Category: Frazer

Posted on

Jane’s Frazer ThruLines Gone Wrong

In my previous Blog on Frazer ThruLines, I looked at Gladys’ ThruLines. Gladys likely descends from three Frazer brothers: Philip, Richard and Archibald.

Jane’s Genealogy

Jane probably descends from two of brothers – Richard and Archibald. I put Jane in the Richard Line several years ago based on her many DNA matches and she seems to fit there. Here is the Richard Branch with descendants who have had their DNA tested:

This next Archibald brother Branch is quite large, so I’ll just show Jane’s Archibald, son of Archibald Branch:

Jane’s Frazer ThruLines

Jane has given me access to look at her DNA matches, so I can also look at her ThruLines. ThruLines is supposed to match trees to DNA matches. This gives additional assurance that the genealogy was done correctly.

As I look at Jane’s Frazer ThruLines, I see a problem:

The first problem is that there are no DNA matches at Jane’s 2nd great-grandfather level. The second is that the ThruLines switch from Jane’s tree at her grandfather to K8777’s tree at her Great-grandfather level. At that level Jane appears to have the wrong great-grandfather. Oh my.

What Went Wrong with Jane’s ThruLines?

I have a similar problem with my Frazer grandmother’s mother. ThruLines is sure that her step-mother was her biological mother and I haven’t been able to fix that.

Here is Jane’s tree starting with her paternal grandfather:

Jane’s tree has Richard P Frazser as the son of Archibald Frazer. k87777 has Richard’s father as Alexander Fraser.

K8777

Here is K8777:

Hmm, what about k8777’s tree?

I don’t see the Fraser name here in k8777’s direct ancestor tree. My guess is that Ancestry likes trees with a lot of records. Here is k8777’s tree:

That is almost 2 records per person. That is a lot.

Here is k8777’s Alexander Fraser:

unfortunately, the Alexander had a William Fraser also born in 1878:

Jane’s William P Fraser

Jane has a lot of references, so I think that ThruLines should have used Jane’s William P Fraser. In fact, Jane has a ton of records in her Fraser Tree:

Another ThruLines Switch

Here is the end of Jane’s Fraser ancestry according to ThruLines:

The tree switches again to Rachel’s tree and ends with a proposed Fraser 3rd great-grandfather for Jane who is wrong. This is pretty bad. I don’t understand how Ancestry could have done such a poor job. Jane has a ton of Frazer DNA matches and good genealogy to go with it. Whatever formula they are using didn’t work for Jane.

 

Posted on

A Look at Kathy’s Frazer ThruLines

In this Blog, I’d like to look at Kathy’s ThruLines. Kathy is in the Frazer DNA project. Actually I’ll be looking at her mom’s and her Aunt’s ThruLines. Here is a combined DNA/genealogy tree:

Kathy is in the 4th row. Kathy is in the James Line of the Frazer Project. James is one level above that which is shown above.

Kathy’s Mom Charlotte

Here is Charlotte’s ThruLine based on her great-grandfather Edward Wynn Frazer:

Charlotte has four DNA matches shown below her mother, but those matches would be with close relatives such as daughter, niece, nephew and sister. It would have been nice if there were a first cousin match – someone descending from Minnie Frazer. That way we could walk the DNA matches up. Sort of like a chain of evidence.

Edward Wynn Frazer

On the Edward Wynn Frazer, Charlotte matches WG:

Charlotte has a match with WG, but not a great one. I’ll start a table for Charlotte:

The <1% is not very good. According to AncestryDNA 2nd cousins once removed share 19 cM less than one percent of the time.  This is likely a red flag issue. In my Blog for Joanna, she also had a <1% match with a 2nd cousin once removed. This would make me want to check WG’s tree. However, his mother is private. I would have to check the tree starting at WG’s maternal grandfather who is listed as William Archibald Frazer. Here is William A in Poughkeepsie in 1910 at age 5:

Here is Poughkeepsie:

I’ll assume that WG has his grandfather correct in his tree. In 1920, William’s father decided that his parents were really born in Scotland and England:

A clue is that the oldest daughter is Mena, transcribed as Ismerie in the 1920 Census.

On to Edward Frazer Born About 1870

This looks to be Edward’s grave stone:

A child Phibbs may be another hint. Here is some more information from Find A Grave:

A father is missing for Edward and his son William A Frazer is missing for some reason.

Here is Edward in 1900:

He is naturalized, arrived in 1886, and married in 1897. Here we have a differnet rendition of their first daughter Ismena. This matches with the Ismena Jane White Frazer from Find A Grave.

Here is a possible birth record for Edward:

Many trees for Edward have him born in County Leitrim, Ireland including Kathy’s Tree. Here is another record for Edward in Ballina:

Here is Edward’s marriage record from St. Paul’s in Poughkeepsie:

Here are the parents:

Unfortunately, Edward was transcribed as a Frager in the Ancestry records.

It seems like all roads lead to Edward and Ismena Frazer. Here is Kathy’s tree for Charlotte’s mother:

 

A Quick Look at Minnie (Mary) Frazer Born 1865

The goal here is to match up Minnie with Edward. Here is Minnie in 1900 in Stonington, CT:

According to this record, Minnie was born in Ireland in November 1865. She came to the us in 1888. She married about 1895 and had two children in Rhode Island. Then they moved to Stonington, CT. Stonington is just over the line from Rhode Island:

On the next page of the Census we see that Minnie’s mother Emma J. Frazier was also living with them. She was born February 1838 and came to the US in 1893. She had six children and five were still living. It looks like she had been married for 37 years. The census says her husband was still alive. That means that Emma married in 1863 if I’m reading the Census correctly.

That means that this record is a good match:

Emma  or Ismena J Frazer Born February 1838

Here is Ismenia J Frazer in 1910 in Stonington, CT living with Minnie:

Here is a 1915 NY Census for 202 South Ave, Poughkeepsie:

Here is an Ismenia Frazer who is staying with the Cline family in Poughkeepsie. She is from Ireland and has been in the US since 1889. Perhaps this is the connection? At 75, she would have been born in 1840. The problem is that I don’t recognize the other people in the house. If she is living in Poughkeepsie, why wasn’t she staying with her son Edward A Frazer?

Edward Frazer was living at Linwood Ave, Poughkeepsie in 1920:

That is very close to 202 South Avenue. This shows to me a connection between Edward’s family of Poughkeepsie, NY and Minnie’s family of Stonington, CT. It doesn’t prove that Ismenia was the parents of Both Edward and Minnie, but it suggests that she was.

Bringing Charlotte Up the Frazer Tree to Archibald Born 1792

Quite quickly, Charlotte is back to the 1700’s with her 2nd great grandfather Archibald Frazer:

With Charlotte’s connection to Edward Wynne Frazer through her cousin WG, the DNA looked sketchy. There was less than 1% chance that the DNA match could be accurate. However, going up one level, Charlotte has many more matches to descendants of Edward Wynne Frazer’s two brothers William Fitzgerald and Thomas Henry.

Charlotte and the William Fitzgerald Branch

William Fitzgerald was the older brother, so we’ll start with him:

I was just looking at a grave marker for William Fitzgerald:

This William was a busy man and made his way from Ireland to Sacramento, CA. Here are the DNA results on the Whitten Branch:

I would be interested to see how WG matches MP and Pamela, but I don’t have access to those results. Somehow, the DNA perked back up in a further out generation.

Charlotte and the Thomas Henry Branch

I like how this branch has DNA matches on three different sons of Thomas Henry Frazer. I get confused sometimes because as I understand it, William Sarsfield was originally William Fitzgerald and he decided to change his name. I’m getting lazy now and not checking the genealogy.

