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Dating Some of My Frazer Relatives’ YDNA Haplogroups Using a New FTDNA Tool

FTDNA has a new YDNA tool called Discover:

Here is a tree I made up of my Frazer relatives who have BigY tested:

Here Dingman’s grandfather is a Frazer. However, there is some confusion at the point of John or Richard Frazer in his line. This Branch has the umbrella Frazer Haplogroup of FT421618. It looks like Y85652 should be older than Y151390, but they are in parallel positions on the tree. What it should mean is that there has been more time to develop privant variants on the James Frazer Line of 1804 as compared to the Thomas Henry Frazer Line of 1836.

Here is what all that looks like on the FTDNA Block Tree. This is from the perspective of Jonathan (Joanna’s brother):

Here I went back one haplogroup to bring in the Frazier name. We don’t know how Frazier fits in with the Frazer tree except that the connection predates what we know about the Frazer tree. On the tree above, Paul is my second cousin once removed.

Dating R-Y85652: James Frazer c. 1804

I’ll start with my closest relatives’ Haplogroup.

I’ll zoom in on my image from above:

We know that James Frazer must have been Y85652 and if we have the tree correct above, Archibald Frazer born about 1743 was not Y85652. That means that it is possible that Philip Frazer was Y85652.

Here is the verbal part of the report:

Now I will need you to check my math on this one. It is 2022 and 350 years before that is 1672. I’m not sure how that ended up as 1700 CE. When I checked on my own Hartley dating, it seemed like the years were being subtracted from the date of 2000.

I had assigned FT421618 to Archibald Frazer who we think was born around 1690. This estimate would have him born about 50 years earlier or perhaps 1650. This estimate seems closer to the date we think that Archibald Frazer was born. However, we will have to wait until later in the Blog when I will plug FT421618 into the Discover tool.

Dating Y151390 from the James Frazer Branch

Here, the good news is that FT421618 is 400 years ago. That would have to be consistent.

Here again, I’m baffled by the math, but 150 years ago comes out to about 1900 CE. When I was young, I learned about the rules for rounding numbers and this doesn’t seem to meet those rules. Furthermore, 150 years ago with 150 years either way is a large margin. For example, it would be impossible to have a common ancestor with someone who was born zero years ago. At any rate, we are quite sure that the common ancestor for Rodney and Jonathan was born in 1836:

My guess is that the issue is that there is an average of 5 private variants between Rodney and Jonathan:

It would seem that is a large number of private variants for three generations. Usually, I believe that there should be about one private variant per every two generations or about every 84 years. That is close to one every three generations. It may be worth taking a second look at these Private Variants at some point. I looked that these private variants here in January 2021, but these were still in a state of flux at that time. For example at that time, there were only an average of 4 private variants in this Branch.

Dating FT421618 – The First Frazer in Roscommon, Ireland?

We believe that this Haplogroup represents Archibald Frazer born around 1690 and believed to be the first Frazer in North County Roscommon.

Here, the dates have normalized and they have been subtracted from the year 2000 to get the year 1600 for FT421618. I am quite sure that the large number of private variants that seemed to have occurred later in the two Frazer lines were creating havoc with the dating tool.

Note that above it says that there is 1 yet unnamed lineage. This would be the Dingman Line which still has the designation of FT421618. This report gives the next Frazer Branch going up the line as 600 years ago. That is the Branch that includes Frazier (or Frasher). If that is subtracted from the year 2000, then that date would be around 1400. As we think the 1600 date may be closer to 1690, I would feel comfortable in adding 90 years to 1400 to get 1490. Here is some information on surnames in England, some of which may apply to the Frazers who may have been in SW Scotland around this time.

According to familysearch.org:

The custom of applying a man’s by-name to all his children began in the late 12th century and spread slowly, with the manorial classes and the south of England leading the way. The first legal recognition of an hereditary surname is found in 1267; it was de Cantebrigg meaning ‘of Canterbury.’ By 1400 three-quarters of the population are reckoned to have borne hereditary family names, and the process was complete by about 1450 in England. Wales is an exception, in that although they had surnames they were patronymics (derived from the father’s first name) and thus changed each generation.

During this early period a married woman could be known either by her maiden surname or by her husband’s surname with wyf added, as in Mary Walker, wife of Henry Field, or Mary Fieldwyf. The term Mrs. for a married woman was not used until after 1500.

Dating YP6489 – Frazier

This Haplogroup goes back a ways.

As I had thought, this Haplogroup goes back to a predicted year of 1400, though as I mentioned above a somewhat later date by 90 years would not be unreasonable. The later date of 850 years ago or the year 1150 would most certainly be before surnames were commonly used.

YP6488 Includes the Stuart and Grant surnames.

