Help appreciated

[indiangel]

Hi there,

I am trying to identify the biological father of CS - my biological grandfather. I suspect CS’s birth certificate to list the incorrect father (I suspect this as my DNA results currently have no links to the listed father, and a bunch to another male). Although I do appreciate that DNA is somewhat random and its possible matches could appear in the future.

CS’s mother was HD (I match to her ancestors). HD was married to the birth certificate father at the time of CS’s birth. CS was born the 6th child of 7 to this couple in 1902 and was named after the birth certificate father (also CS).

The man I suspect to be the true father is EM, also known as HH. EM was a convicted bigamist and lived a very colourful life to say the least. One of his son’s (RM) has uploaded a DNA test and matches to me at 394cM. I have tried to make contact with RM several times, but have not yet had any luck.

RM’s brother is deceased, but his children (EM’s grandchildren) have also uploaded tests and I match to them as follows:

255cM
207cM

And their children (EM’s great grandchildren):

181cM
170cM
159cM
156cM
144cM
128cM
126cM
124cM
110cM
109cM
107cM
103cM

There is also an unknown shared match at 374cM. I have not yet had any luck making contact with them or connecting them into the tree. They do not have a family tree uploaded to refer to.

EM had two brothers, I haven’t found any descendants of them on any database yet (but I will keep searching). They were all of the right age to be a potential father.

I cannot conclusively link EM or his two brothers to the same local area as HD at the time of CS’s conception, but they were all in the Royal Navy. They all lived in a similar but broader area of the UK.
 
I have seen some photos of EM and one of his grandchildren, and there is a strong familial resemblance.

Am I jumping to too many conclusions, or is there a strong chance either EM or his two brothers is the biological father to CS? It’s one of those brick walls that I feel I have been staring at for too long and need a new set of eyes to look at it. I don’t believe I will ever find a paper trail for this, and that DNA is my only way of putting it to bed.

Thank you in advance,

[hurworth]

The amount of shared DNA doesn't exclude your hypothesis being possible.

Have you tried the "What are the odds" tools at DNA Painter?

[indiangel]

I have just had a quick play on there, it suggests 73.68% that RM is my Half Great-Uncle.

I wish I had matches from EM's brother's descendants, but perhaps I'll just need to look harder/be more patient.

Thank you!

[Biggles50]

You could also upload your DNA to the comparison websites to spread the posibilities of finding more matches.

Not sure who you tested with but if they are not one of those that do notl allow uploads like Ancestry then taking their DNA test will expand the numbers of tested people included in the match pool.

[coombs]

Was CS's supposed father, the one named on the birth cert also in The Royal Navy?

[hurworth]

Have any other descendants of your grandfather tested?

Have you tried the "What are the odds tool" I mentioned.

You use it to test the probability of two scenarios.

You're the Target Person and you use the tool to test two hypotheses - one is that EM is your gt-grandfather.  You build the tree (it's backwards from what you'll be used to) and include EM's son. RM, with whom you share 394cM.  You also add RM's brother's children with whom you share 255 and 207cM.  Don't include the children of these two (not needed - you have the parent)

Set up the tree a second time and in this instance put yourself as a gt-grandchild of EM's brother.

Explanatory video here:
https://www.google.com/search?q=how+to+use+what+are+the+odds+tool+dna&rlz=1C1GCEA_enNZ811NZ811&ei=1nkwZNvjIZqk2roPvayugAw&ved=0ahUKEwjbpuj4ypj-AhUaklYBHT2WC8AQ4dUDCA8&uact=5&oq=how+to+use+what+are+the+odds+tool+dna&gs_lcp=Cgxnd3Mtd2l6LXNlcnAQAzIFCCEQoAEyBQghEKABMggIIRAWEB4QHToKCAAQRxDWBBCwA0oECEEYAFDDBFiyFWCcGWgBcAF4AIAB3QGIAc0JkgEFMC4yLjSYAQCgAQHIAQjAAQE&sclient=gws-wiz-serp#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:00bc8637,vid:d6LxMH0zS54

but Johnny Perlman has pretty good instructions at DNA Painter.

[hurworth]

It will comes up with an Odds Ration which tells you which is more likely (I can tell you know just based on the numbers) that the likelihood that EM is your gt-grandfather and it wasn't one of the brothers is very high.

If you have difficulty I can do it for you.

[brigidmac]

Look further back too.do you
R shared matches of shared matches
Do you match people from both EMs paternal and maternal side ?

Follow hurwirths suggestion about resetting tree or create a provisional second tree

If it's with ancestry you can change DNA results to link to new tree and then put back
But it's easier to add alternative bio father  :first name unknown brother surname M
As an extra sibling . Then add his parents and siblings ...

Have you tried looking at ethnicity breakdown of your top matches with no trees and with RM  it can be surprisingly useful

Unfortunately descendants of  half siblings have similar cm amounts to descendants of cousins as both share 1 set of grandparents
So you may never know which of EM or his brothers were the parent but he sounds the most likely

[hurworth]

Just read my reply up there and it has a few typos.  It should read:

It will come up with an Odds Ratio which tells you which is more likely (I can tell you now just based on the numbers) that the likelihood that EM is your gt-grandfather and it wasn't one of the brothers is very high.