Military Monday ~ Veterans Day ~ Reunion on Pearl Harbor

 
 
 


My Dad William C. Carrow  BM1 USN was my hero through life. He served here on the USS Hopping DE -155 where he was a plank holder.

The USS Hopping made nine convoy crossings of the Atlantic Ocean before being sent to the Pacific. While in the Pacific, she withstood numerous Japanese air attacks as well as at least one concealed enemy shore battery. Dad was offered the opportunity to apply for a medal for his effort to secure the ship after it was torpedoed. He never filled out the papers saying "Someone had to do it".

My Uncle Francis Faunt served on the USS Cony DD-508 as a Torpedoman.  Cony was launched Christmas Day 1942 and then escorted a convoy from  Norfolk VA to Nouméa, New Caldedonia, where she arrived 27 January 1943.

From online chronology from sailors onboard I find that this file picture is the Cony in Pearl Harbor apparently in 1944. "Cony received two bomb hits on her main deck, and these with a near miss killed 8 of her men, wounded 10, and caused considerable damage. She was towed into Port Purvis for emergency repairs. She sailed from Port Purvis 4 May for Majuro and Pearl Harbor May 6th 1944.

So it seems that the joyous reunion between my Dad and my Uncle Franny which was joined by Faunt cousins Gilbert Earle and George Wilson at Pearl Harbor happened between May 6th and June 15, 1944. Family!!

2020- New Year New Me- Understanding my ethnicity better ~ Wales~

I  have not been blogging recently- a year for this blog it seems.. In 2003 when I started working with my ancestry, I knew little. With the advent of DNA, at about the same time that I found an Irish  researcher, I made exponential gains in at least my maternal ancestors. DNA and Irish Records becoming digitized helped a lot, and my Faunt Swanson line was really not hidden.

My  father's maternal line was visible also, Carrow and Edenfield anyway were there for the taking in Delaware and Maryland. Kirwan  and Sweeney eventually followed suit in New Jersey records.

Dad's biological father was never known to him but some things must have been known. Rumors were his father was an  uncle, or his stepfather, both of which have been discounted. Another rumor, ( Mom let things leak from time to time), was that Grandmother had more children and they went away somewhere.

I had seen some close cousins with DNA ( 1st-2nd) that had both Kirwan and Carrow ancestors, which brought their parents down to 2 people, Grandmom or her brother. Those people never answered messages about themselves but this time last year one of them did. Oh My! Sister and I had had aunts, 2 of them. both younger than Dad.

This huge breakthrough allowed me to begin to streamline Dad's bio father, who was NOT his sisters' father. My large amount of Welsh  matches is leading me to be able to know at least my  3rd and 4th Grandparents who were from Wales. They are shared with upwards of 15 fairly close cousin matches ( 3-4th) who live in Wales and even speak Welsh.

Ancestry ThruLines and Angharad James Pritchard sister of Owen David

Very excited with Ancestry DNA ThruLines.. Sister and I have about 19% Welsh.. How is that possible? Our distant Carrow line matches are quite tangled both in Delaware Welsh Tract and Wales.. Angharad James is a sister of Owen David (Dafydd) a known ancestor who had Fox Hall Plantation..
Angharad James and her husband William Pritchard are pivotal to maybe 50 DNA matches to Wales.. People who still live in Wales.. Amazing!!
So as I search.. Thrulines lets me click on my matches AncestryName to see if we match..It is awesome..

Wales DNA matches and what they can mean - An expert's compilation

Sister and I share an enormous amount of Welsh cousins.. Four 4th cousins came in just in a week.. Colin and Rees Roberts and Dilys Parker have long been matches from 23andme but it seemed sort of flukey..

Where do they fit?
They have to fit in the Carrow line.. and NONE of our many Carrow DNA Cousins share them( so excited I have them) so maybe it is our Grandfather. This is why we do DNA.
Many of them come from here Pwllheli Caernarvonshire




AncestryDNA with it's over 5 million matches have given us Janet Inglis  Haydn Eryl Hughes, Annwen Hughes,Dylan Fôn Thomas and so on..

We ( Sister and I )each have TWO Geographic Communities from Wales with 40 or more cousin matches.. I also have 2 from Ireland  and Sister has 3 from Ireland..


