1st and 2nd cousins - shared DNA variability

This post is a bit of "thinking aloud" - I have some data, but not a full answer for why the data shows what it does.

We know that the DNA passed on by the same two parents to their children will vary, such that, although every child will receive half their DNA from each parent, the level of shared DNA between the siblings will vary, depending on which 'bits' of the parents' DNA they each received. And that, as relationships become more distant, the quantity of DNA shared becomes even more variable for particular levels of relationship.  

This is why, for a specific quantity of shared DNA, several possible relationships are often predicted by the DNA testing companies.

When I first took a DNA test at Ancestry, my closest match was a predicted 3rd cousin, who shared 92cM with me.

Based on that quantity of DNA, Ancestry gives the following alternative relationships:

 And the "Shared cM Project" tool¹ gives the following probabilities for the various possible relationships:

My match had tested more for ethnicity and 'general' information, and didn't know much about their family history so, based on the image the Shared cM project produces, and the level of shared DNA, I draw out a possible "family tree", showing where my match might fit into my family, along with what I knew about the family at the time:

 

[The only reason for not including the half relationships side of the diagram was to keep things fairly simple.]  

I then set to work on the genealogy - from which we discovered that the match actually seemed to be a second cousin, not a third, despite us sharing a relatively low level of DNA for that relationship. 

A question was asked, by one of the DNA experts, as to whether the match might be a half 2c - and that is a possibility I still bear in mind.

However, I have been interested to see the other quantities of DNA shared, as more of the family have tested over the years. 

I do have quite a few second cousin matches now, thanks to my grandmother being one of ten, but I'm concentrating here on just four of them - a single second cousin from my grandfather's side, and three second cousins from my grandmother's side, who are siblings to each other - and comparing them to myself and two of my first cousins.  This is because the closer relationships, of the siblings to each other, and of the first cousins to each other, are confirmed through the shared DNA, as well as the known family history.

So this is how we all relate to each other:

And these are the levels of shared DNA:

Below is a table of the averages, and ranges, of shared cM for particular relationships, taken from the DNAPainter diagram:

So, with the exception of the 39cM shared between match 5 and me, and of the 23cM shared between matches 1 and 6, all of the values do actually fall within the range for possible second cousins. 

However, the probability of the relationships being second cousins (or even half second cousins) seems to be classed as fairly low for many of the values:   

I have included the Ancestry predictions for the relationships in the following table:

As you can see, only two of the relationships (highlighted in yellow) are predicted to be possible second cousins.  If there is a "half relationship" situation, another two of the predictions (highlighted in pink) would be okay.

But Ancestry's predictions for all the other comparisons are for more distant relationships.

When I received that very first match, one of the first things I did was to put the shared DNA figure into a predictor and, if it hadn't been for the match then being able to give me a couple of names that I recognised, I would probably have been looking at the wrong generation of my tree, at least initially, to try to find our shared ancestry.

As I mentioned above, the question was asked as to whether my first match (and now that would mean their siblings, as well) might be half second cousins to me (and also now to my two first cousins). Since the respective grandparents were the second and fourth children out of ten in the family, with fairly regular "two year intervals" between them all, there would have to be a "story" behind that, if it was true.  

It's obviously not impossible, though, so I'm not discounting it and will continue to explore the possibility, through the clustering of other shared matches.

But, even if a half relationship between my grandparents and their siblings does become evident, it wouldn't explain the fact that the shared DNA, for the majority of the relationships, is still less than would be expected - and therefore, if I needed to search for how I connected to these matches, I might be looking in the wrong parts of my tree! 

So, one point I am trying to make is the importance of "doing the genealogy" and not just relying on such predictions.  Does the predicted relationship fit with the known family history, with ages, and with locations, etc?  If not, don't just assume the "most probable" prediction is the correct one.

Another possibility I have wondered about, is whether the predictions from companies such as Ancestry, and the Shared cM Project, might have a tendency to predict more distant relationships for those of us in the UK.  This could be due to much of the data coming from people with ancestry in the US.  It seems those in the US often have many more matches than those of us in the UK, and potentially, a higher level of "overlapping ancestors", which might create a higher level of shared DNA for particular relationships. And thus 'bias' the predictions.

I don't know enough about the wider field of DNA statistics to know whether that is possible, or whether other people in the UK have found similarly lower levels of shared DNA.  

But I shall certainly be checking the predictions for all my other identified DNA matches more closely in future, to see if those show the same tendency. 

Notes and Sources

1. Shared cM Project 4.0 tool v4

https://dnapainter.com/tools/sharedcmv4

DNA match numbers

 Like many people, I imagine, I've spent some of January doing a bit of 'sorting and planning' to help me achieve what I'd like to during the year.  

