, Steve, John N, Channon or Nutter and now Ethan. However, between 1500 and now there were no closer relatives beween those 5 lines or branches. That means that even with all the testing that has been done, there needs to be more to establish more Hartley Branches between the year 1500 or so and now. The would establish more lines like the Hartley Quaker Branch that we know was from around the year 1600 and connected by genealogy.

 

 

 

Posted on

A New Hartley BigY Test

I have been in touch with Michelle who is a co-adminitrator of the Hartley YDNA Project (as am I). She has interest in the Hartley surname and had a test taken for Ethan. So far Ethan’s STR results are out. We are still awaiting the more important SNP results.

Here is Ethan listed at the Hartley YDNA Project:

Ethan is listed at the top. I show his first STR result, but there are 110 more to the right of that that I do not show. There are more Hartleys who have done YDNA testing. A few notes:

  • There are other Hartleys in the Hartley Project, but many Hartleys are not closesly related to each other by DNA.
  • The bright blue above is one group of Hartleys that are related to each other by YDNA
  • The first group has a Mawdsley in it. This is the oldest group called A11132. It was unclear previously whether Mawdsley was origingally a Hartley or whether the names split off before the time of surnames. I have assumed the latter. Now Ethan has been placed in this group.
  • The second group is the second oldest group. These are all people who are sure they are related to each other by the Hartley surnames. However, the Hartley connections are quite old. The connections could go back to the 1400’s or earlier.
  • Finally, there are the next two branches off of A11134. The first branch is a group who descend from an early Quaker Hartley who moved from England to Pennsylvania ostensibly to get away from persecution in NE Lancashire England.
  • The last two testers are my brother and myself. We would have the newest branch. Our ancestors were from Trawden, Lancashire.

The FTDNA Time Tree

I have taken the FTDNA Time Tree and added a few notes:

First, I do not think that Ethan will end up as A11132. It is more likely that he will be in the A11134 group with the rest of the Hartleys.

Running Ethan through SAPP

SAPP is a program that automatically makes a tree using STR data. This program was develped by David Vance. First the STR data goes into a text file:

This is just part of the data from the tribe of DNA Hartleys that I belong to. Ethan’s data is first. The third kit (Time) must be for 37 STRs as there are fewer STRs. I omitted a few kits that were less than 37 STRs. That left 14 Hartleys in the group.

When I run SAPP, I get a lot of information:

In my first email back from Michelle, she noted that Ethan had a value of 11 for STR 511. This is shown in the top right of the image above.

The last chart on the first page of the SAPP analysis has this:

This chart gives genetic distance corrected for differences in the level of STR testing. To find Ethan’s Genetic Distance one could look etiher at the second column or second row. Looking down the secon column , we see in the note that results with different colors are different level of tests. I believe that green is 37 STRs and brown is 67 STRs. What I see is that Ethan is not closely related to any of the 37 or above STR testers in our Hartley group. This is consistant with what I have seen in the past. What this says to me is that there were a lot of Hartleys a long time ago and they all had separate lines that were not closely related to each other.

Here is the SAPP Tree:

This is small and difficult to read. Here are a few initial observations:

  • Testers are indicated in yellow. So, for example, the yeloow tester at the top left of the tree is current day as are all the other yellow testers.
  • This tree was created withouth knowledge of SNPs and the solid branching that they create. So, in cases where the STR tree conflicts with the SNP tree, the SNP tree is the right answer
  • There is a way to add SNP infomration to this tree, but I have not done that here
  • The tree shows four major branches. The person in his own branch is Mervin

I can see at least one problem right away:

There are three in the Quaker Hartleys of Pennsylvania. The kit starting with 617 belongs with the other two Hartleys with Quaker roots in Pennsylvania. This problem would have been solved had I added the YDNA Branch name to SAPP.

Also, in this initial run, Ethat is in Node #19 with Mawdsley. This is interesting as this is where Ethan was placed on the Hartley YDNA Project. (See the first image in the Blog.)

SAPP Tree with SNP Data

I look at a David Vance video to figure out how to do this:

I need to add SNP data for people.

Here if there was a hartley that did not test for SNPs, I gave a question mark which says perhaps they are A11134.

The first page of analysis gives a new chart which points out a mistake I made:

I put in the Mawdsley kit number twice. I’ll just fix that.

I ran it again:

Now the results are correct for Mawdsley, but wrong for Ethan. I don’t want to show Ethan positive for A11134 as I do not yet know that. My Blogs would be shorter is I took out my mistakes. However, I am hoping that my mistakes are instructive:

Now that this chart looks the way I want it to, I will push the SAPP Tree button:

This tree looks quite different. There are now three branches. A few comments:

  • This does not take into account that the Hartley YDNA Administrator believes that most of the Hartleys who have not done the BigY are A11134.term
  • This also does not take into account the fact of the common Hartley surname for most testers.
  • The program still wants to put Ethan with Mawdsley. I would tend to disagree with this, but we will see when the BigY results come out.
  • Mervin shows in his own branch. I would tend to disagree with that also.

I see one additional thing that could help. In one of my previous Blogs on Hartley SAPP trees, I used an asterix after the SNP to indicate the current  terminal SNP:

This gives some clarity for the three BigY testers who tested as A11134. Unfortunately, that did not change the results. In my previous Blog on the subject, I kept in the two Hartleys that only tested 12 SNPs. Perhaps I should add them back in, as I got better reults last time.

I tried adding them back, but that had no effect on the tree.

