A tale of orphans

 This posting is a rough draft / work in progress of a pamphlet I would like to write for publishing and donation to the Warren County, Indiana Historical Society. 

In August of 2000 I came across a note.

"I am looking for information on Mary Matilda Robertson, born in Indiana Sept 1845. She married James Guider also from Indiana."  The poster asked anyone interested to contact her by email. 

This was just the time that the internet was really becoming useful for genealogy. Here was a woman posting about my GG Grandparents, about whom I only knew very limited information. 

When I reached out to her, I was happy to find another active genealogist. Unfortunately, with regard to James and Mary, she knew about the same things I did.  Pooling our knowledge at that time we were able to identify their children, and we were led to believe James was from Ireland.  We also knew about James' sister Elizabeth and her family in Napa.  The only records we had were of James and Elizabeth as young children, living in Benton, Indiana with a family with a different last name. 

This is a story about James and Elizabeth, Mary has a different story which I am still discovering. 

Vicki, my genealogist cousin and I, after much research, ruled out Ireland.  One of the discoveries was an error in the 1900 census that stated that James was from Ireland. Looking closely at the record, however, you can assume it was the census taker that made an error.   The record claimed that even though James parents were born in Indiana, he was born in Ireland. The record shows the actual document and right where Ireland has been entered by the census taker there is a smudge and a tear forms following the column all the way down to the end of the page. Did it rip then at the house while the information was being recorded?  That mistake was repeated to all of James and Mary's children. Perhaps the census taker copied "Ireland" from the person on the list directly above James. Did the census taker go back over the document and fill the columns for where the parents were born at the end of the day instead of while standing in a door way or sitting in the citizen's house?

Regardless of how it happened, it did send us in the wrong direction for a while. 

Anyway, independently, we discovered that although James and Elizabeth were the only Guider children living in the house in Oak Grove, Indiana in 1860, nearby in West Pine, Indiana there was another child, Susanna Guyder, who also seem to be living in the care of a foster family. Susanna was aged in between Elizabeth and James. 

We didn't get any information on new information on James and Elizabeth for 15 years. Then came DNA. In 2015 we got tests many descendants of James Guider.  Of his 3 children that had children, all 3 had descendants we could test. Vicki and her sister were descended of Opal, Jeanne and my family were descended of Zua and Dorrie was descended of Jesse.  It was also my first introduction to how you might find the unexpected when doing DNA tests. First the DNA test showed that Zua had children by 2 different men and Jeanne really wasn't related to my G grandfather. Then it showed that Dorrie's grandfather Jesse was not really the biological son of James. 

What it did prove, however, was that all of us except Dorrie were DNA to the Guiders. Looking at the DNA, we could see other cousins who we were not in touch with were also DNA testing, unfortunately we knew all of these people and they were not really furthering our research back in time. 

It wasn't until November of 2016 that I finally found someone using DNA that I was confident was a Guider outside of our group. That was Chris Hendryx. I found he was descended of a couple in Pennsylvania named John Guyder and Jane Yocum. How exactly he was related to us, we did not know. 

In 2018 Vicki got the death certificate of James Guider who died in SF in 1909.  It stated his parents were born in Holland.  Another red herring.

In 2019, Elizabeth Owens, GG granddaughter of Elizabeth Guider did a DNA test and matched us just like we would have expected. Unfortunately, Elizabeth did not respond to any requests to share information or her results, stymying research. 

In the following years I was able to connect a woman, descended of the other orphan, Susannah, to our DNA testers. Though not proof that they were siblings, it did prove that Susannah was related to James and Elizabeth somehow. 

Then in Jan 2022 I hit pay dirt, put didn't quite have enough information to know it. I was able to identify many of the shared matches between all of the Guider test with descendants of the family of David Tosser/Scott 1818-1899. In May of 2022 I was able to contact and get the aunt of Elizabeth Guider, Carol Mang to do a DNA test. Now I would have a lot more DNA to use.   In July 2022 I got the results.  Two new couples popped up a Gaines/Randles couple and a Scott/Foster couple.   Now regular genealogy took over. In Sep of 2022 I decided to go to Indiana and have a look around. 

Though the trip was not a fruitful one, it introduced me to the Warren County Historical Society and the genealogy sections of the local libraries. The collections were quite small, and in doing research and speaking with the volunteers, I found no information existed for my family there. It was then I decided I had to put some things down on paper so that one day, if another person like me came looking, they would find what they were looking for. 

