Ancestry matches and Pencombe

 I did work on the Pencombe family in Herefordshire and Devonshire for a few hours pulling out the data and adding it to the chapter. I contemplated ordering one document but did not do so yet. Prepared an interesting table also for the chapter. Then I decided to move to the Ancestry matches that I made up into a chart yesterday. With four people tested there are a lot of matches in four months since I last did the same - 36 matches in total. They tend to be well mixed in the four lines actually so always something interesting to look at for each line. The larger ones tend to be paternal which could be surprising as my father was an only child and we did not have any first cousins. But on my mother's side her brother did not have any children and her father was the only surviving child (although he did have a half-sister (so half second cousins there). I got through all of the matches once and now I just need to check to see if there are any matches less than 20 cM which will not show up in the 4th -6th cousin range. With the use of TIMBER the overall size of the match can be reduced by as much as 50% so I do tend to collect right to the 20 cM and the extras just to see if all of the siblings are matching an individual or just one or two or three. 

Good exercise day and completed everything plus adding in my ten flights of stairs (not continuous as I must go up and down and then up again and down but it does appear to be good exercise). I got the idea from visiting the museum the other weekend. I wasn't tired doing all the stairs but did rather realize how good the exercise was. 

Today finish the ancestry table and think about the Pincombe-Pinkham Newsletter which is due tomorrow; plus write it likely as I have ideas in mind. Then work on the le Blak family chapter. Funny that I am at that point in both books of looking at the mediaeval family period but perhaps not surprising because I am working somewhat in tandem although the two families are considerably different. 

We had our flash freeze and now at -13 celsius after a high yesterday of +14 celsius. Since I did not actually go outside I have not particularly noticed the change except the furnace did not run very often until the freeze came. 

Early morning exercises completed and I have a second cup of tea to drink with my Latin which is next. 

Another day in God's world and the Lenten Readings have been fabulous. They actually talk a lot about the time of Israel in the Bible which was so coincidental I think.

New Ethnicity Results at Ancestry

My memory record for these results.

Results for four siblings:

1st sibling

83% England, Wales and Northwestern Europe
10% Ireland and Scotland
4% Germanic Europe
2% Baltic States
1% France

2nd sibling

81% England, Wales and Northwestern Europe
12% Ireland and Scotland
4% Norway
2% Baltic States
1% France

3rd sibling

84% England, Wales and Northwestern Europe
12% Ireland and Scotland
2% Germanic Europe
2% Sweden

4th sibling

69% England, Wales and Northwestern Europe
17% Ireland and Scotland
6% Germanic Europe
5% Norway
3% Sweden

All of our known ancestry is English (i.e. from six distinct areas in England itself):

Devon/Somerset
Hampshire/Wiltshire/Dorset
London/Surrey
Warwickshire/Staffordshire/Leicestershire
East Riding of Yorkshire
Cumberland

Five waves of migration brought these six distinct areas to Canada between 1818 and 1913.

The first wave coming from Bewcastle, Cumberland in 1818 with my 3x great grandparents Thomas and Elizabeth (Routledge) Routledge and their family including their daughter Elizabeth Mary Ann Routledge who was fourteen years old at the time.

The second wave come from Etton, in the East Riding of Yorkshire with my 2x great grandfather Robert Gray junior arriving circa 1832-34 and he married Elizabeth Mary Ann Routledge in 1835. One of their daughters was Grace Gray born in 1839.

The third wave came from Bishops Nympton/Molland, Devon in 1851 with my 2x great grandparents John and Elizabeth (Rew) Pincombe. Elizabeth though was born at Selworthy Somerset. One of their children William Robert Pincombe was thirteen years old at the time. In 1865 William Robert Pincombe married Grace Gray. Their surviving child was John Routledge Pincombe.

The fourth wave came from Birmingham, Warwickshire in 1908 with my maternal grandmother Ellen Rosina Buller. Unknown to her was the London/Surrey ancestry of her Grandfather Buller's line. Ellen married John Routledge Pincombe in 1913. One of their children was Helen Louise Pincombe.

The fifth wave came in two parts from Eastleigh, Hampshire with my grandfather Samuel George Blake coming first in 1913 followed eight months later by his wife Ada Bessie Cotterill (Rawlings Taylor) Blake and their son Ernest Edward George Blake. Ernest married Helen Louise Pincombe.

