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Genealogy for Heather and JJ: Part 7 – Tacy/Tessier

In my previous Blog, I made an important discovery. I found the birth record for my children’s maternal third great-grandfather Joseph Tacy baptized Joseph Claude (or Plaude?) Tessier. It is difficult to trace one’s ancestor across a border. This is due to language differences, changes in names, different political systems and differences in recording and availability of vital records.

Taking Tessier Back

French Canada has a very good and complete set of records. Once one is back to a certain time period, a lot of these records are in books. Let’s see how easy it is to trace Tacy, which we now know is Tessier, back into the history of Canada. In my previous Blog, I had this 1860 Census record:

This shows that there were three generations of Tacy living near each other. Now I know that Solomon is indeed the father of Joseph Tacy.

Solomon Tessier Born about 1808

When I search for Solomon Tessier at Ancestry, here is the first suggestion:

Here we have the French spelling for Solomon and Margret: Salomon and Marguerite. I’d like to take a closer look at this record:

I have to try to figure out the writing and then use an online translator. It looks like this couple married on the 16th of May 1831. I think that the names of Marguerite’s and Salomon’s parents should be in this record if I can find them.

Here is Salomon’s father:

Joseph is the first name followed by Tessier and the occupation. Looking at a French genealogical word list, this is my guess:

journalier day laborer, farmworker

Salomon’s mother’s name is not as simple:

I get the idea of the first two names. The last, I’m not so sure. Hopefully, someone else has figured this out before me.

It looks like I cut off the last part of the name in the previous image. Perhaps Baudria. [Looks like this ends up being Boudria.]

Marguerite’s Parents

Marguerite Barbary’s dad’s name is also Joseph with the nickname grand maison (large house?). He looks to be a farmer also.

It looks like Marguerite’s mom was also a Barbary:

These last four ancestors must have been born in the 1700’s:

A Marriage for Joseph Tessier and Marie Louise Boudria

This marriage appeared at an earlier date than I expected. It is in the Drouin Collection, 1748-1786:

This must be 1785.

This document is easier to read, but doesn’t have much detail:

These are Notarial Records. Now Joseph Tessier is J Bte Texier. I think I see what happened:

Back up to the Drouin record. This says that Joseph Tessier is the son of Jean Baptiste Tessier, hence J. Bte. Texier. I wouldn’t recommend this Notary.

Joseph’s mom appears to be Marguerite Bernard:

Fortunately, at this point, I am beginning to get suggestions from Ancestry:

Both Jean Baptiste and Marguerite were entered under Ancestry suggestions. I note that Jean Baptiste is also Lavigne. This is a dit name which is sort of a nickname. I read under a family tree owner from my last Blog that Lavigne was so-called because one of the early Tessier’s liked wine.

Getting Past Marie Louise Boudria

Here is another Notarial Record for Marie:

This record is a Testament. Genealogical dictionary says that means last will which makes sense. Here is Terrebonne to the North of the Northernmost of the Three Montreal Rivers:

Marie’s dad is Joseph:

Marie’s mother:

After waiting a bit, I get a hint for Marie Louise. The hint is either Lejuiller (7 hints) or Leguiller (3 hints). I’ll play the odds with Lejuiller.

Here is a new tree:

This gets back to the 1600’s on some lines.

Chalon Sur Saone

One of Heather and JJ’s ancestors was from Chalon Sur Saone (or at least he died there). This is interesting as my wife, Marie, has been having a French exchange with this place for several years:

Here is one of my wife’s photos of Chalon from last year:

Jolicoeur was Jean Baptiste’s dit name: pretty heart?

Urbain Tessier

Urbain was the first Tessier from France. Here is where he appears to be from in France:

Urbain arrived in Montreal in 1648. The family stayed in the area for about 200 years. One part of that family then moved to New York. I read on one web site that Canada was running out of farm land around Montreal so French Canadians moved over the border to Upstate New York. Then opportunities were available for work in New England factories and many moved there for work. It was at that time that some of the Tacy’s moved to Lowell.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I was able to find many marriage and birth records for the Tessier family and their ancestors and spouses. These records in French handwriting are difficult to read but not impossible and follow a certain order or formula.
  • Once back to about the mid 1700’s, these ancestors were written into books which are available on Ancestry.com.
  • It is interesting to fairly easily follow these lines back to where these famiilies lived in France in the 1600’s. One line went back to a small town in France called Chalon sur Saone. Coincidentally, my French teacher wife has been having a school exchange with this Town for many years.
  • I still have not been able to identify the wife of Joseph Tessier who lived in Fort Covington, NY.
  • I also have not taken the Barbary and Boudria Lines back.

 

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My Children’s Genealogy Part 6 – Continuing on the Cavanaugh Side

I took a break on my children’s maternal genealogy while I was waiting for Heather and JJ’s DNA results to come in. Those results have come in and I have some additional genealogical information from their mother Linda. The DNA so far has helped with the Jarek side. However, I’d like to get back into the Cavanaugh side.

The Cavanaugh Tree So Far

This is what I have:

The Cavanaugh/Warren Mystery

The controversial part may be that I have John J. Warren as the father of John E Cavanaugh. This is based on a few reasons. Basically, I have that John E Cavanaugh was going by John E Warren at the time of his marriage record and listed his father as John Warren. I have that Lousa Gately’s husband Michael Cavanaugh died 13 July 1872 – about 8 years before John E Cavanaugh was born. Finally, I have that there was a John J Warren who was a widower living in the neighborhood of Louisa Gately Cavanaugh at the time of John E Cavanaugh’s birth. For these reasons, Heather may have more English heritage vs. Irish than previously thought.

My former wife Linda sent me this information concerning John E. Cavanaugh:

DATE OF MARRIAGE:   1/16/1911–****??? Marriage record(Massachusetts Marriages, 1841-1915 index) of Laoner Morrow(Cavanaugh) shows her marrying a John E. Warren on 1/16/1911 listing Louisa Gately as his mother and a John Warren as his father.  Everyone in the family believes Laoner married John E. Cavanaugh and so is John E. Warren actually John E. Cavanaugh???? Or did Louisa have a baby by John Warren and Michael Cavanaugh raised him as his own?  Why did this man put John Warren down as his name when he went by John Cavanaugh????  Are all the Cavanaughs actually Warrens?  Also note that John E. Warren listed his age as 30—if he is actually John Cavanaugh, he was 41-he also falsified his age on his draft card in 1916.  John Cavanaugh is listed in birth records as the child of Louisa Gately and Michael Cavanah.

When Was John E Cavanaugh/Warren Born?

This family researcher, went down some of the same paths that I did. The major discrepancy between me and the Cavanaugh researcher above has to do with the date of birth of John E Cavanaugh. The Cavanaugh researcher has:

DATE OF BIRTH:    4/3/1870 on Lowell records; he put 8/24/1880 on WWI draft card

The Cavanaugh researcher favors the earlier birth date for John:

Births & Christenings record for Lowell shows him born on 4/3/1870

1870 census-  John Kavanagh  3 ½ m in home with father Michael, mother Louisa and sister Ellen

1920 census- age 39 in Providence, RI with Laoner and 4 daughters

If I can show that John E Cavanaugh aka Warren was born in 1880, then I think my version makes more sense. I think that I may have already shown this, but I’ll put it down again.

Two John Cavanaugh’s Born in Lowell

Above, the Cavanaugh researcher shows a John Cavanaugh born 4/3/1870. This is true, but I believe that this John died young. Here is John who died 13 May 1871 in Lowell:

This John  was born to Michael and Lizzie. Note how old he was at death. If I subtract one year, one month and 10 days from 13 May 1871, I get 3 April 1870 which was the day when John Kavanaugh was born.

