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Pilgrim 400th Anniversary: My Brewster Ancestors

I have quite a few Pilgrim Ancestors. They tended to marry other Pilgrims. I descend from Elder William Brewster in two different ways. All my Pilgrim ancestors come from my third great grandfather, Harvey Bradford. Harvey was born almost 250 years after Elder William Brewster.

Harvey descends from William Brewster on his father and mother’s side.

Harvey’s Paternal Brewster Connection

Harvery was the youngest son of Samuel Bradford. Unfortunately, I have that Samuel died in 1812, when Harvey was about three years old.

In the above image, we finally see a Brewster. Here is Sarah Brewster who married Benjamin Bartlett. Here is an expansion of her tree:

Sarah must be my 8th great grandmother and Elder William Brewster is my 10th great-grandfather.

Elder William Brewster Born About 1566/67

I’ll start will William to keep the Blog in chronological order. Doncaster looks to be about 12 miles NorthEast of Sheffield. Some of my mother’s ancestors lived in Sheffield in the 1700’s and 1800’s.

Although I have that William was born in Doncaster, I see that the Mayflower Families Book on Brewster has him born in or near Scrooby, Nottinghamshire – to the South of Doncaster:

Scrooby is quite small with a current population of about 329. According to the Mayflower families book, William’s father who was also William Brewster was appointed to the office of Baliff-receiver of Scrooby manor by Archbiship Grindal on 4 january 1575/6. So when William, Jr. was about 9 years old.

Here is a photo of Scrooby Manor:

This home was later occupied by William Brewster (Jr.) who served as did his father as Master of the Royal Post. This house played an important part in formation of Separatists later to be called the Pilgrims. Brewster and Bradford would meet in this house to pursue their religious freedom while in England.

In addition, William was unique in some ways compared to the other Pilgrims:

  • The only Pilgrim known to have had a college education
  • The first Pilgrim to visit Holland
  • The only Pilgrim with Government experience
  • William also held the highest non-pastoral Church position as Elder and very often filled in as preacher to the Pilgrims.

William was a much respected part of the Pilgrims. He nursed the sick to health in the first winter the Pilgrims were in Plymouth – even including William Bradford. At the time of his death, he had over 400 books in collection.

William Brewster Places

I have already mentioned Scrooby where William came from. While at Cambridge University, William was at Peterhouse Hall built in 1290, so already old when William attended.

Here is Peterhouse Hall:

In Leiden, William lived in the “stinksteeg” or stink alley in the Pieterskerk section.

The alley William lived on is now named William Brewstersteeg.

Here is Mr. Brewster’s location in Plymouth:

Isaac Allerton was William’s son-in-law. From Plymouth, William moved to Duxbury where he lived with his son Love. This is the likely location of his house:

The location of the house is known as Elder Brewster Lilacs:

Wililam died on 10 April 1644.

Love Brewster Born about 1614

Love was born in Holland and would have lived near or with his father William most of his life. Love and his brother Wrasling (or Wrestling) were on board the Mayflower accompanying their father. Love’s older brother Jonathan and his two sisters Patience and Fear arrived not too long after.  Jonathan, Patience and Fear were likely born in Scrooby. Love married Sarah Collier in Plymouth on 15 May 1634.

Love had four children probably all born in present-day Duxbury:

  • Sarah born about 1635 – probably named for her mother
  • Nathaniel born about 1637
  • William born about 1645
  • Wrestling

Love died late in 1650. His brother Jonathan wrote a letter to Love’s wife Sarah after the death of Love and gave her some land in Duxbury. Jonathan desired to return to England but never made it back. Based on the number of books in Love’s inventory at the time of his death, he appears to have been educated. This education was likely from his father Elder William Brewster.

Sarah Brewster Born about 1635

Sarah was last in my line of Brewster ancestors and still born in the early 1600’s. She was actually twice my ancestor. Here she is as my 8th great-grandmother on my 3rd great-grandfather Harvey’s paternal side:

Here she is as my 9th great-grandmother on Harvey’s maternal side:

It makes more sense that Sarah would be further back on Harvey’s maternal side as women tended to marry at an earlier age. Sarah grew up in her father Love’s house in Duxbury as noted above. In 1654 or 1655, Sarah married Benjamin Bartlett. He had been married previously to Susannah Jenny. In 1656, Sarah received a gift of land from her Uncle Jonathan Brewster. The birth record and marriage record for Sarah are missing. So wills and land records are used to patch the information together. Benjamin’s mother was Mary Warren also of Mayflower lineage.

