2020 52Anc. Wk 4: Maud Emily Alice DOWDING

Let me introduce you to my grandmother, Maud Emily Alice DOWDING.  This photograph of her was taken in 1915, when she was aged 19.

She was born on the 7th September 1896, the fourth of seven children to Charles Henry DOWDING and Minnie Louisa HARRISON.  Her siblings were Charles Christopher George, Horace Charles, Minnie Ellen, Glencoe Roberts, Ethel Sophia, and Rose Harriet.  Five of the children, including Maud, were christened at Saint Anne's, Westminster, Middlesex, England, in Maud's case, on the 27 Sep 1896.  The other two children were christened in Lambeth.

I don't know much about Maud's childhood or upbringing.  Although I have not found school details for her, she signed her own name on her marriage certificate, and as a witness for the marriage of at least one of her siblings, so she clearly had some level of education.  But, in 1901, neither of the two children at home (Charles aged 8, and Maud, recorded as "Emilie", aged 4) were shown as being at school - but then nor were any children on nearby schedules, so perhaps the enumerator only noted occupations.

From my mother's accounts of her own upbringing, Maud didn't appear to value education very much - at least, not for a girl - as Nana didn't seem very bothered about sending Mum to school on time!  My grandfather worked nights, delivering newspapers, and it appears Maud often kept my mother up in the evenings for company and then they didn't get up early in the morning, so as not to disturb Grandad.

As a result, in order to avoid being told off for being late, Mum would then skive the rest of the morning school, frequently just playing in the park, and turn up for the afternoon session instead - assuming, of course, that when she went home for lunch, Maud actually had some food in and didn't need to go to the shops first.

If that was the case, well, that was a whole day off school!

In 1911, Maud, aged 15, is shown as working in a "Tobaca Factory".  It seems likely she remained at the same factory until her marriage to John William Frederick ALLEN in 1926, since she is described on her marriage certificate as a "Tobacco stripper", and the family were still living at 27 Pratt Street, Lambeth, where they had been in 1911.

Maud and John on their wedding day in 1926

Once married, John and Maud moved out to a council house in Dagenham and, five years later, my mother was born.  I think the following picture, with 'Jack', the family dog, would have been taken at around that time.

Maud passed away on the 12th March 1971.

Sources
Ancestry.com. England, Select Births and Christenings, 1538-1975 [database on-line].
Ancestry.com. London, England, Church of England Births and Baptisms, 1813-1917 [database on-line]
1901 Class: RG13; Piece: 101; Folio: 7; Page: 6
1911 Class: RG14; Piece: 1965

2020 52Anc. Wk 3: John William Frederick ALLEN (or was it John Frederick William ALLEN?)

This post is about my grandfather, John William Frederick ALLEN.  There's so much to record about the ancestors we actually knew, and I am already behind with the "52 ancestors in 52 weeks" so I am going to keep this fairly short and just introduce the key facts.  I am sure I shall be returning to John many times!

John William Frederick ALLEN, with 'Jack'

John was born on 17 February 1892, in Bethnal Green, London.

He was the second of four children to John Prosser ALLEN jnr and Caroline NAYLOR.  His siblings were Amelia Bessie, Albert Edward and Robert.

Their names caused some confusion for my mother, when she first began her family history research.  Amelia had always been "Aunty May", and her uncles had always been referred to as "Bert" and "Bob".  It might seem obvious now which is which but, when starting from the shortened versions, especially "Bert", which can represent several names, the early research was not easy.

And, of course, they are all common first names.  Combined with a fairly common surname, as well, identifying the correct civil registration entries was quite a problem for Mum - in fact, it is only since the advent of the GRO's own online indexes, with the inclusion of mother's maiden names before 1911, that I have finally managed to identify Albert's birth registration.

Even my mother's Dad's name caused her an issue when she was younger - it was discovered that, whilst he always seemed to be known as "John William Frederick" and that is what is on my grandparents' marriage certificate, his birth certificate actually shows his name as "John Frederick William".

