It did help me break a brick wall with one of my 2X great grandmothers but not directly. I had contacted a woman who's tree looked as though it might be connected, but she could find no record of my relative belonging to her tree. A few months later we both had our DNA tested and we came up as a good match to each other. This prompted another of our matches who was a known cousin of hers to start digging deeper until she finally found corroborating records connecting our families. Without the DNA match we might never have looked hard enough to find the connection.
I also had a moderate DNA match to someone with an extensive tree, but without any matching surnames. I spent some time reading down the list of names in her tree until I noticed a middle name that was also a surname in my tree. Further examination discovered that this middle name was the surname of the mother, but the mother was only listed under her married name so she didn't appear as a match to my tree. This then opened up a flood of information. It was mostly luck that I found this, but I would never have put in the effort without the DNA match.
I'm happy for your discovery and agree that DNA matches can trigger avenues of research otherwise previously unknown. Also, notice where your DNA brick wall occurs, in the 2x great-grandparent line. You'll have a greater chance of finding possibilities in that generation as you and your matches will likely have more DNA in common. Congratulations and thanks for sharing yoru thoughts.
Great, this gave me a little more confidence in my work on busting down the BBW for my GGF. I'm now making some progress after learning from another vid on this site and reinforced in this one, not to focus "just" on the "elder" kits when working with ThruLines. When ThruLines came out in Beta until a couple months ago, I focused mainly on matches from my Aunt (1920-2018) since she was a generation closer and mine. No volunteers even w/paying for kit, no direct descendants of the main target and probable 2xGGF and 3xGGF had tested (it's been 12 yrs waiting), etc. But I hadn't studied the basics enough. I'd been building out the tree to catch more cousins (which was starting to work), like you mention as well, but, I hadn't been adding much on kits, other than my two kids, and stupid me, I thought no way will they match anything. In short, I finally looked at their Thrulines and my daughter has added a key match (but not confirmed by any other of the 8 kits I now manage) and both have added some "duplicate" or confirming matches to other pieces in the puzzle. My sisters and a cousin have done the same, and I just ID'd two more cousins on Ancestry that may help. With Thrulines, quantity is definitely more helpful than just "quality" only. Still have a good ways to go but it's getting there!
ThruLines can sometimes be a useful check and helps sort some of Ancestry’s database. I think the more tests one has access to, the more effective ThruLines can be. I have used ThruLines to successfully validate ancestral hypothesis by collaborating with distant DNA matched cousins and comparing our DNA matches and ThruLine results. This allows a particular family branch to be more effectively researched.
Interesting. This makes my 25 STRONG Thru-Line cousin matches that share my 5th great-grandparents, Reuben Hawkins and Rebecca Edwards even more remarkable. In fact, as far as I can tell, some of my strongest cousin matches come directly through them overall.
When you see strong matches, it can help validate your research. However, be sure you do documentation validation as well. You don't want to be connected in a different way. But yet, the strength is helpful.
Thank you for helping me understand that Thrulines isn't actually dna based. I had been puzzled why I didn't have ever increasing matches on each generation back in Thrulines. i.e. If I have 29 matches with my GG grandparents why do I only have 6 matches with my GGG grandparents? Logic told me that I should have at least the 29 matches from my GG grandparents Thrulines plus additional ones from their siblings descendants a generation further back - yet there were only 6. It made me wonder if I had the correct GGG grandparents in my tree. Now I can suppose the other matches got dropped off because their genealogical trees didn't go back far enough for Thrulines to connect the dots. At least I hop that's the case :-)
The term "to luck out" means to have good luck, so I was confused when you used it seeming to mean that it was bad luck. I had to go back and listen to that phrase again.
Thanks for pointing out the semantics of a commonly used phrase from where I grew up. If someone didn't have something, they "lucked out" if it was something desirable. I never realized how 'slang' that phrase is.
As you know for well, having all the senses records really helps having a birth record really helps having aggression in as well as a death certificate really helps. But just remember that there are specials out there in this world that can really help.
I'm researching my 3rd great grandfather and his unknown parents. He has the same name and my 3ggmother has a similar name to another couple in the same county at the same time. ThruLines mashes them up and says they are the same people. They are probably related - my current theory is that the 2 men are uncle and nephew - but that makes ThruLines' relationship guesses a generation off. ThruLines has given me lots of leads but I find that my matches' trees are really inaccurate or not sourced, or it makes bad connections - mothers having children at age 9, etc. ThruLines is still pretty amazing though.
You've discovered some of the points I make in this video about ThruLines th-cam.com/video/9PTFo4yh5TA/w-d-xo.html. ThruLines are not genetic trees. They are genealogical and based on the family trees built by members of Ancestry. When you throw in individuals from the same place with the same, confusion happens.