Here is the summary I have:

I’ll add these matches to my Chart:

The orange-colored matches are in Ancestry but haven’t uploaded their DNA results to Gedmatch for comparison. The green line is a family that I’m not quite sure where they belong on the chart. In my DNA chart, Gail has the highest match to Charlotte by far. In fact, the top 40% mentioned would have her at 2nd cousin once removed. That means she matches more than is likely rather than less.

Up One Level to Archibald Frazer Born 1751

Charlotte has only one match here, but it is on an interesting Branch. That is the Edward Frazer Branch. I have to be careful, as I think I accepted the wrong genealogy last time. On Joanna’s matching branch there was a line with an Edward Wynn Frazer who died as a bachelor. Obviously, if you have an ancestor with no children, you have a problem. However, I didn’t see Edward Wynn Frazer in this tree:

This tree is stitched together, but I am assuming that it is correct. It appears that the Private 3rd cousin 1x removed was our famous Frazer cousin Maureen O’Sullivan:

That gives another person on Prudence’s lonely line on the right below:

This match that Charlotte has with Brittney is also a little larger than expected. AncestryDNA uses a cutoff of 20 cM for a fourth cousin and Britney is a fourth cousin, once removed to Charlotte.

Next Level: To the Top of the James Line

This next level will bring Charlotte over to the Michael Frazer Line. He was the brother of the Archibald we just looked at.

Charlotte has 3 matches on the Michael Frazer Line and 14 on the Archibald Line. If it were the other way around, we might wonder if Charlotte really belonged in the Michael Line. However, having said that, there are about three times as many DNA-tested descendants on the Archibald side compared to the Michael side.

Here are Charlotte’s three matches:

It is sort of like two matches because two matches are parent and child.

Charlotte gets her first perfect scores with BV and Bonnie with a 33 out of 33%. A few notes:

  • Charlotte matches Cheryl at a slightly level than her mother BV. This happens sometimes and is normal.
  • Charlotte only gets a score of 5% for her match with SH but gets a 32% with her sibling Gail. I will assume that these two are full siblings. This shows the variation that is possible in DNA.
  • We can’t say that Charlotte is not a 2nd cousin once removed to WG at 19 cM. There are reported values of 0-316 cM and a typical value is 123cM. However, the relationship comes under more scrutiny at this level.
  • Overall, I would say that Charlotte’s matches make sense. It looks like once you get to the 5th cousin level, if you have any sort of a match under 20 cM, Ancestry says that it is pretty good.

Kathy’s Aunt Madeline

Next we’ll look at Kathy’s mother’s sister Madeline to see how the numbers compare. As Madeline is a sister of Charlotte, I would expect many of the same results. Like Charlotte, Madeline has no ThruLines for her grandmother Minnie Frazer and one for her great-grandfather Edward Wynn Frazer. However, the match is smaller than Charlotte had:

I also added in Madeline’s other matches while I was at it.

I’m beginning to see how AncestryDNA does it’s top percentages. Gail, with a 97 cM gets a top match percentage of 40. As I recall, that top 40% was if Charlotte and Gail were 2nd cousins once removed. That means with a larger match there is more certainty. When Ancestry’s top percentage is at 27%, the match levels are just above 20 cM. Ancestry uses 20 cM as the threshold for a 4th cousin. However, the results just above 20 are somewhat ambiguous. Below the 20%, Ancesty is more sure that the results will be in the 5th cousin range, so the top percentage goes up a bit to 33%.

Here is the same chart sorted by relationship:

  • The problem match is at the top. It would be good to have more 2nd cousin matches to compare.
  • There are not many 4th cousin matches, but that is a result of the genealogy. It appears that there aren’t as many people in that Edward Frazer Line – at least not many that have had their DNA tested.
  • In general the likelihood of the matches representing the relationship go from low to high as the relationships get further out. The one exception is Charlotte’s match with Gail. I take that to be unusual based on the other matches and with Gail’s match with Charlotte’s sister Madeline.

Summary and Conclusions

  • Like Joanna’s Thrulines, Kathy’s mom and Aunt had a match with a 2nd cousin once removed that had a very low probability of <1%.
  • I took a quick look at some of the genealogy between Kathy’s descent from Edward Wynne Frazer and her low probability match’s descent from Edward Wynne Frazer. I found a connection between them and the wife of Edward Wynne Frazer who was Ismenia or Ismena [Jane?] Whtie Frazer. She appears to visit her daughter on Kathy’s side in Stonington, CT and her son on the DNA match’s side in Poughkeepsie, NY.
  • Kathy’s mom and Aunt had a lot of DNA matches in the 3rd cousin range.
  • Kathy’s mom and Aunt had an interesting match with a granddaughter of Maureen O’Sullivan at the 4th cousin level
  • I am still gaining experience with the ThruLines. I have noted a general rise in probability of matching from the 3rd to 5th cousin levels. At least in these James Frazer Lines so far.
  • I expanded my James Frazer DNA Chart to include those matches on ThruLines. This fills in a lot of the blanks.
Posted on

Some Frazer ThruLines and Joanna

AncestryDNA has a new utility called ThruLines. The general idea is that they look at DNA matches and patch together trees on those DNA matches to the people who match. Sounds like a good idea, even though things could go wrong. The things that could go wrong are shaky trees and/or shaky DNA matches. However, let’s take a look.

Frazer ThruLines – An Overview

I have done a lot of work with Frazer relatives using Gedmatch. However, this new tool is quite interesting. When Ancestry comes up with a new tool, people take notice due to the millions of people who have tested their DNA there. I have access to ThruLines for some people in the Frazer DNA Project. Those people are:

  • Myself and four of my siblings – I am on at least the Philip and Richard Frazer Lines – both from the main Archibald Frazer. Then I most likely descend from the other main James Line through Margaret Frazer and William McMaster.
  • Gladys – She is on the Archibald Main Line also. She descends from the Philip, Richard and Archibald/Stinson branches of that Line.
  • Jane – She is also on the Richard and Archibald/Stinson Line. Jane’s Archibald/Stinson Line seems to be better verified by genealogy.
  • Michael – He descends from the same lines that Jane does.
  • Richard – I believe that Richard is from the Philip Line. However, there are different degrees of uncertainty on many of these lines due to how far the matches go back and lack of paper trails.
  • Joanna – She is on the James Main Line and comes down through James son Archibald born 1751
  • Beverly – Beverly is on the same Main James Line but descends from James’ son Michael born 1764.

The DNA Family Trees

I have  built some trees of Frazer descendants who have had their DNA tested. These trees have generally included those who have uploaded their DNA to Gedmatch. Gedmatch has made it easier to analyze the detailed DNA as AncestryDNA does not supply that detailed chromosome information.

The Archibald Main Line

Here is an overview of the Archibald Main Line:

The three brothers near the top are Philip, Richard and Archibald. Cousin Richard is in the green branch on the left. My siblings and I are in the blue branch under Philip, but also belong under the Richard Line due to a cousin marriage. Jane in the Army green line was added to the Richard Line due to all her matches there and seems to fit in. Gladys is actually the sister of the person circled and is in all three brother Branches. Michael is in the Richard Line and an abbreviated rendition of Michael is shown in the Archibald/Stinson line on the right above. David is included in purple due to a Frazer in his ancestry and DNA matches. He would be one of those branches with higher uncertainty.

The ones that I have circled are just the ones who I have access to their ThruLines. Many more Frazer’s have tested at AncestryDNA.

 The James Main Line

I have access to only Joanna and Beverly on this Line, though many others have tested at AncestryDNA.

Below I cut off the left-hand side of the James Branch to save room:

I have also put my family in green where they may match up with the James Main Line. It is possible that the green branch should be under the Michael Branch.

James Line ThruLines

I’ll start with the James Line Branch as I have access to only two people in that Line. Joanna has already started doing her own ThruLine analysis on the James Line.