Thinking that this might mean the marriage was not legal, I gather Mum asked, "Does that make me a b......?"

She told me that comment earned her a "clip round the ear"!

We all have our own perspectives on other people, based on our experiences.  To me, my grandfather was a happy man - in all the photographs, he seems to be smiling and having a good time.  I have memories of him and others together in my grandparents' house, larking around on an out of tune piano, (frequently singing a song that involved “more beer”!)

He passed away in 1967, when I was still a child.

So it was only when I was older, speaking to Mum about her experiences growing up, that I learnt about other aspects of his life and possibly why there might have been more to the "more beer" song.

Grandad fought in the 1st World War.  He had actually enlisted before the war, in 1909 and served with the Colours for three years before being transferred to the Reserve.  He was then mobilised and served again from 1914 - 1919.  For some reason, he was recalled to the Colours again in 1921 and served for another five months. 

At some stage, he met his first wife, although he didn't marry her until their son was almost four.  Sadly, she died in 1918, of TB, barely nine months after the wedding.  John was serving in Salonika at the time - Mum believed he did try to get home, but was told by his officer "there's no point, she'll be dead by the time you get there".  And when he asked what would happen to his son, he was reportedly told not to worry - he'd be put into an orphanage!

Fortunately, John's son was not put into an orphanage, but looked after by John's parents - but would it be any surprise if Grandad felt bitter towards those in charge?

I don't know when John met my grandmother, Maud Emily Alice DOWDING, but they were married in 1926.  My mother was their only child.  She's passed on a few stories of her childhood, being brought up by 'older' parents, and effectively as an only child, since her half brother was seventeen years older than her.  But they can wait until another time.

John William Frederick ALLEN with his daughter.

52 Ancestors Week 2: Favourite Photo

Back in 2018, when I first attempted the "52 Ancestors in 52 weeks", the topic for week 2 was "Favourite Photo", just as it is for week 2 of 2020 (and, yes, I know it's now the end of Week 4.  Stuff happens!).  Although I probably won't be using all of the suggested topics for my posts through the year, it's funny that I get to use the same photograph this year:

This is a photograph of my grandparents, Donald and Elsie PARRY, taken at a special wedding anniversary.  My 2018 post had concentrated on my grandfather, Donald, but my second post this year was always intended to be about my grandmother, Elsie May, formerly THOMAS, and her family.  So it seems ideal to include this photograph again now.

In some ways, I feel I missed out on getting to know my Nana.  With my Dad in the RAF, we'd moved away from the area where Nana and Grandad lived when I was six, and only "day visited" for most of the time after that.  Talking to one of my cousins recently, she revealed how it had been Nana who taught her how to knit.  I can just imagine the relationship such shared activities would have created.

I do remember seeing Nana knitting - she was one of those ladies who could hold one needle under her arm as she knitted, which is a very fast and efficient method of knitting, unlike my own technique, which takes me quite a while to finish anything.

Elsie was born in 1902, in Collington, Herefordshire.  She was the fourth of ten children to George THOMAS and Rose Hannah HAYNES.   Her siblings were Edith, Ernest, Hilda, Ada, Matilda, Emily, George, Olive and Dorothy.

What were the conditions that she grew up in?  George THOMAS was described as a "farmer" when Elsie was born, which might conjure up an image of a fairly comfortable life, in a landowning family.  But, for the births of subsequent children between 1904 - 1915, his occupation appears on their birth certificates as "General Labourer", which creates a rather different image, one of someone lacking skills and maybe just taking any work that's available. 

The truth is probably somewhere in-between those two images.  In 1901, his occupation was given as "Ordinary Agricultural Labourer".  The school admission register entries for six of the children over the same time period as the above births describe him as a farmer, with a seventh entry recording his occupation as "Woodman". In 1911, he's a "Farm Labourer" and when Elsie married Donald PARRY in 1927, her father was described as an "Agricultural Labourer".  Finally, in 1939, he appears as a "Farm Labourer retired*. 

