A Perfect Day For DNA

     

     Being stuck in the house here in upstate NY with over a foot of  snow on the ground and more sifting down, this seemed like a good day to check my family's DNA tests.  The results from those Christmas gifts of DNA kits should be starting to show up on Ancestry about now, meaning there could be a batch of new relatives waiting to be found.  Checking for matches with my uncle's test, as close as I can ever get to my late mother's DNA, I found a few new ones but none had trees nor did the shared matches.  I run into that a lot in that line.  I've been having better luck with the group from Ireland.  As mentioned in the last blog post, I've found more solid DNA evidence that my White/Keyes connection is from Rathdowney Parish in County Laois (Queens), and today some new McGarr matches turned up.

     I also took a closer look at my new DNA results on Ancestry after reading somewhere that the results for Ireland are getting more specific.  All I can say is, yes they are!  Ancestry named my areas as Northern Tipperary, (my Ryans and O'Dwyers), North Munster, (my Gunn and Browne families in Kerry), and Leinster, (my McGarrs and OHoras in Kildare and Carlow--along with the Whites and Keyes in Laois).  That's pretty darn specific. Not to quibble, but the Ryans and O'Dwyers were actually from mid-Tipperary, technically South Tipperary, but their area does show up in the circled area on my DNA page map.

The red dot (mine) on the Ancestry map marks Churchfield in Tipperary, home to the Ryan and O'Dwyer families.

     Even with the lack of trees linked to many kit results and submitters who don't answer their email, I've never regretted being tested or hounding my relatives to spit in that little vial.  One of the great things about DNA is the way it can confirm your traditional research even if your matches don't cooperate.

     One "very high" match at the 4th to 6th cousin range I find very highly interesting is that with an attached tree containing a man named John White who was born in County Laois in 1818.  That makes him the right age to be a brother of my 3rd-great-grandfather James White Jr.  Even better, one of our shared matches is for a kit with the surname Keyes among it's branches. The John White tree has 50cM of matching DNA across 3 segments, I'm not an expert on DNA, but that's a significant amount.

     The names of John White's children are also significant.  If he is indeed my James' brother then, like James, he is the son of James White Sr. and Margaret Keyes.  My James named his first son James and his second daughter Margaret. John did exactly the same.  Is that conclusive proof John and James are brothers?  I have to admit it's not, but I think they most probably are.  And it gives me a strong clue this needs serious investigation.