Search for father of adopted Great Great Grandfather

[Wahski]

When I first did the DNA thing, I did it with one goal in mind, seeing if I could find who the father of my Great Great Grandfather George was.

Records show that he was Christened in 1851 with his mother's surname and no details of his father were recorded.
Attitudes to babies out of wedlock were a lot different back then I suppose. Then about a year and a half later he was adopted by Charles when he married George's mother.

There in an entry in Charles' parents family bible saying George was born before Charles was married, and makes no mention as to who is the father, but records now show George with the same surname as Charles (the adopter).
A few years later Charles would have sons Charles (jnr) and Robert with George's mother.

I took the Y-DNA 111 test as I thought this would give me the highest probability of matches within a reasonable genetic distance. Even if I did not get a comprehensive match, I thought it should point me in the direction with surnames.

I got absolutely zero matches with this test. Not at any level whatsoever, disappointing considering the cost of the test. I seemed to be the only one of this 'line' to take the Y-DNA test. Family Finder showed 3000+ 'matches', and the closest 'matches' had no trees of their own and no ancestral names recorded and none had my surname. I found one link but that was on a paternal female line, so it didn't help to determine who my paternal ancestors might be. I even submitted info to Gedmatch, no real help there either.

With this sort of venture into the past it is good to have some sort of game plan thought out, so that any results have high degree of accuracy and leave no room for doubt.

Plan B was to enlist the DNA of relatives to see if can get autosomal and (hopefully) Y-DNA to see if can get more info,
if any Y-DNA matches appear in the future then it will be an obvious match as there is no one else in the system.

I had enlisted (DNA) help of my Father, Aunty, Uncle and Charles' son Robert - direct paternal great grandson, a sort of 3rd cousin once removed (3C1R).

The 'uncle' is the Great grandson of Charles (Charles jnr daughter's son) who is now well into his 90s, which is great for autosomal data as he is one generation closer, but has zero of the needed Y-DNA. Compared the Family Finder (autosomal) with all four samples, my Father, his sister, the 'uncle' and the distant (3C1R) cousin.

I only shared 65cM with the cousin, which the site said was "3rd Cousin - 5th Cousin". I could not determine anything paternally from this either with any high certainty. With my 'uncle' I shared 84 cms it guessing a "4th Cousin - Remote Cousin" relationship. As expected the cousin and the uncle shared the higher 384cMs (2nd cousins).


So a little though occurred, what if Charles was the father of the son he adopted?, they must have been courting each other sometime in the 18 months before hand?

So I did a Y-DNA 111 test with the cousin....

It came back as a match at all markers up to 67 with zero GD (genetic distance), and at 111, only a GD of 1 with my father (GD 2 with me). This kinda proves that Charles is father of my GG Grandfather George as probabilities are in the 90%+ related in last 6 generations, and 99%+ for last 9 gens.

Myself and the cousin went next step further with the Big Y test,
there are only 1 out of 650 Big Y STR Differences, and recently have been given our own terminal SNP.

So a 169 year old mystery has been solved, as up until now my ancestral parentage only went back 4 generations. Now I am able to go back with certainty to 11 generations, and have confirmed who father of the "adopted" was. Charles must have tried to keep this secret from people at the time.

Hoping those who are still searching for their adoptive links have similar success than I.. and that this gives encouragement to not give up....

[georgian1950]

Thanks for sharing your success story.

Good to hear that you and your cousin formed a new terminal SNP within a recent time frame. I find that many experts try to push the date of common ancestors too far back. I just had my Big-Y completed and formed a new terminal SNP with another person in the same subclade study as me. Some say that the common ancestor was 500 - 1000 year back. I see evidence that my second great grandfather was responsible for a NPE. I might be able to prove this one working with autosomal.

Curiously, the person, who I formed the new terminal SNP with, and I were not a Y-111 match.

[mattn]

Thanks for sharing your success story.

Good to hear that you and your cousin formed a new terminal SNP within a recent time frame. I find that many experts try to push the date of common ancestors too far back. I just had my Big-Y completed and formed a new terminal SNP with another person in the same subclade study as me. Some say that the common ancestor was 500 - 1000 year back. I see evidence that my second great grandfather was responsible for a NPE. I might be able to prove this one working with autosomal.

Curiously, the person, who I formed the new terminal SNP with, and I were not a Y-111 match.

I don't understand the leap of thinking your gg grandfather was responsible for an NPE to thinking this NPE was your Big Y match's ancestor. It seems unlikely the relationship is that close if there is no match at 111 markers. Maybe not impossible but extremely unlikely. I would agree though that some seem to push the ages of the SNPs too far back as I hear many believe to add 144 years per SNP but I hear from known relationships that can be traced back there is more like 65 to 90 years per SNP age. I know there will be quite a bit of variability though as it's hit and miss when these mutations occur.