Joanna’s ThruLines

Starting slowly, we see Joanna’s connection with her dad:

This is the obvious stuff, but good research starts in the known present and works back to the unknown past. Going up a generation to Joanna’s grandfather doesn’t add any more matches. However, at Joanna’s great-grandfather level, there are some new matches:

Joanna’s grandfather has a brother William Fitzgerald Frazer who has 7 descendants who match Joanna by DNA.

Joanna matches four descendants of Minnie and three of Walter.

Let’s look at Joanna’s matches to Minnie’s descendants:

One thing I notice that is odd is that Joanna matches Steve by one more DNA segment than Kay. I wonder why?

What Are the Odds?

Next, all the match levels have probabilities associated with them when I click on them. Let’s start with the two second cousins, once removed. They are Chris and Kay.

Chris matches Joanna by 18 cM. Ancestry thinks that has a low probability of being right:

Rather than show each chart, I’ve summarized Joanna’s four matches on the Minnie Branch:

Steve’s likelihood of being a good match is much better than his mom Kay’s. 22% seems low, but it was the second highest category with 25% being the highest in this situation.

Joanna and Walter James Frazer

Here the relationships are a little closer but the DNA matches are much, much higher.

I’m not sure what to make of this. This seems to say that Joanna’s match with the Minnie line is more unlikely and that her matches with the Walter James Line are more likely.

Joanna’s Next Ancestor: Archibald Frazer born 1792

Here Joanna has only one match to give evidence to their common ancestor:

 

Remember above that Chris had a match of 18 cM but he was supposed to be a second cousin, once removed. WG is a 3rd cousin once removed. Chris had a bad likelihood score of <1%. Let’s see what WG gets:

Next Up: Archibald Frazer Born 1751

[Note: The genealogy in this Thruline is not correct. See my correction in my next Blog:]

Joanna’s in luck as Archibald 1792 had a brother:

That brother was some sort of hot-shot based on the size of his tomb stone. By the way, the 11 DNA matches shown above Joanna are the ones we already looked at.

CK and DK have low level matches with Joanna. We’ll put them into my spreadsheet:

When Joanna went back a generation, her percentages went up.

It’s Too Late To Turn Back: James Frazer Born 1720

Joanna has this James as James Frazer of Clerragh:

We are fortunate that Archibald born 1751 had a brother Michael:

Joanna is getting more DNA action on the Michael Line. Here there are five matches. There are two I haven’t opened up yet under Patrick Henry Frazer.

Joanna and Mollie

First off, Mollie and I share the same ancestors of Margaret Frazer and William McMaster, so I find that interesting. The other interesting thing is that Mollie and Joanna are shown as fifth cousins, once removed. That goes off the charts:

Ancestry is giving percentages for up to 5th cousin, but after that, they don’t even want to make a guess.

Joanna and the Michael Line

Here are the numbers for all of Joanna’s ThruLines:

I added in a column for cM. This to point out that Joanna’s matches on the James Frazer line were as high or higher as that with the Archibald Frazer line which is a generation closer. The DNA would suggest, apart from the genealogy, that Joanna could as easily or more easily descend from the Michael Frazer Branch than the Archibald 1751 Branch. Of course, other factors may come into play such as the randomness of DNA inheritance and matching on collateral lines.

Another interesting thing is Mollie’s ancestry. She is said to descend from Margaret Frazer which I do also. I had thought that Margaret descended from the Michael Line, but the more I look at the DNA, it makes me think that Margaret might descend from the Archibald 1751 Branch where Joanna has herself. If Mollie and Joanna both descend from the Archibald 1751 Branch, then that could explain the large match that Joanna and Mollie have.

Joanna has no additional matches up to the next generation to Archibald born about 1690. He was the father of Archibald and James Frazer – the two Main Lines.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I had meant to go through all the Frazer descedants who I had access to at AncestryDNA and look at their ThruLines. That would take too long, so I’ll go through them at a slower pace.
  • I started looking at Joanna’s ThruLines. Joanna’s matches showed some irregularities, but I would like to look at other Frazer descendant matches to see how they compare.
  • Joanna had matches at the 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th cousin levels leading up to James Frazer of Clerragh. [Note: the 4th cousin match was not correct. See my correction in the following Blog.]
  • Joanna had a larger than expected match to Mollie who shows the same mysterious Margaret Frazer ancestor that I have.
  • I am only looking at the DNA here. The genealogy has to be taken into consideration.
  • I am thinking that in the Archibald Branch with all the Frazer cousin matches, that ThruLine analysis could be complicated.
  • I would like to look at Beverly from the James Line next.

 

Posted on

Checking Out a New Frazer ThruLine Match at AncestryDNA

Since the new ThruLine program came out, I have taken a look at some of the hints there.

Hey, look. There is my head with ancestor lines going through it.

My Ancestor, Michael Frazer?

I have been working on a Frazer DNA project for about 4 years now and have not created a connection with Michael Frazer that I can vefify. I am related to many Frazers on two different lines starting in the early 1700’s. Those two main lines are Archibald Frazer and James Frazer. I am related to many on the Archibald Line. I am also related by DNA more distantly to the James Line, but I have been unable to figure out the exact connection. I can get about this far:

This line goes through my Frazer side to my McMaster side and then back to Margaret Frazer at the top. My notes have William McMaster and Margaret Frazer marrying in 1813, so I’ll say she was born around 1792.

 The ThruLine Connection Was

My original connection looked like this:

This showed me matching through Susan up to Michael Frazer. Now I can’t find Susan as she has disappeared as my ThruLines connection to Michael Frazer. I wonder if she will re-appear. Perhaps ThruLines is still in flux or Susan changed her tree. The interesting thing about the connection was that Susan’s tree stopped at James Hazard and mine stopped at Margaret Frazer, but somehow Ancestry made the connection to Michael Frazer at the top.

Now my connection to Michael Frazer looks like this:

 

Now I’m connected through Keith and at one level lower in our connected family tree. Keith also lacks Michael Frazer in his tree, so how was the connection made?

More On Michael Frazer Trees

When I go to Michael Frazer on my tree, I see some hints. One of those hints leads to Joanna’s tree – among many other trees. Joanna has this:

Joanna shows Margaret Frazer as daughter of Michael Frazer and Margaret Stewart and married to William McMaster. Joanna also mentions a Marriage in 1813. However, how the connection was made between Margaret Frazer and Michael Frazer is unclear. My guess is that Ancestry grabbed Joanna’s tree and applied it to me. I asked Joanna if this was an educated guess on her part and that seems to be the case.

Looking for Susan

I was able to find Susan by searching by her last name. Here is the tree that Susan has:

The names of Johnston and Hazzard sound familiar in Frazer genealogy. However, I am having some problems getting past James Hazard or Hazzard or Hassard before 1877.

My Sister’s Connection to Michael Frazer

I note that my sister Heidi also has a connection to Michael Frazer:

Here Richard is showing as descending from Patrick – a different son of Michael. Here is Richard’s tree:

Richard’s tree stops with his paternal great-grandmother Daisy Belle Frazer. However the connection above shows more:

The note under George H Frazer says that he is from lulu’s tree. That means that ThruLines takes the DNA match between Heidi and Richard and applies lulu’s tree to Richard to make the connection.

Summary of Michael Frazer and ThruLines

  • I found an interesting connection between Susan and myself that lead up to Michael Frazer.
  • This initial ThruLine connection disappeared
  • I was unable to easily recreate the connection that Susan had to Michael Frazer
  • It looks like Ancestry pulled my connection to Michael Frazer from a tree by Joanna. She made an educated guess that Margaret Frazer was the daughter of Michael Frazer in hopes that she would find connections to other trees.
  • I checked my sister Heidi and she had a connection to Michael Frazer through Michael’s child Patrick down to Richard. It was easier to see how Richard was connected to Michael Frazer via a tree from lulu.

