Help finding common ancestor

[Biggles50]

Just because a document says that somebody is “Fred Smith” does not mean that Smith is their actual biological surname, it can be an Adoptive surname.

To prove the point, a yDNA test only goes from male to male to male and that should follow with each generation having the same surname.  Wrong, in reality there are hundreds if not thousands of surname variations in the match list.  I know I took a yDNA test.

DNA testing does help but it can unearth secrets and throw research out of the door and into the trash.  Again, voice of experience speaking.

Good luck finding valid solutions.

[hwlambert]

I realise the complexities and problems thrown up by DNA results could throw one’s research out the window and am happy to do that, but I can’t seem to get my head around my one. My matches are fairly high so I should be able to work it out. I guess I will have to be patient and hope someone takes a DNA test that will provide answers.

Thanks everyone for your input.

[Glen in Tinsel Kni]

I have results for five maternal 1c1r's and have access (or manage) all but one set of results. We seem to share one ancestor but that's it, there are no shared matches apart from that one line. We can't work out if we have one or more NPE's, what generation they may be at  or if we just lucked out with test takers at crucial points in our trees.   

I'm unique in that I have a group of matches that has just topped 50 people all descended from a couple but nothing on paper links me to them and they don't match ay of my other matches.  The highest is 199cM and her sister is 168cm to it can't be a freak set of false matches. I have one 1c from another maternal line that hasn't  tested but I was adopted and this cousin is in her 70's  and has no idea I exist as far as I know. It's not an ideal basis to try and find her and ask her to take a test (but knowing my luck she probably knows the whole story already).

Somewhere there has to be a dodgy birth certificate and traditional records/techniques are not going to solve the mystery but just lead me up another wrong path.   

[Biggles50]

I have results for five maternal 1c1r's and have access (or manage) all but one set of results. We seem to share one ancestor but that's it, there are no shared matches apart from that one line. We can't work out if we have one or more NPE's, what generation they may be at  or if we just lucked out with test takers at crucial points in our trees.   

I'm unique in that I have a group of matches that has just topped 50 people all descended from a couple but nothing on paper links me to them and they don't match ay of my other matches.  The highest is 199cM and her sister is 168cm to it can't be a freak set of false matches. I have one 1c from another maternal line that hasn't  tested but I was adopted and this cousin is in her 70's  and has no idea I exist as far as I know. It's not an ideal basis to try and find her and ask her to take a test (but knowing my luck she probably knows the whole story already).

Somewhere there has to be a dodgy birth certificate and traditional records/techniques are not going to solve the mystery but just lead me up another wrong path.

I can so relate to your tale Glen.

My two highest cM matches have been colour coded in the Ancestry DNA Match list.

Going through all the shared matches and shared matches of the higher shared matches gives currently about:-

70 are coded Green

150 are coded Blue

I am never going to find links to so many as all of these are in the 20cM to 364cM range.

[hwlambert]

It is nice to know others face similar challenges. I have 7 people other than myself and my sister who match my paternal line with more than 149cM and I only know 2 of them. I thought I would be able to find our common ancestor but alas not so, there is nothing familiar to start working on.
 
It’s frustrating so many don’t have trees of any sort and are often using initials or a coded name. At least I have the time to sit and stare and attempt to build out a few trees. It keeps me busy in retirement.

Thanks again for the suggestions, they have been a big help.

[Glen in Tinsel Kni]

I target tested two relatives and manage the results alongside my own. I often forget that I see the full names but everyone else will just see a match named 'S.T.; or 'E.J.' As one test is my half sibling some of the matches to that test will see I am the manager but I am not a match.

Off Topic Rant Alert;
I often feel dna is marketed as an easy 'one click instant tree' solution. Many find that isn't the case and don't have the knowledge or experience to make sense of their result. They quickly vanish and if they don't have trees or respond to messages it leaves  the rest of us to choose to either forget them or undertake something resembling clandestine research.   

[Wexflyer]

I think many, many people underestimate the variability of the quantitative DNA match numbers, and hence jump to conclusions that may not be warranted.

In my immediate family I have DNA results from two sibling pairs. The quantitative variation between their matches, and between them and other relatives is large.

[Biggles50]

My 240cM match (on Ancestry) had a tree of two, him and his late Father.

Luckily that was enough to expand upon and to determine who my probable Great Grandfather and Great Grandmother were.

Of course it is all ifs and buts as there is no paper trail to link them to me, there is only DNA.

There is a 199.3cM match (on My Heritage) that also link to me and also to my 240cM.  There are also  over 150 who are coded in Ancestry as Shared Matches of which about 12 are linked in the standalone tree.   So a good outcome.

With regard to DNA matches, as long as I can determine their actual birth name and that of their Mother I try to build a tree and aim to go two generations beyond what the data predicts as the MRCA generation.  Sometimes I am lucky in finding a link, sometimes not and then that just becomes a waiting game.

[Glen in Tinsel Kni]

I can guarantee that if I gave you my birth ref and asked you to build my tree I would have the wrong father displayed.   My mother was married but fell pregnant to someone else, in terms of my birth registration everything was done correctly but it does mean I appear to be a legitimate child born through her marriage.  My father isn't recorded on my birth cert and 'adopted' appears in column 10 so even with that in hand I would be an unsolvable mystery unless my adoptive name was discovered.