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Messages - Guy Etchells

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1
Ancestral Family Tree DNA Testing / Re: Ancestry Matches and Half Cousins.
« on: Friday 23 September 22 13:42 BST (UK)  »
I have had a tentaive search online, and a search through threads on here, but haven't come across an answer that makes my confusion any clearer. So apologies if creating the 1001st thread asking this.

The query I have is in regards to Ancestry matches and 'common ancestors.'

I have a handful of matches where we only descend from one ancestor rather than two.
For example, a female 4xgreat-Grandmother by Ancestry has myself and a "half cousin" being descended from her only, and not also the male 4xgreat-Grandfather.
There is no before or after marriages, as they were married young and died still together years later.

Does this indicate a non paternal issue, or a slight on Ancestry's part figuring out a relationship?





I do not understand your question. Do you mean you are not a DNA match to the spouse of the shown ancestor or are you simply referring to paper trail research and other people's trees?
If the first (DNA) it should be remembered that each parent only provides approximately 50% of their child's DNA (in addition a Small proportion of the child's DNA is "background" DNA which most of the population of the area carry).
Each parent in every generation that passes only passes down approximately 50% of their DNA so by simple arithmetic a child would on average only have 1.5% of any particular 4th grt. grandparent's DNA in their DNA and it is possible may not have any identifyable amount of DNA from that grt. grandparent showing in their DNA.
Cheers
Guy

2
The Common Room / Re: How to reconcile with the past?
« on: Monday 19 September 22 17:11 BST (UK)  »
Hi all

My family history has taken a very unexpected turn, and I'm not sure how to deal with it.

When I began, my family were proudly descended from 19th century South Australian free settlers. I unearthed two convicts on my mother's side and faced some resistance in reconciling my family to that. However, the fact that both convicts were not murderers or rapists but had merely stolen from their employers to feed their families, and had committed no further crimes, helped with that, as had the general Australian attitude since the bicentenary in 1988 to be proud rather than ashamed of convict heritage.

But this week I have now stumbled on the fact that on my father's side we go back to the plantation owning Codrington family of the Leeward Islands and Barbados, who owned and traded in hundreds of slaves. Never would I have expected my family history to take me down this path.

I feel very conflicted about this, as it is totally at odds with my Quaker upbringing. I am literally losing sleep over this.

How do I reconcile this history with myself, and then present it to my family?

Any advice appreciated.

Nudge

You don’t, if you want to do family history the first thing you have to accept is, nothing you do today will change the past, record accurately what you have learnt and do not repeat what they have done if is against your beliefs.
What can you do, trace the descendants of every slave they owned and give each a thousand pounds, would that change any second of the past, NO!
Will it make amends to the people who were wronged no, the only thing it might do is make you feel better, so don’t try to slave your conscious, instead live a true life.
I as a none Quaker thought one of the Quaker values was that the truth is continually revealed. Are you at odds with the revelation or that your Quaker values have proved to be true in this respect?
If the latter do you believe that each individual is unique, if that is also true then show your uniqueness by not repeating the past mistakes.
Bring out your inner strength and respect your fellow man whether they have done right or wrong do not judge them, accept them as I believe your faith guides you to do.
Cheers
Guy

3
I am trying to understand how DNA Testing works but I have to admit to being thoroughly confused so I hope someone will be kind enough to help me.

My situation is that my Paternal GreatGrandfather was illegitimate.  I know from his birth cert and baptism record that his father was Philip Small.  My research has led to me to a Philip Small from Dundee 1845-1931, who I suspect could be my 2 x GreatGrandfather. 

I have made contact with a person who is a direct descendant of Philip Small from Dundee, and  had also come to the conclusion that my GreatGrandfather could be the illegitimate child of their ancestor.

We are both happy to pay for DNA Testing but are unsure if it would definitely confirm if we share the same ancestor or not?

Many thanks.
Not necessarily but there is a good possibility it will.
We inherit approximately 50% of our DNA from our father and inherit approximately 50% of our DNA from our mother.
This means we do not carry or inherit approximately 50% each of our parents DNA. In a similar way any children our ancestors have will only carry 50% of each of their parents DNA. We and they can only pass on the DNA we carry; we cannot pass on any DNA we have not inherited.
It is therefore possible though unlikely that two siblings do not share the same DNA and as the number of generations between the common ancestor and the living people gets larger the less likelihood of sharing DNA exists.
Luckily in many, if not most cases there is still some common DNA but the amount may be too small to differentiate between and ancestor's DNA and normal background DNA from a “local” population.
Cheers
Guy

P.S. DNA is another tool to help in your research, as with paper evidence we need to find and collate as much evidence from as many sources as possible before coming to any conclusion. We should also be aware that even after collating all the evidence we have collected our assumptions may be shown to be wrong. Unless we are aware it is always possible to draw the wrong conclusions and are willing to recheck our existing work as farther records become available we will never be able to claim or tree is totally accurate.
Any tree is always a work in progress and for a man that may even include ones "own" children, in most cases this last is not likely but it is a possibility and I only mention it to make people aware older paper records could be inaccurate.
Cheers
Guy
Corrected my spelling, sorry Guy