In Jan of 2023 later I got it all figured out. All of the above mentioned families coalesced around a the Randles aka Reynolds family.  The Scott's of the Scott/Fosters and the Scotts of the Tosser/Scotts were the same family.  I knew the Scott were also connected to the Reynolds family and because of assistance from a question I put out there, much like the question my cousin asked 23 years earlier, someone pointed me to a family in 1850 Medina Township, Indiana on a page with a Reynolds family that I was investigating. The name of the family was Sheridan Gardner.  Sheridan his wife Amy had three children, Elizabeth, Susan A and James. As soon as I saw their record, I searched the internet for Sheridan Guider and came up with a marriage between him and a woman named Amy Tosser.   Here they were, finally after 23 years, I had found the parents of three orphans, lost until now because of another error on the census.

Much research had already been done on Amy's family was I had a good idea of where she came from. As far as Sheridan, however, this was the only census record that existed. Besides his marriage record to Amy, I was able to locate some land records for him, but Sheridan no luck on anything else.

This led testing a few more people that I had now identified, descendants of Susanna. Susannah had two daughters, and I was able to get DNA tests from both lines. Now using all of the DNA tests I was able to follow back a hunch. 

There was a record for a guy named Abraham Sheridan Guider, but he was the son of a man named James Beverly and a woman named Magdalena Guider from Pennsylvania. I had no way to be confident this was the same man. It wasn't until I discovered the Sheridan was the last name of Magdalena's mother that I became much more excited. Sheridan wasn't a common name, and the fact that Magdalena's mother was Sheridan seemed to pull things together.

Next researching the Sheridan name, I began finding quite a few DNA cousins, many related DNA matches that had excited me at one point that I had completely given up on. I had spent months researching the descendants of Uriah Andreas never discovering his grandmother was a woman named Hannah Geither of Pennsylvania.  Once things like this start happening, these 23 years of research all started falling into place, like a jigsaw puzzle that you have found clusters of pieces for and now only a few places to put them.

DNA Reconstruction: Mathematics Segments and AI

 My buddy is a techie who is helping me with this project. He is sharpening his AI skills with this. I am not sure it was as easy as I initially thought and I am confident AI will have an answer one day. 

Until then I have changed my goal to segment isolation and prediction.   This means finding triangulated DNA segments, assigning them to ancestors and extrapolating what their inheritance means for all the other ancestors and descendants. 

Definition of a segment.

A segment is a string of DNA codes inherited from an ancestor. A person inherits 23 Segments from their mother and 23 from their father. 

A shared segment is an identical segment inherited by more than one descendent.  

Sibling shared segments

With siblings there is a special relationship. We can be fully identical, half identical or non matching.  Fully identical is when we inherit the exact same DNA from both our parents at a specific location on a chromosome.  Half identical is when we inherit the exact same DNA from only one parent  at a specific location on a chromosome. Non matching is when we inherit entirely different DNA from both parents at a specific location on a chromosome.

Saying "at a specific location on a chromosome" can get longwinded so lets just assume from now on when I refer to fully, half or non matching, that is implied.  If siblings were actually fully identical, they would be twins. 

When fully identical, the siblings, say Alice and Bryan have inherited their DNA from the same grandparents. For example the maternal grandfather and the paternal grandmother. A sibling that is only half identical, say Catherine, to these siblings would have inherited their DNA from only one of those grandparents, say the maternal grandmother and the paternal grandmother.  A third half identical sibling to Alice and Bryan, say Daniel,  could have inherited the DNA from the maternal grandfather and the paternal grandfather making him non matching to Catherine.

Alice= MGF and PGM  Bryan= MGF and PGM Catherine=MGM and PGM Daniel=MGF and PGF

When we compare our DNA to our siblings we will find random multiple areas of Fully, Half and Non matching DNA throught the genome.  At any point all siblings maybe fully identical or any combination.  There will be times when a pair of siblings goes from Half Identical to Fully Identical on a single chromosome. In fact siblings can go from Non matching, to Half to Fully to Half and back to non matching all across one chromosome.  What will never happen is for a sibling to go from Fully identical to non matching. 

The switches between the states (FI, HI, NM)  were set at conception when the genes were inherited from our parents (grandparents). Randomly at various points across our genome we inherited from either our maternal grandfather our our maternal grandmother, but only one or the other. Also randomly we inherited from our paternal grandparents. These random shifts will very rarely (read never) happen at exactly exactly same point on our maternal and paternal sides. That is what would have to happen if we went from fully matching to non matching. It is just not going to happen.

The locations on our chromsomes where we shift from one grandparent to the other I will call switches. These switch points are the beginning and ending of our segments shared with our siblings. These points can be labelled and will never move. These switch points will affect how you relate to all of your siblings. If Alice were to switch from being fully identical with Bryan, she would then be fully identical to Daniel or to Catherine.  Then until another switch point in one of the sibllings the inheritance would be known. If Alice were FI to Daniel, we would know she is no longer inheriting DNA from paternal grandmother but would be instead inheriting from the paternal grandfather. 