Summary and Conclusions

  • It seems like FTNDA’s new Discover Tool gives Frazer Haplogroups within reasonable time frames
  • The large number of private variants on two of the newer Frazer Haplogroups seem to be giving the tool some problems.
  • I would like to take another look at Frazer Haplogroups and Private Variants in an upcoming Blog.
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My Frazer Cousin John at Ancestry

I have had a DNA match with John for a while at Ancestry, but haven’t figured out the connection until today. Here is the match:

 

John does not have a searchable tree. However, note that John’s test is managed by Dawn. She has a tree and in that tree, her husband John descends from a Frazer.

This is an easy connection, because I know who Hubert Frazer was:

Hubert was my great-grandfather’s younger brother:

My great-grandfather James Archibald Frazer is sitting down on the left. Hubert is standing on the right. James was about 11 yeaers older than Hubert.

Here, I’ll just add in John to my Frazer DNA/Genealogy Tree:

Assuming I have the right John, he is Paul’s first cousin. I had Paul’s DNA sent to FTDNA where he was tested for YDNA which is the male Frazer line. That makes John my second cousin once removed. This is a big discovery, because, as Paul was tested at FTDNA, John is a good representative of this line of Frazers at Ancestry where there are many more matches than at other testing companies.

My Shared DNA Match with John

My last Shared DNA Match with John is with Dianna. Dianna has a basic tree:

The top part of the tree is Belgian and the bottom favors Ontario. As I have traced one part of my ancestry to Ontario, that would be the place to look first.

Building Out a Tree for Dianna

Turns out that there is a marriage record for Abraham Brandon which is helpful:

This brings us back a generation:

Dianna’s ancestors got added as living, so I need to change that. The death record for Kathleen (or Catherine) gives her parents’ names:

This record mentions Ireland, so that puts us in the right part of the World. This is as far as I got with Dianna’s tree:

Many of these ancestors seemed to be from Northern Ireland. I was getting to the point of diminishing returns, so I may come back to this tree later.

Shared Matches Between John and My Siblings

Shared matches between John and my siblings may give more clues. On one sibling’s shared matches, I saw a Johnston in a tree. I don’t know if I am related, but Johnstons did marry Frazers in the area of Ireland where my Frazers came from.

My sister Lori has a much larger DNA match with John compared to me. Lori matches John at 95 cM. Lori shares a match with John and Glen. Ancestry shows that Glen has two Frazers in his direct ancestry:

That saves me building out Glen’s tree. Glen has Maggie from Scotland and Australia:

Here is what I have in my tree:

This Richard Frazer was born in Ireland and died in Glasgow. Glen’s Maggie was from Glasgow. Glen and I share a DNA match with Jane. Here is Jane on my Frazer DNA/Genealogy Chart:

I got in touch with Jane and she has that Margaret Frazer was the daughter of Archibald Frazer and Winifred Conlon. That came out as Winifred Collins on Margaret’s death certificate. This record is from Jane’s tree:

Also from Jane, here is Margaret’s baptismal record:

I’ll add Glen to my Frazer DNA/Genealogy Tree:

That brings us out to 5th cousins through Richard Frazer and an unknown wife.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I was glad to figure out a Frazer match based on the tree of his administrator.
  • That gives me a hint to try other matches I’m not aware of based on the administrator’s tree
  • Checking into shared DNA matches is always a good idea as it may bring up new connections
  • John fills in a gap in my DNA/Genealogy tree – especially with respect to AncestryDNA matches as I tested his first cousin at FTDNA.
  • Thanks to imput from Cousin Jane, I was able to add my 5th cousin Glen (and shared match with John) to my Frazer DNA/Genealogy Chart.
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A16717 Branch of Hartleys Added to the FTDNA L513 Project Tree

R-A16717 has been part of FTDNA’s YDNA Tree since March 2022. However, this branch did not make it to  the FTDNA L513 Project tree until the end of July 2022. A16717 is a fairly recent branch and is significant as all branches of the YDNA tree are, but this branch is very significant to my particular Branch of Hartleys.

The Big Picture

This is the really big picture. Göran Runström from FTDNA updates these numbers monthly. There should be a new update within a week:

A16717 is only one branch among the 26,742 branches under R and 55,842 branches altogether. R is broken down usually between the larger R1b and smaller R1a group.

Here is the big picture of the R1b group:

At the bottom left of the tree is L513 where my branch of Hartleys are. The larger branch under L513 is S5668. Here is the tip of the iceburg view of L513:

There is an image above representing ‘Celts and other folks’ who were in the British Isles. Hartleys would be under Z16357 which shows as being in England just around or before the time of the Celts.

S5668 Tree

There used to be one L513 Tree when there were fewer branches. Now there are two trees. Here is the S5668 Tree:

This chart is more useful for genealogical purposes as it includes surnames. Hartley is near the bottom left of this tree:

Here I tried to get those under the Z16343 Branch. Under Z17911, Hartley is the only surname with multiple branches. Each branch of Hartley represents two BigY testers.