I hate it when people don’t source their trees. The goal is to be accurate and purposeful. I have one cousin who I’m related to 2 ways from 2 different sides of my family and she went back 800 years all the way to royalty in our blood and she messaged me excited and I go “well you messed up 350 years ago because they were 2 different people living in the same area” but she doesn’t believe me and is giving false information now people copy her tree
I'm just starting to get my head around Thrulines. Can it be used to check the rightness of consensus identification? E.g. I have a 4xgreat-grandmother called Grace House. Every tree I've looked at has the same Grace House, born in Curry Rivel, Somerset and that's the person I added to my tree. Later, I found another Grace House, born in Hatch Beachamp, Somerset, who seemed, in some ways, a more likely candidate. (Was this a case of the blind following the blind?) So I looked at Thrulines. I have 7 DNA matches for Curry Grace but they are not helpful - we could all be related through the right Grace even though we all wrote the wrong one into our tree. So I looked for matches with her mother, Rachel, i.e. descendants of one of Grace's siblings. Very luckily, given the remoteness of our connection, I found one sixth cousin with a single 8cM match. So Curry Grace seems to be 'proven' ... unless I'm related to the 6th cousin by another route & it's only a Thrulines match on paper. Is that a fair summary of the situation?
4x great-grandmother is the limit of ThruLines. What you can do is change out Grace House and her identifying information. Wait a day or two and then see if the Thrulines for the person you think is the more likely candidate has more DNA matches. What you're looking for is lots of matches from different descendants of the Graces. If you match many from one line, then it's less reliable than finding multiple lines of descendants that you match. You could also see if any of the matches from either woman tested in other platforms, MyHeritage is one I would hope they have transferred to. Then you would look at the specific segment your House matches share. If you can see that y'all share the same segment of DNA on the same chromosome, then you're most likely from the same Ancestor everyone's tree points to.
I have a question or 2. When I work my dna matches and search by common ancestors I have noticed that relationships shows for one but not the other. Ex: one will show 5 cousin 1x and another the same but does show on the relationships list. So each time I try to update the relationships list is the same, why??
It must be rare, according to your video, but I believe thrulines has helped me bust through a brick wall with my 5th great grandfather. I have three solid matches, through separate children, that bring their lines back to David Hayden and Jemima Ellswoth, my father actually has a match with William H. Ellsworth, who was the father of Jemima. However, I would like a second opinion, but I do believe it is very good, considering my Y-111 test with Familytreedna.
I would compare your DNA from ThruLines to record research and genetic genealogy triangulation. There are many suggestions with ThruLines that are not correct because people have someone in their family tree that just is inaccurate. I think that's the point I was trying to make. Use ThruLines as a clue to do further research.
Do any of your more recent videos show an update on how you're doing with this brick wall? I imagine you've captured at least a few more cousins and added a few more kits. (pssst🤫, here's a tip on SW OH *records* on Ancestry): If it says "Hamilton, Ohio", it's almost 100% fer sure that it's (Cincinnati, county seat of) *Hamilton County*, not the City of Hamilton, Butler County. Ck Ms Joanna's marriage record (actually that record is only her license on the 10th, w/her father's consent recorded). Like you and many others have mentioned, it would be great if Ancestry was more consistent on place names. What I'd also like to see as part of that is consistency in transcribing records to use the sorta-standard (for the USA); "City or Twp or ..., County, State, USA (or whichever one uses). If they're not going to include the county seat of the county where the license is issued (and I sure wish they'd officially divide those as well when known), then, like in this case, it "should" read; "Hamilton County, Ohio, USA", imho, to avoid confusion. The other, even more common confusion is with Elizabethtown (or Elizabeth Twp), and Elizabeth Borough, and Elizabeth City, Essex/Union, NJ 😁
You are hitting on the frustrating part of genealogy. There are no standards with regard to place names and that makes things very, very confusing. I haven't updated the Townley line because I have had to put my research on hold for the business questions I receive and to tend to my family. When my youngest graduates high school in 6 years, I plan on diving very deeply into my research questions and prepare for a small trip to Essex County, New Jersey for some onsite work.
@@FamilyHistoryFanatics That makes perfect sense. Those years with them are so important and go by soooo quickly. I found we may even be very distant cousins (9th or 10th) in the Townley line! One married one of my Wyckoff cousins but I haven't found the MRCA yet.
Just this week, Ancestry DNA allowed me to fix my 2nd ggmother's line. I was a both confused about her parents as church and civil records contradicted themselves. In the end I found 13(!) 4th to 6th cousins mostly in Glandorf, Ohio to where their ancestors migrated in the 1830s. Studying their lines, there was only one common connection, where the genes could have come from. It goes through a woman, which I suspected also to have migrated and excluded therefor as a mother. Even more as she did not fit the civil record. Since church books are mainly interested in descendence, where civil records focus on legal matters, I now have have to proof the theory, that maybe my ggmother's biological mother left her with relatives of her (the suposed father shared her maiden name), who later became my 2nd ggmother's foster parents. Actually I'm quite convinced, that only genetic evidence could have solve that problem.