Sarah’s husband Benjamin Bartlett was a cooper. Here is an excerpt from werelate.org:

The matchmakers were soon at work again, and in 1655, Benjamin married Sarah Brewster, daughter of Love Brewster and Sarah (Collier) Brewster, and grand-daughter of the spiritual leader of the Plymouth Colony, Elder William Brewster. They moved to Waiting Hill in Duxbury, near the Collier home on North Hill, where the North Hill Country Club now stands. Sarah’s maternal grandfather, William Collier, had been one of the original merchant adventurers who financed the Colony and an assistant governor. Benjamin was soon active in politics and was elected Constable in 1662. He was elected a Selectman in 1666 and was reelected for 14 terms, until 1686. In 1685 he was representative from Duxbury to the General Court of the Colony.

Here is a three mile walk near Waiting Hill that also shows North Hill:

Put this walk on my bucket list. Here is the actual Waitin Hill shown between Routes 3 and 3A:

Before there were so many trees in the area, the story goes that people would wait for ships returning from England on this Hill where they could see the Ocean.

Sarah died before 21 January 1678.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I have three Brewster ancestors who lived in early Plymouth and what is now Duxbury.
  • I have always been interested in Elder William Brewster due to his education and spiritual role and other roles he played in the life of the early colony.
  • These three people are fairly well documented as to where they lived and the lives they lived. I have a special interest in where my ancestors lived.
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An Update On My Mitochondrial DNA from 2020

While looking over my old draft Blogs, I came upon this one last updated in November of 2020. I had not finished it, but I wanted to post this now to show the progression of my Mitochondrial DNA Matches.

My last Blog on my Mitochondrial DNA or MtDNA was in 2018. I won’t go over everthing I wrote there. At that time I had four perfect MtDNA matches:

At that time, I noted that I was getting about one perfect (or Genetic Distance of zero) match per year. That rate has kept up and now I have seven perfect matches:

My three new matches are with Anne, Elizabeth and Ann. The two additional female surnames noted are for Gallagher and McLaughlin.

Triangulation of Female Ancestors – Back to Ireland, or Not?

At the time of my previous 2018 Blog, it seemed like my mother’s female line went back to Ireland based on the common ancestors. FTDNA has a map of my current matches, but only the ones who have listed a location for their female line oldest ancestor:

Here is a key to the pins:

However, along with the map, the dates have to be considered. My female line, from what I can tell goes back to the 1700’s:

Ann Nicholson is my great-grandmother. Ann Scott was certainly born in the 1700’s. I am not certain of Roebuck and Scott, but onely mostly sure. My MtDNA Haplogroup of H5’36 certainly goes back to the British Isles, but I would like to know more than that.

However, 9 people list an earliest known ancestor. These are:

  1. Gallagher
  2. McLaughlin
  3. McKelvey
  4. Jennings
  5. Coleman
  6. Francis
  7. Chiffink
  8. Roberts, Jolly
  9. Touhey

These names are helpful, but adding dates and places would be more helpful.

My MtDNA Matches’ Genealogy

The map above only shows the location of most distant female ancestor where that was added. Most people don’t add this information. Out of 21 matches:

  • four people made it to the map
  • 10 show that they have family trees at FTDNA
  • 9 list an earliest known ancestor (see above)

The last two bullets have some overlap but some are only in one category or the other.

I’ll start a spreadsheet:

Already I have an issue. Anne’s tree has Anne O’Donnell as the oldest on her female-only line. But she listes Annie Gallagher.

A Tree for Newest MtDNA Match Anne

I can build a quick tree at Ancestry Here is Anne’s grandmother:

Anne’s great-grandmother is Margaret Campbell who was born in Ireland. Here is Maggie in 1900 in Philadelphia:

If this is right, Maggie came to the US as a baby in 1862. This appears to be Margaret’s death record:

Conlin is transcribed as Coulin.

This appears to be the passenger list for Maggie and her family:

It is more likely that Maggie was born in December 1862 than 1861. This ship, the Hecla, arrived June 29, 1863.

Summary and Conclusions

  • The rate continues that I get about 1 new perfect Mitochondrial DNA match per year.
  • Going through the genealogy on the maternal side for these matches – if these matches  have provided trees – takes time
  • So far, I have not found a genealogical connection in any of my matches

 

 

 

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Another Nicholson Heard from at 23andMe

Lately I have been reaching out to Nicholson descendants at 23andMe who match me by DNA. The last one that I had identified was Dave and I wrote a Blog about my match with him here.

It turns out that this match is with Cynthia who is Dave’s sister. I didn’t realize that until I just checked. Cynthia’s common matches with me.

This shows that David is my third cousin and Cythia’s brother.

Here is how we match. I’ll need to add Cynthia into David’s box on the lower right. Cynthia didn’t know much beyond her Nicholson grandfather. I have more on the Nicholson family here. Here is Walter’s baptismal record from Kensington Presbyterian Church:

Walter is Cynthia’s Nicholson great-grandfather. Walter and his brother George Dockrill Nicholson were both baptized on April 4, 1886 when they were 10 or 11. Cynthia’s grandfather George Dockrill Nicholson was named for Walter’s brother.