How This Part of the YDNA Tree Looks Like at FTDNA

FTDNA portrays the results in the form of a ‘block tree’. Here are the results for A11138 and down from my perspective:

This is the more detailed view. I am at FT225247 where I match my brother James. Michael and Lawrence represent a US Colonial Branch of Hartleys who moved to Pennsylvania from being persecuted as Quakers in Lancashire, England. This was the A16717 that was just added to the FTDNA L513 Project Tree above. John and Steve represent an older branch of Hartleys that the other two branches descend from.

More on Dating Haplogroups

FTDNA has come out with some new tools recently. Here is one that is helpful for dating haplogroups:

I put my Haplogroup in and get this:

This is a little small to see. Here is a larger image of the left side:

This says that our common ancestor was born around 100 years ago. My father was born in 1918, so I would say that is pretty accurate. Secondly,
A11134 is said to have branched off 450 years ago. That could also be right as that would be the year 1570. That means that the common ancestor for the six BigY tested Hartleys would be around 1570.

Dating A16717 – An Early American Quaker Hartley Branch

Here we have a date of 1600, so they seem to be subtracting the 400 from the year 2000. I actually have what I think is the actual date for the common ancestor between Michael and Lawrence:

 

I have that as 1666. This is the better-documented Branch of Hartleys. Surprisingly, the date that FTDNA has for A11134 is only 50 years earlier than A16717 or 450 years ago. If I subtract that from the year 2000 to be consistent, I get the year 1550. To me, that date seems better than subtracting 50 years from 1666 which would be 1616, but who knows?

Dating A11134 – The Hartley Umbrella Branch

But wait, there’s more. I need to add in A11134:

Two Yet Unnamed Hartley Lineages

I just noticed that the explanation for A11134 says that there are 2 yet unnamed lineages. I assume that these are Hartley Lineages for Steve and John.

The Mawdsley Surname

I have already gone over the 1600 date as being representative of the Hartleys. However, this dating goes one step further to the Mawdsley surname and seems to put it at 700 years ago or around the year 1300.

According to familysearch.org:

The custom of applying a man’s by-name to all his children began in the late 12th century and spread slowly, with the manorial classes and the south of England leading the way. The first legal recognition of an hereditary surname is found in 1267; it was de Cantebrigg meaning ‘of Canterbury.’ By 1400 three-quarters of the population are reckoned to have borne hereditary family names, and the process was complete by about 1450 in England. Wales is an exception, in that although they had surnames they were patronymics (derived from the father’s first name) and thus changed each generation.

During this early period a married woman could be known either by her maiden surname or by her husband’s surname with wyf added, as in Mary Walker, wife of Henry Field, or Mary Fieldwyf. The term Mrs. for a married woman was not used until after 1500.

Dating A11132 – Mawdsley and Hartley Ancestors

If I use the new FTDNA tool for A11132, it should include Mawdsley (A11132) and Smith (A111138):

By the way, the grayed out portion will always be grayed out as it represents the female portion of the tree and YDNA represents only the male portion.

That means that I figured out how FTDNA dates from the year 2000. I assume that 1300 was before most had surnames, so perhaps Mawdsley was never Hartley – though they do share the ‘ley’ which I take to mean field. That also means that the Smith tester’s results go back to the year 800 – very old indeed. Mawdsley must have an additional lineage since 700 years ago that is separate from the Hartley group of A11134.

Summary and Conclusions

  • Hartley Branch A16717 was added recently to the FTDNA L513 Project Web Site. I had notified the creator that it was missing and he added it.
  • I look at the bigger picture of the YDNA tree to show where my Hartley Branch fits in.
  • I looked at the new FTDNA Discover Tool. This tool takes out some of the guesswork in trying to date YDNA Haplogroups
  • This tool also gives ranges of dates. This is useful when more information is known about the genealogy.
  • I checked the dates that the tool gave for the overall Hartley Branch of A11134 as well as for its two branches.
  • I also checked the dates for Mawdsley and Smith. Assuming the dating is correct using the FTDNA Discover tool, Mawdsley from the year 1300 was most probably never a Hartley name and the upstream Smith was certainly before the age of surnames as the current Smith Haplogroup goes back to the year 800.
  • Finally, I realized that the FTDNA Discover Tool predicts haplogroups that will have additional lineages.

 

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A New Match to My Hartley Part of the YDNA Tree

Someone mentioned to me recently that there was a new match to the Hartley and Mawdsley part of the YDNA tree. His last name is Wolka.

The Hartley and Mawdsley Part of the YDNA Tree

Wolka didn’t take the BigY test but if he did, this is the part of the tree he would be in. He took the 111 STR test.