Alice= MGF and PGF  Bryan= MGF and PGM Catherine=MGM and PGM Daniel=MGF and PGF

What else do we know? We know that a parent has only inherited 50% of their DNA from each parent. Hence, a parent, at any location only has the DNA from either a paternal grandfather or grandmother and the DNA from either the maternal grandfather or grandmother. 

Lets take a step back here for now. I have identified the grandparents above, but in reality the only way to do this, is find a third person who can help us label those segments. The segment Alice continues to share with Bryan is from their maternal grandfather. One way to identify this is a relative of the maternal grandfather who matches both Alice and Bryan along this segment. We would also see this same relative matching Daniel.  Another way to identify this would be if there was a relative of their MGM that matched Catherine that did not match any of the other siblings. Using pure logic there are many ways of determining the value of the segments once we have a cousin more distant than full first cousin. 

One final item. When we switch segments from HI to FI and back to HI to NM, it is impossible to know, looking at just two siblings if the switch was in a maternal or paternal grandparent. Lets say Alice and Bryan began a sharing a segment at position 0 and they were HI. Lets say this is from their PGM. Since they are HI, one is inheriting from the MGM (Alice though we wouldnt know) and the other from MGF (Bryan). Lets they become FI at position 5000, one (Bryan) has switched, lets assume they are now both MGM. When they switch back to HI at 7000, one of them has switched a grandparent. There is no way to determine, just from looking at these two siblings which grandparent and which sibling switched.  At position 9000 they no longer match.

This means means they could share the dna from their PGM from 0 to 7000 or from 0 to 9000. They could be sharing the dna from their MGM from 5000-7000, or from 5000-9000.  Though we will see the shared segment(s) from 0 - 9000 easily, and the FI segment from 5000-7000 easily, it is impossible to know, without more information, if the sharing is one long segment from one grandparent and one small segment entirely within that range of another grandparent, or two medium segments with their ranges partially overlapping. 

Example:

Here you can see my brother and I compared on Chromosome 3. We match on almost the entire chromosome exept for the part in the center in red.  The two green areas are where we are FI, the yellow is HI. What is happening here is GEDMATCH is comparing the allele values in my DNA to my brothers DNA. When both alleles match at a certain postion a green tick is added, when just one matches it is a yellow tick and when none match it is a red tick.  Where it is green we have inherited from both of our parents the same DNA. This means either our parent's father's DNA or their mother's DNA.  Where it is yellow we inherited the same DNA from one parent, but different DNA from the other. where it is red, we did not inherit any shared DNA - perhaps I inherited all grandmother (maternal/paternal) DNA and he inherited all grandfather DNA. Using DNA matches and logic we should be able to determine which DNA we inherited from which grandparent. Because of the red areas, we know all four grandparents are represented here at least once.  If the only data were my brother and I, the values in the yellow area would mean we have lost the DNA from one grandparent, and where it is green, we have lost the values of two grandparents. I look at FI segments as actually 2 HI segments. Each segment can ultimately be assigned to one of four grandparents. 

Half matching segments:

Full matching segments:

Full First Cousin Shared Segments

Once we get to first cousins, segments are no longer classified as FI or HI. That is because they can only be HI by definition, inherited only from one of our parents. So when we see a segment we share with a maternal first cousin, we know that segment came from our mother.  Lets say our mother's were sisters. 

Since we have a segment that is HI and shared between siblings, our mothers, applying the rules for siblings, we know we inherited this segment from only one of our mothers' grandparents.  

Example:

Here is data from our comparision to our maternal first cousin Angela.  Because only I match her from 20.7-26.4 and  72.1-89.0 we can deduce that the half matching segment shown above between my brother and I in that range, was DNA from my father. Likewise, we can deduce that the portion we share, from 93.5 to 112.9 is from my mother.  Jumping ahead, this means the allele values over this entire section that  we share with my cousin, are the same allele values that my mother had.  Therefore that section of my mothers DNA is known. Conversly, the values that are left over are my fathers values. Even futher, where only one I matche Angela, we can determine that the corresponding umatched alleles belong to one paternal grandparent and Todd's segment that does not match either of us contains allelels from my other paternal grandparent and the other maternal grandparent. 

Matches to first cousin: 

Segments shared with Nieces/Nephews

Though only HI, it is a big more complicated. When we share a segment with a Niece or Nephew that lies completely within a non switching HI range shared with their parent, we can be sure that segment can be attributed to a single GP. However, in regions where we are FI with a sibling, segments shared with their child cannot be so easily attributed. 

Progress and Regressions

Honestly, genealogy is never done. 