It would seem that ThruLines has given more support to Joanna’s educated guess that my ancestor Margaret Frazer’s father was Michael Frazer. However, my match with Susan showed that she had a genealogical connection to Michael as originally shown by Thrulines. If this original connection between Susan and Michael Frazer could have been shown to be true, then this would have created a sort of triangulation between myself, Susan and Richard and provided more evidence that Margaret was the daughter of Michael Frazer. In order to give even more proof, I would then need to show that I did not have DNA connections to descendants of Archibald Frazer and Catherine Peyton:

I think that this may be difficult to show.

The other question is: what if Joanna had attached Margaret Frazer to Archibald Frazer above? Would that then show that I am related to people who descend from Archibald Frazer and Catherine Peyton? In fact, that has been my most previous thinking as I have myself that way in proposed tree:

Part of the reasoning the the tree above is that I have matches to the other green McPartland group. However, what if the McPartland group belongs under the Michael Line? At some time, I should learn how to used the DNA method called What Are the Odds? (WATO) and see if that sheds any light on the subject.

Posted on

MyHeritage and the Theory of Family Relativity

First, MyHeritage gets credit for a catchy name for their new utility. That reminds me of this cartoon:

MyHeritage is doing what AncestryDNA does in matching up family history trees and DNA. In this Blog, I’ll look at my top three matches at MyHeritage that use this utility.

Melanie

I have blogged about this connection previously through Melanie’s mother Emily. Actually, it looks like I have written three Blogs on this connection. I was quite happy to come across Melanie and Emily. Here is Melanie and my shared tree at MyHeritage:

As a result of our connection, I shared a photo I had of Melanie’s great-grandmother Violet Frazer which appears on her tree. Melanie says this would have been taken on her wedding day. This was a very clear and clean match. Melanie and I share 19.9 cM of DNA.

Celeste: Theory of Family Relativity #2

I don’t recall Celeste. So this is a new find for me.

Celeste and I share 12.7 cM of DNA on Chromosome 9:

I have a web page on the Snell family and what I have matches what Celeste has. In fact, Norman was born in the same Town that I was. Here are our common ancestors:

Mary Ann was from Nantucket. Her father had a business repairing ships. Otis was on an early whaling voyage from New Bedford to Hawaii. He jumped ship, made his way to Nantucket and married Mary Ann in 1828.

Celeste and Snell/Parker at DNA Painter

I can paint Celeste’s DNA onto my chromosome map:

This takes up a small segment in dark blue on the top part of Chromosome 9 (the paternal part) that was already taken up by my great-grandparents’ DNA. However, this DNA goes further back in time and is more specific.

Here is the expanded view of the paternal side of my Chromosome 9:

The dark blue overlaps with Beth and Jim, so that means that Beth and Jim should have Snell/Parker DNA in that area of their Chromosome 9 also.

Marilee: Family #3

My match with Melanie was known and accurate. My match with Celeste was unknown and accurate. My match with Marilee is known, but I had a different connection shown than MyHeritage shows. This is what MyHeritage shows:

Here is how I had Marilee’s connection:

I show Marilee in a separate John Line in pink. MyHeritage shows us both in the Richard Frazer Line. I circled myself in the Philip Line, but I am also in the Richard line above. I left my family out of the yellow line to save room.

So how do I reconcile these trees? MyHeritage (MH) shows an expanded view that seems convincing:

There is a connection shown and percentage that I had not noticed before. When I click on the green percentage, it gives a comparison between my tree and a third tree. The same with Marilee’s comparison. It compares Mariee’s John Frazer with a John James Frazer in another tree and gives the match a 100% probability.

There is another thing that I didn’t notice. There is a tab called Path 2:

This path compares to another tree, which I recognize as Joanna’s – a Frazer researcher.

So, Who Is Right?

We may both be right. All I have to do is show two lines of Frazer descent for Marilee and that will reconcile the two trees.

Marilee and the Richard Line

If Marilee is from the Richard Line, it would support the earlier birth dates for Richard and his siblings. So, that in itself is interesting. Here is what I have now for the Richard Line:

I’m not sure about David on the left. Jane was added in. She has many matches and appears to belong in this line. Here is a detailed comparison between John James Frazer and John Frazer:

Marilee’s Tree

Next, I compare this with Marilee’s tree:

Here is the disconnect. Both trees cannot be right. MyHeritage ignored Marilee’s tree in favor of two other trees. Interesting.

Based On the Above, Marilee Cannot Descend from John and Richard Frazer

That means that there is more work to be done to figure out which tree is right. One might argue that John Frazer born 1825 was named for his father’s father John born 1755. It may be that DNA analysis could shed light on which line Marilee would most likely be in. There is a program called What Are the Odds? (WATO). However, I have not used this yet. It takes two scenarios and looks at the odds of one scenario being more likely than the other based on DNA matching. This could be the subject of a future Blog in addition to more genealogical analysis.

Match #4: Warwick from New Zealand

I’m having fun, so why stop at three? Warwick is my third Irish connection out of my top four Relativily Matches:

According to MH, Warwick is my 4th cousin, once removed and we share 17.8 cM on Chromosome 12:

For a reality check, I make sure that I have Frazer grandparent DNA in that part of my Chromosome 12:

I do. I expect that my siblings Sharon, Jon and Lori will also match Warwick. They do. In fact Emily, Paul and Stephen who are known McMaster descendants are shared DNA matches between Warwick and me.

Checking Warwick’s Tree

Warwick’s tree matches with what I have on my McMaster Web Page – at least down to Samuel:

Let’s Paint Warwick

Warwick represents some very old DNA:

The darker colored DNA next to Warwick’s is my 2nd cousin Paul:

I now know that Paul’s Chromosome match with me goes back to his McMaster side. MH shows it like this:

Paul, Warwick and I are in a Triangulation Group (TG). This TG goes back to Abraham McMaster or his wife Margery.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I took my first look at MyHeritage’s Theory of Family Relativity to see how it worked
  • Match #1 was no surprise
  • Match #2 was a surprise as I didn’t know about it. I’m sure this match was buried deep in my match list and the program nicely pulled it out. The matching trees were easily verifiable.
  • Match #3 , Marilee, was on my radar. However, the MH utility brought into question Marilee’s tree. The utility disregarded Marilee’s tree in favor of two other trees. Now I am not sure of either tree and will need to do some more analysis of the Marilee’s DNA matches.
  • I ended the Blog with Match #4. This match easily mapped new DNA and a new common ancestor onto my DNA Painter Chromosome Map.
  • Overall, I like the program and now see how it works. MH has an advantage over the AncestryDNA programs in that they show where on the chromosome the matches take place.
  • The down-side to the MH Relativity is that I only have 6 matches in the program. The two that I didn’t look at are related to the ones that I did look at.
Posted on

Sorting Out the Philip Frazers of Roscommon, Ireland

I’ve written a bit about Philip Frazer. He was born probably in Roscommon, Ireland between the 1750’s and 1770’s. In one of my previous Blogs, I proposed this tree:

 

In a recent e-mail from Richard to myself and Bonnie, we have this to consider:

I am trying to tie up some loose ends about my Frazer family in Ontario in the mid-1800s.  

In Joel’s blog about my third cousin, Martha, http://www.jmhartley.com/HBlog/2018/10/22/frazer-dna-analysis-for-martha-richards-3rd-cousin/

Joel speculates that Philip W. Frazer, in the household of Philip Frazer and Jane in Plympton, Lambton County, Ontario in the 1871 census, is the son of Philip Frazer, the first child of Philip Frazer (b. 1805) and Mary Taylor, b. in Kilmactranny Parish in January 1825.  However, Bonnie’s Frazer tree on Ancestry shows this Frazer family as descended from James Frazer and his wife Violet Frazer.  It seems clear that the Frazer family in Plympton, Ontario is related to my ancestor, Ann Frazer (b. 1832), m. Robert Johnston c. 1853 and raised their children in Blenheim Twp., Oxford County, Ontario and died in 1871.  Based on Bonnie’s Frazer tree, Philip Frazer (father of Philip W.) and Ann Frazer would be first cousins rather than siblings.  Does this sound right to both of you?