So now I just need to actually do the things I've planned!

One of the first tasks was to update the graph of how many close matches I have at Ancestry.  At the time of my last post, the review of 2025, the number had increased to 376 close matches.  I now have 378 close matches - and I also noticed yesterday that I had exactly 20,000 matches, in total, there. 

(But that total had already increased to 20,003 by this morning.)

Since I was interested in the rate of increase, I also looked at the change in the totals over the years:

The Ancestry test was launched in the US in 2012 and then in the UK, in January 2015.¹ One can see that, after an initial slow start, for me, the three years between 2017-2019 saw the most new close matches, with an average of 50 across those three years.  Numbers have since reduced, averaging 30-35 per year, but are quite variable.

 From the graph, many of the years seem to show a higher rate of increase in the early months of the year - probably due to the sales in December, and 'Christmas gifting', which results in more kits being processed during those early months.

It will be interesting to see if the early part of this year shows the same sort of curve. Although kit prices at Ancestry were reduced, those of one of the other companies, MyHeritage, were even cheaper.  

And, with the news that MyHeritage was moving on to "Whole Genome Sequencing" (WGS)², perhaps more people will have opted to purchase kits from there instead?

Either way, I'm sure, with this change, there will be a surge in the numbers at MyHeritage - if only because of all those who have already taken DNA tests elsewhere now deciding to try the new test, as well. 

I admit it - I did too. ☺

My kit is currently in the "WGS in progress" stage, and I am looking forward to receiving the results.  It will be interesting to see how they compare to those received from the other companies I have tested with, and especially with those kits I transferred to MyHeritage.

Unfortunately, I've not been tracking numbers there in the same way, with those transferred kits - but perhaps it will be worth starting to do so, once these new results are in.

Notes and Sources

1. Launch dates of the autosomal DNA test at Ancestry: https://isogg.org/wiki/AncestryDNA

2. MyHeritage upgrading to Whole Genome Sequencing: 
https://blog.myheritage.com/2025/10/myheritage-upgrades-its-dna-tests-to-whole-genome-sequencing/

DNA progress - Ancestry Pro Tools and my NAYLOR/NAYLER family

 I have made a start on reading about some of the other bloggers' experiences with Pro Tools and found that the main feature they appreciate is the one that I think will also be the most useful to me - the ability to see how much DNA is shared between a specific match and those other matches that the specific match and I have in common. 

I was intending to illustrate this with some data from a few of my first and second cousins.  However, that post will have to wait a while, since a couple of recent new matches on Ancestry have sent me off on a sidetrack.  Since they are also good examples of how Pro Tools can help, I'm going to use the data from them instead.

So how does Pro Tools help?

The two matches happen to be a mother and son. How do I know that?  Because Pro Tools tells me so:

 

The mother matches me by 47cM across two segments (unweighted shared DNA 52cM, longest segment 45cM).  She has a family tree - but there's only one person on it.  The son matches me by 26 cM across one segment (unweighted shared DNA and longest segment both 31cM). He has an unlinked tree, with about fifty people on it.  

Previously, both of the matches would have appeared on my "4th cousin or closer" match list, since they both share more than 20cM with me.  But, when looking at the shared matches, although they would each appear when I viewed the other's list, I would not have been able to confirm the relationship between them, because I only had the family trees to work with. 

Whereas now, with the Pro Tools, Ancestry shows me the quantity of DNA they share between them, as well as telling me the predicted relationship.

A parent/child predicted relationship is the only one that (as far as I am aware) will always be correct and, as relationships become more distant, the predictions by the DNA companies become less reliable, since they are based on a range of possibilities for the quantity of DNA shared. 

But this information is still a major benefit whenever relatively close members of a family have all tested their DNA.

For example, in this case, having seen that the son is the home person on his family tree, I can immediately identify which side of the tree is the relevant one to research, in order to look for our shared ancestry, because I know the connection is through his mother.

If a match happens to have first or second cousins tested, and it is possible to identify where their common ancestry with the match is, then each of those generations back to their shared ancestor also narrows down the relevant portion of their family tree that I would need to focus on.

Without Pro Tools, I might not be able to identify such cousins - in fact, they might not even show up on the shared match list, if the DNA they share with me has fallen below 20cM.  But the fact that Pro Tools seems to show the shared matches where just one of us shares at least 20cM with them, means there are matches on the lists, which I would not have previously seen.

To illustrate this - based on the old 20cM threshold, only twenty-four of my matches would have shown up as shared matches to the mother.    Eleven of these share between 21cM - 25cM with me, five are in the 30cM - 46cM range, and five between 54cM - 59cM. Then the closest three share 78cM, 146cM and 250cM respectively with me.