Blaine Bettinger has shared these tables with the ISOGG Facebook group.. a compilation of many of us and this year's version

DNA Trail back to Wales - Tracking it all

                                             Old Carrow Farm - Idalia Manor
For my DNA friends and rellies..I may go ahead and blog this also as it seems important.My sister Carol Bodofsky ( my DNA buddy) and I have a LOT of DNA matches in Wales..
 Yes the Carrow family is heavily Welsh between 1750-1840 but other cousins do not have all this Welsh..

Sister and I only have inherited about 15-17% of our DNA from our paternal grandfather.. (Which we knew before the 23ANDme test in 2009- from DNA Tribes c. 2008) my father's father who we assume is from Norway.. That leaves 34-35% of DNA inherited from Elizabeth Agnes Carrow..seen here as a young lady on Risnor Row..

We also share a good amount of Carrow matches to Baltimore cousins from Clara Carrow Friemiller..
 Clara and her mother Margaret Edenfield share MitoDNA( female) with her mother Hannah.. who may or may not be a Worters.. the 1870 census calls her Worters but she was married to Edenfield then so is that accurate? None of us know or have been able to figure it out..

Paternal grandmother matches are particularly good for inheritance..( X markers come from there)
 I feel pretty sure now that Hannah, wife of Thomas Edenfield must have been Welsh or 1/2 Welsh and sister and I inherited a lot of that..

To that end I tested with Living_DNA and am waiting for results.. it is Welsh UK in origin..

My close Carrow match this weekend shares matches back to Baltimore cousins also, more so than other directions..

 Tamyr and I also share those matches although she is NOT heavily Welsh..
 Sister and I have been given TWO Welsh communities at AncestryDNA which seems significant.. 

A good puzzle for a rainy week..

Elizabeth Agnes Carrow - Risnor Row Penns Grove NJ

Wisdom Wednesday ~ Fully Identical DNA matches from Full Siblings as seen at 23andme ~ Great Upgrade !

Important update to 23andme the only testing company who does this.. Ron and Peter shown here.. and at bottom Carol and myself
 The X is particularly telling for brothers 
 We’ve updated DNA Relatives and Share and Compare to show full and half-IBD (identical by descent) segments of DNA. You can see completely identical (purple) and half-identical (pink) segments on the Compare page, which you can access by clicking on any of your DNA Relatives matches, or on any of your sharing connections in Share and Compare. 

You won’t share fully-identical segments with all of your matches. Full siblings share a combination of fully-identical (purple) and half-identical (pink) segments. Fully-identical refers to stretches of the genome where the two siblings match each other on both pairs of the chromosome - both siblings inherited the same segment of DNA from both their mother and father. The relationship pictured is between two full sisters. Since half-siblings only share one parent, they will only see half-identical (pink) segments. 

March 16 update: Full and half-IBD segments are now also shown in the DNA view of DNA Relatives

Thrifty Thursday - Family Tree DNA now accepting autosomal DNA transfers from new AncestryDNA and 23andMe tests ~

Everyone who has been waiting for new AncestryDNA transfers and new 23andme (V4) here it is.. it seems to be free but then to get "everything" it is $19..

 I would go for the $19 for sure 

Here is what I just received..

Dear Project Administrators,

You’ve all been waiting for it, and it’s finally here - transfers for 23andMe© V4 and AncestryDNA™ V2 files!

Here are the details, point by point.

•Customers can now transfer 23andMe© V4 and AncestryDNA™ V2 files in addition to the 23andMe© V3 and AncestryDNA™ V1 files that Family Tree DNA accepted previously. MyHeritage and Genographic transfers will be supported in the coming weeks.

•Family Tree DNA still does not accept 23andMe© processed prior to November 2010. A Family Finder test will need to be purchased.

  

•23andMe© V3 and AncestryDNA™ V1 now receive a full list of matches and the ability to use the Matrix feature FOR FREE. For only $19, the customer can unlock the Chromosome Browser, myOrigins, and ancientOrigins.

  Here is a link where you can read about it.. https://www.familytreedna.com/…/family-tree-dna-family-fin…/

Remember that I do have the Carrow, Faunt, Rementer and Lower Delmarva   surname groups that you are welcome to join..

