Friday, May 18, 2018

My daughter's Full mtDNA results and analysis

During what has to be the busiest week for me in some time,  I've actually managed to make a bit of headway with my daughter's mtDNA results.  Her full mtDNA test was done thru FamilyTreeDNA. Usually, it's Tuesday when we get notifications of new matches.  I received a notification that she had a new match and was a bit confused when  I checked and it was actually a 4th cousin from my Hitchcock line but on his Dad's side  This is really interesting because while he does descend from Millie Riddle Hitchcock (see link for more info) who many Family Trees list as Millie Combs and sister to my Nancy Combs Fleming.  Millie's line is NOT his mtDNA line.  His matrilineal line goes back to a Sarah Combs who could be an older sister of my Nancy Combs or at least connected to Nancy's direct mother line..  So I've been looking at the full mtDNA matches who are Genetic Distance of Zero.  There are about 18 matches at that level,  of which about 7 have trees. In addition to those 7 with trees, 2 matches have their most distant FEMALE ancestor listed.  In between everything else I needed to get done I began building a mtDNA tree with the mtDNA lines of those that had trees.  If I can identify the others Most Distant Female Ancestor I will add them to the tree also.  I also added my daughters mtDNA line to the tree.  I build these out from the tester and add GD=0  in the Suffix box of the tester's profile so that I can identify & view their pedigree easily.




I realize mtDNA connections can be a good way back--many generations-a thousand(s) years even.  Our Haplogroup is H3-T152C!  Those who had trees with the exception of 1 seem to all lead back to early East Tennessee.  Unlike YDNA,  the surnames associated change with each generation.  I keep seeing Combs, Campbell, Wallace, Hoskins which makes me wonder if I am about to the point where we connect or have a group of families that traveled and interacted whose matrilineal line is intermarrying.  My mother, while she hasn't done the mtDNA, has done an autosomal test.  Her mtDNA should be the same as my daughter's since the mtDNA which I passed to my daughter was mtDNA I had received from her.  It also seems to me like the backward mutation was prior to 1800s as those Genetic Distance 0 folks who have their tree back beyond that point and have still not connected likely got it back before that point. We do have one of the Hoskin/Parkers who matches with us in our Autosomal tests(Moms)

Hopefully, I will get some time this next week to search thru our matches for some of the surnames that keep appearing within the early East TN time frame. 

I would be interested in hearing how others go about working with their mtDNA results--especially if they have done the mtFULL.  I've heard so many say they are disappointed by the results or don't know what to do with them.  I guess if you have a more common haplogroup that can really be hard to work with but still I think I'd be looking for those in the area where my mtDNA line was just to see if I could make connections that extend my research further back.  I'd be glad to inch back a generation at a time.  Everyone's approach will likely be different and dependent on how common the haplogroup is and the number of close matches.  If you have tested, what's your approach with your mtDNA results?  What works for you? 

Monday, May 07, 2018

Down the Rabbit Hole--Wades of Rutherford Co TN


This "rabbit hole" adventure starts out with me finding this snippet shown below on  Newspapers.com and wanting to know more about this Wade family.


The Tennessean 29 Dec 1889 Sunday morning edition  pg 15 People and Events Murfreesboro section  (www.newspapers.com)  listed as The Tennessean Paper at the time it was The Daily American (Nashville, TN)

Fount and Eth B. Wade appear to be sons of Levi Wade.  Just out of curiosity I pulled their 1850 Census entry where they are living in their father's household.


1850 US Federal Population Census, Rutherford Co. Tennessee Wilkinson Crossroad Dist. Stamped pg #191 written pg #381 https://search.ancestry.com/search/db.aspx?dbid=8054 images reproduced by FamilySearch  (household entry carries over onto the top of the following page)


This Levi Wade's place of birth is given as Maryland.   He appears to be the one who is listed as a son of James Wade and Ann Magruder in Ancestry's North American Family Histories Collection 1500-2000 with the information noted as coming from Daughters of the American Revolution Lineage Book : NSDAR: Volume 159: 1920.  This entry also shows his connection to Maryland as he appears to be the great-grandson of Joseph Magruder who died in Montgomery Co MD in 1793.