My problem is a Non-Paternal Event (NPE). My surname and documented evidence goes back to my great-great grandparents, James Silas Jernigan and Mary Jane Bodine. My direct male line indeed goes back to James Silas Jernigan genealogically. But at 111 markers (soon to be Big Y) my Y-chromosome matches NO guys with the surname JERNIGAN but matches TONS of guys with the surname CHANDLER. The Chandler Family Association DNA (Y-chromosome) Project accepts me as being 100% bona fide participant of their Group 7A. Family Finder at FTDNA did nothing to help finding any indication WHEN the NPE occurred. In other words when did my direct male lineage surname change from a father with the surname CHANDLER to a son with the surname JERNIGAN? I finally decided to take the Ancestry DNA test and comparing my genetic matches and seeing our Shared Matches helped me to determine that the probability is HIGH that my documented great-great grandfather is very likely my genetic great-great grandfather. I descend from his son, Franklin Henry Jernigan and I have high matches to those who I am satisfied descend from some of James Silas' daughters. I also have high matches to some who descend from Franklin's other children. My grandfather was Frankie Jernigan. Also all of the documentation I can find indicates that James Silas' mother was Hannah Jernigan and she was likely a daughter of Clement Jernigan and Drucilla Terry of Sevier Co, TN. And possibly she gave James Silas her surname. I have matches to other children of Clement and matches to those descended from siblings of Clement and siblings to Drucilla. My conclusion is that the matches are probably not just coincidence or crossover. There are too many of them. So, what this does for me is that it helped me to decide NOT to pursue the NPE (Chandler connection) on my lineage AFTER my great-great grandfather, James Silas Jernigan. The probability is very high that my father IS my genetic father. His father (my grandfather) was HIS genetic father. So my grandmother did not conceive my father with a man other than my grandfather. And it is not likely that my great-grandmother, Ella Mae Lindsay, conceived my grandfather with a man other than my great-grandfather. AND it is also not likely that my great-great grandmother, Mary Jane Bodine, conceived my great-grandfather with a man other than my great-great grandfather, James Silas Jernigan. That much I think I can rule out. Does it actually help to find my great-great-great grandfather. By name, no. It does help to narrow down a probable time frame and locations to do the research in documents. Also the JERNIGAN and TERRY matches indicate the strong likelihood that Hannah Jernigan was my great-great-great grandmother. The big keys there are two other males with her in the 1860 and 1870 censuses. A probable brother, Spencer, in both the 1850 census of Sevier Co, TN and then also in the 1860 census with her in Guntersville, Alabama. Then in the 1870 census she is with a probable son named Moses Jernigan in Guntersville, Alabama. Ten years later (about the right age) a Moses Jernigan is listed as "Brother" in the household of my great-great grandfather, James Silas Jernigan, and his family in Guntersville. I've also been to Guntersville and checked maps and locations of where people lived and other circumstantial evidence and the probabilities are high that my theories are all correct. At least to the point that it would most likely be a huge waste of research time to start with a hypothesis that my great-grandmother had an extramarital relationship with one of her relative's Chandler neighbors in Chalkville, Alabama and that my grandfather was the result of that. Time wise and location wise it possibly fits, but, genetically it does not. So that's my complicated story of how Ancestry DNA (after years and years of only being able to wonder) helped me to narrow down what my research should be in reference to breaking through the brick wall of my Direct Male Lineage Chandler/Jernigan NPE.
@@FamilyHistoryFanatics Thanks I didn't even remember that I posted this. I get so involved with genealogy projects. These days mostly having to do with Italian research. A LOT of double surname matches in those lines including siblings who were both my direct ancestors in Italy.
I am Christi, Patricia's daughter & I am the one who does our family research & I manage our DNA testing & I must tell you I am not real great at telling the difference between paternal & maternal matches with the exception of the cousins who we know who have tested & the DNA matches they all have in common, I have to say everything you talk about in this video is exactly what happened with my mother & her sister with regards to their paternal DNA matches on Thru-lines, until her sister tested there were no paternal matches on Thru-lines for my mom nor were there any I could tell for sure were mom's paternal matches on her DNA match list, once her sister tested we gained 12 paternal matches on Thru-lines & that was my "breakthrough" of my brick wall so to speak, the amount of DNA they share is low so just like you said my mom will not match them, also my aunts Thru-line matches only seem to match each other but they all appear to share a common ancestor with my aunt, so in conclusion we now have DNA matches that are not just the maternal matches who we know & the ones we have in common with them, I now clearly see some paternal DNA matches as well.
I have the opposite problem, my thrilling END at my great great grandparents… I’m PNE (father) so… me thinks I have the wrong START to my family tree, that I need to build it from a DIFFERENT PNE (father)… am I thinking correctly? I picked my current PNE (father) based on a 1st cousin match… looked at her grandparents… there was ONLY one male descendant living at the time I was conceived so I used that male as my dad. Now I’m thinking I need to go back another generation to see if I have thrones from their male progeny… I JUST started this Saturday, five days ago, so I am not sure I’m thinking through this correctly.