MyHeritage matches- Where? How?

Yesterday  I was notified that I had matches at My Heritage. And so I did- 473 at this time. Many of them are said to be 3rd cousins..

 A very respected blogger has an excellent blog at ISOGG today  where she says she  is having difficulty finding most of her matches at the 3 main testing sites. 
Nor am I finding mine and many are said to be 3rd cousin  or 3C1x removed..Not at FTDNA,23andme,AncestryDNA or even Gedmatch.

I suspect their imputing needs work. They had this to say on their blog: "MyHeritage has created and refined the capability to read the DNA data files that you can export from all main vendors and bring them to the same common ground, a process that is called imputation. Thanks to this capability — which is accomplished with very high accuracy "

The matches remind me of what I have found at DNA Land. although I have only 4 there.


I will qualify this to say that I have purposefully made my tree at their site as less than 250 to keep it free.. so I cannot contact anyone but I CAN see their trees and their names.. and I am not finding them..

Tuesday's Tip - genetic generational sharing

Importantly for my DNA and Genetic research into my family..( it's a rainy day so no outside work) is the fact that each of us unless we are twins receive 50% of our genome from our parents but NOT the same 50%..

 Here is my sister Carol Bodofsky and me genetically from a start up but scientifically valid place..DNAland..frequesnted by all the experts

This is why I am testing sister at AncestryDNA where they are going towards 3 million testers. We will have about 20 % different 4th cousins.. a lot!

Thank you, Sister Carol Bodofsky 

Also this is why "we" ( Genetic Genealogists) all struggle with the idiosyncrasies of the 3 major testing companies and utilize Gedmatch and hang out at the same places..

Back to these pictures.. Sister and I share a whopping 50.4% of our genome with each other..same two parents..full siblings.. and so on..

The difference is that our grandparent share is different.. so what our parents got from THEIR parents is different.

That of course is why we also, when possible share with first and second cousins.. they got some different genome pieces from their parents..

Children and grandchildren confirm the inheritance from grandparents.. I have tested 3 of them and get 22.9%, 23.1% and 17.1 %.. quite different..I was astonished but that was early in autosomal testing.. Sister and I were said to share only 15 and 17% from our Norway grandfather ..Norway apparently is a "crapshoot"..

 Our grandparent was born in Saami territory north of the Arctic Circle on the border with Russia and Finland.

It's all exciting to me.. Guess that shows..

Tuesday Tip - Making a DNA ONLY Family Tree

                                         
                           My DNA only public Family Tree

AncestryDNA requires a family tree for any success, a reason that I was dragged kicking and screaming to test there. As they pass 1.5 million testers I know that I was wrong in that - but AncestryDNA still has a downside. The downside is that there is no chromosome browser so what segment you inherited from a common ancestor cannot be checked. Presumably that is their own internal "control issue" so that there is less criticism of their matching.

They also came out with a "New " Ancestry genealogy software.. another thing that many of us "old timers" at DNA testing objected to. The visuals were disturbing but OH!! They were correct about the matching being state of the art!

So this month  they came out with a NEW visual change which allows one to choose the color background for trees. Great job, Ancestry! I chose plum after looking them over carefully.
 Here it is:  
http://blogs.ancestry.com/ancestry/2016/03/01/ancestry-product-update-tree-color-preferences/

About the Tree..Yes it is really necessary..What I have done in the interest of some privacy of records is to make an "Ancestry ONLY Tree" which of course is public. Other trees I have and working trees are still PRIVATE and invitation only.

I do not have my children and their relationships in this tree..It goes out 6-7 generations and I only add collateral relatives ( siblings, aunts, cousins) when DNA matches have indicated I should.

Surname Saturday - My 2016 Brickwall on Swanson Street

                                                    My 2016 Brick Walls
I have been working on brick walls in my line this week and will continue to do so. Another researcher has blogged about hers- what a good idea! 

With all DNA tests I have about 5586 cousin matches at the three main sites. That does NOT include matches that my sister and first and second cousins have that I did not inherit. Wow a lot of folks! So why do I have a brick wall?

