Derek Baker
LostCousins Star
I have recently started auditing my tree using Ancestry DNA matches.
I have two main objectives for doing this.
1. Confirm that my family tree researched over the last 30 years is accurate. (Have I made the right choice when no clear evidence existed to enable me to decide if my ancestor was one of a number of possibilities?)
2. See if any ancestors were playing away from home! (If Great Great Granddad was not in fact Great Great Granddad who was the real one (I suppose I will never know but DNA may give some clues).
I wonder how many trees have cuckoos in the nest. Happens in the best of families!)
To start with I chose my Paternal Grandmother's line because a. it is a more unusual surname and b. there is a big brick wall there due to missing Methodist chapel records from before 1800, I am hoping to find DNA matches to the surname in the 5th to 8th cousins which would give a clue s to who my 5G Grandfather was.
I then went back 5 generations on the tree (born ca 1800) and entered into the Ancestry DNA matches 'surname in matchs' trees' search box, one by one as many different surnames that I know of in that branch. So all results would be for genetic matches to myself.
The search results were few (never more than 10 per surname) and fairly inconclusive most had no common ancestor.
A few had a common ancestor and I was able to match that to my tree making our common female ancestor a genetic link. This is better if more than one genetic match all link back to the same common ancestor. It legitimises all male and female ancestors on the direct line between the two of us. I think!
A few of those that did not have a common ancestor had done enough research for me to be able to identify their line in the tree and thus establish a common ancestor.
Sadly the majority just seem to have just taken a DNA test and identified a couple of generations. In these cases it is impossible with any degree of confidence to establish how they are related.
However I did find 10 people (Cousins) who are related via various branches of Gran's tree. So looks like her ancestors are the right ones back to 1800. I must now go back a few more generations.
Having done this for all actual DNA matches in my Paternal Grandmothers line I turned to doing Ancestry Family Tree searches to see if I could shake out a few cuckoos.
I entered the forename, surname and date of birth for my G G Grandfathers, in the line I was checking, one by one into a general Ancestry search, selected Collection Focus - England and unchecked all boxes except family trees. This gave a lot of results, hundreds, I started looking at the trees for those with the most similar looking names and dates and place of birth to names in my tree.
I ignored any who had already shown up as DNA matches as that would be just duplicating what I had already done previously.
Sadly using this method I found no additional cousins and failed to shake out any cuckoos.
On checking the tree owners of all the trees I had looked all just said that 'XXX is either not a DNA match or has not taken a DNA test'. I do wish they would be more explicit. Knowing if the tree owner had taken a test and was NOT a match would be useful, it would indicate that one of us has a 'wonky' tree.
Knowing that someone whose tree showed them being descended from my GGG grandfather's brother and was NOT a genetic match to me would likewise be useful knowledge. Again it may show up an inaccurate tree or something else?
Sorry about this being a little long but had to try and explain it all.
Has anyone tried this? Are my assumptions correct?
Any positive help welcome.
I have two main objectives for doing this.
1. Confirm that my family tree researched over the last 30 years is accurate. (Have I made the right choice when no clear evidence existed to enable me to decide if my ancestor was one of a number of possibilities?)
2. See if any ancestors were playing away from home! (If Great Great Granddad was not in fact Great Great Granddad who was the real one (I suppose I will never know but DNA may give some clues).
I wonder how many trees have cuckoos in the nest. Happens in the best of families!)
To start with I chose my Paternal Grandmother's line because a. it is a more unusual surname and b. there is a big brick wall there due to missing Methodist chapel records from before 1800, I am hoping to find DNA matches to the surname in the 5th to 8th cousins which would give a clue s to who my 5G Grandfather was.
I then went back 5 generations on the tree (born ca 1800) and entered into the Ancestry DNA matches 'surname in matchs' trees' search box, one by one as many different surnames that I know of in that branch. So all results would be for genetic matches to myself.
The search results were few (never more than 10 per surname) and fairly inconclusive most had no common ancestor.
A few had a common ancestor and I was able to match that to my tree making our common female ancestor a genetic link. This is better if more than one genetic match all link back to the same common ancestor. It legitimises all male and female ancestors on the direct line between the two of us. I think!
A few of those that did not have a common ancestor had done enough research for me to be able to identify their line in the tree and thus establish a common ancestor.
Sadly the majority just seem to have just taken a DNA test and identified a couple of generations. In these cases it is impossible with any degree of confidence to establish how they are related.
However I did find 10 people (Cousins) who are related via various branches of Gran's tree. So looks like her ancestors are the right ones back to 1800. I must now go back a few more generations.
Having done this for all actual DNA matches in my Paternal Grandmothers line I turned to doing Ancestry Family Tree searches to see if I could shake out a few cuckoos.
I entered the forename, surname and date of birth for my G G Grandfathers, in the line I was checking, one by one into a general Ancestry search, selected Collection Focus - England and unchecked all boxes except family trees. This gave a lot of results, hundreds, I started looking at the trees for those with the most similar looking names and dates and place of birth to names in my tree.
I ignored any who had already shown up as DNA matches as that would be just duplicating what I had already done previously.
Sadly using this method I found no additional cousins and failed to shake out any cuckoos.
On checking the tree owners of all the trees I had looked all just said that 'XXX is either not a DNA match or has not taken a DNA test'. I do wish they would be more explicit. Knowing if the tree owner had taken a test and was NOT a match would be useful, it would indicate that one of us has a 'wonky' tree.
Knowing that someone whose tree showed them being descended from my GGG grandfather's brother and was NOT a genetic match to me would likewise be useful knowledge. Again it may show up an inaccurate tree or something else?
Sorry about this being a little long but had to try and explain it all.
Has anyone tried this? Are my assumptions correct?
Any positive help welcome.