So the overall picture painted is neither that of a well-to-do landowning farmer, nor one of an unskilled labourer, but of someone employed working on the land, carrying out a range of farming tasks, all of which probably required a certain level of skill, but also, potentially, could have been for the same employer for many years, providing stability for the family. 

In such circumstances, though, I imagine the family didn't have much spare money and all of the children would have grown up helping out in some way, at least until they were old enough to earn money through other means.  For example, in 1911. Elsie's oldest sister, Edith, aged 14, appears to be working as a domestic servant for a PRICE family in Bromyard.*

However, from the National School Admission Registers & Log-Books 1870-1914 on FindMyPast, I know that the first seven children, at least, attended the Tedstone Wafer School (the last three would have begun after 1914, when the online records end). So they were clearly educated, and in some cases, beyond what appears to be the leaving age for compulsory education*.  Elsie herself started at the school on the 17 March 1908, just before her sixth birthday, and left on the 18 June 1915, when she was 13.

I have no evidence for what work Elsie might have done in the twelve years between then and when she married, and there is no occupation given for her on the marriage certificate.  However, according to my Dad, she was employed as a children's nanny at the time she met Donald.  As with many women, their work after marriage goes largely unrecorded but I am sure she was involved in many instances of working on the land, particularly during harvest times, so the "Unpaid domestic duties" reported in the 1939 register is probably a wholly inadequate description of her activities.

I remember my mother (brought up in Dagenham, so very much a "townie") being in awe of Nana's practical abilities (especially her ability to walk to the hen house and have a chicken caught, killed, and half plucked even before she got back up the garden path!) 

So my image of my grandmother remains one of a very practical, and hard working, country lady.


* Sources
1901: RG13/2491/8/7
1911 (Elsie as "Elise") Class: RG14; Piece: 15795; Schedule Number: 20
1911 (Edith) Class: RG14; Piece: 15787; Schedule Number: 50
1939: (George) RG101/5813J
1939: (Elsie) RG 101/5807I

It seem unclear from online sources whether compulsory education ended at 10, 12 or 14 during 1900 - 1918, eg

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raising_of_school_leaving_age_in_England_and_Wales

https://study.com/academy/lesson/school-leaving-age-in-britain-history.html

https://www.parliament.uk/about/living-heritage/transformingsociety/livinglearning/school/overview/1914-39/

Genetic Networks (simple ones!)

Isn’t it great when a new ‘4th cousin & closer’ appears, and you can see this amongst the shared matches:

Four other matches, who all seem to share one suggested line.  I may not have identified the 'most recent common ancestor' yet (the suggested "HARLAND" line comes from a surname & location in common with one of the matches), but this ‘clustering’ gives me something to work on (ie the potential connections between each of the matches), as well as helps me to focus on the part of my own tree that seems most likely to contain the shared ancestors with all of these matches.

In my view, this use of shared matches to produce networks, or clusters, is one of the most effective methods for making sense of our matches at the DNA companies.  Last year, I led a workshop at the Family Tree Live show in Alexandra Palace about ‘Genetic Networks and Triangulation’, and have decided it might be helpful for others if I post some of the  information here.

I wrote about my initial foray into networking back in 2017, with the post at http://notjusttheparrys.blogspot.com/2017/08/ancestry-shared-matches-and-new.html

Since then, other methods for using the shared matches have been developed, for example, the Dana Leeds Method of clustering, MyHeritage’s Autoclustering and the auto clustering of the Collins-Leeds Method in the DNAGedcom Client App - all of which are useful tools.*

But I still like the ‘genetic network’ method, which can take account of every shared match, as opposed to many of the clustering methods, which have restrictions on who is in the cluster, eg all the matches in a cluster must match a certain percentage of the other matches in the cluster.  Whilst that might be useful for those people with thousands of close matches, I think, for those of us with only a few hundred, it can cause important clues to be left out.