Since you have a PNE, use some of the strategies discussed in this video. There is a section about creating a possible father list and then using DNA to test your hypothesis. th-cam.com/video/xmlDticrTS0/w-d-xo.html Another great video is WATO. If you can figure out the relationships of your 1st cousin to other DNA matches you both share, then build your 1st cousin's genetic family tree using the WATO tool. You would place yourself as the unknown person to your 1st cousin and ensure that you're indeed a 1st cousin not a 'seems like' first cousin match. Here's the WATO tree. th-cam.com/video/d6LxMH0zS54/w-d-xo.html Then you can see where you could fit into the cousins genetic tree. Then you would look for relatives in that location to the 1st cousin match and work that angle. Does that make sense? In my mind it does. In words, I'm not so sure.
@@FamilyHistoryFanatics There is a paper trail as well, but the paper trail connections aren't strong. It's mostly circumstantial evidence, and DNA which has given me confidence that my theory is correct. The line I'm working on is my direct male line, so I am able to use my Big Y results as well as autosomal.
Fun. Anytime I see a NJ to OH migration in the very early 1800s (like your John Townley), the probability is about 90% that they'll settle (first) in Hamilton Co. and abt 80% it'll be in Cincinnati in particular, especially up to around 1835 or so (just a guesstimate on %s). Put the video on pause and checked John out. Bingo on both😁. Lol, the Hamilton Co. part was cheating since HC covered most of the area until Statehood in 1803. I always like to ck for possible connections with NJ to OH arrivals on the spouse side as well if the paternal surname doesn't ring a bell. Hmmm🤔, remote possible on kids of daughter Joanne & her Osborn hubby. You likely know, but early SW OH has a ton of "Joisey", PA (NJ to PA to OH) & VA/KY influence pretty much in that order. Okay back to the vid...
@@FamilyHistoryFanatics Yep, it's all due to "one" NJ guy, Judge (and Senator) John Cleves Symmes. Just add the "Symmes Purchase" to that mile long (I imagine) list. His purchase (thought he was going to get abt 1 million acres but ended up with "only" 1/4 -1/3 million acres) from the gov abt 1787/88 for the lands "between the Miamis" in SW OH and his influence in his home state really threw the westward migration into high gear, especially after the Indian Wars ended in 1794. Fun stuff.
My ancestry thrulines shows no dna with my biological father or his family. Does that mean he is not my dad ? On my mother’s side I have a large amount of dna to many generations.
Acutally, no. That's not what ThruLines means and this situation is along the lines of what I spoke of in this video th-cam.com/video/ZTcFN42p0Uo/w-d-xo.html. It boils down to this... you family trees do not share enough of the same information for the people in your tree. Or, the DNA matches for your biological line have not made their family tree public or private but shareable. No ThruLines does not mean you have the wrong biological father.
Doing ancestrycom your matches then have the upload to Gedmatch for maximum dna shared, like for example I have a full 100 percent portuguese dna match,on ancestry.com I share 13 cm on Gedmatch the same person total of 1.245 percent, they say siblings share around 50 percent dna, and Gedmatch I share 85 percent with my brother, while on myheritage only 42 percent
Your are correct. My next step would be to consult all of the platforms to search for Townleys. As for the brother, you can share a range of DNA, not 50% exactly. That blew my mind when Andy told me about it.
On 23andMme, my brother and I share 49% of our DNA. When I uploaded our DNA from 23andMe to MyHeritage, it says we share 39%. I contacted the MyHeritage help desk to ask why and they said they use different SNPs.
@@jasonjoseph8700 On GEDmatch, my brother and I share 50% of our DNA, which is normal. My half brother and I share 25%, which is also normal. Maybe we're not talking about the same thing. I've never known a sibling match to be more than 51% shared DNA. If siblings share more than about half of their DNA, it might be due to incest.
@@rettawhinnery you go on the chromosome browser of shared dna you go to the left of your one to many and hit the A next to the Gedmatch code for that person you type 3 in the default the middle of spaces down below keep other ones blank hit to dot the very bottom, then on the chromosome browser go below the 22 chromosomes it will have a percentage on mine me and my brother share 84.624 percent on ged match 42 percent on myheritage and 39 percent on ancestrycom, we uploaded to Gedmatch from ancestrycom
It did help me break a brick wall with one of my 2X great grandmothers but not directly. I had contacted a woman who's tree looked as though it might be connected, but she could find no record of my relative belonging to her tree. A few months later we both had our DNA tested and we came up as a good match to each other. This prompted another of our matches who was a known cousin of hers to start digging deeper until she finally found corroborating records connecting our families. Without the DNA match we might never have looked hard enough to find the connection.
I also had a moderate DNA match to someone with an extensive tree, but without any matching surnames. I spent some time reading down the list of names in her tree until I noticed a middle name that was also a surname in my tree. Further examination discovered that this middle name was the surname of the mother, but the mother was only listed under her married name so she didn't appear as a match to my tree. This then opened up a flood of information. It was mostly luck that I found this, but I would never have put in the effort without the DNA match.
I'm happy for your discovery and agree that DNA matches can trigger avenues of research otherwise previously unknown.
Also, notice where your DNA brick wall occurs, in the 2x great-grandparent line. You'll have a greater chance of finding possibilities in that generation as you and your matches will likely have more DNA in common.