The Chronology

  • Louisa Gately marries Michael Cavanaugh 1864
  • A Daughter Ellen is born to the couple in 1865
  • John W is born in 1870 but dies the next year.
  • Michael dies 1872
  • John E Warren aka Cavanaugh is born 1880 to widow Louisa Cavanaugh and likely widower John J Warren

This proves to me that Michael Cavanaugh cannot be the father of John E Cavanaugh. He was, however, the father of John W Cavanaugh who died 1871. I have evidence that John J Warren was the father of John E Cavanaugh. I’m quite convinced. A birth record would prove it for me.

The Tacy Line

I will get back to the Warren Line, but I want to look at the Tacy Line as I am stuck on this one.

Nellie H Tacy and Family

According to Nellie’s marriage record, she was born in Fort Covington, NY to Joseph and Phebe about 1861. Here is the Tacy family in Fort Covington in 1860:

Solomon and Margaret are the likely parents of Joseph and Phebe. Harriet Tacy is said to be born in NY, so that could put a date on when the family moved to NY.

Here is Nellie in 1889:

This is from a directory and the first record I have of Nellie right now. This means that Nellie made her way from Fort Covington, NY to Lowell, MA.

Here is the 1886 Lowell Directory:

This lists a Miss Peoebe Tacy. Perhaps this was Nellie’s mother and Nellie at age 25 could have been living with her mother. This same Phoebe was listed in the Lowell 1875-76 Directory:

This Phoebe is perhaps more accurately listed as Mrs Phoebe in 1875. The 1894 Lowell Directory shows no Tacy. Perhaps Phoebe moved away, passed away or was living with her now married daughter. I also see no Tacy in the 1870 Lowell Directory.

Here is perhaps the same Phebe in 1870:

If this is Phebe Tacy, the mother of Nellie Tacy, then where is Nellie who would be 9 by now?

A Boston Marriage Hint?

I found a marriage record for Alfred Joe Tacy. He married on 21 July 1892 in Boston. His parents are listed as Joe and Febey. He was 24 then and born in Malone, NY. Malone is about 15 miles from Fort Covington, NY:

I’ll assume for now that Alfred Joe is Nellie’s brother. There was an Alfred Tacy who died in Lowell in 1940.

I found another marriage for Alfred. Alfred remarried as a widower on 27 December 1899 in Boston. Now his parents are listed as Daniel J Tacy and Phoebe Sawyer. If this is who I think he is, I may have a last name for Phoebe. Perhaps Daniel J is Daniel Joseph. This Alfred was also born in Malone, NY. Whether or not Alfred can be considered Nellie’s brother depends on how many Joseph and Phoebe Tacy’s you think may have been in the area of Fort Covington and Malone, NY in the 1860’s. One possible scenario is that Joseph (or Daniel Joseph) Tacy could have had Ida and Nellie before the Civil War. He then comes home after serving in the Civil War and lives in Malone and has Alfred Joseph. Another factor in considering whether Daniel Joseph is a brother to Nellie is how accurate his marriage records are.

Ida Tacy

Ida is Nellie’s older sister. I found this on an Ancestry Tree:

 

This gives us a birth date and husband for Ida. Ida ended up in Chicago. This means Heather and JJ likely have Puterbaugh relatives somewhere.

Before I leave Nellie’s generation, here is one more Lowell City Directory entry for 1918:

Here Nellie is living with her husband and I assume her son Jeremiah at 58 Church Street, Lowell.

Daniel Joseph Tacy Born 1833 and Phoebe Sawyer Born 1842

My next goal is to try to find a marriage record for Daniel Joseph Tacy and Phoebe Sawyer. I got these names from the marriage record of Alfred Joe Tacy who I assume is Nellie Tacy’s brother.

Another Lowell Tacy Marriage Clue: Daniel Tacy

On 27 September 1870, I see this marriage record in Lowell:

Daniel was a 31 year old painter born in Canada. His parents were Solomon and Margaret Tacy. This of course, raises a lot of questions. This could make him the brother of Daniel Joseph Tacy. If he is the brother, then why does he have the same name? Perhaps the Daniel Joseph is really only Joseph. [Note: I show that to be the case later in the Blog.]

Harriet’s Lowell Marriage

Harriet Tacy shows up in the 1860 Fort Covington Census as the 17 year old daughter of Solomon and Margaret Tacy. Here she is 11 years later in Lowell getting married in 1871 at the age of 28:

There was definitely some connection going on between upstate New York and Lowell, MA. However, in this record, her father is listed as Sullivan Tacy. This makes me think that Harriet could have been in Lowell in 1870. Here is the 1870 Lowell Directory which should be reflective of 1869:

This is the same Daniel Tacy that married in 1870 in Lowell.

Moving Up a Generation To Solomon Tacy Born About 1806 and Margaret Born About 1809

I got stuck on Joseph or Daniel Joseph Tacy born about 1833, so I’ll look for his parents. Here is a much younger Solomon Tacy who married in Northampton in 1886:

He is listed as 19, so that would put his birth around 1867. He lists his birthplace as Dannemora, NY and his parents as Joseph and Delia Mitchell.

Solomon is a potential son of Joseph Joseph Tacy who was born about 1833. At any rate, this area of New York has many Tacy’s.

Solomon and Mary married in the Roman Catholic Church:

This means that Delia Mitchell and Phoebe could potentially be the same person. We can add this to the possibility that Phoebe is Phoebe Sawyer.

A Tacy – Tacy Marriage 1893

This looks to be the same Solomon marrying Elizabeth Tacy seven years after his first marriage:

The plot thickens. Now Solomon’s mother is Sophia and Elizabeth’s mother is Phoebe Riel. They are both from Dannemora, NY. These are all hints. I just don’t know if they are good hints or bad hints. I assume that Solomon and Elizabeth are related.

More Tacy’s In Northampton, MA 1880

Here is a household full of Northampton, MA Tacy’s in 1880:

Here Edward Tacy appears to be 51 or 57. That would mean he was born in the 1820’s. Ellen was born in 1868, so would not be the Nellie we are looking for. I would connect this family to the young Solomon above as Solomon worked in the silk mill also at the time of his first marriage. I have a lot of dots that need connecting. Edward’s mother Rose is 73 in 1880. That means that she was born about 1807. That means that she would be the right age to have been a sister-in-law to the elder Solomon:

What a mess.

Other Clues? WikiTree

I Googled Tacy Genealogy which lead me to WikiTree. WikiTree has this Joseph Tacy:

This Joseph Tacy is the son of Amable Tessier and Rose Luck. Perhaps this is the same Rose who was living in Northampton, MA in 1880. The problem is that I don’t see any Solomon Tacy. That is not necessarily a problem as I have no clear, convincing evidence that Solomon was the father of our Joseph other than Ancestry Trees.

Fortunately, this WikiTree entry has a reference that leads me to Geneanet:

This page is maintained by Giles in French and I used a translator function to put the headings into English. Unfortunately, Giles has this further information on Joseph Tacy:

Here is Mooers Forks where Giles has Joseph marrying:

So the above apparently links to Northampton and the family I found living there in 1880 but not to Heather and JJ’s Joseph Tacy.

More On Young Solomon

Young Solomon was the one who moved from Dannemara, NY to Northampton MA and then to Burlington, VT. Judith maintains a profile for Solomon at WikiTree:

This is all very interesting, but I am still having trouble connecting with the Tacy family in Fort Covington, NY.

Joseph Tacy/Tessier Birth Record Found

I finally put in a search for Joseph Tessier, born 1834 into Ancestry and found this record:

 

How is your French? This is the record that I have been looking for. This is for Joseph Claude Tessier. I think that this is St. Benoit:

Joseph Claude was baptized on the 20th of February 1834. Unfortunately, I am having trouble making out his mother’s name. It looks like Marguerite, but after that, I’m not sure. Also Joseph Claude looks a lot like Joseph Plaude. I see that Solomon was a cultivateur which would be a farmer. My guess at Marguerite’s last name is Barbary:

I am not familiar with that surname. I have heard of the Barbary Coast, but that is in North Africa.

