DNA link to great grandparents

[jennieshrew]

Im hoping you can help me know what to do next in the search for a link to who my great grandparents may be.

My grandma was left at an orphanage in Glasgow when she was around 2 years old. She spent her life travelling backwards and forwards to Glasgow and Edinburgh each year on holiday making enquiries but never found the answer to who her parents were. She had no papers with her. The orphanage estimated her age and gave her the date of birth 27th December 1927. Sadly my mum detroyed all those records when my grandma died But i read them myself before she did that.

I had a DNA test done and found a second cousin once removed. 

Details I know about my grandma.

Name: June Sylvia - given by orphanage. Surname Bell aquired when adopted.
Adopted by Samuel Bell from Glasgow. I think this is him https://www.ancestry.co.uk/family-tree/person/tree/36632710/person/322189888928/facts I used to hear about Auntie Kay, Leonard and Raymond as a child and visited Auntie Kay.
Married David Gollege Pellatt in Lancashire in 1951.
No birth certificate. I beleive my grandad got her an adopted persons birth certificate as an adult. No named parents on there.
Died 4th March 2019 in Bristol.

I also posted on a Scotland board first so you can see what they said here https://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=871076.0

[jennieshrew]

Link to DNA relative

[jennieshrew]

DNA Link

[LizzieL]

I had a DNA test done and found a second cousin once removed. 

How do you know that your DNA match was a 2C 1R ?

[jennieshrew]

It says on the DNA record from 23andme - see photo above - it lists this at the top.

[LizzieL]

It might just be estimated rather than actual. DNA  matches for 2C1R can cover a wide range
I have a 2C1R that LivingDNA says is a 2C. His Ancestry test has 158cM, data uploaded to LivingDNA estimates our match as 168cM
I have 1C1R ranging from 248 to 546cM. These are definite relationships to people I or close family members have met.

[jennieshrew]

Oh that's a shame, I really thought we had got somewhere 😔

[Ruskie]

A few suggestions:

Enter cMs shared here https://dnapainter.com/tools/sharedcmv4 to get other possibilities for relationships

Upload your raw data to other sites such as My Heritage and Gedmatch to give you matches with people who have tested with other companies.

Test with Ancestry as they have a larger number of customers so you might get more/different matches.

Look at the mutual matches between you and this person - they may have clues on their trees. Contact them to see if they know more.

DNA matches don’t necessarily share surnames, so consider maternal lines as women changed surname upon marriage. If surnames are common you could end up chasing the wrong families.

You have probably already done this, but matches from autosomal DNA tests are “mixed up”, so it can be difficult to determine if they belong to maternal or paternal branches. I know Ancestry have introduced a tool which separates maternal and paternal lines, though I’m not sure of accuracy or how well it works - I don’t know if 23 and Me does something similar. Just mentioning this in case you are new to DNA and may not be aware of it.