I found 4 marriages for a Levi Wade all in Rutherford Co. TN.  The DAR lineage book noted that Mary Henderson was his 2nd marriage

1st Marriage to Mary A E. Bedford 17 Jan 1821
2nd Marriage to Mary Henderson 8 Jan 1828
3rd Marriage to Virginia Barksdale 5 Nov 1839
4th Marriage to Catherine E Thompson 7 Jan 1864(one compiled Ancestry.com source says 1863)

Virginia's FindAGrave entry says that Levi Wade was a widower with 12 children when he and Virginia married(see above link-Click on her name). She died sometime prior to Levi's marriage to Catherine likely around 1863 though her Find-A-Grave entry gives 1868 and is not sourced.

Imagine the number of descendants.  This is something to think about if you are a descendant and have done DNA testing.  You'd have 21 other possible lines of descent for cousins as Virginia and Levi went on to have 10 children.  According to some of the info I ran across while trying to see how many times he married, he was a TN state senator who voted for succession at the last minute and was away in Virginia when the Yankees took over his plantation. Levi filed a claim in 1876 with the Southern Claims Commision but it was disallowed.  He lived to be in his mid-80s.  There were many mentions of him in the Tennessee newspapers which you can read if you have access to Newspapers.com.  Virginia's family cemetery(Barksdale) has some details about the Union troops taking over the family plantation.

Tuesday, May 01, 2018

DNA matches & segment analysis

I checked my One-To-Many match listing at GEDmatch for the first time in about a week and found 2 new (above 30 cM) matches.   One 41.6 cM and the other 35.8 cM.  My normal practice is to click on the L of the match to take a look at their match list and use the CTRL + F function to find my email addy on the match list.  That gives me an idea of which of the tests other than mine this person matches.

The first kitt that I admin which is listed on their match list(abt 65 lines down) is my own kit followed shortly by my brother's test.   At this point, I'm thinking that the match is likely on Dad's side as my Mom tested and I haven't seen her name on the page.   After looking down 5 more lines I see another kit I admin.  This is a match that neither I nor my brother has any relation --my daughter's Paternal 2nd Great Aunt(a Mosley/Hogland connection?).  Clicking to the next found occurrence of my email addy(which is about one click of the Page Down button away)  I see that this person also shares DNA with my daughter's paternal Great Aunt(niece of previously mentioned 2ndGr Aunt). On to the next match for a kit I admin which is my Mom's kit,  followed shortly by my daughter's kit.   At this point, I'm thinking the match is on Mom's side.  But wait, there's more.   The last match is my Paternal Aunt.

I can't think of a better example to illustrate the importance of a chromosome browser to establish whether a match is Paternal, Maternal or in this case both.  Segment analysis is extremely important.

While both of my parents have early Tennessee ancestors, I've not found any In-Common ancestors and I have most of the lines back to 4th Greats.  Given that they are both heavily colonial there could likely be some connections once we are back in the 1600s.  Occasionally, I do find cousins that I have in common with both sides which is what is happening in this case.

From this new match's list, I selected each kit adminned by me, selected Visualization Options and then Chromosome Browser(2D Chr Browser).

Once I view the matches of this person to my adminned kits in the 2D Chromosome browser, I can see what is happening.  The image below shows the segments and is a table format I made using the information in the chromosome browser.





The Chromosome 5 segment is one that my brother and I got from our Mom.  I passed that segment on to my daughter.  The Chromosome 12 segment is one that my daughter didn't get but is somewhere down her Paternal Mosley/Hogland lines.  The Chromosome 17 segment is one that my brother and I received from our Dad(never tested)

What's my takeaway from this?

 I can never assume sides from the One To Many lists.  Dad didn't test and there is nothing to compare from his side unless by chance they also match his sister.

While segment analysis is a must,  it's not something we will ever be able to do at Ancestry in my opinion. This match tested at Ancestry which I can tell by the A at the beginning of his kit number.  .I haven't been able to find him in my matches at Ancestry, but at least I have info for the segments.  AncestryDNA match list could really use a reliable search function but that is something they need to work on site wide.  I am not sure if GEDmatch Genesis will allow for identification of where the Match tested.  There was a column for it in the early GEDmatch Genesis Beta but there doesn't appear to be a way to tell with the current display.  I guess we will know once they have combined the two GEDmatch databases

A quick check of my Visual Phasing of myself and my two siblings shows that the Chr 5 segment that my brother and I share is from our MGF and that our sister has a segment from our MGM at that portion of the Chr 5.  I've not finished my Chr 17 Visual Phasing so I can't compare that one yet.

So now I'm off to DNApainter to paint that segment of Chr. 5 as Maternal and the segment of Chr 17 as Paternal.  With any luck, they will overlap with segments of known cousins which I've already painted and perhaps I can narrow down the connection further.