After that is given the sponsor and godmother’s names.

That was the break that I was looking for. Now, I should be able to trace the Tessier line back through Canada and perhaps to France:

I am quite sure on the Tessier connection to Quebec. I’m not so sure on the Sawyer Line.

Summary and Conclusions

  • First I clarified and summarized my reasoning for having John Warren as the father of John Cavanaugh aka Warren.
  • Next, I looked into the Tacy family.
  • I looked at Tacy’s in Lowell and in Northampton, MA. I had some trouble in connecting the two families.
  • Many Tacy’s originate in upstate New York.
  • I saw that the Northampton branch of Tacy was from the Montreal area and were originally Tessier. I had assumed that Tacy was an Americanization of a French name.
  • I did a search for Joseph Tessier and found his birth record from St Benoit to the West of Montreal. This was the hump I needed to get over.
  • Next, it should be easier to trace the Tessier line back through Canada and perhaps to France.

 

 

 

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Heather’s DNA at Gedmatch Genesis

This is my fourth Blog on my daughter Heather’s DNA. Here are the first three:

  1. A First Look at Heather’s DNA
  2. AutoClustering Heather’s DNA
  3. Heather’s Jarek DNA matches

Heather’s DNA at Genesis

Genesis is the new version of Gedmatch. I uploaded Heather’s DNA there for analysis. I am getting used to Genesis and Genesis is still being upgraded. Heather has three kits at Genesis. I uploaded her DNA from AncestryDNA, then I made two more kits for her. These nest two kits separate out her paternal DNA and her maternal DNA based on my DNA.

Heather’s Maternal Matches

Because I know a lot about my genealogy and DNA matches, I would like to look at Heather’s maternal side matches. Fortunately, Heather’s first four matches (after matching herself) are matches that I discussed in my previous Blog on the Jarek Family. When I look at Heather’s maternal DNA compared to everyone at Genesis, here are the top 5 matches:

The first match is Heather’s maternal side matching with all her DNA. Here is where Heather matches the other four on the list:

Heather and her first four matches have as a common ancestor Joseph Jarek and Marianna Ras.

DNAPainter

It is possible to paint these four matches to Heather using a web utility called DNAPainter. DNAPainter is quite easy to use. I set up a profile for Heather. Here is her blank canvas:

I just told DNA Painter Heather’s name and that she was female. DNA Painter wants to know if Heather is female so it can give her two X Chromosomes.

First, I painted in Heather’s match with Robert:

The common ancestors are Jarek and Ras and they appear on Heather’s maternal side chromosomes in yellow. I painted in the other three matches who appear to be siblings and got this:

That brings Heather up to 2% painted with 26 segment. That 2% includes her paternal and maternal side, so that would be more painted on just her maternal side.

Painting Heather’s Paternal Side

The fastest way to paint in Heather’s paternal side is to paint in her match with my mother:

This quickly gets Heather up to 26% painted. Heather’s X Chromosome should be all blue but for some reason she has a gap in the middle. I added some more paternal matches and got this:

This gets Heather up to 34% painted. Heather’s paternal side is 63% painted and her maternal side is 5% painted.

Betty at Genesis

Heather’s first maternal match after the known yellow Jarek matches painted is Betty. This looks to be Betty’s tree at Ancestry:

I’m skeptical of finding a match with Heather’s tree, but I’ll try Here is the tree I came up with:

I feel as though the connection may be with Annie Parson who was born in England – probably Lancashire County. But I don’t have a solid connection.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I was able to find Heather’s top AncestryDNA Jarek matches at Gedmatch Genesis.
  • I mapped these matches to Joseph Jarek and Marya Ras.
  • I also mapped many of Heather’s paternal matches using DNA Painter.
  • I tried figuring out how Heather’s first unknown match at Gedmatch Genesis fits in. I suspect that it is through Lancashire, England, but I haven’t made an exact connection.

 

 

 

 

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Heather’s Jarek Line At AncestryDNA

In my last post, I took a look at my daughter Heather’s autoclustering. The autoclustering included most of Heather’s 4th cousins or closer. I had trouble finding and identifying many matches on Heather’s Cavanaugh Line. In this Blog, I’ll look at her Jarek side which I could find through DNA matches.

Heather’s Jarek Ancestry

Here is what I have so far on Heather’s mother’s father’s side:

Ancestry has a few ideas for a few of Heather’s ancestors on this line with green hints. In my first post, I found Heather’s closest identifiable Jarek relative. This was H.G.

 

I can draw a simple Jarek Tree for Heather and H.G.:

Next, I can look at H.G.’s and Heather’s Shared Match list. This should give me some more Jarek relatives. The next one on this list with a tree is Melanie. Melanie descends from Helen Jarek. I already have Helen on Heather’s tree:

Melanie is Heather’s 2nd cousin:

I had the wrong birth date for Helen in Heather’s Ancestry Tree above, so I corrected it from 1907 to 1917.

M.W.’s Shared Match With Heather

M.W. has a shared match with H.G. and Heather and has this paternal side tree:

At first, I thought that the match was on the Wozniak side. Then I started to build out M.W.’s tree:

I noticed a Cecylia Jarek born in 1873 in Odrzykon, Rzeszow, Austrian Poland. She could be a sister to Francis Jarek, who was born in 1879. Here is Cecylia’s ‘Potential Mother’:

Marianna Rasz looks a lot like Francis Jarek’s mother Marya Ras.

M.W. is Heather’s 3rd cousin by genealogy and DNA.

S.M. On the Matusik Side

Here is S.M’s tree on his paternal side:

This must be where Ancestry gave me the hint of Joseph Jarek and Marianna Ras for Heather’s tree.

All these people are in Heather’s tan Cluster 5:

Cluster 5 is at the top left. However there are links to some of the other clusters going down to the right. These links are indicated by the gray boxes outside the clusters.

R.M.’s Bigger Tree

R.M. appears to be the brother of S.M. and has an expanded tree:

Assuming the genealogy is right, this pushes back the Heather’s Polish genealogy several generations into the 1700’s.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I was able to link Heather with those that show as her 3rd cousin or closer at AncestryDNA. For those that show as matches at the 4th cousin level, it has more difficult to link the matches’ trees with Heather’s tree.
  • Heather has some good matches with people who have Jarek ancestry. Thanks to research with one of the matches, Heather has likely ancestry going back into 1700s Poland.
  • In this Blog, I didn’t do any independent Polish research, but depended on the research of others in conjunction with their DNA matches. At some point, it would be a good idea to go over the research to see if I come up with the same tree.
  • Once Ancestry has had a chance to go over Heather’s tree, it might find more tree connections that match up with Heather’s DNA matches.

 

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AutoClustering My Daughter’s DNA

In my previous post, I took an initial look at Heather’s DNA. In this Blog, I’d like to look at AutoClustering Heather’s DNA. AutoClustering puts Heather’s AncestryDNA matches into groups or clusters. Then those clusters are grouped together. This makes it easy to see which matches go where.

Heather’s AutoCluster

Based on Heather’s number of 4th cousin matches or closer at Ancestry, I chose a lower limit of 20 cM and an upper limit of 600 cM. 20 cM is the limit AncestryDNA uses for 4th cousin matches.  Currently, Heather has 297 in that category.

Here are Heather’s 41 Clusters:

Some of these Clusters will be on her maternal side and some on Heather’s paternal side. The clusters with gray dots between them mean that these groups of matches match each other.

Heather has 283 matches in these clusters minus 22 that didn’t fit into any cluster.