Charles Swanson is my 3rd great grandfather. That information was not known in my family when I began working on my genealogy 13 years ago. The family tale was that we were the "Colonial Swedes" Swanson line- like Gloria Dei Church? Swanson Street? See that picture up there?

Well what I found was an Andrew Swanson and a Charles Swanson living in Philadelphia in Southwark by the early 1800s. Charles Swanson was a river pilot and called "Captain" who died on his vessel in August 1849 of cholera. At that time my John Swanson was living in Beverly NJ as were two other men, Edward and William Swanson.

Were they all related? No one at that time really knew. The widow of Captain Swanson, Letitia, maiden name unknown, was living in Southwark with three daughters, a son in law and two grandchildren. Two other sons were living in Philadelphia.

Andrew Swanson, who likely is brother to Charles, is a merchant with one daughter. Charles Swanson names a son Andrew and both are from Sweden. Andrew, born in Goteborg Sweden, interestingly enough, was impressed off a British ship which explains how he got to US. This:  " Peter Coleman and Andrew Swanson, both Swedes, were impressed at Port Royal, Jamaica, on the 8th September 1796 from on board the Brigantine Betsey, by his Britannic Majesties ship Alfred . Samuel Holt of Philadelphia was Captain of Betsy and was affiliated with Old Swedes Church"

For sure I know now, that Charles and Andrew are related, as between my first and second cousins, myself and my sister,  we have  about 15 DNA 4th and 5th cousin matches with descendants of an older brother of  John Swanson and also a younger sister. Proof!

The problem is this: What was Letitia Swanson's maiden name? Do any of these DNA matches come from her line wherever that is from? Her older  and younger sons sometimes say she is from Sweden and sometimes say that she is from New Jersey but speaks Swedish. The "Colonial Swedes" idea again.

Was she  from an early Swedish family? A Swedish researcher has indicated to me that it is quite likely as this was very early for Swedish emigration. Our family is NOT the original Swansons who settle in the Valley.

I need help. Who is Letitia? These names come up on DNA matches whose family is in Burlington County or Gloucester County NJ: Matlack, Holt, Horton, Dalbow, Mattson, Engle.
Any thoughts? Please let me know.

Those Places Thursday - My DNA matches to Wales - Wilds,David,Rees,Jones,Tilton and Carrow

I have three( at the very least)  4th cousin DNA matches to men who still live in the UK and we ( Jones,Kitson,Stanley)  have puzzled to figure this out.. 4th cousin is close ancestrally but if the families are interrelated it can look like that..
We do know as we all four share the same segment of DNA that we share an ancestor..

New research in the form of Delaware Land Records have gotten me back further and more definitive emigrations times: 


"In 1703 they removed to the land purchased by them in Pencader Hundred, and built a meeting-house on the site of the present church. In the same year the membership was increased by the addition of Thomas John, and Rebecca, from Wales; and by profession of faith and baptism, John Wild, Thomas Wild,  Samuel Wild..."

and.." Evan Rees and James Howell were the heads of 
 two Welsh Baptist families who settled in Duck 
 Creek hundred in 1733, having come hither, with 
 others (James Hyatt, Nathaniel Wilds, David Evan, 
 David Rees, Evan David Hughs and Joshua Ed- 
 wards), from the Welsh Tract in Pencader hundred, 
 and were members of that church. (Morgan Ed- 
 wards's ''History of the Baptists in Delaware.") 
 According to this historian, the first emigration 
 from the Welsh Tract into Duck Creek hundred 
 took place in the year 1733."

My John Carrow born in 1783 is thus mostly Welsh.. South Wales..

Wisdom Wednesday - A Genie Friend's Tip- Delaware Land Records at Ancestry - Joshua and Nathaniel Wilds

Joshua and Nathaniel Wilds

February 1739 

My John Carrow lives on Nathaniel Wilds plantation and we think due to that that his wife is Jean( Jane) Wilds. He is entitled to rents from that land, however how and why Joshua Wilds comes there has been shrouded in mists. This shows some clarity and also sheds light on his ancestry as this land record indicates that the older Nathaniel Wilds in Pencader Hundred is his brother. 

William Carrow his uncle is born in New Castle County which had also been a puzzle. Light is beginning to dawn for me as I read how Joshua got into Kent County. They are Welsh Tract Welsh.