[mattn]

I had enlisted (DNA) help of my Father, Aunty, Uncle and Charles' son Robert - direct paternal great grandson, a sort of 3rd cousin once removed (3C1R).

The 'uncle' is the Great grandson of Charles (Charles jnr daughter's son) who is now well into his 90s, which is great for autosomal data as he is one generation closer, but has zero of the needed Y-DNA. Compared the Family Finder (autosomal) with all four samples, my Father, his sister, the 'uncle' and the distant (3C1R) cousin.

I only shared 65cM with the cousin, which the site said was "3rd Cousin - 5th Cousin". I could not determine anything paternally from this either with any high certainty. With my 'uncle' I shared 84 cms it guessing a "4th Cousin - Remote Cousin" relationship. As expected the cousin and the uncle shared the higher 384cMs (2nd cousins).

Congratulations on your find and your hard work. Out of curiosity how much autosomal DNA did your father and your aunt share with these people?

[Wahski]

I'm not sure if I made myself clear enough re: matches at 111. I mentioned there was a GD of 1 (my father) & GD of 2 (me has extra GD as there was a difference on the faster changing STR marker CDY) with the cousin. That means that there is a match of 109/110 y-dna markers out of total 111 at that level - which is a very close match, and we both had a GD of 0 at 67 level, ie 67 of 67 y-dna matched.

re: autosomal DNA, my Aunt and father shared about 75 cMs each with the cousin. My Aunty shares 194cM & my father shares 151 cM with my 'Uncle'
I have 33 first cousins, and had/have 11 Uncles/Aunties, and GGGF 'George' had 7 children of his own. I would thought there would be more matches in the system (autosomal/yna/mtdna) but I guess you can only match up with those who have taken the tests.

I am not that all up-to-date re: the correct amount of years per SNP, but it is true they seem to go 'too' far back, some mutations may occur more frequently at times.

It sometimes is just that one match that comes into the system that can make all the difference......and also being pro-active about getting people to take the test in time as you never know how much longer they will be around for - my Aunty died a week ago. .

[mattn]

I'm not sure if I made myself clear enough re: matches at 111. I mentioned there was a GD of 1 (my father) & GD of 2 (me has extra GD as there was a difference on the faster changing STR marker CDY) with the cousin. That means that there is a match of 109/110 y-dna markers out of total 111 at that level - which is a very close match, and we both had a GD of 0 at 67 level, ie 67 of 67 y-dna matched.

re: autosomal DNA, my Aunt and father shared about 75 cMs each with the cousin.
I have 33 first cousins, and had/have 11 Uncles/Aunties, and GGGF 'George' had 7 children of his own. I would thought there would be more matches in the system (autosomal/yna/mtdna) but I guess you can only match up with those who have taken the tests.

I am not that all up-to-date re: the correct amount of years per SNP, but it is true they seem to go 'too' far back, some mutations may occur more frequently at times.

It sometimes is just that one match that comes into the system that can make all the difference......and also being pro-active about getting people to take the test in time as you never know how much longer they will be around for - my Aunty died a week ago. .

Just so you aren't confused, my comment on the 111 markers and the NPE was to georgian1950 not to you. Condolences on the loss of your aunt. You didn't tell us how much DNA your father and aunt share with this person you call "uncle".

[Wahski]

Sorry - I missed that your first post was to georgian1950 - definitely getting confused. But I did mention how much father/Aunty shared with the Uncle.
"My Aunty shares 194cM & my father shares 151 cM with my 'Uncle'. You must have been typing your reply as I updated it.....
Just to confuse things my Aunty's husband is the 'uncle' in question ie 2C2R.

[mattn]

Sorry - I missed that your first post was to georgian1950 - definitely getting confused. But I did mention how much father/Aunty shared with the Uncle.
"My Aunty shares 194cM & my father shares 151 cM with my 'Uncle'. You must have been typing your reply as I updated it.....
Just to confuse things my Aunty's husband is the 'uncle' in question ie 2C2R.

Ok thanks. Ok, I guess that makes sense to me as I was wondering why you were calling this person uncle, he is your uncle.

[georgian1950]

I don't understand the leap of thinking your gg grandfather was responsible for an NPE to thinking this NPE was your Big Y match's ancestor. It seems unlikely the relationship is that close if there is no match at 111 markers. Maybe not impossible but extremely unlikely. I would agree though that some seem to push the ages of the SNPs too far back as I hear many believe to add 144 years per SNP but I hear from known relationships that can be traced back there is more like 65 to 90 years per SNP age. I know there will be quite a bit of variability though as it's hit and miss when these mutations occur.