Let’s Identify Some of Heather’s Clusters: Her Highest Matches

AutoCluster puts Heather’s clusters in the order of the match level. So the highest match in a cluster shows first. I’ll creat a spreadsheet for Heather:

This mimics the way AutoCluster lists its clusters with the highest match in the cluster listed first. I can recognize some of these names right away.

D.J. is a close relation to Heather on her mother’s side. I have not yet identified anyone on Heather’s maternal grandmother Cavanaugh side.

Next, I’ll sort by cluster, to get a skeleton for Heather’s clusters:

This brings me down to Cluster 21 or 22. I only identified one Jarek Cluster, but based on the gray dots between clusters, the Jarek or Polish relatives appear to go down as far as Cluster 14. I should have included Wozniak in those clusters.

The Bigger Picture

This shows that we have some gaps to fill in between clusters 23 and 39. I’m looking to locate some Cavanaugh ancestors. Clusters 23-39 would be one place to find them.

Cluster 32 – Cavanaugh Side?

I will be happy to find someone from Heather’s Cavanaugh grandmother side. Glenn from Cluster 32 has a tree:

I’d like to match Glenn’s tree above to Heather’s tree:

Ancestry puts Glenn and Heather at estimated 4th cousins. That means that if Heather and Glenn are in the same generation, then they will need to go back to Heather’s column starting with Jeremiah Warren and one row past where Glenn has gone.

I tried building out Glenn’s tree, but couldn’t find a connection to Heather’s tree. I think that I was on the right track as another person in the Cluster has a common ancestor with Julius Lafantasie and Emma Chamberland. So, no luck right now with Cluster 32.

Cluster 35

As I go down the clusters, I notice some match me or my siblings, so they are likely Hartley Clusters:

Donna has a 10 person tree in Cluster 35. Let’s see if that tree leads anywhere familiar.

Summary and Conclusions

  • Using Clusters, I was able to identify specific regions for three out of four of Heather’s grandparents
  • I had trouble pinning down Heather’s Cavanaugh grandmother side.
  • Once Ancestry has a chance to analyze Heather’s tree, it may make it’s own suggestions as to her Cavanaugh side.
  • One issue with the AutoClustering is that it requires you to build out a lot of trees to try to find connections. Then once the trees are built out it is very rare that a connection is made.

 

 

 

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A First Look At My Daughter’s DNA

I recently got an AncestryDNA kit for my daughter Heather and son JJ. My daughter’s results came in first and she gave me access to her results. The first thing that I did was to link my tree to her results.

That way Ancestry can figure out where the matches are between Heather’s tree and her DNA matches.

What I’m Looking For

  • I now have my mother’s DNA, and mine. With Heather, I’ll have a better look at how DNA is inherited down through three generations.
  • Heather has some Polish ancestry which is different than mine. It will be interesting to see how that shows up in the DNA.
  • I have been working on Heather and JJ’s maternal genealogy. One of the lines came out differently than expected and I wanted to see if the DNA confirms that. Also I want to see if the DNA helps in other areas of their maternal genealogy.

So I’m looking for quite a bit.

Heather’s Ethnicity

At first blush, I don’t see any special indication of Polish:

Perhaps Polish fits into Heather’s 26% Germanic Europe.

I pressed ‘Discover Your DNA Story’, and saw this:

I never see that big blue blob on my ethnicity. That refers to Eastern Europe and Russia. Heather has 17% of that. That must be from her Polish Dziadziu. I had to look that one up:

The Polish name for grandfather is dziadek, used when speaking about one’s grandfather. It is pronounced “jah-deck.” Dziadziu, sometimes spelled dziadzio, is used when speaking to one’s grandfather. It is pronounced “jah-goo.”

Theoretically, Heather is 1/4 Polish, however, the DNA can vary and perhaps Dziadziu had some other non-Polish mixed in with his ancestry.

Also above there is a sub-group called Northern England & the Midlands. My father’s side has ancestors from there. Also Heather has some ancestors on her mother’s side from that part of England.

Migration Routes

On my Ethnicity Report, there is also a section for Migration Routes. This does not show up for Heather as I just linked her to an ancestral tree this morning. Here is what I show:

This basically shows how my ancestors migrated from Europe to North America. It uses ancestral trees for that. For example, my mother’s German ancestors migrated from Germany to Philadelphia. Some of my father’s ancestors came over on the Mayflower and some came to Massachusetts later from Lancashire County in England.

Heather’s Genealogy

This is what I have so far:

Jarek is Heather’s Polish side. The controversial part is where Cavanaugh goes to Warren on the tree. I’d like to see if Heather shows any Warren DNA.

Heather’s DNA Matches

Heather has no Shared Ancestor Hints (SAHs). It will take a while for Ancestry to figure these out. These are based on Heather’s tree also. These hints show when Heather shows a common ancestor with a DNA match.

Heather has 297 4th cousins or closer. These are estimated to be 4th cousins or closer based on the level of Heather’s DNA matches.

Heather’s Match List

Heather’s first category is under Parent/Child. She shows me there. Ancestry can tell we are in this category from the amount of DNA we share. The next category is close family. Here Heather shares more DNA than she would with a 1st cousin. In the Close Family category are my siblings, Heather’s Aunts and Uncles and my mother – Heather’s grandmother. Heather has one person in her 1st cousin category. Justin recently took an AncestryDNA test.

Heather’s Second Cousins

This is where the list gets more interesting.

These are Heather’s top 5 matches in the 2nd Cousin Category. Cindy is my 1st cousin, so she is Heather’s 1st cousin once removed. D.J. and H.G. are people I don’t know, so they must be on Heather’s maternal side. S.W. is my second cousin, so Heather’s 2nd cousin once removed. Joyce is my father’s 1st cousin, so would be Heather’s 1st cousin twice removed.

D.J. and H.G.

D.J. doesn’t have a tree, so I don’t know how he is related to Heather. Perhaps the J is for Jarek? However, when I look at D.J.’s shared matches, one of those shared matches is H.G. That means that D.J. and H.G. are related.

Here is H.G.’s tree:

 

Ancestry shows that H.G. and Heather share Jarek and Wozniak. Ancestry knows this already, because I just linked Heather to a tree. One confusing thing is that H.G.’s profile shows as a female but H.G. in the above tree shows as male. Francis Jarek and Antonina Wozniak are H.G.’s grandparents. These two are Heather’s great-grandparents. That means that Heather and H.G. are 1st cousins, once removed. My guess would be the same for D.J. Heather or I could get in touch with D.J. to find out.

Comparing Heather and H.G.’s Ethnicity

If I push the Compare button for Heather’s DNA match H.G., I get this:

This shows that H.G. hasn’t updated her ethnicity report. She still has the old estimates.

This shows that H.G. is 98% Eastern Europe and Russian. I take that to mean that H.G. is almost all Polish and Heather is much less so.

Downloading Heather’s DNA

Next, I’d like to download Heather’s DNA. Ancestry doesn’t have a way to look at the individual chromosomes for comparison, so I have to download Heather’s DNA for that.

Once I have downloaded Heather’s DNA, I can upload it to Gedmatch Genesis. This used to be plain Gedmatch. I uploaded Heather’s DNA to Genesis and it gave me a PW number to identify Heather.

Heather and Her Grandmother At Genesis

It takes a while for Heather’s DNA to ‘tokenize’ at Genesis. After this happens, Heather will have a list of matches with other relatives who have uploaded their DNA to Gedmatch or Genesis from different DNA testing companies. Right now I can make single comparisons. I can compare myself to Heather, but that will just show that we match everywhere. That is because Heather has a maternal and paternal copy of her chromosomes. Naturally, she got all her paternal part from me. However, Heather got about one half of her paternal chromosomes from my mom:

This shows that Heather doesn’t match her grandma on Chromosome 17, but does match her all the way across on Chromosomes 19-21. On Chromosomes 18 and 22, Heather matches her paternal grandmother for parts and doesn’t on other parts. Why is that? Heather must match her paternal grandfather in the black areas.