"John Kirkpatrick is witness to a 17 May 1735 deed between Nathaniel Wilds,
sadler of Newcastle County upon Delaware, PA and Joshua Wilds, farmer, of 
Cecil County."

Mary Wilds - 28 May 1733- St.Maryanne's Parish, Cecil Maryland to Joshua Wilds  and Ruth.

" Deed 23 Nov. 1739. Ruth Wild of Kent Co., Widow & Admin of hr husband
 Joshua Wild, dcd, also Admin of her brother-in-law Nathaniel Wild dcd.,
 and Esther Lewis of Pencader Hd in NCC for 23 pounds sold to Benjamin
 Elder of Mill Creek Hd in sd Co., their share of messuage tract cont
 150 acres sit. in Pencader Hd. Formerly belonged to David THOMAS
 dcd... by Thomas' Last Will, 3/4 of sd Messuage tract was made over to
 afsd Joshua Wild, Nathaniel Wild & Esther Lewis. Bounds land of John
 England, dcd David Jones, John Evans dcd, Benjamin Cooke and Joseph
 Brown. Signed Ruth Wild, Esther Lewis. Wits John Griffith, Thos James
 Rob Birney.

Those Places Thursday- Delmarva from where exactly?

 As I get older ( this week a milestone birthday) I am particularly interested in knowing where, perhaps 1,000 years ago, my ancestors lived. John Edenfield and William his brother who find their way to Kent County Delaware near Dover at their deaths. They are said to be born in Ovendon Yorkshire and their father and grandfather dies near Halifax Yorkshire

Rebecca  French Wilson who married  a cousin Thomas Wilson and was widowed then marries John Edenfield and becomes son-in-law to William Winsmore who had the estate called"Pipe Elm".

Rebecca's mother Elizabeth was a French who had children with her first husband Matthew Wilson and a daughter Mary with her 2nd husband William Winsmore a prominent planted and settler.

"Wilson, Mathew Of Somerset County, by 1672 transported himself, Elizabeth, his wife, Cornelius Scull, John Collinson, William Thompson, Joseph Thompson, & Mathew Wilson and  Wilson, and By 1667 transported himself, Elizabeth his wife & Elizabeth his daughter"

"Deposition. Christopher Cockram aged about 49 years being legally sworn, saith that about 23 years ago he did live then on the plantation that had been Thomas Willson's being pt/o a tr of land called Great Pipelm, then in possession of John Edenfield who intermarried Rebecca, widow & relict of Thomas Willson, & this deponent saith that about the time afsd there happened a difference about the bounds between Richard Nixon & the afsd John Edenfield who said that as Richard Nixon had possett on his land, that he would press & have his quantity of land out of the land of William Winsmore, who carried said John Edenfield unto a black oak standing near a swamp (sw from said tree, now dead, standing nw by n 21 ft from a white oak, this day marked by Samuel Galloway for Joshua Nickerson & George Hart & George Robisson parties concerned in order to perpetuate their bounds) & that said Wm Winsmore at the time, about 23 years ago, said in this deponent's hearing unto John Edenfield that the dead black oak before mentioned was the first bounded tree of his land & that he could not come any farther into his land & farther saith that said Wm Winsmore brought Benjamin Shurmer to survey the trs of land in dispute who begun the first butt at the black oak now dead, and further saith not. Before me Jno David. Attest. Jno Housman re "

Military Monday - Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.

Medals were framed by his nephew James Gunn Ingram and sent back to Scotland to his namesake, Ian Robert Gunn.

Private Robert Gunn, January 24, 1944, Monte Cassino Italy. Robert Gunn worked for the Railroad and had a deferment but volunteered to enlist. He was a private in the York and Lancaster Regiment and received the UK Army Roll of Honor.

Between 17 January and 18 May, Monte Cassino and the Gustav defences were assaulted four times by Allied troops, the last involving twenty divisions attacking along a twenty-mile front.    The German defenders were finally driven from their positions, but at a high cost. The capture of Monte Cassino tolled some 55,000 Allied casualties, with German losses being estimated at around 20,000 killed and wounded.