Here I backed out the tree to Smith who is at A11138. Mawdsley is at A11132. After that are three flavors of Hartleys. Pulling further out, there is this tree:

This tree is half of the L513 tree. Hartley is in the lower right of this part of the tree. Actually the A16717 Branch of Hartleys is missing from this tree and I have mentioned this on Facebook to the author of this tree, so hopefully this will be corrected. There are other Hartleys in other trees, but they are not closely related by DNA to my Hartleys from the above tree.

STR Matches

Here is how I match Wolka by STRs:

At 111 STRs, Wolka is the only non-Hartley that I match. Based on that information alone, it would seem like Wolka could match me somewhere in the A11132 block and may even break up that block. At any rate, it would be interesting to see where Wolka fits on the YDNA tree.

The Wolka Name

The Wolka surname appears to be Polish. It is the name of a place in Poland, so I assume the name refers to someone from that place. The YDNA, however, points to Great Britain as the true heritage for the person who took this test. The most common way for this to happen would be due to an adoption or single mother situation. I don’t think that any other person with the Wolka surname has taken a YDNA – at least as far as I can tell.

In order to compare the Wolka results in more detail, I would need to know what his specific 111 STR results are. I do see that my brother matches Wolka at a closer level compared to my match with Wolka:

That is because I am a one step difference from my brother. Here is a proposed STR tree I drew a while back:

Here I have myself with DYS572 of 16. I also have the Michael and Lawrence branch with a 16 for the same STR. It appears to me now, that this would also be a valid STR tree:

In this scenario, my brother Jim has a back mutation at location DYS572 from 16 to 15 and what I call the Marsden branch of Michael and Lawrence share a common ancestor with my branch with a man who had a 16 value for DYS572. Either way, the fact that Wolka probably has a value of 15 for DYS572 supports the likelihood that this value is ancestral for our group. I suppose that if I was to test one of my second cousins, then it would be clear which scenario is correct.

Any Other Implications?

My brother Jim matches Wolka at one step less than four other Hartleys. This could mean that ancestors of this Wolka YDNA tester were at one time  Hartleys.

Other Hartley Project Members Matching Wolka

Mawdsley’s closest 111 STR match is with Wolka:

Wolka Match to Michael and Lawrence

These two were on a well-documented Hartley Branch going back to a Hartley from the late 1600’s who was a Quaker. One branch of this family moved to Pennsylvania around the year 1700. Unfortunately, Michael took the BigY test at a time when the 111 STR test was not included, so he does not have those results. Here are the results for Lawrence (with some others):

This shows that by 111 STRs, Wolka so far is closest to the Lawrence (Quaker) branch of Hartleys. This is where Michael’s 111 STR test would have come in handy.

Other Wolka Matches

This seems to imply that Wolka is more somewhat more closely aligned with Steve and then Lawrence and Gary. The 67 STR information is not as important when the 111 STR information is available as the 111 STR information is more accurate.

TiP Report

This report gives a bit more accuracy than the genetic distance, so it is helpful. I’ll just look at the 90% confidence level. Here is the full report between myself and Wolka:

I’ll use 19 generations which is around 90%. That is far out. So if a generation is 30 years, then that would be 570 years ago or around 1452. As 90% is a pretty conservative number, I’ll subtract the generations from today rather than from when I was born which was 1956.

Here is what I come up with for the 111 STR test:

Here Steve is the clear winner at 1662. Mawdsley is back at 1452. If the date of 1662 is correct, that means that we are pretty far into the age of surnames. That also seems to imply that at some time in Wolka’s male line history, he should have some Hartley ancestors.

Here is the full report between Wolka and Steve:

Summary and Conclusions

  • Wolka is an interesting new match and should fit in somewhere in the Hartley/Mawdsley YDNA branch of mankind
  • Wolka took a 111 STR test which gets him into the ballpark of mostly Hartleys and one Mawdsley. SNP testing is more accurate than STR testing. That means that a BigY test would be needed to place Wolka within that YDNA tree
  • The branch that Hartley and Mawdsley are go back to England and likely the Lancashire or perhaps Yorkshire area. As Wolka appears to be a Polish name, that means that there was probably a mis-attributed parentage in the Wolka line somewhere in the last 400 years or so.
  • The more people that test – especially the BigY 700 test – the more defined the Hartley/Mawdsley tree is. Also the dates of each of these branches should become more clear.
  • Based on STRs, Wolka appears to be more closely related to Steve’s branch of Hartleys. However, as mentioned above STRs are not the most accurate measure of relatedness.
  • I did a TiP Report comparison which shows that Wolka’s connection to Steve is around 1662 at the 90% confidence level.
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A New AncestryDNA Match with Chris on the McMaster Line

Chris is a recent DNA match with me and other siblings. He shows as having a common ancestor with me:

Chris’ tree has the common ancestors as Abraham McMaster and Margery Noble:

My tree also goes back to Abraham McMaster, so I’m not sure why this is not reflected at AncestryDNA:

Here is an extensive tree that I have so far based on Genealogy and DNA matches:

Here is an overview of the ThruLines at Ancestry:

One possible issue is that Abraham McMaster and Archibald McMaster both show being born in 1809.