My DNA Match with Cynthia

My DNA match with Cynthia is similar to the one I have with her brother David, but larger:

Here is my match with David:

I match David on the same Chromosomes but for less on each Chromosome.

I had added David to my Chromosome map, now I can add Cynthia. Here is Cynthia on Chromosome 8:

My match with Cynthia is represented by the third purple bar. Her match overlaps some with Linda. In order for these people to match me, each of our unique mixes of chromosome inheritances have to match up. David and Cynthia’s DNA matches with me do not overlap with each other

Other people that match me on this Chromosome are Linda, Carolyn, Beth and Robert.

Robert and Beth are the great-grandchildren of Sarah Nicholson, my great-grandmother Annie’s older sister. Linda and Carolyn descend from Nellie Nicholson and David and Cynthia descend from Walter Nicholson. David and
Cynthia also have a 1st cousin Robert, but he tested at AncestryDNA, so he doesn’t have detailed DNA comparison information unless he uploads his results to Gedmatch, MyHeritage or Famly Tree DNA (FTDNA).

My DNA Match with Cynthia on Chromosome 20

We have two copies of each of our chromosomes. Both Cynthia and I match on our maternal copy of our Chromosome 20. That is because that is our Nicholson side.

Chromosome 20 is one of the shorter chromosomes. Judith descends from my closer Lentz and Nicolson ancestors, so she is in a different color. Cynthia’s DNA match with me on this chromosome overlaps my match with David and Carolyn, meaning we all got the same DNA from William Nicholson or his wife Martha Ellis there.

Here is what my maternal chromosomes look like now:

Cynthia brought my maternally mapped DNA up a percentage to 38%. The purple represents DNA from my great-grandmother Annie Nicholson. I have eight great-grandparents, so that represents roughly 12.5% of all of my DNA or 25% of my maternal side DNA. Taking this one step further:

5.5% divided by 12.5% is 44%. That is the amount of DNA from William Nicholson and Martha Ellis that I have mapped now.

Visual Phasing

I have mapped out by visual phasing where I got my DNA from each of my grandparents on all my chromosome. Here is Chromosome 8:

I am the third person on the chart. All my maternal side (green) DNA came from my maternal grandmother who was a Lentz. However, this is my Nicholson side also as my grandmother’s mother was a Nicholson. That explains why I match Nicholsons well on this Chromosome. My sister Lori has the second most Lentz DNA on the bottom row.

Here is Chromosome 20 for me and my siblings:

Again, I have all green or Lentz. By looking at my siblings’ DNA, you can get a good idea how DNA is inherited differently by each sibling. For example, my sister Sharon would not match Cynthia on this Chromosome as she has a lot of Rathfelder DNA on Chromosome 20. But she may match on another chromosome where I con’t match Cynthia.

23andMe Family Tree

23andMe suggests that I add Cynthia to their tree:

I also added David on the lower left part of the tree.

 

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Cousin Rusty’s BigY Results

It has been a while since I have written about my cousin Rusty’s YDNA. Rusty’s YDNA testing resulted in his finding out that a rumored adoption of I think his grandfather in Ireland was true and that the name he was accustomed to having was not the same name as his ancestors. Here is my last Blog.  At that time, Rusty had not taken the BigY test. Since then he has. I see that previous results lead Rusty to believe that his paternal line was origingally McFarlane or McFarldand. Previously, Rusty was confirmed to be R-BY674.

Rusty’s New Group of R-BY38907

It sounds like a bunch of numbers, but it is really Rusty’s place in the tree of mankind. Here is Rusty’s Block Tree view of his results:

 

The BigY testing brought Rusty down a level to R-Y38907. There are three people in Rusty’s group with 4 variants. There is a McFarlane and a McFarland and Rusty. There are two other testers who hae split off from BY38907 to R-FT91061. If I use 100 years per variant or SNP, then McFarland are 500 years from a common ancestor and Rusty’s group are 400 years away. So a wild guess could be that these five people have a common ancestor around 450 years ago or in the 1500’s.

SNP Tracker

Let’s see what the SNP Tracker has to say about Rusty’s Haplogroup. This is a web based program.

SNP Tracker has BY38907 in Northern Ireland in Roman times. If I add in the group directly below Rusty, it brings us into modern times (1900):

I think I like my estimate better. As there  is only one SNP difference between BY38907 and FT91061, I don’t know why SNP Tracker has about 1900 years between them.

BY38907 in Context

In general terms, BY38907 is a R1b Haplogroup. This is a very common European Haplogroup. The FTDNA L21 project has what is called a Tip of the Iceberg Map or Tree for L21 people. As a Hartley, I am also in this group.