But what is the theory behind clustering?

We all (hopefully) know that having known relatives tested can help us to narrow down which part of our family tree other matches connect to.  For example, with parents tested, your matches can be divided into paternal and maternal matches, depending on which parent they also match. (There will probably be a few "false positives" on your match list, as well, who match neither parent, but we won't worry about them for now). 

The principle can be extended with other known relatives, for example, if a cousin of my father tested, it narrows down the potential link with a shared match to one of my great grandparent couples

ie a match to both my Dad's cousin and me will either descend from the shared great grandparent couple or from one of their ancestors.  So I can discount 3/4 of my tree, when I look for the shared ancestry.

Even if we don’t have any known relatives tested, the principle can still be applied - and also extended further back up the branches of our family tree

It does get a bit complicated when trying to describe shared matching in terms of descendants of ancestral lines!
But it should be possible to see how people in particular positions in our family tree will only match certain other relatives, depending on which ancestral lines they share.

I think a key question to ask to understand this is "Where has the DNA come from?"  We received our autosomal DNA through all of our ancestral lines.  Our matches will have received their autosomal DNA from all of their ancestral lines.  The only way we can be genuine genealogical matches is if we share an ancestor somewhere so that we both received the 'same' segment(s) of that ancestor's DNA.  Each segment will only have travelled down to us through one of our ancestral lines.  

Some other people who descend from that ancestor will also have received the same segment.  For example, many people are testing siblings, parents and close cousins.  Such a group of close relatives will all match each other and several of them would be likely to share any particular segment.   So (assuming there's enough DNA to be picked up as matches to me), the descendants of a particular shared ancestor will show up as a group of "shared matches" to each other.

This is the principle behind all the "clustering" and "networking" methods of working with our matches. 

With close relatives, matches fall into only a small number of clusters, but the further back we go, the potential number of clusters increases. If we could just look at matches who all share an ancestor with us at one particular generation, we would get neat clusters:

Relationship		Shared Ancestors	‘Ideal’ number of Clusters/Groups
Full siblings		All	1
Half Siblings		One side, paternal or maternal	2
1st cousins		2 grandparents	2
2nd cousins		2 great grandparents	4
3rd cousins		2 great great grandparents	8
4th cousins		2 great great great grandparents	16

But the reality is, there will be overlap between groups when there are relatives from different generations included.  For example, matches at second cousin level will match two separate clusters from third cousin level, whereas people in one of the third cousin clusters will not match those in the other:

There are issues to be aware of - beyond third cousins, it's possible there will not be sufficient DNA in common for cousins to show up as matching each other.  But there is also the added complication that, at some stage, we reach a point where we share multiple common ancestors with some matches.  This means clusters can show as being linked to each other when they don't actually share the same common ancestor.

But the main point is that, if we can identify how a group of our matches all match each other, then that can sometimes help us in identifying how we match them as well.

And this was what I demonstrated at Family Tree Live, using my top 25 matches at Ancestry.

First, I allocated a letter to each match, for privacy.  Then I produced a table showing who amongst those 25 matches matched each other:

Predicted Relationship level		Shared matches
1st Cousin	Match A	B, E, G, L, V, W,
3rd Cousins	Match B	A, E, G, L, N, S, W,
	Match C	Q, T,
	Match D	F, H, I, P, R, Y,
	Match E	A, B, G, L, N, W,
	Match F	D, H, O, P, R, Y,
	Match G	A, B, E, L, N, W,
4th Cousins	Match H	D, F, K, M, O, P, X,
	Match I	D, Y,
	Match J	(only shared matches beyond the first 25)
	Match K	H, M, O,
	Match L	A, B, E, G, N, W,
	Match M	H, K, O, P, X
	Match N	B, E, G, L, W,
	Match O	F, H, K, M, R, X,
	Match P	D, F, H, M, R, X,
	Match Q	C,
	Match R	D, F, O, P,
	Match S	B,
	Match T	C,
	Match U	(only shared matches beyond the first 25)
	Match V	A,
	Match W	A, B, E, G, L, N,
	Match X	H, M, O, P,
	Match Y	D, F, I,

