My parents also sent their DNA in to one of the companies and amazingly the results came back knowing they were my parents without me having to tell them! I know it's science and all, but to me that was really really cool. Also it was nice to know my parents were really my parents because hey, you never know, I could have just been blending in after being switched at birth.
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| Guess which one is me |
So anyway, lately I've been paging through all my cousin DNA matches in Ancestry taking a look at the common ancestors for those who list family trees, and taking wild guesses for those who did it for the DNA results only and didn't list a tree. Sometimes it's easy to figure out when you look at shared matches.
I was looking through them all because I wanted to see if DNA matches would help me with any "unproven" ancestor connections.
For instance, I have an ancestor was in the Revolutionary War and I wanted to submit the lineage to the Daughters of the American Revolution. However, there is one Father-Son connection where apparently everyone (including professional genealogists) have assumed paternity because there is no actual written proof anywhere. I was pretty bummed and then thought well what if they really aren't father and son and I've been researching the wrong ancestry all these DECADES!
DECADES! I'm OLD!
I finally decided that the father "Collins Mix" really was likely the father of son "Jonathan Collins Mix", because come on, "Collins!"
Then I just submitted for another ancestor who was better documented.
Thanks Kinsey Harrison and all his kids!!!
Anyway, back to DNA - so I thought, can I prove to my own satisfaction looking at cousins in Ancestry that the Collins and his son were really connected?
So here is how far back I was able to find cousin-connections for some of my lines - this is really cool in my opinion!
MATERNAL SIDE:
Thomas MIX, b.1678 and Deborah ROYCE, b.1683:
These two are my 7th great grandparents from Wallingford, Connecticut, and I had multiple cousins in my matches that had these 2 as our common ancestors. So that answers the question of whether Collins was the Dad of Jonathan. Though I don't think the DAR is ready to accept this kind of proof in their applications quite yet.
Richard BOWEN, b.1662 and Patience PECK, b.1669:
Same generation as Thomas and Deborah above (7th great grandparents), but they lived in Rehoboth, Massachusetts. Again, I had multiple cousins with these 2 as our common ancestors in our trees on Ancestry.
Paul TOMULE, b.abt.1721 and Maria Anna KLEIN, b.abt.1738:
These 2 are my 6th great grandparents, as far from New England as can be, they were born in the Alsace-Lorraine region, then migrated south to Austria-Hungary to an area which later became Romania, though they are ethnic Germans. Did you get all that?
Joseph MARCHAL, b.1755 and Margaretha PIERRE, b.abt.1760:
These are my 5th great grandparents who were born in what is now the Lorraine region of France. Like Paul and Maria Anna above, they migrated south to Austria-Hungary to an area which later became Romania.
Johan REISER, b.1795 and Katharina SCHREIBER, b.1795:
These are my 4th great grandparents, their ancestors also migrated south to the Austria-Hungary region which later became Romania. All these people in Hungary and Romania but no actual Hungarians and Romanians in my ancestry, their ethnicity was mostly German, Luxembourgian and Lorrainian. I made the last one up. But it sounds cool. Lotharingen? Alsatian-Lorrainian?
William JONES, b.1793 and Sylvia BAIRD, b.abt.1797:
These are my 4th great grandparents who were born in Connecticut, but migrated down to New York state, first to Orange County, then westward to Tioga County and nearabouts. I made that last word up too, but I think it really works, I'm keeping it.
Thomas WEAVER and Almira FINNEY:
These are my 3rd great grandparents, both born in New York state, Thomas was born in Dutchess County and Almira was born in Otsego County. I wish I knew more about them, right now they are a brick wall!
Alonzo CHESLEY, b.1839 and Laura KIRBY, b.1849:
These are my 3rd great grandparents and this is a special case and is certainly something that DNA could help with. We have a family story that my 3rd Great Grandmother, Laura, had an affair with her brother-in-law, Alonzo and produced a daughter, my 2nd great grandmother. For the first time just a few days ago, I noticed a cousin in my Ancestry DNA who is a descendant of Alonzo and his wife Sarah Kirby (Laura's older sister). So this could be it - this could be the first chance at prove that the affair did happen. This will definitely bear watching to see how this turns out - am I related enough to end up being related to both Alonzo and Sarah, or is it just Sarah showing up, we'll have to see!!