The last two are my half first cousin, and a half 1st cousin 1 removed, so I recognise them and know where they fit in my family. The next largest, at 78cM, has a family tree with thirty-six people on it, including a Frederick NAYLOR in Hawaii (supposedly b 1870, no birthplace, and no death details given.)  Now, NAYLOR is one of my ancestral names, and it is relevant to the two higher matches, as well.  The unattached family tree on the son's profile also shows a descent from the same Frederick NAYLOR, in Hawaii, as the 78cM match's tree does.

But, other than identifying that these matches are 'potentially' connected to my NAYLOR line, and that the two new matches will probably connect more closely to the 78cM match, based on their tree, I don't think that I'd have been able to identify much more about them.

However, with Pro Tools, there are fifty-three shared matches shown between the mother and I, rather than just the twenty-four.  As well as her son, these include a predicted half-brother or nephew, and seventeen matches with a predicted relationship involving the term "1st cousin".  Nine of these, including the half-brother/nephew, would not have even shown up as shared matches to me, without the Pro Tools, since they share less than 20cM with me.

But they are all close enough to the new match that I should be able to work out how most of them connect to each other.  

A downside to pro tools?

Yes, there is a downside to all this additional information (at least, for me, and the way I work.)  

Previously, before taking out the Pro Tools, I would check on my new matches at Ancestry most days, in order to keep track of the number in the "4th cousin or closer" category.  If that total had increased, I'd view those matches first, check for any shared matches between us and, if there were any, and I'd already made some progress in identifying our connection, I'd add a note to that effect to the new match's profile.  Once any close matches were dealt with, I'd check through the other, more distant, new matches, looking for any that did show shared matches with me and, again, add a note to their profile. Since, without Pro Tools, the only shared matches had to be ones sharing over 20cM with me, I frequently found these, more distant, new matches did not show any shared matches with me.

But, of course, now that Pro Tools means I can see any shared matches that share greater than 20cM with the new match, even if they only share down to 9cM with me, just about everybody shows some shared matches (in a couple of cases seen so far, there's been nine pages of them!)

So, this makes the task of viewing new matches so much more time consuming, and I am going to need to modify my routine - perhaps not even checking the shared matches unless I have some clear indication that there's a 'potentially findable' link to them.

Returning to the two recent new matches…

As indicated above, based on both family trees and other shared matches, it seems the family share ancestry with me, at some level, through the NAYLOR family.  The NAYLOR line is one that quite a few of my matches seem to connect to. (I mentioned the NAYLOR cluster, "Group 1", in my post on 9 August 2017 at https://notjusttheparrys.blogspot.com/2017/08/ancestry-shared-matches-and-new.html.)

Some years ago, because of the number of matches in this group, I constructed a 'rough' family tree, on paper, predominantly derived from other people's family trees (with a little bit of 'fact checking'. :-) ) 

It has remained on paper ever since - mainly because, once I discovered a Herald at the College of Arms in the early 19c was a possible sibling to my line, sifting through the information to distinguish fact from fiction became much more difficult, since there is so much of it!

But now, with Pro Tools showing how my matches relate to each other, I think I will stand more chance of being able to fit my matches into the NAYLOR line, and actually confirm the links, than I was able to do before (bearing in mind that many of them either have no tree, a partial tree, or even an incorrect tree.)

So that has been my 'sidetrack.'  This week I have been entering all of the rough information into FamilyTreeMaker, the program I use for my own personal family history. I am now beginning to check the 'facts' more thoroughly, as best I can, before making the information publicly available on my Ancestry tree.

I don't know whether I shall be able to resolve who the parents of the Fred NAYLOR in Hawaii were - although the son's tree has his birth as England, I do know that other records indicate it was in Australia (and I think there's one record that suggests the USA instead).  There is a potential Fred born in Australia - and at least one researcher on Ancestry has placed the Hawaii Fred into that family - but there is an issue in that Fred's marriage in the US indicates his father was also called Frederick, whereas the father in the Australian birth was a Charles.

It is a common frustration, when an emigration causes such a break in a family line.  I am hoping that, by placing many of my DNA matches onto the tree, I will be able to develop, and test, theories as to where Fred fits.

But it is still a 'work in progress' - and there will be some caveats to the predicted relationships (which I hope to explain further, when I finally get that "1st and 2nd cousins" post written.)

In closing, I'll include the details of two monuments to the family, reported to be in the church of St John the Baptist, Gloucester.¹:

Epitaphs in St. John the Baptist's Church, Gloucester. 

On a large mural tablet in the south aisle : 

Sacred to the Memory of Captain Joshua NAYLER, 

who departed this life 14th Decr. 1750, aged 67 years. 