For the workshop, I produced an image showing lettered dots, with no lines joining them up, so that people could have a go at manually producing the network diagram (A relatively simple task, when the numbers of matches are limited - I suggest not trying it manually with hundreds of matches!)

But here is the diagram with lines drawn to show who matches who:

As you can see, the matches fell into three groups of shared matches.  Not everyone in each group matches everyone else, but the groups are separate from each other.

I don't know exactly how I relate to all of the matches - some have not responded to messages, others have no information about their families.  However, by placing those I do know onto my tree, it is possible to get a good idea as to why the matches in each network form the groups they do:

Network 2 appears to all be on my father's side of my family, as all the known matches would have received DNA from ancestors of my paternal grandmother.

Network 1 is on my mother's father's side of my family.  There are six matches who potentially trace back to a NAYLOR family in London in the early 1800s. The NAYLOR line marries into the ALLEN line at my great grandparents level and, of the other five matches in this network, two descend from the ALLEN line prior to the two lines joining, two descend from after the lines join and one is unknown. 

If I removed from the network the two who descend from after the lines join, as well as the unknown match, who also appears to descend from both lines, this network would fall into two separate groups that do not share DNA with each other - matches who descend from the NAYLORs in one and matches who descend from the ALLENs in the other.  Since these matches do not have any ancestry in common, it is not surprising that they do not share any DNA either:

The smaller Network 3 is on my mother's mother's side of my family and can be seen as a similar pattern to Network 2, with a close match who descends from two of my ancestral lines (DOWDING and HARRISON), matching two others who each descend from one of those lines and who therefore do not match each other.

It is not possible to rely solely on the information from DNA networks or clusters - as I have mentioned, multiple common ancestors, and the variable nature of DNA transmission (as well as company policies regarding the thresholds being used for showing shared matches) can mean that some people show as matches who 'shouldn't' (because they share through a different ancestor), or don't show as matches when they 'should' (because the DNA has dropped out, or the quantity of shared DNA is below the company threshold.)  

But hopefully, it is clear that shared matches can provide vital information to help us trace our common ancestry with our matches.  

[And, just in case you're wondering about the lack of matches from my father's father's side, I suspect this is due to a mixture of family structures and the fact DNA testing is still not as popular in the UK as in some other countries.  In the three ancestral lines represented above, my grandparents all had multiple siblings, and recent generations have embraced DNA testing.  Whereas my paternal grandfather only had one sibling and, as far as I am aware, only one of the descendants has tested and that was at a different company.  I do have matches from further back on this, my PARRY line, at several of the other companies - so no worries so far about anybody's parents not being the expected ones. But that is always something one must bear in mind! :-) ].

*

The Dana Leeds Method of clustering - https://www.danaleeds.com/the-leeds-method/

The DNAGedcom Client App (subscription based) - available from https://dnagedcom.com/

Another new "fourth cousin and closer"

Typical, isn't it? 

Just after I posted yesterday that I had a total of 182 '4c & closer' on Ancestry, along comes another one!

I'm not complaining though.  I have been tracking the number of matches I have on Ancestry for some time and the predicted close matches seemed to have stagnated.  This is the first one since the 27th November 2019.

I'd received four matches that month, with three of them being in the first week so, by the end of the month, with only one new addition, there already seemed to be a slowing down of matches.  To then have none at all during December was a bit concerning. 

But perhaps yesterday's is a sign that everyone was just waiting for Christmas.