Louis G. Carrow was my Great Uncle, my Grandmother's younger brother and also died in Italy. He was 18 years old when he died in Nettuno Italy serving in 7th Infantry Regt. Third Infantry Division. He  was reinterred in Baltimore National Cemetery in 1948.

George Patrick Faunt was also my Great Uncle, a much younger brother of my Grandfather Edward Faunt. He was born in Penns Grove New Jersey in 1918 and  also died in Italy in 1944. He left  a widow who gave birth to his posthumous son 4 months later and his widowed mother.

Eternal rest, grant unto them O Lord, may perpetual light shine upon them, and may they rest in peace ~

New Ancestors You Tell Me? No proof? Is this an April fool trick?

After a neat overnight getaway, I came back to find I had a new ancestral couple from AncestryDNA..Really? Where can this couple fit? I am not all all sure although they tell me this:


"Your DNA matches the DNA of members of the Salathiel Lacy Houk DNA Circle. Because you match DNA with this group, there is a good chance (about 50%) you could be a descendant of Salathiel Lacy Houk."

..And they are telling me that this is proven because I have a strong match to 3 of the 5 people listed below.
They seem to be proving this via some sketchy looking trees which at least  3 people have different relatives in.
My Circle above to Francis and Catherine Rementer  works better BUT one of those 4 people has an incorrect ancestor and is not  descended directly from Francis or his wife.So they are basing this on what? Other people's incorrect trees?
WHICH Ancestor is it linked to,surely not both as we inherit from one ancestor and not a pair?

So  I think they laid an egg on this one. A chromosome browser would have cleared up this big mystery for sure.

I cannot find anyone in this tree any where at all. This line of Houk's seem to move directly from Berks County PA to Tennessee and then Texas? Cotton farmers it is said in this catchy little anecdotal blurb they have shared with me.

The problem is that ALL of my own ancestors have remained in either the Delaware Valley or the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay. Collateral relatives of my ancestors would not be my relatives would they?

I have responded on the appropriate Beta form, so I sincerely hope that Ancestry corrects this unworkable exercise and cleans up their act. They have such a large database that they could do so well with  just a few tools.

Tuesday's Tip - Fishing in all 3 major DNA pools ~ When the tide rises all the boats will float~

AncestryDNA has  32 pp matches for me ( about 1900) and 30 matches are 4th cousin or closer.. 3 of those are 2nd and 3rd..Note.. TWO known to me 3rd cousins are said to be distant, which is not correct.

14 Leaf hints and one 4 person circle with one of those someone who does NOT share the ancestor with the rest of us although he has not fixed his tree or answered any emails..

 For  23andme I currently have 1206 matches ( I rid myself of some 200 unresponsive distant matches a year or two ago)

10 are close relatives that I have tested.. 8 are 2-3rd cousins ( including the TWO Cousins who tested at Ancestry)

and 449 more or 4th cousins.. 467 total if you include the 18 close matches..

My Sister has MORE 4th cousins.. 526 including the close matches..at 23andme

At FTDNA I have 665 matches TOTAL and 8 are closer than 4th.. most known to me.. and 22 for sure closer than 5th cousins.. then it drops off quickly..

Few of my FTDNA matches have confirmed anything or even gotten back to me..

I am grateful that I have been able to test at all 3 places.. One big brick wall was broken down at AncestryDNA.. and a 2nd success was that the Circle pointed out to me that I had a lot of Rementer cousins who tested there..

The remainder of my successes have been at 23andme..

         

           
         

Surname Saturday ~ Descendants of Peter Rementer ~ No World Tree for me

AncestryDNA is making many many terrible mistakes with their product.Last week they blogged at Roots Tech about their improved Circle which would make Trees unnecessary.

Here is what happens without accurate records. In my only Circle at AncestryDNA I have 4 people. One person does not descend from my Francis X. Rementer at all,but from someone else via this Frederick Rementer. He does not seem to know this although he did once have it in his Tree. This death certificate ( from Ancestry.com) proves it..

Everyone is moving towards a One World Tree which has vast and awful implications I think..

I am not cooperating with anything besides my own basic lines. I started to put a Tree on Family Search.org but they started to load incorrect information so I took it out.. and they reprimanded me saying that I had removed other people's information..which was untrue.