Also of GEORGE NAYLER, Son of GEORGE NAYLER, 

of this city, Surgeon. who died 19th March, 1750, aged 6 weeks. 

Also of the above GEORGE NAYLER, Esqr. 

only Son of the said Captain JOSHUA NAYLER, 

who died 12th Septr. 1780, aged 58 years. 

He married Sarah, only Child of John Park of Chitherow [sic], 

in the County Palatine of Lancaster, Esqr. by Frances his Wife, 

Daughter and sole Heir of William Osman, Esqr. and grand-daughr. of John Park 

Of Little Urswick, 

in the same county, Esqr. by Margaret Senhouse, his Wife, 

and by the said Sarah had issue six Sons and three Daughters. 

Also of JOSHUA NAYLER, youngest Son of the said George and Sarah Nayler, 

who died 12th Decr. 1787, aged 20 years. 

Also of EDWARD HENRY NAYLER, only Child of Richard Nayler, Esqr. 

(fourth Son of the above George and Sarah Nayler) by Harriot Howe, 

his First Wife, who died 6 Decr. 1792, aged 4 years. 

Also of CHARLOTTE MARY NAYLER, eldest Daughter of George Nayler, Esqr. 

York Herald (fifth Son of the above George and Sarah Nayler,) 

who died 4th Augst. 1794, aged 

Also of the above-named SARAH NAYLER, Widow, 

who died 31st Jany. 1802, aged 78 years. 

Also of FRANCES NAYLER, Second Wife of the above 

Richard Nayler, Esqr. Eldest Daughter and Coheir of Thomas Blunt, 

of Huntley, in this county, Esqr. she died 19th Decr. 1805, aged 35 years. 

Also of the said RICHARD NAYLER, Esqr. 

who departed this Life 6th Decr. 1816, aged 56 years. 

And of MARIA NAYLER, Second Daughter of the above George 

and Sarah Nayler, who died 28th March, 1821, aged 58 years. 

Below the inscription, on a sort of foliaged corbel, is a shield bearing the arms of 

Nayler, and on an escocheon of pretence those of Park and Osman quarterly. 

On another mural monument placed on the same wall— 

Sacred to the Memory of MARY, Wife of THOMAS NAYLER, 

Lieutenant in his Majesty's Marine Forces, and Daughter of 

Thomas Grimshaw of Preston, in the County Palatine of Lancaster, Esq. 

who ended her course of mortality on the 25th day of September, 1790, 

after having sustained with singular Fortitude and Resignation the tedious progress 

of a lingering Disease. 

Reader! if Devotion without pretence, and Charity void of Ostentation, if filial 

Piety and Conjugal Fidelity be Virtues which thy Justice would commend and Zeal 

would emulate: know here was an Example which might have claimed Applause and 

commanded Imitation. 

This is on a white marble tablet with an urn upon it: on a blue marble back-ground, 

of pyramidal shape, is suspended a small shield, Quarterly 1st and 4th Nayler, 2. Park, 

3. Osman; impaling, Or, a griffin segreant sable, for Grimshaw. 

If anyone can confirm that such monuments actually do exist, I'd be very grateful!

Notes and Sources

1. The epitaphs are given in "The Herald and Genealogist" Volume 7, pages 79/80, as part of an article relating to Sir George NAYLER, pages 72 - 80, which is available at https://archive.org/details/heraldgenealogis07nich/page/72/mode/2up?q=nayler 

DNA progress - first steps

 At the end of 2023, Ancestry released their "pro-tools" in the UK.  This is an additional set of tools for family history, and for more advanced DNA research, than are available through their normal subscriptions. But it does require both a current subscription, and additional payments.  Although I was 'tempted' when it was first released, I left it for a while because that was a busy period and I knew I wouldn't have time for research. But I was then disappointed to discover, when I returned to it later, that the monthly cost had already increased from £4.99 to £7.99.  

That put paid to that!

However, a recent post on FB alerted me to the fact there was an offer on (until 20th January), and I have now been able to take out a cheaper option for six months.  I'll see how I get on with it, and how useful it proves to be, as to whether I continue to subscribe, or not.

Of course, the additional tools and information should be of help - for example, it is now possible for me to see how much DNA is shared, and the suggested relationship, between one of my matches and the matches we share.  The thresholds at which the shared matches are shown is also less restricted than it is with the standard tools.  

This will be very useful in cases where several members of a family have tested but perhaps only one or two of them share 20cM or more with me, so the more distant ones didn't previously feature in the shared match list.  This should  make it easier for grouping matches and allocating some of the more distant ones to potential ancestral lines. 

My main hesitation is how to get to grips with recording all of the additional detail.  So my next step will be to read up on some of the blog posts by other researchers, to find out how they are managing the data.