Ancestry was the first company that we tested at to note our Irish/Scot ancestry and the percentages were substantial in their first recording and continue in this second realignment with 10%, 10%, 12%, and 17% recorded. Known to us already because of our testing of the mtDNA was the likely resting spot for our ancient ancestress in the mitochondrial line prior to modern migration and that area was Argyllshire/Ayrshire, Scotland. This area is known to have ancient migration across to Northern Ireland. But also during the Cromwellian era (the 1640s in particular) a number of Scots were moved to Ireland and referred to as Planters. This was a great step forward in my thinking with regard to my maternal grandmother's mother who is known to us as Ellen Taylor and information from 1879 when she was about 20 years of age until her death at 37 years of age in 1897 is available. It is her actual birth date/birth parents that are unknown although purchasing every Ellen Taylor's birth registration at Birmingham/Aston has given credence to a possible set of parents not yet proven. But it is our present day Irish matches that may yet assist us in that regard. The expected percentage from a great grandparent in our autosomal DNA is estimated to be 12.5% and the variance tends to be between 0% to 25% (i.e. you may not share any from a great grandparent or you could have inherited totally from one great grandparent by inheriting solely from one of two grandparents perhaps but that would likely be pretty rare). What colours this percentage of Irish/Scot somewhat, and it shows up in Living DNA results, is the Routledge family. These 3x great grandparents (second cousins) are originally Scot Highlanders prior to the 1500s and given that they tended to marry cousins the DNA has not been diluted by other family lines through the centuries up to the early 1800s. How much does a 3x great grandparent contribute and that is around 3% so 6% in total since both are Routledge and from the same actual line. If I look at the matches then sibling 4 does match quite strongly with the Routledge family (stronger than the other three) and you can see that in the 17% - Amazing really what DNA can find!

Scurrying away once again to contemplate these latest changes and how they might affect my thinking with regard to that elusive great grandmother. I do have cousins in the United States that share my maternal grandmother's ancestry (two of her sisters) (six 2nd cousins (grandchildren of these two sisters)) and perhaps one of these days they will test and we can triangulate on some of these known Irish matches!

Second DNA Circle at Ancestry

Although I am not doing a lot of research  these days,  the arrival of a new DNA circle at Ancestry was a welcomed surprise.

Jeremiah Rawlins is the ancestor celebrated in this newest DNA circle. He was my 4x great grandfather and his baptism provided a good amount of discussion because all of his siblings were baptized at Enford, Wiltshire whereas he was baptized at Netheravon (not far away in distance only about 3 kilometres). So far, no reason for the baptism being at Netheravon has arisen. Perhaps the priest at Enford was not available; perhaps they had moved house in that time period returning to Enford once again; all sorts of ideas present themselves for thought.

Jeremiah Rawlins was baptized 13 Apr 1755 son of William Rawlins and Mary Ford. He married Sarah Tanner 1 Nov 1780 at Tilshead (the priest kindly wrote on the marriage registration that Jeremiah was of Enford). They had nine children between 1781 and 1801 and he was buried 6 Dec 1834 at Fifield (all in Wiltshire). My line descends from his eldest son Thomas Rawlins. The circle is still small (just six members (of whom three are my close relatives)) but welcomed none the less. As my matches continue to flow in (albeit slowly), I can see more DNA circles in the future as the information comes together.

I am now up to 17 shared ancestor hints and I have corresponded or attempted to correspond with all of these matches. One of my best matches is a mystery as she does not respond. But then my best matches at ancestry are just 57 centimorgans spread over 5 segments and 57 centimorgans spread over three segments other than my siblings.

Comparison of ethnicity over several testing companies

Looking at my ethnicity testing over several companies. My Living DNA Results have really proven to be significant in my trek backwards and leading up to that test was the presence of Irish DNA in other testing companies results. I always knew that I would test primarily British Isles and would anticipate being strongly from the counties of England since all of my ancestry back many generations in some lines and at least back into the mid 1700s in most lines is English.

