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« on: Wednesday 22 January 20 09:25 GMT (UK) »
I owe you an explanation for my query. Some couple of years ago, my mother's DNA test threw up unmistakable evidence of a NEP event. I had literally dozens of Cunningham matches in Ancestry and a couple in Gedmatch with no Cunninghams in my tree. My c19th tree is firmly backed with evidence so one of my ancestors was "not their father's child". The Cuckoo parent was Cunningham of South Shields and Deptford. Both localities were in my existing tree so the common person was apparently James Fairweather Cunningham from SS who spent some 10 years in the naval dockyards in the Deptford area or possibly his father John who stayed put in SS. As a result, I retested with MyHeritage (so now FTdna, Ancestry, Livingdna, MyH, all also in Gedmatch)
Recently I got yet another closeish match - 112 cM - in MyH, but the inactive person concerned had only 5 names and a couple of dates in their abbreviated tree. If names are sufficiently distinctive, I am experienced enough to be able to create their trees pretty accurately especially if it is not too many generations. In this case Thomas Sidney Hodgson (mother Parker) born in 1916 married a female Brown whose mother was Sarah Asselborough. Sarah's father appears to be Francis. I knew the DNA match was Cunningham and their action generally took place from South Shields to Sunderland.
So Boo's question is a good one. In order to track back to my Cunningham connection, I need to know the name of Sarah's father-in-law Brown. If her husband was Francis, one possible is John Brown born in 1858, and another, George Brown 1861 who was the son of Mary Robson Cunningham, sister of James Fairweather Cunningham. George had a brother called Francis Cunningham Brown....
So it is detective work which will find my exact relationship to my mother's new Hodgson 122 cM cousin with a common Cunningham ancestor that I am involved in.
Rootschat is full of fellow puzzle solvers .... if it were my own ancestor, I would happily pay, but I am not wealthy enough to pay for images to prove my relationship to so many Cunningham cousins!
PS I remember my great grandmother, the Cunningham cuckoo born in 1866 pushing me, aged 2.5 in my push chair in King's Cross Station in 1844 while evacuating from the V2s, but she thought her maiden name was Hurrion!