Congratulations and thanks for sharing yoru thoughts.
Great, this gave me a little more confidence in my work on busting down the BBW for my GGF. I'm now making some progress after learning from another vid on this site and reinforced in this one, not to focus "just" on the "elder" kits when working with ThruLines. When ThruLines came out in Beta until a couple months ago, I focused mainly on matches from my Aunt (1920-2018) since she was a generation closer and mine.
No volunteers even w/paying for kit, no direct descendants of the main target and probable 2xGGF and 3xGGF had tested (it's been 12 yrs waiting), etc. But I hadn't studied the basics enough. I'd been building out the tree to catch more cousins (which was starting to work), like you mention as well, but, I hadn't been adding much on kits, other than my two kids, and stupid me, I thought no way will they match anything.
In short, I finally looked at their Thrulines and my daughter has added a key match (but not confirmed by any other of the 8 kits I now manage) and both have added some "duplicate" or confirming matches to other pieces in the puzzle. My sisters and a cousin have done the same, and I just ID'd two more cousins on Ancestry that may help. With Thrulines, quantity is definitely more helpful than just "quality" only. Still have a good ways to go but it's getting there!
Thanks so much for sharing your learning and discovery journey. I'm happy to have helped contribute to your knowledge. Keep at it.
ThruLines can sometimes be a useful check and helps sort some of Ancestry’s database. I think the more tests one has access to, the more effective ThruLines can be. I have used ThruLines to successfully validate ancestral hypothesis by collaborating with distant DNA matched cousins and comparing our DNA matches and ThruLine results. This allows a particular family branch to be more effectively researched.
Yay. So happy you were able to use DNA to validate your research.
Interesting. This makes my 25 STRONG Thru-Line cousin matches that share my 5th great-grandparents, Reuben Hawkins and Rebecca Edwards even more remarkable. In fact, as far as I can tell, some of my strongest cousin matches come directly through them overall.
When you see strong matches, it can help validate your research. However, be sure you do documentation validation as well. You don't want to be connected in a different way. But yet, the strength is helpful.
Thank you for helping me understand that Thrulines isn't actually dna based. I had been puzzled why I didn't have ever increasing matches on each generation back in Thrulines. i.e. If I have 29 matches with my GG grandparents why do I only have 6 matches with my GGG grandparents? Logic told me that I should have at least the 29 matches from my GG grandparents Thrulines plus additional ones from their siblings descendants a generation further back - yet there were only 6. It made me wonder if I had the correct GGG grandparents in my tree. Now I can suppose the other matches got dropped off because their genealogical trees didn't go back far enough for Thrulines to connect the dots. At least I hop that's the case :-)
That's probably the case.
The term "to luck out" means to have good luck, so I was confused when you used it seeming to mean that it was bad luck. I had to go back and listen to that phrase again.
Thanks for pointing out the semantics of a commonly used phrase from where I grew up. If someone didn't have something, they "lucked out" if it was something desirable. I never realized how 'slang' that phrase is.
@@FamilyHistoryFanatics Yes, that is the correct meaning. Maybe I just didn't get what you were saying. I enjoyed the video.
My hometown Pittsburgh says it like how she said it
As you know for well, having all the senses records really helps having a birth record really helps having aggression in as well as a death certificate really helps. But just remember that there are specials out there in this world that can really help.
Thank you.
I'm researching my 3rd great grandfather and his unknown parents. He has the same name and my 3ggmother has a similar name to another couple in the same county at the same time. ThruLines mashes them up and says they are the same people. They are probably related - my current theory is that the 2 men are uncle and nephew - but that makes ThruLines' relationship guesses a generation off. ThruLines has given me lots of leads but I find that my matches' trees are really inaccurate or not sourced, or it makes bad connections - mothers having children at age 9, etc. ThruLines is still pretty amazing though.
You've discovered some of the points I make in this video about ThruLines th-cam.com/video/9PTFo4yh5TA/w-d-xo.html.
ThruLines are not genetic trees. They are genealogical and based on the family trees built by members of Ancestry. When you throw in individuals from the same place with the same, confusion happens.
I hate it when people don’t source their trees. The goal is to be accurate and purposeful. I have one cousin who I’m related to 2 ways from 2 different sides of my family and she went back 800 years all the way to royalty in our blood and she messaged me excited and I go “well you messed up 350 years ago because they were 2 different people living in the same area” but she doesn’t believe me and is giving false information now people copy her tree
I'm just starting to get my head around Thrulines.
Can it be used to check the rightness of consensus identification?
E.g. I have a 4xgreat-grandmother called Grace House.
Every tree I've looked at has the same Grace House, born in Curry Rivel, Somerset and that's the person I added to my tree.
Later, I found another Grace House, born in Hatch Beachamp, Somerset, who seemed, in some ways, a more likely candidate. (Was this a case of the blind following the blind?)