DNA Update

In my last post, I mentioned the need to focus on my own family history again.  One aspect of that is making the most of the opportunities that DNA provides in tracing more distant or 'lost' relatives.  It's been a while since I did any serious work with my DNA results so, as a start, I've updated the graph I initially posted in April 2020¹, showing the numbers of my matches who are predicted to be my "4th cousin or closer" at Ancestry:

I'm currently up to 345 matches in that category.  As can be seen, the rate of increase has slowed down since early 2020, but new matches are still coming in relatively frequently.  I check Ancestry most days and, whenever there are any new matches, the first thing I do is look to see if they have any 'shared matches' with me, since those can help with placing the new match in the correct area of my family tree.  Although the more distant new matches often show no shared matches, most of those in the "4th cousin or closer" category will match 'somebody' and so I can add a note about this to the profile I see for them.   

That's about as far as I've been going over the last few years.  

Back in 2017, I'd worked out how matches tended to group together and what that indicated.²  But everything DNA related seems to have become much more 'complicated' over recent years, what with increasing numbers of matches, changes to the company websites and the information that's now available, and also, consequently, changes to some of the tools used for managing the data.  

It might take me a while to catch up with the best methods for dealing with all these matches now, but at least the "basic principles" about DNA transmission haven't changed, so that the task doesn't feel impossible.

Updates will follow as I make progress!

Notes and Sources
1. Matches graphed in April 2020: https://notjusttheparrys.blogspot.com/2020/04/ancestry-dna-matches-passing-200-4th.html
2. The grouping of shared matches: https://notjusttheparrys.blogspot.com/2017/08/ancestry-shared-matches-and-new.html

Ancestry DNA matches - passing 200 "4th cousins or closer"

I was planning to post an update to my Ancestry DNA match numbers when I reached 200 4th cousins or closer.

But clearly someone, somewhere, has a sense of humour!

Having been slowly creeping up towards 200 over the last few weeks....

....yesterday when I checked, the total had jumped from the previous day's 198, up by three to 201, thus missing out 200! 😀

An increase like this is what one might expect, when a group of family members all decide to test at the same time.  The closest match is a predicted third cousin to me and then the other two are both predicted 4th cousins.

I think it's the first time I've received such a batch of close matches, all on the same day.

Initially. all three matches showed with unlinked trees - but at least they were trees that featured, not just one of my surnames, ALLEN, but also the similar use of a particular middle name.   The trees have since been linked to the matches, so I can now identify the relationships between the three of them.

Another good thing was that, out of the nine other DNA matches shared between myself and the closest new match, I have already identified a common ALLEN ancestor with seven of them, and another one connects to the ALLEN surname, although we've not proved who the shared ancestor is yet.  The ninth match has two other shared matches, creating an isolated group that I hadn’t been able to link into an ancestral line, so perhaps these new matches might lead to the opportunity to do so.

One would think that, with all this information, the connection to the new matches should be obvious, but I didn't recognise the oldest ALLEN ancestor in their line. 

However, following some research today, I have now written to the match.  Potentially, if there is any doubt about the connection between their oldest two generations, then I might just have the answer. 🙂

Another potentially identified DNA connection

Isn't it nice when things just work out?

I haven't done much regarding DNA over the past month or so, due to other activities.  But I have tried to keep up with the "new" events, such as the MyHeritage changes.  I'll write more about my results at that site at another time - this post is about an Ancestry find.

Late last night, (probably too late, I should have been on my way to bed, but you know that thought, "I'll just check one more thing" 🙂) I decided to look at how many '4th cousin and closer' matches I have on Ancestry.  I thought it would probably be 81, which is what it went up to a week ago. But the numbers have been increasing more rapidly recently, with five new matches in that category since the beginning of the year, so I am ever hopeful of an increase.

The total was 82!

I quickly searched for the new match -  no tree and only a 'good' confidence level, with 22.7 centimorgans shared across 3 DNA segments.  That could mean three segments at about 7.5cM each, or it could be one longer segment and a couple of smaller ones.  I won't know unless they transfer their data to another site.  Still, it would be worth following up when I get time.

But then I looked for any shared matches.  Often there are none, as shared matches only show for matches in the "4th cousin and closer" category so, if this match also matches some of my more distant matches, the more distant ones won't show up on this person's profile.  But, this time, there was one shared match shown, predicted 'high confidence', with 38cM shared across 2 DNA segments.  And with a tree of eleven people.

I keep a running total of the numbers of matches I have, as well as noting the names of new matches and anything interesting about them (like whether they have a family tree, or a surname in common with me). So I could tell that the shared match had appeared on the 9th of January and, at that time, was not showing a family tree.  So I am fortunate in that it looks like they are interested in finding out more about their ancestry, as they have taken the trouble to add some family details.