L21 has been associated with people with Celtic background, but it includes more than that. Here is Rusty’s Path:

DF63 is at the top right in brown. I know that I am in L513 in the Orange. That means that Rusty and I are related back to 2600 BC. That is actually not that distant in terms of YDNA:

Also I see that the DF63 is one of the smaller early branches of L21. From there we branched off:

My group is on the left and Rusty’s is on the right. His CT6919 is still at 2100 BC.

BY674 to BY38907

This view takes Rusty’s Block Tree back to BY674 (which descends from CTS6919):

The column on the left gives a measurement of SNPs. This shows that Rusty went from about 11-14 SNPs away with BY674 to four Private Variants away with his present designation of BY38907. The other interesting thing is that there are many McFarlands under BY674. This makes me think that BY674 was around at the time of the McFarland surname. This name is a fairly early surname dating to around 1100 from my understanding. This could also help date BY674. If any of the three people in Rusty’s group get a closer relative to test, then that closer relative and that person should form a new branch.

Rusty’s Private Variants

Rusty’s Private Variants represent his line since the common ancestor he shares with his two other matches who tested positive for BY38907 (and tested negative for FT91061).

Here are Rusty’s Private Variants:

Rusty has more than average Private Variants. The average of the group is four and Rusty has nine. This is partially explained in that Rusty took the BigY 700 and the other two testers probably had the BigY 500. That means that Rusty’s test was looking at parts of the YDNA that McFarland and McFarlane did not look at. That also means that if those two were to upgrade to the BigY 700, they may match on some of Rusty’s Private Variants. Of course, this would make them no longer private. This would also either add more SNPs to the current BY38907 Block or create or create a new branch (or both).

Rusty’s Non-Matching Variants

I’ll look at those listed with Rusty’s two closesty BigY matches:

These are Variants that Rusty has and his matches don’t have. Or they may be Private Variants that Rusty’s matches have and Rusty does not have. As Rusty has more Private Variants, these should be mostly Rusty’s Variants. Rusty’s Private Variants is really what the BigY does well at finding. These should be Variants that have not been discovered in anyone else before.

Here I have highlighted Rusty’s Private Variants in his two closest matches’ results:

This means that McFarlane has one Private Variant that Rusty does not have and McFarland has two Private Variants that Rusty does not have. Add Rusty’s 9 PVs plus the three above to get 12 PVs. Divide those by three testers to get the four Private Variants shown in the Block tree below BY38907.

If Rusty was to have his son take a BigY test, that would name most or all of Rusty’s Private Variants and put Rusty and his son into a new branch. Actually, these Private Variants are all probably already named, but they would then be shown as named. If Rusty’s son takes the BigY test, it would not tell Rusty anthing more about his genealogy. It would just give his branch of the YDNA Tree a name. Instead of Rusty having a bunch of Private Variants, he would have a named branch with a bunch of SNPs in it. This is what I did by having my brother tested:

My results are on the left. After having my brother tested for BigY, my brother and I split off from A11132 to form FT225247 in a block with 7 SNPs.

A Name for Rusty’s Private Variants

In general, FTDNA keeps the Private Variants as position numbers rather than named SNPs. Once they find a match, FTDNA reveals the name and puts the SNPs on a tree. The way to find out the names of your Private Variants is to go to ybrowse.com. Let’s try Rusty’s first which is 5173895.

Put the position number here and search:

This is where the position is on the Rusty’s Y Chromosome:

Here is the name:

This SNP (or Private Variant) was discovered when Rusty had his BigY test in 2019.

 

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DNA Relative Chris at 23andMe – a Lentz/Nicholson Descendant?

I wrote to Chris about a year and a half ago because we had a good DNA match at 23andMe. I perhaps confused Chris by mentioning another common relative named Judy as Chris would not have known the last name of Judy. I sent a message recently about being able to see Chris’ DNA results and got a message back that Chris didn’t know Judy but was curious about her ancestry. I’m curious as to where we connect also.

My DNA Connection with Chris

Here are the places that Chris and I share DNA. Based on the amount of DNA we share, 23andMe guesses that we are 2nd cousins once removed. 23andMe also put my match with Chris onto their Family Tree:

 

The Judith who I mentioned is on the left. She descends from William Lentz. By the way that 23andMe has the tree, it seems like Chris should descend from one of William’s siblings. That is assuming that the tree was created correctly. I know that Judith is my 2nd cousin. 23andMe think that Chris and I are 2nd cousins once removed. That means that he was born a generation after me.

Here are Jacob Lentz and Annie Nicholson:

Jacob is wearing a bow tie and Annie is to his right. My grandmother Emma is in front of Annie and my mother is in front of Emma. This is what I have for the other people:

TOP – Uncle Stanley, grandfather Lentz, Grandmother Lentz
MIDDLE – Aunt Agnes, Cousin Hazel, Gladys’ Mom
BOTTOM – Cousin Doris, Rob, Cousin Rob Poole, Muriel, Gladys

Some Lentz Genealogy

Since I have looked at a DNA tree, let’s look at the Lentz familyTree

Judy descends from William. I descend from Emma. That leaves Stanley and Agnes for Chris. I don’t see a record that Agnes’ son Robert was married or had children. That seems to leave Stanley Lentz.