It will be interesting to see what my graph looks like in a month or so:

 

AncestryDNA - Numbers of "4th cousins and closer"

I was going to make my next post about DNA and Genetic Networks, as I'd like to refer to the networks when writing the "52 ancestors" posts.  However, Ancestry seem to have made a change and I thought I'd write about that instead.

I was alerted to this change yesterday when a 'Help' request was posted on the DNA help for Genealogy (UK) FaceBook Group - the poster had noticed that the number of their Ancestry "4c & closer" matches had suddenly reduced.  Of course, that probably sent all of us to check our own results.

I currently have 182 4c & closer according to my DNA 'landing page':

When I went to the list, it was clear Ancestry has added some new search filters (there was a helpful message telling me about it, and giving an overview of what they were 🙂 ) 

And when I used the filter for the Close matches, it did indeed show me as having less than the 'landing page' shows - 149 instead of 182:

Donna Rutherford, one of the FaceBook Group admins, said she'd heard that Ancestry had changed the threshold for the 'close matches" to 21 cM, which seems to be backed up by the filter description.  And the filtered list did indeed end at matches sharing 21cM with me, rather than the previous 20 cM.

However, when I checked the unfiltered listing of matches - the 'Close matches' still went down to the people who were previously on the list, ie all 182, and who shared 20cM with me 

[Note: Although it looks like some of the 'Distant matches" also share 20 cM, the figures are rounded - when extracted using the DNA Gedcom Client App, the last close match in the image above shares 20.0201 cM and the first Distant shares 19.9934 cM.]

So, is this a genuine change in policy by Ancestry, which still needs to work through the system properly so that the match list split between "Close" and "Distant" agrees with the filter. Or has someone just set the filter threshold incorrectly? 🙂

Update!

When I came to write this post today, I tried to redo some of the images from yesterday, as they were just mobile screenshots.   However, already the situation has changed.  The filter itself now shows my total "4c & closer" matches as 182 - but it still indicates the lowest quantity of shared DNA is 21 cM and the actual list of filtered matches still ends with the 149th, even though the unfiltered list goes up to the 182nd match.

Since the total has changed back to the original figure, I suspect the intention may not be to increase the threshold permanently (but I could be wrong!)

Certainly the changes are still a 'work in progress'.

Another Update (25 January 2020)

I noticed yesterday that the Close matches filter does now show the cM range for 4th cousins or closer as 20 - 3490 shared centimorgans and both the main, unfiltered, list and the filtered 'close match' list ends with the same match for me.

Whatever caused the initial issue has clearly been resolved and Ancestry have not changed their thresholds.

*DNA help for Genealogy (UK)

52 Ancestors Week 1: Fresh Start(s)

Soon after our children were born, we gave my parents one of those Grandparents books - you probably know the sort of book I mean, containing questions about their lives, as children, growing up, and on into middle age.  After each question, there's a blank space, which they are supposed to fill in with lots of interesting detail about the times that we, as their children, have no experience or recollection of (after all, parents are often 'old', or even deceased, by the time we think of asking such questions.)

I remember my disappointment, after my father passed away, when I discovered that the blank spaces were all still blank (even though he had been a family historian!) 

Fortunately for me, there are records and artefacts that shed light on a few of the things they did.  For example, my Mother recorded all of addresses she'd lived in, in her bible.  My Dad also had made use of the end of a kitbag, in order to record the places he'd been stationed at:

I used the details from the kitbag to plot a couple of maps - first of the European detail:

And then to show further afield as well:

Looking at Mum's bible, I can see that, from the time my brother was born, my family lived in eleven different UK addresses, and two (relatively) permanent addresses in Singapore, as well as four temporary guest houses whilst travelling to and from Singapore.

We probably didn't travel as much as some service families but, even so, that's a lot of "Fresh Starts" that had to be made, with new surroundings, new schools, new friends etc. 

But I wouldn't want to change any of it!