4
The Stay Safe Board / Re: The September Covid Jab
« on: Saturday 17 September 22 09:12 BST (UK)  »
Yes I got a message yesterday, it makes me wonder if our doctors are being informend when we have made an appointment for our covid jab
Cheers
Guy

5
The Stay Safe Board / Re: The September Covid Jab
« on: Wednesday 14 September 22 17:47 BST (UK)  »
I get my covid booster next Wednesday, not heard about the Flu jab yet
Cheers
Guy

6
Ancestral Family Tree DNA Testing / Re: Is MyHeritage usually wrong?
« on: Monday 12 September 22 09:25 BST (UK)  »
Snip

Please could somebody help and explain how I have ethnicities that neither of my parents have, I have searched online and it just comes up with the whole "it's only a guess" and " DNA looks simmilar between different regions, it will be a wrong guess" sort of thing!

Thanks for your time, Jonathan.

To understand ethnicity we have to understand the history of a country or region.
Ethnicity tests are a very new “science” and that databases used to determined ethnicity are still being developed and refined at present they are little more than an amusing addition to your DNA results and should not be taken too seriously.
The various companies are trying to form databases that will allow them to determine how the DNA of any specific place is made up. These are based on the ethnicities of a panel of individuals whose families have lived in a specific region for a number of generations, but the accuracty of this is constantly being questioned.
However this is very complex as each continent, country, county etc. is made up not from a specific native population but of people whose ancestors have come from all parts of the world at different times and via different routes. This means each resident in a village may have the same ethnicity of his/her neighbour in that village or may have the same ethnicity as the residents of a village thousands of miles away.
This is due to the fact that people move around their own country and even around the world. Visitors have sex with native populations and the DNA in the resulting children carries the ethnicity of both homelands. Armies from one country may travel across wide swaths of the world allowing the DNA and ethnicities to be spread worldwide.
As the science develops it will become more accurate but do not be surprised if this take 20, 50 or perhaps even over 100 years for really accurate ethnic results to be developed.
Cheers
Guy

7
The Lighter Side / Re: Paper trails and decades of research, what is the point?
« on: Monday 12 September 22 09:01 BST (UK)  »
DNA is simply another tool in the toolbox of family history, but it shouls be remembered that we do not carry the DNA of all our ancestors in our DNA (or perhaps I should write we do not carry, at this time, traceable amounts of DNA of all of our ancestors in our DNA).
Who knows what the future may hold and my view is we owe it to our descendants to take a DNA test because it will be too late for them after we have died. Others may of course disagree, but this is how I feel.
As to how much of our ancestors DNA we have I suggest reading this :- http://www.rootschat.com/links/01ru1/
Cheers
Guy

8
Scotland / Re: Illegitimacy and fathers name
« on: Saturday 10 September 22 15:18 BST (UK)  »
Nevertheless all these links remain irrelevant to the original question in this thread, which was clearly phrased to exclude the situation in which the parents claimed to be married.
Nevertheless all these links remain irrelevant to the original question in this thread, which was clearly phrased to exclude the situation in which the parents claimed to be married.
Threads develop.
Cheers
Guy

9
Scotland / Re: Illegitimacy and fathers name
« on: Saturday 10 September 22 11:19 BST (UK)  »
The specific question in this thread relates to the surnames of children whose parents did not claim to be married when the birth was registered, so the question of how and when they were married does not arise, and any comments relating to the legality of the parents' marriage are irrelevant.

That specific question was also covered in the link I gave, I had tried to add the exact paragraph by time given but for some reason I could not make any changes to the post or indeed access any Rootschat lists until I had rebooted my computer, for which I apologise.

However if you open the link and scroll to Sir Patrick Ford’s extract timed as 12.30 p.m. you will see no witnesses to a statement of being married was required. Scottish law was very relaxed in that matter.

See http://www.rootschat.com/links/01rtn/  Sir Patrick Ford 12.30 p.m. 4th paragraph

“I remember a professor of Scottish law pointing out that there was actually a case with regard to inheritance which some Members seem to think does not matter, but it is, after all, an important point. There was an elderly spinster who lived in one parish and a minister of the Established Church or of the Free Church of Scotland who lived in another. They met at a tea party, and there they certainly did not get married, but they were attracted by each other. They never met again, but from their separate parishes they conducted a correspondence, and that correspondence developed so that it was obvious that they regarded themselves as man and wife. When he died, she put forward her claim as widow under the Scottish law, and, although there was nothing definite in that correspondence to show at what precise date they first recognised themselves as man and wife, it was decided, taking the whole gist of that correspondence over that period of years, that long before the death of the minister this lady was his wife, and she made good her claim to her part of his estate. I give that as an illustration of the peculiar difficulties which we have with regard to proof as to whether there was a state of matrimony or not.”

In the above example there was no witness to a statement that they were man and wife but the gist of the correspondence between them lead to a court finding they were man and wife and allowed her claim to part of his estate. Thereby adding another example to the tombs of case law that may be used to aid a court to coming to a decision.
Cheers
Guy

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