Crossovers Or Recombination Points

The spot where Heather’s DNA goes from her grandmother’s DNA to her grandfather’s DNA is called a crossover or recombination point. When Heather’s DNA was formed, her dad’s maternal and paternal DNA split up and recombined to make Heather’s DNA. The same happened with Heather’s mom. Heather had no paternal recombination on Chromosomes 17 and 19-21. This is normal on the higher-numbered shorter chromosomes. This means that though Heather got her DNA from her mom and dad, it is made up from the recombination of the DNA from her four grandparents.

There were over 400,000 SNPs used to make the comparison. These SNPs are Heather’s individual DNA markers that I downloaded from Ancestry.

Other Cool Things To Do With Heather’s DNA

This is the introduction. There are other cool things to do:

  • Though it is difficult to do with just two siblings, it is possible to use visual phasing to map out how Heather and JJ got their DNA from their four grandparents but comparing their DNA results to each other.
  • It is possible to use a program called DNAPainter to map out Heather’s matches on her chromosomes.
  • AutoCluster looks at Heather’s AncestryDNA matches and clusters them according to how they match each other. This does not required the detailed chromosome information from Genesis.
  • I haven’t looked at DNA to confirm Heather’s genealogy except for two close maternal relatives.
  • I’ll be able to create a maternally phased and paternally phased kit for Heather at Genesis. This will show which of Heather’s matches are on my side and which ones are on her mom’s side.

 

 

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Painting My X Chromosome

I was wondering today if I had missed any painting of my X Chromosome.

My Current X Chromosome Painting

Right now I have this:

The Blue is on my mother’s mother’s side. My grandmother was Emma Lentz, but I put the assignment back another generation to her parents. The blue is based on my first Cousin Cindy’s results. The orange is on my mother’s father’s side. This is based on a second cousin match. She lives in Latvia.

Cousin Rusty’s Match

I was wondering if my cousin Rusty would add anything:

Cindy got the X that matches my family from her dad. He in turn, got his from his mom Emma Lentz. With Rusty, we match on our mother’s sides. Our mother’s got their X Chromosomes from both of their parents.

Comparing My X Chromosome with Cindy and Rusty

When I compare my X Chromosome with Rusty and Cindy, I get this:

Compare that to my Chromosome mapping with Visual Phasing:

The places where I match Rusty is where I am mapped to my Rathfelder grandfather. The place where I match Cindy, is where I am mapped to my Lentz grandmother. The places where my X Chromosome matches go back and forth between Rusty and Cindy are the same places my DNA goes from Rathfelder to Lentz and back again. Based on this, I would say that all my X chromosome match with Rusty is from Alexander Rathfelder. Further, I could say that Alexander got all his X Chromosome from his mother Maria Gangnus. Further, I could say that she got her DNA from her two parents Johann Philipp Gangnus born 1829 and Jacobine Lutke.

Painting My Gangnus/Lutke X DNA

Before I paint in new DNA, I check my current stats:

This shows that currently, I am 36% mapped overall, but only 25% mapped or painted on my maternal side.

Here is the new look:

The New Stats

My maternal side went up 3%. I added over 100 cM of DNA with Rusty.

Overall, I went up 1%.

Checking My Work

Based on how I match Cindy and Rusty, I would not think that Rusty and Cindy would have much of a match on the X Chromosome:

The spot where Rusty and Cindy match each other is same area where I am missing a match on my X Chromosome. I can guess what this means. I am mapped to Lentz in this region. Everywhere I match Rusty, I match him on Rathfelder. I match Cindy in this region except for one segment. My assumption, then, is that Cindy has a small Rathfelder segment in the middle of her Lentz DNA. There are probably other explanations, but that is the one I thought of.

Any Practical Application to This?

Yes and no. No in that I already had this information. Yes, in that this makes me more aware of what I had.

X Chromosome Matches at Gedmatch

My first X Chromosome match that I don’t already know and who has a tree is Alice.

Alice has no autosomal match with me.

Scanning her tree, I see a Faunce name:

Elizabeth Faunce is Alice’s mother’s mother’s mother’s father’s mother. That fits in well with X Inheritance.

Here is my mother’s tree:

Here I have a Faunce at my mother’s mother’s father’s mother’s mother level. She is Catherine Faunce born in 1805. Do you think the families match up?

Alice’s Tree

I see that I already had a tree for Alice. But I didn’t go far enough.

I had gone out to Elizabeth Faunce. Her father is believed to be George Faunce who was born in 1776 in Philadelphia and died there in 1838. My ancestor Jacob Faunce was born in 1774. He lived in Kensington which is part of present-day :Philadelphia and died in 1854. From what I can tell, these two Faunce men were not brothers. Too bad. So close.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I realized that I could map my first cousin’s X Chromosome matches to DNA Painter.
  • This got me thinking about DNA X Chromosome matches
  • I tracked down an X Chromosome match’s ancestry. I got back to the same city and the same last name but couldn’t make the connection. This seems like too much of a coincidence to me.

 

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AutoClustering My Cousin’s DNA

My cousin, Cindy, has tested at AncestyDNA. Cindy’s father is my mother’s brother, so her maternal side matches on my maternal side. Cindy’s results are important, because she will match relatives in different ways than my family will. Cindy’s father and my mother both inherited 50% of their DNA from each parent. However, they inherited a different 50%. That means that one child represents 50% of the parents’ DNA, but two children would represent about 75% of each of their parents’ original DNA.

My Cousin Cindy’s Tree

Here is Cindy’s tree starting with her great-grandparents:

I’m mostly interested in the top part of Cindy’s tree as that is where we match. While writing this Blog, I found this high school photo of Cindy’s dad:

Cindy’s AutoClustering

AutoClustering takes Cindy’s matches at Ancestry and groups them together by how they match each other. These groups or clusters represent common areas of Cindy’s ancestry. I did a basic autoclustering for Cindy and came up with this:

I used pretty narrow parameters for Cindy. These are matches between 40 and 250 cM. That means I filtered out close and far away matches. I took out most of Cindy’s match names on the top and left of the chart.

Cindy’s Six Clusters

Who are these people in Cindy’s six clusters? I recognize people in the last 4 clusters. Those are Cindy’s paternal side matches:

Clusters 3 and 4

I’ll take these together because there is a link between the two clusters shown as a gray square between the red and purple clusters. Carolyn and Kathy are in the red Cluster 3. I have been in touch with Carolyn and know how she is related. Elise, Matthew and Joshua are in Cluster 4 in purple. Kathy from Cluster 3 matches Matthew of Cluster 4. However, I don’t have trees for Kathy or Matthew.  I have been in touch with Joshua.

Carolyn descends from the Nicholson/Ellis Line. Joshua descends from the Lentz/Nicholson Line.

Cindy’s Clusters 5 and 6

I can’t figure out how Cluster 5 fits in. Cluster 5 has the lowest level DNA matches. That makes it difficult to tell who the common ancestors are or where they come from.

Cluster 6 fits in with Cindy’s German/Latvian heritage. Cindy’s top match in Cluster 6 is with Otis. Here is how Cindy and Otis match:

The Schwechheimr and Gangnus families lived in a German Colony in Latvia called Hirschenhof. Here is a map of Hirchenhof where Cindy’s Latvian ancestors lived:

Clusters 1 and 2 on Cindy’s Maternal Side

Cindy matches Holly in Cluster 1. Holly also has a tree:

 My guess is that Holly’s Heinrich Nachbar is the same as Cindy’s Henry Nachbar. That should put Cindy and Holly at 2nd cousins once removed.