Possible BigY Outcomes for Ethan

Here is my Block tree:

  • If Ethan is truly related to Mawdsley, he may form a new branch under A11132
  • Ethan my show as A11134 and result in no change to the Hartley YDNA Tree. That would mean that he would form another parallel branch with Channon, John N., an Steve
  • Ethan may have a SNP in common with one of the testers in A11134 and form a new branch under that SNP.

The Wolka Connection

Ethan’s closest match at 111 STRs is Wolka:

The Genetic Distance [GD] between Ethan and Wolka is 3. This is by far Ethan’s closest 111 STR match. Ethan’s next closest match is with Steve at a GD of 7. Wolka has many other Hartley matches. The assumption is that this particular Wolka male line goes back to a Hartley Line at some point. Unfortunately, not much is known about this tester’s genealogy. It may be assumed that that the terminal SNP that Ethan tests positive for will likely apply to Wolka also.

As a side note, Ethan is Mawdsley’s closest STR match at a GD of 8. Mawdsley’s next match is Wolka at a GD of 9.

Here is FTDNA’s time predictor for a GD of 3 at 111 STRs:

This means that the likely date for the common ancestor between Ethan and Wolka is around 1750.

Summary and Conclusions

  • There is a new Hartley BigY tester However, so far, only his STR results are in
  • The Hartley YDNA Project administrtor has grouped Ethan with Mawdsley
  • My previous understanding was that the connection between Mawdsley and Hartley go back before the time of surnames.
  • I tried using the SAPP Program on Ethan’s STR results, but I was not satisfied with the results compared to my understanding of Hartley YDNA at this point
  • STRs are very difficult to analyze and interpret. In constrast, SNPs tend to give more straightforward answers
  • It will be interesting to see if Ethan’s BigY test creates a change in the YDNA tree of man and specifically in the Hartley part of the YDNA tree.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Posted on

Tying Up Some Loose Ends: Hirschenhof Revision Lists

I have written several Blogs lates concerning my HIrschenhof Ancestors and the Revision Lists. So far I have covered:

  • Rathfelder
  • Schwechheimer
  • Lutke
  • Fuhrmann and Biedermann

I want to do a future Blog on my Gangnus ancestors in the Revision Lists. However, I have left a few loose ends which I wanted to address in this Blog.

Biedermann Families

One of my goals in looking through these Revision Lists is to add siblings to my ancestors’ families.

Above are some of my ancestors in my Biedermann Line in 1816. The name Biedermann is abbreviated, but it was clear from the 1811 Revision Lists that this was Biedermann. I tried to add Luise to the family, but Ancestry noted that I had that Maria Margaret her mother died in 1802:

This leads me to believe that the death I have for Mother Fuhrmann was wrong. I see two trees on Ancestry. One has a later death date for Anna which seems more realistic:

This means that someone else saw something that I saw.

Maria Eva Buchenroth Born 1772

It should be possible to find this family in the 1782 Audit of Souls for Hirschenhof:

Here is Johan Peter on Farm 43 suspiciously close to some of my other ancestors’ farms. the next page is difficult to decipher:

Eva Maria must be my ancestor at age 10. That means that it appears that Johan Peter was Eva Maria’s father at age 72 and not her grandfather! It is also possible that Maria Anganesia? Schmidt could be a second wife.

This chart shows how close my ancestors’ families lived near each other.

It appeaars that Maria’s second name was more like Agnes. Here is Helmsheim, Germany:

 

This fills out the Buchenroth family. I found a record of Barbara, but with no date and no mother’s name. I assume that the mother was Maria Agnesia.

Filling in a Schwechheimer Blank

Unfortunately, Anna Schwechheimer was born in 1784. That means that she missed the 1782 Audit of Souls. And by the time that the 1816 Audit came around, she had been married for a while. However, I have a hint from the 1811 Revision Lists.

Only men were listed, but here is Simon Fuhrmann living on Farm 11 with Joahnn Schweigheimer. The note at Ancestry says:

I do not see the word ‘schwester’ in the record, but let’s assume that Ancestry is correct. Simon is obviously not Johann Schwegheimer’s sister. However, I think that Simon married Johann’s sister. The good news is that Johann was born before 1782. I skipped transcribing this family into my spreadsheet previoiusy (not a good idea), but will do that now:

What I gather from this is that Macus Schweigheimer had a large family. Likely he had three sons in law living on his farm in 1811 after he passed away. I further surmise that Anne E Schwechheimr was the daughter of Marcus Schweigheimer born in 1874 when her father was about 55 and her mother Anna Maria Schmidt was about 38.

Here I have added two people as Anna’s parents who were already in my Ancestry Tree. What this all means is that I must descend from this couple twice:

This shows my Rathfelder descent on the top left through Johann G Scwechheimer. The Gangnus descent is on the right through Anna Schwechheimer. Bottom line is that there were only so many Colonists in Hirschenhof to marry. This fills in Maria Gangnus’ Tree:

I am not able to see others who have made this connection at Ancestry. I see that a DNA connection at MyHeritage, Wolf has made this connection in his tree:

Thank you, Wolf, for your research.

Summary and Conclusions

  • Without the connections noted in the Revision Lists, it would be difficult to assemble some of my Hirschenhof ancestral families
  • In a closed society it should be assumed that one will descend from a person or couple more than once.
  • After researching US, English and Irish records, it appears that these Revision Lists are some of the best records for the time that they covered.
  • French Canadian records are also good, but they do not have the family relationships. These relationships have been developed from birith, marriage and death records for French Canadians.
  • There will always be loose ends, but this solves some of the looser ends
  • There are some loose ends on my Rathfelder side which I will look at later.