There were two surnames in common with me, LEWIS in Wales and ALLEN in London.  The Welsh one was not in one of "my" counties, so I took a closer look at the ALLEN first.

There were no dates, just the location for the one female ALLEN's birth in London.  But her marriage was shown, so that gave me her husband's name.  Armed with that information, I was able to identify their marriage, in 1926, on Ancestry.  London records are well represented on the site so I didn't just find the civil registration index but also an image of the actual parish register.  That gave me the bride's father's details, Herbert Henry ALLEN, a poulterer.  As the bride's age was shown on the certificate, it didn't take long to find the family in the 1911 census, Herbert Henry (33), with wife, Ada (32), and children, Edward (12), Florence (11), Herbert Henry (10), Frederick (7), Joseph (6), Dorothy Violet (5), Cyril James (4), Bessie Maud (3) and Frank Reuben (1).  From there I checked the 1901 census, which showed Herbert and Ada, along with the two older children.  Herbert's birthplace was Lambeth in both censuses.  Ada's and the children's varied from Lambeth to Brixton and Stockwell, but these are fairly closely connected areas in south west London, and all familiar from my own family.

The next step was to identify the marriage of Herbert Henry ALLEN to Ada - I used FreeBMD for that and found that the most probable entry was in September 1898, in Camberwell.  Back to Ancestry to search for the church records.  Yes, again the entry was there - Herbert Henry ALLEN, aged 20, married Ada SPRINKS on September 12, 1898.  Herbert's father was a John ALLEN, Perambulator Maker.

Now that's exciting - because my John Prosser ALLEN, snr, was also a perambulator maker. And, on February 10th, 1878, my John, with his wife, Sarah, christened their son, Herbert Henry ALLEN!

Obviously, I need to continue to work through the details, and check for my John and Sarah in records such as the censuses, to make sure their Herbert is with them, or not, as appropriate, and that there's no evidence to suggest this isn't the right connection to my DNA match.  I also need to contact the shared match who appeared on my list yesterday, to confirm whether or not they connect to the same family line.  And, of course, it would be great if both matches transferred their raw data to one of the other DNA sites, so that we can check exactly where we match on the DNA.  That would also mean I could look for more evidence, for or against the connection, amongst my other DNA matches.

ALLEN is a fairly common surname, so I don't follow up general references to it on my DNA matches' surname lists - but, who knows, if these two matches do transfer their data, perhaps there'll be others matching over the same segments and with the same surname.  I'd certainly be following those up then!

Just going back to the quantity of DNA shared - 38cM is the average for 4th cousins (based on Blaine Bettinger's Shared cM Project*) whereas we actually appear to be 3rd cousins.  So the shared DNA is a bit on the low side, but well within the range.  The match with 22.7cM could be more distant, but I am hopeful that they will still be within the range of my genealogy!

(And I did eventually get to bed last night - although it was 'today' rather than yesterday!)


*
Blaine Bettinger's Shared cM Project - https://thegeneticgenealogist.com/
Interactive Tool by Jonny Perl - https://dnapainter.com/tools/sharedcm

Ancestry shared matches and a new connection

This post continues my general theme of looking for strategies to deal with my DNA results - in this case, results from AncestryDNA.

I have 225 pages of matches at Ancestry, which equates to almost 11,250 matches.  I use the DNAGedcom Client app to download the information.  That gives me three files - a list of my matches, a file showing which of the matches are in common with each other (based around fourth cousins and closer only), and details from my match's trees.  This latter, 'ancestors', file has over 345,000 lines of data in it, which seems a staggering amount to consider dealing with - especially as, unfortunately, most of it is probably not relevant to my connections with my matches, as the majority of them are in the USA and few have traced their connection back to the UK, which is where most of my pedigree information relates to.

Although I do have three Ancestry Hints, which have been helpful, I don't appear in any 'DNA Circles'.  So I've been looking at the "shared matches", to see what clues I can garner from those. Ancestry provides details of my matches that are fourth cousins and closer, and indicates where they share DNA with another of my close matches.   They do also show the more distant matches that are shared matches to the closer cousins - but only by showing the closer match on the more distant match's profile.  Given how many thousands of distant matches I have, I do not check each of their profiles individually to see if they just happen to match a closer cousin.  So the app download makes this feature more useful, by picking up those more distant matches who are in common with the fourth cousins, as well as providing the information in a more convenient, (ie spreadsheet) format.