Cluster 2

In Cluster 2, there is one grandparent remaining for Cindy. That is DiOrio. Cindy matches Vincent in Cluster 6 who has this tree:

Vincent’s Etore seems to match Cindy’s Ettore DiOrio. That would make Cindy and Vincent 2nd cousins.

Cindy’s Cluster Summary

For the No idea Cluster 5, I can only tell that it is on Cindy’s paternal side. Cindy’s match with Otis in Cluster 6 went back to the late 1700’s. Cindy’s matches in Cluster 5 were smaller than her matches with Cluster 6 members. That implies that the common ancestors could be further back in time.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I ran an autocluster report for my first cousin, Cindy at conservative settings and got six clusters
  • Cindy’s six clusters sorted themselves into two maternal clusters and 4 paternal clusters. This was probably a coincidence, but worked out well.
  • I was able to figure out all of Cindy’s clusters except for one of her paternal clusters.
  • Cindy hasn’t linked an Ancestry Tree to her DNA. If she did, then Ancestry would make some of these connections automatically.
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AutoClustering Aunt Esther’s Newfoundland DNA

In previous Blog, I looked at the autoclustering of my mother-in-law Joan’s DNA. Esther is Joan’s half Aunt. That means that Joan and Esther have a connection on only one of Joan’s grandparents. All of Esther’s four grandparents were from Newfoundland. I am hoping that the AutoClustering process will make sense of Esther’s Newfoundland DNA.

Esther’s AutoCluster

This is the overall chart:

The 54 clusters are difficult to see because Esther has 612 matches. I set Esther’s autoclustering limits between 30 and 600 cM and was a little surprised at how many matches Esther had at that level.

Esther’s Family Tree

There are a few holes in Esther’s family tree:

The Peter Upshall born 1800 above is also a guess.  I’m not as familiar with the Shave and Kirby sides as my wife is not related on that side. The Clusters should identify some of them.

Here is a spreadsheet that I will need to fill in.

My wife is at the top of the list with the largest match in Cluster 1. In a way that is not good because my wife will be related to two of Aunt Esther’s grandparents: Henry Upshall and Catherine Dicks. Perhaps that is why the Cluster 1 is so large. I will try another AutoCluster for Esher between 40 cM and 250 cM. That should be clearer. Also Marie’s niece Tina is the top match for Cluster 6. Tina will also share Upshall and Dicks matches. However, lowering the upper match limit to 250 cM will not solve all the problems. Even though Marie and Tina share both Upshall and Dicks, it is possible that many in the clusters will only have either Upshall or Dicks DNA. Or they will have more Upshall than Dicks or the other way around.

Esther’s Shared Ancestor Hints (SAHs)

At AncestryDNA, Esther has some Shared Ancestor HInts. Here is one:

Pat is a 2nd cousin once removed. Esther and Pat share the common ancestors of Shave and Burton. I was looking for easy answers but got thrown for a loop because Pat is in Cluster 1. She is in Cluster 1 with Marie who is not related on the Shave side. Interesting.

Here is some more of Pat’s paternal side lineage:

This tells me that perhaps Pat is in Cluster 1 because of her Upshall match and not her Shave/Burton match. That could mean that Margaret Upshall is a sister to Esther’s grandfather. If that is the case, then Esther and Pat may be 2nd cousins once removed on the Upshall side also. It’s a possibility.

A Kirby/Emberley SAH

Here Esther and M.B. are shown as 3rd cousins. AncestryDNA thinks they share enough DNA to be 2nd cousins, so something is going on. Not only that, M.B. is also in Cluster 1. Martha is the administrator for M.B. Look at Martha’s tree for M.B.

There is Upshall again. I have been in touch with Martha and we both agree that Peter is a pretty good potential ancestor. He was born to Sarah Upshall who was a single mother in Haselbury Bryan, Dorset, England.  So far, I’m thinking that there is more than meets the eye to these SAHs.

This Just In: Another AutoCluster for Esther

While I am thinking about the Upshalls in other SAHs, I’ll look at another AutoCluster for Esther. Things are still a bit muddy. I changed the lower limit to 40 and the upper limit to 250cM and got almost 300 fewer matches for Esther. However the picture is still muddy:

Esther is down to 33 clusters, but the grey dots between clusters represents crossover in ancestral lines. M.B. who was previously in Cluster 1 is now in Cluster 19. Changing the thresholds changes the delicate balance of the clusters and the relationship between the clusters apparently.

Which AutoCluster Version Should I Use?

It seems like Newfoundland genetic genealogy is already complicated enough. There are intermarriages of lines and missing lines. I have just put in for a third AutoCluster for Esther at the default thresholds of 50-250cM. I am hoping that those thresholds will simplify things.

Take 3 with Esther’s AutoCluster

You can’t say I’m not trying.

This looks more manageable with 20 clusters and 220 matches. I’m ready to rock this AutoCluster.

Cluster 1: Dicks?

My notes for many in this Cluster indicate the Dicks family. D.M. in Cluster 1 has a good match and Dicks on her maternal side:

I was able to build out D.M like this:

However, I have been proposing that Elizabeth Collier could be Elizabeth Crann. That is something to keep in mind. It looks like D.M. matches Esther on Kirby, Dicks, Dicks wife Elizabeth, Shave and Burton. That is quite a bit.

Cluster 14 – Kirby/Emberley

My notes for this Cluster say Kirby and Emberley. AutoCluster sorts the clusters by size of match and this cluster has the second largest match.

Cluster 8 – Upshall?

I’d like to make a guess that Cluster 8 could be an Upshall Cluster. There are a lot of high matches but not a lot of answers there:

I’ll make it a working theory. The first person on the list is Jane. I couldn’t see any connection to Esther in her tree. The second person James said that his grandmother was Laura Upshall.

Laura Upshall’s Tree

I found a Laura Upshall from England and a Laura from Newfoundland born in Harbour Buffet. So I chose the Laura from Harbour Buffet and built out a fast tree at Ancestry:

Assuming this tree is right, Esther and James are 2nd cousins twice removed with the common ancestors of Peter Upshall and Margaret Burton. While I’m at it, I’ll add Margaret Burton to Esther’s tree. The good thing about Laura’s tree is that I don’t see any Dicks in it. This could rule out Cluster 8 from being a Dicks Cluster. Here is what I have so far:

I still don’t see any Shave Clusters.

Another Cluster 8 Tree

Next down on the list of Esther’s matches on Cluster 8 is someone I call Hat. Here is what I think is his tree:

I think the person taking the test is the son of Ella Grace Upshall, but I’m not sure. Again, I don’t see Dicks in there which is good. One other thing is that these trees also have Shave. So that is a possibility.

Cluster 8: Shave Or Upshall?

One way to tell might be by comparing Esther to her half Niece Joan, my mother-in-law. Joan is related on Esther’s Upshall side but not her Shave side. The Jane that I couldn’t connect to Esther from Cluster 8 is in Joan’s Cluster 41. I had that listed as an Upshall Cluster for Joan. James is also in Joan’s Cluster 41. Finally Hat is in Joan’s Cluster 41, so that is three for three.

A Tree for Eileen from Esther’s Cluster 8

Christina has a short tree, but her mother’s Reid name looks like a possible Newfoundland name. I assume that Christina’s mother Eileen is the one that took the test. I see from the 1940 Census that Eileen’s father was born in Newfoundland, so I guessed right:

Will Flint, Michigan lead back to Upshall?

The answer is no.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Sarah Ann Dicks was born in Harbour Buffet as I couldn’t find records for her birth and Harbour Buffett records are poor. I have that William Reid was born in Harbour Buffett in 1811.

Here is a tree for Lorna in Cluster 8:

I don’t see Upshall here. But Margaret Burton may have married Peter Upshall and she may be the daughter of Charles Burton. She did name what appears to be her second son Charles. It would have been customary to name the wife’s second son after her father. I know, a lot of if’s.