So I looked at Thrulines. I have 7 DNA matches for Curry Grace but they are not helpful - we could all be related through the right Grace even though we all wrote the wrong one into our tree. So I looked for matches with her mother, Rachel, i.e. descendants of one of Grace's siblings. Very luckily, given the remoteness of our connection, I found one sixth cousin with a single 8cM match.
So Curry Grace seems to be 'proven' ... unless I'm related to the 6th cousin by another route & it's only a Thrulines match on paper. Is that a fair summary of the situation?
4x great-grandmother is the limit of ThruLines. What you can do is change out Grace House and her identifying information. Wait a day or two and then see if the Thrulines for the person you think is the more likely candidate has more DNA matches.
What you're looking for is lots of matches from different descendants of the Graces. If you match many from one line, then it's less reliable than finding multiple lines of descendants that you match.
You could also see if any of the matches from either woman tested in other platforms, MyHeritage is one I would hope they have transferred to. Then you would look at the specific segment your House matches share. If you can see that y'all share the same segment of DNA on the same chromosome, then you're most likely from the same Ancestor everyone's tree points to.
Good video. Cleared up some questions.
Yay! I'm so glad.
I have a question or 2. When I work my dna matches and search by common ancestors I have noticed that relationships shows for one but not the other. Ex: one will show 5 cousin 1x and another the same but does show on the relationships list. So each time I try to update the relationships list is the same, why??
It must be rare, according to your video, but I believe thrulines has helped me bust through a brick wall with my 5th great grandfather. I have three solid matches, through separate children, that bring their lines back to David Hayden and Jemima Ellswoth, my father actually has a match with William H. Ellsworth, who was the father of Jemima. However, I would like a second opinion, but I do believe it is very good, considering my Y-111 test with Familytreedna.
I would compare your DNA from ThruLines to record research and genetic genealogy triangulation. There are many suggestions with ThruLines that are not correct because people have someone in their family tree that just is inaccurate. I think that's the point I was trying to make. Use ThruLines as a clue to do further research.
Do any of your more recent videos show an update on how you're doing with this brick wall? I imagine you've captured at least a few more cousins and added a few more kits. (pssst🤫, here's a tip on SW OH *records* on Ancestry): If it says "Hamilton, Ohio", it's almost 100% fer sure that it's (Cincinnati, county seat of) *Hamilton County*, not the City of Hamilton, Butler County. Ck Ms Joanna's marriage record (actually that record is only her license on the 10th, w/her father's consent recorded).
Like you and many others have mentioned, it would be great if Ancestry was more consistent on place names. What I'd also like to see as part of that is consistency in transcribing records to use the sorta-standard (for the USA); "City or Twp or ..., County, State, USA (or whichever one uses). If they're not going to include the county seat of the county where the license is issued (and I sure wish they'd officially divide those as well when known), then, like in this case, it "should" read; "Hamilton County, Ohio, USA", imho, to avoid confusion. The other, even more common confusion is with Elizabethtown (or Elizabeth Twp), and Elizabeth Borough, and Elizabeth City, Essex/Union, NJ 😁
You are hitting on the frustrating part of genealogy. There are no standards with regard to place names and that makes things very, very confusing.
I haven't updated the Townley line because I have had to put my research on hold for the business questions I receive and to tend to my family. When my youngest graduates high school in 6 years, I plan on diving very deeply into my research questions and prepare for a small trip to Essex County, New Jersey for some onsite work.
@@FamilyHistoryFanatics That makes perfect sense. Those years with them are so important and go by soooo quickly.
I found we may even be very distant cousins (9th or 10th) in the Townley line! One married one of my Wyckoff cousins but I haven't found the MRCA yet.
Just this week, Ancestry DNA allowed me to fix my 2nd ggmother's line. I was a both confused about her parents as church and civil records contradicted themselves. In the end I found 13(!) 4th to 6th cousins mostly in Glandorf, Ohio to where their ancestors migrated in the 1830s. Studying their lines, there was only one common connection, where the genes could have come from. It goes through a woman, which I suspected also to have migrated and excluded therefor as a mother. Even more as she did not fit the civil record.
Since church books are mainly interested in descendence, where civil records focus on legal matters, I now have have to proof the theory, that maybe my ggmother's biological mother left her with relatives of her (the suposed father shared her maiden name), who later became my 2nd ggmother's foster parents. Actually I'm quite convinced, that only genetic evidence could have solve that problem.
Wow! Exciting. Great sleuthing.
My problem is a Non-Paternal Event (NPE). My surname and documented evidence goes back to my great-great grandparents, James Silas Jernigan and Mary Jane Bodine.
My direct male line indeed goes back to James Silas Jernigan genealogically. But at 111 markers (soon to be Big Y) my Y-chromosome matches NO guys with the surname JERNIGAN but matches TONS of guys with the surname CHANDLER. The Chandler Family Association DNA (Y-chromosome) Project accepts me as being 100% bona fide participant of their Group 7A.
Family Finder at FTDNA did nothing to help finding any indication WHEN the NPE occurred. In other words when did my direct male lineage surname change from a father with the surname CHANDLER to a son with the surname JERNIGAN?