I have trouble picturing all this, so let’s look at Bonnie’s tree:

The way it worked, is that it would have been traditional to name your first son after your father. Well, Philip and James, under this scenario both were the sons of Philip and both named their first son Philip. Bonnie has Philip’s first son born in 1825 and James’ son born 1828  – both named for the elder Philip. This makes life for genealogists quite confusing. Under Bonnie’s tree, Richard descends from James and Violet Frazer. I would say that Bonnie’s tree looks better than mine:

I don’t even have Philip as the son of James and Violet – even though I have had him on my web page for a long time:

My October 2018 Blog – Philip Frazer Son of Philip Or James?

Here is the Blog that Richard was referring to:

In my Blog, I assumed that the 45-year-old Philip Frazer in the 1871 Ontario Census descended from Philip and not James and Violet. I can see that I did not at the time consider the other possibility.

Arguments For Philip Frazer of Ontario Being the Son Of James Frazer

Seeing as I did not consider this before, I will now. First, Bonnie’s tree has Philip Frazer married to Jane Hayward. I notice in the 1861 Ontario Census, Jane Hayward Frazer was living in the Haywood household:

Philip was an early Frazer with a connection to Kilmactranny. My own 2nd great-grandfather, George William marries a woman from Kilmactranny Parish and later moves to the area. This may or may not be a coincidence.

Richard Frazer who would have been Philip’s brother under this scenario also lived in Ontario for a while. This could also be considered coincidence.

Here is a photo from my grandmother’s photo album from Toronto:

I have no idea who this mysterious young woman is.

If Philip was the brother of my ancestor George, he may have named a son for him. However, I have that both Philip and James had a brother named George.

I have that my ancestor George lived in the house of his father James. If Philip or Richard, George’s older brothers, continued on in Ireland, then this may have not been the case.

I have not come up with a convincing argument, but I think that Bonnie’s tree is probably right. It feels right.

Other Trees

Joanna, who is a noted Frazer researcher, has this in her Ancestry Tree:

 

Joanna agrees with Bonnie though I think they do collaborate some.

The Counter-Argument: Philip Frazer is the Son of Philip Frazer

My original suggestion was based a lot on naming patterns. It would have been traditional for Philip, son of Philip to name his first son Philip. If Philip was the son of James, why didn’t he name his first son James instead of Philip? James’ first son was Philip. James’ second and third sons were Richard and George William. Richard’s first son was James Archibald born 1856. He died in 1861. George William’s first son was also James Archibald who was born in 1867.

Philip in Kilmactranny or Ardcarn?

I believe that Philip was from Ardcarn Parish. A search for Frazers in the Tithe Applotment Books shows 18 entries for Frazers in County Roscommon and none in County Sligo. Ardcarn Parish is in Roscommon and Kilmactranny Parish is in County Sligo. Here is Philip in 1834 in Derrycastle aka Derrycashel with some of his relatives:

Here is an early marriage record from the Kilmactranny Church:

This clearly indicates that Philip was from Ardcarne and Jane was from Kilmactranny. A search for Johnstons in Kilmactranny Parish in the Tithe Applotment reveals three Johnston families in Dromore in 1834: William, Alexander and John. Perhaps they were brothers of Jane. Here is Dromore:

The dotted line to the South of Kilmactranny is the County Roscommon border.

Here is another try at a Philip Frazer Tree:

 

This tree focuses on the Philip’s and omits some of the siblings. I have a Philip marrying Jane Johnston and then Mary Taylor. If he first married in 1818, I would guess that he could have been born around 1795.

Another Ancestry Tree

Here is a Tree that is not associated with the Frazer DNA Project:

Here they have more information on George Frazer. They also have a William Frazer who would make for a young parents for James and Violet Frazer. This William is also unexpectedly born in Edinburgh. The tree has the generally accepted Philip husband of Jane Hayward as the son of James and Violet Frazer:

 

The DNA?

I mentioned in the Blog that Richard referred to, “All we need to do next is to see if there are descendants of Philip W, Alfred, Mary, Emily and George and see if they would take a DNA test.” I don’t know of any of the descendants of the Philip Frazer family of Plympton, Ontario who have had their DNA tested. Perhaps one will soon. This would be especially interesting to me as we would have the common ancestors of James and Violet Frazer – assuming the above tree is right.

Summary and Conclusions

  • Thanks to Richard’s diligence, he pointed out a disagreement between my previously proposed Philip Frazer tree and what others had in their Frazer Trees.
  • Given what I know now, I think that the most recent tree above should be fairly accurate. Next time I need to check existing trees before suggestiing a new line.
  • If any descendants of Philip Frazer and Jane Hayward have their DNA tested, it would likely give more proof as to whether the above trees are correct.
  • I haven’t seen a death record for the elder Philip Frazer. It could be that he died before there were good death records available. If that was the case, that would mean that it would be his son Philip who was in the 1834 Tithe Applotment.

 

 

Posted on

Cousin Frank on the James Frazer Line and His DNA

Joanna is great at finding Frazer’s and getting them to upload their DNA to Gedmatch. That is where I do my analysis, to see how they compare to other Frazer’s in the Frazer DNA Project. Here is an old map of the general area where the Frazer’s came from in Ireland:

The early Frazer’s settled in the lands between Lough Arrow and Lough Key around the early 1700’s.

Frank’s Genealogy

Frank’s DNA will not make a lot of sense outside his genealogy. Here is Frank’s Ancestry Tree:

There are two sides to the Frazer DNA Project. There is the Archibald and the James Branches. Frank is from the James Branch.

This tree represents the James Line descendants in red who have had their DNA tested and uploaded to Gedmatch. There are two major branches above under the James Line: Archibald born 1751 and Michael born 1764. Frank is from the Michael Line. I’ll add him in there:

 

Here Frank sits comfortably with other Michael Frazer descendants. However, he is in the Fitzgerald Frazer Branch all by himself. Fitzgerald Frazer moved to New York from Ireland. I assume that he felt his prospects would be better there. He was living in Haverstraw, NY in 1850.

The Census indicates that he was in New York at least by 1835 when his eldest daughter was born. He apparently married in New York before that time.

Frank is 4th cousin to the other DNA-tested Michael Frazer descendants. Frank is 5th cousin or further out to other James Line descendants. My guess is that Mary Gordon, Fitzgerald’s wife, was not related to Fitzgerald. At least, if she was not related to him, that would make the DNA analysis easier.

Frank’s DNA

I would like to look at Frank’s DNA to see how he matches with other Frazer’s. First, I ran Frank’s matches against all in the Frazer project with no known genealogical link to the James Line and came up with this:

Paul is my 2nd cousin, once removed. Karen, Chris, and Charlene are from the McPartland Connection. I forget how Jenn fits in. I have written a lot about my family’s connection with the McPartlands and likely James Line connection. I hope to make some suggestions later in this Blog.

Here is how Frank matches the above and those from the James Line:

This Matrix is difficult to interpret.

  • The McPartland Group seems to match the Archibald Frazer/Peyton Group the best
  • Marilee has a large match with Bob from the McPartland Group. I have discussed Marilee in past Blogs.
  • Frank’s best match is with Betty from the Archibald/Peyton Group. He also has good matches with the McPartland Group. Frank matches one of the four Michael Frazer descendants above 7cM.

Triangulation to the Rescue?

I like to look at triangulated segments or Triangulation Groups (TGs). The theory is that when three or more people share the same DNA that indicates a unique shared ancestor for the group. If Frank triangulates with any of the above people, it could shed some light.