That does support my idea that I am primarily English many generations back but other companies have picked up a European component and I might assume that it is fairly ancient because of matches that I have with people living in European countries with lengthy trees dating back there. I still have my Christopher Buller who lived circa 1764 to 1832 mostly in the Bermondsey Surrey area and close to Tooley Street, Bermondsey Lane and Long Lane whose parents are a mystery. His Slop Shop was on Tooley Street; slops being the name for the uniform that sailors wore. With a name like Buller one might think that he is descendant of the Buller family of Somerset or perhaps of Warwickshire (are they the same family? have not yet found that link) but I can not find a link back to either of these families for Christopher. The hint of European and my DNA matches with people of German ancestry (and no other) led to to wonder if the name was anglicized from Buehler to Buller. That still remains a thought as immigration from Germany to England was ongoing especially during the times of the Georges (George I, George II, and George III in particular). This family also was involved in the confectionary business in Birmingham lending more credence to this thought as early German immigrants to London were in the confectionary business.

The Irish ancestry is interesting as some claim that my Charley/Charlie line (my 4x great grandmother Mary (Charlie) Pincombe)) was Irish but this is too strong at Living DNA to just be the influence of Mary one would think! As a 4th great grandmother she would contribute slightly more than 1.5% on average so I do have to keep her in the back of my memory but in general this does look like my maternal grandmother's mother who also quite handily carried my mitochondrial DNA which is passed on to me. The mitochondrial DNA H11a2a1 in the Blood of the Isles Database was found in Ayrshire/Argyllshire Scotland and Northern Ireland. Hence my thoughts did quickly go back to her.

The Scandinavian component (Germanic perhaps) has been picked up by most testing companies in various percentages ranging from a high of 37% to a low of 0%. Certainly the east coast of England has a component of Germanic races and I do have Yorkshire ancestry but always suspected it was a long way back. I still think that but I do have matches come in for fifth cousins or greater who live in Germany, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland and have, where they have family charts dating back for a long time. 

 Living DNA

Great Britain and Ireland 96.5%
South Central England 31.7%
Central England 14.6%
Devon 14.6%
Southeast England 7.2%
South Yorkshire 5.4%
Southwest Scotland and Northern Ireland 4.8%
Northumbria 4%
Northwest England 3.5%
North Yorkshire 3.5%
South England 2.7%
Aberdeenshire 2.5%
Lincolnshire 2%
Europe (North and West) 3.5%
Scandinavia 3.5%

Ancestry DNA

Great Britain 64%
Ireland 14%
Europe West 11%
Scandinavia 6%
Iberian Peninsula 1%
Europe East (less than)1%
Italy/Greece (less than) 1%
Finland/Northwest Russia (less than) 1%
Melanesia (less than) 1%

FT DNA

West and Central Europe 46%
British Isles 38%
Scandinavia 12%
West Middle East (less than) 1%
Finland (less than) 1%
Oceania (less than) 1%

National Genographic

British Isles 48%
Germany 33%
Southern Europe/Middle East 19%

My Heritage

English 53.4%
Scandinavian 33.3%
Irish, Scottish, and Welsh 2.1%
Iberian 10.3%
Italian 0.9%

23 and Me

British and Irish 54.7%
French and German 15%
Scandinavian 2%
Broadly northwestern European 26.9%
Broadly southern European 0.3%
Ashkenazi Jewish 0.2%
Broadly European 0.7%
Broadly Oceanian (less than) 1%
North African (less than) 1%

23 and Me offers an interesting Ancestry Timeline with their ethnicity reporting which places all of my Ashkenazi Jewish, Oceanian, North African ancestry as dating back to a 4th to 7th or greater grandparent likely born between 1680 and 1770. My Scandinavian ancestry from a 4th to 6th grandparent born between 1710 and 1800. My French and German ancestry from a great grandparent to a 3x grandparent born between 1800 and 1860. My British and Irish ancestry from a parent, grandparent or great grandparent born between 1860 and 1920 and of course my father was born in 1904 in Eastleigh, Hampshire, England (and three of my grandparents were born in England in 1875, 1876 and 1886).

DNA and The Surname Society

As The Surname Society continues to grow, I am convinced that this tool will aid me greatly in my pursuit of my own personal ancestors. I have found a lot of them and do travel back a long way into the past with many of them. The advantage to being a late emigrant to North America and knowing each and every one of their emigration stories, where they came from and why they came.

