And another DNA success?

This one is much more tentative, but nonetheless very interesting for me.
One of my genealogy mysteries, aka brickwall, is the parentage of Amelia MILLAR, my 2*great grandmother.
Her granddaughter provided the information that her mother was "a Miss Chrystal", Amelia's death cert, the information that her father was a James MILLAR and that she was born in Kippen, Stirlingshire.
Sum total of "known" information as to her origins.
DNA matches to date have indicated that there might be some Irish connections in there somewhere, but nothing has given me a "BINGO" moment.
This however has just come close.
As a DNA addict, I've tested at all three main genetic genealogy companies: FamilyTreeDNA, 23andme, and Ancestry.
The latter drives me potty as it simply does not provide the information necessary to confirm where you match, just provides  an indication of the strength of your match, and a link to the test takers' trees.
The match can be anywhere, or nowhere, on such trees and without a chromosome browser to show you what segment of dna you share, and who else shares that segment of inherited DNA with you, it's guesswork.
Which is where the wonderful independent site, run by a dedicated group of volunteers, http://GEDMatch.com, comes in.
If only all my Ancestry matches would upload their data there, I'd be happy.
Enough of a rant.

So why am I excited by an ancestry match that I know nothing much about yet?
The attached tree had a MILLAR of Kippen in it, and around the right timeframes.
It gets better.
Their ancestor was a Jane ROBERTSON bap. 1811 St Ninians, married (1835 Fintry) a George HUTTON born Lochwinnoch (Renfrewshire), and emigrated to Quebec between about 1847 and 1851.
Jane's parents are shown as Duncan ROBERTSON & Margaret MILLAR who married 1798, Kippen.
Which rang bells.
My research into the family differs from that on a couple of ancestry trees, and is more exciting!

The last time I dug around to see what might now be available for MILLARs and CHRYSTALs around Kippen I found a death cert. for a Margaret MILLAR who just happened to be married to a Duncan ROBERTSON, and had the fortune (for us) to die in 1855, the year civil registration started in Scotland, where the certs for that year have a wealth of information on them.
Yes, a daughter Jane was shown as aged 44 on the certificate (as was a son James Chrystal ROBERTSON).
I've not yet found any other candidates than the emigrant Jane for Duncan and Margaret's daughter Jane, and the naming pattern of Jane and George's children "fits".

Who were Margaret MILLAR's parents?
A David MILLAR and an Elizabeth CHRYSTAL.
Research back then had shown David and Elizabeth also had a son James of an age to have had a daughter around 1817. Pity Amelia's death cert. provides no hints as to her father's occupation. This one was a mason, dying a pauper in 1863, no indication that he had been married. Back when I found him last year, I couldn't find him in the censuses. Still looking for earlier than 1861 now.

Anyway, the family of Duncan and Margaret (MILLAR) ROBERTSON, and some of the CHRYSTALs of Kippen have now been included in my WorldConnect database LornaFishing.
I'd LOVE to hear from any descendants who have undertaken DNA testing and work with them to explore an potential hints to see if this is indeed the line where my ancestry dna match belongs.

Gone fishing.

I've added a new database to my WorldConnect account - LornaFishing.
It joins:

• LornaHenderson - the known relations (mostly those) no longer with us, and their connections and inter-connections
• LornaPotential - those researched for potential connections
• and some RUNCIMAN data there.

LornaFishing consists only of families I have researched because of DNA matches in the hope of finding yet another descendant of the family who has tested and whose absence or presence of a match will help pinpoint that the researched line is indeed where the match belongs.

Of particular interest:

• Elizabeth CHRYSTAL of Kippen's family - because of a dna match to a descendant of Duncan ROBERTSON and Margaret MILLAR
• John MITCHELL & Elizabeth WILSON of Edinburgh - because of the triangulated dna match to a segment I've inherited from Archibald and Alison (CROSSER) FAIRBAIRN - see prior post
• Some descendants of Matilda Edmonstone TURNER nee McKENZIE - to see if this pinpoints the match to the LEOV extended family - having seemingly ruled out the earlier LEOV/SULLIVAN family  
• The GRAHAMs of Botetourt (VA) - see even earlier posts
• the family of John LOCKHART and Elizabeth JOHNSON marr. 1828 St Ninians, STI

I've still to transfer into LornaFishing some of the families previously researched and published in  LornaPotential as I've decided to separate out general research from DNA match targetted research.