This Abraham is related to another McMaster Branch. I have guessed at the connection here:

This Margaret Frazer Mcmaster on the left side of the chart moved to Ontario with all of her children except for Fanny. Fanny was my ancestor and stayed in Ireland. Just to confuse things, she married another McMaster (James McMaster Sr from the chart above).

Building a Tree for Chris

My building a tree for Chris would give me more confidence of how we are connected. Here is Sadie McMaster’s birth record:

Here is the start of Chris’ tree I am working on:

Mark McMaster’s Marriage record:

This gives his father’s name as Frank. However, the 1881 Census has the father’s name as Mark:

The 1861 Census for Euphemia, Ontario implies that Mark’s parents were Abraham and Eliza:

The 1861 Census Vs What I Have for McMasters

I have a web site on McMasters and the relevant part looks like this:

Here the difference is that Abraham marries Margery rather than the Eliza in Euphemia, Ontario. Also in my genealogy, James is younger than Mark. Also the timing is a bit off. If Mark McMaster was born in 1817, he would be about 44 in 1861, so we are about a generation off.  My guess is that the Abraham in the Ontario Census could be the 1817 Mark’s brother. So in my genealogy above, a likely scenario would be that there was an Abraham the son of Abraham and this Abraham had children William James and Mark. That is what Chris’ Tree shows:

That means that I would be happy to add Abraham as an older sibling to William and Mark in the family I have the genealogy for above. The earliest Kilmactranny Church records appear to be in 1817, so Abraham predated this time. Here are some transcriptions I received from a McMaster researcher:

If the records are right, there were two McMaster boys born on the same day. A problem I see with Chris’ tree is that Margery probably was not born in 1775 as I have that her daughter Eleanor was baptized in 1828. That would put Margery at 53 when she had Eleanor:

That means that some adjustment may be necessary for Abraham the father of Mark. I’m guessing he was born some time around 1813 to 1815 (before the start of Kilmactranny birth records in 1817). I would say Margery should have been born around 1785. She would have been 18 or 20 when she had her son Abraham and 43 when she had Eleanor in 1828. Genealogy by biology.

However, now there is a new issue. Here is the tree I had at Ancestry:

If I now move Abraham from 1797 to 1785, that puts a 17 year gap between him and William Briton McMaster. Further, there is this record from an Ancestrty Tree to contend with:

This 1812 record lists an Abraham as son of Abraham which most people take to be the ancestor of Chris. This works also:

Likely Margery was born at some time after 1785 that I have her. If Abraham was named after his grandfather, then by popular naming conventions, he would have been the first son. I’ve adjusted Margery to being born in 1787 in my tree. Fine tuning.

My DNA Match with Chris

I match Chris at 24 cM which is probably more than would be expected for a 5th cousin once removed. First I need to add Chris to my DNA/genealogy tree. That involves squeezing three Abraham McMasters into the tree:

Also note that the younger Abraham born in 1809 would have an uncle who was born the same year. This is of course possible. Also, I have two Abrahams who both married a Margery which is also possible but a little suspicious. However, this is the best I can do with the information that I have. It helps to make these charts as the way I have it, Chris is a 5th cousin two times removed:

If we combined the two Abrahams and Margery’s, that would move Chris up a generation, but as I said the configuration above seems to me to be the better choice.

Shared Matches with Chris

When I checked my shared matches with Chris, I see an interesting trend. The first shared match with Robert. Robert and I have this connection:

Recall above, I had this simplified genealogy tree:

I have ancestors on both sides of this tree via William McMaster and Abraham McMaster. I match Chris on the right side of the tree. However, for Chris to have a common match with Robert, it would have to be on the left side of my proposed tree or go further back to Archibald McMaster born in 1730. Of course, that is assuming my hypothetical tree is correct.

The next shared DNA match between Chris and me is a brother of Robert and matches me at 29 cM. Other matches don’t have much in their trees, so I can’t tell where the match is.

Linda: Shared Match Between Me and Chris

As the other two matches are on the McMaster/Frazer side, I will look at Linda’s match. It turns out that Linda’s tree is the same as Chris’ tree so she is likely as sister or other close relative.

That means that there is a tie of sorts between me matching Chris by DNA and the Shared Matches on the McMaster/Frazer Line.