But even with that much knowledge, I do have a couple of lines that need help and they mostly lie in my maternal mtDNA line and my maternal grandmother's father's male line Buller. I hope to meet more people interested in these particular lines although also welcome anyone interested in my 22 personal surnames and the four surnames of our grandsons' French Canadian lines. Although being on My Heritage has been a real eye opener into those French Canadian lines that are a brickwall as there are so many people searching for that information.

My cousin asked me to test on Ancestry DNA and facilitated that process since the DNA testing is not yet rolled out to Canada officially. I had tested her at FT DNA thinking we might share Buller DNA since we are fifth cousins once removed. But we did not share any DNA at all. However, she had matched a known third cousin once removed to me at Ancestry. So I tested and indeed I did match my third cousin once removed in the 4th to 6th cousin with a Very High Confidence of accuracy. In all I have seven such matches at the 4th to 6th cousins with very high confidence. I can place a second one of the matches as she is my fourth cousin once removed in my Pincombe family lines and is known to me. The other five though are a mystery but they have quite small trees and I am likely looking at 3rd or 4th grandparents as being the likely common ancestors. Plus their ancestry is totally American colonial thus far and I do not have any American colonial ancestors. Indeed my first ancestors did not come to Canada until 1818 and it was the emigrant daughter of this family that married the next emigrant in my lines in 1832 and then 1851 the next emigrant arrived to marry the daughter of this couple. Not again until 1908 did I have another emigrant who married the son of the next couple and she was my maternal grandmother. In 1913 my father arrived with his parents and married the daughter of this last couple. So a very shallow history on this side of the Atlantic.

Ancestry DNA has come up with a very unique way of displaying matches called DNA Circles. I do not have any yet because you need four people to make a circle and thus far I just have the two matches and must wait for others to add to their family trees, make them public or simply actually have a tree on line. I am hopeful though that I may find leads to my two lines that are most puzzling.

I am able to name 28 of my 32 3x great grandparents with 100% accuracy and the other two sets are likely but I would like to have the marriage registration of Edwin Denner Buller and Ellen Taylor and Ellen Taylor's birth registration. Then I would be completely satisfied that Thomas Taylor and Ellen Roberts are indeed my 2x great grandparents  and that Samuel Taylor/Ann Lewis Harborne and Thomas Roberts/Ellen Lawley are my 3x great grandparents. One of the matches (not yet known to me) is quite interesting leading into my grandmother's ancestry but it is my Welch line which is known to me back into the early 1700s.

So hats off to Ancestry for a really great addition to their DNA material.

Slowly trying to work my way back into genealogy but suspect it will be as mentioned earlier into January before I am really back to transcription and blogging on a daily basis.

Returning slowly to transcription

I will be slowly returning to transcription and hope to be back at it full time again by early December. Instead of eight hours or so a day at my computer I find time for a couple of hours only. Thank you to everyone for your kind words. During this long interval of months I have been once again rethinking my approach on my studies of all my lines and my new methodology will not emerge until after the New Year. My this year has passed fast in actual fact.

I did test with Ancestry DNA and was quite pleased with the results. I have a 5th cousin once removed on my Buller line and we did not match when I tested her at Family Finder and downloading all the results and taking them into Gedmatch did not reveal anything. Tested at Ancestry DNA and we still do not have a match but we do have a mutual cousin that we both match and that can only be on the Buller side. I just happen to be a third cousin to this individual. The matches at Ancestry appear to be more distant in their estimation than FT DNA in that she is judged to be a 4th to 6th cousin whereas a known 4th cousin at FT DNA was said to be a 2nd to 4th cousin. All in how they do it and we benefit from their effort nevertheless.

My  ethnicity estimate was rather interesting at Ancestry and possibly the closest to what my estimate would be and that was 64% Great Britain, 14% Ireland (yielding 78% British Isles), 11% Europe West (probably accounts for my German matches everywhere), 6% Scandinavia and I have no ideas on that ancestry. Trace Regions Iberian Peninsula 1%, Europe East 1%, Italy/Greece 1%, Finland, Northwest Russia 1%, and Melanesia less than 1%.

Back to exercise as I do that about eight times a day for an hour at a time; plus amazingly I can still run so do 3K morning and evening. We also walk 4 K or so per day and the hours pass quickly. It is amazing how much a back problem can affect your entire life style!