I have 59 matches within the '4th cousins or closer' category and 379 rows in the ICW* file downloaded by the Client app, which, as far as I am aware, includes each individual who connects to one of my '4th cousins or closer' matches.  That's probably not many in comparison to people with colonial US ancestry but I imagine it's about average for those of us in the UK.  And it is enough to do some simple 'network analysis', which I hope might allow me to make more sense of the data.

Let me say here that I don't really know anything about proper network analysis - I think that's complicated computing, with thousand of entries, which produces things like the Genetic Communities.  It involves lots of statistical calculations and terms that I don't even understand the meaning of, yet alone know how to use! But most of us are probably capable of using some simple techniques - the basic concept for what I am doing I learnt when studying for a GCSE in psychology, so that's a qualification designed for teenagers. In that course, we were using it to analyse friendship patterns in a class of schoolchildren.  The "sociometric" technique simply consisted of asking each child in a class who their three best friends in the class were.  One then drew a diagram something like the following, where each dot is a person and the arrow shows the direction of the 'choice'.

It occurred to me some years ago that this type of diagram could possibly be used to help analyse genealogical networks and I had hoped to use it in my Parry One-Name Study to try to sort out the potential relationships among the lower gentry of Herefordshire (which contains numerous Parry connections that may, or may not, relate to the same Parry family). I came across a (free!) program* that looked like it would be useful for actually drawing the diagram (although it is easy to do by hand, if there's a lot to draw, a computer obviously does make it easier) but I never managed to get all the pedigrees typed up sufficiently to try it out for my study.  Now, with doing genetic genealogy, it seems to me that the same principle could be used with shared matches.

And so the following diagram shows the connections between my shared matches at Ancestry:

In this image, each red dot represents one of my matches, and the blue lines indicate the other matches that they also match.  I am not using arrows, just lines, as the genetic relationships will be in both directions.

As you can see, the matches fall into groups, Sometimes these are made up of just two or three people who are shared matches with each other.  But there's also some larger groups, one of about 50 connections, and the other with over 150 connections.

It was interesting to see how the data plotted, but how does this help me?

Well, my theory, as you've possibly guessed by now, is that the people in the same group are likely to connect to me (at some level) through the same ancestral line.

So, firstly, I allocated everyone in each group an 'AncestryICW Group Number' (both in the Notes section of my view of their DNA profile on Ancestry and in my spreadsheet) to help me keep track of the Groups.   I also added any information about potential surname connections.  Here's the same diagram, with those numbers added and also some additional symbols based on my family history. (Key in the bottom right corner of image)

As you can see, the Group 1 (derived just from the genetic relationships provided by Ancestry), contains two people who share the surname NAYLOR with me. One of these I have discovered the potential connection to, the other currently just has the surname in common with me.

I've also 'starred' one match - over the weekend, I carried out a new download of the shared matches file. There were 32 new rows added since the previous download, which, once charted, increased the size of some of the existing groups and also created a few new ones.  (NB these are not new 'fourth cousins or closer' - these are more distantly related new matches, who just happen to connect to my fourth cousins and closer.  As such, I would not normally have checked them out, among the many new distant matches that keep being added.)

I was just starting to work through them, adding the group numbers to my spreadsheet and checking if the people had trees attached to their account, when I noticed the surname NAYLOR.  Yes, one of the new additional matches in Group 1 also had a NAYLOR in their tree!  It was just one, a NAYLOR female marrying into their SMITH family, with no other information about her except her husband's name, and their child's details.  And the family were in the 'wrong' place in the UK (up in Lancashire, rather than in London) - but obviously I didn't leave it there.

By initially working on the husband of the SMITH child, and then finding him and his wife in the 1939 Register, I was able to obtain her proper birth date (1895, not 1885 as shown on the pedigree). That correction meant that I could then find her in the 1901 and 1911 censuses with her parents - her mother being the NAYLOR by birth. Those censuses gave me sufficient information to get back to the previous generation - who traced back to London and the entries I believe relate to my family in 1841!

All of this still needs confirming properly, especially the early censuses for the family, which I had found some months ago when identifying the other NAYLOR connection, who is in Australia.

But it all looks very promising that my new match and I are fourth cousins through the NAYLOR line.

So, just the process of simply grouping my shared matches, on the basis of who they are in common with, has been sufficient for me to spot a connection that I may not have seen otherwise, since the new match was identified by Ancestry as a more distant 5th-8th cousin, sharing just 9.7cM across 1 DNA segment. Although I understand that there may be other reasons for shared DNA of that quantity, unless I can find other evidence to contradict it, the simplest explanation, that the three matches in Group 1 who all share the NAYLOR surname with me obtained it from a common NAYLOR ancestry, does seem to be logical.