Christina From Cluster 8 and Her Tree

Christina’s tree looks hopeful.

Here is Madge and family in 1935 St. John’s West:

I can’t tell if Hattie is the same as Ethie. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get much further than Christina’s tree.

A Possible Upshall Tree

Now that I’ve reduced the possibility of Cluster 8 being Shave, it is more likely an Upshall Cluster. I’ll build a theoretical tree for Upshall with theoretical but possible common ancestors Peter Upshall and Margaret Burton:

 

I put this out there to see if it makes sense genealogically and with the DNA evidence.

Summary at Mid-Point

Here is my spreadsheet so far:

Subject to change.

An Upshall in Cluster 11

Here is Barbara’s paternal side of her tree:

Peter and Alice Upshall married in 1916:

Here is a marriage for Henry Upshall to an Elizabeth Smith:

Henry was said to be living at Little Harbour at the time of the marriage.

Madonna’s Cluster 11 Tree

Madonna shows her maternal grandparents at Ancestry:

I recognized the Collett name and built out Madonna’s tree with some help from other Ancestry Trees:

It’s not my greatest tree as I didn’t build out Susan Collett. I see a record showing a Peter Collett marrying a Susanna Hann in 1905:

That gives me a new line for my horizontal Upshall Tree:

B,A. On Cluster 11

B.A. appears to have an Upshall on his tree. I say appears because there are many trees posted by B.A.’s administrator. I picked the tree that most looked like B.A.’s initials and it had an Upshall in the line:

Solomon Upshall 1921

In 1921 Solomon was living among many Upshalls in Little Harbour:

I wasn’t able to build out past Henry Upshall. I did note one Ancestry Tree had this:

I suppose that is possible.

Cluster 10 and Phyllis’ Tree

Phyllis is missing her paternal side, but her maternal side has some familiar names:

A lot of these names are beginning to sound familiar after a while.

Building out Phyllis’ tree:

Dicks is a common ancestor, but there are other possibilities. With these clusters, I am looking for trends. The clusters are saying to me, in a particular cluster the DNA says that you are more related within this group than outside of this group. So in a sense, the clusters may be clearer than what the genealogy is showing.

Another Cluster 10 Tree: Not All Trees Are Created Equal

This tree is better, in a way, than Phyllis’. Tha maternal side is England and Toronto. That leaves the paternal side:

I built out this tree and found some common ancestors:

This person goes by ‘it’ for short at Ancestry. It is 2nd cousin once removed to Esther. I prefer it’s tree because it is less ambiguous. It’s one Shave/Burton line is the one that is in Harbour Buffett where Esther’s ancestors lived. Where was Shave on Phyllis’ tree? Shave may have been on her paternal side that Phyllis didn’t show

Richard’s Cluster 10 Tree

I could use another tree to confirm, even though I am pretty sure of Shave/Burton already. Richard has a small, but high-grade tree:

The reason I like his tree is that maternal side and paternal side are shown. Also it narrows down to a name I know instead of expanding out to many ambiguous matches. I sort of cut off Lucy Shave. Sorry, Lucy. Richard’s Tree shows two lines of connections:

However, the closer Shave/Burton connection puts Richard also at 2nd cousin once removed to Esther. Cluster 10 represents Esther’s fourth grandparent Line of Shave:

A Shave/Burton Tree

 

Here is Esther’s Cluster 10 Shave/Burton Tree:

Cluster 4

Cluster 4 is next on the GeneticAffairs Report. Daisy is Esther’s first match with 177 cM. Her tree says that she shares the Dicks ancestral name with Esther.

Daisy has a good tree:

Daisy has Joyce and Dicks at her 2nd great-grandparent level above. Here are two more generations on Daisy’s Tree:

This shows Christopher Dicks and his wife twice. Daisy descends from Rachel and Robert Dicks. I’m sure there is a Crann connection also, but this should be overshadowed by the Dicks connections.

That means that Esther and Daisy are 4th cousins once removed twice on the Dicks Line.

Match #2 on Cluster 4 – Julie

Julie shows her two parents on her Ancestry Tree. My first attempt to build out Julie’s tree was a disaster. I think that Julie attached her DNAresults to her mother’s side. I was able to fix this by going into Julie’s tree and going down one lever from her mother. This worked better and I came up with a Newfoundland Tree for Julie’s paternal side:

None of the names sound familiar, but at least I’m in Newfoundland instead of Ireland. I built out Julie’s tree a bit but didn’t find a connection to Esther.

I was able to build out Julie’s tree a little more:

The tree has William Henry Dicks from England. That means that the match could go back to England or that a descendant of Christopher Dicks moved back to England and then back to Newfoundland.

I’m ready for a new cluster.

Cluster 12 – Bridget and bam

I’ll start with bam because he has Newfoundland ancestors in his tree. Here is my build-out based on some Ancestry suggestions:

 

There are a few interesting things about this tree. First, it is possible  that this Charles Burton could be an Uncle or father of Esther’s ancestor Margaret Burton born 1825. Also The Frances Dicks could be the Frances Dicks I have as daughter of Christopher Dicks. I have this tree, roughly based on DNA testing:

However, I see that the first George in the tree must be wrong. He should be in a later generation. Also there is a discrepancy on the birth date of Frances Dicks. I have her here are born 1811, but 1805 may make sense also.

That still leaves the question as to whether this is a Burton or Dicks Cluster (or something else!). I think I may be able to figure out the answer to that question, but not today.

Cluster 20

This could be the last Cluster for now. The top match with a tree is G,K. Here is a clue from AncestryDNA:

G.K. and Esther both have a Joseph Dicks in their tree. I had added in Joseph on Esther’s maternal line. She had a Jane Dicks there that I couldn’t place. The Dicks on Esther’s paternal side were easier to place.

My Theory on Joseph Dicks

I think that the Joseph Dicks in G.K’s tree and the one in Esther’s tree could be the same person. In G.K.’s tree Joseph is born in 1818 in Oderin and has son Michael in 1869 with Mary Murphy. She could have been a second wife. In Esther’s tree, Joseph is born in 1810 in Famish Gut and has Jane Ann Dicks with Mary Griffith in 1841. If I’m right, that would make Esther and G.K. half third cousins. I had that Esther’s Joseph descended from Christopher Dicks. However, the tree that I made for G.K. has Joseph’s parents as John Dicks and Mary Corbett. That may make more sense.

One point is that the tree I make for G.K. has Joseph Bulley Dicks born in 1818:

However, G.K. has Joseph born in 1849.

Jerome’s Cluster 20 Joseph Dicks Tree

I notice that Jerome follows G.K with a later birth date for Joseph Dicks:

It appears that Jerome is 2nd cousin to G.K and they both descend from different daughters of Michael Dicks.

Beth in Cluster 20

Beth in Cluster 20 also has a Joseph Dicks tree but with the earlier Joseph Dicks birth date:

Esther’s Cluster Summary

This is a start:

I’m sure that the more I work on this, the more it will come together:

In general the matches between clusters seem fewer as you go down and to the right. That would mean that if I am right with Joseph Dicks, then that is one of the more unique lines. Cluster 20 represents a Roman Catholic Line also, and I believe that most or all of the other lines are Church of England. I see that I already had a 14 and 15 Cluster label, so my newer label for Cluster 15 should refer to the lower right of the green box.