Stanley Lentz Born 1894

These are the children I have for Stanley:

I couldn’t find much information about Hazel Lentz.

This findagrave.com record suggests that Doris may never have married:

Stanley Lentz

He had these children:

That filled in some more of my Lentz genealogy, but shed no light on how I match Chris.

William Lentz

I have that Judith descends from William. Perhaps Chris does also. I’ll look into some of his children.

Margaret Lentz

Margaret married John Viden. I couldn’t find a record that they had children.

Elva Lentz

I have this husband and children for Elval:

Bernice Lentz

In my last Blog, I had that Judy was the daughter of Florence. Now I see I should hae had her as the daughter of Bernice. I see this photo at Ancestry:

Judy shared the above photo with this caption:

My guess is that Judy is Bernice’s only child.

This family lived in Pitman, NJ:

Emma Lentz

Emma was born a little over a year before my mother:

I’m sure there were other descendants, but no clear connection to Chris, my DNA Relative at 23andMe. If Chris gets back to me with more family information, I’m sure I will be able to make a connection.

 

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A New Nicholson DNA Relative at 23andMe

Back in August, I sent out a message on 23andMe to David who appeared to have Lentz or Nicholson ancestry. I wrote:

Hi I see we have common DNA matches that I know. You must be related to me on my Lentz or Nicholson side or both. Do you have any information on your family history?

David wrote back:

Nicholson side…What do you know about the Nicholson’s??? Most of my family on both sides are from Philly. My grandfather was George Nicholson.

This sent me off to my web page on Nicholsons. I found a George Nicholson but he seemed to be born too early to be David’s grandfather:

Plus, I didn’t have that this George had any children. Then I found another George apparently named for his Uncle George:

He was born in 1902, but I hadn’t taken his line any further. I went to Ancestry and found George in the 1940 Census at 400 Chandler Street, Philadelphia:

If I have it right, this is what shows up on Google maps at 400 Chandler Street:

David’s DNA and My DNA Relatives Chart

I have a chart for my DNA matches on my Nicholson side:

Looks like I have already been tracking David’s grandfather George Dockrell Nicholson as I have David’s cousin Robert who tested at Ancestry:

Here is David:

Turns out we are third cousins. My great-grandmother Annie Nicholson was the sister of David’s great-grandfather Walter Nicholson. Here is our common 2nd great-grandfather William Nicholson:

Here is David’s 23andMe photo:

My DNA Connection with David

The DNA connection that I have with David is either from William Nicholson or his wife Martha Ellis:

That shared DNA is mostly on our Chromosome 20 with a little on Chromosome 8. I have quite a few Nicholson relatives who have had their DNA tested. Those who tested on Ancestry like Robert don’t have the detailed information on DNA that 23andMe shows, so they don’t show below:

This is the DNA that I share with William Nicholson and Martha Ellis so far. Let’s see if David adds any new DNA to the mix. I use an online program to paint my DNA called DNAPainter. This is my whole maternal side:

This shows that I have 36% or a little over a third of my maternal DNA painted or identified. The purpleish color is William Nicholson and Martha Ellis.

On Chromosome 8, I share Nicholson/Ellis DNA with David and Linda:

This is also called triangulation when three people match. It is a proof of sorts that there has to be the same common ancestor between the three of them.

Shared Nicholson/Ellis DNA on Chromosome 20

Here David adds new DNA to my profile:

David’s match with me ends about where Carolyn’s picks up. That could mean that David and I share DNA from William Nicholson and Carolyn and I share our DNA from Martha Ellis. Or it could be the other way around. The way that DNA is inherited, it comes down separately from each ancestor. However, we don’t know which one it is coming from unless it is verified from an earlier ancestor – say the parents of William Nicholson or Martha Ellis.

My match with David on Chromosome 20 brings my maternally mapped DNA up to 37%:

Here is all my paternal and maternal DNA mapped:

I don’t know where I was before, but I am at 45% mapped now. The maternal side of my DNA shows on the bottom row. For example next to Chromosome 20, the bottom row is my maternal side which is all Nicholson. This was randomly inherited. So for each of my siblings, this would look different.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I’m glad that David contacted me. I was able to update my Nicholson tree once he identifed himself.
  • I was also able to map our DNA matches as David has opted to share his DNA results with me. Most of my matches have not opted in to DNA sharing.
  • David represents the first shared DNA coming from his great grandfather Walter Ellis Nicholson born in 1877 that is identified by Chromosome.