*
Network analysis program used for drawing chart: Pajek (http://mrvar.fdv.uni-lj.si/pajek/ )  [One day, I hope to learn to use the program properly, as I am sure it could potentially display the DNA information more effectively, taking account of features such as the closeness of relationships etc]

ICW - stands for "in common with" - the term often used for matches who also match someone else you match.

My First AncestryDNA Tree Hint

Last week I noticed one of those leaves.  You know the sort - the little 'hints' that appear on  Ancestry, to indicate that they have identified an item in their records, or in someone else's pedigree, which the company's search tools suggest could possibly relate to someone in my own pedigree.  When I first put my tree online, there were over 1000 of these and some of the suggestions seemed so ridiculous to me that I soon decided to ignore the little leaves.

But not this one.

This one was on my DNA account.  That's the same pedigree for me, but being matched to a specific group of people as comparisons, people already identified by Ancestry as connected to me through shared DNA. 

Excitedly, I checked my match's details.  A private tree.  Never mind, send a message - and wait.  (Did they receive the message?  How long should I wait before sending another, 'just in case' the first went astray?  Oh, aren't we genealogists so impatient at times!)

I receive a reply. Hurrah!

And, yes, we do appear to have a common ancestor.  Or, more correctly, a common ancestral couple.  Thomas DOWDING (b. 1768 d. 1857) and Ann WHATLEY  (d. 1861), living in Donhead St Andrew.  I descend from their son, George , who married Mary COLLINS and my match descends from their daughter Jane, who married a John HOWELL.  I show the family on my "DNA Tree" at http://homepage.ntlworld.com/im.griffiths/parryfamilyhistory/personaldnatree.htm (search the page for "Whatley" to find them, as I haven't yet added links to specific families).

The research for this family was mainly carried out by my mother, and it is part of my "Genealogy Do-Over" goals to check her work during this year.  But, at the death of Ann DOWDING, the widow of Thomas DOWDING, the informant was a John HOWELL, and I have found some look-ups I did for Mum on Ancestry, back in 2005, relating to the John HOWELL, so we were definitely considering that family as another descendant branch.

John HOWELL appears to have first been married to a Mary (HO107/1175/5/ED8/F22/P6) and had at least four children by 1841.  There is a possible death for Mary in March 1849 and, based on the 1851 census, John and Mary had, had further children by then (HO107/1849/62/24).  John then marries Jane DOWDING* and has at least three children, Emma J, Georgina and Abigail.

My DNA match is descended from Emma Jane HOWELL.

The Ancestry relationship prediction is that we are 5th-8th cousins.  From the genealogical relationships, we are 4th cousins , once removed.

Unfortunately, at Ancestry there is no chromosome browser, so we cannot see where we share DNA.  If we could, it would enable us to each identify our other matches over the same area.  If those matches then matched both of us there, this would mean we all shared the same common ancestry somewhere on the lines through Thomas or Ann (either their descendants, or, as descendants of one of their ancestors).  Thus it would potentially help us find our connection to these other people, who might not have sufficient detail in their pedigrees for us to spot the link from the pedigrees alone.

Also, currently, even though the two of us have found common ancestors, it does not necessarily follow that the shared DNA definitely comes through them - so, finding other matches who share the same DNA segments with both of us would enable us to see whether their pedigrees have the potential to link to this same ancestral couple, which would help to confirm where the DNA actually came from.

I wonder if my match might be willing to upload their data to Gedmatch, so that we can actually compare DNA - currently, transferring the data elsewhere is the only way to make up for the deficiency in the Ancestry provision.

So, there is still a lot to confirm, but at least this 'shaking leaf' does seem to be a hint in the right direction. 

[*Jane appears to have been married before as well - a Jane DOWDING marrying an Elias DUNFORD in 1842, with Elias dying in 1843, and a 'Jane DUNFORD' then marrying John HOWELL in 1849.  These details do still need confirming.]

Ancestor Score as at Valentine’s Day 2015

I am so pleased that genealogists like sharing what they do – and encourage others to copy it, by asking how the rest of us compare to them!

Cathy Meder-Dempsey posted her “Ancestor Score” today, at https://openingdoorsinbrickwalls.wordpress.com/2015/02/14/my-ancestor-score-as-of-valentines-day-2015/, copying an idea that she’d seen on another blog the previous year.  What a good way of measuring one form of progress in our research.

So here’s my ancestor score, based on the research carried out by my parents:

I have added an extra column to those used by Cathy, so that I can also record the number of DNA matches where I know the common ancestral couple.

Now seems a very appropriate time to “take stock” like this, given that I will soon be working through my parents’ research as part of my "Genealogy Do-Over".  Hopefully, by this time next year, I will not only have confirmed all of these ancestors but also added a few more – and, perhaps, also managed to identify a few more common ancestors with the thousands of DNA matches that I have.