Chromosome 12

 

Here Frank is in a TG with Paul and Joanna. I find this interesting for a few reasons. First, I believe that this TG represents Paul’s McMaster/Frazer side. This is from my web page from about 15 years ago.

 

Here I speculate that Michael Frazer could have been Margaret Frazer’s father or brother. If Margaret was 20 when she married, she would have been born in 1793. I now have that Michael Frazer could have been born in 1764 which would have made him 29 at the time of Margaret’s birth – assuming I am on the right track.

Here I will try out my theory:

Here I have Paul and my family under the Michael Line, but we are one or two generations down from the others. I don’t know if we belong here or to the left under Archibald and Catherine Peyton. Here is what the triangulation would look like assuming that Paul and family descend from the Michael Line:

The common ancestor would be the same whether I put Margaret Frazer under Michael or his brother Archibald.

Not Being in TG12

Interestingly, Prudence, Karen and Chris could have been in this TG, but they were not.

A wild guess could be that Karen and Chris from the McPartland Line descend from Archibald born about 1792. Then it would have to be that Chris, Prudence and Karen were sharing the DNA from Archibald’s mother Catherine Peyton. That could explain some of the McPartland DNA matches here:

This is what the McPartlands would look like under this scenario:

They would be the green family on the left. I would be in the green family on the right. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. It doesn’t hurt to build these make-believe trees as it helps to see where these families could be. However, I would rather have the McPartlands and my green branch under the same side. I’ll explain why in the next section.

Chris and My Sisters Match on the X Chromosome

Here is how Chris from the McPartland Line matches my three sisters on the X Chromosome:

Those are pretty big matches. The only way for Chris to match Lori, Sharon, and Heidi on the Frazer Line is by going through the McMaster side. This is the scenario that I am proposing:

Under this scenario, the X Match would head up to Catherine Peyton. My second choice would be to have both green branches under the Michael Line. In that case, the X Chromosome matches would go back to Margaret Stewart. I’m sure I’ll do more analysis on this in the future. If we had more information on where all these people lived it may also make things more clear.

Usually X matches are not helpful in surname studies such as this. That is because the X Chromosome is not passed down from father to son. However, this case is different. On the McPartland side, the Frazer ancestor is deep in the ancestry on the maternal side. In my family’s case, I have Frazer on more than one line. One of those lines goes back on my grandmother’s father’s mother’s line which is McMaster. In fact, my three sisters got all their paternal side X Chromosome from their paternal grandmother. She in turn got all her paternal side X Chromosome from her paternal grandfather who was Margaret McMaster born 1846.

Back to Triangulation and Non-Triangulation

Above, I had mentioned how Paul, Frank and Joanna Triangulated, but Prudence, Karen and Chris did not even though they matched on the same segments. How can that be? Here is one possible explanation:

Prudence, Chris and Karen could be matching on Peyton DNA and Joanna, Paul and Frank could be triangulating on Frazer DNA. With DNA, at a certain level, there are only two choices. The DNA is either from the mother or the father. In this scenario, either Archibald Frazer or Catherine Peyton. Of course, there are other possibilities, but those would be based on different possible family histories.

I have more Triangulation Groups (TGs) in this Blog. However, some of them need to be updated based on the information from this Blog. It is interesting after that reading that Blog to see how I was heading in the right direction and see the answers starting to unfold. In this Blog, the answers are continuing to unfold as to how my family, the James Line and the McPartland Line all tie together.

Frank’s DNA Matches

Here’s a summary of Frank’s matches:

The facts of Frank’s DNA matches are simple. The interpretation is complicated as the genealogy is skimpy.

Summary and Conclusions

  • Frank’s DNA results are important as he provides a new Michael Line on the James Line.
  • That line is a bit isolated from other Michael Line descendants and Frank only matches Bonnie from that Line. Statistically, Frank should be matching 4th cousins on this line at greater than 50%. In reality, he matches one out of four of his fourth cousins on this line.
  • On the Archibald Line, Frank matches five out of about 15 tested descendants. That is better than the >10% reported for fifth cousins.
  • Frank is in a Triangulation Group with Paul and Joanna. For Paul, who is my cousin, that most probably on a line that goes from Frazer to McMaster to Frazer.
  • I proposed a scenario where Paul’s Line and the McPartland Line fits on the Archibald Frazer/Peyton Line.
  • This proposed tree includes that fact that Frank’s closest matches seemed to be with the McPartlands. The McPartland line and my sisters share a large block of X Chromosome. The pathway of X Chromosome inheritance narrows down many matching possibilities and therfor common ancestors. Paul, Frank and Joanna were in a TG which gives rise to certain possibilities for common ancestors.
  • As I look at the genealogy, I notice that Frank has a William and a Fitzgerald in his anestry. I see those names also on the Archibald Line. However, Fitzgerald also appears in Beverly’s Line on the Michael Frazer side.
  • As I look at previous Blogs, it seems like the answers are coming together slowly, though there is no definitive answer yet. I am not sure how much more definitive one can get with just DNA testing and minimal genealogy.
Posted on

Caz: A DNA Tested Frazer

I heard from Caz recently who responded to one of my Frazer Blogs. Caz tells me that her grandmother was a Frazer. She also says that she is a third cousin to Ros. That would put her near here:

Here is a slightly bigger picture:

Fortunately, Jane gave me access to her matches and I found Caz as one of Jane’s Shared Ancestry Hints. I’ll add Caz to the Australian Line of Frazers:

 

This is becoming a good group.

Caz’ DNA

Here is Caz in what I call the Stinson Group:

The furthest out relationship on this branch is 5th cousin. Here are some guidelines for the chances of matching a specific cousin.

Here is what I get for the DNA for the above group:

I left out the blue line as I am not as sure about them. The matrix shows how everyone matches everyone else in the group. It is a little complicated as some of the Frazers intermarried and some of these people are matching Frazers outside this specific group. Note that everyone matches each other within the Archibald Stinson/Catherine Parker Group. Everyone in that group is a third cousin once removed or closer.

Caz and Triangulation

Triangulation is when three people match each other on the same segment of the chromosome. Here is one example:

Here Caz matches Michael and Jane. For these segments to triangulate, Michael also has to match Jane which he does. Notice that Michael also matches Vivien. Vivien would be in the Triangulation Group (TG) also, but Vivien probably matches Caz below the match threshold of 7 cM.

Here is how I would show the TG on a tree:

This should be important information for Jane and Michael. That is because Jane and Michael also match on the Richard Frazer Line.

Although it is possible that the DNA is from the Richard Frazer Line, it is much more likely to be from the Frazer/Stinson Line. That is because a match between Caz and Jane or Michael would be an extra generation away.

A Closer TG

This TG is less ambiguous:

Caz, Don and Cathy are not known to be descended from other Frazer Lines.

A Frazer/White TG

When people are in a TG, they share a common ancestor.

For example these three may be sharing the DNA from either John Parker Frazer or Honora White. However, their children were Frazers, so we consider the DNA to be Frazer DNA.

This TG is similar to the second one I looked at:

In this case, Vivien replaced Don in the TG. These four TGs represent DNA from ancestors from three different generations of Frazers – from 1778 to 1827.

Caz Compared to All the Other Frazers

Here I will do a little fishing expedition to see who Caz matches and who she doesn’t. Here is what I get:

This brings up some interesting possibilities and may make me revise what I wrote above. First, let’s look at Charlene. She is on the McPartland Line. I have written many Blogs about this family. This is a small match that Caz has with Charlene, so it may or may not be valid.

The more interesting match is on Chromosome 1. Here there are two possibilities. One is that Paul, my family (Heidi, Lori, James and Jon) and Emily all have McMaster ancestry. So the TG could be on that family. Another is that this is part of an older Frazer TG.