Summary and Conclusions

  • Looking at Esther’s 20 Cluster Report was helpful. It was also a lot of work to build out and analyze trees.
  • I forgot to mention the Crann connection in New Zealand. This is the small Cluster 2. I believe that the younger Christopher Dicks married Elizabeth Crann, so it may be fitting that the small Crann Cluster was next to the large Dicks Cluster 1.
  • The clusters help to focus on where to look when comparing trees. The clusters at least suggest that the ancestors should be along the same line as each other.
  • Clusters are a good place to try out theories on ancestors. The theory I had on Joseph Dicks seemed to play out well. From my previous Dicks DNA project, I had tried to connect Esther’s Joseph Dicks line and was unsuccessful. This would explain the fact that the Joseph Line appears to be differenrt than the Chirstopher Dicks Lines.
  • I hope to continue looking at Esther’s DNA clusters at some point and comparing them with her half-niece Joan’s. For example, I would not expect that Joan would be matching Esther’s Cluster 20 as that is Esther’s maternal side and Joan matches Esther on Esther’s paternal side.
  • A lot of the progress is from reviewing the matches’ trees, but the AutoClustering helps focus and direct the analsysis of trees.

 

 

 

 

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A Latvian Match at MyHeritage – Patrick

I recently was pleasantly surprised to get a message from Patrick from Berlin. He says that we are connected through his great-grandmother Wilma Pfeiff.

Wilma Pfeiff

Here is a photo of Wilma from an article written in 2010:

I enjoyed reading about Wilma’s history [translated on-line]:

Wilma Pfeiff was born in Riga, Latvia. She experienced the First World War in Russia in a city on the Volga. There her father had to work in a machine factory. She was allowed to herd cows and learned fluent Russian. “I always went to the other girls and talked to them.” After the war, they went back to Riga. There she married. “My husband was supposed to marry my older sister, but she did not want to,” remembers Wilma Pfeiff. The girls had hardly any say in the election of the groom. In 1929 she got her first child, nine more followed. In 1939, the German-descended family was relocated to the Polish Wartheland. Her husband later went to war and did not return home. Then the day came Wilma Pfeiff had to flee from Poland with her ten children. In open wagons, actually coal cars, the families were penned. “Mother was always smart. She had a blanket, “says her sonErich Pfeiff (71). And his brother Edwin adds: “We still got straw to keep us warm.” The family was stranded in Brandenburg, on detours, it went on to Lemwerder. That’s where the Pfeiffs lived in the refugee barracks, that was in 1947. “That was a very difficult time,” says the 104-year-old. She had to fight for her children, they wanted to take her away. “‘Young dogs are distributed, but no children,’ I told them then.” She was allowed to keep the children, the elders were apprenticed. “The children were all very nice, they helped a lot,” says Wilma Pfeiff. She never married again: “I could have found a husband, but no father for my children.”

I have found DNA relatives to people in the US who have had ancestors from Saratov. I have wondered how they could be connected to Latvia and this article may explain it. Saratov was about 1,000 miles away from Riga, Latvia. I know that my great grandmother was also moved around a lot in WWII like Wilma was.

The DNA Match – My Mom and Patrick

Here are the DNA matches between Patrick and my mom, Gladys:

There are five matches that are fairly small. This could mean that our common ancestors go back several generations. I have a cousin who has not uploaded her DNA to MyHeritage. I have other Latvian cousins at MyHeritage but they do not show DNA triangulation with Patrick.

Wilma Pfeiff’s Genealogy

A good resource for Latvian Genealogy is a website called Raduraksti. They have a page with 10,000 Latvian names that could be helpful to find Wilma Pfeiff. One problem with using this list is that the Latvians like to spell German names their own way. Another problem could be that Wilma was not in Latvia when they took the survey or if she was, she may have gone by her maiden name. This appears to be the Latvian spelling:

Another Hint from Patrick

Patrick messaged me at MyHeritage:

My Family lived in a German enclave with 3 other Families: Pfeiff (my one), Schmidt, Gangnus, Wolde. They all married each other. For Example my Great Grandma was firstly Schmidt and married Johann Otto Pfeiff. 

This is a big help as I didn’t know Patrick’s great-grandmother’s maiden name. There are two Johans in the list above:

The second Johans seems to be born in the right time.

Wilma Schmidt

Next, is Wilma listed on the Latvian database? This must be her:

She was born in Riga. This also gives a name for Vilma’s father. However, there were many churches in Riga. Here are some Oskars’ from the Latvia database:

My top choice is the Oskars born in the Irsu pag. as that is another name for Hirschenhof where my ancestors came from.

Patrick’s New Finds

Since I started writing this Blog, Patrick has found a lot more information on his Hirchenhof ancestors. I built out part of Patrick’s tree that I had started based some of Patrick’s new research and got this:

I put a green box around the common ancestors Patrick and I have. It looks like Patrick and I are double 4th cousins once removed.

The Lutke Connection

Lutke is interesting because I was previously stuck on Friedrich Lutke as well as Eva Fuhrmann. Patrick’s research helped me fill in this whole lower right side of my Latvian tree:

This added a new Buchenroth surname that I had not heard of and an additional Schwechheimer. Here is how Patrick connects with me on the Lutke side:

A Gangnus – Biedermann Tree

This tree is more complicated because I already match some other people there by DNA:

This is complicated because I descend from from Gangnus ancestors on my grandfather’s mother’s and father’s side. Robert above also has a double connection.

Patrick’s Pfeiff Side

I can’t see the ancestors of Johann Otto Pfeiff on Patrick’s MyHeritage Tree:

Patrick has Johann Otto Pfeiff born in Riga on 23 May 1906. I have Johann Karl Pfeiff born in Hirschenhof on 6 August 1906. I wonder if they are the same person? I did find a birth record for Johann Otto Pfeiff in the HIrchenhof Church records.

The record goes onto the next page. At this time, the Church records were in what appears to be Russian. Fortunately, the names are also in German. I did find a Russian Genealogical Wiki. The first column must be birth and the second baptism. My guess is that Patrick’s 23 May was right.

I don’t know when to give up, so I looked for a marriage for Georg and Ottilie:

This marriage appears to be in 1902 or 1903. The German translations of the names are in parentheses. I think that the second name after the first name must be the father’s name of the groom and bride. I see those names as Johann and Georg.

Painting Patrick

I would like to paint Patrick’s DNA matches using DNAPainter. The problem is that we match three different ways. I’ll work around this by just naming the common ancestors by the two closest pairs of common ancestors. That would be Lutke/Fuhrmann or Gangnus/Biedermann.

Here is where I match Patrick:

Here is my already maternal side that is painted:

One problem here is that Chromosome 20 is already taken up by the wrong side. My Lentz ancestors mostly lived in Philadelphia. Also matches under 7cM are not likely to be valid.

There also seems to be a problem with the match at Chromosome 18:

The MyHeritage Chromosome Browser shows no triangulation on Chromosome 18. My match with Patrick is in red and my matches with my two Latvian 2nd cousins are in orange and yellow. That means I am skeptical of this match also, but I don’t want to just toss it out.

Here is the new DNA painted in light blue.

I made a note under the match in DNAPainter that the Chromosome 18 segment did not triangulate. Here is a portion of DNAPainter with my paternal side included:

My Latvian maternal matches are on the bottom bar of the Chromosome.

My Mom and Patrick

Here is my mom’s currently painted matches:

Here is my Mom’s map where Patrick’s matches were added:

DNAPainter doesn’t add the matches under 7cM. The match on Chromosome 18 doesn’t show as it is under other matches:

My mother didn’t match Patrick on Chromosome 20.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I’m glad Patrick contacted me. It has been fun working with this enthusiastic and talented German genealogist.
  • Patrick and I both have an interest in German/Latvian genealogy and we are working well together.
  • Thanks to Patrick, I have added some ancestors where I was stuck on our shared Lutke and Fuhrmann Lines.
  • Painting my matches and my mother’s matches with Patrick gave some more insight on the shared matches.
  • I’m hoping to find out more about Patrick’s genealogy and meet other DNA matches with an interest in genealogy like Patrick.