I finally decided to take the Ancestry DNA test and comparing my genetic matches and seeing our Shared Matches helped me to determine that the probability is HIGH that my documented great-great grandfather is very likely my genetic great-great grandfather. I descend from his son, Franklin Henry Jernigan and I have high matches to those who I am satisfied descend from some of James Silas' daughters. I also have high matches to some who descend from Franklin's other children. My grandfather was Frankie Jernigan.
Also all of the documentation I can find indicates that James Silas' mother was Hannah Jernigan and she was likely a daughter of Clement Jernigan and Drucilla Terry of Sevier Co, TN. And possibly she gave James Silas her surname. I have matches to other children of Clement and matches to those descended from siblings of Clement and siblings to Drucilla. My conclusion is that the matches are probably not just coincidence or crossover. There are too many of them.
So, what this does for me is that it helped me to decide NOT to pursue the NPE (Chandler connection) on my lineage AFTER my great-great grandfather, James Silas Jernigan. The probability is very high that my father IS my genetic father. His father (my grandfather) was HIS genetic father. So my grandmother did not conceive my father with a man other than my grandfather. And it is not likely that my great-grandmother, Ella Mae Lindsay, conceived my grandfather with a man other than my great-grandfather. AND it is also not likely that my great-great grandmother, Mary Jane Bodine, conceived my great-grandfather with a man other than my great-great grandfather, James Silas Jernigan. That much I think I can rule out.
Does it actually help to find my great-great-great grandfather. By name, no. It does help to narrow down a probable time frame and locations to do the research in documents.
Also the JERNIGAN and TERRY matches indicate the strong likelihood that Hannah Jernigan was my great-great-great grandmother. The big keys there are two other males with her in the 1860 and 1870 censuses. A probable brother, Spencer, in both the 1850 census of Sevier Co, TN and then also in the 1860 census with her in Guntersville, Alabama. Then in the 1870 census she is with a probable son named Moses Jernigan in Guntersville, Alabama. Ten years later (about the right age) a Moses Jernigan is listed as "Brother" in the household of my great-great grandfather, James Silas Jernigan, and his family in Guntersville. I've also been to Guntersville and checked maps and locations of where people lived and other circumstantial evidence and the probabilities are high that my theories are all correct.
At least to the point that it would most likely be a huge waste of research time to start with a hypothesis that my great-grandmother had an extramarital relationship with one of her relative's Chandler neighbors in Chalkville, Alabama and that my grandfather was the result of that. Time wise and location wise it possibly fits, but, genetically it does not.
So that's my complicated story of how Ancestry DNA (after years and years of only being able to wonder) helped me to narrow down what my research should be in reference to breaking through the brick wall of my Direct Male Lineage Chandler/Jernigan NPE.
I LOVE this! Sorry it took me so long to finally read it. Way to go on your research journey.
@@FamilyHistoryFanatics Thanks I didn't even remember that I posted this. I get so involved with genealogy projects. These days mostly having to do with Italian research. A LOT of double surname matches in those lines including siblings who were both my direct ancestors in Italy.
I am Christi, Patricia's daughter & I am the one who does our family research & I manage our DNA testing & I must tell you I am not real great at telling the difference between paternal & maternal matches with the exception of the cousins who we know who have tested & the DNA matches they all have in common, I have to say everything you talk about in this video is exactly what happened with my mother & her sister with regards to their paternal DNA matches on Thru-lines, until her sister tested there were no paternal matches on Thru-lines for my mom nor were there any I could tell for sure were mom's paternal matches on her DNA match list, once her sister tested we gained 12 paternal matches on Thru-lines & that was my "breakthrough" of my brick wall so to speak, the amount of DNA they share is low so just like you said my mom will not match them, also my aunts Thru-line matches only seem to match each other but they all appear to share a common ancestor with my aunt, so in conclusion we now have DNA matches that are not just the maternal matches who we know & the ones we have in common with them, I now clearly see some paternal DNA matches as well.
I'm so glad you watched to the segment where I talked about the value of having access to my relatives' DNA. Congrats on your discoveries!
@@FamilyHistoryFanatics Thank you.
This is also good for finding errors.
Tell me more.
I have found errors in my own ThruLines when I find a half relationship in my DNA matches. I have had the wrong mother attributed in a few cases.
I've found Thrulines to be a good tool, as long as you do other research to confirm information.
Fair point. Validate the clues before accepting them.
I have the opposite problem, my thrilling END at my great great grandparents… I’m PNE (father) so… me thinks I have the wrong START to my family tree, that I need to build it from a DIFFERENT PNE (father)… am I thinking correctly?
I picked my current PNE (father) based on a 1st cousin match… looked at her grandparents… there was ONLY one male descendant living at the time I was conceived so I used that male as my dad. Now I’m thinking I need to go back another generation to see if I have thrones from their male progeny…
I JUST started this Saturday, five days ago, so I am not sure I’m thinking through this correctly.