Here is what the TG with the older Frazers would look like:

Note that my blue family is also part of the Richard Frazer group. Michael and Jane are in the Richard and Stinson group. I circled Vivien because she matches some of these people but not all. I think that she would be in this TG if I lowered her match threshold levels. Probably what is happening is that Emily, Paul and my family are triangulating with each other from George Frazer. This in turn was probably DNA from George’s mother Violet who was the daughter of Richard Frazer born about 1761 (on this chart but 1777 on the other chart). The blue circled people then match Jane and Michael as part of the Richard line also. Then Caz matches everyone else through Archibald Frazer and Mary Lilly. This DNA would have come down to Caz by way of Archibald Frazer and Ann Stinson. That means that this is a multiple level TG and a rolling TG. What I mean by rolling is that others come into it at different parts of Chromosome 1.

More on the Chromosome 1 TG

Seeing as so many people triangulate at the right side of Chromosome 1, let’s take a closer look. Here is an old list of matches tha I have been tracking:

PF is my cousin Paul. MFA is Michael. MB is Mike. I don’t know who he is, but he is in the TG and is likely related. BR is Bill who is related to Gladys. LH, HHM and Jon are my siblings. VO is Vivien. At the time, the common ancestor seemed to be Richard Frazer, now with Caz in the mix, that seems to have changed.

Pre and Post-Caz TGs

I stared at the numbers for quite a while. I’ll go through the matches. They seem to sort into pre and post-Caz TGs. This will be a little in-depth, so I apologize in advance. I’ll take a tour of Chromosome 1 starting at about position 181 M. My cousin Paul is matching with Jonathan from England on some other line than the TG that Gladys, Jon (my brother), Jim and Doreen are in. I called this TG the Pre-Caz TG:

 

This is a fairly recent TG as it represents Frazers born in the early 1800’s:

Paul breaks away from the Jonathan from England and joins the Caz TG around position 202M.

The Caz TG is a large one consisting of ten people. I took out some of the matches as gedmatch doubles the matches and ten people all matching each other is a lot of matches. Vivien drops out of this TG at 203M. Paul joins in at 202M. My family joins in at 205M and Emily joins at 209M. This could be considered two TGs or what is called a rolling TG with people exiting and entering.

I originally had the Caz TG starting later, but Caz does match Vivien on Chromosome 1 if I lower the threshold:

 

Here is the much older Caz TG:

 

This is a more detailed description of the TG I discussed earlier in the Blog.

The Post-Caz TG

In the Post-Caz TG, Caz and Emily drop out and Bill joins the group:

However, Michael and Jane are still in the group, so that makes this Post-Caz TG a Richard Frazer TG. Here are some of Michael’s matches:

 

I went back and did a more detailed analysis. Caz dropped out of the above TG but dropped into another one.

Here she is with Don and Cathy:

My normal guess would be that they share Parker DNA because they are overlapping another Frazer TG.

However, with multiple Frazer Lines I wouldn’t want to say that for sure.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I’m glad that Caz got in touch and that I was able to look at her DNA results.
  • Caz added some good depth to the Frazer/White Line of Australian Frazer descendants.
  • Chromosome 1 has been a hotbed of activity for many Frazer matches. Caz added some clarity to those matches and TGs. That is probably because she only matches on one Frazer Line – The Archibald/Stinson Line.
  • Using Caz’ DNA results I was able to take a detailed look at the many matches on Chromosome 1 and sort out the different TGs. These TGs represent four sets of ancestors in three different generations. These Frazer relationships are complicated by the fact that it appears that two sets of Frazer first cousins married each other.
Posted on

Keith’s McMaster DNA and Genealogy

From what I can tell, Keith is my best DNA match on the McMaster side. Here is how Keith appears at AncestryDNA:

Keith is a Shared Ancestor Hint. That means we have common ancestors and shared DNA. Here, Keith shows as my 3rd cousin once removed. Keith is an especially good match because he doesn’t show any recent Frazer ancestor that could confuse the DNA match. Also, Keith uploaded his DNA results to Gedmatch.com which means that we can compare more specific DNA matches and figure out how they relate to our shared ancestors.

McMaster Genealogy

My McMaster Genealogy for this Blog focuses on those who have taken a DNA test. Here is Keith’s Tree as seen at Ancestry:

Note that our shared McMaster Line also includes a Margaret Frazer. However, this match is further back and will be less likely to show up in a DNA match.

Here are the McMasters that I know of that have had their DNA tested:

Any DNA matches that Keith has with my family (Joel) or with Emily, and Paul will represent the DNA from James or Fanny McMaster.

A Summary of My McMaster Genetic Genealogy Research So Far

John

John is in the lower left of the chart above. I wrote about him here. John tested at MyHeritage which is good, but I don’t think he has uploaded to Gedmatch.com. If he did, that would show how he matches others with McMaster ancestry that haven’t tested at MyHeritage.

Stephen and Ron

I have these two as descending from Thomas Leroy McMasters. However, I have Edward as the son of Abraham. This seems unlikely has Abraham was born about 1764 and Edward was born in 1851. Here is my correction based on my Blog of Stephen and Ron here.

What I found out about Stephen and Ron was that I am more closely related to them on my Clarke side than on my McMaster side. Stephen tested at 23andme. 23andme is not compatible with Gedmatch with their current testing method. I believe that Ron has tested at MyHeritage and AncestryDNA, but has not uploaded his results to Gedmatch.com which makes DNA comparison more difficult.

Emily and Paul

Emily, Paul and my family have common Frazer and McMaster ancestors. That means that I can’t tell which of our shared DNA is Frazer or McMaster without independent Frazer or McMaster matches on the same segment of the Chromosome.

My Match with Keith at Gedmatch

Here is how I match Keith at Gedmatch:

Based on the amount of DNA we share, Gedmatch estimates that our common ancestors are 4.7 generations away. Keith and I are 3rd cousins once removed, which means that our common ancestors are 3.5 generations away. The once removed accounts for the half generation. However, these numbers are based on averages and I share less than the average amount of DNA with Keith. For example, my brother Jim shares about twice the amount of DNA with Keith compared to me:

Painting My DNA

There is an on-line utility called DNA Painter. That is a fun way to figure out what DNA you got from whom. This match with Keith shows DNA that we both got from James and Fanny McMaster. Here is what I have so far:

The top bar of each chromosome is my paternal side. That is where I am related to the McMasters. I match Keith from position 3 to 10 million. That is at the beginning of Chromosome 19 which is currently blank. At the right side of Chromosome 19, I have DNA from George Frazer and Margaret McMaster (the daughter of James and Fanny McMaster).

Here is the update at the beginning of Chromosome 19 in a light shade of blue:

In the key, I now have James and Fanny McMaster. James was born about 1806. This couple is in a section which represents my father’s mother’s side. This is the largest of my four grandparent groups in the key above.

A Triangulation Group (TG) for Keith

A Triangulation Group is when three or more people match each other by DNA. When this happens, this is almost certain proof that the DNA came down from the same ancestor.  Here is Keith’s match with Emily and Paul on Chromosome 12:

In order to make sure this is a true TG, we need to see if Paul and Emily also match each other on Chromosome 12 around position 92M:

Yes, it looks like they do.

We were already pretty sure by genealogy that Keith, Emily and Paul had the same two McMaster 2nd great grandparents, but the DNA also confirms it.

The fact that no one in my family is in the TG does not mean that we do not also descend from James and Fanny. It just means that we didn’t share the same exact portion of DNA that Emily, Paul and Keith did.

Shared Matches at AncestryDNA

AncestryDNA does not show specific Chromosome matching information, but it does show shared matches. These shared matches tend to indicate that I match Ron on the Clarke side and Keith on the McMaster side. I have 12 shared matches with Keith at AncestryDNA. Three of those 12 are my sisters. The remaining 9 are guessed to be 4th cousins by DNA. Ancestry only looks at Shared Matches out to the 4th cousin level.