Summary and Conclusions

  • Chris’ AncestryDNA common ancestor seems nearly right. The way I figured it out, it appears that it should be back a generation on his tree from what AncestryDNA has.
  • One problem with the tree I have is that is has two Abraham McMasters in a row married to two Margerys.
  • There were a lot of McMasters and a lot of vital records are missing.
  • I am related to McMasters on two lines
  • I have shared matches with Chris on the second line where I match McMaster (on the McMaster/Frazer Line). This could indicate a more ancient DNA match between Chris and me. Most in this family also moved to Canada.
  • I mentioned a proposed tree that tries to pull the two McMaster lines together.
  • Deed records help in the iterpretation of the genealogies. These typically mentioned three generations. However, they were not always straight father to son lines in the three generations.

 

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A Few Matches to My Mom on the Baker Line

I see a new DNA match my mom has on her Baker Line. The ThruLines look like this:

Ruth is the new match. Looks like I tried a tree for Gwen in the past. The ThruLines above showed Harry Wood’s mother as Rebecca Andress. I had a different mother:

Building a Tree for Ruth

Bassed on the ThruLines, Ruth is two more generations back from Gwen. The tree I have for Gwen appears to go back to Rebecca Andress:

A Social Security record was helpful:

Here is the 1920 Census:

Samuel was a widow at this time. Here a record for Rebecca Andress:

For the ThruLines to be right, Sophia Andress needss to be Sophia Baker. This death record implies that Sophia was a Baker:

Bottom line is that the ThruLines for Ruth appear to be correct:

Summary and Conclusions

  • It is interesting that of my mom’s two ThruLines matches going back to Conrad Baker born 1764, one appear to be incorrect and one appears to be correct.
  • The current match Ruth is two generations closer on the Thrulines than the other match, so that made it easier to verify her connection to Conrad Baker
  • It would probably a good idea to check the connection with Gwen again, but the last time I checked, I couldn’t connect her back to Conrad Baker.
  • If both these matches (Ruth and Gwen) uploaded to Gedmatch, it would be possible to see if they matched each other by DNA. If that were the case, it would be more likely that Gwen would also be descended from Conrad Baker.

 

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My Mom’s DNA and Genealogical Connection to Katja

I’ve noticed lately that Ancestry has some helpfull Latvian records. So I have been looking through some of my mom’s Latvian DNA matches to see if I can find out how we are connected.

Katja at MyHeritage

MyHeritage seems to be a good place to find Latvian DNA matches. Katja also has a Theory of Relativity with my mom, but I don’t think that it is right:

I have a different genealogy for my mother:

Besides, why would have a Pfief have a Biedermann for a daughter?

Here is Katja’s tree at MyHeritage:

Katja is missing a maternal side and has additional Hirschenhof ancestry on her Lutz side.

Building a Tree for Katja

I will check out Katja’s genealogical tree by building a tree at Ancestry:

When  I entered Wilhelm Georg Lutz, Ancestry gave me hints for his parents. The hint for Wilhelm Georg is from this tree:

I checked the records at Raduraksti for 1895, but those records appear to be in Russian. I’m not sure if the Ancestry suggestion is correct at this point.

Pauline Rathfelder

Next, I will check on Pauline. Here is a record – perhaps baptismal?

Pauline and Emilie appear to be twins. I see Pauline’s mother’s maiden name as Mattheus, but I’m not sure. Here is the record transcription of their marriage:

This Goerge Ludwig seems the right age to have Pauline in 1879:

Based on the DNA matches between Katja and my mother, I expect that the match is on more than one line:

Sometimes many small matches mean more than one pair of common ancestors going back. So likely, some of the DNA matches represented above are from Lutke and some from Rathfelder- or perhaps even other surname.

A Common Rathfelder Ancestor for Katja and My Mom?

It turns out that I already have a Georg Adam Rathfelder in my Ancestry Tree:

However, this Georg was born in 1798:

I also see another marriage for a Georg Adam Rathfelder:

This marriage was in 1818. So this Georg Adam could have re-married in 1839 or had a son Georg Adam who married in 1839. Fortunately, I have a paper which seems to help:

According to this paper, Georg Adam was actually the son of Johannes Rathfelder born in 1796 I think I’ll go with this paper.

Here is what I have so far:

The Johannes in Line A above was the son of Johann Adam Rathfelder and Anna Catharina Elisabeth Rothweiler. I have Johannes in my tree already:

That should be enough to add Katjia to my Rathfelder DNA match tree:

Katja is my mother’s 4th cousin twice removed on the Rathfelder side.

Back to the Lutz Connection

Here were the hints for Katja’s ancestors from Ancestry:

It seems like two possibilities here:

I see a Gottlieb Hermann and a Gottlieb Otto. Here is a third more likely candidate:

Here is a Peter Gottlieb Lutz who married Elisabeth Hauk (maiden name Herman).

Katja’s Family Tree

I have this so far on Katja’s paternal side:

It would take a while to build all the other lines out as far as Hans Jerg Rathfelder and his Bittenbinder wife.

