We welcome any query on Who When Where. If you have previously posted it on another forum (including the old WDYTYA forum), please state this in your opening post - this will save people redoing the research which has been done before: they can look at it and possibly go further with it.
You know I dabble rather than focus on this DNA stuff so forgive what might be an obvious question BUT I’ve got a specific branche that doesn’t have any Ancestry matches and wondered if this is unusual? I appreciate that there are a large number of matches without trees (annoying) where they might be hiding so this is just a general query.
I can track and match this line back to great-grandparents but have no matches linked to the five further generations who were very unlucky with infant mortality. I’m comforting myself that this lack of side shoots probably explains it. Might it? Or is it glaringly obvious?
I have, so far as I can tell, loads of branches that don't appear to be linked to any of my Ancestry matches. My Griffiths line has DNA matches descended from my G-GP Griffiths and from my GG-GP Griffiths - but then, so far as I can see, nothing further back. Which is a shame since GG-GF Griffiths might have been born a Griffiths or a Maddocks and just assumed the Griffiths name to avoid being done for bigamy.
There just aren't that many genealogically useful matches in the UK for me.
Well, I’m glad to hear that Adrian, purely for my own selfish reasons of course. it reassures me a bit. I know the science is 100% but it’s the interpretation that’s a bit unreliable. Current gripe concerns the child of a pair of my first cousins - he’s described by the website as my half nephew. As my only sibling never had children (known fact) that could have put a cat amongst the pigeons. Anyway, thanks for replying.
Norfolk Nan wrote: ↑07 Jan 2024, 18:29
Well, I’m glad to hear that Adrian, purely for my own selfish reasons of course. it reassures me a bit. I know the science is 100% but it’s the interpretation that’s a bit unreliable. Current gripe concerns the child of a pair of my first cousins - he’s described by the website as my half nephew. As my only sibling never had children (known fact) that could have put a cat amongst the pigeons. Anyway, thanks for replying.
I wouldn't say the science is 100% as there was a court case some years ago when the DNA said it was that of a white person and as the defence counsel pointed out that their client was black!.
Science is fine 'cos the science just says "Marker XYZ at position 1234". It's the interpretation about what that marker at that position actually means...
Generally autosomal testing, such as an Ancestry test, will only provide links back 6 generations from the subject who tested because the DNA usually becomes too diluted for earlier generations to show clearly.
I'm assuming it is only an Ancestry DNA test that you have taken so I am unsure how you can be certain about the claim that a specific branch has no matches. I think you will undoubtedly have many matches given by Ancestry that you cannot tell how they relate. Very often these are low matches around 8 centimorgans or so, but sometimes you may come across some in the 20 cM + range that can't be linked by genealogy but show as matches on Ancestry.
Assuming that you haven't got parents that have tested, then the only way that you can attribute matches to your two parental lines is by recognising names in others trees or by shared matches with known relatives on each side of your family. What you may well face in reality therefore, is the problem I have highlighted previously, that Ancestry does not offer the complete information to trace families except through linking to surnames. It may well be that one or more of your ancestors is the result of a false paternity in which case Ancestry would indicate a certain match to you but you would have no way to identify where it fits in to your tree.
Ancestry testing is a great resource due to the size of its database, but anyone who takes their test should also either test with any other company that offers a Chromosome Broswer or upload their results for free to GEDmatch, where more matches are gleaned (they take results from a number of companies) but also enable to analyse your results. It is, in fact, also possible to upload Ancestry results to other companies sites such as Family Tree DNA, who about the earliest to offer genealogical testing, though a smallish fee is required to access full access to all tools.
A Chromosome Browser actually arms you with the information showing as to which are the chromosomes and segments you share with other testers. Knowing that, you can examine who else shares those chromosomes and are thus related to each other, with luck.
Regrettably, few on Ancestry seem to test or upload elsewhere and unless you can persuade them to do that you may never be any wiser as to sorting out where they match. It must be said, the further back in time, the harder it is to identify false paternities anyway unless you have several testers that you can triangulate results with. As an example, I have two matches that both share a portion of DNA and both have a the same Samuel COX in their trees. I also share the same portion of DNA but have no COX in my tree so we are unsure whether I have a man named COX begetting someone in my family or someone in my tree who actually begat Samuel COX or his ancestors. It would take more matches to try to make sense of this but as yet I too have no known DNA matches to my paternal grandmother's extensive paternal family. Or, more correctly, there are several with trees on Ancestry but who do not reply to messages nor seem to have tested anywhere as yet and so I am stymied at present.
Hello Hardwork, and thank you for your detailed reply.
I have tested with other sites and uploaded to GEDmatch so have a wide range of matches, some I can easily identify and many are too small to be helpful and/or don't have linked or useful trees (isn't that annoying) or don't answer messages. Some of my branches have dozens of matches but these generally relate to the families who emigrated whereas the particular lines I'm talking about here are traceably UK based - perhaps there's no curiosity about DNA for folks who haven't strayed far? Personally I tested to discover my origins - was I a viking (no!) - but I think I've over-estimated what this sort of DNA matching can do in respect of proving research. I'd like to know if two people were siblings but the matches don't go far enough and I'd like to confirm the parentage of another ancestor but again, the matches stop short.
There are limitations as to what DNA can prove but by far the biggest problems are those which you have highlighted, namely not enough people test (particularly in UK), not enough people respond to enquiries, testers who may not be that interested in genealogy or have tested at the request of someone else and have no interest themselves, and frankly not enough folk having even a rudimentary idea of how to get the most out of DNA testing. I'm not surprised about the latter because it can get infernally complicated.
It is good you have tested elsewhere etc., but very often DNA testing carries a fair amount of luck with regards to the above issues and very often is a long game. It took me 5 years to establish who my real great-grandfather was (false paternity) though DNA can never tell which of 5 brothers was my grandfather and it took a lot of hard work, persistence and targeting and even paying for others to test to reach that point.
I'm still not clear in your case, however, how can be sure you know you have no matches for a particular ancestral line, unless someone in your family descended from that line has tested and has no matches. Sorry if I am being rather dense over this but how do you even know the DNA footprint for this branch of your family which you are looking to find a match to? It seems to me that you may have matches that link to the family that you just can't recognise, probably in part by not seeing a recognisable tree or name. It is also possible that you may not carry DNA in a large enough quantity from this line yourself, if it is 4 or more generations back.
Again, I have one or possibly two false paternities in my mother's family that concern her grandfather and great grandfather. I've found no matches to this family earlier than the descendants of the said grandfather. I do however have Ancestry matches to my maternal line, whole groups of 20 or more in some cases, that I can't see any pattern to, to pinpoint how they fit. A chromosome browser would help enormously to see that pattern in those instances, but I'm assuming that these groups, though related, are from those false paternities at this point.
I sincerely hope you can sort your problem out because I can understand your frustration.
Thanks for the encouragement and it’s exactly as you’ve said. ThruLines confirm a lack of matches to these particular lines and I only know for certain that I do have many matches to individuals in the generations after the questionable ancestors. There is one questionable match of 8cMs that would prove a link but it hinges on someone else’s US research and I’ve not been able to follow that through yet - if it’s accurate it shows a match to grandparents three generations before my question mark! It’s the only one but I’m keeping it in mind.
As it stands I’ve got a long branch with the question mark in the middle. I’m very fond of this branch and have put a lot of effort in tracing them so if it was proven he WAS a cuckoo I’d have to break the branch. That would be really sad. Perhaps a bit of ignorance isn’t a bad thing?
Seems there's very little you can rely on these days...