Here is the comparison:

I have my comparison with Keith in the right hand box above. I also included Keith’s comparison with two of my sisters. These matches should represent those with McMaster ancestry. On the left box, I have my AncestryDNA Shared Matches with Ron. These people should represent those on my Clarke side. The point is, that these are two different groups. The only Shared Match was GG. This could mean that GG has Clarke and McMaster ancestry, or she is matching both Ron and Keith with McMaster ancestry.

I also note that BV is a strong Shared Match between Keith and my family. BV has a Maryann McMaster born 1819 in her tree as a direct ancestor. Here is Maryann’s photo from Ancestry:

MaryAnn McMaster – But Which McMaster?

BV at Ancestry doesn’t have information on MaryAnn’s parents. By DNA, Maryann could be related to me on my James McMaster side or my Fanny McMaster side. That makes things a little more complicated. I have that James’ father was Abraham McMaster. Here is what I have on my McMaster Web Page:

Note that I have a Marrianne, daughter of William McMaster and Margaret Frazer baptized 9 January 1820. This must be the same as BV’s Maryanne. Here is how I show I’m related to BV:

This shows that I am a 3rd cousin, twice removed to BV. That is equivalent, by DNA, to a 4th cousin. Now I just need to add some other McMasters:

This shows that BV is a 3rd cousin once removed to Emily, Paul and Keith. If BV uploads her DNA to Gedmatch, that could give clues on our common McMaster and Frazer ancestors. This tree also shows that BV is related to those on the right side of the chart on the Fanny McMaster and not the James McMaster side.

Putting the Two McMaster Lines Together

This comes out a bit small. The McMaster/Frazer Line is on the left. The Abraham Line is on the right. Note that Abraham as shown is about 26 years older than William McMaster. That means he could be an uncle to William or even a father to William. However, I doubt that William was the son of Abraham as that was not mentioned in William’s Lease of land:

I assume that the William and elder Abraham are the two lines I have above. In the lease above, it is stated that Abraham had a son named Abraham, but does not mention William as Abraham’s son.

Summary and Conclusions

  • Keith is the first good McMaster match who has also uploaded his DNA results to Gedmatch for comparison.
  • Keith tested at Ancestry. As a result, shared matches between Keith and my family are likely along the McMaster Line.
  • B.V. is a good shared match between my family’s AncestryDNA results and Keith’s AncestryDNA results. She also has a McMaster ancestor from Ireland that fits into research I had previously done on the McMaster family.
  • Finally, I combined the Abraham McMaster Tree and William McMaster/Margaret Frazer tree to see how they fit together. I have them lined up by the current generation at the bottom. However, that might not be the way they should be lined up.

 

 

 

Posted on

Kim’s (Irish?) Match to My Family

I recently had a message from Kim at AncestryDNA. Kim wrote:

Hello… I am trying to figure out how we are related because you don’t match any of my closest relatives well there’s not that many that have tested anyway. My relatives are from England Scotland Ireland and Sicily.

Kim matched my sister Sharon at AncestryDNA. I wrote back saying that she didn’t match my mom. My guess was that Kim matched my Clarke side.  My father’s maternal grandmother was a Clarke. They lived in County Sligo, Ireland but I don’t know much about that family. Before Ireland they may have lived in England or Scotland. I said that I would know more if Kim uploaded to Gedmatch. Kim wrote back to say that her DNA results were already at Gedmatch. Kim’s tree is private as she doesn’t want people copying any mistakes. She also wrote:

I’m pretty new at the DNA stuff and it’s so confusing how some people can match more with other people in the same family.

Kim at Gedmatch

I had told Kim I would know more based on Gedmatch. That is because my family’s DNA is mapped out by chromosome to each of our grandparents. Here is Chromosome 5 for me and two of my sisters:

Below is Kim’s match with my sister Sharon. Kim matches on our paternal side. That is the bottom red bar. The lighter red is from my grandmother. Both her parents were born in Ireland (Frazer and Clarke). Here is the detailed information of how Kim and Sharon match at Gedmatch.com:

This means that Sharon and Kim match on Chromosome 5 between about position 11 and 35 million. At Sharon’s red bar, her lighter red goes to darker red right where she stops matching Kim. That is because Kim and Sharon match on Sharon’s paternal grandmother’s side. Sharon got her DNA from her paternal grandmother up until position 35 million. After that point, the DNA that she got was from her paternal grandfather. If you look at my red bar at the top, I got almost all my Chromosome 5 paternal DNA from my dad’s dad. This is the dark red side where Kim and our family don’t match. That explains why Sharon matches Kim up to 35M and I don’t.

Why Doesn’t Kim Match Heidi at AncestryDNA?

It appears from the map above that Kim should match Heidi more than Sharon as Heidi has more light red on her paternal side. Here is how Heidi and Kim match at Gedmatch:

These matches are pretty close. Note however, that Kim and Heidi match up to 36M. This is just a little way past Kim and Sharon’s match at 35. That is the point where Sharon’s Frazer DNA stopped and her Hartley DNA started on Chromosome 5. My guess is that Gedmatch’s information is more precise than AncestryDNA’s. Even Kim’s ‘One to Many’ list Sharon match shows as being closer than Heidi’s. It is only when the One to One analysis is done, that we see that Heidi is a closer match.

Here is Kim’s ‘One to Many’ List at Gedmatch:

Sharon is at the top of this portion of Kim’s match list. My brother James is next, but I tested him at FTDNA. That means he would not show as a match at AncestryDNA. Heidi is at the bottom of the portion of the list that I copied.

Where Do Kim and Sharon Match Genealogically?

Here is my grandmother’s tree at Ancestry:

Based on Gedmatch, Kim and Sharon could be 3rd cousins, once removed. Let’s round that up to 4th cousins. If they are in the same generation from a common ancestor and they are 4th cousins, then they would have a common ancestor in the column starting with James Frazer above. Note that I have two Spratt ancestors missing. That means that one of my missing ancestors is a Spratt and the wife’s surname is unknown. If the common ancestor is further out, the news gets worse. I have only 6 ancestors at that level out of a potential 16.

As I mentioned, I have not seen Kim’s tree. It is private. However, if we were to look for a common ancestor, a good place to look would be in the area of the last two rows above. The people I have identified lived in Ireland. So that would be a good starting place to look for a common ancestor.

One Last Gedmatch Trick

Gedmatch has a useful utility with a clumsy name: “People who match one or both of 2 kits”. I want to find other people that match both Kim and Heidi. I picked Heidi as she matched Kim slightly higher than Sharon at Gedmatch. Here are some people that match Kim and Heidi on Chromosome 5:

The reference point is Heidi. Heidi’s match with Kim is #2. A yellow match is higher than a green match. #1 above is Catherine. I recognize her at AncestryDNA. In my Ancestry notes for Catherine at Ancestry, I have that Catherine is Heidi and Sharon’s largest match with an unknown connection. Here is one of Catherine’s Sligo ancestors. Sligo is where the Clarke’s lived:

Summary and Conclusions

  • I explained by Chromosome mapping how one sibling could match someone and another one would not.
  • I confirmed a guess that Kim matched my sisters on their paternal grandmother’s side. This grandmother’s parents were both from Ireland. Searching in Ireland for a common ancestor between Kim and my family would be a good start.
  • I made a guess as to why Ancestry showed Kim matching Sharon and not Heidi.
  • I found another person who was on Ancestry and Gedmatch. Catherine has a Tighe ancestor in Sligo. This person lived not too far from where my grandmother’s Clarke mother came from.  Perhaps my grandmother’s grandmother Jane Spratt was related to the Tighes.