During COVID I have had a lot of time to spend on my family. I have also been volunteering for a group called Search Angels (www.Searchangels.org).  I have been applying techniques I have developed helping others to help myself. 

One of the most unexpected things that has happened is that I have found more of my Miller tree.   Sherman, my great grandfather, had some brothers. I knew that there were some descendants,  but I never thought any were living. I now have found descendants of 2 of them. 

Their DNA has led me to believe my suspicions about the Swafford connection.  Using the tool at DNA painter, however, it always comes out more likely that Sherman is not a half brother to his siblings at all but rather a full brother.  The confidence level at the tool is not as good as it could be though because the distance of the relatives. 

DNA Reconstruction

I am currently working on a project to reassemble my parents DNA and the DNA of some ancestors before that. 

I am refreshing some of my old skills from my programming days and using SQL to analazye DNA raw files to create the composites.

Luckily I have quite a lot of DNA files to work with and I am confident I can reassemble the DNA for both my father and mother. 

The benefit to reassembling DNA is that these files can be uploaded to some sights to get relationship estimates that are better than what I get from my test alone. Testers that show as 4-6 cousins now would be more accurately predicted because instead of working with 50% of my parents DNA, I can work with 100%. 

I can use this same idea, going back generations. 

I had to put this on hold. 

 

A DNA confirmation

I was able to make a confirmation to my Brown/Guider family via a DNA match to Lena Rosalind White Keith.

She is descended of Catherine Brown Robertson Purple, my mtDNA ancestor.

This has been a suspicion for a while ever since my cousin Jeanne Mendes told me that Catherine Brown's daughter was called Grandma Purple. Jeanne supposed this was due to her always wearing purple, but she wasn't sure.

My experience with genealogy

I started studying genealogy around the time my grandmother died in 1991.  At that time I inherited a lot of photos from her and my siblings and I didn't know who many of them were.  My mother had died in 1985 and I didn't have any easy reference to answer my questions.

So I started working. I was able to make some progress with a few cousins, but soon I found that many of the cousins on my mother's side were not really the people I wanted to be associated with. They were strongly religious and opinionated and even before social media was popular, I found my inbox flooded with stuff I did not want to read. 

As was to be a pattern, I didn't take advantage of the close family I had to get their stories and their knowledge. I lived under the belief, I would have time to get to them when I was ready. 

In my immediate family, no one really has the desire like I do to do this kind of research. Though they will often listen to what research I am able to complete, they do not have any desire to get involved. 

So I began researching my grandmother's family. I assumed this would be pretty easy, because I knew they had been in the U.S. for quite a while. When I hit brickwalls, I often gave up, losing interest.  The Miller name was so common, I never thought I would be able to make progress on many of my questions. 

When my aunt died in 1995, I no longer had any connection to my mother's family that I was aware of besides of course, the people I did not want to talk to. 

Both of my maternal grandfather's parents were born outside of the United States. I did a little research and sent off some letters to my grandfather's family in Germany, and was greeted with one response, a newspaper article about my grandfather's grandfather. After that nothing. 

I had confusing information with regard to my grandfather's mother, and met many dead ends.  Perhaps I could have connected with people I discovered later, but this was before I was looking at genealogy they way I look at it today. 

In the past, I was mostly interested in genealogical information from me to the past. It wasn't until the popularity of DNA testing, did I really start thinking about living cousins. 

I missed an opportunity to get information my grandfather's nephew, and discovered later he died in 2011. He had stayed in close contact with my grandfather's step niece, Deanne. 

In 1998 my father passed away, his mother had passed away in 1987. This left me with no connections to either my father's or mother's family. This is when I truly started realizing my missed opportunities. 

I tried speaking with my step mother, but she really knew very little.  I knew my father had a cousin, but it wasn't until after he died I found out that he actually had a half sister and half brother. 

I inherited my father's collection of photos and memories and it opened even more questions. 

Now I have tons of cousins from all over. I have found many cousins who are as enthusicatic as I about tracing the roots. 

MtDNA

I ordered a new DNA test yesterday for myself.

I am K2b1 haplogroup on my MtDNA. It is fairly rare. I have not tested it because it is unlikely to be of much use in genealogy. However, I am hoping, that because of its rarity, I might find a breakthrough for Mary Matilda Robinson and Catherine Brown. (They are both my mtDNA anscestors).

In looking at GEDMATCH I did discover a mtDNA match (they listed K as their Haplogroup) and was surprised to find, besides the Brown surname, Catherine, Arvella and Matilda all mentioned in the appropriate generation.  These names of course all being part of the family line I am researching. The inconsistency is the Kentucky heritage, but that is not too troubling.

I have created a landing pad for researching other possible matches here at wikitree.