 

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Another One of Gary’s Marshall Ancestors

In my previous Blog on Gary, I was looking at one of his ancestors who was a Marshall. The question was whether this Marshall was related to Chief Justice John Marshall. The anwer to that question was no. I assume that the question is the same for this other relative.

Here is what Gary says:

My other great grandmother Venie Marsh, was also a Marshall. 

OK. I have that Gary’s maternal grandfather was Sammie B Marsh. Here is Samuel in 1920:

Samuel was a machinist working for the government in 1920. Samuel’s father Jessie was a sailor. Vennie was born in Virginia according to the Census as Gary told me. Samuel was also born in Virginia.

Vennie Marsh

I think that Vennie is a nickname for Virginia. In 1900, Vennie was listed as being born in Maryland:

She was married about 1894 and born in 1876.

Findagrave.com has this information:

C

Come to find out that Vennie is short for Lavenia. Here she is in 1880 in Accomack County, Virginia with her mother and three sisters:

This appears to be a transcription of Lavenia’s birth record:

Here is another Samuel. Gary already has an ancestor from 1745 named Samuel Marsh:

That could mean that these two families were related as they were both from Accomack County, Virginia. That means that Sylvia’s parents could have been related to each other. We’ll see. These two Samuels were born 100 years apart.

Samuel J Marshall Born 1845

This record explains why Samuel wasn’t listed in the 1880 Census:

Too bad he died so young.

Here is a transcription of his marriage record:

Here is the young family in 1870:

Gillet Marshall

Going back to 1860, we see both Samuel and Gillet:

Here is the tree I have so far for Sammie B’s maternal side:

In 1850, Gilliett and family were farming in Accomack:

1850 is the earliest Census showing family units together. This death record gives information on Gillet’s parents:

I’m guessing that Hessie is short for Hester, but I’m not sure. I think that Hetty may be more normal. Also Gillet shows at Gilbert. If I take the Ancestry hints for the parents of Gillet, I get John A Marshall and Hester Parks:

Those are the same parents for John Taffy Marshall. I think that means that Sylvia’s parents Sammie B Marsh and Amanda Jane Evans were third cousins. They both had the same 2nd grandparents of John A Marshll and Hester Parks.

 

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Was Gary’s Great Grandmother Related to Chief Justice John Marshall?

My friend Gary recently sent me a question. He was wondering if his great grandmother was related to Chief Justice John Marshall? He also sent a link to findagrave.com:

Gary’s Maternal Side

I already have a tree for Gary’s side, but Mary Jane Marsh is on his maternal side. I’ll need to build that tree out and figure out Justice Marshall’s tree.

Here is Gary’s mother. That’s all I have so far. Here is Sylvia in 1940.

She shows as John Evans Aunt which is interesting. The 1930 Census is also a bit confusing:

Why would Sammy have a son with a different last name?

Also Sylvia’s last name is given as Marsh not Marshall, but there are Marshall’s close by:

I guess the Marshall comes in earlier. Amanda Marsh was an Evans and her mother was a Marshall.

Amanda Jane Evans Clayton Marsh

So, if Amanda was a Clayton, then these other children were hers from a previous marriage. That makes sense. Here is Amanda in 1910:

Amanda’s husband was a dredger.

Here is Amanda in 1910:

This shows that Amanda’s mother Mary was born in Maryland, but that her father was born in Virginia. Amanda’s father was lister as a ‘Sailor’.

Chief Justice John Marshall

Here is what Wikipedia has:

I bring this up now because Justice Marshall was from Virginia. That means that we are at least headed to the right location with Amanda’s mother. Also Justice Marshall had a lot of sons. If he had no sons, we could stop here. 

Mary Jane Marshall

Let’s see if Mary Jane Marshall leads us to Chief Justice Marshall. Here is a record that ties Amanda Evans back to Mary Jane Marshall:

Here is Ewell, Maryland:

Here is some more on Amanda:

I’m not sure how the half siblings fit in. Between findagrave.com and Social Security, we seem to be on the right track. Here is Mary J in 1880 with her family:

The Census shows that Mary’s father John was born in Virginia as was his father and mother.

John W Marshall

Based on the 1880 Census, John was born around 1840 in Virginia. Here is John 10 years earlier in 1870:

John must have moved to Maryland around 1865 – an interesting year.

John was in Accomack, Virginia in 1860:

He was also born in Accomack:

Here is part of a death record for Hettie L Barnes. She is probably the Hester L Marshall who shows up in the 1880 Census:

If correct, this gives her mother’s name as Julia Anne Tyler.

Summary to this Point

So far, I have have traced one of Gary’s lines back to John W Marshall. He was born in Accomack County, Virginia in about 1839. The question is whether this John W Marshall descends from Chief Justice John Marshall. Chief Justice John Marshall was born September 24, 1755 in Fauquier County, VA which is to the West of Washington, DC.