OK, I take a Star Trek approach to these things. Where do the lines intersect in the time-space continuum? It met that requirement, but it is not proof. On GEDmatch, we had a distant match which the other person rejected as weak. I also saw some interesting triangulations which supported my hypothesis. I had an original Family Finder test and my Big Y match had the newer AncestryDNA one. They do not give very good comparisons, so my next step is to take an AncestryDNA test in hopes that it will clarify the relationship.

[mattn]

OK, I take a Star Trek approach to these things. Where do the lines intersect in the time-space continuum? It met that requirement, but it is not proof. On GEDmatch, we had a distant match which the other person rejected as weak. I also saw some interesting triangulations which supported my hypothesis. I had an original Family Finder test and my Big Y match had the newer AncestryDNA one. They do not give very good comparisons, so my next step is to take an AncestryDNA test in hopes that it will clarify the relationship.

georgian1950 I assume you've done traditional genealogy on this person's ancestors? Was his ancestors living next to yours? If your talking about a son of your gg grandfather it shouldn't be that far back to just do research on it. I think you already got your answer when he didn't match at 111 but that is just my opinion. Nothing wrong with doing further DNA testing though.

[puentesr79]

When I first did the DNA thing, I did it with one goal in mind, seeing if I could find who the father of my Great Great Grandfather George was.

Records show that he was Christened in 1851 with his mother's surname and no details of his father were recorded.
Attitudes to babies out of wedlock were a lot different back then I suppose. Then about a year and a half later he was adopted by Charles when he married George's mother.

There in an entry in Charles' parents family bible saying George was born before Charles was married, and makes no mention as to who is the father, but records now show George with the same surname as Charles (the adopter).
A few years later Charles would have sons Charles (jnr) and Robert with George's mother.

I took the Y-DNA 111 test as I thought this would give me the highest probability of matches within a reasonable genetic distance. Even if I did not get a comprehensive match, I thought it should point me in the direction with surnames.

I got absolutely zero matches with this test. Not at any level whatsoever, disappointing considering the cost of the test. I seemed to be the only one of this 'line' to take the Y-DNA test. Family Finder showed 3000+ 'matches', and the closest 'matches' had no trees of their own and no ancestral names recorded and none had my surname. I found one link but that was on a paternal female line, so it didn't help to determine who my paternal ancestors might be. I even submitted info to Gedmatch, no real help there either.

With this sort of venture into the past it is good to have some sort of game plan thought out, so that any results have high degree of accuracy and leave no room for doubt.

Plan B was to enlist the DNA of relatives to see if can get autosomal and (hopefully) Y-DNA to see if can get more info,
if any Y-DNA matches appear in the future then it will be an obvious match as there is no one else in the system.

I had enlisted (DNA) help of my Father, Aunty, Uncle and Charles' son Robert - direct paternal great grandson, a sort of 3rd cousin once removed (3C1R).

The 'uncle' is the Great grandson of Charles (Charles jnr daughter's son) who is now well into his 90s, which is great for autosomal data as he is one generation closer, but has zero of the needed Y-DNA. Compared the Family Finder (autosomal) with all four samples, my Father, his sister, the 'uncle' and the distant (3C1R) cousin.

I only shared 65cM with the cousin, which the site said was "3rd Cousin - 5th Cousin". I could not determine anything paternally from this either with any high certainty. With my 'uncle' I shared 84 cms it guessing a "4th Cousin - Remote Cousin" relationship. As expected the cousin and the uncle shared the higher 384cMs (2nd cousins).


So a little though occurred, what if Charles was the father of the son he adopted?, they must have been courting each other sometime in the 18 months before hand?

So I did a Y-DNA 111 test with the cousin....

It came back as a match at all markers up to 67 with zero GD (genetic distance), and at 111, only a GD of 1 with my father (GD 2 with me). This kinda proves that Charles is father of my GG Grandfather George as probabilities are in the 90%+ related in last 6 generations, and 99%+ for last 9 gens.

Myself and the cousin went next step further with the Big Y test,
there are only 1 out of 650 Big Y STR Differences, and recently have been given our own terminal SNP.

So a 169 year old mystery has been solved, as up until now my ancestral parentage only went back 4 generations. Now I am able to go back with certainty to 11 generations, and have confirmed who father of the "adopted" was. Charles must have tried to keep this secret from people at the time.

Hoping those who are still searching for their adoptive links have similar success than I.. and that this gives encouragement to not give up....

That’s pretty awesome that you were able to solve this mystery. I’m kind of in a similar situation (great-great-grandfather was an illegitimate child and my dad has no Y-111 matches) so it was nice to hear about your success.