" Dear Kathleen Carrow Ingram,

According to our research, you have recently deleted more than 25 records from Family Tree. Deleting records that you have not contributed will affect family history work of others...
Just as a reminder, Family Tree is an open-edit, collaborative system.  There are no private records or pedigrees in Family Tree, except those records of living individuals that you create...  If you wish to have private records of your ancestors, we suggest you use a personal computer program that is not online"

What I actually DID do is to delete a Tree that I was building on my own sign in at their site. Shame on me!!

My personal rant on Surname Saturday!

Shopping Saturday - Choices in Family Trees

Family Trees are a bit confusing.. 

My Heritage for me is free at this point in time but to confirm anything it wants to upgrade to Premium.. I only intend to have a tree less than 250 nodes( people?) so that it remains free.. so I cannot ever confirm anything..and just at 23andme.. if they expand it, I will expand it but for right now it does not allow me.. I do have all of my genetic relatives attached to the 23andme tree.. 11 of us connected..

Others use Familysearch.org.. Can it stay private? Does anyone have a Tree there? Thinking about that one also since record search is free..

However Ancestry.com which is decidedly NOT Free and that I pay through the nose to use as World Deluxe ( Irish and UK records) is likely what I will stay with..

My Tribal Pages Tree may remain but I am NOT going to upgrade to premium this year as Ancestry.com has my major Tree..

Who else has something else?

There is a Tree of sorts at FamilyTreeDNA but it is not a good one I don't think..
 I should go and look and make sure the Gedcom is current.. which it probably is NOT

Software does not work for me..Twice I purchased Family Tree Maker and it crashed completely..
 I do have the free Legacy software that also lets me keep records but if my computer crashed then that crashes also..

SOOO Ancestry.com it is for now..

Surname Saturday - Kirwans of Borris, County Carlow, and the DNA pile up regions

AncestryDNA has a very large database, second only to 23andme which is why I finally tested my own genome there in 2104, kicking and screaming the whole way. 

I received my results back Easter weekend and was very pleasantly surprised to identify a known Carrow descendant, and her brother as my 4th cousin. At some point I realized I had cousins in this database who  shared my Kirwan/Sweeny line. 

There were other matches, not surprisingly, since I had at that point more than 11,500 matches.Eventually that amount topped out over 13,000 a ludicrous amount.A long anticipated and discussed "correction" of these matches, the majority of which were supposedly "IBS" or Identity by State was to happen late in 2014. IBD means we inherit genes from a parent and IBS essentially means  they could be not ancestral at all.

This correction when it occurred left me with 11% of the matches that I had 5 minutes before. This fact is known because Ancestry saved the whole big mess from before as a download. I was able to look and see that one Kirwan cousin was my match  #865 and his son #866 prior to the match. After the correction they moved up to #11 and #14 and jumped into my field of vision.

Other persons moved down  in hierarchy ( if there is a hierarchy based on relatedness) and  of course 89% of those matches disappeared. I sadly waved goodbye to some small Carrow matches and a few Fant from Virginia matches, who I never felt could be real anyway. My Kirwan  3rd cousin with a known ancestral ties to me moved from #24 to #57 and he tells me that I was once quite high on his list and now #27. He is still my third cousin of course but it is important to look at all changes and try to understand them.

AncestryDNA's white paper discusses ancestral "pile ups" and as an attempt to visualize them I went into Gedmatch today and posted the result of MATCHES ABOVE IN BLUE. Some of it I do see here or what I think it is because one of my Kirwan cousins is on here in an area begun and dominated by my Faunt cousin Francis. Odd as I do know that these cousins do not share my Limerick Faunts or my Donegal Dugans with me. 

I am concluding at his moment that some of these segments are as a result of very very old DNA from Ireland, surely an example of "by state", in this case the SNPs are pointing to a shared ancestral region shared by many. I also realize that this is not an accurate representation of "pile ups" but since Gedmatch came up today I took a peek at the segments I was questioning.

AncestryDNA does not yet market their product in the UK so it is possible their algorithm has excluded or included certain ancestral populations or is skewed in some other fashion not yet clear to me. 23andme has begin their UK and Canadian marketing push and they will incorporate some of the "nodes" of ancestral couple in their collaboration with My Heritage which has begin it's work.