I did find a book from 1890:

This book has Chief Justice John Marshall in it, but I didn’t see any John W Marshall at least in the index.

Back to John W Marshall

At this point I am going to Ancestry Tree hints for John W. Ancestry has 10 trees for John W.

The eight trees that have parents for John W Marshall have these two parents. As I have no other ready clues, I’ll go with John Taffy as the father of John W.

Another web page has this information:

It would be nice to find this family in the 1850 Census.

I did find a John T Marshall on an agricultural Census. That John was also a slave holder and corresponds to this John:

However, the other names don’t match well.

John Taffy Marshall

Here is John in 1860:

 

John is listed as a Sailor. That could explain the difficulty in finding the family in 1850? Rachel Evans is listed as being from Maryland. This could be Eleanor’s mother. Perhaps the family was in Maryland in 1850.

Going Back Further Using Other People’s Trees

There are 10 trees for John Taffy Marshall:

They all have the above parents.  However, two trees mention Germantown, Virginia. In one tree John A was born there and died and in Accomack. In the other tree he was born in Germantown and died in Accomack. My guess is that these two occurances of Germantown are not correct and are an attempt to link the family to Chief Justice John Marshall.

John A Marshall Born 1775

This John was born in an interesting year. There are also 10 trees for John A Marshall.

These trees have as a father Samuel Marshall born 1745.

Samuel Marshall  Jr Born 1745

Here is Somerset County. Ancestry trees have Samuel born here:

This seems a likely place for Samuel based on the geography of the area. Assuming these trees are correct, that rules out Chief Justice John Marshall as Gary’s ancestor and rules in Samuel Marshall.

 

 

 

 

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Updating My 23andMe DNA Matches and Tree

Due to finding a Frazer DNA 2nd cousin once removed recently at 23andMe, I have taken a closer look at the 23andMe Tree. I last looked at 23andMe’s Tree last year in this Blog. At that time, the tree grouped together some of my relatives, but it seemed like they had a difficult time telling which of my relatives were paternal or maternal. These relatives were mixed up on both sides. For example I had both maternal and paternal relatives on both sides of my tree.

This tree has been getting a little better as time went on. Recently, I found out that I can now modify the tree to make it make more sense. I have done that and moved my maternal matches to the left side of my tree and my paternal matches to the right side of my tree:

The circle with the face is me. The red side is my mother’s side and the blue is my father’s. The colors now make sense. My Nicholson side is purple. Rathfelder is red. The Frazer side which happens to come from Ireland is green and my Hartley side is blue. Most matches are on my Hartley side as my Hartley great grandparents had 13 children.

I have added some matches to the tree manually. I am not sure how 23andMe adds matches to the tree. Here is what Diahan Southard says in one of her Blogs:

23andMe Family Tree – Beta

23andMe is beta-testing a new Family Tree builder that works based only on your genetics, with no input from your genealogy. This is especially great news for those who don’t know their family trees or haven’t entered the information into a tree file yet.

“Your genetic family tree [on 23andMe] is built automatically by an algorithm that predicts relationships based the DNA shared between you and your DNA Relatives,” explains a recent company statement. “The size of your family tree depends on how many connections and DNA Relatives you have close relationships with in the 23andMe database. Participating in 23andMe’s DNA Relatives tool helps improve the experience. As the 23andMe database grows, customers may see their trees expand.

Update in March 2020 from 23andMe:

“As of February 2020, 23andMe customers are now able to edit and add relationships to their Family Tree for richer storytelling and accuracy. Family Tree builders are now able to move individuals and groups of relatives elsewhere, and add relatives, even if they haven’t participated in 23andMe’s services. Customers can also add personal notes to the tree including ancestor names, important dates, and photos, and send messages to relatives who may offer more information and fill in further gaps on their Family Tree.”

My Hartley Tree

It takes a little while to edit these trees. I need to add more of my grandfather’s siblings to the 2nd row above. I already had my grandfather’s brother Greenwood. I was above to add three more siblings:

I added Robert, Mary and Annie Hartley. 23andMe doesn’t arrange these ancestors by their age. For example, I would have had Rober on the right as he was born in 1911. He is to the left of Mary who was born in 1895. I’m not sure who DL is as he/she didn’t answer my previous message. It appears that this cousin does not descend from the four siblings identified. Actually five, including my grandfather James.

My Frazer DNA Tree

While my Hartley tree was already in pretty good shape, my Frazer tree was not. I believe that it had a Rathfelder from my mother’s side in it and one of the Frazers which should be on my father’s side was on my mother’s side. I tried to fix it, but made some mistakes:

I added William and Hubert Frazer to the tree, but they should be brothers of James Archibald and not sons. My first correction was also a mistake. Here is William moved:

I next need to delete the old William line. Note that Katherine has a symbol by her photo. This indicates that she was placed on the tree by 23andMe – even though I had to move her. It also points out that Linda on the left, if placed correctly by 23andMe would be a Clarke relative and not a Frazer relative.