Identically named trees exist on both Ancestry.com and on MyHeritage, for exactly the same purpose, and I make no pretence that the three trees contain the same set of people, but the purpose is identical in all instances.
Fishing.
So if you spot an ancestor in any of the above trees and  have tested your autosomal DNA, do let me know, I'd love to swap notes and compare DNA to see if a match holds up on the lines suspected.

Has DNA testing come up trumps?

Early days yet, but indications are that we may be on the way to proving that Robert FAIRBAIRN,  married to Kate SCOTT and emigrated to Ontario around 1827/8 is indeed a son of Archibald and Alison (CROSSER) FAIRBAIRN.
One of my closer previously unknown DNA matches appears on a segment of dna that I share with a known double cousin (4C1R and 5th, as he descends from both James and from David, sons of Archibald and Alison).
"Do you have any known FAIRBAIRN ancestry" I asked.
"Yes, a Mary Catherine FAIRBAIRN married to Peter Nelson KELLER."
Now I just happen to know that Mary is Robert's granddaughter.

Although I don't yet know how my match links to Mary, or whether there's another line in her ancestry that could account for this match, I'm pleasantly hopeful we're finally on our way to proving my long held theory about Robert being "family".
Updates on Mary's family will now ensue.
Confirmation may shortly be forthcoming as the kit from another descendant of Robert & Kate's is en route back to the lab.
It would still be great to find a direct male line FAIRBAIRN descendant of Robert's willing to do a y_DNA test to quickly and more easily prove this link though!

Moral or medical judgement?

(From an 1866 death certificate)

Found during investigations into a dna match between a descendant of a FAICHNEY/McTAVISH family from Dunblane and two of the extended HENDERSON/McEWAN family tree FamilyFinder participants.

If there are any dna tested descendants from the family of Fergus FAICHNEY and Mary McTAVISH who married at Dunblane in 1842 I'd love to hear from you to help rule in or out that this is the line where the match comes from.

Or, for that matter John McTAVISH and Margaret McDIARMID who married at Killin, Perthshire in 1811.

A few more CLINTON/PARKER dna snippets

Slowly but surely...
Here's an updated chromosome map for the dna segments identifiable as being inherited from the common ancestors of William CLINTON and Jemima PARKER who married in London in 1810.

With many thanks to the two cousins found amongst our matches at 23andme - you have added new segments to the map.
One day this will help us find more about one or other of the ancestors of William and Jemima!

A small increase in knowledge of the map published in June.

Anyone else claiming descent from William and Jemima would be MOST welcome to add to our sum of knowledge.
Order a FamilyFinder kit*, and join the autosomal DNA project FFLornaHen!

* using this link to order gives WikiTree something towards their wonderful free collaborative tree.

For your consideration/support

A message from Andrea that I'm happy to post here to spread the word.
Her own webpates are at http://breastcancernirvana.co.nz/author/andrea-fairbairn/
and provide inspiration to all.
----
Hi everyone

Would you please share this with anyone who you think might be interested or could donate.

http://www.givealittle.co.nz/cause/breastcancernirvana

I am assisting Kiribati set up a Cancer Society and organise effective cancer services either in Kiribati or in the region. Currently there are no treatment options for children with cancer - as well as breast and cervical cancer etc.

I'm heading up to Kiribati in the second week of December and am looking for funding to work there for a week. During that time, we'll create a strategic plan and write funding applications for the major aid donors such as NZ Aid Programme (where I used to work), Australian Aid, USAID, the World Bank, WHO, Japan Aid etc.

Thanks, Andrea

Richardsons of Morebattle

As explained on my  RICHARDSONs of Morebattle page, we are exploring a (very small) subset of the overall RICHARDSON Surname DNA project to tease out connections between the lines listed, and any others that come along, using both Y-DNA and autosomal DNA.

Our knowledge of the y-DNA of one of the lines has just increased by an upgrade from 37 to 67 markers, and the RICHARDSON results page of the DNASurnames Lineages site, has been updated.

Only two tests are now at 67 markers however but at least the representative from the RICHARDSONs of Eckford, and that of William the Dancing Master, are only minimally further apart.
At 37 markers they were at a genetic distance of 5 (GD5), which included 4 faster moving markers, so only distantly related.
At 67 markers that became GD6 by the addition of one more slow moving marker.
So still only rather distantly related - FamilyTree DNA's Time Predictor gives only a 71% probability of a common ancestory within 16 generations.

Jury still out, from lack of sufficient information on whether or not the Dancing Master belongs to James and Margaret (MABON) RICHARDSON as we can't compare apples with apples, they could be a minimum of GD1, or at most, GD7 apart (one tested with the now defunct ancestry yDNA test, the other with FamilyTree DNA).