Since you have a PNE, use some of the strategies discussed in this video. There is a section about creating a possible father list and then using DNA to test your hypothesis. th-cam.com/video/xmlDticrTS0/w-d-xo.html
Another great video is WATO. If you can figure out the relationships of your 1st cousin to other DNA matches you both share, then build your 1st cousin's genetic family tree using the WATO tool. You would place yourself as the unknown person to your 1st cousin and ensure that you're indeed a 1st cousin not a 'seems like' first cousin match. Here's the WATO tree. th-cam.com/video/d6LxMH0zS54/w-d-xo.html
Then you can see where you could fit into the cousins genetic tree. Then you would look for relatives in that location to the 1st cousin match and work that angle. Does that make sense? In my mind it does. In words, I'm not so sure.
I've been able to figure out what is on both sides of my brick wall, but have yet to make the connection with documentation.
Do you mean you figured this out with DNA research but not paper trails?
@@FamilyHistoryFanatics There is a paper trail as well, but the paper trail connections aren't strong. It's mostly circumstantial evidence, and DNA which has given me confidence that my theory is correct. The line I'm working on is my direct male line, so I am able to use my Big Y results as well as autosomal.
I plan to hire a professional genealogist who specializes in New York brick walls to help me hunt down any documentation that may exist.
Your best! Thanks
Wow. Thanks.
Fun. Anytime I see a NJ to OH migration in the very early 1800s (like your John Townley), the probability is about 90% that they'll settle (first) in Hamilton Co. and abt 80% it'll be in Cincinnati in particular, especially up to around 1835 or so (just a guesstimate on %s). Put the video on pause and checked John out. Bingo on both😁. Lol, the Hamilton Co. part was cheating since HC covered most of the area until Statehood in 1803. I always like to ck for possible connections with NJ to OH arrivals on the spouse side as well if the paternal surname doesn't ring a bell. Hmmm🤔, remote possible on kids of daughter Joanne & her Osborn hubby. You likely know, but early SW OH has a ton of "Joisey", PA (NJ to PA to OH) & VA/KY influence pretty much in that order. Okay back to the vid...
I didn't know the last little bit that you shard about the Joisey, PA influence. I'll add that to my research To Do List to be sure.
@@FamilyHistoryFanatics Yep, it's all due to "one" NJ guy, Judge (and Senator) John Cleves Symmes. Just add the "Symmes Purchase" to that mile long (I imagine) list.
His purchase (thought he was going to get abt 1 million acres but ended up with "only" 1/4 -1/3 million acres) from the gov abt 1787/88 for the lands "between the Miamis" in SW OH and his influence in his home state really threw the westward migration into high gear, especially after the Indian Wars ended in 1794. Fun stuff.
My ancestry thrulines shows no dna with my biological father or his family. Does that mean he is not my dad ? On my mother’s side I have a large amount of dna to many generations.
Acutally, no. That's not what ThruLines means and this situation is along the lines of what I spoke of in this video th-cam.com/video/ZTcFN42p0Uo/w-d-xo.html.
It boils down to this... you family trees do not share enough of the same information for the people in your tree. Or, the DNA matches for your biological line have not made their family tree public or private but shareable. No ThruLines does not mean you have the wrong biological father.
If a husband has 4 DNA matches and his wife has 2 matches in the thru lines, does this mean he was married twice?
I would have to see a visual of this before I could answer. Could you send me a screen shot to info at familyhistoryfanatics dot com
Not when people keep adding the same incorrect information in their trees.
I have discussed the accuracy question before in this video th-cam.com/video/9PTFo4yh5TA/w-d-xo.html
Doing ancestrycom your matches then have the upload to Gedmatch for maximum dna shared, like for example I have a full 100 percent portuguese dna match,on ancestry.com I share 13 cm on Gedmatch the same person total of 1.245 percent, they say siblings share around 50 percent dna, and Gedmatch I share 85 percent with my brother, while on myheritage only 42 percent
Your are correct. My next step would be to consult all of the platforms to search for Townleys. As for the brother, you can share a range of DNA, not 50% exactly. That blew my mind when Andy told me about it.
On 23andMme, my brother and I share 49% of our DNA. When I uploaded our DNA from 23andMe to MyHeritage, it says we share 39%. I contacted the MyHeritage help desk to ask why and they said they use different SNPs.
@@rettawhinnery try Gedmatch they give the maximum on dna shared should probably be at least 80 percent on there
@@jasonjoseph8700 On GEDmatch, my brother and I share 50% of our DNA, which is normal. My half brother and I share 25%, which is also normal.
Maybe we're not talking about the same thing. I've never known a sibling match to be more than 51% shared DNA. If siblings share more than about half of their DNA, it might be due to incest.
@@rettawhinnery you go on the chromosome browser of shared dna you go to the left of your one to many and hit the A next to the Gedmatch code for that person you type 3 in the default the middle of spaces down below keep other ones blank hit to dot the very bottom, then on the chromosome browser go below the 22 chromosomes it will have a percentage on mine me and my brother share 84.624 percent on ged match 42 percent on myheritage and 39 percent on ancestrycom, we uploaded to Gedmatch from ancestrycom