Here is the cleaned up version:

I added in George and Margaret Frazer at the top to avoid confusion. I also need to add the parents of Margaret Clarke to clear up that side. Note that there is not a DNA symbol next Stanley and Brenda. That is because I added them manually to the tree. I’m not sure why 23andMe adds some DNA relatives to the tree and others it does not.

My Small Rathfelder 23andMe DNA Family Tree

Even though this tree is small, 23andMe originally had this on my paternal side, so I had to correct it. One interesting thing about Ian is that he appears to be a direct male Rathfelder descendant. That means that 23andMe should have a basic YDNA Haplogroup for him:

Iain should not match me unless by coincidence as I am a Hartley. This Haplogroup formed about 4400 years ago and is from Central Europe. That fits in well with Germany. This map shows where the Rathfelder ancestors may have been 4400 years ago:

Further YDNA testing would refine this information and refine Rathfelder on the YDNA of all mankind.

My Lentz and Nicholson 23andMe DNA Family Tree

My grandmother was a Lentz but her mother was a Nicholson.

I added the Nicholson descendant. There is no DNA symol next to Joan.

Lentz YDNA

It should be possible to find a general YDNA Haplogroup for my Lentz ancestors:

Here, Jereme is R-Y4355. I discussed R-Y4355 in this Blog previously. This haplogroup is a further refinement of R-L2:

R1b More>L2> Z49>S8183>> Y4355

This makes sense as both these lines are German.

Here is the first part of the FTDNA Lentz YDNA Surname Project results:

This first group mentions L2, so these are probably distant relatives.

Summary and Conclusions

  • By manipulating the 23andMe Family Tree, I was able to wring some more information from my DNA matches
  • It feels good to now be able to manipulate the 23andMe family tree and correct errors that it had
  • I see that if my tree is right, then Linda matches on my Clarke and not my Frazer line.
  • I was able to get my first indication of a YDNA Haplogroup for my Rathfelder ancestors through cousin Iain

 

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Another Frazer DNA Match at 23andMe

I get emails from 23andMe on a regular basis telling me I have new DNA matches.

I don’t usually recognize who they are. This time I saw a closer than usual match with a name I recognize: Frazer.

My other new matches were predicted 4th cousins and shared less DNA. 23andMe’s Relatives in Common helped me figure out who he is:

Stan is related to Katherine and Brenda. In fact, Brenda is Stan’s sister. I wrote about Brenda here. Here is where Stan fits in:

All these people have had their DNA tested. I am at the bottom left as I descend from the eldest son and Stan is on the right as he descends from the youngest son of George Frazer. According to this chart, I am a 2nd cousin once removed to Stan. Stan is Paul’s first cousin.

Here is a photo of the five brothers:

Hubert is back right. I have more and better photos of Hubert, but I have not scanned them.

Stan’s DNA

I see that I now need Stan’s permission to see his DNA results. Here is how I match Stan’s sister Brenda on Chromosome 6 and 7:

I share three segments with Stan, so my DNA match with Stan could represent Frazer DNA that I have not yet identified. The other yellow matches are other matches with people who descend from George Frazer and Margaret McMaster.

Stan’s YDNA

23andMe gives a haplogroup for Stan’s YDNA. YDNA is interesting as it is only from the male line – in this case Frazer.

My R-L21 Haplogroup represents my Hartley lineage. Stan is R-L664 which represents Frazer YDNA. We know a lot about Frazer YDNA. There have been three Frazer BigY DNA tests done which describe Frazer YDNA in great detail. Every hundred years or so, there is a mutation in the YDNA which is passed down from father to son. Based on these changes, we can create a YDNA tree.

L664 is actually a Germanic Haplogroup going back to about 3,000 BC. That means that before our family was from Scotland, it was from Germany:

However, much has happened in the last 5,000 years. Here are some of the SNPs that have formed in the past 5,000 years:

Here are Paul’s matches:

Paul and his two Frazer YDNA matches are all R-YP6489. We awaiting two BigY tests to refine this tree. One test is from a Frazer with known ancestry. He is more closely related to Paul than to Rodney and Jonathan. The other tester is a Frazier. We don’t know how he is connected, but the connection probably goes back to Scotland before our Frazers moved to Ireland.

Here is the SNP Tracker map:

Here are some more details since L664:

Summary and Conclusions

  • It is somewhat rare to find a 2nd cousin once removed show up as a DNA match
  • Stan’s YDNA type fits in perfectly with other Frazers who were from Ireland
  • If Stan shares his autosomal DNA results, I will be able to tell how we match. This matching DNA is the same DNA that we inherited from Stan’s great grandparents and my 2nd great grandparents George Frazer and Margaret McMster.