Painting Katja’s DNA Matches to My Mom’s Profile

Here is what I have so far for my mom:

The first line for each chromosome represents my mom’s paternal matches. The Rathfelder/Bittenbinder DNA matches are in red. As I intimated earlier, Katja’s matches with my mom are probably not all from Rathfelder and Bittenbinder due to the nature of where this family lived. They were in a German Colony and married among their own which means that intermarriage of families normally took place.

My mom is 35% painted overall and 40% painted on her paternal side.

By default, DNAPainter adds matches of 7 cM and over. Here are my mom’s paternala matches with Katja added:

Katja matches my mom on Chromosome 4 at 6.7 cM, so that match did not get added. Here are Katja’s specific matches with my mom:

There is no overlap with the matches Astrid has. Astrid and my mom also have Rathfelder and Bittenbinder common ancestors.

Summary and Conclusions

  • Katja matches my mom at Ancestry and has a Rathfelder in her tree
  • I was able to find Katja and my mom’s common Rathfelder and Bittendbinder ancestors
  • Katja and my mom probably match on other ancestral lines
  • I painted the DNA matches Katja has with my mom on my mom’s profile. Those matches were painted to Rathfelder and Bittenbinder even though they may represent other common ancestors.
  • Without a published document that explains some of the complicated Rathfelder relationships in Hirschenhof, it would have been very difficult to figure out the Rathfelder/Bittenbinder common ancestors that my Mom and Katja have.
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Connecting Eva to the Rathfelder Tree

I had wrtten a Blog about Eva in 2020, but had trouble connecting her to my Rathfelder Tree despite a good DNA connection. Now I see the connection.

Here are the DNA matches that Eva has with my mother:

The Rathfelder Genealogy

Here is what Eva has for her tree:

I am interested in the Rathfelder side. Through recent research, I have found “Henrihs Ratfelders”. I found him as Johann Heinrich Rathfelder. This is the same name as my great-grandfather. In fact Eva’s grandfather was probably named for my great-grandfather.

While searching for my great-grandfather, I found this record:

This is a family church record from St. Paul’s in Riga showing Eva’s Johann Heinrich born in Linden (the church for Hirschenhof) on 8 October 1887. I don’t know who the Marie and Heinrich are at the bottom of the page. I wonder if they are my great-grandparents. At any rate there is also a Nicolai in this family who was probably named for my great Uncle Nicolai born in 1874:

Adding Eva to My DNA/Genealogy Tree

This is the DNA matching Rathfelder Tree I have so far:

Here I have added in Eva:

Eva is a 2nd cousin once removed to my mother Gladys. Our common ancestors were Johann Rathfelder born in 1819 and Rosine Schwechheimer.

“Painting” Eva

I use DNAPainter to show DNA matches. Here is what I have so far for my mother:

My mom is 35% painted over all (or 35% filled in) and 40% painted on the paternal side. It turns out that I had already added Eva on my mom’s chart:

It looks like I had guessed at a more distant Rathfelder ancestor. Now that I know better, I can correct that.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I am glad to see now how Eva fits in to the Rathfelder tree
  • Her family and my family were apparently close. Her grandfather appears to be named after my great-grandfather and at least one of her great uncles was named after my great uncle.

 

 

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Browsing Latvian Church Records for Ancestors

For a while, Raduraksti was updating its website, and I was not finding the Church records I used to see for my ancestors in Hirschenhof, Latvia. My ancestors attended the Linden Church in the area:

These appear to be the records:

There should be earlier records. Perhaps they will become available later.

Liepkalnes, Not Linden

I see now that I should have been lookiing at Liepkalnes, not Linden:

That would explain why I was having so much trouble finding people.

Here are some of my ancestors who lived in Latvia:

I see that some death dates are missing. It would be nice to fill some in if I could find them. However, that seems difficult. Perhaps filling in marriages would be easier.

Jacobine Lutke

I see that I don’t have a marriage for my second great-grandmother Jacobine Lutke:

Ancestry has this hint:

Here is the record on the page:

I would say that this looks right. Of course, this is just the summary of the marriage record and not the marriage record itself. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find this record on the Raduraksti website.

Johann Georg Rathfelder Born 1778

I am missing Johann Georg’s marriage record also:

This is a tricky person to research because my memory tells me I had that Johann Georg had another brother by the same name – improbably as it seems:

The other confusing part is that the second Johann Goerg was supposed to have been born 14 years afther the first one. Aslo the Johannes who was supposed the be the son of the first Johann Georg was born in 1819 which would make him of an age that he could have been the son of the second Johann Georg! I would like to find the birth for Johann, but it appears that the records only go back as far as 1824 currently.

Browsing Ancestry Records

I found this interesting record at Ancestry:

I don’t recall seeing this before. This appears to be a personal register for the Rathfelder Family for Saint Paul’s Evangelical Lutheran Church in Riga.

From what I can tell, this is a record for the brother of my great-grandfather Heinrich Rathfelder. I have this brother as Georg Gustav Rathfelder:

The above record can at least fill in some family history. I don’t know if the +1918 attached to Heinrich was to mean his death or just his leaving. It appears that Johann Heinrich was named after my great-grandfather. I couldn’t make out the second name for Jakob. There appears to be much other interesting information on the page, but I don’t know what it all means.

A Record for My Great-Grandfather Johann Heinrich Rathfelder

This appears to be a baptismal record:

Sponsors appear to be Gerhard Schwechheimer and a Rathfelder. I see that I can also add this wedding record to my Ancestry file:

I’m having such fun with these records, I’lll look more into Alexander’s siblings.

Johann Phillip Nicolai Rathfelder

This appears to be Nicolai’s Baptismal record:

Again, I take the additional names to be sponsors. However, there appear to be more names than usual. I found this record listed under Marriage Banns:

I think that this is telling me that Philippe Nicolai’s mother-in-law was Wilhemene Rathfelder.

This is my great-aunt Maria Caroline Rathfelder’s baptismal record:

I recognize the last name as Pfief or similar spelling.

Harry Eduard Rathfelder

Here I think I have a mistake and I think I know how it could have happened. Harry is the son of Phillipe Nicolai:

Harry’s Personal Register is interesting:

I don’t understand all the notations. It appears that although he was born in Riga, he was confirmed in Linden. Looks like he married in 1932 and has a swastika near his name. The above record is from the Jesus Church – I assume in Riga.

Erna Auguste’s Baptismal Record

Erna’s great-grandmother was a Fuhrmann. I believe that Ern died young:

I am glad for transcriptions as I would have had trouble finding this record:

Caroline Antonie

It looks like I missed one of her names. Ancestry had her birth year as 1877, but that bumps into Erna’s birth, so I will keep the 1878 that I had. Caroline’s Confirmation Record shows her born in 1878 also:

Johann Jacob Reinhold Rathfelder

I may have too many names here:

I dropped the Reinhold in my family tree.

Robert Ernst

It appears that Robert also died young:

Marie Otilie Hilda

Otilie must have been for her godmother. Marie also died young at 2 month:

Ludwig Artur Wilmar

If I have him right, he would have been my grandfather’s next oldest sibling. I am having trouble finding this person in the Latvian records that Ancestry has. I also cannot remember where I got the original information. I may have to re-evaluate Ludwig. While searching for Johann Heinrich Rathfelder, I finally found him:

The Ludwig name was probably for his sponsor Ludwig Metz.

Leonhard Florentin

Leo was apparently the baby of the family:

He got his name from Leonhard Goldigowsky(?).

My Grandfather, Alexander Siegfried Oscar

For some reason, Alexander’s baptism was at St Paul’s rather than St Peter’s Church in Riga. It looks like Alexander didn’t pick up a name from his sponsor. I see that Alexander’s godmother was Ottilie who was a sponsor for Alexander’s older sister Marie Ottilie HIlda who died young. It also appears that Alexander was born in July not June as I had it previously. Of course, all other records appear to show that Alexander was born in June. I guess I’ll go back to June.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I started out trying to use the Raduraksti website to find the records of my Rathfelder ancestors, but found the Ancestry records much easier to use
  • The death records were especially easy to use as they are difficult to read and go through without being able to search for records.
  • I found that searching in different ways helped. For example, I could only find one of the sons of Johann Heinrich Rathfelder by seaerching for the father
  • I found that one of the sons I had for Johann Heinrich Rathfelder was actually the son of his oldest son Nicolai. Nicolai’s son Harry appeared to have a swastika by his name which I am sure would have been common for Germans in the 1930’s.
  • Finally, I found out that I was looking at the wrong records at the Radurakski website.
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A New Ellis Match for My Wife’s Aunt Elaine

I was notified by Ancestry recently that my wife’s Aunt Elaine had a new DNA match named Jolene.

Ancestry thinks that these two could be in the 2nd to third cousin range.

Here is Jolene’s tree:

As Jolene and Elaine have shared DNA matches on the Ellis side, it would seem like the connection should be on Jolene’s Ellis side. I can try to build out this tree:

I see that Arthur’s father was antoher Arthur. Arthur’s marriage record gives his parents:

They were on the next page:

That gets Jolene’s tree this far:

Now George is starting to match my Ancestry Tree for my wife’s family:

However, I had that George’s wife was Marion MacArthur. I think that Matthews is more correct at this time. So, I have corrected my tree, but not added the families down.

An Ellis DNA/Genealogy Tree

This is the tree that I have so far:

George was probably the younger brother of James Henry Ellis:

When I add in Jolene, I see that she is a third cousin to Elaine:

It could be that the Georges on my wife’s line could have been named for this George Ellis. George’s Death Certificate listed him as a bridge builder: